Saint for Rent - To Welcome Home One's Time-Traveling Brother

By Xu Ru

Patrick is greeted by Kanon, who has many q's regarding how often he'd been traveling. He then gets down to business regarding what could possibly have happened to his lift mirrors, asking if Patrick would care to confess anything. Kanon then deduces he must have upset a Consultant, Mei then coming in with signs for him to stay quiet, so Patrick throws the puppy he'd been holding back at Kanon, and 2 more dogs coming out by Mei's legs. The 2 biff off by elevator, Patrick coming down on Mei for supposedly going to come clean about her time traveling permit, and noting how she'd be getting her 7 year old counterpart also into trouble. Mei realizes this, but knows this would be her one chance to tell him, since it was the same day she'd gone off to get certified. She then attempts to compare herself to how Patrick'd gone off not long after 7, he stating he'd been 10 and responsible about it.

Patrick then attempts to have both parties stay out of the other's having to tell their pop's stuff about their secret lives. Patrick effectively ends the chat, by reentering the lift and considers how he can fix his mess, this not quite the same as what Mei was going through, he not able to rely on anyone else, so debates returning to the Cloverhouse, hoping Saint could help him. When he gets there, it's 2017, and Saint is with his younger bro, who looked a bit startled with the older Patrick requesting he wake him up. Once he does, Saint is a bit startled by older Patrick, as well, but soon peps up with the idea of Patrick coming back to help out with little Patrick, who was starting 1st grade, embarrassingly for lil Patrick. Patrick doesn't end up staying long after this, realizing Saint didn't know what was going on, he still having his monocle which he hadn't yet given to little Patrick, but before he goes, Saint making sure he knew he could always call this place home Teardrop. Patrick began wondering why he'd been taken to live with his pop, since he hadn't become more worth anything during his time with Kanon and Mei, either.

When Patrick walks back out into the Cloverhouse in 2019, it seems empty, which has him sensing something was amiss. When he runs into Armand standing still at the coffeemaker, he realizes the time had paused. He locates and attempts to wake up Saint, this not a common occurrence at time houses, but this being one of their pop's mysteries about the 2 bros. Saint q's who Armand was, who had presented him with a coffee, and being reassured by Patrick he was chill, Patrick then able to tell how he'd lost the monocle, being Kitty Cat having swiped it.

When Saint attempts to have Patrick catch up with him again, Patrick goes off on him as he tries to leave, since Saint still didn't know any of the key players who he was attempting to regain their pop's monocle from, taking a slash at him by saying he shouldn't be qualified as an innkeeper. When he returns again to see Saint, it's been many years later apparently, and he collapses before he can answer any of Saint's q's regarding whether he'd seen his nethers when he'd fallen with only his robe on. When he wakes up, Saint is dozing and Armand responds to him about how he must have a good contract to be able to revive from time-lag so quickly, Patrick getting annoyed with him. When Saint does wake up, he's tripping out over how much visa is on his body, normally it being a hand wrist ratio, this one all over him, Patrick uptight about answering, since Saint knew so little as it was.

When Saint avoids answering his logic, Patrick continues about whether Saint was even aware of what their pop was doing, and why time would stop if the inn-keeper were asleep. Saint can't seem to stop simplifying the issues, and this only aggravates Patrick more, Saint thinking he could blackmail him into saying what was going on by saying he'd tell their pop when he next came by, Patrick straight up declining this. He angrily says he should only tell their pop he was handling it, but Saint reverts to taking the blame on himself completely. He then suggests he could make it so his pop hadn't taken him away by returning to 2019, which had Patrick asking what would happen to Saint, if he did. Armand stepping up, and clocking Patrick in the face, Saint protesting and q'ing why he'd do this.

Patrick leaving and asking himself how he'd be able to change his bros whole life, Saint even saying Patrick must've lost faith in him when he'd let their pop take him away, and now he didn't feel his bro was strong enough to help him do anything. Then, an older Armand is calling after Patrick, who attempts to ditch him, Armand grabbing him. When Patrick states he'd already clocked him, Armand gauges his age and deduces he probably owed him more since then. Armand then details how Patrick should resist returning to 2019 since Saint had worked on himself and had made headway which Armand thought Patrick could ruin if he changed. Patrick is feeling overwhelmed again, and so Armand shares with how he knew where Kitty Cat had stopped off. Armand has Patrick agree to stop bugging his bro once he regained the monocle, he then leading him straight to the spot.

Saint greets Patrick warmly once more, Kitty Cat and Armand watching, then the Consultant saying to future Armand of the human who had signed was now present, it walking and pointing to 1 of the 3. This being the end of chapter. The Inn-Note provides Mei's perspective of watching Armand attempt to stop it, and Mei goes into where Armand was resting after getting stamped on by Saint. She gives him OJ as she q's him on whether he knew why she was there. When he guesses she'd been trying to see Saint and it'd been when he wanted to meet an older self, she explains the rest, but he falls asleep again. He does reassure her of not all visas needing to be fixed, since Consultants preferred humans not mess with them. He also states of meeting Patrick when he'd been going by another name, and he definitely wouldn't have been able to run from a Consultant for too long. Armand then dissuades Mei from returning to the room, so she wouldn't be harmed, so she decides to go and be more careful.

This comic only becomes more heartfelt and like it should've been a movie or TV-show. So frickin' good, and I'm glad there are more than the initial 4 graphic novels, hopefully if the others do come out, they'll become an omnibus, because these are too good to read separately in parts on any forum!