Time loops revealed.

"There are two Daniel Kikunos?" Henry sighed, completely done with this shit, "What next? The gods return? Another apocalypse?"

"Uh..hahahha.." I laughed awkwardly, and Henry took a shot of his own flask, raising a hand to stop me, "Don't complete that thought."

I nodded.

"Excuse me, ANOTHER apocalypse?" Margo asked.

"There was one in the 1990s. A group of our students stopped it. Some died. It was a travesty.

But at this point it's like a recession. Every so often, another apocalypse just comes around." Henry sighed as he explained.

Oh right. I remember that from. Lipson's batch had those three sisters who stopped an apocalypse, one of the sisters died and they retired to running a consultancy firm till the protagonists found them in season 5 for help stopping another apocalypse.

Honestly, in the show the protagonists themselves faced like four apocalyptic scenarios and survived.

Well almost all. Quentin heroically sacrificed himself to save the rest of the world in season 4 and died. Permanently.

That was one of the few times I felt any respect for his character.

"Anyways, Henry. I had a question for you. Since you've lived through all those past timelines, I was wondering if you knew which one that Daniel was from?"

"Hold on. What's this about other timelines? There's only one timeline." Eliot cirrected, unsure of himself when

Henry and I looked at each other.

"There's only one timeline, right?" Eliot repeated.

Henry sighed again, rubbing his temples and I just smiled neutrally.

"Remember the time wizard that attacked me?" I had them recall, "Yeah. He's not the only one. There is one more time wizard. A witch, rather."

Alice raised an eyebrow.

"I thought horomancy was a budding discipline?"

"On Earth, yes. On Fillory however...."

"The Watcherwoman. Of course!" Quentin exclaimed, entering nerd mode, "She was this surreal antagonist in the Fillory books. She planted clocks in trees and pulled time pranks on Jane and Martin and pushed them to learn magic-oh." He realised something.

"Jane Chatwin is the Watcherwoman isn't she?"

"Yup. Jane Chatwin was given a watch by Ember, made by the dwarves. A watch that could fuck with time on a cosmic scale. One she needed to stop her brother, Martin who was quickly becoming manic and beast-like, abandoning his humanity by drinking from the Wellspring.

And the first time around, she tried and failed to stop her brother. And Rupert Chatwin fell in the battle. Unwilling to lose, knowing that her time magic was the only thing that stood between Martin and the rest of the world, she created a time loop." I explained.

"Everytime she failed, she would turn back the clock and start over again, changin one little thing. One variable at a time. 39 times she tried. 39 times all of us died. And 39 times she failed."

Henry chipped in.

"Until the 40th time around....he came into the loop." He pointed at me, taking another sip.

"Yes. I came in like a wrecking ball. Blew their carefully laid out plans to bits and kicked the Beast's ass." I smiled cheekily causing Henry to just sigh and roll his eyes.

"So wait, we all have died 39 times already? And we don't remember a thing?" Margo said, exasperated.

"No. But I do." Henry said, taking a long sip from his own flask, "And trust me, you're better off not remembering."

"You say that as if I don't already drink my liver ragged every day." Eliot scoffed as his face twisted into anger and betrayal.

"And you..." Eliot looked at me with disgust, hunching over accusingly, "For someone from another world...you seem to have a lot of connections here. And the things you know....."

I could see the pain in his eyes even though he tried to hide it.

It didn't sit right with me, seeing that.

Like a pit in my stomach, a sinking feeling of dread.

As if something inside me was screaming.

'Don't look at me like this. Not you. Not my friends.'

I clicked my tongue and buried that thought deep within, putting on a mask of cool confidence.

"Was this some game to you? Like a new game plus sort of thing?" Eliot hounded me.

"El!" Margo tried to intervene but he wasn't listening.

"Was our friendship even real? Or were you just pressing the right buttons like some pupp-"

Before he could finish his angry rant I reached out and flicked Eliot in the forehead.

I needed to stop that line of thinking before it infected the rest.

"Ow!" He cried out.

"Didn't you just hear him say I'm new to the time loop thingy?" I said, "This isn't like you, Eliot. What's up with you?

You're drunk. And presumptious. But you're not stupid. If I manipulated you like a puppet, you'd know. Have some faith in yourself. Because I do. And I know you're better than that."

"You don't know me...."

Eliot muttered softly, suspicious still.

"Really?" Margo chuckled, imitating Kamina from Guren Lagann, "Believe in the me that believes in you? That's your argument?"

"No. My argument is this. If I remembered the previous timelines, why would I need Henry's help in finding the other Daniel?" I pointed out.

"Oh." Eliot sucked in a cold breath upon realising that.

"J, I'm sorry. I didn't-"

"I know." I patted his shoulders.

Everyone has insecurities. Eliot's was betrayal. He feared he would be betrayed the same way he betrayed his friend, outing him as gay in his southern catholic school and joining in on the bullying to avoid getting outed himself. An externalization of his self doubt and shame.

"Look, you just saw me gutted today and this is some heavy stuff. I get it. Don't worry about it." I assured him.

Eliot nodded, and fell silent, leaning back into his chair.

"...yeah." He muttered, and nodded.

"Yeah."

I looked up at the rest and shook my head.

"Should we go find Jane Chatwin then?" Quentin suggested.

"No." I said, turning back to Henry, "Unless there's nothing you can do?" I asked.

"What exactly do you want to know?" He asked.

"Anything you can tell me. Any clues. Did you notuce something odd in one particular timeline? Any people of interest that were present in one timeline but absent in another. Even minor factors like students who didn't raise any alarms but disappeared mysteriously from one timeline to another. Think carefully." I suggested.

I had my suspicions about what it was but I didn't want to presume.

What the future Daniel said.

How he didn't know me, but knew about me.

The look of hatred in his eyes.

I knew that look. It was gloating.

The kind you see in kids after they soil the new air jordans of someone who they hate.

Envy. That's what it was.

The feeling of 'if I can't have it, neither can you.'

"I will look into it. It'll take some time to go through them all but I have a memory spell." Henry explained.

"I will pore through them and get back to you. Now out. It's a quarter past five and I'm in no mood for overtime. Go out and party your worries away. Vape and nay-nay or whatever you millenials do nowadays." He shooed us out.

.

As we walked back, Margo piped up with a thought.

"Are we just going to scroll past the fact that you literally resurrected?" She asked, "That was some biblical shit. Like Jesus. But on crack."

"Yeah. Why didn't you tell us you were immortal?" Eliot added.

"It just never came up. You guys didn't ask, I didn't tell." I shrugged.

"Oh come on!" Margo groaned, "That's bullshit and you know it."

I sighed.

"Margo, you use a macbook, right?"

"Don't change the topic. What does my macbook have anything to do with this?"

"Tell me, how many times have you recommended macOS to people? Eliot still uses windows, so does Quentin."

"I do have an iPhone." Eliot said.

"But not a macbook?"

"No. The performance is just better with windows."

"It's not." Margo argued, "But to each their own. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. No matter how wrong. I don't go around pushing my opinions on others. No judgement."

Alice gave her a look that said, 'Really?' and Margo relented.

"Okay a little judgement. It's not my fault you dress like an amish farm wife. I think even Amish women show more leg than you."

Alice huffed in annoyance.

"I like it this way." She insisted.

"Sure you do, sweetie." Margo patronised.

Eliot and I chuckled at her antics and I continued.

"So no, yes?"

"If you mean I don't go around selling apple products then yeah."

"Exactly. Normal people don't just talk about mortality, the same way they don't go around recommending OSes to each other."

"You clearly haven't been on twitter." Quentin said.

"Do the people on twitter seem normal to you, Quentin?" I asked.

"Yes? I use it." He replied and I shook my head.

"Why am I not surprised?" I teased annoying Quentin.

We continued to chat until we came upon an intersection and Yue yawned.

It was only then that I noticed that she hadn't spoken a word the whole time.

She seemed really sleepy.

Did the regeneration tire her out?

I stopped and called out to the rest.

"You guys go on. I think I'll go back to the dorm. I have some work to do."

"If this is about earlier, J, I'm sorr-"

"Enough apologizing, Eliot. It's okay. I'm not mad." I gestured at the sleepy Yue leaning on my arm and they understood.

"Oh, alright. See you tomorrow....I guess?" Eliot said

I nodded.

"Good night."

.

Once we returned to the safety of our dorm, and got into our pajamas, I fell onto the bed, more tired than I expected.

Guess Yue wasn't the only one huh?

I looked over to her side and saw her staring right back at me.

I shrunk back, startled and she giggled.

"Jay.....so cute." She cooed.

"Uh huh?"

"I heard what you said....earlier. When we got blown away."

Wait what?

"I don't know what you're talking about?" I feigned ignorance.

"Yue is mine. How dare he hurt Yue?!" She mimicked, teasing me as I blushed in embarrassment.

"Ohmygod!" I facepalmed, "Did I say that out loud!?"

"No." She scooted closer, a big, stupid grin plastered on her face, "But I could hear it with your telepathy."

Shit. Right.

I didn't have enough control of my new psychic abilities yet. I was still using a blocker just in case, making baby steps in my training.

I was focusing more on the teleportation aspect of the discipline than the psychic one and that only made things harder for me.

Being able to get out of dodge at a thought was far more useful than mind reading and telepathy. Especially since most magicians had mental wards that didn't allow anyone to peek in. Psychic power was basically useless unless someone deliberately opened up to you.

So, naturally, I didn't practice it as much.

Still, it was coming along slower than expected even though I was a partial being of thought myself.

It's like if a saiyan was bad at fighting.

So embarrassing!

I looked up and saw Yue happily looking at me and pinched her cheeks.

"Didn't you want to sleep?" I changed the topic.

"In Jay's bed." She licked her lips.

"Why are you licking your lips?" I raised an eyebrow.

She didn't answer but just pulled my bed closer with telekinesis, dragging me together with it.

Before I could say anything, she was onto me, and just as I was about to grab her, she stopped, looked me in the eyes and planted a kiss.

On my forehead.

I sighed in relief and gave Yue a stern look.

"Don't scare me like that." I said.

"Hehehehehe....." Yue giggled smugly, nuzzling into my chest, "Jay....so shy."

"Don't even." I warned her, knowing her habits, "Use the blood bags."

"Uhun!" She made a noncommital noise.

"That's not a yes."

"Uhun!" She repeated just to annoy me and I gave up.

She was just so childish sometimes.

Though I knew she was just teasing me. I had gotten to know her at least that well over the past few months.

And what do you know.

When I looked down I found her sleeping soundly on my chest, her arms wrapped around my arm.

I smiled, and caressed her head, before kissing her forehead.

"Goodnight." I whispered and she made a cute noise, as I fell asleep too.

______________________

A simple character building episode today.

Next time, shit begins to play out better and Mayakovsky enters the picture.

Next time.

Final exams and secrets magic.

Sorry for the lack of chapters.

I wasn't well.

Extra chapter at 400 powerstones.

Please donate your powerstones!

Let's get to top ten!

Thank you for reading.

Bye~