Cycles of Entropy

Day 1

Darkness closed around me and I immediately felt suffocated and helpless. The earth pressed in on me mercilessly, snapping my arms before I could put them to my side. Crushing. Ripping. Muffled popping sounds churned my stomach as I realized they were coming from me, barely audible in the closed ground. The pain from all directions distracted me from my failed attempt to protect Harrison's neighbors. The fear I had been suppressing flowed from me with my blood until, after an eternal moment, I woke up in the inn.

My entire body shook as if with a fever. I couldn't get out of bed at first. My body protested every movement with uncontrollable tremors and I couldn't push the overflowing fear back down. I hadn't felt like this since I left home. Not this bad. Not this terrified. Even with Hadley's boot closing in on my broken skull I... I felt like I was failing to fight back properly. This was different. This was true powerlessness. I carried none of the blame for this death. Something of the darkness had stayed with me. I shuddered and jerked in the bed as if still fighting the stone, crushing my body from all directions.

I wanted to freeze. I wanted to count my way out of bed. I was desperate to spend the morning in a hot bath, safe from the earth that had swallowed and hurt me. I wanted a stronger word for it, but somehow none fit. Agony, misery, torment... all of these should have described the creature the world had left me as, but the only word that really felt right was 'hurt'. But I couldn't do what I wanted to do. No matter how hurt I was. Every good thing I had done for this world had happened in a day that no longer existed, and I couldn't let it stand. I couldn't leave the girls alone. I couldn't leave anyone alone.

I forced myself to sit up, my shaking legs resting loosely against the ground. I stood on them anyway. I took one step, then another, and my body spasmed. I fell to my knees, barely catching myself as I vomited onto the floorboards. Some small part of my mind wondered how many times I had puked the same stomach content in different places. My loose hair slid from my shoulders to the floor as I heaved. Some was painted to my face with sweat while some mixed with the bile on the ground. My jaw quivered with an unreleased sob.

Camilla wouldn't be collapsed on her floor. Camilla would already be out there, stopping whoever was doing this. However many people were doing it. I knew there was more than one, at this point. There had to be at least two mages involved. I had been killed... mutilated by an earth mage. The Quiet wasn't earth magic, so that meant two. I clenched my teeth and screamed through them, just to release the frustration and anxiety. It didn't really make me feel better, but as I clenched my fists, I was able to suppress the tremors. I couldn't indulge the shock of my death. I had to be Camilla. I needed to be her.

It was slow and shaky, but I managed to climb back to my feet. I was vaguely aware of the stink of my hair as it fell against my shoulders but I didn't care. At least, not for my own sake. But I didn't have time to explain it to the people I needed to help. So as I marched past Livia and out of the in, I began to cast 'undone'. It was all very mechanical. I couldn't stop to think. I couldn't stop to process. I certainly couldn't stop for long enough to feel... anything. Or the earth would close in on me. It would break my bones and tear my body. I would be Mars again, and it would suffocate me.

'Undone' didn't make me clean, but it removed the mess from my hair. It was enough that I would be able to present myself to the girls and Harrison without drawing too much concern. I realized too late that I had forgotten my hair tie and would have to leave it loose. This was less than ideal considering the grease it held from days of travel and neglect. But it wouldn't matter to them. Again I found the girls. Again I found Harrison. I did exactly what I had done the day before. I sat with them. I told them about my sister. It may seem like a waste but I needed it. Sharing Camilla with them was part of how I saved them.

And it was part of how I kept my feet moving. I knew I would always fall short, but I needed a reminder of my goal. If I ever skipped this step, I worried I would return to the woman, frozen in fear outside an inn where a kind woman was dying. Sharing stories of Camilla was a kindness to them, to me, and to my sister. It was the only well I could draw energy from, and I needed that energy. Especially at this point, after seeing everyone from the last loop. I knew how many people I'd saved. I knew what would happen to them if I slowed down, even a little. So I told my friends about my big sister again.

And again I left. This time I found the two women by the fountain before the attack and stopped the Quieted woman before she hurt her partner. Again I left both women hollow, staring at each other with empty eyes. I didn't get as many teal sparks of aura this time, but I couldn't dwell on it. I went through the motions. I saved the same people mostly. I made a few different choices, helping different groups. It all felt so pointless. It all felt so important. I returned to Harrisons' home to prepare. I sent the girls to safety, and I sent Harrison to protect them.

I stood in front of the dead, weary tears in my eyes. I tried my spell again, this time with more power, earned from the teal aura I had been collecting. It was slightly larger this time, but it still failed to protect everyone. It still exhausted me. This time, however, I didn't stumble forward when I gasped for breath. Instead, I scanned the empty lot in front of me. I searched the buildings and alleys nearby with my eyes. I saw footprints and ash. The was no one there. But I was alive. I hugged the wall of the home and circled around to examine the homes I hadn't saved.

I sighed in relief and stepped out into the open. I reached for the teal aura dancing around the homes I had saved this time, but not the first. Before I could absorb them, however, the earth swallowed me. It chewed me up. It crushed me and I shook in the bed of Livia's inn. I tried again. I forced myself from the inn. I helped the girls. I skipped the couple and told stories of Camilla. I rushed through the town to save everyone I could. I stood before the dead. I failed to stop them. I was eaten by the earth.

I tried four times. Seven. Twenty. I realized I earned more aura the first time I helped someone than the second, and none after that, but I couldn't stop. I was numb. I was sick. And the pain just. wouldn't. stop. I started feeling it constantly. I hid from the earth. I cast my spell from inside and was spared. But whenever I left the home and the aura circled me, I was murdered again. By the earth mage. By the earth itself. I never had the aura left to fight it. I never had the energy. I couldn't escape it. I don't know how many times I lived that day. Trying to save everyone. Telling the same stories about my sister. Failing. Dying.

I could feel the pain constantly. Resetting the loop couldn't erase the memory and the hurt wouldn't leave my mind. It was like a phantom tree, ancient and cruel. Wrapping its roots around me and strangling me with every step. I stopped eating. I would never grow too hungry. I couldn't eat the same porridge anymore. I could barely help the same people. I couldn't see that look of hopeless, sudden loss one more time. If Luna had given me her gift, I would have taken it. I would have done anything to end that day. Even the second day in the loop would have worked for me.

Well. Almost anything. Anything but ignore what I had to do. I had to be Camilla, and I had to keep those girls safe. I had to bring them to the second day with me. Instead of me, if I had to. But I wasn't Camilla. I couldn't be Camilla. I was Mars, and I was a failure. I started trying variations on 'Still World'. I tried letting the fires and the barricades start then choking the flames, as I had the first time. I tried a narrow wall between the dead and the homes instead of a wide bubble. I tried everything I could think of, and it worked, in a way.

I had gained more and more aura. Not just my blue aura but the warm teal aura. I had grown more powerful, and after dozens of tries, I had managed to save every single life in every single home. The aura burst from every window like it was fire itself! And when I left the home, too tired to defend myself, the aura started to surround me, and the earth mage murdered me. One night, after stopping time for almost as long as I could, stopping the fires that started anyway, and casting reversing time for everything around me, I couldn't take it anymore.

I had forgotten to send Harrison to protect the girls. Or perhaps I knew I wouldn't need to. The day had become a blur; chalk on a rainy day and it was washing my mind away with it. "I can't be Camilla, I can't be Camilla, I can't be Camilla," I whispered to myself. I was hunched on the floor after stopping the attack, holding my knees to my chest and rocking. I didn't want to die again. I didn't want to hurt anymore. I didn't want to keep failing to live up to an impossible standard. Water ran down my cheeks and snot dripped from my lip into my mouth. It all hurt and I couldn't find the way to stop it.

I didn't notice when Harrison crouched in front of me. I barely registered as he wrapped his arms around me. The world was so loud. The aura that promised a moment of relief flew past the windows and I feared it. I feared what would happen when I touched it. I was so tired. I was so empty. I was numb in all the wrong ways and ached in all the others. I couldn't count the red things in the room. I couldn't count my own pained gasps for short breaths that struggled their way out of a tightening throat. I was without hope. I wasn't Camilla. I was Mars.

"You aren't Camilla, You're Mars," Harrison whispered in my ear. I froze. I had, as usual, told him all about my sister. The desperation with which I told him my childhood stories had only grown. It had only been a day for him, but he knew what being Camilla meant to me. I didn't understand why he would say that. "You are Mars. You saved Junia. You saved Millie. You saved my neighbors. The grumpy old lady who hates the plants I chose for my garden. The newlywed couple on the other side. You gave us all our lives, Mars. Not Camilla, you. I know you admire her. I know you love her. But we aren't alive because Camilla was here. We are alive because you were. Because of who you are. Mars, you were able to do what you did because you are Mars."

It was like pulling my head out of the water. It was such a simple thing to say, but it was everything. I could breathe again. The world stopped shouting at me, and the phantom tree stopped strangling me with the pain of the earth. I wrapped my arms around him in a hug and sobbed, loudly, and without holding anything back. Junia emerged with a look of confusion and, with nothing more than a look of shocked concern, ran to hug us as well. I had to take deep, gasping breaths between sobs as I held them. I didn't have Camilla, but I felt like a child again. A child with a new brother and sister.

I still didn't know how to leave that home alive. But it felt like a new dawn anyway. Because I wasn't Camilla. I was Mars.

End of Day 1