Cycles of Entropy

My sleep was tormented by nightmares. Of crushing flesh. Of fear. Of innocent bystanders, killed by empty shells that were hunting me. And, of course, of the woman who sent them after me. She was in every scene and every moment, watching me. Her eyes were full of hate, and sorrow, and confusion. Like she didn't know where to direct each. Hers joined the same hateful, condescending eyes that have haunted my sleep since I left home. Neither woman watched the events of the dreams. Neither cared. They only watched me.

I shuddered, and finally opened my eyes. I was greeted with another stare, belonging to neither woman and hovering a few inches from my own. I couldn't help but jump at the proximity of the invader. I feared one of the quieted had found me and I had been too slow to notice, but as my beating heart forced my body to action and pulled me fully from sleep, the girl deftly avoided a collision of our heads. She danced away whimsically with her hands clasped behind her back.

"Hey there, you're not supposed to sleep here, you know," she greeted. I stared in confusion. My vision was blurry from a deep, troubled sleep and it took me a moment to focus on her.

"I'm... sorry?" I asked, in part because I had trouble parsing her words and in part to buy time for my mind to catch up to the moment.

"Oh, I don't mind at all. I don't own the place or anything. You look like you could use a break anyway. Do you feel better?" She asked, leaning forward slightly, her hands still clasped tightly behind her back. Her hair was tied in two tight buns on either side of her head. It took me a moment to recognize her without her costume and makeup, but once my vision finally cleared and my mind caught up to me, it fell into place. It was the girl from the theatre company. The understudy.

"Um, hello," I greet. "Shouldn't you be... getting ready?" She giggled and walked around me as I sat up in the empty aisle.

"No performance today! The people out there are too scared. There's been lots of attacks, you know. No point in performing in all of that, who would show up?" she asked. Her words hit me like hail. That was because of me. People out there were too afraid to leave their homes, on the second day, because of me. No. No that wasn't right. That thought tasted like moldy fruit. It soured in my mouth and the heat of oncoming vomit warmed my throat. "What are you looking for?" The girl asked.

"Um... B-books on magic," I stuttered, mental whiplash increasing the difficulty of the question. "Specifically soul magic, if there are any." She looked up for a moment and tapped her lips with one finger.

"Hmm, nope. Sorry, those are all checked out. Or purchased, rather. Not gonna find any books on magic at all here," she informed me. I blinked.

"Do you... work here?" I asked. "I thought you were part of the theatre troupe, don't you travel?"

"Nope," she answered cheerfully, "but those shelves are empty, right?" I blinked again, then grabbed the shelf on my left to pull myself up. I was sore from sleeping on the floor. From running and casting all day the day before. From being afraid for so long. Although strangely, I didn't feel that way at that moment. I didn't feel afraid at all. I just pulled myself to my feet and looked around. Sure enough, several rows of shelves were completely empty.

I groaned. "I needed those..." I whispered and the girl tilted her head at me.

"Well, why don't you check who bought them?" she asked. I looked down at her. She was right, the library probably had records somewhere. I looked around for the front desk, which stood strangely empty. I supposed the librarian could be dead at this point. Especially this loop. Because of me. As soon as I thought that, the same bitter taste poisoned my tongue and I almost spit on the floor. Again, I was focused on my goal.

"Thanks, uh..." I asked and the girl smiled at me.

"Chandara," she answered.

"Thanks, Chandara," I said. I rolled my shoulders back, trying to work out the sore spots. I felt strange. Calm. It was almost eery. In fact, the entire library was. Even with the Quiet, someone should have been there. Margaret should have sent someone looking. But I'd slept on the floor for hours, and this strangely cheerful girl was the only one to show up. I walked behind the front desk, completely unchallenged, and started rifling through drawers, journals, and books. Chandara followed me and rocked on her feet, watching me.

"What are you doing here, by the way? Where are your parents? Do you need any help?" I asked, pausing my examination of a book to look up at her. I couldn't believe I didn't think of it sooner. It was like walking through heavy fog. I couldn't see what was right in front of me. I couldn't even feel. This was a child, left alone in an openly violent town. It was a miracle neither of us had been killed here. I couldn't believe I hadn't immediately asked her this.

"Oh, I'm alright. I can help you, though. If you like?" She asked. Well, that was alright then. If she was okay I was okay. I kept looking through the books until I found what I wanted. I didn't know why I dismissed the ledger for borrowed books and opened the ledger of sales. But that was where I found what I was looking for. Chandara was right. Every single book under 'magic', 'aura', and even religion had been sold, all at once. Just a couple of weeks before I got there. I traced my finger along the parchment until I got to the bottom. It was purchased by...

"Mathew Cross?" I said with mild interest. "Huh." Then the girl's offer finally broke through to me. "You can help me? How?" I asked. She smiled at me.

"Well I can give you something, I'm good at that. Everyone says so. Maybe just some advice?" she offered.

For some reason, I shrugged and nodded. "Well, alright," I agreed. She then proceeded to smile warmly, and silently at me. "What advice?" I asked after several minutes and she laughed.

"Well, what do you need advice on?" she poked and I immediately felt foolish.

"Oh, uh. Well, there is this woman. Margaret. She's... well she's doing something terrible. But she believes she is helping people. I think she needs to believe that. I want to stop her... but I also understand her and want to help. Any idea how I can do that?" I explained. The child I was speaking to looked thoughtful.

"Why don't you ask her?" She responded and I blinked.

"Well, she wants to kill me. It'll be dangerous," I protested.

"Then ask when she doesn't want to kill you," she countered.

"Oh. Right," I said, a little baffled.

"Well, happy to help. Good luck with the grave keeper!" she said, then skipped away and out the door. I stared after her for a moment, completely in a daze. There was a moment of silence. That type of quiet only a library can contain, like the pages themselves will accept no sound but their own and the patrons would never challenge them. It was peaceful, for a moment. Until the world came crashing down on me. All the false calm of the moments before collapsed like rotten wood, allowing my mind to acknowledge a suppressed horror.

The girls. Harrison. I didn't know if they survived. I barely knew Marcus; I couldn't rely on him to make it to them in time. Not with the early attack. Not with everything going on outside. Luna's gift, he could have died on the way... I felt immediately sick. I'd compartmentalized so many things to make it this far. Let people die in one loop so I could help someone else. But since meeting the children, I had never let anything happen to them. Intellectually, I knew they must have died the first night before. I didn't find them right away. I didn't even know if the loop continued without me when I died.

It didn't dull the ache. The horror. It did nothing for the image of what likely happened this time, because of me. I'd gone to Margaret and revealed that I was fighting her, and this entire city paid for it early. The people I was growing to love as much as any. This time, I was easily able to swallow the soiled flavor of the thought, with the sugary aid of sweet self-loathing. It was easy. And it was so fucking hard. My breathing grew short and my vision blurred. I couldn't grasp what I had done. I needed the apathy that filled the library a moment before. I stumbled forward, watching my hand catch the desk at the front.

I was supposed to do something when this happened. I was supposed to count something. But when I tried to remember what, I simply saw Junia and Millie. Huddled together. Afraid and unprotected. I couldn't breathe. Something else was wrong. Who had the ledger said had bought the books? That was important. Mars stumbled toward the door, certain for some reason that she could follow the calm she had felt. That it was something that had moved away from her. She fell to her knees when she left the desk and vomited on the carpet. I looked down at the same bile she had left all over the city. I smelled its pungent stench and recoiled.

Mars was gasping, far too quickly to be safe. I wanted to help her. It hurt. It ached. It was terrifying. She couldn't get enough air, the world was suffocating her. I pictured Margaret. I saw the look in her eyes as her mother died, and I knew it never left. I knew she wore her father's mask to hide it, but it must have been there. I was looking down at my own bile, gasping for breath, and I closed my eyes. And I remembered. Count the blue things in the room. 'One, a blue label that reads fiction. Two, a blue ribbon marking a spot in a book. Three, a blue spine on a novel about foxes. Four, the word tomobishi in blue text on another spine. Five...' I counted, and counted, and opened my eyes.

I needed to move. I needed to learn more. I needed to speak to Margaret. The girl, Chandara, was right. I could talk to her when she didn't want to kill me. I just needed to make it to the next loop. Two days left. But... that didn't feel right either. I'd spoken to her before. She didn't want to talk to me on the first day. For some reason, I felt like I needed to find her today. I forced myself to my feet. I took one step, then another. Finally, I found the large oak doors leading to the outside, and pushed.

What I saw was wrong. Destruction. Smoke. Death. Too much of it. There weren't enough Quieted to do all this. Not on the second day. My eyes widened in shock. It wasn't the second day at all. I had slept through it. It was the morning of the third. The girls. The girls could be stuck in Hadley's house again. I had to move, again I ran. Just like the last time I'd made it to the third morning. I found many of the same sights I had run past the first time. I tried to look away. I couldn't help them, I didn't have time.

I ran past almost all of them. Except one. One sight I had taken only vague note of the first time. A woman, horrified, clawing at her own face. Tearing open, aching gashes in her own flesh. They hurt me just to look at them. I had been in too much of a hurry to help the first time. I needed to save the children. So I had taken note to help her on another loop when I knew the girls were safe somewhere else. This time I froze and stared at her. Her eyes fixed on me as well, and she immediately started sobbing.

"Margaret?"