Time Looped

Forty-three seconds was the standard amount of time for a real-time event to become viral. After that, it died away to potentially be rediscovered later. In this case, it didn’t take nearly as long. With arrows vanishing moments after hitting their target, no one outside the room had seen anything remotely dangerous. However, what the entire schoolyard had seen was four large windows shattering for no apparent reason.

Two more arrows struck the door, just where the previous ones had been. The archer was making sure not to let the pair leave the classroom, despite the shortcomings of his ammunition. Other than that, not a single arrow was wasted.

The boy dashed under the leftmost window. Counting to five, he then stood up. Almost as quick, an arrow flew at him, aimed at the center of his chest.

In his mind, Will caught the arrow just before it hit him. That’s what they always did in movies. Thankfully, his body refused to make the attempt, twisting to the side instead. The arrow passed by less than an inch away. This was the point at which the boy caught it. Turning around, continuing the motion, he made a full rotation, ending up facing the neighboring window.

On cue, three more arrows split the air. This time, though, he was prepared. Not only that, he had the means to deflect them. Using the captured arrow while it was still in solid form, Will hit each of the shafts mid-air.

Just like jabbing, he thought.

The arrows hit the walls and ceiling of the classroom, causing him no harm whatsoever. So far, so good. The trick now was to reach the archer and to reach him, he had to find him.

Without thought or hesitation, the boy rushed forwards leaping through the shattered window and onto the school ground. Since the classroom was on the first floor, the height was no more than a few feet, but the impact still felt as if he had landed on five-inch nails.

Ignore the pain! The boy leapt to the side. I got this.

The leaps were nothing compared to the ones he’d get upon reaching second level, but they did the job. Arrows struck the asphalt, piercing it like paper. No matter how many Will avoided, though, there were always more. The archer class was definitely overpowered. To complicate matters further, the attacker remained out of sight. He crossed the courtyard, then jumped over the brick and wire fence and kept on going.

Cars honked and hit the brakes as the boy crossed the road and kept on running.

Where the hell are you?!

There were several buildings, but the arrows seemed to come from further away. A few apartment blocks were also visible in the distance, but surely it couldn’t come from there? The distance was insane, even for a class.

Another cluster of arrows followed, though this time Will wasn’t the target. The front left tire of a car went out, causing its inertia to flip it in the air heading straight along the boy’s path.

You gotta be kidding!

Why did the looped always have to go all out on the first encounter?

Will plunged forward, dropping just enough to have the car fly above him. More cars collided as screams and yells filled the entire intersection. With so much chaos and arrows to boot, it was a standard reaction to head for shelter. Unfortunately, it was also wrong.

The boy was halfway to the nearest building when he suddenly realized. The building he was heading towards was a bar. It also happened to be on a corner.

The large pane windows of the bar shattered from the inside, revealing two monstrous heads.

“Wolves,” Will whispered.

They were a lot bigger than the ones he’d dealt with before. Large as cars, they paused for a moment, sniffing the air. One of them stared at the boy, letting out a low growl. The other three did no such thing, rushing up the street as fast as they could.

At this precise moment, Will felt it—a sense of fear he’d never felt before. It wasn’t so much knowing that he would lose—he’d been killed by wolves before. It was a more primal fear, knowing he was facing something that he had no chance of defeating. All he wanted now was for the loop to end, and hope that the beast wouldn’t follow him into the next one.

The monster seemed to grin, slowly taking a step forward. It recognized the boy as looped, just as it felt the fear emanating from its prey, rendering him incapable of movement.

The wolf moved closer and closer, stopping a foot away from Will. Silver eyes looked down at him with conceit, as if he wasn’t worth the effort of killing. In the current circumstances, the boy would agree. He felt like a rabbit driven into a corner. There was no possibility of escape, no prospect of a fight, even the end of the loop was minutes away. All he could do was—

A drone slammed into the side of the wolf’s head. It was one of those small entertainment drones that everyone bought for no reason in particular. Flimsy and made mostly of plastic, it was incapable of doing any real harm, especially against a beast as huge as this. Reacting on instinct, the wolf turned its head, jaws snapping to devour the drone whole before it had a chance to fall to the ground.

That single moment presented Will with a deus ex machina situation and he took it. The petrification lost hold of him, allowing him to grab one of the glass fragments from the road. They weren’t large, no longer than a pen, but they were his only chance.

Realizing the change in his prey, the wolf quickly turned around, aiming to chomp the boy in half, but it was too late. Will plunged forward, thrusting the edge of the shard—along with his entire hand—into the weak spot just beneath the rib cage. The pain felt like an electric current running through his heart, but the boy held on.

The growling sound lost strength, turning into a deep breathing sound. The wolf took a step back, still refusing to believe it had been killed by such a weak human. Its paw trembled, attempting to take a final step, after which it collapsed on the ground.

“I won,” Will said to himself. His hand, as bloody as his shirt, let go of the piece of glass, letting it fall to the ground. How, though?

Another yelp followed by a crash quickly brought him to reality. There were still three more wolves out there, not to mention the reason he had set off running through the streets.

People were fleeing the area in panic. The bar the wolves had leaped out from was completely empty at this point. Yet, the massive mirrors remained, each of them displaying the words LEVEL UP.

The boy smiled. One wolf meant one level. Adrenalin took control, causing him to dash and touch the closest mirror. Next thing, he was running along the street again. Two of the wolves ahead lay lifeless, covered with more arrows than a pincushion. The third one was barely visible, continuing ahead. By the damage done to cars, road, and pavements, one could tell that the archer had done his best to get rid of it, but had come short. The number of arrows had progressively increased, suggesting that, like Helen had said, he had been playing around until now.

A steady stream of arrows flew at the last beast, as if they were shot from a waterjet. They were pouring from the sixth floor of an apartment building several blocks away.

So, that’s where you are. Will ran to the side. Now that he knew the destination, he could easily reach it in a way that didn’t leave him exposed.

The sound of sirens filled the air, only to be ignored. In the chaos, two groups of people formed: those trying to get as far away from the danger area, and the small group that wanted to move in closer to get a better video. The patrol cars in the vicinity were going to have a hard time with either to bother with Will. Just to be sure, he leapt onto the roof of the nearest building. That made him a bit more exposed, but he’d be able to reach the archer faster.

While running, the boy checked for his phone. Thankfully, it was there. The screen was all cracked, but it was still functional. According to the time, he had two minutes to eight. Just two minutes to reach the archer? Difficult. But not impossible thanks to his level two abilities. Leaping from rooftop to rooftop even seemed fun, especially since there were no wolves or arrows to deal with.

TRAP ACTIVATED

Entangled.

The tile the boy had stepped on pulled him to the ground. Unable to get rid of the build up inertia, the top part of his body continued on, only to be briskly pulled back like a piece of rubber. There was no pain, just the sensation that he was stuck.

What happened? Will looked down at his feet. To his surprise, he found that there was a mirror there, one that he was certain not to have seen before.

“That’s far enough, bro,” a familiar voice said.

“Alex?” Will tried to turn around, but the way he was stuck didn’t let him. Still, he was able to glance at the goofball over the shoulder.

“Dangerous going on, bro.”

Alex shook his head. He seemed the same as he always was—calm and carefree. Even now, Will had a hard time thinking of him as looped… if it wasn’t for everything that had happened in the past nine minutes.

“You’re the archer, aren’t you?” Will asked, grasping at straws.

“Fail, bro.” The other laughed. “Archer’s op. Cross that street and you’ll find out.”

“I already found out.”

“Nah, he’s just playing, bro. Danny made a deal—no playing outside one’s pen.” He walked up to the edge of the rooftop, still keeping five feet from Will. “Cross this line and you’re out of your pen.”

“So, you’re saving me?”

“Something like that, bro.”

If he wanted to, the goofball could kill him here and now, bringing Will’s loop to an end. Why wasn’t he, though? It clearly wasn’t enough to have stopped him from continuing. He had to make sure that Will knew he shouldn’t go on.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked. “You knew I was looped, and you kept on pretending you didn’t know. All those times saying the same shit over and over again just to make me think that…” The boy tried to break free from the trap, but his feet weren’t able to move off the mirror. “Does Helen know?”

Alex didn’t say a word.

“Did Danny know?”

The goofball looked away.

“He knew. He knew that you were one. That’s why you’ve been stealing his shrink file, because he outed you. Am I right? He said something that’ll make no sense to a normie, but a looped would figure it out. Am I right?”

“Never get out of your pen, bro. You’re not ready for it.” He turned around.

“Alex! Just tell me what—”

Restarting eternity.

“What are you looking at, weirdo?” The pair of girls walked by, entering the school building.

The boy blinked. All the pain had gone, but he felt that the adrenalin rush was still there.

“Alex?” he looked around. “Alex!”

“Will.” Helen rushed out of the school building. “What the heck did you do?”

“What happened?”

“Wolves overrunning in the city? The national guard being called in?”

Overrunning the city? There had only been four and three of them had been killed.

“What did you and the archer do exactly?” she whispered.

“We must find Alex,” he said. “He’s the one who kept stealing Danny’s files.”