Short Stories and Oneshots

come now, my next stop

The potion glimmers, catching the dim torchlight in the corner of her eye. Mocking her.

It would be so easy. All she would have to do is leave it alone, and convince Axel not to touch it. Everything else could continue as normal. She could do it.

But she won't.

She's stalled long enough already, taking every possible opportunity to talk to any of the others, look through every part of Ivor's basement hideout. She's been avoiding the corner with that one fate-changing potion, out of fear.

Changing things is dangerous. She learned that lesson in the previous loop, and learned it hard. She's utterly terrified now, of doing anything that will set off anything as horrible as what happened last time.

Slowly, as though her feet have iron weights attached to them, she approaches the potion. It emits a faint purple glow, staining the chiseled quartz block it sits on with the coloured light.

Her mouth is dry, but she still says, "Hey, take a look at this." to Axel.

He walks over, and Jesse can feel the pressure building in her chest. This is her last chance. She could still stop it.

But she won't.

She's not about to set off another catastrophe like last time. She's not going to meddle with fate this time around. Not again.

"You're not gonna believe me, but I swear I had a dream about this." Axel says. A familiar light enters his dark eyes, the mischievous twinkle of a thief who knows they can get away with something.

He glances at her for a moment. In the first loop, she was the one to take it, before he had the chance. The second time, she'd halfheartedly told him to leave it be, and he'd ignored her.

This time, though...

This time she's not going to fight fate.

"Hey, if you want it, it's all yours." she says as casually as she can.

He grins, and swipes the glowing bottle, depositing it immediately in his inventory.

"There's no way he won't notice his fancy potion is missing." Jesse says, sticking to the script. She knows what happens from here, but it isn't a relief.

"A good thief always covers his tracks." Axel proclaims. His eyes dart around for a moment, and he catches sight of another bottle, filled with a potion of a similar colour. He snatches it quickly, setting it in the exact spot where the previous one stood.

"Fixed it!" he says in a stage-whisper.

Almost automatically, Jesse replies, "Oh yeah, the perfect crime."

Her voice sounds weak and tinny to her own ears, but luckily Axel doesn't seem to notice. He's already moved on, so Jesse does the same.

She stares at the lever that the second potion had been hiding. She doesn't want to pull it. She doesn't want to make it real. She doesn't want this to keep happening.

But what other choice does she have?

Well. She already knows the other option, or at least another possibility.

Haunting memories of her previous run are resurfacing, unbidden. All the things she did wrong, and all the nightmares that ensued because of it. She can't let it happen again.

She steps forward. It feels like she isn't consciously moving at all, like some other force is pulling her forward, dragging her into a dark abyss that she's already too familiar with.

One hand on the lever. Pull it down.

With a grating sound, the bookshelf that Olivia is currently examining drops, tugged down by unseen pistons. Her friend gasps, already moving to examine what's been revealed.

The loop pushes onward, tugging Jesse with it.

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I realize I haven't yet clarified something DEATHLY important about this AU, so now's as good a time as ever to do it.

I am not writing/posting these oneshots in chronological order. I repeat- these events are not being written in the order they happened in.

This isn't a book, like Parallels. It's just a collection of ideas I want to write about, that all tie in together as a chaotic little story.
I've got this whole giant list in a Google Doc, of catalysts and things that happen to them in certain loops. So when I want to write an Undetermined oneshot, I scroll through the doc and find one I want to write.

It's not a meticulously planned and organized thing, and it makes absolutely 0 sense from an outside perspective.

That's somewhat of a lie, though, because it is a ridiculously complicated plan. I have a lot of plot twists and wild things prepared that won't be revealed until later, especially once we get to season 2. But the point is, I'm not writing this like...well, anything I've ever written before, essentially.

So be careful when making guesses or assumptions or whatever. There's a lot of loops, and a lot of catalysts, and unfortunately I'm shit at organizing them lol

with that said, can we get an F in the chat for Scorpio-