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It’s like the Vatican until it isn’t.
Her head swivels around, cataloging each and every bit of information as Ava tries to make sense of the chaos around her. A crowd of possessed townsfolk has completely descended on Mary, rendering the other woman lost in the sea of red as she tries to defend herself. Lilith, Camila, and Beatrice are all heavily engaged in combat with the rest of the possessed who seem to just keep coming .
And then there’s Adriel, who stands in the midst of it with relaxed shoulders and an incredibly curious look on his face. Her hand grips the sword tighter, blade glinting with an ethereal blue as her back hums.
Ava charges at him, focused and purposeful. He won’t be getting away this time.
She throws herself forward, blade slicing through the air until it meets resistance. Divinium meeting divinum echos with a dull clang. Spinning, she tries again, aiming for his torso that Adriel calmly blocks with his sword again. With teeth gritting, she tries her best to keep Adriel’s blade from coming down on her.
They trade blows back and forth, the area echoing with a distinct clang every time their swords meet. She’s not doing well. With every passing moment, Adriel is pushing her further and further back until she’s only a few feet away from the cliff-face.
She’s trying her best to keep him from gaining on her, but exhaustion is starting to set in. Her body throbs as blood drips from open cuts during moments when she hadn’t been so lucky at evading. Adriel looks nowhere near as roughed up as her, but he’s heavily favoring his right side—a product of her blade successfully meeting one of its targets.
Good, she thinks grimly.
Ava redirects another incoming blow—this one headed for her shoulder. A breathless laugh escapes her lips when she thinks back to how they ended up here.
It was just a simple recon mission. A passage from a book and some old thousand-year-old legend had led them on a wild-goose chase around Northern Italy in search of an ancient tree that held the key to defeating Adriel.
So here they were by the cliff-side in a town whose name Ava could hardly pronounce and there was the useless tree—with very nice leaves, and some incredibly colorful, yet weird-looking flowers—which had turned out to be a dud since Adriel was still not defeated and had apparently decided to ambush them here instead.
There’s a small cry of pain as Adriel’s sword catches her leg, forcing her legs to buckle. She fights against it and pushes back, launching a strike of her own. Her back sears, skin heating up dangerously as the Halo works overtime to protect her from blows that she can’t deflect.
A quick glance to her periphery lets her know that the others aren’t doing much better than her. Mary seems to have resurfaced, beaten and bloody with only one shotgun, but still holding strong. Lilith has taken to slicing at throats in a desperate attempt to stave off the ever-growing flow of possessed townspeople that seem to be just appearing.
Her stomach curls at the thought of all those dead people.
Camila does her best to disable her attackers with her crossbow. To her left, Beatrice weaves through the crowd, spinning and dodging her aggressors. Each move calculated and controlled as knives fly from her hands. She looks like a beautiful angel, face set with determination and Ava’s heart can’t help but swell with an indescribable feeling at the sight.
Another slice at her leg, this time slicing clean through a very important tendon behind her knee and forcing her knees to crash into the ground. The Holy Sword slips from her grasp, clattering in front of Adriel. He shoves it away with his foot like one does with a piece of trash.
They may not have found their Adriel-killing tree, but he had definitely found his Ava-killing sword.
The fight around them continues, but she sees them losing their advantage as soon as their eyes catch Ava on her knees.
“Here you are, kneeling before me.” Adriel uses his sword to tip up her chin, forcing Ava to look at him. “Will you give it up now?”
She pants heavily, forcing her lungs to cycle air. The air is unusually warm and heavy. Ava looks up in desperation and she thinks she feels a few water droplets land against her lips. Her tongue slips out to catch them, eyes fluttering shut.
The sky is a deep red, uncharacteristic of the usual grey that accompanies a thunderstorm, but the clouds are rolling in, heavy with intent. And really, that should have been their first warning that something was not right.
She’s close enough to the edge that she can feel the impact in her bones every time the water crashes against the rocks, foaming with anger.
“Over my dead body,” Ava grits, opening her eyes. It isn’t over until it’s over. The steady thrum against her back lets her know that she’s still got a chance. She won’t go down without a fight.
“So be it,” he smiles, grim and dark. Ava prepares herself, the muscles in her legs coiling in anticipation.
They say that moments before a disaster strikes, you can actually see it play out before your eyes. When Adriel raises his sword, Beatrice moves towards them, fully intending to stop him from harming Ava, but Ava knows that no matter how fast Beatrice is, she won’t make it in time to stop whatever happens.
That’s not the disaster.
Adriel’s feet shift the tiniest bit to the left and Ava knows.
It all plays out before her eyes. Ava lunges forward, fully intending to keep Adriel’s sword from meeting its target, but she knows. She knows that no matter how fast she is, she won’t make it in time to stop disaster from striking.
Something inside of her cracks on a fundamental level. The air is knocked from her lungs as her chest caves in on itself. Her heart; a dying star on the verge of collapse.
Divinium cuts through flesh like butter.
A knife clatters to the ground.
Her head spins, ears buzzing with white noise that gets louder and louder every passing second. Beatrice calmly looks down—goddamnit Bea can’t you show emotion for once in your life?—at the blade that’s now protruding through her chest.
Ava screams in agony and the sea roars with her.
1
She wakes to the sound of birds chirping.
Ava throws open her covers, jumping out of her bed to get to the kitchen because Beatrice has to be here, she’s not dead, she has to be—
Oh, would you look at that.
Beatrice is sitting down at the table, nursing a cup of tea as she pursues through a heavy tome with all the nonchalance of someone flipping through the morning newspaper during breakfast.
When Beatrice tears her attention away from her research to send Ava a fond look, the knot inside of her chest loosens.
“Got a long day ahead of us.” Mary breezes through the room and grabs the entire coffee pot. “Meet by the van in fifteen!” She calls out, coat swishing behind her like a cape as she disappears with the heavenly brew that Ava had set her sights on.
Two hours later, they’re pulling up to that familiar cliffside.
Ava pushes open the door, clamoring out of the van to make her way towards the site. She breathes in saltwater, and immediately, she’s assaulted with the familiar taste of iron against her tongue but it disappears as quick as it came, leaving her with nothing but a hollow feeling of deja vu.
Ava circles the tree twice, searching it for any tricks, traps, or maybe a secret weapon that would bring down Adriel. She shakes her head trying to dispel the lingering traces of doubt and joins Beatrice who examines the tree with unrestrained curiosity as she traces the intricate patterns on the leaves with almost a soft reverence.
Her breath stutters. “Bea—”
Whatever she’s about to say gets cut off by Camila, who comes up next to them, face twisted in confusion. “That’s odd, it didn’t say it was going to storm today.”
Ava turns around to follow the other woman’s gaze. In the distance, she sees dark, heavy clouds rolling in.
They only have a split second of reprieve before it all goes to hell.
This time, when the sword goes through Beatrice’s heart, Ava is sure it goes through hers as well.
2
She wakes to the sound of birds chirping and immediately tumbles off of her bed in surprise.
Either she’s had the same dream for the past two nights or something very weird is happening.
She finds Beatrice in the kitchen, sitting at the head of the table, tea in one hand, book in the other. And this time, when Beatrice sends her another one of those soft looks, Ava’s mouth is filled with a sour taste. She tries not to let any of the discomfort show on her face, but some of it must have bled through because Beatrice’s expression immediately turns concerned.
She opens her mouth to say something, but Mary beats her to it.
“Got a long day ahead of us. Meet by the van in fifteen!”
3
She wakes to the sound of birds chirping.
Twice a coincidence.
But the same thing happening three times? That’s a pattern.
4
She wakes to the familiar sound of birds chirping and promptly throws up.
5
This time, she keeps her eyes closed when the blade goes through Beatrice.
6
She’s an atheist but if this keeps up, God might just make a believer out of her. God, Liam Nesson, whoever is doing this obviously doesn’t want Beatrice to die, at the hands of a shitty thief-slash-angel-impersonator who thought he could control humanity. Her mother had been very religious, always attending the Sunday masses that Ava would find new ways to always sneak out of when they would get too boring.
A second chance, her mother would say.
A way for Ava to right the wrongs.
Wretched and cursed, Sister Francis would counter.
Maybe this was Ava’s punishment.
7
She wakes to the familiar sound of birds chirping.
8
She wakes.
9
She screams.
10
“Got a long day ahead of us. Meet by the—”
“No!” Ava yells. “Nobody is going to the van.”
Mary gapes at her, clearly shocked by her outburst.
“We’re—” Her heart stutters against its cage when her eyes meet Beatrice. Sweet, sweet lovely Beatrice, her lovely Beatrice who is going to get shish-kabobed later that day if they don’t do something about it. “We need to have an emergency meeting. It’s important.”
“Now?”
“Now.”
Minutes later, they’re all gathered around the dining table with expectant gazes at Ava.
She takes a deep breath. “Have you guys ever seen the movie, Groundhog Day?”
Lilith guffaws. “We’re pushing the recon mission back for this?” She pushes away from the table, ready to get to the van, but Ava snatches her wrist pulling her back.
“Listen to me!” Her hand spasms around the edge of the table. “Please,” she begs.
Beatrice searches her face. “What’s happened, Ava?”
This is it. This is her chance.
Trust your team.
“I’ve lived through Mary telling us to get our shit in the van at least ten times now. It’s a time loop and every day is the same. We go to the site, we find the stupid tree, Adriel shows up with his demon sword—”
“—Wait, hold on—”
“—And his demon army ambushes us. Then, Beatrice gets stabbed through the chest and dies. ” Ava turns and meets Beatrice’s calm, steady eyes.
“Do we win?” Beatrice’s eyes are calm and steady. And Ava knows that look, she’s weighing the consequences.
“There’s no winning, Beatrice.” Her voice is hard, “You die, every time.” She slumps in her seat. “And then the loop restarts.”
“Start from the beginning,” Mary orders.
.
.
.
She still ends up on her knees.
Beatrice still ends up with a divinium sword through her chest.
11
“For the past ten days we’ve been stuck in a time loop and I’m the only one who remembers. It starts with us going to the site. We find a dumb tree, but it’s the same as always. And then, Adriel shows up out of nowhere with a divinium sword and an army of possessed and it’s just like the Vatican all over again. Except I keep fucking it up and he kills Beatrice.”
.
.
.
Beatrice is dead before she hits the ground.
12
She decides to stop telling them. It’s all going to hell anyways, what difference does it make? She might as well save them the pain.
14
She pulls Beatrice aside before they leave.
“Listen Bea, whatever happens out there, don’t be a hero.”
.
.
.
That self-sacrificial idiot.
16
She wakes up to the sound of birds chirping and immediately feels like she’s suffocating. For a moment, she’s tempted to spend the entire day in bed, just laying there because what’s the point.
“Got a long day ahead of us. Meet by the van in fifteen!”
Water crashes against the rocks and Beatrice’s body crashes to the ground.
17
She finds Beatrice in her room, packing the last of her belongings in preparation for their trip. Ava stands there, leaning against the doorway as her eyes track the woman moving around the room with purpose. The corner of her mouth twitches up in a small smile.
“What would you do if tomorrow was your last day on earth?”
Beatrice sets down her book, rolling back on her knees as she regards Ava. Soft honey brown eyes stare into her own, dark and unyielding ones. “I suppose I would make sure that I didn’t leave without any regrets.”
Ava moves forward, stopping until she’s standing in front of the other woman. She slides down to her knees, mirroring Beatrice’s position. “And if that day was today?”
Beatrice shifts closer until their knees are touching. She reaches out, cradling Ava’s face delicately. Her thumb traces across her brow, smoothing out the worry lines on her forehead that Ava wears heavy, like a crown.
Ava’s eyes flutter shut in a desperate attempt to save herself from crumbling under the tenderness of Beatrice’s gaze. She feels Beatrice leaning in, a soft exhale against her nose that sends a distinct burst of warmth throughout her body. And then, soft lips pressing against her own.
“No regrets,” Beatrice murmurs softly.
She chokes back a sob.
19
No regrets.
So she pulls Beatrice in by the back of her neck and crashes their lips together in an all-consuming kiss. Mouths move against each other, tongues swipe against lips, fingers messily tangle in hair. At some point, she feels wetness against her cheeks, and realizes that she must have been crying. Beatrice must realize at the same time as she does because she makes a noise of concern, but Ava swallows it up, pulling her closer, hip to hip. Every movement of her mouth against Beatrice’s in a desperate attempt to put enough life into her that she might stay alive this time.
Will she ever get out of this never-ending cycle of watching the love of her life die before her eyes?
20
She tries to convince them to not go. A tree is just a tree and this one isn’t any different. They’re better off spending the day inside.
Her suggestion is poorly received.
23
No matter how hard she tries to keep them away from that damned tree, she fails in every iteration.
27
She wakes and the air smells like death.
28
She runs.
She takes the keys and drives west.
She drives until she leaves it all behind; the town, the stupid tree, Beatrice’s death. She drives until all she sees is red-orange skies and deserted roads. She drives until the only thing she hears is the rumble of the van and not the sound of Beatrice’s last breath.
She drives until the fuel gauge reaches empty and the sky is dark. The van shakes and sputters under her until it comes to a stop. Only then, does she stumble out of the vehicle.
Distantly, she hears the sound of running water and the back of her throat throbs in response. She can’t remember the last time she had some water. She can’t remember the last time she ate. Her vision goes hazy around the edges and she blinks rapidly, furiously shaking her head to dispel the fuzz inside her mind.
So she walks. She keeps walking, following the sound until it gets louder and louder. Until she leaves it all behind for the familiar companionship of saltwater and iron.
A humorless laugh escapes her lips, hollow and dying.
No matter how far she runs, she can’t get away.
Destiny arrives all the same. Shut up, brain. Now isn’t the time to make movie references.
That damned tree sits under the pale moonlight, leaves fluttering in the soft breeze, taunting her. She’s pleased to see that it has lost some of its shine from before. There’s nowhere near as many flowers as there were before. Some branches have even started to droop, spines bending unnaturally, rendered powerless against the force of gravity.
Ava lurches forward and the world tilts on its axis. There’s black spots dancing in front of her eyes. It’s like she’s wading through an ocean of sticky taffy, limbs getting harder and harder to move.
She’s knocked to her knees and makes no effort to get up. She bows her head and bends down, further and further, letting gravity carry her down until her face meets the earth, until all she tastes is dirt and death.
And then she inhales.
32
She finds herself by the cliff-side again. Her chest is tight and her hands tremble. “Fuck you,” she says weakly. Her voice is hoarse from screaming obscenities at the Adriel, Beatrice, and the damned tree. In another life, maybe she could have enjoyed the view for what it was. It’s scenic and could have been beautiful—could have been somewhere she brought Beatrice to for a nice romantic getaway, had this not been the site of their unbecoming.
The water roars loudly, waves striking against the cliffside, angry yet calm.
She steps closer to the edge.
42
Ava has watched her die thirty-three times now, but every time, when the sword goes through Beatrice’s chest, it feels like the first time all over again.
Adriel plunges the same, blood-soaked blade into her chest and the world finally rights itself as she falls next to Beatrice. Maybe this is how it’s supposed to be.
Her hand finds Beatrice’s as she pulls them closer together until their foreheads are touching. She can feel the rattling of their lungs as their bodies struggle to keep them alive.
No no no, not yet.
The black spots are back, multiplying until they completely obstruct her vision. As her breaths get shallower and shallower, her grip on Beatrice gets tighter and tighter. The hand in between hers has been cold for a while, but she doesn’t stop trying to squeeze the warmth back into it.
“In the next life,” she murmurs and her eyes flutter shut.
49
Her head lolls to the side as she coughs up blood on the ground next to her. The world around her spins, eyes moving in that unfocused way as they desperately try to find a certain nun. It sharpens in focus for one brief moment when her gaze locks on to the thing that got her here in the first place—some fucked up version of the Tree of Life.
Now it stands before her, a husk of its former self, looking as pathetic as Ava. It looks sick, bark peeling off of the trunk in multiple places, oozing infection and carrying a nauseating smell. The base of the tree harbors the remnants of what were once thick roots, now barely held together, looking frayed and rotten. The spines of each branch are almost limply hanging down, leaves cracked and brown.
Her mind is hazy with blood loss and regret, but she doesn’t dare close her eyes, no matter how many times the voice in the back of her head is telling her to rest. This moment is significant. There is something being told. A message that is being sent. If she can just stay awake long enough to figure out—
Her eyes roll back.
The last thing she sees is a lone flower—bright pink and full of life, sitting on the dying tree.
“Oh,” she realizes. This is it.
50
She wakes one last time.
As soon as Ava finds solid footing, she takes off in the direction of Beatrice. Upon arrival to the kitchen, she immediately yanks the other woman out of her chair, dragging her past the sliding door and into the backyard, near Camila’s rose garden.
“Ava—”
Forty-nine times. That’s how many times she had failed Beatrice. She can’t afford one more. This may be her last chance and she can’t fail Beatrice. Nails dig into the soft skin of her palms, I won’t let you leave me. Not this time.
She sucks in a shallow breath and meets Beatrice’s concerned gaze, “I have a story to tell you, if you’ll let me.” Her lips quirk up into a small, wavering smile.
At Beatrice’s reassuring nod, she launches into the story—the sparknotes version, because they don’t have enough time for Ava to list out every iteration. She briefs her on the situation before listing out everything she tried to save the other woman from her death.
She strategically tries to leave her feelings out of the retelling, listing facts in a clean and clinical way, but some of her emotions bleed through anyway because Beatrice's eyebrows are drawn together, jaw locked tight when she finishes the story.
It’s the exact opposite of what she wanted and the familiar feeling of despair burbles inside of her.
They stand in silence, faces grim, before Beatrice speaks up. “Maybe, you’re not meant to change anything.”
“But then why—” Her voice cracks, unable to finish the sentence. Why do I keep getting sent back to watch you die?
Why do you have to die?
“Control what you can,” Beatrice murmurs distractedly. Her brow furrows, “Maybe, you’re not meant to stop Adriel from turning the blade on me.”
“But then you’ll die!”
Beatrice’s lips quirk up into a secretive smile, “Not necessarily.”
Ava wants to object, exclaim that the last two times she told someone else about the loop, it never worked in their favor. She wants to say that this is not what she had in mind when she decided to tell Beatrice. This might just be their last chance to fix things and if she watches Beatrice die one more time, it will break her.
“I can’t watch you die again,” she says, choking back a sob.
Beatrice steps closer, cradling Ava’s head in her hands, head ducking down to meet her gaze. “You won’t,” her voice is firm, resolute, taking on that determined edge it gets when she has a plan in mind.
Ava opens her mouth to ask but Beatrice silences her with a soft, chaste kiss—a kiss that erases the existence of any other one that might have come before it, becoming their first and possibly their last, if they fail. Her throat burns.
“Trust your team,” Beatrice says softly, eyes shining so brilliantly, full of life, and Ava is scared that she’ll never get to see that light ever again.
Those three words echo inside her head, bringing up memories of a different place, a different time—of caves and bombs and ridiculous puns. They settle in between her ribs, soothing the erratic beating of her heart.
.
.
Beatrice leaves her by the garden, disappearing from the house with a suspiciously heavy black duffel bag only to return two hours later, empty-handed.
The other sisters, having learned not to question Beatrice’s decisions, only give her a momentary glance as she climbs into the van, sliding the door shut. She’s changed into her combat habit after coming back from her impromptu trip into town. Ava gives her a searching look and only then, does she notice something critical missing.
“Hey, where are your knives?” The aforementioned knives that were once strapped across Beatrice’s chest are now missing, leaving the area bare.
“Still with me,” Beatrice replies mysteriously.
Sensing her growing anxiety, the other woman reaches out and squeezes her hand in reassurance. Settle, she says. Trust me, she says.
So Ava does.
.
.
The tree is dead. It sags pitifully, trunk oozing rot and completely decayed beyond repair. There’s not a flower in sight.
It hits her then, the gravity of the situation. The immense oh shit, this is really it moment and Beatrice better not fuck it up or else I’ll bring her back to life just to kill her, myself—
Her knees hit the ground, aftershocks of the impact traveling up her bones but she remains numb to the pain. There’s an intense need building inside of her, the urge to do something because she knows what happens next, but Beatrice wants her to not interfere and let the events run their course like they did the first time.
So she waits. Her heart dropping further and further in her chest as Adriel’s sword lifts her head, Beatrice calmly moving behind Adriel, knife raised just like the last forty-nine times. And then Adriel pivots, blade slicing through the air aiming for Beatrice’s heart only to stop with a dull clang —the familiar sound that accompanies when divinium strikes divinium—as it meets her chest.
Ava can’t help the hysterical laugh that bubbles out of her. It takes her hardly a minute to put two and two together, between Beatrice’s impromptu trip to town and her missing knives, she realizes the other woman had likely procured a blacksmith to melt down her divinium weapons into a breastplate. Beatrice, you crafty little shit.
Adriel doesn’t outwardly react to the development and moves closer to strike again, but Ava uses his moment of distraction to scramble forward to grasp her fallen sword. Not this time. She won’t let him win again.
As soon as her hand finds purchase on the Holy Sword, it’s a surge unlike any other. The Halo thrums to life and she feels the white-hot heat of a burning sun searing across her spine. She recalls equating that feeling inside her chest to the collapse of a dying star—god, it feels like a lifetime ago—but she was wrong. And can you blame her? Astrophysics has never really been her forte.
No, this must be truly what it feels like to be a supernova—ending a painful cycle in order to give life to more.
Ava pushes the blade through his back, further and further, until it sticks out from the front of his chest. Then she yanks it out and watches as Adriel stumbles, turning around to weakly reach out to her in a desperate attempt to make a grab for the Halo one last time. His effort is in vain and he staggers to his right, collapsing near the base of the dead tree.
She looks up to find Beatrice standing only a few feet away from her, still alive, still standing, eyes full of tenderness and love.
In this life.