Archive of Our Own ^beta

Rita dreams, vividly.

It's been ages since she's really dreamed, and this hits her like a tsunami wave. It's a jumble of overlapping places -- base camp, a beach, a field, a town, a farmhouse, Paris -- and the sensation of dying a thousand times in a thousand ways. Everything is the same blue as it was when she still had visions from the Power, but she can't seem to control it this time, so she falls and falls through a blur of nearly repeating scenes until she wakes with a start in her bunk.

The mission briefing from General Bringham is simple: get in, burn a line through the Mimics, take out the colony in northern France before they can cross the channel into England, have the miraculous Angel of Verdun lead the charge to inspire the troops and use her keen battle sense to take out the toughest aliens.

Sounds simple, sure. Really hard to actually pull off, especially with the Mimics cheating with time loops.

If she can just find an Alpha on the beach and bathe herself in its blood she can fight them on equal terms again, but they're so stupidly rare, and hitting the one in Verdun was such a complete fluke, that the frustration keeps building. Slicing open Mimics can only burn off so much steam.

She heads into the middle of the training floor where no one will bother her and starts a sun salutation sequence. Yoga helps settle her mind. It always has, even before that meteorite slammed into Hamburg and started this whole mess. She steadies her breath and focuses on the flow: solid mountain pose into bends, lunges into planks, down to the floor and back up again. It feels good to let the world drop out and just focus on her muscles and breath.

She pushes herself back up into cobra pose, and then notices the man walking towards her.

He's some stuffed shirt officer, judging from the uniform. He's distractingly handsome; perfect hair, perfect hazel eyes, perfect crooked smile.

A series of ghostly afterimages flash across her vision of this same man walking across the same floor, but different: desperate, scared, confident, angry, hopeless; knocking into the training bots, gracefully dodging the bots. Always with those same hazel eyes focused right on her.

Huh.

Rita pushes herself up to her feet and stands at attention. "Yes?" she says. "What do you want?"

His face lights up as he breaks into a toothy grin. "Sgt. Vrataski, it's good to finally meet you."

"And you are?" she says, still standing strong against the double offense of his rank and good looks.

The man leans in a little. "Someone who had the same Power as you. We need to talk to Dr. Carter."

Oh.

Well, that's a whole different thing. She gabs his arm and leads him off the training floor. "Then we need to talk about this in private. Carter!" she yells. He looks up from his work and follows her out to a side room.

The man starts talking in a flurry as soon as they close the door like he'd practiced this speech a million times before - which, honestly, if he had the time loop Powers, he might have. "Major William Cage, Public Affairs. I got thrown into this upcoming battle, killed an Alpha by accident, and ended up controlling time by dying. You taught me how to fight them and how to reset things by killing me a lot. Two fingers," he suddenly says, pointing at Dr. Carter, who pulls his hand out from behind his back, impressed. "Your device thing definitely works, Dr. Carter, but did it have to use that many needles?"

"Uh, it's like a satellite dish," Dr. Carter says, ruffled from such an onslaught of information. "The more connections it has to the human nervous system the better chance it has to tap into the Mimics' neural broadcast network."

"Well, still hurts," Cage says, rushing on. "But. But! We found the Omega's location. The Omega's real location. Yes, they've been sending fake visions as a trap." He cuts off Rita before she can even open her mouth to speak. "We tracked it to Paris, we got through the hive of Mimics, and yesterday--" He smiles again. "--you and I killed the Omega."

Cage's eyes eagerly watch Rita's face like he's expecting something specific from her. Whatever it is he doesn't find it, because his smile drops for a second before his perfect TV broadcast expression comes back.

"So if we killed it, why did you restart the day again?" Rita wants to believe this -- so, so wants to believe that the war is over -- but she's seen too much battle to believe the ramblings of someone she's just met. Even if there's still an itch in the back of her mind that she's been in this room with Cage before.

"It was different this time. I got sent back even earlier than every other loop." His brows crease. "It bled out on me before things reset. Do I have the Omega's time powers now? I should deal with that thought when there's time."

Rita picks up a jagged combat knife from one of the supply tables and looks over Cage's uniform jacket thoughtfully. "If you're worried, I could bleed you out here and now."

Cage quickly raises his hands. "No, no, I'm good. This timeline's pretty okay so far."

Rita shrugs and sets the knife back down. "Later, then." She crosses her arms. "So, what, they cancel the war and we all go get drunk at the pub?"

"I'm pretty sure the invasion is still on. The thing about time loops is that nothing you did really happened to anyone else."

"Tell me about it," Rita says. "That's fine. I'll just keep up with my prep for the drop. And what are you doing, Major?"

"Cage," he says quickly. "Call me Cage. Or William, or Bill, or whatever. Just... just not 'Major'."

"Fine, Cage it is," Rita says. "And what are you doing? Sitting pretty in some TV studio with the other talking heads?"

"Like every other version of June 6th, I'll be right there in the beach invasion. General Bringham asked me to be part of the invasion force for on-the-ground media coverage and I of course -- of course -- said yes." He sighs. "I'm trying to talk them into give me a Jacket so I can help out but no one actually believes the garbage I said on CNN about any new recruit being able use it without training, and I, technically, have never been trained to use one. I'll be watching your back, so keep an eye out for me out there."

Rita gives Cage a withering look. "Do I look like Mary Poppins? I'm not your nanny."

Cage raises his hands. "No, ma'am. Still, with the Omega gone I think we can take out the ambush this time."

Rita rummages around in the top drawer of a cabinet and puts a pen and a terrain map of the Normandy beach map in front of Cage.

"Alright, future boy, if you've already fought the invasion before, give me a layout of the battle. Numbers. Directions. Surprises. "

And so Cage does, and Rita intently studies everything he tells her.

The weird sense of deja vu doesn't go away.

The wait before the drop was always the worst bit. The tense quiet of being suited up, loaded into the drop ship, waiting to hit the release button and drop into another fight to the death.

Rita closes her eyes and focuses on pranayama breath control as she does her pre-battle meditation. In. Out. In. Focus on the muscles. Feel the tension and try to let it go. Let go of any stray thoughts to focus on the mission and what needs to be done.

Break through the wall of Mimics. Get past the beach. Try to reach a city.

A klaxon sounds and her attention pulls back to the present. "A Squad, fall in," she yells. The status light goes from red to yellow to green, and Rita hits the release button on her Jacket.

She slams down onto the beach. It's instantly chaos. Soldiers everywhere, the otherworldly screams of Mimics, the smell of blood on the sand.

And yet.

And yet, something is different. Usually, the Mimics would be expecting them. They'd be organized, in formation, ready for whatever plans military high command had come up with. The Mimics today seem distracted. They're out of formation, unaligned with each other, and seem surprised with some of the attacks from the human forces.

Maybe Cage is right; maybe they really did kill the Omega.

Rita smiles, grabs her helicopter propeller blade, and starts to cut her way through the beaches of Normandy.

It's still hard going, but they're winning. They make it through the Mimic army,’ off the beach, into the fields of Northern France and all the way to the city of Caen by the end of the day. General Bringham calls for a halt there, and the troops celebrate in some abandoned pubs as news reports come in from other fronts having similar success. For the first time in years there's a real sense of hope.

Rita watches footage of herself being played on the BBC. They've captioned it The Angel of Normandy -- another terrible nickname to hate -- but the camera angles are excellent and the way it’s shot makes it look like she's almost glowing against the overcast sky.

She looks around to find Cage and ask him if the army actually gave him anything more dangerous than a Steadicam to hold, but he's nowhere in the crowds. She asks around to see if anyone's seen him.

Rita finally finds him off on a bench by himself on the east edge of town. His fingers idly flip through a battered paperback copy of Interview with the Vampire, but his eyes stare off into space, off past the dark fields around Caen. She gives him a friendly slap on the shoulder as she sits down next to him. "Hey."

Cage comes to with a start. He looks surprised to see Rita but slides over to give her space. "Rita. I didn't expect to see you here."

"I heard you'd slipped out and I asked myself: why exactly would the overly toothy head of Public Affairs not be at the party celebrating a victory that he helped pull off?"

"Ah. Well, it's..."

Cage turns his head away, something of a vulnerable expression flitting across his face. "I've lived June 6th thousands and thousands of times, dying and dying and trying all over again, but..." He takes a deep breath in and out before continuing. "But I've never actually seen the sun rise on June 7th."

Rita nods, understanding the feeling. "Welcome to tomorrow. It takes a while to get used to uncertainty in life again."

Cage runs his hands down the paperback’s spine again and then looks up at Rita almost shyly.

"I know you... don't know me the way I've gotten to know you in all these loops, but would you want to..."

"Watch the sun rise with you?" Rita finishes.

"Yeah." Cage gives her a handsome crooked smile. "It's stupid, isn't it?"

"No, it's not," Rita answers. She crosses one leg over the other and leans back. "It was overcast with freezing rain in Verdun, the most miserable weather you could ever imagine. I didn't see the sun for a couple of years. That kind of thing drives a person crazy."

"How did you deal with that? I at least had you I could talk to after a while, but you had nothing."

It's Rita's first instinct to lie. She could protect her heart with the thick iron shell she's learned to keep over it, and Cage would probably never know the difference. But they're alone here, and he's so vulnerable right now that something makes her open up just a little.

"It was hard. Figuring out what was going on and how to live with death broke me and soldered me back together in ways that don't fit quite right. I wasn't any kind of soldier before the war, but I got really good at giving myself a good, quick suicide to get on to the next try. Sometimes, I think it's still 21st February in Verdun and all of this has been one long delusion as I bleed out."

"It's not," Cage says. "Verdun is over, Normandy is over, and it looks like the war itself might be over soon enough. Then I suppose we can try to go back to what life was like before all this."

Cage sets his book down on the bench. "So, what did you do before the war?" he asks.

Rita raises an eyebrow. "None of your business, Major."

He chuckles. "I suppose you never have told me that before. Why start now?"

Somewhere in the distant farmlands, a rooster crows. Rita looks up to see the sun start to crest the horizon.

Cage quietly reaches out his hand, and Rita takes it. Their fingers lace together as the light of a fresh dawn spreads across their faces. It's warm.

It's nice.

They sit like that for a little while as sunlight slowly spreads across the French countryside. Rita finally pulls her hand away, and Cage lets her go. He turns his head to face her.

"So, Rita Vrataski," Cage says in his best TV interview voice, back to the sparkling persona he seems to put on for the cameras. "You've won the alien war. What do you want to do next?"

Rita stares out towards the horizon. The light of dawn spills over a field of lavender flowers, lighting up the world with purple. "I want to go to Hamburg."

"Hamburg, huh?" Cage mulls it over. "If you're willing to be part of a ceremony of remembrance with the German Chancellor, I think I can make that happen."

"Sure."

It takes another week of fighting to get there, but finally, finally, humanity makes it back to where everything started.

Hamburg is a mess. The meteorite impact crater is a scar across the north end of the city and what remains of the airport. Most of the centre of town is in ruins from the Mimics' first wave attack and the desperate, futile attempts by the EU and NATO to keep them from spreading out of the city. The tower on top of Hamburg's city hall has been blasted off, but crews have worked hard to at least get the rest of the building cleaned up enough for a stage for General Bringham and the German Chancellor to give a public address to the troops for managing to finally defeat the Mimics, and mourn those lost in the war.

Rita stands a distance away from the square, watching as crews set up chairs and stands for the TV cameras. There’s a script for the event, but she's done enough of these that she already knows what to do: sit and look serious as the Chancellor gives her speech, give a few remarks as the Angel, lay a wreath.

Cage has been bustling around making sure that all the members of the press are sent to the right spot, the teleprompters and translators are ready to go, and other Public Affairs tasks, but he takes some time to join her in her quiet spot overlooking the Elbe River.

"Ready to go?" he asks, flashing her an annoyingly bright smile.

"Sure," Rita says flatly. "I know the drill by now."

His smile fades a little, and he leans against the railing to look at her. "Are you okay? I know this is a heavy place for everyone, but you seem quieter than usual. Is it that hard to see the destruction up close?"

"No, not just that," Rita says. "It's more personal."

She pauses. She could just shut down and leave it at that. Cage would probably accept it and not pry anymore. But after five years, she finally wants to admit out loud what's kept her going all this time.

Rita pulls a battered, old-style iPhone from her pocket, turns it on speaker mode, and hits play on a saved voice file. The tinny sound echoes back from the rubble around them.

"Rita, love, it's Mum. Your father and I just wanted to check in with you, and update you about our European holiday. We're in Hamburg today! Your father's so excited to see Miniature Wonderland. You know how he loves his model trains! Give us a call when you're free. Love you."

The message ends, and she pockets her phone.

"They were here in Hamburg when the asteroid hit. I was busy at work when they called. They probably went so quick they never even saw the Mimics, which is good."

She looks down at the ruined street of Hamburg beneath them. "When I figured out how to use the Power to loop time, I was angry that it was just that one day in Verdun. If there was one day I could choose to do again, I would have taken that call."

Something inside her cracks like a dam, and after years of holding it together, of being the unflappable warrior, hot tears stream down her face. Cage gently wraps her in his arms, and she weeps quietly.

Rita has spent so long as the stoic, full metal warrior angel leading the human armies in a losing conflict against aliens that she can't remember the last time she's been comforted and allowed to lay her burdens down. Rita stays like that for a minute until the tears stop coming, takes a deep breath to ground herself, and then does something impulsive she never would have done weeks ago.

She leans up and kisses Cage.

Everything suddenly bursts into an explosion of blue light. Rita jerks her head back to see that Cage's hazel eyes are burning blue -- and from his shocked expression hers must be as well. A tangle of blue webs like in her visions of the Omega weaves and unweaves patterns around the two of them as the rubble of Hamburg disappears from sight.

And then suddenly -- finally -- everything clicks.

Days and weeks and months and years of June 6th. The same cycle over and over: training, deployment, dying on a beach. And then like a blip Cage starts to appear and things start to change, events cycling further out, further away, until she's leaving the beach and heading other places, until she punches her way into the Louvre and she grins as an underwater explosion causes the Mimics she's fighting to collapse, and she laughs and laughs as the entire world is absorbed into a flash of light.

Her head hurts like someone's driven an icicle directly through her skull and her eyes are watering but she starts to laugh, low and quiet.

Cage's face is full of concern as he looks her over, his eyes hazel again. "Rita, what... Are you...?"

She blinks away the tears and punches him lightly in the shoulder. "You know, it was kind of fun shooting you all those times, Private Cage."

Cage steps back. His eyes widen in hopeful surprise. "Then, you..."

"Yeah. I feel like I've been shot in the head, but I think I can remember what I did while you were resetting time. It's so strange to be outside the loop, doing the same things over and over." Her face darkens. "Dying on the beach from an attack I didn't see."

"Yeah, tell me about it," Cage says. "I think I saw what I was doing while you were looping at Verdun, because I saw the very same boring board meeting a couple hundred times." He gives Rita a soft smile. "I wish I could have helped you like you helped me."

Rita lets out a snort of derision. "Like I would have wanted some useless, self-absorbed, stuck-up desk jockey showing up out of nowhere." Her gaze softens. "But I appreciate the sentiment."

She looks down at Cage's fancy officer wristwatch. "I suppose we should get back to it. Some Public Affairs officer is likely to start herding me back towards the stage so the ceremony can start on time."

Cage gives her a crooked grin. "We're annoying like that."

He reaches out his hand. Rita links her fingers through his. "But we're here," Cage says. "We're fine. You and I saved the world, even if no one else will ever know."

Rita gives him a smile back. "And who would ever believe some ad man and a yoga instructor made it happen."

It takes Cage a second to register what Rita means, but when it clicks his smile is bright as the sun.

The sidewalk around them lights up with sunshine as a break in the cloud cover passes by. Rita closes her eyes, breathes deeply, and revels in the feel of warm sun on her face.