Work Text:
By the third time you wake up two weeks ago, staring at the Quakitus-themed windows of your team's base, you feel like the world might be trying to tell you something. Maybe. The idea doesn't seem to stick very well, fading in and out even as you try to grab it to explore that strangely compelling path. It's odd, you think, usually you can keep hold of emotions and thoughts you could use for videos pretty well. You hope your editor won't be too upset that you can't provide much footage where you share your thoughts about the whole time loop situation. That thought, too, floats away from you, and for the first time in a while, you're no longer thinking about your editor's requests. You might be a little concerned about this if you could keep your mind on it for more than a second. You move on to thinking about more pressing matters. Namely, what you need to do to defeat Q, destroy his lag machine, and escape the time loop. (You're assuming that defeating him is the way you escape the loop, of course, what else could it be? This is how the story is supposed to go, after so many trials, the innocent hero finally gets his revenge!)
If Quakitus is just going to lag the whole server again and again, you don't really see the point in working with your teammate right now. Ex-teammate. Actually, current teammate, with where you are in the time loop and all? Whatever, it doesn't matter, this whole "friendship" you have with him won't last much longer. He never really cared about you at all, did he? Always demanding things from you, being so possessive of the team's resources, trying to guilt you over just wanting to use a few items for yourself! Since you know what he's like in the future, you decide not to do anything for the team this time. If you can get geared up early instead of wasting time with Q, you'll have more time to achieve your goal before it all restarts again. You laugh to yourself when he gives you that enchanted armor set again while he's still only in an incomplete iron set. You'll never forgive Q for what he's done, but if you would ever accept repayment, giving you gear that you'll use against him seems like a good start.
The lag starts up again and you know the end is coming, heralded by the tremors that seem to be pulling your body apart. You know enough about how this scene goes to stop running for a bit, but not enough to know that it never quite seems to work out no matter how long you wait. You don't react fast enough, your legs being jerked back to where you were standing a moment ago, a searing pain ripping through your body before stopping abruptly. It seems like it hurts more than it did in the last loop. You grit your teeth, thoroughly tired of the lag by now, but you have no choice but to move forward. You hate Quakitus more each moment his machine impedes your progress. You start to worry the lag will make the video hard to watch, but a soothing thought enters your mind, that it really doesn't look as bad as it feels and that it's necessary to tell the story. All this pain will be worth it, you know in your heart.
You make it to the final battle with Q, barely even noticing that you picked up fewer allies against him than you did last time. It isn't long before you realize it isn't enough, that you'll fail yet again this time. As you glare at Q, a realization shoots through your body like lightning even while the lag lets Q's sword slice clean through your body a hundred times before you even see him move. The time loop must be Q's fault! The lag machine that's been constantly sending you backwards whenever you try to move or do anything at all, the loop always starting right after you teamed up with him and ending just before you have your best chance to defeat him and destroy the lag machine, it's so obvious that you can't believe it took you this long to notice! With your last moments in this loop, you stand tall and shout at Q, "This time loop plan is never going to work, Q! Do you really think this is going to make me give up on saving this server from you? No matter how many times I have to live through having such a toxic teammate, my resolve will never falter!" The last thing you see as your vision goes dark is Q's expression changing from anger to pure confusion. As you wake up in your base with Q yet again, you remark to yourself on how good of an actor Q must be to so convincingly pretend he has no idea what you're talking about.