Chapter Text
You sigh as you see the familiar shelves of the shop. The taste of sugar is still on your tongue as you leave it, tears were painless but the loops just make them feel worse.
You head over to the favor tree, like always. And like always, Siffrin is making a wish. It seems like you got here earlier than usual though, since they are still- You pause as you notice that he’s not just clapping their hands.
He’s doing a lot more than that.
You watch as he whispers a mantra into a leaf, you’re too far away to realize that he said, though. You write down what that ritual was, for a new experiment.
It seems you zone out, though, as you suddenly see them in your face, “Hey, Odile!” They say, “Diddd you want to make a wish? I didn’t think you’d. yknow. do that??”
You put on a smile, “Yes, actually i was,” You’ve said this before, “I was going to see what it does, as an experiment.” You’ve said this before.
Siffrin looks at you questioningly, and you make sure to school your expression so he doesn’t suspect anything more. They clearly want to point it out, but you both know neither of you are the feelings people of the group. (That award goes to Mirabelle and Isabeau, their speeches every loop get tiring..)
Once he leaves, a figure appears under the Favor tree. “You need to get better at controlling your emotions, Researcher~” Loop says, “Poor Stardust almost suspected you of lying- to their face, nonetheless!!”
You shoot them a look as you pick up a leaf, “Even if they did, they wouldn’t remember.” You grumble, “It didn’t work the last time i told everyone..”
The last time you did, the loop just rewound itself back to before you said anything. So you clearly can’t say anything.
Loop sees you picking at the leaves, “Planning to make a wish like him, huh, Researcher?” They ‘ask’.
You continue to pick at a leaf you think looks nice as they go on, “Do you even know how to do it? Ohh I bet you don’t~”
They , surprisingly, explain how to do it. It seems accurate to what you saw your rouge doing under the tree, so you follow their instructions.
You think of what to wish for, you already have someone to guide you through the wishes, so you can’t do that (not unless you want another Loop..) You could wish for the loops to end, but something in your gut says it isn’t possible. You decide to wish for someone else to remember- anyone.
Once you finish, you see Loop staring at you weirdly. “Why would you wish for another person to remember?? To bring someone else into o- YOUR suffering!?”
“I’ll just go insane with only you to talk to, Loop. If anyone else remembers, atleast I can have an actual conversation instead of the same repeating lines.”
They glare at you and you decide to go, before they can blow up again.
You continue on with the loop, saying what you always say, doing what you always do. Except it turns out zoning out isn’t the best thing to do, you realize as you remember the key in the notebook. You’re already past that floor now.
You sigh as you, once again, touch a tear. Atleast you’ll see if your experiment worked.
- LOOP 74 -
You wake up in a field, the smell of burnt sugar wafting around you.
You woke up in a field…
The scent of sugar is suffocating you.
You look in the corner of your eye, and see an all too-familiar glowing light.
This must be a nightmare, right..?
You get up, you know your lines, your role. It kept you sane throughout real life, it will keep you sane in a dream.
Come on, Siffrin, you think, Just do it one more time
You walk out of the path, and you wait for Mira.