The Years of Apocalypse - A Time Loop Progression Fantasy

Chapter 52 - New Developments

To her credit, they only got lost once on the way out, and not for that long. The bog lion barely fit through the narrower parts of the catacombs. It had to weigh several hundred pounds, but Cassius didn't appear to be straining at all, unlike his apprentice, who was trembling with the effort of his lift object spell. Come to think of it, the spell resistance probably made it harder to carry the first apprentice.

"I could just carry him over my shoulder," Mirian offered, but Two just shook his head and cast a meaningful glance at Cassius.

If going past the students with four professors on the way down to the catacombs had caused the rumor mill to start turning, coming back out with an injured student, a skeleton and a bog lion corpse was like lighting the rumor mill on fire. A crowd gathered at the plaza, including Bertrus. "Was that… inside the spellward?" he asked.

"Yes," Cassius said casually. "Three, get the priest. Again."

Seneca asked, "Iliyia, what do I tell him? What do I tell any of them?"

Torres was silent except for the grinding of her jaw.

It was Cassius who prodded her next. "Your oath is to Baracuel first. To the crown, to our republic, and to its people. No oath sworn can be greater."

"And yet, in all this time, I have managed not to break any oaths. Not since I was a child. But I suppose the woman I swore it too is dead." She took a deep breath, and looked at Jei, then back to the skeleton. "This is Adria Gavell, of the Arcane Praetorians, sworn defender of crown and country."

"But Adria's still alive," Bertrus said. Then, "Oh shit."

"Tell the magistrate," Seneca told Bertrus. "And any guards you know can be trusted. Not the captain," she added. "Do you know where the pretender is?"

"Then who…?" Obviously he didn't.

"Go," Torres said.

Bertrus started running.

"Roland is cool!" Mirian shouted after him. Then to the professors, she said, "I'm missing something," Mirian said. "Who's Adria? I've never heard of Adria."

"Adria Gavell was in charge of security for the project," Jei said.

"Oh," said Mirian. Then, "ohhhhhhhh. Oh wow. You all… alright, see, you should just tell me everything. Akana Praediar knows literally everything about your project. Gods above, they've been spying on it for… three and a half years? Did you know they send an army over it? An entire army group. And two airships, like you've never seen. Big ones, packed with artillery. Cassisus, you'd love them. If they didn't kill us all, that is."

"I was not privy to this part of the tale," he said. "You are… part of the Department of Public Security? Undercover?"

"I should just start telling people that. Don't they have a special signet ring, though? No, I'm just a regular, ordinary time traveler, of the common variety."

Cassisus blinked. His two conscious apprentices looked at each other.

Seneca shrugged. "I don't really have a better explanation at this point."

Jei was looking at Mirian. Not just looking at her, but looking into her. She understands, Mirian realized. It was one thing to have it implied the future didn't matter, that nothing you did mattered. It was another to believe it. She believes it now.

The crowd continued to gather, with the bog lion being the biggest talking piece. As a healer finally arrived for One, the medly of students and townsfolk continued to talk over each other.

"...ought to have a plebiscite! Mayor Wolden's incompetence could get someone killed!"

"It already has, clearly."

"...are the spellwards failing? Wait, how did it come from Bainrose? It's a library…"

"...is this going to interfere with registration? I really need to get into the third year of arcane fundamentals…"

"...look at the size of that thing!"

Mirian let it wash around her like a river. It was comforting to see so many people acknowledging things weren't normal. For most of the cycles, she'd kept everything to herself, and ridiculousness of everyone going about their daily lives when armageddon was approaching had felt maddening.

Then, the conversation changed.

"...what's that?"

"Is that smoke?"

The crowd started to turn and point.

Mirian dropped her satchel. "Watch that for me!" she called to the group, then started running. The column of smoke was coming from the southeast of town, by the station. Before she got there, she already knew which building it would be.

She arrived panting and out of breath. Sure enough, the spies' secret hideout was already burning. She'd arrived just in time, too. The firefighting sorcerers were already heading in, their wagon parked in the street. The shimmering fields surrounding them indicated they were prepared for heat and smoke, but they were oblivious to the real danger.

"Wait!" she called. "There's a trap in the entryway!"

The first sorcerer stopped, hand inches from the inner door. He gave her a puzzled look, probably wondering who the weird student yelling at him was.

"Turning that handle opens a trap door. Stand–whew, sorry, been doing a lot of running today. Stand back from the room and use a force spell to turn the handle." When they didn't, she added, "This is the Akanan spy hideout. Someone set it on fire to burn the evidence. Going through the window is probably safer."

"Are you an agent or something?" the second sorcerer asked.

"You know what? Sure, that'll make things easier. By order of the crown, I order you to not go through the front door so you don't mangle yourself. Please."

"I don't think she's actually an agent," the first sorcerer said, but he at least came out of the entryway.

Since they were both clear, Mirian used her lift object spell, enhanced so it could handle torque, on the handle. Predictably, the floor fell away, revealing last cycle's dead-end for her. "See? This is why people should listen to me. Use the window!"

"Five hells," hissed the first sorcerer, looking down at the six foot drop full of nasty looking stakes. "Yes ma'am, using the window!"

Mirian may have had foreknowledge, but the firefighters had the advantage in power. Mirian marveled at the intensity of their spells. They pried open the wood boards easily, tearing them right off the heavy-duty bolts that had secured them. Smoke came pouring out. Quickly, they cordoned off the fire with force shields, smothering it, then gathered up the smoke and soot into black spheres that they submerged in water barrels waiting on the wagon.

Just as quickly as it went out, though, the fire reignited. "Assessment," called the first sorcerer.

"Checking it out. Hm. There's a spell engine–a heater. It appears to have been… repurposed. Alright, we need to form a perimeter. Depending on how they modified it and what sort of fuel its using, disabling it or taking it apart could cause it to explode. Back away people! You too, girl."

Mirian was happy to oblige. By then, Torres had caught up to her. "What's going on?" she asked, breathing heavily.

"Someone figured out we were coming for them. This is the spies' headquarters. I guess they set it on fire as a last fuck-you?"

"They probably wanted to destroy all the evidence and information they gathered so we can't use it. And distract us from their escape. Did anyone see who did this and where they went?"

"They might have gone by the underground," Mirian said. "Say, you don't happen to have any secret maps of it lying around? Next cycle I could block off their escape route. Exploring it myself has been a real pain."

Torres gave an exasperated sigh. "We'll talk later, okay?"

It wasn't a no.

***

It took a few hours for the dust to settle. By then, a few things had happened. One, the general agreement around town was a plebiscite would be called to elect a new mayor, made much easier by the fact that the Mayor Wolden couldn't be found.

Two, the fire fighting brigade had finally put out the fire, assisted by some careful consultation from Professor Torres, who had the design of a standard spell engine heater memorized and had intuited what kind of glyph changes the spies had made to turn it into an ignition source just by turning the problem over in her brain for a few minutes. She'd helped them take it apart with the precision of a chef dicing up potatoes. Really complicated potatoes that would explode if cut wrong. Mirian was too tired to think of a better analogy.

Three, a pair of fishing boats had gone missing by the docks at about the same time the fire started. Captain Mandez had also gone missing, along with whoever was pretending to be Adria. It was possible some less prominent people had disappeared; Mirian would just have to keep her ears open.

The guards, for their part, had closed ranks, and no one was admitting to bribes. Their story was that it just have been Captain Mandez taking the bribes, and they had just been following his orders. Enough people didn't belive this that an angry crowd had formed outside the magistrate's office. They shouted and postured for a bit, and then the magistrate had come out to promised them she'd 'investigate.' Who knew how long that would take and how much it would uncover. There was still a lot of grumbling, but the crowd had dispersed.

As evening descended, things certainly weren't back to normal, but at the very least, everything didn't seem like it was happening all at once anymore. Torres departed with Jei for an emergency meeting with the project team. "No, you can't attend. And so you don't follow us, it's the third floor of Bainrose. Give us… give me time. I need to think before we talk."

Mirian accepted that, and watched her depart. She did stick around and watch the entrance of Bainrose for awhile. Several wizards from Torrian Tower made their way over to the castle, none of whom Mirian recognized. She tried to memorize their faces. After awhile, no more arcanists seemed to be going in.

Not sure what else to do anymore, Mirian went back to her dormitory, where a furious Lily greeted her.

"Mirian! What is going on!? Do you know what I've heard today? That guy that fell from a building and died was because of you, and that you and a bunch of professors killed a bog lion in the library, and that you found a corpse that caused the mayor to flee town? And do you know who told me?"

Ah shit. Mirian knew.

"Valen! Who you apparently have been friends with also and didn't tell me?"

Now that caught Mirian by surprise. "She told you we were friends?"

Lily threw her hands up in exasperation. "That's the thing you deny? You're not denying the other stuff?"

"I didn't really help with the bog lion," she admitted. "Too many cooks in the… well, catacombs. Lily, first, let me just say I'm really sorry–"

"You could have died!"

"I did," Mirian said, and that made Lily stop talking and stare at her. "I'm… Gods, how do I say this? How do I stay your friend when everything we do, you forget, but I don't? Lily, I'm in a time loop. I've told you about it before, in previous cycles, so I know you don't remember. I'm telling you about it now, but… you didn't believe me back then. You humored me, sure, but you didn't believe me. Every time I go through this, I'm going to piss someone off. Usually you. Certainly Valen, who, by the way, is stalking me. Total creeper. The point is–how do I explain it to you? The first time I went through this loop, I watched you die. The second time, I saw it again. I've mourned for you, then–then here you are again, but without those things we shared. None of the things we shared, the good or the bad. Lily, how do I stay your friend when only one of us remembers what we've been through?"

Lily blinked, clearly not expected the onslaught of words coming back at her. Mirian found herself in tears, kneeling in front of her best friend. "What… what are you talking about?"

"I've lived through this month a dozen times now. When I die, I'll live through it again. And I will die. We all will, only, it's just me who will remember it. There's no stopping that. It won't stop for–" Mirian choked on her words, unable to give voice to that terrible thought. Right now, she couldn't even conceive of what could stop the cycles. She was focused on the attack on Torrviol because she could imagine stopping it, and maybe, just maybe, it would give her some idea, some direction. But how did one stop the apocalypse? "I don't know when it will stop," she whispered. "What will I say when the month repeats again, when you ask me the same question?"

"What do you mean? I… I don't understand."

Can't, or don't want to? Mirian wondered. How would she react, if it had been Lily who was chosen by fate? She wanted to be fair to Lily, but she was already sick of having the same conversations over and over again. And she could tell that despite everything she had learned, there was no end in sight. How could anything last? Selesia, she thought. I didn't meet her this time. Maybe that's for the best too. She yearned to hold her hand again. To go on quiet walks under the starlight. That couldn't last either, though. Maybe I can find a way, she told herself, even as part of her knew it was wishful thinking. What kind of relationship could last, when only one person remembered?

A deep pang of loneliness ran through her. She wanted to see her mom and dad again. She wanted to see little Zayd, and hear him call her Mi-Ri as he ran up and tackle-hugged her legs. She wanted to play wands with him, and listen to him make up ridiculous spells until she picked him up and spun him through the air and he was laughing too hard to imagine any more.

"Mirian?"

One of the reasons Mirian had been drawn to artifice was it made things that lasted. She liked that. Liked the permanence of them. She liked Torrviol because it was full of things that had been laid down centuries ago, but still stood. She didn't want to create things that were ephemeral. But now, that was all she could cling to. Nothing she built in this world would last.

"Let's… let's go eat dinner," Mirian said, standing, wiping a tear away from her cheek. "I'll tell you what I've been up to this past year. Valen can join us too."

"Oh, that's good," said Valen from out in the hall. "I was afraid things might get awkward."

Lily started. "Was she…?"

Mirian just rolled her eyes. "It's roast asparagus and chicken marsala. You'll say it's just okay, and your dad made it better."

"Not my dad," Valen said.

"Your dad was an abusive drunk who couldn't boil water in a burning house. Come on, let's go."