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Info It's your choice.
Humanity is at stake, our peers are lost and soon it'll only be us. One by one we are lost, not in space, or time, but our humanity. What even makes us human? And why do we lose it? (An An Anthology Page) All An Anthology Pages:
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Escher's Well
The paradox has been changed from the "Active" status to the "Stabilized" status. May their courage light our path.
You walk into the Vault, and search for the original archived document from Mira. The hall is lit by a dim orange, and dust flutters through the air with particulates glowing like fire. You feel like you could almost reach it as they settle on the endless shelves and cabinets. You walk up to a filing cabinet and wipe the ash of the handle, and the sweet scent of paper fills your lungs as you open it. You reminisce about how far we've come. It's been a long way, and you can feel a small smile put on your face. You remember how it used to be, where each paradox could've been the end. It really did only feel like yesterday. You breath a deep breath and let the last of your fond memories flow out. With something to do, your daydreaming ends at once. You pull out Mira's signature velvety black page at the front of the cabinet.
From Mira R.
On behalf of ■
There's an imminent paradox that's been detected. It will be called the 2014 Escher's Well paradox. We trust you will discover why it's named that eventually, as we hesitate to say that we don't know either. The coordinates that we traced lead to an unexplored area of the Backrooms, almost certainly a new level. The cause of the paradox is unknown, but we can guess it's another time loop. Care to not become part of it. Attached are details.
You run your fingers through the cabinet, and notice that the attached documents are missing. Strange. Zahra usually doesn't make mistakes like this. You wonder for a moment what could've happen, but you decide to notify her about this. This isn't something that can't be fixed by her, so it's nothing to worry about. Besides your previous intentions, a sense of curiosity makes you decide look deeper into the cabinet and pull out a crispy sheet of paper. It's a first hand account of the paradox. A tang in your breath makes your heart beat a pace faster. It's quite odd. This shouldn't've been written in first person.
ON ACCOUNT OF THE 2014 ESCHER'S WELL PARADOX
Kiran Thornfield's Account
On team: Ronan A., Elara M., and Nova A.
We put our right fist to our chest, looking back to the base, and the few people sending us off. The air tickles with this strange solemn feeling, the anxiety and anticipation is irritating but not painful. We then grasp our heart, and bump fists with those sending us off. Oh, the tension feels like it may as well snap. I can see it in their eyes too, as they whisper "We wish you well." We turn around to the lantern instead of responding, and raise our two fingers to the lantern. The fire burns, it burns but we already knew it all would: Sacrifices must be made to stop these paradoxes, and those sacrifices are worse than mere physical pain. My fingertips have thoroughly charred, enough to be completely numb, and so I rub my finger against the pole the lantern stands on. A bit of my charcoal mixes with the layers and layers of ash from every other Firekeeper before me, and it feels like I'm becoming part of them. There's no other word to describe this shift from a solemn to an uplifting feeling except for "camaraderie".
With our sense of duty instilled upon us, we begin our silent walk to the paradox: Escher's Well.
Once we stop smelling the oil lantern, left with only the deeply comforting smell of campfire ingrained in every part of our being, Nova guides us through the coordinates. The rest of us trailing a bit behind, but never too far, as we're tethered together. Blinking away would be an issue, now wouldn't it? I quite hope it doesn't happen to me. But I digress; I just take in my surroundings, the cold, damp, metallic smells that I'm not so used to; the sheer presence that comes from the behemoth of a maze we call the Backrooms; and the slight sounds that fill the rest of my sense: Our footsteps, the rustling paper of Nova's map, and the background noise that's constantly changing drowning everything else out. It's calming. Or it would be if the tension wasn't so high. Because I'd like to talk right now, of course I do, but in the moment it's difficult. The silence is infectious, nobody, not even I, want to break it.
Ronan's eyes are distant, not looking towards where he's walking. His eyelids are open wide, and his eyes point straight forward, not moving to his steps. He sure is lost in the halls, and I feel bad. I can picture exactly what's going through his mind right now; what's flashing like a presentation in his eyes: Horrors. Unspeakable horrors. I awkwardly reach to my shoulder, not exactly grasping what to do besides simply walking, and feel how tight it is. Memories like splotches of oil coalesce to a memory. I push it away. I can't deal with it, instead I just watch Ronan awkwardly, hoping that he's okay. My fist tightens as I think that all of us have been like Ronan in one point or another, even if it was the moment we saw our family for the last time.
Elara speaks up, hands in her pockets, shattering the unbearable silence instantly, as jarring as the crunching of glass, "Have you ever wondered how they can predict the paradoxes?" Her voice is timid, a contrast to the way it prickles me like a deep sensation of dissatisfaction, it tells me she hates the silences as much. It's not something I can see in her shaking posture as she fiddles withs something, but I understand it well in her voice. Soft-spoken but with a presence, she adds, "Do you think they can predict the future?" Silence, as we think of answers; confusion, flashing in all our eyes equally.
"No, not really." I respond as quickly as an answer comes to my mind, doing what I can to lean into conversations rather than that uneasy focus, in a prayer that it won't stay silent. I don't quite think much about the question itself, just rambling instincts let's me respond, "But honestly? There's no goddamn way they can predict the future. They'll do it when Zero turns purple, but they've been wrong before."
"Fair, but you gotta understand what they do." Ronan jumps in, his eyes here with us, just jolting down to the ground. He understanding his assignment, "It's impressive, really, their precognition." Ronan's voice is decisive yet detached, with unease at the end of every phrase. He yawns and blinks a few times, his watery eyes shedding a few meaningless tears before he adds, "I couldn't even begin to think of how they could possibly do it."
"I get that," Elara starts, looking down, her presence no longer dominating the scene as we walk, "sometimes it just feels like magic how they come up with all this."
"Hey, get ready, we're nearing the coordinates." Nova says, with authority. A demanding sense of authority that almost leaves me breathless. A hush falls over us as quickly as the conversation lasted, and I suddenly become more aware of my surroundings. The Merge is beginning to happen. Ronan seems to actually be with us still, Elara is now shaking, and Nova is intensely focused as she has been the entire time. I, for one, don't know how to feel. I go through the motions like I'm wading through Level 37.
Every day is normal until it's not, after all.
You feel ash in the cabinet. Before another bout of concern grips you, you remark how soft ash is, despite it being nothing of what it once was. Another paradox must have erased this document; it’s just char now. Of course, you must realize nothing is intentionally burned, nothing will leave us unintentionally. You realize that you really should bring this up with Zahra. You blink, and in front of you has always been a notebook. It's a bit worn, opened to the page you stopped at. For a moment you think this is normal, then, you think this is odd, and then you realize something is wrong. You decipher the causality in the moment that something changed in your hands; you can almost smell the cinders even though they never existed at all. What it was erased is beyond you, you're not one of them, but enough concern flushes through you that you're sure it flashed across your face. You take a breath of musty book, and clear your thoughts. You ultimately decide to continue reading.
And so it was a staircase; it spirals upward and downward to infinity. I look up and it strikes me that there are railings on the bottom of the stairs as well as the top. It’s odd but it starts coming together once I make the connection. Everything around me could almost look like it was drawn by M.C. Escher, made with a light concrete that's slightly weathered, with a harsh and ragged texture that just pushes the border of uncomfortable. The cold and lifeless air hurts to breath even if it’s inherently calm. It’s just not humane. I shake my head subtly, just enough to clear it but not enough to show it to the others. Seems like this level is Closed, as the entrance disappeared behind us, the Merge ending like it never happened in the first place. I demand with as much authority my burning lungs can possibly utter, "Let's get this paradox stabilized as quickly as possible. No time to lose."
Nova says an obvious response considering her position, "Let's not get ourselves killed, Kiran, let’s start by exploring the level. It’s level is Closed, so pray that it isn't infinite."
Silence. Except for the howling wind that probably is just my imagination to fill in this fear. I open my mouth to speak but make no noise. She really didn't have to be so blunt. She could've lightened it a bit, I can tell by the way Elara looks, downwards and focusing on something I can't see, it's seeping into her edges.
I begin to hear low murmuring, like someone whispering from long ways away. It sounds as a call and response from a variety of directions. There's multiple. I begin to wildly look around, and notice Ronan open his mouth and I look down at him. Not metaphorically. "Got it. I’ll watch our back." Ronan responds definitely. Makes me kinda wonder what’s going through him. I understand it, I’ve been there before. Where you just feel like you’re chest is about to explode and every breath is its own kind of torture. I feel that my jaws are tightly clenched, and I let them loosen naturally, but before I can manage I catch another whisper and whip my head around. There not there anymore. And weirder, nobody else seems to have called me crazy yet. Either way, I’ll give Ronan the space he needs.
"We'll stick together, right?" Elara asks, misunderstanding Nova and clearly distracted, with a shaking voice. I can't help but find Elara a bit… pathetic, and I don't exactly want to speak my voice. I don't want to be rude, I don't want to do it again.
Another moment of silence passes as we shift our configuration. We shuffle our little dance as we reorganize ourselves, unclipping and clipping tethers with a satisfying click. Eventually we get to the point where Nova and I take the lead, Elara is in the middle, and Ronan is in the back. The entire duration we were careful to never let go of one another, and the tense breathing as we very well could Blink was all I could hear. The ebb and flow of murmuring has since stopped.
I quickly recall the question Elara asked a moment ago, "Oh, and Elara, we will for now." I answer, trying to do so softly, hiding my voice that wanted to lash out, hiding my clenched fists, hiding the subtle changes in my posture. I continue, "Given the name they gave us we're bound to come across something non-Euclidean. Splitting up could mean death, so don't worry about that."
Elara refuses to keep eye-contact, her eyes now darting wildly about, leading to her looking down at the ground, something different than before. I wince as pain surges through my hands as my nails dig crescents in my palms. I'd like to say that being a step above her makes me feel in power but that'd be narcissistic. I swear to God I won't let myself become like him again. And if there is a God, he better smite me down before that happens.
"Y-yeah," she responds—I can feel the tension like a coil, ready to explode—she still doesn't look at me, fiddling with an object in her pocket, "okay, thanks."
Ronan starts walking up the stairs, pushing me, startling me enough to jump, an instant relief from my intense gaze at Elara. Nova gets the queue and starts walking, but us two do not. Ronan mocks me, "'No time to waste,' he said. Let's go." Ronan's voice is harsh and mocking but his eyes is lost in the maze, I can't pick up exactly on why. He seems angsty, something is making him restless. I decide to not talk back and just start walking, there's no reason for me not to.
The stairs lead us up in an endless, sickening spiral and after about thirty minutes and a quick three-thousand steps, Nova points out, "We've been going in circles. The staircase isn't infinite, it's looping in on itself." She takes her map, and definitively drops it down the staircase. I track it going down as the rustling paper flutters down the spiral stairs with some vertigo, and after a few seconds of silence eventually broken by the sounds of her map falling from above. Nova reaches to grab it from the air. "The loop is a long one, but it's there." Her confidence never ceases to amaze me.
"Hey, uh, did you notice—" You pause, with your finger still pointed to the left. Your heart begins to race. Some say that your heart can beat two-and-a-half-billion times in your lifespan. You feel like you've used them all up. Cold sweat is dripping down your face, you can't breath, "—Oh god. Oh God. Oh God—"
Everything is wrong.
"What's wrong, sweetheart?" Zahra says to you. You've always been standing in front of her. You walked up to her desk a few moments ago. No, no, you we're in the Vault. What paradox was it? You're numb, static tickling you. You try to look at Zahra but it's only a blur. The sounds of fan become deafening. It hurts, goddamnit it hurts. You were just-
What were you even doing? Where are you?
Smoke fills your lungs and your eyes begin to burn. Fire licks your fingertips.
Images flash like bombs going off:
Mira's black page.
The lantern.
The document.
The last time you ever saw your mother.
Stop. Stop, stop. God make it stop.
You can't breath; you're curled up and crying; you can hear Zahra try to save you but God you're pathetic right now.
See yourself:
With long arms we can't see the end of they walk.
Dark trails lead behind them but they do not drip.
They do not fall.
Are they going up or down?
Both, we're just not looking right.
Like God reaching down to the surface, this world plastered with white concrete contorts into meaningless shapes. An intense vertigo hits me, worse than on the staircase. Just by merely taking in this scape I can feel my stomach acid rising. "Oh what the hell?" I don't even realize that I'm talking, I'm absolutely captivated in this scene, no other thoughts flowing through my head. It hurts to look at, it doesn't make sense: shapes melting together, walls, stairs, and rooms floating upside down. "Now I get why it's called Escher's Well." Everything is still, and it feels like I may as well be part of a drawing, the air is perfectly room temperature and I feel almost no sensations. I look around and just moving my head makes me sick. The sky is a pure white, almost glowing but not quite blown out, and the expanse goes out into infinity in every direction except for behind us. One pathway lies in front of us to walk, stretching further than the few kilometers I can see.
"It's…" Elara begins to take the first steps, her eyes are wide open and her mouth is slightly ajar. She's not shaking anymore and she takes her right hand out of her pocket, her finger still raised to point out towards the pathway. "Beautiful." I can't understand her awe, all I feel is sick, every movement amplified in my stomach. After a few steps, Nova follows, arms hanging to her side, composure completely lost. All I smell is the smoke of our uniforms. I'm becoming numb as I am lost in thought.
Ronan taps me on the shoulder, and I grip my mouth as I gag. "You good, man?" Ronan asks, sympathetically. I look towards him and he still is lost in the halls.
"Yeah," I say, queasily. Ronan starts walking with the others, and as I take my first step: One, my throat closes and I stop breathing these painful breaths, two, I feel everything move around me, shifting and changing even though it's all the same as it was, my head is spinning and which way is up is turning, my vision tumbling, and three, I see a movement in the far distance. A figure shaped in black. I can't tell what's what but as soon as I think it's there it disappears. Was it really there at all? My head is pounding. I can't stand up straight. My feet scuffle as I stumble and trip to the side, collapsing into Ronan. "Sorry!" I gasp out, my first exhale since a moment ago, "Sorry, sorry." The breath whispers out and I almost feel like something besides air escapes my lungs.
Someone grabs my hand while I'm on my knees but I don't know who. The floor isn't a place I can stand on when it's twirling like a waltz. The hand pulls me up, and I fall over again as the rough concrete floor slips under me. I fall again. My knees are bleeding, fabric soaking up the red liquid, as it scrapes on the ground, but that's just a guess because my brain refuses to process anything. Ronan was helping me, "You don't seem to good, dude." I lean on him, as my insides probably escaped onto the floor. I'm gasping, hyperventilating but each breath feels like a hammer hitting my head. Where am I? What just happened?
Another something grabs me from my armpit, and props me up. I can't even be upset that I'm being coddled like this when I can't think. That other person helping me seems to be Nova. My head is starting to clear up but the pain doesn't go away. I'm still dizzy. Elara is probably watching, mortified in the distance like usual. Or maybe whatever's in her pocket is taking her attention. Ronan was on my left, apparently, which means Nova is on the right. My breathing still is painfully fast, but in my mind I could gasp. I can tell some of them are talking, I can hear someone's voice is worried. I can't even tell anymore, I just don't know, and it seems like we're walking now. Moments pass, only mere moments as I slowly begin to recollect what just happened, along with the current situation. I did see something, right? As I begin to use my own feet to walk, I start looking around, slowly, not enough to make me loose a meal I didn't eat. Behind me I notice that the doorway in which we came is over a kilometer in the distance. "How far have we walked?"
"Why?" Nova responds, still holding onto me despite me trying to shake her off, "Only a few steps. How long did you think just passed? Kiran, it's only been a few seconds since you got up."
"Turn around."
"Welp. That sucks."
You are lifted off the ground, still in the fetal position. The pressure points you feel are in your knees and upper back as you're rotated to face skyward, not that you can actually see right now. With memories so vivid you may as well be blind.
All at once, you're brought back to the present. You'd describe it as snapping back to reality but it felt much softer than that, like a feather falling through honey.
You heave for breath because although the moment felt like forever, it was just a single movement. You take large, quick gasps for breath that can barely keep up. A disgusting taste fills your mouth, and it feels sticky, slimy. Zahra is sitting on the other side of the room from you, legs crossed, and she asks without making eye contact, "Would you like some water, dear? It's not awfully common when a paradox," she noticeably pauses, "doesn't fully erase something."
You nod your head eagerly, and take in your surroundings as she pours you a glass. The steady whirring of a fan—a desktop one, not a ceiling fan—and the slow click of a clock that mesmerizes you. At first you thought you were greeted by a pale white, sterile room, but really it isn't. The room is made out of a dark wood, with nick-nacks scattered across shelves and walls, each one somewhat dusty, with a history. A picture captures your attention but your vision is too blurry to see it clearly. Breathing through your nostrils, you can almost taste the age in here, but it's a sweet one. This room feels lived in.
She hands you the glass, and you weakly take it from her. As you bring the water to your lips, head leaned sideways, you pause. Just for a split second. Then you drink it quickly, nearly choking. The water doesn't feel like it goes own right, a thick film over your throat making it hard to feel refreshed. The water is cold, and it cools your mind. The water does help, it's just that your body wasn't quite ready to accept it. You breath.
You're lying on a bed. It's soft and a bit squishy, the floral patterned sheets only enriching the vintage quality of the room. The air around you isn't cold like the Backrooms usually is. But you suppose that all of us Firekeepers like to be on the warm side, so it makes sense. You ask Zahra, without the grand magnitude that talking to her usually carries, "Where am I?"
Zahra says, looking up at you, "Oh, this is my room." She has a slight pitiful glaze. But she's sympathetic. "No, not my office, this is my room. Yes, you're on my bed, no need to ask." She pushes up her glasses hanging on the bridge of her nose, and reaches for a book. It's a large book, and old enough that she wipes the dust off of it. "Close you're eyes, I'll read one of my stories." You open your mouth to protest, she catches you, "Don't feel embarrassed, sweetheart."
Looking at the blazing blue wordless cover, you ask, "What story is it?" Zahra shifts in her chair, an armchair with a matching pattern to the bed. A deep green with soft cyan accents, following the pattern of a flower you can't recognize.
"Oh, you'll see. You might find it a bit comforting." She opens up the book to the first page, licking her finger to flip to the part where it begins. "I always choose the right story, after all."
A creature shadowed in a two-dimensional black walks with long strides, sideways down a staircase, parallel to the horizon. It has a rough texture almost like cloth, but it casts no shadows as it is the shadow. And for the first time I’m not the only one that sees this Being. As it walks in an out of view in large arcs, overlapping with something behind it in a way that doesn’t work, Ronan points it out. “Hey, do y’all see that?” For the first time since I met him, Ronan is shaking, his finger not quite raised all the way. We all look to the Being in a strange curiosity as we begin to hear it click; it has arms that almost look like it has two joints, extending out into the ground, staying in view despite clipping through solid material. Their legs stand tall, digitigrade, and their posture is straight and natural as they continue walking straight down. Their face is in the shape of a beak, with strange strands dangling downwards in large sways, following the rhythm of the beings walking, connecting to a mass on their back. The clicks it make are dry, almost metallic, not particularly high pitched, but without any bass in its timbre. The clicks aren't quite regular, not following the pace of their strides, and the clicks go in an out, oscillating but never in time. The clicks are haunting, it does not echo but I can feel it almost shake and resonate in my body. And in a way that makes my legs feel numb, it turns a corner to be upside down mid-stride and promptly vanishes out of sight. In a crescendo, the clicks stop. Ronan averts his gaze, and in the duration, none of us talked.
Now it's silence.
Complete silence.
My body tingles as it expects to vibrate from the clicks but instead receives sensory deprivation. The silence makes me feel like I'm floating. Like we're all suspended in space, astronauts that are a long way from the spacecraft, floating in a white void, inching away from it, knowing that we'll never return, to eventually loose oxygen and suffocate. A doomed fate. It feels like the liquid in my entire body begin to rise in weightlessness, my brain increasing in pressure, and I can faintly hear the humming of a radio, or is that just the blood pounding in my ears? My breathing is slow in this serenity of anxiety, and I can feel each breath, in and out.
The four of us, tethered together and nothing else. Separated from everything. The only horrors is existential, no longer are we bound by survival as that is an inevitable when. My fingers and toes begin to tingle in soft throbs, to the rhythm of my heart. Then my hands and feet begin to throb and I forget what my fingers and toes are. Then my arms and legs—
"Snap out of it goddamnit," Nova slaps me across the face and it stings. At first I wonder how she slapped me with my helmet across my face. Then I gasp for air, not necessarily expecting to breath, as I realize I'm not wearing mine. My face burns hot and cold at the same time, with temperatures so hot in space it may as well be both. But I can breath, my lungs weren't stripped away of its air. I'm not in space. Nova is pinning me down on the ground, looking at me with furrowed brows, putting pressure with her knees digging into my stomach, holding both my wrists with one of her hands, the other used to slap me. Damn, that hurt.
Once Nova makes eye contact with me, she releases her grasp. My wrists have deep red marks on them, and my abs feel like they're being stabbed as I look to see my surroundings. Ronan is in the fetal position on the ground, rocking back and forth with Elara trying to comfort him, both hands outstretched. I can't tell exactly what she's saying, but I can see her rub Ronan's back. I can also see a jagged grey shape in her pocket. She's visibly shaking. She's not strong, but she was able to realize for the first time that she did have influence, and could help. I would say I feel prideful, but I'm in too much pain. Everything is sore, it aches. I don't even know how I got in this state. I look back at Nova and her hair is greasy, filled with sweat. Then: I notice my surroundings.
We stand on a large path, white concrete that makes a perfect infinite line out past the horizon. It's cold to the touch, and it's just as rough as before. Above us is infinite pillars that extend upward, in a repeating pattern indefinitely. The pillars have a perfectly square face on the bottom, about the same width as the slab we stand upon, and about as high. As far as I see to the horizon, though, there are none of these pillars. The sheer scale of it makes me feel small. As vast as the void, what is anything when compared to infinity?
Each one of the infinite pillars are exactly the same. The uniformity of the floating pillars is haunting, like we're the odd grain in a pot of infinite rice. Shadows are cast from the pillars shrouding us in it, we're enveloped in a state where we can only partially see from the light glowing from the fact that there's no pillars above us. Almost everything is tinted at half brightness, even the shadows unable to make the grand structures pitch black. It feels as though the concrete refuses to get darker. Like a state of being in shadows or not. They're not real shadows. This is all my imagination.
Clicking.
Irregular and high pitched, droning. It feels airy like a falsetto. It's different than before.
And it's coming from behind us.
You wake up in a jolt, that same feeling you get when you fall in a dream, or really that feeling when you fall in general. Sweat lines your forehead, and you can feel your heavy uniform wrinkled and stuck to your skin. You look around, whipping your neck around enough that it hurts. You don't see what you expected to. You gasp, a sudden release of all the pressure in your mind. Each breath prickles at your heart as you slow your breathing. You're still in Zahra's room, but she isn't here. You're alone, and although the room may be calming you feel nothing but unnerved.
You sit up, slowly with your aching muscles burning. The air slowly moving from the fan's stead whir makes a page on an open book flap loudly. Besides that, you almost feel as if you're frozen in time. The serenity is haunting. You yawn the last winks of tiredness from your mind, eyes watering, and turn your body to stand.
As soon as your foot touches the ground you realize you're too weak. You wouldn't be able to explain the feeling in an essay, you simply, just, can't. Your legs buckle under your weight and you fall to the ground like rain from the sky. If you weren't in unbearable pain you'd muse about how you haven't properly seen rain in years.
Lying on the ground, you feel cold. Really damn cold, you feel like frost is eating away at your skin. Your muscles burn so hot it feels like ice, and your bones crawl in your frigid body. I can feel my joints creaking and cracking even though I don't move. The cold feels like a parasite
Moments pass as you thaw.
Your body tingles like static as your blood starts flowing back through your body. As you rise from being sprawled across the ground, you feel blood drip from your mouth. The pain increases as you lose adrenaline. It tastes like iron, a bit salty and it's hard to imagine tasting anything else now. You begin to stand after what feels like hours of waiting for these sensations to pass. They don't, and you stand anyways. You push through the pain because there is nothing else to do.
Now standing, weakly, but standing, you take the step to the door and stumble, catching the handle. You lean a majority of your weight on the round handle with your forearm, and the pressure stings a bit, but not nearly as much as your teeth that feel like they might fall off and your legs that are about to crumble. Taking a deep breath, you turn the handle, and open the door, swinging inwards.
The door leads to a hallway, similar to the room in looks. A dark green-ish carpet, dark wooden planks with a shiny finish running halfway up the walls, and quark board for the rest. Dim lanterns hang on the ceiling, casting the hall in a warm tint. There's nothing else in here, but the carpet feels old and the walls dusty. On the other end of the hallway there's another door. No turns, no other doors leading off to the side, just one door that's on the opposite side of the hallway. The distance feels punishing, just thinking about it makes it feel like it stretches further away. The air is still, easy to breath, except it's cold, though no longer frosty. You shiver.
You decide to take a step, no need to think about walking when just extending and contracting muscles burn. Your feet scrape across the carpet, it's soft but not "soft", a bit rough and you can tell how much it's aged. You lean against the wall, your arms brushing both against the smooth finish of the wood with the occasional nail, and the quark board that feels like sandpaper even though it doesn't rip against your skin. Each step you take, one by one, you brush against the wall. Your surroundings move, everything is relative. This is a normal hallway. Yet the door at the other end seems to only get farther. You can feel a hot sensation build up at your throat, and you don't know if it's exhaustion or anger.
You should be halfway down the hallway. But the door feels like it's endlessly far away.
This is a normal hallway.
You turn around.
You haven't taken a step away from Zahra's room.
"Get up," Nova's voice is rash, quick and her eyes are dilated with fear, "Elara, get Ronan up." Her voice is rising as she continues to look at the Being behind us. My heart is racing, I'm usually not afraid, but this time I don't even want to look. She's yelling, now, "Goddamnit get up!" She grabs my wrist in the same spot it burns and yanks me to my feet. I can feel my arm almost fall out of its socket.
I scramble up to my feet, barely managing to stand. Elara is heaving Ronan off the ground by the elbows with something sticking out her pocket, and I can hear him groan in pain. His breathing is labored and I can hear the whimper as he exhales. It's loud enough that I feel his pain as my own. "Can you help, Nova?" Elara is crying, the pressure might just be too much for her.
Nova runs over to Ronan and lifts his feet, and Nova yells, "Come on Elara, Run!" Her voice has lost it's power, screaming so much is starting to blow out her vocal cords. The start stumbling forward, starting slowly and then they pick up pace, I follow, mostly dazed, everything still blending together.
I look behind me for a moment, the Being looks completely different from before, except for the core features. It's a silhouette, but a different one, yet the same long appendages. Time freezes as I begin to run, it looks like what could be a head is bowing outwards at the top, like a bell, like an all-seeing watchtower. No matter where it looked they always saw us. As Ronan's gasps of pain get louder, I can begin to hear Nova cry. A tear down her face, a shaking breath, it's clear. This Being means something to her. And it turns toward us.
We're running, to where? I don't know. But God, we're running faster than our puny endurances can take. Something clatters to ground in a metallic ring but I don't know what, I hear Elara gasp in fear. I can see our surroundings bend around us like a fisheye as we run down the straight pathway floating in this purgatory. I know how fast we're moving and yet our surroundings feels viscous, slow moving. I see Nova look behind us and I can see her grip tighten on Ronan, she's shaking, and muttering something that I can't hear over the clicking of the Being.
Sounds and footsteps and breaths and crying and terror echo around us infinitely. It doesn't end.
Landmarks start forming, bending into something that isn't forever, and we pass by a structure that almost looks like a doorway on our left. After a minute of running we pass by it again, with no way of reaching it. And then we don't see it, I turn around and the Being is the same distance behind us. We didn't move a goddamn inch. My throat feels hot and dry, sticky and sharp, I don't think I can keep running. We're not making any distance. What the hell is going on?
I see Elara's grip begin to slip, so I get closer to Ronan, and a moment after Elara drops Ronan I catch him. I'd say it felt like it was in slow-motion but I have so much anxiety that nothing could feel slow.
And when I take a good look at Ronan my mind breaks.
What the hell?
The door clicks open, echoing infinitely far away. It's Zahra. She takes one glance at me and gasps, seeing the salty blood drip down my face, splattering to the ground in small star-shaped stains. She walks hurriedly to me, not quite running but with haste. "Oh my," she says, in a soft cliche. Somehow, she makes her way through the infinite distance of a barrier. Somehow, she's completely unaffected.
Somehow this is normal to her.
You fall into her arms, collapsing. Is it because your mind broke for the second time? Is it because you lost too much blood? Is it because you're weak? Is it because you're worthless?
"Don't worry, my dear. I know all the effort you put into our cause." Zahra announces this quietly, soft-spoken and the only thing that seems to slow the downwards spiral. How does she know what you're thinking? "It's only natural to feel worthless when you're at your weakest."
You try to mumble a response; instead, fire burns your throat and you cough up blood and phlegm.
"Take this moment in steps. Remember the way you feel." She looks you in the eyes, making sure you see hers, "One day you'll face something much worse than this, and I won't be there to help you." Her voice is rising, stern but not aggressive, "Remember how it feels to be worthless, and ingrain the knowledge of how to get past it."
You're shocked. You always expected Zahra to sound this way, but this is the first time she has. You're numb.
"These paradoxes will make you helpless. Don't be another number on our tally of deaths, my child."
She picks you up like you're her daughter, and you can feel the world twist around you. Vertigo from being tilted back and picked up. In long strides, she takes you to her office, and sits you on a chair in the corner. It's brown, a soft leather, one that your blood doesn't soak into. The ticking of a clock that wasn't there before becomes the only thing you focus on besides watching Zahra work.
Who knows how many hours pass after that?
Not you.
Not you, even though you're looking at the clock.
Ronan's limbs are longer, starting to bend in awkward and backward ways; his uniform along with his skin is fading into shadows. His eyes look even more distant than before, dilated beyond belief. His fingers move in cracks, and I feel like they're extending.
"Kiran," Nova calls my name, loudly with a sharp tone of fear. "Kiran, we're gonna jump the gap."
I look towards that doorway that's much, much farther than I could possibly jump. It's more than a few meters away. "How?" I yell, over the chaos, I yell it even though my throat and lungs don't let me, "It's way too goddamn far, Nova!"
"We'll make it. Trust me, just this once." I can see her eyes begin to water. All I feel is pain, burning exhaustion in every fiber of muscle. There's no room for me to cry.
"What the hell do you mean? I can't jump ten meters! Not while carrying Ronan, at least."
"Then leave Ronan!"
"What?" I'm shocked, a deep shock that I can feel in the core of my stomach. It hits me in a place that doesn't make sense, I don't get it. "What the hell? We're not leaving him behind."
"Don't you get it Kiran?" Her voice is now wavering, as hoarse as it is, it's wavering and she's scared, "We have to sacrifice ourself to the paradox."
"What does that even mean?" I say, starting to get angry but so out of breath it's hard to even talk, everything hurts and it's amazing enough that I'm even standing, "Don't get ahead of yourself, Nova. We'll figure this out."
"Look at him, Kiran, look!" Ronan's mouth is fading to a shadow that's depthless, strands of ichor closing his mouth and nose shut in a conical shape. His low warbles of pain get desperate, and once his mouth is covered it stops dead in its tracks. I can feel my disgust in my face. Nova drops Ronan and as he hits the ground with a silent thud he spasms. What has Ronan become? "I'm gonna jump, Kiran."
"You're gonna leave me behind?" My throat is burning up in flames, my lungs are heaving, "You're gonna leave Ronan behind? You're not gonna save him?" I look to Elara, my vision shaking, "What about you? What are you gonna do?"
Elara shakes her head and grasps it tightly on both sides, pulling her hair. She looks as though she wants to scream. She looks as if there's no solution to her suffering. She looks as if simply not existing would be better. I'd agree if I didn't know their fate.
"I'm jumping, Kiran." I whip my head to Nova and she jumps. She flies in the air.
She falls; she doesn't make it. But she's not afraid. Her eyes light before they move out of view and I can almost hear a chuckle. She's not afraid of death. I can tell by the way her posture shifts. She's not scared, she's happy. How? She falls down until I no longer can see her past the edge.
Instead of screams I only hear the same clicking from the Being. With only myself to drag Ronan, I pull him in tugs, singular points of force. Each tug makes my arms burn, and I lean to give my legs leverage. They might as well buckle and not let me pull Ronan because I'm doing nothing it all. The silence is deafening.
I look up, only to be reminded that Nova is gone.
I look over to the Being. It is gone.
I look over to Elara. A hooded Being takes her place, with the same posture I last saw her in.
I'm not going to describe what the Being looks like this time. What happens next is more important.
The Being turns to me, and my heart is already racing, it's been racing. From what? Exhaustion, probably. Maybe the fear from Nova's absence. But certainly not what I just saw.
The Being looks at me, face and hood merging together in a shadow.
I drop Ronan, he looks even worse than before, almost entirely an inky black.
The Being takes a step towards me and Her footsteps ring out. I recognize those footsteps.
I recognize the posture, despite being a digitigrade creature.
There is no clicking.
The Being closes in on me and I try to take a step away but do not move. I struggle to push Her away but I do not. She's taller than me now, maybe half a meter.
She embraces me in a cold hug, her talons or feathers surrounding me.
This is the warmest I've ever felt, but the emptiness hurts. My heart feels restless.
The Being clicks, the only sound She can make. I can tell She wants to cry.
She wants to cry so badly.
Me too,
me too.
And so I do.
Loudly, hiccupping. A gross cry. My face is burning up. I grip what was Elara tight. What still is Elara. I feel like I hardly knew her. I shouldn't have been so hard on her. Why wouldn't I try to know her better?
Why did I do all those things? Why did I say those things to her?
Why in the hells am I becoming like him?
What did I do wrong to deserve this?
What did Elara do?
What did Ronan do?
What did Nova do?
These Beings are no monsters.
We have been mistaken.
I'm sorry Elara.
"Is she still in the paradox?" You ask.
"What do you mean?" Zahra looks up from her papers.
"Is the time loop still trapping her?"
"Dear, you misunderstand. It hasn't happened yet, Elara."
"What? It's two-thousand-sixteen?"
"No, it's fourteen. A few days before the Escher's Well paradox happens."
"How?"
"Sweetheart, you are the paradox." Zahra pulls out a handgun from her drawer. "Take it, if you want. If you pull the trigger, reality could collapse, for all we know. But, to answer your question, you will stay in that time loop forever."
You stutter between thoughts, you look at your hands, and shakily grab the gun.
"It's your choice."