#memories and regret

[samazing0831]

Take Me Back to the Night We Met - Bucky Barnes x Reader

Bucky Barnes x Reader // Song Lyric Challenge

It's been five years since Bucky vanished. Five years since he turned to dust in the middle of an argument and took your heart with him. Left behind with only memories and grief that refuses to fade, you've clung to anything that makes him real - his hoodie, his side of the bed, the sound of his laugh echoing in your dreams. But grief doesn't play by rules. And neither does fate.

When the dust begins to settle - literally - Bucky returns, just as the world begins to put itself back together. But what happens after the happy ending?

1.2k words

I still wake up on his side of the bed.

Every morning, I roll toward the ghost of him, hand searching in the quiet. And every morning, I only find the cold.

I used to think grief came in stages. That once you made peace with one step, the next would come easier.

But that was five years ago.

And I still haven’t moved past that moment.

I am not the only traveler Who has not repaid his debt I’ve been searching for a trail to follow again Take me back to the night we met

I felt so lost when he left.

And it’s selfish to say I was heartbroken - everyone lost someone that day.

Technically, I didn’t even have a reason to be - we broke up two weeks before the blip.

But how else could I explain the gaping hole in my chest?

Knowing he was gone, and there was nothing I could do to bring him back?

We were fighting.

Not about anything important. Something stupid.

Like who left the coffee pot on - again.

He laughed when I snapped at him.

He always laughed when I was irritated.

Then he pulled me into his arms anyway. Whispered, “You’ll miss me when I’m gone.”

I rolled my eyes.

And then he was gone.

Just like that.

People vanished mid-sentence.

Screams split the sky.

Dust danced through the air like ash from a war I didn’t understand.

And Bucky - my Bucky - just disintegrated.

I didn’t even get to hold him.

I tried everything to repent.

Like I could trade my soul for his.

I walked the streets feeling like the only one left breathing

Sometimes I’d catch my reflection and swear it wasn’t me anymore.

He died fighting for us. Again.

And I stayed.

Sometimes I dream of him.

Not as he was at the end, but as he was when we met.

It was a rainy night in Bucharest.

He was quiet. Guarded.

Eyes like storm clouds.

He asked me if I wanted to get a drink.

I said yes, even though I hated the bar.

That was the first time he touched my hand. Not romantic. Just a brush of fingers.

By accident.

And it was like something clicked into place.

And then I can tell myself What the hell I’m supposed to do And then I can tell myself Not to ride along with you

I wish I could go back there.

Before he let me in.

Before I let him fill my lungs and take root in every part of me.

I had all and then most of you Some and now none of you Take me back to the night we met I don’t know what I’m supposed to do Haunted by the ghost of you Take me back to the night we met

Because maybe if I could return to that moment, I could stop myself.

Maybe I could be smarter. Safer.

Maybe I could survive this.

But then what?

Live without him, and never know what it felt like to be loved by him?

No.

I couldn’t.

Wouldn’t.

I talk to him sometimes. Out loud.

Like he’s just in the other room.

I lie to myself a lot.

Pretend I’ve moved on.

Pretend I don’t stare at the door every time it opens.

Pretend my heart doesn’t ache when I see couples holding hands.

The truth is, I’m still here. Still waiting.

Because that was the last time I remember who I was.

Who we were.

Before the terror.

Before the fight.

Before his eyes filled with tears he wouldn’t let fall.

Before he turned to dust in front of me.

When the night was full of terrors And your eyes were filled with tears When you had not touched me yet Oh, take me back to the night we met

Maybe one day he’ll come back.

Maybe one day, the dust will settle in reverse.

And his body will reform from the pieces.

Maybe I’ll get to hear his laugh again.

Until then, I’ll keep waking up on his side of the bed.

He came back in the spring.

I heard it before I saw it - rumors, headlines, whispers of people appearing out of thin air.

Then Sam called. His voice cracked when he said, “He’s asking for you.”

It was raining the day I saw him again.

Fitting.

It had rained the day he left, too.

He looked the same.

Maybe a little thinner. A little tired.

But those eyes - they found me instantly.

Like they’d never stopped searching.

He stepped forward.

I didn’t.

Couldn’t.

I’d imagined this moment a thousand times.

But none of my fantasies prepared me for how it would actually feel.

Not joy.

Not closure.

Just the overwhelming weight of everything we lost in between.

His voice was hoarse when he said my name.

Like he had to fight through the dust of five silence years.

I had all and then most of you Some and now none of you Take me back to the night we met I don’t know what I’m supposed to do Haunted by the ghost of you Take me back to the night we met

That’s what he had been.

All of him. Then most. Then some.

Then dust.

Then silence.

Then nothing.

And now?

Now he stood in front of me like time hadn’t chewed me up and spit me out.

Like the last five years hadn’t been a slow unraveling of every piece of my soul.

He reached out, like I could just fall back into step with him.

Like I hadn’t tried to bury the memory of tracing the lines of his metal hand in the dark.

Like I hadn’t sobbed on my bathroom floor, whispering into the silence, Take me back to the night we met.

The moment passed slowly - thick, heavy, full of everything unsaid.

His eyes glassed over.

I knew he was crying before I saw the tears.

God, I remembered that night too well.

I remember how terrified he was that he wouldn’t come back from that fight.

I remember holding his face and telling him we’d have time.

That time was the one thing we’d always have.

I lied.

Now he was here. And time felt like a cruel joke.

I wanted to run to him. Wrap myself around him and never let go.

But I also wanted to scream.

To punch him.

To ask him how it felt to leave me behind with an apartment full of memories and a heart full of ash.

Instead, I said, “You left.”

His head bowed. “I know.”

“You didn’t say goodbye.”

He swallowed hard. “I didn’t get to.”

Silence.

The wind blew. The rain softened. Somewhere in the background, the world kept turning.

But we stayed still.

“Do you still love me?” I asked.

He blinked. A single tear slipped down his cheek.

“I never stopped.”

And suddenly, I remembered the first time he kissed me.

How careful he was.

How his hands trembled like he was afraid he’d break me.

How I had whispered, “You’re safe with me,” and meant it with every atom in my body.

I took one step forward.

Then another.

And when I reached him, I pressed my forehead against his chest.

Just to make sure he was real.

Just to feel the thump of his heart beneath my fingertips.

He wrapped his arms around me like he was afraid I’d vanish next.

I whispered into his jacket, voice cracking:

“Please, don’t leave me again.”

[asoftepiloguemylove]

Mikko Harvey Wind-Related in the Wheatfield // Jonny Bolduc open question @jovialtorchlight // Cheryl Strayed Tiny Beautiful Things // @/mkpoet (instagram) // Mary Oliver Count the Roses // Phoebe Bridgers Waiting Room // Fyodor Dostoyevsky // Marie Howe Magdalene Afterwards; "Magdalene: Poems"

[beepborpdoodledorp]

this shot has been living rent-fucking-free in my head I want to fucking shout it from the rooftops WHY DOES HE REACH OUT TO HER LIKE THAT. why is it so slow? why does he look so sad?? 'Oh he's just confused' NO AFTER SHE SAYS HIS NAME THAT IS NOT A LOOK OF CONFUSION. THAT IS NOT THE LOOK OF A PANICKED MAN ABOUT TO SPIN WHAT HE THINKS IS THE DELUSIONAL STALKER CASHIER AROUND TO ASK HER WHY THE FUCK SHE KNOWS HIS NAME WHEN THEY'VE NEVER MET BEFORE.

So Pomni understands here it's for the best to let Gummigoo leave because he doesn't remember her. or. OR. he does and can't and/or won't say it. why do you look away for a split second. is it because you are uncomfortable or is it out of shame. do you want to speak but you cannot? do you want to tell her there's the slightest flash of familiarity about her? WHAT ARE YOU NOT TELLING US YOU REPTILIAN PIECE OF SHIT

bro this is not the goodbye you give to the weird stalker girl who's been trying to get your attention the entire time, even if she did seemingly give up on it and just give you a normal farewell. that smile is warm. it's genuine. it's wary but it's understanding. even if ONE TINY FRAGMENT of his memory survived the confetti obliteration, JUST ENOUGH to know this was once his friend and as such he should give her a proper farewell, I can sleep peacefully. but also I just spent the past twenty minutes trying to read the expression of a cartoon candy alligator so clearly I was never sleeping peacefully to begin with. I AM IN PAIN. I AM BY LAW A GROWN ADULT AND THIS IS WHAT I CHOOSE TO DO WITH MY LIFE

[ut-regret]

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[nobeerreviews]

...the place you have left forever is always there for you to see whenever you shut your eyes.

-- Jan Myrdal

(Black Sea)

[bellaciao-ciao-ciao]

Good morning to all the #neverkamala pro Palestine protest voters and the “influencers” who asked their followers to abstain from voting or vote Jill stein. Where is she btw?? Did she crawl back into her hole now that the election is over?

Anyway good luck and just know that those protest vote influencers who influenced you won’t be suffering. They’ll be sleeping perfectly fine. The victims will continue to be victims and those that actually did the right thing will now be forced to suffer as well because of short sighted ego. And those that protest voted will continue to deny any accountability and “oh it didn’t even make a difference guiseeee I swearrrr” stfu.

[windchime-of-teeth]

and here’s the finished gif of this section of the animatic!!

and a hint- the song is from a musical that recently went viral (i am putting jiang wanyin(derogatory) in the torment nexus because he fascinates me as a concept)

[crimsonphantasmagoria]

Veilguard is not about regret

I've seen a lot of discussion going around about the themes of regret in Veilguard. In particular I've seen a couple of related claims thrown around: one, that Rook and the Veilguard companions are supposed to act as parallels/foils to Solas, an example of how to deal with regret healthily, and two, that Rook is a terrible foil to Solas because there's nothing that they've actually done that's worthy of regretting, and anything that they theoretically should regret (like helping disrupt the ritual that freed the Evanuris, whether you think that's a deserving accusation or not) they simply don't. I'm here to tell you that both these perspectives are true, and it's because Veilguard isn't actually about regret.

Let's start off by talking about the companions shall we. Let's list off the regrets in their storylines. Bellara regrets not being more careful and not somehow saving her brother. Taash regrets not making up with their mother before her death. Davrin doesn't actually have one of his own, instead the regret in his storyline is Isseya's regret about what happened with the Griffins. Emmrich's storyline is more about wavering on the brink of a choice, which may cause regret, though I suppose we could include regret about where his friend has ended up in life. Lucanis regrets what happened to his relationship with Illario. Neve regrets Aelia remaining free, and the death of Rana's partner. Harding regrets not seeing through Solas earlier, and also I suppose the fate of the Titans, though I'm not sure I would categorise what she feels about that as regret.

Are you seeing a pattern here? Let's elaborate on it further. While in the Regret Prison, Rook is confronted by three regrets: the loss of the secondary team leader, the loss of the companion who disabled the wards, and the loss of Varric. And the solution to all of these regrets is this: it wasn't your fault. Those companions, they knew the risks, and they volunteered to go into danger. It was their own choice.

Now Solas. Solas has a great many regrets. He regrets tranquilising the Titans. He regrets taking a body. He regrets killing Felassan. He regrets killing the fragment of Mythal that was in Flemeth. He regrets creating the Veil. He may even regret starting his slave rebellion, given everything that followed after, though that memory is unclear what the actual regret is. These are all active choices he made. The only comparable regrets amongst the companion's storylines and Rook are Isseya's, and sort-of Emmrich's. I'll come back to Emmrich later. Isseya's regrets are actually a pretty good comparison point, except, as is obvious, that's not actually Davrin's storyline. Davrin's regrets on the Griffon front are more institutional, and feed into his storyline about having been made into a weapon, and what to do with yourself after your purpose as a weapon has been served. Actually a pretty good parallel with Solas! Except, once again, it wasn't really his choice, was it? And it's certainly not a choice about a horrifying atrocity he comitted.

Which brings us to Solas’s final regret. He regrets Mythal’s death (the first one). Except, that isn't his fault, is it? She chose to go and confront the Evanuris, rather than join the rebellion or run away with Solas. All he did was give her the information that they were interfering with the Blight, information that she would almost certainly have learned for herself eventually, and assuming she would have made the same choice to confront them would still have resulted in her death. The solution is: it wasn't his fault.

This is the regret that is being paralleled, by an overwhelming majority. And they're right, it isn't his fault and he should forgive himself for it. The thing is: this isn't regret. It's a twisted form of grief. Once you realise this, the whole theme starts unravelling, because not all regrets are created equal. I think this is why some people accuse the narrative of excusing Solas, or trying to sweep aside the things he's done: because it is. The whole message of Veilguard is that you should forgive yourself for the things you had no control over, except that Solas did have control over all those other regrets I listed out earlier, and I say that with a great deal of affection. He did that. He can't forgive himself because it wasn't his fault, because it was. Not all regrets are created equal. And the focus on the narrative of 'it wasn't your fault' means that people look for the person whose fault it was, and that blame lands on Mythal. Who does share some responsibility for some of those acts, but again the narrative is about deliberately pushing away culpability. I suppose one could make an argument for blaming Elgar’nan for everything? I think we should blame Elgar’nan for everything.

Indeed, the narrative focuses so hard on the idea of Solas doing everything because of Mythal, because of that twisted grief, that it completely loses sight of the actual reasons he had for doing the things he was doing. The spirits are trapped in the Fade, many of them yearning to access a world they naturally should have access to. The elves have been enslaved for millenia, and have lost almost everything about themselves, including their origins. Mages are either feared and reviled, or use their overwheling power advantage to lord over those who don't have the same access to magic. And let's not forget, two more Blights and the Veil comes down anyway, releasing the Turbo Blight (which he created) onto unsuspecting Thedas. Not to mention there were suggestions in Trespasser that there was something going on with the remaining ancient elves in Uthenara, who apparently vanished from existance along with his agents.

I mentioned earlier that I would come back to Emmrich. That's because his storyline, in my opinion, is the only one that actually depicts the theme they should have been going for with DA4, namely, when presented with a difficult moral choice, what will you do? What are you willing to sacrifice, and for what? In theory, as has been pointed out before, Bellara's archive choice might once have also been this: it is implied by the phrasing of 'free the spirit' that the Nadas Dirthalen was supposed to be a trapped sapient spirit, forced into servitude, rather that a fantasy VI, and the choice at the end would have been do you free the innocent at the cost of the knowledge you could extract? These naturally feed into: do you bring down the Veil, causing a great deal of sorrow and harm but also potentially creating a better, more equal future, or do you refuse to make such a great sacrifice of lives? At the very least, I think this theme would have stayed more true to the setup of Trespasser, as well as the design of the companion binary choice system, and who knows? Perhaps there might even have been a third option.

[whatididtomakeitbetter]

What wonder, held to highest scrutiny,

Exceeds the beauty that lies within thee?

No pride nor shame will our final end make

Less than catastrophe; a grave mistake.

so many words, only for you.

[cheaploafs]

no fights are ever won without sacrifice

[clowndensation]

anyways when richard siken said "if you can point to it, you don't need a word for it. you only need a word for it when it's no longer there"

and when tolkien said "but of bliss and glad life there is little to be said, before it ends; as works fair and wonderful, while still they endure for eyes to see, are their own record, and only when they are in peril or broken for ever do they pass into song."

and when claudia said "diaries are friends of last resort"

we don't see madeleine and claudia in their months together because their happiness was created in the present and presence of each other, and captured only in the eyes of the other. there's no need to share to strangers what was already shared between the people it mattered most to. the voyeurs of the world will only ever see the outline of where pleasure lies.

[popponn]

sometimes, you wondered if the 'i love you's you had said were enough. if he understood how much you mean to them. if he truly ever heard and took them with him, tucked in a secret corner in his heart.

you wonder, if he knows that you regret not saying it more to him.

"i..." you tried to tell the empty space in front of you. a space that had come to place itself in your life in a presence that resembles a puzzle's hole more than a crack.

something should have been there and you know more than anyone what it is—who it is. yet, it remained unfilled no matter how much you wish to reverse time back to a happier time.

you wish it was all meaningless. that all these thoughts are mere hauntings built up by your own fantasies and when you blink, he will be there. maybe he could smile, maybe he could feign a cool mask, but all the same, his finger would intertwine with yours.

maybe, he would take a step closer to you, bumping your shoulder. maybe, his eyes would stray and look around, while the heat from his body remains just next to you. maybe, full of concern, full of care, he will ask you, "what's wrong?"

but, it is mere wishful thinking.

from somewhere, the strangers' footsteps resounded in the distance and he was not by your side. it would have been like a penitence, like an admittance to no one. so, in the end, you swallowed all your words down.

"i love you," you wanted to say, "i truly do."

sae, ISAGI, nagi, chigiri, VIL, jack, deuce, cater, jade, cyno, al-haitham, zhongli, NEUVILLETTE, wriothesley, diluc, KAEYA, XIAO + your faves.

[ask-trialtale]

guys I got so inspired by y’all’s pieces of the dtiys that I drew a dtiys of my own dtiys

anyways combat duo >>>>

[clarionglass]

yeah, we all knew this one was coming. 5395 words, if you're wondering exactly how bad the brain rot has set in ^^;

----- deja vu (sam reich!master cinematic universe, part 2)

Right from the beginning of Game Changer, Sam had had a small monitor in his dressing room where he could watch the show being recorded. He'd always appreciated it being there, but never quite understood the point of having it, if he was going to be on stage hosting the shows himself. 

When his doppelganger was hosting, though, being able to watch the show while hidden away was absolutely ideal. 

Since Escape the Greenroom, the pair had been less cautious about being seen in the building together. It was always more enjoyable to debrief immediately after a show, and besides, they had their secret weapon. The magic technology that kept anyone from thinking too hard about two Sams in the one place had turned out to be nothing more than a small lump of circuitry attached to a key on a loop of string, and whichever Sam wasn't on set at the time held onto it and watched the session from the dressing room. It was an extra precaution—hell, if everyone knew Sam was in the middle of a recording, why would they be going into his dressing room—but it was handy to have nonetheless. 

It didn't work if you knew what you were looking for, though, so when the door creaked open and his doppelganger walked in, pure glee painted across his face from ear to ear, he turned his megawatt smile on Sam straight away. 

Sam raised his eyebrows. “Good record, was it?”

“Oh, was it ever.”

“Well, great!” Sam replied. “You were pretty keen for this one, glad it lived up to expectations.”

As his double nodded with satisfaction, Sam's eyes flicked back to the monitor, now showing a view of backstage, and Trapp, Ify and Siobhan talking quietly to each other. 

Something felt off. They didn't seem distressed or anything bad, bad, but the energy between the three contestants was weirdly muted. As it was for everyone, actually. Josh, Zac, Brian—the general vibe backstage was sitting noticeably lower than usual, particularly with such big personalities in the room. 

“How'd the cast take it, though?” he asked. “They all look exhausted, was everything alright?”

His doppelganger flapped a hand dismissively. “Oh, they're fine. It was just a long record.”

“No longer than usual,” Sam said, with a brief glance down at his watch and a frown. “We had seven loops planned, right? And you definitely didn't get through all of them, you only did, what—”

“Five, yeah,” his double agreed, speaking with him. “For the episode, we ended up recording five.”

There was an odd tone in his voice as he said it, an emphasis on the specifics that was just a little too weighted. Sam grimaced. 

“I'm sensing there's a but coming.”

“Yeah,” his doppelganger admitted slowly, then grinned, a bright, twinkling expression of pure mischief. “We actually ran a lot more loops than that.”

“Wait,” Sam said, “wait. No, you didn't, I was watching the entire thing.”

“Come on,” his doppelganger shot back, a bite of impatience bleeding into his excitement. “You really think I'd fight to do the fake time loop episode and not throw in a real time loop or five?”

“Oh my god.” It was all Sam could say, and he really couldn't tell if he was impressed, or dumbfounded, or just really fucking worried. “Oh, my god. What did you do?”

The giddy delight shining in his double's eyes as his smile broadened even further, brilliant and infectious and only slightly predatory, did nothing to calm Sam's nerves. 

---

The first loop went well enough, and confusingly enough. Weird trivia, questions that clearly had an answer, but no way of working out what that answer was, cameos that didn’t seem to relate to anything—it was strange, but you knew that was what you were getting into when you signed up for Game Changer. Trapp, Ify and Siobhan knew that there was a solution to it, but they’d just have to work until they found it.

And then Sam pulled out that bizarre dance that he expected them all to join in on, and accidentally kicked Kevin’s camera out of his hands, and the three of them shuffled offstage for a two minute reset.

-

The second loop, the pieces were starting to fit into place. The trivia was a memory tester; the weird questions had answers that could only be worked out with knowledge gained in previous rounds; Zac’s—sorry, Grant’s—spaghetti was going to cause problems by way of Brian’s podium inspector; the list went on. 

This time, it was pretty clear that the kick wasn’t accidental. 

-

The third loop, everyone knew they were dealing with loops right from the start. 

-

“I think my watch battery is dead,” grumbled Ify on the t̷͖͗̅h̶̥̔͗i̴͉̞̊r̴̭͘d̵̢͔͌̈́ loop.

-

Loop aft̵̐͜e̷̘̓r̵̩͊ ḽ̵̞́o̷͉̬̼͈͘ö̸̖̠̭́̈̀p̶̡̣̖͂ ạ̸͌͘f̸̱̲͐͗t̶͈͐̇ẻ̶͇̮̄ř̷̤̗͝ ̷̹̌l̸͎͎̔̀̅̀��̕ò̸̢̨̜͓̳̮̀̕o̶̮̕p̵̪̫̠̝̘̒͒͗̚ͅ, ad infinitum ad nauseam. 

-

A few loops in, Siobhan watched Brian get paler and paler as he examined the trio of podiums. And this time, he was actually taking the time to look at them properly, not just making an act of peering through that stupid little magnifying glass in order to justify a foregone conclusion. He was acting weird, even for him.

Still, he put a good face on it, declaring each one dirty in increasingly elaborate ways, just as he had every time before. Something had clearly rattled him, though, and it made her uneasy in turn.

“Sir? Excuse me, sir?” she said, just as she had the last few rounds, and smiled sweetly with a dollar bill folded in her palm. As Brian came over, she locked eyes with him, hoping the look was enough to convey her question.

“Camcorder, Jan ‘97,” he muttered as he took the money, and had given her the (bribed) point and hurried backstage before she could ask what he meant.

She knew the video he was referring to, it was one of his. Creepy, definitely, but very well-done, all about rewinding tape and rewriting time. And—yeah, man, duh. This was the time loop episode, apparently, so why state the obvious? And why so cryptically?

Unless… unless it was something to do with time loops that wasn’t to do with the format of the episode. 

How long had they been recording, anyway? All their phones were in the box backstage, Ify’s watch was dead, she wasn’t wearing one at all, and with her and Trapp on the outside podiums, there was no way she could ask him without making it look stunningly obvious. But it had been a while, for sure, and Sam wasn’t showing any of his usual signs of wanting to usher the recording session towards a natural conclusion.

If anything, he was looking wolfishly pleased with the way things were turning out. He'd even favoured Brian with a wider grin than usual, where Brian's own smile had been kind of watery. 

Another part of that video, Siobhan couldn't help but recall, was that sinister, looming silhouette.

-

Through more and more loops, and the brief interludes they were granted backstage, they’d worked out the rules, sort of. People weren’t affected by the loops resetting, they carried through pretty much as normal. Objects didn’t, though. Things on the set, like the ducks, the money in their envelopes, and the spaghetti stuck to their podiums, reset to the state they were at at the beginning of what they’d begun to call “Loop 3.0”. Things brought across the threshold of the set, like Zac/Grant’s plate of spaghetti, or Josh’s balloons, reset as soon as they crossed over that boundary.

Josh hadn’t had a good time when he realised that one. While the contestant cast and the cameo cast were kept separate backstage, the contestants had to assume that Brian would have told them everything he’d worked out. The next loop after Brian had given his hint to Siobhan, the contestants had to watch a very good character actor try to keep control of the creepy clown role while going through a moderate existential crisis. It was uncomfortable to watch, stuck at their podiums and unable to help. At least they could mutter a few words of encouragement each time they went up to pop a balloon, and the same with Zac and Brian each time they came by to mess up or inspect their podiums. 

It was good to have that connection, brief as it might have been. They might have been stuck, but at least they were in this fuckery together.

The crew, though, seemed to be immune from feeling the weirdness they were caught up in. Or—no. Not immune. Exempt. They weren’t trapped in the loop, they were part of it, moving along their set tracks like automata. It took the cast a while to work that one out, because Sam kept time perfectly, interacting with Ash when she brought out the contraption and the jar of beans as if they were having a normal, fluid conversation. But then Ify spotted that the camera operators were moving completely out of sync with the cast, and Trapp noticed that only Sam’s half of the interaction with Ash ever changed, and the illusion fell apart from there. The crew wouldn’t be a lifeline.

And speaking of Sam… Fuck, it was a hard one to swallow. He was their boss, their friend, and they’d all known him for years—hell, he’d come through for each of them multiple times. Until now, he had been pretty unequivocally a Good Guy. But it was becoming harder and harder to ignore the signs that Sam Reich was the puppeteer of this entire shitshow.

He was still pretending to not know what anyone meant when they expressed frustration with the loops, but the words were accompanied by a twinkle in his eye that said he knew exactly what was going on, and was staunchly refusing to help. He was delighting in their discomfort, even more so now the cast knew just how fucked they really were.

He looked like Sam, he sounded like Sam, every single mannerism was something that the cast knew intimately. But the personality driving his actions was wrong. Maybe this guy wasn’t Sam at all. Fuck, if they’d suddenly been catapulted into a reality where time loops were real, maybe so were evil clones, or brain-snatching parasites, or—no, the magician great-grandfather lore from Escape the Greenroom was still a stretch too far. But given the choice between believing that a weird sci-fi plotline was true, when another one was literally happening around them; or believing that their friend had secretly been some kind of torturer with access to sci-fi tech the entire time they’d known him—the decision wasn’t particularly hard. 

“We have to stop him from kicking the camera,” Trapp said quietly, as soon as they had all huddled backstage. “That’s what he’s going with as the trigger.”

“It could be another bluff,” Siobhan interjected glumly. “More fucking misdirection.”

Trapp shot her a look. “You got anything better you want to try?”

“I can get between him and Kevin if I’m quick,” Ify volunteered, the tallest among them by a good half a head, with a build to match.

“See what happens,” Trapp said. “But be careful, yeah? Don’t get yourself hurt.”

“So what’s the way to get out?” Siobhan asked, as Ify nodded his agreement. “There has to be something, I might start killing people if I let myself think this is actually completely random.” She paused for a moment, thinking. “Popping the right balloon? Or winning the video game?”

“Or unlocking that,” Ify suggested, nodding to the green chest that had been sitting on the table the entire time. 

“Yeah,” Siobhan and Trapp agreed together.

“Cool, so we try and—”

“Sorry, y’all, but I’m supposed to take your phones?” Kaylin interrupted, holding out the box as she always did. 

By virtue of podium order, Trapp, then Ify, then Siobhan noticed it as they walked on and gave their introductions. Something had changed.

The point totals on the podiums read 14, 9, 14. The points they’d ended with in Loop 3, not started with. They’d survived it. Time was moving.

-

“Sam, look over there!” Siobhan exclaimed as she entered, and dragged a couple of boxes onstage with her in no more subtle a way than she did the last time. 

Trapp got it, he really did. These loops had been… wearing, was probably the best word for it. “Sadistic” was a bit too harsh, particularly when nothing actually bad had been happening (and to be honest, he didn’t even want to risk thinking too badly of the person who seemed to be pulling all the strings in this scenario, in case he somehow noticed, and decided to turn the heat up), but… yeah. Wearing. So he understood why Siobhan might be trying to keep things the same. Making the group less fun for their host to play with.

The trivia rounds were chaos, as always, and passed in a jumble of noise that Trapp was only half focused on. A quiz show was still a quiz show, even if it had descended into some kind of weird time loop purgatory, and he’d be damned if he wasn’t going to be first on the buzzer regardless. Maybe the points were the way to get out of this whole shitshow, who could say. But when Ify and Siobhan started to have their exact same argument over the equation question, complete with Ify’s triumphant twerking, Trapp felt his stomach rise into his throat, as if once again, the ground had been cut out from under him.

“Yeah, Solzhenitsyn,” Siobhan nodded in response to a question he hadn’t asked, and his blood went cold. 

Sam, or possibly ‘Sam’, looked him dead in the eye and winked. 

“Next up, there’s a little game I have just for Mike Trapp,” he said with a smirk.

Tinny music started up, and the bright colours of that infuriating video game popped up on the screen, but Trapp didn't care. There wasn't any point in pretending now. 

“You fucker,” he said, walking close to eyeball the host. “You mother fucker.”

‘Sam’ just wheezed with laughter, exactly as the real Sam Reich would when a contestant insulted him out of annoyance at the game, and for the briefest of moments, Trapp had his doubts. Everything about this man said Sam Reich, every tiny detail. Had he really been hiding this all along?

“You were doing great playing as a team,” ‘Sam’ said once he'd regained his composure, looking at Trapp with wide-eyed sincerity. “But that's not really the point of the game, now, is it?”

No. Sam, actual Sam, wouldn't do this to his friends.

“What have you done to them?”

“To them? Nothing,” whoever the fuck this was said brightly. “To the studio, though… Well, it would take too long to explain, and you wouldn’t understand most of it anyway. Let’s just say I can run this whole place like a VCR, and the only two people who wouldn’t be caught up in it right now are you and me, bud.”

“That’s fucked up,” Trapp said, as Ash, deaf and blind to their conversation, came out with the giant jar of beans. “That’s just fucked. Let them go.”

“Aw, but they’re probably having a better time than you are right now,” ‘Sam’ said, mock-serious. “They think time’s finally moving ahead for them, remember? And anyway, do you really want to be arguing with little old me when you’re wasting your one chance to earn points without any competition? It is an individual game, after all.”

Trapp’s eyebrows shot high. “Are you saying only one of us gets out of this? You sick fuck.”

‘Sam’ just shrugged and smiled, looking meaningfully at the empty podium. “Do you want to risk it? The choice is yours, Trapp, but time's a-ticking.” His smile flashed. “Or maybe it isn't.”

-

“Next up, there’s a little game I have just for Ify Nwadiwe,” ‘Sam’ announced.

Yeah, no shit. Ify wasn’t an idiot, even if his point total was sitting below his fellow contestants’. He’d been checking his not-actually-dead watch at the start of every loop, so he knew right from the off that even though their host had been gracious and let them pass through one gauntlet, it sure didn’t mean that the time fuckery had finished. 

This run, though, was looking extra screwed up. Siobhan arguing loudly with him about things he didn’t even say this time was the final confirmation. He was alone in this loop, just him and the guy who was running the show.

He knew that ‘Sam’ knew that he knew that he was the only person who wasn’t stuck. So he waited, staring flatly at the person who had taken over the host’s podium, watching to see what move he would make.

‘Sam’ just smiled. “Left or right?”

Alright, so that’s how he was going to play it. Yeah, no, absolutely not. 

“Nah, nah, nah,” Ify said instead of engaging, because it didn’t really matter. In his peripheral vision, the game kept scrolling through. “Fuck that. What’s the win condition? What do we need to do to get out of here?”

“Play the game,” ‘Sam’ replied.

“Shut the fuck up, man.” Ify shook his head, and ‘Sam’ chuckled like he’d told a good joke. “We’ve already done that, and it’s got us exactly fuckin nowhere. You put us in this thing for a reason, so there’s gotta be something you want to see happen.”

‘Sam’ blinked at him innocently. “Who says this isn’t exactly it?”

Ify took a deep breath. “Let me get this straight. You’re saying we’re in here, doing the same shit over and over again, until you feel like you’ve had enough?”

“In a nutshell,” ‘Sam’ beamed, “yes.”

“Fuck you, man,” Ify said, shifting his weight to lean more heavily on the podium. “Fuck you.”

“Noted,” ‘Sam’ said brightly. “But I wouldn’t spend too long being mad at me, because—” he broke off, giving the front of Ify’s podium a significant look, “—you’ve got quite a lot of ground to make up, in… well. Who can say how much time?”

“Fuck you,” Ify repeated, and ‘Sam’ just laughed, and laughed, and laughed.

-

Ify was taking too long to name a goddamn Keanu Reeves film, again, and Siobhan had had just about enough. So when he stalled, and stalled, and still came up with the same title he’d answered in the last round, grinning like he’d just got one over on her, she could have screamed.

And then she remembered where she was, and who was asking the questions, and her heart sank. They weren’t done yet, apparently, and this time she was completely on her own.

She playacted the rest of the argument, that and the equation question, and hated the fact that even to her own ears, she was sounding more and more shrill as she shouted, because yeah, it’s panic-inducing to continue a screaming match with someone who doesn’t even register that you’re there. Every word was another reminder that she was trapped.

And then the melodrama stopped, and ‘Sam’ smiled at her. “Next up, there’s a little game I have just—”

“—for Siobhan Thompson?” she finished with him, voice dripping with sarcastic surprise, just like she had in Loop 3.0. 

“That’s right!” ‘Sam’ said happily. “Now. Left, or right?”

“No,” Siobhan said.

The man in front of her raised his eyebrows. “No?”

“You’re not Sam, which means I’m not fucking playing. So, who are you?”

“Sam Reich,” he answered quickly, easily, naturally.

Siobhan frowned. “No. Bullshit. Who are you?”

“Sam Reich,” he repeated, sounding somehow even more sincere, and genuinely confused that Siobhan would be asking. Fuck that. She wouldn’t take it. Couldn’t take it.

“No. Bullshit. Try again! Who the fuck are you?”

This time, instead of doubling down, he paused. “Do you want to know a secret?”

After a moment, she nodded warily. He beckoned her close, and slowly, cautiously, she left her podium, walking up to this devil in the shape of a game-show host. Close enough to see his eyes properly, and how truly, deeply old they were.

“Even if I told you,” he stage-whispered, those ancient eyes sparkling with terrible glee, “it wouldn’t make a single bit of difference.”

-

“Did you just—”

“Yeah. And—”

“Yeah.”

The three of them were once again huddled backstage, debriefing. 

“So, are we allowed to do this?” Trapp asked quietly. “Because he seemed pretty against the idea of us working together.”

“Didn't say anything to me,” Ify shrugged. “And I don't see another way of getting out of this if we don't share stuff. And even then—sorry, but I think we're here til he wants to let us go.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah,” Ify said. “Because we got the game, we got the key, we opened the chest, and here we all are again, so I dunno what we have to do. I asked him point blank about the win condition, and—”

“He made it sound like the points, to me,” Trapp interrupted.

Ify nodded. “Me too. But he also pretty much said we're here because he's having fun. I don't think the points are it.”

“So we can lose, but we can't win.” Siobhan's voice was dull.

“C'mon, Siobhan,” Trapp said encouragingly. “We'll get out of it. We've gotta have hope.”

Siobhan just looked flatly at him.

“Look, there are silver linings, okay?” Trapp insisted. “Not many, sure, but enough to look for. Like, because it means our actual friend isn't fucking with us—this guy isn't Sam, that's for sure.”

“I'm not…” Siobhan started, and winced. “This is going to sound bad. But I'm not even sure he's human.”

Ify exhaled deeply.

“Don't give me that,” Siobhan snapped reflexively, and Ify raised his hands placatingly.

“I'm not saying I don't agree,” he said. “It checks out. But it's heavy going, that's all.”

Siobhan nodded, looking calmer. “He still wouldn't say who he is, but… I saw him. The real him, up close. And yeah, he's the spitting image of Sam, but… fuck. People don't look like that behind the eyes.”

“Jesus,” Trapp breathed.

She just nodded wordlessly in reply, and despite knowing that it was costing them valuable discussing time, all three lapsed into silence. What could you say to that sort of revelation?

“The microphone,” Ify said abruptly, and Trapp and Siobhan’s eyes both swung to him. “I mean, I’ve still been thinking about win conditions. Or at least how he’s controlling the loop, and how we can use that.”

“He said he can run it like a VCR,” Trapp added. “But I’m not sure how, I assumed it was something in his podium—”

“But he keeps drawing attention to the microphone,” Ify continued. “Every single goddamn loop.”

“So we break it,” Siobhan said decisively. 

Trapp made a face. “Or steal it?”

“Whatever. Either way, we get it out of his control.”

“Sorry, y’all,” came a familiar voice, and they all had to stifle a groan. Planning time was over.  

The game started back up again, and—the point totals were as high as they remembered. The set was just as dirty. All promising signs. 

And then their host’s eyes turned to Siobhan after Ify’s successful run at the video game, and her stomach clenched. Even though the time loop continuing was the worst possible scenario, departures from his routine were never a positive thing.

He gave her an indulgent look. “But, Siobhan.” 

She was focused, she was prepared, she could handle whatever he threw at her. “Yes.”

“Because it is the last round of our game…”

Oh.

The buzzy little chiptune started up again, but to Siobhan, Trapp and Ify, it didn't mean a thing. The words “last round” rang in their ears sweeter than any music.

All of them knew it was probably false hope. Nonetheless, it was better than nothing. Something to cling to as they trod the motions of the remaining questions.

And then the cameo cast and all the crew came onstage when the wenis music played, and that certainly had a grand finale type feel to it; and Kevin didn’t get kicked in the face, no matter how much he was darting around in what had suddenly become a minefield of flailing limbs; and whatever it was that was wearing Sam Reich’s face led them all through more repetitions of the routine than usual, radiating manic joy the entire time.

“And stop!” he yelled as the music cut out, throwing his arms wide and looking around frantically as if the camera remaining intact had any fucking bearing on the time loop whatsoever. “Kevin, did we get that?”

The cameraman pulled open the now heavily duct-taped camera body, then looked up, scripted embarrassment mingling with scripted regret. “There’s no tape in the camera.”

And with that, their host turned away from him to look straight down the barrel of the main camera, favouring it with an open smile of pure, uncomplicated enjoyment; the sort of smile that invited you to share in it with him, no matter how strong the hatred that burned in your veins. “That brings us to the end of our show!” he announced happily. “Our winner tonight: Mike Trapp!”

“No-one’s a winner,” Trapp cut in, shaking his head. “No-one’s a winner here today.”

But even so, he was presented with a cool watch, and the confetti cannons went off, and they left the set for longer than two minutes and weren't called back at all, and finally, finally, they could let themselves believe it. 

The loop was broken. They were free. 

---

“What did I do?” Sam’s doppelganger repeated, pausing for a moment to think. “Oh, nothing awful.”

Normally, Sam would be content to let that slide. But just lately, he’d been getting a weird feeling from his doppelganger, and there was too much grey area between ‘something good’ and ‘nothing awful’ to be comfortable. “No, seriously.”

“We just ran the recording a few more times,” his double huffed, his smile fading—not quite impatient, but visibly put out, somehow, like he didn’t feel sufficiently appreciated. “Look at them, they’re fine.”

“I am looking at them,” Sam said. “And that’s why I’m asking. They’re my friends, I can tell when something isn’t right.”

His doppelganger hummed briefly, moving next to him to come and look at the monitor, and—just for a flash, less than a second—Sam felt the hair on the back of his neck rise when his double passed behind him. 

“Maybe you're right,” he said slowly, after watching the feed for a few seconds. “Okay, I'll fix it. I'll have a chat to them.”

Sam exhaled, relief washing over him. Of course there wasn't anything to be worried about.

“Thanks,” he said.

His double just smiled faintly and nodded, then left the room.

Sam turned back to the monitor, waiting for the moment a minute or so later when his double would appear in the frame. And sure enough, he did. The sound setup was only piped in from the stage, and even then it wasn’t the best quality, so Sam didn’t have a chance of hearing what was actually being said. But he watched as, without exception, every single cast member flinched when his doppelganger touched them lightly on the shoulder to get their attention. 

The conversations were quiet, with a gentle sort of intensity. His double seemed to be focused on making sure each person felt acknowledged—Sam couldn’t recall him breaking eye contact with anyone he was speaking to—and whatever he said, it seemed to work. One after another, he spoke to all the cast, contestants and cameos, leaving calm in his wake. And when he had talked to the last one, and everyone looked settled and genuinely at ease, he shot a look of pure satisfaction towards the backstage camera, and headed out of view.

“Thank you,” Sam said again when his doppelganger returned to their dressing room, and received a gracious nod in reply. “Just out of curiosity, though—what did you tell them? Because fuck, it worked like a charm!”

His double tilted his head, half-smiling. “Oh, you know. All the right things. That I was very sorry for anything that might have gone weird during the recording, that I wasn’t feeling like myself, that it’ll never happen again… Oh, yeah—and then I wiped their memories.”

Sam coughed. “You what?”

“Wiped their memories,” his double repeated matter-of-factly. “It was the simplest solution, really. Everyone stays in continuity, they’re blissfully free of any… more troubling memories, our cover isn’t blown—it’s perfect.”

“No, hang on, you can’t—”

“I can, and I did,” his doppelganger replied. “I fixed the problem—which you asked me to, I might add—and now everyone’s back to their regular happy selves. It’s a totally closed system. The only person who knows it happened at all is me. Oh, and you, of course.”

Sam frowned.

“Besides, this way, you don’t have to worry about having to work out the overtime for a time loop, because they’ve got no idea what the extra pay would even be for,” his double added breezily before he had a chance to say anything, then snapped serious. “And don’t look at me like that, Samuel Dalton Reich, because you were thinking about it. I know you.”

Unfortunately, he couldn’t deny it. The tiny part of his mind that was always in Dropout CEO mode had been grappling with the ethical and financial implications of a time loop and getting nowhere, and the relief of not having to deal with it was like a fist unclenching.

“See?” his doppelganger said, meeting his eyes with a pointed sort of kindness. “I know what I’m doing, Sam, I’ve been doing it for a very long time. And it’s better for everyone like this.”

“I don’t—” Sam started, faltering. On the one hand, there was something intuitively and viscerally horrifying about his friends having their memories wiped. But on the other… 

“If you don’t want to know,” his double said softly, and god, it gave Sam the shivers to hear his own voice used that way, “there is a way around it. I thought you’d rather be a part of everything that’s going on, but…”

His eyes caught and held on Sam’s like magnets, and—something had shifted behind them, something small, but with a seismic effect. He was pinned by that gaze, trapped, electrified; wholly unable to look away.

“I can do the same for you as I did for them.”

On the other hand… his double was right. It was kinder, probably, if they didn’t remember whatever they went through, and in that moment, he realised he couldn’t even begin to guess what that was. And… it was definitely easier.

“No,” he said, and when the word came out as a whisper, he cleared his throat and tried again. “No. It’s okay.”

His doppelganger blinked, and the spell was broken.

“Great!” he said brightly, back to his usual cheerful self, with all traces of that scary side—that dangerous side—folded neatly away. “You know, I really didn’t want to have to do that to you—you’ve been so much fun to work with, it would have been a shame to have it all come to nothing.”

And Sam, feeling like a marionette with its strings cut, hated the fact that he agreed. Even with everything that had happened lately, he couldn’t deny that the electricity that came from working with his doppelganger, the sizzle of pushing ideas just that bit past the boundaries and laughing uproariously at the result, was liberating. Exhilarating. Addictive, almost, a heart-racing excitement that sang in his blood.

Maybe the danger was part of the game. And as long as nobody came to any harm, he could keep playing.

“Just… promise me one thing, okay?” he started, and his double turned wide, patient eyes on him. “Promise me I won’t have to see anything like that again. There’s nothing we can do to change this now, but I can’t let it happen again, yeah? They’re my friends, and there’s a line.”

“Sure,” his doppelganger agreed. “You’re right. And I do like them, so—hm. I’ll treat them like I would my own friend.”

“Thanks,” Sam replied, finally letting the tension drain out of him. “That means a lot.”

His doppelganger just nodded in acknowledgement, then clapped him on the shoulder and grinned. “C’mon. We’ve got more work to do.”

----- missed an installment of the sam reich!master cinematic universe?

original idea by @ace-whovian-neuroscientist: x

art by @northernfireart concept: x scissor sisters sketch: x sam and his doppelganger: x

writing by me (!) part one (escape the greenroom): x part two (deja vu): you are here!

[dk-thrive]

Guilt is such a sticky emotion; you can’t wash the damn thing off.

― Alice Feeney, Beautiful Ugly: A Novel (Flatiron Books, January 14, 2025)

[iamnmbr3]

I think Snape's death scene is super interesting because Snape is the only person we ever see Voldemort apologize to. Yes, he’s not sorry enough to not kill him but he does express regret which is a unique moment. He definitely respects Snape a lot more than he does most of his followers and maybe even likes him to the extent that he likes anyone by that point in his life.

They do after all have a lot in common - both from poor, low class backgrounds, both halfbloods, both with a bad relationship with their Muggle fathers, both outsiders to the privilege and influence wielded by the old wealthy pureblood families like the Blacks and the Malfoys, both prodigiously talented etc. It's just interesting.