It's looping.

The truth pierced her brain with what she failed to understand about space-time; the two interconnected concepts, never one without the other, too intertwined to be apart. Two sides of the same coin. Where space existed, time went, and vice versa. One simple dream — the sea of stars, the sea of time where the ripples of reality manifested into shattered truth.

Or so the stories told.

But I'm not an anomaly expert. I don't question these things. I don't think about these things. I think about what's in front of me. I think about what I can put in my hands and create. Where would I begin to understand? Or even how to stop this? I told Neo... and it killed him. If I tell him again, will it kill him either way? But who else would know a way out? He's the one who mulls over these things.

Not me.

Not. Me.

Stars sang.

I have to approach this like I approach a blueprint. I need to understand the machinations — the timing. We have the briefing, and then the lockdown. Those were consistent the past two times. What I'm not entirely sure of is Thuni and Ulin's fates. I need to see what I can change, and what I can't.

Prototype droids were easier to understand than an inconceivable time loop.

I need to figure out how to say 'we're in a time loop. I'm the only one that remembers and everyone dies around me each time.' Unbelievable, even saying that I sound like I've lost my mind. But, Neo would say 'without concrete observations to the contrary...'

It pulsed with the space in her mind.

Oh, Neo, was the truth worth this? Was your truth worth this? Was your question answered in the end? Why did you touch the anomaly when we barely stood it — when we barely had actionable understanding to proceed with the 'blueprint' of an anomaly.

Nova lifted herself from the repeated past to Neo, who sat at his desk, once again doodling on his datascroll with an unfocused expression. One more familiar, but strangely odd detail, though the reason for the strangeness slipped over her tongue. Everyone's actions — dictated by her. It's me. Every move I make affects the actions of others... like a...

Neo died too close to safety, the butterfly soaked in blood.

Like the single wing beat of a butterfly across the world... causing a tsunami on the either side.

Alone; time and time again.

It took all her impulse control to not tug out her brown hair, strand by strand, out of her scalp with her fingers. His butterfly necklace tangled in his hand when he toyed with it in his daze, flapping its crystalline wings in the nebula. If there's a way to break this... maybe I'll find it by going with Thuni and Ulin to stall the monster, but there's too much I don't know about it... like why it seems at the very end... it tears itself apart? No... I don't think that's the right word for it.

Behind her, Thuni clenched his fists on his desk, and she knew the questions in the air before he did. As Ulin patted his back, Thuni drew his attention over the walls.

Wait, I don't... I don't remember him doing that before. Nova switched her seat around. "Do you want help with your droid?"

Something echoed out a difference. "Sure." Thuni shrugged his shoulders. "We could use the help."

"Great." Nova hesitated and checked on Neo, who continued to drown in his familiar daze. "I'm going to bring Neo with me. Maybe he can provide some insight."

Thuni studied her, but then shrugged his broad shoulders without a word of complaint towards her company. I just need to make sure they don't... die this time and if I can keep an eye on Neo maybe he stands a better chance. Unable to focus when he gave his looping presentation, she drummed her fingers to counteract the dissonant music as he spoke familiar, methodical words, never cognizant of the death he experienced. Once the first alarm rang, she decided to get to work on sustenance instead of the theories of a reality she lived in. Nova gathered her things into her arms and waited outside for the others. Thuni and Ulin went ahead, but never left her sight.

He shuffled through the door, but she frowned at his furrowed expression when he examined her. "Are you feeling alright, Nova?"

It's you. You're unpredictable when it matters the most.

"What makes you ask?" she asked and frowned when he held onto her shoulders. Her heart hammered in her ribcage when Neo peered at Thuni and Ulin, who waited for her before walking into their deaths.

"You just seemed out of it earlier," Neo mumbled. "And just now in the briefing. You were distracted — I should know. I, too, get distracted easily if there's something else on my mind; unless I was boring. Was I boring you? I mean, I can think of something to liven up briefings..."

His words from the last echoed through her mind. "No, you didn't bore me. I... It's just a lot to explain."

That I tried to, in another reality.

Bloodbound butterflies fluttered in his shadow. "Well, you've spent countless hours listening to my explanations," he pointed out with a slow, almost gentle twist to his words. "We have the time, if it's something you need help with... I owe you."

Nova jolted at his wording. "Neo, you... don't owe me anything."

If anything... It is the least I can do. But we don't have time. I just know it's not enough time. I need a blueprint of this loop.

His brow furrowed and lips thinned, their silent bubble in empty space, stuck in cracked time.

"I'll try and explain later, how about that?" In her heart she knew it wouldn't satisfy Neo — curiosity incarnate. Already, she saw the gears turning in the greys cranking his brain into overdrive. Nova smiled at the one comfort among her continuous horror. Her best friend was still her best friend to the end. "I do appreciate the thought, you know," she pressed and patted his shoulder before gripping his forearm. "You should come and check out Thuni's droid. Maybe see the scanner for yourself?"

"Yeah, Teimea," Thuni blurted out. "You might be able to give me something more substantial than a 'I don't know'. I don't fix or build things with uncertain, vague plans. I need something tangible; something that I can work with. You can tell the damn research team I said that, by the way."

Neo's attention never wavered off of her until a millisecond in their silent bubble popped. He faced Thuni with a pout. "I will reiterate that I'm not the one giving a strict 'I don't know'. It's the entire research team. I, at least, tried to find a feasible explanation." He shrugged his shoulders and his smile returned. "If, of course, you don't mind me poking your droid I might be able to provide an answer to your problem."

"Go nuts as long as you don't lick it." Thuni bopped his fist off of Ulin's back. "Let's get to work. We only have so much time to examine it for ourselves before we're kicked out by the higher-ups for their study — like my droid is an anomaly and not whatever they dragged in..."

He's right, but not in the way he realises. Nova frowned when Neo ignored Thuni's impassioned complaint to rub the back of his head, with the other two heading to the tram station. "Neo, are you okay?"

"I'm fine, are you?"

Blood caked the hem of his lab coat and spread over her fingers — and the universe left a hole in his heart to scatter it across the cosmos. How many times will I have to lose you? Nova sighed out the pain of the uncertain future and the unchanging ways of the past to look upon the doom. Neo tilted his head with a nervous, curious frown.

"Why are you looking at me like that?"

Nova forced a smile on her face, then hugged him around the middle. "It's nothing, Neo. It's very sweet of you to worry, but I'm alright. Let's catch up with them." Keeping herself aware of the vents, she tugged Neo along, who no longer blinked to continue his focused study of her. Nova stepped out of view of his equally odd expression. "Same to you, Neo. You know I don't like it when you look at me like that."

"Oh. Sorry." Neo chuckled and fell in step with her. "I'll take your word for it."

Shadows fluttered on butterfly wings, but it remained silent when they caught up to Thuni and Ulin on the tram. Doomed lives. Doomed stars. Unless I can change their fate here. Tongue stuck between her teeth, she checked on Neo when he flicked through his datascroll to take notes. She never got the chance to pry to get back to work. "Ulin, I recall you suggesting an update on the droid exoskeleton?"

"Yeah, I wanted some time to make some adjustments when I first heard the higher-ups wanted a deep exploration of the nebula," Ulin replied. "We were told a cursory sweep on something of this magnitude wouldn't garner anything substantial. For the most part, Movium 1XH stands as the last bastion before the unknown, and there's still a lot we don't know about the planet." Ulin sighed then shrugged. "Jokes on us I suppose, the nebula ended up coming to us instead."

Thunk strangled the railing over his head, and his lips contorted with something more than simple irritation. "Jokes on us." The tram came to a stop, and he wiped his hands when they stepped off it. "You measure twice and cut once."

Yes, a lesson taught from the start at our collegiate. You measure before you cut, and if you have doubt, you measure again. I need to do the same with these loops — and cut them in one stroke... if I can even quantify something that's intangible to everyone but me.

But why me?

Why not someone like Neo who would be able to do this better and faster than I can?

"You check every variable before setting on a single conclusion or else you might misread or misinterpret data," Neo blurted out. "You'll miss things you wouldn't have if you hadn't taken the time to give further study and examination." He bounced on his heels with a wide smile at the prospect of connection and relation. "Will you look at that! We have a common proverb in our respective circles of work!"

"Great." Thuni swiped his keycard into Droid Bay A's panel, and they poured in when it opened with a hiss. On one pad, her droid sat, free of the ooze caking Thuni's. "If you want to take a look, Teimea, you can have a gander at the security footage while you're at it. Ulin, try and get our core out. I can rebuild the entire exoskeleton if I have that intact."

"Anything you need me to help with?" Nova asked.

"Actually, I want to discuss something with you," Thuni said as Ulin lowered himself underneath the droid pad to pry open the metal exoskeleton. Nova nodded and followed him into the quiet workshop, abandoned and empty of any projects the engineers of the space station once worked on. "Did you listen to the briefing at all?"

"... not really."

Thuni glanced at the half-open door to Neo, who examined the droid from side to side and stayed out of the way of Ulin's work. Thuni huffed out a breath. "I know Teimea is in his internship, so... him knowing anything to try and explain something no one else seems to understand came as a shock," he admitted. "I never expected the higher-ups to tell anyone anything more than they need to know — especially with the fatality on their watch." He scowled, but not at Neo, at the roof above their head. "I don't like where this is going."

Nova trembled when the station let out a metallic moan, but Thuni brought no attention to the sound. "What makes you say that?"

"What do you know about the disappearance of the D.S Butterfly?"

Nova frowned. "Not much apart from the news back home."

Thuni eyed Neo again, and then closed the door on the two. He let it go after a minute of quiet. "Ever since I started this shift I've been getting a sinking feeling," he grumbled. "I try not to put too much stock into random gut feelings that sometimes lean towards being wrong — and I do not want to get prodded by anomalous scientists for it. But they do like to talk a lot when they think no one can hear them." He folded his arms. "The IAR didn't send us out here on a purely charitable retrieval mission. They know something, and they aren't telling us."

"Do you think the senior research team knows this?"

Thuni shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe. Maybe not. I just have a bad feeling about this." He opened the door and motioned for her to leave first. "Go help Ulin get our core out."

Nova froze when the lights flickered.

One quick purr, and darkness descended.

Nova fumbled for the light on her belt and followed Thuni's heavy footsteps to the others.

"Is it a power surge?" Ulin asked as they climbed to the main level.

Crimson shimmered in the air, but when she raised her light and expected the stickiness of pressure, it was nebulous grey clouds weaving around each one. Neo, Thuni, and Ulin followed her pointing.

"What the fuck?" Thuni hissed, but he blinked before sending his own light around the facility, resting on the vent she first spotted the horrific, mangled black hole.

"It's permeating the air," Neo remarked with a hint of exhilaration. His shape tugged out his anomaly scanner. "Is this coming from the cloud outside?"

Thuni snapped to Neo. "You tell me. What are you picking up?"

Neo raised his scanner into the swallowing nebulous clouds of reds and greys. "Gaseous, but... the same composition as the liquid we found on your droid." He left them at the terminal to stand at the front of the droid, back to the vent. "I wonder if it started in this gaseous state before being turned to liquid going through your droid. I mean... the fact it would then return to its original state."

Pressure drove a knife into her temples, swallowing the light. Nova groaned at the pain when it filled her lungs, causing Neo to turn to her. "Neo?"

Wait, why did I—?

His name slipped past her lips.

He stood in her beam of light and shadows danced across his cheeks. "I hear you, what's wrong?"

Gaseous grey mist formed into the pitch of space. No ooze stained the metal. Thuni's eyes widened when it hushed out of the vent, never needing to squeeze itself to fit in space. It made space bend to its whim. Nova kept her light sensor on Neo and tried not to scream out the flashing pain in her head. In the silence of space, she focused on the threat. Its maw opened to reveal an empty void. Quieter than the vacuum of space. It met her gaze with cloudy bubbles to shudder on the event horizon, and she expected it to make a retreat.

It looked at Neo to change the truth.

Rage swallowed her throat when the pressure popped her eardrums with an unsettling hiss of hatred. Her bones rumbled when it opened its maw further to swallow them whole.

It deafened her.

No, this doesn't make sense — why is it focused on Neo? Before, it didn't seem to care about its targets... unless... No, Nova, we need to get out of here! Nova whipped around to find an escape room from death. I can't bridge the gap that fast!

Neo faced the beast and raised his anomaly scanner to it, where it pinpointed the monster's position. His thumb clicked one of the tabs. Lines of data frizzed his scanner and filled it with endless, mismatched graphs. The black hole molded around the emergency lights and drained them of power.

What is he doing?

Nova slammed her palm against the control panel at the flicker of lights.

Lights blasted to life and sent a scream of pain through her head when the protective casings shattered and spread glassy embers. Smoke sizzled into the beast. In a world of black, white, then black again, she fumbled for Neo as it continued to screech in her ears with the breaking pressure. Thuni roared something out, but she found Neo's forearm and followed what little noise there was to stumble to the transit station.

It groaned.

"On the transit!" Thuni snapped and tossed Ulin onto the transit. "Nova, let's go!"

But this doesn't make sense. It looked right at me!

Her hand found Neo's back, and she threw him onto it, slamming her fist into the panel to send the tram without her.

It went quiet and dark.

Nova whimpered at the searing pain in her knuckles from her haphazard punch, left alone when she sent Neo ahead with Thuni and Ulin. "Ow..." It bloomed a headache over her brow as she stumbled around, her back hitting the closed door as the maw held itself open.

I need it to make sense.

Its sucking maw closed. The gaseous grey clouds returned and bubbled at the surface of the event horizon.

Why is it not killing me?

Nebulous gas tangled at her feet when it came closer with an unfathomable breath.

Something sparked at its center.

Her focus drifted on it, the star in the black hole. It fluttered.

Butterfly wings in a myriad of a rainbow.

Nova shook when the fathomless being pulled itself from her to reveal the broken pieces of the transit station. The grey clouds dissipated into the tiniest specks of light, disappearing into the space around her.

Left alone in silence and the pounding of her head.

... what?