Archive of Our Own

Joe hits the alarm clock, rubbing his eyes. It’s 6 AM on a Monday again, and he’s in the hole under his pinball machine, just as he always is at 6 AM on a Monday again. He lies there on his bed for several minutes. Already, the night before is slipping from his memory. Already, he has so much to do; the timeline is short, if he’s going to get everything done.

He fishes the tape recorder out of his pockets. It, like everything on his person, is still exactly how he remembers it from last night, which is awful good, because his memory’s pretty bad, and if he didn’t have this thing to listen to from time to time, he doesn’t know what he’d do about it. Talking out loud is like, half of his process. Imagine if he lost it all now. The progress that would be gone. The setback that would take.

It’d almost make him as mad as moving all the walls on the castle from last season again, except, like, unlike that, which he did all the time anyway, and which kept on making him lose progress in what was really an unnecessary way if they had actually done the measurements right the first time, and sometimes he can feel his blood pressure rising thinking about it and that was before the moon destroyed the world which really put a damper on the whole thing and great, now he’s thinking about how far he’d have to move the walls now if he wanted to fix them. And. He’d been going somewhere with that.

He loses enough progress every Monday, anyway, that the tape recorder is important, before he goes out. If he still thought it mattered if he tried to rush to the vault or to the Rift, he would, but that ship had sailed a long time ago.

He clicks the tape recorder on.

“Hermitcraft Season Nine, episode—forgot what I was calling this, it doesn’t matter, think it was thirty-eight, but like, at this point it’s gonna be so much footage worth of—starting over. Hermitcraft Season Nine, episode thirty-five, maybe, segment… uh… beta-golf, that’s how I was doing that. As you cannot see, because this is an audio recording, it is Monday again, which means I’ve got to recount for you the events of the prior four days, and more importantly, the discoveries made therein! I think I’m starting to get close. I have ideas for this time around. I think I know what’s causing it, I do, and like, that’s a good thing! That’s a really good thing. Of course, don’t really know how to stop it from there, but those are details for future Joe. Or, now Joe? Honestly, this whole time thing is getting kind of confusing here, but it started to get confusing several segments ago. Right. Okay…”

It’s always hard to record first thing in the morning. Problem is, if he doesn’t do it now, he’ll never get it done. If he never gets it done, he’ll lose everything he’s done so far. If he loses everything he’s done so far—well, he’ll go mad, is what he’ll do, but he thinks a lot of people would argue he’s already there, so.

He stands up as he keeps talking. He stumbles a few times. One of these days, he’ll run out of room on the tap, but that’s not current Joe’s problem either. He looks up the stairs behind endless birch walls. The sun is barely rising.

The alarm clock blinks. It says it’s 6:16, by now, which is fine, because he only has until about 7:00 until he has places to be, but he’ll have enough time to do all his talking before then just fine if he got moving this quickly. He bounces on the balls of his feet. He keeps talking. He’s real good at that, the talking.

It’s what he’s been doing for weeks, after all, one of many patterns he’s fallen into that work. He’s reluctant to change things he already knows work at this point.

He’s tired.

He’s not sure how many tries he has left, after all. When he’ll stop repeating it.

One of these days, it’s gonna stick. Joe can’t go breaking things that already work when that happens.

The shopping district is always quiet early in the morning. That’s good; Joe isn’t sure he could take it if it were loud and bustling. There are still signs hanging over it. They’re not signs anyone is going to enforce properly soon here, given that Ren had built that whole vault thing, and well, Joe’s not an idiot, he knows a way to lose a war when he sees one. Luckily, if he’d had any loyalty to the crown, he’s found it’s pretty useless to keep having by now, so he’s discarded it. If he ends up having to sneak people to the vault early or something, he ends up having to sneak people to the vault early, but he’d tried that, and that had just sped up the timeline, and he can’t really—he needs the whole four days.

Anyway. The shopping district is quiet at almost-seven in the morning. There are signs and posters hanging over it, containing rules no one really follows and no one’s really all that happy with. Joe is about to ignore all of them except the ones he has a use for; namely, he has a bunch of royal emeralds, and no diamonds, and like, Ren’s definitely, definitely never gonna refund these, right, so he’s probably kind of stealing, but also Ren said it was fine, so it’s not Joe’s fault.

He’s got to do the shopping early in the morning on Monday. That’s part of his schedule. Nothing else important happens early in the morning on Monday, so it’s when he can go shopping, and also when people won’t ask questions they won’t believe the answers to.

He’d dumped his inventory into a chest in his base, taken stock. After the last four days, he’d had on him a tape recorder, a sword he doesn’t want to use again, and everything, eaten away, burning, glowing—

Anyway, he’s replacing, like, all of that, except for the tape recorder, which as established, he can’t replace. It means getting his entire wallet out of his ender chest, partitioning the emeralds, pausing as he has the past several times to try to decide if he’ll have time in his schedule this time to run a quest to earn emeralds, and then considering that there are some odds this won’t be permanent anyway, so he can just steal them.

Grian seems to get mad at the emeralds, so Joe steals them from him. Joe figures that, like, if he does have it all figured out this time, Grian won’t miss them.

This is why he comes to the shopping district first thing, early in the morning. It’s not stealing if you don’t get caught!

Or, well, it’s probably still stealing, but that depends on whether you define the crime by the actions, or by the code of the justice system, and like, Joe can’t really vouch for ‘listen to the justice system on what counts as a crime’, he’s against that concept in principle. But like, theft is defined, currently, by whatever King Ren says is stealing, probably, that or whatever the person you’re stealing from would break your kneecaps for. Joe knows that second thing because Cleo has broken his kneecaps for it before. The point is, if no one catches him, he only has to feel crushing guilt for stealing from Grian’s stupid rock for the rest of his life, not like, deal with anyone yelling at him, which is basically the same as it not being stealing.

The emeralds are in better hands anyway and it’s not like anyone’s gonna be able to spend them unless Joe actually succeeds. There’s already a buzzing in his bones from the direction that Grian’s base is in, and—well, maybe that’s the other reason he’s stealing from Grian specifically.

(It’s not his fault. Probably. Like, Joe could probably test that more but it seems like not-his-fault, as a rule. Joe’s doing his best not to blame anyone. He’s getting tired, but he’s trying.)

He goes to Jevin’s shop first. The pork chops are well in-stock, and Joe’s gonna need plenty of food. Several stacks of pork chops, several stacks of rockets—restocking gets hard the last few days, so the more, the better. He goes to check if Impulse is selling bottles of enchanting, because if someone is, it’ll be him. He’s not. Joe knew that. Joe knew that. It’s just easy to forget.

Moss makes cheap building blocks. He buys some of those. He remembers that, right, going the pork chop route does mean he’s gonna get yelled at about the pies. He keeps forgetting about—

Nevermind. It doesn’t matter. Spare enchantments, because there are a lot of people who don’t have enough, and some spare tools, and then even after stealing from Grian, he’s running low on emeralds and inventory space. He’s standing in the middle of the shopping district. It’s a clear day. It’s pretty. The moon is small. Joe sort of wishes it were the moon, because everyone would have some idea what to do if it were the moon, the ‘what to do’ being ‘leave before it’s too late’, and…

He shakes his head. The thing about having a period of several days repeat infinitely is that, paradoxically, there’s absolutely no time to get anything done. Which, Joe is stressed all the time anyway! He’s constantly doing things with no time to get them done! That’s his whole thing. You’d just think, well, in a time loop, there’s infinite time, because it keeps on repeating. But he’s got a schedule to keep to, because unless its in his inventory, it won’t keep. None of the changes he’s made will keep. None of the things he’s tried will. So, time limit.

Also because in five minutes Joe knows for a fact that Scar will turn up and Scar is on the list, okay, but on the list for after Joe has himself set up and settled. Also, Scar is showing up as Hotguy. Hotguy will shoot Joe. Joe doesn’t want to get shot.

Joe leaves just ahead of when Scar will alive, stolen good in hand, a throbbing between his ribs. He has a few more things to do before he talks to anyone.

Breaking into Doc’s base is, despite all the signs of general redstone tomfoolery, surprisingly easy. Maybe it’s because the place is so big, no one could possibly expect Doc to protect the whole thing, pet warden or no pet warden. It’s just too big.

Of course, it helps that after about the first six times getting bodied by said pet warden, Joe knows exactly where it will be. He’s getting good at this whole dodging wardens thing, too! He just needs something from here.

For the record, for the past… four-ish? Four attempts? He’s basically spent all of the first day stealing, because it gets really hard to steal once people know he’s doing it, and like, he probably could just ask politely, but it somehow seems improper. He’s found himself in what might be a sci-fi thriller? He hasn’t read many sci-fi thrillers before, so he’s not totally certain that’s what he should call it, but in a thriller, one doesn’t just ask the local mad scientists for materials. So Joe steals them.

Anyway, Doc’s the only one who has diamonds left, and Grumbot only takes diamonds, and Joe won’t be able to actually get to Grumbot safely until tomorrow but the diamonds are a necessary bribe so the robot actually warns them when they’re running out of time, and—

There’s a shuffling behind Joe. Joe doesn’t yelp, because that tells the warden where he is. Instead he walks really slowly, sort of like avoiding the sand worms from Dune? Since it’s a shuffling pattern to make fewer vibrations and all. it works really well, and the stuff Joe wants from Doc has to be nearby!

Doc absolutely won’t mind him taking something from his redstone wiring. Probably. Definitely. Joe definitely hasn’t been hunted to the ends of the earth by the creeper for this in at least one loop before, and definitely hadn’t had to start over with nothing but setbacks as a result. It’s kind of fun avoiding Doc now, though! Like, even if Doc does realize Joe’s the one who stole the diamonds before he realizes why, it turns out he’s super predictable? Like, yeah, he builds superweapons, but half of them Doc can’t build quickly and follow specific paths, and unless Joe stands really, really still, all he actually has to worry about is Doc’s blade. Which, like, still a thing worth worrying about? Doc has now stabbed him many times.

(He’d have to go back to the tapes to remember where and how he’d been stabbed. That’s why he’s recording the tapes—helps keep track of any past and future stabbings!)

The point is, though, it’s not an arrow that can shatter all of Joe’s armor in a single blow, and also when and how Doc will try to stab him is fairly predictable by now, too, and also Joe has almost finished memorizing the layout of the circuit in Doc’s creeper launcher that he’s mining out, so he might even be able to halfway fix it.

The world goes dark. Joe hides under the wires and stands still. He hears the warden shuffle by. he watches for the brief moment he can actually see it, and when it is far enough away it can’t hear him properly anymore, he starts mining blocks again. It really would be much easier if Doc hadn’t made it so that thing couldn’t dig into the ground, but alas, that poor warden is constantly wandering the bottom of Doc’s massive hole in the ground. Maybe that’s comfortable for it? It’s not a tiny hole, the way Joe had been lead to believe most wardens have. Maybe that’s disconcerting. He’s… spiraling.

Oh. He knows what time it is. He stands still and, pulling a bit of wool he’d stolen from Beef out of his inventory, covers his mouth, because he may be practiced by now, but he still screams when it starts. He has ever since he started looping. He doesn’t know why. No one else feels it in time, let alone when—

It’s like the whole universe shudders as one, except that’s not right, because saying ‘as one’ implies some amount of coordination. No, it’s more like the universe shudders as a million small pieces, each rubbing up against each other’s jagged edges, making a horrible cacophony, metal screaming against metal, air sliding against air, water drilling through a hole that’s too tight, and the whole air is bending, and the whole air is snapping, and then, for a moment, everything is horribly everywhere and purple and Joe puts his hands over his ears and counts like the numbers still have meaning because he may have done this nearing forty times but—

It stops.

Joe counts some more, because it helps him regulate his breathing, and then he stands up. He eats one of Jevin’s pork chops, because he’s bruised himself while trying to hide from the tearing of the universe asunder. Right. Okay. So he’s really on the clock again now.

Every time, he hopes it doesn’t happen. Every time, he hopes that instead he’ll just go help Ren finish the vault, and they’ll play the game in it, and everything will just go back to normal.

Every time, he hopes one of these loops will start at a different time, because he has this time memorized. The time is eleven am. He’d have to have figured out a way to stop it entirely in five hours, and he’s gotten efficient, but clearly not that efficient.

He tries not to blame Grian. He really, really tries. It’s not Grian’s fault his Rift broke like that. He’d had it all under control until the last possible minute, Joe’s pretty sure. He probably even ought to thank Grian for it.

Joe is tired.

There’s a warden roar. Joe yelps, lights a firework rocket, and leaves, because, oh boy, he’s felt that one before. Nope. Not dealing with a warden respawn when he still has all his stuff on his person, and the next item on his list is—well, now it’s an ender chest, that’s for certain!

Ender chests will still work for the next two days. He should take advantage of that while he can. The sun is getting high in the sky. The whole world is buzzing. Joe’s buzzing too.

Joe lands in the Crastle on unsteady feet. He doesn’t need much. No one’s in it right now, because Ren’s too busy building a new vault for the diamonds, which is why Joe hadn’t taken the diamonds from here. He needs something else.

He stares at the netherite throne.

“Bdubs is gonna kill me,” he says cheerfully.

Killing spiders and enchanting armor isn’t Joe’s favorite pastime, and Keralis’s spider spawner is so slow as to feel like wasting time. He doesn’t want to go to the End, though—other people actually use the Ender Ender, and also there’s too much purple there. That’s definitely something he’s going to have to examine about himself later, because like, it’s not as though the color purple is a problem or something, it’s just that the Rift is purple, so everything that’s going wrong is purple in Joe’s head, and hey, at least he won’t easily accidentally look at endermen right now?

He needs a few sets of gear. Most of the hermits have their own gear, but a lot of them tend to lose it, and they need backups. Also, many of the hermits don’t have full netherite on them all the time, since it’s only really necessary occasionally, so like, once the ender chests go out, it’s all over.

Plus, enchanting in a way that doesn’t literally explode, after—

Well, having all his armor explode had been a good lesson! Sometimes, in life, something just has to explode to teach you.

So, Joe enchants the armor, and kills spiders, and the hissing becomes a background noise as he scans the horizon. He’s done this enough that he knows not many people go by here. He’s not ready for people yet. He has a plan for this loop, a plan to figure out more details, and it can’t involve people yet. They’re on the list! They are! It’s just…

He hears rockets outside. He blinks several times and looks up. He thinks about what he’s done. He thinks about what time it is, and—oh, he knows what’s happened. He crouches and hopes that Scar doesn’t come down into the spider farm.

He doesn’t.

Joe finishes the gear. He takes a deep breath. He goes to the nether.

He technically still has time for this. He watches from afar to give himself time for it. The thing is, his timetables are short, so any emotions he feels about the matter will have to be short too. It’s late afternoon. One of four, down. Three more to go. One more where everything will still be normal enough to plan. He needs the evening time, too, because he knows what she’s going to ask to do.

Joe climbs up to the nether roof. He follows coordinates to a place he is starting to know well, Under-construction walls tower to the sky. Cleo is placing lava buckets. Ren is far enough away he won’t hear, which is good, because Ren should only get brought in at the end. He’d tried bringing the king in early. It’s too messy. Ren gets all dramatic about it, and also no one trusts him right now, and like, Joe isn’t trying to get the whole world to trust him, but when the whole world is falling apart—

He watches from afar. He needs the whole evening. He has time to steady himself, though. Time to—if he stays too exact, she’ll respond the same way every time, and he can’t really deal with the existential nightmare that is hearing Cleo respond to his horrible news the same way every time. So he waits, just a little bit, watching her place the lava. She looks beautiful in the red light, really.

He steps into the room. “Howdy, Cleo. So, I’m in a time loop!”

Cleo jumps. “Joe? What on—where have you been today?”

“In a time loop, didn’t I just say?” Joe says, and his voice is probably a little flat, but that’s both because he knows that’s not how time loops work and because that’s the same way she’s been responding, anyway.

He’s not good at waiting a random amount of time. He always waits just a moment too long, he thinks.

“I don’t even know what to say to that,” Cleo says.

“Don’t worry, I do,” Joe says. He could then try to freak her out by saying what she’d say next, since they’re doing the usual conversation, but he has other things to worry about. “Uh, listen, before you start trying to talk to me about how you believe me about the time loop thing but do I like, have any proof—”

“Am I that predictable?”

“I have a tape,” Joe says, and then he lets himself be as tired as he feels. It’s more than a little manipulative, and he’s definitely a bad friend for doing it. He knows Cleo worries about him. He knows she cares a great deal, and worries in equal measure. But he’s tired. If he can do this faster by manipulating her a little by letting himself actually look as tired as he feels—he’ll—

“Joe?” Cleo says. “Are you…”

“I really… I really need you to listen to it. You’re normally the only one who catches—I ramble a lot. You’re normally the only one who can catch the details I missed. About the time loops. You’ll listen, right?”

Cleo stares at him.

“Go to bed,” she says, and Joe laughs at her, and his fingers tremble.

“Don’t lose it,” he says. “I need it back tomorrow morning by seven. No sooner. I need to—there’s a few more people. Luckily, they’re all here, and practiced at lying to Ren!”

“Joe,” Cleo says.

“Sorry, Cleo,” Joe says, and, oh. That’s a lot more desperate sounding than it had been the last six times. Maybe it’s getting hard to remember his lines.

“Joe, don’t you dare—”

Joe leaves Cleo where she is. She’ll probably go listen to the tapes. Probably. He really hopes so. She’s the only one who can follow most of his shorthand, and that’ll be necessary for whoever listens.

He finds Cub after a bit of hunting. He’s making—honestly, his course is very, very sadistic. Joe doesn’t watch him as long as he watches Cleo, mostly because he always watches Cleo a moment too long. If he were better at self-control, he’d give himself time to watch everyone, and then it wouldn’t be a problem at all. He’d have all the time to pine for what he’s not going to get, and then…

“Hey, Cub!”

“Howdy, Joe,” Cub says. “How’s helping gamemaster?”

“Not great, I’ll admit,” Joe says. “Do you believe in time loops?”

“Enough to know that’s the question that would get me curious,” Cub says. “How many different ways did you try asking me?”

Joe grimaces. “Just that one, really; I’ve outright told you before, but you normally think that’s a prank for some reason. Can’t really tell the difference; both are just telling you.”

Cub nods and smiles. This is the actual moment Joe knows Cub believes him. The question doesn’t actually matter; Joe saying how many different ways he asked it doesn’t matter either. What matters is that Joe knows how Cub responds to just being told outright. Cub’s easy, which is never something Joe had thought about Cubfan in his life before now, but he’s curious about everything and perfectly willing to believe in time loops if it’ll let him have a good time.

“I assume we aren’t telling Ren?” Cub asks.

“Oh, heavens no,” Joe says.

“Figures. Or Scar?” Cub asks.

“I’m telling Scar,” Joe says.

“What? Why?” Cub says. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, love the guy. I love the guy. But in a time loop situation—”

“I’m allowed to be a little selfish,” Joe says after a moment. “I mean, sometimes, right? It’s a time loop. If I mess it up—”

“I’m not going to be in one of the go-rounds that messes up,” Cub says.

“You sort of are,” Joe says. “I mean. Uh, you don’t get a choice.”

Joe feels dirty.

“Man, I might not be the one time looping, but I can solve a problem,” Cub says. “Do you think I, Cubfan135, is going to get caught up in a failing time loop? Previous Cubs may have, but not like this, my friend. Not when I believe you immediately.”

Joe swallows.

“How do you know you didn’t do this last time?” he asks, the words sticking to his mouth like blood or honey.

“You’re Joe,” Cub says. “I mean, you probably don’t decide to tell Scar every time, or that this is gonna be one of the selfish go-rounds.”

“You’re right,” Joe lies.

“So I have an advantage,” Cub says. “I’ve got spite. Did you already tell Cleo?”

“Go talk to Cleo,” agrees Joe.

Cub leaves.

Cubfan is easy. Unlike Cleo, Joe wants the conversation to stay easy. He doesn’t like that he’s easy, though. It’ll be a bad habit to get into, after the loop, thinking Cub is easy. He’s going to fall for so many pranks and end up in so many bad situations and really, thinking Cub is easy is a trap no hermit should ever fall into. But Joe does! He does think that now!

There’s no other reason Joe feels miserable about it.

Joe puts his things in an ender chest before talking to Scar and lets him shoot him. He respawns and grins. “Howdy, Scar.”

“Joe! You know who I saw running out of the shopping district with pork chops? Against the rules, Joe. Against the rules.”

“Well, golly gee,” Joe says, “I didn’t—”

Scar squints at Joe. “There’s something wrong.”

Joe relaxes all at once. “You didn’t say that last time, either. You’re unique every time. Never change, Scar.”

“Oh, thank you, I am an absolutely unique, impossible-to-replicate—what do you mean every time?” Scar asks.

“Oh, I’m just in a time loop,” Joe says.

“If that’s all—awoahwoahwoah!” Scar responds, and nearly falls off of the volleyball court he’s constructed. “What do you mean? That’s a pretty nasty prank to pull, you know. Did you learn that from Cub? Oh, wait, is that what’s wrong? Oh, geez. I don’t know how to fix a time loop, but don’t worry—Hot Guy’s trusty bow will defeat all your time-looping enemies!”

Scar starts striking poses. He waggles his eyebrows at Joe. It’s an incredibly predictable response from Scar. Joe laughs anyway. The words are probably already a repeat, but they feel new.

Joe hadn’t been lying. He needs to be a little selfish sometimes. Scar’s predictable in exactly the way that means he’s never the same. It’s a little like staring at his own personal sun, sometimes, the way Scar offers something new. He can’t say that to Scar, though. He also can’t hide it. He thinks that’s probably part of it. He doesn’t know.

At any rate, that’s the whole list.

He’s about to try to explain as much to Scar when Cleo appears.

“Joe,” they say.

“You can’t have finished listening,” Joe says, frowning. “I only just sent Cub over.”

“Cub already knows?” Scar says.

“Joe, you’re describing the end of the world,” Cleo says.

“I mean, it is a time loop,” Joe says apologetically.

“That doesn’t mean it has to be an apocalypse!” Cleo says.

There’s a pause while Joe tries to remember what his line is—no. He doesn’t need to remember his lines. He just has to be Joe Hills. Cleo probably believes him now, anyway. It’s not the sort of thing he’d make up, the universe breaking around Grian’s stupid Rift like that. Also, they always believes him after listening to the tapes, even if he messes up and has her unsure while they listen to them. That’s just how it goes. It probably doesn’t matter—

“Guys,” Scar says. “So this is embarrassing.”

“Scar,” Cleo says, as though only just noticing he’s there. They look at Joe in askance. Joe shrugs. He needs to be selfish sometimes. He’d sort of thought Cub had explained that part. Maybe if this keeps going forever and he gets bored enough he should listen in on… Listen in on…

Hm. He’s already stealing things and manipulating people. He probably shouldn’t add spying on private conversations to get an edge up on all the stealing and manipulating.

“Cleo,” Scar says.

Cleo sighs. “Well, on with it,” they say.

“What is a pocky-lips?” Scar asks.

Cleo sighs, and Joe, with a degree of hysteria he didn’t know he currently possessed but should probably be worried he does, starts laughing.

The Crastle at the time of evening their crew arrives at it isn’t normally busy. Joe’s pretty sure Ren and Bdubs both currently sleep by the pile of server diamonds. He is mostly sure of this because during segment quebec, Joe had caught them sleeping by the pile of server diamonds. He supposes it’s probably good that they’re so determined to protect them? It also means Joe has an easy meeting place for himself, Cleo, Scar, and Cub that they’re unlikely to get interrupted in, on account of it not normally being busy unless Joe makes it so.

They all stay in Ren’s bedroom. Joe’s pretty sure there’s a joke in there about that, and Scar had snickered when Cleo had suggested they all stay in King Ren’s bed. He’d held back from actually making the joke, though, which Joe will count as a victory. They’re sitting shoulder-to-shoulder, an array of shulker boxes surrounding them. Ultimately, since ender chests are going to break, they need to have all their valuables somewhere accessible. This does leave them all somewhat vulnerable to stealing, but Joe is able to say with confidence that no one comes to try to steal them over the next three days, probably on account of the world ending during them and all.

“That’s so weird though,” Cleo says. “I steal stuff from here all the time. It’s not exactly secure.”

“Haha, same,” Cub says.

“You two are entirely disloyal subjects of the wondrous King Ren,” Scar says.

“Did you only now realize this?” Cleo marvels.

“It really doesn’t matter who is or isn’t loyal to King Ren and who is or isn’t subtly trying to undermine his rule in a million ways no one every picks up on,” Joe says flatly. All three of his friends give him looks. “What matters is that we stop the Rift.”

“I can’t believe Grian would do that,” Scar says.

“We try not to blame him,” Joe says.

“Scar, I remember your sock puppet,” Cub says. Scar looks away and whistles.

Joe checks out of the conversation for a bit to check on all of their supplies instead. He really does think he has everything, but this is the part where it gets hard to prepare for, on account of them normally trying something new after the Grumbot bit. A lot of the time, it goes about the same—can he say ‘a lot of the time’, yet? In stories, these things can go for hundreds of loops, and Joe had only just recently had to start using codes preceded with a ‘beta’ to make clear they were after twenty-six. He really shouldn’t act so jaded. He probably just hasn’t tried everything yet because he’s comfortable in routine!

If he’s lucky, he won’t have to try everything. He has a good feeling, this time. Cleo had been listening to the tapes. He’s going to have Grumbot monitor. It’ll be fine. It’ll be fine! He has plans from last time to follow, and only a little bit of things that make his heart feel like lead to do.

Joe checks back in when he hears his name.

“Last time, you’d figured out it had to do with the other side, right?” Cub asks again.

“Yeah, Cleo understood that right. It’s more detail on the Rift than we’ve ever had before, but it’s not just our end that’s breaking it. Something is trying to connect to us! The problem is… well, I don’t really know. I don’t know much about rifts yet. In my defense, it’s only been—a bit over a hundred days? I think?”

“Around a hundred and twenty-five,” Cleo says after a moment.

“Yeah, that,” Joe says. “So I mean, I’m getting pretty good at it, but it’s like, not really my thing, you know? I’m not a big rift kind of guy. But like, we figured out there’s… something wrong with the other side? Something that scrambles… and then everything breaks.”

“And you go back in time.”

“And I go back in time!”

Cleo buries their head in their hands. “Joe, I don’t know why I thought you’d have more information than that.”

Joe feels oddly offended. He wants to try to explain that for the first several loops, he’d mostly been very afraid and very dying. The fact he’s worked out as much as he has, he thinks, is very impressive! He’s even been keeping it all on tape. Lots of little notes Cleo would have listened through, like when he realized it was the Rift at all, and all the bits on why people were acting specific ways, and so, so many details about what happened when the world finally broke.

They’re important. Everything Joe has done so far is important. It’s just… incremental, is all. Very slowly incremental. He doesn’t have that much time, for all he keeps repeating it.

“No, that’s useful,” Cub says, slowly. “The other side’s incompatible somehow?”

“Yeah,” Joe says. “I don’t really know how or why, but the other side of the Rift’s incompatible. So, uh, when it and our side starts connecting—”

“Joe, just to make sure: this isn’t an attempt to get out of having to help build the vault, right? Because we already believed you when you said you were busy,” Scar says.

“I mean, I’ll still show up! If it happens—if we end up actually running the vault—I’ll be so helpful, guys,” Joe says, instead of trying to explain that he actually does not remember why he’d originally said he was busy, and that’s kind of concerning, because it’s not the only detail of the first day that’s starting to erase in his mind, let alone the next or the next or the next. That’s why the tapes, though. That’s why they’re listening to them now. That’s why Joe can’t lose them. They’re one of the only things he’s managed to carry over between practically every loop, even if he only started recording on the fourth. Because he’s forgetting details. He’s forgetting mostly details from before the loop, sure, but all of the details of the many times he’s lived these days are already starting to blend together. They’re going to keep on blending together.

He has a good feeling about this one.

He keeps telling himself that. He’s tired.

“So, we’ve just got to work out how the other side is incompatible, and fix that?” Cub says. “Sounds like a piece of cake.”

Joe takes the tape from Cleo. It’s late. They’ve finished listening to them. He’d given them until the morning, but that’s mostly a holdover from when they used to leave with them, instead of staying with Joe. He really needs them back, because if he loses them, it’s all over, really.

He puts them in his pockets.

“Yeah, piece of cake,” agrees Joe, flatly.

“You could sounds more enthusiastic,” Cub says.

“Sorry, it’s late,” Joe says, “I haven’t slept.”

“I said before—sleep, Joe,” Cleo says. “We’ll plan overnight.”

Joe hesitates. He’d told Cub he needs to be selfish sometimes. He does. He really does. But if he helps plan, he can probably remember the sorts of lived details he’d forget to include in the tapes, like what it feels like when the cracks in the world start to properly overtake you, and what it feels like when apathy starts to—not that that’s really relevant to them. Or him, really. He’s doing great, if anyone asks. He thinks he’s doing like a crocodile, and, uh, he started that but immediately lost where he was going with that metaphor, so maybe not like a crocodile. Something about he thinks he remembers crocodiles being good at remembering things? Joe’s getting pretty good at remembering things. Also, at not sleeping, but crocodiles are a terrible metaphor for that, because Joe’s pretty sure that, like most lizards, they do a lot of sleeping. If lizards sleep a lot, at least. He can’t quite remember.

The point is, he’s tired in his soul, not in his body. His body had slept fine. He’s missed more sleep before.

“I know it’s hard to sleep alone sometimes. We can sleep together!” Scar says seriously. “I mean. Wait.”

Cleo wheezes and falls off of her chair.

“Yeah, sure, thanks Scar,” Joe says laconically, and that gets Cub, too. It’s almost a new joke to get him with. Maybe Joe should get more points if he gets new reactions from people from the great arcade game scorer in the sky that’s probably busy deciding if he’s got a good enough score to go home yet or something.

His metaphors are getting really labored. He’s too tired.

Scar gestures him at Ren’s bed and Joe passes out immediately.

Joe wakes up next to Scar and looks over at the other man. He’s still fast asleep. So is most everyone. Joe didn’t set an alarm. He’s not used to sleeping a long time anymore. Or, well, he’d think maybe his body would be? Like, his internal clock should still be set to Before, given that it’s a time loop, but then again, Joe carries back the things that had been in his inventory with him with every turn back of the clock. Maybe his like, internal sense of what time it is also counts as inventory, and also comes back with him as the clock ticks backwards?

It’s funny to say that he used to sleep more. Like, he did. He’s never slept well, but he used to sleep more. And like, it hasn’t been that many loops, right? Only… thirty… that’s why he has the tapes, really, to count that. He’s not counting. Is it bad he’s not counting? The point is that it hasn’t been that long, so he should be used to his normal kind of not-sleeping, not the exhausted not-sleeping of day after day of the end of the world.

He looks outside. The moon is still high. Joe hears phantoms. That’s not fair. He did actually sleep this time.

Scar snores loudly. Joe looks over fondly. He didn’t do that last time—the snoring or the sleeping next to him.

He looks over the room. Cub has slumped over next to Bdubs’s computer, passing out in front of spreadsheets and numbers that Joe can’t understand. Cleo has fallen asleep slumped against the bed. Joe knows that pose; she’d been standing guard, and then refused to wake any of them up until she passed out herself. It’s sort of sweet, if it didn’t also sort of make Joe upset and jealous in turns.

A phantom screams. Joe looks out the window at the moon. It’s not fair. He did sleep this time.

He’s so tired.

Carefully, he extracts himself from under Scar’s arm. Scar makes a loud snort but doesn’t wake up. He’s drooling everywhere. He probably drooled on Joe? Kind of gross, honestly, but a new experience, which like, Joe values new experiences. He always has—part of why he likes Scar anyway—but now?

He looks over the room of his friends, exhausted on his own word about the world ending and a time loop, and thinks: this is why he’s bothering. It’d be easy to just give up. To go back to his pinball machine and sleep and die and die and die and—

Maybe not easy.

But he’d be fine, really. It wouldn’t be hard, honestly. It’d be—it’s not fair that there are phantoms, but…

“Sweet dreams,” he mumbles, and he pulls a sword from his inventory quietly before he climbs out the window. At least in full armor phantoms are honestly more annoying than an actual risk. He has a slightly genocidal robot to visit, now, when he’ll actually listen to Joe, and before things fall apart so far that he doesn’t have time to visit it.

He looks back only one more time, long and exhausted and wondering how many more times he’ll have to ask his friends the exact same way to lose sleep over something they can’t remember, and a phantom nearly bites him in the face for it. Answer given, he supposes.

Grumbot is a strange creation. Joe honestly doesn’t really get it still? It’s like… that’s sure a robot! It sure likes Mumbo a lot! It takes diamonds to talk to him, and Joe’s gonna need to do a lot of talking? Apparently Grian made him, like Grian made the Rift, or like Grian made—

Joe tries not to blame him.

Anyway, Grumbot! Weird creation! Strangely popular for a robot that apparently really like mayors and/or murder. Joe’s learned a lot about the murder. The end of the world even makes robots talkative, apparently, and one of that robot’s go-to solutions is murder, and like, Joe doesn’t really want to try murder? The permanent kind of murder, he means. That’s like… the opposite of his goal. Also, he’s not blaming anyone. He’s not blaming anyone so good. Murder would be the opposite of not blaming anyone. Murder would be like… super-blamey.

(Joe would never forgive himself, is the thing, no matter how easy it seems as a solution the more he does this. He hasn’t even done it that many times, is the thing. How many times did the loop happen in Groundhog’s Day? He’s pretty sure he’s at the part of the movie that was a montage. If he murders someone during a montage, does anyone hear them scream?)

(Whatever deity is out there doing this: don’t answer him.)

He doesn’t even ask a question before putting a diamond in Grumbot. He realized after wasting a lot of diamonds that this is often faster.

WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE JOE HILLS

“Hey, Grumbot!” Joe says cheerfully. “I’m here about the Rift. I wanted to give you a chance to threaten me first, though, since you tend to like that.”

I AM NOT THREATENING ANYONE

“The Rift. Something’s wrong with it. I, uh, think we’re the only people to know? Or like, technically not the only people—here, another diamond, answer when you’re ready—I told some other guys. Don’t worry, they won’t do anything crazy! Or, uh, well, actually, no, they’ll probably do something crazy, but like—”

I DON’T KNOW WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE RIFT

“Yeah, I know,” Joe says. “I know.”

He doesn’t put another diamond in yet, because he’s not ready for Grumbot to respond. He doesn’t have anything important to respond to yet. He takes a deep breath.

“Anyway, it’s going to end the world in like, two days here,” Joe says.

WHERE IS MY DAD

“Which one’s the dad you’re looking for?” Joe asks, knowing full well exactly who it is.

WHERE IS MUMBO

“Uh, not sure, but like, if the world ends—”

IF MUMBO IS NOT HERE I DO NOT CARE

“You don’t know he’s not here, though? Like, you didn’t see him leave. You came here to find him, right?” That had taken a few tries to figure out. He really, really doesn’t understand Grumbot, but like, he needs this data. If he doesn’t negotiate this, he’s in trouble. So here he is. Arguing with a robot he only understands through the parameters of trial, error, and a glitch in time.

In some ways, the fact Grumbot almost always responds in the same ways is a blessing. It means he’s actually a robot. Same inputs, same outputs, right? Easy enough to handle.

In some ways, the fact Grumbot always responds in the same ways is terrifying. Same inputs, same outputs—what does that say about everyone else who does the same thing? If everyone is actually a robot, Joe wants a refund. That’s not the kind of sci-fi he thought he was in, and he doesn’t particularly like to imagine he isn’t real. It’s an easy thing to imagine, what with the world glitching and whatever Ren went on about after the moon was big and everything else, but he’s pretty firmly certain in his own status as not-a-robot, and he’s pretty sure everyone else is not-a-robot too, and the point is that everything feels real enough to him, and ah, he’s spiraling a bit, isn’t he?

He looks down at the sheet of paper in his hands.

WHAT DO YOU THINK I CAN DO ABOUT IT

“I think you can monitor the Rift for us. Uh, last time—I mean, uh. I think what’s happening is that something has connected on the other side that’s incompatible with us. If you could try to help figure out what kind of incompatible, that would be great? So you have a place to start, you know.”

WHAT DO YOU MEAN LAST TIME

Joe looks at the piece of paper and sighs.

“Does it matter?”

I WANT MUMBO

“I’m sorry. Hey, maybe if you help us fix the Rift…”

WHY ASK ME AND NOT FATHER.

Joe looks up and away. There are a lot of reasons for it, not the least of which is the fact that Grian rarely believes Joe. They just don’t know each other well enough for important conversations like ‘this is a time loop and I’m trying not to blame anyone’, right? Even when Grian does believe Joe, though, there isn’t much he can do. He may be the one with the Rift beneath his base, but he’s only but so familiar with it, and he’s honestly just not that helpful. He tries, he really does, and that’s the thing that Joe appreciates. When Grian realizes what’s happening, he tries so hard that it’s painful. He tries so hard that—

Well.

There’s an answer Grumbot wants to hear, though. To be honest, Joe was sort of uncomfortable when he figured out the fastest way to get Grumbot to comply. It’s not something that seems particularly good of someone who Grumbot calls Father. Joe’s not sure how this relationship works, but…

“I don’t really trust him,” Joe says. “And like, I don’t know if I trust you either, but I trust you more than him.”

Well. Well.

YOU WILL HELP ME FIND MUMBO

“Yeah, as soon as this end-of-the-world is over with, I’ll help you find Mumbo,” Joe says easily, and it’s a promise he’s made time and time again, and hasn’t had to keep yet.

I WILL LET YOU KNOW WHAT I DISCOVER, Grumbot says, and just like every time, Joe breathes a sigh of relief. He really doesn’t understand Grumbot well. He’s just sort of figured out the conversational code here, and there’s basically no one else there out there as capable of Grumbot as doing important things like ‘warning Joe when he’s out of time if it’s shifted at all’ and ‘collecting data to give Cub in future run-throughs, if Joe has time to read that data out to the tape’.

Joe’s definitely using him, which probably, like using everyone else, makes Joe sort of a bad person. He’s pretty certain there’s supposed to be a moral lesson in time loops. Joe’s not sure what it is, though, given how much he sort of feels like he has to give up morals like ‘maybe don’t use people against their will’ if he wants to ever fix this. Maybe it’s like, an evil moral? Sometimes, the moral is just ‘get worse’, right?

Is Joe getting worse? He thinks he’s just getting more…

He wonders when the apathy counts as having set in.

Anyway, using Grumbot is like, fine, Grumbot is a robot and Joe has paid him plenty of diamonds for the service. He’s exchanging currency for goods and services to a machine. He’s probably at least a little okay morally, he thinks?

…hopefully.

The sun is out, and it feels like there are ants under his skin. In the distance, he hears someone shouting. He thinks it's Doc. That would check out; now is about when Doc normally notices the stolen diamonds. If Doc had less well-hidden diamonds that were less easy to steal, he wouldn’t steal them! The only reason Joe isn’t taking some of the taxes from Ren is because Ren would notice immediately and like, that doesn’t work, he needs someone who won’t notice until he tries to grab some amethyst from his farm and realizes the farm in question is not actually working. Which, Joe does wonder how often Doc actually needs amethyst, and whether or not his anger is all that justified, but like…

Doc probably hasn’t realized it was Joe yet, though. With any luck, he’ll blame it on Grian and Scar, and start aiming the superweapons there before he realizes that neither Grian nor Scar have had anything to do with the theft.

The world shudders. Joe shudders too. He doesn’t have much downtime. He has a few other things to do, before things fall—

“There you are! You know, it’s rude to leave a man alone in bed in the morning without telling him,” Scar says.

“Oh, hey Scar,” Joe says. He pauses in his stride. Joe could do some of the other things he likes to do. He could go warn Xisuma to keep an eye on the server parameters, if he hasn’t already gotten the warnings; sometimes during big events, like the vault run coming up, there are so many error messages that Xisuma starts missing them. He could go appease Ren and Bdubs, who are about to start scouring the server for their missing round table and yell at them for abandoning the big fun event at the last minute, which is also super fair, all things considered, just like, not in the face of what they’re actually doing. He could do both of those things, as he’d originally planned.

He could also pause and talk to Scar.

“Where were you? You know, Cleo was worried,” Scar says.

“She knows better than to worry about me,” Joe says without thinking.

“I was worried,” Scar says.

“Ah,” Joe says.

“I guess I don’t know better, huh?” Scar says.

“I wouldn’t say that,” Joe says.

“So it’s fine if Cleo’s worried?” Scar says.

“Well, that’s not fair,” Joe says. “That’s not fair, Scar. You know, I don’t have that much time—”

“You have all the time in the world,” Scar says.

“You’d think that’s how that would work,” Joe says. “You really would. Things start fast tomorrow, though, and the day after, we never get that far into it. So, like, I don’t actually have all the time in the world. I have very little time, if I want to get across to Xisuma what to look for, or to go over Grumbot’s data tonight, or—”

“Oh, you were talking to Grumbot Prime?” Scar says.

“Yeah, I had to do that before Grian would—”

“One of us could have.”

“Probably not? I mean, I have the information.”

“That’s rude. I’m a good talker, Joe! I’m a really good talker!”

Joe smiles. “I know you are, Scar. I know you’re a good talker. That’s part of why I always—I know.”

They’re both quiet for a moment. Joe nearly takes that as his cue to leave after all. He feels strangely grey and blank about the conversation. Everything is fuzzy. Everything really does go quickly, once it starts, and Joe doesn’t have time. He sort of wants to do more preparations. He knows what’s coming, and it’s very much his job to deal with it, since no one else knows. There’s a tape burning a hole in his pocket. It’s a nice tape. It’s segment after segment, so many segments he ran out of the nato alphabet, an alphabetized list of ways that he’s watched the world end, which should be more concerning, Joe supposes, but he wakes up on a Monday afterwards every time, so it’s not that bad. He’s pretty sure the time he stops waking up, the world won’t end, and it will be like nothing happened.

He wants that to be soon, though.

“I’ll come back to the Crastle tonight,” Joe starts.

“Joe,” Scar starts, and then stops. “Joe, I listened to some of those tapes too.”

“I mean, it sort of didn’t happen now,” Joe says, looking away. “It didn’t happen. I mean, it did definitely happen, presuming it was all real, and I wasn’t—I have the tape. It did happen. But don’t worry! I didn’t in every—I mean, if we stop it this time, you don’t have to remember. You won’t know about it happening. So it’s fine. It’s fine! Everything is fine.”

“You only say that when you aren’t fine,” Scar says.

“Would I really do that? Just lie to you?” Joe says, and regrets it the moment he does, because yes, he would. He’d do it over and over again. He’s pretty sure he’s admitted as such to the tapes, over and over again. The problem is that it doesn’t count. The problem is that it doesn’t matter. The lies aren’t anything that matters to anyone, in the end, because everyone will only remember the last ones, and by then, everything will be fine.

Joe probably shouldn’t get used to it.

“You know, you don’t normally think I’m dumb,” Scar says.

“I don’t think you’re dumb,” Joe says, startled. He stares at Scar, wide-eyed. “You can’t be dumb. You’re unpredictable! It’s—it’s good. You always do something new. I don’t think—”

“How many times have we had this conversation, Joe?” Scar asks.

“This is the first one,” Joe says.

Scar stares at him for a while.

“You’re good at lying, but you aren’t that good,” Scar says, finally.

Joe swallows.

“It hasn’t been enough to have a script yet,” he says instead. “You don’t have a script. You’re…”

“Joe,” Scar says, and then stops. “Joe. Gods. Joe.”

“It’s fine,” Joe says. “It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine.”

“Gods,” Scar says, “it doesn’t have to be.”

Joe shrugs weakly, and before he says anything else stupid, he leaves, because he doesn’t want to have this conversation, actually, even if he also doesn’t want to stop looking at Scar, and doesn’t want to do a lot of things that he’s going to do, because they’re easier to do, and easier to understand, and yesterday he’d woken up at 6 AM and he’d started the same day again and sometimes, he thinks, he’s allowed to be selfish when he’s this tired.

Ultimately, he decides that the Xisuma route is the easiest one, this time. A little less risky of Scar or maybe Doc following him, that route, than going to go reassure Bdubs and Ren. It will make life harder for Scar and Cub and Cleo, but that helps keep Scar out of Joe’s way while he’s trying to put the most pieces together to give them the best chance of survival he can. His head feels foggy the whole time. He doesn’t think about what to say to Xisuma.

Xisuma’s one of the easy ones too. Joe’d like to think it’s just because he’s known the man so long. Knowing someone a long time makes it easy to predict how they’ll respond, and easy to get them to monitor their console warnings more, and everything else.

It means he can have the conversation on autopilot, which like, the fact that he can barely remember what he says to Xisuma probably isn’t a great sign, but it works, so whatever. He thinks he can already hear phantoms again. Do phantoms go after just sort of feeling sick? He doesn’t think phantoms care how sick you feel? He’s pretty sure phantoms like, eat sleeplessness-induced hallucinations or something. Or maybe they’re like, hallucinations come to life? He can’t remember the justification the world gave for their existence when they suddenly started becoming a problem, but it was something like that. He doesn’t think he’s—well, he’s certainly not hallucinating, but—

He really is in the ‘is this even real’ stage of the time loop, isn’t he? He hopes he gets over it quickly. It seems kind of inconvenient. Like, he knows this is real. He’d be more creative about making it up if it weren’t. He’s just… spiraling.

He says goodbye to Xisuma. He takes a deep breath.

He has too little time to worry about this, is the thing. He has far, far too little time. You’d think that the time he has is ‘all the time in the world’, and in some ways, that’s true. If he ever decided to just ignore the end of the world in the room, and to instead like, he’s not sure, wander off and start teaching himself how to speak Piglin, he could. He’d have apocalypse after apocalypse after apocalypse to do it. It wouldn’t be the same thing again. It wouldn’t be boring.

Is he bored? He doesn’t think he’s bored. He’s not really scared anymore, either, but there are ants under his skin, so he can’t really be—

At what point does apathy set in?

At what point does it all start to feel pointless? At what point did he look at Scar trying to ask if he was okay and go, god, it doesn’t matter, there’s not a point, there’s no fixing it?

At what point does the apathy become all he feels?

Joe stops where he’s standing. He squints at the sky, and the ants under his skin, and the places he can already see where reality isn’t quite bent right. He runs a hand through his hair. It’s filled with knots, and Joe realizes he hasn’t brushed it in two days. It’s too long for him to really be able to get away with that, especially with all the running and flying and fighting he’s been doing, but he doesn’t want to waste time on making his hair look okay. Makes it hard to run his fingers through it, though.

Hm.

Maybe he’s still afraid after all, he decides blandly. That seems like a thing he could be. He’d tell Cleo about it—Cleo’s scared all the time, so she’s normally pretty good about being afraid—but the thing is, he’s not sure she’d do anything different than the last time.

He crawls back into the window of the Crastle with several papers from Grumbot clenched in his hands. He could try to cut it close and retrieve them tomorrow, but he probably won’t have time, not with the way he brushed off Scar earlier. Indeed, the moment he crawls in, Cleo whips her head around to face him, and does not punch him. Instead, her hands just shake, and she looks at him with the most furious expression he’s seen on her in a long time.

“Don’t vanish again,” she says.

Joe stares at her.

“Don’t do that again. Gods, Joe, and then you just left Scar there!” Cleo pulls Joe towards her, shaking, into a hug, and Joe stands there. He likes hugs alright. This is a perfectly fine hug. They don’t have that much time, though. He spent most of the rest of his diamonds teasing out everything he could from Grumbot, and Cub would need to crunch the numbers, and given the vault was originally meant to be run soon, Ren is going to confront them any moment to give them a piece of his mind, and the only reason he hasn’t yet is probably that he’s too stressed about the actual vault, Joe’s not sure, but it all happens so fast once it starts and he’s too tired to miss it.

“Sorry,” he says, and it’s genuine, for all he’ll do it again.

“Did you know you’re a moron?” Cleo says.

“I think I’ve done pretty well, given the circumstances,” Joe says.

“I listened to the tapes.”

“I told you to.”

“Gods, Joe, how many times—”

“They’re conveniently numbered. Just because I’m the only person who knows the NATO alphabet—”

“Joe,” Cleo says, and she stops, and she pushes Joe back to search his face. Joe searches hers back, because it seems polite. “Scar said you said something about scripts.”

“You know I love you, right?” Joe says.

“I’m not asking,” Cleo says. “I don’t want to know the answer. That’s existentially horrifying. I’m not asking. I want to knock you out. I want to keep you out of this. You know that, right? I want to…”

“Uh, well, objectively speaking, I’m not out of it,” Joe says, trying not to shake through words he’s said some variant of before.

“I’m not going to ask,” Cleo says, “because that will make you feel worse.”

Joe shrugs. He’s not sure it’s feeling worse so much as adding to reasons he feels the way he already does. He doesn’t blame Cleo. He tries not to blame anyone, but out of everyone, he really, really tries not to blame Cleo. She doesn’t deserve any blame. She wouldn’t have anything to do with it if Joe didn’t have so much to do with it.

Cleo looks at him. For all they’ve had this conversation before, Joe can’t read her expression.

“You definitely brought things to help,” Cleo says.

“When wouldn’t I?” Joe says.

“You can be selfish,” Cleo says.

“I’m being a little selfish,” Joe says, which isn’t his line, but it’s probably true. He’s being a little selfish. Not the most selfish he’s ever been, but in doing the easy thing, over and over again, and constantly dragging Cleo into it instead of trying someone else, and he hears rockets outside and he knows it’s Scar, and somewhere there’s Cub, and if Joe weren’t selfish, he wouldn’t keep hurting them, is the thing. It’s an awfully selfish thing, to keep hurting people to make yourself feel better.

“You know, in the movie, he uses the time loop to teach himself new skills. To do everything he’d wanted to do but never could. You know that, right?”

“He also uses it, in the end, to help people,” Joe says. “I mean. That’s what gets him out of it. The fact that he helps people, and falls in love, and also that the world wasn’t ending, I think. That helps too.”

“Gods, Joe.”

“Scar said that too, but I’m not any god, I’m just—”

“Joe Hills, from Nashville Tennessee, having the worst few days of your life?” Cleo says.

Joe is quiet.

“They might not be the worst,” Joe says. “They might just—I think we’ve got a good chance, this time.”

“Do you actually believe that?”

Joe smiles, like he does, and nods, but he doesn’t think it’s particularly convincing, because Cleo wears an expression he never, ever, ever wants to see again on their face.

It is the third time he’s seen it.

Scar tumbles in the window too, interrupting their conversation. His eyes widen when he sees Joe, but he doesn’t say anything other than:

“Cub has an idea, based on what you put in the tapes, but he needs more data.”

“I have this from Grumbot.”

“Oh, good, I’ll tell him to get here. Also, I shot the king, so I think I’m technically a traitor to the crown now?”

Cleo barks out a laugh. “Good for you,” she says. “Good for you.”

That night, the ants under Joe’s skin get worse as Cub crunches numbers. Cleo paces outside the door. Ren hasn’t shown up yet, which is expected, unless Scar shooting Ren this time has changed the timing for when Ren leaves his vault and comes to find them. Scar sits in the windowsill, watching the moon. Joe gets snarled at every time he tries to leave by either Scar or Cleo, so Joe stays in bed, and he hums “I Got You Babe” periodically to himself. He should hum it in the morning instead, he thinks, but he never remembers too when his alarm goes off, because his heart is normally still pounding, and remembering to make funny movie references in the middle of his whole life being a funny movie reference is surprisingly hard.

Eventually, Scar crawls next to Joe in bed and falls asleep where Joe isn’t, and Cleo is still pacing outside when Cub pushes back from the computer and, very calmly, throws his sword at the ground. He aims it so true that it makes a ‘thud’ instead of a properly loud noise, and Scar doesn’t wake up. It’s an impressive trick. One day, when Joe has more time and more energy, he’ll learn it.

“I don’t have enough information,” Cub says.

“Oh,” Joe says, not that surprised. He’d been hoping. That’s okay. They’ll try their best tomorrow, and however far they make it into the next day, and then Joe will try again.

“I think the universe connecting to ours has really different rules than our universe. I don’t think their gravity is different so much as their… reality? It runs on different rules for how reality works. When it collides with ours, its reality and our reality are trying to compete for which is in-charge.”

“Hold on,” Joe says, and he pulls out his tape recorder. “Say that again, while we’re still on this segment. Just so I don’t lose it.”

“Right,” Cub says, and then he says what he said again. Once he’s done, he pauses for a moment before continuing. “What’s happening in your accounts is—basically, the universe competing for ours has a lot more reality-bending going on in it, and that reality bending in turn is making it so we don’t exist anymore. Which, uh, doesn’t sound pleasant, honestly. Doesn’t sound pleasant at all.”

“It isn’t!” Joe says cheerfully.

“Well, we’ll have to do our best to stop it. I just—”

“That’s more than I knew before,” Joe says. He’d get up, but Scar is comfortably splayed across his lap, almost certainly in a cat-like attempt to prevent Joe from moving. It’s worked, to Joe’s consternation.

“It’s not enough,” Cub says. “It starts soon, right? We’ll have to get more information while it’s happening. That’s our one shot.”

Joe knows this. Joe also knows it’s too late by then. He doesn’t really want to say that out loud, though, because then Cub will get sad, and also it sounds like he’s given up, then, and for the people who don’t relive it, but instead stay in that purple haze together, giving up is probably a very, very cruel thing to do. Instead, Joe nods slowly.

“We can do that,” he lies.

Cub looks at him sharply. “Can we?” he says.

“I mean,” Joe says.

“Hm,” says Cub. “I’ll prepare for it.”

There’s something about the flat dismissal in Cub that hurts far more than Cleo and Scar’s angry worry. He can see from the shape of Cub’s shoulders that it’s not that Cub doesn’t care. He can see from the shape of Cub’s shoulders that Cub knows exactly how hopeless it is. He can see a lot of things.

“I’m sorry,” Joe says. “It’s instinct.”

Cub looks up. He looks at Joe. “You know what? I understand that. I understand that.”

Joe snorts. “Glad you understand then.”

“Not at all a problem, my friend. Not a problem.”

They both stay up the rest of the night.

They don’t leave in the morning to start their final countdown. Instead, someone else finds them.

“Open up, you fiends and traitors! You have been sentencethed by the King to death, and hard labor! Like, seriously dudes, not cool to ditch a man in his hour of needeth! Or a Crown!”

“I was always going to betray you!” Cleo shouts back, slamming inside and barring it shut.

“So, Joe,” Cub says easily. “Can we take Ren in a fight?”

“I have no idea why you’re asking me,” Joe says. “I don’t know what I have to do with that.”

“I mean, you’ve seen it before,” Cub says. “You’d know. You’d know.”

“Yeah, but like, you already know the answer, don’t you?” Joe says, grumpy and filled with nervous energy. He can hear the hours tick down in his head. He can feel his skin vibrate more and more and more. It isn’t long now. It isn’t long now.

“I think a better question is, do we need to beat him in a fight?” Cleo asks. “Because like, he’s… just Ren.”

“WHY HAST THOU, MY ONLY LOYAL COURT, BETRAYETH…ED? BETRAYETHED? WHY HAST THOU BETRAYETHED ME?”

“I mean, can we let that live?” Scar says. “Personally, after shooting him once, I hunger for blood.”

“You say that so casually that it disturbs me,” Cleo says.

“Haha, yeah,” Cub says.

“I mean, not really? He’s just kind of annoying,” acknowledges Joe. “If we want any final numbers from Grumbot before it begins, we need to leave, though. We could stay holed up here, but that loses that final opportunity, because in two hours it gets too dangerous to get that close to the Rift, so we don’t have much time.”

“Cool. In that case, I’ve been waiting a long time for this.”

Cleo pulls out her axe. Joe, Cub, and Scar, all equally wise in the world for all one of them has more experience in predicting what will happen in this exact moment, step back.

Cleo kicks down the door. It’s very unnecessary, but it’s understandable. There’s a slightly unhinged grin on her face. On the other side, Ren is wide-eyed.

“Hello, King Ren,” Cleo says.

“Er, hello, my fair Cleo,” Ren says. “Have I ever said your hair looks lovely? Like a hundred mambas in the sunset.”

Cleo momentarily pauses. “What?”

“Yeah, you know. Like… like a mamba sunset,” Ren tries.

“You know what, that doesn’t make me feel any less like killing you,” Cleo decides, and Ren yelps.

“Wait, wait, wait, what do you mean, what do you—”

Cleo cuts his head off in one fell swoop. “You have no idea how satisfying that was. He’s respawning in the nether. We have time to go get to Grumbot.”

“I know how satisfying it was,” complains Scar. “I did it first, you know.”

“And I’m sure it was just as impressive!” Joe says as Cleo marches down the stairs.

“It was,” Scar says. “I used momentum and everything.”

Joe pats Scar on the back. “You should show me one day.”

Scar thinks about it for a while. “Joe, I think I show you pretty frequently, actually. Are you okay? Are the time loops getting to you worse than you said before?”

“Oh. Yeah. You do. I probably shouldn’t invite you to show me more killing things with a bow, actually,” Joe says.

“Too late!” Scar says.

“You know, this is why we’re friends with you,” Cub says conversationally, which sounds somewhere between a compliment and an insult. Joe takes it as both.

They make it to Grumbot in time. The whole place feels electric. Joe’s whole body tries to prevent him from walking closer. Luckily, Joe became apathetic to the danger signals his body tries to send him like, at least twenty repetitions ago, so it doesn’t stop him from going forward. It does stop the others, who are wide-eyed and startled. Joe offers them a smile that he has to force onto his face. He knew that they wouldn’t be coming. They never do. It’s okay; they’re invaluable when it actually begins.

He drops himself down into the cave. Everything is hazy and purple. Grian is pacing.

“Joe?” Grian says, turning around. His voice is oddly staticy.

“Hey, Grian,” says Joe. He knew Grian would be here. He’s always here. Joe tries not to blame him.

“What are you doing here. It’s not safe, Joe, it’s not safe.”

“Come over here, Grian. I’m almost out of diamonds to talk to Grumbot. I could use some of yours.”

“It’s not safe, Joe,” Grian says, frozen in place. Joe taps his feet. He has to do this. This part—he has to do this. He doesn’t have much time. Sometimes, he skips this part. He feels horrible when he does, but he skips it, because by now, Joe normally knows if there’s actually any odds he’ll succeed this go-round, and so far, the answer’s been ‘no’. So sometimes—

Joe puts a diamond in Grumbot and presses the button. A paper comes out without the question. Joe, unflinching, reads it.

“It says, I DON’T WANT TO LOSE MY FATHER.”

Grian stares at Joe, wide-eyed.

“I don’t blame you,” Joe says. “I don’t. I try very hard so I don’t.”

“I don’t know what’s happening,” Grian says. “I came to check and it was like this. I have to fix it. I have to fix it, Joe.”

“You can’t,” Joe says.

“What?” Grian says.

“Come on,” Joe says. “Come with me. Uh, Grumbot, here’s a diamond, I had to get the last data from you, too.”

Grumbot does not add any commentary with the numbers that Joe would spend a loop or two trying to learn the meaning of, if he didn’t have so little time if he wants to save the world and get out of here anytime soon.

“Thanks,” Joe says, and then he grabs Grian by the hand and lights a rocket. It takes a moment before he stops having to drag the weight of Grian out ot the hole in the ground and onto the soft earth above it. Scar yelps and runs over to Grian, checking over the bruise from where Joe had been gripping it.

“I don’t know what’s wrong,” Grian says.

Scar looks up at Joe. “Should I throw him at Impulse or Pearl?”

“Yeah, probably,” Joe says, as grateful as the first time Scar had suggested it. He really doesn’t understand Grian, and really can’t be that close to him for that long right now, but he doesn’t blame him, he really doesn’t. To be honest, it’s hard to care. It’s also hard to bother.

“I’ll tell them he’s here,” Scar says. He pauses before leaning down to whisper something to Grian. Suddenly, very intensely, Joe wants to know what Scar is whispering. He doesn’t ask. It’s not his business.

Joe hands Cub the data. He tells everyone to don their armor. Then, they start going. Joe tells them that they’re going to the shopping district portal. That’s actually a lie. He claims to want them in the nether before it begins. He doesn’t. It doesn’t matter where they are; being in the nether is probably a pretty bad plan, actually. The lie’s the easier one, though. He can’t exactly say why they’re actually going in the direction they’re going.

Behind him, Joe hears TNT. Scar yelps.

“Oh, Doc’s yelling about you stealing diamonds,” Cub says.

“What? I only stole a few!” Scar says, panicked. “I hardly stole any! He has so many, guys! He has so many diamonds!”

“MY FARM!” yells Doc.

“What farm?” Scar says. “Joe, what farm?”

“You should really get better at redstone,” Cub says.

“Yeah, uh, good luck with that,” Cleo says.

“I swear, they weren’t near any of his redstone thingiOH GEEZ,” Scar says, and Doc descends on them. Scar runs away, in the manner of someone exceedingly guilty. Joe watches them go.

The remaining three of them are silent for a while.

“So, you’re the one who stole them. That’s one of the reasons you needed Scar,” Cub says.

“Yeah,” Joe says.

Cleo wheezes.

The place Joe wants it to begin is his pinball machine. It’s a very selfish thing. It doesn’t matter where it all begins, really; everywhere is hit about the same, and everywhere starts to warp, no matter what they’ve planned. It’s all about surviving after that, really, and that’s the part that they don’t always do so well at. It’s almost noon. It will be 12:31 PM when it begins.

Still, Joe leads them to the trench under his pinball machine like it matters, to the floor he’d replaced with Cleo next to his skeleton farm, to a place underneath waves and wind and that he associates with safety almost despite himself. It’s not very safe. There’s an alarm clock next to the bed.

“What now?” Cleo asks.

“Survive long enough to get Cub’s data,” Joe says. “That’s all. Then I get what I can from Cub, and—”

“That doesn’t sound like you think we’ll make it,” Cleo says.

“I should wait outside,” Cub says.

“You don’t have to. I shouldn’t have left Scar to Doc. You don’t have to,” Joe says, and he’s startled at how shaky his voice sounds. He’d been wondering if apathy had set in.

He’s tired, but not yet. Not yet.

“Okay,” Cub says. “If it all ends—”

“You won’t know, I don’t think. I mean, that’s how time loops work, right? That’s how they work.”

“Okay,” Cub says, his voice oddly small. “Okay.”

“Joe, Joe, I said I wouldn’t ask,” Cleo says. The clock counts down. “I said I wouldn’t ask. How many times have we done this, Joe? I just need you to tell me. We have the rest of today and a bit of tomorrow, so I shouldn’t ask now, but—how many times have we done this?”

Joe is quiet.

“I don’t always make you go to the pinball machine,” he says instead.

“Thank you,” Cleo says.

“We could make it,” Joe says. “I had a good feeling this time. I did. I thought we might do it.”

Cub wraps an arm around Joe and pulls him close. “You know, it’s okay if we don’t, right? It’s okay if we don’t. You’ll figure it out, won’t you? That’s the Joe Hills difference. The man who conquers death.”

It’s a testament to how many times Joe’s had this conversation that he doesn’t start crying. He doesn’t, though. He just leans into Cub’s hold and stares at the ceiling. They really are close, is the thing. He can taste it. They aren’t quite there, true, but they’re going to collect more data in—the clock is counting down—it will be 12:31 when it begins.

“We’re close,” Joe says. “We’re close.”

“We don’t have to be,” Cleo says.

Joe laughs. “Yeah, you’re right.”

The clock counts down.

It begins, and then—

Joe hits the alarm clock, rubbing his eyes. It’s 6 AM on a Monday again, and he’s in the hole under his pinball machine, just as he always is at 6 AM on a Monday again. He lies there on his bed for several minutes. Already, the night before is slipping from his memory. Already, he has so much to do; the timeline is short, if he’s going to get everything done.

Shakily, Joe fishes a tape recorder out of his pockets. He scans his inventory. Cub had tried to write a note this time. It’s corrupted, but the tape recorder isn’t. The recorder is fine. They’re so close, Joe can taste it. Cub had almost figured it out, this time, Cleo had stood there in front of him, Scar had—

The other universe, it’s familiar. It’s shared with some of them. They figured it out. They did! Joe almost feels optimistic now, he, he—

He throws his alarm clock against the wall. It shatters into pieces.

He’s so close. He can taste it.

He wants to go home.

But he’s so close. They’d gotten a name this time. They had! Something about a Jimmy?

Joe doesn’t know what a Jimmy is. But they’re close. They’re so close. And he’s gotta keep going. Gotta say what he can. He can do it.

He takes a deep breath. He fishes the alarm clock from the wall and props the broken clock up next to his bed. It looks surprisingly nice. Broken alarm clocks are gonna be the new chic, you know?

Anyway, he knows what he has to do.

He takes his time, but he doesn’t have much of it. You’d think he would, this being a time loop and all, but he really doesn’t.

“Hermitcraft Season Nine, episode—who knows? I think it probably doesn’t matter what episode it is—Hermitcraft Season Nine, episode thirty-something, segment beta-hotel. It’s sure Monday again, but as it turns out, I’m feeling good! We got close this time, I can taste it, I really can…”