The Loop

Chapter 4: The Help.

Not even 30 minutes in and he's already felt like leveling the whole building to the ground. With a click of his tongue, he made a move to get the fuck out of the place. He can't keep holding himself like this.

With a slam of his hand and a bubbling necessity to sigh, he got up and left the place, he sought to never come back. Ever.

^8^

He came back.

He can't help but have this nagging feeling behind his mind. If he gives up for such a trivial reason while not knowing how much more time he will have to spend in this loop, he will end up suffering fate far worse than death. That is losing his mind.

He's seen what it does to people, and it was never pretty. Never good. Never nice. He doesn't want that to happen to him. Like hell he'd allow it to happen to himself.

With the motivation set, he walked back. It was still early in the morning, so he was expecting the place to be pretty quiet as most of the people would have to be attending school by this hour.

What he didn't expect however was that most of the people who come to this place truly don't have a life. The majority of them are the same people from the last loop. Except they have bags under their eyes.

A new sight that he's yet to see is like a breath of fresh air for the albino. He has something else to do for later, he thought with a slight satisfaction.

He navigates through the place, checking out every machine he his eyes landed on and trying them out. Not many of them are really that interesting. Claw machine for example. For someone who literally calculated vectors in real time in a split second, moving them manually felt just like his power except it's more bland and boring.

Oh, and did I mention? That shit grabs things how he'd imagine if your hands were made up of only pinkies.

The only ones so far he'd find remotely enjoyable are the fighting and racing games. They were competitive and required actual skills to excel in. Unlike rhythm games. That game sucked. You need to have good reaction times, something the likes of him truly lacks in.

Slowly he learns the movesets, taking his time memorizing each and every one of them. His supercomputer-like brain leaves no flaws in his execution, but his muscle memory is rusty. His fingers are rigid as he moves the controller, occasionally messing up but manages to pull through.

It was when he achieved his first win that he finally truly understood what victory meant. A hard-earned, blood soaked win that took every ounce of his ability to achieve, it made him feel proud, sweat running down his forehead as he eyes the shining golden font in front of his eyes. It's delightful, fulfilling and satisfying, that's what victory felt like.

More and more he played. Winning and losing both felt exhilarating. He was unknown to them and he knew nothing of them. They have the experience and he has the talent. An adrenaline rush filled game that is balanced and not one-sided.

He'd fought so many opponents, playing for so many hours, he didn't even realize it's already 9 pm, nor did he realize the crows surrounding him. They were watching him with content, cheering him on. He was confused, but it made him feel nice about himself. He'd never received support for doing something he enjoys before.

Behind Accelerator is a pair of brown eyes. Watching him with slight unease. She blinked, shook her head and left the place.

The game went on until midnight.

^8^

Twice he spent an entire day there, sitting still on a single chair for a questionable duration. And the fact that his back had only been hurting because of the loop instead of the amount of hours spent sitting both relieved and pissed him off.