It's different this time. She appears standing in a blank white room, looking around at the padded cell-esque walls. Of all the weird forms this unnatural place has taken, this might be one of the worst.
"Right on schedule."
She turns, already glaring, to face the person in the black mask. Ere smirks at her, and she involuntarily shudders. They're wearing her face, but that's not her smile.
She doesn't know who they are, or where this is, or any real information. Ere looks exactly like her, down to the dents in their armour, but they're not a perfect copy. They don't have the same voice, or the same mannerisms. Talking to them is like looking into a distorted mirror.
"How long is this going to go on?" she demands, stomping a foot in impatience. "This has got to be, what, the sixth time I've gotten those axes through my chest? When am I going to be done?"
The other her tips their head to the side, assessing her through the eyeholes of the small black mask. "You're not gonna like this, but you're not even close. You're not changing enough. I told you, Scorpio. It's all about trial and error."
"Don't call me that. My name's Jesse." she snaps. She's tired of getting the same answer over and over. She doesn't like changing things, doesn't want to trek down increasingly dangerous paths. But she's also getting so, so sick of this pattern.
"I just want to get out of these goddamn loops." she growls.
Ere nods. "And you will. When you get it right."
She's about to come back with another snippy remark when there's a strange popping noise, and a new person appears near Jesse and the masked mirror version of her. They look startled, glancing panickedly around for a few moments before sighing and lowering their head.
She watches this newcomer with interest. They're around the same height as her, with tanned skin and messy brown hair. She's never seen anyone other than her inverted duplicate before, and wonders what they could possibly be doing here. They're not...they couldn't possibly be another victim of the loops, could they?
Ere's expression hardens as they turn to look at the new person. Abruptly, they shift, becoming a copy of them instead of her. "How...what the hell are you doing here? You're not supposed to die again for another full day at least."
The new person ducks their head again, scratching at the back of their neck awkwardly. A lock of brown hair falls in the way of their dark eyes as they guiltily say, "Ah...I may have made a mistake. I'm not totally sure what I did wrong, but Aiden uh...kinda stabbed me."
"Stabbed you?" Ere exclaims.
"Aiden?!" Jesse asks, her interest piqued even more.
The second person raises their head, looking at her as if just noticing her for the first time. "Yeah, him. Who are you?"
"This is Scorpio. She's another catalyst." the masked person says in a disinterested voice. "How on earth could you let this happen? I knew you were a troublesome one, but I didn't think even you could mess up this bad!"
They shrug. "Like I said, I don't know what I did. But I'll be able to go back and try again anyways, so how much does it really matter?"
Puzzle pieces are slowly fitting together in Jesse's mind. "So...you are part of these loops too. You keep repeating the same adventure, coming here when you die and resetting back to before you died?" she asks.
They nod easily. "Yeah." they say in an almost eerily offhand way. Like her, they've clearly already been going through this for a while. "I've already won the fight on Sky City three times- I don't quite get what happened this time around."
"He's become aware." Ere growls. "Somehow, somewhere along the line, Aiden's become aware of the timelines. And with you dead...you're no longer the catalyst of this loop. Goddammit, Sagittarius. You don't even know how much trouble you've just caused."
"It's not my fault!" the second person- Sagittarius? -protests. "I don't know what happened! It was an accident."
The masked duplicate of them glares coldly. "There are no accidents."
A now-familiar tingling feeling suddenly ripples through Jesse, making her shudder. She looks down to see her armoured feet beginning to glow and fade, signaling that she's returning to the world.
Ere turns, shifting back to match her appearance as they look at her again. "Good luck, Scorpio. I'll be seeing you back here soon enough."
"Don't call me that." she snaps as more of her body disappears.
Sagi steps slightly closer to her, watching her fade. Then they look at the masked person. "When will we be done? How long is this going to go on?" they ask confrontationally.
Again, Ere's appearance changes to match the individual they're speaking to. Their voice is low and ominous, almost threatening.
"Until you get it right."
=====
continuation (??) of the previous story :]
this is becoming a Thing and I'm not sorry hehe
EDIT: the catalysts are now named Zodiacs instead of numbers