#11

#8

"Wanna know a secret?"

"Daniel, it's 3 AM on a Monday."

The disgruntled groan and pillow over the head didn't seem to deter the overly energetic boy.

"Is that a yes?"

Another agonizing groan and what sounded like him whispering 'don't kill him, you don't have the energy to hide a body' over and over again like a mantra.

"Fuck off!" He pushed the gremlin squatting on his nightstand roughly, ignoring the loud 'oof' he let out.

However, when the sound of a body hitting the floor never came, Zack opened his eyes and turned around. Daniel was hanging precariously on the curtain while his feet still remained partially on the nightstand. Zack blinked, then shoved the other's feet off.

"Ooof" And the sound of the curtain rod hitting something hard then falling onto the floor and someone scrambling around in his failed curtains.

Zack reached for his earplugs and pulled the pillow over his head again. He was not doing this today!

Poke.

Poke.

He swatted the offending hand away with vitriol.

Poke. Poke.

He discreetly reached for the chemistry book beneath the bed and pulled it close to him, ready to strike.

Poke.

Thunk!

After that, the night was quiet, with no more poking.

#9

It was a wonderful day in Seoul and Danny was an awful person. And if it happened that Eugene was on the receiving side of him choosing violence that day, well it was simply bad luck~

It started with him coming into Eugene's office out of nowhere with an obviously fake neon green mustache and a box of spiders, which was promptly yeeted at the president and shattered all over his desk. A sharp high-pitched scream had his men tumbling into the office before they took a look at the little black devils skittering everywhere and booked it out without another backward glance.

It took almost three hours until they finally managed to get rid of all the spiders and shards and coax the mini evil-doer down from the chandelier. The spawn of chaos that was Danny had long since escaped the building, leaving behind only his fluffy green mustache attached to a cardboard cutout of one of their female streamers.

Eugene was displeased but chalked it up as a one-off thing, a sort of petty revenge from a man who could do nothing more to him. Oh, how wrong he was.

After the spiders came the baby crocodiles with lightsabers strapped to their backs. That was an ordeal that left the teen president quite paranoid since it had taken place in his personal apartment.

The third attempt wasn't stopped by his quadrupled security nor their new fancy gear. After all, Daniel was a one-man army, stupid electric fences and radars were no match for the ungodly amount of caffeine and pure spite that fueled his revenge. Judging by the screams and colorful curses, Eugene and him were on the same page.

Another terrorizing attempt successfully completed, Danny pulled out his list and checked another item off. Unfortunately, despite being useful for the drip, his makeshift batman mask was a bit hard to see through, so he had to take it off to read the next item on the list.

"Hmmm, okay, let's see... Spiders? Check. Baby alligators with light sabers? Check. Possessed Michael Jackson Animatronics? Check. I think I have time for one more before the loop ends...let's see..."

ghosts of all the bugs he's ever killed crawling on his skin? Nah, too tame.

waking up at a furry convention? I think the loop will reset before I have time to wait for this year's furry convention.

injecting him with truth serum before a fancy gala? Too much political drama, and too little chaos.

Daniel paused at the last one, a shark-like smirk overcoming his features.

"This...Heh...This is going to be good...Hehehehe MUAHAHAHHA-"

"Can you knock it off!" His neighbor reinforced his words by knocking on their shared wall rather forcefully.

"Sorry!" Came the boy's sheepish reply.

Even evil masterminds have to be mindful of their manners when committing atrocities, he nodded to himself before returning to the task at hand with an impish smile. He set out to gather his army.

The next day at 9 AM sharp the Worker's main building was invaded by an army of angry middle-aged women, armed with various household appliances, all claiming that the young businessman had seduced their daughters.

"He promised to marry my Lia!" A lady wielding a portable vacuum cleaner shouted indignantly at the poor receptionist, underlining each word with a menacing thump of her weapon onto the counter.

"He already proposed to my daughter!" Another woman chimed in waving a mighty frying pan with a murderous expression.

"Mine's pregnant with his baby!" Came the enraged shouting of another.

"My-"

"He-"

The crowd erupted into outrage, screaming even louder than before and banging onto the walls and floor while trying to speak over one another. Another outrageous comment, another wave of shouting and banging, until the whole street and every employee in the building had stopped to watch the chaos.

Daniel's muffled giggles were abruptly cut off when he felt the telltale tug on his soul that came with every reset.

"No wait, I didn't get to see the aftermath!" He whined, but to no avail.

"At least I get to try out the rest of my ideas in the next loop." He shrugged, downing the remaining chips in the bag.

Polite but feral was the best way to characterize Daniel Park on most days. Today, however, he was just plain flabbergasted. I mean, It's not every day that you wake up back on the day it all started and get to look at yourself in the mirror without being able to recognize your own body. Either of them, actually.

His original body lay on the floor, a soft lump of fat and regrets, while the one he was currently using bore none of the marks that had come from all the fights he had survived. As if the memories written in thin silvery lines across his skin had been washed away by an unforgiving cold wave.

The sink shattered under his tense fingertips but he did not let go of it. Instead, his burning gaze remained fixed onto the mirror as if willing it to admit it was wrong and revert to the reality it had seemingly abandoned in favor of this bitter-sweet illusion. To his dismay, it refused to relinquish the fake image no matter how much he waited. Instead, it was he who first lowered his head onto the cracked remains of his marble sink, stifling a sob as the reality of the matter came crashing down on him like an avalanche.

Denial was over, it came time for anger. But even then, he was much too tired to do anything, nor did he have anything to destroy in sight. At least, nothing he would not regret destroying later. Thus, he settled on clawing at the skin on his back until blood trickled from his nails and down to his elbows. As the blood dripped onto the cold floor below he moved his hands, dragging strips of skin along the entirety of his exposed back. When the pain no longer satisfied him he let his arms fall limply and sunk to his knees, banging his head onto the floor with a muffled thud that left him wondering if anyone was wondering about the noise. His neighbors had been awfully eager to stay out of his way, while expressing their displeasure by loudly banging on the walls in his past- life?

"Take me back."He pleaded into the darkness of his room. "I shouldn't be here."

The moon only stared down at him, cold and unresponsive.

"Please, please"He tried again, though it came out more as a gasp, his chest heavy with sobs he tried to keep at bay.

Failure had never tasted so bitter as when Daniel felt the tin strims of water going down his cheeks. Like a mockery, no matter how much he rubbed at his eyes, the tears never stopped, filling his mouth with the tiny drops of salty water that threatened to drown him. He gasped, clutching his chest as he cried like he hadn't since he was a babe, with tears and hiccups and snot that left him feeling like even more of a pathetic mess than before.

He couldn't tell you how long he laid on the floor, curled with his hands clutching his wildly beating heart and weeping for what was but what could never be again. Sure, he could try to repeat his past experience, sticking as close to the original actions as possible, but it wouldn't be the same. He wasn't the same. Something was fundamentally different about him. Something was broken that last time had been whole. His faith.

Finally, he rose his body and stumbled through washing his face, not quite there. For a second time that night, he rose his face and looked, really looked, at himself in the mirror. He traced unseen scars across his face, trying to commit to memory where each silvery mark and red splotch had been. His body felt so, so awfully wrong. So horribly alien yet familiar to him. Not how it had felt the first time, but similar in a way he couldn't express.

The boy displaced in time could not help but feel as if he had stolen something. Maybe a chance, or a life? It didn't matter.

Acceptance.

He would find his way again, he wasn't lost, merely trying to find his footing again on a path he had taken once already. He could do this.

But not today.

He flopped onto his ratty mattress and cried his heart out until his breathing turned to wheezing and his body felt like turning to mush. Then, he closed his eyes and opened them again, seeing the world from a different angle.

----------

In his last life (it still felt wrong to use the word, but he couldn't find a better way to put it) he had abused his ability to use another body. A body that was attractive and brought his positive attention wherever he went was addictive to him, who had only been even viewed with disgust and contempt by others. He would still use it, of course, but this time he would focus more on the body he had been gifted from mother nature and all of its qualities. Beginning with sewing a few new clothes for his bigger body.

Daniel made quick work of a couple outfits that he felt would suit his bigger body better than his smaller one. His chubby fingers moved swiftly with the needle, although his only source of light was the full moon that was slowly descending out of view and thus, making him have to change his angle several times so as to still keep it in view.

When the sun finally rose off the jagged line of Seoul's horizon he had adopted a calm and collected attitude that he hoped could fool his classmates (no longer his friends) for the day and changed his body. The clothes fit him nicely and although it was still mostly his uniform, with a few pieces changed here and there, like the blue pants that he had swapped out for a pair of black jeans. Adjusting his hair one last time in the mirror he departed, taking the familiar route to school.

He ignored the stares, the whispers, and the ridiculous, over-the-top reactions of the people he passed by, already used to it from the last time. However, he did not miss the hidden eyes of a certain blonde once he entered the class and presented himself (much more casually and without stuttering this time). Nor did he miss the daggers Zack was shooting him for Mira's reaction to his introduction.

When Zoe came and flirted with him he just gave her a small smile while internally cringing. How had he not noticed how bad that line was the first time?

The day passed by in a blur, a few familiar faces here and there, but Daniel was much more focused on that evening and the events to follow. He didn't fall asleep though and thus saved Zoe the embarrassment of being yelled at, not that it changed much of how the girl saw him.

"Home..." the word itself left a bitter taste on the back of his tongue, though perhaps that should be attributed to the amount of dirt and soot that had slipped past his cracked lips in those moments of weakness when he had relapsed to his primal instinct and wept akin to a child who had just killed his first hunt.

Dick felt sick to his stomach as his brother's wails echoed through the cave.

He and Bruce had been the first to respond to his beacon. Batman's antidote didn't work against this new strain of fear toxin, so they had to bring him back to devise a cure. Tim was unresponsive, trapped in whatever hellish illusion Scarecrow's gas had triggered. They had barely been able to get him into the car, with how wildly he was flailing. His limbs struck around violently, uncoordinated. Not trying to attack, but as if he were desperately trying to flee from something. (The smell ozone lingered in the air) Once they'd reached the cave, they had to strap him to the medbay table to keep him from falling off.

And the screams.

God, the screams.

The first one had made Bruce recoil and nearly drop him. None of them had ever heard him scream like that before. It was something out of a nightmare, high-pitched and raw, carrying an unimaginable amount of pain. (Like a death wail) There was a frenzied, tortured quality to it that had Jason stumbling away and tripping when he reached the scene. It had made their blood run cold.

"It's like he's dying." Jason had remarked quietly from the side once they'd moved to another part of the Batcave. The red helmet lay discarded on the table he was leaning on. His face was pale, and there was a tremor barely hidden in his voice. A disturbed look flashed in his eyes, as if he was remembering something. (Pools of swirling green)

Bruce's black gloves squeaked as his fists tightened. He was stone-faced, but his sons could read the worry in his blue eyes. The Batman was just as helpless as them. It made his blood boil. (Electric currents buzzed through the cables on the floor)

The room was bathed in blue light from the Batcomputer. A white cup of cold coffee sat untouched by Jason's elbow next to the keyboard. (An accident waiting to happen) It sat there since the afternoon, when they had been urgently called for an Arkham breakout. Tim's coffee. Dick was suddenly struck by the absurd though that his brother would never leave his coffee around like that. Hysterical laughter bubbled up in his throat, but he swallowed it down. Distantly, he recognised that his fingers were twitching along with his baby brother's screams.

It was all so incredibly wrong. The whole situation was just plain wrong. Red Robin's mask should have held against the gas. Hell, Crane should never have had the time to make a new type of toxin in the first place! It made no sense! (It made no sense to put an ON button inside the machine!)

Muffled screaming could still be heard even though the medbay walls. It was now more hoarse and ragged, as if whoever was making the noise had swallowed a bucket of sand.

Truly, it was a testament to Alfred's strength and devotion that he had stayed and taken care of him through all of it. Meanwhile, they'd fled like cowards into another room, pretending as if they were figuring out a cure, and not hiding from their failure.

The computer was processing the blood samples at an agonizingly slow pace, while they stood there unable to do anything to soothe their brother and son, respectively. The sounds grew more strangled and faint the longer it went on. They'd cut out a few times, when he'd run out of air, but they always inevitably started back up twice as anguished. (Incredible how he so rarely ran out of air, as if he didn't even need to breathe.)

Dick couldn't even imagine what Tim was going through to make him let out such a sound. (Privately, selfishly, he was glad that Damian was not home to witness it.)

With Jason's gun pointed to his head and Batman preoccupied with his third son, Crane had bragged that the gas made you relive your most painful moment. Dick turned a blind eye to his brother using a bit more strength than necessary to knock out the rogue.

They tried to figure out what Tim's worst experience was. Jason brought up the Titan's Tower, Bruce the JJ incident. Dick quietly proposed it could be something from the year he went missing to find Bruce. (Something from before they knew him, something from before he was Tim, something from when he was Da-)

The screams cut off again for a few blissful seconds, then started back up. It was a miracle he could keep going after so long. Dick felt his stomach churn. He'd heard people yell, cry, and shriek before, but this was something different. Something born entirely out of agony. Something guttural, prolonged, and horrible. Something no human should ever be able to produce. (Only something that was no longer human could let out such a scream.)

---------------------------------------------------

DannyTim woke up feeling like he had swallowed glass. His vision was swimming, and his head pulsated painfully. (He hoped he hadn't died this time, or Jason might actually kill him for stealing his gig again.) A sudden wave of searing pain made his muscles spasm painfully.

A big shadow loomed over him. Someone was touching his forehead and speaking to him in a hushed tone. The words were garbled, like he was deep underwater. They should really work on their pronunciation.

"-im.... -nother shot...-eetheart"

There was a pinprick somewhere on the back of his elbow. He tried to pull away, but his arm felt like lead. He let out a scratchy, quiet whimper, and immediately regretted it. The pathetic excuse for a protest left his throat feeling like it had been burned from the inside. The Demon Brat would never let him live this down if he learned of it. The big shadow returned to shushing him and patting his hair. It felt cozy and safe, like Dad.

Darkness once again closed in on him, and he settled for listening to the big shadows rumbling to lull him back to sleep. (He awoke panting from the phantom electricity still coursing through his bones, searing off his flesh and replacing his blood with green-)

Screaming into the night

Danny is reborn as tim.

Tim gets his memories back near the beginning of his robin run when he still has a rocky relationship with Bruce. He’s scared and keeps his mouth shut. This goes on for years never getting the right time to be revealed.

It isn't until the scarecrow uses a new fear gas that it comes up. Tim is hit and has to relive the portal incident. He is screaming with no brakes and does not respond to anyone.

The bat family has idea what he is seeing but they do find out from scarecrows taunting that the gas makes you relive your most painful memories. The entire family is wondering when this happened and when Tim wakes up he is not going to be very forthcoming.

#8 No sleep gang!

Danny: What if the 'g' in 'gif' is silent? Zack: Go the fuck to sleep Danny: What gif I don't want to? Zack: Fuck You

In the midst of the void, daniel knows that he is going through another loop as his soul goes in the process he felt shivers even though he doesn't have a body, it felt to him that someone's hands lingering in his soul like he is being toyed with love? obsession? admiration? adoration? awe? Daniel feels calm as he thinks he knows that person or knows that they won't hurt him. Daniel felt their hands let go of them as he vanishes to his next loop. Daniel Daniel My beloved Daniel No matter what loop we are in, we will be together even after death. You will love me for awe, You will hate me for being obsessive with you. You are our light, and we sacrifice ourselves for you But we will drag you into the abyss for your mind, body, and soul. Again And Again And Again As you are our beloved daniel

"Daniel, my dear? wake up! it's time for school!" Daniel hears a familiar voice. ________ You can interpret it in any way on who the is the person in yellow and black bold. the coloring is already a hint.

Jay didn't know what the empty feeling in his chest was but he detested it. Nevertheless, he endured, knowing that his beloved would soon rejoin him. Soon.

The darkness lit up with the arrival of Daniel's soul. As usual, it waited around for a new loop to start while making silly little shapes out of his forms. Jay snickered at the blue being that resembled a cow and cooed over the cat-shaped one before his darling melted back into a floating blue orb. He adored watching his Danny's antics and shenanigans across the loops, secretly cheering him on each time from the sidelines.

This time Jay felt strangely emboldened and reached out an invisible hand to touch his lover's soul. It shivered and backed away in confusion, but that did not deter him. He sent his feelings of adoration through the void and felt them echo around the little soul. Joy and adulation bubbled in his chest as the little soul tried to curl around him like a satisfied cat expressing its affection.

Of course, his perfect Daniel, his love, would find a way to sense him although he could not see him!

Jay felt as if his heart could burst at that very moment, but he was snapped out of his fantasies by a crack appearing in the void. He clicked his tongue in annoyance and gave the little blue soul another gentle nudge before reluctantly stepping away and allowing him to be engulfed in the light and take to the next cycle.

"My beloved, you will come back to me! No matter how long it takes! You will forever be mine, and mine only!"

With another loving sigh, Jay drifted through the cracks left in the other's wake, eager to join him once more. He slipped through the jagged shards of the void with practiced ease, paying no mind to the infernal shrill sound of his prison mending itself once again. It never matters anyways, since it can never withstand his honey's power and always crumbled before his bright soul. Daniel was just special like that, and it only served to further fuel his obsessive love for the boy. That was partially why he always followed after him.

It didn't matter that he forgot his memories at the beginning of each loop like all the others, the echo of his affections never faded from his heart and they would be reunited before he would be forced to leave again, he just knew it! So each time he was found and his soul was torn from these worlds, he clung to his darling Daniel and dragged him back to the void with him.

Never would he be willing to leave a world alone.

Never would he and his beloved be separated again, no matter how selfishly he had to act.

Never.

They had sworn an oath after all~ And Jay would see it through. No. Matter. What.

small snippet from my WIP

Shards and Splinters | Weeping Embers

Dried leaves fluttered in the breeze, crunching amongst each other as if whispering secrets into the wind to be carried away. The streets lay abandoned, everyone still asleep tightly in their warm beds awaiting the dawn of yet another day like any other before. But today wasn’t going to be a usual day.

From the moment his eyelids opened, and he jolted out of bed breathing as if he had been chased around the whole world by an army of demons Archer Uberto could tell there was something different about today. The sun rose to the skies just like every other morning, drowning the world in light and warmth as it had done perhaps trillions of times before, yet still, the boy could not shake the feeling something was out of place. It wasn’t anything obvious, else he would have noticed by now, like how you’d know if someone had moved your socks from their rightful place, but not if a splinter was missing from your desk. The feeling, although persistent did nothing to deter him from entering back into his routine almost robotically, forgetting about the dream that had startled him awake, or of the pungent smell of creos in his home...

Archer paused repeating the thought that had just passed through his mind. Creos? What even were creos and why did he think of that? A puzzled expression flashed on his face before the shrill ringing of his phone broke his line of thought, pulling him back into reality harshly. His body moved on its own, traversing the neat and clean room all the way to the small bookshelf adorning the whole left wall of his room before turning off that blasted noise, so he could once more rejoice in the softer morning sounds.

A crow stood atop one of the branches that neared his window, silently observing the teen as he exited the building dressed in an old baseball shirt and dark green jeans. It cawed out twice before taking off into the mushy clouds in search of its morning meal.

The sudden flapping of feathers alerted a nearby mouse and sent it scurrying back beneath the dumpster it had crawled from, the dark feathered bird now taking its place, atop the lid that rested on the wall behind it. From there it had a clear view of the lanky teen as he scurried into the backroom, before coming out with a green apron and getting behind the counter, just as the doors of the cafe opened to let in a stream of groggy and grumpy customers who couldn’t be bothered with pleasantries at such an early hour.

Archer sighed in relief upon hearing the bell hung above the door ring one final time that day, the last customer exiting the small Starbucks, coffee in hand. With a sudden sense of accomplishment, the boy grinned to himself, returning to the backroom. He greeted the rest of his colleagues politely and made a bit of small chat before changing from his uniform back into his soft dark jacket and exiting the building while humming a soft tune and swinging his arms in

Page Break

the air as if he were conducting a band of invisible musicians. There were barely any people on the streets at the time to judge him, and even those who saw him as mad he could not be bothered to pay attention to.

Upon crossing the street, he stopped in the middle, waiting for someone to come out of nowhere and run him over, but after a few minutes and not even the sight of a bike, he let out an exasperated sigh and continued on his journey back to his warm bed and fluffy pillow. Perhaps next time he would have more luck, Archer pouted jokingly while swatting a few stray strands of mahogany hair out of his eyes, only for the evening breeze to blow them right back into his face, blinding him momentarily. And it was all it took, just that one moment, he smelled that same scent his room had that morning, and that feeling came back over a thousand times stronger.

He whirled around clutching his sides, as a stinging pain bloomed right where his ribs caged his lungs and the wind picked up, raising clouds of fallen and dried leaves into the air and surrounding him. Archer clenched his eyes tightly, burying his head into his chest, now fully aware that that feeling of something being awfully wrong had not been only in his tired mind.

“There’s no way I’m going to die to a cloud of leaves today” he screeched, before choking on something and falling into a coughing fit, his eyes watering and his ears ringing.

#18

He had been stupid and careless. Again. Only this time it had been someone else who had paid the price.

Hubris.

Danny thought he was untouchable. It's easy to understand why. He was a man who couldn't die, or more accurately, couldn't stay dead. There was nothing anyone could do to him to make him break, not anymore, not after he had repeated his life so many times he could tell you what would come to be in 30 years spot on.

He acted on impulse, and did things without thinking them through because what's the worse that could happen? Excessive pride had let him to provoking Eugene, using his deepest darkest secrets to threaten him, and for what? Fun?

Daniel tempted fate, forgetting that although he was not bound by it others were. His friends were. His mother was. Jay was. And although he knew that, come the next loop, they would not even recall the horrors they had suffered and their broken bodies would mend themselves as if it had all been a mere dream born of a sickened mind, it didn't mean anything to him in the end.

"No" Had been the first word that slipped past his lips when he lay eyes on the mangled corpse of his beloved.

Daniel swallowed the bile, unconsciously cataloging each injury and automatically knowing how it had been done. He knew how those injuries were done because he himself had both experienced and inflicted them on others. He stumbled, suddenly dizzy and vaguely nauseated.

Burn marks covered his darling's once fair skin, almost entirely covering the other wounds present on his torso. There were bruises. Cuts. Punctures. His face was a pale shade of gray and his lips were swollen. His love's last moments had been spent gasping for air, the torturous end deliberately prolonged for the attacker's sick entertainment. The bastards had FUCKING STRANGLED him, slowly...painfully... (cut off their hands~)

Gently, he caressed Jay's cheek and for a moment wished he could pretend that the blonde was just asleep, waiting for Danny to wake him up by peppering him with kisses. Then he took the body in his arms, carefully holding it as if it were made of glass. He took it-HIM! home and laid him on the bed with his arms crossed over his chest like ancient kings.

The funeral was a messy affair filled with sobbing and streaming and blaming. It wasn't how Jay would've wanted. It was horrible and the boy returned home quietly with a gaping hole in his heart.

It didn't take long for the numbness to fade, washed away by the raging storm of anger.

How dare those filthy maggots lay their disgusting hands on his beloved?!

Red...(More~)

Did they think they would get away with their odious actions?!

Blood...(Yes~)

He would make them pay!

Whose blood...?(More~ More~)

They deserved to suffer for their sins!

There were too many of them to count...(MORE!)

He would not forgive them for this!

It didn't matter anymore...(It didnt~)

THEY WOULD PAY!

...the blood...it didn't matter whose it was...(It didn't matter! Just bring us more!)

...

...

...

The loop reset again...It didn't matter...He would continue his mission regardless...they would pay...in blood...with their lives...again...and again...until he would be satisfied...until they learned...until-

The loop tugged at his soul in warning, coiling its dark tentacles around his neck threateningly. No more! it seemed to hiss in his ear. Enough!

Reluctantly, he obeyed.

Pity! I only got to torture them for a measly 20 loops. Well, it just means I have to get more creative! If physical torture was banned it just meant he had to mess with them in other ways. He already had plenty of ideas. After all, the mind was fun to toy with as well! (yes~)

FemSammy & BabyDanny Loop

Sammy: Daniel… Danny: Oh no, 'Daniel' in b-flat. Danny: You're disappointed.