. ...... O_ O . [O .|] _ (Iteration 16. Observe: Subject state [error/negative emotion]. Continue action/observation.) The thought felt less clinical now, almost... smug. 6:58 AM. Kitchen. Apple. Eye symbol with its single dot. The loop felt less like a glitch and more like a cage.
An hour and fifteen minutes. Repeated sixteen times now. Over twenty-one hours trapped in the same five-minute window. Elias leaned his forehead against the cool glass, the eye symbol inches away. His attempts at communication were blocked. His physical disruptions were erased. His arrangements were reset. The system observed, occasionally dropped a cryptic breadcrumb like the apple or the dot, but offered no explanation, no escape.
He pushed away from the window. Despair was counterproductive. He was an analyst. Analyze. What hadn't he tested? He'd focused on what he did within the loop, but not precisely when. The reset triggered exactly at 7:03 AM. What happened in the milliseconds leading up to it? Could he inject an action, an intent, into that transitional moment?
And what about the outside world? He'd confirmed the loop reset his apartment, but the figure on the roof... that had been external. Was the outside world also looping? Or was his apartment an isolated instance, a bubble reality? If he focused his intent outside the window just before the reset, could he affect something? Could he even perceive something beyond the boundary?
He looked at the clock. 7:00 AM. He had a plan. Risky, perhaps pointless, but different.
He ignored the apple, the eye symbol. He walked to the window and slid it open a few inches, letting in the cool morning air and the muted city sounds. The sounds seemed normal, not looped, but could he trust his senses anymore?
He focused on a specific object across the street: a blue recycling bin placed on the curb, ready for pickup. It was mundane, unremarkable, unlikely to be a deliberately placed variable like the apple.
He waited. 7:01 AM. He kept his eyes fixed on the blue bin, excluding everything else.
7:02 AM. He gathered his mental energy, not in frustration or questioning, but in focused intent. He visualized the bin tipping over onto its side. He didn't scream it, didn't command it. He just held the image, the desired outcome, projecting it outward, aimed at that specific point in space-time.
Now. As the clock ticked from 7:02:59 to 7:03:00, he pushed the intent with all his will, trying to bridge the gap between his mind and the external reality in that final instant before the reset.
He blinked.
Kitchen. 6:58 AM. The window was closed.
. ....... O_ O _ [O _] [O .|] . (Iteration 17. Observe: Subject acts [external entity action]. [Deviation state] confirmed.)
He scrambled to the window, peering out. The street looked exactly the same. The blue recycling bin stood upright on the curb, unmoved. His attempt had failed. Or, perhaps, the external world had reset along with his apartment. There was no way to know.
He sighed, turning away from the window in defeat. Another failed hypothesis.
But as he turned, his gaze fell upon the eye symbol taped to the glass. His breath caught.
Inside the pupil, next to the first minuscule dot, was a second dot. Perfectly identical, positioned slightly beside the first.
Two dots.
His external focus, his attempt to interact at the boundary, hadn't changed the outside world, but it had registered. It had triggered another modification to the symbol. The system wasn't just reacting to his presence or his emotions; it was tracking his intent, his focus, especially when directed towards the edges of the loop itself. The rules were complex, the feedback cryptic, but it was feedback. Two dots. What did two dots mean?