Scar looked around in confusion, glancing at the companions that stood alongside him and looking to them for answers to a question he didn't yet ask, but also didn't have to. The baffled expressions they all wore, identical to his own, told him they were thinking the exact same thing.

Since they had stopped in the middle of the street, the crowd of people dressed in casual, modern clothing had grown as they once more gawked and photographed them, yet even little Daisy was too confused by what was going on to feel nervous about it all.

Scar frowned behind his mask, lifting his hand slightly and wriggling his fingers in the air as he inspected it casually, turning it over to look at both sides.

"I... What the hell?! I don't understand. Just a second ago we were asking around about Cratos, then the next we were here. That couldn't have been a dream or Illusion, could it?"

Cynthia asked, although she avoided her usual habit of forming a question mark above her head. These people were already annoying enough, they didn't need to be made worse by seeing her doing something that no cosplayer could ever hope to recreate, no matter how good their crafting skills were.

Daisy and Alexandra were still adjusting to the sudden change to answer, but Scar's mind was already whirring as he turned over his hand. He stared at the scar on his palm, the one he had strangely based his name off of and was the permanent reminder of what he was.

Yet missing from that hand was the twisted and pink burned skin he had given himself only a few hours ago. His healing factor had advanced tremendously since as he had evolved throughout the stages, and had already started to cause the lesser burns to fade, but it wasn't nearly good enough to have completely eradicated them in such a short amount of time.

If it was a dream then it would make perfect sense that they were missing. But he had felt the pain of acquiring them, even if it was muted and more of a tingling feeling. His companionship with pain was his closest, even more so than his relationship with Astra.

Pain was his most loyal mistress, even if he wished that she wasn't. Even still, because of that Scar felt he could easily detect the difference between the real and the fake when it came to pain. At least, that's what he hoped.

"That was definitely not a dream. Illusion is still on the table, but it would have to be an incredibly powerful illusionist to fool all of us so perfectly. Especially with our various senses and abilities. If I had to guess, I'd say it's something even worse than that.

Cyn, baby sit for a few minutes. Make sure Daisy doesn't wander off with anyone or that your girlfriend doesn't punch anyone out. We still don't know what's going on here."

"Hey!"

Both girls protested simultaneously, upset at the insinuation that they would need a baby sitter, but for different reasons. However Cynthia just gave Scar a thumbs up as he quickly moved through the gathering crowd, ignoring their protests entirely.

Once he was out of the crowd, who were already starting to ask all sorts of questions about their appearance and presence, with one even asking if they were aliens here to probe them. However Cynthia quickly shut that down before the weirdo could answer Daisy's question on the specifics of what probing was.

He seemed like the type who would get far too detailed.

Scar quickly approached the woman he had spoken to yesterday, who happened to be in the exact same place and taking pictures, just as she had been last time. Once again, he did his best to sound friendly.

"Hi there, This might sound like a strange question. But do you recognise me?"

The woman half smiled and half frowned, seemingly wondering if this was some strange pick up line while still being amused by the strangeness of it all.

"No, I can't say I do. Oh, wait! Are you supposed to be dressed up as one of those Ring Lords from that movie? You do look all spooky and fantastical."

Scar nodded softly, letting out a slightly forced laugh that the woman didn't seem to pick up on.

"Yes, that's me. A Ring Lord, well done. I was wondering if you could help me with a little something."

He went on to give her the same story as last time, almost repeating the entire conversation word for word. The only small differences here and there were mainly down to his poor memory. I mean who memorises every word of a random conversation they had with a stranger? He could hardly be blamed for it.

But once more, the woman confirmed that the date was, still, October 21st. The day of the apocalypse, again. It was arguably the worst day to relive, yet here he was doing it for the third time, apparently. Wonderful.

With his suspicions growing, Scar pulled his group from the crowds, convincing them once again with the strange cosplaying excuse. It was a dreadful excuse the first time, and was even worse this time. Yet these people just bought it. Perhaps it was easier than believing a woman was actually made of slime.

Once they were clear of people, he made short work of disclosing the details of his conversation with the woman, leading them to come to the same conclusion as him. It was Alexandra that was the one to officially say it, as she muttered under her breath,

"God... It's a time loop, isn't it? Please, I don't want to be stuck in Looper."

"Looper wasn't a time loop movie." Scar couldn't help but correct her, as he continued, "I mean... There was time travel in it, but there wasn't a time loop like this. This is more like the one with Bill Murray."

"What? You mean Zombieland?"

"No, the other one you block head. Zombieland didn't even have time travel in it!"

"Who's Bill Murray?" Daisy asked softly, tilting her head as she looked up at them innocently.

Although the question was innocent, it was like a cold knife stabbing into Scar's heart, making him feel like he had aged a hundred years and was officially classed as ancient despite the fact he was only... actually how old was he?

He had spent months in that infinite void world, although he wasn't entirely sure how many months. It kinda made him lose track of his birthday. The fact they didn't exactly use calenders anymore and mostly focused on day to day life rather than dates, didn't help either.

If anyone asked, he would just say 27. That sounded about right. Although to someone like Daisy, maybe 27 was considered truly ancient.

He shuddered at the thought and quickly put it out of his mind, patting Daisy softly on the head.

"Doesn't matter sweetie. You did good fighting with the pirates. Now I want you to go with the big scary lady and see if you can find anything odd."

"Big scary... Just because you've got some fancy new title doesn't mean I won't kick your ass string bean."

"Just do me a favour and keep her out of trouble will you? We don't know exactly what we are up against or the rules of this time loop. So I'm counting on you to keep her safe."

Scar winked at Daisy, clearly directing the 'look after her' comments towards the little girl, as if she was the one in charge, causing Daisy to giggle softly. Alexandra wasn't as amused as she huffed in annoyance and stomped off. She only stopped for a second to let Daisy catch up and lifting the little metal girl up onto her shoulders before they carried on. Watching them leave, Scar chuckled to himself and nodded down the street.

"Come on, You're with me. We've got some investigating to do of our own. Before anything bad happens, We need to understand how this works. For example, why do we still remember what happened while the others don't."

As Scar and Cynthia started to walk down the streets, still drawing some amused looks, Cynthia tilted her head and considered the question.

"You're right... I didn't even think of that. Maybe it's the mutations, these people are mortals after all."

"Perhaps... but they are living the day of the apocalypse. Meaning statistically at least a dozen of them got some mutations, plus the animals. Yet there is nothing, no one is different. As far as I can tell, no one is freaking out about missing people either.

So no one is missing, and the dead come back to life at the end of the loop. Even we popped back to where we started entering rather than the start of the day, yet no one has seen anything strange at all. What's wrong with this picture?"

Cynthia frowned deeply, processing everything he had said, before the realisation dawned on her.

"The others! The one's who reported the ghost pirates in the first place. Shouldn't they be stuck with us? Why haven't the people said anything about them?!"

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