This is the shortest chapter so far. I mean it literally took me a whole day. That's with editing. Still, I hope you enjoy. Don't forget to tell me what you think!
Max smelled ocean water. Which was surprising, given the last thing she remembered was looking at her boyfriend and her best friend in the girl's bathroom. Now, with her eyes still closed, she could smell ocean water and…
Was that sand?
She felt around slowly with her hands and felt hot grains in her fingers. Slowly, she opened her eyes. Unless someone had blew up the toilets and filtered sand in, Max would guess she was at the beach.
Max unintentionally let out a squeak and sat up. She surveyed her surroundings and started to panic when she saw there was no one in sight.
Am I at the beach? Where are Chloe and Warren?
She looked out to the west and saw the lighthouse. Which gave her momentary relief.
At least I'm still in Arcadia Bay.
She walked around a bit, confused. She just realized her feet were bare on the sand. Miraculously, the sand had cooled to a pleasant degree. As she noticed her bare feet, she noticed she was dressed in a plain white t-shirt, a white bra and white shorts. A light, pleasant breeze riffed through her hair.
She looked once more around herself. All she saw was sand, ocean and lighthouse, until her eye caught a brown pier. At the end of said pier, sat a dirty blonde woman clad in a red and black shirt. The woman lifted her hand and brushed hair behind her ears. Blue earrings gleamed back at herself.
Max felt an urge to talk to this woman. It couldn't be who she thought it was. Could it? After all, stranger things have happened.
She approached the woman and awkwardly shuffled her feet. But suddenly the woman turned around. At least her head.
"Hey. You must be Max. I'm Rachel."
"Rachel Amber?"
"The one and only," she smiled pleasantly.
"Where are we? What are we doing here? Are you alive? W-"
"Whoa," she held her hands up, laughing. "Hold the fire. Sit down and chill. You probably haven't done that in forever."
Max huffed. She was dying for answers, but sadly Rachel was right. She hadn't had time to wind down. Ironically, the only winding she's done has been rewinding.
Max sat on the pier on the right side of Rachel. The water was just high enough to put her feet in. The warm water felt pleasing to Max's skin. She sighed in contentment.
"Good?"
"Yeah."
"Good. Now ask your questions. I have a feeling you have a lot of them."
"Uh, sure. Where are we?"
Rachel eyed Max carefully before taking a deep breath. "Limbo," she said carefully.
"Limbo?"
"Limbo. The place between life and death."
"Are you saying that I... died?"
"Yes and no. What I mean is, and, keep in mind, I don't know everything, but whenever you crushed that butterfly, you killed a part of yourself. You lost your powers and a small piece of yourself. I'm going to be honest, I think the shock of suddenly losing your abilities might have exhausted you or nearly killed you, but I know you're still alive."
Max's eyes widened. "How do you know?"
Rachel shrugged. Her voice betrayed sympathy for Max's confusion. "It's hard to describe. It's like I can see you, but I can't really. I'm not going to try, but I'm sure if I tried to touch you, I'd go right through you."
"So I'm basically a ghost?"
"Basically. I can still see your features. Like your freckles, your brown hair and your blue eyes, but it's like looking through a thin mist," she shrugged, satisfied with her analogy.
"I'm not sure how, but I used the last of whatever power I have to send you here. This, Max," she said, looking out into the horizon, "is my limbo."
"I'm not sure I understand."
"Sometimes, I don't either. Isn't it beautiful though?"
Max took a second to survey her surroundings. The brilliant ocean, the phenomenal sand, the magnificent horizon. Could Rachel have created this? "It is. I love it. I would take a picture of it if I could."
The girl beside her nodded in satisfaction. "It loses touch when you see it everyday. By the way, that's why you're wearing the white clothes. I could've have you wear any clothes, but, I admittedly didn't think about it too much. I was too concerned bringing you here.
"This is fine. You have powers too?"
"Yeah. I never had a chance to understand them before Nathan killed me," she said this nonchalantly, as if she were talking about the latest death in a TV show.
"You barely even sound upset about your own death!" Max replied, flabberghasted.
Rachel chuckled, "Trust me, Max. I've had wayyy to much time on my hands to still be angry. I turned this place into a junkyard and a demolition derby way too many fucking times."
"How does that work? Do you imagine it and just BOOM?!"
"You sound just like Chloe," Rachel laughed and turned to look at Max. Then she turned a little solemn before turning back to the horizon. "Kind of. It would take too long to explain limbo to you. Let's just go with the way you described it."
"Okay," Max said quietly. She felt bad. It was pretty clear that Rachel missed Chloe.
"You're probably wondering why I brought you here."
"That may have crossed my mind."
"I thought so. Simply: I just summoned you to talk to you."
"I feel special," she said as a joke. She even grinned for emphasis.
The joke proved to be successful, "As you should."
"I called you here to discuss strategy, I guess. Like Chloe when she played D&D with Stephanie."
Max had no idea who Stephanie was, but Chloe playing D&D?
Rachel chuckled, "Yeah, she wouldn't ever admit it, but she really enjoyed it."
"Anyway, pressed for time and everything. You don't have your rewind power, so you don't have any more second chances. So, what's the first thing you should do?"
Max thought for a while. There seemed to be an obvious answer to this, but still she felt it was the wrong one.
"Put away Jefferson and Nathan."
Rachel made Family Fued wrong answer type noise in the back of her throat, "Wrong answer, Caulfield. Try again."
Max blushed, (if that were possible in limbo). She racked her brain for the right answer but came up with nothing. "I don't know?"
"Give up that easy?"
Max nodded.
"Well, not to bring you down, but remember in the timeline before with the tornado? On Tuesday? What happened?"
"Fuck! Kate! How could I forget?"
Rachel nodded sagely. "Because she had been so happy the last few months, you nearly forgot she was ever depressed. You need to help her first before she does something everyone will regret. You have to be careful though. You will only have one chance. I know you'll find a way though. If there's one thing I know about you, you always put others before yourself."
Max pondered Chloe's words for a second. "How do you know all this?"
"I watch. Being in limbo gives me time to reflect before I move on. I'm stuck here with a lot of regrets and I just can't get passed them. Yeah, I know, I'm almost like a character a lazy author or director would put in a story to make a cameo appearence to teach the main character a lesson. Oh, what a shithole my life has become."
"Aren't you dead, though?"
Rachel laughed so hard she started crying. She pushed her heels in her eyes and wiped the tears.
"Touché, Max," she sighed. "Holy fuck it's been a long time since I laughed like that. Thank you."
"No problem," Max smiled. She was glad to help the girl. She wished she had known her in real life. She was sure they would have gotten close.
"I can see why people like you. Funny, smart, talented, cute, you got it all, Max."
Max blushed scarlet. "Uh, thanks."
"Not used to compliments?"
"No, not really."
"I can understand. You want to see how I do it?"
"Sure," Max said. Her morbid curiosity overcoming her.
Rachel dipped her toe in the water. The water rippled and Max could see a scene. Warren and Chloe stood off with Nathan and Victoria.
"I think she's more scared of your haircut than you, Nathan."
Rachel wistled. "Oh, shit."
The two watched as Victoria grabbed Nathan and pulled him away from making a bigger confrontation.
"Wowser," Max whispered as Rachel caused another ripple in the water. The water lost the image and reduced to its normal color.
"They should be more careful. They should know not to provoke Nathan," said Max.
"In all fairness, I doubt he has a gun in swim trunks and a t-shirt. And Chloe has a habit of making people around her more daring. Plus, you know how your boyfriend gets when his friends are in danger. Give Victoria some credit too. She may be a pretentious bitch at times, but she kept Nathan in check. Usually."
Max nodded. She'd seen first hand how protective Warren could get. And felt firsthand Chloe's influence. "You know a lot, don't you?"
Rachel scoffed. "I have nothing else to do."
Max let herself have a moment to compose herself before starting her next question. "How should I g-?"
Max started shaking violently. She laid back on the pier and felt her thrash. "What's happening to me?"
Rachel sat up. "Shit! It looks like someone's trying to wake you up! We only have a minute or so, so listen to me, Max! I don't know what's going to happen, but trust yourself and be careful!"
"There's so many things I need to ask you, Rachel!"
"I'm sorry, Max. But I think it's time for me to go too! Just promise me something, okay?"
Max could somehow feel herself regaining consciousness. Her vision started getting blurry. She could still see Rachel's face over her, however. "What is it?"
"Tell Chloe and Frank that I love them! And I'm sorry. Even if they won't listen, they need to know! And Max?"
"Yeah?" She could see a white light behind Rachel. It started getting brighter.
"It was nice to meet you. Still, I hope I don't see you anytime soon!"
Max smiled as the white light swallowed Rachel whole.
"Me too."