I expected the struggle. I always knew that this would be excruciating.

I expected the raging, chaotic storm of light and darkness around me. I figured I'd have to deal with the bucking and twisting current, trying its hardest to throw me off into oblivion.

I expected the confusion, too. Even on the days I thought of rewinding as 'easy', I never really lost sight of the fact that I didn't actually know how I was doing it. Maybe I'm just a little paranoid, but it'd always felt like every rewind came with an indistinct feeling of disapproval.

("I'm letting you do this," said the Universe. "But that doesn't mean I like it.")

I expected all of this and more because it made sense to me. It seemed logical that going so far back would be a thousand times worse than anything I've ever experienced, and I'm not wrong about any of it. But in all my preparations, I always assumed that the hardest part would be to keep going.

I thought I'd be fighting to hold on the whole way, but now that I'm here, I'm not sure I could let go if I wanted to. The still point I'm holding feels like it's glued onto my hand. It hurts like hell, but in a weird way that's comforting. I'm so used to the absurdly contradictory sensations that come with time travel that good old-fashioned pain is almost a welcome change. That said, I'd still like it if my brain didn't feel like it's getting too big to fit inside my skull.

(If my head explodes while I'm rewinding, would the pieces land at different points in time? Asking for a friend.)

I once read that if you grab a live electrical wire, it'll make your hand seize up and you won't be able to let go again. You'll just keep on holding it until it kills you. The thought makes me want to go back and find every past version of myself who ever thought time travel was easy so I can kick their asses, one by one. Then, when they got to the future, they would go back and kick some naïve Max asses themselves. It's the only acceptable punishment; an infinite cycle of quantum ass-kicking.

(I should really stop putting the word quantum in front of everything. It probably doesn't mean what I think it means.)

I sometimes really hate the way my body tries to physically understand time travel. There's never any consistency to it. Sometimes it feels cold, sometimes it feels hot. Sometimes it's like the deepest crushing ocean, and sometimes it's like the empty vacuum of space. And then there was the one and only time Chloe convinced me to try her prescription weed and a five-minute rewind that felt like I was running on a hamster wheel for hours and hours.

Seriously, that stuff was potent.

(Just a little more. Push the envelope. Be the ball. Leave it all on the field. I shouldn't have binge-watched Friday Night Lights with Victoria last month.)

My muscles feel like they're burning and freezing all at once, like I've been thrown into the middle of the arctic ocean and forced to swim for shore. The only alternative is drowning, and it's that thought that triggers some hardwired survival instinct buried deep in my brain. The one that forces you to inhale, no matter how hard you try to hold your breath. The same instinct that'll drive an animal to gnaw its own leg off to escape a trap.

Entirely against my will, I start trying to get free. My hand refuses to cooperate, stubbornly maintaining its hold like it doesn't belong to me anymore. I pull harder, trying to free myself, imagining I can feel the strain of my joints as they threaten to dislocate. I'm almost ready to start clawing my own arm off when my hand suddenly relaxes, and I tumble away.

(Maybe I should have thought this through better. Or...you know...at all.)

I brace myself for a rough re-entry, hoping that I've managed a couple of months at least...but the normal flow of time doesn't reassert itself. The world around me doesn't come back into focus. Instead it gradually fades into darkness as I come to a soft landing on an unseen surface. The chaos is gone and the buzzing pain of the adrenaline fades as a warm sensation begins to creep up my legs. A sense of vague contentment washes over me, making me wonder why I'd been so worried in the first place.

I decide, cautiously relaxing, that it feels like I'm standing ankle-deep in a warm stream. Except now the current is calm, slowly flowing past my legs. Like a relaxing bath, where the water is just the right temperature to make you feel like it isn't even there.

(Except it's not actually wet. That's weird.)

I can see a line of pulsing energy in front of me; a bright thread that stretches from my future into my past. I reach out, letting my hand hover close without actually touching it. It seems to hum, rushing past at a speed I can't even imagine, and as it does I feel like I can just watch the past flow by. The water-that-isn't laps gently at my knees as I watch Chloe going through chemotherapy, but in reverse it seems like she grows more and more healthy as it goes on. Her skin brightens and her blue hair comes back.

(Everything is fixing itself. I didn't have to do anything. That was so easy.)

As the soothing flow rises above my waist, I watch Chloe's twentieth birthday go by. I see the two of us supporting each other as we follow Jefferson's trial, our first Valentine's Day, and Chloe excitedly opening presents under the Christmas tree just two months after the storm. Each glimpse comes with a rush of happy memories, and I let my arms fall limply to my sides as the flowing warmth envelops my chest.

I see our first night in Seattle and watch myself hesitantly creep into the guest bedroom where Chloe lay awake. The not-exactly-water sensation rolls over my shoulders and, for a second, I'm not sure if I'm climbing into bed with her, or just watching my younger self do it.

(It couldn't be both, could it?)

It feels like the water is lapping at my chin now, and for the first time I wonder - in a nebulous sort of way - whether something might be wrong. I want to keep my head above the surface, but when I kick my feet I realize that I'm not standing on the bottom anymore. I try again, but I can't really feel my legs. I know they're there and I can feel the weight of them. They're just kind of...numb.

(Is this bad? I think this might be bad.)

The warm, dull sensation starts in my hands as well, creeping up my arms until I can barely move at all. I'm not sure I've been breathing at all for the last few minutes, but just to be safe I take a deep breath right before my face slips beneath the surface. I lose all sense of sight and sound instantly, wrapped in a warm liquid cocoon. Something like sleep begins to tug at my consciousness, and I wonder if this is what being in the womb feels like.

(Wow, that's actually kinda gros-)

(Wake up, Max!)

Wait, what?

(Don't lose yourself! Focus!)

Is that my voice? I don't think that's my voice.

(Hold on!)

Huh?

(HOLD THE FUCK ON!)

Hold on. Okay. I can do that.

Summoning up my strength, I force my right arm to respond. It lifts slowly, as though I'm moving it through half-dried cement. Reaching out, I splay my fingers wide as I look for the steady point I'd been holding on to. It can't be far, but all I can see is darkness and my arm is getting weaker the longer I search.

I'm getting scared that I've lost it forever when I suddenly make contact with something and a crackling bolt of energy rockets up my arm. A shockwave pulses from my hand, rushing out in all directions and instantly bringing sensation back to my body - including the burning pain of the adrenaline. The feel of warm, flowing water vanishes, replaced by a violent, ice-cold current. I can feel myself being jerked in every direction and I tighten my grip, holding on to that still point like it's my only lifeline.

(That's it! You got this!)

It seems to buck in my hand, trying to throw me off as it draws me deeper into the dark. The familiar pain that comes with holding on too long begins to set in. It feels like a steel vice wrapped around my skull, squeezing every coherent thought from my mind, and replacing each one with pain. Before long, the pressure begins to coil its way around my chest, as well. It crushes the air from my lungs, and I'm sure that if I weren't surrounded by pitch darkness, I'd be watching my vision fade to black. I force myself to hold on as the current rushes violently by, buffeting me like a ragdoll. I tell myself that it doesn't matter if every other muscle in my body fails, so long as I can maintain that grip.

(I believe in you! You ca-)

Just as I think I can't hold on any longer, the pressure is gone, and I feel solid ground under my feet once more. I gasp for air, savoring each sweet breath, and hesitantly crack one eye open to see...the Blackwell Academy science classroom?

"What the hell...?" Opening my other eye, I turn a slow circle. It's definitely the Blackwell science classroom. Everything looks just the way I remember it, too. The rows of desks, the locked cabinets, and the faint but ever-present chemical smell. Even the way the sunlight streams in through the windows feels familiar. The only thing missing is the students. The entire space is devoid of life, in fact, except for one other person.

"Miss Grant?"

My old science teacher, who I know for a fact was killed in the storm, is standing right in front of me in a classroom that was reduced to rubble two years ago. "You're late, Miss Caulfield."

The whiteboard behind her is completely covered in unintelligible mathematic scribbles. If any of it is supposed to make any sense to me, it's failing miserably.

"H-how are you...what are you doing here?"

Crossing her arms, she gives me a stern look. "I'm trying to teach class. And the sooner you sit down, the sooner we can get started."

"But..."

"Sit down, Miss Caulfield."

For lack of a better option, I slowly make my way to the nearest table. As I take a seat, I feel an absurd flicker of anxiety over not having my textbook.

"All right, everyone. Settle down," Ms. Grant says, addressing the otherwise empty room. "Today we're going to be going over the finer points of temporal mechanics, with a particular focus on how Maxine Angela Caulfield is an unforgivably irresponsible fuckup."

"What?! That's not...!" I begin, but she silences me with a sharp look.

"If you have something to add, Miss Caulfield, you can raise your hand like everyone else."

"But I..."

"Yeah, Max. Quit being disruptive."

Startled by the unexpected voice, my head snaps to the seat beside me. The girl sitting there appeared out of nowhere and without a sound. Her feet are up on the table, her chair is tilted back as she plays with her phone, and she's the spitting image of what I'd looked like when I'd gone to Blackwell.

"Heya, Max," she says with an affected cheeriness that puts my teeth on edge. "How's it going?"

"Oh, you've got to be shitting me," I groan.

"Missed you, too," she responds mockingly, not looking up.

Imagined or not, the nightmare I went through as Chloe practically carried me up to the lighthouse was still one of the worst experiences of my life. And when you look at my life, that's saying something. "What the hell is this?"

"This is me watching you screw up again," she shrugs. "Just like I knew I'd eventually have to."

"Fuck you."

"Well, someone's feeling feisty."

No, I'm not doing this. This isn't at a version of me from a parallel timeline or a 'Max I left behind' or some bullshit like that. This is just a figment of my own neurotic imagination trying to scare me, and I have more important things to do than be insulted by an old nightmare. "I don't have time for this."

"You don't have time? Are you cereal?" She cackles. "Fuck me, that's such a stupid phrase. That's probably why you like it."

"Whatever." Rolling my eyes, I start to rise from my chair when she reaches out to grab my sleeve.

"Actually, you should pay attention to this part." She gestures to the front of the classroom. "It's pretty important. You might even learn something."

"Thank you, Maxine," Ms. Grant says, smiling at her. "As I was about to say, the principles behind time travel are incredibly complex. More complex than the human mind can possibly fathom. In fact, if a human did try using time travel, she'd be much more likely to cause problems than solve them."

Turning to the whiteboard, she gestures to the mess of calculations. "As you can see here, one of the worst possible abuses of time travel would be to intentionally inhibit, counteract, or otherwise circumvent the termination of a sapient being."

"That means keeping someone from dying," my old nightmare stage-whispers.

"A hypothetical example of this," Ms. Grant (I guess?) continues, "would be averting the shooting death of a young woman in a high school bathroom, thereby creating a new timeline. In this new timeline, neither a very troubled student nor a deeply disturbed teacher get arrested, an innocent bullying victim is driven to suicide, a marriage is destroyed, and – finally – and entire town in northwestern Oregon is wiped off the map." She turns back, looking me in the eye. "All because one stupid girl couldn't let the dead stay dead."

"That's not... I never asked for these powers!" I have no idea why I'm defending myself to people who don't exist. This is a nightmare, just like before; my own anxieties run amok. Any minute now I'll be running through a dark maze, or late for an exam, or naked in public. Maybe all three.

"Always with the excuses. It's never your fault, is it?" The other me snorts. "You may not have asked for them, but you sure do love using them."

"Oh god, will you just shut up already?"

"I'll shut up when you finally get with the fucking program," she says. Despite her hostile words, her voice is calm and measured. "I told you before that if the world is going to keep turning, the dead need to stay dead and you need to leave her in the past."

The words land heavily, dragging me back to the day I was talking to myself in the mirror, sleep-deprived almost past the point of sanity and hating my reflection for every gentle word she said back. It might be the most vivid experience I've ever had, even if I've never been able to fully recall it.

"Oh, remember that, do you?"

"I...nope. That was just some screwed-up hallucination, and so are you."

"Ouch," she pouts mockingly. "Guess that's what I get for being nice."

I don't know what infuriates me more; the way she's talking to me now, or the fact that she really had been surprisingly kind then...except she wasn't real. Not then, and not now. This is all in my head.

"I even tried taking the passive route, locking a moment in time to keep you from fucking around with it. Not that it stopped you from trying over and over and over..."

"That was y-" I refuse to finish the question. It not like that's some big reveal. She knows everything I do. Taking a breath, I harden my resolve. "No. I'm ignoring you."

"Sure you are," she laughs. "Y'know what's crazy? This plan of yours. I mean, you spent months putting it together with your little band of merry morons, thinking you'd covered every angle. And all the while missing the great big danger sign right in front of your face. The most obvious thing in the world, and you happily ignored it so you could try to save your precious Chloe."

I refuse to acknowledge her, but she still has my attention. Insecurities are like that. They worm their way past your defenses and stick you where it hurts. I can't block her out, and she knows it.

"Do you know what happens when you rewind someone back to life, Max? Do you have even the faintest fucking clue?" I don't bother responding. She's probably dying to share whatever nonsense my mind has cooked up, anyway. "Of course you don't. If you did, you wouldn't even be here." She pauses. "No, actually, you're pretty stupid so you probably would."

I try to open the classroom door, but it won't budge. The knob won't even turn.

"Have you ever seen the inside of a clock? It's pretty neat. All those springs and gears working as one. All fit together so perfectly." She hums happily. "The universe is kind of like that. Everything working together in harmony. All the pieces set just so. At least, until some moron comes along and starts putting parts where they aren't supposed to be. The more complex a machine is, the more damage an out-of-place piece can cause. And guess what? The universe is pretty fucking complex."

Waxing poetic about clocks? What is she, a Bond villain? C- for effort.

"When you save a life, every single thing that person does from that point on has an effect on other people," she continues, because she's an asshole. A fictitious asshole. "And then those people go on to affect other people, who affect even more people. You let enough time go by, and you could see entire nations rise and fall just because one fucking person didn't die when they were supposed to."

Also known as the plot of who knows how many time travel movies. That C- just turned into a D, Fake Max. See me after class.

"I know you're listening, Max," she sing-songs, mockingly. "Chloe was a jammed gear in the machinery of the universe, and things started going wrong the second she existed where she wasn't supposed to. I mean, did you think that all those birds forgot to fly all on their own? Or that a bunch of whales suddenly decided to take up sunbathing?"

I briefly consider trying to open one of the windows, but there's nothing outside. Just an off-white expanse, because apparently my mind could create sunlight but couldn't be bothered to add a few trees. Meanwhile, Bizarro me just keeps on talking.

"But hey, the universe can be flexible. I mean. if it really needs to be. It probably could have adapted if you'd only saved Chloe the one time. But no, you just had to keep on doing it. Do you have any idea how many times you kept her alive that week?"

Four, I think. Maybe five. It gets a little tangled.

"I bet you're only counting the big ones. The bathroom. The ricochet. The train. Jefferson putting a bullet in her head."

Some of the worst moments of my life, and she's reciting them as if I need to be reminded. I start looking for something heavy, telling myself I want to use it on the pane of glass in the door and not on my doppelganger's skull.

"There were others, though. Ones you didn't see and never even knew you prevented. A car accident she didn't get into because she was driving slower to talk to you. A fight with Frank Bowers she never started because you were there to pull a gun on him. You kept her from taking a knife to the gut on that one." She laughs humorlessly. "Nine times, altogether. And every time, the universe had to bend a little further to adapt, and more tension built up."

I can see her staring at me from the corner of my eye. I keep telling myself that she's not real. It's just my own mind screwing with me. Trying to piss me off and bait me into a pointless argument. Give me an excuse not to focus on the much scarier task at hand. I really wish it weren't working so well.

"And when things finally snapped? Boom!" She slaps her hands together and I almost jump. "Fifteen hundred innocent people, stone fucking dead."

"Fourteen hundred and sixty-three," I correct automatically, cursing myself for responding at all.

"Oh, spare me. You might know the number, but how many of them can you still name? How many have you just forgotten?" That one actually hurts. "I gotta ask, though. What's it like knowing that you killed a whole town, just so your blue-haired sweetie could suffer a thousand times more than she had to?"

I turn to face her. "What?"

"Come on, Max," she sneers. "Haven't you ever heard of consequences?"

"Your actions always have consequences, Miss Caulfield," Ms. Grant adds, startling me. She'd been so quiet that I'd almost forgotten she was there.

"See?" The other me points at the woman. "At least a gunshot would've been quick. She'd have gone into shock and bled out in minutes, never even knowing about the cancer. But she didn't get her gunshot, did she? She had to keep going, suffering every day while that disease was eating her alive, and it was all your fault."

The accusation grinds against something raw inside me and all thoughts of escape fly from my mind. Surging forward, I grab her by the front of her hoodie and haul her upright. "Shut up!"

"Ooh!" she laughs, looking unconcerned about the hold I have on her. "I think I struck a nerve."

"I didn't kill her!"

"Well, you sure as shit didn't save her."

"I said shut up!" I snap, shaking her. I can feel the tears on my cheeks and I'm furious at myself for letting her make me cry. "Why are you doing this to me?! Why won't you just leave me alone?!"

"Because you're doing it again, you arrogant bitch!" She shouts, shocking me into releasing my grip and shoving me back a few steps. "You think you're some big hero by trying to save everyone, but it's just going to make everything worse! You think it was bad the last time? You have no idea what bad is. You haven't just failed to learn from your mistakes; you're going back to make way, way worse ones."

The way she's speaking, slow and condescending, almost makes me feel like a stupid little kid...but I refuse to give her that victory. I remind myself that she's a figment of my own imagination, she doesn't know anything I don't, and I'm not about to be bullied by myself.

"This is bullshit!" Furious, I lunge forward and shove her right back. She doesn't even try to move out of the way, and I'm not sure which one of us is more surprised when I send her tumbling to the floor. She stares up at me, stunned. "First I'm a fuckup for getting everyone killed, and now I'm a fuckup for trying to save them? Pick a damn side already!"

I expect her to jump up and fight back. I expect her to twist the knife or accuse me of being stupid and arrogant again. I want her to scream something cruel at me, so I can scream something cruel back at her. I want us to go round and round until our voices give out and we're reduce to glaring. I'm aching to show this spiteful little bitch how much I hate her, and so I'm a little unprepared when she just sighs and rubs her eyes tiredly.

"Fine, Max. I'll spell it out for you, if that's what it takes." Slowly climbing to her feet, she lifts a hand and snaps her fingers; Ms. Grant (or whatever the hell it'd been) vanishes into thin air. "The people in Arcadia Bay were never supposed to die. But they did die, in the storm that you created by refusing to let Chloe die. The same storm that will always be created if Chloe Price lives and will always destroy the town."

"Which is why I want to get everyone out. So nobody dies."

"Oh, for fuck's sake," she mutters. "Haven't you been listening? Didn't you hear me say how much damage a person can do just by being around when they aren't meant to be?"

"I get it, alright!" I didn't mean to start shouting, but it does make me feel a little better. "Chloe lives, storm gets created, town gets leveled. That's why I want to get everyone out!"

"Leaving you with a town's worth of people who should have died."

"I...oh."

"Yeah. Oh." She gestures in the vague direction of the whiteboard. The equations start shifting and rearranging, though they don't make any more sense to me now than they did before. "If Chloe dies, the people in Arcadia Bay will just keep going like they always have been, living out their pointless little lives in some shithole Oregon town and barely making a ripple in history."

She gestures again, and the math seems to get a little messy.

"If Chloe lives and everyone else dies, that does make a ripple. A manageable one, though. Most of the world didn't give a shit about Arcadia Bay when it was there; why should they give a shit when it isn't? It's a tragedy for a couple of months and a statistic forever after. But if everyone lives..."

Another gesture turns the entire board into a tangled mess of scribbles.

"Do you get it now? You see what you'll get if you try to have your cake and eat it, too?" She looks at the board. "Fucking chaos! Entire histories rewritten. Empires rising out of nowhere. Others never existing at all. Timelines would all but shatter! Who the fuck knows what could come out of that mess?"

You ever have one of those crappy tutors who know the material super-well but suck at explaining it? And then they get pissed off when you don't understand what seems obvious to them? "That's ridiculous! None of them were supposed to die in the first place! How is them living now such a disaster?"

"Because they'll fucking scatter! Fifteen hundred people out in the world, living lives that were never supposed to have existed in the first place! That's not ripples, Max. That's a fucking tsunami!"

Wait a second...something's off here. (Besides the whole 'I'm literally arguing with myself' thing, I mean.) She's trying so hard to make her case, but does she really think she could ever convince me not to save Chloe? What is she...oh... oh.

"You're trying to talk me out of doing this."

"Are you fucking kidding me?! Of course I am, you dumb f-"

"No, I mean you're trying to talk me out of it. But why would you bother? Why would you need to unless that was your only option?" I smile as the pieces come together. "It's because you need me to quit, isn't it?"

"I..." For once, I think she's actually speechless. Oh my god...am I really this neurotic? Am I really so tied up in knots that I'll invent another version of me just to try and psych myself out? Unbelievable. One more reason I'm going to need to see a therapist when all this is over.

Turning away from her, I slowly walk around the classroom, letting my hand brush over each surface as I pass by. The textures all feel real enough; the delicate roughness of the wallpaper, the smooth sides of the wooden supply cabinets, and even the slightly worn laminate tabletops. The air even has the faint chemical tinge I remember. Gotta hand it to my imagination; it really worked overtime on this one.

Pressing my hand against the wall, I close my eyes and search for that flow of energy. I know it's out there, just beyond the edges of whatever the hell this room is. And the more I focus on my destination, letting the details refine themselves one by one in my mind, the more I can feel it rushing by under my fingertips, like the flow of water through a heavy plastic sheet.

It seems to pulse in time with my heartbeat, and the harder I push, the more it bleeds through the wall and into me. I can feel it in my bones, washing across my skin, and suddenly every breath I release seems to come out as a hum. It's rushing in my veins, and there's a tension to it that's inching closer and closer to the breaking point. The room around me begins to twitch and blur. Then, as a familiar burnt-orange glow begins to creep in on the edges of my vision, she cries out.

"Max, wait! Please!"

I'm so surprised that I actually do stop. The room snaps back into focus. "What did you just say to me?"

She glares at me. "You fucking heard me."

"Because it sounded like you said please."

"I..." Her lips twist like she's swallowed something bitter. "I can stop you, but..."

"Yeah, okay." I start to raise my hand again.

"Stop that!" She reaches out to grab my wrist. Her grip is like steel and almost disturbingly cold. "Of course I can, you idiot. I could wipe your arrogant ass out of existence. That doesn't mean I want to."

"Aww. I didn't know you cared."

"I don't," she snaps. "But consequences cut both ways."

Again with the cryptic bullshit. "Oh, is that right?"

"Yeah. It is. Remember when I compared the universe to a clock?"

"You mean your whole b-movie supervillain monologue? What about it?"

"You're a piece of that clock, too. So am I. So is everything. And as much damage as a loose or misplaced part can cause, it's nothing next to the loss of one."

I'm...not really sure how to respond to that. As if I'm some important piece of this universe clock? Is this my ego talking, or my own sense of existential dread?

"Look, I'm deadly serious about how much damage what you're trying to do could cause. But forcibly stopping you could cause just as much. Maybe even more." She sighs, her expression softening. "Don't force me to choose. Just say the word, and I'll send you right back where you came from. You can tell Victoria it didn't work. The two of you can go home and move on with your lives."

"I can't ju-"

"Your book would've been accepted by the first publisher you took it to, you know," she interrupts. "They'd have signed you to a three-book deal. You'd be an actual novelist."

"...really?"

"Mhm. And Victoria's legal problems were coming to an end. Another year and she'd have regained full control of Chase International." She smiles a little. "Bestselling author Max Caulfield and billionaire industrialist, Victoria Chase. It was going to happen anyway. All you have to do is let the clock keep ticking."

The life she's describing isn't hard to picture. It's something I've thought about before, in my most hopeless and discouraged moments. When the idea of risking everything on some crazy time-travel scheme seemed utterly impossible. And now, like then, the idea of giving up and finding a way to live again is so tempting...but it isn't real. She's making it up, because I made her up. And since bullying, threats, and insults haven't worked, my subconscious has moved on to bribery.

I've heard this song before. Stage three. Bargaining.

"I think we're done here," I answer, simply.

Her smile collapses and she just stares at me. For a second, I swear she even looks the tiniest bit scared. Then her lips move, and all I can discern is a faint, "...never stop."

"What?"

"You'll never stop, will you?" I get the impression that it isn't really a question. "It doesn't matter what I do. You'll never, ever stop."

"Welcome to the conversation. Now let go and get out of my way."

She doesn't move, but she does release my wrist. I try to be subtle about trying to rub some warmth back into it. Standing uncomfortably close and still staring at me, she takes a slow breath. "Fine. We'll try it your way."

Well, that's new. "Is this some kind of reverse psychology thing?"

She looks down, takes another deep breath, then looks back up to glower at me. "Here's how this is going to go. I'm going to give you a shot at your happy ending, I'll deal with whatever damage you're definitely going to cause as it comes up, and we'll both just hope that it's less than what would've happened if I just ended you right here."

"How very generous of you."

"You can't begin to fathom how generous it is, you fucking ingrate." She snarls, baring her teeth. "You get one chance, Max. One. And when you just end up making everything worse, like I'm fucking certain you will, you're going to have to live with that. No more do-overs."

"Is that right?" I scoff.

"Yeah, asshole, it is. Wiping you out would have serious and far-reaching consequences that I'd much rather avoid, but there's a big fucking difference between shouldn't and won't." She jabs a finger into my chest. "You become a big enough problem and I might just decide to take my chances."

"Ooh, scary," I snort, despite the shiver that runs down my spine. I know she's not real. She's just some character my mind invented to screw with me and I've got no reason to listen to a word she says. That doesn't change the fact that a little part of me wants to be scared.

"Just hold still," she grumbles. "I'm going to give you a push. Enough to get you where you're going."

"What kind of push?" I chuckle nervously. What kind of weird shit am I throwing at myself now?

"Don't ask questions you can't comprehend the answer to," she responds, unhelpfully. "Just be ready for a rough landing."

"Are you sure you're not actually going to wipe me out of existence?"

"Don't fucking tempt me," she presses a disturbingly cold palm to my stomach. "I am so tired of dealing with your bullshit."

Does her saying that mean I'm actually a little suicidal? At this point, I wouldn't be totally surprised. "Yeah. Right back at'cha."

"One chance, Max," she reminds me. The sunlight streaming into the room flickers the tiniest bit, and I'm pretty sure I feel the ground under my feet tremble. "Don't fuck it up."

"Gosh, I'll sure try."

"And one last word of advice?" She grins wolfishly as the room begins to flicker and fade again. "Be careful how much time you waste after you get there."

"What's that supposed to m-" Before I can finish, a staggering wave of something slams into me, violently shoving me backward. The classroom vanishes as I'm plunged back into the void, and just before I black out I swear I can hear Chloe's voice floating up from the darkness.

(You can always rewind...)