Learning to Love Time Loops Without Going Insane

“Bug, I’m here girl. Where are you?” Andy yelled into the woods behind Stan’s house. Bug took Andy to the ground as she tackled him at high speed. “Good girl, it’s okay. We will figure this out. Let’s go inside, and I want you to tell me everything that happened.”

*

“Alright, let’s focus on the good here. Everyone else will be back next time loop. So the best thing we can do right now is get Cal out of there before they leave any lasting damage. You said you remember their scent. How close do you need to be, do you think, to track it?”

“I don’t know, it took me so long to find my way home back here, but maybe I can find it if we just try to drive where they went.” Bug was still on the verge of tears from the incident.

“We can do that. First, let’s head to Cal’s and break into his emergency supplies. We need to be prepared for this.”

*

Andy and Bug spent months searching for the kidnappers with zero signs until one night, as they were taking a break at a rest stop, Bug yelled, “Andy, that van smells like Cal. We have to get inside of it now.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes, one hundred percent.”

“Alright, let’s go, get beneath the van and wait for me to grab the guy.”

Bug listened without question. Andy waited behind the van until he heard someone approaching. He charged at the man before he had a chance to react and hit him with a taser. “Bug on top of him now,” Andy ordered. Bug emerged and put her full weight on the man, growling loudly as she did.

“If you want to survive this with all your limbs, you are going to do everything we say without question. Do you understand me?”

“Yes. I’m just a transporter, I swear.”

“Good. I’m going to zip-tie your hands and feet together, and then you are hopping in my van with us. You will be giving us directions to where you transported the person you had in the back.”

“Alright, just please don’t hurt me. I have a wife and kids.”

“Just do what I say, and everything will be fine. Where did you take him?”

“There’s an old hotel two exits back. The people with me unloaded him there and stayed with him.”

“How many people are in the hotel?”

“I don’t know, a few at least, though.”

“Okay, direct me as I drive. Bug, if I tell you to, rip his throat out.”

“Grrrr.”

*

Andy pulled the van in front of the hotel and looked at his passenger. “Give me your arms.” He complied and Andy zip-tied them to the van’s steering wheel. Andy then climbed into the back of the van and started grabbing ordinance.

“Here’s how we do this, Bug, as much overwhelming force as quickly as we can. We just need to find Cal and either rescue him or end this.”

“Roger.”

“What the fuck, did that dog just talk?” The man in the front of the van yelled.

“Shut up!” Andy and Bug yelled back in unison.

Andy opened the back doors of the van. “Follow my lead.” He said as he stepped out and made his way through the front doors. There were two people at the front desk, and Andy headed straight for them.

“Is your hotel pet friendly? I need a room for the night,” he asked as he approached.

“We have no open rooms, sorry,” was one of their responses. Andy knew it was a lie, considering how empty the parking lot was.

“Ahh, fair enough.” He dropped a grenade behind the desk and dashed through a nearby door, Bug on his heels. They both heard some brief yelling and then an explosion behind him. The room was full of monitors and what Andy thought looked like an intercom.

“Andy, look, Cal’s on the bottom monitor. I think it says basement one.”

“It sure does, Bug.” He grabbed the radio sitting on the desk and ran for the stairs. They located a door labeled basement one, and Andy spoke into the radio, “Cal, if you can hear me, duck.”