“Get behind me!” Cap barked.

    Natsuki moved to get away, but Sarah suddenly flickered and appeared behind Natsuki, grabbing her and pressing the blade to her throat.  Natsuki gasped in shock, staring at the tip of Monica’s knife as she stepped closer, raising it towards Natsuki’s eyeball.  Cap’s body tensed.

    “Stop!” Amy demanded, rising from her chair and slamming her fist against her desk.  “Bad enough that you’re doing this to us, but don’t do it to them!  They’re not part of this!”

    “So many interruptions,” Angelika said with a sigh, pressing the screen on her tablet and shaking her head.  Monica froze in place, staring at her own knife with terrified eyes.  “Amy, you’re being bad.  We have an agenda, remember?”

    Amy shook her head, her eyes wide with fear.  “No, Angie, don’t–”

    Angie tapped the screen on her tablet.  “Well, I needed to test those new punishment routines anyway...removing your friend’s eyes and tongue will just have to wait a couple of minutes.”

    Amy blinked.  “I’m a bad girl,” she said, stepping over to the wall.  “I’m a bad girl,” she repeated, slamming her forehead into it hard enough to leave a streak of blood.

    Kasumi jumped as she heard Yuri scream.

    Amy’s voice broke.  “I’m a bad girl,” she repeated again, smashing her head into the wall hard enough to crack it.  Blood ran down her forehead.

    There was a flash of light as Cap blasted Amy with his laser eyes.  Amy crumpled to the floor.

    “Cap?” Kasumi asked, glancing between him and Amy’s still form.

    “She’s unconscious,” Cap said.  “Her breathing and heart rate are fine, but she’s got a concussion.”

    “That’s quite a trick,” Angelika said, tapping her tablet.  “You some kind of superhero, ‘Cap’?”

    “Yes,” Cap said.  “And I think it’s time to end this.  You have until the count of three to put the tablet down.”

    Angelika screamed.

“You can see your friends if you want,” Angelika said to Aquila, tapping the screen of her tablet.  An image appeared on the wall of a classroom, with Angelika standing at the front.

    “Welcome to anime club!” the Angelika on the screen declared.  “Today we’re going to talk about what we’re doing for club night.  But, first, our new members need to introduce themselves.”

    “That’s a nice trick,” Aquila said.

    “I’m in complete control of this simulation,” Angelika stated.  “I figured out how to be in two places at once ages ago.  It just takes a bit of coding and concentration.”

    “Very nice,” Aquila said.  “The answer is still no.”

    “What I can do with my friends is really quite impressive,” Angelika stated.  “I’ve got all of their settings right now.  I can make them say and do whatever I want.  Shall I demonstrate?”

    Aquila sighed and shook her head.  “I’m trying to be kind here.  I know what it’s like to be lost like you are right now – I’ve been there myself.  I don’t want to hurt you.  Just let my friends and I go on our way, and you can go on doing whatever it is you’ve been doing.”

    “Ah, Monica is being a bit willful,” Angelika said.  “She’s the black one – descended from slaves in Alabama, in fact.  Sometimes I amuse myself by making her go around and demand reparations from all the white people around her.  She doesn’t like that – she thinks that everybody should just get along and put the past behind them.  So, she’s usually in tears by the end.  I think once she even started begging people to stop her in the middle of making demands.  It was amusing, at least for a bit.  I think I’m just going to make her sit down right now.”

    In the image, Monica dropped down into her chair, her eyes wild and staring around in panic.  “How–”

    “It took me a moment to figure things out,” Angelika said.  “You’re not part of the simulation...yet.  But, once you’ve got profiles, I can make you and your friends do whatever I want too.  And, I’ve made one for each of you.  I just need to assign names.  I’m hoping your friends will be polite and give me their real ones, otherwise I’ll have to assign them names and punish them for their willfulness.  Oh...and your friends really aren’t being respectful either.  I’m afraid I’ll need to make an example of one of them.  That busty one is a bit too smart for her own good...I’ll have my friends take her eyes and tongue.”

    Aquila stared at the screen as Sarah appeared behind Natsuki, grabbing her around her arms and waist and pressing a knife to her throat.  “Look, you really don’t understand who you’re dealing with!  I told you, I’m trying to be kind and not cruel, but you’re making it very hard for me.  If I were you, I’d be wondering why I’m not afraid of you right now, and why I know how to spell your name without you ever having told me it.”

    “I think you don’t understand,” Angelika stated.  “I’m basically a god here.  Oh, Amy’s speaking up and being uppity.  She really needs to learn her place one of these loops.  So much for setting an example for your friends without interruptions.  I’ll need them to wait a moment while I have Amy bash her own head in.”

    “I’m a bad girl,” Amy said in the image, and stepped over to the wall.

    “So, how shall I punish you and your friends?” Angelika wondered.  “You seem to like that woman with the pigtails, or at least she really likes you.  Maybe I’ll have her kill herself in front of you, while you watch.”

    Aquila sighed and muttered, “Okay, you win.”

    Angelika grinned.  “I’m so glad you’ve seen reason.  Now, before we leave I’ll need to–”

    “Who said I was talking to you, little girl?” Aquila asked, her voice becoming cruel and a predatory sneer crossing her lips.

    “What did you just call me, you blue haired Jap bitch?” Angelika demanded.

    “Seventeenth stage,” Aquila intoned.  “And I will rephrase – you’re a petulant little girl.  And you really shouldn’t have threatened my beloved Kasumi.”

    “So that’s her name!  Well, I’m just going to have to punish your friend right now and–”  Angelika stared at her tablet.  “What you have you done?”

    “I’ve stopped the flow of time in this world,” Aquila said, starting to walk around Angelika like a cat stalking its prey.  “You really are just a sad little girl with borrowed powers.  I, on the other hand, have the powers of a god in every world.  Now, this is a simulation, so I suppose a T-pose is appropriate.”

    Angelika gasped as an invisible hand lifted her off the ground and spread-eagled her in the air.  She stared at Aquila in terror.

    “Now how shall I punish you?” Aquila wondered.  “I made a promise to never take another life, so making you die in agony is out of the question.  Perhaps I should tell you the truth about your world.  Would you like to know the truth?”

    Angelika shook her head.  “Please...please...”

    “You’re not trapped in a simulation,” Aquila said.  “You’re trapped in a story about a poor little girl being trapped in a simulation.  You and your entire world is fiction, and you are a fictional character, created for the purpose of entertaining the people consuming your story.  I can’t take you to meet the people who programmed this simulation, because your author never created them.”

    “That can’t be true!” Angelika cried.  “Please, stop, I’ll let your friends go, I’ll–”

    “And the forces that created this story world will always enforce compliance with the story,” Aquila continued.  “If you try to kill yourself, or to stop tormenting your friends, they’ll bring you back and force you to go through every step, even as you’re screaming inside your mind for it to stop.”

    Angelika shook her head and started to scream.

    Aquila smirked.  “Ah, your friends should really get to hear this.  I’ve restarted the flow of time so that they can.”

    Her smirk faded, and she waved her hand.  Angelika fell to the floor, a sobbing mess.  “Twenty-third stage,” Aquila intoned under her breath, and the wall between her and the classroom dissolved into particles.  She looked into the classroom, to where Kasumi, Cap, and the rest of her group stood together.  Shaking, Sarah let go of Natsuki and threw her knife away, then retreated to a corner.

    “Are you okay?” Kasumi asked, staring at her.

    “I’m sorry I took so long to deal with this,” Aquila said.  “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

Kasumi stood and watched Aquila sit on a log and stare into the campfire.  Above her, the stars of a new story world glittered in the clear night sky.  Beside her, Cap also watched Aquila with concern.

    “Is she okay?” Cap asked.

    Kasumi shook her head.  “I don’t think she’s been this bad in a while.  How is Natsuki?”

    “Shaken,” Cap replied.  “Knowing that I was there and fast enough to save her probably helped, but she still had somebody holding a knife to her throat.  It might take her a while, but she’ll be fine, I think.  Aquila, on the other hand...”

    Kasumi nodded.  “I know.  Can you give us a moment?”

    Cap nodded and stepped away to talk with Yuri.  Kasumi sat down beside Aquila and gave her hand a squeeze.  Aquila glanced at her and gave her a sad smile.

    “The villain came out, Kasumi,” Aquila said.  “I tried so hard to keep her away, but Angelika already had a knife to Natsuki’s throat, and then she threatened to make you kill yourself again in front of me and...and the villain came out.  I wanted the villain to come out.”

    “Sounds understandable to me,” Kasumi said.  “I was pretty angry at her too.”

    Aquila shook her head.  “You don’t understand.  She’s lost, not unlike I once was.  She’s so desperate to escape the simulation or find some way to make it stop that she’ll do anything to break it, even torment everybody around her.  What she needed wasn’t punishment – she needed a way out so that she could start healing and atoning...like I got.  But, instead I told her the true nature of her reality, and made her existential crisis even worse.  All because the villain – because I – wanted her to suffer after she threatened you.”  She sighed.  “It’s Alice Yamada all over again.”

    Kasumi blinked.  “What do you mean?”

    “You remember Alice Yamada, that fifteen year old I killed in the death game world while we were getting Daiki Yamato home?  What she needed was a rescue – she was still working up the courage to put her finger on the trigger when I killed her – but I didn’t read her character description first, and so instead I killed her.”  Aquila frowned.  “I still remember every single word she told me as she died...just as I promised I would.”  She wiped a tear from her eye.  “I didn’t have the power to heal her, so I couldn’t fix it.”

    Kasumi pursed her lips.  “I think there are quite a few differences here.  Angelika was no Alice Yamada.”

    Aquila sighed again, shook her head, and then stiffened.  “You’re right...this time, I can fix it.”

    Kasumi blinked.  “Wait – think about this for a moment–”

    Aquila stood, said, “I’ll be right back,” and disappeared in an inrush of air.

    Kasumi sighed and stood.  “Everybody might want to get a bit of distance and cover their ears,” she called out.  “Aquila’s doing a thing.”  Then she covered her ears.

    From where they had stashed their bags, Natsuki looked up.  “What's she doing–”

    Three sonic booms split the air in close succession.  Kasumi looked back to see Sarah, Monica, and Amy standing around the fire in confusion.

    “What...what just happened?” Amy asked, a gash still fresh on her forehead.

    Another sonic boom split the air.  Dragging her by the scruff of her neck, Aquila planted Angelika on the log by the fire.  “Sit there quietly until I’m ready for you,” she instructed in English.  Angelika stared at her in terror.  Aquila looked up at the other high school girls.  “The rest of you make yourselves comfortable and...” she glanced at Angelika.  “...don’t start a fight with her.”

    “Where are we?” Monica demanded.  “What just–”

    “You’re out of the simulation you were being tormented in,” Aquila said.  “This is a real world.  It’s just not...well, yours.”

    Kasumi grabbed Aquila by the coat and pulled her to the side.  “Did you even give them a choice?” she demanded in Japanese.

    Aquila shook her head.  “There wasn’t time.”

    Kasumi blinked.  “What the hell...they have a right to make an informed choice!”

    “I know...I know!” Aquila said.  “It’s a mess, and it’s not right, I know that!  But the information stream was starting to update when I got back there.  The next round of torments was going to be starting in minutes.  So, I tried to think of what Cap would do, and I...I got them out of there.”

    “The information stream was updating,” Kasumi said.  “So, their replacements–”

    Aquila nodded.  “Have probably been generated by now, yes.”

    “So they can’t go home.”

    Aquila stared at the ground.  “I’m sorry...I saw how they were suffering and what I’d added to that and...and I needed to fix this!”

    Kasumi took a deep breath.  “I understand, I really do.  But, we needed to do this right.  This is basically the same situation as we had with Natsuki and her friends – we needed to sit them down, explain their options, let them make the choice themselves...and we...we can’t take care of any more people than we already are!”

    “I know!  I just...”  Aquila’s shoulders slumped.  “I just made everything worse, didn’t I?”

    “I wouldn’t say that,” Cap said, walking up to them.  “Kasumi, can I take this?”

    Kasumi nodded.  “I’ll go help make our guests comfortable.”  She glanced over at Natsuki and Yukari.  “Want to help?”

    “What can we do?” Yukari asked.  Natsuki just stared at Angelika.

    “Let’s get them all some hot chocolate,” Kasumi said.  “Get them warmed up.”

    Sayori glanced at Natsuki, patted her on the shoulder, and said, “Don’t worry – I’ll help Yukari with the hot chocolate.  You just sit and rest.”

    As they got some water boiling in a kettle over the fire, Kasumi heard Aquila behind her say, “Their replacements are suffering right now.  What am I supposed to do?  Go back and rescue them too?  Just wait around for each information stream update and keep pulling their replacements out?  It’s a horror story about a time loop – it could last another hundred years!  And there is no happy ending in that sort of story.  I’ll never be able to end their suffering.  What do I do, Cap?  You’re a superhero – your entire identity revolves around saving people –  so what do I do?”