[ WP ] You 've been trapped in a `` Groundhog Day '' style loop for years . After your most destructive loop yet , you stop looping .

**The Misadventures of Dale and Luke: The Flute** 
 ***** 
 
 The innkeeper pounds on the wooden door. 
 
 `` Literally the worst way to wake up,'' Luke groans and rolls over. `` What round are we on?'' 
 
 `` I'm not sure,'' says Dale. He swings his legs out of their shared bed and slips into his boots. The pounding continues. Dale reaches out to open the door, then pauses. 
 
 `` Maybe we should let him break in.'' Dale looks back at Luke, still wrapped in his sleeping blankets. `` Have we tried that?'' 
 
 `` Yes,'' comes the mumbled reply, `` forty-eighth round. Did n't do shit.'' 
 
 Dale shrugs and throws open the door. The innkeeper, in mid swing, stumbles in. 
 
 `` I TOLD YOU BASTARDS-'' starts the innkeeper before he is interrupted by Dale's knee in his stomach. He grunts and collapses to the floor. 
 
 Luke peers over the blankets in mild surprise. His eyes widen as Dale grabs the innkeeper by his hair and slits the man's throat. Blood spurts onto the floor and mingles with the straw dust. 
 
 `` Hey!'' Luke scrambles out of bed. `` Whoa!'' 
 
 Dale shrugs. `` I'm tired of this jackass waking us up every morning.'' He kicks the innkeeper's corpse. The body releases a fart and Dale laughs. 
 
 Luke hurriedly dresses himself. `` Not cool, dude. You know our rules.'' 
 
 `` *Fuck* the rules,'' spits Dale. `` The rules went out the window after the tenth round. None of this matters anyway, we'll see this asshole-'' another kick to the corpse `` -in the morning.'' Kick. `` Same goddamn time.'' Kick. `` Same goddamn door.'' Kick. `` Same goddamn thing.'' 
 
 Luke pulls Dale away from the corpse. `` Whoa there, buddy,'' he says, `` this is n't like you.'' 
 
 Dale pushes Luke away. 
 
 `` Maybe I should try killing *you*?'' He cocks his head to one side. `` Maybe that will get us out of here.'' 
 
 Luke crosses his arms and frowns. `` You're acting like an amateur. Fucking. Bush. League. And I do n't appreciate it.'' 
 
 Dale laughs and flips his middle finger at Luke. Turning on his heel, he walks out of the room and disappears down the hallway. 
 
 `` Where are you going?'' Luke calls. 
 
 Dale's voice floats back to Luke: ``... Breakfast!'' 
 
 Luke sits on the bed. *The rules*, he thinks, *went out the window after the tenth round. * Dale's words. Luke wonders. Perhaps the rules are gone, perhaps not. Luke is certain that his own magic has not left him, and Dale appears mostly unaffected. 
 
 Sounds of a commotion rumble down the hallway. Downstairs. Dale. 
 
 The common room. 
 
 `` Oh, shit,'' mutters Luke. He jumps over the innkeeper's corpse and dashes towards the stairs. 
 
 Luke tastes copper as he reaches the bottom of the stairs. From his vantage point on the landing, he can see the entire common room. Dale is sitting at a table in the middle, picking at a plate of eggs and potatoes. 
 
 The rest of the room is covered in bright red blood. 
 
 `` What...'' breathes Luke, ``... what have you *done? *'' 
 
 Bodies lay everywhere- on the floor, over tables, on the bar. Luke gingerly steps over and around the carnage, and sits across from Dale. 
 
 Luke had eaten over a hundred identical breakfasts in this common room, on identical mornings. He knows the men and women in the room. The three Queens guard in the corner, on a search for some duke's missing nephew. The smugglers at the bar negotiating for safe passage of a highly illegal demon's corpse. The farmer and the merchant at the table to Luke's left, haggling over harvest prices. Luke sees nothing but familiar faces on the corpses filling the room. 
 
 `` Are you feeling any better?'' Luke asks, his voice level. 
 
 Dale shrugs and scoops another bite of eggs into his mouth. 
 
 `` *I'm* the one who freaks out,'' says Luke, `` not you. You are the one-'' Luke leans forward and jabs Dale with a finger with each syllable `` -who. keeps. his. shit. *to-geth-er*.'' 
 
 Dale brushes Luke's finger away and mumbles. 
 
 `` What?'' snaps Luke. 
 
 `` I said,'' says Dale, wiping his mouth, `` maybe it's opposite day.'' 
 
 `` This is n't a joke!'' Luke explodes. He sweeps his hands around the room. `` *We* do n't DO this!'' 
 
 `` Maybe,'' Dale admits, `` maybe not before. But our rules are gone.'' 
 
 `` I've always been curious,'' he continues, `` how far I could go. If we did n't have the rules.'' He raises a cup, drinks, and gestures towards the room. `` Pretty damn far, it turns out.'' 
 
 Dale stands up from the table and claps Luke on the shoulder. 
 
 `` Do n't worry'' says Dale. `` Tomorrow, it'll be like nothing ever happened.'' He walks behind the bar and fills his cup with ale. `` Welp, I'm going to get blotto. Cheers!'' 
 
 The thump of Dale's footsteps recede as he climbs the stairs. Soon Luke is alone. He sits in silence, his gaze rolling from corpse to corpse. 
 
 `` No rules...'' he mutters. 
 
 CLANG! Luke's pondering is interrupted. Across the room, a guitar had fallen from the fingers of the inn's bard. Luke had forgotten about the bard. He walks across the room and places the guitar on the bar next to the bard's almost-severed head. He notices a flute sticking out of the bard's coat. 
 
 Luke grabs the flute and rushes upstairs. He reaches the door to their room and bursts inside. 
 
 `` GAH!'' Dale yells and dives off the bed. His pants are around his ankles and the bed is littered with thin woodcuts displaying images of women in various states of undress. 
 
 `` Uh... what are you doing?'' asks Luke. 
 
 Dale nods towards Luke's hand and says, `` same as you, just polishing my flute.'' He pulls his pants on. 
 
 `` Come look at this,'' says Luke, shaking his head, `` this is serious. I think I found a way out.'' 
 
 Dale freezes and turns back to Luke. 
 
 `` Do n't fuck with me,'' he says slowly. 
 
 Luke tosses the bard's flute on the bed and begins rummaging through his pack. 
 
 `` I'm not.'' Luke extracts a small bag from his pack. `` Ah ha!'' 
 
 Luke slides a small black flute from the bag. The flute's surface is finely etched with runes and a delicate script. Dale whistles. 
 
 `` I thought you said that we are n't allowed to use that,'' Dale says. `` You said, and I'm quoting here,'Dale, this flute is so dangerous I ca n't let you hold it for even a minute,' end quote. If I remember correctly, you were kind of a douchebag about the whole thing.'' 
 
 `` It *is* dangerous,'' says Luke, `` ordinarily.'' He points to Dale's boots, which are caked with blood. `` But no rules, right?'' 
 
 `` No rules.'' Dale nods. `` So are you going to tell me what that thing does?'' 
 
 Luke sets the black flute on the table. `` Imagine that this world, this *dimension, * is a house.'' He gestures with his hands. `` It has walls, a roof, a floor - everything that is important is safe *inside* the house.'' 
 
 `` I am familiar with the concept of a house,'' says Dale, motioning for Luke to get on with it. 
 
 `` Right,'' says Luke. `` So the house, this world, it is made up of the physical dimensions that we can see, but also the dimension of time. And there are... *things* that want to come inside. They are very old, they are very powerful, and they are *very* dangerous.'' 
 
 `` The old ones,'' says Dale, `` I know of them. How can they help us?'' 
 
 Luke shakes his head. `` They would n't be helping us, not intentionally. The old ones exist outside our normal dimensions. They even exist outside of time. And we-'' he gestures around the room `` -are stuck in a loop of time.'' 
 
 Luke holds up the black flute. `` If we use this, then it will crack open one of the windows in the house, so to speak. Give the old ones a little room to come in. And when they come in, they will rattle our cage, they will distort time. That might be enough to break us free.'' 
 
 Dale raises his eyebrows. `` I'm sorry, I thought you just said that you wanted to summon the old ones into this place, which sounds suspiciously like'Hey Dale, I want to take the entire world of living creatures and subject them all to the worst hell imaginable, forever.''' 
 
 `` Do n't worry,'' says Luke, `` the flute ca n't open a window entirely, it can only crack it. The old ones will only be able to manifest a tiny fraction of their power in this world.'' He pauses. `` Of course, even that would be incredibly destructive.'' 
 
 `` How destructive?'' asks Dale. 
 
 `` This entire town, plus the surrounding fifty miles or so, will be converted into an unstable zone of reality. Nothing will survive for long, and any sentient persons will go mad almost instantly.'' 
 
 `` Well, so what?'' says Dale. `` It will all reset once the loop is broken anyway, right?'' 
 
 `` I do n't think so - if the old ones are able to break the loop, then I think it's broken permanently. We move forward from there.'' 
 
 `` That's a lot of, uh, permanent death.'' Dale sighs. `` Not really our style.'' 
 
 `` It gets worse,'' says Luke. `` The flute requires, uh, sacrifices before it will work.'' 
 
 `` Sacrifices?'' asks Dale. `` Like, plural?'' 
 
 `` Yes,'' says Luke. `` That's why we could never use it, ordinarily. Our rules would get in the way. But here, inside the loop...'' He trails off. 
 
 `` No rules,'' Dale finishes for him. Luke nods. 
 
 `` How many?'' asks Dale. `` How many sacrifices?'' 
 
 Luke grimaces. `` Let me put it this way: so many that we will have trouble getting everything done within the twenty-four hours that the loop allows.'' 
 
 `` Wow,'' says Dale. `` And what happens if we succeed, and the old ones break the loop?'' 
 
 `` Well, I think it's only fair that we clean up after ourselves,'' says Luke. 
 
 `` By'clean up,' do you mean'bury the bodies of all the people that we are going to murder' or do you mean'do battle with impossibly powerful god-things from another dimension that we purposefully invited into this dimension'?'' asks Dale. 
 
 `` Yes.'' 
 
 Dale scoops up the woodcuts with the naked women, and drops them in Luke's bag. `` I'll try these some other time, let's go!'' 
 ***** 
 If you like this story, there are more Dale and Luke stories [ here ] ( /r/TMODAL ) and my other stories are [ here ] ( /r/hpcisco7965 ). 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

