Y/N walked.

Y/N was past fear.

He felt empty.

The memories started out as just that, but slowly they turned and became emotions. He felt all of it in the moment. Emotions of endless lives.

Love was the strongest one.

He continued walking.

Towards Rain.

A red, sticky thread tugging at his chest, leading him through the bright, sunny park.

It was wrong, this sunny day. Wrong for what was coming.

Faster.

Go faster.

The voices whispered, impatient now, hungry.

They wanted it to end. They wanted Rain.

Vengeance?

Release?

Y/N didn't know.

He just walked faster.

The park was getting emptier. People were moving away, like they could sense something bad coming.

Or maybe it was just him. Maybe he was the wrong thing, walking through the sunshin.

He saw her then. By the lake. Where he'd been sitting just a little while ago. It felt like days ago, lifetimes ago.

But it was just minutes.

Rain was there. Standing by the edge of the lake, looking out at the water. Her back was to him. She was wearing a pale blue dress, the same color as always.

The color of innocence.

Lies.

He stopped walking, a few feet away from her. He just stood there, watching her. Waiting. Letting the voices build, letting the coldness fill him up, push out everything else.

Now.

Do it now.

End it.

He hesitated. They were him, and he knew why they told him to do what he will do.

But he felt weirde.

Rain turned around.

Slowly.

Like she knew he was there.

Her face it was beautiful so beautiful. The dark blue hair, the pale skin, the dark eyes.

The smile.

Always the smile.

But now he saw it underneath the beauty were everything else, a monster.

"Y/N" she said, her voice soft, sweet. Like honey. "You came."

He didn't say anything. He just stared at her.

"I missed you" Rain said, taking a step towards him. Her eyes weren't sparkling now. They were glowing. A faint, red light deep inside, like looking into a bottomless pit.

"Did you?" Y/N said, his voice flat, toneless.

Rain stopped, her smile faltering, just for a second. Like she sensed something different in him. Something wrong? For her, maybe.

"Of course, I did" she said, her voice still sweet, but a little sharper now. "I always miss you, Y/N. We're meant to be together. Forever."

"Forever" Y/N repeated. "Is this what you want?"

Rain's smile came back, wider now, sharper. "It's what we want, Y/N. Don't you feel it? The connection? The love?" She took another step closer.

"No" Y/N said, his voice still flat, still cold. "I don't feel anything. Not anymore."

Rain stopped again. Her smile vanished completely.

"What- what are you saying, Y/N?" Her voice was losing the sweetness now.

"I'm saying I remember" Y/N said, taking a step forward, closing the distance between them. He wasn't afraid. "I remember everything, Rain. All of it. All the loops."

Rain's face twisted. Not into anger. Not yet.

Into something else. Confusion? Surprise? But it was gone too fast to be sure.

"You can't" she whispered, her voice barely audible now. "You can't. It will ever..."

"I did" Y/N said, stopping right in front of her, close enough to touch. Close enough to do something.

"And now I'm going to end it."

Rain stared at him, her eyes wide, dark, glowing.

Then, she laughed.

A soft laugh, at first.

Then louder, sharper, more insane.

The laugh of something broken.

Something monstrous.

"End it?" she said, her voice rising, the sweetness gone, replaced by something cold, cruel.

"You can't end it, Y/N. You're mine. You belong to me. Forever. Remember?"

She reached out, her hand moving fast, blurring, reaching for his face.

To touch him? He didn't know. Didn't care.

He moved faster.

He didn't know where it came from, this speed, this strength. But it was there. Ready and waiting.

He grabbed her hand, stopping it in mid-air.

Rain's eyes widening even more, surprise flashing across her face.

"No" Y/N said, his voice low. "You belong to me."

And then he broke.

Not him.

Not Y/N.

But something inside him broke.

Something snapped.

The coldness of all the previous lives it exploded. It burst out of him, like a like a volcano erupting.

He didn't think. He didn't plan. He just acted.

Driven by the voices, by the coldness, by something he couldn't name, something that wasn't him. Not anymore.

His other hand moved, faster than thought. It went to Rain's throat. His fingers tightened.

Rain gasped again, this time for air, her eyes widening in real fear now. She tried to pull back, but his grip was too strong.

Impossibly strong.

"Y-Y/N...?" she choked out, her voice weak, strained.

Her eyes they were changing. The red glow flickering, fading.

Fear replacing the hunger. Real fear.

He didn't answer. He just squeezed. Harder.

Rain's face started to turn red, then purple. Her hands clawed at his arm, weak, desperate.

Her legs kicked, uselessly.

Her eyes they were bulging now, blood vessels bursting, tears streaming down her face, mixing with the rain that suddenly started to fall.

Rain.

It was raining again. Of course it was raining. It was always raining. In the beginning. In the end.

Always Rain.

But this rain it wasn't soft, gentle. It was hard, cold, biting.

Rain was choking, gurgling, her eyes pleading.

Pleading with him? Or pleading with someone else? Something else? He didn't know. Didn't care.

He just squeezed.

And squeezed.

Until something snapped.

Not in his hands. In her throat. A sickening crack, like breaking bone.

Rain's body went limp. Her hands fell away from his arm. Her legs stopped kicking. Her eyes went blank.

Empty.

He kept squeezing. Just to be sure. Just to make it stop. Just to end it.

And then it was done.

He let go.

Rain's body slumped to the ground, falling like a puppet.

She lay there, in the mud and the rain, her pale blue dress stained with dirt.

Blood coming out of her nose and mouth.

He looked down at her. At her broken body, her lifeless eyes, her smile. And he felt nothing.

Nothing.

Just done.

Good.

It's done.

You did it.

The voices said, satisfied now.

You're free. We're free.

Free? Was he free? He didn't feel free. He just felt less.

Less than nothing.

He looked at his hands. They were covered in blood. Rain's blood. Crimson blood, mixing with the rain.

He watched the blood drip from his fingers, fall to the ground, stain the grass, the mud, Rain's dress.

He watched until the rain washed the blood away. Until his hands were clean again.

He looked down at Rain's body again.

Empty. Lifeless. Not beautiful anymore. Not sweet. Not anything. Just gone.

And as he looked at her, as the rain washed the blood away, as the voices whispered their satisfaction, something else started to fade too.

Something that he couldn't name.

He felt like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders.

But also emptier. Like something had been taken away.

Something that he needed?

He didn't know. Didn't care. It was done.

Rain was gone.

The loop maybe the loop was broken too.

He didn't know. He just stood there.

Y/N closed his eyes.

And waited. He didn't know what. But he waited.

And as he waited, in the silence and the rain, he heard a whisper. Soft. Sweet. Familiar.

"I love you"

Rain's voice. Whispering in his ear. Right next to him. Even though she was dead. Even though she was gone.

"I love you" the voice whispered again, closer now, warmer. "I love you, I love you, I love you..."

The whisper turned into a murmur, then a chant, then a scream. "I LOVE YOU! I LOVE YOU! I LOVE YOU!"

Rain's voice, screaming in his head, in his soul, filling him up, drowning him, suffocating him.

He opened his eyes, gasping, stumbling back, away from the body, away from the voice, away from everything.

But Rain's voice was still there multiplying into hundreds. Screaming. "ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!"

He covered his ears, but it was no use. The voice was inside him now. Part of him.

He screamed.

A long, raw, scream of pain and terror.

He screamed until his voice gave out. Until he was just sobbing. Huddled on the ground, in the mud and the rain, sobbing like a child.

"ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!ILOVEYOU!"

Until everything went black.

Again.