text: “Welcome to Day 1,247,” a voice billows through an invisible speaker. “It’s a new day,” I say through gritted teeth. I take the same three steps to grab the same backpack that sits in the same corner of the same room where I have started every day for the last 1,246 days. You see, 1,247 days ago, an almighty force which still remains unnamed announced to all of us humans of the world that it would destroy the concept of time. Everyone thought this was just another crazed cult leader thinking he was God. We were wrong. This force actually followed through on its promise and has had us all living the same day every day. We can only do one days work over and over and over again for the rest of our lives. We can’t celebrate holidays. We can’t predict tomorrow’s weather. We can’t pick up where we left off yesterday. We can’t grow. We can’t die. So how do I spend my time? I spend every day trying to find the damn force that killed my baby. Since this all started, I can never remember what I did the day before. I have no belongings or writings or reminders that carry over from previous days. I can’t retrace steps. I’m only told what number day it is when I wake up each morning. All I know is that I was pregnant before this but no longer am. How exactly does one find a mythical, probably intangible, godly powerful thing? Isn’t this just a hopeless mission? Along with everything and everyone else I had before, I’ve lost all hope too. I’m just doing this to pass the time. *** Yeah, yeah, yeah. I killed her fetus. If you’ve got power like mine, shit happens. Protecting unborn humans is not my priority. Rather, teaching humans the dangers of their own narcissistic nature is. I spent millennia after millennia looking after these dimwits, assigned to pulling off miracles for the undeserving few that either showed an instance of selflessness or needed a supreme slap in the face in order to realize the basic truth that they don’t matter anymore than anyone else. How can you tell me that a well-off woman shopping for her thirteenth onesie for her only-conceived-two-weeks-before fetus is more important than an animal tortured or a child starved? Sitting in my high and mighty office, witnessing day after day of different humans doing the same selfish shit, I couldn’t stand it anymore. I took over the highest power, destroyed the entire concept of time, blessed these lab rats with a completely self-absorbed eternity, and have enjoyed day after day of watching them drive themselves mad with the very selves they once adored. Hm. Bliss. *** I still remember everything from before time was destroyed. Before this concrete cell, there was my partner and me renovating a nursery. Before I was given only this backpack and jumpsuit to wear every day, there was us shopping for baby clothes. I was pregnant. We were expecting, but then it all stopped. I leave my cell like I do every day, hoping to find that one crucial thing that leads to the next crucial thing that leads me to that force. Maybe, on some already-lived day, I already found it. Have I seen that child before? Have I seen that man before? Have I seen that cloud before? I stand on top of the drained fountain in the middle of our gray townsquare, looking at the crowd around me, everyone looking for anything that makes sense. We all bend and wander and shuffle, twisting our eyes in the hope of turning them into magical binoculars which have the power to point out the important. “Mom?” a young boy calls out to a woman across the way. Like oil separating from water, the surrounding crowd follows the boy’s eyes to make an instant path to his mother. I know that the unnamed force already destroyed the concept of time, but when that mother hugged her son and when he cried into her shoulder, I swear I felt time freeze. Every person in that square, still and silent. The only thing moving was the wind carrying the faint smell of saltwater. *** Did you just see what happened in Territory 73? The humans made way for a mother and son. They didn’t get bitter. They didn’t pout for someone else’s happiness. They only did what they should have done. They’re learning! See? This apocalypse isn’t all negative. I’m not all horrible. This woman wants to find me and end me, I guess. I don’t know what she wants. She doesn’t even know what she wants! She blames the loss of her fetus on me, when she should blame it on all the very humans surrounding her. They’re the ones who upset me, who disappointed me! Without them, we wouldn’t be in the mess, and she would be with child. But the humans are learning. I’ll give them that, but that doesn’t earn I’ll ease up. I’ll never ease up. *** Saltwater. Nick loved the smell of saltwater. He grew up near a beach, would spend all the time he could swimming, sea shell hunting, sand castle building. He wanted us to live in a beach house. He wanted his child to love the smell of saltwater just like he did. I can see him now like he’s walking along his favorite shore. Wait. I can see him now. “Nick?” I stumble off the fountain’s ledge, the people around me treating me like they did that boy. “Nick!” They watch my every move to curve the path with my steps. “Nick!” The man was always hard of hearing. “Nick!” The whole crowd echoes his name and becomes my choir. He hears us. He turns the right way. We see each other. We don’t know if we’ve seen each other every day for the past 1,246 days or not yet once since this whole thing started, but we cry. *** Wow, it is a dramatic day for Territory 73! I remember these two. They threw the biggest tantrum when I separated them and seemingly ended their life together. However, they are miraculous, and that shouldn’t be taken lightly coming from a supreme being like me. These two have somehow managed to find each other every single day for the past 1,246 days, and today, they continue their streak. They baffle me, which I thought was impossible to do. I just don’t understand how they can pull this off every single day. Is it luck? It must be luck. Luck, the one and only thing higher than me. But I can’t let them get to me. I can’t let them strike down my confidence. I can’t let them deter me from my priority. They’re nothing more than lucky. They’re nothing more than lucky. They’re nothing more than lucky.