Seven days apart, including the transition from one year to the next. Mimsy was not superstitious, but it still felt wrong, and she couldn't manage to shake the lingering sensation that she had forgotten something. Like something was missing.

It only got worse as the reality that had been so graciously provided for six hours began to settle into her mind. This wasn't right. She wasn't right. Thankfully, there were simple steps towards recovery and a fail-safe to employ, and everything would be all right. It had a proven success rate, after all, and she found herself weakly smiling by the time she reached the door. They could talk about it until it didn't feel important anymore, reason that it only held significance if they wanted it to, and could remind themselves of the superiority of this universe, even if she still really wanted that doctorate.

Everything would be all right.

She opened the door, expecting to find him there. Instead, it was empty, and the room was--

Ramona.

The name was everywhere, maddeningly ubiquitous in its impermissible existence. It littered her entire field of vision, no matter which way she looked, a disgusting infestation that swarmed from the floor to each of the four walls she counted on for stability, every one of the hundreds, thousands of iterations of the terrible pest gnawing at her security, consuming her carefully constructed comfort.

Ruined.

Her nails dug into her arms, and the pressure against her FEAR shield brought the realization that she was hugging herself. In the face of anxiety and overwhelming hopelessness, she was hugging herself, just as she had in a ballroom buffet room 12 hours ago.

No. No. This was not as senseless as a slippery slope of disaster caused by a bite of black forest cake, and she was not that person. She was not. Still, her arms remained tightly wrapped over her chest until she dropped to her knees in the mess, hands trembling with a furious uncertainty. There was proof. She was not that person, and the evidence was...

Wide eyes skipped in a frenzy from one corner of the room to the other, erratically searching for the consolidated information that served as her anchor to reality. The longer she looked (Ramona), the more her gaze fell upon (Ramona) her belongings strewn about the room, the more she found (Ramona) evidence that the care for (Ramona) her well-being had been very obviously (Ramona) discarded in favor of Ramona.

A strangled scream clawed its way out of her throat when the sight became too overwhelming for her to bearably continue her search, and her useless, shaking fingers clenched into fists, gathering handfuls of splintered wood and displaced objects and her anchor.

Her anchor. There was a glimmer of hope, just for a fraction of a second, until she discovered that it was only a torn fragment of the guide to reality that she had so painstakingly created, neat and definitive and organized, to contain her sanity and identity. It was a once-sturdy metaphorical box of factual information, timelines and charts and the most crucial portions of her existence, lest that existence be removed or destroyed or altered in any capacity. All of it was very neatly tied together with a ribbon of trust and verity each time a new contribution was made, just before it was sealed away again, awaiting a new moment of necessity. It was a box made of paper and words and it was everything, and she had been incredibly foolish to believe that it was safe here. Just because she once felt safe here didn't mean that it was. She had made an irreparable mistake by trusting love with the delicately crafted coffer containing the correct actuality of Mimsy Kercher, Timeline 0.

Because now it was open. Smashed to pieces, torn and scattered with abandon. Carelessly.

Without any consideration for her.

One hand sifted through the debris around her, finding nothing. She knew that the pieces were here, but that name (Ramona, Ramona, Ramona, Ramona--) made her sick, and she doubted that an anchor made sturdy with tape could offer any security to her anyway. It already felt as if she were drowning. She couldn't breathe, and the corners of her vision threatened her with darkness, her heart beating so rapidly that her lightheaded world now looked as disoriented as it felt.

Desperate, she opened her hand to look at the ripped section of paper in her palm. On it was only an image drawn hastily in pencil and the words 'yellow', 'goddess', 'scissors', and 'heart'.

She was not that person.

Her hand slammed against the floor, crushing the image against it, and she sucked in an angry, shuddering breath through clenched teeth, glassy eyes staring at the room again.

It happened every time. Every single fluctuation of the universe, every instance of quantum entanglement, every incident that inflicted amnesia upon her, all of it resulted in the same thing: she sought love, felt love, wanted love. Most recently, she had wanted marriage and children. She wanted a family.

Each new existence explored humanity in one of the most human ways, and statistically, she was the outlier. Visibly distant from all other observed data. No better than an error.

And everyone knew that including an error was reckless and unreasonable.

This was not the first time she considered embracing the uncomfortable feelings and ideas that had begun to form in her mind with increasing frequency. The last time that it became too much to bear, she sought someone to help her share the burden. When she finally found herself incapable of escaping the crisis, she responded to the threat by standing still and holding his hand. She spilled her concerns until he coaxed her to sleep, and in the moment, it felt as if this was the right decision to make. So she had, selfishly, assuring herself that it was for a greater purpose. Allowing him to hold all of her broken pieces together was easier than she thought it might have been, despite the risk of what might happen if he let go. It was never a concern to her, because if there was anyone in existence who would keep their arms around her forever, it was him.

She thought it was, at least.

She didn't think that anymore.

In the moment that she gave in, it all descended upon her all at once, a storm of deafening static and whispers, insults and laughter and told-you-sos. The only actions that she had ever consciously taken to place herself among the rest of the data, which might have been indicative that she was not an error at all, were turned against her, mockingly erasing any evidence that she could be human, and that she could be loved, and that she could belong.

How had she ever believed otherwise? She chose a man who was already sharing his love with someone else, and encouraged him to allow her into a position of greater importance than the woman he chose to marry. Truthfully, bitterly, she was not incredibly surprised when he had done it again. She had been abandoned in favor of a stronger connection that she could never compete with. The girl (Ramona) was untouchable in her nonexistence, and Robert could do her no good if he slipped through the rabbit hole of the wrong universe. Or if she did exist, and had been kept a secret from her, he would inevitably leave the island to find her. He had refused to run away with her, but he would surely do it for Ramona, because he loved her more.

The sharp taste of blood began to faintly fill her mouth, and she slowly released her lip from her teeth. It stung when it met the air and the salt of tears; she didn't notice that she was steadily crying, and it did not come with sniffling or sobs, just silent streaks of pained regret that slipped through the cracks into visibility.

Among the small selection of objects that she carried in her pocket was a miniature lighter, meant to reignite the burners in the lab when the pilot went out. It fit easily in her palm, and brought a soothing comfort to her numb fingers as she tested it. The glow of the flame almost matched the glow of the heavy book in her other hand, and the coincidence felt incredibly encouraging.

She did not laugh or smile or watch with curious wonder when the bedsheets easily ignited, quickly spreading across the room. Though her steps out of the door were slow, tentative in the wake of injury, she did not linger or turn back. It was already burning easily, without any need for a catalyst - she'd had too many of those today, and the remnants of what she and Robert shared were vulnerable enough to be easily cleansed by fire.

But it could not destroy it, because he already had.