Chapter Text
Penelope Eckhart was no stranger to death. She had died over and over and over again. So many damn times. No matter how hard she tried she couldn't`run away because the Eckharts or Ivonne always seemed to catch her. She couldn't fight back because she just wasn't strong enough.
So Penelope had resigned herself to death. She would never get back to her world and she didn't care anymore. She had all but lost the will to live.
But something changed. Actually a specific person had changed.
Reynold Eckhart.
As annoying as he was, he was also oddly endearing in his own weird way. Penelope used to want to punch him in the face every time she saw him but that feeling had all but gone away (Reynold could still be a complete idiot at times).
After dying a bunch of times Reynold had barged into her room and had almost given Penelope a heart attack. He had spilled his guts to her telling her everything. He had died and had kept coming back to life and he told her that he was sick and tired of watching her die. He begged her to forgive him to let him help her.
At first Penelope was shocked. She wasn't sure how to react. Should she be mad, should she be upset, should she be indifferent? In the end Penelope had decided that if she ever wanted to get out of this god damn loop she needed more resources and Reynold Eckhart was someone who could give her resources.
So began Penelope and Reynold Eckhart's path to get the hell out of this damn time loop.
Unfortunately for Penelope and Reynold their plans were not really going anywhere at all. Most of the time the plan blew up in their faces and Penelope ended up getting killed. Leaving Reynold to reflect on how badly they had fucked up.
It was incredibly frustrating that no matter how hard they tried that nothing ever worked.
They had tried to find Ivonne before Penelopes coming of age ceremony. They never could.
They had tried poisoning her but Ivonne always managed to blame Penelope for it.
They even went as far as stabbing Ivonne with a knife. It had worked for about 30 seconds before they had realized that attacks on Ivonne wouldn't work unless the whole mirror of truth was pieced together.
Reynold was beyond frustrated. Punching walls, drinking, and even breaking very expensive things.
Penelope was trying to avoid everything. She slept more than humanly possible and sometimes refused to eat for days on end and barely talked to anyone. (usually Reynold would barge into her room and make her choke some food down saying “If I have to live in this god damn fucking time loop so do you.”)
They were at a stalemate. Absolutely nothing they did worked. Ivonne always seemed to be one step ahead of them (most people were a step ahead of Reynold anyways because he wasn't the brightest). She always seemed to get the most powerful men in the empire to back her up
And while Reynold Eckhart may be influential his brother and the crown prince had much more power than him. So Reynold had decided to sharpen his swordsmanship to perfection. So Reynold Eckhart was now very, very good at sword fighting.
This time around Penelope and Reynold had had what they thought was a pretty solid plan. They would reveal Ivonne to really be Leila and it would be happy ever after (at least according to Reynold). But as usual the plan had blown up in their faces.
But unlike usual instead of Penelope being bound in front of the crown prince her brother was.
Penelope was horrified she wanted to puke. Although she had died countless times she had never seen Reynold die. He was the one person on her side; she didn't want to watch him die.
So when Callisto pointed his sword at her brother's chest she screamed. She tried to run to him but someone was holding her back. She looked behind her to see Derrick Eckhart's stoic face staring at her.
So all she could do was watch as Reynold Eckhart was killed by the crown prince. A part of Penelope broke when she saw that. Later that day Penelope Eckhart killed thinking that it was better not to live at all then to live without anyone on her side.