Friday Black

Content Warning: This story references intense violence and violence against animals.

Ama, a young woman trapped in a time loop, wakes up to the affirmations of a robotic drone bird. After getting ready for the day, she hops across rooftops to get to her neighbor, Mrs. Nagel, and prepare her tea. Back at home, her brother, Ike, begs her to kill him, wanting to free himself from the trap of the Loop. She refuses and goes to the kitchen, where she is attacked and killed by her father.

In between iterations of the Loop, Ama dreams of her mother, who died by suicide before the time loop began, reassuring her. The dream strikes her as something new since Ama hasn’t had any new dreams since the Flash, the destructive event that triggered the time loop. Afterward, Ama dies by suicide to experience the dream once more. However, she fails to see her mother.

Ama shares what she saw with Ike, who explains that Ama’s dream is likely an anomaly—a deviation from the usual sequence of the Loop. Past anomalies have enabled those trapped within the Loop to maintain their memories through the Flash and develop characteristics such as heightened intelligence, musical mastery, or in Ama’s case, increased speed and agility.

Ike decides he wants to tell an acquaintance named Robert about Ama’s dream. Ama stops by their neighbor Mr. Pople’s home to retrieve a piercer gun before she and Ike proceed to Kennedy Street, where Robert lives. On the way, Ike theorizes that the increase in anomalies might suggest that a permanent end to the Loop is imminent.

Kennedy Street is ruled by the sadistic Carl Samuel, who, in the days before the Loop, mocked Ama’s late mother’s suicide. When the Loop began, Ama hunted Carl for sport and tortured him in front of his mother across multiple iterations. Carl eventually showed an equal propensity for violence and developed characteristics that elevated him into a “war god” alongside Ama. Ama is remorseful about the extreme acts of violence her “old self” committed, especially as she eventually turned away from violence out of boredom. She is also aware that her actions molded Carl’s present behavior. As they approach Kennedy Street, Carl shoots Ama in the knee. Ama tries to shoot Ike to spare him from Carl’s wrath, but Carl kills Ama before she succeeds.

She wakes up in her next iteration of the Loop and repeats her routine with Mrs. Nagel, making her tea as she wakes up. She confesses that turning away from her old self to help others feels futile. Mrs. Nagel fails to see the difference between the old and present versions of Ama, affirming that she’s done well.

Going back home, she discovers Carl having breakfast with her father and Ike, whom Carl spared so he could kill Ama in front of her family. After Ike reports that his conversation with Robert was inconclusive, the family band together to fight Carl. Ama attempts to apologize for her actions in the middle of combat and subdues Carl by exposing his head, which he usually hides with a torn-up shirt. Instead of killing Carl, Ama lets him rest in her room. Ama, Ike, and their father then go outside to strike poses against the wall and watch the explosion of the Flash as it obliterates them.