[i]A multiverse apart...[/i] [b]Zlalmaw Zfani 032.18510 88 AU from Terr-S35Y[/b] Crowned around this world sits the Ishkgi ring, a colossal construct used to transfer the planet to an unfamiliar orbit. It acts as an anchor in the K'isti; one of millions used to travel the breadth of the Zlalmaw Gizati, the Eternal Empire. It is filthy with parasites, stellar worms grown swollen as they leach off of the ring's energy. If ignored, they could eventually misalign the K'isti and cause untold chaos as voyagers find themselves ejected billions of years from their destination, or hurtling into the heart of a star as they fell from the bleed of superluminal travel. A slurry of translucent protoplasma is exuded from vents along the ring's broad expanse. It propels itself through gravitational flux and undulates towards the nearest stellar worm. It envelops the organic mass, undergoing rapid cellular mutation as it begins the process of harvesting all energies and returning them to the K'isti. Similar slurries are ejected elsewhere to never complete their task; their hindrance nothing more than a bubble. A very particular bubble. The bubble, an oscillating glome birthed from entropy, ascends and with its entry catalyzed the conversion of existence to a true vacuum. Geometries distort as the Greisman-Zatsepin-Kuzmin limit is ruptured with the sudden introduction of dark energy and an unknown force. Reality is violently rent through total protonic reversal then suffused into a grander magnitude of chaos. [b]10,000,000 AB The Aggregate of No Dimension[/b] Alone, in perfect self-contentment, exists the Absolute. Perpetuity manifest, the Absolute basks in its lack of imagination. Impeded by egoism, the Absolute was incapable of conceiving of anything other than itself and this reflected in its dominion; an infinitesimally small yet impossibly lustrous bead. It soliloquized in onanistic praise with bursts of low, monotonous tinkling. "It is fathomless ecstasy! It occupies all, and all is it! One yet all, all yet one! Such splendor!" Its luster faded as it was submerged into matterless void where billowing masses pulsed from one vague shape to another. It plummeted past effulgent spirals of quintessence and bled into something beyond existence. Neatly condensed, the Absolute is consumed. [b]7.7.2002 Mt. Takao, Japan Earth-B21X[/b] "Ojii-san! I'm hungry!" Beads of sweat roll down the gleaming pate of Seijuro Taniguchi as he plods along his scurrying grandson, hand in hand. The boy waves a toy katana as menacingly as he can, giggling with delight. He enjoys hiking with his grandfather; it meant picnics with all the sweets he could eat. They stop at a series of benches and take a much-needed break. Seijuro dabs at his forehead with a handkerchief and basks in a cool breeze. His grandson runs happily into a field of soft grass, singing with each swing of his mighty blade. "Delicious sweets! For you and me!" Seijuro looks through the basket he'd brought and removes a small bundle wrapped in cloth. He opens it and pops a morsel into his mouth. Setting the bundle aside, he produces a watermelon and goes about cutting it. "Keichii," the old man calls out having lost sight of the boy. There is no reply. "I've got your favorite candied persimmons." He grows anxious at the continued silence and rises with an aged groan. Reaching the clearing, he rushes with a yell as he sees the thrashing form of his grandson. "Help! Someone help!" the old man pleads as he swaddles the tiny frame in his arms, flecks of spit soaking into cotton. Seijuro clings to the child as clenched eyes burst open and in them was reflected.. [b]Local Void Universe-F67X[/b] Engulfed in a field of its own spacetime, the beam had bored through countless AUs at transluminal speeds. Aberrant energies roiled, having dispersed none along its trajectory towards the core of a naked Kerr black hole. Spacetime is cast aside as it tunnels through the singularity, down a multiversal fault and into an adjacent universe along the nexus, B21X. [b]?[/b] Alone, adrift in the wake of protonic decay is a crown, awash in crimson. Beyond time, the corpses of Titans sit like jewels set in morbid tapestry. Gods old and new had fallen in the 10^100 years since the crown-bearer's awakening. Might and cunning had failed them and with their passing, boredom grew. It reflected on its birth pangs. Having undergone complete subatomic breakdown, what had been Keichii Taniguchi struggled to bind its consciousness to a singular vessel. By way of energies it had yet to come across in its timeless travels, Keichii had been seeded into the subconscious of a multiversal cluster. Trapped within quantum uncertainty. The more of himself he perceived, the greater his capacity to experience and contain grew. Humans often numb to chronic pain but no respite was to be had at the hands of multiversal expansion. Its omnipresent attention was suddenly aroused at the sensation of something at the edge of its dread awareness. The fluctuation and dilation of Time across infinity was but a stream to play in. It pierced the ken of Its being and perceived an object of its endless desire. Now surging with an azure brilliance, the crown-bearer stirred and with its motions a white hole was birthed into the Faultverse. Electromagnetic waves cascaded forth in a staccato of octaves, towards blight and brilliance.