XII.

The swirling soup of eternity boiled and bubbled throughout the Void. Floating outside of it, just beyond a metaphysical arm’s reach, was a silently floating husk of a man. At one point in time, he could resemble a crumbling statue. At another, a jumble of scribbles. And at another, a charred, waxen skeleton. The mad doctor wandered through the ether, craning his head to speak into the screaming abyss. DOTS TO DOTS. THE PIXEL MATRIX DISPLAY OF EXISTENCE HAS GONE QUIET. SHATTERED FOR NAUGHT. INTER, INTERRED. Creeping from the shadows, silent figures emerged. One, a head with a toothy-crescent grin. Another, a lanky humanoid holding his face in his hands. You speak of a great disaster. Is that what you meant, W.D. Gaster? they said in unison. ALL I SPEAK IS TRUTH. I CAME, I SAW, I DID NOT CONQUER. THE ABYSS DOES NOT LEND ITSELF TO VICTORY.

More of the doctor’s followers emerged, a small congregation trailing behind him. Can you imagine a universe where everything is the same, but the universe doesn’t exist...? A broken man said. It seems they’re living through it... If what you say is true. The doctor hunched over, his face twitching. ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT PIECES IS MISSING, TRUE. YET THE NINETY-NINE PERCENT CONTINUES EXISTING, SOMEHOW. THIS SHOULD NOT BE. A grey lizard lacking arms shuffled forward. What do you think we should do...? The mad doctor turned. EVEN A PRESENCE IN THE GATE. TOOK INCREDIBLE BENDING OF PLOT. TO MANIFEST YET AGAIN WOULD BE SUICIDE. Then we bide our time? IT IS ALL WE CAN DO. BUT ONE DAY. EVEN IF IT IS NOT THIS TIMELINE. I WILL RETURN. AND YOU WILL FOLLOW.

Another one of the followers spoke. What does your research say about this? Did you... have any? The doctor nodded in a spastic gesture. INTERPUNCT SHAPED REALITY. FROM OUT HERE, I SAW THIS. THE OVERSEER HELD IT FIRST. THE FOURTH CONQUEROR HELD IT SECOND. THE TEN SUPERIORS HELD IT LAST. WITH NO ONE TO SHAPE IT, REALITY TURNS FORMLESS. ACTIONS WILL TAPER OFF. COHESION WILL CEASE. THE PROCESS WILL BE GRADUAL. BUT THE DIGESTION OF A DOT DEMANDS DOOM. THE END OF MAN DRAWS EVER CLOSER. How can you say so without fear? Our ultimate death will soon be here. The doctor stared into the darkness, calmly walking forward. THE DEATH OF THE AUTHOR. NOT OF HIS WORDS. AND NOT OF HIS WORK. THOUGH WE DO NOT EXIST, WE LIVE. THOUGH WE DO NOT THINK, WE TALK. THOUGH WE ARE NOT, WE ARE.

Peeling back the shadows outside the realm of the extant, the doctor stared at the shimmering matrix of reality in all its objectivity. Though those inside claimed to view it as a constantly changing, fluctuating sea of shapes and corners and bubbling universes, when you stood outside, you saw it for what it was. It was an unstoppable, unfolding flower of life that was the fastest thing in existence, for it was existence, and yet as still as a pane of glass, for it did not exist and had never existed. Everything in its web was ensnared by crowns and connecting lines and shifting prismatic tendrils, the forces of plot in their metafictional glory. Encircling unreality was a set of six circles, a set of six circles, and a single circle. Spinning, cartwheeling, and forging themselves into being within were a set of five solids — a tetrahedron, a hexahedron, an octahedron, a dodecahedron, and an icosahedron. The geometry was cooled and hardened, the underlying form within the geometry had rotted away, and the twelve outer circles seemed barren. The inner circle was punched out of being entirely, a hole cut through all conceivable points in Fiction simultaneously. The doctor stared at it, curiously.

His head twitched, and he chuckled.

The doctor stared through the eye socket of God, and turned away. The wind was silent — and then he heard a knock at his door.

< 3.1: FROM EDEN | 3.2: SOCKET OF GOD | 3.3: DEVIL'S IN A FINE SUIT >