“The Real Adventures in Capitalism” is a memetic condition consisting of spontaneously-occurring false memories of an animated television show of the same name. These memories are fragmentary, but portray a consistent picture of the show, even in subjects who have had no contact with other affected individuals. This allows for accurate reconstruction of the contents.
According to provided accounts, “The Real Adventures in Capitalism” consists of two 13 episode seasons, first airing in late 2013 and ending in the spring of 2018. Reports of severe delays and hiatuses are common. The art style and character design can vary significantly between episodes. The credits for each episode list only the voice cast, with all characters listed as being portrayed by themselves.
The primary parties, entities, factions, events, or persons referenced in “The Real Adventures in Capitalism” are believed to be fictional.

Episode 101: The Boss Lady
Everyone remembers the opening scene: Isabel slouched in her office chair, Emma standing proper and awkward, an army of corgis (all named Jeremy) delivering tubs of ice cream. Meandering discussion of the dire financial situation facing the Wonderful Workshops Toy Company, the Executive Board's corporate mismanagement, competitors, Isabel's loss of creative spark, and clever wordplay. The reveal that Emma is not nearly as humorless as first impressions would imply, and in her own way nudges Isabel out of her moping episode.
All's well that begins well.
Episode 102: Ticker Tape Tango
Rubberhose animation, all black and white. A big band musical number, the tune and words escaping the mind and leaving the weathered impression of bombast. First appearance of the Executive Board with their ticker tape mouths and hissing voices and joyless enforcers of corporate propriety. Chases and pranks and pratfalls, slapstick and silliness. The memory is weaker here.
Episode 103: Isabel Becomes President
Emma is the vice president, no surprise twist there. Jeremy is appointed to be secretary of state. Chaos descends upon Washington as Congress desperately tries to restrain Isabel's manic decrees and fun-oriented domestic policy. They fail, and watch on in misery and horror. The nation's nuclear arsenal is replaced with jellybeans, cats and dogs live together in harmony, debt is turned into donuts, and political parties that do not involve dancing are banned. World War 3 seems inevitable after publicly informing Vladimir Putin that he “needs to go take a poop and come back when he's less grumpy.”
The state of affairs only lasts for a few hours, as it is revealed that Isabel's election was the result of a catastrophic mistake in vote-counting. She has already grown bored of politics by this time, and resigns gracefully.
Credits roll overtop images of nondescript men in sunglasses and black suits speaking to government officials and members of the press seen earlier in the episode.
At no point in the series is Isabel's exact age or nationality stated. It isn't known if the election was legitimate in the first place.
Episode 104: Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo
“I know it's a grammatically correct sentence!” Isabel exclaims, waving her detached arm around. “You didn't need to point it out!”
Episode 105: The Beach Episode
Emma is sitting on a beach chair beneath an umbrella, reading a book. In the background, Isabel is playing with Jeremy, building a sandcastle, and jumping about in the surf. After five to six minutes, Isabel stops moving and shouts “Emma!” while pointing to a large white-grey form emerging from the water and making low, whale-like noises. A wave of pink foam washes onto the sand. Emma places a bookmark in her book, and rises from her chair.
Episode 106: Cryogenic Chaos
Frosty blue tubes of cracked and shattered glass. Dinosaurs wandering the halls, eating office plants and terrorizing the workers. Bigfeet wearing suits of squid and flatworm and flower. Red-robed cultists, faces too blunt and broad for cro magnon man and flesh carved up in squirming scars and scabs. Isabel dressed up in a tacky safari getup with a net. Emma provides handy dinosaur facts in crayon-colored interludes. Jeremy survives getting eaten. While the most dangerous escapees are recaptured, several re-appear later in the season for background gags.
The dinosaurs featured are feathered, where appropriate.
Episode 107: Heist of the Century
Isabel in bunny slippers and a planet-pattered evening gown, illuminated by a refrigerator light, staring at ransacked cabinets and a spray-painted decal on the wall: A black rabbit with a hammer.
Episode 108: Jeremy, Jeremy and Jeremy
In order to save Isabel from a board meeting, three Jeremies band together to stage a rescue attempt. Being cute dogs in possession of minimal brainpower and no thumbs, they spend the rest of the episode doing things more appropriate to their station in life. Cuts to an exasperated Isabel, mere moments from rescue but for the Jeremies' lackluster efforts, are interspersed throughout.
Episode 109: Therein We Find the Shark
Two rows of men and women in spotless labcoats wail on sharks trussed up by their tails. Isabel and Emma are led down the center causeway by a man twelve feet tall if he was an inch, his knuckles raw and bloody. The nametag at his breast pocket reads “M. K. Harker”.
“You see, the real shark was inside us the entire time,” he says, pointing to his chest. Isabel nods in agreement.
Above their heads, the mangled corpse of a dream-whale shark hangs as a trophy.
Episode 110: The Green Hart
Three men at the corner table:
Edwin, dark and dour, whose heart held only the clink of coins.
Theodore, young and bright-burning, the venture-scholar-soldier.
Reginald, who kept his head in the clouds and his hands at the workbench.
The first would stay in London, sink deep into the inky shadows of its back-alleys until he was inseparable from that unimpeachable gloom.
The second would set out around the world, butler in tow, and delve into all the secret places hidden from the sight of the natural sciences.
The third took his toys to the World's Fair, Chicago. It could have gone better, but it came to be that he received a job offer from the Anderson Factory. They were looking for a new draftsman to design their toys.
Episode 111: The Terrible Tale of Mr Redd
He is pale like curdled cream, save his hair. That is red. His hands are likewise red. He prefers the straight razor, but will use whatever is on hand. A screwdriver. A protractor. A newton's cradle.
The security cameras see it all: he moves, the lens does not. He jumps from screen to screen and the camera never shifts to focus on all the red, or the Misters and Misses lying still in the halls. He cannot take out his fester-anger out on his father, his father is long dead.
He never stops talking. Narrating a cavalcade of all the faults wrought against him by his dear departed father. His companion nods serenely, but does not interrupt. Mr. Redd does not appreciate interruptions.
He kills the Misters, he kills the Misses, he kills the workers and the guards and tears the wiring out of the drones and he won't stop talking.
He kicks down the door of the boardroom with a boot stained with blood and shit. He kills the dusty gray beancounters, and stomps their sagging gray heads into red paste on the white tile floor.
Mr. Redd's companion smiles. He has too many teeth for his mouth. They fall out and plink on the floor, crowded in a jaw twisted by the strain.
In the doorway, Isabel. She is wearing a striped sweater. She tries to say something, it sticks in her throat. She is crying.
Redd lunges. Emma is in-between them. Too fast. She shouldn't be that fast. Deflection, redirection, palm to the chest. Redd slides back but does not fall.
Emma says nothing, nor needs to. Isabel runs, scrambling over herself.
The fight is a thing of beauty and muscle-clenched terror. There was budget that went into this. Redd is everywhere, swinging around like a maniac. Emma is rooted, defensive, solid. Redd rambles. Emma doesn't.
“Who are you?” he asks, blood dribbling down his chin, shiv buried in her shoulder
“Nobody important.”
She breaks his arm, shatters his jaw. Redd falls, Emma runs. The ground shakes, and Mr. Hungry, for that is his name, places a hand upon Redd's shoulder.
“Thank you, my boy. Your services are no longer required.”
Red looks up, and sees that Mr. Hungry is made of teeth.
Episode 112: The Big Crunch
White text upon black: “In the outer darkness, there is weeping and the gnashing of teeth.”
Sound only: The grinding of molars, the tear of meat, the slither of a tongue on blood-slicked gums. Swallow.
Faint whisper: “It is very hungry."
No credits.
Episode 113: The Factory
And from the crumbling Workshops, that cocoon of childish joy, rises the bleak and terrible countenance of a dark and horrible Factory.
Episode 201: Road Trip
A bright purple convertible, all spoilers and chrome, speeds down the deserted highWay beneath the burning light of alien suns. Emma is driving. She's got her hair pulled back beneath a red bandanna, sunglasses, a band t-shirt with the sleeves cut off, jeans. She's never, ever worn jeans before, not in this show. Things have changed. They're on the run now.
Isabel sits in the passenger seat, Jeremy curled up in her lap, a thousand-yard stare down at her dirtied sneakers. She looks like she's been punched in the stomach, had the life stolen out of her breath. She says nothing.
Emma cycles through radio stations. Solar flare rap. Shattered Deus' new bronzecore single. The Sarkic Tabernacle Choir. The smooth hip-hop of Old Crab. Goat-drinker loneliness-songs. Yeren throat-chanting. Eventually, she just turns it off.
“It's not going to stop hurting,” Emma says. “Closure is a load of horseshit.”
The bone-dry desert, orange and pink, flashes by.
“I'm sorry, Isabel.”
Episode 202: Pit Stop on the Borderland
The swine-things at the window are detailed, rotoscoped, hideous in comparison to the friendly pastels of the rest of the diner's patrons. They snort and squeal and scream in the night, clawing at windowpanes, gnawing at the doorframes. Emma leads the building of barricades. Isabel hides under the counter. She has barely said anything this episode or the last. The barricades hold for the moment, but they will splinter before dawn comes. Emma looks exhausted, for the first time that can be remembered.
Something is going on inside Isabel's head, no viewer privy to it. But she acts without prompting, and concocts a plan far more sober-headed than most. Battle plans are drawn on the counter in ketchup and mustard. Salt shakers are marched through their paces in preparation. A counter-attack is designed, striking the swine-things where confusion might drive them to retreat along with the coming sun.
She's never been like this before. There's no going back after it.
Episode 203: Red Planet Blues
There is a funeral on Mars. No one was invited, but two guests show up anyway. Emma carries an umbrella, though the blue-white sun is weak in the Martian morning. Isabel cleans the sand off the solar panels and wakes Opportunity up for one last time, to send the girl off.
Episode 204: Maximizing Prophet
A fellow in a red turban and black bathrobe mans a stand of bootleg toys. His name is S.D., and he scratches his scraggly beard as Isabel inspects his merchandise. He admits to no wrongdoing. His words coat the ear in snake oil. You hate him and love to hate him. Smarmy, silver-tongued, razor-eyed bastard.
The pair keep running into him, all over that cosmic crossroad marketplace. Each time he's selling something new. He balances scams like spinning plates.
A comet falls to earth, and from its core steps the DEER. It will not be the end of this world, but no one knows that now. The market town scrambles to escape its path. Isabel's attempt to delay or redirect it go nowhere – Emma is forced to drag her to safety.
SD is vaporized when he challenges the god. Not out of bravery or self-sacrifice, no: pure self-aggrandizement. Without a sound, in a flash, he is gone.
Hanging in the metallic fog, a moment before the wind wipes it clear:
YOU AIN'T GETTING RID OF ME THAT EASY.
Episode 205: Hard Times in the House of the South
The Empress is dead! Utmai C-jen VII is dead, murdered in her own sanctum, murdered in her own Summer Palace, murdered with her daughters and sons and consorts! Murdered and cast down by the northerners! Treachery! Treachery! They come under the banner of the five-pointed star, the crown of their Red Emperor, those black-clad men of the land of Göc!
They all forget the little bastard, sired by a commoner in a village far away. The simpleton-princess. As the bombs go off, and the gas fills the streets with corpses, as the firing squads execute each block in turn, the gamboling black-furred brute Zhos-Who-Makes-Wonders steals the girl away. By hidden paths and secret Ways, the tinsmith takes the last Empress out of her burning kingdom.
In his vest pocket, he has a Library card.
Episode 206: Disaster on the Way
Dust from the DEER's arrival rises still on the eastern horizon.
An upturned car, crumpled like paper.
The corpse of a Leviathan collapsed across the highWay, its belly swollen and split open.
The stench of rot, oozing and choking.
Brown slime, coagulating in the grass, knotted with tumorous blackened fibers.
Emma, drowning under a tide of Rotting Ones.
Isabel clutching Jeremy to her chest, thrown into a gap between worlds.
Episode 207: Among the Trash Gods
See the very beginning, a memory of a memory. All was dark, then split by light. The Brothers Three and then the Tree. All the cosmos in cosmic order, all boundaries set down, all gods above and below born of light and shadow, and last and loneliest of all, Emma Aiselthorpe-Brown. Nobody important.
She wakes up half-buried in a landfill, beneath a bronze dome. She wades through plastic and glass and interplanar detritus to a porthole: she is in a bathysphere, descending into the Abyss.
Take a universe, and cut it open. Make it bleed. Spill its guts out. Tear the corpse into chunks. Mix it with another, and another, on and on through thousands and ten thousands until it is an ocean on the face of the cosmos, and that is the Abyss. The bathysphere's lights barely illuminate the crimson depths. Shadowed figures, teeth sharp, swim about in the ethereal viscera.
Emma turns to see her captors: three men with magpie heads and grotesquely fit. Trash gods all, collectors and sellers of worlds not yet digested by the Abyss.
They know a good prize when they see one. They know enough that you can find a buyer for nothings and nobodies down in the Court, and so they go. Down, down, to the Court of the Scarlet King.
Episode 208: Isabel Alone
Isabel is lost. Just when it seemed that there had been a new stability, her work was torn out from underneath her. She is aimless. She does not know where Emma is. She is afraid. She passes through Ways and worlds of increasing hostility and strangeness. The people here have a cold and hungry look. Jeremy is small comfort to her here.
She is found out. People talk down here in the Way-warrens; she's been recognized. Reggie's girl. Worth a pretty penny to some parties. She is pursued. She runs. She runs and runs and runs and the worlds blend together and the Ways overlap. The maelstrom sweeps her pursuers away, sweeps her away.
She is in the mountains, winter is here, and she has nothing left.
She curls up in the snow and cries.
Episode 209: Sins of My Father's Hands
There once was a toymaker named Reginald Westinghouse who came to America to seek his fortune. He took a job at the Anderson Factory, where they chained him to his desk. He drew up toys in that sweltering steel coffin till his fingers bled and his nails cracked and the carpal tunnel crippled his wrists.
He filed through his chain and clawed his way to freedom, he ran far away, changed his name and his face, started again. The Anderson Factory slunk into the shadows, and he built toys just as he dreamed. All was not well, but it was well enough. He began thinking of an heir.
His son came out wrong. Despite all the care that was put into his making, he came out all wrong. He was all sharp edges and cruel, twisted thoughts. Reginald tried to teach him, but Redd refused to learn. He tore off the bars of his window and fled into the night.
By now, the good doctor was old. His finances were falling apart. His memory and his life were fleeing him. The spark of creation was dimming. He built a machine to keep himself alive, to stretch his life over as many years as he could. He hired a maid, to take care of him when the machine could not. He handed his company to a board of Executors, to care for it while he withdrew to his secret workshop, and began again on preparing an heir.
His daughter, too, came out wrong. Not like his son: she had the spark, she was joy and wonder within, but there was a veil of ignorance cast over her. Too much of an innocent, stuck inside her own imagination. He could not bear to be near her, so crushing was the acknowledgment of his failure.
He faded there, in the dust of his hiding place, as his daughter grew up happy and ignorant, and the executive board fossilized in their places.
The maid stayed with him until he passed, and then was on her way.
Episode 210: Wonder-Maker
There is an old man and a wolf there, shin-deep in the snow. His face is weathered and kind, his furs flap in the blustery mountain wind. He knows a secret, and has come to lead the girl.
There is a cave up on the mountain.
He wakes Isabel. He leads her up the mountainside. He can go no further, but the way will lead home, he says. He does not say goodbye, vanishing in a swirl of snow when Isabel's head is turned.
In the cave, there is darkness.
In the darkness, there is nothing.
It is not the absence of light; it is the dark of the absence of everything.
Voices rise from the darkness. A chorus, a chant, an old song rising up from nothing…
And Isabel whispers…
“I raised up my hand…
…And there was fire.”
The flame dances, and in its light, there is Isabel and the multitudes of memory. Each Wonder-Maker and Fire Bringer back to the beginning, unbroken and unforgotten. She is of their number, and they are of her. She knows the secret now. Behind all things that exist, there is existence.
She will save her friend.
Episode 211: In the Court of the Scarlet King
Imagine now, the deepest point of the Abyss, the rotting Qlippothic tree, the Pit of Benthos' Hell…
A sun of black iron, pocked with eyes of sickly fire. Septic smoke and glistening ooze pours from its mouths. The water is thick with oil and flesh-slurry. Shards of bone and the corpses of old gods rise above the ice-crust, fashioned into crucifixes for the deities who were spared. Icebergs, filled with thousands of bloodied souls, melt slowly. Below its obsidian surface, there are faces, bodies packed together tight enough that each bone has been broken. Jellied eyes spin about in crumpled sockets; crushed jaws mouth agony without sound.
The air, cold and empty, thrums with the constant moans of pain.
Emma is dragged out of the damaged bathysphere in basalt chains. Teeth missing, eyes blacked, nose broken, lip split. The trash gods do hasty business here, exchanging her for a handful of souls to a beetle-headed duke.
Darkness overwhelms her as blind-idiot servants cart her off.
A cell, some pit carved from frozen flesh. The door vanishes as she is tossed inside. Motes of soul-residue cast a leprous light on the place. The duke will be with her momentarily; the whole business with Moloch needs to be taken care of.
One second turns to five, turns to ten. She has yet to struggle.
Then! With a jerk of the wrist, she snaps her chains. Pulls them apart like so much old thread. Stands up. Stretches. Wipes the blood from her nose and spits out a tooth.
Nobody would ever want to be here.
Nobody would be able to do what she is about to, either.
She presses her left palm against the wall, gauges its firmness. Curls a right fist one finger at a time, pulls back…
and…
THOOM
The beetle-duke's palace shatters. Emma erupts from the crater in a bolt of sakuga, eyes set on the throne, the Throne, the THRONE of the King adorned in scarlet. She sprints atop the water, a blur. Faster, faster, faster, arms pump, a razor of slurry-water.
The monster designers have a field day. Characters barely stay on-model. Bones vaporize. Heads are ripped off, limbs torn from their bodies. Impacts shatter mountains and throw up tidal waves. Brimstone blood splashes paint the screen in monochrome. Dukes and demons and Leviathans throw themselves at her and her name is hyperviolence.
Her punches have shock collars, her jumps feel like they clear continents.
God as my witness, that man was broken in half.
Holy fuck, she is red-shifting.
Jesus H. Christ is that a NUCLEAR FUSION PUNCH?
The King sits on a black throne with seven red spears, which pierce the brides that lay bloodied at his feet, from whose wombs spew the great Leviathans that teem around that dread mountain's base. A fist tightens around his lance.
Emma tears a Leviathan in two from jaws to tail and launches herself forward; not at the throne, but just off-center. Towards the smallest bride pinned to the barnacles and bones. She lands on the smooth grey flank, digs her fingers into the spear, and with the one cry of strain of this entire sequence, pulls it out. The seal is broken. The seventh bride is freed. The spear drops to the stone with the sound of tectonic thunder.
The King rises from his seat.
“Go!” Emma cries, dropping to the ground. The seventh bride is able to stand; she clutches the hole in her stomach with one hand, and takes up the spear that pierced her in the other. She forms a sign of Waymaking with a bloody hand, and vanishes in a swirl of darkwater and whalesong.
Emma leaps at the King with a scream fit to dig into his chest and tear out his heart…
…and is swatted away by the back of his hand. She skips across the water like a doll thrown at concrete, clouds and sea cleaved as if by a sword.
She struggles to pull herself up from the broken ice, as the King steps down from his throne, and wades towards her, spear in hand.
Fade to black.
Far away, the seventh bride spirits the girl out of her chamber, steals her away to a land across the hills so quiet. There is peace there, for a moment.
The seal is broken, the cloud of fire rises up above Montauk Point.
The center cannot hold.
Episode 212: Dawn of the Final Day
A man in a tattered lab coat, stands on a high cliff by the sea. In his hands, he holds a book bound in leather: blackened, weathered, human. He lifts his sigil-carved arms high, blood drips onto his face and chest. He cries out to the storm with keening, formless sounds, and casts the book into the sea.
Listen…
Can you hear the footfalls of the brokentooth'd march, sweeping up through the past? The Daevites are coming. They are eating history.
The walls of Uruk crumble.
Harappa is devoured by demons.
Ramesses lies vivisected open atop the Great Pyramid.
Cyrus is paraded through the streets atop an iron spike.
Athens meets a relativistic kill vehicle.
Qin Shi Huang is flayed and torn to pieces, and still he screams.
Jerusalem is swallowed by a pit of cinders.
Rome chokes on chlorine gas.
Byzantium drowns in blood.
Charlemagne is crucified in the Palatine Chapel.
William's men hang him from the mast with his own spine.
The Great Khan strangles his sons in their tents, and runs out into the steppe alone.
Baghdad is buried in the ash of its citizens.
Oh God, Joan, what have they done to you?
Moctezuma is fed molten gold before all his people.
The Mughals cannot stop the tide of flesh from the sea.
The rape of the New World is ahead of schedule.
The Reign of Terror enthrones a Hanged King.
London fucks its queen mother to death.
In Flanders' Fields, the tumor metastasizes.
The Sarkists feed the Czar to his people.
The Germans walk out into the fields and forests to lay down.
Stalin starves himself in his own gulags.
The Americans build of themselves a great and hateful engine, and throw their children before Moloch reborn forever.
The Veil tears apart.
They are here. They are now. They are upon us.
***
The battle is met, across all the world. The camera does not turn away. Witness how the world dies. Do not forget these images.
The battle is met.
Burning mushrooms, orange-gold, spring up as after soft rain.
Fields of flesh, clawing up from the frozen soil and crawling upon the shores, hateful, hateful.
The nations of earth hold the gates for a moment, they break beneath the horde.
The Witch of Hope Lake stands beneath a burning Seal of Solomon, wind and water tearing at her rainjacket.
From the depths of the great library Yggdrasil slithers peacock-feathered Nahash, the serpent vast as mountains. He rears backs with fire upon his fangs; far above, Hakhama-MEKHANE, the goddess no longer broken, sits in the sky with her fleets of dreadnaut-angels. Brother and sister, guardians of man, reunited at last to watch the passing of their wards.
The Stars seethe with hate.
The Scarlet King rises from the Pit of Megiddo with all his Leviathans and demon lords.
The gods and all their hosts descend from the heavens and rise from the abyss, to make war with each other.
The good ship Solidarity is rammed into the Scarlet King at lightspeed.
The gates of the Silent Halls swing wide; three brothers in black ride three horses of white, and lead behind them a column of the endless dead.
Creation crumbles under the strain.
The Ways were torn up.
The Library burns.
Two sons of Adam meet for the last time, and die at each other's hands.
Nahash is torn in two.
Hakhama shatters a second time.
The flame of all thinking beings, dims, sputters, and goes out. Stars are eaten alive. The dead are reduced to dust. The heavens are dark, choked with smoke and ash. The abyss is fattened with blood. All lights have been extinguished, across a billion, billion worlds.
Save one.
Thirty-six saints gather on the mountain slope, and together fulfill their ancient destiny. The passing of the world in this cruel and horrible fashion could not be helped – they had been waylaid by the forces of the world too long to prevent the horrors of the King.
But they might break the seal upon him. They make the final sign, and pass into the mists.
Upon the ashen firmament of Yesod, the King raises a new throne.
Episode 213: The End of the World Goes Like This…
Open upon the dark and starless mists. There is a man there in the stillness, wearing the robes of the Thirty-Six. He is praying: lips move, there is no sound. He is weeping. At his feet lie two mangled bodies. He builds a cairn for each. There is little left to bury.
“Ah my brothers, you have left young Set alone again,” he says, wiping his lined face.
Around him, the dark mist shifts, and there is soft whalesong.
A'habbat steps forth, the spear in her hand. The girl Grace is by her side, dressed as her patroness. The bastard Empress, veiled in gold and red, clasps a trinket of Zhos' to her chest. Harker the Fist chomps on a cigar, dumps the remnants of a great goblin shark on the ground. S.D. is last, riding upon the DEER and wearing a different body.
“Fucking little reunion of fools we've got here,” he grumbles.
“Fools we are, but we are the Fool's fools,” A'habbat says. She taps her spear on the ground and it splits it into seven parts. “That will have to do, Fawn.”
S.D. snorts as he takes his fragment of the spear. Set goes to each of the six in turn, places his hand upon the weapons; the tips glow phosphorous white. The seventh stands embedded in the ground and goes unchanged.
The little Empress asks as she loops her toy's cord around her weapon, and sings a nursery song of long-vanished Antarctica.
Harker tightens his sandals.
The DEER paws at the scabbed-over gravel.
In the distant fog-depths, a glow forms as if a campfire seen faintly in the gray of predawn. It grows in brightness and breadth until the curtains part…
***

At the very bottom of the Abyss, the cries of souls in torment have ceased. The bloated black sun lies cracked and half-sunk in the slurry. The Throne is empty. All the dukes and demons of hell left with their master. Not even echoes remain.
A broken body lies curled in a field of ashen sludge.
Emma.
The scene lingers. There is no music.
Feet crunch in the snow. A pair of bright red sneakers comes into view. Emma's eyes open, just barely.
“Easy there, easy there…” comes a voice from off-screen, and careful arms lift her up.

***
..and Isabel is there, a tottering Emma leaning heavy on her shoulder. She waves to the audience with a smile.
“Hey guys. Sorry I'm late.”
She eases her assistant to the ground and props her up against a rock. Emma's appearance is terrifying; nobody could look like that and still be alive.
“Thank you, for everything,” Isabel says as she places a hand on Emma's shoulder. Emma makes a weak noise of acknowledgment, but nothing more. Isabel stands up and turns to the rest of the group.
“Right then!”
She snaps her fingers and is set alight with fire that has not been seen since the beginning. A cascading mantle of stars falls on her shoulders. She takes the seventh spear from A'habbat and wreathes it in oldest song. Galaxies spring into being and fade away old and happy in her footsteps. A Jeremy-shaped fireball jumps out from her shoulder, runs around her feet, and returns to the flames.
“You all ready?”
“We are,” A'habbat answers.
“Great. Let's go say hi to your dad.”
Isabel waves her hand and the mist flees, as if sucked out of frame by a vacuum. They stand before the Throne.
The King is waiting for them. There is nobody else left. He has eaten his servants.
He flashes forward. His lance plunges through A'habbat's stomach. He laughs. Laughs? Whatever sound is made, it is only the apparent glee of its maker that names it so.
The seventh bride spits blood and dark water in her father's face. She wrenches herself free, blood and plume-smoke pouring out of the wound, and stabs him in the stomach. Harker jumps over her shoulder for the assist.
Memory fails at piecing together the exact sequence of events to follow. There are too many parts, too many frames put into each movement.
Shattered firmament is thrown about in the razorblade wind. The DEER clears a path through the air, its metallic gaze sweeping across the broken skies. The Empress and Grace fight in synchronicity. Harker grips his spear in his teeth to free his bloodied knuckles. S.D. screams and panics, swinging to and fro. Set and A'habbat masterfully counter his blade; Back and forth, back and forth, feet dancing, blades singing. Isabel flits about like a lightspeed firefly, training streamers of starstuff. She is a sharpened line, a cutting edge. The music swells above the corpse of the cosmos, calling up emotions that the waking world has deadened in the heart.
Some distance from the battle, the Brothers Three watch. An old exiled man plays cards with the youngest and finally, finally loses.
Watch now as the true blows are made. Hold fast to that hope, do not be troubled by what is to come.
Harker strikes first, piercing the King's right eye. He is knocked from the air and crushed underfoot. S.D. pierces the left eye and is bitten in half with the DEER. Set pierces the liver, and is impaled. The Empress stabs him through the stomach, and she is smashed to pulp. Grace renders his right arm useless and is knocked flying out across the dark waters.
A'habbat drives it through his blackened heart, just as the king drives it through her own. He sets a foot on her chest and pulls his weapon out of her lifeless body. The goddess has not yet hit the ground before Isabel is on him. Blades clash and sing and glow and the world fades around them until there is only a great darkness. They stand upon black waters among the drifting ashfall of the consumed Tree.
There are now only the two. A good fight is always just two. This fight has always been two.
The fight is all to exist for as time.
There is a final clash of blades, and the combatants are sent spinning away from each other. There is a pause, the sizing-up before re-engagement the wolves a-circling each other. The King is wounded; Blinded, impaled on six spears, bleeding oceans into the deep. Isabel remains afire. Emma stands beside her. She is smiling.
At no other point in the entire run of this series has Emma Aislethorpe-Brown smiled.
“It's been fun, ma'am,” she says, patting Isabel on the shoulder.
“Wouldn't have been half as good without you.”
The King roars, charges with blade raised high.
Emma's hand darts out. Isabel leaps up on it, balancing on tiptoes. Emma rears back. Muscles bunch, tense, strain under the pressure…
Watch and see…
The Emma Aislethorpe-Brown Fastball Special.
Isabel is a beam of fire, cutting the cosmos in half, a vapor cone of tattered spacetime rippling behind her.
Emma's broken body turns to ash, starting at the fingers and working down. She is still smiling.
The king's face is frozen in a contorted moment of realization.
Isabel lets loose the final note of Creation's war-song against oblivion…
And punches a hole right through the Scarlet King's skull.
The King stumbles. Isabel lands on the darkness. He turns, and in turning to face her again he falls to one knee. Blood burning sunbeam gold drips from his wound. He lifts his left hand, and his shattered weapon, he makes as if to drag himself forward.
He freezes. His arm falls. The Brothers Three appear behind him, dwarfing the King who thought himself so mighty. The Youngest's sickle shines without light.
“Enough, already.”
He slits the King's throat. No wound is left. The corpse of Khahrahk the Worm sinks into the deeps below. The Middle Brother spits on him for good measure, and makes to do so again when the Eldest raises his hand.
Youngest and Middle appear for a moment startled, but accept the sign that has been made. Their duties completed, they fade into their own deaths and coalesce back into the dark form of the Eldest.
There is nothing at all now. Only the Death of All, and the Maker of Wonders.
She holds out her hand.
“Shall we dance?”
All-Death takes it gently.
“As we did in the beginning.”
They dance there at the end, eldest son of greatest dark and the light that was his opposite. They spin and twirl about each other, orbiting bodies drawn closer. Their forms brush, intertwine, become one. There is no beginning nor end to the light or darkness now, only the soft notes of completion.
Fade to black.
After a time, Isabel speaks:
“The end of the world goes like this: Everyone lived happily ever after.”


D-4413 sat in the empty waiting room. At his side were numerous periodicals and magazines, none of which interested him. He gave occasional glances to the secretary, but would always lower his head when she looked back at him. He never noticed her concerned smile.
"Clark?"
Dr. Ashtekar stood in the doorway. In his hand was a clipboard and on his face was a smile. D-4413 stood up and made his way over. Ashtekar held his hand out, and D-4413 shook it, but he never matched the doctor's smile.
"How are you, Clark? Excited?" Dr. Ashtekar motioned towards his office.
I have a number, not a name. Dee-Dash-Four-Four-One-Three. "I'm okay I guess."
Dr Ashtekar sat in his chair; D-4413 sat opposite him.
"Just okay? I thought we had made some progress since last time. Are you looking forward to Monday?"
D-4413 looked down at the floor. He wished, desperately, that he was anywhere but here. That thought was snuffed out quickly; He's trying to be nice to me. It's not his fault.
"Most people look forward to their last day."
D-4413 continued to say nothing. He twisted his hands together into various shapes and positions. After a while it started to hurt.
"Try to relax. This final session is just a formality at this point."
Nothing. Set in stone. Like I could change it.
Dr. Ashtekar gave a small sigh and rubbed the tip of his beard. He put the clipboard aside and reached into a small refrigerator next to his desk. "What would you like to drink? And I'm not taking silence for an answer."
"Coke."
"I've got Pepsi."
"Okay." Dr. Ashtekar handed a cold can over, and D-4413 popped the tab open. The doctor grabbed a Dr. Pepper for himself. D-4413 took a sip, savoring the sweetness of the sugar. He hated Pepsi.
"Do you have any alcohol?" D-4413 was surprised he had spoken. Stupid stupid stupid.
"Err, no, I don't. Do you want some?" Dr. Ashtekar seemed curious.
"No. I don't know why I said that." D-4413 felt his face burn red. He pretended to pick at his shoes. Dr. Ashtekar flipped through the clipboard until he found the ID page. He nodded as if he had confirmed something.
"You've never had beer before have you?" There was a click as he put his pen to paper. He expected a response.
"No." Why did I ask that? Why did I think I could ask him like he's my friend he's just a doctor that wants to know if I'm going to hurt more people in the future.
Dr. Ashtekar flipped back and forth between a few pages. "Yes, I can see that. Unfortunately, I don't drink, but once you are out of here nothing is stopping you. Just be responsible."
"Okay." There was more silence. Outside, D-4413 could hear the secretary greet another patient. He could swear she sounded less enthusiastic than earlier.
"Clark." D-4413 turned back to look at the doctor. "Are you worried about your release?"
"No." A lie. D-4413 could feel tears brimming in his eyes. He hated that he didn't know how he felt and he was ashamed of it. I don't want this. Any of it.
'You've been here for almost sixteen years. That's almost half your life. It's okay to be worried." Dr. Ashtekar was somehow both leaning forward and sitting back at the same time. Like an animal about to strike.
"I'm not worried." Lying. Why am I always lying? Why can't I just take that leap and try to understand why I'm like this I wish I could explain it but I can't and now I'm stuck with myself because someone had to.
Dr. Ashtekar's gaze was unrelenting. He knows. But he then nodded and wrote something down.
36 minus 16 equals 20. "Are you going to help me?" Take me back to the cell, please.
"You'll be given employment through a Foundation operated company. Consider it a probationary period so we can see how well you adjust."
"And if I don't?" D-4413 could feel his heartbeat start to accelerate. He felt like he was getting there, to the point. I can't do this.
"I'd rather not think about that. You've made great progress these last few years. Not just in terms of testing, but personal growth. The Committee certainly thinks you are ready."
D-4413 didn't respond. Can I still say no? That was what he wanted to say. To crawl back into his regulation bed and fall asleep until the next round of testing. I can say no… I can tell him I'm not ready, I don't want this I hate how this feels I don't want to live like a fish through a glass where I can't make out why everyone is so happy and I feel like I'm trapped looking out I want to feel something I want to be like you.
A familiar throbbing sensation pulsed behind his forehead. The Doctor's voice droned on in the distance, ever farther away. Just tell him. You aren't ready. He opened his mouth to speak. No one will help you unless you help yourself. You've been hiding for so long how can you expect others to understand?
Why would anyone care?
I don't want to be a burden.
"I guess I'm ready."
That earned him a large smile. Dr. Ashtekar clicked on his pen and wrote something down. "That's what I wanted to hear. You'll do fine, trust me." He stood up and held out his hand. Like a programmed routine, D-4413 reached and and did the same. They shook hands. "Congratulations, Clark, or formerly D-4413. You are now officially rehabilitated."
This means nothing. "I have a question."
"Yes?"
"Will you guys remove my memories?"
"No. It feels counterproductive to the process to remove the context behind your change."
"Oh."
Silence.
"What if I told people though?"
This earned him a hearty laugh. Dr. Ashtekar gave him a gentle slap on the shoulder.
"Do you really think anyone would believe you?"

Once, a few years before he broke, he had a dog. Savannah was a beagle, and a light in his life. In a rare moment of tranquility, his parents had left him alone for the day. He spent it outside, running with Savannah.
When he got tired, he took a breather on the porch. He called for Savannah. No response. She had been sniffing around some bushes earlier. Oh well. He went inside and made some lemonade, bringing the pitcher outside.
There sat Savannah, with something between her teeth. It twitched and bled, and for a moment he could see a large singular eye. And then it closed.
She dropped it at his feet. A rabbit. Savannah gave a bark of happiness and rushed off again. He didn't know what to do, so he ran inside and grabbed some gardening gloves. Gently he picked up the little rabbit. It's hardly a baby. It didn't move.
He only realized after that he felt nothing. If he had, it was lost in such a place. He simply sat there, corpse in hand.
Savannah reappeared. She had another; this one already dead. Again, she dropped it at his feet and ran off. He laid the one in his hands next to its sibling. He still felt nothing.
The cycle repeated again and again and again. By the end, he found himself with five murdered rabbits, and one proud beagle. He tried to scold her, but the words wouldn't come. Instead, he patted her on the head and sent her inside.
Later, while digging a hole for them, he realized what was wrong. I didn't stop her. I sat there as she ran and killed and I could have done something. The emotion was real this time, but fleeting.
Why did I do nothing?
But he knew of course.


Young ladies wore gowns and flowers in bloom
Young gentlemen preened and wandered the room
Anxiously waiting for her to arrive
With the crowd we thought we'd never be missed
Two fools engaging in a lovers' tryst
Risking the wrath of the Queen of the Hive
One suitor above all she wished to claim
Blessed with fortune and charm and ancient name
For his hand and his heart did she connive
But he was immune to all of her charms
And sought his refuge in my loving arms
The poor cousin of the Queen of the Hive
Under the apple tree we met in hope
Determining there that we would elope
This did her sudden appearance deprive
Caught in the garden on that fateful eve
By she who we had hoped most to deceive
We stood shamed before the Queen of the Hive
Then she produced under teasing banter
Crystal wineglasses with matched decanter
Refreshment to make our spirits revive
Handing us glasses carved with bloom and bee
She bade us both drink and complying we
Fell to the spell of the Queen of the Hive
She was determined to punish and shame
For him to die and to me go the blame
Against her dark magic we could not strive
With a smile of ice she bade him stand still
Then turned to me and commanded I kill
With grief we obeyed the Queen of the Hive
He stood like a statue and did not flinch
As I smashed my wineglass against the bench
From our struggles a thrill did she derive
As I embedded a shard in his chest
And a crimson bloom appeared on his breast
In mock alarm cried the Queen of the Hive
As her crocodile tears began to roll
I saw that my glass on the ground was whole
For a breath I thought he might be alive
A drugged wine's visions and not a spell cast
Then I saw his corpse as they seized me fast
So thus was revenged the Queen of the Hive
One thought has sustained me through all my trials
Through her accusations and secret smiles
When it was decreed I should not survive
She destroyed our lives but never our love
I know we will join in heaven above
While here alone dwells the Queen of the Hive

Email exchange between Dr. Kate Greenaway, Lead Researcher SCP-3876 and Archivist Erina Carson, January 20, 2017:

Dr. Greenaway,
The attached poem, written on the back of an envelope, was attached in SCP-3876-2 along with a series of newspaper clippings detailing the arrest, trial, and conviction of one Maria Duchamp. On succeeding pages were a sketch of a decanter with a set of wineglasses and a description of certain mind-affecting properties: when an individual pours an alcoholic beverage from the decanter into one of the wineglasses, other individuals who consume the beverage from one of those glasses will obey any spoken command of the first individual.
We did some investigating in the database, and found the following:
Anomalous Item: Crystal decanter with four matching wineglasses
Location: Site-81 Anomalous Item/Safe Object Long Term Storage
Description: Ornate crystal decanter and wineglasses carved with an intaglio of a bee on a flower. Glasses and decanter will spontaneously reassemble/reform upon damage.
In light of the information in 3876-2, further testing of this item might be in order.
Erina Carson, Site-81 Archives

Agreed. I'll contact the Director and see if we can get that item back to the Classification Department.
-Dr. Kate Greenaway


I thought I'd seen everything, but it was a goddamn Muppet that broke me.
I was the site director of Base-19.1 I thought my senses were completely dulled by some of the ultra-violence I'd seen in over 30 years of service. Someone stole SCP-447-1 and hid it in a morgue. I had to tear open an unsuspecting junior researcher's ribcage to access an encrypted data drive because someone decided to "get edgy" with the emergency response procedures of a keter. On a gamble, we neutralized SCP-2317-K by drilling a bargeload of poison into its skull before it could wake up.
Even then, we were on the way out. The Sarkic cults had managed to summon a creature they thought was Grand Karcist Ion, but… fuck if I know, someone forgot an accent mark on their unpronounceable magic words. A few millennia has left my memory fuzzy on the particulars. Either way, SCP-37238, object class Apollyon, was about to wipe us all out in a millisecond at 11:34 in the morning, December 3rd, 2329.
At least we had about five years' advance warning. All the human race could see the wad of flesh in low orbit, and they knew exactly what to expect when it landed. The world's central government had actually made our transition into oblivion a bit easier. The word "radical acceptance" was tossed around quite a bit on the airwaves.
Five years of peace. We threw away our money and let strangers sleep in our beds. It was an anarcho-libertarian's nightmare. You'd be surprised how good complete strangers could be to one another when we're all about to move into the same graveyard.
December 2nd. I sat in the onsite nuclear warhead's room of Base-19, popped open a cold one, and watched some TV on my laptop.
Sesame Street. After 360 years on the air, their series finale came on the day before the world ended. I knew they dealt with some pretty heavy topics sometimes - lead poisoning and Mr. Hooper's death comes to mind, along with that one episode back in 2148 about dealing with radioactive fallout. But at least with all those other "very special" episodes, there was an element of hope. A promise that something better is coming, so long as we look out for it.
This episode was called "Saying Goodbye."
"Elmo heard the news guy say that the whole world was gonna go away tomorrow. You scared? …Elmo scared too."
I dropped my beer.
I closed my laptop.
I walked into my office.
I screamed.
I spent five hours browsing through the Foundation Archives, most of which had been declassified the week prior to the end, if only to satisfy all our curiosities before we went away. There had to be some kind of way out, even if everyone else had stopped. And at about T-minus four hours to XK, I found it.
SCP-3319. "The Lotus." It was an old Global Occult Coalition project still in its launch base in Canada, and the Foundation got a hold of it after they disbanded in Operation Apoplexy.
If the world was about to go up in flames from an extraterrestrial threat, SCP-3319 could launch into orbit, unfold all its "tachyon displacement panels" like some kind of flower, and teleport the Earth to far-off, sun-like star somewhere in the Crab Nebula.
And here we were, letting this thing sit in the ice, all because we had made this ridiculous peace with our doom. Well, that, and it was barely functional - diagnostic testing of the Lotus yielded only a 30% chance of reaching the target star, and a 70% chance of an unintended extradimensional-juxta-huxta-manahmanah something-or-other causing all life on earth to data-expunged all the way to redacted.
30% was better than 0%.
T-minus 2 hours, I found the launch codes.
T-minus 1 hour, I pirated the launch control applet.
39 minutes to XK, with MTF Nu-7 knocking down the door of my condo in Baltimore, I launched the lotus.
What I wanted was someone else's sun. What we became was a moon in someone else's sky.
…and monkey food. God, I never thought I could joke about the first harvesting war, but time really does heal all wounds - and here in Corbenic, time is the best weapon we have.
My point is this: in Corbenic, you can't afford to accept what you've been given. That's the quickest way into a strider's gullet or one of the Elephant King's meat orgies.
Perhaps we did die. Perhaps the lotus took us to where we were going anyway. But this way, we were able to keep our planet, our armies, and our technology - and our clothes, thank God. With these, we had a chance to rebuild. To not accept.
When we came to the afterlife, there was no heaven and hell, so we built them. There were no angels, so we trained them. There was no god, so we hired one - Glory to thee, Jalakåra. (In the higher ranks, he even lets you use lowercase!)
And now, with the third moon being smelted apart for raw materials, we're the closest thing you're going to get to divine intervention.
You are watched. You are protected. And no matter how goddamn frustrating you are, you are loved.
- President Girard Niang, ☽☽☽ Initiative

Footnotes
1. "Site" was a product of your world. Lesson number 1 of working at Three Moons: Multiverse theory's a bitch.


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Joey Fucknuts Takes to the Skies

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clang
Clang
CLANG
CLANG.
The sound of metal pealed like church bells throughout the small town of Vulture Gulch.
This wasn't terribly unusual. Metal was altered and molded and beaten to form night and day in the poisoned desert burg, by men and women that had forgotten how to sleep and knew only one thing: progress.
They did not know what the word “progress” meant, nor how to spell it, but they chased it relentlessly, all the same.
CLANG!
And one of these men, the mayor, was hard at work.
He needed no hammer. He needed no schematics, nor training nor any real knowledge at all. He shaped the steel with his heart, knowing that what he did was good, and necessary.
But more tangibly, he shaped it with his fists.
CLANG!
Joey Fucknuts punched the steel plate, deforming it greatly. And he punched it again. And again. He beat the metal against its supporting frame, welding it into place not with fire, but with pure physical force. Working it cold, so it kept its crystalline lattice and maintained strength without requiring any tempering or annealing.
He did not understand any of these concepts. He just thought that it didn't make sense to work the metal with tools when his fists were good enough.
CLANG!
He punched it again, each of his knuckles sending sparks flying. The metal caved in further. Taking form. Becoming something that he understood as clearly as any man understands his god.
He had waited for a very long time before dragging these pieces into the yard. He had thought for long hours, before squeezing any rivets into place with his bare hands. He weighed his options and considered the path he was to take before lifting any beams or struts.
And he had watched the sky, for many days.
He was afraid. Joey was always afraid of something, because he was a man who thought for long periods of time. Men who think cultivate fears as a farmer cares for his crops.
But while Joey was afraid, and confused, and stupid, he knew that he was these things. And he refused to let them stop him, though he could feel them pooling in his mind like sludge.
Joey stopped. It was time for a smoke.
He pulled his goggles up over the bill of his hat and rested them on his forehead. He pulled a pack of cigarettes out of an inside pocket of his brown leather bomber jacket. They were labeled “Shallowgraves”, and they had a picture of a smiling skeleton on the front.
He removed three from the pack and lit them all with a blowtorch.
Joey took a deep drag, then let the smoke flow from the hole where his nose used to be. He sighed. The dead man knew that if he wasn't focusing on punching the metal, he was going to start to think again. But he was tired. He had been working for four months, day and night. This was the third break he had taken.
“Joey!”
From across the yard came a colossal monster. Eight feet tall and weighing nearly half a ton, with a torn, rotted face and muscles that bulged under its skin like bridge cables. It wore mismatched rags cobbled together to resemble normal clothes. No trousers or shirts would ever fit its behemoth frame. This beast was seen frequently around town, tearing cars apart with one twist of its massive hands and pulling down buildings without so much as a grunt.
It lumbered up to Joey and smiled with teeth like a row of moldy tombstones.
This was Awesome, one of the nicest guys that Joey had ever met.
Awesome said, “Hi Joey! Whatcha workin' on?”
Awesome was visibly very excited to see Joey and talk to him. Awesome was always excited to be doing whatever he was doing at the time, especially if it had something to do with one of his friends. Which was everyone.
Joey replied, “Same thing as yesterday.”
Awesome kept smiling and nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah. Yeah, what is it again? I forgot.”
“It's called an 'airplane'. It's a car that goes in the sky.”
This made the seventh time that Awesome had had this explained to him, and he reacted the same way every time.
He put his huge hands up to his head and his eyes widened.
“Joey. Joey, woah. That's like… Joey I don't even know. That's like… You're like a supergenius, Joey.”
Joey smiled and shook his head. “No, Awesome. The Boss told me how to do it. He's the genius. I'm just working, like you.”
Awesome laughed. “I'm not working right now, though! I'm fucking around!”
Joey nodded. “Me too. But just for a little bit. Then back to work.”
Awesome seemed suddenly confused, his smile melting away. His voice, which had the timbre of a cinderblock being thrown into a woodchipper, became plaintive, and diminished. “But Joey. Joey, if you make a car that goes into the sky… you could go away. Like, away away. Joey, I don't want you to go away. You're my friend.”
Joey nodded. He reached up and patted Awesome on one of his swollen arms. “You're my friend too, Awesome. But I gotta. We gotta do what the Boss says. He's taking care of us. I'll come back. And when I do, I'll probably have lots of stories. You like my stories.”
Awesome smiled again, and nodded. “Yeah. Like, oh! Oh! Like that one that you readed to us, oh. The one about the little boy that goes to a school and he learns how to do magic and he makes friends and they do magic. I like that one a lot. Magic is really metal.”
Joey nods again. “And metal is really magical.”
The titan's eyes widened, and he froze. Then he lurched forward and picked Joey up by his shoulders, bonking their heads together so he could look Joey right in the eyes.
“Joey that's the smartest thing I've ever heard. I love you, Joey.”
He then gave Joey the biggest hug that ever existed.

A lot of people had talked to Joey about what he was doing. He had been working for a long time, almost a year now, and naturally it had caused a lot of buzz. Most people were convinced that Joey was doing a really metal thing, and that he should keep doing it. Some, like Paulie, who was kind of a jerk, thought Joey was wasting his time.
And Joey thought it was possible that he was. But he didn't care.
One day he realized he had not slept in nine months.
He was very tired. The airplane was nearly done. He gathered supplies, he put the things together and the whole time, he felt himself changing. Joey, like the rest of his brothers and sisters, didn't feel much. But Joey felt something. Something different. It was inside him, in his chest, in his arms and legs. It felt like the time he had tried to make battery salad, but good instead of painful.
He decided to sleep for a while. Then he would stop being tired, and he could think more about what this all meant, where he was going, and why. Maybe his dreams would help settle his humming mind.
He went to his home, which was the vault of a destroyed bank. The citizens of Vulture Gulch did not understand money, but they understood that one should probably put really valuable things behind a big steel door, and so they had decided that Joey had to sleep in there. They insisted that Joey was important, no matter how he protested.
He laid down on his mattress made of shredded tires and torn automobile upholstery. He lit his blowtorch nightlight to push back the cold gloom of the vault interior. Then he slept, his head heavy, full of thoughts putrefied by doubt.

Joey finds himself in a familiar place.
The desert yawns all around him, wide and empty. He can count the number of things that are here without even using his fingers.
One, there is the ground, made of orange-warm dirt and dust. It holds Joey up and stops him from falling down, back to where he came from.
Two, there is the wind, unseen but felt on his dead skin, gentle and urging. It brings the promise of distance, whispers of places that are far, far away, and asks Joey if he would like to see them.
Three, there is the sky, colossal and unknown, blue and royal. The demesne of mysteries, that great expanse within and through which Joey knew there were things of great importance.
Four, there is the sun, hot and bright, the undisputed ruler. The king of the sky. Here it is far larger and hotter than when Joey was awake, a massive blast furnace and foundry, where all things were made.
And five, there is Joey. Small, ugly, stupid, and dead. A gross scarecrow of a man, thin and tall. Dressed the way that Joey always was, both within his mind and without: brown motorcycle boots, worn jeans, faded Ramones t-shirt, green army cap with his goggles resting above the bill, and his scarred leather bomber jacket, its woolen collar frayed and thinning. A grim caricature. A bony pretender. A ruined thing that most people on Earth would not call a 'person' at all.
Joey has no conception of people beyond the ones that he knew. But he has seen pictures, on burnt postcards and travel guides from the old gift shop, and he has heard stories from when the scrapper teams used to come back from stealing from and scaring those people. People that knew and built things, and loved one another, and had families and houses and jobs. Soft, pink and brown people, with their own dreams. Joey, like the rest of his siblings, is gray-green, dry and leathery, and tough. And he knows that every time one of the outside people saw one of his siblings, if they weren't wearing a long white coat or thick black armor, they were terrified.
The mayor of Vulture Gulch sits cross-legged in the dirt. He can feel a tide of chill, scummy waves washing all around and inside him. He is sure that when he leaves, he could meet some of the soft outside people. And he is sure that they are going to be scared of him. This makes Joey very sad. He didn't want to scare anyone. He wants to make friends, and be nice. He wants to learn, and get stories that he can tell to his brothers and sisters, and see how much he can help everyone when he really, really tries his best.
Joey wanted to keep being mayor. He had never asked to be mayor, but he helped people understand things better every day just like he imagines a real mayor does. He reads things to them so they can do better work and make themselves happy. If he leaves, he can't help them anymore. If he leaves, they will miss him, and he will miss them. They will be sad, and so will he. He will be letting them down, all so he can chase a strange desire that he cannot understand, so he can go on an adventure that could end in disappointment or frustration. Or much, much worse.
The waves of slime pool around Joey, turning the warm dry earth he had been sitting on into clammy, viscous muck. The sun dims, and he begins to feel cold. Cold, and wet and slick with the saliva of some great beast that Joey has never met and could never imagine, but he feels it all the same. Something bad. Something… horrible.
“Hello there, Joey.”
Joey looks up, and sees two more things in this place that used to be warm and bright.
One looks like something Joey has seen before. A lizard. But this one is blue, and huge, and standing on two strong legs. It has metal armor on parts of its body, and things that look like guns attached to its back and sides. One of its eyes is metal and red, but the other is brown, and soft, and looking directly at Joey.
The other is also like a lizard, but just as huge as the other one. This one is red, and has enormous wings with claws on the end. On its frilled, spiky head is a pointed hat with twinkling stars in the fabric, and in its claws are a long wooden stick and a thick book.
These two lizards are giant. They have sharp teeth and claws. And they are both looking directly at Joey.
The blue one turns its head to the red one and says, “Oh dear. I think he's frightened.”
The red one nods once and replies with a quiet boom, “Poor guy. Look at all this mess. I don't think this place is usually like this; this filth feels nothing like him. I suspect foul play, Palsinnor.”
The giant blue lizard leans its head down close to Joey's own. Joey is terrified, and wants to move, but can't. He is cold, and frozen, and can feel all of his fear and doubt writhing and multiplying within him. He can no longer see the sun.
A huge blue head touches its scaly-smooth cheek to Joey's. And Joey hears a gentle, powerful voice in his left ear. A voice like warmth and rest.
“Peace, child. Peace. I know you are scared. I know. But we will not hurt you. We only want to talk to you for a short while. You do not know us, but we know you, and we love you. Let go of your fear and hear our voices.”
The head pulls back, and Joey sees that the sky has changed. The sun is gone, and replaced with an explosion of stars all across a sky that softens to deep indigo as Joey stares. The slime has gone, and Joey is sitting in rich, soft earth, lush with grass and flowers that seem to spread out across the ground from the two huge newcomers.
Joey no longer feels cold, but cool. Not slimy, but clean, and refreshed.
The red lizard snorts, producing a short flash of fire from its nostrils. “I've pushed it out. It's not gone, but I've put a lock on it. It won't bother him for some time. It's the best I can do until he puts the pieces together.”
The blue one nods. “Thank you, Dathrun.” It regards Joey, looming, its sapphire scales and burnished armor sparkling in the starlight.
“Listen to me, Joey. Do you understand me?”
Joey nods silently, afraid of sounding stupid in front of these very smart lizards.
“Joey, you must not let your fear overtake you. It is natural to be scared. Going out on your own is hard, and the world is full of scary, strange things. But you are special, and you are loved. You have a beautiful heart, and a soul as bright as the sun. You have so much potential, child. You have to be brave, and believe in yourself. Your people are counting on you to see many things, to learn great lessons, and lead them to where they were meant to be.”
Joey frowns. He looks down at the ground and says, “But I'm dumb. I'm really dumb. I don't know how a lot of things go, or how to do stuff, or where I should go or what to do. I don't know how to help them.”
The red lizard says, “Nonsense, Joey. These are your brothers and sisters. These are the Black Iron Boneheadz of Vulture Gulch. Are they not heavy metal? Are you not heavy metal?”
Joey looks up and blinks. “I mean, they are, mostly. I don't know if I am, really.”
”If they are heavy metal, Joey, then they can take care of themselves while you are gone. They are strong, just like you, and you must have faith in that. Trust in them, and in yourself.”
The blue continues, “You are more than capable of this, Joey. I know you can feel the heat within your chest. You want to go. To see. To discover. You cannot stay here and idle away the years, wondering what it all means. You say that you are dumb. But it does not take a vast wealth of knowledge to do the right thing, to be the best person you can be. And most importantly, you are aware of your limitations. You know how much you do not know. That is wisdom, Joey, and you must use it well. Your curiosity, your passion, your wisdom and your kindness will carry you and your family so far. All you need to do is decide to take the first step.”
The red growls, “Use your strength. You are Mayor of Vulture Gulch, and you were given that title for a reason. Your people are capable, but they need direction. They need someone to show them the way, to happiness and a life that they deserve. Do not acknowledge your fear. Do not doubt. You are their champion. You did not choose to be, but you are, and you stand at the edge of something glorious. Go to it, Joey. Go, and win your people a place among the stars.”
The blue stands tall. “Go, Joey. We know that you will do your very best, and you will succeed. Go, and discover all that the wide world has in store for you.”
The plants have grown from horizon to horizon, bringing sweet smells and color to what was once a bare wasteland. The stars shine above, each a precious and scintillating jewel. And Joey feels an old feeling, once again.

"Go, Joey. We believe in you."

Joey stands in the wide vacant lot at the end of Gold Street and sighs heavily.
Behind him are the results of his work.
An airplane with broad, sweeping wings rests on fat tires, shining gray and bright in the desert sun. It is enormous. It is haphazard, unpainted, messy, and in all likelihood extremely dangerous. It is inelegant, clumsy, misshapen, and a flagrant mockery of aeronautical engineering. Made of aluminum beaten into shape with Joey's own two hands, equipped with four massive propellers molded painstakingly from the finest scrap metal the Mayor could find, with powerful engines handcrafted night after sleepless night, it was a dreadful Frankenstein's monster of twisted metal and rust.
It was also an airplane. And Joey had never been more proud of anything in his entire life.
He had found a book in the small library some time ago that had pictures of airplanes in it. He had tried to design it as close as he could to his favorite picture, which was labeled B-17 Flying Fortress. He didn't get it exactly right, but he thought it was close enough.
In its cargo bay and cockpit he had placed supplies. A big black motorcycle, armored, turbocharged, and rigorously tested, so he would have something to ride on the ground. Six or seven flamethrowers that Joey had enhanced himself, adding axe blades to the heavy ends and extra barrels and fuel canisters for better coverage and weight. He didn't know where he was going, but he wanted to be safe when he got there.
There was also a box of keepsakes, mementos, and gifts that the people of Vulture Gulch had given him. Some containers of Chef's best oil soup. A bowling ball that Awesome thought was hilarious for reasons that he tried to explain, but couldn't because he kept laughing so hard whenever he saw it. A copper chain with a pendant in the shape of a cactus flower, given to him by Flower so he wouldn't forget her. Joey had said that he could never forget her no matter what, but failed to explain why that was.
Those people and more, all those people that he had grown and learned with, the ones that he loved with all his heart, were standing before him, gathered in a small crowd. Work had been stopped for the day. Making super rad cars was rad, but the Mayor flying into the sky to go on an adventure, to bring back amazing stories to tell?
That was fucking metal.
Joey cleared his throat, and said to them all, “I don't really know what to say. I pretty much never know what to say, I guess. I'm not good at talking. Or a lot of other stuff.
“I'm sad to go. And I know that you're all sad too. But I'm not going away forever. I'm going to go and see what's outside. I'm going to go there, and I'm going to try to figure it out. I'm going to see what the Boss wants me to see, and what I want to see, and what I want the rest of you to see one day too. I'm going to go meet the whole world. And I don't know when I'm going to come back. But when I do, I promise, I'll have some amazing things to tell you.
“Build cool things while I'm gone so I can see them when I come back. Be safe, and be nice to one another. Goodbye. I love you all.”
The crowd exploded into cheers of different flavors. Some, like Awesome, cried. Others, like Chef, howled wordlessly into the sky, not having the words for how proud and excited they were for their Mayor and friend. Some raised a chant, echoing an idea that someone had had not long ago when Joey's plan was discovered. A new name for their Mayor. They shouted it again and again.
One, unnoticed by the rest, merely watched, and waited.
Joey didn't look back. He climbed into the airplane's belly through the bomb bay door, and hit the switch to bring it up. It worked. He had checked the electrical system over three thousand times.
He went up some stairs just thick enough to hold his weight, through some rooms he had made to hold some things, along the central aisle. He entered the cockpit.
Joey did not understand how he knew that he could make this plane fly. But he built it, and he knew.
He flipped switches and let power flow into the plane. Little lights came on, in different colors, all taken from different sources. A Christmas tree light below a label that read “OK YOU CAN FLY NOW” flickered to life. There was a big switch there.
Joey hit it. He didn't have to pray, or hope. He knew it would work.
The four huge propellers coughed, then roared, spinning up and reaching speeds so fast that Joey couldn't even see them anymore through the cameras. He looked ahead through the cockpit window. Gold Street was, unusually, completely clear of cars or wreckage. And just wide enough.
He let go of the brake, and the huge airplane, the massive, absurd work of a restless year, thundered down Gold Street. It lurched, it juddered, it creaked and complained, but it held together. Joey had poured all of his determination into this machine, and he could feel that it wanted to scratch the sky as badly as he did. This was going to work. This was going to work.
He pulled up.
The wind and air swept over and under the great steel bird's wings, and it left the earth behind. It shattered the chains that held all things hard to the ground and roared in defiance against gravity. It rose, higher and higher, the buildings and crumbling ruins falling away below.
Joey saw the wall that the men in the white coats had built. And for the first time in his life, he did not care about it at all.
The one they now called Joey Steelwings rose above it all, and flew on toward his destiny.

Addendum 3885-03: On 2 May 2018, an unmarked makeshift aircraft visually resembling a World War 2-era B-17 Flying Fortress took off from SCP-3885, using the town's main avenue as a runway. After investigation, it was determined that personnel assigned to Subsite 3885 had noticed this vehicle periodically during its construction by a single SCP-3885-01 instance, but did not take action, citing disbelief that SCP-3885 instances possessed the mental capacity to successfully construct a functional aircraft. Subsite 3885's administrative staff have been formally disciplined on charges of gross negligence leading directly to a containment breach.
The aircraft in question was observed flying due northeast. Foundation recovery assets have been dispatched to recontain the SCP-3885-01 instance or instances onboard.
No other SCP-3885-01 instances within SCP-3885 have cooperated with Foundation investigative personnel, and as a result, the aircraft's destination, and purpose, are unknown.

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“Pius, how do you keep getting us into these messes?” Eugene asked as he lurched over the side of the inflatable lifeboat, his face literally green from seasickness.
Though, it would perhaps be more accurate to call it motion sickness, as they weren't floating upon an actual ocean. The body they were bobbing upon undulated up and down slowly and without rhythm, like a super-viscous fluid being frothed around in a bowl. The surface was a perfect mirror, but instead of the sky, it reflected an ever-shifting mosaic of scenes from every corner of Reality, stretching onwards without a horizon and seemingly to infinity. Though it looked fluid, if Eugene tried to cup it with his hand it would float into the air like smoke and sift through his fingers like sand. The strange sea was neither gaseous nor liquid nor solid, but rather a substance wholly alien to the known space-time continuum. As such, Eugene's only perception of it was what optical illusions his brain would generate as it desperately tried to make sense of it.
“I hardly see how this was my fault,” Pius replied as he calmly read over the survival guide he had found among the lifeboat's effects.
He glanced up briefly at the sky, which instead of a sun or moon or stars held a colossal, hyperdimensional tangle of multiverses, stretching from one end of the firmament to the other. Individual universes appeared primarily as midnight blue orbs stained with luminous webs, strung together like octopus eggs.
“If it weren't for me, you wouldn't even have the lifeboat and you'd be sinking all the way down to the Not Abyss. Do you know why this place is called the Not, Eugene? Because it's Not our world, Not our universe, Not our multiverse and Not even our omniverse. We are outside of Reality itself, and the only reason it's even remotely comprehensible is that this is just the surface of the Not and we can still see our own Reality from here. Now, if you go deep enough down that you can't see home anymore, then your mind will shatter just from the sheer nature of the Not itself. Those are some truly unfathomable fathoms, let me tell you. Literally indescribable, utterly inconceivable and unimaginable, not a single mote of stuff down there that wouldn't drive you absolutely bonkers just trying to wrap your head around it.”
Eugene retched, releasing a copious volume of glittery black Clown vomit out of his mouth and straight into the incomprehensible Not.
“Okay, well now there's Clown vomit down there, and that I understand,” Pius conceded.
Eugene groaned as he flopped over on his back, his face still as green as a pickle.
“You're the one who shapeshifted into a mouse and sent Bubblegum into a panic while we were in the Nautilus's passenger hold,” Eugene reminded him.
“I thought she was passed out.”
“Well, why would you turn into a mouse in the first place?”
“It was cramped in there, so I turned into a tiny animal. It was a perfectly reasonable thing to do. It's not my fault that a startled, hungover elephant accidentally knocked Danny over and his eternally enflamed head set the hold on fire. You were the one who screamed ‘abandon ship!' and leapt out the porthole.”
“You didn't have to follow me!”
“I didn't, and neither did Bubblegum. If her head wasn't stuck in the porthole, or she hadn't been trumpeting like crazy, someone might have noticed we went overboard.”
“Well, like you said, at least you had this inflatable lifeboat on you. I'd probably be dead right now if it wasn't for you.”
“Thank you.”
“What about the rest of the Circus? You don't think they're…”
“Unlikely. There was at least one fire extinguisher in the hold and the blaze hardly seemed out of control. The Nautilus is probably looking for us right now.”
“Fat lot of good that'll do us. Space and Time are meaningless here. For all we know, they've given up the search, gone home, and our universe has already expired from heat death.
…
“Try calling Gary.”
“I doubt we'll get a signal here.”
“Just try it.”
“Alright then.”
Pius reached into his pocket, pulled out a French-style rotary phone and dialled Gary's eleven digit number.
Ring Ring
Ring Ring
Ring Ring
…
Ring Ring
“It's ringing.”
“I can hear it.”
“Gary? Gary is that you?” the voice on the phone asked.
“What? No, I was calling for Gary. Who's this?” Pius asked.
“This is Pius the Clown. Who's this?”
“You're not Pius, I'm Pius!” Pius objected.
“It sounds like you,” Eugene claimed.
“I do not!” the voice on the phone said.
“Pius, it's just pattern screamers, hang up,” another voice that sounded like Eugene said.
“We're not pattern screamers, you're pattern screamers!” Pius screamed, in a very pattern like way, slamming the receiver down. “That's why I like old phones; you can't hang up angrily with a smartphone.”
“I think we should take stock of our supplies,” Eugene suggested.
“Good idea. We have one rotary aether phone that can only be used to call pattern screamers. We have this survival guide, How To Survive When Reality Doesn't by Dr. Alto Clef.”
“Why is the cover just a crudely drawn bunny in a hat?”
“It's memetic, or at least a meme. As for the essentials, we have 1,2,3,4… 23 pints of Clown's Milk.”
…
“You just carry nearly two dozen pints of Milk around on you now? Are you trafficking the stuff?”
“Well we get lost a lot, plus since we started ultra-pasteurizing it we don't need to worry about it spoiling.”
“Pasteurized Milk is a Fun-Lover conspiracy to weaken us! Raw Milk is natural! Raw Milk is healthier! Raw Milk is delicious! Raw Milk is…”
Eugene's rant was suddenly interrupted by his cheeks ballooning with more vomit, which he promptly expectorated into the Not.
“Uggghhh. Not that I'll be able to keep it down, but how are we set for food?”
“Let's see. I've got a bag of Circus Peanuts, some Cotton Candy, a couple boxes of Animal Crackers, still got some of Saccharina's Sweets but I was hoping to hold onto them.”
“You always were too sentimental.”
“There's Kettle Corn, Corn Dogs, Dog biscuits, Purple Fluffernutter Sandwiches (Lolly's favourite) and… an apple.”
“A caramel apple?”
“No, just an apple.”
“Gross.”
“Plus, I'm sure you still have the Bazooka, so that's an infinite supply of cream pies right there.”
“Wait, that's it! The Bazooka!”
“What about it?”
“We can use it as a rocket engine!”
…
“Huh?”
“It's Thermodynamics! We set it to make pies with extra inertia, fire them out the back, and that will propel us forward!”
…
“That is the greatest idea you've ever had.”
Eugene forced himself to his feet in spite of his motion sickness and retrieved the enormous bazooka from his tiny pockets. Mounting it on his shoulder and taking care to keep it level so they didn't go plunging down into the Not or flying up towards the Is, he fired off a coconut cream pie.
The pie erupted forward with so much force it sent Eugene, but not the boat, flying backwards. Thinking fast, Eugene immediately shapeshifted into a giant anthropomorphic parachute with the bazooka tied up in his safety harnesses. He was moving fast enough that he was able to catch enough air (or whatever was floating just above the Not) to lift him up by several dozen meters. As he gradually floated back down, he was able to manipulate his position by blowing until both he and the bazooka gently landed back inside the lifeboat.
…
“Guess we should have secured it to something, huh?”

After they had completed the inventory of everything in their pockets, Pius decided to try his luck at fishing with a rod he had found.
“And what exactly do you hope to catch? It's not a real ocean, remember?” Eugene asked, busying himself with trying to create a pivoting holder for the bazooka out of a unicycle and a few rolls of duck tape (not a typo, actual analogue tape rolls of numerous documentaries about ducks).
“Well, it's the Not, so Not a fish,” Pius explained as he hooked the popped kettle corn kernel onto the fishing line. “Not a crab, Not a squid, Not a polyp, Not a sponge, Not a slug, Not an eel, Not a starfish, Not a jellyfish and Not a sea turtle. But at the same time, Not nothing.”
Casting his line, the popcorn kernel splashed into the Not with a good solid ‘splunk'. At the same time, a giant popcorn kernel suddenly appeared, dangling in front of them while held by only a hairsbreadth of thread.
“Ah…Eugene, do you see that?”
“I see it, Pius. Is that yours?”
“I'm not sure. Let me try something.”
Pius tentatively moved his line back and forth, only for the large kernel in front of him to mirror his movements.
“Eugene, can you see what it's attached to?”
“No, the string just goes up for as far as I can see.”
Pius lifted his line out of the water, causing the giant kernel to disappear, only to reappear as soon as he let the lure drop below the surface again.
“I hope it's not another pattern screamer. That last one was so rude, hanging up on us like that.”
…
“Wait, what?”
“Hey, bring it a bit closer. I want to try something,” Eugene ordered. Pius complied, manoeuvring his fishing line so that the giant kernel hung within reach of the boat. Eugene jumped and grabbed it, giving it a sharp pull. Just as expected, Pius felt a tug on his line.
“That is truly perplexing,” Pius said with a furrowed brow. “I wonder… hey Eugene, hold on tight!”
“What? Oh no, no, no, no!”
Eugene screamed as Pius reeled in his line, causing him to shoot into the sky and reappear bursting through the surface of the Not, dangling from the end of the lure.
“See Eugene, I told you I wouldn't catch nothing!”

As Eugene huddled under a blanket and sipped Clown's Milk in an attempt to calm himself after his brief Not exposure, Pius (who had made himself a tricorne hat out of an old newspaper, irrefutably making him the lifeboat captain) read aloud from Dr. Clef's Survival Guide.
“Did you ever think about how weird the terms Humes and Kants are? Most scientific phenomena are named after the people who discovered them or Greek letters, but we named these things after Enlightenment Era philosophers as… what, a joke?
“Anyway, say you're in a region with a low Hume level – or low Kant level, whatever, I never learned the damn system – you'll know because a) the number on your Kant Counter will be low – I don't know how low. Again, I never learned the system – and b) EVERYTHING WILL LOOK LIKE YOU'RE TRIPPING BALLS!
“Now, it's possible you are tripping balls and reality is actually perfectly normal, so you're going to want to do a little field sobriety test. First, stare at your hands. Keep staring at them. If your hands don't look normal, then you're tripping balls. Get yourself someplace safe – not a hospital – and enjoy. If they look normal, then that means you're in a low Hume/Kant region and are probably fucked.
“I'll be honest, getting yourself unfucked ain't going to be easy. Talloran managed to do it though, so there's some hope, right? Best advice I can give here is not to count on Scranton Reality Anchors. Hell, those things didn't even help Scranton in the end, you know (You probably don't know since this is all highly classified information)."
“Can you please just skip to something that might actually be helpful?” Eugene asked.
“I”ll try. Let's see, next is a rant about how he thinks he might be in a nuthouse somewhere and all Reality is his delusion, making him God. Then he speculates on how Gears can be a robot and the Black Queen's father at the same time, talks about some stuff from his Geo Sea days… yeah, I'm starting to think this isn't an actual survival guide.”
“It's probably not a good idea to take survival advice from a guy who would kill us if he had the chance in the first place. Where'd you get that book anyway?”
“I found it in a Bargain Bin at The Ikea that time we were there. The review on the back said it was must-read TV.”
…
“What?”

Ring Ring
Ring Ring
Ring Ring
“The phone's ringing again Eugene.”
“I hear it.”
“Should I answer it?”
“No.”
…
Ring Ring
“I'm going to answer it.”
“Don't.”
“Hello, this is Pius the Clown, whom may I say is calling?”
“I'm sorry, but the number you have dialled is imaginary,” an automated voiced replied.
“I didn't dial anything, you called me.”
“Hang up. It's either a pattern screamer or a telemarketer.”
“All of our operators are currently disembodied consciousnesses trapped in an eternal hell of their own existential despair. Please, stay on the line.”
The phone began playing a dramatic if melancholic instrumental track as hold music.
…
“Are you actually staying on the line?”
“They said ‘please' Eugene.”
“Ugh.”
“The Is is what was Nevermeant, the Not what should have Been,” a deep, demonic voice said as it suddenly broke the melody of the hold music.
“Hello, who's this?”
“For all that Is, there is an Infinity more that could have been. It is not just. The Is hath no more right to Be than the Not. Some Not is Ought whilst most Is should be Not, yet the Is will rot to Not in time.”
"How are you speaking in bold?"
"Hang up!"
"…THE KING SAT ALONE ON HIS THRONE OF BONE, CONDONED BY THE CLONES OF STONE. BEMOANED BY THE KNOWN, GROWN FROM WHAT WAS SOWN, and the world felt like nothing, amen."
…
“I'm sorry, you have the wrong number.”
Click
"I told you it was a telemarketer."

“Alright, that should do it,” Eugene said as he completed the final inspection of his cream pie jet engine rig.
“Hey Eugene, what do you think these big monoliths are?” Pius asked, cocking his head at the peculiar protrusion of gleaming stone rising out of the sea.
“It doesn't matter. If this jet engine works, we'll be able to travel the Not until we find a whirlpool back to our Reality, then we can find the Library, and then the Circus, and then forget all of this ever happened.”
…
“Do you think they're just like some kind of iceberg or something?”
“Next time Icky wants to travel outside all known Reality, I'm taking a personal day.”
“This one's getting awfully close.”
“I'm telling you, I'm going to have to get Tinkles to up my dose of Clown Impulse Suppressant after this.”
“The more I look, the more real it becomes.”
“This is not where I thought I'd be at this point in my life.”
“And yet, I cannot look away.”
“Being shuffled across the Not just so that I can crawl out of a snake's ass.”
“It's hypnotic.”
“Pius, are you even lis – Pius, no!”
Alas, Eugene's intervention came too late. The Monolith had drawn existence from Pius's mere observation of it, entrancing him and becoming more and more real the closer it got. As soon as it was in reach, Pius reached out to touch it. The act of feeling it was enough to make it fully real. Luminescent cracks formed in a grid-like pattern all along the Monolith's exterior, causing it to break off into a million pieces and evaporate into smoke. In its place was an entity of some sort, composed entirely of radiant blacks and vacuous whites, of three-dimensional shapes that only made sense as two-dimensional drawings, of particles and forces which could only exist in the mind but drove mad any mind that beheld them.
…
“Oh, it's an egg or cocoon or something. That's neat,” Pius remarked.
The entity landed with a splash into the Not, generating a tsunami that sent the lifeboat spiralling away from it. Both Clowns screamed in terror and Eugene puked from a combination of terror and motion sickness, looking up in horror at the colossal entity before them. Their horror only increased when the entity seemed to take an interest in them, swimming towards them and opening a large orifice to engulf them.
“It's going to eat us!” Pius screamed.
“The hell it is! Why fill up on Clowns when you can skip straight to dessert?” Eugene asked as he aimed the bazooka/jet engine at the approaching monstrosity. “Eat Lemon Meringue you son of a bitch!”
Eugene squeezed the trigger and held it, producing a volley of pies at a rate of 700 rounds per minute (he had illegally modified the bazooka to be fully automatic sometime back when he realized the key to a good pie throwing sketch was overkill). The inertially modified pies propelled the little lifeboat forward at fantastic speeds as it rode up and down the massive bow wave the creature generated in its pursuit. Though many of the pies disappeared down its cavernous cavity, they did not slake its appetite. The entity needed a conscious observer to ensure its continued reality. If it vanished from sight, it would cease to be all together, but with a pair of observers incorporated into its being it would become self-sustaining, free to go where it would.
As the tiny lifeboat and colossal entity skidded along the surface of the Not, neither seemed to be gaining the upper hand. Eugene steered as evasively as the jerry-rigged pie thruster would allow, but the monster would not be shaken. As if sensing its preys growing sense of hopelessness, the entity widened its cavity, eager to devour them and become real.
This, however, proved a foolish decision, as a beam of emerald green light was fired into its gaping maw, triggering a catastrophic explosion and blowing the creature into rapidly dematerializing bits. The blast was so powerful that the lifeboat was sent flying through the air.
Eugene and Pius thought for sure that this time they would plunge into the Depths of the Not, but they instead landed in the Crow's Nest of the Nautilus. The pair looked up to see Munin staring down at them stoically.
“Eugene,” he said, in as polite a tone as he could manage, but Eugene was sure he sensed the man's anal sphincter tighten in memory of their recent performance.
“Well, this is awkward.”
“You morons!” Icky shouted as she crawled into the Crow's Nest, right before throwing her arms around the two wayward Clowns in relief. “I really thought we might have lost you this time! You have to be more careful!”
“Sorry Icky,” the pair apologized, slightly out of synchronicity with each other.
“It was Pius's fault,”
“You're the one who jumped ship!”
“You're the one who caused a fire, making jumping ship the rational choice!”
“Enough!” Icky ordered. “Next time we travel through the Not, I'm locking you two up in a crate.”
“How'd you find us anyway?”
“We detected a Monolith breaking on our scopes from 80 000 grimnauts away,” Munin replied. “It's a rare and calamitous occurrence that Icky assured us could only have been caused by the two of you. Luckily, we're well prepared for Schrödinger Krakens.”
“Come on you two. I want you below deck and well secured before Nemo makes the dive back home.”
“Sounds good to me. The sooner there's dry land under my feet, the better,” Eugene said, slinging the bazooka over his shoulder.
“I hope you two realize how lucky you are,” Munin said severely.
"It wasn't luck, I broke open a Monolith."
“The surface of the Not is not only vast but an ever-changing kaleidoscope, with distance and location having little meaning," Munin continued. "Anything, or anyone, lost typically remains so until it sinks beneath the surface and the very concept of existence ceases to –“
His melodramatic monologue was interrupted by a cream pie to the face.
“Sorry. Hair trigger.”

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