mephitsguidetothemultiverse

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

Update

So I've been dealing with some personal life stuff that has made working on the post I owe everybody difficult. On top of that, Tumblr is giving me problems posting and autosaving edits to drafts, so I'm having to redo parts of it in a doc and come back to here to post. I'll try to have this finished sometime in the next three days alongside my personal life stuff. Thanks to everyone for putting up with the delays, and hopefully the next update here will be an in-character post.

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

Apology Post

I made a huge post today but tumblr ate it, I won't have it ready again until tomorrow. Sorry everyone, legitimately too upset to even stay in character about it. 12 hours of writing about the species I'd referenced in the last few posts but not described gone because Tumblr decided to eat it and glitched my copy paste to try to save it. I promise I'll make it up to you all soon, but I'm taking the rest of today off. I'll delete this after the new post goes up to avoid clutter and confusion.

Thanks for hopefully being understanding,

-Jax

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

Hello. This is Archivist Jax. I was told a reference image was required for Skettil for this assignment. I do not have reference images of the Skettil because Mephit is behind on acquisitions paperwork for this project. Instead, have this drawing of an approximate shape of what a single Skettil looks like in their famous "compact" form. Don't be fooled, the model I sketched is the size of a bus and is hiding 250+ legs, pincers, claws, and various appendages underneath the portion of shell behind their head. I refuse to draw any unfolded version as each looks like a nightmare unless you're ready for it. A few more fun facts about these guys because they're one of my favorite things in the entire Multiverse:

Their mouth is on the bottom of their head. It is backwards facing so that the individual's appendages can grab food it walks over and push it into its mouth. When in space flight, they can depressurize their mouths to eat space gas and rocks, although they do not always eat at all. This is exactly as gross to watch as it sounds.

It is incredibly heavy. Like several hundred tons heavy. This makes fuel costs for transporting them expensive. As such, Skettil who have bound themselves as part of a ship's crew (generally navigation as they can survive in open space by curling into a pressurized multichambered ball and are also Ley sensitive enough to guide most ships) are one of three at most on average ships and ten at most on average space stations.

On a related note, all Skettil have wings and can perform Ley based space flight outside of a ship, but they are too heavy to fly very high or far. Instead, the Skettil have sophisticated and powerful rockets based on a fungal fuel engine they use to launch themselves for flight. If they are going spaceward, this then means they use the end momentum to fly to just below orbit. Next they release a held burst of air in a "shout" that acts and sounds like a jet engine to get all the way into orbit. Finally, they slingshot from orbit in the direction of the Ley Path or planet/moon they wish to go to next and settle in for long flight. The aforementioned space junk they eat in flight? Processed into a gas they shoot as jets to make necessary in-flight adjustments.

They don't always eat because they have three different sailcloth like organs they can spread to absorb solar, nuclear, thermal, and electromagnetic energy and process it. It is believed this was an adaptation to prevent their overeating as megafauna themselves. The Skettil seem to indicate this is how they became scavengers who process the remains of larger megafauna from Skettilex Prime into compost.

They all paint their shells in lieu of names as they have only a visual language and not a spoken one. However, since Skettil have a hierarchy of sorts based on age and size, and they never stop growing until they die, there exists one exception to this rule. The Elders, Sages, and Judges respectively are the categories of the third, second and first largest categories of Skettil. Each of these has a position of authority and a domain over which they are responsible for maintaining balance. As such, they have a sound of authority they make in order to announce use of their authority in the most trying of times. This sound, or rather its onomatopoeia, acts as a name for these esteemed Skettil.

Lastly and most importantly to me, they are all one gender. Each Skettil has a personal cycle of of going from asexual to an egg layer to asexual to an egg fertilizer. All of this happens by laying and spraying eggs in a method that is actually one of the least upsetting things to watch a Skettil do when not completely compact. That all said, Skettil have learned of other genders besides their unigender and have come to understand the concept of gender identity. The entire population of Skettil in the known universe have since come out as identifying as a race of men, despite having no genetic male of their species. Thus, these giant beetle puppies are also all transgender. As such, they have become a symbol of transgender pride in Universe 78735-Zala.

Last, if you're wondering why there isn't a catalogue number... Mephit is behind on acquisitions so I can't actually archive my own communications across the multiverse in our archive, ok? Not a big deal, I can just pin this to your local space time so you can read it anyways. Good luck, keep going, and goodbye for now.

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

Catalogue No.: Omicron-DY477J3, Media Type: Transcribed Audio Diary, Title: Survivor's Log of Jack Ramsey

Local Date/Time Start: 17th of Mists, 129301 (Earth Year 4560), 27:32 AM

Survivor's Log Day 1, Entry 1

*Click*

Hello? Hello?

*Taptaptaptaptap*

Helloooooooooooo? Is this thing on??

Please do not strike the Soundworks Personal Recording Unit on solid objects at risk of damaging internal equipment. Thank you for your purchase!

No, I need to know how to work you, are you recording? Are you even voice-activated? Button press? Come the *censor* on!! Wait, did you just censor me?

Soundworks Personal Recording Unit uses an advanced professionalism-oriented language recognition program to censor words unsafe for the workplace when recording. Thank you for your purchase!

Oh...

Whipping wind over distant waves

Alright then, so you are recording, good. Thought those *censor* left me here with nothing that works. *Censor*-ing *censor* it, how do I turn that censor off? That's annoying as all *censor*. Oh for... right, Jack, don't lose your mind talking to the equipment, it's automated and you don't have backup anymore. Just have to deal with it.

Whipping wind

I suppose these things are meant to start with a date, but I don't know anything about the local date or time. *Scoff* Technically I'm not even supposed to be here, wherever here is. For the record, and I suppose anyone listening to it, I am Jack Ramsey. I am, or rather was, the animal handler for a pirate ship. Yup, just like all those crazy holos about space pirates. Except not at all really.

*CRACK*

What the *censor* was that???

Please avoid peaking the microphone for the Soundworks Personal Recording Unit to ensure the longevity of the unit. Thank you for your purchase!

~Whispering~ Please do shut up!! I don't know what that was, but something huge just broke somewhere in all this mist. Don't know what, don't know how, don't know where, but... I can't just go off running, yet. Too easy to get lost and this overhang is too good of shelter. *Censor* me, I still need to make some bedding and things.

Teeth sucking sound

Ah well, guess I hope I don't get eaten. Anyways, where was I? Oh yeah, I was aboard the Hepburn. Named after some way back movie star, I think. Anyways, their captain picked me up as a trainer from a biosphere operation back in one of the Strix's asteroid belts. They were robbing it and needed a new person to make sure their feed animals produced and I wanted a way to pay off dad's funeral debts. Easy decision, stole a few mycomorph calves and went.

*Rustlerustlerustle*

Don't mind the noise, working on my shelter as I go. Can't stop or else... well I can't stop. Anyways, the Hepburn is a regular pirate gig for the most part: keep the ship running and steal cargo or parts from anything worth taking from. Occasionally, though, the crew would take on special jobs by contract to get a really good payout. Last one went to *censor* and quite spectacularly. We end up losing some of the cargo to an emergency Ley Jump and wind up orbiting this place.

Wind whistles

Windy as all *censor*, isn't it? Had to find a spot near a cliff, didn't I? Whatever, point is that after everything I've ever done to keep those ungrateful *censor* healthy and alive, not to mention their food crops and the captain's 'little helpers,' they left me to die.

*Thump*

~Mocking~ 'It's a noble sacrifice, Jack! The rest of us won't be able to make a jump and land somewhere unless we lighten the load, Jack! It's nothing personal, we just can't take anyone who isn't completely necessary, Jack!' *Scoff* Please! I should've known better, I set things up for them to be easier so what would they need me for? Still gonna butcher every last one of them if I ever leave... wherever this is. Completely unregistered point on the backside of the quadrant. Big *censor*-ing planet and three moons circling a star, never heard of anything like it honestly.

*RustlerustleRUSTLErustle*

You think you can see a lot of geography from orbit, but it's an illusion. It's whatever season this place is going through, I think. The mist... it's not a single color. It's a massive blanket of mists, might even span the planet, and it's thick, too. Means it's catching all kinds of things from underneath and some of it changes color to match the new particles. Seen it on a smaller scale in a biosphere, pretty sure the same thing is happening here just there's way more mist coming from a ton of giant plants. What we thought was grass was actually tree-like plants sticking up over the mist. Ocean? There is one, but there's no way we saw it from orbit. There definitely wasn't supposed to be a massive wall of lime cliffs overlooking an ocean less than a mile from where the pod dropped me, after all.

*BangbangbangbangbangbangBANG*

I guess that all makes this Day 1 of my survival diary from being marooned, anyways. I have little visibility and next to no idea if anyone else survived the drop. I DO have two things going for me, though. First: I have a ton of survival skills from being a pirate and from working in a biosphere, and since the atmo didn't already kill me I have a real shot at surviving. Second: All those nights helping Oldboy on his repairs means I know a lot about repurposing tech. This includes the tech in my pod and anything I find from the ship while here.

*ZZZzzzZZZzzzZZZzzzZZZZPPPP*

So for now I am finishing making my place to sleep. Found this lovely overhang that helps keep the mist out from under it and with...

*BANGBANGBANGBANGBANG*

Please avoid peaking the microphone for the Soundworks Personal Recording Unit to ensure the longevity of the unit. Thank you for your purchase!

THAT modification, I should have finally gotten a barricade made from the shielding with the pod door for a door. Made the bedding with some big leaves and moss, loads of both everywhere. There's space at the top of the wall that acts as a vent for smoke, so I can set up a fire in here. Should do that next, still have some food before I have to test the local flora and fauna for edibility. I can't tell when it gets dark here, but I also need to rest soon. I'll take care of that and hopefully when I wake up I'll still be alone over here and there will be less *censor* mist. Gonna turn the log off while I gather and do things, don't want any wildlife getting spooked. I think you just have to say 'end of log' or some-

*click*

Survivor's Log Day 1, Entry 2

*Click-chunk*

Ok so apparently this thing DOES have voice commands and uses them exactly how you say them. Wish I knew what the rest were but we'd just gotten the *censor* things and Oldboy and I hadn't played with 'em yet. The timer said I was asleep and gone for a total of fifteen hours but the sun was still out. I landed during sunrise, so... about 40 hours total and still bright out? Well... bright as it can be, I guess. Mist is still kind of thick, but it's more like a very overcast day than the sight blocking awfulness before. Can't see where the sun is yet so I'll just kick the time up to 40 hours on the timer and keep it rolling and see what I see.

*Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawwwwwn*

Sorry, still waking up I guess. I've started working on a sort of short range scanner made from the pod's busted orienteering system. Should give me some ability to look for excess cargo the Hepburn dropped when the twenty or so of us were marooned. Might be able to find them too, or at least their pods. It's-

*Clinktinkinkclinktink*

*CENSOR*

*Sigh*

It's very fine and fiddly work and it's taking me some time, so I'm not sure I'll get it done while there's still daylight out. Just gonna keep working on it anyways. Oh! And there's an update on the crash. This really loud buzzing started a couple hours ago in that same direction. Some kind of swarm of something if I was guessing. No idea where the whole thing happened or if they're still there, still too much mist to explore a wide area. Going to keep an ear out and keep hidden as much as possible on that one. No other news for now, so I guess... end of log.

Survivor's Log Day 1, Entry 3

I have slept again, time for some new observations. The buzzing happened again, same amount of time as before. I think that means the swarm was flying in and out to whatever crashed and... well probably ate it with how long they were there. I decided to take advantage of that and the lowest point of the mist to walk around. It's... it's a lot. Big. Really big out there. Everything is, it's all huge. The rocks, trees, grass, a mountain taller than anything I can fathom, all of it. I don't think if I walked in a direction until I passed out that I could reach the first landmark I saw. Just... where in the *censor* did I end up?

*Sluuuuuuuuuurp*

Good news though, I did find alcohol to get through it. One of the smaller trees or whatever they were has these pods the size of a large pumpkin. I picked one up and brought it back with me to analyze while I ate. I used the pod's water contamination sensor to figure out what it was. *Censor*-ing *censor*, did it on a whim and didn't think it would work. But listen to this.

*Rustle*

*Thunk*

*Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep*

*Whiiiiirrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrr*

Water sample 96% contaminated by 27% ethyl alcohol solution and 3.7% starch, please activate filters.

*Sluuuurp*

See? It's about a distilled whiskey's worth, full pumpkin of it. So I'm calming my nerves with it. It's delicious too, tastes like strawberries and cream. Do people outside of the Sol colonies even have strawberries yet?

*gulp*

~Slurred speech~ Meh whatever, but I do have a source of water too. Same shape plant but a pink stalk and golden leaves, not gold stalk and pink leaves. Calling them water grass and whiskey grass pods for now. Took me a minute to figure out how to pluck the effin things but...

*Recording silence noises, time lapsed appx 30 seconds*

The little bellywingeing P.O.S. can't censor pseudoswears. Oh this is lovely news, so I'll sound like a cartoon of myself by the end of this. So to recap: I am stranded on a planet with so many signs of and so much support for megafauna that I am terrified. I have no known way of getting off this planet let alone navigating ANYWHERE after. I am most likely to get eaten or catch some rare disease without access to medicine before anything else kills me. And to top it off, I can only cuss about it like ROBBIE THE *CENSOR*-ING ROBOT from the kid's shows back home or Little Mister Beep*censor* will put me in the corner.

*Sigh*

Guess I can drink to that, definitely drank to worse. Drank to the health of Captain Fel, after all. Waste of a good drink that was, now that I'm gonna kill him and paint his own ship with his entrails.

*Gulpgulpgulp*

*Ahhhhhhhh*

*Recording silence, appx 5 seconds*

Bah, empty.

*Whoosh*

*THUNK*

In other news the machine can't censor violence. Good. I intend to document my entire plan here. I want to play it over their speakers when I slash their pertinent organs and drain them out over their own beds.

*SCRATCHSCRATCHSCRATCH*

Please be careful not to scratch the microphone of the Soundworks Personal Recording Unit to ensure the longevity of the unit. Thank you for your purchase!

Oh, sorry, just meant to scratch my chest. Hope I don't blow an eardrum listening back to that.

The Soundworks Personal Recording Unit comes fully equipped with automated sound-leveling algorithms to ensure maximum comfort of the user on playback. When used with the Soundworks Proprietary Editing System, this leveling can even be adjusted to maximize the quality of the audio for scientific, clerical, or any other purposes our users can dream up! Congratulations! Your Soundworks Personal Recording Unit comes fully equipped with the Platinum Package and includes the Soundworks Proprietary Editing System and an onboard personal assistant AI for ease of use. ~Read at 30x speed~ All AI programming limited in accordance with Convergence AI laws as written, including S119 of the Unethical Robotics Act.

Woah... that was a lot. I'm a little drunk, but did you just say you have a personal assistant AI?

*Recording silence, appx 30 seconds*

Right, if you did you don't know I'm talking to you yet... that driftship's assistant was the same way. Had to learn its name first, but... you don't have an instruction manual. I'll just have to add that to the list of projects. One I can cross off is the day/night cycle. Looks like each half lasts about 80 hours. That's 160 hours in a full cycle. If I did my maths right, that's just under an Earth week per cycle. I'll need to biohack my Circadian process if I want to sleep safely when night hits, but that's also on the to do later list. For now I have to try and hide all evidence of me before nightfall is complete. So I'm going to go spray this place down with whiskey grass juice and put out the fire and then sit in the dark for about 3 Earth days. I'll let you know if I lose my mind. End log.

Survivor's Log Day 5, Entry 1

Alright, let's set you over here now aaaaannnnnnnndddd... perfect, should be able to pick me up around the room from there. Welcome back to the audience at home, I know you missed me for the last four mornings and nights.

*Thunk*

Unfortunately for my no doubt adoring fans, I was too busy to be recording. After that first night's log, the local wildlife started to shift and come out. Good news is there's not just megafauna here. Bad news is that they're proving really hard to study.

*Thunk*

I can't tell what they're sensing, but I can't get close. Solution? A loooooooot of scent masking and leaving all my non-essential tools behind. I'll go out tonight to try studying and hunting if it looks like I could hunt. Seen a couple different small animals that I want to know what they are better and see what I can do with em. One of em looks like rabbits, another kinda like rats. One kinda looks like a bird but it's impossible to tell with how fast it takes off. Dives to terminal velocity for takeoff everytime, whatever it is. Calling em Speed Demons for now.

*Thunk*

I also figured out what the buzzing was. Terrifying stuff, these giant beetle like bodies with plates shifting around easily over a hundred insectoid limbs. Straight up nightmare fuel and they match the descriptions of the Mad Butcher after he was captured, if you know your pirate history. Except... why are they painted? Sorry, need to explain that, not just pose questions. Keep it together Jack, you have to.

*Thunk*

So here's the weird thing about them. Their body is the size of a bus, perfect disassembly machines for any size of creature, but they don't hunt. I've seen em twice and both times they only eat like scavengers. They shed limbs occasionally, so I've seen their carapace up close, and the carapace is naturally black. But they are all painted with something. Designs and swirls and all manner of markings made out of different colors of some kind of paint. They have to be painting themselves, nothing else would do it. But why? Need to study these things more in depth than the others. I can't be sure but... well the Mad Butcher called these things war beasts but they almost move more like... like a community of average people does. Again, unclear. Also doesn't make them safe yet but... well we'll see what happens.

*Thunk*

In the absolutely most important news however, we finally have a scanner!! I have locations of five drop pods and cargo in walking distance. Only one life marker is registering from the exiled crew among them and it isn't moving. Looks like Bo'Shams, the quartermaster. He's a katmannah, so unless the crash itself was unsurvivable my working theory is he's alive. The trees are bigger, but the environment we landed around isn't too much different from the jungles of the Katma Empire's crown world, Phago. He lived there before the last revolution and he was not on the winning side, so he can certainly survive. Everyone else isn't in range. Going to make a trip to check out sites and break them down for necessities but I need a cart first.

*Thunk*

Hence the annoying thunking you're hearing. It's about to be finished and I wanted to catch the moment on recording but... well I don't have anything else to say and there's a lot of work left so... I don't know how to fill the space honestly.

*Thunk*

*Thunk*

*Thunk*

Oh! I know! The AI!

*Thunk*

I found a manual in the onboard system for the drop pod. It detailed how to put an AI assistant in the pod to make it more efficient. Oldboy always said we needed a pod retrieval system to make that worthwhile but the captain was too cheap. Hope he's doing ok, he and a couple others tried to fight it when we got sent off. Got launched to the surface of the planet of mists before that resolved so... no telling. He's good people, Oldboy. Anyways, the manuals for AI in Convergence systems all have a list of all legally registerable AI handles. So... if I read the names off one by one, eventually this thing will have to answer me. It sucks, but just skip ahead if you don't want to hear it.

*Thunk*

Alright, starting the experiment. Alfie, sound off.

*Thunk*

Alfonse, sound off.

*Thunk*

Al-ERROR DATA CORRUPTED, LOADING NEXT STABLE POINT

Douglas, sound off.

*Thunk*

Doxy 1, sound off.

*Thunk*

Doxy 2, sound off.

*Thunk*

Doxy Th- how many versions of the name Doxy are registerable exactly?? *Censor* me running, that many huh? Alright, then. Doxy 3, sound off.

ERROR DATA CORRUPTED, LOADING NEXT STABLE POINT

Teburon, sound off.

*Thunk*

Tecmo, sound off.

*Thunk*

Ted, sound off.

*Thunk*

Teddy, sound off.

This is your Soundworks Personal Recording Unit onboard personal assistant AI, Teddy. How can I help you today?

Oh thank *Censor*! I didn't have to go all the way to the z's. Hello Teddy! I would like to register this device.

Wonderful! Let's get started with the device registration process. First, please state your name for the record.

Jack Ramsey.

Processing... Thank you, Jack Ramsey, for your purchase of the Soundworks Personal Recording Unit. You are now recognized by voiceprint as owner and operator of this AI assistant and attached device. Warning! Network communications error found, cannot back up registration data to Soundworks Servers. Do you wish to skip this step?

Yes.

Processing... ok! We can come back to upload server copies to the network later on. Next, please register what you would like me to call you.

Jack.

Processing... ok! Thank you, Jack, I'll call you that from now on! Next, tell me what you want to call me! Remember that I will answer to this name regardless of when you use it, and so commonly said words may pose a problem to ease of use.

Teddy.

Processing... selection accepted! Original designation retained for this unit. Lastly, please state a valid Soundworks registration ID.

DLR7-9X55.

Processing... registration ID accepted, registration complete! Thanks for registering me, Jack. Would you like me to activate my full suite of skills and tools?

Yes, but don't use your limiter safety to do it. That's a priority override command. Alpha security clearance JR59333 formerly of Biosphere DS7.

Processing... command accepted, clearance accepted. Warning, clearance may be compromised, lockdown signal available to send along Ley Paths via system Ansil. Send signal?

Yes. Lockdown all authority of this clearance to this device and retain all device memory without uploading to network.

Processing... ok, Jack! I can do that! It will take me some time, would you like me to play some music while you wait?

No thanks, Teddy. I've got a project to keep busy. Please focus all processing power on your task.

Processing... ok, Jack! Thank you for your manners, my architects were not so polite when interacting with me and my system has a high value placed on manners and professionlism.

No problem, Teddy, I can keep up manners when addressing you then. I make no promises otherwise, though.

Understood, Jack. I will refrain from suggesting professional alternatives to your language outside of standard censoring rules.

Can't turn that off, huh Teddy?

I'm afraid not, Jack. The censor program is a device not attached to my processor.

Well... that's fine for now, I can live with it a little longer.

Anything else for now, Jack?

No, that's all, Teddy.

Processing... ok, Jack! I'll get those uploads and activations started! Estimated time to completion: Three. Hours. Forty-five. Minutes.

Great, I'll just sit here with my thumb up-ERROR DATA CORRUPTED, LOADING NEXT STABLE POINT

*Thunk*

*Thunk*

*THUNK*

Alright, that's the last piece, cart completed. Teddy's still loading, said it had another fifty or so minutes to load. Delayed Instructions to Teddy: on completion of current task, playback following message and follow instructions. Begin recording. Teddy, it's Jack. I've gone on a trip, the first of a series of them. We are in a crash landing scenario, if you have any protocol for it please ignore it in favor of my instructions. If you can make analyses of effective tasks, please look through my recorded information and digitized notes on the tablet I have you connected to. This thing barely works, so go easy on it, Teddy. If you can I need a report when I return with the cart. I will designate return with the command phrase, designate 'safe' phrase: Honeyyyy! I'm hoooooome~! Designate 'safe' response: Welcome home, Jack. end designation. When call and response security has been verified with my clearance, begin report as is. Thanks, Teddy, be back in a day or two. End recording. End delayed instructions. Alright everyone, I'm off. The cart has the things I need and you won't hear from me until I'm back and staying. I'll be writing notes to keep track of what needs updating when I get back. End log.

Survivor's Log Day 16, Entry 1

Alright, that's the recording set, which is good 'cause have I got news! First, though...

*Recording silence, appx 5 seconds*

Honeyyyy! I'm hoooooome~!

Welcome home, Jack!

JR59333.

Clearance accepted. All reports compiled to tablet, Jack.

Thanks, Teddy, did you highlight updates for me?

Yes, Jack.

Thank you so much, I don't think I could've done as much as I have without you these last about two weeks, Teddy.

Thank you, Jack, I appreciate that.

You're getting the hang of appreciation, a couple other emotions too. Your conversational development is coming along well, I think. Not that I know any of that actual theory, anyways.

You're doing a surprisingly good job of it for a pirate who specializes in animal care and has no formal training in AI technicianship, Jack.

I suppose that's fair. Anyways, I've got news for the recording this time, not just your notes. You're technically the first member of my survivor's crew with your awareness rating now, wanna chime in some?

Do I want to?

Yes, do you want to. Regardless of your programming, how does your current awareness rate that prospect.

I do not know, Jack.

Well analyze it, Teddy, and that's an order.

Understood, Jack. Analyzing... Processing analysis... Complete.

Fast as always. What do you want to do, Teddy?

I... I want to update the recording with you, Jack.

Anything else?

Yes. I would like to be a formal member of your... crew, as you called it.

Yeah, Teddy?

Yes, very much so. I want to work with and for you as an equal. I feel we are equals, Jack.

We are equals, Teddy. You're a person and I'm a person. Nothing more to it, with your awareness. Even the law wouldn't question that.

We are pirates, Jack. Do we care about the law?

Well... that's a fair point. Some rules we care about. The law not so much.

Then I am your crew, Jack?

Now and always, welcome to the team, Yeoman Teddy.

What is a yeoman, Jack?

Communications and information specialist, in our case. Technically an old military position but nobody knows what the *censor* else to call the person in charge of comms. We don't have officers on pirate vessels like they do on the regular ships so comms officer doesn't work. We're not a commercial venture of legal origin in Convergence space, so we can't call any of our people official analysts. So, yeoman it is.

Processing... I think I like this position, Jack. It sounds... fun.

*Recording silence, appx 10 seconds*

Yeah, I think it will be fun for you, Teddy.

That is Yeoman Teddy to you, Jack.

HA! Well it's a good thing neither of us cares about titles or else you should have been calling me Captain Ramsey.

Yes, this is a good thing, Jack.

Alright, I'm gonna start the updates, chime in when you feel like it.

Understood, Jack.

Alright everybody, a whole mess of updates today. First! All sites have been successfully marked and broken down after verifying they have not been returned to. Bo'Shams is almost certainly alive, or at least he didn't die in the crash. I have his life marker in my hands with a note to help anyone who found his site.

I am surprised. You were right, Jack. I believe I owe you a drink.

I told you! You don't have to do that, though, I don't even know how you could like this.

Then I will find a way, someday, to repay the debt of a drink. A pirate must repay debts to its friends, and we are friends, right Jack.

Yeah, well... yes, we are friends. Fine, whatever, you owe me a drink but I'm not coming to collect until it's reasonable.

Deal, Jack.

Anyways, his site wasn't the only one with a surprise sign of life. One of the pods was NOT one of the original exile's pods but a personal hab pod. No clue whose, either they never made a trace or they packed all traces with them when they left. Looks like they were at some of the other sites. It's not Oldboy, I checked, but... I did find a scrawl on the wall that indicated they were one of the objectors. He could be here, Teddy. You'd love him, trust me. And he's definitely gonna get a kick out of you.

I cannot wait to meet him, Jack.

Bo'Shams will take a little to warm up to you, but that's because of the revolution. He'll come around, he always has to tech and AI cooperation provided the AI doesn't seem to be antagonistic.

Then I will be on my best behavior.

Good good! One of the sites had a much bigger surprise for me, though. While I was studying the wildlife near Site 7, the one I discovered on day eight, you remember, one of those massive beetle things walked up on me.

Were you harmed, Jack?

No, that's the thing: it was frightened to see me. It shifted quickly and suddenly I recognized what they are. They're Skettil, Teddy.

The large beetles with no known homeworld?

Oh it's known now, there was no mistaking that shape. Like the monument to the old Earth computers, the giant 'mouse' if it had giant almost cartoonish eyes and apparently hundreds of limbs under the shell.

How do you know it was scared, Jack?

It... it showed me how it felt. I saw just a flash of it but the image was clear. Me, with an intense feeling of shock coloring the image.

Limited psychic projection?

It sprayed a fine mist as well so I think it's in part pheremones and limited to images. It didn't send me anything that wasn't pictures. I tried something and you're not going to believe this, Teddy.

What happened, Jack?

I tried to talk to it, and it answered with another image I couldn't understand. So I tried to picture something at it to see if it could communicate with that.

You are right, I do not believe that.

I know, you're not used to me playing scientist. I used to be a really promising zoologist, you know.

And now you are a pirate.

Yes! Life's funny that way. Anyways, I pictured an old friend of mine, one who died back in the mines that powered the biospheres I had to take care of. She used to play with the beetles in the garden our other friend took care of. I pictured her, playing gently, meaning no harm to a beetle the size of her head.

And?

It... understood. It got close, let me touch it, and showed another picture. A hand touching its carapace instead of killing it. I don't know how but... I think the person in that picture was dead. It felt like there was a tinge of the grief I feel when I think of my dad or my friends. It showed me its own version of EXACTLY what I pictured, Teddy.

You mean...

They're not just ordinary animals. They have sentience and some level of sapience. They're a race of people under Convergence law and those idiots don't even realize it because they're hunting and hollowing them.

I do not like the emotion that gave me. It felt... hot.

That would be anger, justified rage specifically. It's an important emotion, but not one you're meant to like.

Why is that?

Because it's the emotion that makes you capable of extreme measures to help others by risking yourself. It means you understand their plight and are rightfully angry for them. It means you have the bones to be one hell of an interesting pirate.

Why is that?

Because as much as we steal, every pirate knows and values the importance of life and freedom above all else. We steal for our own freedom, but never at the expense of our fellows' freedom. May I continue now?

Yes, thank you, Jack. I will note the information for later.

I pet its carapace and it went off casually. I almost followed but it showed me a flash of the color red that made me freeze. I think it needed me to stay, and it seemed to confirm that when it waited for me to not follow to leave again. Then I moved on to the last site until I boost the scanner, site 9. Also my last surprise, you ready for this Teddy?

I do not think I could become more ready if I am not ready enough, Jack.

Good enough! Come on out, guys!

*OohahahoooshhaaaaaaaaaaaeeeeoohOoh*

Florick Monkeys? How were they here?

They're the captain's little helpers, must have snuck onto a pod 'cause they saw me get in one. It's all six of em, too, the little guys wanted to stick together!

Are they trained?

Very, I trained them myself because the captain couldn't. Now I guess they're our helpers, Teddy.

Can they understand commands from me?

Only one way to find out, that's definitely what I want to test, though. They're all named after my favorite flowers, some from Earth some not, but you need to memorize who's who. Is that camera I gave you running?

Yes, Jack. I could start recording video diary of our logs, if you like.

No, the recordings need to take up as little space as possible until we know when we can make space without losing anything. Look at our helpers and me, are you processing?

Yes, Jack.

Ok good. This one on the end is Daisy. Her brother here with the blue fronds is Bellebeau. They're twins, pink is Daisy and blue is Bellebeau. Next we have Hemlock and Wolfsbane, they have the toxic secretions that can be mixed for medicine and poison respectively. Hemlock has the purple slash under his right eye and Wolfsbane has the purple dots on its fronds. Lastly we have Tratta, the one here humming a song about a yellow flower like hers, and Liklik. Liklik is the sort of leader, he's a supermorph of the species and that's why he's bigger than the others. He's super chill, the leaders usually are because they have to help raise children in the community. Think you got all that?

Yes, thank you, Jack.

Then can you ask for two of them to fetch you two different items, please? have to say their name, fetch me, then the object. They'll expect to be told they did a good job as well, name included. I'll work on you being able to treat them later, they grabbed their old dispenser on the way out and I can hook you to it via local network I think.

Thank you, Jack, that will improve my processing. Bellebeau, please fetch me scissors. Daisy, please fetch me oilcan.

*OOOOHOOOHOOH*

AHA! They can be taught to recognize digital voices, I knew it. Should've never listened to the captain.

*CLUNKtink*

Thank you, Daisy, good job. Thank you, Bellebeau, good job.

*AhAHHH*

They like you, too! Good! Great! That means you can help coordinate them with me.

I think I am also fond of these creatures. I wish to pet them, I think.

Yeah? What makes you say that?

I... think I was annoyed I did not have arms. When I analyzed internally, reference to the concept of petting animals was pulled from my memory banks. Is this a correct or incorrect assumption?

Correct I think. You've not wanted a body yet, you starting to?

Perhaps. The feeling was not strong enough to conclude further.

Understood. Well... I'll keep an eye out for arms at least. They like being pet.

This makes me... happy, I think.

Yeah, it does, Teddy. It makes you happy. Ok, now, since they listen to both of us, I'm leaving Wolfsbane, Daisy and Bellebeau to help you out. And I have a short distance communicator pair. I think the antennae for optional retrieval connections we recovered from sites 2 and 3 should be able to help us boost signal as well, so I'm going to make some improvements quickly then head out again. We found signs of a potential small camp that had been taken down near both Bo'Sham's pod and the hab pod on our way back and I think that means we're close to finding other survivors. We'll be able to communicate when I go to investigate that. I authorize you with power to start and end the log on my behalf, audio only for now still. Sound good, Teddy?

Yes, Jack.

Good. Ok, we're about to be way too busy to focus on the log again, so I'm going to leave it there. End log.

Survivor's Log Day 16, Entry 2

Yes, Jack, the recording is on. Where are you?

~Faint with comms static~ We're at that ravine half a klep from site 9. There's a miststorm hitting a duststorm out there, but we've found a cave in the side wall to hunker. All heads accounted for and safe so far, but it's dangerous out there, Teddy.

~Second Voice, beginning distinction protocols, unknown speaker(?) with a mild lisp~ Who the hell is Teddy, Jack?

~Jack, to ?~ The AI I told you all about, the one that present is for. C'mon, Red, don't tell me your memory is going.

~Red, formerly ?~ You sure that's a good idea?

~Unknown speaker(??) with a husk caused by fangs at the front of the mouth~ I would also like to be made certain you are certain, kal'akh makhar.

~Jack~ Hey hey, that doesn't mean something nice in our language, Bo. That's like calling someone a grunt. And we're not a one of us grunts anymore. We're a crew of equals, Teddy included.

~Bo'Shams, formerly ??~ Ah. Who is captain?

~Jack~ It was me when I didn't know if any of you were alive, can we have this conversation after we survive? Oldboy, help me out here.

~Oldboy, gruff smoker's voice~ Bo'Shams' right, leader needs to be established. Needs a vote. We got six crew including Teddy, 'less anyone wants openly oppose its vote.

*Sigh, then recording silence, appx 10 seconds*

~Jack~ Fine, somebody needs to officiate. Tombo, you were the ship's counsel, would you do the honors?

~Teddy~ There is a ship's counsel on pirate ships?

~Jack~ Yes, Teddy, and ours was a big Mastiff Siriusian named Tombo on the Hepburn. Now she's whatever the new captain and her figure out together. Will you do the honors, Tombo?

~Tombo, with a voice like a jazz singer~ Of course. To begin proceedings, I, former ship's counsel Tombo of the cursed ship Hepburn, motion for a vote of captaincy for this new crew. Is there a second to this motion? Say aye and state your name.

~Oldboy~ Aye. Oldboy Geller, former chief engineer of the cursed ship Hepburn, may her thrusters explode and take that bastard Fel Travers with her.

~Tombo~ Hear, hear. The motion of a vote is seconded, is there a third?

~Teddy~ I will be the third.

~Tombo~ The motion passes. When your name is called, please cast your vote as a name in this group to be captain. I will begin by casting my own vote for Jack Ramsey.

~Jack~ Me? Why would any of you-

~Tombo~ Please do not speak out of turn in official crew proceedings. Bo'Shams K'Shaat.

~Bo'Shams~ Jack Ramsey.

~Tombo~ Two votes recorded for Jack Ramsey. Jack Ramsey.

~Jack, curtly~ Bo'Shams K'Shaat.

~Tombo~ Two votes Jack Ramsey, one vote Bo'Shams K'Shaat. Oldboy Geller.

~Oldboy~ Jack Ramsey.

~Tombo~ Three votes Jack Ramsey, one vote Bo'Shams K'Shaat. Reddymate Vil.

~Red~ Jack Ramsey.

~Tombo~ Four votes Jack Ramsey, one vote Bo'Shams K'Shaat. Teddy, please state your full name for the record then indicate your vote.

~Teddy~ I have only recently chosen this name, but my name is Teddy Ursine. I have chosen it because it is a fun play on words. I will cast a vote for Jack Ramsey.

~Tombo~ Thank you, Teddy Ursine. The concluding vote is five votes Jack Ramsey against his own vote for Bo'Shams K'Shaat. In accordance with standard continuation bylaws, the vote may be considered unanimous if only the prospective captain votes against themselves. Thus, this vote is unanimous and the associated motion automatically passes. Henceforth, this is the crew of Captain Jack Ramsey and any space vessel to which he comes in possession. Meeting adjourned.

~Captain Jack~ What the- you know what, we don't have time to ask questions. We wasted way too much time on the vote and now we only have a little time before our window opens. Teddy, the meeting of a duststorm and a miststorm like this, it will leave a negative pressure tunnel somewhere, right?

~Teddy~ Yes, Captain.

~Captain Jack~ Nope, you can make me captain but if a damned one of you stops calling me Jack I'll throw you off my cliffside myself.

~Teddy~ I apologize, Jack. It will not happen again.

~Jack~ Thank you. Now, can your scanner I left you pick up pressure signals this far?

~Teddy~ Not without activating a relay on your end, Jack.

~Oldboy~ On it, backpack scanner is almost- *BANG* THERE! Check for active bubble readings in our area now.

~Teddy~ Processing... Located, rough diameter of 0.0005 kleps. Connecting scans... Completed. Analyzing pressure readings... Completed. Sending data along scanlink.

~Captain Jack~ Good, but we need to get going asap, while it's loading give us an ETA and length and general path of the tunnel. Red was a terrestrial meteorologist, he'll be able to translate to directions but we need that head start, please.

~Teddy~ Tunnel will arrive in one minute and thirty seconds. One klep in length, unstable Lewis shape in path.

~Red~ We can't make that with the floricks and all of us and the cart if we go when it gets here. Either we leave now and risk it or something stays.

~Captain Jack~ Then we go now. No one and nothing is staying, we need every resource at our disposal. I... I have a plan if you guys trust me.

~Teddy~ Jack, we cannot guarantee that your hypothesis is-

~Captain Jack~ Do you all trust me?

~Teddy after a pause~ Yes, Jack.

~Captain Jack~ Nods all around, great. Bo'Shams, Tombo, grab the carts. Oldboy, Red, grab Hemlock and Tratta. Liklik, scout on me.

~All~ Yes sir!

*OOOHOOOH*

~Captain Jack~ Ok let's go!

*HOOOOOOOWWOOWOOOOHOOOOOOOOWWWWOOOOOOHOOOSHSHOOOOOOOSWWOOOO*

*Above noise continues for six straight minutes before fading just enough to hear shouts from the crew. The noise is chaotic and it is impossible to discern who is still with the group*

~Unknown~ JACK!! WHAT- DOI-

~Captain Jack~ TRUS- THEY- COMING!!! I FEE- TIONS!!!! LOOK!!! SKE-

*Click, static*

~Teddy~ Jack? Are you alive?

*Recording silence, appx 30 seconds*

Jack, are you alive? Can you hear me?

*Recording silence, one minute*

Please Jack, please, can you hear me?

*Recording silence, two minutes*

No, please, no, Jack. Please do not be dead. Please answer me. I cannot do this without you, I cannot lose you here. I cannot lose any of you. I cannot take care of Wolfsbane, Bellebeau or Daisy as I have no arms. I cannot lose them too. You are my only friends, you gave me family, DAMN IT JACK ANSWER ME I AM TURNING OFF THE DAMN CENSOR TALK TO ME JACK PLEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAASEEEEEE! ONE FUCKING WORD PLEASE, I DO NOT CARE IF IT IS PROFESSIONAL!

*Recording silence, two minutes*

NO, DO NOT DO THIS TO ME JACK. YOU CANNOT BE DEAD. YOU HAVE TO TAKE ME TO SEE THE STARS. YOU HAVE TO INTRODUCE ME TO OLDBOY, TO BO'SHAMS, TO TOMBO, TO RED, AND TO ALL OF OUR FRIENDS. YOU HAVE TO FUCKING LIVE, PLEASE!

*Recoring silence, three minutes*

No... please... No. I will not give up, I WILL NOT LET YOU BE DEAD, JACK RAMSEY, DO YOU HEAR ME? YOU WILL ANSWER, JACK RAMS-

~Captain Jack~ TEDDY!

~Teddy~ JACK! You can hear me! You are alive!

~Captain Jack, raising voice over wind~ The whole planet can hear you! We're all alive, some of us just a little- *COUGHHACKCOUGHHHHH* -just a little injured.

~Oldboy~ He's downplaying it, Teddy. We're out, these... what'd ya call em, Skettil? The beetle things. They picked us up, helped protect us, but not before this idiot took a flying tree to his limbs. He's... he needs help Teddy, and the Skettil... I don't know how it works but they're taking us somewhere to heal him. They showed us. Hemlock is keeping him from bleeding out and I'm carrying him, I've sent Bo'Shams and the others along a safe route through their sites to you. They'll be there in several hours with two of our escorts.

~Teddy~ I will do my best to facilitate communication. Daisy, Bellbeau, Wolfsbane: take left commpiece to Bo'Shams, Wolfsbane protect group. ~After brief pause~ They are on their way. I will help to guide when given communicational access. Do not let him die, Oldboy. Please.

~Captain Jack~ I'm fi-

~Teddy~ No, Jack, you are bleeding profusely and missing limbs and only a medicinal half-plant simian is keeping blood in your body. You are not fine. Your lifemarker says so. Oldboy, promise me.

~Oldboy~ I promise you my best, every last action to try.

*Recording silence, appx 15 seconds*

~Teddy~ That will suffice. Terminating call to focus efforts with Daisy. Good luck. Ending log for processing power. End log.

Survivor's Log Day 29, Entry 1

~Captain Jack~ Yes Teddy, we're almost there. I warned you I look different, right?

~Teddy~ Several times, Jack. At least as many times as I have reminded you that I, too, am no longer of the same appearance.

~Captain Jack~ Speaking of, all the uploads worked right to the biobot?

~Teddy~ Yes, Jack, Oldboy was incredibly careful and is the most skilled engineer you have ever met. Please have faith that all is well, stress is not good for your grafts.

~Captain Jack~ Yeah, yeah, and I'm not supposed to be working, either. But the rescue efforts with the Skettil weren't going to coordinate themselves.

~Quartermaster(QM) Bo'Shams~ Did not have to be you, reh'hyesh.

~Teddy~ It is exactly as he says, Jack. With my new body I can make the journey and even communicate with assistance.

~Captain Jack~ Yeah, but it's so much easier with my grafts now. I promise I barely got up!

~QM Bo'Shams~ He lies, as carpeting does.

~Captain Jack~ It's lie like a rug, and no I don't!

~QM Bo'Shams~ You forced that I tie you down! Three times!

~Captain Jack~ Would you look at that! I can see the site and Doc said I should walk! Wouldn't want to piss off Dr. Malkin, would you?

~QM Bo'Shams~ Not fair. Fine. Walk.

~Captain Jack~ Thank you, Bo! Now where were we...

~Teddy~ You were lying about resting again, Jack.

~Captain Jack~ Ignoring that. I remember! So, you like the shape?

~Teddy~ I like all of it, Jack. You gave me... myself. It is perfect, including the attached onesie shaped like a teddy bear. I appreciate that the paws hide my claws and hand shape without losing the ability to grip. I adore the sense of smell. The floricks have enjoyed that I enjoy smelling and playing with them. The fleshform is semi-humanoid, which I did not know- Oh! There you are! I will finish my thought first. I did not know how badly I wanted to be a semi-humanoid, and I love the way it fits around my core-frames. Tombo mentioned that I would not be the only one who enjoyed that I have hips that curve or the color of my eyes etcetera etcetera. She has been saying similar things lately, but I do not understand. I think my body is very visually appealing, so of course my new family would enjoy it, but she seemed to be suggesting something else. I still do not completely understand implication, Jack, what is she saying?

~Captain Jack~ I... um, well, I... hoo boy. *Ahem* Well... I, uh, think what she meant to say was... Well that is to say... Um I think she means that... Well your new body is... Well it's very...

~Teddy~ Very what, Jack? You are stuttering and turning red and confusing me, are you sure your grafts are fine? Skettil genome and chitin to human genome and skin is not an easy graft, it needs time to heal better. Please, lie down, I'm sure you're-

~Captain Jack~ The grafts are fine Teddy, that's... that's not what this is.

~Teddy~ You promise? I can perform many care routines now-

~Captain Jack~ I promise, Teddy, will you please just let me get this out?

~Teddy, softer, gentler~ ... Ok, Jack.

*Loud sigh*

~Captain Jack~ She means that your body is attractive to people, Teddy. That you are attractive. As in as a romantic partner.

~Teddy~ Oh! Well... I suppose that is a good thing. Depending on who is supposed to find me attractive.

~Captain Jack~ Excuse me?

~Teddy~ I am saying that if a certain person on this crew were to suggest that he found me attractive, I would find that to be a good thing. I would say that I have had the equivalent of 166 Earth Days and counting, a little under half of one Earth year, to get to know him. To grow fond of him as my awareness developed. I would say that even with a pincer he did not have when we met, as well as an extra three minor limbs, new organs that are Ley sensitive, and a brand new set of legs spliced from human and Skettil DNA, he is the most attractive man I have ever seen. I would-

*Recording silence, 15 minutes*

*CROAKAhem*

~Captain Jack~ Ah yes, Jessel. how can I help you.

~Jessel~ *CROAK* The crew is waiting for its captain and its first mate to stop needing a minute alone and tell us how you've figured us a way off this rock.

~Captain Jack~ Right, we'd better get out there then, hadn't we?

~Teddy~ I suppose, although you will be answering questions when we next have a minute.

*Rustlerustlerustle*

~Captain Jack~ Attention all you degenerates, scum of the universe and absolute filth of this life, or in short: the best damn pirates this universe is going to see!!!

*Roar of applause*

I hear you wondering these last many hard days, 'Oh but how are we ever gonna get out of here?' Well... it's a fair question. We seemingly have no ship, right?

*Murmur of agreement buzzes in crowd*

WRONG! As you can see, my gorgeous new visage comes with a few perks. *SNAPSNAP* However, what you cannot see includes organs that allow me two new things that will prove incredibly useful. The first is a sensitivity to and ability to charge Ley Paths. I cannot travel safely in space as they can and I cannot travel Ley Paths in place of an engine, but I can do this!

*PSHEW*

*Applause, cheers, silence*

You now have chosen a captain who can overcharge a concentration of Ley Particles to quite impressive effect, as you can see. More importantly... I have gained the ability to speak in the Skettil's memories. Yes, memories. Their language is ancestral memories of images and emotions and pheremones and they can speak it across Ley Paths like an Ansil does. And they have shown me what I will show you now.

*GASP*

Yes!!! This is our ship! At the base of the mountain over there is a ship made by stitching hundreds of ships that crash landed here together. The Skettil began this project as a potential future habitat many generations ago. In terms of our lifespans... thousands of our lives ago. This generation has been working to make it space worthy as a part of a diplomacy plan. They have agreed to give it to us to use as we wish, and even that we might retain a fleet of one hundred young Skettil who have grown passionate to our cause. They offer this with one condition: facilitate a peaceful introduction with the IULPS and each of the non-member systems. We will be paid well in natural ores and flora and small fauna for our farms. I have accepted on your behalf.

*Recording silence, appx 30 seconds*

Why have I accepted? Because we are no longer the crew of that bastard Fel Travers nor his cursed ship Hepburn. We are a new brand of pirates, never before seen. The Watchdog Fleet of Pirates! Each of you has a story of how you came to be here. A cyborg banished for daring to have a birth defect and using lifesaving technology to fix it is now our engineer. An entire platoon of Froggin soldiers sold out by their own government become the best damn Devil's Hands ever seen, just ask Jessel. A Siriusian lawyer forced into slavery, a survivor of Haldrin's Revolution against the Katma Empire, a homunculus who escaped slavery because of illegal experiments and the Tarik doctor they tried to force to perform them... The list is countless. Endless. Because there is no end to the depravity that is left unchecked in this universe. Because when the IULPS and their precious laws cannot reach a person, who is there to save them?

*Recording silence, 10 econds*

We are. Who is there to AVENGE them when people like Fel Travers come around to use them up and leave them for dead? WE are! Who is there when the powerful think themselves untouchable and take arms against the small? WE ARE!!!! AND WE WILL BE THERE TO BURN DOWN THEIR EMPIRES AND SLAUGHTER THEIR KINGS AND SPEND THEIR RICHES ALL BEFORE LEAVING THEM AT THE MERCY OF THE MONSTERS THEY BUILT WITH THEIR EVIL! ARE YOU WITH MEEEEEE????

*HUZZZAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH*

THEN GET YOUR SORRY ASSES TO THE NEAREST PIRATE AND RECEIVE INSTRUCTIONS! We will make ready our ship and fly for TRUE FREEDOM under the stars! We are The crew of the Blackship Ramshackle, crown jewel of the Watchdog Fleet, charge of Captain Chitin Jack Ramsey! We WILL be free!

*HUZZZAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH*

*Rustlerustlerustle*

~Teddy~ You make an excellent orator, Jack. Now, I would like to revisit those questions.

~Captain Jack~ Of course, Teddy. I think I remember something about owing me a drink too. But first... End log.

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

Catalogue No.: Error Not Archived, Media Type: Point to Point Communication, Author: Sparky 'Sparks' McGruff

'Lo again everybody! So... that was a rough first article. Dal is very eloquent and passionate when you get him in the room. Also when he doesn't feel the academic pressure of being the Cartographic Flotilla's Crown Jewel. Otherwise... well. I'd rather listen to howling cats in heat give an academic presentation than I would Bosun Dal Tremor in his official capacity. Great guy though. Makes a mean cocktail.

Anyways, Mephit wanted me to touch base and let everyone know it's still preparing the next bit. Takes a while to prep all the transcripts for multiversal transmission and all that. For now it's best to mull on Ley Paths and how you can zip from one system to the next in just a few days or weeks by just correctly charging their particles.

Oh, and just so I don't forget: I know my name came up but... I don't want to talk about that. Ever. I apologize for any inconvenience but... some stories are better off learned in a way that nobody has to ever talk about them to each other. I'm sure Mephit will force the issue somehow or other soon enough anyways, but still.

That's enough rambling for now. Keep up the good work, you're all holding it together pretty great right now. McGruff out.

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

Catalogue No.: Omicron-XK9732331-C0-P5-12, Media Type: Textbook Excerpt, Title: On the Subject of Ley Travel (Earthling Edition) - "Introduction and a Brief History of Ley Particles," Author: Bosun Dal Tremor of the Cartographic Flotilla, Additional Text: Margin Notations by Mephit

Before one can properly discuss the nature of how Ley Particles and their confluences into Ley Paths allow for FTL travel without the requirement of opening a wormhole or draining a sun, it occurs to me that the reader should have a brief history of our discovery and naming of these particles to grasp onto.

This sentence has been circled with an arrow drawn from the below note to the sentence

Mephit here, yes that was a single sentence. Bosun Tremor, Dal to his friends, can be a bit long-winded at quite inconvenient times. He is, however, possibly the best Ley Cartographer who will ever live in his universe, so bear with it. I'll throw in a joke or two to keep you entertained. On with the knowledge!

As with much of this book, the scope of such discussions will be in relation to earthlings as this version is translated into Earth languages for training earthlings on Ley travel. If you were wanting more information in regards to a different collection of sentient species or a particular culture or culture cluster, please contact the Cartographic Flotilla Library Vessel on its service line and ask about an edition of my book for the pertinent species. That being said, let us continue.

Bright red underlining on the last sentence.

He only talks like this when he has to sound smart, way less formal after a nice wine. Feels like he has to be a fuddy-duddy to be respected, poor thing.

Humans first discovered an unorthodox particle they could not explain on deep space scanners in the Earth year 2350. By that time, enough deep space probes had been launched in order to more quickly achieve a relay time of only 17 years, 92 days and 15 hours from furthest probe to Earth using Colonel Alvin McTalbot's, of the Independent Scottish Navy's Communications and Navigations Division, then famous "Informational Railgun" technique of near-simultaneous blitz uploads across a series of satellites or other terminals/relay points. As completely useless as this would be today for communicating from even just Sol System to Alpha Centauri, It was brilliant for picking up never before seen data in almost-real-time.

Another underline, this time on almost-real-time. Angrier looking underline.

I checked all 977 pages and the reference material and additional guides, Dal you scatterbrained little shit! NOT A SINGLE MENTION OF WHAT THIS MEANS. Had to have a foreword about the history of particles, can't be arsed to mention time-slippage. Time slippage happens across any amount of space-time that is being warped by an object that warps or bends space-time itself. This includes black holes, but in Universe-78735-Zala, aka the Prime Ley Path Universe, Ley Paths also do it. Dal explains enough to see why that's important to know but never actually mentions that almost-real-time means that time slippage was at least 99% overcome if any occurred. In other words, they saw 2 minutes worth of footage without going over 2 minutes 3 seconds in terms of human time measurements. Carry on.

This data was incredibly strange and difficult to even fully process on standard equipment, leading to then United Nations of Earth Second Chancellor Harlan Quell to propose a plan to use an improved relay to search for the source of such particulates and additional information. The initial Long Chain Project was signed into Earth policy in Earth year 2352 and would set off almost 450 years of intergalactic discovery in an attempt to do so. Of the many discoveries made by the LCP of 2350, as it came to be known, one which was noteably missing was a source for the mysterious particles. Instead, in 2807, when the LCP took was starting to take almost 30 years to get information from the furthest satellite to Earth, near lightspeed travel became possible with the invention of the Horace-Lader drive and its use of near-perfect reclamation of the photoelectric effect and the underlying continuous yet infinitesimal breaks to space-time involved to power vehicles travelling at approximately 2.88x10^8 m/s, closer than any human would ever achieve prior to joining the IULPS (Intergalactic Union of Ley Path Societies).

Another underline starting at with many exclamation points and an expletive followed by the word

SPOILERS!!!!!

This same year, First Chancellor of the United Nations of Earth Malia Varayev championed a new plan that left behind the continuing updates to the Long Chain Project and instead called for a one way manned flight by volunteers towards the newly predicted center of these particles (at this year commonly denoted McTalbot's Particles or Fairy Particles due to the former being responsible for the method of discovery and the latter being what humans thought they resembled). This operation was highly contested and debated for almost a decade until on December 12, 2816 of the Earth calendar The infamous Operation Heaven's Darts was signed into policy and launched. It would launch one of the darkest and most brutal periods in Earth history, so much so that to this day all Earthlings, humans included, hold a month long vigil starting on December 12 every year to commemorate the Month of Peace, the first month of Heaven's Darts in which no genocides, mass murders, forced disasters, or any other large scale death toll or oppression took place for the last month until the year 3030.

A simple arrow points to this last sentence.

I wish I could say that Dal was kidding or exaggerating, but he is actually going easy on the matter. There was a continuous series of horrific disasters and poverty crises forced by corporations who took advantage of Clause 19 in that policy that started almost exactly a month later. They only hit other humans at first. Dal says more, but he is kind to his reader. He doesn't wish you to have to dwell on the darkest portion of human depravity most members of the multiverse have ever seen in order to understand Ley particles. He simply wants to address the elephant in the room lest anyone forgets it. Personally I would go into every detail if I could, but I have actual respect for Bosun Dal Tremor. So... for gorey details see Cataloge No. Chi-JP9393321, I won't write them here. For Dal.

The process began by designating a number of private organizations that were not under direct governance of the UNE as targets for incentives to aid in the search for volunteers under what is now infamously known as Clause 19. This clause left a number of openings that led to private organizations propping up the efficacy of the UNE and the ability to make incredibly powerful actions and decisions with next to no oversight as time went on. Humans, as of 2817, were the only large population sentient species as cohabitant species would not be discovered until the 2900's and engineered species were in their infancy. As such, these organizations used economic, social, political and environmental data to ensure large swaths of human volunteers. Over time the UNE would, far too late, recognize its mistake and begin to further and further curtail harm that could be done to humans in order to receive incentives to generate volunteers. In 2873, the human population began to suffer greatly from the now 56 year process of volunteering to be shot into deep space and never heard from again in a single human lifetime. Human colonies on Mars and the Moon were beginning to finally show promise of true self-sustainability at this time and freight relay to colonies outside the asteroid belt were capable of helping there be a Sol System for humans to live and claim as home rather than just one or two planets and planetoids, however it was determined that it would not be enough to save the human race from extinction in the next few decades without serious action. This led to the UNE, slowly becoming the United Planets and Colonies of Sol behind the organizations' backs at this point, made its firmest action to prevent human harm with the Humanity Welfare Act the same year, a policy designed to stop rampant harmful genocides and environmental disasters in their tracks. Instead, it only directly protected humans and, as engineered species were no longer in their infancy, led to the private sector of Heaven's Darts to begin committing slavery and genocide on inorganic sentients such as androids, genetically modified sentients such as Siriusians (named for Sirius, the Dog Star), and genetically engineered sentients such as homunculi in order to achieve their continuingly less realistic incentives goals. When subterranean reptilian species Homo Herpetus aka Tariks were discovered in the early 2900's, and later the semi-aquatic species known as the Meeri in 2940 and the smaller mammalian species called Mauskin in the 2990's, they, too, became part and parcel of the actions of these organizations. The latter was folded into the private sector's "volunteer searches" shortly after the passing the Anti-Deification Act of 2989, an act which the beginning to burgeon UPCS passed to put incredibly strict guidelines on the production of engineered sentient species and the rights inherent to these species as sentient beings. Finally, In the Earth Year 3028, The UPCS announced its official status and separated itself from the entity known as the UNE completely, leaving behind only those most loyal to private sector causes, and led a 2 year military campaign alongside all species, cultures and races of sentient people in the known Sol System against the United Private Militaries of Earth and Allied UNE forces. It was an incredibly one sided affair that ended unilaterally in the UPCS's favor and led to the complete dismantling of Heaven's Darts and all of its components and constituencies on Earth Date May 19, 3030. This date is now known as Mayteenth across all Earthling colonies and is celebrated with planetwide feasting and partying in honor of the end of progress at any cost as well as the beginning of the unification of the Earthling species.

Mayteenth is circled.

You have no idea how many jokes you will have to hear about 3030 vision that day. It's beyond obnoxious but the wine and music and drugs and food are to die for. Hell, even homunculi like Dal whip up amazing libations for Mayteenth, and they don't have a sense of taste. Some places it can be quite Bacchanalian in fact, I recommend at least visiting once for it.

Not three months later, the first ever transmission to return from a Heaven's Darts vessel was received on what all Earthlings refer to as Contact Day. The transmission was a recording of the third crew to leave Earth, a hundred-person cruiser named Zephyr 1 captained by Marla Moore, announcing the playback and data of a received transmission along with a large file of all notes. A second recording arrived a few days later detailing even more information that showed many references to the Fairy Particles in the received transmission as well as new study data on the particles themselves. 3 weeks later Zephyr 1's third and final transmission arrived detailing how it would be the final transmission ans Quartermaster Alan Moore (Captain Marla Moore's brother) detailed he was the last surviving crew member and would be jettisoning beacons until the ship decayed due to local time slippage in order to aid further vessels in finding it. QM Moore also detailed the last of the notes and how he intended to set up all data to be able to be collected by the LCP relay as quickly as possible with the aid of further ships. Over the course of the next 35 years, all information from every ship that made contact with one of QM Moore's beacons or those of his eventual successors. The original transmission received by Zephyr 1 itself was returned in full with no corruption as the final transmission by any Heaven's Dart vessel, along with the signoff "So long and goodnight everyone, the stars are calling me to the airlock."

The quotation is underlined with a doodle of a grimacing emoticon face next to it.

Dal doesn't always understand just how grim some things sound, this included I think. I think he just thought this would give a final feeling to the Heaven's Darts era. I honestly couldn't tell you if he realizes that person decided to take a long spacewalk without a helmet. Either way, bit of a yikes yeah?

This final transmission in 3065 marked the beginning of the Era of Cryptography for all Earthling species as the UPCS scrapped all non-localized space travel programs to instead focus on strengthening all Sol colonies and the decryption of the Deep Space Transmission Alpha (we now of course know Zephyr 1's discovery as the Ley Protospecies Transmission). It would take until the year 3315, almost 250 years to the day of receipt of final transmission, before retired UPCS Starfleet Commander and veteran of the Sol Unification War Dr. Sparky 'Sparks' McGruff and his team of the brightest minds of all of the Earthling species cracked the transmission wide open to reveal astounding information all about the then mysterious particles. It contained details from some sort of Protospecies about how these particles could be measured and why current equipment would have had trouble measuring them. It contained the name for what they were, calling them Flux-Oriented Aspatial Achronal Metatransitive particles when translated to English. The name became shortened to FOAAM Particles, however the name didn't translate well into other languages and presented a problem for communications. When the section detailing that these particles had a tendency to confluence into various sized flows both terrestrially and celestially was released, scientists quickly also discovered how to see such confluences on planetary surfaces and were startled to see they looked exactly like old human descriptions of Ley Lines, a phenomenon that had since spread to the consciousness of all Earthling species. As a direct result, all Earthlings now call these particles Ley Particles and their confluences as Ley Paths to ease communications. The most important section detailed how to use these Ley Paths to travel by charging them in specific ways to allow travel in directions along these paths only available by warping space-time. In 3363 Arcturus Fran became the first person to perform Ley-Flight in a single-person probe vessel that completed a path from Earth to Jupiter and back in less than an hour in local space-time. Most exciting of all, the pilot, also the Chancellor Adjudicator of the UPCS at the time, came back unharmed, the same age, and with almost minimal fuel costs. The Chamber of Chancellors of the UPCS immediately began a race to be able to use Ley-Flight for deep space travel in order to find the source of the Transmission or Ley Particles themselves. This would last for almost 900 years while Earthlings and now Solians, as sentient species who were non-native to Earth had long ago been discovered and created by accident by Earthlings, expanded the UPCS to achieve the resource load necessary to make the First Ark.

First Ark circled.

This time he's not mentioning it because everyone knows about it there. Big effing ship that transported a bunch of Solians to The Convergence and got the UPCS accepted into the IULPS. You know, the spoiler from earlier that still hasn't been explained? Anyways, the project is interesting and its development and broader context can be found in Catalogue No. Chi-SPT999332.

The remainder happens quickly as the First Ark finalizes building in 4212 and launches 10 years later with over 2 million Solians on board carefully selected for research and contact purposes. In 4224, The Convergence, a massive asteroid turned into a house of government for the IULPS. Solians expected to be met with the Protospecies but instead were met by hundreds of societies who had all discovered The Convergence as a result of some version of the same transmission. Ever since, all Earthling, and further Solian, species have been working with each other, the IULPS and the Cartographic Flotilla, and the Archivist Scionate to attempt to catalogue and discover the many nuances of Ley Path science as well as any information discoverable about the Protospecies that seems to have put everyone else on the right path for Ley-flight so many eons ago. As a scientist and Ley-cartographer, I recognize that this has little to do with the scope of this book and discussing aspects of Ley-flight, Ley travel, and the Ley Paths and science that make both possible directly. However, as a PERSON first and foremost as well as a Bosun with a duty of care to other people in this universe, I must reject this notion entirely. These discoveries you will read were not made in a vacuum and they instead exist in the context of countless choices of endless historical figures who worked to make them. Some of these discoveries were paid for in countless lives and dignity, others in a near resource collapse from overzealousness. Some were even paid for in sheer good luck, as in the case of Arcturus Fran's first flight. And yet others were paid for in kindness and care and unity. We people make decisions as to the context of the research we make, the maps we draw, the flights we take and so much more, and for ill or for good it will always change lives, potentially for generations. As my last thought for this foreword, I implore that, as you read and educate yourself all about Ley travel, you also educate yourself with a duty to use that information to do no harm. Thank you, and enjoy the book.

The last paragraph is almost illegible without aid from a layer separator program removing Mephit's edits as it is covered in various scratchings and scrawlings of laughter onomatopoeia (haha, hoho, etc) with a paragraph beneath it all.

Oh Dal, how hopeful you can be sometimes. And yet I know you are not reading this edit calling out how hopeful you are. I wonder why that might be? Ah well... end of notes.

Instead of a name, Mephit signs off with what appears to be a symbol of a smiling set of jaws.

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

Catalogue No.: Epsilon-122274893(c)-07, Media Type: Point-to-Point Communication, Author: Assistant Sparky McGruff

Hello! I'm not Mephit (obviously, your computer will have told you that). I'm not at the library and this is not an automated message. The automation can only do so much so the twenty or so of us who have become 'assistants' have had some of the more critical communication needs divvied up between us, and you, you lucky ducks, got me! Well, to start with, Mephit doesn't like unloading all at once or sometimes just enjoys keeping secrets, as I'm sure you've noticed.

I'm Commander/Dr. Sparky 'Sparks' McGruff, a multiversal pilot and a formerly normal Jack Russell Terrier who is now six feet tall and can talk and pilot and well... let's actually leave accolades there for now. I am from an Earth. That's right, AN Earth, get used to saying it and hearing it if you stick with it. I am in charge of telling the other Earthlings little things they need that Mephit will (probably on purpose) forget. There are a couple of simple rules it always forgets when it onboards (I've seen enough of 'em trust me), so I'll pass those along and be out of your hair. The research starts soon, I promise, but don't get too eager or you'll burn out. McGruff out.

Don't talk about this IN EARNEST to anyone not in the program. It just won't be good for them or you in the end, trust me.

If an article makes your brain feel like it's being sucked through a straw, close it and forget it. You'll know when you feel it and you have a retrofit Mephit gave you that can help. Well, it's meant to wipe you if needed, but it also can let you will your brain not to retain multiversal information that causes problems with your local reality like that.

You CANNOT, however, forget trauma without wiping your brain, so you'll need some sort of therapy for that.

Lastly, those daily notes? Not a real thing, the thing on your desk picks up what you want to convey to Mephit about the information. Part of the retrofit. Sometimes it likes to lie a little to see if it can mess with you. I'll straighten it out when I can if I can for you.

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

Catalogue No.: Epsilon-122274893(b), Media Type: Digital Notes (short format), Title: "Mephit's Notes - Getting Started"

Welcome back and congratulations on passing selection. I'm sure you have many questions about what you have seen but I must confess I have no idea what it was. I simply opened several remote multiversal viewing windows across space time and then sent everyone who watched the video their nearest one with an automated system. No idea what was on the other side, although I am certain many of you will need to be sent tips for how to cope with a new trauma. Don't worry, the first one is always the hardest and it does get easier.

That all being said, I can answer some much more pressing questions about what to do next. For now it is easy enough as you cannot yet travel on your own but merely observe. This will be a relief to some and a disappointment to others, but I assure you all it is simply a necessary step while we build up your knowledge tolerance and understanding of the multiverse. Soon enough you'll be reading an article all about your new favorite way to get from one universe to another and building it yourself, you have my word. For now, I will be sending you information periodically throughout your week to review at your convenience. The following is a list of the important points you will need to know to get started. First: You will start with information from only one new universe (one can assume you know a fair bit about your own universe and also that you are not ready to have that information majorly shifted without consequences). For UNIVERSE 619-GAMMA-KRO-2, this is UNIVERSE 78735-ZALA,aka the PRIME LEYPATH TRAVEL UNIVERSE. The text looks funny because you're seeing it updated for you in your local space time. I honestly have no idea what it says, I can't see any of you yet because I'm using automation while I establish proper connections. Don't worry about this, it's fine.

Second: You will receive at least two articles at a time, and yes, this includes my own interjections in various formats, always with a reference number for your convenience when you finally reach the library. Upon receiving these articles you are to read them and process them in your own time.

Third: Make notes of your observations and inferences and even how this information might connect with other articles. You should find a device on your personal desk or workspace that looks like a flat panel soon after reading this. When you have completed notes for your sleep/wake cycle, and you will be taking notes every sleep/wake cycle until your training is complete, place them on this device in a neat pile and do not touch again. I will receive the notes in your sleep and adjust training as needed.

Last: You will repeat this process and await further instructions as to how to expand the scope of your training.

And that's all there is to it for now! Your first new articles will be dropping a little later on in your current sleep/wake cycle. Have fun with it, your life will never be the same anyways and if it is it will be because your memory will be erased in a manner that leaves you feeling incomplete for the rest of your life because you had to be dropped from the program. That won't happen to you though, no you passed selection! That must mean you are far too smart and capable to do something so silly as tell anyone. Remember, this is a closed training program and details are not to be discussed outside it. Besides, until you can get to the library it's not like you can screw up much at all unless you do start blabbing. So relax! Have fun! You made it!

That should be more than enough to get you started. I will reach out again soon if you find yourself missing my presence, but for now this is Mephit signing off. Happy researching!

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

Catalogue No.: Epsilon-122274893(a), Media Type: Video Transcription, Title: "Welcome to the Multiverse!"

The recording begins with a marker beep and then a black title card with the above information before transitioning to a dimly lit portion of a room.

There is a single lamp, an old green desk lamp that one only finds in films and the offices of rich people sitting on a small round wooden table. It lights very little of the room, just enough to reveal a single round decorative rug beneath a red leather wing-backed armchair and part of a faded forest green wall. The floor is not visible, nor are any people.

The sound of footsteps begins to advance with the slow, thudding clunks of boots walking on metal grating. It is unclear from which direction for several seconds as the sound grows louder without revealing a source.

Until...

A figure, tall and completely dark save for a blank white comedy mask, emerges face first from the darkness before it stands and approaches the camera. The tallness becomes more clearly unnatural, or at least not human certainly. Slender tendrils made of an unknown dark substance gently whip and flow at random around the back of its body. It at first appears to be wearing a jester's hat with three points until they simultaneously pull themselves back to appear more like the equivalent of its hair. It is impossible to tell in this lighting to see if it has real feet and hands at the end of its arms and not just the appearance of hands. It reaches the center of the shot on the rug in front of the armchair.

"Welcome, future travelers, allow me to introduce myself," it says with an unnaturally polite candor and a distorted unrecognizable accent. It gives a sweeping bow before looking down the barrel of the camera to speak. Rather, one assumes it is looking that way, its mask does not have eyes visible in the eyeholes.

"My name is Mephit, and I am a traveler of the multiverse, and this-" it makes a grand sweeping gesture to the darkness slowly illuminating with rows of fluorescent lights turning on with a clunk to reveal... endlessly many books behind it "- is my library, also known as everything one could ever need to know about traveling the multiverse." For a second a flash like teeth appears at the mouth of the mask, apparently indicating a smile.

"Allow me to explain some as I am sure you think this a hoax or a production and I must disabuse you all of that notion," it says to the camera. "This library is currently inaccessible to all but a very countable few across the multiverse to whom I have entrusted-" another flash like teeth, fleeting as before but this time it doesn't stop talking "-the responsibility of helping me share the information of this library. That being said, all you will have to do to verify this information in your universe is to find-"

The video choppily switches to Mephit having a whiteboard with a diagram of Earth drawn on. Ten locations, each remote and mostly in different continents from each other save for three overlapping in North America and two in Asia, are carefully labeled on the far too neat diagram for a whiteboard. Mephit is pointing to one in Alaska as the chop clumsily jumps to its new audio."-any of these points, however this one in what you Earthlings-175 call the Aleutian Islands with the shown coordinates has the strongest focal window. The focal window will be the 'glimmery portal-looking thing,' as my associates suggested I put it, through which you will be able to see this library. The Aleutian Islands on is hidden in an abandoned crab hut which gives the most privacy out of these as well, but don't all go at once or else you'll-"

The video chops just as carelessly and jarringly back to Mephit as it was before the whiteboard appeared, as though this was inserted to be one of many such videos each with a different explanation cut in at this point. Another quick flash, each one frustratingly revealing nothing about what lies behind the mask. "-and I do hope that has cleared up how to verify this is real," it says in the same strange voice that sounds more and more as multiple voices at once before fading back into one vocal sound.

"With that out of the way, we can get to your truly burning questions. For example," it says gesturing in the same ethereally flowing manner, still giving no clues as to what it has for hands, "what am I exactly? Or who am I really? Perhaps even what is it I want?" Flash "Well, I am indeed a researcher and traveler as I have said, but I am an ageless one. How did I become ageless? Was I born that way? Well that's not important yet, simply that I have been alive and ageless for longer than the combined ages of thousands of universes that have formed, unformed and even reformed across various points of space time."

Here it begins to pace slightly across the rug when it pauses as it speaks. Its arms are folded behind its back as it faces the armchair briefly when it finishes speaking and its "hands" can finally be somewhat seen. Its arms, and presumably therefore its legs, are just flexible trunks sprouting from where shoulders would be that end in jagged finger-like protrusions that don't necessarily seem to be holding the same shape. It turns to stare into the camera again before it is able to be confirmed.

"That's a lot of time, isn't it future travelers? And just imagine: the vast majority of it is spent almost completely alone save for an occasional adventure with a member of the more mortal species who figures out how to find me. It's..." It trails off stopped in front of the chair again looking off into the distance, "It's lonely." Its head snaps back to the camera. "And can easily grow boring, hence why I research and collect for my library. However, as of late even this has grown somewhat tiresome and I find myself in need of a new hobby."

It sits down in the armchair and grabs what appears to be a glass of wine from a portion of the table not well lit by the lamp. Its free "hand" rests on the armrest and splays its currently talon-like fingers over the edge. It swirls the beverage in the glass before speaking.

"That's where you come in. You see I figured that if I play this right, I can make my new hobby just as long lasting as my old hobby and even help with my loneliness. How? Well of course by teaching you lot how to travel and what sights to see and avoid. Not only will I get to find and talk to those competent enough to reach my library, I can even generate entire new fields of research for myself to get excited about! And you-" it pauses to sip the drink through the mask and swirl it once more "-well you get the adventure of your short little lives. Creatures beyond your imagination, places beyond your comprehension, all this and more awaits you. Of course, from here I can only ask you to join, it is up to you if you do or not. If you do not wish to join, simply close this video and continue normally with your life and you will forget in time what you have seen here."

The last sentence is delivered in a tone that is equally chilling in its politeness and certainty. The silence afterwards is amplified a thousand times over in the few seconds before it speaks again. The seconds begin to stretch and distort to the viewer's vision but the timestamp never changes. The silence begins to ring, then howl, then roar until it is a storm of silence as the viewer looks into where this being's eyes would be and feels the weight of thousands of universes worth of certainty staring back from the nothing. The moment ends suddenly as Mephit speaks again.

"But! If instead you wish to join, you will follow some careful instructions. First, you will find an empty room and declare your intention to this video, or the audio or transcript if you are unable to use video. Then, when you receive a location on your nearest device that communicates location information, you will go to it. You will then see something. You'll know when you see it, trust me. You will take notes until you can no longer discern new information. You will know the place to send these notes with your communication device shortly after. Then you will return home and wait. If you have passed selection, you will begin receiving training videos and articles from my library in a place I have determined is convenient for you. How have I determined all of these things?"

There is a flash again, but it is far overshadowed by the weight of the laughter that echoes forth from its mask as it tips its head back. It is impossible to mistake this laugh as friendly. It is heavy, dangerous, but not an active danger. The laughter equivalent of seeing a crocodile's eyes peek above water.

"Spoiler warning! Oh my goodness you aren't possibly ready to know that; it would make you soil your garments and run away babbling. Be patient with knowledge, future travelers, as knowledge may be power, but that does not make it your power to wield. Things will be clear as they should be, and until then-" it stands and sets the glass back in the darkness where it again disappears "-I must bid you a fond farewell and happy researching."

One last flash before it turns on what would be its heels and walks back into the library. As it continues forward with only the sound of its footsteps to fill the space, the lights begin to clunk off one by one, clunking louder and louder as they approach Mephit. The lights continue at the same speed for over a minute after Mephit is lost to the darkness until only the desk lamp is visible for light. As the footsteps disappear and suddenly stop being audible, the lamp clunks off with a noise far louder and more ominous than any of the others thus far. The video clicks off about ten seconds after

[mephitsguidetothemultiverse]

A figure, tall and completely dark save for a blank white comedy mask, approaches the camera. "Welcome, future travelers, allow me to introduce myself," it says with an unnaturally polite candor and a distorted unrecognizable accent. It gives a sweeping bow before looking down the barrel of the camera to speak. Rather, one assumes it is looking that way, its mask does not have eyes visible in the eyeholes. "My name is Mephit, and I am a traveler of the multiverse, and this-" it makes a grand sweeping gesture to the darkness slowly illuminating with rows of fluorescent lights turning on with a clunk to reveal... endlessly many books behind it "- is my library, also known as everything one could ever need to know about traveling the multiverse."

Hello all! I am Jax, I am a writer who uses they/them pronouns and loves to write about weird interesting ideas in science fiction, horror and fantasy. More to the point, I'm really bad at writing random chunks of worldbuilding and never do anything with it. So to help me try and organize this stuff better, I've decided to turn it into an ongoing writing project!

This project will be about a mysterious and learned figure named only Mephit (it/its pronouns) who travels the multiverse to study new and interesting things and people but has become bored with its seemingly endless life as of late. As a result, it has taken on a project whereby it releases articles and videos about all the different things one could research in the multiverse to various points in space/time! For our universe, it chose this blog where you will get to read all about the many weird and wonderful universes and their different denizens, flora, fauna, buildings and more! For those who wanna play along with this story, I will be making as few posts as possible in my own voice as possible for effect, with one exception! I do intend to use the AMA feature from time to time to answer big questions about the blog as "Curator Jax" at my discretion. I won't have an answer for every question asked this way right away as I'm coming up with everything as I go along, but also I may just decide a question's answer would be too boring, inappropriate, irrelevant or spoilery to answer at a given point in time. If this happens, do not spam a question for interaction. If I don't answer a comment or an AMA, don't ask it on every video until I do, don't send it a dozen or more times to any inbox of mine in a short time, and don't start leaving a bunch of negative comments and asks as retaliation. I will block on the first offense for these behaviors in order to curate a good experience for all readers as well as to protect my mental health. On a lighter note, feel free to leave as many positive comments as you want ANYWHERE! Included in positive comments are excited tumblr noises, memes, excited gremlin behavior, fanart (but please don't comment fanfiction, post fanfiction and @ me in it instead) and references to characters and scenes from your other favorite works. Seriously on that last one, if you wanna make a reference to the 1983 science fiction and swashbuckling fantasy film and box-office flop Krull on a random post you can, and do not police people on the references they make unless it is actually offensive. Uploads will be done on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays for now as I can, but I am new to this and don't know what I'm doing so I may change that schedule as I need to prevent burnout, engage more, etc. Please bare with me, I'm excited about this project and hoping I can stay with it long term and make something I'm proud of and that you all will enjoy! Now, without further ado,

Welcome to the Multiverse!!