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The Simulacrum - Volume 7 Epilogue
🕑 Added 2024-05-02 17:21:27 +0000 UTCSlipping into the hard-to-define space between spaces, I spent some time to get my bearings. Not in a literal sense; since there were no directions in this place, reorienting myself was, quite frankly, impossible. I meant it more in a 'figure out my exact goal' kind of sense, but as usual, I was quick to get sidetracked in the process.
As embarrassing as it was to admit it, I never really put much thought into this void. I just casually accepted it as 'something weird' and 'there's no point trying to figure out what it is', because it was just a means to an end; to get me to the not-dark not-room and its enigmatic inhabitants, but when I paused and looked at it objectively, it felt wholly alien.
I thought that coming here in person would maybe nudge some memory or information to the surface from the pile that other-me dumped on me, but no cigar. If anything, now that I had a slightly better understanding of my role and… dare I say 'nature'? Whatever, the point is that, somehow, this place became all the more egregiously incomprehensible. Was it because it was 'outside' of the Simulacrum, I wondered. Maybe because I now had a firmer grasp on my existence 'inside', the 'outside' now felt more uncomfortable.
But then that raised another question; how did I access this space between spaces? Once again, I didn't mean that in the literal sense, as the process of 'stab the stubby phantom limb into the head' method was pretty straightforward (if a bit disconcerting when spoken without adequate context), but on the metaphysical level. When I did the same to people inside the Simulacrum, I got to see their souls, or records, or whatever one wanted to call it. The bedrock of their existence, essentially.
Yet, when I did it to myself, I always ended up here, and I couldn't quite understand why, with other-me's memories proving completely useless once again.
Anyhow, just thinking while floating in the void of timeless space (or spaceless time? One or the other) was rather pointless, so I mustered up my courage and started looking for the not-dark not-room. Before long, I found an anomaly, similar to the one from the last time I came here. This time, I tried to be more careful as I slowly squeezed myself through the… well, it wasn't really a barrier, but more of a weird labyrinth kind of construct. It took some trial and error, but soon, the lack of space around me roiled and changed into the shape of a not-particularly-not-well-lit not-exactly-chamber.
Because I was trying to be sneaky, as much as that applied to this situation, it took a while for the people in the not-room to coalesce into existence, and even longer for me to understand their words.
"… find him anywhere," the level voice of The Woman stated, distorted and staticky like an old TV broadcast.
"I was ejected by him," the vague shape near her, his outlines vague and shimmering, answered in a flat yet distasteful tone. "Are you questioning my words?"
"Not at all, *****************."
When she said that, her voice warped even further, the sounds replaced by a series of sensory stimuli, mostly images, but there were even smells and tastes, as if instead of using a label to refer to someone or something, she was trying to convey everything about the concept at once. I was familiar with this kind of thing, and better understood it thanks to merging with other-me, but it was still a bit nauseating.
Untangling the ball of sensations and meanings, I soon realized it was a different means of referring to what I labelled Venerated Emergents. Or was it 'Venerable'? It didn't quite mean something like 'honoured', but more like 'someone who deserves respect because of their age', and… honestly, I was no longer sure about the 'Emergent' part either. I called the stellar-people her 'Emergents' as well, but it was more nuanced at that. In their case, it meant something like 'a combination of many root causes that emerge from the state of non-emerging', while the same word in 'Venerated Emergents' meant more like 'a merging of many sources into one that emerged from the state of non-emerging'. There was a subtle difference there that I had a hard time putting into words, but it felt really important.
"It doesn't change the fact that we can't find him," The Man's voice jolted me out of my thoughts, and as his form gained a more defined outline, so did the others.
In particular, the aforementioned Venerated Emergent, the Predator Moon, seemed to gain more substance as his attention shifted from the oceans of ruby from his right to the barren moon illuminated by endless lighting strikes. He looked… softer? That was the best word I could use. His angular features were more rounded, and his alien visage became a bit less unnerving. Was it because of what happened? Did the Red Sun, the Crowned Coalescence, do something to him? Or… was it that my impression changed because of what happened back then? Did the way I view them change how they appeared to my eyes?
I mean, that made sense. These eldritch star-beings weren't humans, so their humanoid shapes were kind of… projected, I guess? Probably the same way as some of their words, like 'Emergent' or 'Submerged One', were communicated through a bundle of sensory information at once. I had to actively decipher those, so their appearances might've been also influenced by how I interpreted them. That could've meant that, since I saw him getting unceremoniously thrown out of the Simulacrum, my apprehension towards the Predator Moon lessened, so he now appeared less threatening. I couldn't help but wonder how far that effect could go, but this really wasn't the time to experiment with something like this. And not only because I was afraid that the trope of 'scary supernatural entity turns into a gothic lolita' trope would rear its ugly head.
"I… I have double… no, triple-checked everything, but there was no external access to the Simulacrum at the time," The Boy spoke up as his form came into view. For once, his skies weren't raining molten silicon, and the orbital rings in his sky looked rather pale. He was probably pretty out of it.
"Which means that, by definition, he has to be inside," The Man stated emphatically, but The Woman shook her head in denial.
"No, that can't be right. We've checked the Simulacrum's internals at least a hundred times, ever since he first disappeared. There's no way we couldn't have noticed if he was inside." She paused for a moment, her crimson waters turning turbulent as a new thought occurred to her. "Furthermore, it would be impossible for him to remain inside for this long. The Simulacrum would've collapsed a long time ago if that was the case, and there's no way he would've endangered the entire system for just a prank."
"I-If the Simulacrum collapsed, it would be… catastrophic…" The Boy noted with a trembling voice, and the Predator Moon voiced his agreement in a soft voice.
"Indeed. Normally I would shut down the entire Simulacrum until we got to the bottom of this mystery, but if he were to resist, we could destroy it instead. We're lacking information, and moving hastily could prove to be detrimental to us."
"So, we're back to square one," The Man scoffed. "We don't know where he is, we don't know what he's doing, and we can't carelessly do anything about it but watch and try to figure out what he's trying to accomplish."
"B-B-But at least we know that he's still alive, right?" The Boy interjected, sounding almost desperate. "That means the Venerated *************** One has no reason to suspect us anymore, right?"
Oh, that was another new term. Or torrent of sensation, rather. It felt like… maybe an especially polite way to refer to the Predator Moon? Something like 'Venerated Whose-nature/essence-is-of-predation/consumption/stalking-across-the-stellar-realm/space One'. Damn, that was a mouthful.
"True," the being of bones noted with a thoughtful hum, and while he didn't have any eyes, I could totally see him narrow them as he pondered. Then he suddenly had eyes. But when I remembered that he didn't, they disappeared. But before I could get more confused by that, I recalled that he was a celestial object, in the first place, and he was momentarily replaced by a planetoid covered in teeth and maws. It was only for a split second though, before he let out another hum, and added, "I'm more concerned with the other one."
"You mean, Leonard Dunning?" The Woman blurted out, and when the Predator Moon nodded, her eyes shook and she tentatively asked, "Are you certain he was the one who spied on us back then?"
"The very same entity," the bone-man nodded again, causing The Woman's waters to grow still, like the surface of a mirror.
"He was always part of the scenario," The Man pointed out, and since they were talking about me in the open like that, I felt like this was as good an opportunity as I would get to reveal myself and ask one of the bazillion questions I had.
But… this wasn't the Simulacrum. I didn't have any kind of out-of-context power advantage over these people. If anything, it was already shown the Predator Moon could injure me, and the rest… while they weren't so overtly scary as that guy, I was a fish out of water here, to the point I couldn't even fathom any of them. However, as they say, nothing ventured, nothing gained. As such, I made sure to secure my way out, mentally prepared myself, and then… my vision was suddenly filled with an endless desert of glowing blue sand whipped by stormy winds.
"What the—?"
Before I could react, the image, abruptly warped, as if folding in on itself, and took the form of a young girl in a frilly dress, with a finger on her lips.
"Psst!" she hissed with an impish smile, and after a beat, the colour drained from the not-dark-not-room and she let her hand down, accompanied by an echoing giggle that sounded like an especially enthusiastic bluebird was trying to sing underwater. "Hihihi! I can't believe you really showed up!"
"… Pardon?" I whispered, a bit worried about the other occupants of the room, but they seemed to be frozen at the moment. In sharp contrast, The Girl suddenly grabbed hold of my hand and… wait, slow down! Since when did I have a hand here!?
"He told me you wouldn't be able to hold back your curiosity, but I didn't think you would really come here again! You're so silly!" The Girl exclaimed between giggles as she shook my hand, without any indication that she would let go.
"He? Are you talking about the ****************?"
I tried to say 'Crowned Coalescence', yet somehow I ended up expelling a tangled ball of impressions and ideas instead, and upon hearing it, The Girl's lips parted into an even wider grin.
"Yeah, that's him! Wow, you're already fluent! He's impressive, isn't he?"
"Erm, sure, but… Can we slow down? I don't quite understand this situation."
"Ah, right!" She finally let me go and put her hands on her hips. "That's the point. He told me to tell you that you should focus on stabilizing the Simulacrum on the inside, and just leave the rest to him. Got that?"
"Yes, but… I have so many questions."
Fidgeting, The Girl's glowing sandstorms quieted into a gentle breeze as she glanced between me, and the still-frozen group behind her, and she ultimately shook her head.
"Not now. Let's talk later, okay? Can you leave on your own? Do you need help with the separator?"
"The what? Do you mean that labyrinth thing? No, I can leave whenever I want, I just—"
"Really? Wow! When I was your age, I couldn't even touch something like that! So cool! You really are his ************, huh?"
"Wait, hold on. Let me untangle that."
Tried as I might to stall her, we both noticed that the colour started to return to the not-dark-not-room, and so she hurriedly pushed on my chest (which, by the way, I also had now).
"I'll distract them! Hurry!" Caught up in the moment, I automatically retreated, and seeing that I was leaving, The Girl flashed another toothy smile and yelled, "See you later, *********************!", and she proceeded to energetically wave at me until she completely disappeared from my vision.
A long moment later, I suddenly found myself in my body again, and I let out a startled gasp. Blinking, I stared at the ceiling in a daze following the sudden development… only to get startled again when Rinne's head suddenly popped up from the shadow my legs cast on the surface of the bed.
"Lewnard-donyo? Ish dere ahn emerzsenshi?" she mumbled as she glanced around with a pair of sleepy eyes, and her woozy appearance drained whatever tension was still left in my body.
"Were you sleeping?" the question slipped through my mouth, and she defiantly shook her head.
"N-No. Rinne never sleeps while on duty!"
"… You're not on duty right now."
"L-Leonard-dono knows what Rinne meant!"
Suppressing the urge to smirk and roll my eyes, I told her, "Whatever. There's no problem, so you can go back."
"Okay."
And with that, she disappeared back into my shadow, probably to continue her nap. As for me, this random intermission caused my head to feel a little lighter. All in all, I absolutely wasn't expecting a development like this, but things could've gone way worse, so I had no reason to complain.
"So, The Girl and the Crowned Coalescence were working together, huh?" I whispered under my breath as I sat up on my bed, and rubbed my face.
There were still lots of things I didn't understand. In fact, my contact with The Girl arguably raised more questions than it answered, but it was still something. I was finally beginning to lift the curtain hiding the backstage of the play, and it seemed like I had at least one friendly face on the other side. That was what we, in the business, call 'progress'. Not a lot of it, but enough for the day.
"Baby steps, Leo. Baby steps," I whispered under my breath, and after a glance at the clock on the wall, I got up and turned on my PC. Not to contact anyone, or to take notes, but to write 'funny cat videos' into my search bar, and waste the time away with that. Because after this day, I deserved at least this much.
Comments
Vega
As I read this I remember a comment I read on a trailer for one of the Cthulhu games. It ends on a close up of Cthulhu and the top comment for the video is “that’s a funny cat”. We are also getting closer to a full picture, how exciting!
Danielle Warvel
Everyone deserves some funny cat videos after a hard days work. They cleanse the soul. 🐈❤️
