text: [Themes: horror]
  
  > go downwards
  "Very well, if you no longer need me. . ." The gnome bows, then disappears with a *poof*.
  
  Narthex (Hanon Ondricek)
  The narthex extends the width of the church. Despite the
  gloominess, it's not that unwelcoming except for the eye-watering pattern of industrial linoleum floor tiles. They checkerboard underfoot in grayish green and grayish white squares with dark speckles, stopping only at the margin marked by a wall border at waist level.
  
  leads out of the building.
  
  Two side by side openings lead in to restrooms.
  
  Shattered glass and broken pieces of picture frames cover the floor of the narthex around the edges near the walls.
  
  > Leave
  The gravel road curves here past the doors of an old stone church, which squats defeatedly amid a few straggly trees. Behind it, to the northeast, you can see the first few stones of a modest graveyard. To the east the road narrows to cross a small bridge into the village proper; to the north, it crests the hill toward the train station.
  
  An insubstantial trolley stop sign reads Gold Line -- Church.
  
  > wait for the blue Line
  You lean against the thing that isn't here, hold out your pass, and wait for the blue line. Within moments, an ethereal trolley arrives. Instead of stopping and allowing you to board, it passes
  through you, and you find yourself transported to
  
  A short street terminates here. To the south it opens into the town square. To the east, a few worn steps rise to the entrance of the public library, and to the west you can see a real estate office. A gloomy path leads northwest, towards the woods.
  
  You can see a notice board here.
  
  A mistlike trolley stop sign reads Blue Line -- Library Square.
  
  > Go inside
  Inside the Shack (Daniel Ravipinto)
  The shadows pool in strange shapes along the earthen floor of the shack, the only light coming from the cracks in the surprisingly high ceiling and through the opened door. Piles of accumulated junk that Peter's family must have stored here over the decades lie against the inner walls, which have turned grey with either dust or the mere passage of time.
  
  Peter is here.
  
  Peter paces nervously.
  
  > examine the coffee
  The swirls in your cup form a single cherry. Botanical images mean that while there is much left to accomplish in the present situation, your immediate environment sustains you, and you have everything that you need.
  
  A faint smell of mildew emanates from it.
  
  Peter lies down and seems to go to sleep. A few moments later, he jolts awake.
  
  > Ring chime
  Nothing happens. You try again. Still nothing.
  
  The third time the chime bellows in response, a deep, aching
  tone like a brazen bell the size of the manor itself. And then, silence. And yet the tone goes on - for you can feel it in the bones of your hand, your chest. And then
  
  the chime is falling from your nerveless fingers as your hands clamp to your ears. For the ringing must still be going on, but your
  ears...
  
  Your hands come away, covered in blood and the grey walls of the shack slide to one side and you see Peter, on his feet, tears running down his face, screaming silently at you as he slams his fists against the strange barrier again and again and then it shatters and him
  along with it.
  
  A thousand shards of Peter are floating in the air, rotating slowly in the light and then they each slowly align, each a tiny dagger pointed at your face and then they fly...
  
  A cramped and claustrophic darkness sketching out a triangular space of a few square feet. There must be light of some kind, because you can see, but for the life of you, you couldn't say where or what it's coming from. The walls are the same solid air you saw in the shack, but without the sigils you saw under the surface. Outside is only darkness.
  
  Somehow, again, trapped in the same, small space, is Peter, lying slumped against the far wall.
  
  > look at Peter
  Peter's eyes roll upwards until they're pointed in your direction. He blinks exhaustedly. He's dressed in the same grey shift you find yourself wearing. He blinks again, as if uncertain what he's seeing, then he starts backwards as if surprised. Then he climbs to his knees and smiles.
  
  "Darling?" he asks, passing his hand over his face in disbelief. "Is that you?"
  
  He stands and takes a single step closer to you and somehow whatever is allowing you to see here brightens. Now it is you who is
  blinking.
  
  His face is wrong.
  
  This isn't Peter. You don't know how you know but you know. There's something in his eyes, in the planes of his face.
  
  "What?" the thing that is not your husband says, his mouth moving just a millimeter too much, his eyes half-closed, hiding something horrible behind the lids. "What is it?" he asks, with an awful wonder in his voice that turns your stomach. This is not Peter. This is Not-Peter.
  
  Not-Peter approaches you slowly, frowning. He walks the length of the prism, back and forth, his eyes never leaving yours. Then he stops dead. "You're not her, are you? You're...who are you?"
  
  > say vaadignephod
  (to Not-Peter)
  Not-Peter shudders. "What are you?"
  
  > say naomi
  (to Not-Peter)
  Not-Peter frowns and presses himself against the prism wall, keeping as far from you as possible.
  
  > say Cragne
  (to Not-Peter)
  Not-Peter suddenly turns to you, clearly angry. "What have you done with her!" he shouts. "What have you done with Naomi?"
  
  > say vaadignephod
  (to Not-Peter)
  The non-light in the darkness beyond the wall flares and beyond it you can now see -- another prism. Another space defined by three walls, one of which is the wall of your own cell. And in that space -- another you, another Naomi, dressed in a grey shift. And with her, another Peter.
  
  Not-Peter spins and stares at the pair, then looks back at you. "Is she the real..."
  
  > About yourself
  What you were wearing and everything you carried are gone. You're been left clothed in a coarse grey shift, barely enough for modesty.
  
  There's another flare and the light expands. Now there are
  two other prisms.
  
  > look at the prisms
  There are four - two of Peter, two of you. The newest two can seem to see the older two. They're pounding on the prism walls to no avail.
  
  There's another flare of non-light on either side of the prism. The number of others jumps to eight.
  
  Far in the distance, you can make out what's happening in another chamber. Naomi is screaming and ripping at her face. Her eyes are gone. Peter keeps trying to offer her one of his.
  
  > look at Peter
  Not-Peter cannot take his eyes off the other cells. His face is pressed against the wall, his eyes flickering constantly from face to face.
  
  The thing illuminating this space breathes outward. Doubling,
  doubling  again -- so sixty-four copies?
  
  You glance up. There is nothing in the prism other than six arms, arranged against the walls. You can't tell who they belong to from here.
  
  > hit Peter
  He's shocked by your sudden outburst of violence, but he manages to fend you off.
  
  More non-light, more people ... hundreds...
  
  There's another prism visible now. Peter is laughing. He can't stop laughing. He is gasping for breath, and his lips are turning blue. But the laughter still comes.
  
  > Kiss peter
  Not-Peter might not like that.
  
  Oh god. You somehow now know that there are exactly 1,227 copies around you. But you don't know which of you or Peter is missing a copy.
  
  Your eyes randomly focus on one of the other chambers. Peter and Naomi are calmly drinking tea. At least you think it's tea. Now Peter is eating his cup.
  
  > say vaadignephod
  (to Not-Peter)
  And now the non-light expands outwards - up and down and you
  are at the center of a matrix extending infinitely in all directions and all there are are walls and Naomis and Peters. For ever and ever, amen.
  
  Faced with the infinite, Not-Peter manages to pull himself away from the prism wall. He turns on you, tears in his eyes. "Which one? Which one is us? The real us?"
  
  > say yourself
  (to Not-Peter)
  Not-Peter drops to his knees and begins to sob. "I can't take it anymore. I can't. I've just -- there's nothing here. Nothing real."
  
  As he continues to sob, you notice a strange shimmering along the back of his hands.
  
  > look at the hands
  A strange helix of multicolored strings are attached to Not-Peter at various points - his hands, his elbows, his head. They vanish into the infinite madness of copies above you.
  
  more of them - more threads, pulling upwards towards the ceiling...
  
  Oh god. There's something in the ceiling.
  
  > look at the ceiling
  There is a thing. In the prism. In the ceiling. A spider thing. Eyes and legs and threads of rainbow. And all of them are attached to Not-Peter.
  
  Not-Peter turns and the spider-thing turns and he opens his mouth and it opens its mouth and oh god its speaking and and crying in time with him because they're the same thing and god please let none of this be real nothing will ever be real again --
  
  eyes are looking into your eyes because they're its eyes because you chose to move your hand and your eye and it's not telling you
  you're telling it and then you pull back and it pulls up and then it's puppets all the way down...
  
  An origami unfolding of your mind along an axis that you always knew was there but did not wish to see. A centipede with a million arms unfolding in all directions. Circles of patterns and routines. Sharp edges of improbability. Jagged lines of perverse action. Outright impossibilities cutting deep, defining a horizon.
  
  And then a slowing and a flattening, and there you are, all of you -- all you were and are and could be -- laid out on the grey slab that is the rest of your non-reality. Pinned and flensed and categorized and autopsied before the great mass of eyes and twitching limbs above. And still the thread climbs and your sense of self climbs with it and then they both narrow and expand and soon you are not even you anymore...
  
  The Vaadignephod-continuity was exceptionally clear as to what is to be allowed. The complete possibility space of the intersection of the Naomi-entity and the Peter-entity has been given over to the Weaver-continuity for purposes of experimentation and/or entertainment in exchange for support of material and/or energetic resources within the bound-domicile up to and including quasi-real multi-dimensional manifestations, as well as any necessary calculations performed within the given hypergeometric domain.
  
  An equitable and standard enough exchange, like much of existence in the lower dimensions: limited, but full of possibility.
  
  The initial state-machine, however, has revealed the full possibility space available utilizing only the entities' immediate physical manifestations to be rather small. It seems there is, in fact, a hard and considerable limit to how much a continuity can achieve with such mere flesh before repetition sets in.
  
  Hence the Book.
  
  A metaphor, of course. But a useful one. Its pages are theoretically infinite and the permutations of each individual page an orthogonal, additionally endless axis. For reasons that are unclear, there are only three such pages here. (Singularity is not to be desired. This is not good. You were in the mansion, you were looking for...something. Someone?)
  
  Above the first of the Book's pages float sigils in the Tongue which read WHEN WE WERE NOT YET. The others await a mere turning away.
  
  A tableau of meeting is laid out across the Book's scenery: a domicile of primitive education. Tiny entities scurry in the background from gathering to gathering, futilely attempting to expand their primitive minds. In the foreground is a momentous meeting between two entities as small as the others that crowd the scene. The Naomi-entity seems to be greeting the Peter-entity.
  The Vaadignephod-continuity (oh god that's the...it's the thing doing all of this, isn't it?) utilizing a mere four of its myriad and infinite Aspects, had/has/will-have defined a complexly interesting manifold of hypergeometry -- bounded by the Four Fundamental Movements of the Utter North, South, East and West -- which defines the probability-space over which the Weaver-continuity was/has/will-be given dominion.
  
  Laid across the top of the book's opened page like a bookmark is a lovely message-thread of your own design.
  
  > look at the thread
  It links this manifold possibility space to those of the rest of the continuity (though why you cannot hear them even now is disturbing). Pulling at it signaled/signals/will signal the rest of the continuity that the book may be closed, for your work/play here is done.
  
  > About yourself
  A Weaver of Forms is a fine thing to be -- as beauteous and graceful as one is delicate and fragile. Clever of limbs and eyes and mind so as to encompass a myriad of creative realities. Your fate as part of such a continuity is much to be desired.
  
  > check your inventory
  You carry the whole of possibility within your claws.
  
  > look at the page
  The Book lies beneath your twitching limbs, aching to be changed. Above the first of the Book's pages float sigils in the Tongue which read WHEN WE WERE NOT YET. The others await a mere turning away.
  
  A tableau of meeting is laid out across the Book's scenery: a domicile of primitive education. Tiny entities scurry in the background from gathering to gathering, futilely attempting to expand their primitive minds. In the foreground is a momentous meeting between two entities as small as the others that crowd the scene. The Naomi-entity seems to be greeting the Peter-entity.
  
  > look at Naomi
  That which exists within the book is possibility made manifest. Left in a given state, the entities and their environs define a singular spacetime slice that the rest of the Weaver-continuity may make use of, once they are alerted via the mechanism of the message-thread.
  
  > Turn page
  The Book does not, of course, turn its pages. They are a metaphor. Yet as a metaphor it does an admirable job, shifting along yet another axis, giving you access to yet another portion of probability.
  
  Above the second of the Book's pages float sigils in the Tongue which read WHEN WE BECAME. The others await a mere turning away.
  
  A tableau of a primitive binding ritual is laid out across the Book's scenery: a group of mortal entities gathered against a green background, surrounded by flora of all kinds. Are all of them necessary as a sacrifice? In the foreground stand those that must be bound. They are adolescent, younger than those that surround them. One of the entities is the Naomi-entity. The other is the Peter-entity.
  
  > Turn page
  Your tarsi ache with anticipation as the next probability-space slides into existence.
  
  Above the third of the Book's pages float sigils in the Tongue which read WHEN WE WERE NO LONGER. The others await a mere turning away.
  
  A tableau of some sort of parting ritual is laid out across the Book's scenery: a repository for the storage and repair of mortal entities. In the foreground stand those are to be parted. They are adolescent, barely sentient. The Naomi-entity is beginning the ritual.
  
  > Turn page
  The current Page slips from probable existence and another shifts along the reality axis until it stands before you.
  
  Above the first of the Book's pages float sigils in the Tongue which read WHEN WE WERE NOT YET. The others await a mere turning away.
  
  A tableau of meeting is laid out across the Book's scenery: a domicile of primitive education. Tiny entities scurry in the background from gathering to gathering, futilely attempting to expand their primitive minds. In the foreground is a momentous meeting between two entities as small as the others that crowd the scene. The Naomi-entity seems to be greeting the Peter-entity.
  
  > Turn page
  The Book bends to your will once more, slipping easily to the next Page.
  
  Above the second of the Book's pages float sigils in the Tongue which read WHEN WE BECAME. The others await a mere turning away.
  
  A tableau of a primitive binding ritual is laid out across the Book's scenery: a group of mortal entities gathered against a green background, surrounded by flora of all kinds. Are all of them necessary as a sacrifice? In the foreground stand those that must be bound. They are adolescent, younger than those that surround them. One of the entities is the Naomi-entity. The other is the Peter-entity.
  
  > look at the photograph
  Which do you mean, the photograph of a memory, photos of you (smelling faintly of mildew) or the a worn out, decaying picture (smelling faintly of mildew)?
  
  > examine the photograph memory
  It's an old black and white photograph, with a silvery sheen that indicates that perhaps it was taken in the the early 1900s. It depicts a sunny day in an open park, the background filled with trees. A group of people have gathered in formal dress. You and Peter stand in the foreground. He's in a tuxedo, you're in a lovely floor-length dress. You're both so young - barely out of your teens.
  
  This is from the day you were married! You remember it like it was yesterday. It was so awful. Papa had never approved of you and Peter. That was why you'd always met in secret. But then Mama had found out you were... in the family way. All of a sudden, any talk of separating the two of you stopped and they and Peter's family demanded that you and Peter tie the knot immediately. There was no real time to plan. You ended up getting hitched under a tree in the park.
  
  This is impossible. There's no way this happened. There's no way it could have happened. And yet -- you remember. You
  remember it as certainly as you remember anything else in your life.
  
  > read vermibus
  (first taking De Vermibus Laceris (smelling faintly of mildew))
  Now you can flick through the yellowing pages of the grimoire, you learn that to open a way to your lost husband, you must:
  blow the horn of the black goat,
  while the stars are reflecting upon the grimoire,
  with the stars falling under his true star sign,
  and his most treasured memento,
  and a divine pustule,
  placed in a chalk circle beneath the raised grimoire.
  
  Only then will the way open.
  
  > look at the coffee
  The swirls in your cup form -- weird, they've entirely dissipated. Lack of a symbolic image means that you have accomplished everything you must in your current environment and should move on to find new challenges in order to grow as a person.
  
  A faint smell of mildew emanates from it.
  
  > wait for the Eggplant Line
  You lean against the town square, hold out your pass, and wait for the eggplant line. Within moments, a noncorporeal trolley arrives. Instead of stopping and allowing you to board, it passes through you,
  and you find yourself transported to
  
  From this corner of the attic, paths lead south and west, or you can head back down the rickety staircase. A damp wind flows through a gash in the exterior wall.
  
  A ghostly trolley stop sign reads Eggplant Line -- Cragne Manor Attic.
  
  > go west
  Branching Corridor (Zachary Hodgens)
  A trace amount of sunlight filters in impossibly through imperceivable cracks in the ceiling, illuminating the barren wooden walls and floorboards of this narrow passageway. A short distance away you find yourself in a crossroads of sorts. Corridors leading elsewhere go off toward the northwest, west, east, and southeast. Several large potted cacti line the walls of the passageways.
  
  The trace rays of sunlight beaming down from above get in your eyes.
  
  > Go southeast
  You carefully sidestep through the maze of cacti you have built.
  
  The Observatory (Joey Jones)
  The observatory is a cramped domed room cluttered with all manner of mechanical contrivance. The way out is northwest.
  
  At the top of the dome is a large telescope. Immediately beneath it is a vast projector, bristling with obscure controls.
  
  To one side of the dome is a worn wooden lectern, set before a large chalk circle.
  
  The device is projecting a star sign upon the walls of the dome.
  
  > put Tome on the lectern
  You place the grimoire on the lectern and it falls to the page of the ritual. The stars from the projector dance across its pages.
  
  > put Cyst in the circle
  You put the Cyst (smelling faintly of mildew) into the chalk circle.
  
  > put the memory in the circle
  You put the photograph of a memory into the chalk circle.
  
  > Blow horn
  You try to draw some sound from the horn, putting it to your lips. It lets out a low shuddering sound, like a thousand goats crying out in slow motion.
  
  The grimoire shakes upon the lectern.
  
  The chalk circle glows.
  
  The cyst starts to bubble.
  
  The stars shine brighter upon the observatory's walls, and the whole room ripples.
  room ripples.The horn cracks and crumbles to dust in your hands. The cyst bursts and evaporates into the ruin in a greasy haze. The photograph in the chalk circle burns to ash. Something perpendicular to this plane of existence worms its way through into the observatory.
  
  There is a crack in existence; a portal taking up the space in the center of the room where the device once stood.
  
  > examine the portal
  Peering through you catch brief glimpses of impossible geography beyond. If the ritual has worked, entering the portal will be the way to reach your husband at last.
  
  > enter the portal
  You take a deep breath and step outside of the world. Your senses curdle. You see yourself outside of yourself, as if you were a second person. Your memories of the last day (or night? or season? or year?) shuffle like the star signs across the observatory, with dozens of competing possible versions of yourself juxtaposed incoherently.
  
  You try to grasp at what the true memory was. A woman, searching a house for her husband? A trip to the library to return overdue books? But now in your mind you only have a patchwork of impossible moments. Of bizarre creatures, unlikely tasks and glimpses at the precipice of madness.
  You arrive somewhere else.
  
  Gulf of Nehilim (Nobody)