The Closing of a Tome.

This is the end of Muffin's Excerpt and The End of The Story except for one last detail.

Emergency services gathered around the burning warehouse on the wharf. The fire was resisting all attempts to be put out. As the battle raged to keep the fire from spreading to the surrounding buildings a figure, burned, riddled with bullet holes and with just a blank abyss on it's face between the mouth and forehead, staggered out of the building. A paramedic spotted the figure and rushed over to help the injured man. The man turned his eyeless face towards him and a torrent of black birds flew forth swarming the poor paramedic and then turning on the rest of the people in the area. Before long the burned figure stood amid a pile of picked clean skeletons and raised his head to the sky. "May... I... I'm coming for you May..." It spoke in a raspy voice. It's words wobbly and uncertain. It began walking and the swarm of birds followed behind it.

As the figure passed through the city the birds killed anything alive and the figure stole for itself: a Machete, a cloak and then it headed into the suburbs where it stopped at a small house and went inside picking up a skeletal mask like one would find in a costume shop with a cap over one eye. It put on the cloak and the mask and The Faceless Bastard went back outside.

Muffin and the others were celebrating their victory at Muffin's place. Portnoy and Dr. Malice were drinking and talking about the future, Muffin was just drinking and The Liar merely sat and watched them all. The party had been going for about an hour when there was a crack of thunder and the lights went out. Muffin jumped to his feet, but had imbibed quite a bit of alcohol at this point and stumbled back to the chair after about a few second standing. The Liar immediately stood as a cry entered hearing.

"May! Come on out!" Faceless called out. He stood in the street swaying drunkenly as birds perched on every rooftop.

The Liar stood up and went to the door looking out. Dr. Malice rose to go with her, but as he reached her she put a hand to his chest and flung him back knocking over the table he and Portnoy had been sitting at then went outside.

Faceless spotted her and took a few steps towards her. "May... I'm so glad to see you..."

The birds began letting out piercing cries and flew down towards her. A mist rose up from The Liar and obscured her from view and soon covered the whole street. The birds tried to find her in the mist, but couldn't and the mist sapped the life out of them. When the mist cleared the birds were dead and The Liar stood directly in front of Faceless. He smiled beneath his mask and hugged her.

"I... I'm so sorry. I never wanted to hurt you. I'm so glad you're back." He spoke clutching her to him.

"Sergei. What's happened to you?"

"Lots of things. It's ok now though. We're together again" He said.

"Oh Sergei... They've taken your mind from you..." The Liar said hugging him back gently.

Faceless whimpered slightly. "No... It's ok. We're together. I didn't get to say it before you died, but I love you May and we're gonna be together forever now."

The Liar smiled weakly. "You're right..." Her hands moved up taking off his mask. "I love you too, Faceless. I'm sorry."

She kissed him and as she did she began to take over his body. He stiffened momentarily and then relaxed. The  sound of more birds filled the air as May's body fell against his and The Liar took complete control.

"I'm sorry."

The lightning came down from the sky striking them both amid a chorus of shrieking birds as Dr. Malice and Portnoy, supporting Muffin, watched from the window. As the lightning faded there was nothing left where they had been standing.

So, ends the story. There were more stories ahead for the universe and the heroes were part of some of them, but this was the last story where they were the heroes.

~The Voidskipper   

Everything is Ending Pt. 2

Continuing to transcribe the events here from Muffin's point of view as taken from his own writing.

When I arrived with Megan and The Cold Boy to the area of The God's Way where the others were I found arranged before me the entirety of The Fears, with the exception of The Empty City and the obvious exception of The Quiet. The Unnamed Child was also missing and the reason why seemed obvious with my new knowledge. I wonder if she ever dared to travel through The God's Way. Again my mind took a couple of agonizing moments to settle The Fears into manageable forms. At this moment I did however notice some strange things about my own allies. The Liar of course was a Fear and so the same effect occurred there as well. Portnoy looked completely normal, but he had the same quality of seeming like just a picture imposed by my mind as The Fears did. He also seemed to glow slightly with some sort of internal light. Dr. Malice also appeared strange. It took me a time to realize it was him. He appeared as a man in his mid to late forties with greying hair, receding a little on the sides and in front. He had a wispy almost goatee and he was pixelated. The Cold Boy announced my presence and The Fears turned their attention to me.

I stepped forward to join my allies and gave The Fears as respectful a bow as my rebellious streak would allow and then launched into my glorious speech. It went something like this:

"Hey. So, I know you guys want to kill me and all, but I have a reason you shouldn't. I came here to meet you, but in order for me to inform you of why you shouldn't kill me I'm gonna need us all to pop into the normal world for a short period. That okay?"

Breath taking, right?

The Fears didn't seem happy, but obviously they were willing to hear me out because we were back in the normal world.

They say the imagination is a door to countless worlds. The Empty City sounded inside my head like the trumpet of revelations and a passage extended from behind me projected by my mind. A Door opened from my imagination and memory to link to another universe. Metaphors are fun aren't they.

At the end of the hallway stood a figure. I didn't recognize her by sight, but I knew who she had to be. With everything in place I began to explain. 

"The Empty City told me about another Universe. One where my plan succeeded. It took me there and showed me what happened. You're all dead there and so I imagine you didn't know about it. If you go speak to the figure at the end of the hallway she'll explain. Her name is Unikeia and she's your replacement in that other universe."

While The Fears went to speak to Unikeia and learn about the other universe, though I imagine she'd keep quiet about her own personal secret, I fell to my knees and Dr. Malice came to support me. Having a Fear use your head to open a path to a universe that should be impossible to reach takes a lot out of you.

I rested for a bit before The Fears returned. The Blind Man spoke. "This information is... Interesting and will be added to The Archive, but how does it prove we shouldn't kill you?"

"Because I'm not a threat anymore. I've seen what happens if you die. Things only get worse. I won't try again and you know how to stop my plan now if someone tries to enact it again anyway. So, I guess what I'm saying isn't that you shouldn't kill me, just that there isn't a reason to kill me and certainly no reason to kill my allies who never really did anything to you anyway other than save this entire universe. So, to sum up. We're not a threat, We saved you and this universe, killing us would be a dick move."

I waited for them to deliberate, but I already knew what the answer was going to be. Unikeia's appearance wasn't just to provide explanation and there was a reason we needed to create an actual connection to the other universe instead of just a projection. Unikeia would use her powers to help me convince them. Assuming other me's plan worked we had made her sole ruler of an entire universe and even a monster can be grateful.

The Fears decision came down exactly as planned and it was finished. The Fears would let us live. Megan was leaving which was... unfortunate, but she was happy about it so... I don't mind... Much. No clue what Portnoy and Malice will do and I... Well I'm going to go back to being The Muffin Man. 

All's well that ends well and stuff... 

Everything is Ending Pt. 1

The group headed out to their final confrontation with the fears, in sullen silence. The Liar had left them for a time and returned with normal looking clothes and the bandages that had covered May's body gone. The lack of blood on the clothes giving the impression she had somehow healed the chest wound and probably closed the gaping hole where her arm had been. The group walked in a careful formation. It would have been preferable to have used their respective paths, but it would be far too risky. It took some time to reach their destination, walking. It wasn't anywhere special. Just a wide open area, far away from civilization where there would be no collateral damage if things went wrong.

When they finally stopped at their destination they moved into a small circle and Muffin began to speak.

"Alright. We're going to start now. A few warnings. Where we are about to go is not owned by The Fears or as far as we know anyone. It's technically neutral ground, but not in the way you might think. The power of the fears will be mitigated here , but they will still be dangerous and they will still be able to do things they just won't be as capable of influencing the area as they would be in their own realms or our own normal realm. Second warning... This will be disorienting, and in some cases painful, as all hell so be prepared for that. Everyone ready?" There were a few chorused noises of assent and then The Liar and Muffin opened a door into The Godsway.

Unfortunately, I can't see into the Godsway and so I could not get a firsthand account of what happened and instead I'm afraid I only have a transcript of Muffin's own account so the following will switch to a first person account of the events that transpired from Muffin's point of view.

We entered the God's Way. The moment you enter... Well, I don't know about when Fears, or any of the other creatures out there, enter The God's Way, but when I enter it I'm just immediately hit by a debilitating sense of loss. Not loss like of a loved one. Loss as in a loss of identity, motivation, order, purpose... All of the things that make you and make you do things are just gone. You then have to struggle to reclaim those things within yourself and find out who you are and why you are there... Sometimes the answer isn't what you're expecting. Regardless, once you've put yourself back together you can then actually experience The God's Way and the best way to describe that is... Well, diminishing. If looking out into space makes people feel like a speck of dust experiencing The God's Way makes one realize that dust is far more important than you. Of course this again requires a great feat of will to not just give up on everything right there. As for an actual physical description of the place the only way to describe it is to say it's the reality of an illusion and the Illusion of reality. It's the place you were when you entered, but in a form infinitely more majestic and grand then it was. If you entered while in a sewer that sewer in The God's Way would still be more majestic and grand than anything built by the hand of mankind. As well anything in there has sort of a ghostly feeling to it while also still being more solid and unyielding than you. If you ever enter The God's Way do not hesitate to touch something. The feeling of your flesh yielding in the same way water yields to your touch is something you will never ever get a chance to experience anywhere else and is... Well a bit weird, but not in fact unpleasant. Anyway enough about The God's Way. When we had entered and after we had acclimated we were immediately split apart. Megan stayed with me but everyone else vanished. My hand gripped Megan's tightly as something began to coalesce before us. It was The Archangel. Now I should point out. Another strange thing about The God's Way is you can't hide who you are, so when I say The Archangel showed up I don't mean the guy in the gas mask or any of the other bodies he uses or even the strange forms he takes that other people have reported on I mean The Archangel appeared before us. It is a remarkable trait of the human mind, however to protect itself and my mind only attempted to process what was in front of it for a couple of agonizing seconds before just mentally inserting the gas masked man in it's place. The fact Megan didn't start screaming and freaking out tells me her mind did the same or similar. He simply stood there staring at us and I eventually couldn't take it and spoke. "What's going on? I wanted to talk to The Fears not just you."

"I know and so do they. You friends are informing them of that fact as we speak. I took you aside for reasons of my own."

"Which are?"

"Your entire family was meant to die. You ruined that for me. I don't really care about the reasons the others want you dead. I just know I want you dead for defying me and regardless of what you want or they want I'm going to kill you both right here." 

It's already hard to fight a creature like The Archangel who's form is so utterly beyond comprehension, but when you can't even see the incomprehensible form and how it's attacking it's downright impossible. There was nothing we could do. This hadn't been part of my plan. Luckily neither was what happened next. As the unseen blow undoubtedly came towards us I saw my breath come out in a visible cloud and then my mind screamed in pain as it struggled to adjust to the sight of another unthinkable creature appearing as The Cold Boy entered the event. My mind settled on The Cold Little Boy and The Gas Masked Man standing motionless as their true selves engaged in some invisible battle. "What are you doing?" The Archangel demanded of The Cold Boy who tilted his head in my vision and then responded in a voice that made my ears start bleeding. No that was not exaggeration.

"The Muffin Man is an enemy of ours for understandable reasons, but the girl is mine and I do not agree with the others regarding her execution I will not allow my servant to be harmed for her brother's crime." Something unseen happened and The Cold Boy stumbled backwards. The Archangel seemed to loom larger in my mind's view of him and his voice took on an echoing quality like hundr thousa milli lots of people were speaking at the same time.

"You have no power. I am not some weak mortal, nor am I alone. I am inhabited by the infinite dead all of their power furthering mine. What can you do against such power?"

"The true power I wield and the reason for this form is that my foes and prey underestimate me. Even those like yourselves who would know better underestimate me. If not my power than my range. You push away your allies and even those of your own kind and surround yourself with power and the dead who hate and fear you. Already we are among the loneliest creatures in existence. Incapable of acting in any normal capacity with the multitudes of creatures that are bound by time and space, but having pushed away the others you have become even more alone." The Cold Boy responded and then frost began to appear on The Archangel and he began to become smaller in my view. He turned his mask towards me and I could see ice forming on the mask and then he was gone. The Cold Boy looked at Megan and gave her a smile then his face turned grave when he looked at me. "You wanted an audience with us you will have it and I will bring you to them. Know though that whatever happens I will not allow your sister to die and she will be coming with me to serve as was her wish."

Megan let go of my hand then and approached The Cold Boy. "I don't mind. Even though I have my brother now I once wanted to be part of your court and I still do. You don't scare me and you never have. I thought that you didn't want me though?"

"The Archangel convinced me that you were a trick. You were being used by others to undermine me, but The Shadow and events since then have convinced me otherwise. You will be a fine servant."

Megan smiled in response to that and then The cold Boy brought us to meet The Fears.

I will end the recounting here for now and continue with the events later.