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Description
The machines of LOLAM churned endlessly every day, no one knew what they did, or what they were for. Josh had always assumed they were part of a massive generator, creating power for the Scratch Construct, should one day the need for it arise. Today was the day. Today, whether he succeeded, or failed, the world would end. He didn’t know what the fourth wall really was, or how it worked, but he did feel one thing about it, a feeling of wrongness. He knew that whatever it was, it had no business in this universe, as if it shouldn’t exist, but it does. What concerned him the most is how he would get out of the session personally, LORAS is a long ways away, even WITH flying abilities. His god tier powers would do the work. Before Josh towered a massive hourglass, with sand in the top, but a glass barrier stopping the sand from falling. “Okay, let’s start this” he told himself, as he prepared to scratch the session.
LOFAR is a strange little world, the forests of pine trees covered the surface, with no oceans, only many large lakes. The ruins were plentiful, and full of ancient relics that Carmen would die to get a hold of. And it seems that given the circumstances, she will. She rested on her quest bed, a surprisingly comfortable slab of stone, she must admit. She had crafted a simple handgun for the event using the code Thom sent her, and set it as her second strife deck. “Well, It’s not a big deal, right? I’m not ACTUALLY killing myself, I’ll be fine,” she muttered, “Okay, no I’m terrified.”. She pulled out the gun and raised it to her head. “Okay, on a count of three, no turning back,” she told herself, “Oooonnne......” her voice wavered out of fear, but she held firm. “two...,” she found a hidden well of resolve from deep within, “THREE!” and pulled the trigger.
At the same time, in the land of Sands and Sparks, Sarah found herself in the same place. Laying on the quest bed of her world. She had found a way to get to the top of her own echeladder, mainly involving repeatedly shooting at targets with The Frozen Vanquisher, so most of it was marksmanship-based in title. The amount of grist that she gained was impressive, she felt, and the amount of grist she could keep at one time was even more so. “Well, I snow what I need to do, it’s one hail of a predicament. I should do this before I freeze up from fear!” she told herself as she took out The Frozen Vanquisher, her trusty weapon. She cried out “Well, here goes nothing!” and pulled the trigger.
On the world of LORAS, in the basement of Thom’s home rested the fourth wall. It’s unnatural existence sent chills down Josh’s spine just thinking about it. Thom had no issues with it’s existence, no matter how unnatural he knew it was. He considered himself more... adaptable than Josh, believing all laws and rules of the universe to be more like suggestions, and breaking the would be simple acts of rebellion. Now Thom was having a nice chat with the strongest being in the universe, Echidna, stalling her to the choice until he could get Carmen out. He wouldn’t need to escape, though, as the choice would do the same for him. No matter which session the fourth wall sent Carmen, she would still end up in one that he was in, not just any variant of him, the current him. This of course was all irrelevant. Echidna still pressed him for an answer, but Thom was a fine manipulator when he wished to be, and could change the subject whenever it came up. Unknown to him, he was running out of time. The scratch has begun.
Josh had just broken the glass barrier keeping the sand in the top. With a loud crash the sand started to fall into the bottom rapidly as the hourglass began to hover. “Well, not what I expected, but this will do” Josh muttered, quickly flying back to his personal favorite library, the Viceroy Bubbles Von Salemancer Memorial Library. He still didn’t quite know who or what it was commemorating, but it had a nice feel to it, and was packed with interesting books, many of which he has to thank for his immense knowledge of Skaia, and most of the incipisphere. Time was running out, and he had to escape. Quickly. His god tier powers took immediate effect as he willed the timeline to form such a way that he would reach the fourth wall in time, and would survive the event. Before he knew what was happening, the ground started to rumble, and a giant being crashed through the wall. “Well, it’s about damned time you got here, [denizen]”
The Skaian debris field have seen a lot of events in the past few hours. First Thom ascended to the god tier, followed by Josh. And now, Carmen and Sarah ascended at the very same time. The symbols of mind and light shone brightly above the region. Carmen, the seer of mind. Sarah, the maid of light. They both had arisen very close together, and at the same time. They saw each other immediately, and they were furious.
“About time you showed up!,” Carmen shouted, “So you just run along on your little way and I’ll consider letting you”
“And let you and Thom get us all killed? I don’t think so!” Sarah shouted back, drawing out The Frozen Vanquisher, it’s icy cold body with an eerie icy glow in the hot atmosphere of Skaia.
“I’ll be going now, I have business to attend to. DON’T follow me.” Carmen shouted as she began to fly down to LORAS to enter the fourth wall and escape.
Sarah had no intention of respecting that request, however, and quickly followed with a mild smirk on her face. “Well, at least she doesn’t know about the wall..” she mumbled.
On LORAS, Echidna is beginning to get impatient, pressing for the choice even stronger than ever. Thom had trouble holding his ground, he had to accept it now or risk provoking her, and with a single statement, he determined the fate of an entire session.
“I accept.”

On LOLAM, Josh stood on the roof of the library, speaking with the denizen of his world, Aion, the god of time itself. He was offered a choice, one that he couldn’t help but chose, the session was doomed enough as it was. In exchange for his guaranteed safe entry into the scratched session, he would have to give Aion complete and total control of the session, and every aspect of it. He held the secret that the session would be completely destroyed in minutes, and any control wouldn’t matter in the slightest. And with a single statement, he also changed his fate.
“Ah HELL no!”

-- SnowyDisciple [SD] has begun pestering TemporallyMisguided [TM] --
SD: *** I’m on my way to LORAS, following Carmen, she seems determined to reach the planet. ***
TM: What business does she have on LORAS?
TM: I have to go.
SD: *** NOW? ***
TM: Yeah, it seems the god of time is trying to kill me, can I message you back?
SD: *** Okay we’re entering the atmosphere. ***
SD: *** She’s landed in the house as well. This is odd. ***
SD: *** Good luck! ***
-- SnowyDisciple [SD] has ceased pestering TemporallyMisguided [TM] --

“I told you not to FOLLOW me!” Carmen shouted in Sarah’s direction.
“Oh, I’m sorry I didn’t hear” responded Sarah in a witty manner.
“You don’t know what you’re messing with, I’m just going to walk inside and do a few things and you can be on your merry way!”
“I have business there too, I have to get out of here, just like you”
Carmen pulled out her pen, and ensured the blade was sharp by pulling the edge across a plate of metal left lying around, sending sparks flying. “Well then. That’s a problem”
“Yes, it is,” Sarah responded, pulling out The Frozen Vanquisher again, chambering a round and aiming it directly at Carmen.
In a flurry of movement Carmen charged towards Sarah, pen at her side, the blade shining in the dim light of LORAS. Sarah didn’t hesitate and opened fire, grazing her shoulder, earning a sharp cry in response, but Carmen kept charging, and Sarah met her blade with her own weapon. With a resonating clash of steel the two combatants were knocked back away from each other. Before Sarah could fire again Carmen ran past the corner of the house. “Why did you come here?” Carmen shouted.
“To bring an end to Thom’s schemes!” Sarah responded with stark determination.
“Oh? Prove it.” Carmen responded.
“What’s there to prove? I’m already here and I’m headed to stop him!”
Carmen took the advantage of her distraction to walk around the house and enter through the back. “Why so interested in the house, then?” She asked. No response. Walking up the stairs she heard a crash, Sarah was breaking into the home. All bets were off, it was about to get ugly.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the incipisphere, the battle between Josh and his denizen, Aion, the god of time. The match was even, Josh wielded the Twisted Blade of Light and Darkness with extreme precision, as if it were no more than an extension of his arm. His style and ease in fighting was like a dance, choreographed to perfection with a whirlwind of cold steel. The god of time, Aeon, was no match for such an expert, especially since Josh himself was the mage of time, and countered any time-related abilities that Aeon would use against him without effort. Up in the sky the hourglass was out of sight on it’s way to Skaia. With ruthless drive and effectiveness he charged Aeon with his blade held high, bringing it down with a blow that tore a hole in the fabric of time, vanquishing the great beast with a massive burst of grist. “Well, That’s one hell of a god tier power. I should use that more often.” Josh muttered as he took off for LORAS.
Thom was not sure what happened, why he had not died, why the universe had not ended. What was going wrong? Did I just get tricked? He did not know. He took out his bow, a personal favorite, composed of small blackhawk helicopter blades for the body, and a tow cable for the string. The arrows were made of concentrated grist, and were extremely sharp, and expensive.
-- DistinguishedPhysics [DP] has begun pestering PsycologicalTechnitian [PT] --
DP: -| => I’ve accepted the deal, go to the top floor of the house, you’ll find what looks like a painting leaning against the wall next to my old desk. Take the sheet off, and smash the top right panel, and go through. NOT any other panel, ONLY that one! <= |-
PT: You sure about that?
DP: -| => Yes, do I sound sure? <= |-
PT: No.
DP: -| => Well I am!
PT: Whatever you say.
PT: I’m busy here though.
DP: -| => With WHAT? <= |-
PT: I happen to have a certain Sarah trying to kill me.
DP: -| => And what’s with your quirk? It’s gone. <= |-
PT: Too serious to have a quirk right now
DP: -| => Understood. You have to finish quick, I’m at the doorstep, I’ll have your back. Sarah is still outside, I’ll keep it that way. <= |-
-- DistinguishedPhysics [DP] has ceased pestering PsycologicalTechnitian [PT] --
On his way to LORAS, Josh was impacted by a stray asteroid. On the asteroid was what he considered to be a laboratory of sorts. He crashed through the roof and landed on a pedestal of sorts. “Well, what have we here?” he muttered, as he went over to the computer monitor dead ahead. Each of the four screens were blank, and there was a single green button as a keyboard of sorts. He instantly recognized it as an ectobiology lab. He had always wondered why that has never happened yet. Why none of them have been cloned. He turned on the machine and it buzzed to life.
Many years ago, in the rubble of Berlin, a Soviet flag rose high, and a war ended. Suddenly, with a bright flash, an artillery piece vanished. None saw, but for the briefest of moments a figure of a man was outlined in the flash of green light, the machine locked onto this man.
==> Push button
The machine did it’s work, creating an ecto-biological clone of the figure, Thom's grandfather, which is promptly absorbed into a vat below. “Well that worked just fine,” he muttered, “Three to go”. As he continued, pushing the button when needed, cloning the guardians of him and the rest of his group. And with the fourth push of a button, a new function activated and created four small clones of the guardians. Thom’s grandfather, Josh’s father, Carmen’s mother, Sarah’s sister. Another push of a button, the final process began. The cloning process was put underway, and four new babies were created. Thom and Carmen were created from Thom’s grandfather and Carmen’s mother, and Sarah and Josh were created from Sarah’s sister and Josh’s father.
“Well, shit,” Josh muttered, thinking of Carmen and Thom as siblings, “And to think that they almost dated once.. They’re siblings!”
Meanwhile, on LORAS, things were about to escalate dramatically. “Okay, remember when I said I’d have everything handled and you’ll be just fine?” Thom shouted up to Carmen, inside the house.
“What about it?” she replied.
“Well I may have been lying... We have one hell of a problem here,” he said, warily stepping back into the house and slamming the door as massive pounding footsteps approached. A shadow was cast over the house, turning day into night. “It’s him!” he shouted.
“Sarah?” Carmen wondered.
“No! THE SILVER FREAKING KING!” he shouted back, clearly terrified. “We need to get the hell out of here now!”
With a massive crash the roof of the house was torn off, revealing a massive beast, black in the shaded regions, which were plentiful, white in the faint light of whatever remnants of Skaia that still glowed. “It’s open, we have to go through NOW” Carmen shouted as she jumped through the broken pane. Thom made no move for the window, and simply stood there as the silver king of ballan grabbed him by the waist with a single tentacle-like appendage.
“Well to hell with you! Сome on! Just kill me!” Thom screamed at the top of his lungs, safe in the thought that he would never remember this, and live on in the alternate universes.
The king let out a sharp groan that was somewhat mechanical, and somewhat natural, a fowl mix that made Thom shiver. It was then that he recognized the source of the shriek.
A ways away from the king was the artillery battery that Thom had shaped. The barrel swished about and fired several large projectiles with the fury of a god towards the king. Josh had controlled the piece from his laptop. “Well, shit, I left that on.” Thom muttered, although whatever Josh does will be futile. The king did not falter, and moved towards the artillery piece, crushing it with a swift step. But the real threat was directly behind him.
Josh had just arrived on the planet, and was entering the atmosphere with a burst of flame, and then a familiar rush of adrenaline as the ground approached. He drew his sword, the twisted blade of light and darkness, holding it high as he fell from the stars to deliver a blow that would tear a hole in reality itself. The king did not notice his descent, and he took his advantage. He continued to fall with his blade directly in front of him, slicing the silver king in half, and causing it to burst into a massive ocean of grist. He noticed Thom fall to the ground, and the house, where the fourth wall hummed ominously, waiting for the final moment.
However, they were not to know the time that they had left. The scratch construct was still flying towards Skaia, moments before gently reaching the scratch port and resetting the session. Five minutes remained, thanks to Josh’s manipulation of timelines.
5:00
4:59
4:58
Josh landed on the ground with the force to create a small crater. The wind was knocked out of him and he was left gasping for breath. When he regained his strength and stood up he heard something whistle past his right ear, an arrow.
“Damnit! You had to come here and try to intervene, you always do! It’s too late!” Thom shouted.
“We’ll see about that” Josh responded, drawing his blade to face a new threat.
Thom drew a trio of arrows and opened fire, missing. He twisted the knob on his sleeve to increase the viscosity of the armor to substantial levels. This armor would stop bullets. At least, it would if there was a knob, and he had his regular armor on, his god tier outfit had no such advantages. Josh kept his distance, his sword at his side, waiting for Thom to make a move.
“Fighting you won’t change anything now, so let’s just settle down”
“Oh? I’ll see about that” Thom responded, putting away his bow and taking out the fist blades.
“Oh, shit. He’s gone mad.” Josh mutters, keeping his sword at the ready.
Thom charged with a newfound fury. Closing the distance with extreme speed. When the gap was erased, Thom attempted a sweeping strike to Josh’s legs to immobilize him, but the battle was turned around in the blink of an eye as Josh sidestepped and drove his blade into Thom’s abdomen, rewarded with a burst of blood and a shocked reaction.
Thom fell to his knees, defeated, and spoke. “You idiot. You always had to be in control, to have leadership. You couldn’t face the fact that you weren’t in control, that the situation changed. We were never supposed to complete the session, we merely had to survive. I did everything to ensure our survival, right now there are thousands of copies of me in every alternate universe that we’re in, we can have a second chance”
Josh suddenly had a shocking revelation. Thinking of his time in the medium, where he found a version of Thom with the same wounds as he does now, to tell him about the future. Not many of the things that he mentioned came true, however, and he was in a dream body outfit from Derse, not a god tier outfit. Nonetheless, it was what he had to do. Josh took out his hourglasses and primed them to send Thom back directly to that time. “Listen, I don’t know whether I believe you or not, but I’ll give you a chance to prove it. Touch this hourglass, it will send you back in time to warn me, back in the past, of all of the things that will happen. There is a downside though” Josh mentioned.
“Just send me back, I know what you’re talking about. I die,” Thom muttered, reaching out for the hourglass, “Was it worth it?” he asked. “Well, make sure it was.” He reached out and touched the hourglass, transporting back in time with a flash of light, to an alternate timeline, leaving Josh alone.
“Well, time to go!” Josh muttered, as he began to run towards the house.
1:19
1:18
1:17
The silver king had torn the roof off the house and sent it flying into the distance, along with the wall. He could see the glow from over the dark horizon, through the dense rain. He began to fly toward it.
0:21
0:20
0:19
He reached the wall, feeling a terrible feeling of wrong. Like the wall shouldn’t be there, it can’t be there. But yet it is still there. “Well, here goes nothing” he muttered as he jumped into the broken pane, moments before the scratch activated and the universe was reset. Unknown to the players, the silver queen of Ballan herself escaped through the wall, into the new session. And there was only one word on her mind.
Revenge.

==> End of Act Three