Snippet #2758012

Prologue:
Space. A very broad term, either a synonym for volume or capacity, or the vast blackness outside the atmosphere, or equivalent thereof. The latter is considered infinite, or at least, infinite from the perspective of a sapient being. The Creators may think otherwise, but they're not in a position or inclination to educate their creations. The Centre itself, the area in which the known worlds of the Imagiverse reside, spans mere light years, but there is a frontier beyond that, a deeper, more ancient blackness that more loosely follows the logic of reality than the Centre itself; a deeper space known as the Edge. It is in this intergalactic gulf, which surrounds the Centre as the abyssal sea surrounds a desert island, that the most potent mysteries of the Imagiverse itself are buried, waiting for the strong-willed and foolish to uncover, the most interesting relating to the Creator of the Imagiverse, the Maker, who has been slumbering for aeons, brought to a coma by the equally omnipotent but malignant Maelstrom that haunts the Creator's End, it's galactic prison, and is said to be at least vaguely responsible for all universal evil. This, along with the Maker's fitful dreams that pervade the Imagiverse but are more potent in the Edge, makes the subconscious gulfs a dreadfully dangerous place. Only a knowledge-hungry or suicidal person would dare traverse it.
One is planning to do so now.

The Teslatorium, located in the heart of the industrial district of Old Albion, timeless home of the Victorian undead Skeletorians, was undergoing the most activity it has seen in years. Tinkerers, engineers, apprentices working under the engineers, are rushing around the spacious hangar like ants in a hill, tweaking gadgets, soldering bits onto others, ensuring the stability of complex mechanisms that the living world has long abandoned for being too redundantly difficult to maintain. For the apprentices, it is an honour to work within the private workshop of Jonathan Skelecoot, Governor of Old Albion, and more specifically, under, or rather over, the supervision of the dwarven skeleton engineer Giles Mackle, Head of Engineering in the whole city. Moving through the throes like a small, muttering comet, Giles bellowed instructions to the masses of workers, the majority working on the centrepiece of the operation.
The space-bullet, Giles' peculiar term for the brass spacecraft, sits square in the middle of the hangar, and is being tended to by only the most senior engineers; the others are polishing the hull until it gleams. It spans the same size as a galleon, a proud mechanical wonder capable of travelling countless lightyears a minute, thanks to it's engine. The engine is powered by Innovatium, the mystical compound common in Skeletorian technology, considered to be the material anima mundi of the Imagiverse. Possibly no other machine uses the amount of Innovatium as the S.S Victoria - as the space-bullet is titled, after the deceased monarch - which was possibly why the interior was much larger than the exterior, a nasty shock for the engineers at first, but they adapt at a speed that makes learning A.I look like slugs.
The Governor had the audacity to put out an advert in the Imagiverse Hub, asking for only the bravest and strong-willed to join his latest voyage; a brief sail across the Edge. Giles was not going to question his superior's wishes, but he silently wondered what had sparked this latest lapse of madness in John, who was well-known to be several wires short of a circuit-breaker at the best of times. He was currently going with his brother, Adam Skelecoot, and the Chosen Few, who were all acquaintances to the skeletal brothers and therefore close friends. The band of heroes were known to be impervious to all sorts of trauma, so there's nearly no risk of welcoming back a bunch of vegetables, if they ever came back, that is. The head engineer was only worrying about whatever new recruit the advert was going to attract, and how many will actually reach the Teslatorium.