Jack "The Ducky Boy" Quackers's Story

Impressively, she was barely shaken from the warp itself but rather what came after caused her to stir. Wrapped in the bedding, she rolled and fell from her bed with a thud. Fighting her way free of the sheets, she peered out groggily around for the source of her disturbance, and narrowed her eyes. "Ey! What the bleedin' 'ell is that? "

Grimms would look up from his book, his eyes blinking out for a moment as he focuses on the music for a moment. "It is music, early 20th century I would assume," he responded, rather confident in his assessment. "I wouldn't know the title, however, but-"

"Music," she huffed. "I'd prefer somethin' with a... a beat, life, temp, y'know?" She then pantomimed playing a guitar to make her point, bobbing about to the beat in her head.

The S.S Victoria was already picking up considerable speed. It was speeding past the many space-time bubbles that orbited the centre of the Imagiverse, entire worlds of different textures and colours, each entirely different, or rather similar, to the other. Soon, the spaceship had left the inner circle of worlds and was venturing deeper into the less-spacious Outer Centre, where raw Imagination, filtering through space on cosmic currents, crystallised into strange entities. As Max the Robloxian, currently playing a card game with his comrades to pass the time, glanced away from his shoddy hand towards the window, he was greeted by a large eye, belonging to a lolligo caeleste, also known as a giant space squid, its star-flecked hide a glowing blue. He would stare out of the window for several seconds before Adam nudged him back to attention. Afterwards, he kept his gaze firmly away from the window.
To name a few other peculiar phenomenon, the volunteers in the other cabin might see, through their window, a bitten green apple the size of a moon, a titanic purple whale with a little top hat perched on what could be considered its head, and a snoozing giant formed out of sea-blue stardust. It has become apparent that they were approaching the threshold in space where what can't possibly be real turns out to be just that.

“Hmmm…It’s difficult to hear but I rather like it, myself.” Vragi replied, “Ah, not that there’s anything wrong with having a different preference!” he hastily added, not wanting to get into an argument. Getting on the duchess' nerves was something he thought best avoided

As the ship passed through space, the dwarf’s attention was drawn back to the environment outside which was becoming stranger by the minute.

“Now that’s…certainly a view.” He observed, gesturing toward the window. He wondered if looking at it all for a prolonged time was good for his health, but of course this didn't stop him gawking at it anyway.

Skitters looked at Vragi, raising a brow, then, with a mightly leap, and kicking her feet, she pulled herself up far enough to a porthole to peek out. "Cor..."

Grimms steps over to lean over and look out as well. After a moment he just gives a short chuckle.

"Whaaat? What's so funny?"

Grimms pointed at the massive apple. "Look there."

"Oh? What is it?" Looking out for a moment, the raccoon looked attentively, swaying her tail excitedly, shifting her focus on one and then the other. "Sure, it is odd, is there something I'm..."

"Suppose since Mr. Giant didn't want it, anyone hungry?"

She freezes for a moment, then her ears and tail drooped, turning to give Grimms a glare. At first she seems ready to lash out for the bad joke. "All yours, sparky, I ain't eatin' after a bloomin' giant, let alone anybody."

Grimms chuckled at her reaction. He then cleared his throat and straightened his suit. "Well, to be serious for a moment," he said in monotone. "Although they seem benign so far, we should perhaps be on our guard in case there are some that are not. Not to be ominous, of course."

The gramocon speakers would shudder and whine once again. John's disembodied voice spoke thusly, "While we are waiting to reach the Threshold (we are already halfway there, by the way!), I might as well educate you illiterate thugs, and the volunteers, on a piece of mythology unheard of anywhere except the Palm Grove, a rather select world inhabited by the isolated Hand Druids - that is, in fact, 8 foot tall hands that wear druidic robes, rather hospitable people, I find. Anyway, they are possibly the only species in the Imagiverse to even know about this story - except for myself, but only because I ventured there myself and read all their books - so listen well.
There are those who claim that the Imagiverse was created by a galactic detonation known as the Imagiversal Implosion, and I was once one of those who accepted the theory. However, the religious books of the Hands say that the Imagiverse was brought to existence by the Maker, Creator of Creators, a multiversal being who could create anything from nothing with only a thought. He lived in the very rim of the Imagiverse, within His dream castle, writing the rules that would govern the workings of His new universe, as well as forming creatures that would act as His caretakers, maintaining the castle He resided in. It was there that He also made the Creators, who you might consider to be His children, if the laws of reproduction apply to multidimensional gods of His level. According to the Hands, He intended to create a... playground for His children, a universe where they, and He as well, could shape the Imagiverse to their liking, free from the pressures of Reality.
Of course, things didn't go exactly to plan. You see, the Maker, after making the Creators and teaching them His abilities, he started having nightmares. Of what exactly, the books do not specify, but each nightmare brought forth increasingly dangerous creatures - a horde of black, tar-like demons that He imprisoned in a box, only to be released many years later as the Darkness - a towering mass of flesh and eyes, known nowadays as Argus, whose blood was later spilled onto Minecraftia and became the Flux Taint, and whose body broke apart into umpteen abominations - the list goes on to mention other demons with names I cannot pronunciation or recall at the moment. The final nightmare would be His worst yet, bringing to existence a malignant entity equal in power to His own; the Maelstrom, often referred to by the Hands as the Unmaker, the opposing bringer of Destruction to the Maker's Creation.
What followed was an intense battle between the two gods, until the Maker imprisoned the Maelstrom within the rim of the Imagiverse and sent the Creators towards the Centre of the Imagiverse, where they could create in peace. The effort in imprisoning the Maelstrom, as well as the resulting trauma, sent the Maker into an aeons-long slumber, and He hasn't woken up to this day.
His fitful dreams, as well as the Maelstrom's increasing influence over the aeons of wearing down it's chains, are likely the main reason the Edge is incredibly dangerous. The Threshold is the barrier between the Centre and the Edge, the froth of chaotic Creation that would tear any ill-equipped vessel to shreds. When we do get there, I would like it if you try and stay in your cabins, and don't, out of sheer curiosity, look towards the engine. We will experience what could be the highest level of hyper-fantasy that is possible in the Imagiverse. In short terms, well, try not to go mad from whatever you see, aight?"

Vragi had his own maelstrom of sorts swirling inside his head, as his ocean of questions swelled yet again and it was all the poor dwarf could do to keep his trap shut. He was already racking his brain to make sense of the whole thing.

“I think I prefer the first theory, if it’s all the same” he mused quietly. Despite his own curiosity and usual openness, he was quite sceptical and not a fan of legends and rumours. When asked why he would usually go off an a rant that incorporated various words long the lines of 'fanciful' and 'airy-fairy' as well as some probably made-up phrases. His own thoughts were cut short by a warning to stay away from the engine.

“Ah, he just had to go and tell us not to do it. Might as well throw me off the side o’ the ship, It’ll just as well be ten times harder now.” He lamented, scratching his nose.

Skitters's body slowly slid off from the porthole and dropped to the floor as she listened to the story. She was rather personally aware of a portion of this, being as she was, but it interested her in actuality on an outsider's position. While the thought of... talking hands was absurd even to her, seeing what she has been through thus far, it isn't hard to believe either. Her life thus far has lead her to accept the improbable, similar to Mr. Grimms, but with the added drive to... harness it, rather than simply observe and document.

The dwarf then said something quietly to himself, her keen ears picking it up rather clearly. To this she snorted, and from her jaws, rather than from the device that spoke for her, a shrill sound was uttered. "Kreehkehkehkehkeh..." It was laughter, or, at least the closest thing the vessel's vocals could muster. She held her sides, with all four of her forelimbs, and rolled on the ground. "Kreeeehkehekehkehkeh!" she cackled louder, the device now just sputtering in monotone: "ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha."

She stood back up to regain her composure, giving a short soft snort as she wiped a tear from her eye and spattering it against the wall beside her. What hit was rather not water, but something black that quickly dissolved into the shadows. "Well then, I know what I'm looking forward to," she muses in an almost childish singsong manner. Her tail flicked as the last words were spoken. "'Don't,' he says... oy, oy, he had to say 'don't'," she mused, slapping her upper forepaws against her cheeks, squirming anxiously. She was toying now, possibly teasing Vragi, if only for the reason to see the dwarf's views turned on its head, much like her's was when she stepped across the threshold. It wasn't exactly malicious, but rather curiosity on how another being handles the awakening process, a bit of scientific curiosity that made her almost gitty. Maybe then, finally, somebody would be able to understand her on her own level.

Grimms on the other hand stood silent, listening, until looking at the other two. He looked to the raccoon, who was rubbing her hands together, looking rather shifty, and the dwarf being compelled by his curiosity. "Okay, what are you up to?"

"Nuuthin'," she answered cutely, rolling her eyes to the side and shifting slightly, under her mask however, she cracked a smile.

It was clear to Grimms that she was up to something, what surprised him, however, was that she wasn't even trying to hide it. On one hand he was concerned what her scheme may be, but his profile of her, so far, was not one of a particularly sadistic nature. She's greedy, prideful perhaps, she was out to gain something, but what, well he didn't know that yet, but he had theories. "You know, that warning most likely comes from experience."

"Eh, he turned out alright, give or take," she responded with a coy little shrug. "I... would prefer to keep the insulation, however."

Soon, the Innovatium-powered space shuttle was within lightyears from the Threshold, the galactic barrier between fantasy and hyper-fantasy, between conscious Imagination and the more primeval, subconscious streams of Creation. This was not readily apparent to the crew, although outside the porthole, they could see a planet-sized turtle gliding through space, four elephants perched on it's star-flecked shell, which in turn supported what looked to be a flat world, complete with continents and a spire of ice protruding from the centre of the disc. "Great A'tuin," John would announce. "The star turtle, carrying the Discworld on it's shell. It's often theorised by the collective scientific minds of the Imagiverse that it can only exist in areas of very low reality levels, so we're close to the Threshold."
Time would pass before they were now relatively touching the barrier. From a spacious distance, it seemed as if there wasn't anything unusual, just the regular specks of stars sprinkled across the infinite horizon. This close, however, there was the unnerving impression that the stars were merely painted onto a vast dome, the stars overhead climbing over the spaceship.
When John next spoke, there was an odd undertone in his voice, almost imperceptible under the feedback of the gramocon. "In the next few min- next few moments, your ideas on the fundamental workings of the universe will be strained to their limits, changed either minutely or completely. I'm sure you have gotten the hint from what you have seen so far, but once we pass the Threshold, you will know for certainty what I have known for many years. If you are of faint heart, then close your eyes, although that alone may not shield your vision from the creative froth that is (From the opposite cabin, "John, for the love of Telamon, would you JUST STOP TALKING FOR ONCE IN YOUR LIFE AND GET ON WITH IT!") the Threshold."
Again, the increasing intensity of the engine's hum. The gradual vibration of the cabin. Then a great deal of distance, into the Threshold, in a matter of a second.

Vragi watched the Duchess’ apparent mirth in befuddlement, one bushy eyebrow twitching anxiously. He was mostly unsure what exactly was going through the raccoon’s head though he would have to guess that she was waiting for him to trip himself up in some way or other.

As the ship began to speed up, he glanced around. His eyes widened beneath his goggles, and the dwarf grabbed the end of his beard and, spiky as it was, pulled it back over his head, tying a knot just behind. The result was what looked like a tiny creature with a large white pom-pom for a head, one dagger-like nose protruding.

Whether it would shield him from whatever it was looking at the engine would do, he had no idea, but at least now he didn’t know how to look at it, so if he did try it, he at least had a reduced risk of succeeding. The smith braced himself as the ship began to cover the remaining distance to the threshold. During this time he appeared to lock up, not even a twitch of movement.

Grimms's body, or rather, his shell, braced him as they breached the Threshold barrier, a technicolor dreamscape suddenly searing into his eyes. For most this would be a moment of seizure inducing madness, but for him... a distant memory bubbling up from the depths of his soul. As space stretched before him, warping in every breadth and width, he almost felt something through his shell. Reaching out with his hand he truly felt... or believed he felt... as if he could feel the pulse of the cosmos. His mind flooded with a fullness, eyes bleeding of cognition, ears filled with the profound. No, this is nonsense, I must remain resolute. His thoughts, though of thought, spoken without breath, was yet heard as sound none the less, rippling through the fabric of hyper-Fantasy. Ah, fascinating, it would appear here the realms of the improbable, or rather, impossible, are the same as truths.

For the raccoon, however, she was not ready to embrace the collision against the Threshold, yet too proud and stubborn to look away. The impact was a rush of colors and sounds. Her voice box made a series of tones like a radio flipping through stations. Barely audible voices and shrieks could be heard from it, many of which not belonging to her. A shadow, or rather, a black image was cast behind her. It was a feminine silhouette, quite a bit taller than her, with unbridled waving hair. Its eyes opened, and three sets of arms stretched out over the cabin around the banded rascal.

"A̷̍͜s̷̡̈́ų̴̎r̵͈̐a̶̫͂.̵̳̄?" a voice beckoned to her.

"Wh-what did you say?" her voice cracking, startled further to actually hear her voice. It was not some cartoonish electronic fabrication of voice, nor the screech of an animal, but instead that of a woman, even if a bit coarse. She held a paw up to her throat, the disbelief wafting through her as she vocalized a bit. It was not exactly through her throat, exactly, but rather, the sounds she made, through her mind, were transformed into... her old voice. Profound. The last time such a phenomenon occured was when she was next to the Innovatium engine.

"C̴̟̿u̸̦͗r̴̡̒i̵̹̕o̴͍͘u̸͖̇s̸̳̈́e̸͖̒r̷̼̈́ ̶͔͂ȃ̶͖ṉ̶̂d̵̼́ ̷͎̕c̷͕͒ȕ̸̦ŕ̴̹i̵̡͘o̴̻̚ů̸͕ṣ̴̓e̷̲͆r̵͑͜...!" the voice returned, suddenly cackling with mad laughter. A third eye opens in the head of silhouette cast by Skitters, the third eye blue and having a club-shaped pupil. The figure begins to stretch out, forming a long grin, two large teeth up front and hints of jagged ones deep inside a dark maw. The other two eyes open, yellow, with horizontally slit pupils. Long ears became visible, along with the teeth, it appears to be some twisted rabbit-like creature. "G̴u̸e̵s̴s̷s̸s̶s̷s̸s̸S̸S̷S̴S̷s̴s̵s̴s̴t̸s̷!̴?̶ Guests for TEA!? Or are they... fools? T̶o̵ ̷b̸e̷ ̸t̸o̷r̴n̶ ̵a̴s̵u̷n̸d̵e̸r̴ ̸a̵n̸d̵ ̴c̵a̴s̸t̵ ̴t̷o̸ ̶t̸h̶e̶ ̷s̴e̵a̷!̶?̸"

Skitters turned and looked back to see half of the creature that had emerged from her shadow, now just loomed above her with a wide grin and big wild eyes. Of what could be seen, a long rabbit-like head with an expansive grin, sewn shut on the side, obscuring somewhat the jagged teeth within. Atop its head was a large top hat of eloquence only a true mad hatter could appreciate. Taken aback for only a moment, the tenacity of the raccoon won over her better judgement, and leered aggressively at the rabbit. The rabbit's jaw shut tight and expression blanked, ears drooping for a moment. Its nose wiggles for a moment, before it roars again with distorted maniacal laughter, it's immense jaws agape displaying a discolored maw.

"I see! I see! An ambition sparks within your soul... stoking the flames of a megalomaniacal heart! How frightening! How unsettling! How... fun! G̴y̷a̶h̴a̴h̶a̸h̸a̶h̷a̴!̷" the creature cackled once more. "We're all mad here! And here, the mad perseveres! And to the logistical? ...well... sucks to be them! But you, you... gyaha! Mad! Mad as a Mad Hare..! Caution to the wind, embracing the pandemonium! You will soon be shaped by it: mind, body, and soul!"

Grimms turned, shifting his attention to Skitters. From his perspective, he only saw her, standing there, spaced out, tensed up and confronting a blank wall. "What are you looking at, little one?"

She looked over at him, her glare perplexed by his lack of reaction to the thing behind her, but looking back, she saw nothing but a blank wall as well. She knew, however, that it was no figment... even now she could still feel the heat of its breath lingering in the air. She turns back, and after staring at Grimms for a moment, she finally spoke again. "Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore." she said softly, as one of her eyes twitches briefly.

"...what?"

No one would have believed that, since the first mortal of fantastic origin was brought existence by the young Creators, that sapient affairs were being watched from the timeless gulfs of space. Perhaps from those damn aliens from the red planet and neighbouring galaxies, yes, but the idea of an intelligence infinitely greater and nastier than man, woman or in between studying them with the utmost hatred was lost on the vast majority of all sentient life in the Imagiverse. Of course, the Hand Druids knew of said intelligence, as well as the blissful ignorance of the rest of the sentients, and kept it a closely-guarded secret, that is, until they were greeted by their first and, as of currently, only visitor, who was of less skin than any living thing should be...
And yet, across the infinite gulfs of deep space, a near-omnipotent being, chained to the rim of the universe like the beast it was, regarded all beings of Creation with immeasurable hatred. To attempt to fully understand the extent of it's rage, think of someone you really, really hated, so much so that you would locate them on every piece of social media, every article, every scrap of conversation, and vent your utmost abhorrence in stunning length, send them messages filled with venom and vitriol, and never avert your attention from them. Can't think of anyone? Well, in which case, merely consider this scenario, then multiply it a thousand-fold. Then, you might have an inkling on how much the malignant being despises all that is formed of Fantasy, of the Maker's dreaming.
And slowly, and surely, the Maelstrom drew its plans against the Imagiverse, or, specifically, against the minuscule capsule, with a small crew of insignificant mortals, that was reaching it's realm of influence...
Stars. But not stars. A whirling sea of colours, some from the rainbow, but others that corresponded to no pigments of the mortal eye. A whirling sea of Creation, forming and unforming into ghastly creatures, faces howling in unnatural frequencies. There were no stars in this realm. Nothing but Creation, the burning waves of a mad god's restless dreaming.
Of course, the passengers could not properly see into the sea, as it burned to even glance outside. What they could see, however, was that the porthole was now a screaming mouth, contorting and shivering inhumanely. There were more coming out of the walls, the metal now slowly resembling flesh. Out in the corridor, voices whispered, forming a susurrus which haunted the ship.
From the gramocon, there was a brief noise, somewhere between a scream and a wild laugh, before it abruptly stopped. Jack was hiding under the covers of his bed. The others were staring at the walls. Max had attempted to fight back the faces, but stopped when one bit him.
None of them bothered to ask the most commonly-asked question in these situations, which was "what the hell is going on?", because they were already given the answer prior; the wild currents of an ancient Imagination was distorting the reality around them. There was an affliction associated with space travel, similar to cabin fever, referred to as space madness, in which long periods of travelling the empty, infinite planes eventually wear down a man's resolve and causes him to turn against his crewmates. This, however, was the term approached from another, terrible angle; it wasn't them that were going mad, it was time and space itself.

Vragi relaxed slowly, feeling (wrongly) that he had acclimatized to the threshold’s effects.

-Well, this isn’t so bad- he mouthed as he untied his makeshift blindfold. Unfortunately, rather than making any sound, the words appeared as glowing runes in the air just a few inches in front of him. He cleared his throat.

“Apologies, I meant to say, well this-” as he began repeating himself each rune changed from its pale silvery hue to a deep crimson as he spoke, “…isn’t so…bad.” The now ruddy symbols each disappeared with various sounds, one of which was something like a lost sock meowing.

He stared at one of the runes, which had stubbornly refused to give up its brief existence. The thing seemed to be staring him down. Reaching out a hand, the dwarf poked the glyph experimentally.

There was a rush of something around Vragi, as if the air were about to pounce on some unsuspecting prey, and his hair seemed to stand up on its own accord. With a bouquet of iridescent sparks, a wave of forceful energy scraped across his body and launched the poor dwarf across the room, slamming him into the wall. The rune, thankfully, did go away. From the look of it.

“OK, I take that back.” He muttered, as his goggles began to glitter merrily contorting and shifting into a quite unpleasant creature vaguely like a sea-cucumber which dropped to the floor and was promptly squashed by the startled smith.

“Those were my best pair…” he lamented, waddling to his pack which he rummaged through, to find a spare.

While he was doing this he was oblivious to the unsettling transfiguration of the ship’s fabric, so that when he re-emerged donning a pair of rather bright lime-green goggles (they’d all changed appearance under the threshold’s influence) He was immediately hit with the...scene.

He walked silently up to the wall, and poked it.

"Should I try feeding it the slug? Hm? Are you alright?" he asked the raccoon, apparently oblivious to whatever she'd encountered

"Uh..? Wh..." she mumbled, a bit confused as she shifted her gaze to the dwarf. There was a moment of silence from her until she let out a short laugh. "Am I alright? What? Do you think this little disturbance bothers me much?" she says, folding her two set of forelimbs. "So the very air around us is going mad, so what? To me this space, this subcon-manifestation anomaly of hyper-fantasy... it is to me a sign, an opportunity, my rapture, my-"

A horrific distorted laughing face on the hull interrupted her, getting up in her face with its warped voice passing all through the vocal spectrum... and beyond. With a swift motion she punches it across the cheek,distorting its features even more... and apparently dislodging a tooth from it.

"S-stop laughing!" she screamed, looking a bit manic. "They all laughed, I know they did, all with that 'oh that poor girl'! And then there's that performance arts... dancer girl, whatever... oh, how they all loved her! News flash! Everybody can dance! It isn't special!" she continued in a wild rant, grabbing the face by the ears and laughing back at it.

"Miss, please, control yourself, the Threshold is affecting you," Grimms chimed in, trying to calm her down.

"Oh? You think I'm mad? 'Oh poor thing, not right in her head,' is that it? Do you pity me!?" she said, as she released the... wall face... and looked to Grimms with crazed eyes, aglow with a misty green light as a few tendril reveal themselves from her back. With no hesitation she leapt from the ground onto Grimms, who stood perfectly still as the little mutant began to crawl and peck at his head. "So calm and confident!, always looking down! What makes you tick, hm!? Bet you're the most deranged of the lot! Who in their right mind wears such horrific things as this mask!? Does nothing hurt you!? Do you even feel anymore!?" she rants, taking shots at him making metal clunks with each strike, until reaching around for his mask. Inadvertently, in doing so, she singes her hands, causing her to yell and fall back, causing Grimms to try to grab her, but instead only grabs her bandana mask. Catching herself, she blew her hands a bit, shaking them, then glared up at Grimms, her lower jaw having what seems to be wire wrapped around it. A fissure ran down near center of her lower jaw, the wire seeming to be what is keeping it together, and there was a blackness to her mouth. Her eyes jittered a bit before resting eyes on Grimms's hand holding her handkerchief, her eyes widening in horror. She gasped, twitched nervously, and tried to cover her face.

"I'm sorry, I only meant to catch you so you wouldn't hurt yours-" Grimms began to say, cordial as usual, but she hissed and leapt up to snag the cloth back, hastily wrapping it over her face, avoiding eye contact from anybody, even the maddened aberrations littering the ship's interior. "Perhaps you should have that looked at," he said, but she was unresponsive, holding the cloth over her face. "And hm..? Weren't you shorter than Mr. Odd before?"

The volunteers would be interrupted by a blood-curdling cry, coming from the fourth bed. Once unoccupied, now it held the vague shape of some sort of humanoid being with fin-like ears and huge, bulging eyes, like that of a mutated goldfish, batting at invisible demons with one claw and clutching the bedsheet with the other. Continuously, it cried out in terror, "No! Get back! Get back! You can't take me! No no no- AAARGH," before it abruptly vanished, the bedsheet deflating into its original shape.
Perhaps unbeknownst to the volunteers, that was not the only phantom currently haunting the ship. The numerous, unoccupied cabins rang with the cries of dozens of different throats. Another phantom ran down the main corridor, which was now bending and swaying as if it were a snake in motion, towards the now incandescent technicoloured light of the engine, crying out, "Turn off the engine! Turn off-" before it too would vanish. As time knotted, and reality crumbled amidst the crashing waves of the Threshold, spacefaring souls that were imprisoned within the Edge, unable to find their way to the afterlife, were forced to relive their last moments within the twisting bulk of the S.S Victoria.

Meanwhile, within the bridge, Jonathan had now partially recovered his senses enough to determine the direction they needed to travel. This is proving to be difficult, as most of the dials and buttons have now crawled from the control panel, now dotted around the walls and the floor; he was now left with only the basic controls needed to sail the ship, but with impaired awareness of the ship's conditions in terms of valve pressure and gathered heat.
With a front-seat view of the prismatic hell of the Threshold, it would come to surprise to many, including himself, that he was still at least partially coherent in the face of maddening circumstances. Those who have known him long enough (this also included himself), however, would surmise that this was mainly because he had already passed the madness horizon long ago and had reached the opposite side of the spectrum from the wrong way; in short, he is now in possession of a very special type of sanity, one built out of the fragmented pieces of his broken mind, sane thoughts constructed out of insane components.

As the dislodged tooth arced through the twisting space of the room, Vragi made a dive and just caught the strange apparition. He proceeded to peer at the curiosity from different angles, tapping and shaking it questioningly. Perhaps he wasn’t entirely absorbed in his own world though, as he did at least glance at his fellow volunteers.

In fact, he did spin round when his full attention was won by Grimms’ accidentally revealing Skitters’ face, though a slight grave look passed over his own and he looked away, deciding not to pursue the subject.

Luckily for him, this threshold was by no means short of surprises as he was almost immediately greeted by their strange new guest. He rushed over to the phantom, the bubbling stew of questions within the dwarf’s head literally making his ears steam like a kettle. Unfortunately, any hope of interrogating the poor soul was cut short, so he shrugged and got back to examining the strange tooth. Well, assuming it hadn’t already either vanished or become some other oddity.

"Ah, these are... people? Our predecessors?" Mr. Grimms commented as he observed the phantasms as they all screamed and ran in distress, his tone being a bit more grim than usual. There was sympathy in the fiery giant's eyes an motions. "I cannot tell if they are alive or dead, if this is a mere recording of their final moments, or their personal essence is preserved? I wonder if they can be saved somehow."

"If they are alive, they are as good as dead, or maybe worse, constantly in a chronological flux, reliving the end on repeat. On the off-chance you could recover them they would never be the same again," Basalah muttered, still trying not to make eye-contact with anyone.

"I would've assumed you would be in favor of living in spite of conditions," Grimms retorted, causing the creatures hair to bristle.

"What does it matter, anyways? Better to look out for number one in these kind of situations, because I'm not going through that again for some randos. Besides, they knew what they were getting themselves into," she grumbled.

"Did you?" he asked bluntly.

The pompous raccoon wrinkled her nose, and tensed up her claws into fists, wanting to retort, to yell back, but the words failed her. He keeps reading me like one of his damn books! she thought, puffing up as her hair stands on ends. She wanted to tell him what for, put him in his place, tell him it was easy for him because he ended up strong because of it.

"Frankly, my dear, smart as you are, you're a real spitfire. You are far too vain, too jealous, and too angry," Grimms said. She turned and glared at him. "Honestly, if that weren't the case, you'd be quite charming with that energy and ingenuity of yours. You're not even that bad off, that jaw of yours can be treated."

She froze, confusion took its course, that giant again won a round of psychological chess with her. She couldn't say anything, not to him at least, and she couldn't remain angry at this point. In fact, somehow, she felt... rather sobered. She huffed and scurried over to the gramocon.

"Please tell me we're about clear of this madness, the apparitions are just getting worse... and I think my blanket is slithering up the wall... not really sure how to feel about that," she said rather calmly, a tone that was only half-serious. "Oh, and... I'm talking without the box now, surprise~!"

Something in the distance would catch Jonathan's eye. To a more unordered and easily-confused mind (that is, a living mind inhabiting a lump of wrinkly muscle), the faint twinkle in the searing abyss would have easily passed as part of the visual chaos. John, however, blessed as he was by peculiar foresight, took it as a metaphysical lighthouse, leading him into the clear and away from the jagged space-time rocks that awaited his precious vessel. Relieved, he resolved to reassure his crew on the awaiting closure of this moment of madness.

The gramocon curled like a waking snake. A metallic honk emitted from it's flared mouth before a distorted voice said, reassuringly, "wibble wibble sneep, snill fibble gibble zib snip snip. Gib gib flib flibble vip-" before the piping, hidden within the tormented hull of the ship, tied itself into a knot and prevented anything else to pass through. Just outside the cabin, a gibbering phantasm was scratching the walls, as if trying to peel away the hull in a desperate attempt to escape.
Meanwhile, in the opposite cabin, Max was standing on a struggling Jack's shoulders, yelling into the resisting gramocon. "John! I know you can hear me in there! How much longer have we got? I'm up to here with the f____ing wall-faces! You hear me?"
"Wibble wibble sneep, snill fib-"
"Don't you give me that shit, you good-for-nothing bonebag! I'm gonna keep screaming into this gods-damned trunk until you give me-"
The tone of the engine's moaning rose. Before he could react, the vessel accelerated rapidly, causing Max to fall off Jack's shoulders. And onto Fancy Pants.

The Imagiverse occupies one half of a spherical universe, as to make it easier for humans to comprehend it's structure. On one hemisphere, Reality operates like clockwork under laws of physics and logic, while on the other, Fantasy manifests all dreams and imaginings of the inhabitants of a blue planet. As you get closer to the equator, where the two hemispheres touch, the two dimensions begin to mix, adopting certain aspects from each other. For Reality, this means inexplainable phenomenon that does not correlate with the known physical laws. For Fantasy, this means that beings of a Fantastic nature are less able to survive, as they reach a no-man's land untouched by Creators and inhabited by unknown terrors. The equator, otherwise known as the Rim or Creator's End, is, theoretically, an area of spacetime where the ratio of Fantasy and Reality is equal, although it is uncertain what this means in practice. It is very likely this is in no way good.

Alone in the cold depths of deep space, a metallic shape glides, trailing a blue, shifting mist behind it. With the exception of the occasional nebula, the Edge is seemingly barren. Where the Outer Centre was rife with strange activity, the Edge was bleak and unpleasant. What was once nearly certain, is now rife with uncertainty.
Within the hull of the S.S Victoria, a warbling song plays through the multiple mouths of the gramocom, serving only to punctuate the uneasy quiet. This near-cessation of noise, save for the almost-oppressive hum of the engine, was initially taken as an improvement of the invasive smorgasbord of noises that filled the Threshold. Now, as the excitement dissipated, it only grew more profound.
The volunteers, once again, have a moment of peace before they reach a suitable world to explore. The present enigma stands; how will they spend this moment?

The silence pounding on Vragi's ears like a particularly uncomfortable cabin pressure was thankfully broken by song lilting through the speakers. Mind slightly more at ease, the dwarf took a moment to ponder all of... whatever they had just been through. Although thinking about it might not have been wise, his thoughts immediately turned to the mysterious phantoms. The chaos around them may have worn off for now but as usual a flock of questions raced around his head like seagulls caught in a storm that had just started raining chips.

“Whatever those spectral folk were,” he mused, “it’s a right shame they couldn’t have stayed longer. The knowledge I’ll bet they could tell. Oh, er, not that I would want them to keep suffering like that or anything.” He added hastily, “I meant more, it’s a shame they were in those circumstances, whatever exactly those were.”

He scratched his head in shame. He wasn’t lying, it was more a case of tactlessness.

The raccoon, or rather, what had taken the body of one, now spent time in a corner to herself, grooming herself to a small hand mirror, as best she could with a varmint's form. She wasn't prettying up, however, but studying the extent of her... transformation. The exposure had given back her voice, the box no longer necessary for communication, aside from that, she had become a little taller, and her coat now had a more silvery sheen to it. The tendrils on the back of her head, as well as down her back had become more visible, resembling black hair. No change can occur without adversity, she thought to herself. And that was quite adverse. She put down the mirror and hopped off from the bed, heading to the door.

"Strange... I have this strange feeling of déjà vu," Grimms said as he stood motionless in front of a porthole. He caught a glimpse of Basalah, as she preferred to be called, slinking out the door. He said nothing, as she exited, and simply turned back to look out the porthole again. "Getting a bit of cabin fever, I imagine," he said.

She had not turned to go to the engine, but rather, she was in search of the rest of the crew, in hopes that would give her something to do for the remainder until they hit some form of land, hoping that some even existed.