text; un: higgs

[finalrequest]

I have a couple of questions for y'all, and I'd be much obliged if you could answer them.

1.) How many realities have you visited, and what were they like?
2.) What is the last thing you remember before coming here?

It probably goes without saying that I'm new around here. There's not much to say about myself, really. Name's the same as the username, this place is a step up from home; the usual, I'm sure.

[He makes it sound like he's been world hopping before but really he's just read a lot of science fiction.]

Comments

[morethanatrickster]

I've never heard the name. What does it mean to you?

[finalrequest]

Well, in Norse mythology, she and the mythological Loki had a bunch of kids together. Mythological kids, so they weren't normal.

The most normal one is a god of death, who as far as I know isn't an animal. There's also the world-enveloping serpent, the giant wolf...

Oh and I don't think Angrboda has anything to do with it, but there's also an eight-legged horse.

I don't know all of the stories by heart or anything so I couldn't tell you the details.

[morethanatrickster]

I can assure you I have no children.

[At least not that he's aware of.]

I know of no god of death, though I've an adopted sister known as the goddess of death, though that was her own claim. She did have a mount which happened to be a giant wolf. How in Heaven's name do mortals get things so wrong?

Odin rode an eight-legged horse, yes, but it existed when I was a boy.

[finalrequest]

It might have been a woman? I don't really recall; I know much more about Ancient Egyptian mythology than I do any other.

I think the name was Hel, if that helps at all.

I'm also going to spare you the full story about the horse if one detail is that off.

[morethanatrickster]

Lucky for them.

Her name was Hela. Hel is a place.

Morbid curiosity notwithstanding, I thank you.

You mentioned being familiar with more than one reality yourself. Tell me of yours.

I'm sorry for this infodump, this man never shuts up

[finalrequest]

Pluto is both the name of a god and a place in which the god inhabits in a different religion. Ancient peoples were creative like that with their death gods.

The reality I'm familiar with is more like two worlds layered together, as I've said before. There's the mortal world, the world of the living, and then there's the Beach. Think of it as an endless purgatory filled with sand, saltwater, and a lot of dead marine animals.

The cycle of life and death broke some fifty or so years ago. As a result, the dead can't move on to the afterlife. The only direction is back to the world of the living, where if they reach their bodies results in a creature invisible to the majority of people known as a BT.

Should the living come into contact with them, it causes a massive explosion capable of wiping out entire cities known as a voidout. So people burn bodies after death to sever the dead's tether to the living world.

Material from the Beach known as chiralium has blotted out the sky. It caused every satellite on Earth to stop working, and cut off contact with the outside world.

Oh, there's also the rain that ages anything it touches. Walk outside unprotected, and a person would be dead in minutes.

[morethanatrickster]

And just as like them to take credit for the naming.

And what caused this cycle to break, I wonder? Whose blunder and damned your world? And what does 'BT' stand for?

[finalrequest]

That would be the fault of the Extinction Entity, I'm sure. Though She never did tell me exactly what happened. She quite literally has the ability to wipe off all life on Earth, so it was Her doing.

BT stands for "Beached Thing". Like how marine life used to strand itself on beach shores, the BTs are stranded in the world of the living.

[morethanatrickster]

If that's the case, why didn't she do it? Why instead sentence the lot of you to this half-existence, living in fear of the dead you can't see?

Ah, quaint and profoundly creative.

[finalrequest]

Because She enjoys toying with people.

I would have thought the inspiration for the Norse trickster god would have gotten that. You really ARE different from your human-created counterpart.

[morethanatrickster]

Or others saw to it the humans saw me poorly.

There is a line between mischief and tyranny and your death god crossed it.

[finalrequest]

"Mischief" in mythology tends to be code for "toys with people in ways that vary from stealing all the spoons in the house to kidnapping and eating children" depending on the culture.

You know, standard tales for how to stay obedient in society.

I don't disagree, really, but She does still exist to end the world. There's nothing benevolent about the Extinction Entity.

[morethanatrickster]

If I understand correctly, the Norse saw me as a god of revolution and chaos, which I much prefer.

The world? Just the one?

[finalrequest]

That's the optimistic way of framing "trickster god", I suppose.

It might be the entire universe, I don't know. I guess if you're one of those "it's just one planet" folks it's not exactly important. It's not like there are that many people left alive on Earth to begin with.

[morethanatrickster]

There's nothing wrong with a bit of fun.

Ah, humans haven't encountered anything beyond their little world in your reality, then.

[finalrequest]

That, and there's no way to leave at all. Radar and satellite technology is useless.

The technology to launch rockets was lost along with most of the rest of human knowledge before I was born.

[morethanatrickster]

Oh, I'm sure it's somewhere, you need only find it. There are greater things out there than the pittance to be found on Earth.

[finalrequest]

I like your... well, I'm not sure if I'd call it optimism exactly, but it's appreciated nonetheless.

Unfortunately, even if it does exist, I'm a delivery man. Rockets to the mood are a bit out of my depth. I could tell you a lot about them, but that's about it.

[morethanatrickster]

Delivery men tend to get their hands on many, many things which, when brought together, could change everything. You have quite a lot of resources at your disposal.

[finalrequest]

You do have a point.

Problem is, even if there were people who could operate the technology still around, there's still the issue of the clousa blocking out everything. There was this thing that used to connect the world together like a big spider's web, and the chiralium in the atmosphere permanently cut communication.

I guess what I'm saying is that leaving might not be impossible, but return trips would be a disaster waiting to happen.

[He's not shooting the idea down so that's probably an improvement?]

[morethanatrickster]

Has no one devised an alternate means of communications?

[finalrequest]

Technology to do so has been lost. We DO have the Chiral Network, but that only spans the continent, not beyond it.

There's also only one ship left in the known world, and it's used to cross a lake; it can't exactly be moved.

I've never gone near the coast in the Western Region because of how dangerous it is, but I suppose it's possible someone has something that can cross the ocean stored away somewhere.

[morethanatrickster]

That sounds as though quite the adventure is in order.

[And one he would no doubt volunteer for, if he ever found himself in Higgs' world.]

Though I suppose that's neither here nor there, considering our present situation.

[finalrequest]

That's true enough.

We can't do much of anything about anyone's worlds while we're here.

[morethanatrickster]

No, we can't. I suppose we'll have to make the most of this one.