metaverses | CRISIS ON INFINITE DREAMWIDTHS: EVENT END

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!event end

CRISIS ON INFINITE DREAMWIDTHS: EVENT END

AT THE END OF THE WORLD

The sound isn't unlike thunder when the universe begins to crack apart. Loud, thrumming thuds that tear the sky and the fabric of reality. The nexuses are being stomped out, engulfed back into the void one by one.

Characters may be in these nexuses as they're slowly engulfed by the cracks. Some may be saying they're final goodbye's to old friends, new friends, or simply watching as the apocalypse descends on whichever world they're in.

And then, just before they're about to fall into oblivion - they're snatched away.

IN CENTRAL CITY —

Outside The Alliance HQ, Chaos Gate and the Silent Mystic stand with their eyes tightly shut, hands linked together as one. Above you the sky has turned a deep crimson. The crack is a yawning chasm as buildings are torn apart brick by brick, falling into the abyss.

If something isn't done soon then you're all dead.

This world is a nexus and this can't be changed, but it can be pulled from the 'between' it has fallen into, and restored to its proper place. This will require an enormous amount of energy. The mystics bid the gathered to join hands: they ask you to remember their world, the one they left behind and tether this world to it. Your strongest memories may bleed out, giving the people around you a glimpse of who you are, what you were.

The universally displaced are here with you. This is a last mingle opportunity. The comm will remain open so people can continue to play any threads they didn’t get a chance to during the run of the event. They too can join hands and share their memories, but as they are not tied to this dimension, when it’s restored they will either return to their own worlds or the nexuses they left behind.

CONNECTION —

Everything goes dark.

It feels endless, swallowing your sight as well as all sound as it closes in. Slowly, glowing threads begin to appear, tying one person to the next, then to the next, and so on. Only those who are linked to Metaheroes are tied with these golden glowing threads. The threads flow down to their feet and then shoot up towards the sky.

There's a boom, different to the thunderous cracks of before. The sky rushes back into place, day and night speeding by as it hurries to realign itself to the proper date and time. It's dizzying, for a moment, before it begins to feel grounding. Right.

The air feels different. Fresher, somehow. The sky is brighter; the world seems fuller, like it has been allowed to become what it should have been all along. A cheer goes up. The people are elated, relieved to see the sun again.

Players may be troubled should they have ventured into other worlds. They have seen the nexuses that have fallen to ruin, know how they too once felt exactly like this.

THE WORLD CONTINUES TO TURN —

The world has been restored to its proper place. Interdimensional communication is coming through again. The Guilds, exhausted as they were putting fires out across the non-meta cities, are relieved. Perhaps this is finally over.

With the return of interdimensional communication comes the return of interdimensional travel as well. This technology has been used in this world before; it was only with the advent of the recent powerful Confluences that it all went dark. Now that it’s back, the Guilds start to make plans immediately. It will take a little time to organize everything, but once they have a system in place, it shouldn’t be too difficult to locate everyone’s home universes and return them there. They set a tentative date for September 4th to start trying to return everyone home.

That being said, the government is none too happy with any of this. The Guild Systems were put into play by two metahumans who wanted the best for the world, as a means to protect them from those who would do them harm. Years have been spent slowly wrestling control from those two and now there is an opportunity.

Behind the scenes a storm is brewing. If they can spin this to blame the Unaligned then perhaps they have no more need for the Guilds. The Society is a thorn in their side that they’d like to finally be rid of, but they’re essentially untouchable. The Unaligned, however, are flagrantly breaking the law. Constantly putting themselves in the spotlight, making it all too easy to yank the rug out from under the metahuman leaders.

How wonderful for them that these strangers from away have made such a wreck of the trust in the systems that protected the metahumans of this world.

Mechanima is all too aware that things are about to go to hell. The Society is welcoming all metahumans, regardless of moral alignment, to join them. It is heavily encouraged among the rumor mill that the Unaligned should start reconsidering their position.

As the days go on, things begin to change across Meta.

Excelsior has become vehemently anti-metahuman. While this outrage may pass, they’re passing new AI laws in rapid succession. Limitations on what AI can and can’t inhabit. Limitations on robot bodies, on mechanical prosthetics, on the research that can be done into what gives things the spark of life. Magic is essentially forbidden within the city. Any abilities that can be mistaken as magic are treated as suspect.

Sunset Falls is worse for wear. Yet the people remain as grateful as ever to the metahumans who stepped in to save them. That gratitude outweighs any fear that they could have caused this - Sunset Falls has disasters all the time that have nothing to do with interdimensional weirdness. They continue to be unbothered by the metas among them.

Central City, having witnessed all the off-world metas stepping in to save them, is oddly grateful for this - but they haven’t forgotten what happened. The disappeared are among them again and are unharmed despite their sojourn through the universe, but the fact that it happened at all is cause for concern. Confluences are a problem. They want answers, they want solutions.

Little Love remains untouched and unchanged.

I DREAM A DREAM SO PRETTY —

Two days after the apocalypse is averted, every off-world meta will find a pillow lying on their doorstep. It doesn’t matter who you are or where you live - one of these pillows will find its way to you.

If you’re quick or wary enough, you may be able to catch a glimpse of the being that placed it there: a figure clad in blue robes. They’ll appear seemingly out of nowhere and lay the pillow down before vanishing into dust. Should they happen to notice they’ve been spotted, they’re clearly started, and lay a finger to their lips before departing.

Atop the pillow is a note: an invitation from the Dreamers of the Willow Maiden. You would have undoubtedly heard of this group: they have a presence in this world, though their reputation’s benign. They’re oddballs and weirdos, but ultimately harmless. They believe in the power of a good night’s sleep - literally.

If the note is to be believed, then the Willow Maiden herself has requested an audience with you, and this audience can only be granted in the world of dreams. Should you accept this offer, the note explains, all you need to do is lay your head upon this enchanted pillow. Sleep will come to you quickly.

Your dreams will be extremely vivid. There are recurring themes bleeding through them: your greatest accomplishment juxtaposed with your greatest failure. The moment you could have acted but stayed still. Highschool embarrassments. Falling. Flying. Here in your own dreamscape, you’ve got more control than anywhere else; you feel as though you can do anything. But beware: these dreams grab for you, both the nightmares and the fantasies. It can be easy to lose yourself and forget what exactly is real.

Luckily, the dreams grab for others as well. Sleeping metas may find themselves involuntarily wandering into one anothers’ dreams. Visitors to a dreamscape don’t have any powers outside of what they normally would, but they can reach out to the dream’s host, should they want to.

If no one else arrives, don’t worry. She is patient and waiting, and doesn’t mind that you stumble. Fall too far into the abyss, and she’ll reach out her hand to steady you.

THE WILLOW MAIDEN —

As you find your way out of the haze of your subconscious with uour allies at your side, the Willow Maiden greets you. She is a massive tree nymph, long-limbed and wooden. She is curled against an enormous tree, looking like a statue. At your approach, she lifts her head from the crook of her arm and extends a hand in greeting. Her smile is warm and motherly. You may feel distrust, but that feeling of safety and protection that guided you home radiates from her.

“You from a far away land, come to this world and made its own.” Her wooden lips don’t move, the words echo through your soul itself. “I can do little for you now but issue warning. Danger is waiting in the dawn, in the shine of her sword. You won this battle, your strength and the strength of all those you have touched has saved you… but she is coming.

She is coming.

“My time is short… your words cannot reach me as you are now. Carve yourselves a new future. One in this world and all others. Dream, and in those dreams, you shall become more powerful than even she can stand. My gift is the gift of new life, new lives, new futures… I have shielded you from her gaze until I could no longer bear it and now… I must rest. May the next time we met be true conversation.”

The Willow Maiden lays her head back down on the curve of her arms. Within moments, she’s asleep.

You wake. Not with a start, but as though you’ve been gently roused from a deep and restful sleep. The dreamsharing effect lingers, and can reoccur off and on throughout the month of September, but you will not find your way to the Willow Maiden’s realm again.

IN SUMMARY.

The fourth wall ends in a near apocalypse. Characters will have a chance to say goodbye while the metaphorical walls are closing in. They will be pulled back from the brink at the last second.

Through the collective effort of metaenergy, Metaheroes will rejoin the multiverse, tethered to the worlds which playable characters come from.

As a result, there's tentative optimism that characters will be able to go home

Anti-meta sentiment is growing across Excelsior, and within governing bodies. Government officials will begin looking to blame Unaligned heroes for various crimes and disturbances.

It's a good time to pick a side. Or don't.

Amidst all this, The Willow Maiden invites players to Meta's first dream share event. The dreaming effect lingers and characters may find themselves intermittently sharing dreams throughout September.

However pleasant this is, however cathartic - it doesn't change that things are tense in the waking world. The Willow Maiden's warning will ring in your ears, too: who is coming?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

i. memories

a: daedalus

[The first memory is calm, ordinary. Otto doesn't look much younger in it, but somehow he seems far less worn. The actuators aren't present, nor are his glasses, and he moves far more easily than he does nowadays.

Really, it could be a completely unremarkable memory, except that the young man he's meeting introduces himself as Peter Parker.

Otto's a little sharp with him at first. He obviously didn't want a student in his lab right now to begin with, and the way Connors described the boy didn't leave the best of first impressions. He's a little embarrassed about that, in retrospect, but how was he to know at the time? Nonetheless, he quickly warms to the boy as he proves to be every bit as brilliant as his friend Harry promised. They end up sharing a meal together with Otto's wife - the famed Rosie, for anyone he's talked to about her. It's a pleasant lunch -

"Rosie, our new friend thinks I'm gonna blow up the city."

- if, again, a little ominous in retrospect.

He then proceeds to give Peter romantic advice about poetry. As Doc Ock does, you know.]

b: arachnophobia

[The shape of these memories are different. They present themselves as if from multiple perspectives, several different moving angles merging into what must be something of a disorienting gestalt.

One memory of this sort begins with Otto alone, perched on the side of a skyscraper. He looks far more like the man he is today; the actuators are here, watching alongside him. In the distance, a red dot swings its way towards him.

"Where is she?" Spider-Man demands when he arrives. But Otto brushes the question aside. They fight, eventually falling from the tower to land on top of a moving train, where the fight continues. As brutal as it gets, Otto almost appears to be making a game of wearing Spider-Man down - tossing random commuters around for him to catch, and nearly deliberately sending the entire train hurtling off a bridge. With a dad joke as he does it, of course. Some things stay the same.

It's only after the train is successfully stopped that he boards again, shoving the civilians aside to knock out Spider-Man with a single blow and cart him off. Looks like the octopus man won this round!

Or perhaps you see another memory, Otto destroying cars and crushing the concrete bridge beneath them as he approaches yet another Spider-Man. He ignores the fires bursting out behind him, the civilians fleeing their burning vehicles on foot; in spite of it all, he's almost calm, greeting this boy by name:

"Hello, Peter."

But the veneer of civility quickly falls away. There's still the odd joke - "You wanna play games? Catch!" as he flings a car with a screaming family inside at the hero, sending all of them over the side of the bridge down towards the river - but there's an edge here that he didn't have on the train. There's no more reason to hold back. This time, he's clearly trying to kill Spider-Man - Peter - where he stands.]

ii. nightmares

a: icarus

[Otto has had many failures of late. But, of course, they all stem from his one great disaster.

He stands in front of a machine that contains a blazing ball of light and plasma, like a miniature sun. Though he's trying frantically with the actuators to control it, it's plainly slipping out of control - flares of energy burst out almost faster than he can contain them, dragging in shards of metal and glass from somewhere beyond.

Distantly, a woman screams.]

Rosie?

[Otto tries to turn, but he can't. The sun is growing, the heat blistering his skin. He can't stop, or it'll get worse. More than that, it's almost as if he's physically unable - he moves as if to try anyway, but the actuators keep right on at their work, and he can't drag them away.]

Rosie? Rosie!

[Cold water begins to rush into the room, flowing dark around his ankles at first, then beginning to rise.]

b: iatrophobia

[This nightmare is muddled and hazy, far more dreamlike than the majority of these waking dreams. Otto wakes facedown on an operating table. The room sways around him, filled with blinding light. He doesn't seem entirely with it, as if he's been drugged - but it doesn't take more than a second for him to see that there's nearly a dozen corpses strewn about the room. Doctors and nurses in blue scrubs, torn apart and slashed; some left bloody marks across the floor where they tried to drag themselves away.

He shouts in wordless horror, trying to get up, but his knees buckle beneath him. The actuators step in instead, carrying him bodily out of the room. But no matter where he goes, every room of the hospital is strewn with more bodies. There's blood on his hands, on his hospital gown. There's blood on the floor, the actuators leaving red prints everywhere they touch down.

Panicking and only barely lucid, he still tries to flee. Where's the exit? He can't think straight, can barely see, and there's so many bodies - ]

iii. wildcard

(( hit me on lluosogrwydd to plot something else! ))

[ ... Jeez. It's one thing to hear Otto allude to his Doc Ock days in that apologetic, sort of ashamed way that he does, but it's another thing to see him in action. When he's in full-on Villain mode, Otto is friggin' scary. It's not so much the actuators wrecking havoc and smashing their way through everything, it's the way that he's willing to throw random civilians around as distractions, and even casually sabotage an entire train full of people to make a getaway.

Doreen is suddenly very, very glad that she never had to fight her universe's Doc Ock.

It's hard not to think of Kraven the Hunter back home, and how horrified she'd been once she read his rap sheet at the police station ("Sergei 'Kraven' Kravenoff, you killed Spider-Man?!" "He got better!"). But... Kraven had meant it when he said that he was trying to be a better person, and she's never seen Otto be this casually cruel before, so... he probably meant it too. She hopes.

Man, she wishes that Kraven were here. Maybe they could start a support group or something. ]

You, uh... you really weren't kidding about the dad jokes, huh?

[ 'You have a train to catch', oof! ]

...Doreen.

[If it helps, Otto is just full-body cringing. He'd been standing on the train behind his past self, watching the memory play out with muted horror. It's nothing new, of course. It wasn't even that long ago. But this is different. What he remembers is his experience of it at the time, filtered through the lens of who he'd been. He hadn't cared about those people he threw from the train, hadn't given a second thought to a single other person. He hadn't been able to recall any of their faces, hadn't taken notice of the screams. Standing here now, in his right mind, and seeing it all over again...

It's sickening. The complete disregard - how could he have just done that? How did it all feel so right?

As his past self leaps away, he and Doreen are both pulled along, forced to watch the train speed off without them. Otto reaches out instinctively to grab onto the building facade with his claws, just as his past self is doing now. But as Doc Ock starts leaping from building to building, following the runaway train, he lets go and allows himself to just be dragged behind. It's only a memory.]

I...I'm sorry. This was...not one of my better moments, to say the least.

[He glances sidelong at his past self, who seems to be having a marvelous time actually! Watching Spider-Man try to stop a train with his body! Otto follows his gaze, grimaces, and elects to just look very hard at a building across the street. The actuators are coiled close to his body - sensing his distress, but obviously still not understanding why.]

Though it was actually quite remarkable, what he did down there.

No kidding. He's amazing.

[ It really is something else, watching Spider-Man in action. Doreen's always been a Spidey fan - hell, she had some of his merch when she was a little kid - but seeing him fight up close like this, dodging tentacles so he can get up close to land some punches, using the environment to his advantage, swinging in and out of the train like an acrobat, and finally just putting his whole body on the line to stop the train in it's tracks...

... part of her keeps waiting for some backup to arrive. Something this big in the middle of New York would draw attention back home, someone would show up, whether it was another Spider-person, that firey dude from the Fantastic Four, or one of the backup Avengers. But this Spider-Man doesn't have anyone else, does he? Just the thought of it makes her frown.

That said, she recognizes a conversational deflection when she hears one, and he ain't getting out of it that easily. ]

... What made you stop?

[Despite himself, Otto does watch Peter pull the train to a halt a second time, lips thinning. Truly an incredible feat. But it's something he never should've been forced to do in the first place.

As anonymous hands gently pull a limp Spider-Man into the train, Doc Ock starts down the building and back towards the bridge. Otto turns to look properly at Doreen for a second, the first time he really has.]

...do you see how the lights in the actuators were red, back then?

[His past self's moving, because of course he can't be helpful right now, but Otto reaches out with an actuator as if to catch one of the past versions anyway. The light inside his claws are white, as they've always been since Doreen met him.]

Those are indicator lights. Means there's significant problems with a critical function. The accident that fused them to my spine also destroyed the safety device I'd built to prevent their A.I. from influencing my own mind. I stopped because another Spider-Man was able to contain me long enough to replace it.

[He frowns as they start to ascend the bridge supports. It's all true, to the letter, but he doesn't...quite like the way it sounds. So pat. Like he'd just been a helpless victim of circumstance. It doesn't feel right.]

I don't want to make excuses for myself. I knew the chip was broken. And they weren't controlling me, exactly, I just couldn't - [He breaks off, shaking his head, jaw tight.] I should have done more. I was an arrogant fool, if I'd only listened to him, none of this would have happened at all! It was my fault, not theirs.

... Damn.

[ That may be the first time Otto's ever heard her swear, at least in English, but... man, what else is there to say? That explanation certainly fills in some big gaps. Doreen pauses for a few seconds to gather her thoughts, and then takes a deep breath. ]

... Okay, I get not making excuses, because this is pretty bad, but it does kinda sound like you were also working with a brain injury and a malfunctioning AI system with the 'check engine' lights on. Mixed metaphor, but my point stands.

Either way, it doesn't sound like you want to do anything like this again, and that in itself is pretty important. Trust me, I've fought a lot of supervillains, and a lot of people never get that far - they get to the point where they can look back on their actions, and then just double down on 'em, because deciding to change is too scary. So go easy on the self-loathing, okay?

Do you have failsafes in place to stop the safety device from getting janked up again? Is the Spider-Man who helped you here?

[ BECAUSE, LIKE... DOREEN'S WILLING TO HELP IF IT EVER COMES TO THAT, BUT SECOND-YEAR COMPUTER SCIENCE CAN ONLY GO SO FAR... ]

You're too kind.

[Doc Ock storms into the train car, forcing his way in amid twisted metal and shattered glass. The people there try to protect Spider-Man, who's clearly only barely standing now, but he viciously pins them all against the walls.

It's true that he had neurological damage even outside of the A.I. situation. He had it officially diagnosed in this world, but he'd known long before that. It was the obvious explanation for his sudden sensitivity to light, his pains and migraines, even some of the emotional volatility. Common, after an accident like his.

He watches Spider-Man give himself up to protect the passengers, and get knocked out with a single blow. Whatever was wrong with Otto to get him there, he can hardly help but hate himself for letting it.]

Yes, he's here. I've walked a few other people through the designs as well. I don't want it to be entirely on him, if anything ever happens. But as far as additional failsafes go...

[He sighs, actuators drooping. Of course he's thought about it. Otto thinks a lot, really, about the fact that one computer chip is all that stands between him and this. Peter's version is an improvement on the original, built to stand up to the kinds of danger Otto faces now, but it's still only a small device. It could be damaged any number of ways.

But installing anything else isn't much easier.]

It's all a mess. It was a bolt of plasma in the back that did all of this. I've been to a few doctors here, and as far as anyone can tell, the original connections have...melted into my nervous system. Impossible to remove, and damn near impossible to modify.

[He lays a hand over the back of his neck as he speaks, a nervous gesture. The chip there isn't visible; he always wears shirts with high enough collars to cover it.]

It's a miracle that I'm as functional as I am now. I worry that trying to graft anything else on would only make things worse - if anyone could even manage the operation.

[Doc Ock's carrying Spider-Man's limp form away. Maybe it would only be right, for him to assume that risk in order to stop this from ever happening again. But Otto doesn't...really want to die so much anymore. He's built a decent life here. Even on his worst days, he knows it would hurt too many other people.]

No, I'm not.

[ Doreen has no poker face whatsoever, and can't hold back a sympathetic wince. Whether she's wincing at Spider-Man getting KO'd, or the thought of having something melted into your spine and nervous system isn't clear, but let's be honest, it's probably both. There's like a 30/70 ratio here in terms of sympathetic horror. ]

That... yeah, that sounds pretty risky. At least other people can help here, right? Not with operations, but I mean... I know your world doesn't have many super-people, but we've got a pretty great cross-section of tech wizards, literal wizards and superheroes here who can all help out if you need anything.

Yes, that's true.

[He smiles, though it's still rather forced. Though he's trying not to show it, it's obviously all an upsetting topic - to say nothing of the memory they're stuck in. That, at least, appears to be dissolving; apparently capturing Spider-Man was the main gist of this one.]

It does make me feel better. When I first got here, I'd hoped to stay away from anything too dangerous - I'm always a little worried something will happen to the new chip. But you can see how that's worked out. [Though he speaks like it happened to him, it's really all been Otto's own decisions to get involved. He just can't bring himself to stay on the sidelines anymore.] At least if anything did happen, it doubt anyone would let it get this far. That's one benefit of having to join a guild - I know the Alliance contains any members that go rogue.

[Otto would personally much rather be dealt with in-house, so to speak, by other off-world metas. He trusts them a lot more. Still, the Alliance is a solid insurance plan.]

He was fine, by the way. Showed up again that night to foil my plans.

Yeah, that sounds like him. Does whatever a spider can.

[ Does the theme song exist in his universe? That reference may not have landed. Whatever, not important.

Doreen reaches out and lightly punches him in the shoulder, broadcasting the move slowly and clearly enough that it hopefully won't set off any defensive protocols in the actuators. That would be awkward as hell, especially considering what they just watched! ]

But hey, Alliance aside, we got you, bud. You're good. This isn't gonna happen again.

[ because if it does, then by god, Otto is gonna get stopped by the power of friendship (and possibly a couple well-placed punches, depending on the circumstances). ]

Mmm. [Otto just nods; seems like it did not land.] He was going through a difficult time. I hope I didn't make it too much worse on him, in the end.

[Of course there's the whole "quit being Spider-Man briefly" thing. Otto doubts that was entirely because of him, though he probably didn't help. His death, though, and the way the future Peter had looked to see him again...he's concerned the boy blamed himself. Probably did, knowing Peter Parkers.

But there's little he can do for that now, save perhaps continuing to not die. The actuators allow the mock punch, though they are watching, and Otto smiles down at Doreen.]

Thank you. That - that means a lot to me.

[ Continuing to not die is a pretty good plan, all things considered! Doreen gives him a thumbs up in response, and grins. ]

It's all good! Just... don't beat yourself up about this too much, huh?

I wish Kraven were here. He's also doing the whole ex-supervillain thing, you guys could make a support group or something.

I'll do my best.

[It's hard not to beat himself up over it sometimes - hard not to feel like he doesn't deserve to not beat himself up. But time has helped. Otto felt so completely horrible when he first came to this world, but lately...it's gotten better. He still has his low moments, but they aren't as low, or as frequent. Time and company, he thinks.

Of course he's never heard of Kraven, but as the real world starts to fade back in around them, Otto arches his eyebrows as Doreen.]

Oh? Do you hang out with a lot of ex-villains?

otto octavius | mcu

arachnophobia (the first part!)

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arachnophobia (the train part)

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