//------------------------------// // Epilogue // Story: Lost in a Terrifying World // by Erisn //------------------------------// It is a curious fact that even the eldritch gather and meet. It seems odd that beings with no sense of society or the need for social intercourse do such things. But they do commune, from time to time. They will converse, so far as we understand that word. But even more rarely, the eldritch gather. All of them. There is no reason for the communion, or at least none that we understand. There is no set time that must pass before all the eldritch join each other. Perhaps they have a signal. Perhaps the meeting can be called by the greatest of their number, or perhaps it is an authority granted to all. Maybe it is just coincidence that causes them to group. It is impossible to know. The Slender Man joined the gathering, and remained silent throughout. This was usual of him however, and those eldritch that knew him found nothing unusual. When the eldritch join together, they do not talk of interesting experiences, or acquaintances made, locations visited. In such numbers, they only care for one thing: the game. All their discussions revolve around killing, and the realities they had destroyed, or the destruction they had caused. There is no leader among them, but they nevertheless have rankings, of a sort. Some eldritch drift together, whether because they share similar traits, or because reside in similar realities, or simply because they appreciate some quality the others possessed. But a few groups in that wierd gathering are unique and special. The Slender Man listened to The Rake ‘speaking’. It was a small group he was among, filled with some of the greater Ancients, of which it has to be said The Rake was not one. Nevertheless, his mythology was linked closely to The Slender Man’s, and for that he was often recognized as one of them. They were legendary, even among their kind. Cthulu, Sithis, Fendahl, The Glow Cloud, Rovagug, that which is known as The Flying Spaghetti Monster, Azathoth…and The Slender Man. They all were known and revered for their accomplishments, and it was a mark of how high The Slender Man stood among them that The Rake was allowed to join. It boasted, of course. They all did. The Rake spoke it its way of worlds destroyed, despair driven into the hearts of many. Cthulu among that group seemed most appreciative, expressing appreciation as The Rake described a human world destroyed. The Slender Man listened impassively as The Rake talked of the countries that had fallen, one by one, launching desperate attacks against him before their people fled and their leaders died by its hand. He made no comment, but he seldom did. He was silent, listening, until The Rake mentioned a barn it had destroyed. It hadn’t been much. A farmer and wife had fled it long since, and it was the last remaining source of life in that continent. All it held were a few cows, some rats living among the filth. Oh, and a young pony. The Rake had killed that one slowly before it had moved on. At this, The Slender Man stirred. He moved, and so unusual was the event that The Rake fell into silence at once, and Cthulu ceased its appreciative comments as all of the eldritch focused their attention on The Slender Man. In fact, it wasn’t just that esteemed group that stopped to listen, but most of the entire gathering. The Slender Man seldom boasted of his accomplishments, preferring to his work speak for himself. But the times he did communicate always heralded victories over life that had been unheard of, deaths of realities, the greatest of civilizations wiped away. They waited for him to speak. They listened for a tale that would sprout legends of horror in itself, set the bar higher than it had ever been set before. The Slender Man was silent for a long time. And then he laid one hand on The Rake’s shoulder and began. ---- Nobody knows when the Great War of the eldritch ended. It is not a thing spoken of. Gods silence each other, and immortals fear to speak of that event. It is not a set point in time. You may even remember it, for the war was long and raged forever, and was over in the space of a heartbeat. It was a war in a place where time had no meaning, where beings fought with weapons we have no name for, and all that remained was nothing in the end. Some survived, of course. Such is the nature of war. Some remained, to destroy and consume, but others changed from The War, and forgot their game and their rules, and the nature of the eldritch, their common bond was dissolved. No one knows when that war ended, when battle ceased and silence reigned once again. No one knows, no being remembers. But all agree that The War started when the Slender Man ripped off The Rake’s head and used it to beat Cthulu into a protoplasmic mess. ---- Alone one being drifted through the nothingness. He had been wounded, hurt, but he had survived. He always survived. But his heart was not full of sadness or rage. He did not curse his existence as he had done so many times before, unconsciously railing against his very being. Instead, he simply drifted. Time had no meaning in this place. Eternity was captured, and time no longer flowed but swirled around him. He had forever, but he did nothing with it. Instead, he sat in that void, that nothingness, and thought. To be more accurate, he remembered. He dreamed. He remembered a face full of happiness. He remembered a smile, a voice. He remembered someone calling him friend. And he dreamed of a day when he might hear that voice again. He dreamed on and on and never hoped to wake. And so the tale of the eldritch ends. All that there is to know about them is this: they never change. They obey rules of their own devising, and none of ours. They cannot be understood, cannot be reasoned with. They exist to destroy reality, and to break the many ifs of the multiverse into fragments and leave nothing left. That is what they are. That is what we know of them. But that is not the truth.