The Simulacrum

The room that was not a room. It was a space defined less by walls and more by a profound, unsettling sense of enclosure. The air hung thick and heavy, tasting of forgotten memories and unseen colours. Light, when it deigned to appear, did not emanate from any source, yet it pooled in viscous puddles across a floor that slanted in two directions at once, a phosphorescent pattern glowing on surfaces that were simultaneously flat and deeply ridged, depending on where one's gaze dared to rest. The walls breathed, a slow, inexorable tide. The grain of the wood swirled into hypnotic, ever-changing mazes. To stare at it was to feel the architecture of one's own thoughts begin to liquefy and run.

In the heart of this shifting gloom, furniture performed a slow, silent ballet of impossible forms. A high-backed chair, its silhouette carved from negative space, would elongate its spindle legs, stretching them to a needle-fine point as it swayed, before collapsing in on itself with the liquid grace of a dying swan, resolving into a low, crescent-shaped divan upholstered in what might have been crushed velvet or solidified shadows. A wardrobe stood against a patch of relative darkness, but in a beat of a heart, it had become a towering bookshelf, its shelves creaking under volumes that seemed to breathe, their spines pulsing with a faint luminescence.

A table of petrified wood stood in the middle. Its surface, swirling with galaxies trapped in amber, would ripple, its four legs melting into a single, gnarled root that plunged into the paradoxical floor. Around it, four astral bodies of celestial objects projected into human shapes. Four Emergents, their forms wavering at the edges like heat haze, their gestures are a tapestry of anxiety and panic.

The boy, whose form was overlapping with a rain of molten glass, now stood as a youth with dark hair and eyes the colour of a forge's heart. His fingers twitched, a nervous tic that sent silent shockwaves through the shimmering air.

"What can we do?" Fulgor, the lightning-struck moon, responded. His human form was a middle-aged man, with a face that was all sharp angles and a grim set to his lips, and his arms were crossed over his chest, a clear sign of his displeasure and frustration. His voice, a low rumble, was laced with the crackle of static. "We can't stop a Venerated Emergent!"

"But this is absurd!" Oriole exclaimed, her voice a high-pitched birdsong of panic that was as beautiful as it was distressing. Her eyes were wide and pleading, her hands clasped together in front of her chest. "He can't just do that!"

"He already did," Carmine spoke in a soft voice, a veil of crimson silk hiding a red-hot blade of ire underneath. Her human form wavered, her flowing hair growing brighter with the colour of fresh blood, and her eyes were a deep, dark red, like the heart of a dying star. "And we can't do anything about it."

"So that's it?" the boy, Obsidius, asked, his voice trembling with a mix of anxiety and disbelief. "But what about the rules! Y-You can't just forcefully intrude into the Simulacrum like that!"

"There are rules for us," Carmine corrected him, her words a soft whisper that cut through the silence of the not-dark not-room like a shard of glass. "The Venerated ***************** doesn't seem to care about them anymore."

"But it's still really, really bad!" Oriole insisted, her hands now balled into fists at her sides. "At this rate, he's going to ruin the scenario! Who's going to take responsibility for that?! What about the Submerged Ones?!"

Carmine raised her brow for a moment, looking genuinely concerned. It seemingly cooled her anger, and her appearance returned to a more placid state, her hair now a gentle cascade of dark red, the colour of a sunset, while her eyes became the hue of a dark, still lake.

"That's a very good question," she said, her voice now calm, her words measured. "Can His direct intrusion into the Simulacrum negatively affect the Submerged Ones?"

"P-Potentially!" Oriole yelped, but it was clear to see that she was clutching at straws now. "It could have unforeseen consequences! It could even damage the Simulacrum itself!"

"That's not going to happen," Fulgor said, a hint of disdain in his tone. "I mean, I understand that the Venerated Emergent is acting out of line, but he's not crazy!" When he didn't receive the agreement he was expecting, his eyes turned a bit wider, and he repeated himself with a little more anxiety. "He's not crazy, right?"

"The Venerated Predator Moon was always rather... direct in His approach to problems," Obsidius noted, shrinking back both metaphorically and physically as his human form wavered, a shimmer of the endless rain of molten glass visible through his skin for a brief moment.

"Which could mean he'll break things if he's left alone!" Oriole continued to insist with ardent fervour. "We have to do something!"

"Like what?" Fulgor shot back and then let out a frustrated sigh as he paced across the non-existent floor of the not-dark not-room. The shifting patterns of light and darkness warped and twisted around him, as if in response to his agitation. "We can't stop him! We can't even talk to him! Who even knows what he's doing right now!"

The room lapsed into a heavy silence, the four of them standing frozen, their forms wavering and shifting in the non-light.

"A-Actually, I can check..." Obsidius proposed and waved his hand, not even waiting for Carmine's approval.

The table in the middle rapidly shifted into a pedestal made of something akin to black marble and polished to a mirror sheen. It then started to emit a low hum, the kind that makes one's teeth ache, and the surface shimmered as if it were made of water. From it emerged a strange, constantly shifting polyhedron, a geometric shape with countless facets, each of them glowing with a different light. The shape was slowly spinning, casting long, distorted shadows across the already twisted room.

As the polyhedron spun, the four of them stared at it, their breaths held in their throats. It was an interface meant to view the state of the scenario, and through it, the Simulacrum itself to a certain degree, but its scope and complexity made it appear a maddeningly incomprehensible display of light and colour to mortal eyes.

A short eternity later, Obsidius let out a nervous hum and explained, "It… It seems the Venerated Predator Moon had already done something..."

"Is it... bad?" Oriole asked, though her expression said she wasn't sure she wanted to hear the answer.

"He erased 'Leonard S. Dunning' from the scenario."

"Oh... Oh no..." the girl whispered, her face and stellar rings both turning a deathly pale white at once. "That's really, really bad!"

"It makes sense," Carmine offered a different perspective, though her expression was also clouded. "He's technically an anomaly, and was involved with the first encounter, when the ************ ********** revealed himself, so I can see why the Venerated Emergent would pay attention to him"

"But... But he was erased!" Oriole cried out, her voice like a cacophony of crows over a battlefield. "It's over! Everything is ruined!"

"Don't be so overdramatic," Fulgor scoffed as he returned to the newly formed pedestal. "Sure, as the second Free Actor, his presence led to a series of major and unexpected changes, but it's not like the entire scenario is going to collapse just because—"

"But it will! And not just the scenario, but everything!" Oriole yelled out, her panic mounting to a fever pitch.

It made Carmine narrow her eyes and stare at her with a look that seemed to slice through the girl's panicked frenzy, making her flinch.

"You know something you're not telling us, don't you?"

The young girl froze mid-motion, her previously frantic appearance giving way to a subdued fright as she turned to face the woman in red.

"W-What makes you think that?"

"You're sounding way too sure of it," Carmine stated simply, her words a velvet dagger. "How are you so certain that erasing an Actor from the scenario would cause such damage to it, let alone the Simulacrum?" Her eyes narrowed even more, her squint like the horizon of an endless sea of ruby with the last rays of the dusk sun peeking over. "Is this related to our guest?"

"Right!" Fulgor exclaimed, sounding like he just figured out how to cut the Gordian Knot of the situation. "We could ask him! If he really is an incognito Venerated Emergent, maybe he could talk with the—"

"He isn't, and…" Oriole interrupted him before he could gather more steam, her voice reminiscent of a lonely songbird perched on an empty nest. "There's no way we can find him now. Not anymore."

That made Carmine let out an impatient huff, and she tapped her foot against the ever-changing floor, causing it to ripple like the surface of a lake.

"You really aren't telling us something. If you want to come clean, now is the—"

"E-Excuse me?" Obsidius cut in, the weight of the situation overpowering his usual social anxiety, and he pointed at the lazily spinning polyhedron. "S-She's right! The scenario... No, the Simulacrum is reacting. It's like... It's pushing back against the Venerated Emergent's interference."

"What? Let me see!" Fulgor exclaimed and leaned over the pedestal, squinting so hard at the shining shape that his face began to distort, the lightning on his moon-like surface crackling with renewed vigour. "That... Now way..." He reeled back and turned to Carmine. "Obsidius is right! The Simulacrum itself is rejecting the Venerated Emergent's intrusion, and He's lashing out in response. At this rate, the scenario is going to completely fall apart!"

"Oh no! No no no no!" Oriole whined, while the woman in crimson's countenance turned grim.

"Everyone, calm down." She turned to the boy next. "Obsidius? Give me a worst-case scenario."

"Y-Yes..." He reached out towards the polyhedron on display, and it began to spin erratically, its shape going through all the platonic solids in a matter of seconds before settling on something resembling a star tetrahedron. "If this keeps up, it will damage the foundation of the scenario."

"What about the Submerged Ones?" Carmine asked insistently, but it took a while for Obsidius to respond.

"Do you... really want to hear the worst-case scenario?"

"Yes."

He swallowed hard, the glow of his surface dimming.

"The entire scenario will collapse, but it won't stop there. The damage will ripple outwards and potentially affect other scenarios that share the same base setting, and those will collapse in turn, and..."

"And?"

He was quiet for a long moment, a silence so profound that it seemed to press in on the others from all sides. The not-dark not-room itself seemed to hold its breath, the shifting furniture freezing in place.

"It may damage the Artificial Domain of the Simulacrum itself, and could... no, if it comes to that, it definitely will cast any Submerged Ones in the process of Emerging back into the Noise"

Oriole let out a strangled gasp, and even Fulgor looked stunned for a long moment, his barren surface dark and still like a starless sky. The implications of this were catastrophic.

"No..." he finally whispered, his voice a low rumble. "He wouldn't..."

"Does the Venerated Emergent know this?" Carmine asked next, and the boy let his arms down and shook his head.

"I... don't know. I don't think so, but... It's a worst-case scenario. Maybe we're just being overly pessimistic, and he'll limit the damage to the scenario only."

"Only the scenario!?" Oriole exclaimed and raised her small hand high, as if preparing to hit him. "Why are you saying that as if that was a good thing?! Are you listening to yourself?!"

Carmine interjected with a firm, "Calm down," followed by a detached, "Even if we presume the worst possible outcome, there's little we can do to stop it at this stage."

"Right," Fulgor agreed and crossed his arms again. "What are we even supposed to do here?"

Oriole was about to respond to him, but then...

<Oh, for the love of god! You can't be bloody serious!>

A voice. No, a will. A booming beacon that washed over the not-dark not-room with the intensity of a lighthouse beam cutting through a storm-tossed sea. It made the very fabric of the space shudder, the furniture ceasing its restless dance to hold a single, terrified shape. The four Emergents froze, their projected human forms blurring at the edges like a watercolour painting left out in the rain.

<Stop bloody procrastinating, stop talking in circles, and do something already!>

The demand, while less than elegantly phrased, was still as direct as it could be, and it was enough to make the four Emergents stare at each other, their faces a tableau of stunned silence.

"Who...?" Fulgor stammered, looking left and right as if hoping to catch a glimpse of the sound of the mysterious speaker. "No, what was that?"

"I don't know, but—" Obsidius started, but then he nearly jumped when Oriole exclaimed from the top of her lungs, her previously raised hand now clenched into a determined fist that shone with the light of a hundred orbital rings in unison.

"Wooo! We're still in the game! Let's go and save the day!"

"What do you mean 'Save the day'? How?" Fulgor muttered, still stunned, and soon they all found themselves looking at Carmine.

The woman stood tall, the corner of her lips tugged into a soft smile as her form seemed to stabilise, the bleeding edges of her embodied self solidifying into a clearer, more defined silhouette. Her crimson hair ceased its liquid shimmer, settling into a deep, rich red that seemed to absorb the bruised light of the room. She took a deliberate step forward, her movement so purposeful it seemed to pin the chaos in place.

"You heard it," she said, her voice a low, confident murmur that held the room's trembling attention. "Obsidius, keep monitoring the scenario and report if there are any new developments. Oriole, go and stabilize the ************ Record ************ Matrix. Fulgor, do your job and make sure the scenario retains its ********* consistency. I'll go and use the backup ************* ************ to patch up any holes in the ***************** and keep the damage from spilling over into the Artificial Domain. The only thing we can do is to ensure that the scenario remains stable as long as possible, and we're going to do just that. I hear no objections."

Oriole responded with an enthusiastically chirpy, "On it!" and immediately disappeared from the not-dark not-room in a puff of orbital dust being sucked into a point of nothingness.

"I'll... erm... try my best," Fulgor said with considerably less passion, yet he still followed suit at once, leaving with a flash of thunder.

Now, only Carmine and Obsidius were left behind in their communal space, but the latter was already too focused on the spinning polyhedron in front of him to say his goodbyes, or even react when the woman stepped away from the black pedestal.

"Let's make sure we finish this scenario..." she said, her voice full of determination, yet she didn't depart right away. Her eyes drifted upwards, as if looking past the non-existent ceiling of the not-dark not-room, and she whispered, "... and get some answers."

With that, she also disappeared from sight, akin to a giant gem folding in on itself along its facets. Like that, the Emergents were on the move, ready to buy time for something even they didn't completely understand. If there was one thing for certain, beyond the shadow of a doubt, it was that the time to act was now or never, both outside the Simulacrum... and within.

<I know. I'm on it. Geez.>

And so, the curtain rose on the last act of this long play. Whether its conclusion would be accompanied by the sound of thunderous applause or universal crunch was something no one could say for certain yet.