Damn it!

Trinity betrayed me! She forced me out of the house and now I'm stuck outside with no defenses. I'm gonna try to hole up in the public park for the night and hope nothing goes wrong.

It happened again...

I woke up to hear Trinity conversing with someone. It sounded like the same person...

Man: You almost gave yourself away.

Trinity: I know. I made sure he wouldn't see anything.

Man: You can't take that risk again.

Trinity: You're telling me not to take risks revealing myself? Do you remember any of our interactions prior to-

Man: -I was created to do this and I am capable of... convincing people not to look. You don't have that ability and you need to be more careful.

Trinity: It was that or let him die.

Man: You should have.

Trinity: I won't. I'm going to carry my plan through to the end and I will save him.

Man: He wouldn't let you save him if he knew what you were. For the sake of your own plan whether I agree with it or not you can't reveal yourself.

Trinity: Fine... So, your plan to kill him doesn't seem to be going so well?

Man: Humans even proxies are not the most useful creatures. That one was stupid enough to attempt to kill him in the presence of The Jack of All is just proof of that.

Trinity: ... You do remember I still identify as human right?

Man: You're also not an exception. Even you have to admit you aren't exactly useful to anyone when not calling upon the powers or knowledge The Master gave you.

Trinity: ... Wow... Ok... That was mean...

Man: Deal with it. Your friend is eavesdropping btw you should probably go engage in some damage control.

Trinity: What? Why wouldn't you tell me that earlier?!

Man: If you were paying attention you'd be able to tell by yourself...

There was a sound then and then silence. I went to look but found no one. Not Trinity. Not whoever the person she was talking to was. Just an empty kitchen...

I'm pretty sure this isn't just paranoia. Not quite ruling out The choir yet. It definitely does seem like Trinity is up to something though and she's involved with The Enemy. Unfortunately my hatred aside she seems to be intent on helping me and saving me from some yet unknown danger. It's obvious without her help I would have died long ago. Perhaps I can... Put aside my enmity at least until the plan is complete...

Onwards to better things.

Regardless of what happened. My only choice is to continue forward with my plan and deal with any fallout from this when it comes. So, the next step in my plan was a bit more difficult.

More difficult than breaking into the domain of a god like entity to steal a book? Well, yes. Since this time we're going into the domain of a godlike entity to steal a train that is attached to said godlike entity or at least attached to the domain of said godlike entity. More accurately for anyone aware of these godlike entities. Let me tell you a story.

Back in some year in the past. Some one creating a very special type of train. It could travel anywhere on special tracks that it basically created. I don't know the specifications exactly but basically it's a train that can go anywhere. Unfortunately one of the people working on this train brought with him an unfortunate object. It wasn't anything special really. At least from the look of it. It was a mechanical pencil. Nothing else. Except it was. A few days before they were going to go public with this invention the pencil fused itself to it's owner and began absorbing everything around it. The objects in the room, The workers and engineers who built it and eventually the train itself. After that it opened a path to it's domain known as The Towering Realm. The Train was lost to the realm of The Godlike Entity known as The Manufactured Newborn.

So, apparently I didn't quite explain the train as well as I could have. When I say it can go anywhere I mean anywhere. See it basically lays down it's own rails except the rails themselves don't have to be layed down on anything. The rails can like... Hover or something? I'm not entirely sure but basically you aim this thing at an ocean? Drives right over the water. Aim it at a mountain. It will drive straight up the side. Off a cliff it will drive down a non-existent hill till it reaches solid ground. This train is unstoppable. You could drive this thing through the most dense forest without hitting any trees because it'll just go over them. I don't know how it does it and I have my theories that it's creation wasn't entirely by human hands in the first place but it's what I'm going to need. Where I plan to go lots of things are going to try and stop me and I need something that can pass over everything in it's way. Oh right plus there's an old fashioned ww1 machine gun mounted on the roof of the first car so, that will be handy as well.

Getting into The Towering Realm wouldn't be hard. Jack called and told me he was perfectly willing to accommodate me before I even thought to ask him. We went to visit Jack. While waiting in the waiting room a man entered in a duster and fedora. I ignored it as it seemed to just be part of the strange aesthetic Jack was cultivating in this office. The figure spoke to the receptionist than headed towards us. It wasn't until he pulled out the knife and it was far too late for either Trinity or I to act that I realized he wasn't just part of Jack's Decor. Fortunately before the knife hit the door opened and Jack stepped out and waved his hand.

For a second there were just two of them. One a completely naked man and the other what appeared to just be the duster and hat. I thought that Jack had merely teleported him out of his clothes for some reason at first. Then the body crumpled like a bean bag chair with no beans and I saw the man's skeleton fall as well still wearing the fedora and duster. Jack then turned to Trinity and I.

"The Receptionist will clean it up. Come on in."

Inside the office Jack showed us a mirror and told us we could step through it to enter The Towering Realm. We prepared ourselves and then stepped through.

The Towering Realm is something that can't be described in words. At least not well enough. I'll try though. It's a sprawling wasteland made out of infinite things meshed together to create a location. Anything you can think of is part of the structure and in what could be called the center if this place had an ending in any direction is a massive spire made out of an uncountable number of living creatures made up of an uncountable number of objects and beings and anything you can think of.

Now in all of that how were we ever supposed to find the train especially before The Newborn noticed us and absorbed us into the mass... Well... It was easy. We appeared standing inside the train's cockpit. Normally I'd be agog at the coincidence but I'm pretty sure Jack did it on purpose. The hard part was figuring out a way to get it unnattached and then out of here. Eventually we settled for shooting it free from the mass with the machine gun and then seeing if we could drive it out of here somehow. I asked Trinity if she could teleport us and the train into The Empty City. She said she could but The Empty City would probably wreck the train and then make us walk for months again.

At this point I got a call from Jack.

"I can get you out but I want a slight addendum to our original deal"

"Really, Jack? What would that addendum be?"

"Nothing much. Just need you to get something for me from The Megablok baby's realm first. It's not too far from you. Just head west. a little ways until you see a cane. I need that Cane."

"Fine. Which way is west in here."

"Just turn till your facing the trains controls and then head right."

So, we went. off looking for some cane. It didn't take long. It was old. It also wasn't technically a cane. It was a crook. The kind often pictured with Ancient Egyptian Pharaohs. We grabbed it but found it was lodged into the ground. Upon pulling we proceeded to pull up a... Well there's no better way to say this. A cyborg mummy. It was a dead body. Wrapped in silk but combined with parts of clockwork and even some more modern technology like the clock radio embedded in it's shoulder. It let out a whirring sound that became a very human like growl of rage and then attacked us. It pulled me forward with the crook and grabbed me by the throat. Trinity began attacking it with her bare hands while I began kicking it. It of course wasn't doing anything. I guess I should be glad it didn't have a robot hand that could crush my neck in seconds or something, but slowly being strangled isn't exactly much better. While it was strangling me, Trinity was still hitting it. She hit a blow to it's shoulder that apparently turned on the radio. It began blaring out
"Rasputin" by Boney M (I had to look up the song later) for some reason and the creature seemed to freak out. It tossed me and proceeded to hit Trinity in the face with The Crook. I saw her go down before I landed on the ground and for a moment I saw everything go black and heard a high pitched squealing sound like metal on metal and then screams of pain. I quickly got up to my feet and saw Trinity  kneeling on one knee. The Pharaoh guy was torn to pieces. The music was still playing though was now heavily distorted and static-y. I was confused but I didn't think we had enough time to ponder it so I began running back to the train with Trinity following me. She told me to get on top and man the gun while she'd drive. I didn't bother arguing. The Train was attached to a mass of flesh and metal so I took aim at the flesh. The gun was miraculously still loaded with... Whatever those long lines of bullets are called. I began firing and it also miraculously didn't jam or anything and while I'm not exactly used to firing almost if not centuries old rapid fire weaponry I did manage to get the train free and immediately the train took off. We were racing straight towards the tower when suddenly a cloak fell over the tower or more accurately over us and we raced through it and emerged stopping in what appeared to be a warehouse. The train fell silent and dropped about an inch to the ground. Jack was there waiting as we got down.

"You can leave your train here until you need it," he informed us, "which as I understand it shouldn't be too long. I believe you only have one more step to go before you're ready?"

I glared at him and tossed him the cane. "Why did you want us to get this thing exactly?"

He caught it and broke it over his knee then tossed the pieces away. "I didn't. Just thought this mission was a bit too easy and wanted to make the game a bit more fun."

I stood open mouthed. "You... We almost got killed by a fucking robo-pharaoh and you... THIS ISN'T A GAME!"

He merely tilted his head slightly. "It is to me." After that we suddenly reappeared at my place. I wrote this and now I'm going to bed.     

Conversations with no one.

So, I ended up falling asleep for longer than I intended. When I woke up I heard Trinity talking to someone. She was in the kitchen and I was in the living room. I heard a male voice speak.

"Why do you continue helping him? You should just let him die. You know that regardless of your actions his plan will end in death and failure."

Trinity responded a few seconds later. There was a brief pause between his statement and her response.

"He doesn't have to die. When his plan fails I can still save him. The only danger to him is you. If you refrain from acting this can end without his death."

"He'll die regardless. The Master will-"

At this point I had gotten up from the couch and moved to see into the kitchen. Trinity was in there all alone sitting on my counter. She glanced at my confused expression with her own confusion.

"What?" she asked me with a worried tinge to her voice. I shook my head and told her it was nothing.

There are possibilities here. Unfortunately they are all equally logical.

First option: Trinity is somehow involved with The Enemy but desires to protect me from one of his servants for some reason.

Second Option: I was still mostly asleep and that was just my paranoid mind.

Third Option: Other Fears are starting to target me and The Choir, a sound manipulating Fear, is trying to turn me against Trinity.

If it's the third option I'm pretty screwed.

Second option is just annoying but what they were talking about might mean I might be a bit nervous about my plan succeeding and I'm a paranoid person.

First Option: She'll have to die in the end... also The Enemy knows my plan and is confident it will fail.

None of these options are beneficial to me the second while embarrassing is probably the best possible outcome.

Regardless until I know more I can't do anything about it. Tomorrow hopefully we'll set out on the next part of the plan.

Into The Catacombs Finale

So, we ran through the wall which opened and suddenly we were in a city. It was like... A stunning metropolis of stainless steel and glass buildings. Really utopic and futuristic. Nevertheless it was completely devoid of people and fears homed in on me. I knew this place. Vaguely. I'd heard about it. It was The Empty City. A place... No. A thing. Still not right. It's a living, thinking location. An utterly malevolent thinking, living location. You could say it was another domain. Like The Path or The Catacombs and it sort of is but at the same time it is itself an entity. A monster like The Enemy or The Blind Man. It traps people inside and devours them. I turned to Trinity and asked her if she knew where we were. She nodded and started explaining The Empty City to me. I cut her off and asked her how we ended up there. She explained that apparently The City has a tendency to connect itself almost parasitically to other domains. With knowledge one can travel from domain to domain through The Empty City. She said she recognized the sign and brought us into The City. She said it was the only way she could keep us from dying. I informed her that we were still going to die and The Blind Man probably would have been less torturous. She then informed me that we wouldn't die. She claimed she has a slight agreement with The City and that it wouldn't kill us. It would let us back out into our world. When I asked to be let out however she explained that while it would let us out... It would do so grudgingly and would not make it easy. When I asked what that meant she merely replied that we should start walking. Time... Time moves different in The Empty City. Time moves different in the catacombs as well frankly. We were only gone for about maybe an hour or two in our world. We spent almost a day in The Catacombs and we walked for something like 4-5 months in The City. The City didn't kill us. It provided food and water. Not enough to keep us happy but enough to keep us alive. Permanently on the edge of dehydration and starvation. Sleep was possible but difficult and never lasted long. We didn't talk to each other much. We were far too weak and tired to keep up a conversation. I did spend a lot of that time thinking though. About Trinity, About my plans, The Enemy and the other creatures. I started thinking about that catacombs floor plan too... I might as well share with you the musings of my sleep addled mind.

I thought about why would the floor plan of The Catacombs be a human brain? Is it a joke of some sort? Does The Blind Man have a sense of humor? Is it a coincidence? Is the Catacomb actually mapped out like a human brain? I thought about this and then I started to think. Is it a brain? Is The Catacomb some sort of giant brain? Maybe The Brain of The Earth itself? Is The Earth alive? The passageways of The catacombs neural pathways. The Books memories and knowledge that The Earth has gleaned? Is The Blind Man the guardian or caretaker of The Earth's Mind?

Having given more thought on the matter now that I've rested the idea seems a little far fetched still... It's an interesting thought. Other musings passed through my mind during this torturous walk but none really important to share and none very conclusive. Anyway our torture lead us through the city, a jungle, a swamp and finally a sprawling desert before we came to a small shack in what appeared to be a bombed out city. We opened the door of the shack and tumbled forward into my living room.

We lay there for a bit. I think we might have even fell asleep just laying together on the floor. After that we had a feast. I had stored up food to last through a siege. We ate all of it. Well, probably not all of it but a fair amount of it. After that I wrote up the post and went to sleep. The next morning feeling rested I finally checked to make sure I still had the book. I probably should have done that sooner but it was so far from my mind when I first got back. I didn't. I had a single page of the book but the rest of the book was gone. Somehow though the page was exactly what I had needed. I'm sure something happened either while in the city or perhaps even while I slept. Someone purposely took the book away but left me what I needed.

Anyway so I got what I needed and spent an hours worth of months trudging through a living city and then slept almost for three whole days. I intend to sleep for more. It might be a bit before I update again.

Into The Catacombs pt 2

So, we were in the catacombs now. You ever talk to someone who you know is smarter than you and just listening to them talk about anything makes you feel stupid and insignificant? Well whether or not you have I have and being in The Catacombs made me feel that way the whole time. The place was also really dusty. Every step or movement kicked up a cloud of dust so thick it would momentarily block our view like a solid wall being placed directly in front of us. As well the simple dust in the air had an almost physical presence as well. It was like moving through a really thin stream of water. Or... More like a spiderweb I guess. Speaking of spiders... The Bone Spiders. The Bone Spiders are basically horrific arachnid like creatures made out of bone and flesh. They tend to the catacombs and also protect it from intruders. Intruders like us. Every once in a while we would come across some sort of stone archway in the passages. It was while passing under one of these archways we ran into one of the creatures. I was coming out the other side when it swung down on it's back legs from the top of the other side of the arch and grabbed me. It then swung back up holding me onto the ceiling it's fangs hovering over my face. It's fangs were interesting. Like human fingerbones elongated and sharpened to a pair of very nasty points that were mere inches from my eyes. I dropped my gun but luckily Trinity grabbed it and fired at the creature. Her aim was terrible. She fired three shots. Two hit empty ceiling but the last blew through one of the creatures legs and it lost balance and fell from the ceiling. It leg go of me when it hit the ground and I rolled a way while Trinity emptied the rest of the clip into the creature. This didn't work. The creature was very much still alive and mostly unharmed and began to right itself. Trinity seemed to come to the same conclusion I did as she bounded past the creature grabbed my hand and we began to run.

We ran for a while though I doubt we could ever really lose the thing we did stop eventually. The passages, at least this branch of passages, seemed to end at a large door. The door was iron and just as dusty and ancient as the rest of the place. Also I feel I need to take a moment here to point out something. Trinity refuses to kill people and doesn't even like to harm them but was totally fine with emptying an entire clip in a Bone Spider. Guess she just doesn't like killing "Humans". Monsters are totally ok to kill. I guess it technically makes sense but still seems somehow hypocritical.

Right on with the story. The room beyond the door seemed to be some sort of index room. There was a computer in here. Strangely enough despite computers being relatively new technology at least compared to the rest of the Catacombs it still gave off the same ancient presence as the rest of the catacombs. It seemed likely that this would be the best way to find the information I sought since searching the infinite catacombs forever or until we died was probably not a great choice. I went to the computer and it immediately turned on. It was open to what appeared to be a floor plan of The Catacombs. At least that's what it said it was. The floorplan seemed to just be a picture of a human brain. I clicked on another page reading search and searched up what I was looking for. "The Origin of The Path of Black Leaves". At this moment alarm bells began going off.

"Alarms? In a place this old?" I questioned.

"Well they have an ancient computer why not ancient alarm systems?" Trinity answered.

I couldn't leave yet though so I turned back to the computer hoping I could finish in time. It didn't take long. The third thing that popped up seemed to be exactly what I needed. More than I needed in fact. It was a book called "Everything you could ever know about Fear Domains." It was by some girl named Beth Lamnnid. I clicked on it and suddenly a light started glowing on the floor heading out through another door. I made sure Trinity was paying attention then ran to follow it. The alarms were still blaring but while we occasionally saw Bone Spiders down other passages they never seemed to bother us ourselves. The light led us to a shelf and while Trinity stood guard I began searching the shelf. I found the book and pulled it from the shelf then I felt something. I turned to see Trinity standing directly in front of an old man in a robe the color of old parchment. His hair was grey and his eyes were covered by a pair of thick sunglasses. He was holding a massive book in one hand and seemed to be watching us both. It was The Blind Man. The owner of The Catacombs.

"Why are you intruding upon my Demesnes Tall One?" he said in a curious tone. I was too scared at the time to be confused and, before I could register confusion, Trinity suddenly grabbed my hand and we ran into the wall.

Sorry I promise last little bit will be tomorrow. I'm still a bit confused and tired from what happened.

Into The Catacombs Pt. 1

So it turned out The P.I. we were waiting for was Jack. We were ushered in and met a man sitting behind a desk. His legs up on the desk and head and face hidden under a stetson. The moment we stepped in the entire place seemed to lose saturation till the world was black and white. The only colour was the P.I.s hand tapping on the desk. It was bright red. The defining trait of the Jack of All.

"Aaron... Wasn't expecting to see you again," he said tilting his hat back to expose his eyes, "Oh and The Femme Fatale form."

Trinity stiffened and Jack laughed. "Oh don't worry. I wouldn't spoil the surprise..." he glanced at me "for either of you. So, what do you need?"

Deciding to cut through his cryptic bullshit I told him the plan. His response was to take off his hat set it on the desk which then disappeared along with the hat. Stand up which caused his chair to disappear and walk toward us which caused the entire office and in fact building to disappear leaving us standing in a vacant lot.

"You've both made deals with me before. Normally I'd require something for another deal, but... This small act on my part will hasten you both to the fulfillment of your original deals and the inevitable epilogue of a boring tale. So, I'll make this one a freebie."

He then raises his hand and snapped his fingers and a door appeared in the middle of the lot. He vanished then and the door opened to a dark, dank, dusty underground passage lined on both sides by walls filled with books. The entire place emanated a feeling of age, knowledge and mystery. I looked at Trinity. Ready?

She shook her head but proceeded inside ahead of me. I followed her and the door closed behind us.

It was a bit exhausting. I'll tell you the rest when I wake up. I'm not letting Trinity touch my computer.

Deal Makers and into the Catacombs: Prologue

I explained the plan to Trinity and she was a bit iffy about it but eventually agreed if it was the only way. It's not but the other way would involve killing a number of people.

Anyway we're doing it this way. She's going to help me locate and safely get to a man called Jack. Some of you may know of him but those of you who've been lucky enough to only deal with The Enemy may not be aware of him.

To explain there are other creatures similar in nature and being to The Enemy. Some of you may also know of the creature known as "The Rake" and if so you are at least aware The Enemy is not the only one. There are far more than just The Enemy, The Rake and Jack but they aren't important at least most of them aren't. Info on a need to know basis.

The entity known as Jack or more professionally The Jack of All is a deal making entity similar to legends about "Genies" and occasionally more folkloric depictions of The Devil. He makes magical wish like deals that promise to grant you your fondest desire, but always or at least almost always come with some terrible cost usually hidden from the unfortunate victim until it's too late.

So, knowing that any deals made with this entity always turn out badly why would we go to him? Well... To be completely honest I already made a deal with him before and he's our only chance to get where we need to go anyway.

Speaking of I should probably at least explain where we're going. I have the knife but more is needed for this plan. I need knowledge of  a certain place as well and that knowledge was lost to the ages. However information is never truly lost to a certain man. He's another being like The Enemy or Jack. He is a creature called The Blind Man or sometimes The Grandfather. Like The Enemy he has his own domain and in that domain is every book or piece of information in existence is stored. It's rumored to even hold knowledge not yet existing in this world or that only exists in other universes. If I can find the information I need anywhere it will be in his domain which is referred to as The Catacombs. Unfortunately like The Enemy's domain it's almost impossible to get into if you aren't a follower of the entity controlling it. According to rumors there is an entrance through the headquarters of the creature's followers who call themselves The Archive. They'd undoubtedly attempt to stop me from entering though and I'd rather not kill tons of people or die trying to get into this place. So we're going to ask Jack to get us in.

We're actually currently sitting in the waiting room of a private investigator. Apparently this P.I. can lead us to Jack or something. I've never seen a P.I. with a waiting room before... Then again I've never really run into any real life P.I.s.

Trinity says this is where we need to be so we're here waiting. I'll let you know when something else happens.

Flaws.

Sorry for the lack of updates, but I've basically been sitting on my ass for the last little while. Not literally. Mostly I've been defending myself and trying to find ways around my problem. Yes. There was a problem. See a small flaw opened up in my plan. Well... A pretty big flaw actually. I need to travel to a place. One that is very difficult to travel too and I don't have any actual way to get there. Also Trinity disappeared after the whole knife incident. So, I basically stayed in my booby trapped house. A gun and blade always on hand and tried to think of some way. I eventually found a way, but it would be difficult.

Luckily this morning Trinity returned. This will make my plan much easier though still insanely dangerous. Tomorrow we're going to go meet someone. This time if all goes well no one is needing to die so she'll be happy about that.