There Was Lore

A new day. There hadn’t been too many of them since the formation of the megaverse but today, there were fifty two. Fifty two big bangs, fifty two planet Earths eventually forming and all at once. The life cycles of reality were occurring around them and it was all new but there was something even newer that even Reality was yet to learn. In their dreams, Lore watched as time progressed. Darkness, then suddenly, light. There were two masked faces before them; they didn’t recognise either of them. They spoke but Lore couldn’t quite make out what they were saying. Then came the alarms. The monitor beeped rapidly before emitting a single, unbroken tone. They looked back as they were torn from the scene. A third figure was sat with her legs in the air as one of the masked faces climbed atop her. From darkness to light, they were on a rollercoaster with no end in sight as they were wheeled from room to room. They had no idea where or when they were but the hallways had a familiar similarity, a mundane distinctness that told them they were in a Protectorate building. Lore’s dream began to flicker as they jumped to the next universe. They were older now. Standing on their own two feet in yet another familiar location. With almost no time to react, a fist narrowly avoided their nose. They ducked and weaved themselves around their opponent before striking themselves. Their instructor shouted something that told them it was time to stop as they watched her leave with a group of familiar strangers. Lore sidled across the ring and next to their opponent. They smiled for a moment, enjoying each other’s company. Then the flickering returned. In their dream, they awoke. In the bed beside them, Crait. Despite everything, this brought them warmth. Smiling, they propped themselves up and watched as their partner’s ribcage slowly filled and drained itself of air; softly displacing the duvet as they did. Unable to watch further, they gently placed their lips to their cheek and retreated from the bed. In as close to silence as they could manage, they dressed themselves and prepared for the day ahead. A quick visit to the commissary before reaching the bridge gave them the caffeine they needed to start their day as they looked down on a warring Quatarr. The past flashed before their eyes as they found themselves unexpectedly on the planet below. Armoured as the locals were, they ran. Crait was by their side as they made their way into the opposition’s camp and Crait was by their side as they found themselves in a darkened room. The sudden transition nearly woke Lore but the fatigue kept them under. The tribunal went as it did for them as they watched Crait and Lore escape together to, assumedly, meet with Char and employ her services. The blinding light of their escape dazzled them and when they regained their sight, they found they had missed a large portion of the story. Crait and Lore were living with Char and all three of them were wearing matching rings. They seemed happy together and in fact, they were. Time flew by once again. The three of them stood together on Quatarr’s cracked surface, mining scowls surrounding them and an army at their feet. The three of them touched their rings before disappearing in a flash of white light. Lore remained on Quatar, alone with the army, until eventually, they returned. Two Lores, two Craits and two Chars versus and army. The fight hadn’t even started before the six of them vanished once again. They repeated this cycle until their numbers matched that of the army’s ground units. Lore looked to the skies and noted a recent development, attack ships. The battle begun, one hundred and fifty eight Lores, Craits and Chars stood before the army. In threes, they came together and formed Reapers. Fifty two Reapers against an army seemed more than fair as the fighting begun. Twenty six peeled off and began an attack on the aerial units leaving the other half to the troops below. The battle was long and hard but it was over. The fifty two Reapers aimed their arms to the stars as they each fired a beam of light into space. Rather than opening a bridge into null space as Lore had expected, the tear they made was in reality and without the dark matter to stabilise the reaction, it would be fatal. Lore’s words echoed in The First’s mind. Without knowing quite why, they flew themselves into the breach. Lore snapped awake. They detangled themselves and rose from the floor where they collapsed. Out of the observation window they watched as the first multiverse they created decayed before their very eyes. They could only hope now that they were right. It was almost too hard to see but extending from the collapsing universe was a beam of gold, a beam of gold that was heading straight for the multiversal core. Soon after the destruction of the first universe, the second fell, and like dominoes, so did the rest. Fifty one universes created and destroyed on the same day, each dying and each emitting a single golden stream as they did. When universe fifty two fell, things became more interesting. As its energy joined the void and its golden beam fired towards the central universe, the ring of time they once orbited on began to glow once more. As it did, the universes were reborn. Slowly but surely, the fifty two universes reformed and Reality realised what Lore had created: Something new. The first light dawned on fifty two virgin universes, created from the ashes of the fifty two that came before them. An endless and eternal cycle of life, death and rebirth as something completely new was created. After the first couple of cycles, which for those outside of the universes only lasted half an hour, things slowed down. A hopeful Lore took one last look at their creation before they turned around to their wife and child.
“It worked.” They couldn’t stop smiling.
Neither of them knew quite how to respond, their voices stolen by the majesty of their accomplishment. They simply ran to their Lore and wrapped them in their embrace.
“Shall we go and introduce ourselves?” Lore giggled, giddy as the proverbial schoolgirl at the prospect of making some new friends.
They breached together to the surface of the central universe which hadn’t changed much since they left it barring the cessation of hostilities. The once warring armies formed a ring around the newcomers. At the centre, an army of Reapers took defensive positions. Their guards dropped as they watched Lore gently land before them.
“Welcome to the new age.” They spoke softly yet all of them could hear. “My name is Lore.” They extended their hand. The closest Reaper split and three people approached them.
“Crait.” They took Lore’s hand. “And these are my partners, Lore and Char.” Lore nodded.
“It’s an honour.” Ecstatic didn’t cover quite how they felt as they saw familiar faces in the crowd mixed in with ones they didn’t quite recognise. “It’s an honour to meet all of you, I’m glad you got my message. There shouldn’t be any new arrivals for a while so might I suggest we convene on the station above for a proper headcount and some quick introductions?” The Dramatis Personae.