Chapter Text
You’re amazed by how long it takes for him to find you.
Perhaps the other Destiny was better apprised of your shenanigans.
“What, exactly, do you think you’re doing?”
The man before you (behind you, a moment ago) looms. You’re not sure he has any other way of standing. In his hands is an open book, and he flips the pages rapidly without using his hands and without looking at their contents. Perhaps he doesn’t need eyes to see. Those eyes glow from the depths of his hood and the darkness of his skin. Brighter than eye-white, they shine with the snow-blue of the unseeing, yet he is very clearly reading.
“Walking,” you say.
He freezes to a degree just beyond that of statues. He tilts his head up, and suddenly, it’s you being read.
“What are you? Explain.”
“A… person?” you say, your voice tinged with a hint of uncertainty, as if you are not entirely sure of your own nature.
“She is one of us, Destiny of the Endless.” A voice—three voices—speaks from behind. You know them. They’re you, but you’re them.
“The Three cannot be Four,” the man—Destiny of the Endless—says, with an exasperation you’re sure is quite uncharacteristic of his usual moue.
“Long have men told us what we can be—and long have they failed to make it so.”
“It is not written.”
“As if that’s an answer,” you scoff, folding your arms. For the first time (Hundredth. Millionth. Hundred-millionth.), your voice rings with authority and surety that rattles the cobbles beneath your feet. As soon as it comes, it goes, but it’s enough to make everybody—the both of you, the five of you—pause.
“What is written in the Book must be. It is all of what has come to pass. Even the Three-in-One appears before it.” His frustration turns to confusion as you roll your eyes.
“You’re obviously not reading from the start, then. No sense in trying to understand the ending when you never even read what came before.”
“I have been reading the Word since the Beginning, since the dawn of time.”
You wince, remembering. Right. She doesn’t exist here.
“And you never finished it? Shame. I liked it plenty around this time. So I came back, and I’d like to do it all again! Don’t you ever reread your favorite parts of books?”
His thunderous silence told you in no uncertain terms, no.
“What is it that you want? You cannot disrupt my gardens so.”
“There’s just so much of it; I want to see it all.”
“The paths in the Garden—”
“Not just your shrubberies. I want to see the whole universe.”
Destiny of the Endless looks shocked. None had ever managed to interrupt him. His words were the Word. He speaks a little louder to dissuade you from attempting it again. “The paths in the Garden of Forking Ways are not meant to be retreaded. You must choose and remain on the path you choose.”
“Some paths will be different each time you walk them, are they not?”
The ground trembles some at your words. Destiny cannot see, but he glares at you.
“You are not of my realm. I ask again, what are you?”
“Well, you’ll have to keep reading to find out, won’t you?”
In all your time, there are some parts you wish you could experience again for the first time. Those parts are what make lives worth living, friends worth having, and mistakes worth making again and again. The feeling of growing up, of understanding, of changing for the better—all those things make it worth the pain of remembering to forget why you ever said I’m never doing that again.
But it’ll work out this time. This time.
Your sister-selves visit when you pass by a mirror on your way out the door.
“What are we up to, my butterfly?”
“No good, I’d expect.”
“She looks to be in love, or at least seeking it.”
You face yourselves and raise an eyebrow that’s echoed threefold. “You’re not helping.”
“We were never meant to help, only to decide.”
You hum, noncommittal. Your sisters haven’t seen you in several billion years, but they know you as they know all others in this or any other universe. “Suppose that’s why I never fit in with you lot. Could never quite make up my mind.”
“Making up things is something you always did well, my raincloud.”
“Now there’s a thought. Who might else do the same?”
“Surely not him.”
You cover the mirror with a black cloth and head out the door.
Upon moving somewhere new, the first place you visit tends to set the tone for the rest of your stay, first impressions and all. You suppose it’s a touch of irony that you end up at the Worlds’ End.
Nobody recognizes you because you’d never been here before, in the grandest, most cosmic sense of the word. It’s that fact that garners you a lot of attention. The truly old and powerful tend to sniff out the strange faster than anybody else, and you’re as new as it gets in this universe.
You may not have been here, to this Worlds’ End, but you’d been to it and the others like them in the universe you’d just come from. You found stability in their instability. The Four Free Houses were the Worlds’ End, the Toad-Stone, the Inn Between Worlds, and one (like you) that seemed to escape a name at all. They bore no loyalty to any reality or plane and had no location but the circumstances from which they were borne.
Because they’re the same as the ones from your previous universe, you assume a few other things are true: that countless other, smaller Houses fulfill even more specific circumstances than the Four; that the Moon Road, dangerous as it is, was as close to a path between the realms as it gets; and that the price for safe harbor was always the same: a tale for the Worlds’ End, a secret for the Toad-Stone, a promise for the Inn Between Worlds, and a heavy heart for the fourth nameless House.
You’d sat in the last one too many times to count.
“What’ll it be?”
“Red wine. Take your pick; even swill’ll do.”
You are new. Already, a few folks are creeping closer, curious, and about to ask questions you don’t want to answer. The cup of wine is put before you, and you pay your way in the usual form at the Worlds’ End, hoping that speaking of the devil will effect that same end here.
Twice and thrice more, there were and are universes.
The first time the universe happened—because they are as naturally occurring as sunrises—nobody quite knew the rules, let alone the Crafters. Even so, everybody tried their best, but as the eldest sibling in any family seems to know, the Crafters were more interested in making new things than cultivating what they had.
From that neglect, galaxies, worlds, and realities sprouted up like weeds, undisciplined and unruly. Already, the Crafters were planning how to improve things for the next universe while the one they had languished before them. There were no such things as stars or life or happiness in that first universe—
“How in the hell do you know this?”
“It’s a story, shut up.”
Ahem. Thank you.
—There were no stars, life, or happiness in that first universe. In full transparency, it was a shameful half-baked creation when I visited it. Even knowing the desolation I’d surely see, I was curious and needed to travel, so I did. I sometimes wonder what it’s like now that I’ve touched it, half because things I touch tend not to ripple outward and half because perhaps things would be different here from the universe I hail from. I can’t know for sure its fate. Maybe it’s gone, or at least tucked away on a shelf I can’t reach.
It’s fitting, considering its storied abandonment.
The second time the universe happened—because the Crafters were surely going to get things right this time—they elected to make some help. They formed several self-indulgent ideas, the most important of which were Night and Time. They created that which was from that which was not, and that which would be from that which could be.
If I have to explain, I won’t bother trying.
In the image of their creators, Night and Time created images of themselves, the first children in all of existence: eight of them, to be precise. You may have only heard of seven, but that, like the first universe, was both an accident and by design. The first of their children was underdesigned, even so.
She was once Dawn, the Dawn of Time. She was her mother’s opposite in each way and brought light to the dark garden her parents had cultivated until then. She crafted the stars from her smiles and spun comets from her kisses. She asked her parents for siblings, for others to play with and spin up worlds alongside.
So her parents, petty and cruel, created someone to plan those worlds for her, another to make their inhabitants, another to write their stories, and four more to further upend all of Dawn’s wishes—and it was then that Dawn understood her place was being usurped if she ever had a place to begin with. She could not outcompete her younger siblings, as she had been found to have faults long before they existed.
Dawn withered beneath her father’s prolonged neglect and dimmed beneath her mother’s disdain. She had not changed yet, but she would soon.
And in this second universe, Dusk, the Dark at the End of the Universe, happened.
All fell to the darkening: worlds, lives, stories, love, hope, and happiness. Even the Free Houses fell, unbound as they were to most laws set by the powers that be. Dusk stayed cloistered in the darkness with her mother as her handmaiden, made to sit in the tenebrous sanctuary among the cold twinkling of stars she’d once brought about, and waited and waited until what she knew would come.
Her parents, like the Crafters, grew bored.
The stars and the smiles they came from darkened one by one until all was as it had been before she’d come at all. In the sanctum of nothing, she started to end the universe.
This one was sad to see. Yes, you may cry.
The third time the universe happened—and what a shock to the Crafters when they came back from work on the third universe to check on the second and found it had essentially ended itself—they found they had a particular fondness for Time and Night and even poor little Dusk. So they brought the three of them to the third and told them to do it again, but better. “Learn from your mistakes,” they said, “so it will be different this time.”
Time and Night did not need a doomed daughter to create the stars, though, so when they—
“How in the fuck did you end up here? And why?”
It feels like the Worlds’ End comes to a screeching halt. From where you hold court at the bar, among an audience of a half-dozen or a half-thousand, you don’t bother hiding your smile at the man who just walked in.
“Funny, I was just talking about you! The first you.”
The massive man cleaves the path before him and walks over, taking the seat beside you that had mysteriously and quickly become vacant. When you mention his previous incarnation, the erstwhile Destruction of the Endless laughs long and loud, shaking the firmament of the tavern, truly, for the first time. Worried looks pass over the regulars who can feel it.
Worlds are constantly being created and destroyed, and the nature of the Free Houses relies on the same principle. You remember when Destruction (the one beside you) had first created the Free Houses, and what a nightmare they’d been the first few thousand times they existed. His visits both defy and assert reality, and the unease of his entrance set the bar for every ‘random visit’ by a landlord ever since.
You wave the bartender over to get your friend a drink. “He’s on my tab.”
A half-dozen or a half-thousand beings wait with bated breath until he receives a massive stein of beer and sighs, turning back to you with a grateful smile and a question.
“Was it true that none of them grew past children?” His bright green eyes contrast with his distinctly rain-rumpled appearance. Everyone looks as though they’d trudged through some kind of storm to get here, literal or otherwise, but you supposed that was the point of the Free Houses: to be the port in every storm.
As you continue, you’re confident that the story you tell tonight is worth all the ale in every Free House that ever existed.
The third time the universe happened—because goodness, it needed to—they simply started with Destiny.
And that universe? It was sublime. That third time was indeed a charm in every way. Each of the seven (new) children of Time and Night was gorgeously powerful and did much of the work managing the universe.
Dusk remained, never to be Dawn again, and was therefore without use. Of course, she made little fancies of her own, but never anything that stayed.
If I may briefly interlude, after that rather depressing bit of history…
Night and Time of the second (and, technically, third) universe did not encourage their children to make any permanent decisions or lasting evidence of their existence. Some of them did anyway, like Dawn and her stars, and the others with worlds, life, stories, and the like. They were there to carry out functions—echoes and ripples in a pond that would forever exist in perpetuity, but never as the pond, the fish, the dirt or the water or the rock that made the ripple.
All that’s to say that this universe was not made by this one family of all-powerful beings, as it had been before. In a way, they didn’t even inherit it. They managed the wakes and the waves on the surface of a pond they hadn’t made, making and breaking them per their duties.
But even these seven children followed in the footsteps of those before them and crafted places of their own that they could rule. Some even had children. Some even got bored of their domains and left. The thing about kings is that they will never know exactly what kind of kingdom they rule unless they live among it. And very, very few of this family, in all its iterations, ever attempted to do so.
But this also meant there were things not under their purview—they were not the only gorgeously all-powerful beings in the pond. To repeatedly beat the horse I’ve long since killed, these beings set the rules for the wakes and waves the—the family lorded over.
What rules? Two simple ones.
They could not spill family blood. They could not love a mortal.
Don’t look so surprised. Adhering to these rules is more challenging than you’d think after ten billion years. Disaster struck many a time in this third universe because of them.
Now, the fourth time the—
“Pardon, but you didn’t finish that part.”
You raise an eyebrow at the woman who spoke. She has a bandage over her forehead and a worried man over her shoulder, but it seems she needs neither.
Destruction looks amused and waits for your response with a twinkle in his eye. “Tell her,” he urges after a long moment where you don’t. “Tell her why.”
Before speaking directly to her, you sigh and ask for another glass of wine—and perhaps a cheese board? Thank you so much...
“I didn’t finish the story of that universe because it isn’t over yet, not like the other two before it. Twice and thrice more, there were and are universes.”
Skipping between worlds and galaxies isn’t too hard—especially after the first few times you’ve done it. Everyone has done it; how do you think you got to the Worlds’ End in the first place? Though… some of you will never do so again after the storm has passed and your world has ended. But it’s not hard to do again when you know what you’re doing.
It’s as simple as changing your mind. But that’s near-impossible to anyone for whom the rules outweigh all else.
That means many of those gorgeously all-powerful beings beholden to rules others have written cannot ‘skip town,’ so to speak, except in specific circumstances. They prefer their misery and their self-imposed lovelessness to the point of utter devastation of themselves and those around them. Everyone makes their own destruction in that third universe. It’s the same as it is here, or it will be. And I’m sure it will be the same in the next.
As I was saying.
The fourth time the universe was created—because some parents need a ‘safety child’ for when the first one’s depressing, the second one’s unsociable, and the third one’s done nothing wrong but still isn’t spectacular—the Crafters decided to spin up a few billion things before the usual. Yes, they created Night and Time again, and Night and Time created their seven perfect children again. Yes, they created beings more powerful than them so that they could be held in line by two simple rules, and yes, all the obstinate ones made even more rules for themselves just to keep things insufferably dull at times.
I can’t give away the ending for this one or the one before, and I can’t even tell you about the fifth time the universe will happen—because it’s still quite primordial every time I check in with it. You will have to discover the end of the universe on your own, and you’re in the right place to get practice for it. Worlds are ending all the time, after all.
When it’s clear you’ve more than paid your way in the tavern and don’t intend to say a word more, the half-dozen or half-thousand listeners wander off searching for more stories.
“You never answered my question, chuffling.”
You spit out your wine, laughing at the new name he made up for you. “That’s awful. You’re awful, waiting til I drink like that.”
“Fine, what would you prefer?”
What a loaded question. You take the time to look him over. The two of you are relics of the third universe, and though you had never stepped foot in this one, Destruction’s a regular enough wanderer that he doesn’t attract as much attention as you.
He does, technically, own the place.
“It doesn’t matter. I’ve just discovered I’m not written in your brother’s book.”
He purses his lips and focuses on his beer. “Not my brother. Not here, anyway.”
“Come on, they wouldn’t have made everything the same all over again if you couldn’t call him your brother. Have you met yourself yet?”
“Do any of us?” he muses, and you roll your eyes.
“Your sister has, frequently. I haven’t, though. I’m likely not to if I was written out of this draft.”
“Then I shall simply call you friend.”
You smile at the man who was once Destruction of the Endless and nod in acceptance.
“Now, friend, you haven’t answered my question.”
How in the fuck did you end up here, and why?
“All mazes lead to Destiny’s garden. It was tricky to get back after my jaunts in Universes One and Two—they didn’t even have the concept of mazes in One until I got there, but I wandered and wandered and saw every inch of that mess until I got to the sequel. Right into your brother’s first garden where I was dreamed up but never borne. I met you again, then. You were much shorter. It was weird.”
“I’m sure it was. But very few are ever one height their entire lives. And fewer still seek to change their perspective.”
“For all your compassion, you seem to be a bit of a downer, friend,” you tease.
“Old habits. Answer the rest of the question.”
“Fair enough. And I don’t think I need to tell you—you know why I left. Why I left every time before.”
He fixes you with an agitated look. “You can’t be serious. Again?”
You stuff your face with cheese, which is an answer on its own.
“He is—I will not say different, here, but he seems to love making the same mistakes more than anything else, all for their familiarity. It’s all due to happen again very soon.” He runs a hand over his beard and huffs a sigh. “He does nothing but hurt you.”
“I hurt myself,” you counter sharply. “We were young, then. We all were.”
“And you’ve skipped to the middle of this story—why?”
“You just said why.”
“And when this time fails, you’ll just jump into Mark Five and hope there’s a Dream for you to love again in that one?” He’s made you. You’re cut from the same bolt. While you’re certainly not a creation of Destiny, you operated within his jurisdiction long enough to know Destruction well.
And he you.
“I won’t have to. This time will be different. I’ve seen every permutation, and this is the one that has to work.” It’s a bluff. You hope he sees it for what it’s worth and doesn’t blow on your house of cards. You aren’t sure if it’s your hands trembling or the floor beneath you.
But he is your friend. “What do you plan to do, exactly? You said you weren’t written into this universe’s Book. You want to—” he lowers his voice to a whisper, “you want to tangle with an Endless, and you’re not even part of this universe.”
It hurts to be scolded so. First from Destiny, and even with the backup of the Fates, he did not believe your intentions were good. Even the Fates questioned you. Now, with one of your oldest friends chastising you, warning you, you know you’re being foolish. You’re not even part of this universe. You’re technically not part of any universe, you want to say. You’d said as much a few times before, but instead you say—
“This time will be different.”