There was a conversation to be had, and it would happen, even as they floated thousands of meters above a lava filled pit.

The danger would soon be subsided though, as the ocean would return to its domain, crashing against itself and refilling the space that had been opened up.

The conversation would have to wait even then as the spectators were lagging behind by a few minutes. They stared at the two authors of Fate with dull yet wide eyes, trying their best yet failing to comprehend what they had seen.

To tell them there was more then, would have been evil, truly the act of a sadist. So, the conversation would have to be rescheduled as the affected had taken too long to catch up to the events. And the eldritch horrors cared not for their time nor their lives.

“I’m glad I got another chance to see you people before you entered the Abstract… but since your mental facualties seem a bit worse for wares, I’ll make it brief… pick a direction, and go, remember… you’re headed for the ‘mainland’… you can even think of it as your salvation… just don’t forget where you’re going… pick a direction and go… never… and I mean never… turn back… you can ‘go’ back… but don’t ‘turn’ back… Sonata…” The Stranger would stand up, looking to the sky from within the box.

They were a few hundred feet below the sea, but even there they’d hear it, whistles. There was one at first, then there was another, and another, and another, and another. They would eventually come into view, streaks of fire barreling across the sky, distorted by the raging ocean.

“You’re really going to send them there…!? People!? Living… people…!? Can’t we just give ‘them’ what they want… we’re halfway there anyway…? Aren’t we…? Can’t we just be done…? How much longer…? How much… longer…?” The eyes of the small child seemed to glimpse the falling flames for a moment, but she looked away.

“We are halfway there, but didn’t you say you wanted to live? What do you think they’ll do to us? Hm…? How many years has it been… even just between us and our broken perception of time… you think they’ll forget all that time we ‘locked’ them away…? I don’t…? The monster didn’t reason with me, it can speak, and yet it said noting when I looked it in the eyes… all those things want from us is our lives… because separating form ‘her’ means our deaths anyway… but, you’re just as important as I am… so what will it be… I’m not the aspect that meddles with realities… so it’s your call anyway…” The stranger would look down at the tired child.

Her eyes welled up as if to cry, but then they relaxed as she looked away from him.

“You always do this…. Why couldn’t you just decide?” The child, as disinterested as she seemed, looked over at the four she was yet to send on their journey. “Do you remember what you’ve been told…?” She raised her hand in their direction, though the box was so small she was basically touching them.

They’d pull away from her, though there wasn’t far to go.

“Answer me…!” The child grit her teeth as the box shrunk and they pulled even closer to her. “well…?”

“P-pick a direction a-and go was it…?” Bob, even as mad as he thought himself, fumbled a response.

“Yes…” She waved her hand as if to shew the four victims, and it was done.

The space behind the four would let out a crack as if glass had broken, and by the time they realized what was happening, the fracture of light was spreading.

It was too late for their questions, and when they came to it, reality shattered behind them falling in on itself to reveal their otherworldly destination.

And so, before they could even speak, the rift passed over them and they were sat in grass, if it could have been called that.

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They’d freeze for a moment as they looked through the broken fragment of creation. They were looking into the ocean, yet they were basking in crimson lights, it was a joke, it had to be.

Whether it was a joke or not, the rift fixed itself and they were looking off into a jet black, shattered distance lit by red light.

“Aha… ha-Ahahahahaha!” Bob would fall flat on his face, sanity playing hide and seek with him.

There wasn’t much to where they were, but the little that was there, inspired no confidence.

They were on an island among an infinite archipelago, and while that should have provided some sense of familiarity, it was not so simple.

There were fields, grass and reeds, but it was all pitch black. At first, they assumed it natural for the unnatural, until they moved and the things broke, carried away by the wind, ash.

That was strange, and strange enough, but there was more. The island was hung above a red lake of luminous bubbling liquid, the thing looking like the ocean, only blood, and raging.

The sky, yes, that thing was one of night filled with glowing red piercing stars, like eyes. The sun, which indicated that it was midday, was overhead hidden by some celestial body, never allowed to rain solely.

“W-what is this!? Huh!?” Bob would take a hand full of the foliage, or try to at least. “I-is this supposed to be grass!?” As his words echoed, from where he sat, the ‘vegetation’ would begin to turn green, and binding themselves together, they became whole again, and thus, a few moments later, green was on the horizon.

“The… t-the hell…” The sight was a spectacle, but that wasn’t Bob’s concern, he had become dizzy, and his nose matched the sea below. “Haha… ha…” The sight of his blood worsened his condition, and so, he’d pretend it didn’t happen, hoping that fiction would become reality, standing. “Might as well follow their directions… why not…?” Bob would turn to look at the rest, and a multitude of things were wrong.

The first, and most noticeable was that looking at the other three, specifically Kim and Brody their faces were gone, distorted to noting but swirling colors. Then, behind them, were legs twice as big as they were, something, something that could finally be seen then that the grass was no longer pitch black, was stooped behind them, and its posture suggested that it was leant forward.

The words he had been told would ring true, the monsters they sought to escape, where they had been tossed into, was their home.

The thing had a singular eye that was its face, vertical, purple, and crying blood. It made no moves though, it only watched them.

The other three would realize that Bob was startled by something, because for starters, his mouth fell open and he also dropped the golden cube.

As the metallic construct hit the ground though, it passed through it, and as if it had hit something below the ground, it bounced back and flew up into the air. It then let out a blinding light that consumed everything and the monster would tumble across the plains, falling into the sea below. A tower of the buring substamce shooting up like a gyser.

The golden cube would then fall back to the ground, unassuming, as if it had not done what it had. Bob was then left with a choice to make, address the faceless or the cube.

“Y-you’re alive…?” The small man looked down on the cube, hoping nothing would happen.

The thing would shift at first, and then it rolled towards him, stopping at his feet.

“S-so that’s a yes…? Huh…? Ha… ha… hahahaha…” Bob fell to his knees, his impure eyes violently and randomly shifting from one wave length to the next.

It was not an exaggeration to say that Bob was not taking it well, but what about the rest, well, Kim and Brody were probably fine, but what about May.

She was looking at the grass, the sky, the horizon, the monster, and yet she saw none of it. As far as she was concerned, her whole family was dead, because the man she had seen was not her brother.

As such, she was ready to die there and then, to her, Cali had died just for her to die too, so she’d at least make it quick. She’d spin around, and approaching the edge of the island, she sought to jump into the tempest below.

I suppose, that if she had remembered her distain for the canvas of chanced light upon the shattered glass, the insides, out, she’d laugh at her own naivety.

She wouldn’t make it far still, as a burly and callused hand would rest on her shoulder. It was then, almost as if instinctually, that she’d take hold of it, and pouring all her strength into her hands and back she leaned forward and tossed the faceless man over her small frame with strength she shouldn’t have had.

Thankfully, he’d catch the edge, missing the carnage below, but only by a hair. She’d blink a few times, and taking the time to look around her, at where she was, she realized that they were right.

As such, she had latched on to truth, and she had experienced it, but she wanted to know if she was right. She’d retrieve Brody from the edge of death with her new found strength before then though, apologizing.

An apology that he accepted seeing as it was his fault. May would then retreat to a less fortunate soul in Bob, though, as far gone as he was, he’d have to come back to answer the girl’s questions.