[NEW/LNH] Saviors of the Net #12.5: 'A <click> within the Darkness'

Arthur Spitzer arspitzer at earthlink.net
Wed May 31 22:36:33 PDT 2006


                              T H E
   /////////                                        /////////
   \\\                                              \\\
    \\\                                              \\\
     \\\\\\\\\                                        \\\\\\\\
           /// ///\\ \\\   || ||  ///\\\ \\\\\\\           ///
          /// ///  \\ \\\  || || ///  \\\ \\\ \\          ///
         /// \\\\\\\\\ \\\ || || \\\  /// |||\\\         ///
   //////// ///      \\ \\\|| ||  \\\///  ||| \\\\\ ///////
                   

                           O F  T H E


            \\\\\\\     \\\     >>>>>>>  //////////////
             \\\\\ \\    \\\    \\            ///
              \\\\\  \\   \\\    >>>>>       ///
               \\\\\   \\  \\\  //          ///
                \\\\\   \\\\\\\ >>>>>>>    ///




                   Saviors of the Net #12.5

                        An Interlude

                'A <click> within the Darkness'

In the beginning...

In the beginning, there was just the Net.  An Infi.net.e of never ending
darkness.  Nothing.  Nothing at all except the Net.  Well, okay... that's
not completely true.  There was something else.  Something that had been
waiting a long, long time.

And for the longest time there was nothing, but the Net and this Waiting
Thing that lurked within the Primordial Darkness beyond the Net.

And then there was a <click>.

And the <click> begat a Letter.

<click> <click>

More Letters.

The Letters became a Word.

<click> <click><click> <click><click> <click>

And the Words became a Message.  And the Message did unite with the Sig. to
become the Post.

And the Posts became Threads.  And some turned into Flames.

Out of this, two races of Posters came into being.  The Net.Gods and The
Net.Trolls.  They divided the Net into many different parts.  One part
became the Newsgroups.  The Living Moderator was given rule over all of the
unmoderated newsgroups.  Seven other entities: Infi.net.e, Inter.net.e,
Are.Em, Killfile, Alt.lactus, Lord MUD, and Master Workload created by the
Source Code were given rule over their specific domains on the rest of the
Net.

And the Waiting Thing observed all of this.  And the Waiting Thing noticed
that as powerful as these Cosmic Entities were they weren't able to detect
the Waiting Thing's presence.  The Waiting Thing saw something else.  A
Wall.  A Wall separating the Net from something.  A Wall that was very far
away.  The Cosmic Entities called it the Fourth Wall.

The Waiting Thing focused its attention on a newsgroup called net.comics and
a race of posters called the N.Celestials that lived on it.  It watched as
they renamed the group rec.arts.comics and changed their names to that of
the RACelestials.  It watched one of these RACelstials called The Net.Roach
respond to another RACelstial -- The Ahkond of Swat's post about a 'Winsor
McCay' spelling error.  This post became a massive thread.  And from that
thread something formed.  Something called the Looniverse.

The Waiting Thing wondered why it was interested in this silly little thing.
Something important had happened there, but it couldn't remember what it
was.  It gazed into the Looniverse.  And watched it evolve.

It saw alien civilizations, like the Dorfian and Dvorkanian, form into
massive intergalactic space empires.  But they did not interest it.  It
focused its attention on a small blue world circling a yellow sun.  It
watched bacteria evolve into multi-celled life forms.  It watched fish
become amphibians.  Amphibians into lizards.  Lizards into mammals.  One of
these mammals eventually called himself Man.

And then nothing really significant happened until the early part of the
20th century when a kid by the name of Boy Lad found a briefcase with the
letters LNH on it.

The Waiting Thing wondered why this was significant.  Boy Lad disappeared
and so did the LNH for awhile.

It wasn't until the year 1970 that the Waiting Thing became fascinated with
another event.  This time it was a birth.  A human couple by the name of
Nathan and Natalie Net.ropolis had a baby.  A baby girl.  A baby girl named
Vivian Net.ropolis.

The Waiting Thing started to remember.

It watched Vivian Net.ropolis grow up.  It watched her be tormented by other
kids because of her intelligence.  It watched her suffer, and cry, and pray.
And it watched as she lost faith in her world and humanity.  It watched her
graduate from college.  It watched her plan.

The LNH returned. 1992.  A group of villains armed with a Cosmic Plot Device
and a Ring of Retconn warped the world to their whims.  The Waiting Thing
absorbed the excess retcotheric energy.  Something called Cry.Sig happened
causing the Looniverse to shift to a new newsgroup called alt.comics.lnh.
More retcotheric energy.  The Waiting Thing feasted.

1994.  Vivian Net.ropolis got a job at a place called the Mr. Paprika
Company.  She was sent to a place called Omaha.  There was a rip in reality.
A crack.  A crack in the Fourth Wall?  No.  Not the Fourth Wall.  The Fifth
Wall?  How could that be?  The Waiting Thing was disturbed by this.  How
many walls were there?  How many would it have to break?

It watched a suicidal Vivian Net.ropolis throw herself into the crack.  It
watched her return.  It wondered what she saw.  What was beyond the Fifth
Wall?  But it knew that she understood.  She understood what she needed to
do.  That night Vivian Net.ropolis wrote an equation on a piece of paper.
And the Waiting Thing smiled to itself.

Retcon Hour.  The Looniverse moved to a new newsgroup called
rec.arts.comics.creative.  More retcotheric energy.  The Waiting Thing
gobbled it all up.  The Waiting Thing felt incredible power flowing through
it.  But it was not ready.  Not yet.  But soon.

1998.  Vivian Net.ropolis recruited a group of super-powered types.  Or did
they recruit her?  Retcotheric Energy made everything hazy.  This
super-powered group called itself the Saviors of the Net.  The Saviors
themselves were hazy except for Vivian Net.ropolis.  Why was that?

Vivian Net.ropolis worked on prototypes for her project.  The Waiting Thing
breathed life into three of them.  They would be his Knight, his Bishop, and
his Rook.  The Saviors announced their presence to the world on the
MacLaughlin Man Show.  Cosmic Entities across the Net started to become very
nervous.  But they didn't know why.  They couldn't see the Waiting Thing.
They couldn't feel the rope growing tightly against their necks.

A battle between one of the Saviors and the LNH'r Retcon Lad.  The Waiting
Thing was tempted to feast on the retcotheric energy, but knew that it
couldn't do that.  This retcotheric energy was meant for the birth.  The
Waiting Thing licked its lips.

The Cosmic Entities started to become aware of the Waiting Thing.  Some
tried to warn various members of the LNH and the Saviors of the Net.  Some
tried to take advantage of the situation.  But it was too late.  It was out
of their hands.  Everything started to move into position.

Vivian Net.ropolis started to have doubts.  Was she doing the right thing?
The Waiting Thing didn't seem to have the power to force Net.ropolis to push
the button.  The Waiting Thing caused Bad-Timing Boy to drop his fork.  If
Net.ropolis would not push the button then fate would.

The Dominoes started to fall.  Vivian Net.ropolis's elbow hit the button.

There was a burst of light.  It was born.  And it retconned the world.  But
it was young.  It did not understand.  It didn't have the power it needed
and so it created servants that would help it get that power.  And the
servants reshaped the world back to the way it was, but without the Saviors.
And they sent the Waiting Thing back to the beginning.  So it could learn.
So it could feast.  And finally it understood what it must do.

The LNHQ was overrun with teenage girls that had been turned into sheep.
Its servants were doing this.  Its servants had become corrupted by the
silliness of the Looniverse.  Their time was to come to an end.

It absorbed all of the retcotheric energy from the Mutton Mania chaotic
add-on storyline.  It was time.

The Waiting Thing stretched its perfect arms.  It was time.

The Waiting Thing crackled its perfect knuckles.  It was time.

The Waiting Thing gazed at the perfect keyboard and lay its perfect fingers
down on the keys.

It was time.  Time for the perfect story to be written.

Time to create the perfect world.

The Mechanical Author smiled the perfect smile.

<click><click><click><click><click><click><click><click><click><click>

Thundered through the darkness.

==============
Writer's Notes
==============

This was mostly written to be a bridge between SotN #12 and #13.

A lot of the info here was snagged from Jameel and Dave's 'Kid Kirby's Guide
to Cosmic Beings'.  And some stuff I probably snagged from Saxon Brenton's
stuff.  Boy Lad is David R Henry's and Retcon Lad is Saxon Brenton's.

It is also seen from the point of view of the Mechanical Author so
everything probably is a little suspect.

This is history at the time of the Saviors of Net Series.  I'm sure anything
you find wrong with this has been retconned away since then.

The Fifth Wall was created by Chris Sypal.  (See the Omaha Project and the
Pliable Lad Annual for more on that.)

Arthur "Yeah, I know.  This probably should be #4Pi." Spitzer



More information about the racc mailing list