(Author's note at the bottom)
The cold, and dark was the most oppressive thing he'd ever experienced as he floated in the abyss. He felt weightless and impossibly heavy all at once. Trying to move or shift felt like an impossible task. It was strange, feeling so isolated like this, since isolation was normally something he sought out. For a brief moment a sudden surge of panic washed over him before rapidly fading away.
Odd, he thought. Where did that come from? What is there to be so panicked about? I'm fine after all. I'm...
Where am I?
"Why ask 'where' when the delicious question is 'when?'"
He spun around, startled, to come face to face with a young woman, one he recognized from- wait. Since when could I move? Or see?
"Since just now," the woman explained, drawing his eyes once more, the question evident on his face. Was she reading his thoughts?
Instead of answering the unasked question though, she simply smiled and walked past him, his eyes following her as she approached a large doorway that opened on its own, leading out onto a landing, the sound of water lapping against stone reaching his ears and the glint of stars in the night sky shining down.
"Not stars," she said, "But you should already know that."
He trailed after her, too shocked to hesitate as he came to a stop next to her. He looked up at the sky, with wide eyes, knowing suddenly that it wasn't a sky, but a vast, endless sea that was dotted, not with stars, but lighthouses exactly like the one he stood at. "How?" he muttered, right before reality hit him with what he swore was a physical force and he lurched forward, hands coming to rest against the rough stone of the waist high wall in front of him. His head rang and vision swam as nausea welled up in his gut before it faded, drawing his attention to the warm, wet sensation of liquid running over his lips. His tongue licked across them instinctively and the harsh tang of iron rich blood greeted him.
"Don't worry," the woman said, "It will pass... at least for now."
He felt a swelling of emotions he couldn't describe and nearly panicked again before he latched onto an emotion he did recognize; frustration. "HOW?!" he demanded.
"You already know," she explained before adding, "Well... the basics, anyway. The bare minimum basics."
The physical force hit again, along with the ringing, swimming, nausea, and fresh flow of blood from his nose. As he recovered from the newest bout he choked out, "Multiverse?"
"See?" the reply came with the subtle quality of a genuine smile, "Don't think about it too hard. You'll only get frustrated. Honestly it all comes down to a lot of quantum bullshit. Take me for example. I'm Elizabeth Comstock, Anna Dewitt, and dead all at once."
He frowned and look at her, taking in her appearance. She certainly look like the girl from the game he'd played, but for some reason beyond his understanding she seemed off. "Dead?" he asked.
She gave a nod, "Yes, well...yes and no. Both. I know about what you know of me. Those games you played. In that last bit of that last game of yours, I well and truly died after having given up my... let's call it quantum superposition. Should have been the end of it. Except it wasn't. And before you ask, I don't know how. As I said, quantum bullshit."
His thoughts churned and stilled all at once. He was sure he was processing everything on a subconscious level, as he usually did, but at the conscious level there was nothing going on. He stood there, silent, waiting for his mind to start working again. Waiting, and waiting, and waiting. It could have been a few seconds, or it could have been a few millennia, but finally he turned away from her and looked back up to the endless sea above him. For some reason he couldn't fathom and didn't want to dwell on, he wasn't panicking. In fact his mind was rather clear now despite the fact that he knew he shouldn't be able to function in this... impossible situation.
"Why am I here?" he asked.
"Do you see that lighthouse?" She asked, pointing off to the right, "Not the closest one, but just to the left of it. The one with the faint light?"
He followed her direction and his eyes fell on the lighthouse. In the dark it was hard to see much clearly but he could see it well enough to know that it looked just like all the other ones nearby. "Yes," he said quietly.
Elizabeth gave a nod and then shifted her arm to point to another lighthouse, "And that one? The closest one too it by distance, but four to the left by number?"
Again he looked and saw the lighthouse she indicated, giving another ,"Yes."
"Look at the water around them," Elizabeth ordered with a tone that hinted at trepidation.
He looked at the bases of the lighthouses, glancing from one to the other before noticing what he suspected she wanted him to. There were ripples flowing outward from both lighthouses, as though they were moving through the water. He frowned at the sight before saying. "It looks like they're moving toward each other."
Elizabeth was silent for a moment, just long enough to make him wonder what she was thinking before she replied, "They are. When they meet, there will be no crash. No jarring impact. They will merge until they become one, and then that one will start moving again to find another to merge with."
He turned to look at her with a frown. She, in turn looked at him, a distinct sadness in her eyes. "It's a Collapse," she explained, "Two universes becoming one. And... it's happening all over. Eventually, they will all become one."
"When?" he asked.
"Not for a long time, but eventually," she said.
He swallowed the sudden lump in his throat before speaking again, "And what happens then? Why are they merging? What does it do?"
Elizabeth took a deep breath as she turned back to look out at the sea, "Usually when two merge, very little happens. Universes are vast and empty after all, but eventually, it will start causing problems. Cataclysms on a galactic scale. It will destroy life. Destroy everything. I'm not sure what will happen when all become one. Maybe things will settle down, but I doubt it. After living the life I've lived, I have a certain 'sense' about these things. I think when all finally become one... that one will end as well. When that last lighthouse disappears, and this beautiful sea of existence becomes dark, the sea itself will vanish. What's the point of the sea, if there is nothing to light it? To inhabit it?"
He felt an overwhelming sense of dread as she spoke. Feeling the lump return to his throat he let out a quiet choking sound as he tried to think of something to say. Before he could though, she turned to him with a sad, almost apologetic smile. "As for why," she said, "It's your fault, Atrius Telos."
A/N: So, after a very long absence I'm looking at getting back into writing. Life has finally settled down for me, I got my degree and a good job, as well as a mountain of ideas that I feel a desire to get down on paper. That said, I want to be sure that I'm writing not only something I want to write, but also something you want to read. So, what is this story about? Well if you read these first two and a half pages, you'll have a rough idea. This is a story about the collapse of the multiverse, and while I intend for this first part (assuming all goes well there will be sequels/off shoots) to be based in the Mass Effect Universe, I would very much like to see the Collapse play out in the story, so I do intend to bring in other characters from other media into the story.
That said: Who do you, the readers, want to see in the story?
I'm open to suggestions and willing to look into adding just about any character from any fandom or media type so long as I think they'll fit and I can get a good feel for the character. I already know about some characters I'll be adding, but I would welcome more, because this is not going to be a rehash of the Mass Effect story-line with additional characters, my intent is to change things and the more variety, they greater the changes I can plausibly create.
Finally, thanks for reading.
