I'm sewn into the void… What does nothingness taste like?
In my 800 years and various months of being alive, I've come across a fair amount of literature. Fiction and nonfiction. Straight-laced and fancy-romancy. Nuanced, emotional masterpieces and trashy propaganda for kids. Being old, and therefore less picky, I've enjoyed a great variety of stories and essays and other wordy schmiggeldy-schmook to occupy my eternal existence on this ephemeral earth. (That loquacious enough for you?)
The human imagination is truly boundless, and a lot more powerful than realized. One might call it imagination, while another calls it perception. The simple authors, even my fangirls, have a simplified version of my power to see other worlds. Other universes, even. Everything that is written down, as a story, or an account of a real-world scenario, actually happened somewhere in the cosmos. The human psyche can't describe events that never happened; it's impossible.
When an author conceives of an idea, she sees its perfect form floating in the haze of the Anticanon. When she writes it down, her consciousness pushes forth, past the wall of dreams, and into the world of the story. She doesn't world-build. She world-observes. Granted, she might not observe an accurate version of the universe's essence, and that's why we have stories about America being a whiner and me wanting to die all the time. (Good grief, and have my legacy be "It's the same thing as Russia?" You like to see me suffer? Write about the time I got my fingers caught in the toaster.)
Some notable authors, like the guy writing that Kung Fu Panda fanfiction set in a post-apocalyptic intergalactic socialist empire, believe reality has a fabric. That the cosmos are a physical, tangible entity sustained by the energies it encompasses. Space-time, as a concept you can see, touch, and even manipulate.
Now, I'm not going to prove or disprove "crystal essence" or "quantum limbo" or any of the other stuff you consider when writing Kung Fu Panda fanfiction; that all exists anyway in its respective universe. But I'll espouse one thing — reality is made of fabric. And it's not a stretchy fabric like nylon or spandex. It's the printed cotton fabric sitting stiff on its cardboard core in the corner of the craft store, waiting for some big shot to come by and sew it into rat hammocks.
How do I know this?
Because I sewed myself inside on accident.
Living in the 3-D world I call home is my own choice, but that doesn't make it easy. Like I've said before, my body is volatile. It likes to betray me sometimes, bloating into 4 or even 5-D without my command. Doesn't destroy me, but it's a little painful. Probably gonna take me a few billion years to get used to it. But hey, by that time, Germany'll be my little brother to teach everything to again.
Honestly, right now I have no idea what dimension I'm in, or if I even exist at all. I'm totally in the void. BETWEEN existence and nonexistence, and not encompassing both like I usually do. I must've really warped myself good back in that fantasy world. I can't feel my face, and everything below my knees is numb. Some part of me is physical, because I can clench my stomach somewhat. Is that my stomach or my back? I can't see. Well, I can see, but I can't describe to you what I'm seeing. Hyperchromatics and ultra-ultraviolet swirly patterns and generally relative monographolithics.
You honestly thought that was a real word, didn't you.
I've been swimming through the void for who knows how long — memories run like thick soup when time is sluggish. My hands touch gray, gray, a flash! Then gray again. Am I gray? My whole body is gray! Oh, hey there, worm person. Do I actually have three arms? What's an arm? What's a body?
No, Prussia, you know what a body is. You need a body, or people won't know and respect how awesome you are. The humans won't trust something that doesn't have a body. But can you have a body when you're inside the fabric of reality? Or are you just part of the fabric? Ach, I feel nauseous. Barfing up a few galaxies. Think I'm melting. Nope. Condensing. My fingernails have seven dimensions. My nose is sticking into an eighth. I must be the tallest person in the universe.
Keep pushing on. Follow the tether of earth power. It's outside the pocket of void, but it's there, leading me, showing me the light of my home. Ha! Is that something familiar? Warm? Comfort? Germany's baking? Should such an infinite being as me be concerned with the pettiest of mortal endeavors?
Somebody's cooking in our house! An orangey aura flashes in the gray. The fabreality softly swells at the energy and presses up against my face, which I think I have. America. My America. Of My World. I'm home. I want to cry so badly, but the sodium of my tears will explode.
"You're in luck, Germs! I'm gonna make you a hearty American breakfast, starting with fried, buttered mushrooms! Or as I like to call 'em, buttshrooms!"
"Sounds… tasty," Germany replies.
Golden aura! My Germany! Oh, thank John Mayer, I made it home! I thrust my arms forward, but my arms are enormous, encompassing the whole world, but also barely a millimeter thick. Mein Gott, I hate irrationality.
Normally I can phase right through the walls of the universe! They crumble at my touch! But from inside the wall? It should be even easier, but I think I'm caught in the seam! My body is bloated so many different ways into so many different dimensions that I can barely focus on the image of Germany for five seconds before I'm looking at the quantum structure of my own ass. Oh, shit. I'm over the edge. The existential crisis is here anyway. Am I supposed to let go of 3-D existence? Is this formless void my True Form? A mishmash of constantly-expanding consciousness that flows past all cosmic barriers until it's convoluted past its own understanding of what IS?
I don't wanna!
I'm getting scared. The part of me that must be my face rams into the barrier over and over again, but the rest is stuck like the hair in Germany's shower drain. The golden aura of Germany's presence expands, then shrinks. I see everything about him. His birth. His growth. The particles that make him up. The particles that make up those particles. The idea dust that makes up those particles. But mostly, and most curiously, I see millions of bands of sparkling energy flowing to and from his body. Earth power? No, it's deeper. Something not even nations can feel.
Or… can we feel it?
I consult my otherworldly knowledge. My consciousness explodes, bloating up to the size of the universe, and I see the bands of energy on a massive scale. Woah… those are huge. They stretch so far from Germany's body, I can't even see the ends of them. Straight out of my domain.
It's love, dumbass, says Ignorance, knuckling his shades and narrowing his brows at my head popping up to where his cloud floats in the void.
Okay, so it's the energy of love, or some shit. It's powerful. Love Germany gives. Love he receives. From all across the broad expanse of the multiverse. He loves watching TNG, so there's a thin band heading off in the direction of that universe. He loves spending time with Italy, so there's a shorter, wider band connecting the two of them. He's loved by billions of women just like I am, so there are billions of colored bands tethering their hearts to his, invisibly.
I shrink back down, my own heart settling a bit. So… love is tangible, too. It has an energy. A wavelength. Connecting everyone across the vast schemata of everything. Maybe sometime I'll check out my own spectrum of sparkling bands. Sometime when I'm not trapped inside the universe's garbage chute.
I bang my glitching fists against the celestial threads, but they hold strong. Each tendril of my being I will to press on the barrier. Every exploding tear. Every steely drop of aether.
"Germany! Germany, get me out of here! Germany, string theory is true! And the strings are starched and woven into space pants! We are living inside our own trousers, Germany! Germany! WEST! LUDWIG! I'M SCARED!"
My vaporizing mind slides down the wall of the void, out of energy. I'm ruined. Germany can't perceive what I can. He can't see the bulge in space-time where I'm stuck. All he'd have to do is create a warp and shake me a little bit until all of me drizzles out onto the carpet. I can see his aura so clearly, but there's no way he feels mine. So close to existence, and yet I don't exist at all in his world right now. All he's got is my tether of earth power leading to nowhere. He doesn't know I'm back. I could be galaxies away in his mind…
"Germany," I sob, my voice shaking and shifting until it sounds like it's coming from my feet. "Germany, look for me. I'm here. Please… Try to see me. Think of me."
"All right, ya ready for some buttshrooms? They're cut nice and thick."
"Is that all we're eating?"
"Nah, I made eggs, too. But the buttshrooms are the best. I used to make 'em just for steak, but they're totally delicious on their own! Come on! Say it! Buttshrooms!"
Awwwwww, if I were there, I'd make him say it!
"By the Power of Prussia, split!"
Nothing.
"Sword of Preußen, cut me out!"
Still nothing.
From depression to acceptance? No! Never! I am the Great Prussia of Several Dimensions! Nothing is too whimsical or impossible for me to tackle! Germany still cares about me! He'll come looking for me eventually! When he's done eating the buttshrooms!
Germany cares about me…
That's it.
I press my stomach against the fabric because that is my face now. My galaxy eyes focus. Germany's aura sharpens and brightens. A spiky corona. An emanation of neutrinos. THERE! BANDS OF LOVE! And the shortest, broadest one is tethered to his heart AND MINE!
Now, this is a power I definitely keep in the void! I yank my arms out of 9-D, wipe the lava off on my shirt, then seize the band of energy pulsing as it connects to me. My heart flutters, and my whole chest goes warm. My brother! I feel him! And now I'm going to make him feel me, too!
I yank the band backwards, squeezing it until it's bright from irritation. I then feed it with positive thoughts. Everything I love about Germany. His tiny smiles. His diligence. His adaptability. His Brötchen… dammit. The band brightens. Brightens. Come on, I'm thinking about you! Loving you! Love me, too!
"Prussia…" Germany says from beyond the void.
"P? What about 'im?"
"He's here."
Yes! I'm here!
"W'll, where is he, Germs? Invisible?"
The shining glob of aura glows. I know he's looking at me. My breath goes… somewhere.
"I can see him," Germany says with that disappointed voice. "In my peripheral vision. There's a kind of shimmer. You can come out, brother."
"I need help. I can't get out." I jostle the bulge of fabric a little bit, getting his attention.
"Dude, what are you looking at? I can't see anything!"
"He's there," Germany says. "I… think he's communicating through our hearts… or some shit."
"Ah, man, that is so 80s."
"A reference he wouldn't get. America, grab me a butter knife. Any will work."
The orange leaves for a minute, then returns. "This is the one I used to make buttshrooms. Whaddaya need it for—"
A swipe of the arm.
Germany speaks. "Prussia. Come."
My parts all flow back together in a spectacularly disgusting sloosh. Then the glitter explodes from my chest, there's a sound of ripping fabric, and I'm out on the carpet, breathing normally again.
"So… butter knives are magic wands now," America says.
"Brother, what were you doing!?"
I rise and shake off the dust. "What? No welcome after I come back from holiday? I was trapped inside the fabric of reality. In the VAST VOID. You should be happy I'm not eternally dismantled.
Germany sighs. "We'll talk about it later. Can I just ask why you're wearing two pairs of trousers?"
I look down. One pair of comfy cargo pants… under a pair of fancy slacks. Both sewn together at the cuffs.
"Holy shit! These are the slacks I lost in the wormhole! They came back!"
I think I was inside them the whole time.
~N~
That KFP fic is real, and it's awesome. Also real and awesome: buttshrooms. Just fry 'em up with butter in a pan, and it's breakfast.
Updated by Syntax-N on FanFiction . Net July 26th, 2020. Reposters cursed.