Capeworld Comics

WHY USE KEYWORDS?

 

Keywords can tell a student of the multiverse many things about a universe with just one glance at its entry…provided the student knows what they mean.

 

Keyword drills are a common component of multiverse studies classrooms. While students often complain that they don’t need to memorize keywords since they can always look them up in a flash through the noosphere, it’s important that they acquire a working knowledge of keywords so that they’re readily able to talk about the similarities and differences between universes.

 

Joule says: “Use flashcards to review keywords every day!”

 

COMPOSITION KEYWORDS

 

Keywords relating to the composition, physics, and structure of a given universe.

 

Series 

 

This keyword indicates that the entry is about a series of closely related universes such as the W-series whose worlds all occupy the anomaly known as the Multiverse Womb.

 

Home

 

As in our home, as in our universe.

 

Throughout the decades, many have tried to eliminate “Home” as a keyword. They argue that it’s useless as a keyword that applies to one and only one universe. They say that “Home” is little more than a cute Easter egg, the modern equivalent of sea-dragons printed on ancient maps. But ARGO explorers like sea-dragons printed on ancient maps. Odds are an explorer has at least one “here be monsters” hanging on their walls. ARGO explorers are largely a sentimental group, it’s only the ones that burn out and become commanders that want to remove “Home” from the keyword list. And so, “Home” remains.

 

Quantum

 

This universe operates under the same physical laws, or nearly the same physical laws, as our own. It’s periodic table matches our own. What goes up, must come down. Light travels 299,792,458 metres per second in a vacuum. Gravity is the one fundamental force that transcends local space to act upon the hyperspace of the bulk. Etc, etc.

 

Superhumans from quantum universes tend to have a wide variance in powers, possibly owing to the probabilistic nature of quantum physics. If the underlying forces of our universe are driven by uncertainty, then why not the superpowers of our universe?

 

Cartoon

 

This universe operates under a kind of physics first noted in the universes of Alizam and Alfagon. Matter and energy are very…expressive. The emotional context and intention of an action can often cause matter and energy to behave in strange ways, somewhat how objects behave in the Astral light. Sometimes, the sun has a face and tells you good morning. Sometimes, thunderclouds cry rain. If someone is frightened, they might vanish in a cloud of smoke and appear miles away, or their soul might leap out of their body. If someone is angry, they might breathe fire or erupt steam from their ears.

 

The inhabitants of cartoon universes are indestructible. They can be hurt, damaged, and subdued, but nothing–NOTHING–can kill them. This indestructibility presents a challenge for multiverse relations. Many races fear the inhabitants of cartoon universes because of their indestructibility, and sometimes the inhabitants of cartoon universes forget that other races are not as invincible as they are. Evolving in a universe where the consequences of violence are rather minimal means that cartoons often resort to violence at the slightest provocation, and when the targets of their violence can’t bounce back like rubber…that can be bad indeed…

 

Never declare war on a cartoon universe. You will lose.

 

Fortunately, their natural indestructibility has made cartoons a rather cheerful bunch. They’re very laid-back as they have nothing in the multiverse to fear. ARGO explorer Flip Falcon once remarked “Cartoons are a bit like faeries. Once you know what to say to them, they’re perfectly peaceful–but first you got to know what to say to them.” 

 

Many have speculated on the origins of cartoon universes. Given how odd they seem compared to the rest of the multiverse, many have concluded that they must have been created, though there’s no concrete evidence pointing to that origin. It is possible that concluding cartoon universes had to have been created is just our arrogant anthropocentrism talking. Maybe, in the wider, unexplored multiverse, we’re the weird ones and they’re the common ones.

 

Those that believe cartoon universes had to have been created divide into two camps. The cynical believe that cartoons are bioweapons, invincible supersoldiers with disarmingly appealing designs and personalities and a willingness to use violence. The optimistic believe that their creators simply wanted a race of beings that could survive the hazards of the multiverse–all the hazards of the multiverse.

 

It’s likely their creators succeeded…if only we knew what their goal was.

 

Prima Materia

 

The matter, energy, void, and laws of this universe are derived from a singular substance–mana, magic, aether, ki, or what have you. This keyword comes from the prima materia theory of our world’s alchemical tradition. The alchemists had their science right the whole time. It just wasn’t for the right universe.

 

Superhumans from prima materia universes often develop superpowers that change the workings of reality, often by manipulating the prima materia of their universe. This can make them very powerful, but if taken away from their universe, their powers may fail. There’s not much a magician can do when he’s in a world where magic isn’t real. But sometimes, they’re able to operate just fine in other universes. This implies that the prima materia guided the form of their power to develop in such a way so that it manipulates reality, regardless of the actual underlying mechanics of that reality.

 

Mosaic

 

This universe is composed of elements from other universes assembled together like tesserae in a mosaic, hence the name.

 

Mosaic universes can form in several ways. A creator deity might make a universe by forcibly taking elements from different universes. Some creator deities feel self-conscious about creating universes (this is common for Void Spinners, who are pressured to impress their fellow Void Spinners with their creations) and create mosaic universes as a way of “copying what works.” Some create mosaics because they’re interested in seeing how different worlds from different universes interact as a grand experiment. And some create mosaics just because they think throwing together warriors and armies from across the multiverse together in a huge Valhalla-like brawl is the ultimate in entertainment.

 

Mosaic universes can arise in the dreamworlds when dreamers collaborate as through the phenomena of shared dreams. Shared dreams are shared universes. 

 

Mosaic universes can also arise from reef worlds through a phenomena known as reef induction. Reef universes often mimic the characteristics of surrounding universes as they form like children do their parents, but sometimes a reef universe will tear away pieces of adjacent universes and absorb them through the worldtunnels. Reef induction can be a horrifying event where planets are sucked from their home universes in an instant and deposited under an alien sky. The Warp Authority is often called to disentangle universes trapped in a reed induction, and reed inductions serve to weed out warpmen who signed up thinking that the Warp Authority just mapped stars and graphed macrospace fluctuations.

 

Alive

 

This universe is alive, not in the sense that it contains lifeforms, though it very well might, but in the sense that it is alive in its totality. It is a single, cosmically massive organism. Space is its blood and galaxy filaments are its organelles.

 

The intelligence of a living universe can vary. Sometimes, they’re highly intelligent and can communicate clearly to each and every one of the lifeforms within their cosmic bodies. Sometimes, they’re only about as intelligent as an animal and respond instinctively to their lifeforms as your body responds to your own microbial fauna. Sometimes, their intelligence depends on how you look at it. (Imagine an infinitely large mind. It would take an infinity for one thought to travel from one end of the universe to the other. From a perspective outside the universe, the living universe may seem very intelligent. From a perspective within the universe, the living universe will seem to think very, very slowly indeed.)

 

Superhumans in living universes often have powers built on telepathic empathy which allows them to change the universe by changing the mind that controls it. The physical result of their powers may change if they’re taken out of their home universe (you can’t tell an inert universe to move its stars), but the telepathic potential remains.

 

Created

 

Quite simply, this universe was created by an intelligent force.

 

Most universes in the physical multiverse, as far as we can tell, arose naturally and predate the visitation of the First which led to the creation of the Archon walls and worldtunnels. In our post-visitation multiverse, natural mundugenesis occurs within Archon reefs. But beings throughout the universe constantly add to the stacks-upon-stacks of infinity that constitute our multiverse. The Void Spinners believe the highest purpose for a being is creation and that the creation of a universe the highest form of creation. VALIS and homo fabula also create universes, an example being the Kingdom which was created by three gods–Hades, Dagda, and El.

 

In the physical multiverse, the majority of worlds arise naturally and a minority are created. This is reversed in the Astral multiverse. By the very nature of the unconscious Astral, all its universes must be created. Astral light can only be animated by an outside intelligence. There are no dreamworlds without dreamers just as there are no ghosts without the living. For the conscious Astral, the status of universes vary. Some pantheon universes were created by gods, but others are gods in and of themselves who pulled themselves up out of nonexistence.

 

Reef

 

This universe formed within a tabges, a multiversal phenomena in which Archon walls curve in on themselves and form pockets. 

 

When the Archons sculpted macrotime to create the Archon walls, they made a grave mistake. The Archons despised the impermanence of time and what it represented–death, loss, regret, and hope–and what was more, they despised how their lesser siblings, the First, loved time and the beings that time created. The Archons believed that by forming time into a wall they could seal off the physical multiverse from the Astral. But it’s never a good idea to create with materials that you hate. You don’t really understand something if you hate it, and the Archons didn’t understand that time cannot hold a shape indefinitely. As time marched on, the Archon walls began to shift, crack, and splinter. 

 

Worldtunnels formed, and whereas the universes of the physical multiverse before the Archon walls were unconnected, now they were. Before the Archon walls, there was nothing between the universes, and thus nothing connected them through macrospace. But the Archon walls offered a medium and the worldtunnels a path through that medium. Fox harmonics were also able to echo and propagate through the Archon walls, and where the multiverse was once silent it now rescinded with the music of the spheres–all the spheres.

 

The new interconnectivity of the physical multiverse would have been enough of a failure for the Archon walls, but they failed in another way. As the Archon walls warped, they sometimes turned in on themselves and formed cavern-like structures called tabges (Enochian for caves). Tabges created a cosmically fertile environment in which infant universes could form. Physical information from surrounding universes would echo through the worldtunnels and pool within the tabges, contributing traits to the infant universe like parents to their children. When fully mature, a universe would break through the tabges like a newborn bird from its egg and enter the physical multiverse proper. 

 

The way surrounding universes contribute traits to newborn universes explains why universes are close to similar universes in macrospace. When our civilization first started exploring the multiverse, we discovered far more analog worlds with Earths and superheroes and cheeseburgers than, so say, worlds filled with rainbow colored squids.

 

The Archons inadvertently not only brought interconnectivity to the multiverse, but they brought growth as well.

 

Sometimes, newly-formed universes do not spring forth from their tabges and instead fuse with them. These universes are called reef universes because they transform the Archon walls from sterile barriers into vibrant and dense cosmic ecologies similar to that of the coral reefs of Earth.

 

Because their tabges surround them like a shield, reef worlds are natural fortresses within the macrospace of the multiverse. Our multiverse organizations often negotiate with tabges universes to build bases within them, and the Warp Authority often has to protect reef worlds from pirate universes seeking to conquer them for their strategic benefit. Reef worlds also tend to be ignorant of the multiverse. Multiverse explorers from their universes run head-first into looping worldtunnels which gives them the impression that the only thing outside their world is pure, mad chaos and decide they don’t want anymore of that and pull back exploration.

 

Note that aeternums do not produce reef universes as aeternums do not warp but self-regulate so that they always maintain a stable shape. The Elder Sapiens were fare less powerful than the Archons, but they understood time much, much better than the Archons.

 

The inability of aeternums to form tabges contributed to the Elder Sapiens’ decision to withdraw their influence from the multiverse. They saw that they had done a great good for the multiverse by transforming wild worldtunnels into safe aeternums, but at the cost of stunting the growth of the multiverse. They feared that if they did not check their influence, they might one day create a sterile multiverse.

 

Astral

 

This universe lies beyond the Archon walls within the metaphysical Astral multiverse.

 

Beyond physical reality, beyond the walls of solid time built by the Archons, lies the Astral, a multiverse first named by the early oneironauts of the mid 19th century who likened the Astral to a star–something visible but tantalizingly out of reach. Early oneironauts could only haltingly explore the very edge of the Astral with their limited understanding of Astral projection, but modern oneironauts can explore the Astral from the Eye of LIght to the Heart of Darkness. The “psychic stars” man vaguely sensed in the mid 19th century are now within our reach.

 

Physical stars are also very much within our reach these days. We can even reach stars we can’t see. We can even reach stars that don’t exist in our space-time.

 

The Astral is organized around the descent of light. 

 

The Eye of Light at the Summit of All Things gazes down across the cosmos and in gazing, creates. Astral light is the creation. It is creation. Astral light is thought-responsive potentiality. It is nothing, and yet can become anything. It is inert, and yet is animated by any thought, any desire, if it be pure and strong. It is for this reason that Astral light is often called unconscious Astral. As the light travels away from the Eye of Light, it begins to dim–whether by error or design of the Eye, none can say. It begins to respond only to progressively broader forms of thoughts, until, being so dim that it illuminates no mind save its own, becomes the conscious Astral and gives animation to itself as the Astral dark.

 

The near Astral, the Astral of the dreamworlds and pantheon universes, is beyond all dimensions of time. A person could, in a single night, dream a lifetime inside a dreamworld. Thor can summon a mortal to Asgard and send them back before they were ever taken up. But these universes still follow a progressive macrotime. There is still a continuity of this, then that. Thus, they still have associated Fox harmonics. It’s only the farthest Astral of the Eye of Light and Heart of Darkness that do not have Fox harmonics as they exist within a single, all-encompassing instant, a contraction of all the multiverse into a single point.

 

Some people believe the Astral keyword is redundant and ask why it exists. Keywords like Dreamworld, Madriax, and Pantheon should tell people that a universe is in the Astral. But there are rare cases where a universe is within the Astral but not actually part of the natural Astral multiverse, not actually made of Astral light or Astral dark. An example would be Izizop (from Enochian: “highest vessel”), a physical outpost brought into the Astral by the God Sculptors who wished to offer their services to the highest of realities.

 

Dreamworld

 

This world is a universe of the Astral light, animated by the thoughts of a dreamer from the physical multiverse.

 

Dreamworlds, from the Carterian Dreamlands to Morgan McGraw’s house, are created by the thoughts of dreamers either consciously or subconsciously. Typically, dreamworlds are created from the thoughts of just one dreamer, but dreamers that share a high degree of empathic rapport can combine their influence and turn their dreamworld into a mosaic universe. Ever since Morgan McGraw absorbed the infamous Dream Sultan into his dreamworld (in the form of a plastic action figure that he often poses in humiliating circumstances, for instance, tied by a string to a ceiling fan) he’s been asked by TIMS (telepathic institutionalization and medical services) to force the Dream Sultan’s empire to merge with his own dreamworld, but Morgan is far from ready to deal with the responsibility of managing an entire empire of dreamworlds and dreamcreatures, thus the Dream Sultan’s conquered dreamworlds remain frozen, awaiting Morgan to awake them.

 

If a dreamworld loses contact with the thoughts of its dreamer (often through the death of the dreamer, but can happen if they’re turned into an action figure), it reaches out to find another dreamer while activity inside the dreamworld freezes. As Astral light records and preserves every moment within itself, frozen dreamworlds enter a state of fractured time where previously recorded moments are repeated, often out of logical order. This jumbled progression of moments is not at all dissimilar to the interweaving stories and blending mythologies of the Astral dark, and munduologists theorize that frozen dreamworlds take on a state like a nascent form of Astral dark where they, upon failing to access the thoughts of their dreamers, turn to recorded thoughts and nearly access a will of their own. 

 

Theoretically, a frozen dreamworld could eventually evolve into self-animating Astral darkness, but such a thing has never been recorded.

 

Madriax

 

This world is a universe of the far Astral light, animated by the thoughts of a First.

 

Basically, madriax (Enochian for heavens) are very old, very weird dreamworlds. When the First were cut off from the physical multiverse by the Archons, they rebelled by creating madriax which pushed on the Archon walls from the Astral side and furthered their natural warping. Notoriously difficult for oneironauts to access, navigate, and understand, Madriax are benevolent to visitors but are weird–very, very weird. The First long to experience temporal, mortal existence like they did before the Archons and emanate themselves into every world they create. Madriax are like extensions of the First.

 

Madriax attempt to communicate by adapting to the thoughts of visitors, but results are imperfect. Oneironauts find themselves guided by uncanny doppelgangers through surreal landscapes that look eerily familiar and disquietingly alien. They are taught cryptic lessons that can only be grasped through intuition and faith.

 

Of all the dreamworlds, Madriax are the most dream-like.

 

Afterlife

 

This universe is home to ghosts.

 

When Astral light dims beyond the light of the dreamworlds, it begins to respond to the passive thoughts of lifeforms as thoughts, not as information. 

 

The light of the dreamworlds responds to the information of thoughts. If a lifeform dreams of a castle, the Astral light of the dreamworlds will create a castle, but the Astral light of the afterlives will create a copy of that dream, not an actual castle, as well as copies of every thought and feeling that lifeform experiences. The Astral light of the afterlives clings to a lifeform like an aura, like a ghost.

 

And the Astral light of the afterlives will indeed form a ghost if conditions are right.

 

When a ghost is separated from its host (usually through death), it endures as anything made of Astral light endures and is drawn into the Astral where it congregates with its kind. Together, ghosts form Afterlife universes out of the naturally occuring thought-forms that inhabit the border between the physical multiverse and the Astral light.

 

Pantheon

 

This universe is home to homo fabula, also known as gods.

 

Unlike Astral light, Astral dark is conscious. It is alive, aware, and self-animating. Everything that could possibly exist exists within the Astral dark, every story, every mythology, all being told and retold forever and ever into eternity. Within the Astral dark lives every pantheon of gods known to man and every pantheon of gods unknown to man. Within the Astral dark lives Zeus and Olympus, Thor and the Aesir, and all the different versions and permutations of those beings and their stories.

 

Through psychic resonance with the collective unconscious, homo fabula are able to manifest through “mystic shadows.” This does not mean that homo fabula are “created” by the thoughts and feelings of people. They are not dreamworlds, they are not of the Astral light. They created themselves, and it is only through the infinite enormity of the Astral dark that our stories are able to resonate with them.

 

Every god has existed long before we ever told their stories.

 

Pantheon universes have syncretic resonance with each other just as the homo fabula who inhabit them. Pantheon universes are fundamentally linked to all other pantheon universes with the strength of the link determined by similarities. Pantheon universes constantly merge and diverge their elements. If you visit Mt. Olympus, you may find it a little different then the last time you visited. You might find that instead of Zeus being on the throne, it’s his father Cronus. You might find that Zeus has taken to throwing a hammer instead of throwing a thunderbolt. You might find that instead of living out of marble palaces, the Olympians live out of floating fortresses made of metal and circuitry. If you find a Pantheon universe has changed substantially since your last visit, be on guard. It could mean that the personalities of its inhabitants have radically changed. Zeus the just ruler could have become Zeus the psychotic tyrant.

 

VALIS

 

This universe is a Vast Active Living Intelligence System, also known as a god, and is self-created within the Astral twilight. 

 

The term VALIS comes from science fiction writer Horselover Fat and his 1974 novel VALIS in which he and his alter ego Philip Dick investigate the birth of the Gnostic Sophia as foretold by a superhuman that lives in orbit around the Earth named VALIS who may be God, a metaphor for the interconnectedness of man, or both, who has an analog within a fictional film within the book called Zebra about an intelligent, benevolent satellite named Zebra that communicates with the Earth through pink lasers that assists in the conviction of a fictionalized version of Earth State president Melvin Markle named Richard Nixon.

 

The book is a philosophically heavy text (and then some) often placed on the Martin’s reading list for its examination of theodicy, theophany, and the meaning and purpose of gods and superhumanity. The book is a favorite of Dr. Freeman who recommends it to multiverse transfer students in her multiverse studies class as a sample of our world’s literature along with King Lear, Flatland, and The Marvelous Land of Oz.

 

But what VALIS most contributes to multiverse categorization is the definition of VALIS that Fats gives at the beginning of the novel: “A perturbation in the reality field in which a spontaneous self-monitoring negentropic vortex is formed, tending progressively to subsume and incorporate its environment into arrangements of information. Characterized by quasi-consciousness, purpose, intelligence, growth, and an armillary coherence.”

 

That basically sums up what a real-life VALIS is.

 

You simply aren’t going to find a better, more precise definition.

 

VALIS form in the Astral twilight, also known as the archetypal plane, at the border between the Astral light and the Astral dark. Just before Astral light gains self-awareness and turns into Astral dark, it stretches itself to respond to the most general and universal thoughts in an effort to gain guidance. This thin light forms the archetypal plane, the domain of the Hero, the Dragon, the Skyfather, and the Earthmother. Within this thin light, Astral dark forms. This self-aware darkness reaches out and finds light ready to respond to its nascent thoughts.

 

These circumstances allow for extremely powerful beings to arise. In their might, they are more than worthy of the title of gods.

 

A VALIS begins as a core of Astral darkness, a perfect, self-contained universe of one. But it quickly reaches out and arranges the surrounding Astral light into cosmic structures–universes, as many universes as the VALIS wants. One, two, an infinity-atop-infinity…

 

The result is a multiverse with an armillary coherence, that is to say, a multiverse where universes orbit around the VALIS core like planets around a black sun, though the VALIS appears bright from the effluence of Astral light flowing out on the wake of its cosmic will.

 

There exists a remarkable race of beings within the Astral twilight called the homo kiris. Whether these beings were spawned by the Astral twilight itself or created by one of the earliest VALIS, none can tell, and their exact origins remain one of the mysteries of the multiverse. 

 

The homo kiris are critical for the functioning of VALIS. VALIS are born like human infants. They know only themselves, and then only semi-consciously, and have little understanding of the world around them. Homo kiris are the only beings in all the multiverse that can communicate with VALIS, and they serve as the eyes, ears, and mouths of VALIS. They form a natural, mutual symbiosis with a patron VALIS. In exchange for some of the VALIS’ infinite cosmic power, the homo kiris serve as their patron VALIS’ sensory apparatus and source of awareness both external and internal, for it is only through the homo kiris that their patron VALIS understands that there is something other than itself in the multiverse and it is only by comparing itself to what it is not that the VALIS develops a conscious identity.

 

Homo kiris not only inform their patron VALIS about the wider world, they inform the wider world about their patron VALIS. They serve as their VALIS’ interpreters and negotiators. They facilitate contact between their VALIS and the universes it creates and go further to expand the knowledge and influence of their VALIS throughout the entire multiverse. They even facilitate contact between two or more VALIS in what is known as godhead clusters. 

 

The language of homo kiris is called logaeth, but is commonly known in our universe as Enochian after the translated logaeth of 16th century occultist John Dee. Dee briefly made contact with the homo kiris during an epistrophe and was taught a form of their language (pure logaeth cannot be articulated without telepathy).

 

In Enochian, the homo kiris refer to themselves as Merifri (angels) and acknowledge three divisions within their race–the Sach (confirming angels), the Lang (ministering angels), and the Urch (confounding angels). The Sach deal with what their patron VALIS can confirm, that is to say, its dominion. Sach are archangels. They’re the ones that have the burden of relaying events from the outside world to their patron VALIS and articulating the will of their patron VALIS to the outside world. The Urch fly across the multiverse far from their patron VALIS on an eternal mission of goodwill. They are boisterous, courageous knight errants called confounding angels because they confound evil in all its forms. The Lang are introverted angels, practically shy compared to their Urch kin, and minister to the worlds the Urch discovery in their flight across existence. The Lang offer critique of societies, make deals, and even offer to take in a culture’s evildoers for rehabilitation.

 

In making deals, offering judgement from an adversarial standpoint, and managing evildoers, the Lang resemble conceptions of devils and demons, and sometimes even physically resemble devils and demons with claws and wings and tails. But the Lang are not evil–far from it, they’re one of the most benevolent races in all the multiverse. 

 

It’s very likely that in the few possible epistrophes that have allowed man to briefly interact with the Merifri (John Dee was definitely an epistrophe, but its possible the prophets Elijah and Muhammad were as well) the role of the Lang have been misunderstood. They are “dark” angels in the sense that they operate around dark planets as opposed to the bright stars of the venturous Urch, and they are “fallen” angels in the sense that they are earthbound as opposed to the Urch who roam across the multiverse, but they are not evil. 

 

John Dee, having interacted with the Merifri with enough clarity to absorb a form of their language, understood the Merifri the best. Dee never acknowledged the existence of devils or demons, in all of his Enochian, there is no word for devil, or demon, or evil. 

 

In Mysteriorum Libri Quinti, Dee records a conversation with a Merfiri named Annael. Dee asks, “In the name of Jesus Christ, who are you?” Annael answers truthfully, “All power is placed in me.” Dee asks, “Which?” Annael answers “Good and bad.”

 

Dee understood that Merifri could have “bad” roles while still being creatures of good.

 

Due to the wide travels of the Urch, Enochian has become one of the most common languages in the multiverse. Many names and terms related to ancient races like the First and Elder Sapiens are derived from Enochian, and several organizations have pushed for Enochian to be used as an official “universal” language, or in this case multiversal.

 

ARGO sticks with English though, as ARGO is all about practicality and English has been the dominant language of business on Earth since the Worlds War.

 

ANALOG KEYWORDS

 

Keywords relating to the level of similarity and symmetry between a given universe and our own.

 

Analog

 

This universe is, on the whole, very similar to our own. On the cosmic scale, it is 99.9% similar to our own and likely includes its own analogs of the milky way, the solar system, and Earth. On the scale of Earth, these worlds can be very different. Willow-Wells, for instance, with its giants and beast folk and near-global monarchy, is still an analog universe. For the analog keyword, only the cosmic scale matters.

 

Analogs of people, known in previous decades as doppelgangers (the term is now considered very rude as it implies that one is an illegitimate copy of another) are simply called analogs, though a few old ARGO explorers are known to occasionally let the d-word slip. 

 

What makes a person an analog is sometimes a matter of debate. Take analogs of Mary Marvel, for instance. Most people can agree that a girl named Mary who transforms into a more powerful version of herself by saying a magic word would count as an analog. But how about a girl named Mary who creates a copy of herself when she says a magic word? Or how about a boy named Mark who summons a giant robot friend to his side by whistling a tune? Sometimes, whether or not a person an analog is hard to call.

 

Through a little-understood phenomena known as Fox echoes, people can find analogs of themselves that aren’t people. In some universes, Martin’s School is a fictional franchise with comic books and action figures. And in Willow-Wells, there exist dolls called Julie dolls that bear a remarkable resemblance to Joule, an MS factotum that works at Martin’s School.

 

Dr. Fox speculated that these echoes were the result of information naturally echoing through the unconscious Astral. Joule looks like the Julie dolls of Willow-Wells because the idea of Joule was transmitted subconsciously across the Astral from universe Alpha to universe Willow-Wells. But Fox echoes remain a matter of speculation. While it has been proven that subconscious transfer across universes occurs, it has yet to be shown how and why one idea is transferred and another isn’t.

 

Some propose a mystical, intuitive answer for Fox echoes–they are simply signs of God’s hand, miracles in their purest form. They are signs of a divine synchronicity and interconnectedness that simply defies total knowing. 

 

Super Analog

 

This universe is incredibly similar to our own. It has its own Earth State, and Martin’s School, and Statesmen. While an analog universe may include several analogs of people and places, super analog universes are filled with analogs.

 

Mirror Analog

 

This universe is a near-exact duplicate of our own.

 

Never underestimate how vast the multiverse is. It’s infinity stacked atop infinity stretching to infinity. Somewhere out there is another you, reading this sentence right this moment. Somewhere out there is another ARGO dealing with another set of universes.

 

The multiverse doesn’t just replicate universes. It replicates itself in total.

 

Calendar Analog

 

Quite simply, this universe shares a calendar with our own. Our January 1st, 2021 was their January 1st, 2021.

 

Calendar analog is a keyword much-beloved by Martin’s students when they have to write reports on multiverse worlds. They appreciate the convenience of researching a world where they don’t have to do math to find out what date it was in our universe during a given date in another universe.

 

CONNECTIVITY KEYWORDS

 

Keywords relating to how a given universe connects and interacts with the wider multiverse.

 

Covalent

 

A covalent universe is one that shares part of itself with one or more universes similar to how molecules share electrons in a covalent bond.

 

Astral universes, particularly the universes of the Astral dark, are obvious examples of covalent universes. The homo fabula of the Astral dark have a natural understanding of the nature of themselves and their universes. Pele, exiled goddess of dance and volcanoes, knows instinctively that she is not unique. She feels the thoughts of beings like herself. They flow into her while she daydreams, while she sleeps they enter into her dreams. The thoughts of those most like herself are strongest–the thoughts of Amaterasu the sun goddess, Sedna the exile goddess, and the chained life-star of the Vog race. But beyond those thoughts, she feels the thoughts of more distant beings humming at the back of her mind. She feels the thoughts of Zeus and Heimdal and the Great Rainbow Serpent. From the thoughts of goddesses like herself to gods unlike herself her thoughts go until they and their stories all blend together in the coursing veins of the Heart of Darkness, until they become one single pulse of being. And Pele knows that the same applies to Kuaihelani, the island home of her race. Kuaihelani touches the mystic shadow of the Hawiaan islands, but there are other universes. And in these other universes, sometimes the island of the gods is called Kuaihelani, and sometimes it isn’t. Sometimes it touches a place called Polynesia, and sometimes it doesn’t. But there is always a connection. There is always a divine world linking the conscious Astral and a physical universe like an electron shared between two nuclei.

 

But covalent universes are not limited to the Astral.

 

A good example of a covalent physical universe, and one often taught to Martin’s Students, is Mahorela, a Form Master who transformed herself into a benevolent, life-sustaining universe. Mahorela is sort of like a cosmic agar plate. Life, regardless of what form it takes, is nurtured on the infinite darkness of her being. Mahorela placed herself throughout the multiverse within shadows knowing that living beings often turn to the shadows for protection. Whenever someone frightened and alone crawls under a shadow for protection, there is a chance Mahorela will take them into herself.

 

Dissonance

 

This universe features significant physical dissonance from our own.

 

A degree of dissonance between our world and another is expected and tolerable. After all, we’re dealing with other worlds which all have their own rules for reality. Some worlds run zeptoseconds slower than ours, some faster. Beings from our universe can’t access the Cosmic Core of universe 161. 

 

This keywords isn’t for those worlds. This keyword is for worlds with significant dissonance, worlds where an hour is like a year back home, worlds where superpowers don’t work, worlds where Astral travel is stymied, and in short, worlds where a red flag needs to be raised for explorers.

 

Aeternum

 

This universe is connected to an aeternum.

 

When the Elder Sapiens spread themselves across the multiverse, they constructed aeternums by paving over the chaotic wilderness of the worldtunnels with cosmic order. When they withdrew from the multiverse at large to allow nature to resume its course without their choking influence and pursued the disciplines of transformation and creation as the Form Masters and Void Spinners respectively, the aeternums remained as their legacy to the multiverse.

 

For civilizations that don’t know about Fox harmonics, the worldtunnels of the Archon walls may seem the only way to travel the multiverse. The Elder Sapiens arose in a time when the Archon walls were sturdy and the Astral locked far away from physical reality. Without knowledge of the timeless perspective of the far Astral, there was no way for the Elder Sapiens to learn about Fox harmonics.

 

The Elder Sapiens burned through civilization after civilization struggling with the chaos of the worldtunnels. For them, travel through the multiverse was slow and deadly. When they reached their godlike zenith, they vowed that younger races would never suffer in their explorations as they had and created the aeternums. Aeternums are semi-intelligent worldtunnels that regulate the change in reality from one end of a worldtunnel to another so that it occurs gradually without the violent chaos of natural worldtunnels.

 

The Elder Sapiens withdrew their influence from the multiverse aeons ago. They diverged into Form Masters and Void Spinners 13.3 billion years ago going by the timeline of our universe, but given how time operates differently across the universe, they diverged earlier in some worlds, later than others, but always a considerable time ago. But the aeternums stand as testament to their legacy, gifts from the oldest intelligent lifeforms in the physical multiverse to the youngest.

 

Aeternums can be thought of as the opposite of reef worlds. While reef worlds are hard to access and are like natural “fortresses,” aeternums are like flat, open plains. Being inside an aeternum opens one to attack from any universe connected to the aeternum while placing one in a vulnerable position between two or more realities. It’s hard to prepare your weapons when you aren’t sure if Newton is out to lunch. This, combined with the fact that aeternums are often a civilization’s first exposure to the multiverse, makes them prime targets for multiverse pirates. This is why the Warp Authority has such a large defense budget. Freshmen in multiverse studies often ask why an organization that handles matters in the multiverse that occur outside civilizations needs to buy so many weapons. What are they doing, hunting down stars?

 

(Actually, sometimes they do. Never underestimate how tyrannical a living star can be. They can get very upset when planetary civilizations start to migrate away and turn their back on their ancestral life-giver.)

 

The Warp Authority has a huge defense budget so they can set up fortresses inside aeternums and staff them with superheroes. First Warpman Bennon (First Warpman is equal to the ARGO rank of Commander) has compared the Warp Authority’s activities in the aeternums with the United States federal government establishing forts along trails to protect Old West pioneers. Though his analysis might be colored by him being a proud descendant of Wild West vigilante Mary Bennon, better known as the Crimson Rider, as well as his fondness for Stetson hats.

 

(You have no idea how put out he was that ARGO called dibs on using a star as their symbol.)

 

Note that this keyword refers to worlds connected to aeternums. It does not refer to worlds inside aeternums. Infinite though they might be, they are not qualitatively distinct as they draw upon and merge the physics of separate universes, thus they fall outside ARGO’s definition of a universe. Worlds inside aeternums are still listed in ARGO universe databases with the keywords mosaic and covalent and with an asterisk by their appellation denoting that they are technically not universes. The Warp Authority keeps a seperate database for aeternum worlds and the Weft Authority records aeternum worlds as part of the entry of whichever universe holds it under their political authority.

 

Sealed

 

This universe has been sealed by its inhabitants from the multiverse.

 

For whatever reason, they have chosen to put up a barrier, and pushing against this barrier is often a very stupid idea.

 

Forbidden

 

Don’t travel to this universe. If you do, you’ll be rerouted by a harmonic shield to an ARGO checkpoint to explain yourself. These universes are sealed off and monitored for good reason. Perhaps there’s a dark god inside whose influence is slowly being pushed back by the multiverse’s superheroes? Maybe it’s got a crysaloid infection or an outbreak of the supervirus? Whatever the reason, you’re being kept out for your safety and the safety of others.

 

If a universe has both the forbidden and sealed keywords, it implies a significant political disagreement between our multiversal organizations and the universe. It implies that they don’t want us to come in and we don’t want them to leave.

 

Belligerent

 

This universe doesn’t play nice with others. 

 

It’s a relative term, to be sure, and universes slapped with this keyword often protest vehemently, but it remains a fact that some universes are actively hostile to the wellbeing of the general multiverse community. There are universes ruled by genocidal robots, demon-stars, dark gods, xenophobic empires, and other unpleasant despots.

 

ARGO is hesitant to use the term “evil” to describe these universes out of fear it might invoke prejudicial thinking. But whether we call these worlds evil or belligerent, we must be careful not to return their attitudes. Belligerent worlds present a challenge that mankind has always grappled with on a new scale–how do we handle evil? Do we fight with evil, negotiate with evil, ignore evil, or contain evil? How do we handle inhabitants from belligerent worlds? For instance, how do we handle the supersoldiers of Raclir who became stranded in our universe following Raclir’s unsuccessful invasion? Do we change them? Integrate them? Isolate them?

 

It’s an important question, and one often used as an essay prompt for students in multiverse studies at Martin’s.

 

Historic Partner

 

This universe has been in peaceful and productive contact with our own for at least thirty years.

 

Sleeping

 

This universe is mostly or completely unaware of the multiverse. A handful of people may know about it, but by and large its people have not discovered the world-outside-their-world.

 

Observe Only

 

For whatever reason, we cannot access this universe and can only observe it. This is different from the keywords “Sealed” and “Forbidden.” Those two keywords imply that the universe is isolated by choice, be it our choice or the choice of the universe’s inhabitants. But “Observe Only” means that some sort of physical or metaphysical impediment is in the way. 

 

Archon thorns are the most common impediment. Archon thorns are created by the same twisting and turning of the Archon walls that creates reef universes. They form when a portion of the Archon walls suddenly jut into the physical space of a universe. Archon thorns distort space and time and must be excised carefully by powerful superhumans before a universe can be safely accessed again. An explorer trying to travel into a universe with an Archon thorn will find himself flung deep into the worldtunnels where he will hopefully end up in an aeternum or peaceful reef universe. Hopefully.