Finding the core of the Faceless is a lot easier when they have guidance. Some way or another, they find a massive, twisted fortress at the center of it all, converging where many of the organ-like structures meet up. It's clear that dimensional space around the fortress is shifting and changing, as if this is the central engine of this strange, shifting, sprawling dimension.
Inside, there's a cavernous circular space with a bone throne in the center and oozing walls that undulate, covered in criss-crossed blood vessels. In some places, blood oozes out of the walls, leaving an ankle-deep pool over the entire floor of the cavern. In many places in the walls there are beating hearts, in half-open ribcages, all of them beating in unison, loudly. It's clear from the bloodflow in the walls that these hearts are attached to everything in this little world.
Over the bone throne is a strange shifting window attached to nerves that has some similar structures to the human eye and part of the brain. Its fragmented view shows locations all over the In-Between -- it's this structure that N-45LEN used to guide them here.
This is the center of the Faceless' entire being. The core of his body and the central point of this dimension are one and the same.
Thanks to their own efforts, or Len's guidance, or the strange shifting nature of this place, they all arrive at the same time, through the many entrances that lead in.
N-45LEN -- who is just a robot head -- lays on an outcropping of bone, where he was bashed and thrown by his insane teammate Bob. Despite being damaged, he is still intact enough that his processors are still firing.
"You made it! We can still save your teammates. The Faceless bragged about how Phalanxing works to Bob. If your teammates haven't bled to death from their transformations you can still save them if you kill the Faceless first."
Maybe he couldn't save most of his own crew but after everything he's been through, Lenny wants to save theirs, especially since he's watched them struggle.
"You have to act quickly, before he finds you here! Destroy his hearts! He can't be hurt physically -- he just regenerates his body out of the flesh and blood of the In-Between. But I can see on more spectrums than organics -- the hearts only look like hearts on the visual spectrum; my scans show they're attached to the quantum fabric of this dimension. If you destroy them you'll be destroying the equivalent of his brain. It should destroy the In-Between or at least weaken him enough for an exit to open up. And please, take me with you. I'm not alone in here -- some of my fellow Robotican crewmates managed an upload to my datacore before their physical forms were completely destroyed."
You heard it right, Legionnaires. The Roboticans are alive.
"There are 55 of us in all."
Even for those without functioning powers, there are plenty of sharp bones to destroy the hearts with. There sure are a lot of them, though. Enough that the entire team will have their hands full. And those hands are about to get even fuller.
"Too late," says a voice and the Faceless himself swoops out of the shadows. "Naughty, naughty little robot. I overlooked you. I always do have trouble with sensing and transforming inorganics. But I did sense the entire Legion showing up on my metaphorical doorstep. And I brought friends."
Their Phalanxed teammates heard their master's call and they're here now, along with many other nightmare creatures.
He holds a long-fingered hand to his chest.
"I offer you a gift, something that will spare you from It. Maybe if you see, you'll understand."
All of a sudden, they all see it, hear it, smell it, feel it, slamming into them like a wrecking ball. A memory. They see a vision of a world made of flesh, but it's not as ugly as this place. There are plants and trees and machines and homes that are all organic, that blend in and out of each other symbiotically, and maybe it's not beautiful by the standards of many species, but it's clearly considered beautiful to the people that live there -- the Faceless is only one of many. And those many can warp dimensional fabric -- a gift they use to shape their world and view other dimensions. And just like their flesh blends, so too do their minds, through a form of telepathy.
They lived and died, and loved and hated, and built and destroyed, like any other species. But mostly they loved, and mostly they built, and mostly they cared for each other. But then It came.
In the memory, strange crystalline eye-creatures float in the orbit of every inhabited world in their universe and all their powers and technology can do nothing to banish them. Its Heralds come and sow chaos. The Legionnaires can see two of them, their bodies glowing like living photo-negatives, destroying a city. One is dressed like a clown, cackling maniacally, the other is a long-haired woman armed with a sword, cutting down everyone she sees. The Faceless' fellow flesh-people scream and cry telepathically and try to destroy the Heralds with their reality-warping powers, but they come back again and again somehow.
In orbit around The Faceless' world is where Chronoblivion breaches like a whale, breaking through reality. The sky rips open and they see the Bleed, the nothing-space between dimensions, lacking in light or color -- not dark, not bright, not anything. They can't see Chronoblivion Itself because the Faceless' mind could not comprehend him, but light radiates out from the breech, and...
It deletes the world.
The rays are like the white-nothing blast of an atomic bomb, in colors that don't even exist outside of nuclear fire and the strange isotopes within it that only briefly flash in and out of existence. The rays cut through everything, but destroy it piecemeal instead of all at once. The Faceless' people scream their telepathic screams as they're made into nothing.
The nightmare-vision fades and while their heads are still ringing, Faceless speaks to them.
"Chronoblivion chose me to be one of Its Heralds but the reality-altering nature of my peoples' powers were...incompatible. It twisted me. This is what I am now, always hungry like It is. I managed to slip away, into the Bleed, the nothing-space between worlds, and whenever I can latch onto something drifting into a material universe, I add to my biomass. Whether it's by soul or flesh, you'll be mine. Trust me, it's much better than being destroyed by It -- at least you'll still be a part of something bigger than yourselves. Isn't that what you heroes are all about?"
And then the monsters attack. Time to get with the stabbin'.
FACING THE FACELESS
Inside, there's a cavernous circular space with a bone throne in the center and oozing walls that undulate, covered in criss-crossed blood vessels. In some places, blood oozes out of the walls, leaving an ankle-deep pool over the entire floor of the cavern. In many places in the walls there are beating hearts, in half-open ribcages, all of them beating in unison, loudly. It's clear from the bloodflow in the walls that these hearts are attached to everything in this little world.
Over the bone throne is a strange shifting window attached to nerves that has some similar structures to the human eye and part of the brain. Its fragmented view shows locations all over the In-Between -- it's this structure that N-45LEN used to guide them here.
This is the center of the Faceless' entire being. The core of his body and the central point of this dimension are one and the same.
Thanks to their own efforts, or Len's guidance, or the strange shifting nature of this place, they all arrive at the same time, through the many entrances that lead in.
N-45LEN -- who is just a robot head -- lays on an outcropping of bone, where he was bashed and thrown by his insane teammate Bob. Despite being damaged, he is still intact enough that his processors are still firing.
"You made it! We can still save your teammates. The Faceless bragged about how Phalanxing works to Bob. If your teammates haven't bled to death from their transformations you can still save them if you kill the Faceless first."
Maybe he couldn't save most of his own crew but after everything he's been through, Lenny wants to save theirs, especially since he's watched them struggle.
"You have to act quickly, before he finds you here! Destroy his hearts! He can't be hurt physically -- he just regenerates his body out of the flesh and blood of the In-Between. But I can see on more spectrums than organics -- the hearts only look like hearts on the visual spectrum; my scans show they're attached to the quantum fabric of this dimension. If you destroy them you'll be destroying the equivalent of his brain. It should destroy the In-Between or at least weaken him enough for an exit to open up. And please, take me with you. I'm not alone in here -- some of my fellow Robotican crewmates managed an upload to my datacore before their physical forms were completely destroyed."
You heard it right, Legionnaires. The Roboticans are alive.
"There are 55 of us in all."
Even for those without functioning powers, there are plenty of sharp bones to destroy the hearts with. There sure are a lot of them, though. Enough that the entire team will have their hands full. And those hands are about to get even fuller.
"Too late," says a voice and the Faceless himself swoops out of the shadows. "Naughty, naughty little robot. I overlooked you. I always do have trouble with sensing and transforming inorganics. But I did sense the entire Legion showing up on my metaphorical doorstep. And I brought friends."
Their Phalanxed teammates heard their master's call and they're here now, along with many other nightmare creatures.
He holds a long-fingered hand to his chest.
"I offer you a gift, something that will spare you from It. Maybe if you see, you'll understand."
All of a sudden, they all see it, hear it, smell it, feel it, slamming into them like a wrecking ball. A memory. They see a vision of a world made of flesh, but it's not as ugly as this place. There are plants and trees and machines and homes that are all organic, that blend in and out of each other symbiotically, and maybe it's not beautiful by the standards of many species, but it's clearly considered beautiful to the people that live there -- the Faceless is only one of many. And those many can warp dimensional fabric -- a gift they use to shape their world and view other dimensions. And just like their flesh blends, so too do their minds, through a form of telepathy.
They lived and died, and loved and hated, and built and destroyed, like any other species. But mostly they loved, and mostly they built, and mostly they cared for each other. But then It came.
In the memory, strange crystalline eye-creatures float in the orbit of every inhabited world in their universe and all their powers and technology can do nothing to banish them. Its Heralds come and sow chaos. The Legionnaires can see two of them, their bodies glowing like living photo-negatives, destroying a city. One is dressed like a clown, cackling maniacally, the other is a long-haired woman armed with a sword, cutting down everyone she sees. The Faceless' fellow flesh-people scream and cry telepathically and try to destroy the Heralds with their reality-warping powers, but they come back again and again somehow.
In orbit around The Faceless' world is where Chronoblivion breaches like a whale, breaking through reality. The sky rips open and they see the Bleed, the nothing-space between dimensions, lacking in light or color -- not dark, not bright, not anything. They can't see Chronoblivion Itself because the Faceless' mind could not comprehend him, but light radiates out from the breech, and...
It deletes the world.
The rays are like the white-nothing blast of an atomic bomb, in colors that don't even exist outside of nuclear fire and the strange isotopes within it that only briefly flash in and out of existence. The rays cut through everything, but destroy it piecemeal instead of all at once. The Faceless' people scream their telepathic screams as they're made into nothing.
The nightmare-vision fades and while their heads are still ringing, Faceless speaks to them.
"Chronoblivion chose me to be one of Its Heralds but the reality-altering nature of my peoples' powers were...incompatible. It twisted me. This is what I am now, always hungry like It is. I managed to slip away, into the Bleed, the nothing-space between worlds, and whenever I can latch onto something drifting into a material universe, I add to my biomass. Whether it's by soul or flesh, you'll be mine. Trust me, it's much better than being destroyed by It -- at least you'll still be a part of something bigger than yourselves. Isn't that what you heroes are all about?"
And then the monsters attack. Time to get with the stabbin'.