An endless white space, with small black specks in the distance. A place out of time. An episode which is an orphan of an episode that has not been created. A place where no one has gone before.
Into this nothingness appeared Sean the traveler. As he looked around the great emptiness (while surprised that he could breathe in emptiness and that there was a whiteness instead of a blackness in this void), he sighed. At least it was better than the world of spelling errors. Not by much, but still...
Of course, he was referring to episode 79000. Ever since episode 337000 (or more precisely, 337006), he had found himself in one strange situation after another, each time appearing in another episode ennumerated by a multiple of 1000. Each time, he interacted with characters from some other part of the addventure.
But this time, there was nobody. "Hello?" Sean called out. There was no answer. He waited. And waited some more. Nothing happened. He sighed. "Well, at least I can check to make sure that I haven't been corrupted by the bad-spelling world," he decided. For a test, he decided to say a certain comedian's name. "Janeane. Janeane. Janeane." He knew he couldn't say it quite right while he was in the bad-spelling world, but at least now he seemed to have it under control now.
And then a ghostly voice behind him wailed, "Beware! Bewaaaaaaaaare!"
"Oh great, this is like the movie Beetlejuice, right? And I've just called up Janeane Garafolo. Bleah." Sean turned to verify his assumption, but was proven wrong. All he saw was a shimmering off-white shape which was not too distinct against the whiteness of the non-reality he was in. "Hey, who the heck are you?"
"My name is not important," the shape replied. "I have come to warn you that you are in great danger!"
"Yeah, yeah, story of my life. So what's so dangerous this time?"
"Traps are being set for you... traps from which you can not escape!"
"Well, I've been traveling uncontrollably, so that shouldn't be a problem..."
"There is no escape listed for you in these traps, no way back to this cycle you are on."
"Oh. I guess that's bad, huh? Where are these traps, then?"
"The traps have been set in places where you can not go."
"Places I can't go? What do you mean?"
"I fear you would not understand..."
"Try me."
"These traps are in episodes that lack a property we call 'Linking Enabled'."
"Oh, I see. Well that's pretty stupid, isn't it? How can I go to an episode that's not even Linking Enabled? What kind of a doofus would set up a trap in a non-Linking Enabled episode?"
"You... you know about the episodic nature of reality?"
"Of course. I used to be an author. Didn't anybody brief you?"
"Well, no, but... Beware! Bewaaaaaaaaaaaaaare!"
"Yeah, yeah, you said that already. If I can't fall in the traps, what's the big deal?"
"If these traps fail as they must, the setter of traps may become aware. He may correct his mistake. And then you will be doomed. Doooooooooomed!"
"Bummer. So what are we gonna do?"
"I shall create mindless duplicates of you as you are now and send them out to fall in these traps. These duplicates won't fool anyone who knows you, but they should be good enough to set off the traps and keep the trap-setter from realizing his mistake."
"Hmmm, okay. That'll work. Go ahead."
The shape gestured in an inexplicably formless way. "There it is done. Your duplicates are now headed for episodes such as 34000 and 99000 (possibly more later if needs warrant)."
"So now what? This place is pretty boring."
"Ah, that is so only because nobody has yet claimed this space. No story has led to this location. This place can be whatever you wish it to be."
"Hmmmm," Sean thought as he stroked his chin.
Wed Jun 02 11:31:01 2004
Linking Enabled