70Bonus Chapter 2: What Will Be
A/N: Surprise, I'm doing it now!
So here we are, with the last chapter (more than likely) which will ever be posted to this story. Big things are afoot with this one; you'll see what that means soon enough.
Meanwhile, in a universe both similar and different to the one we have just seen...
It was a perfectly normal day at the ordinary household. And by normal, I mean that the bedroom on the top floor was in a state of relative chaos. I mean, things weren't blowing up or anything, but it still wasn't a place you'd want to walk into. The reason: Calvin, the most hyper six-year-old in the world. Having run out of things to do about half an hour ago, he had simply decided to have his tiger friend Hobbes (yeah, I said tiger, get used to it) toss things into the air. Calvin's goal was to try and catch these objects with various parts of his body, but so far all it was doing was breaking them or denting the floorboards.
"Okay," said Calvin. "Let's try another one. You throw the lamp, and I'll try to catch it on my back!"
"I don't know," said Hobbes doubtfully.
"Oh come on!" exclaimed Calvin. "My back has tons of surface area; it should be easier than just catching it with my arms!"
Hobbes shook his head. "I really don't think this is a good idea," he said.
Calvin rolled his eyes. "Fine," he said, throwing himself on the bed. "But we need something else to do. I'm just...so bored."
Hobbes thought for a moment. "Hey," he wondered suddenly, "what kind of weapons do you think starships would have if they existed?"
Calvin considered this for a few seconds. "Plasma beams, definitely," he said.
"Oh yeah, totally," Hobbes agreed. "Can't believe I didn't think of that."
"Where did that come from?" asked Calvin.
"No idea," admitted Hobbes. "It just sort of popped into my head."
There was another moment of long silence.
After a minute or so, the silence was suddenly broken by a small ping sound. Looking over, the two saw that there was an alert flashing on Calvin's computer.
"Oh god," moaned Calvin, burying his face in his hands. "Just what I needed to make a bad day worse."
"The troll again?" guessed Hobbes. "You know, you could always try just kind of...not replying to him."
"Then he's just gonna spam my inbox," sighed Calvin. "And if I don't reply the alert is just going to be sitting around on my computer all day. Besides, I need something to do; who knows, maybe he'll have something interesting to say today."
"Whatever," sighed Hobbes. "I'm gonna take a nap."
"You do that," said Calvin. He quickly climbed into his computer chair, opened the chat client, navigated to the new message, and started to type.
unleashedGenesis [UG] began trolling calvinUltima [CU] at 8:31
UG: Hello again, Calvin.
UG: 5o I 5uppo5e thi5 i5 the day you do ab5olutely nothing.
UG: I gue55 there'5 nothing I can do to change your mind.
CU: oh god you again
CU: how many times do i have to tell you to go away!
CU: you and your stupid typing thing!
UG: I'll have you know I find that very offen5ive.
UG: I don't make fun of any of your human cu5tom5.
UG: Even though many of them are utterly laughable.
CU: what do you want
CU: im busy working on very important things
UG: Plea5e.
UG: I happen to know for a fact that you're just 5itting there bored out of your think pan.
UG: That i5 why I cho5e to contact you on thi5 5pecific day.
CU: well lets get it over with
UG: Fir5t, I wi5h to give you a me55age.
UG: The other you i5 no longer relevant.
CU: ?
UG: You 5ee, I have been ob5erving your timeline for 5ome time.
UG: Of all the human5 I have ob5erved, you are perhap5 unique.
UG: Your timeline i5...fractured.
CU: fractured?
UG: With every deci5ion you make, a new univer5e come5 into exi5tence.
UG: Thi5 i5 perfectly natural.
UG: After all, every player create5 doomed timeline5, particularly a5 their entry to the 5e55ion approache5.
UG: But your timeline5 do not fade away or diverge, you and tho5e a55ociated with you dying off.
UG: The timeline5 continue to exi5t, becoming 5omehow...
UG: ...5table.
UG: And mo5t intere5tingly, at a certain point it 5eem5 they begin to converge.
UG: 5adly, I cannot 5ee that far down the timeline.
UG: There i5 5ome interference: a di5tortion in Paradox 5pace.
CU: as usual your talking gibberish
UG: You 5ee, earlier today you made a choice.
UG: Regarding a topic of conver5ation your mutant lu5u5 rai5ed.
UG: In thi5 univer5e you cho5e not to pur5ue it in depth, and 5o let it drop with a 5imple agreement.
UG: But thi5 created another univer5e in which you became fru5trated, and ultimately u5ed the time machine to find an5wer5.
CU: why the heck would i do that?
CU: other me is an idiot
UG: Regardle55, I would 5imply like to inform you that I have no further bu5ine55 with the other you.
UG: He ha5 hi5 own journey5 to take 5oon enough.
UG: Fir5t the Pillar5, and then the...other thing.
UG: You are now the only Calvin I am concerned with.
CU: good to know
CU: now can I go
UG: Not quite. I have more I mu5t tell you.
UG: 5omething ha5 gone wrong with the Omniver5e.
CU: what
UG: There i5 a 5torm coming: a catacly5m which will place every world in danger.
UG: Even now, the crack5 5pread out acro55 the universes, through Paradox 5pace and beyond.
UG: In a ca5tle of enchantment, a dark omen ha5 fallen over one who know5 5uch thing5 well.
UG: In a different ca5tle entirely, death walk5 the land even a5 new life take5 root.
UG: In the univer5e I recently 5topped caring about, your other 5elf plays a game which i5 not a game and prepare5 to fight a battle of mon5ter5 and magic.
UG: In a town where world5 meet, bea5t5 of unfathomable 5hadow 5talk the land5cape a5 the man of gold 5cheme5 to rend time a5under.
UG: And in a place which i5 both here and there and yet nowhere in particular, the mo5t evil being5 in exi5tence prepare to exact vengeance upon the only one they fear.
CU: god just stop
CU: i cant take this weirdness
CU: and thats coming from ME
UG: Very well, I will depart 5oon.
UG: I have ju5t one more me55age for you.
UG: There i5 a 5ale coming.
CU: a sale?
UG: Ye5. A 5ale of game5 on your primitive human Trollian.
CU: you mean steam?
CU: there's not another sale until next summer
UG: True. But be ready when it arrive5.
UG: I recommend checking out the 5election of adventure game5.
UG: It will be...beneficial to you.
CU: is that it
UG: Indeed. Farewell, Calvin. We will 5peak again when you enter.
UG: Perhap5 we will even be able to experience thi5 human emotion called friend5hip.
CU: friendship isnt an emotion numbskull
UG: No, I 5uppo5e it'5 not.
UG: (-:-)
unleashedGenesis [UG] ceased trolling calvinUltima [CU]
Calvin rolled his eyes and pushed himself away from the computer. As usual, the conversation had made no sense whatsoever.
Still, something about what he had said made him... uneasy. He had to admit the guy had been a lot more coherent than his previous random trolling. The reference to the annual Steam summer sale in particular was strange. This UG guy was so dedicated to his stupid alien roleplay, so why would he slip up by mentioning such a specifically human event?
Calvin shrugged. Whatever the troll had meant, if he'd meant anything, Calvin still had almost a year until he had to deal with it. He figured that was plenty of time.
"Hey Hobbes!" he called.
Hobbes, who had been curled up asleep on Calvin's bed, woke with a start. "What?" he asked, turning to look at the boy.
"Wanna go look for weird bugs down by the creek?"
Hobbes considered this for a moment. "Eh, why not?" he said finally.
And with that, Calvin and Hobbes ran downstairs and out the door: two best friends off on yet another exciting adventure.
A/N: And there we are: a glimpse at things to come. You may be thinking to yourself "GK, what in the name of Mega Ultra Chicken was that all about?" Well, this is a project I've been planning for quite a while: almost since I decided to totally rewrite the ending of this story.
You see, I really like crossovers, especially those that explore theories which connect one franchise to another. But I'm also notorious for abandoning stories and I don't want to do that anymore. So I started thinking "How can I create an expansive universe of crossover stories without getting bored with any of them?"
The idea I finally hit on was the idea I now call...
THE OMNIVERSE EVENT
This is a massive crossover event which any writer who wants to participate in can. All you need to do to take part is to send me a PM or leave a review with your idea so I can clear it. A more complete set of rules will show up on my profile shortly, explaining what each story has to have in order to qualify. Basically, the gist of the story is that, because of a mysterious disaster, the rules of one universe have begun bleeding into another, causing concepts, items, and sometimes even people from one franchise to start interacting with those of another. What kind of changes are wrought and how the world responds to them are entirely up to you.
And so with that, this story is officially over. But this is not an ending: merely a new beginning. For as Calvin's Quest ends, the Omniverse Event begins.
Good luck, and I'll see you on the other side.
(Oh, and don't worry about this alternate-universe Calvin yet. I assure you, the Calvin who went on the Quest isn't even close to being finished with his role in events. Oh yes, he'll be back soon enough...)
