Tales Between the Lines

I.1 Universe's Store

During her wait, Destiny got bored. Out of boredom and other reasonable options of things to do, she dug deeper into the pile of dark matter. The stuff had amazing properties. Not only was it the inexhaustible source of energy of the dark side of the force, but it also served as a hiding place for shady creatures wrongly believed to exist solely in nightmares.

Soon, Destiny's rambling through the maze-like burrows leading through the multidimensional space of dark matter woke one of its stranger residents.
Two bright green eyes with slitted pupils opened, accompanied by an audible yawn. Destiny stopped in her tracks.

In the reflected luminosity of the eyes—and because Destiny doesn't need much light to find her victims—she recognised a shadowy figure resembling a shaggy but altogether ordinary black cat.

"Hello cat," said Destiny. "What do you do in this forgotten corner of the universe?"
Cat shrugged. (Yes, Destiny could see the shrugging. As mentioned before, Destiny's eyes are pretty awesome).

Cat shrugged again, just for emphasis and to regain your attention.

"I'm Schroedinger's Cat. I got bored in my box. No one ever checked on me. So I figured I could as well leave and sit in the dark somewhere else."

It took Destiny a while to recollect enough quantum physics to remember Schroedinger's experiment. She frowned.

"But this was just a thought experiment. There never actually was a cat involved."

"Guess what. It's basic knowledge that in a vast universe like ours, everything imaginable is bound to happen somewhere, earlier or later. But I'm not supposed to like it, am I? I mean, waiting in a zombie-like state neither alive nor dead, who would want that? And I certainly had no intention to become poisoned in the name of science."

Destiny had to admit the cat had a point. Besides, she liked the idea of taking destiny in her own hands. Who better to change destiny than Destiny? Together with her new buddy, Cat the Schroedinger's cat, she left dark matter to wreak havoc on the universe.

~~~~

As they emerged from the pile of dark matter, Cat and Destiny gasped. They were still in Universe's store, and the store was huge. Shelves upon shelves of... stuff. Fortunately, there were big, arrowed EXIT signs pointing to the right.

Following these, they passed a display of what clearly classified as organs—not in the musical but the anatomical sense. They were petrified or mummified, small and large ones—all of them ended in tubes. And all of them were broken in half.

"I think they're hearts." Destiny shook her head.

"Broken hearts?" Cat shrugged with emphasis.

Some steps further down the aisle, there was a basket filled with small, furred and tailed rodents. Cat started to purr as he saw them. He sniffed the animals. "They're dead... and desiccated." Cat preferred them fresh, scared, and juicy.

Destiny lifted one by its tail and dangled it before her eyes. "It's a dormouse. A dead dormouse."

"Ghastly," Cat said.

There was the noise of someone clearing their throat behind them. They turned and stood face to face with a slim, short, dark-haired man. He wore a thief's eye mask.
Cat hissed.

"Who are you?" Destiny took a step back.

The man gave a little bow. "I'm Time, the thief."

Cat and Destiny stared at the figure before them until a fluttery movement behind it caught their attention. A small, blueish butterfly made unsteady progress through the air and finally alighted on Time's head.

Time pointed a hand at it. "And this is my friend, Butterfly."

Cat ducked, its every muscle taut, his green-yellow eyes on the animal.

"Don't even think of it, Cat!" Time's voice was cold as liquid nitrogen. "She's my friend."
Cat relaxed.

Destiny was confused. "What's all this?" She motioned at the huge hall and the weird objects it held.

"It's the Universe's store. And the Universe collects..." Time grinned, enjoying everyone's rapt attention. "... metaphors".

"Metaphors?" Cat had the impression that he must have missed some joke here.

"Of course," Destiny said. She was definitely smarter than Cat. "Schroedinger's cat... Time's a thief... Destiny waiting in store... broken hearts... dead as a dormouse..." She stopped, her squinting eyes on the butterfly.

"Butterfly, bat your wings please," Time said.

Butterfly obliged and moved its tiny, blue wings.

A noise like wind, thunder and rattling shelves reached our friends from the remote parts of the store.

"I see," Destiny said.

Fascinated, sick of lurking in this store for centuries, and always having been one for grandeur, Destiny had an idea.

She cleared her throat and held up her hands. "And now we are... The Four Metaphors* of the Apocalypse!"

Cat meowed in glee. Time grinned and displayed a row of weirdly pointed teeth. And Butterfly batted its wings once more.

Cat scratched his ear with a hind paw. "Sure I'm a metaphor? I rather think I'm a thought experiment."

"Argh, don't spoil the fun," replied Destiny. "You're a metaphor now."

Cat gave one more of his shrugs. "Okay."

This little detail clarified, Time, Destiny, Cat, and Butterfly left the storage of the Universe and followed a faintly glowing sign spelling EX T. Destiny mused about its meaning till she realised there should have been an 'I' as well. Probably the letter had paid Time's toll and was lost for good.

A dark, musty smelling tunnel led them to a Door.

"Stop," Door said. "Where do you think you're going?"

Our friends stared at Door. Door stared back, eyelessly.

"Out," answered Time. "We're going out."

"To do things and stuff," added Destiny.

"To find some juicy mice," explained Cat, not entirely altruistic.

"And who do you think you are? The Bremen Town Musicians?"

"We..." answered Time with a dramatic pause for effect, "are the Four Metaphors of the Apocalypse."

Butterfly bat its wings emphatically, and a far distant rolling of thunder marked its point.

Door contemplated the arguments at hand and reluctantly opened a crack.
Immediately, Butterfly fluttered outside, and the resulting gust of strong wind nearly blew Door off its hinges. While Time and Cat walked out, the later with swishing tail, Door whispered a cryptic warning to Destiny.

"Beware of the mighty Magamoo."

Destiny stopped in her tracks and turned to ask Door for more details. But Door shut herself with a heavy thud and wouldn't budge anymore, not even when Cat tried its sharp claws on the lower wooden door-panel. Door's only reaction was a rather smelly fart coiling through the letter slot.

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* The Four Metaphors of the Apocalypse sported here are not to be confused with The Four Baristas of the Apocalypse by @Reffster