Schrödinger's Coffin

There is a so called "Magical Trick" that was popular some time ago, until too many people failed at it, that consisted of being buried alive and then miraculously appearing from offstage as if you had magicked yourself out of it somehow. There were, of course, variations as to the actual affects of the trick, but usually it did, in fact, require being nailed into a coffin and being buried alive. How one got out of it usually entailed the construction of the coffin including trap-doors, safety passages in the dirt, smoke and mirrors, etc.

The point I'd like to draw your attention to, however, is not the trick itself, but what is going on during it. Look at the audience. Place yourself in their position. Now, look to the stage, at the place where the "Magician" was buried. Is he still in there, or has he escaped? Is he alive, or is he dead? According to a popular theory involving cats, boxes, and questionable use of radioactive substances, the answer is "Yes". Yes, to what? Yes, to all. The Magician is still buried. The Magician has already escaped. The Magician is dead. The Magician is alive.

Yes. At least, until someone checks. Then the possibilities disappear and are replaced by a singular reality. The "What If?" becomes "What Is:". The waveform collapses, only leaving behind the certainty of what has actually happened, regardless of the infinite possibilities that existed picoseconds ago...

Now, back to the matter at hand.

A similar situation has occurred. A man has stepped into a chamber. A box. Not dissimilar to a coffin, for it will certainly be where he is buried. Furthermore, something has happened inside this box. We do not know what. We simply know that it is a conclusion, based upon a fact. From an observation point of outside this box, we have no way of knowing what this conclusion, and subsequent decision, is. So, in effect, it is all of them; Every possible one. And there is no way to get inside, to look, and define reality. The moment remains undefined. Timelines a being born, sprouting forth from this seed like new-born life.

This does not please Madame Butterfly.

Not one bit.

On Timelines

Timelines are the philosophical envisioning of the flow of time from one point to another, as established by the Great Houses during the creation of history.

In more mundane terms: A timeline is a chronological sequence of events. Timelines can be made by era, century, year, month, week, day and even an hour. They can be made for a single person, group, city, or even country. In a timeline, there are moments which represent the most important events in the life, be they few and far between or plentiful.

By researching a timeline, the researcher can learn the major events which have happened, or in some cases, will happen, along that particular line. Typically, timelines do not include all of the events of the subject’s ‘life,’ but only the events that will change at least one thing concrete or abstract if affected.

Altering a timeline has much the same affect as altering a river; you may end up destroying a city, wiping out a civilization, killing crops, etc. In short, any number of things could happen, but the river is no longer flowing along its original course. While minor changes to history may have no lasting affect on the Web of Time (imagine throwing a decent sized boulder into a river, and then watching the flow reform around it), it is still frowned upon to do so, especially considered the current absence of any major Time-Active Power with the ability to police causality as the Great Houses once did, though the Coalition intends to fill this role.

It should be noted that alternate timelines are not the same thing as parallel universes, as even timelines that have been forcibly split off from Base Reality still exist in the same universe as its parent timeline, while parallel universes are actually separate universes from our own.

Masques

The mask of a Factional Cousin is traditionally made of bone. The Bone, more often than not a skull of some sort, traditionally comes from some creature/being/animal that can, often times, not actually exist in this universe.

Usual examples consist of the skulls of House members from a timeline where the Yssgaroth won, or the skulls of beasts that only exist outside of our universe. More modern trends have leaned towards animals that no longer exist, such as mammoths, or, in one odd case, a carnivorous kangaroo.

Bearing all this in mind, it is easy to see why the mask of this Cousin mite confuse those accostomed to such things.

Her mask, or rather Masque, is still a skull, but... with all the features still there. This skull has been shape-cut like diamond and polished like glass. It appears porcelain in nature. Rouge and make-up have been applied, and the eyeless sockets covered by a funerary veil. The jaw has been welded shut, cut to shape, and smoothed over, leaving only the bairest line hinting that the pieces were once seperate. The end result is the look of a mourning geisha, delicate and manufactured.

Odd in and of itself, this Masque becomes all the more disturbing when it is revealed that this mask she wears is her own very skull... No one is quit sure how this is anatomically possible, and she never removes it, so how she appears beneath has been long forgotten. The rest of her attire matches the masque, suitable gothic funerary garb, all lace and tears.

While she is indeed a Cousin of the faction, it is unclear what station she holds within its ranks. Every there simply refers to her as "Madame Butterfly."

On the Nature of Cause and Effect

A cause is an event. Simply an event. Something happens. It is a cause. Anything, and everything, that anything, and everything, may, or may not, have done, or has simply happened, just because, is a cause. An effect is an event. Simply an event. Something happens. It is an effect. Anything, and everything, that may, or may not, have ever happened, for any reason, whatsoever, is an effect. The difference between the two, is that one of them, later to be know as the cause, results, directly, or not, as the case may be, in the other, later to be known as the effect.This may seem simple enough. Logistically speaking, or mathematically, if you prefer, this boils down to 'a then b'. Not even an 'if' in preceding it, just 'cause then effect'. An effect must always have a cause, and every cause, by its very nature, must have an effect.

We have just witnessed a cause.

Now, let us look at some effects.

A Prologue

A wiry man, if indeed he is a man, though he is, indeed, a 'he', steps into a room. He is wiry in the same way that muscle is wiry, all tendon and bone, with enough fat to make him look healthy, as opposed to not. The room, like the man, is also wiry. The room is wiry in a similar manner, bony and taught, with mechanisms and chords spread thin just visible, underneath the floor. It, too, had a a sense of healthy fat, furnished just more than enough to say that the room was a place to be in, rather than a place that needed to be healed. On closer, inspection, however, this is not the case. There are wounds there, burns, scars, just visible, if only you know where to look. The man paces this room, after a time, his hawkish nose seaming to lead him in his trance, as the engines fire into life around him.

Ah, the engines. Engines imply a vessel, a device made for travel. And so it would seem as the room vibrates to the churning of the rotor, though if we are to make note of the room by its inhabitant, than this vessel must also be wondering aimlessly.

After an age, the man steps to a pillar of import at the center of the room. He seems to have come to a decision, or perhaps has just accepted one. It is hard to tell. He raises an arm, shaking the sleeve down a bit, and reaches forth, to the console.