Fasoma Span, The Horror That Spans Dimensions, and Its Minions

"You cannot oppose what you cannot see or feel. You cannot oppose the thousand-dimensional."
- from 'The Space Eaters' by Frank Belknap Long

According to the Correspondence Theory, all places are in fact a single place, the Correspondence Point. But what few mages know, is that there exist other such points, alternative ways of perceiving space completely alien to mankind. Fasoma Span is one of them, a force beyond human comprehension worshipped and served by demented K'llasshaa Nephandi and even worse beings.

Fasoma Span

Fasoma Span is a secondary Correspondence Point (or maybe a way of seeing space) that is not continuous like our space, but completely discontinuous; there are no straight lines or united objects, only disjointed parts randomly linked together. In Fasoma Span the distance between otherwise nearby points (such as the vital organs of a human) can be immense, or practically zero. A normal human moving through this space would suffer roughly the same effects as moving through a titanic meat-grinder...

However, Fasoma Span is currently much weaker than the Correspondence Point, and most of existence follows the laws of the Correspondence Point instead. Only a few Nephandi and some bizarre spirits move through Fasoma Span. But Its worshippers seek to make It more powerful, to make all of reality obey the random laws of Fasoma Span instead of order and continuity. It is also served by a number of lesser beings, the Flowers of the Rifts, which are somewhat like even smaller correspondence points or complex patterns of discontinuity within Fasoma Span.

The Flowers of the Rifts

"'If we can see it clearly, we are lost!' he warned, his voice vibrant with terror. 'Pray that it remains without form!'"
- from 'The Space Eaters' by Frank Belknap Long

Very little is known about the Flowers themselves. The Eater of Dimensions is believed to be one of them, although this bizarre predatory realm could equally well be an independent being. Another being, known as the Chains of Orthogonality, seems to be an abstract manifestation of finite geometries and their structure. A third, the Yg Medallion, is only described in Malleus Neffandorum as an "Unapproachable Aberration".

One kind of beings serving the Flowers are the Space Eaters. These bizarre beings are apparently unable to move through space other than by eating the intervening spaces. They can only perceive the physical world dimly, but a human who is conscious of them becomes very visible to them and immediately attracts them. When they manifest they are formless, but human perceptions define them somewhat, making them semi-tangible and might finally give them a form, giving them the ability to make all who see them think of them. They immediately burrow into the brains of viewers both physically and mentally, keeping them alive but filling the victims with a sensation described as an acid, terrible cold and a brilliant light while gradually devouring them. Exactly what they use the brains for is unknown - perhaps they feed on them, perhaps they learn from them or perhaps they just play with them. These beings have made intrusions into reality several times, but have so far been driven off by mages or the Church.

The Rratcha

'I've got to get out of here,' he screamed. 'The thing wants room. My head won't hold it. It wants the night - the vast night. It wants to wallow in the night.'
- from 'The Space Eaters' by Frank Belknap Long

The Rratcha are warped even by Nephandi standards. Very little remains of human thinking or perceptions, just scraps of thought and emotion which are randomly linked together and discarded. In fact, they are perhaps more Marauders than Nephandi, since their insanity is given some direction by what remains of their Avatars. Their bodies are totally warped; when they don't pay attention completely pieces move in and out of existence, change places or turn into something else. When they lose control or become enraged, their apparent structure vanishes completely and they become a cloud of independently moving bodily parts; parts belonging to other people trapped within Fasoma Span might also appear in the mix, which constantly shifts and twists through space.

The Rratcha vaguely seek to bring other beings to the same perceptions as they do, sometimes just by appearing, shifting in and out of space around the terrified victim and then leaving, sometimes by actually dragging somebody into Fasoma Span. The victims add a bit more belief in discontinuity and Fasoma Span to reality, and in addition the pieces of their Avatars provide sustenance for the Flowers of the Rifts or raw material for new Rratcha.

Gnnnnn, a typical Rratcha

Gnnnnn was once called Tracy Heathcliff and lived a normal life as a young pre-school teacher. During her drive home one evening, her car was hit (or rather, crushed) by a truck and she suffered severe brain damage, both her legs were ripped off and what remained of her face was horribly disfigured. Unmercifully, she survived. Locked into her own world of pain and paralysis she began to hallucinate that her legs where out there somewhere, slowly finding their way back to her. The hospital around her seemed to split into meaningless shapes all the time, moving apart and together like a huge jigsaw puzzle. Finally one night, her legs found her, and she walked out the door into the place beyond the puzzle. All that remained in the bed was her organs, which still continue to live independently today against all reason.

Gnnnnn is the Rratcha which was mostly created from Tracy. It is one of the more human Rratcha, able to cohere into a passable human form for minutes at a time. It will then look like a young woman with extremely pale skin criss-crossed by thin bleeding cuts which sometimes open to reveal the internal labyrinth or cause her body to drift apart in hypnotic patterns. Her voice is surprisingly deep and husky, but she cannot talk anything but gibberish (she suffers from aphasia) As she loses coherence her limbs begin to move apart from each other, hanging in the air without support. Then they split into a cloud of tiny globs of flesh and bone, whirling around and teleporting themselves across the room.

Most of the time she appears to people (especially mages) to show them the immense freedom/pain/truth of being disjointed. She appears to them in human form, holds a short speech (which is complete gibberish due to her aphasia) and then disperses into a cloud of flesh around them, sending visions of Fasoma Span and finally vanishing (often leaving a nasty paradox backlash). Many people have become seriously unhinged by the experience, and a few of them have even been picked by the Flowers.

Quote: "Gnn Gnnnnnn Gn Gn Gn Gnn Gn! Gnnnn Gnnnn? Gnnn Gnnn Gnnn Gn Gnnn."

Translation, using Mind: "Worlds are really pieces! When can't kitten you you bled darling? Look see through puzzle."

Essence: Primordial (although its Avatar consists of a mosaic of different Avatars, constantly being rearranged)
Nature: Visionary
Demeanour: Psychotic

STR-2  DEX-5  STA-2
CHA-0  MAN-0  APP-1
PER-2  INT-1  WIT-2

Notes: She manipulates objects using Correspondence, changing shape as needed. Appearance is 1 in collected form.

Abilities: Irrelevant. Due to its aphasia and visual agnosia, it cannot recognize any object or formulate anything verbally.

Willpower: 1

Arete: 3

Correspondence: 3 (All Rratcha encountered in the world have at least 3, since otherwise they could not manifest).

Mind: 3

Paradox: Lots. When it accumulates too much it disperses back into the Fasoma Span.

Damage: Penetrating or slicing damage won't hurt Gnnnn in its dispersed form, since it only moves apart around it (although a mage using Correspondence 1 to hit will succeed). If a part of it is burned, crushed or otherwise destroyed, other parts will reappear to replace it (this lowers all damage with three levels). Otherwise like a human.

Rotes of the Rratcha and their enemies:

Enter/Leave Fasoma Span (Qlippothic Correspondence 3): The Rratcha shifts his perceptions and body in or out of Fasoma Span, becoming spread out through reality or collecting together again.

Killing Distance (Qlippothic Correspondence 3): By simply moving the parts of an object or a being apart, the Rratcha are able to damage it or even split it. This is actively resisted by the pattern, which makes it hard to actually remove the head from the shoulders of a human without much effort. The wounds are bizarre, like extreme stretchings or internal bleeding in regular patterns.

[This makes damage just like a normal level 3 attack (Rratcha with higher levels of Correspondence do more damage).]

Vision of Fasoma Span (Qlippothic Correspondence 3 Mind 3): The Rratcha gives someone a vision of his perception of the world and the entire Fasoma Span. This is both very distracting to the victim, and increases the chances that he will begin to see the world according to Fasoma Span instead of the normal way (which in turns makes him vulnerable to the Flowers of the Rifts).

[If the total number of successes exceed the Willpower of the victim, the victim becomes able to think in the ways of Fasoma Span, and if a mage to use Qlippothic Correspondence. Such thinking, or actual use of Qlippothic Correspondence increases the number of successes even more, until the effect becomes permanent. The successes also become a penalty to all actions for the duration of the rote, since the victim is extremely confused. If the victim botches the Willpower roll, he becomes visible to the Flowers of the Rifts.]

The Sign of Banishing (Prime 4 Mind 3 Forces 2): This rote was developed by the Celestial Chorus to banish the Space Eaters, and is so far the only known way of doing it. Since the mage has to perceive something to affect it, the mage opens up himself to the Eaters if he fails.

The Choristers found that the Eaters could not stand a surge of quintessence disrupting their developing patterns and strengthening the minds of humans around them. The Chorister draws the sign of the cross using fire against the Eater, and invokes the holiest of mysteries. Despite its power, the rote cannot save anyone who has been infested with the Eaters, such poor souls are already lost.

[The Forces effect allows the fire to remain suspended in the air for a short while, which is merely a visual illusion but very helpful to focus the attention of witnesses towards the cross instead of the Eater. The Mind part fills the viewer with a sense of triumphant joy and holiness, and makes him briefly forget the shape of the Eater. The Prime part channels quintessence into the fire and joy, but also drains the accumulated quintessence from the Eater.]

Swimming through Chaos (Correspondence 5 Life 3): This rote makes it possible for the Master of Correspondence to shift his existence into Fasoma Span without actually being ripped apart; using his spheres he can give himself a personal continuity so that the discontinuities do not harm him. It is rumored that the Postulants to the Oracles of Correspondence train themselves through this rote, but it would appear unlikely that they would deliberately subject themselves to the presence of the Flowers of the Rifts.