This story came to mind after watching the end of Atop the Fourth Wall's story arc "A Piece of the World is Missing" with "Pokemon: The Electric Tale of Pikachu #1." This was the conclusion of possibly the best story arc Linkara has written to date with his greatest threat ever, The Entity, or as we discovered the Entity's true identity, MissingNo. Sorry if I spoiled it for you but frankly why would you read this without watching Atop the Fourth Wall first? Anyway, I would like to offer to you all my version of the events that created The Entity.
The multi-verse, an infinitely growing collection of universes in which every possibility is explored. Some universes are radically different from our own: Germany wins World War 2, the American Revolution fails, Christianity never spreads beyond the initial converts, etc. While in other universes the differences are so small from our own that you could waste your life time trying to find that one change: you drank apple juice instead of orange juice for breakfast five years ago, the current president of Italy is left handed instead of right, the release of the original McRib occurred one day earlier than in our universe, that kind of stuff.
Whatever could happen will happen in a parallel universe and for our story let us enter one such universe that no longer exists on the eve of its destruction, ironically some time around the dawn of the new millennium. This universe is in so many ways exactly the same as our own and in some ways different: a few people died who instead had lived in our universe and visa versa, the Mona Lisa was completed fifteen minutes earlier than in our own, the 1960's Batman television series won an Emmy, and most importantly on this night a random convergence of chance would lead to the downfall of this and other universes.
It was a dark and stormy night, cliché but apropos as the city was suffering from the worst storm in years. While nature raged outside, within one of the houses a ten year old boy sat happily playing a game that he had played many times: Pokemon Blue.
Despite the joy the game brought him, there was also an undercurrent of sorrow in the boy's mind. Through a combination of cunning, skill, and dumb luck the boy had done everything that the game had to offer: he started his career with a Bulbasaur and raised it lovingly until it was a powerhouse without comparison. The eight gym leaders of Kanto had all been defeated, Team Rocket had blasted off for the final time after defeating Giovanni and thwarting all of their plans, the Elite Four had put up a good fight but lost to his skill, his rival had struggled valiantly but in end even the best trainer in the world couldn't defeat him and the boy was now the champion of the world. The legendary Pokemon couldn't stand before his skill from the three elemental birds to the genetic powerhouse known as Mewtwo. Thanks to friends with other versions of the game who traded with him every kind of Pokemon had been captured, every plot point the game scripted had been played through, every opponent defeated, there were no challenges left…except one: Missingno.
The boy had avoided the fabled glitch Pokemon because, well he didn't want to risk losing everything which he had gained. But eventually the temptation became too much, and so the boy asked the old man in Viridian City to teach him how to catch Pokemon and then flew to Cinnabar Island.
The storm overhead grew in intensity, unseen and unheard by the boy within.
Upon arrival, the boy walked to the edge of the Island and started surfing up and down the coast, never straying beyond the watery tiles that bordered the land and the rest of the sea. It took one of those eternities of waiting that was actually just seconds in real time before the animation suddenly sprang into action that started a Pokemon battle. The boy's emotions began to churn as he readied himself to flight the scrambled pixels that was Missingno.
But it was not those scrambled pixels that appeared to fight him, but rather the skeletal remains of a Pokemon long since dead: Kabutops.
The boy's emotions raced all over the place clashing for dominance: joy at accomplishing the glitch, shock at not seeing the expected enemy, anger at himself for risking his saved success to battle this mistake, excitement at the new challenge, sorrow for this being the last challenge he would likely face and fear at the very site of the animated skeleton that looked like they were bones from hell itself.
At the exact same second as the boy's emotions started spiraling out of control, a stray lightning bolt descended from on high and struck the house in such a way that a surge sped through the house's electrical systems, until it reached a certain plug in that was being used by the boy to power his Game Boy. The surge raced through the adapter into the machine supercharging the electronics and triggering a fatal reaction. How or why it could have happened we will never know, but what happened next would alter events in the multiverse forever.
The Game Boy's display screen starting transforming into copies of the scrambled pixels that made up the body of the traditional form of Missingno.. The boy watched, emotions still swirling, as the pixels spread out from the screen consuming the Game Boy itself and transforming it into a mass of static. The boy should have done something, but his emotions paralyzed him into inaction and that would cost him. The static extended out from the game system and onto the boy and as the first pixels bonded to skin the being known as Missingno. felt something within the boy…a potential and a power unknown to the glitch, something that could help it. The data spread faster and fused with the boy; the chaos of the boy's emotions provided the perfect compliment to the chaos that defined the existence of the glitch from a game and as the strange power and strange glitch united, the man/data hybrid let out an inhuman cry.
A cry that reached out into the multiverse, a cry that some would hear and feel the power within driving them to pledge their devotion toward the source; others would hear the cry become enraged and fearful at the power and swear to kill the sound's source. As this hybrid, this accident, this….entity's scream died out, its mind paused as the final bits of human and data combined and from the mixing of perfect machine logic and imperfect child logic, purpose was determined: the quest for challenges and greatness from the boy and the desire for existence the glitch.
The challenge to exist, to seek greatness in existence, to become greater at existing, to challenge all that existed around it until it became the greatest thing that would ever exist, to become the only thing to exist…to become all of existence.
"I am the voiceless, the never should, the beautiful horror, I am error, I am glitch, I am all things terrible and wonderful and everything in between…I am missing." The entity stated these words, fragments of thoughts that raced through the unifying mind as they searched for a place to join with him. As the mind forged purpose, the body stretched its digital tendrils to the rest of the house and those who lived within, challenging them to a battle with their continued separate existence from the Entity on the line.
The boy was a perfectionist, the glitch was a destroyer. It knew its existence outside the game was an accident, but it would become the best accident that would ever exist…until it would become the only thing that would exist. It would continue to merge with everything until it was everything in the universe. With each absorption, it would take what it had absorbed and add it to its perfection, becoming even more perfect, adapting and growing in power and knowledge with each successful assimilation.
Once all was one with the Entity it would move on to another universe, to see new things, to experience new challenges, and to take all that existed there and merge it with the perfect order that was its imperfect chaos within.
On worlds parallel to this one, lightning would never strike and the fusion would never occur. The boy would grow up, unknowingly harnessing his power and becoming a mighty warrior, defending his universe against mad scientists, invaders, would be destroyers, and the people who rightful owned where he was at the time. He would gather an assortment of allies: enthusiastic, musical, silent, metallic, or insane…most of whom who would be very physically similar to himself.
In some universes, he would fall in love with a girl he met in a bookstore, in others he and one of his male friends would fall in love after fighting side by side, in still others he and a female friend would fall in love after surviving an epic battle or war, in still others he never fell in love, others he started loving somebody but then that fell through and he fell in love later with somebody else and in one universe he fell in love with a blender.
Don't ask.
In a few darker universes, the boy would unknowingly harness his power to become a villain such as a would-be conqueror through the use of sciences he developed or through the spoils he won by fighting other would-be conquerors of his universe.
But this was not any of those universes, for in this world Lewis Lovhaug was the first person taken by the Entity and would be the one to first influence the digital creature's mind…from a simple absorb function into seeking perfection and new challenges on that quest for perfection. All this from the mind of a boy who no longer felt that he had any challenges.
This is my attempt to explain why in some shots of the episode the Entity doesn't have the digital eyes or its voice might slip into something more human and Linkara-like…its not an editing error, it's the Lewis inside the Entity starting to come into conflict with the glitch of the Entity. And for those who didn't get it, those last paragraphs would provide a basis for shipping between Linkara and Iron Liz, Spoony, MarzGirl, or just about anybody on the site…or nobody at all…or a blender, not sure why that one's in there but hey, why not?
Anyway, thanks for reading.