Editing Abyss (section)

==Manifestations==
===The Drains===
Also known as the Sewers or Compost Heap, it is a manifestation, where the sky above is nothing but sheer darkness that has a weight and presses down, making you want to crawl in the mud beneath your feet. Bits and pieces of things from the real world could be found there too. It's a constantly evolving maze that's only growing as more and more things fall through the cracks, but the different parts are connected to one another via tunnels and small lights.
===The Forests===
Floral manifestation(s) connected to wild areas. The Forests are where the [[Faceless Woman]] arose from<ref>He turned around, giving me a more thorough look.  “You came from the same place as ''her''?”<br><br>I glanced at the faceless woman.  She’d stopped pacing, though she still fidgeted.  She held her hand straight up, fingers splayed, but for the two that held the cigarette, and grabbed her arm at the base.<br><br>“Forest?” the quiet man asked.<br><br>“No,” I said.<br><br>“Same ''general'' place, then,” he said, and the words were barely comprehensible.<br><br>“I suppose,” I said. - [https://pactwebserial.wordpress.com/2014/08/19 Excerpt] from [[Mala Fide 10.2]]</ref> and where [[Midge]] vacationed.<ref name=":0" /> Blake glimpsed a small settlement there where every sensation was grating and raw.<ref name=":1">I could hear the Drains, the wind whistling out of sync with the creaking of unstable architecture in the Tenements, distant howling and screaming, the gnashing of machinery, faint songs or tunes that might have been a carnival. <br><br>

[...] <br><br>

A small village, desolate, in the midst of a dense forest, with a screen door attached by only one hinge, caught by the wind so it slammed incessantly against the doorframe.  Every sensation was ''raw'', as if the place laid every last nerve bare.  Something, I was pretty sure, lurked in the woods.<br><br>

A festival.  A crowd of Others and lost souls, bumping and jostling, leering, cheering, screaming.  Here and there, the screams were real, as someone failed to keep up, lost strength and showed vulnerability near the wrong partygoer.  The buildings that framed the narrow street had no windows, entrances or exits, more like tombstones than any place people lived. - [https://pactwebserial.wordpress.com/2014/10/28/ Excerpt] from [[Duress 12.8]]</ref>
===The Tenements===
A manifestation of steep vertical surfaces that look like apartments, the air is thick with choking dust, fog, and darkness.  The bottom disappears into darkness and fog for a good kilometer or five, red and orange lights around that flicker violently. The windows are spaced too far apart, or clustered, and took different forms as sections of building had fallen and somehow jammed together, like a game of Tetris. Anything that looks easy is a trap and the hand holds are riddled with insects, broken glass, or other obstacles, while the insides are nests for [[Others]] and [[Bogeymen]].
===The Library===
A manifestation that formed when the [[Hillsglade House]] fell through the cracks, stairwells and bookshelves lay along every wall, books filling them as water and dirt flowed in along the sides, streaming along the surfaces, turning what had been conventional novels into sodden messes. This manifestation of the abyss is aggressive, actively targeting and attacking those within it and shifting around at inopportune times, changing the landscape. It also appears to be petty; successfully navigating or bypassing its challenges sometimes results in it simply hurling unavoidable obstacles at its occupants instead. The books on the shelves are are empty, contain indecipherable gibberish, or hold things that will harm the reader. Anyone making noise within the library is subsequently attacked by the [[Others]] or a giant set of hands. At the time Hillsglade House fell into it, Bogeymen such as the Ink Man from other places in Limbo were attempting to position themselves to take on roles as Guardians of its exit routes, or to otherwise influence its formation.

===The Outskirts===
The area Blake arrived at, which mirrors the trashed outskirts of cities. Connects to the Drains, Box Store, Forests, as well as various urban regions of the Abyss.<ref name=":0">'''Wildbow:'''<br>On the layout of the Abyss - yes, it's all interconnected. Blake (and Green Eyes) starts out in the Outskirts, very close to the Drains. Had he taken another path, he might have made his way to the box store, or into the edge of a city/urban Abyss area. Or he could have gone further into the woods and ended up in a place similar to where Midge went.<br><br>Who you are, how you go, and where you are when you go determine where you end up. You're not going to go to a place where you'll immediately think "Oh, I'm in the Abyss"- it'll be similar to where you were when you dropped in. If you pass through from a wartorn area where people are lost, desperate, and trying to survive, you're going to find yourself waking up in a place where the city is all ruins, everything's burned, and 'bandits' are prowling around - and it steadily becomes apparent the bandits aren't limited to very scarred/mutated humans. Or you could end up in a series of buildings that are perpetually on fire.<br><br>By this metric, Blake goes from an area of wilderness of the sort you find on the periphery of a big city, trash strewn with hints of civilization or outlying buildings, to the outskirts. Except, you know, horrible.<br><br>When Hillsglade House fell to the Abyss, it connected to some similar regions, tapping Others more fitting for the Library than the School (Schoolmarm), Manor (Diary Girl), etc. Normally areas of the Abyss don't form so blatantly, but more as places are forgotten or lost.<br><br>Some places will be lost or abandoned (say, a small town struck by natural disaster and neglected by neighboring states or countries) but won't become Abyss so much as they trend that way over time, with more and more monsters and horribleness appearing over time, as Others find their way in (where there's a great deal of easy prey and easy living, until competition gets fiercer) and the Abyss gets more of a hold. Places can be pulled out of this 'sinking' state, but it's hard.<br><br>You can die and get ground down in the abyss, that route is available, but it's hard. If you fall from the tenements you're liable to land in another area with all limbs broken, but still be alive, as things come after you. If you get eaten alive, you might get partially torn apart, partially digested, and shat out with some semblance of life. There's also a whole tract of things in the Abyss that collect living things, whether it's to dress them up like a doll and add to a collection or keep in cages, to snip pieces of for later snacks. They do this because the life and emotion of living things is serves them like a campfire might for you or me. So, you know, you can die and probably will get ground away (or transmuted into something nonsapient) eventually if you're not very tenacious, but actually getting there is hard and it's fraught with peril of the 'now I'm in a cage for the next decade' kind. - [https://redd.it/8flpkm Finished Pact a couple of days ago, quick review and questions regarding the Abyss inside] ([[Wildbow]], Reddit.com, 2018-05-29)</ref>

===The Machine===
The area [[Chain Man]] came from.<ref>[[Execution 13.2]]</ref> Filled with the gnashing of gears.<ref name=":1" />

===The Box Store===
An area [[Green Eyes]] encountered. She believed it was only intended as "scenery" and couldn't find an entrance.<ref>I… it’s hard to remember the details, but I arrived, and I wandered for a long while in the rain.  I found this big store, you know the kind, one of the huge ones you could spend half a day inside, but the parking lot was fenced in, and I tried walking around to find the front door, but it was like every side of the store was the back of the store.  That’s when I first realized something was wrong, because I’d just left this… this ''place'', and found a city and I somehow found myself-” <br>[...] <br> I found a group of people, and they told me that there was nothing there.  That it’s just ''landscape'', for show.  They laughed at me and took what little I’d brought with me.  I ran before they could hurt me, and I got ''here,'' after a couple days.  Except I didn’t get far.  I stepped onto that broken bit of ledge right there, and I fell.  Just like you almost did.  Water pushed me down, and I wasn’t strong enough to swim against it.  Someone saved me.  He wasn’t strong enough to lift me up, either, so he pressed his lips to mine, and breathed for me.” - [https://pactwebserial.wordpress.com/2014/07/26 Excerpt] from [[Null 9.1]]</ref><ref name=":0" />

===The School===
The area the [[Schoolmarm]] came from.<ref name=":0">'''Wildbow:'''<br>On the layout of the Abyss - yes, it's all interconnected. Blake (and Green Eyes) starts out in the Outskirts, very close to the Drains. Had he taken another path, he might have made his way to the box store, or into the edge of a city/urban Abyss area. Or he could have gone further into the woods and ended up in a place similar to where Midge went.<br><br>Who you are, how you go, and where you are when you go determine where you end up. You're not going to go to a place where you'll immediately think "Oh, I'm in the Abyss"- it'll be similar to where you were when you dropped in. If you pass through from a wartorn area where people are lost, desperate, and trying to survive, you're going to find yourself waking up in a place where the city is all ruins, everything's burned, and 'bandits' are prowling around - and it steadily becomes apparent the bandits aren't limited to very scarred/mutated humans. Or you could end up in a series of buildings that are perpetually on fire.<br><br>By this metric, Blake goes from an area of wilderness of the sort you find on the periphery of a big city, trash strewn with hints of civilization or outlying buildings, to the outskirts. Except, you know, horrible.<br><br>When Hillsglade House fell to the Abyss, it connected to some similar regions, tapping Others more fitting for the Library than the School (Schoolmarm), Manor (Diary Girl), etc. Normally areas of the Abyss don't form so blatantly, but more as places are forgotten or lost.<br><br>Some places will be lost or abandoned (say, a small town struck by natural disaster and neglected by neighboring states or countries) but won't become Abyss so much as they trend that way over time, with more and more monsters and horribleness appearing over time, as Others find their way in (where there's a great deal of easy prey and easy living, until competition gets fiercer) and the Abyss gets more of a hold. Places can be pulled out of this 'sinking' state, but it's hard.<br><br>You can die and get ground down in the abyss, that route is available, but it's hard. If you fall from the tenements you're liable to land in another area with all limbs broken, but still be alive, as things come after you. If you get eaten alive, you might get partially torn apart, partially digested, and shat out with some semblance of life. There's also a whole tract of things in the Abyss that collect living things, whether it's to dress them up like a doll and add to a collection or keep in cages, to snip pieces of for later snacks. They do this because the life and emotion of living things is serves them like a campfire might for you or me. So, you know, you can die and probably will get ground away (or transmuted into something nonsapient) eventually if you're not very tenacious, but actually getting there is hard and it's fraught with peril of the 'now I'm in a cage for the next decade' kind. - [https://redd.it/8flpkm Finished Pact a couple of days ago, quick review and questions regarding the Abyss inside] ([[Wildbow]], Reddit.com, 2018-05-29)</ref>

===The Manor===
The area [[Diary Girl]] came from.<ref name=":0">'''Wildbow:'''<br>On the layout of the Abyss - yes, it's all interconnected. Blake (and Green Eyes) starts out in the Outskirts, very close to the Drains. Had he taken another path, he might have made his way to the box store, or into the edge of a city/urban Abyss area. Or he could have gone further into the woods and ended up in a place similar to where Midge went.<br><br>Who you are, how you go, and where you are when you go determine where you end up. You're not going to go to a place where you'll immediately think "Oh, I'm in the Abyss"- it'll be similar to where you were when you dropped in. If you pass through from a wartorn area where people are lost, desperate, and trying to survive, you're going to find yourself waking up in a place where the city is all ruins, everything's burned, and 'bandits' are prowling around - and it steadily becomes apparent the bandits aren't limited to very scarred/mutated humans. Or you could end up in a series of buildings that are perpetually on fire.<br><br>By this metric, Blake goes from an area of wilderness of the sort you find on the periphery of a big city, trash strewn with hints of civilization or outlying buildings, to the outskirts. Except, you know, horrible.<br><br>When Hillsglade House fell to the Abyss, it connected to some similar regions, tapping Others more fitting for the Library than the School (Schoolmarm), Manor (Diary Girl), etc. Normally areas of the Abyss don't form so blatantly, but more as places are forgotten or lost.<br><br>Some places will be lost or abandoned (say, a small town struck by natural disaster and neglected by neighboring states or countries) but won't become Abyss so much as they trend that way over time, with more and more monsters and horribleness appearing over time, as Others find their way in (where there's a great deal of easy prey and easy living, until competition gets fiercer) and the Abyss gets more of a hold. Places can be pulled out of this 'sinking' state, but it's hard.<br><br>You can die and get ground down in the abyss, that route is available, but it's hard. If you fall from the tenements you're liable to land in another area with all limbs broken, but still be alive, as things come after you. If you get eaten alive, you might get partially torn apart, partially digested, and shat out with some semblance of life. There's also a whole tract of things in the Abyss that collect living things, whether it's to dress them up like a doll and add to a collection or keep in cages, to snip pieces of for later snacks. They do this because the life and emotion of living things is serves them like a campfire might for you or me. So, you know, you can die and probably will get ground away (or transmuted into something nonsapient) eventually if you're not very tenacious, but actually getting there is hard and it's fraught with peril of the 'now I'm in a cage for the next decade' kind. - [https://redd.it/8flpkm Finished Pact a couple of days ago, quick review and questions regarding the Abyss inside] ([[Wildbow]], Reddit.com, 2018-05-29)</ref>

=== The Abattoir ===
Contains Bogeys such as the [[Milkmaid]], the Ram-headed Man, the Calfbone Child, and the Font of Meat.<ref name="Abyss QA" /><ref>
Other Bogeymen resemble living people, but fall more into the realm of heavy carnivores, dining on fear.  Like heavy carnivores, they don't need to eat often.  Finding other things to eat helps fill the space between, so they'll do that a lot, and beyond that they tend to patrol or wander.  If the Milkmaid locates herself in the abandoned farmhouse and the surrounding fields, then she might get to know the ins and outs of the property, where the fence is reliable, where the holes in the ground are, and she'd find the things to alter the property.  A whole day can be spent on one window, so it's ajar but closes when someone slips through.  A week can be spent on the floor, so that the window closes when someone comes running along the shaky floorboards of the house, directly toward the opening.  Two weeks to a month to have the window close just as someone puts their hands or head through the opening.
<br><br>
This might be stretched out over long periods, the Milkmaid going through her routine of sleeping until evening, waking up, kicking at a floorboard here, adjusting a window there, getting her things and then going out to check the traps in the nearby woods for any caught foxes, deer, or coyotes.  If any are caught, then a few hours are spent stripping the animal, the meat eaten with some glasses of milk (a little bit more strength, a bit more time before she needs to eat real human fear instead of trapped animal fear), the offal strewn in strategic locations, the bones added to the collection in a key location of the home (like in the cellar one will fall into if they run too hard along that one stretch of breakable floorboards).  While passing through the home at the later half of the night, she'll adjust a door, move some curtains so that one hook isn't on the rod but is at a level to catch on some clothes, stomp at a floorboard.  She fixes up her milking machine for a few hours, feeds and milks the cows, then goes for a walk, touring the outer edges of her territory, familiarizing herself with that ground, expanding her territory out a fraction, maybe moving a rock so a tire might pop on the road or breaking a branch or three so the farmhouse is more clearly visible for anyone passing down the dirt road.  She watches the sunrise, then returns home and dozes off.
<br><br>
When she does get a victim, it becomes about milking them for fear, literally.  They get snagged, caught, the exits turn out not to be exits, the fields have holes in them that don't seem to trip up this one-hundred-and-twenty pound woman with the cow-skin hood and wrapping, but do twist the ankles of the unwary.  One victim is chosen, the rest killed off, and she drags her victim off to the barn, where they're summarily chained up.  A cow is skinned and the skin is sewn onto and around the trapped man or woman.  Then she starts up the rusty old milking machine, places the first three glass tubes with the suction going, holds up the fourth with its shattered edge, and then places it- the suction rhythmically pulls the glass edges in deeper, releasing, over and over, the blood flowing in with inexplicable milk and other bodily fluids the machine is pulling in, to join her collection of regular cow's milk.  She'll have something to drink with her next meal of fox or deer, she has her supply of fear and pain for the next few days or weeks until her victim passes or slips into the Abyss, she gains some power, and she buys her continued existence in a world where she has quiet days and can watch sunrises.
<br><br>
It's not really a Crone Mara style adjustment of territory over decades or centuries - more that obsessive focus, memories of the Abyss, and the influence of the Abyss itself staining reality can help make this work.  The places she visits and the things she does serve to taint areas and things.  The milking machine is a big one for this particular bogeyman, as are the cows of her barn, which might start to end up more abyssal (mutated, with special properties, potentially with skins that transmit sensation  after being sewn on).  For Bogeymen of this type who aren't the Milkmaid, it could be something like the house being bigger from the inside, or hallways that look different when you revisit them. - [https://www.reddit.com/r/Parahumans/comments/8r4hha/_/e0qz9pn What Do Most Others Do All Day?], Reddit</ref>

=== The Carnival ===
Endless crowded streets.<ref name=":1" /><ref>[https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/2kjv7r/_/clmc1wr/ Reddit Comment by Wildbow]</ref>