He Manipulates

4

Tw-mentions of past death, slight threats, I'm confused and I was the one that wrote this,

~~~

"Wait, what's that name?"

"Uh..."

"Why is it crossed out?" Foolish was holding a large leather bound book with many, many names printed in ink. There was one name on the pages that began with 'K' that had been scribbled out viciously. Seven-Four-One really wanted to know, but Foolish just wouldn't tell him.

"Well... It's the name of a deceased Time Keeper. Not lost, deceased. One Keeper-a very important one-couldn't bare to look at the name so it was crossed out."

Seven-Four-One frowned. "What's the name?"

Foolish rubbed the back of his neck. "Karl." Seven-Four-One grinned. He liked that name. "I want that one."

"But the-"

"Nope."

"You really shouldn't-"

"Nuh-uh~." Karl sang, walking towards the door.

"I'm-"

"I'm going to see Puffy, she said something about explaining stuff." He waved his hand around in the air. "You coming or am I going to go get lost right now?"

Foolish stared at him with a twitching eye. There was the distant rumble of thunder in the background. He stood up. "Let's go." The moment he walked out the door, he went from six feet tall, to around twelve feet tall. "Oops." Karl muttered. Now he wondered if it was a smart move to sort of get on this guy's nerves.

The god lead them through the halls, others in white and grey scrambling out of the way offering a polite bow or curtsey.

Karl followed calmly, a certain spring in his step as he hummed to himself. He nearly crashed into Foolish when he halted suddenly. "What-"

"Sh." Karl's mouth snapped shut. What was going on?

"...I understand, but you need to leave." He heard Puffy's voice. She sounded serious, tense.

"Our request is simple, we're short many Keepers, and that is a problem. Without them, the timelines may just fall apart." There was a tall man dressed in black and dark grey standing in front of Puffy. He had a frown on his face as he feigned worry. Puffy didn't fall for it. "I will not let you turn one of my Keepers into a Dreamon."

"That's a very offensive name, don't you know? We keep time just like you do. We are Keepers too." Puffy rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. "Leave or I will call her."

"Oh, please. We both know she is on our side, she is our god, not yours."

A crow entered the hallway, landing gracefully on Puffy's shoulder. "We are the gods. Now please, leave." The room went from a cool temperature to positively boiling. The unknown character hissed at the heat. "We will have him. You do not need them all." With that, he faded away until nothing was left of him except for a wither rose on the ground.

Puffy let out a sigh, eyes aging a million years before stepping on and crushing the rose. "Puffy?" Said woman looked up at the young god and smiled tiredly. "Yes?"

"Seven-Four-One has chosen a name."

"Oh, good. What did he choose?"

"Karl."

The hall went silent. The Keepers that had been scurrying around, murmuring amongst themselves, froze. It seemed as though the world was holding its breath. "I see." Puffy nodded. She cleared her throat. "Well, we cannot force him to change his name. Come... Karl..." She turned towards the nervous man and motioned for him to follow her as she began walking off.

He hurried to catch up, waiting for her to speak. She didn't. The walk was silent until they reached a set of double doors with spirals on them. She sighed and pushed them open.

Inside, there were six rows and eight columns of necklaces of all sorts of designs. She walked to the right, heading for the last column. Karl followed her nervously.

She took a beautiful spiral necklace out of a wooden chest and held it out to him. "This, was our previous Karl's tool. It was his portal to and from us in the In-Between." He took it, examining it, brushing over the green and purple book with delicate fingers. "It is only right you hold his old tool."

"What do you mean by tool and portal?" He questioned.

"We watch over time. This helps us get from server to server, or back home quicker than normal server inhabitants." She began walking out, making sure Karl stayed close to her. "It keeps your memories. You must never take it off. Many Time Keepers often loose themselves because this job comes at a price. Our old Karl came up with an idea to help this but it cost him his life. Instead of speaking with Death or Lethe he spoke with Death's cousin. She had enough power to grant his wish, but only with an equally powerful sacrifice." She shook her head. "It's an old story. A sad one you don't need to hear just yet."

Karl nodded. "Okay, what do the keeper people do?"

"Keepers monitor servers assigned to them. They involve themselves as little as possible. They are meant to watch to make sure the server's path doesn't get altered to the point of collapse. Recently though, we've been having an issue with a certain few individuals being reborn too many times collapsing servers."

Karl nodded. "How do these servers collapse?"

"We don't know for certain. The only warning we get is the view of a server gets blurry and soon becomes impossible to travel to. Your task is not to watch any servers, it is to follow these individuals and correct them whenever they may stray from the written path. You may need to go back in time to correct old mistakes, or even forward in time. Once you are in the server, only you will be able to tell which events didn't happen according to plan. You must record everything you do and don't do in the past, present, and future."

"We are entrusting the entirety of time to you. Please, help us. We have no other options."

"How am I supposed to do anything? I barely know anything!"

"Wearing Karl's necklace will give you the knowledge you need. All our Keepers here are at your disposal. If you require any assistance, simply let us know. We will do everything in our power to help you complete this mission. Take them away from a server before it can collapse, if it comes to that. Take them to a new one, we will integrate them with the timeline. Eventually they will die permanently. No soul can be reborn forever. Especially not as they have been."

Karl bit his lip.

"Go on, make your way to the gates. The necklace will show you the way. DreamXD will take you to your first location."