Darth Wiki / Universe 11-N

---

Universe 11-N is the collective literary universe where all of the stories and works from young author, Nathan Thornsbury, take place. These stories include the likes of Non-Existent, The Copper Marionette, NOCO: Calcin Inc, Centrallia College, My Life Stuck In Someone Else's Body, among others. The author has gone on the record to say that all of his stories are connected in some way or form.

The original author has announced that in September 2017, he will be creating a Patreon and a Kickstarter in order to start making his stories and novels into full, feature-length films in a collected universe, similar to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

All of the works in this collected universe are:

Story List

• Non-Existent: (See the trope page for Non-Existent)
• Centrallia College: The anthology horror story following a college in central America that seems to be the heart of darkness, where horror and evil grows powerful, and where the Dean of the school, Lucius, is harboring a very dark secret... and an even darker power.
• Caines' Case Investigations
• Reverence
• Rapture: Taking place shortly after the end of Reverence, Rapture deals with the aftermath and fall-out from the events of the previous story while trying to deal with all of the remaining loose ends. With rotating perspectives of the stories cast, the novel goes through multiple characters trying to deal with what might actually become the end of the world, in the most dangerous threat to ever come to this literary universe. Ezekiel deals with his new position as ruler of Hell, Caine and Abel try to get along once again while solving spiritual mysteries, Cooper and Olivia track down the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, The Judge's plans finally begin coming to fruition after many years, and possibly most dangerous of all, Azreal, the first Patron Saint of Righteousness has escaped from Heaven, and seeks to rid the world of sin by destroying Hell itself. This story is the ultimate crossover culmination of this literary universe, tying together almost all of the other stories in their own ways.
• Dark Moon: The sub-universe of superhero stories, such as the crippled vigilante, Sabre; the patriotic terrorist, Uncle Sam; and the conflicted all-powerful hero of cosmic power, Nebula.
• Copper Marionette: The dual-sided sci-fi story: The first telling a coming-of-age story/mystery of an artificial human child, leaning the truths and beauty of the world; while the other story tells of a future where synthetic humans live alongside the pure peoples, and a Synthetic police officer, S407, investigates what might just be the very first synthetic humanoid.
• NOCO Calcin Inc
• Mr. Purple
• Shadow Society: An anthology story of a group of horrible criminals, anonymously telling the stories of their past crimes and their horrible sins in the form of an evil AA group.
• Silent Knight: The story of a mute vigilante, trying to save his city from the shadows.
• Infamy
• My Best Friend From Hell: The dark comedy about the workings of After-Life, and the special workers known as Borrowers.
• My Life Stuck In Someone Elses Body
• STASIS
• The Joining
• The Squadron
• Dream Jumpers: The tale of a psychiatrist who helps people with chronic insomnia and mental trauma, by using the power to enter their dreams.
• The Other Side Of The Screen (Which was not a short story, but a short play)
• Godfrey: The Kinda Sorta Dragon (Also a play)
• Father & Son: A Time-Travel drama about a man who travels back in time to save his father as a child, from a horrible fate.
• The Girl On My Back: A horror story about a mentally disturbed man whose mind is taken over by a little girl with strange powers and a lust for blood.
• Christ Among The Cosmos: In the immediate aftermath of a disastrous massacre on a space colony due to a murderous alien parasite killing most of the ship, the story picks up at the end of the disaster when the last of the aliens are killed, and the distress signal finally reaches someone coming to save the nine remaining survivors. Unfortunately, it is discovered that one final embryo of the parasite had escaped, and it's up to the last of the crew to contain the situation among themselves before assistance tries to eliminate the threat themselves, along with the rest of the ship and everyone on it. The original draft was inspired by the likes of The Thing and the original Alien film.
• Paradiso: When all of the nations greatest minds disappear from a government sanctioned community of seclusion and technological development, one man will risk everything and search everywhere for his missing wife... Even through time itself...
• Career Day: A short play starring Leon Avidan, taking his estranged daughter to a school event when his ex-wife couldn't. Though when he finds out that the event is career day and that he is supposed to speak to the class about his job, he panics. This of course, is because he works as an international hit-man.
• An Honest Man: Said to be one of the most brilliant and skilled combatants in the world, Lei Fumaida has been able to win every battle he's ever fought without throwing a single punch. However, with the death of a civilian while trying to stop a bank heist, Lei feels such guilt that he has himself sent to prison to atone for a crime that most view as not being his fault.
• Live For Laughter: In a small town, a new surreal TV show has all of the children raving and obsessed. Unfortunately, the other parents start to discover the horrifying influences the show gives as the children begin disappearing and becoming violent in the name of the show's host, 'Larry Laughter'.
• Time Travel Experiment 210-B: A comedic take on a time-travel experiment, where a man from the modern day goes back to 1983, and explains what the future entails to a man at a bus stop.
• A Man Who Would Be Legend: A non-traditional super-hero story of a young home-invader who is thrust into taking the mantle of a golden-age hero from the 1950's, bringing the hero back to the modern day as a symbol of hope. He must deal with the struggles of living up to his predecessors legacy, while also unraveling the mystery of who the previous hero really was.
• The Dot: A young man starts to lose his grip on reality after he keeps noticing a small red dot in the corner of his vision that doctors can't explain. After doing his own research however, he finds a Deep-Web site where once he pays for an ID-Code matching his own phone number, he finds a live-video feed coming from his own eye, that anyone who pays for a session can access to see anyone in their most private moments. Terrified, he finds that many of his friends and people he knows have live-feeds in their eyes as well, and when he finally learns that it is a wireless camera implanted into his new contacts, he is blackmailed into obedience, and is put under even further surveillance until his mind finally breaks.
• The Glitch: A man has his entire life turned upside down when he discovers that nothing in his world matters because it doesn't truly exist, and that he is simply an NPC in a Grand Theft Auto style open world video game. This sends him into existential dread, realizing that not only is nothing real, but that he doesn't matter at all in his game, so he decides to fight back by breaking his programming, and seeking to kill the protagonist character of the game. But there is one important obstacle in his way, protecting the player: The Tutorial.

---

This universe provides examples of:

General Tropes In Universe

• All-Powerful Bystander: The entire race of The Narrator's, omnipotent beings that watch over all universes, and they are the voices which narrate many of the stories in this literary universe.
• Big Bad: Lucius Morningstar, who is the literal Devil.
  • On the NOCO side of things, The Judge.
• Crossover: There are so many between these stories, that they have their own pages.
• Cult: A recurring faction of individuals exist between seemingly unrelated stories, where normal civilians seem to go mad and worship something called "Those Whom View Us All", and though they have no way of knowing of each other, they all refer to themselves as "The Eyes". They turn out to be individuals whom became aware of the omnipotent race of beings known as The Narrators, and they go mad realizing that there will always be beings whom watch them all.
• Eye Motifs: A very common theme in this literary universe is the focus put upon eyes, where they can be a signal of special perspectives, their statements of ones character, their spiritual value linking them to ones soul, their nonverbal communication capabilities, and even their relation to a cult that worships Meta Deities called the Narrators.
• Manipulative Bastard: Lucius, one of the most important Big Bad characters in the entire literary universe.
  • Also, Jacob, to a certain degree.
• Time Travel: A major theme in the entire literary universe is the concepts of Time-Travel, whether that be through NOCO, The Squadron, Father & Son, and even Paradiso. In each of these stories, time travel works slightly differently, though this is because the different technologies were developed by different scientists.
• Unreliable Narrator: One of the recurring characters in the literary universe is a race of beings called "The Narrators" who are nigh-omnipotent beings who narrate many of the stories, such as The Squadron and Silent Knight.

---

Tropes used in each of the stories throughout this literary universe are:

0- 9

• The '80s
  • Live For Laughter: The story is actually one of the earlier events written about in the literary universe, taking place in the early eighties. It also shows just how long Lucius has been planning the concept for Centrallia College.

A

• Abandoned Area
  • Caine's Case Investigations: The Asylum from Non-Existant and Centrallia College appears again in this story, but it had been shut down and is now abandoned... Abandoned except for the faceless demon called Aiu.
  • Paradiso: The Initial Paradiso Complex, after the public breaks through security to find The Greats gone.
  • STASIS: There does not seem to be anyone else in the complex except for You.
• A Boy and His X
  • Non-Existent: Or at least, a man and his self-sentient hallucination/fractured persona/imaginary friend.
  • NOCO: Allison, a girl and her massive invisible beast which protects her.
• Abusive Parents
  • Non-Existent: Both Jacobs parents, as well as Olivia's father, though each for very different reasons, to different degrees of abuse.
  • Silent Knight: John Doe's horribly abusive, drunken, maiming mother definitely qualifies.
  • Copper Marionette: Dr. Brown, though not really towards Thomas. Towards Elijah, his own son though, most definitely.
  • Dark Moon: Sabre's father, whom killed the rest of the family and caused Sabre's childhood crippling.
• Acceptable Breaks from Reality
  • Silent Knight: In a story where a mute vigilante is running amok brutalizing dangerous criminals and taking justice into his own hands, it is easy to look past the fact that his DNA should reasonably be in police databases, since he was recovered from his abusive mother and was sent into child-services.
• The Ace
  • NOCO: Beta Squadron is seen as this. Too bad they are beaten almost immediately by HTD.
• Achilles' Heel
  • Centrallia College: The ancient blade, which is the only weakness for both Aiu, and Lucius.
  • MLSISEB: For the Borrowers, there is the fact that their spirit can be torn away from the occupied body through damage to the hosts eyes, because "Eyes truly are the windows to the soul".
• Action Girl
  • Centrallia College: Jessie.
  • Reverence: Olivia, for sure.
  • NOCO: Agent Georgia, as well as Allison.
  • Paradiso: Leah.
  • MLSISEB: Elizabeth.
  • Dark Moon: There are many female heroes, including Artemis, Luna, among others.
  • The Joining: Isabelle.
• Added Alliterative Appeal
  • Live For Laughter: Presenting Live For Laughter, hosted Live by Larry Laughter , who is actually Lucius.
    • Actually, all of Lucius's alternate forms have names that start with L, including the midget strip club manager, Lucky Lenny Lucio.
• Adorkable
  • Copper Marionette: Thomas is described as this, based on how Allesandra reacts around him at least.
• Advanced Ancient Acropolis
  • The Squadron: When the team first discovers the Great Marble Temple, before discovering that a civilization still lives within it.
• Affably Evil
  • Reverence: Esau can be considered this. He may be trying to hunt down Cooper and Olivia before brutally killing them with magical tracking arrows, but it is only because they killed his children. And even though he hates them for killing his sons, he does treat them with respect and honor, like he would any of the prey he hunts.
• After the End
  • STASIS: You discover that the world has ended outside, and You, G 0 D, and Adam are the only ones left on Earth.
• A God Am I
  • Reverence: The Judge thinks this of himself, if Coopers strange mentally influenced nightmares that the Judge gave him are anything to judge by.
• The Alcoholic
  • Non-Existent: Jacob.
  • Caine's Case Investigations: Caine himself is a former alcoholic. Eventually, his taste desire is quenched.
• All Crimes Are Equal
  • Silent Knight: Whether you are a murderer, drug-dealer, child-abuser or sexual assaulter, John Doe will still beat the ever-loving hell out of you regardless... though he will probably especially brutal with the later two for... Personal reasons...
• All Men Are Perverts
  • Centrallia College: How Jesse felt based on how she is harassed on campus once her secret way to pay the bills is revealed.
• All-Powerful Bystander
  • The Squadron: The first big, blatant mentions to the existence of the race known as the Narrators, simultaneously Lampshading it, Breaking the Fourth Wall with it, and then shooting it in the face.
• Amoral Attorney
  • MLSISEB: Jeb is said to have been this when he was alive, willing to fake being Amish in order to tap into a rarely used market for special cases for easy money.
• Anachronism Stew
  • Live For Laughter: It may be The '80s, but there are a few details that are from later in time, like some of the kids making references to films that hadn't been made yet.
• An Aesop
  • An Honest Man: One of the few purely morally responsible characters in the entire literary universe, Lei is An Aesop in himself towards taking responsibility for the wrongs one may do.
• Antagonist
  • Non-Existent: Jacob.
  • Centrallia College: Lucius.
  • Reverence: Lucius, Esau, Father Abraham, The Judge, among others.
  • Caine's Case Investigations: Lucius, Caine himself at times, Aiu, among others.
• Anti-Hero
  • Silent Knight: Take a guess
• Anti-Villain
  • Shadow Society: Mr. Orange.
• Anvilicious
  • Non-Existent: So, is the very cover of the book to heavy handed of a nod to the duality between Ezekiel and Jacob, and which one is the darker side? Yes? Oh well...
• Applied Phlebotinum
  • Non-Existent: What is in the unexplained drugs that Jacob takes for his migraines which inexplicably loosens the tether with Ezekiel? Maybe it's the same stuff that's in the strange red liquid that completely severs Ezekiels tether and setting him free as long as Jacob takes it. Who knows?
• The Apocalypse Brings Out the Best in People
  • Reverence: When Lucius is killed completely and the world is going to be crushed by a collapsing AfterLife without someone to rule over Hell, many of the main characters, no matter how Jerkass they may have been at times, are willing to sacrifice their own lives to save mankind. It essentially becomes a moment where no one wants to make the sacrifice themselves, but they'll be willing to in order to not force any of their other friends to need to make that choice.
• Apocalypse How
  • MLSISEB: Why does a soul having been in Hell and escaped for more than one week cause the end of AfterLife itself?
• Apocalypse Wow
  • Reverence: When they say that the afterlife will collapse in upon the Mortal Realm if there is no one to take control of hell, they are not exaggerating at all.
• Archenemy
  • Dark Moon: Uncle Sam is this towards Sabre, Eclipsilan is this for Luna, among others.
• Artifact of Doom
  • Centrallia College: Does Michael even hesitate to give his succubus girlfriend a brand new engagement gift that was a gift from the Devil himself, which he gave "As an apology" after he told Lucius that he was done with these favors? No he does not. He will quickly regret that oversight...
• Atomic F-Bomb
  • Non-Existent: Ezekiel doesn't curse much, though as time goes on, Jacob's frequent use of foul language does rub off slightly onto him. However, Ezekiel does have an Atomic F-Bomb mixed with an Oh, Crap! when he opens his eyes after being freed from Jacobs tether, once in Limbo.
• The Atoner
  • Caine's Case Investigations: Booker qualifies as this, since he does sincerely feel bad for what he had to do during the events of MLSISEB, though he'll never admit it to Jeb's face. Also, Caine himself, feeling such regret for what he had to do to Abel many years before.
  • An Honest Man: Lei's entire character, atoning for a crime that wasn't his fault, though he accepts the blame.
• Attention Deficit... Oh, Shiny!
  • Non-Existent: Jacob, in his introductory scene. He becomes much more calm and focused as time goes on... Well, focused at least...
• Awesome, but Impractical
  • Reverence: Coopers giant angel wings.
• Ax-Crazy
  • Non-Existent: Jacob, in the end of the story.

B

• Backstory
  • Silent Knight: We do discover why John Doe doesn't speak, though not immediately.
• Badass Bookworm
  • Silent Knight: Reggie, the self-taught physics prodigy whose life was ruined when he lost his athletic scholarship due to an injury. He now sells high-tech tools to criminals to help them with burglaries and crimes for dirt-cheap. He is a genius, but he will not hesitate to resort to physical violence when he knows it's necessary.
• Bad Boss
  • NOCO: Most of the higher ups in NOCO seem to be ambivalent towards the safety of their employees.
• The Bad Guy Wins
  • Centrallia College: Lucius may die and be banished back to Hell, but he absolutely ruins the psyche of Michael and destroys whatever innocence he has left, when his final action is taking Centrallia down to Hell with everyone inside.
• Bait-and-Switch
  • Non-Existent: There are many moments where the author makes you think that the story is going one direction, but then he throws a curveball, like a sudden Journey to the Center of the Mind.
• Batman Gambit
  • Dark Moon: In the Death of a Hero story, Uncle Sam plans on either ending Sabre once and for all, or nuking Bellstrike City. The plan rests upon the idea that will risk his own life to save his city, and if he doesn't, then the city gets destroyed. In the end, his plan works, and Sabre dies.
• Bears Are Bad News
  • Dark Moon: When the entire Crypto story-line begins, it starts with the team searching for sightings of the Jersey Devil on the outer borders of the city. Tick protests to this however, literally saying "Come on guys, now we're screwing with urban legends? I mean, that's just poking the bear with a stick, and we all know that bears are bad news, right? Right guys? *Beat* Damn it..."
• Be Careful What You Wish For
  • My Best Friend From Hell: Be very careful about your phrasing when asking for favors from Lucius...
• Berserk Button
  • Non-Existent: Jacob gets very upset when the subject of his past, childhood, or parents are mentioned or asked about.
• The Berserker
  • Silent Knight: John Doe gets especially violent with rage when he's dealing with crimes having to do with children or the loss of innocence.
• Beyond the Impossible
  • The Squadron: The literary universe sets up the Narrators as these All-Powerful Bystander type characters whose omnipotence makes them Immune From The Plot... but that doesn't stop the Squadron, a group of fourth wall breaking Anti-Hero anarchists from shooting one in the face in the first five pages because one of them didn't like how he was describing them.
• Big Bad
  • Non-Existent: Jacob.
  • Centrallia College: Lucius.
• Big Damn Heroes
  • NOCO: The final battle, when Delta Squad airdrops onto the scene, ready to kick ass and save the day from HTD.
  • Silent Knight: A rare example of a One-Man Army version of Big Damn Heroes, when John Doe bursts into the Yakuza hideout, sawed-off shotgun and magnum in hand, guns blazing and taking down anyone in his way.
• Big Good
  • Non-Existent: Ezekiel.
• Big "NO!"
  • Centrallia College: Michael does this as Jesse dies in his arms, right after he proposed to her.
• Bilingual Bonus
  • NOCO: The Judge gives one of these during his first meeting with Roman. The Judge is monologuing to Roman calmly that not everything in NOCO is what it seems, when he suddenly bursts into speaking different languages, speaking each of them so fluently and fast that Roman is unable to translate. What he says though is along the lines of telling Roman how everyone that he loves will die from his own faults, and that the Judge will make him watch as he feasts upon their very hearts.
• Bittersweet Ending
  • Non-Existent: Ezekiel is free to be with Olivia, but Jacob is dead. Jacob may have been a scumbag, though his upbringing and perpetual trauma make him a tragic figure in many peoples eyes, with his death marking a somber note. The idea of this truly being a Bittersweet Ending is really up to interpretation. Except Owen is still dead, though it is hinted that Ezekiel will be using his new freedom to try and find his soul.
  • Centrallia College: Michael is victorious in his vengeance, with Lucius being dead and banished back to Hell without the opportunity to escape (at least not for five more years). Unfortunately, Lucius's final action was dragging the Centrallia College campus down to Hell with him, killing every person inside, and erasing the memory of Centrallia College and all who died within it from everyone except Michael himself, so that he can remember causing the death of thousands of innocents with a single stab of the knife. After compiling all of the information that he could about the college and sending it out to every publishing house in the country to try and get the word out about what happened, Michael says that he will go out to the field the Aiu battle, and commit suicide by cop. So with all said and done, the Devil is beaten and banished to Hell, but thousands of innocents die in the process, and our protagonist has himself killed in the end. This ending can technically be bittersweet, though it leans heavily more towards bitter.
  • Reverence: Lucius is vanquished, but Ezekiel is forced to sacrifice himself and the life he and Olivia could have led, in order to become the new ruler of the Underworld and stop AfterLife from collapsing in upon the mortal realm. Not only that, but each of our main characters get satisfied endings, though with the knowledge that it is not happily ever after, because Rapture is coming. ALSO, even Ezekiel gets a happy ending initially, where he is actually able to finally find Owen, but he also has to deal with the last person that he'd ever want to find again, his former tormentor, Jacob.
  • NOCO: In the end, Delta Squad is victorious and saves the day, but Emory is still dead, and the truth about his Face–Heel Turn and Sanity Slippage is covered up by the Squad, letting him die a martyr. Though it gets worse when we find out that The Judge is still free in the facility secretly, and that he has access to the tesseract containing the behemoth that destroyed a large portion of Tokyo in the Final Battle.
  • Paradiso: It is not explicitly confirmed within the story or by Word of God, but one of the popular interpretations is that Franklin is happy because he can finally be with his wife and even his long since deceased daughter again, living in a timeline where she never died and they can be happy for the first time in many years. Unfortunately, this would mean that he chose to be with his wife and daughter in a different timeline, instead of going into the Alpha timeline to stop the initial event that began destroying the time stream. This would mean that Franklin could live the rest of his life with his family again, but that the entire existence of all that ever was is or will be shall soon cease to exist due to no one stopping it. Yes, it is just as heavy and convoluted as it sounds.
• Bizarchitecture
  • NOCO: The facility has such strange design that one may think that it is constantly reshaping itself on its own. It is, but under NOCO's control.
• Black-and-Grey Morality
  • Silent Knight: John may be an ultra-violent vigilante with a troubled past and cloudy morals, but he focuses on hunting down some of the worst of the worst criminals and horrible individuals, so it puts his morality into context.
• Bloodier and Gorier
  • Centrallia College: Compared to the first three stories, Bachelor Party Massacre From Hell has Kill Bill levels of blood and violence and gore.
• Blood Knight
  • Silent Knight: John Doe doesn't just hunt criminals for the good of mankind, but he does take a particular enjoyment to beating the ever-loving hell out of criminals.
• Bloodless Carnage
  • Non-Existent: Jacob even lampshades this when he stabs Ezekiels hand to a medbay bunk, mentioning how he's glad Ezekiel doesn't exist so that he won't have to clean up the non-existent blood after he's done beating or wounding him.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality
  • Paradiso: This story contains the best example of this in the entire literary universe. There are no characters that work towards purely morally virtuous or morally corrupt goals. Franklin does not care about rescuing all of the Greats or recovering their research to better humanity, all he wants is to find and get his love, Leah, back to him. The Greats, (even Peikoff, Roberts, or Salvador) are not really sinister, nor is their actions or disappearance done for sinister purposes. They accidentally began tearing the time-stream apart and essentially ending mankind with their initial discoveries, and they disappeared not to avoid blame, but to try their best to fix it their mistake. They could care less about given mankind the advancements or discoveries they made, they just want to fix their mistake to stop further damage to the time-space continuum.
• Body Motifs
  • Non-Existent: Focuses on the eyes frequently.
  • Reverence: Puts special focus on the eyes as statements of character.
• Bookends
  • Non-Existent: "I open my eyes to see..."
  • Silent Knight: The story begins and ends with John Doe, sitting on a subway, about to take down yet another scumbag, though now through slightly less lethal means.
• Boom, Headshot!
  • Shadow Society: You would expect an international assassin to have impeccable aim between a targets eyes. You'd be right.
• Brainwashed and Crazy
  • Live For Laughter: After watching the show, the children in the town start to act differently, as if they're being controlled by the show and its creator.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall
  • Non-Existent: Ezekiel and Owen do this very briefly when they are trying to figure out what Ezekiel might really be.
• Broken Bridge
  • STASIS: You encounter a broken suspended walkway while exploring the complex.
• Broken Pedestal
  • Non-Existent: Ezekiel gets this towards Jacob in Act II, once he realizes that everything Jacob told him in that incarnation was a lie.
• The Brute
  • NOCO: Delta Squad encounters a group of Oddities disguised as circus freaks, and one of them is a 6 year old boy... Whom can throw 500 pound balls of pure solid steel at speeds of 200 mph easily.
• The Butcher
  • Dark Moon: Meet Mister Gigglez, the Laughing Butcher of the North.
• The Butler Did It
  • Silent Knight: Lampshaded in the story arc, Robin Hood's Quiver, when John is looking into a wealthy estates break-in, and he finds that their housekeeper was shot in the shoulder trying to defend the residence. John thinks to himself "Well, we know the butler didn't do it..."
• Butt-Monkey
  • Reverence: Jack is frequently treated as the comic relief of the group, and he goes along with it because deep down, he feels like that's all he's good for there.
• Byronic Hero
  • Paradiso: Roberts and Peikoff want the betterment of mankind through grand developments, nothing less. And they might be willing to make some dangerous oversights in terms of moral responsibility in order to make that progress.

C

• Call-Back
  • Non-Existent: When Ezekiel and Jacob are fighting shortly before Jacob has a migraine-induced seizure, Jacob starts to get confused and calls Ezekiel Vermus. Ezekiel asks who Vermus is, and Jacob dodges the question, but he seems significantly upset about the memories.
• Call-Forward
  • Reverence: Ezekiel is told by the spirits of Salem that the one whom he seeks is back home, in reference to Chicago, and he disappears from the group to go after him. The group assumes that he is looking for Lucius, but he's really looking for Owen. Unbeknownst to everyone else though, the spirits were actually saying that he seeks himself, or the truth to what he is, and that is exactly what he finds, in the form of a cult which worships him and 'His Kind'.
• Call to Adventure
  • Reverence: Comes in the form of an angel and a demon simultaneously trying to possess Cooper, causing him to get into a horrible car crash.
• Canon
  • ALL: All of the stories on this page are considered canon in the literary universe.
• The Captain
  • NOCO: Roman, for Delta Squad.
• Cerebus Retcon
  • Reverence: It didn't quite Retcon a comedy into a drama, but this story Retcon's what the readers expected of the ending to Non-Existent, instead of it having the happy ending it set up, revealing that Ezekiel didn't return to Olivia for two years after she woke up from the coma, making her question Ezekiel's entire existence and making her settle for Cooper, the first genuinely good guy since Ezekiel.
• Cerebus Syndrome
  • Non-Existent: The story starts out as a fairly dark and marginally surreal comedy. It quickly slams into the darker side of the scale however.
• Character Filibuster
  • Non-Existent: The doctor who seemingly caused Ezekiel for Jacob has one of these when he's explaining the procedure meant to subdue Jacob's aggressive tendencies as a teenager.
• Chekhov's Gun
  • Non-Existent: Jacob's migraine's are frequently mentioned for a reason...
• Chekhov's Gunman
  • Non-Existent: The doctor whom treats Jacob in the asylum. He becomes important in the third act.
• Chekhov's Skill
  • Caine's Case Investigations: More along the lines of Chekhovs Disorder, with Caine. It is mentioned that he is a former alcoholic, but that comes into play by the end of the first act.
• The Chessmaster
  • Centrallia College: Lucius.
• Chess Motifs
  • Centrallia College: A large point of the 'Just A Pawn' story.
• Child Eater
  • Live For Laughter: It is heavily implied that this is what Larry Laughter does to the children whom are drawn to him. As it turns out though, it is arguably much worse...
• The Chosen One
  • Reverence: The cult in Chicago view Ezekiel as this.
• The Climax
  • Non-Existent: How does a final climactic altercation on a stormy hospital rooftop sound? How about adding into the mix the fact that Jacob is dying of a brain tumor anyway, so he has literally nothing left to lose? How about raising the risk factor by having Jacob threaten to break the hospitals generator, killing dozens of patients on life support in the process? Climax much?
• Cloud Cuckoolander
  • Live For Laughter: In the beginning, it is implied that Andrew is paranoid and over-protective, reacting so vigorously and panicking to the idea of his son watching the show, and the other kids start to say that Andrew is crazy, thinking VHS tapes can brainwash people and such. The other kids even start bullying Andrews son for it.
• The Cloud Cuckoolander Was Right
  • Live For Laughter: As it turns out, Andrew wasn't wrong for forbidding his son to watch the show, and he was just being careful by destroying the tape, because the show was actually dangerous. How did he know though? Because he knows that the show's host, Larry Laughter, is actually Lucius, due to prior dealings with the Devil himself.
• Cluster F-Bomb
  • Non-Existent: Jacob usually gets this.
• Cold Sniper
  • Shadow Society: Mr. Purple
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience
  • Shadow Society: Well, all of the characters are given code names for anonymity with each other. The only one whom we realize who it really is is Mr. Black, who it turns out is actually the Devil himself.
• Combat Pragmatist
  • Silent Knight: If John Doe is taking down a group of muggers in an alley and he notes a window air-conditioning unit, then be ready for him to use that air-conditioning unit in some way shape or form to take out one or two of the muggers.
• Conflict
  • Silent Knight: John Doe's adventures gradually go from Villain of the Week to intertwining cases, to going after one particular criminal whom he has a particular grudge against.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive
  • Shadow Society: Mr. Green, ironically enough.
• Creator's Favorite
  • Non-Existent: Word of God confirms that Ezekiel is one of the author's favorite characters in the entire literary universe, since Non-Existent was the first story in his literary universe.
• Creepy Child
  • Live For Laughter: Plenty of creepy, murderous children here.
• The Cynic
  • Non-Existent: Ezekiel, after he regains some of his memories in the Second Act.

D

• Damsel in Distress
  • Non-Existent: Olivia seems to be this at times in the first act, though we find out that she learns to fend for herself significantly better in later stories.
• Dark Reprise
  • Non-Existent: "I don't like sharing", is a line used by both Jacob and Ezekiel in different points during the story, towards the other person. They have very similar meaning, but based on how each of them use it, it makes Ezekiel's usage more terrifying, and Jacobs usage of the phrase slightly more tragic.
• Deal with the Devil
  • My Best Friend From Hell: The entire idea of the story.
• Death as Comedy
  • MLSISEB: Jeb has occupied bodies whom died from axes to the genitals, coke overdoses while having threesomes with gay midget twins, and those whom simply died of a heart attack on the subway.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance
  • Silent Knight: When John finally meets Reggie, the genius that's been arming criminals with high-tech tools, he finds that they share a very similar Straw Nihilist view of society and the depravity of mankind. They both had been wronged by those meant to care for them, and they've both come out crippled and working parallel to the law in order to do what they feel is right. However, John decides not to let Reggie arm him with better equipment, because though he respects and understands why Reggie does what he does, he can't agree with the flexibility of Reggie's morals. In the end however, John decides not to take Reggie down, as long as Reggie is more careful about who he's handing his tech out to, even though John knows that Reggie won't stand by that deal.
• Despair Event Horizon
  • Reverence: See Break the Cutie above.
• Deus Exit Machina
  • Dark Moon: Why doesn't any of the other heroes come in to take care of Bellstrike city after Sabre's death in "Death Of A Hero"? Out of respect for his memory, and respect for his protoge, Justice. Plus the fact that they have their own cities to take care of.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?
  • Non-Existent: When he's trying to explain what Ezekiel is to Ezekiel, Jacob literally asks "Have you ever seen Fight Club ?"
• Domestic Abuse
  • Non-Existent: Jacob isn't just a sarcastic Jerkass, but he is also an abusive scumbag.
• Do Wrong, Right
  • Live For Laughter: Lucius takes offense to the fact Andrew thinks that he's brainwashing the children of the town in order to consume their souls. He might be taking the children for a horribly sinister purpose, but not to eat them or their literal souls.
• Driving Question
  • Non-Existent: What really is Ezekiel?
• Died in Your Arms Tonight
  • MLSISEB: Poor, poor Elizabeth and Jeb...

E

• Even Evil Has Loved Ones
  • Career Day: Leon may be a brutal assassin who's started civil wars, curbed political uprisings, and done all sorts of horrible things over the years... But he still has a daughter whom rarely gets to see and whom he cares about more than anything.

F

• Faux Affably Evil
  • Centrallia College: Lucius initially seems like he may be Affably Evil, but his atrocities are enough to show how fake his polite nature is... Though the falsity of his polite nature is also easily helped by when he loses control for brief moments.
  • NOCO: The Judge is very polite and well-spoken when Roman first meets him. As it turns out, The Judge is the sinister mastermind behind everything that goes wrong in the facility, all of it a means to an end to get him out of his cell, and on the road to freedom.

G

• Glasgow Grin
  • Dark Moon: In the story, "A Monster", Mister Gigglez is actually killed by Alex, a young boy whom he tried to take from a cell as a hostage/future snack, when Alex turned the blade upon him. Alex proceeded to gut Gigglez, cut a massive smile so wide it almost breaks his jawbone, and he shoves the mans own intestines into his mouth. Alex then wrote a message on the ground in the blood, saying "Still Hungry?"
• Gratuitous Latin: NOCO: There are a few times that the organization uses Latin motto's or titles for things, and each of those times it is lampshaded for how pointless it seems.

H

• Heroic Sacrifice
  • Dark Moon: Sabre ends up losing his own life when he deactivates a nuclear reactor that was going to crash into the city.

I

• Immune to Bullets
  • Caine's Case Investigations: Played straight with Lucius, it is however surprisingly averted when Caine opens fire and shoots the ancient Sumerian demon, Aiu, in the shoulder and kneecap.

J

• Journey to the Center of the Mind
  • Non-Existent: When Ezekiel finds himself inside Olivia's comatose mind, traversing through her memories with her. Also, when Ezekiel is going through Jacob's mind near the end of the novel.

K

• Killed Off for Real
  • Dark Moon: In "A Monster", Mister Gigglez is actually killed, and he doesn't appear in any other story from that point on. The same goes for Alex, who also dies in that story.

L

• Lack of Empathy
  • Silent Knight: John rarely feels anything but satisfaction taking down criminals and scum of the streets.
  • Shadow Society: Mr. Purple does not feel any empathy for the people he kills... Well, not normally that is...
• Love Triangle
  • Non-Existent: So Ezekiel falls head over heels for Olivia, who is the current girlfriend of his creator/only 'friend' Jacob, but Ezekiel can't be with her anyway since he doesn't physically exist. Guess who she chooses to be with in the end?
  • Reverence: The triangle from Non-Existent is even further complicated when we find that Ezekiel was gone for 2+ years after the end of Non-Existent, and Olivia thought that Ezekiel never really existed after all, so she moved on to Cooper. But when Ezekiel came back, she left for Ezekiel because he was her first true pure love. But now she grows closer to Cooper again, and feels great guilt about it towards both sides. She probably wouldn't even be able to make the decision of which of them to save if her life depended on it. Luckily for her, she doesn't get the chance to make that decision...

M

• Mad Scientist
  • Copper Marionette: Dr. Brown, at times. Or at least, very eccentric scientist.

N

• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown
  • Silent Knight: John is ready to leave the stalker posing as a private eye off with a shattered hand... That is, until he sees the stalkers son, covered in bruises. At that point, John escorts the child back to his room, giving him some headphones and Johns own phone to listen to music, before closing the door and beating the ever-loving shit out of the stalker and apparent child-abuser, without any restraint. When he's done, John gives the child a blanket, covers his eyes so that he doesn't see his fathers broken, barely conscious body, as he personally takes the boy to a police department, leaving the boy with a note containing an explanation of why he's there, and where to find his fathers beaten body before he bleeds out.

O

• Our Zombies Are Different
  • Reverence: Very. Zombies aren't past corpses rising from the grave, but the recently deceased whose souls have simply returned to their beginning to decay bodies, with their full consciousness. They don't even need to eat flesh, though it does halt further decay.

P

• Perspective Flip
  • Non-Existent: After the end of act II, there is a sudden perspective flip to Jacob, from his time in the asylum during Ezekiel's absence with Olivia in her mind.

R

• Real After All
  • Non-Existent: Well, Ezekiel is at least not JUST a figment of Jacobs mind.

S

• Sir Swears-a-Lot
  • Non-Existent: Jacob.

T

• Tempting Fate
  • Non-Existent: "Jacob seems alright, so I don't know why I'd want to kill myself. I mean, it's not like he could have been that bad." This comes from Ezekiel in Act II, once he loses his memory.

U

• Unreliable Narrator
  • The Squadron: The introductory narrator of the story is a third person perspective with snarky descriptions. This turns out to be one of the omnipotent race of watchers who tell the story of the worlds they observe, which the Squadron had taken hostage to narrate their adventures. The group doesn't care for how it describes them though, so their 'Leader' Riley, proceeds to shoot it in the face by the end of the prologue, deciding to tell the story themselves. The rest of the story is told in rotating first person perspective.

V

• The Voiceless
  • Silent Knight: Well, John Doe is a mute... Though it's not like he has nothing that he wants to say.

W

• White Mask of Doom
  • Caine's Case Investigations: The Sinners get these, even Caine himself when he starts to lose his mind.
• Whole-Plot Reference
  • Non-Existent: Jacob literally asks Ezekiel in the beginning, "Have you ever seen Fight Club?" when he's trying to explain what Ezekiel is.
• Word of God
  • ALL: The author has been very outspoken about his works and very willing to answer questions people have in order to clarify it. The author is even said to go on TV Tropes frequently to see how people analyze his works, and to even add tropes in for his works himself.
• Would Hurt a Child
  • Dark Moon: Mister Gigglez is by far one of the embodiment's of this trope, his targets normally being specifically children.
• Wouldn't Hurt a Child
  • An Honest Man: Lei actually invokes this when he talks to a young purse snatcher, Tony, who tries to hold a child at knife point for an escape. Lei is actually able to talk Tony off of the ledge very peacefully and reasonably, convincing him to let the kid go and turn himself in. Tony actually wishes to apologize greatly to the child and his parents, whom don't report kidnapping/hostage taking to the police. Later on when Lei is first sent to prison, he gets transferred into a cell with Tony, whom is extremely grateful that Lei stopped him from making the biggest mistake of his entire life, and they become close friends.

---