"Mæra
" is a crossover between Worm and Little Nightmares, by Pictsie Styx.
Instead of waking up after the Locker incident with control over insects, Taylor finds herself repeatedly having awful nightmares set in a twisted mirror of the waking world, which she details in a dream diary to help with the trauma.
Consistency of the dreams, A chance meeting with a young girl in a ghost costume, and another incident involving the Merchants soon make it clear that her nightmares are in fact very real indeed, and she has become the door between Earth Bet and the world of Nightmares.
And those Nightmares want in.
Mæra contains examples of:
- Alternate Universe: Earth Ayin appears to be one to Earth Bet, as areas in the Pale City match up with places in Brockton Bay.
- And I Must Scream: A tragically self-inflicted example. It's made abundantly clear the Thin Man actually despises what he does and would like nothing more than to be free of the Tower and the Transmission. The problem? If he doesn't do his job, some poor soul will take his place, and the Thin Man considers that to be a Fate Worse than Death.
- Badass Normal: The PRT Rangers, whose job it is to explore dangerous, potentially Cape infested areas. They are shown to be able to take down various monsters with the help of specialized munitions and overwhelming firepower.
- Bedsheet Ghost: Celine's attire of choice. Becomes very fitting after she triggers with Intangibility powers
- Big Brother Instinct: Taylor gains this in regards to Celine. Also Kurt, who will go through hell to keep Tucker safe.
- Bubblegloop Swamp: The Garden, home to The Gardener. It's an array of greenhouses filled with mud pits.
- Crapsack World: Earth Bet is in already in bad shape due to Endbringers and other S-Class threats, but Earth Ayin is even worse.
- Cuteness Proximity: Taylor finds Celine to be absolutely adorable. As do several members of the Protectorate and the Wards when she meets them on Earth Bet.
- Eldritch Abomination:
- The Tower, which doubles as an Eldritch Location.
- Also mentioned is the North Wind, a living storm that haunts the world outside the Pale City.
- Eldritch Location: The Pale City, especially the Tower. After accidentally letting the Transmission through, Coil's bunker also becomes one, with Armsmaster's exploration team coming across at least one room that is too big to be part of the bunker without sticking out of the ground.
- Extendable Arms: The Gardener has a leg variation, with wooden, stilt-like Artificial Limbs that extend to help them move about the greenhouses of the Garden.
- Family of Choice: Taylor basically adopts Celine shortly after they meet.
- Fate Worse than Death: The Thin Man's condition. He knows what he does is terrible and hates doing it, hates what he has become, hates the Transmission both for what it makes him do and for mocking him by allowing him to see what a world that isn't dead yet is like before forcing him to help it spread there, and even feels that he is destined to die by his own hands some day. The only reason he hasn't is because he knows the Transmission would simply find another person to do his job, and he refuses to inflict his fate on anyone else.
- Heroic BSoD: Both Celine and Taylor have one after the events in the tower lead them both to think the other is dead. Celine recovers quickly, but Taylor, not so much.
- Idiot Ball:
- Emma, Sophia and Madison's decision to bully Taylor outside of school, even if Taylor didn't have powers, would have likely not ended well for them.
- Coil's secret observation of Taylor's power testing despite clear warnings bites him big time.
- Monstrous Humanoid: Most of the 'Big Ones' from Earth Ayin. And Taylor herself, in her 'Tall Owl' form.
- Old Media Are Evil: The televisions scattered about the Pale City are what the Transmission uses to spread it's power and influence. Notably, when it begins transmitting into Earth Bet, it doesn't transmit via the internet, even though it can infect computer systems like Coils.
- Out-of-Genre Experience: Chapter 16, The Transcript, reads like an SCP Foundation exploration log.
- Plagued by Nightmares: Or so Taylor thinks.
- Reality Bleed: Earth Ayin seems to be doing this to Earth Bet.
- Religion of Evil: The Cult of the Maw, made up of the children left to rot in the abandoned Maw, who have turned cannibalistic and worship non other than Six as a god.
- Tragic Monster: The Thin Man. It is made clear at the end of chapter 22 that he does what he does because the Transmission forces him to, and he'd stop if he could. He also really doesn't want to help it spread to Earth Bet, with the Transmission giving him a little extra freedom to explore it, apparently just so he can see what a world that isn't dead yet is like before he is forced to help destroy it. Chapter 24 reveals that the only reason he hasn't killed himself or allowed let himself be captured or killed is because he knows the Transmission would simply corrupt another innocent person to do his job, and he refuses to let anyone else suffer his fate.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Coil spying on Taylor's power tests results in the Transmission crossing over to Earth Bet, taking over his bunker and turning it into Bet's equivalent of the Tower, corrupting him, his henchmen, and the Travellers, and eventually forcing the PRT to evacuate and quarantine all of Brockton Bay.
- Was Once a Man: In addition to the usual examples from Little Nightmares, Coil, his henchmen, and the Travellers all end up transformed when the Transmission takes over his bunker.
- Wham Episode: Several
- Chapter 15: Celine triggers, with the implication that either Earth-Ayin has its own entities, one of which may be the Transmission, or Scion is in contact with something on Ayin. After that, the PRT finds out that the Transmission has crossed over to Earth-Bet.
- Chapter 24: Taylor meets the Cauldron, finds out Scion is actually evil and is interested in Earth-Ayin, and concludes that Earth-Bet might actually be worse off than Ayin. Kurt and the rest of the Earth-Ayin crew reach the Maw, only to instantly be stranded there.
