Between our universe and its neighbors, there exists a region of unreality dominated by The Wasn't: a timeless and formless entity of endless appetite eternally eating back the outgrowth of the universes. Even with its main task done, it didn't go hungry. There were always lost time travelers and other escapees of the laws of physics that became The Wasn't's snacks between meals.
Its eating brought about the gap that caused it to exist. The Wasn't isn't very philosophical, so this circular causality doesn't bother it in the least.
It happened that a child was born on Earth possessing the most powerful mind humanity would ever produce. At the age of seven, the child's mind exploded in power, resulting in a large version of the child's subconscious suddenly appearing in the realm between universes. The child's mind took it all in, understanding the order of things in an immense flash of cosmic insight.
Unreality abhors a lack of vacuum, so the child's subconscious was swiftly attacked by The Wasn't, but instead of devouring the child's mind, The Wasn't suddenly—was. This was incredibly upsetting to The Wasn't, now that it, she, had feelings. She stomped her feet and demanded to be put back, but the child was gone. Instead, she heard the child's parents running away screaming, something to do with her eyes.
The Wasn't called out to her siblings: The Isn't, The Could Never Be, and even the oft-maligned Would've Could've Should've, but received no answer.
A puppy ran up to The Wasn't and smiled.
"Why are you smiling?" said The Wasn't.
"Because I wasn't meant to be. I was supposed to die before birth. I like existing. It's nice."
With that the puppy trotted off. The Wasn't fumed. She was hungry. Worse, the universes would overflow into each other and in so doing, destroy the space between where The Wasn't needed to be.
The Wasn't sat down on the ground and tried to figure out a solution. She thought long and hard. Something touched her. She looked up and a large machine was trying to pick her up. The Wasn't stood and glared at the man behind the machine. He jumped out of the machine and ran away screaming. All The Wasn't caught was something about a statue coming to life. All these beings seemed to do was run around screaming.
She looked down and saw she was covered in layers of dust so thick, it had hardened into a shell. She shrugged, breaking the shell. Wondering how long she'd been thinking, she took a walk. She saw various machines flying around in the air. She saw beings that weren't on the planet when she started thinking. She asked a tree. The tree didn't know when she had sat down, so it couldn't tell her how long, just that the humans of the area called the year four thousand three hundred and ninety-two, or was it ninety-three now? The tree apologized for not knowing more and went back to sleep.
The Wasn't dug into the remaining memories of the girl and found she arrived on this rock over two thousand years earlier or fifteen eating cycles.
Would've Could've Should've replied to the earlier message, saying it had other things to worry about and it would check-up in a few weeks. There were no more messages.
The Wasn't saw a mirror in the back of a vehicle getting ready to lift off. She ran to the mirror and looked at herself. Mainly, her eyes. They were dark and big, and she could see her home between the universes. She stared long into that abyss.
The truck pulled out and went about its business. So did The Wasn't, back between universes.
And none too soon as half the universes had joined. It had its work cut out for it, but it wasn't worried. The Wasn't was very, very hungry.
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