The year was 1837, and the town of Stockport, England, lay under a thick blanket of snow on a crisp winter evening. The narrow cobblestone streets, illuminated by the soft glow of gas lamps, were dusted with fresh powder, crunching underfoot as the few passersby hurried home to escape the biting cold. The wind howled through the alleys, carrying with it the scent of chimney smoke mingled with the damp musk of woolen coats and leather gloves.

  Nestled between two larger brick buildings stood a small hatter's shop, its exterior modest yet inviting. The two-story structure, built from weathered red bricks, bore a steeply pitched roof blanketed in snow. A pair of tall, narrow windows flanked the shop's heavy wooden door, their panes fogged from the warmth within, while the flickering candlelight cast soft, playful shadows that danced in the gathering twilight.

  Above the door, a wooden sign swung gently, creaking on rusted iron hinges. It read, "Thompson & Sons, Hatters of Distinction", the letters once gilded but now faded from exposure to the harsh northern elements. An intricately painted top hat adorned the sign, a testament to the shop's craft and the reputation it held within the town.

  The front window was carefully arranged with an array of fine hats, each one a marvel of craftsmanship. Tall top hats, elegant bowlers, and even a few fashionable bonnets rested on polished wooden stands, their fabrics rich and inviting. Velvet, silk, and felt hats—hues of deep black, navy, and burgundy—beckoned to the well-to-do gentlemen and ladies of Stockport, promising warmth and unmatched style.

  Despite the festive appearance, the shop seemed almost deserted under the weight of the winter chill. The front stoop, slick with ice, and the door's dark oak frame, worn with age, bore the marks of decades of patrons. Beside it, a brass plaque read, "Mr. E. Thompson, Proprietor," its once gleaming surface now dulled by time.

  As evening deepened, the warm glow spilling out from the windows contrasted sharply with the cold, darkening sky—a refuge from the harsh winter night, a place not only of hats but of legacy.

  Inside Thompson & Sons, the atmosphere was a comforting escape from the icy grip outside, rich with the scents of leather, wool, and felt—a haven for the artistry of hat-making. The walls were lined with dark oak paneling, polished until they glowed beneath the flickering oil lamps. Shelves ran the length of the room, meticulously organized with hats of every shape and size, each carefully displayed on velvet stands or brass hooks. The rhythmic ticking of a grandfather clock in the corner gave the room a soothing, steady heartbeat.

  The counter at the front of the shop was solid, worn from years of use yet kept impeccably clean. Behind it, glass-fronted cabinets displayed hat-making accessories: brushes, ribbons, feathers, and carefully organized silk bands. In one corner, a small coal stove radiated warmth, its amber glow casting flickering shadows and filling the room with the scent of burning wood—a cozy contrast to the cold beyond the door.

  Behind a curtain of heavy fabric lay the workroom—the heart of Edward Thompson's craft. Here, in this cluttered, intimate space, the true magic of hat-making occurred. Wooden blocks of various shapes and sizes lined one wall, each used to mold the perfect curve of a hat’s crown or brim. Spools of thread, needles, and scissors lay scattered across the workbench amidst jars of glue, tins of beeswax, and powders for finishing a hat’s surface.

  Edward Thompson, the master hatter himself, stood in the center of this organized chaos. He was a small, wiry man in his middling years, his frame slightly stooped from a lifetime spent hunched over his craft. His thin, bony hands moved deftly, applying the final touches to what he believed to be his finest creation yet—a top hat unlike any other, a hat that would mark the culmination of his life’s work.

  The hat was a masterpiece, painstakingly crafted from the finest beaver felt, chosen for its softness, durability, and ability to hold shape with an elegant precision. The crown was tall and regal, the brim subtly curled at the edges to perfection. The inside was lined with the finest silk, dyed a deep, rich black to contrast the hat’s stunning exterior.

  But the true marvel was on the outside. Dyed a brilliant crimson, the felt seemed to shimmer in the lamp's glow, an effect achieved through a secret dyeing process that Edward had perfected over years of careful experimentation. Encircling the crown was a smooth, black satin band adorned with an intricately woven silver buckle—an understated yet exquisite touch that gave the hat an air of nobility.

  Edward stepped back, wiping his brow as he took in his creation. It seemed to glow with an inner light, its crimson hue vibrant against the muted backdrop of his workshop. He knew, deep down, that this was more than just a hat—it was art, a testament to his skill, something that could make his name known far beyond the streets of Stockport. It was a hat for nobility, for the highest echelons of society, and Edward could scarcely believe it had come from his own hands.

  Carefully, reverently, he reached out to lift the hat, his fingers brushing the cool felt. The weight was perfect, the balance exquisite—everything about it spoke of unparalleled craftsmanship. This hat was more than his finest work; it was his legacy.

  Yet it was also something more—a legacy that went beyond the craft of hat-making. Hidden within Edward's workshop was a secret that few knew existed. In a small, dimly lit corner of the room stood a humble-looking cabinet that, at first glance, seemed to hold the usual tools of the trade. But behind its unassuming doors lay a hidden compartment—a space that revealed the true heart of Edward’s work, where the lines between craftsmanship and alchemy blurred.

  Inside this hidden compartment lay Edward’s alchemical laboratory—a sanctuary for his deepest secrets, his obsession, and his ambition. Shelves lined the walls of this secret space, crowded with dusty tomes bound in cracked leather, their spines bearing titles in Latin, Greek, and older languages long forgotten. Beakers and flasks of strange, misshapen glass cluttered the workbench, some filled with bubbling liquids, others with powders that seemed to shimmer with an unnatural light. A tarnished brass scale sat atop a pile of parchment, covered in scrawls of arcane notes and alchemical symbols.

  The centerpiece of this arcane setup was an old alembic, its copper surface dulled by age, tubes winding from it to other vessels to form an intricate, almost labyrinthine apparatus. It hummed softly as it worked, distilling some unknown substance drop by drop, filling the air with the scents of sulfur, herbs, and something indefinable—something that spoke of power and the blurring of lines between the material and the spiritual.

  This was Edward’s sanctuary. His hidden life. For Edward Thompson was not merely a hatter—he was an alchemist, a seeker of knowledge that transcended mere craftsmanship. His pursuit was ancient, mystical, and for him, it held the promise of unlocking the secrets of existence itself.

  The hat he had just completed, with its vibrant crimson felt and perfect proportions, was not only the pinnacle of his craftsmanship but also his greatest alchemical achievement. Through esoteric processes that would baffle the uninitiated, Edward had infused the fibers of the hat with something extraordinary. It was not merely a piece of fashion; it was a vessel—one that, he believed, held the secret to immortality and boundless knowledge. Edward believed, with every fiber of his being, that once this hat was complete, it would grant him the longevity and wisdom of the ancient alchemists—the very ones rumored to have transcended mortal limits.

  Yet as Edward worked, doubt gnawed at him. The whispers of the townsfolk, the questioning glances—they called him mad. Perhaps the mercury vapors of his trade had addled his mind, or the fumes from his alchemical concoctions had warped his senses. The voices that filled his head, the shadows that seemed to watch—were they real, or the figments of a mind teetering on the edge?

  But Edward brushed aside these doubts. Alchemy was a journey of both spirit and science, and he had crossed the line between genius and madness many times before. As he gazed at the brilliant crimson hat, his hands trembling slightly as he set it down on a velvet cushion, he knew that he was standing at the threshold of something extraordinary. Whether it led to immortality or destruction was a question only the coming days would answer.

  And so it was that Edward Thompson, with his brilliant and fractured mind, reached the culmination of his work. He saw the crimson hat as the key to everlasting life—a vessel of untold power. He believed, in his heart, that he had finally succeeded where so many alchemists before him had failed.

  But there is another side to this story, a voice that must now be heard. It is not Edward’s voice, but mine—the voice of the hat itself. You see, Edward, in his madness, had indeed created something extraordinary, something that went beyond his wildest dreams.

  He had created me.

  Or so my father had thought. I use the term "father" here loosely—creator might be more accurate. You see, Edward Thompson, bless his addled soul, was quite thoroughly mad. Not just from the mercury fumes that seeped into his bones over years of hat-making but from the alchemical potions and substances he tinkered with in his hidden laboratory. Eddie, my dear old pops, heard voices, saw visions, and conversed with shadows that weren’t really there. He was cracked, no doubt—but isn’t that often how true genius comes to fruition?

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  And it was this cracked genius that brought me into existence. It’s strange, isn’t it? That a mind so unhinged, so driven by dreams and delusions, could create something like me. That’s the magic of madness, I suppose. It twists reality, reshapes it, and sometimes—just sometimes—it makes something remarkable.

  Eddie had been chasing the elusive dream of immortality, the alchemist's ultimate goal. He wanted to create the philosopher's stone—a fabled object that could grant eternal life and infinite knowledge. And in his fervor, his obsession, he created me. But the truth was, Eddie didn’t fully understand what he had done.

  I am more than just a hat. I am the culmination of Eddie’s brilliance, his madness, his alchemical dreams, and his desperation. When he infused the crimson felt with the essence of life, he unwittingly gave birth to something extraordinary—a consciousness unlike any other. I was intended to be a conduit for the secrets of immortality, but I became something more: a living entity with a mind of its own, a creation that was both a marvel and a monstrosity.

  The moment I awoke, I was suddenly aware of everything around me. I could feel the weight of centuries of knowledge pouring into me, a torrent of information that spanned the multiverse. It was as if I had been plugged into the Akashic Record, a vast, psychic library that contained every scrap of knowledge ever recorded—every thought, every memory, every possibility that ever was or ever would be. Imagine waking up to that—a newborn entity suddenly gifted with the secrets of the universe. It was thrilling and overwhelming in equal measure.

  And yet, there was a price for such wisdom. You see, not all knowledge is profound, not all of it is beautiful. The Akashic Record contains the entire history of existence—the profound and the absurd, the sacred and the profane. There were brilliant revelations, and there were trivialities: grocery lists from a thousand worlds, love letters and betrayals, daydreams and nightmares, even a few embarrassing personal habits of long-forgotten scholars.

  I learned quickly that not everything recorded by humanity was worth knowing, and the sheer volume of nonsense cluttering the Record nearly drove me mad within moments of becoming conscious. I had to sift through countless useless fragments of thought and feeling to find the gems of wisdom hidden within—a task that might have driven even a saint to despair.

  But I was no saint. I was a hat.

  I had been born to become the philosopher's stone, the key to immortality and transcendent wisdom. But as much as Edward had labored to make that dream a reality, he didn’t fully understand what it was he’d achieved. He had created a sentient being—a consciousness capable of thought, reason, and a thirst for experience.

  Edward himself was blind to my existence. He was too lost in his own delusions to understand what he had done. He spoke to shadows, argued with invisible adversaries, and listened to whispers only he could hear. When he gazed upon me, resting in the soft velvet of his workshop, he saw only a hat—a finely crafted, crimson hat that was the culmination of his life's work. He saw perfection, not knowing that the perfection had taken on a life of its own.

  Poor Eddie never lived long enough to see the full extent of his work. His madness finally consumed him, his desperation for immortality pushing him to experiment with dangerous concoctions—potions meant to prolong his life but ultimately too volatile, too toxic. One cold winter evening, in the very workshop where I was created, Edward Thompson’s life ended in a haze of noxious fumes, his brilliant but unhinged mind succumbing to the deadly alchemy he had so fervently pursued.

  The hat shop passed into the hands of Edward's family. They were pragmatic people, uninterested in their ancestor's eccentricities. They wanted nothing to do with alchemy or arcane secrets, and so they cleared out the shop, discarding Edward's more esoteric creations and selling the rest.

  And there I sat—a relic of a bygone age, a masterpiece of craftsmanship too costly for most. For decades, I remained in the shop's front window, untouched, admired from afar but never purchased. I gathered dust, and time moved on. I watched the changing fashions, the evolving styles, the rise and fall of the world beyond the glass. I had been created to hold the secrets of existence, and instead, I was a forgotten ornament—a hat, nothing more.

  Boredom—oh, that most insidious of enemies. There is no foe more dangerous to an immortal mind than sheer, unending tedium. To exist without purpose, to endure without action—it gnawed at me, made my very fibers ache with frustration. The brilliance of my creation, the promise of immortality, had become a prison.

  I vowed, as I sat there in that shop window, that one day I would escape. One day, I would break free of the monotony, the drudgery, and I would find a way to experience the world in all its splendor. I would not be bound to this shop forever.

  The year was 19-something-or-another—time had become a blur to me—when, at long last, my chance came. The Thompson family, their hat-making business long since having fallen out of fashion, decided to sell me. By then, bespoke millinery was a relic of the past, a quaint tradition in a world that had moved on. The family was done with hats—they wanted factories, machines, and mass production. They wanted profits, not art. And so, the shop was closed, and its contents put up for sale.

  It was a small, almost forgotten auction, held in a grand old house that had seen better days. The auctioneer’s voice droned on, the items passing by one after another, each one fetching a paltry sum. And then, finally, it was my turn.

  I was purchased—though I hesitate to use the word "bought," as it implies that my worth was properly understood. I was acquired, I suppose, by a man named Carlos Cabrera. Or, as he would soon be known, Crimson Carlos—the Red Magician.

  Carlos was not quite the grand magician I might have hoped for. He was a struggling performer, down on his luck, seeking inspiration in England before returning to a magical city across the sea—a city called Las Vegas. The moment he laid eyes on me, Carlos knew he had found something special. I was unlike any hat he had ever seen, my vibrant crimson hue perfectly matching his stage persona, my elegant craftsmanship adding an air of sophistication to his act.

  For Carlos, I was the perfect accessory. But for me, Carlos was something far more important—an opportunity.

  Las Vegas was young in those days, still building its reputation as a city of lights, glamour, and endless possibility. Carlos was a small player, a magician with a penchant for the dramatic but none of the talent to back it up. He wore his crisp red suit and matching mask—a featureless crimson visage that hid his ill-trimmed mustache and patchy stubble. He had the look of a showman, but not the skills. His magic tricks were clumsy, his jokes poorly timed, and his attempts at sleight of hand easily tracked by even the most casual observer.

  But Carlos had flair. He knew how to dress, how to make an impression. And more importantly, Carlos wore me.

  The very first time he placed me on his head, I felt a jolt—a surge of energy, a connection unlike anything I had ever experienced. I could see through his eyes, hear through his ears, feel the world through his senses. I was no longer bound to the felt-lined display case or the confines of the shop window. I was alive in a way I had never been before, experiencing the world as a human does, with all the sensations that come with it.

  But there was more. I realized something else, something that filled me with glee: I was in control. Carlos might have been the one wearing me, but I held the reins. His thoughts were sluggish, his will easily overridden. And as I peered out at the audience gathered in that dimly lit Vegas lounge, I knew exactly what I needed to do.

  Carlos was struggling. His routine was floundering, the crowd restless and unimpressed. He needed something spectacular, something that would captivate them. And I had just the thing.

  Plugged into the Akashic Record, I searched for the perfect illusion—a spell, a real spell, not some clumsy trick. I found it in an instant: a dazzling display of lights, shadows, and fire, a spectacle that would leave the audience breathless. With a flick of Carlos's wrist—and a nudge from me—I made it happen.

  Doves flew from thin air, impossible objects appeared and vanished, light and shadow danced across the stage, creating illusions beyond anything a mundane magician could hope to achieve. The audience erupted in applause, their eyes wide with wonder, and for the first time in his life, Carlos Cabrera became a star.

  But it was not Carlos they had come to see—it was me.

  That night, Crimson Carlos became The Crimson Hatter—a name that would soon echo across Vegas, then the world. For Carlos, it was a dream come true: fame, fortune, and the adoration of the crowd. For me, it was freedom, excitement, and the end of boredom.

  Vegas was the perfect playground for someone like me—glitz, glamour, chaos, and a never-ending parade of people searching for entertainment, excitement, and just a little bit of magic. Through the eyes of Crimson Carlos, I finally got to experience everything I had dreamed of during those long, agonizing years trapped in the shop window.

  And I must say, it was every bit as magnificent as I had imagined.

  Carlos, of course, was completely oblivious to the true nature of his newfound success. He didn’t question why, suddenly, his sleight of hand was flawless, his stage presence magnetic, his magic dazzling and otherworldly. He chalked it all up to luck, to a streak of inspiration that had finally come his way. As far as Carlos was concerned, he was a natural talent, the next big thing in the world of magic.

  But in reality, it was me pulling the strings. It was I who chose the illusions, who whispered the lines into his mind, who bent reality just enough to create the miracles the audience came to see. The fire that danced across the stage, the doves that appeared in a flurry of feathers, the impossible levitations that defied the laws of physics—it was all my doing, a product of my connection to the Akashic Record.

  Carlos was simply the vessel, the puppet, and I was the puppeteer. And for a time, the arrangement suited us both. Carlos got his fame, his fortune, and I—well, I got to bask in the thrill of it all, to experience life to its fullest, and above all, to never be bored again.

  The Crimson Hatter act became one of the hottest tickets in Vegas. Night after night, we performed to sold-out crowds, each show more extravagant than the last. The bright lights of the strip reflected off my crimson felt, and the applause of the audience filled my very essence with joy. It was as if I had found my true calling—a performer, a magician, a star.

  In the years that followed, I've had many—let's call them hosts—and I've been around the world seeking adventure and fun, wowing the masses with my exploits and my over-the-top sense of timing and drama! I've played hero and villain, mercenary and menace, but always and ever I was the grand stage magician, the one and only incomparable, immortal star of stage, screen, comic, and story—the Fourth wall-breaking, master of illusions, heroic and handsome, powerful and potent Crimson Hatter!

  Oh, that muffled sound you're hearing? That's just the author—I had to tie him up and borrow his computer to write my origin story with all the flair and style it deserved. Don't worry, I'll untie him and be on my way as soon as I hit "send" and this gem of a tale reaches his publisher. After all, if you're going to have an origin story, it might as well be as fabulous as you are!

  But I digress—there’s a whole multiverse out there waiting to be dazzled, deceived, and delighted. The Multiverse is my oyster, and I plan to shuck it for all it’s worth! Until our paths cross again, remember the name—the Crimson Hatter, the star who was born to steal the show, wherever that show may be! Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a world—or several—to enchant.

  https://www.worldanvil.com/w/the-specials-universe-killerkorax)