"You don't really have a choice!" the Faceless said, spinning around in a delighted little circle, blurring as he did it. "I made this place just for you, the ones that fall through the cracks of time and space. When other cosmic entities throw you away like chaff, I harvest you, and my little world is going to wear you down to your darkest selves, strip all the layers of story away."

A pause.

"Or add them on, as it were. You two aren't ones that started with that much darkness inside. You were all in 4-color, bright and crisp inside your white panel space -- one, a fresh start with a fresh face, the other, laughter and a light heart until all the little children burned to a crisp. This place will add on grimy layer after grimy layer. Your armor," he said to Robbie and Robbie's eyes popped open wide. To Sam he said, "or layers of hardship. You're not like the other one, the one who went to war. Not yet -- and even he escaped the dark, because of the fire inside him. But no one escapes this place. No one. And when you've gone to war here and never come back, I'll be there in the end. To suck the ink out of your outlines like marrow from your bones."

"Nova?" Robbie said slowly, his eyes still nearly bugging out of his head. "You fly faster than I can bounce. You know that armpit thing fliers do to non-fliers, right?"

They needed to get out of there. That kind of crazy talk meant this was not someone they wanted to attack.