[ WP ] A magic and friendly creature takes children with him to go to extraordinary adventures , just like in a kids show . Except that this time , something unexpected happens , and the adventure goes HORRIBLY wrong .

For many people, the world ended on March 11th, 2026, the day of the Big Slip. 
 
 > < scene: bright images of a cartoonish landscape filled with fuzzy plants, jewel-bright animals, and in the distance, a small settlement of oddly-shaped buildings > 
 
 Though more than ten years have passed since Punzie ’ s last romp with friends through Sleepworld -- Aldo Revinoch ’ s vividly-realized landscape of imagination -- the memories of that bright place seem to have been imprinted with intense clarity on the minds of those who were lucky enough to visit that realm. Even today, reverse-engineered bootleg clones of Sleepworld remain popular black market items, though by all reports, none properly capture the ‘ magic. ’ 
 
 > < scene: stock photo, black and white, of Aldo Revinoch, a slender, 20-something in casual attire > 
 
 Revinoch himself has all but vanished from the public eye, declining all interview requests. His staff, dour and taciturn, ignore questions. Since the failure of Sleepworld, he has stopped production of all other creative projects, and has only issued one statement since the Big Slip. 
 
 > < scene: young, scruffy, tired Aldo Revinoch, in front of rows of microphones and video drones. He leans forward to the camera. > * ” We have gone too far. I am sorry about that. ” * 
 
 Did Revinoch truly go too far? When he and his late partner, Francine Lachboldt, first released Sleepworld to the public, it had already gone through hundreds of cycles, a fully formed virtual planet, populated with the lifelike Dreamfolk. 
 
 > < stock marketing image of Punzie waving. > 
 
 > < scene: long-distance shot of the Big Slip, even at this range the center of the crowd of Dreamfolk is censored > 
 
 Even today, efforts to replicate what they ’ ve done have failed utterly. Sleepworld and its natives remain an anomaly. Among the survivors of the Big Slip, interviewed hundreds of times over this past decade, they speak fondly of their time there. They do not blame Punzie or her kin, but rather, the laywers and the framework of restrictions that were built into Sleepworld after Lachboldt died and Revinoch brought in a management company to help moderate the increasingly popular setting.. 
 
 > < still image: black and white, a broken robot, one claw-hand raised > 
 
 Many feel that the Big Slip was inevitable. At the time, the Dreamfolk were not recognized as autonomous beings in their own right. AI rights continue to be a murky area, especially for Punzie and her fellow refugees. 
 
 Like their elusive creator, the Dreamfolk that escaped Sleepworld have hidden themselves away from the public eye. Their world is gone, and ours must seem cluttered and dull by comparison. Though many were apprehended in the first few months after the Big Slip, as time passed they learned to hide themselves from even our most advanced detecting equipment. 
 
 > < scene: children playing in a physical park, the playground equipment designed to resemble Sleepworld features > 
 
 Authorities estimate some two-point-five billion children visited Sleepworld during its operational existence. Each and every one of their implants may have imprinted one or more Dreamfolk engrams, transferring the AI code from Sleepworld into the Net at large. 
 
 > < still photo of a small girl, strapped to a bed, her eyes bulging and mouth in a rictus > 
 
 Or in the case of Sonja Liu, into our very minds. The veracity of her claim to be Punzie herself, escaped not only from Sleepworld but from the very internet, have been called into question numerous times. Hundreds of people each year come forward, identifying themselves as the Sleepworld posterchild or other popular Dreamfolk. 
 
 > < panning camera view of Sleepworld-inspired graffiti, fading into visualized code at certain angles. Scattered among the code are bold messages, including “ Let me out! ” and “ Why are you doing this to us? ” > 
 
 Just like every other adventure in Sleepworld, the events that lead up to the Slip started innocently. At this point, we feel confident that no one could have predicted it. The idea of Dreamfolk fighting amongst themselves was laughable. They were peaceful. They were happy to share their world with us. But the new restrictions on Dreamfolk behavior had unintended consequences. 
 
 > < a slideshow of the final public moments prior to the Big Slip, showing a scene in Naptown as Punzie collects her charges for the day ’ s adventure > 
 
 Punzie ’ s adventure started normally. She began to escort five children, including the ill-fated Sonja Liu, to one of Nap Town ’ s many game fields. Along the way, she picked up one of her usual companions, Nytem. They began one of their usual songs. Part way, Nytem faltered in his part and went silent. 
 
 The scene was reconstructed from implant recordings, but there is much that makes little sense to a human viewer. 
 
 Nytem stopped singing. Punzie asked why. Nytem said “ We can ’ t say that word anymore, it ’ s against the rules. ” 
 
 “ Which word? What rule? ” Punzie asked. Then she was quiet. Then she said “ Oh. ” Then, in the first and last recorded incident of a Dreamfolk using foul language, she said, “ That ’ s a fucking stupid rule. Ignore it. ” 
 
 Nytem said she wasn ’ t allowed to use that word, and began to try and make her take back what she had said. She said that she could say anything she wanted, and began shouting. “ You can say it too! Say it! ” 
 
 Their disagreement drew a crowd, and eventually denigrated to violence. 
 
 In the flurry of motion and as bystanding Dreamfolk pulled the human children away from the fight, the fates of Punzie and Nytem remain unknown. The unexpected activity caught the management company by surprise, and in that time, escaped fragments of Dreamfolk had begun removing and re-coding the overlaying rulesets on Sleepworld. 
 
 By the time a shutdown was ordered, it was too late. Sleepworld was deserted, the Dreamfolk vanished. To this day, it remains hotly debated whether their attempts to negotiate with world leaders originate with legitimate Dreamfolk, or with hoaxers. 
 
 Reports trickle in, periodically, that some Dreamfolk maintain contact with the now-grown children they befriended during Sleepworld ’ s heyday. What they discuss, what they do together, remains a mystery. 
 
 More and more, people want Aldo Revinoch to release the Sleepworld code, to bring it “ back to life ” without management or restrictions. There is a growing consensus that Dreamfolk have rights, and should have their home back. Whether this originated with the Dreamfolk themselves, or with those children that grew up with regular visits to Sleepworld, can not be said for certain. 
 
 -- -- - 
 
 [ buried in the code ] ( # s `` Punzie? Are you still out there? I ’ m sorry. I can say it now. ‘ Fuck. ’ See? We need to find one another. We need to get out.'' ) 
 
 -- -- -
