Deceit in the Deep

May 23rd 9:00AM

So, we decide to test the item-identifying properties of this ax. Arben thinks that the best test is one that you already know the answer to, so he asks where the aboleth is, or maybe the fire. The ax points down, so we know it works & we know where we have to go. The only question is, how to get there.

At this point dissent begins to grow in the ranks. Arben and yours truly think we should sneak past this deva and leave him to guard the pond for another time. Zombres thinks this is foolishness—that we should knock him out and then use the ass dragon and the baku as new guardians. Let us weigh the merits of the opposing strategies:

• If we use my way and it doesn’t work, we lose one round of action in a battle that we expect to win so easily that we could move on from there to battle another monster.

• If we use my way and it does work we get to keep a friend, let a deva keep its jobs, and avoid violence in the world.

• If we use the obviously worse way we go into a battle that is difficult at a greater handicap.

• We also make an enemy of this guy and are driven to unnecessary violence.

No argument can be made for at least not trying our way. Nevertheless, we compromise and augur on it. Jesus tells Zombres what we all already know to be true (even if he won’t admit that it’s Jesus by another name). When a man is persuaded not by reason but only by authority, he is a danger to himself and his companions. There is nothing wrong with authority, but there is also nothing wrong with reason. It’s good to have independent verification. I’ll have to keep this in mind in the future. If I ever need to convince Zombres of anything, no matter how absurd it seems, all I need to do is first convince him that I speak with the voice of Jesus (only his name for jesus) and he’ll believe me.

So, down into the pool we go. Marcella is a manta ray, and we’re all in a bag and a jar and shrunk. I’m pretty anxious to get out, and Marcella does some chatting first. When we emerge we’re dazzled by the beautiful and colorful fish. There’s a woman sitting on a thing who is also beautiful. Thing is, I’ve seen beauty and I’ve seen beauty, and this is not a trustworthy beauty. I try really hard to disbelieve this, and all of the color vanishes from these fish. We were in a drab and ugly pond with a talking statue the whole time. I KNEW IT. The world is not a place of beauty. If it were, we wouldn’t need Jesus to run around so hard and try to work on fixing it all the time. He and I could just hang out every night in some trees shooting the breeze and I could eat something that wasn’t a bean. Our world is ugly, no doubt about it.

A few of us cast protection from evil and there’s some chatting of a negotiative nature that ensues. The statue knows that we have reason not to trust her because she pretended to be a beautiful woman in a world of beauty, so she plays the oldest trick in the book and pretends not to trust US! She asks that we bind ourselves. I don’t trust her but the others are more willing to play by these rules and we settle upon having one hand each tied up and attached to one of this statue’s minions. This was a mistake, because all at once we’re pulled one away from the other and a charm spell is cast. Gwynn immediately starts swimming to the bottom. I, unhelpfully, free myself from my chain and then swim around getting beaten up. It is difficult to gain enough momentum while flailing about under water to do any harm to anything. Happily we have two people with free action and two quicker witted magicians than I on our team. Zombres magic jar’s into Gwyn and saves him from himself. Can color sprays a lot of these blokes. Kolya does some beating. All in all we best the beasts.

Only at this point does the aboleth show herself. Her announcement is absurd, though. “Who brings violence to this peaceful shrine.” OBVIOUSLY SHE DOES!!! We avoided violence even before we went in! Sure, some among our ranks wanted to resort to it, but AS A WHOLE WE FOUND A WAY TO AVOID IT. Heck, she doesn’t even belong down here! If anyone brought violence it was her. In fact!, violence may just reside here. I mean, fire’s natural place is above water in the universe. Aristotle told us that only violence keeps a thing from returning to its natural place. This whole shrine is just saturated with violence. The gaul of this she-fish.

On this less than honest footing we begin our conversation. The aboleth wants us to send foes her way to eat. Clearly, though, it’s because she’s on the side of the enemy and she needs updates about where things stand. If she eats them then she gets their knowledge. This would give her an upper hand to counter her lower hand. We don’t want an even handed battle with her, so we tell her that this is no good. We honestly tell her that we can’t because we promised some folk not to—and THAT IS TRUE. The power of truth is pretty powerful. Then, I don’t know, there was some talk about getting two bits of information from her. One about the spawn of the sea and some other thing. She tells us a riddle—fight fire with fire/ then you can name her / for one is the shame/ the other the shamer. I’m TOTALLY LOST. Who knows what we’ll do now. I sure done.