An Unwelcome Guest and Set of Problems (part 1)

"You there!" an unearthly voice calls out, causing the hairs on the back of my neck to stand up on end. I definitely feel the blood drain from my face (not that such will show in my complexion), but that said? I almost knock over poor Hannah as she goes rigid apparently in horror, I must add! "I will have word with you!"

Almost against my will, I turn around and find myself staring at a tear in reality, which acts as a window to another place (complete with a slight shimmer of some kind of membrane/glass-like substance separating here from there)!

And through the window to another world, I and the Fairy Queen (whatever she calls herself but we'll go with that for now) see several figures. Two I just HAPPEN to be familiar with due to having interacted with them in the past, but even though BOTH warrant paying attention (and concern) it is the mass of TENTACLES!

They've COME! This is not an Ithaqua, but something I KNOW is related! The damnable abominations that were fated to hunt down and attempt to KILL my father after they had temporarily possessed him and had indirectly led to "Lady Ragnall's" death. Those kinds do NOT know when to leave well enough alone! And I NEVER was going to let something like that happen, even IF father is no longer a "mere" human but a full-grown DRAGON of the East!

Family is family!

. . .

But am I strong enough to fight and defeat this . . . tHING?!

"And if you gaze long enough into an abyss," I find myself quoting Nietzsche of all things!! And I had come to utterly LOATH Nietzsche by virtue of it being Supreme Commander Gendo Ikari's philosopher! "The abyss will gaze back into you."

"What in the name of the Lord is that?!" I hear a hoarsely whispered woman's voice filled with baby's breath and fairy bells. It is the voice of the Fairy Queen, an odd fact that I could hardly care less about right now. Much less the oddity of her having used a Holy term that SHOULD have caused extreme pain to her by speaking!

...

Ah, remember that the Faire Folk tend to use terms like "Oak and Ash" as exclamations of surprise of anger? More pagan terms instead of "modern" Christian ones? No? Well, it's pretty telling that the Queen used that term because that meant that she hasn't lost her old identity enough to NOT be able to swear like that, more or less.

BUT right now I do NOT give a t*ss considering that I have THIS tentacle monster before me! This BETTER NOT be the eldritch things from that penny dreadful "Allan and the Sundered Veil" that are after father or else there's going to be a right MESS because only ONE IS GOING TO WALK AWAY from this!! It is honestly one of the BIGGEST issues driving me to rise as a mage and . . .

. . .

OH GIVE ME A F*ckin' . . . NO! No! NO!! No temper!

Do NOT needlessly antagonize powerful eldritch abominations without at least being polite! AND DO NOT assume or mouth off, else you might just bite off more than you can chew!!

Done more of that garbage and gotten into situations we almost all couldn't walk away from there!! Way too many times, at that!

"Oy, tone it down!" the figure that appears to be a human man dressed as some sort of US Sailor in a uniform of some type, but which I actually recognize as one of those Author entities from that space/non-space reality called Game 3.

Not the most . . . personable of chaps but beats some of the others by MILES!

"Oh and by the way!" Crossroads Man adds, glancing at Rei and the Fairy Queen on the other side of the mystical field. "The Abyss is NOT allied with those after your father, so . . .tone down the hostility please."

"Wait," the Abyss pauses, blinking several eyes in a random pattern showing slight confusion. "You are of that Quatermain branch? And your genetic heritage my powers tell me . . . "

"He and my mother adopted me if you should need ask," Rei informed the blob of tentacles, who are now thrashing now and then in concern.

"And Quatermain just happens to be a Champion to boot?" The Abyss mutters to herself, shaking slightly. "And that damn fool won't stop despite that rather important fact..."

"Something you'd like to share?" Rei prods. While by the looks of things there wasn't going to be an imminent battle that would surely end in a failed Quest (at the very least), due to possible breaches of the Dome, this Abyss entity . . .somehow rubbed her the wrong way. And not just because of the non-Euclidian geometry of said entity!

God, just looking at it made her headache even WORSE than it already had been since that damnable battle with Hercules (all of THEM). It was making her a bit more . . . snappish than was healthy.

"Yeah, it would at that and you're right about that AND you might have wanted to ask me about that instead of just barging ahead and trying to intimidate her into complying with the issue," Crossroad Man tutted the mass of tentacles. "Humans do NOT react well to such tactics and consider that wrong . . .by their morality."

"How is that even considered morally . . . oh!" the Abyss mutters, remembering suddenly the rather twisted (by her kind's view) morality they had.

Truly it had been a most vexing morality class project back in her younger pupa days but had won great acclaim from her mentor in the end. The Author's aid in studying had helped so very much, and had even eventually made interaction between herself and humans . . .feasible instead of doomed to end in fire (and madness). For the poor humans.

She'd be fine whatever the case unless she would be so foolish as to step upon the human plane of existence. Unlike that one FOOL of a mirror entity that had!

. . .

"What can I do for you both?" I ask, managing a miracle and sounding halfway polite.

"Let ME do the talking," the Author says after gesturing for Rei to wait a moment, then frowning at the mass-o- tentacles. "Like you asked me in the FIRST place? You didn't even start with the thing we agreed with there!

The human appearing entity dressed as an American sailor an annoyed look at the Abyss, who waves a tentacle in what Rei guesses is a gesture for "Crossroads Man" to continue in its place. But Rei gets the impression that the tentacled abomination is somewhat impatient about all this.

Whatever the case, the Author--for that is what Rei knows what this entity is from what Crossroad Man is from accounts from other Champions--turns to speak.

"Your majesty?" Crossroads Man begins. "Arch-Mage? Let me first introduce ourselves officially and then tell you just WHY we are here."

The Author is some kind of Random Omnipotent Being from a reality/non-reality which mimicked an internet" choose your own adventure" game known as Addventure (Game 3).

http:// www.add venture. com/add venture /game3/

Crossroads Man was one of the less . . .sadistic Authors of that realm towards the focus character of that place, but only by degrees. Not the best person out there, but bearable.

The Abyss is . . .a mass of tentacles who gives off a sense of being "female" if nothing else (and something of a bitch in Rei's humble opinion). She is also what Rei would say was the Eldritch equivalent of a Youtuber whose continued existence depended upon the continued patronage of her viewing audience (from all sorts of walks of life and reality, including the world that Rei and her sisters had recently visited)! As seen in episode 79686, that one where Rei's group had been ignoring while taking care of a trio of homeless elven females and their children (oh and a smallish griffin familiar). . . .

The Abyss had a few salty comments about that, not seeming to understand why Rei's group would have skipped "the Game" over a small set of mere elves!

Just as well that the Abyss fails to recognize what the two-finger gesture Rei gives in response while muttering something about annoying "blue/orange morality tentacle monsters", even though it causes the Master and other humanoids present to cough in consternation in reaction. Frankly, it wouldn't have helped anything even IF Rei's annoyance with the Abyss was . . .understandable.

The Abyss only has the barest understanding of "human" morality and Rei has NO understanding of the Abyss' morality, beyond the obvious issue that she does what she does --pitting teams of an aquatic flavor of "tsukumogami" (creatures from Japanese folklore which were tools that have acquired a kami or spirit)--in order to survive and grow in power/influence.

And the thing that the Abyss wants Rei to do here? It is revealed through Crossroads Man --whose relationship with the Abyss never was to be revealed and which Rei didn't feel much desire to delve into things that man was never meant to know --that an old "friend".

1. "Randal Flagg?" both Rei and the Master grumble, having knowledge of that old Stephen King villain.

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