There are two things in life for which we are never truly prepared: twins.

- Gud the Ettin

There is no such thing as conversation. It is an illusion. There are intersecting monologues, that is all.

- Rebecca West

The Inordinate Amount is playing a game of cat and mouse with the Brinkmanship, as both ships race to find the Crown of the Lost Sphere. Their brief pretense to common cause with Thaliose Hothex is completely in tatters, and the vessels are now in open competition. For over a week the Brinkmanship appeared at the edges of the helm's two day long-range perception sensors. Sometimes ahead, sometimes behind, and suddenly not at all for several days. So when Shilynn detects the Brinkmanship's reappearance ahead of them driving two Kinori (space whales) into an elemental nebula, she advises the command team immediately. After a lengthy debate, the Inordinate Amount makes to enter the nebula. The crew works diligently to avoid the unspeakable hazards of the chaotic space. Nevertheless, the Inordinate Amount takes a massive beating to reach the center of the nebula only to find a spelldasher under an illusion spell, and a recording crystal. Captain Thaliose of the Brinkmanship can't help boasting to Basile, whom he believes he has bested. He had visited the time anomaly that had resulted in creating Basile and Hazel, and there are now two of them, though there were once three - one having been destroyed by the reverse mind bomb left in the former Brinkmanship crew member they marooned on an asteroid. The two remaining Thalioses claim they are travelling, one to Mezsoul to leave Monad the Ylfen Zealot of the One and mess with the plans to help the illithid revolution, and the other to the Kinori herd where Jennifer/Hooper Meadowtop left the Crown of the Lost Sphere, to claim the prize for themselves. Although Thaliose and Basile are evenly matched in their mind games, it is clear to Basile that there is an unresolved and very authentic tension between the two existing Thalioses. 

Before I continue… I am going to give you 5 minutes to come up with strategies to delay the Brinkmanship or accelerate your own passage

Pilot’s Personal Log. It’s been almost two weeks since we replenished our air supply and we have made good progress towards Mezsoul. With the gift of these long range sensors, I’ve been able to avoid two illithid patrols, and incredibly, one long range Imperyion corvette. If any of them did detect us, they didn’t pay us any mind. It’ll be hard not to get too cocky.

However, in the meantime, the Brinkmanship, is sure to keep that from happening. For those same two weeks, their pilot has been playing cat and mouse with my sensor bubble, entering and leaving only to reappear and disappear later. Sometimes ahead of us. Sometimes parallel. One day they’ve got a two day deficit the next a two-day surplus! How are ”

It’s maddening. At this point, I am certain they have long range sensors themselves.

I’ve just alerted the Command Team of the latest surprise…

Veronica comes to the Command Team, Shilynn needs to see you…

SHILYNN: “I picked something up on the Helm’s long range sensor. It’s an elemental nebulae. They periodically get thrown from the Maelstrom and, with so much debris inside the shattered sphere, they inevitably grow in size.

Although they are filled with opportunity and resources, they are dangerous. Fortunately, they can be avoided when you can detect them.

As soon as this one appeared on my sensors, I noticed something that was there only for a moment and then it disappeared beyond my sight in the nebulae. I almost didn’t want to tell you because I thought you would over-react. But I’ve replayed it in my memory crystal, over again several times… and there’s no doubt in my mind. It’s the Brinkmanship. Ahead of us. And parked next to an opening in the nebula. Before entering it, forcing two space whales in first.

• By your last navigational calculation, traveling around your perception sensor bubble, it should be at least two to three days behind you

• Certainly it is beyond the Helm’s long range sensors… and to the best of your knowledge, Thaliose does not know you have long range sensors

• HAZEL: an examination of you realize… to put it in mechanical terms – he is effectively undead. He has a negative constitutions. He has been infused by negative energy of the Bone Ooze, and in the absence of drained powers as a gardener… in effect the vessel is now filled with undeath.

A storm of mud and magma swirls around the gravity plane of the Amount. A terrifying display of raw power, held back by your tiny gravity field, the Amount’s suicidal speed,  Sihlynn’s deft manouvering and the bravery of your doughty crew.

Molten lava flows into itself – bursting through steaming, spinning cascades of mud, sending ash and dust into a great burning haboob swallowing y our ship. Then, just as suddenly, torrents of steaming rain seethe up from below.

As the rain mixes with the volcanic ash and debris, it forms rivers of thick, sludgy mud that surge up like great rivers moving with unstoppable force. Boulders grind, geysers trumpet, magma hisses, fiery projectiles roar, mountains of wind roar.

The air is thick with choking smoke and steam, making it difficult to see more than a few feet ahead. Lightning crackles through the ash-filled sky, illuminating the chaos with jagged streaks of light.

Huge boulders and debris are swept along in the torrent, crashing into one another with bone-shattering force.

Despite the best efforts of the Shilynn and the crew, the Amount is taking a beating.

You are surrounded everywhere by a heaving nightmare of elemental destruction. But the worst has only just begun… roll for initiative.

Hello! Hello? Is this thing on. Of course it is. Luckums, right? I’m sure it’s nice for you to see me.

This has been a most enjoyable game, but alas, now I must rush to claim my prize. Both of them.

We did watch you for a while, you know, on Bral. Gathering information about your opponent is so important for creating strategic options, wouldn’t you say, Basile?

Ooo… I want to tell you so badly. I want you to admire what I’ve done… I think you I particular would appreciate it…

Should I? It seems reckless… and so cliché to monologue like some Fenris Steel villain. He looks aside… it’s so difficult to find clever opponents. What do you think, Thaliose? Should I tell them?

“Go ahead.”

Another Thaliose appears

“Hello, Thaliose, it’s good to see you.”

“Not as good as it is to see you!”

“We do miss other Thaliose though”

“Yeah, the one you murdered!”

“Could you imagine how great three Thalioses would have been!?”

“I mean, what is better than ONE Thaliose Hothex? TWO of us, of course! Thank you Basile and Hazel for the inspiration! You know, don’t be too hard on yourself, you’re pretty dangerous yourself. You lead us on am merry chase towards those Ruins of the Lost Goblins… and your counterintelligence is very impressive…

Both Thalioses laugh. One of them gestures, “Hooper Meadowtop” here is helping us…”

• “Undead goblin Jennifer”

As I said my Githyanki sages learned a great deal watching you…

• You wouldn’t believe how many Brinkmanships we lost in that damn chronomancer’s anomoly

• More than we lost to the way you meddle with the geas on my crewman…

• Hazel and Basile aren’t cousins… You’re both Basile

• You’re obsessed with chronomancy… how many times did you visit Molator?

• He has been most helpful.

• And you are in the company of a Gardener--now don't be modest Shroktath--I had to do something about that…

We’re going to take this guy to Mezsoul (Monad the Evangelist)… see what happens! Fun. And we’re going to go get the space whales and claim the Crown of the Last Sphere for ourselves…

“Love you Thaliose. You’re doing great.”

“Thank you. Love you more. Looking forward to commiserating.” 

Maybe it's nothing. The again, maybe it's everything. No one else would ever have noticed it. But, Basile detects an underlying tension between the two Thalioses.

ONE THALIOSE is going after the Kindori herd and the Crown

OTHER THALIOSE is taking Monad to Mezsoul and intends to mess up your Prison Break plans

I’m still sorting out what all of this means, and how I feel about it. Odd things catch me short at times. Like the other day, as Charlotte and Craik came down from the top deck wiping some stoo off their chins and chatting away I realized I hadn’t eaten for days. Hadn’t even thought about it really. It’s not that I’ll miss Edgar’s “cooking” (though I did head directly to the galley and had a bowl just to check - yep. Still had a sense of taste. Unfortunately), but it was just weird to realize is all. I no longer needed to pee or take a shit. I no longer needed sleep. Heck, I even experimented one particularly boring night watch shift with securing myself with a rope to the ship and casting myself off the aft of the Amount, out past the air bubble. Trailed along behind the ship for minutes, no problem. Didn’t even feel cold.

I miss being alive, don’t get me wrong. Still. Kinda neat - gotta say.

But there was much more going on than just changes in my body. I could feel something had shifted, and powerfully, in my soul. It wasn’t just that I could feel the power of the gardeners in me again, it was like I could feel it time ten. The power to heal, the power to smite foes, the power to cast spells all that was back and then some. And some things more. I guess I first noticed it with the crew. They’d started acting funny with me. Out of the corner of my eye I’d catch them looking at me kinda like I looked at Brahl the first time I saw it. I’d look at them, hard, and they’d snap out of it, but only after a few seconds. I’d give orders, and they responded all weird. It took me a while to figure it out, but it was like they were trying to please me. Wanting to impress me? Weird. I hardly ever had to slap any of them around anymore.

I remember feeling a bit cheesed at my ancestor, showing up just to watch me get claimed by the world of the undead. But now I think it was almost like some sort of benediction, or blessing of a hard but needed transformation. I felt closer to my ancestor - the first gardener - than ever before. I could feel their power in me. There was a big garden out there, and it needed my tending.

In other news, we got suckered by Thaliose. Again. I have to say, I’m not very impressed with us. He lured us into a deadly space nebula, with an illusion - that he was chasing down one of the space whales on which Jennifer had hidden the Crown of the Spheres. Like the bunch of do-gooders we are, he played us - save the whales! The nebula, and its resident elementals damned near tore the ship to shreds.

Fool me five times, shame on you? He left a little hologram of himselves to look at after we’d caught up with the fake Brinkmanship. Basically taunting us. But we did find out some extra information, too, and I’m hoping we can make him regret that. Inspired by the Legions of Luckums - the Throng of Thaliose? - our enemy had managed to divvy himself up. He’d also gotten ahold of an undead version of Jennifer. Oh, and he (plural) was going after both the Crown and the Prison at the same time. Great. Felt like I had gujamellon all over my face.

We had a tough decision to make. Oh, and he’d revealed something else, too - maybe even the key to beating his ass. A sphere might not be big enough to contain the ego of one Thaliose. Any more than that was asking for trouble. We just needed to find a way to speed that trouble along, I think.

I was looking forward to pruning that deadly weed from the garden, that’s for sure. And it was my intention to invite my pack warden’s presence within me if I had a chance to lay the final blow. Basile deserved that.