The tactical hologram was not encouraging. It showed the spinning neutron star, along with curved lines indicating the local warping of space that its rotation caused - something Moka calls 'frame dragging' - and the only other object in the system: a structure less than 100 kilometers across which seemed to hover about a thousand kilometers above the star in a fixed position instead of orbiting it.
"Impossible object," the Phin complains. "Should be orbiting. Should be torn apart by tidal forces."
"That's usually a good sign you're dealing with a First One or younger civilization that's incorporated Outsider or older civilization technology, or else an Old One or Outsider design," Tasha reviews, having seen a number of 'impossible' objects on her recent past. The impossibility largely stems from local impossibility, the inability for anything constructed using local rules -- rules from this reality alone -- to achieve the effect. As very old civilizations may have learned to call upon external rules, and as outsiders naturally use them, these are usually the causes, at least in Tasha's experience. Their own ship is a good example. "So, um, about boarding that ... "
There's a ratchetting cackle of a laugh from Kaa. "See the frame dragging zone? That's what becomes turbulence in the Maelstrom. Unless that thing is casting some k-kind of shadow we can follow, we can't get too close. But.. can get closer, maybe see something we can't see from here. Like what that thing looks like."
"Lets do that," Tasha urges. She walks up to the railing, having left navigation to more capable hands given the situation and secretly wanting to be accessible should the station feel talkative. As diplomat and envoy to gods, talking to them may be the best service she can provide to the ship and their mission.
The tactical display vanishes as the ship dives into the Maelstrom. A few minutes of travel pass, and the buffeting begins. "Surfacing!" Kaa alerts, and the ride smooths out quite a bit. The neutron star does not loom large, since it's so incredibly small. But they're now in a position to observe the mystery object using the star's light to see actual details. When the telescope's finish focusing, the image is.. odd.
"That's a castle," Lacci notes first. It does have battlements and towers and other castle-like features, but they cover the entire surface to create a spherical castle. The focus keeps shifting, however.
Among the many oddities Tasha sees, she is surprised that her first impulse is to wonder why Lacci knows about castles. It may have something to do with her recent arguement with Horus, and thus a hyperfocus on Vartans. She squints, not to see better as a whole, but to narrow the focus of her vision further and spot individual landmarks without as much distraction. She wonders at the design, too; why ancient builders sometimes use such whimsical designs, if they even are whimsy and not an expression of some concept or engineering she isn't aware of.
This one looks like a rather menacing castle, being made of black stone.. or something made to look like stone. Given the size of it, the features are certainly exaggerated - it's a castle built on a Titan's scale. There also isn't any light being generated that she can see. "We can do an active scan to get the geometry of the thing," Yue suggests.
"That might make it aware of us, which is probably what we want," agrees the young hybrid. She continues to search the image, wondering if the Titan-scale means suitably Titan-large corridors and entranceways. She'd feel safer in her Titan, although she also knows the desire is likely a level of self-delusion, at least where safety is concerned. The benefit of company, on the other hand, is much more robust. "I was told people sought this place out over the ages, that it recieved a lot of visitors, uh, relatively speaking. Galactic time scale relative."
"That would explain the warm, welcoming architecture," Gabriel notes. "Okay, knock on the door, Yue. Kaa, be ready for.. something you don't expect to happen."
"All the girls can't fit inside my piloting tank though, Captain," Kaa retorts.
Katie rolls her eyes, and looks to Tasha. "What are the chances they'll talk to us in any conventional way?" she asks.
"Active scanning engaged," Yue reports. "Will be a few minutes before we get a reflection.."
"Maybe the ancients thought scary castles were very comforting?" Tasha has to admit that seeing the castle is vaguely comforting, if just in a slice-of-home sort of way and not as a whole. Dark, sinister structures remain frightening, and more so given they're actual civic and military structures on her homeworld and not anacronysms as they would be for the others. She's stirref from her consideration of the matter by Katie's question.
"Uh," she begins, looking over, " ... well, it really depends who is talking. There are many outsiders that can speak to us in ways we understand even if they don't communicate in the style we do. The, um, culture. Their frame of reference and understanding is different from ours, sometimes very different. But they can talk. The Piper has spoken to many species and civilixations over a long time, so it can probably communicate with us. If it's the station, that might require we translate whatever language the automation uses." It then occurs to Tasha that's not exactly what katie asked but more of her own reflection of her concerns for dialogue, and so she clarifies. "Oh. Coventional. If it's the station, maybe. If it's the Piper ... Probably not."
The real answer comes before the scan results: piping. Music fills the ship, both alien and familiar. But it apparently isn't actually meant for the crew. "We're moving," Kaa says. "I've lost the reins! The horse is moving us by itself, not using the ship drive functions!"
Gabriel sounds an alarm, which causes everyone to come to the bridge - since there was not training about what else to do when the alarm goes off! Even the two Jotoki arrive, sans cats. Cats don't like alarms.
Tasha's ears flick; she supresses her internal anxiety and tries to look calm and expectant. After their encounter with the Trumpeter, and given the similiarity, she feels that as the one with experience it's more important than ever that she maintain a calm front for the others. She remembers how unnerving and sanity-warping her original exposure to the alien and incomprehensble ways of the outsiders was, and these people are getting theirs as a group in sudden doses, relying on ehr as their guide. "Well, this goes a long way towards the idea that the Piper helped make the Horse." She hopes her voice sounds as steady as she thinks it does.
"Which also means we probably won't be able to leave without permission," Gabriel notes quietly to Tasha.
"What's the flute mean?" Aaron asks, looking like he just woke up, with Liza in tow. "Seems odd for an alarm."
Hakeber doesn't look happy, but also doesn't look scared, which is something at least.
"Yeeeaah," goes Tasha, just as quietly. Her ears go back, but then go right back up with visible, frown-faced effort that Gabriel can see. She raises her voice in repsonse to Aaron's question, not shifting her gaze from the looming structure. "The Piper is piping, Aaron. It's the strange music of an outsider."
"Musicians are all crazy, you know," the Lapi claims. "Bards are alright. Some of them are really cute. But the musicians.. well, at least this one isn't a drummer."
"I can't record it," Katie notes. "Wanted to see if there was a mathematical pattern, but.. it's not real sound, apparently."
"It is a lot more pleasant than that annoying trumpet," agrees the blonde. "BLURT. Everything breaks. BLURT. Are you scared now? At least I'd probably consider listening to this." She then tilts her head to nod in Katherine's direction. "I expected that. A lot of what they do doesn't register in general reality, but resonates with us somehow. Sentient beings."
The Dark Horse is moving at quite a clip, causing color distortion in the view outside as they remain in normal space. And then quite suddenly everything blurs and the castle is right in front of them. "I think we hit an engineered spacetime manifold," Moka reports. The ship is definitely being led into the castle structure.
"The prison is going to involve a lot of warped space, both from the Piper's influence and by design of the prison. The last prison of an outer being I was in seemed to exist both as a place and only in my mind, except I know it was a real place and I removed an object from it. I remember dropping in to a hole, but also waking up after leaving. Strange things happen when our realities mix." The hybrid woman wonders if she should have gone that far, touched on the exotic strangeness of the prisons in-depth. The experience could still be fairly mundane, after all, and she doesn't want to scare anyone -- at least not when their lives are at stake. A little fear and teasing are fun, a kind of stress relief and preperation training in one. Yet, she thinks she made the right call. Better to be prepared, she decides, so that the crew can tell the difference between an exotic experience and madness. Not knowing which is which was a good part of her own stress, as was not knowing what to expect and then having
it leap out at her. "Be prepared for strange experiences. Remember that I've met many of these beings and I'm still here, sane." Mostly.
"Sane as a Vartan," Aaron offers.
"Probably not sane as a Vartan." Tasha thinks of Kem's words, and in particular, Horus's lack of affection and seeming rejection. "I might not be a good example, though."
The ship moves deeper into the structure. Once past the surface structure, notions of up and down are lost. "No gravity, no atmosphere," Yue reports. "Can't tell what it's made out of.."
Moka finally throws some light on things. Detail jumps out from the walls. They aren't made of brick or traditional stone structures - instead they appear to be made of bodies. Black and smooth, in strange shapes and sizes and representing thousands of different species, if the figures are based on real beings. They all seem to be contorted in pain, or showing expressions of fear and horror though.
"Talk about your gorgon's lair," Katherine mutters.
"I'd be really surprised if you could. We may be looking at it something like what the Horse does, or even its flesh or our perception of its existence and not a real structure. It may be a warp in space-time." Tasha rubs her nose. She wonders if it's better or worse for her, given her lack of broad understanding of many scientific topics the others take for granted. She doesn't have preconceptions to break, at least not to their degree. Probably better, she decides.When she sees the bodies, she frowns. "That's kind of ominous." A pause. "Heavy handed? Or maybe that's what its flesh looks like. The last one looked like eyeballs, tentacles and little licky worms."
"The City of Hands supposedly had a royal palace with people fused into the walls and turned to crystal," Aaron offers. "The castle ate them, or something. So either the architect of this place was really disturbed, or those might be real people. Hopefully dead if they are. But hey, at least they aren't screaming, right?" he adds, trying to sound cheerful.
Lacci just looks horrified at both descriptions. Maybe she doesn't like tentacles.
"It's nice to now regular, mortal beings can be just as creepy and twisted with special powers as outsider aliens. It makes me think of how connected we all are." To say Tasha's statement is wry is to say the sun is slightly warm. She rolls her eyes, which causes her to notice Lacci's expression. "The licky worms were kind of cute," she insists, trying to sound encouraging. "I wanted one but it was like asking for an arm or an eyeball or something."
"My dad has arms hanging in his study," Katie offers. "Mostly from canal monsters of course. Mostly."
"Your father kind of scares me," admits Tasha, who does lay her ears back this time. It's okay to be afraid of Katie's dad, who is probably not an outsider. "I kept expect he might pop up behind me on Abaddon and ask me uncomfortable questions."
"You are all.." Lacci starts to say, but then the piping stops, as does the Dark Horse. The chamber is very large, something like a cathedral - but at least it has a definite roof and floor.
"Kaa?" Gabriel asks.
"Sorry chief, still no response," the pilot reports. "Got control over the ship, but not the horse, so.. not moving."
"Well, I think we're as 'here' as we're going to get. Lets see if a docking ramp extends or something." Tasha works her muzzle a moment, staring at the carvings, and suddenly has an insight. "You know, the screaming faces might not be about us, but it could be about the Piper. It is a prisoner, and it's not like prisoners are really happy."
"How do you know it's a prisoner?" Gabriel asks.
"I was told," Tasha replies. "You know, by the gods." She lifts her taloned hand and wiggles her fingers in what presumably is a mystical sort of way.
"We don't have a docking ramp," Gabriel points out. "This ship isn't built to land. But you can use the manual vernier kit to get Melchior out. I assume that since there's a floor, there will be gravity once you touch it or something. I've gotten used to this somehow. But you are not to leave the Titan!"
"Don't exit and walk around in the halls full of screaming bodies, check. And here I was hoping to get some rubbings for my collection." She doesn't actually have a collection of rubbings, but did take them on several occassions. She assumes Eli has the collection, now. Pushing off, Tasha rises and turns to regard the crew. "So! Who wants to come with me? Lacci!" She points at the terrified Vartan "I bet you do!"
"Uh.. in the grunt?" the Vartan asks nervously.
"I'll wait here, Tasha," Hakeber volunteers.
"Well, yes. But, no. I'm teasing you, Lacci. Consider it one of your duties! It helps me relax, vent stress." Tasha then straightens, thumbing herself with her Vartan hand. "And clearly I am more than a match for this place, so bringing others is just a waste of personnel when you could all be doing something more productive like watching vids or teaching the newcomers where to go when there's an alarm. I'll be back in, uh ... A jiffy. A jiffy." Galactic vids have done strange things to her vocabulary. She heads aft.
Aaron and Jonas follow Tasha.. at least as far as the med bay, where Jonas stops and starts preparing things just in case. It isn't until they get to the first junction that Aaron asks, "Nervous?"
"Oh, sure," Tasha replies as turns and angles down the corridor, deciding she'd probably be best just using her standard armor for all its interface options. She hasn't had the time to understand and apply the technology to her hand built suit. "I mean, it's just an outsider of similiar but different nature to an Ogdoad. Which, you know, is kind of unsettling on a power scale, but it might be even higher than anything I've met so far except for maybe Atum. And, it's not as if I'd been having any problems or failures talking to higher ebings lately. I'm probably not nervous about botching it."
"I'm scared witless," Aaron claims, but doesn't really change his expression. He's probably following along because he's one of the few people Tasha doesn't have to maintain a calm demeanor around. "But I'm sure you'll do whatever you need to so that we don't stay stuck in here forever. I mean, you've never gotten one of these things angry at you, right? I imagine they must be pretty patient. But if it demands a blood sacrifice or something, you'll let us know right?"
"I'll tell it to go stuff itself," Tasha replies, her tone deadpan but her eyes somewhat harder than they were previously. She approaches the hangar, doors sliding open. "At least they like to talk. They're drawn to sentient beings, did you know that? We're food, in a way, but also not food and-- Well, it's complicated. But, I think we fascinate them, too. They're all different, and what they want is different. The Source could have chosen to eat me. Eat my soul. I'd be gone, maybe gone in some fundamental way. But it didn't. Because I think it likes me. Maybe the Piper will, too."
"Just act like a Lapi," Aaron advises as we watches Tasha prepare and don her fancy armor. "Make the predators think you're cute and cuddly so they don't eat you. Also makes it a lot easier to stab them in the back later. That's what I told Calligenia to make her behave, you know."
"The thing is, I'm not a great liar. And, also? Some of them can read your mind." Tasha's jacket gets hung on the locker door, hoof-booties at its base to keep it from shutting. She holds aher arms aout as the armor interlocks, closing her in. "So I just go with being direct and normal, because how can I really know what it's thinking or what it expects? I can't, so I'm just me, and it's it, and I talk directly and normally because I guess I think directness has universal appeal. Or, um, is easiest to understand, anyway. Honesty is probably good, too."
"So.. that's worked so far, right?" Aaron asks nervously.
"Yeah, mostly. Atum seemed to like it and the Source didn't eat me. The Trumpeter attacked first, so I was mad. And Horus is kind of a jerk for someone who says he cares so much about Vartans." Tasha leaves off the earlier thought about her Vartanness, but scowls anyway. "He even tried to pawn me off on the Piper. "Maybe he'll be a better god for you," he said! Well, maybe he will be."
"There's always another god," Aaron agrees. "I'd go with the one that makes the best coffee. Or can turn water into coffee. There's always a god or twelve for beer or partying. I want a god who helps you deal with mornings. But good luck. Don't sign away our souls if you can avoid it. And.. uh.. what are you seeing this one about again?"
"I can't go with that one, Gabriel would be really jealous. I'd have to forward the deity to him for the sake of our relationship." At that, Tasha smiles. Whatever else has happened or happens, she still loves her Gabriel. The smile remains as she answers the question. "I need to ask about the Horse and how to deal with the Trumpeter. I might ask about Ogdoad and other outsiders, too, and of course try and get to know the Piper and, well, whatever else comes up. Maybe it already knows me, so that'd help."
"Somehow already knowing you sounds like it would be really terrifying," the Lapi notes. "It puts you at a big disadvantage when it comes to negotiating for anything. Gods like to get into people's heads you know." He gives her armored butt a good-luck pat. "But then getting into your head could just confuse it too, so you've got that going for you!"
Tasha eyes the patting, but her her look has only mock suspicion. She grins, crookedly. "Well it scares some machine intelligences, so I've got that going for me. It's supposedly chaotic and kind of unknowable, and people say that about me, so maybe we've got a lot in common? I do seem to end up around a lot of screaming people if different species." And then she tilts her head down; her look is knowing -- knowing of Lapi. "Well, time for me to go. We can discuss the finer points of outsiders when I get back, if you want."
"Hopefully the Piper isn't a god of chaos then," Aaron says, and salutes. "You usually don't like competition, after all," he adds with a wink. "Come back whole and sane though, alright?"
"I don't know, I gave up a lot of fun things, maybe more chaos would be good for me. Like vitamins." Tasha's shrug is facecious. She then lifts her hand and waves. "One way or another," she promises, and then she turns and heads to board.
Melchior is kneeled over and has his chin perched on an upraised fist in order for him to fit properly in the hangar. It makes him look contemplative. But it's also easier to get into him since one can just walk up his tail to his back. A few moments after starting, Tasha is ensconced in the cockpit and the Titan is waking up. "Hello, Tasha," the masculine voice greets.
"Hello my superior machine god," Tasha greets her Titan, the system checks running through her mind and apparently -- but not actually -- her vision. "Today we are goin to visit the Piper, here in its Citadel on the edge of a neutron star."
"Do we need to bring a gift?" is the AI's response to this.
"We don't know what it could want. I'll ask," Tasha replies, never having thought to bring a gift before. She always approached godlike beings in the same manner as most people, sometimes with even less propriety and more directness, largely due to a lack of frame of reference. Not knowing anything else, she chose to plain communication and honest, natural speaking, though later on the tone of things could change markedly. "First, though, we need to make our way through the Citadel and that means traversing freefall." Once the diagnostics complete the hand of the Melchior reaches out and takes hold of its thruster brookstick, all while Tasha sends to the bridge, "Melchior here. We are heading out."
"Keep in touch," Gabriel notes. "If we don't hear from you for an hour, I'll be sending out the shuttle after you."
"We'll see if an hour's an hour in here." Because it could not be. Time, space, and many other things might change the closer she gets to the place where the Piper dwells. It has before. "Lifting off. Be back when I can be." The machine she pilots pushes off with its legs, then fires the thrusters of the stick to slow its climb relative to the ship, sensors searching for a way deeper in to the structure.
There seems to be only two directions: the way the Dark Horse came, and the smaller archway in front of it at the far end of the cathedral.
"At least the way in is simple," Tasha tells her AI, the thrusters of the broomstick firing shortly after. The machine accelerates in to a smooth approach, not too quick in case there's a change in mass or a field present that might takes offense to large chunks of mass at greater speeds. "The cathedral reminds me of the place where the Source is imprisoned. They also used black walls with frightening designs, but the designs ended up being literal representation of the Source's body. Both designs were respectful of the prisoner. Whoever made this felt the Piper deserved or required recognition."
"Who do you think made it?" Melchior asks they drift down the hall beyond. The walls are still made in the depiction of people suffering though. At least the Titan's senses show that it isn't going to be a very long hall. There's another archway ahead, with a larger space beyond it.
"Maybe the ones who imprisoned it, or the belivers who came after? It means something, that I'm certain of. It could be what the Piper looks like, or the Piper could feed on or be interested in suffering. It may be suffering, and expresses it through ways we understand. Or, maybe those who suffered came to it to find an answer they couldn't find anywhere else. I guess we may know, soon." There's no change in Tasha's flightplan as they drift. Without friction nor gravity, their course is constant. The archway grows large.
Things change at the threshold of the next chamber. There's gravity, which is sudden but not such that Melchior falls. It takes a few seconds, giving Tasha plenty of time to reorient for a landing. The chamber is hemispherical, with the writhing figures rising up the sides towards something that covers the top of the dome that looks like a cross between a starfish and an octopus. In the center of the chamber is a mound made of more of the figures, rising up to a peak. At the top is something that at first seems amorphous, but become a throne of sorts, also made of bodies. There's a dark figure seated there, a set of Pan pipes in one taloned hand. The body is scaled, but the lower legs are shaggy and end in hooves. Aside from taloned hands, the scaled torso seems humanoid, but the head resembles that of a Rughrat ram, complete with curling horns. But also with tusks. And four eyes that glow red, one set over the other - and reminding Tasha a bit of the cameras on a Grendel Hardsuit. "The Daughter of Veng
eance, and even the Executioner. I thought he had retired," the deep voice echoes in Tasha's head. "But you've brought me back my Tatha-hem, so you have my interest."
It takes Tasha a moment to compose herself and take it all in. First she sweeps across the core, noting the shapes and structures with cursory interest, tucking them away mentally even as the words wash over her. They may be important. She then turns to the throne, from the bodies to the figure, wondering if it exists in actuality or is but a projection in to this place -- or her mind. Wondering if statue above them isn't the real being, veiled behind obfuscation or avoidance. She hasn't time to wonder long, not wanting to keep the Piper. Not wanting to hesitate so long her anxiety becomes fear.
"Piper, I came to ask about the Trumpeter, what you know of it and perhaps how it may be defeated. I wish to know of the Ogdoad and their threat to this reality. And, I would like to know of you."
"Then stop calling me Piper," the being says. "That is a little girl's name. You can call me.. hmm.. Thotep. And how do you wish to be addressed?"
"Sorry," Tasha offers, feeling it's probably needed but uncertain the sentiment will be appreciated, "If I had a better named I'd have used that, but I only learned of your existence recently." She inclines her head, from the cockpit. "Thotep, then. For me, Tasha is fine. Or Aldara."
"Tasha the Avenger," Thotep says. "You ask about Urgo-hem, my neighbor. What do you wish to know?" He leans forward and strokes his beard as he asks.
Tasha the Avenger? She isn't sure what she avenges, but she does seem to end up aggressively negating things, so she can't exactly deny the title either. It feels strange on her shoulders, like a jacket that's too big for her. "I am seeking Urgo-hem's destruction until I have reason to change my mind about it. I seek to elimate the threat the Ogdoad pose to our universe, which means ensuring their servants can't allow them in to our reality. The Berserkers are also a threat, but they're not my job. Because I have found Urgo-hem, and because it has attacked us, I am chosing to elimate it now that it has acted with hostility and negotiation has failed." A pause, then a hope. "I don't know how to suppress the threat they represent without destroying them. Not yet. But some I haven't attacked in case I do learn how."
"You have Tatha-hem, whom I bound at the behest of the Tnuctipin," Thotep says. "For their weapon against the Ogdru-hem. But.. you don't actually know how to use it, do you?"
"The Titanians never expected I'd be able to awaken it, and even then they didn't know much about it." Tasha bites her lip, leaning back in to her command couch and chewing a moment. The words are spoken, but she knows it's the mental commanders they are sent through to the speakers -- if she were even using them. Thus Thotep must either her her words, or her thoughts. "No ... No I really don't. I didn't even know an Ogdru-hem was in the core until hours ago. I was told the creature within was just an animalm but I think now it might conceal its nature? Or, the ship does."
"They are all just animals," Thotep claims. "It was the Executioner then who told you? Horus I think he was called. The Vril-ya are like children, forever chasing at the heels of the ones they call gods. Trying to create, to be noticed and acknowledged. To be like them. But never quite managing it. And the Executioner was the best at not managing his task."
Tasha's expression falls at the unflattering description of the Vril-ya. Some of it is new information, and some she had suspected or known. Yet, she'd been greatly disappointed to learn it all in the first place and, having greatly desired to look up to the Vril-ya, felt her hope in that crushed when last she spoke of to Horus. The proximity and the conflict are an ache in her heart, and while part of her wants to defend the Vril-ya, another can't find the desire. The reason to defend them. Watchers, profiteers, not destructive but apathetic, except when their minds have been awoken, or they've been injured. Only then. Yet Atum, is a good memory for her; she doesn't want to lose it.
At length she settles in to grudging and unhappy agreement. her head, nodding slowly, her face twisted in a frown, body back against her seat as if weighed down by gravity and not the mental impulse to hold her there. "Yes, Horus. He's the one who told me, and before him Atum." The part about chasing after gods stings, both because of her issues with the Vril-ya, but also because it feels too close to home. She admits it, as if admittance might somehow free her. "Atum, because I chased after the Vril-ya. And met the Waybuilder. I wanted to help."
"But you are a flesh and blood mortal.. so much more powerful than them," Thotep says. "You are only bound by the rules of nature. And mortals are very good at creating life. But the Ogdru-hem, the Harrowers.. demons and daemons and demi-urges.. all are bound by specific rules. Rules that can be exploited. Rules that trap them. Even the Ogdoad have their rules."
"It's hard to feel powerful when everything is ... " Is what? Bigger than her? Smarter, faster, stronger? More knowledgeable? Far reaching? Vaster, older? She isn't quite sure what it is, except that maybe it's all these things. Or, perhaps that it's her, forever chasing something she can't identify. Something higher, some recognition. It sounds too mucb like Thotep's description of the Vril-ya. She lets her words drift off, looking down a moment. "Rules. I've heard of the rules, but I don't know them. They assumed I did, but I don't. Mostly I just talk, sometimes I fight. But you said the Ogdoad have rules, those would be good to know. I had thought maybe they did, or that there might be some other reality or being that was their weakness."
"Power is relative," Thotep claims. "Have you ever known a god to actually do anything on its own? Even the Ogdoad need their version of mortals to carry out their will. But it's always the ones that seem the weakest who end up bending the gods to their will. With a little help from.. oh, me! Someone had to teach them how to do it, after all. And I have an obligation to mess with the Ogdoad."
At this, Tasha leans forward, her expression a scrunched up look of focus. "Oh, really? It was you, you taught the Old Ones? The Sifra, and the others, the ones who came after? And why would you be after the Ogdoad?"
"Because I serve Chaos," Thotep says with a wide-toothed grin. "Creation is messy. Life is chaotic. Universes are not meant to be farms and gardens. The Ogdoad prefer Order. Namely their Order. But they still break the rules of Order, and will be punished by the ultimate servant of Order. I always enjoy watching that. It's very messy in practice."
"Huh," goes Tasha after a long moment of silence. Chaos, and Order. Not concepts, but spoken of as gods. Perhaps both, at once. Entities and concepts. She hadn't heard of them before. "Chaos and Order, bigger than the Ogdoad and yourself, too. Are you the ultimate servant of Chaos, then? And who serves Order? They're entities? You can speak to Chaos?"
"You can speak to anything," Thotep says. "But I sometimes serve Chaos directly. I play it a lullaby on my pipes. It is the force of creation.. and destruction. It is far more interesting than Order. The highest level of Order is Oblivion after all. Nothing is more orderly than nonexistence. It is a state of perfection, you might say."
Tasha squints at that, she knew that. It was what she thought of when someone described the Star to her. Perfect. Untouchable. Beyond interference. It does nothing, because to do anything would taint it. It made her mad, and in particular, it reminded her of not existing in the first place. It's just like that statue her old instructor talked about, perfect and unmoving and when someone needs help, it remains unmoving. She thinks she must feel that in civilization as well, that sense she's never exactly comfortable and when she seems to be getting along, she breaks some rule or has some difference and suddenly she's on the wrong side of their order. That or is stiffles her, sucking the life out of what should be desirable and life-fulfilling. Politics. Empty parties. Sacrifice for honor and duty, resulting in nothing but more honor and more duty and more dead people. Restraint that erodes the fun of life. She thinks it must be what draws her to Titanians, and so now sees the connection that eluded her.
"I think ... I think I agree with you. I tried fitting in, I tried chasing the Vril-ya, and I saw what it was like. The second order doesn't need you, or you're a distraction, it doesn't need you anymore. Or it's strangles you, even if it does. The Vril-ya must look down on us, even if they learn, because being like us makes them afraid. Then there's the Star, perfect and useless, the god the Silent-Ones use to seem better than everyone else, to seem so perfect and orderly. Their order." The young woman chews her lip. Is this what Horus meant? When he said maybe this is what she'd want, did he know? His words sounded disparaging to her ears, the orderly telling what doesn't fit to shove off, no matter how much she had wanted his approval. It all leaves her in a lurch. She wonders where to go with this.
"The Vril-ya will never catch up to their gods, because their gods are actually flesh and blood beings - something they still struggle to understand," Thotep says. "I understand flesh and blood. Life is order.. but order born of chaos. Right at the center of it all. And it keeps on creating order and chaos. What god could match such a thing? Horus hopes the 'Archon of the Waybuilders' will solve his problem for him, but the Archon isn't a god either. Who knows what it will do? Uncertainty is a wonderful thing! But it scares the Vril-ya, who are made of ordered patterns of energy. But order isn't all bad. Music is nice, after all! But now.. hmm.. now comes the obligatory negotiation. Nothing is really free, after all, Tasha. You want to know how to destroy Urgo-hem. I want something too."
"It's not my first deal with a outsider," Tasah notes, trying to put on a strong front even if it ultimately accomplishes nothing. "You've offered me a lot more than just the way to use the ship and defeat Urgo-hem, after all. It's more than a lot of beings give me. What do you want from me?"
"I want you to dig up a body," Thotep says with a grin.