When the horrible undersea creatures cry...

[awitchdidit]

[The Psychic camera is back on Beatrice, who is under deep protest broadcasting from her mansion in the increasingly gross Liminal Space for the sake of operational security. To make herself feel better, she's magically applied her regular appearance back over her Miyo disguise, like some sort of Shakespearean comedy in magical lecturer form.]

Alright, ladies and gentlefish, we've made a few discoveries with regards to what I think we're calling the Deepsong. I'd make a bigger production of this, but frankly, the facsimile of that noise in Liminal Space sounds even worse, somehow, so I'll stick to using visuals to get your attention.

[With that, several S. Tech party poppers go off in the background and Beatrice summons a spotlight on herself.]

First, our inestimable Detective, Naoto Shirogane, has determined the effects of the noise itself - you can also thank her for the camerawork. The Song's effects are threefold: it breaks down both physical and mental resistances to disease, it "resonates" with those who have a connection to song magic, and in that area of resonance, it drastically increases the power of the "Stricken" virus that afflicts mermaids with violent, cannibalistic urges.

[Beatrice's old friend the magical blackboard illustration appears over her shoulder, with an image of a kraken-like creature, arrows pointing from it to little heads with fish tails obviously representing mermaids, and smaller arrows pointing from them to skull-and-crossbones symbols.]

So much so that it could even allow the Stricken disease to affect humans, not just mermaids.

[She flips the S. Tech blackboard over, where there is one word written in red chalk: Spillover.]

Be extraordinarily careful interacting with Stricken mermaids no matter what your species condition happens to be right now. Don't interact with them at all while the Deepsong is happening.

Now, this is a serious problem for both ourselves and the locals, including our numerous Infiltrators. This is essentially a magical spell or psychic affliction, so the only way to stop it is going to be to find the source and deal with it. To that end, I have my own plan.

[Flipping the blackboard a second time, predictably, shows an entirely different image: a stylized picture of the Haunted Isle with two five-pointed stars marked on its edges and a series of question marks sketched around it.]

Two groups of investigators camped in two different places while the Deepsong is ongoing should be able to determine the direction of the song. If we do that precisely, using some of the Cornu's navigational instruments, we should be able to pinpoint our Deepsinger's precise location.

[To demonstrate, she draws a line from each of the stars, which intersect and form an X over one of the question marks.]

We need to do this immediately. There are many Stricken mermaids around this island, and if the disease propagates to the whole population, mermaid and human, it's almost certain to be a disaster.

[She nods her head.]

I'll be leading one group of triangulators, and will take volunteers for the second. A compass and a sextant and decent ears in each group should be all we need, although actual navigational skills can only help, if we want to bring in one of the Investigator sailors on this. I'm open to suggestions.

[She sighs.]

That's all for now. Thank you, Miss Shirogane.

Comments

[naturaltwohands]

If they will work with us.

[Drizzt recognizes this salt mine, as he has several of his own. He gives a disappointed sigh.]

Then they are simply blind. Maps are powerful. Maps are everything to a traveler, and should be so for a Traveler especially.

[loyalrebel]

It cannot hurt to try.

[Malik is a bit too tired for this but... the kid asked.]

It is more than just the maps. Most everything I spent a lifetime learning is either irrelevant or easily replaced with magic or retaining something of an overlay's abilities. I am... mostly irrelevant.

[thornsofmalkav]

Oh Malik...

It's not just you. Strip away everything from being a vampire and everything I've learned here and all you have are a bunch of useless knowledges and skills that couldn't get me proper employment back home, much less help anyone here.

[Except for speaking Spanish. That was useful. Still didn't get her a job when someone else bilingual with a better CV also applied.]

[loyalrebel]

Thorne.

[He is trying not to yell, okay.]

This is a somewhat different situation.

[thornsofmalkav]

...

[She knows, kind of. Being the idiot who went for the B.A. in English is not the same as Malik's problem.]

You're right. I'm sorry. It's different when you could do things back home and you can't here.

[loyalrebel]

I was a Master at what I did back home, and now.... a gun and a cantrip can do the vast majority of it.

[thornsofmalkav]

... there's no artistry to them. I've seen your maps, Malik. They're art. Art is worth it. Even if no one wants it, because they're idiots and philistines, they're still worth being made because creating art is one of the things that makes us human. Even when we're not.

I'm sorry. That's all I have.

[loyalrebel]

It is more than just maps.

[ He's just not going to bother with this fight, it's too much like banging his head against a wall to make a doorway.]

I will be doing what I can from liminal space for this.

[thornsofmalkav]

[YEAH BUT SHE CAN'T SAY THAT YOU'RE A MASTER CRAFTSMAN AT MURDERING PEOPLE IN PUBLIC ON THE NETWORK.]

That's fine. Thank you.

[shiroganeheir]

I am well acquainted with that circumstance myself. Everything I am, everything that my entire heritage has made me is only useful for one slim set of circumstances, one that I might not even be able to sustain in my own world.

Here, in the face of things magical, fantastical, and supernatural, I have found myself and my skills to be many times unhelpful.

[loyalrebel]

Mine is somewhat less specified than your training, but you are exactly right.

Now the trick is getting other people to understand how tightly such things are tied to who we are as people.

[And why it's levels of offensive to suggest that they just change.]

[shiroganeheir]

Even my friends many times do not understand how tied my identity is to what I do. Without my skills as a detective, I have nothing.

I do wish I could help people understand that, but to those who do not identify by their skills, it is difficult to impossible.

[loyalrebel]

I would enjoy hearing about it sometime, we do not have detectives in the same way you are in my time. Mostly we just have incompetent guards.

[shiroganeheir]

I would certainly not mind speaking of it.

Although, I must admit that even in my time, most who call themselves detectives are incompetent imbeciles.

[Or actually multiple murderers, but who's counting.]

[loyalrebel]

I will be in the Workshop's Library once the sun sets, if you are not busy some evening. I can at least offer dinner of some sort in exchange.

[naturaltwohands]

As always.

[And Drizzt listens intently, quiet for a long moment after Malik is done. Have a mental sigh. Now Drizzt is starting to understand some of the differences between him as an adolescent and the adults around him.]

Are all adults like this? My father complains as you do.

When I first came to the surface of my world, I knew nothing of it, save for a short time in a forest ten years hence and some propagandist stories. There are no seasons in the caves of the Underdark, only light where one lights a candle, no changes in temperature, no seas, and everything strives to be whisper silent and deadly. If I had the attitude that you do now, I would have frozen to death during the first cold nights of winter, not even knowing what winter was. Instead, I am now both a ranger and sailor because I learned new skills through my own stubbornness and through the help of others.

Even now, with these new worlds, I am constantly learning of things outside of my knowledge until I become knowledgable.

If you are a capable mapmaker, and have other skills beside that, you are more than capable of learning new skills to make yourself relevant again. It will not be easy, but you are smart. If you feel irrelevant, then work to no longer be so.

[loyalrebel]

[There is a momentary pause, and it is a warning more than anything else.]

Thank you for completely ignoring the point and being offensive in the same breath.

[naturaltwohands]

[This response confuses Drizzt more than a little. He goes back and listens to it quietly, now that he can do so. In the end, he can only come to one conclusion:

Malik doesn't want to try, and Drizzt can do nothing to change that. Adults are so stuck in their ways. Did he only survive reaching the surface because he's a child and flexible in thought?

No, there's something more to this, something that Drizzt can't understand. And there is nothing he can do.]

... I meant to inspire some hope for finding a new place, perhaps through being blunt and invoking your ire. You are a smart and learned man, and I respect your skill. ... It is.. Difficult for me to accept that you are doomed to irrelevance, but I will acquiesce to arguing about it further.

[He does know the man has a good enough heart, but he's kind of mean to everyone, and assumed the worst of Drizzt when he was simply stating during the ball. And Drizzt knows that they have a more important task at hand.]

But I suppose we should focus on the task at hand, since that is something we can do together, and our views of the world will not clash.

[That's Drizzt giving in, basically. He would love to get a rise in Malik, to help him process emotions, but that would only make him useless to the task at hand. And from that simple dismissal? Drizzt isn't sure the attempt would even be worth it for all the good it would do. Like Wulfgar, Malik is beyond his help—just in a different way that Drizzt understands even less.]

[loyalrebel]

I do not need assistance in making maps.

I have my tasks, find your own.

[Sorry Drizzt, Malik is Super Done with you for now.]

[naturaltwohands]

[... He meant in a general working together sense and. Well. Okay. Drizzt is perfectly fine avoiding Malik. Or at least to keep his guard up, to treat him more like someone to be kept at a distance. Drizzt will commence to avoid Malik except in a professional Traveler sense from now on, he thinks.]

As it has been planned.

[Drizzt is done here, too.]