TSH # 318 • Payback

[Anna]

http://www.pasteldefender.com/to%20save ... 20318.html

No, that's mean!
Really!

No more comment.

[Quaeras]

We barely knew thee, Only.

<takes off hat>

[Jennifer Diane Reitz]

He was warned.

[Skatche]

Well, she's amputated the finger. Wait 'til the fist shows up.

...Or anyway, I just hope this doesn't mean we'll never find out what Only was.

[Jennifer Diane Reitz]

Well, she's amputated the finger. Wait 'til the fist shows up.

...Or anyway, I just hope this doesn't mean we'll never find out what Only was.

If you ever find out what Only was, you will have an idea of what Uni was, and that would destroy forever the precious Enigmatic Ground that gives the Unicorn Jelly any power it has.

Mystery, with a capital 'M', fades into a drab Known the moment it suffers denouement.

Let me put it this way... I think Stephen King was talking about horror, and he said something like:

'Not seeing is as important, probably more important, than seeing something in horror. If I show you a 50-foot spider, initially you may be frightened, but afterwards, you will start thinking that if a 50 foot spider is scary, a 100 foot spider would be even better. And so on. But if you only see fleeting glimpses of something, and you can't quite tell that it is a spider, or quite how large it is, the horror of it can live forever, you don't need to find anything greater, because what you don't know always keeps it amazing you, because your mind will keep reinventing it'.

Now that isn't an exact quote, but it is close in feeling to what he said, and I would like to alter that with regard to any amazing thing, from some inexplicable post-singularity technology to a fantasy beast - it doesn't only apply to horror. It applies to any form of imagination.

If I show you that Only is a super-technological, living agent designed to maintain the integrity of timespace, a kind of 'white cell' that fights 'infections' that alter causality in negative ways, suddenly he is no longer interesting, he is just a machine.

If I show you that Only actually IS Uni, and that Uni really is a truly spiritual entity, an Enlightened Master Slime that plays cosmic Buddha, sometimes appearing dark and scary, sometimes light and friendly, ultimately serving to guide important events to needful conclusions before the Unicorn Buddha fades back into the Cosmic Oom, again he becomes uninteresting. He becomes a defined spook.

If I show you that Only never existed -and neither did Uni- that both were actually just hallucinations, wishes, dreams, delusions that served to fill in inexplicable events or poorly-remembered circumstances, ghosts of the mind, a symbol for those moments when humans interpret their lives in mystical ways because they cannot maintain a complete grasp on reality by nature... you might think it clever for a moment, but then Only just becomes empty. Defined, all curiosity, all power is lost.

And If I demonstrate that Only is the Yang to the Yin of Uni, that they are the dark and light sides of a multidimensional entity that surpasses the Krawlni, so utterly alien that it can only appear as a representation of a half-forgotten earthly legend to the people of Tryslmaistan, interfering with things for alien reasons, nothing at all is gained. That would be trite and hackneyed.

BUT if I forever leave the Unicorn Jelly, in any guise, in every role, wherever he is used, as an enigma, with just enough there to be tantalizing but always careful to reveal nothing sure, nothing absolute, then Uni, Only, or any other name, can be all of those things above, and more. The power remains because it is not drained away by completing the gestalt. The hints of meaning - Unicorn, the symbolism it represents both dark and light, fierce and kind, bestial and angelic are intact, and the unique Jelly design renders it all new, and includes the possibility of technology, as well as fantasy. There is a kind of magic to not knowing what Only is. That magic is very precious, and rare, and a writer can consider themselves fortunate if they stumble across such a wonder.

To destroy it would be a crime.

Only will not be forgotten in this story; but in the end, when all is revealed (it still hasn't all been revealed yet???) do not look forward to seeing the schematics of Only, or an exacting description of what Only Actually Truly Really is. I will never do that. Not ever.

Anyone can invent some creative whatsit, even if all they do is stick part of one famous widget onto another famous widget and call the result original.

But a good Mystery only comes about once in a rare while; I would be cruel, and insane, to reveal it.

[EvilMidnightLurker]

...Just how much time passes between panels 1 and 2? It doesn't seem like it could be more than a fraction of a second, from command to execution, and yet young Mr. Ngo has got his pants (mostly) on and has circled around Pho...

Oh, and NOOO! ONLY!

[Skatche]

Only will not be forgotten in this story; but in the end, when all is revealed (it still hasn't all been revealed yet???) do not look forward to seeing the schematics of Only, or an exacting description of what Only Actually Truly Really is. I will never do that. Not ever.

This is more what I meant, honestly: just that Only wouldn't disappear narratively as well as literally. I do see what you're saying about mystery.

Although, I should point out that it's not a universal principle. Philip K. Dick is one author who managed to make the knowing even more horrifying than the not knowing.

[Jennifer Diane Reitz]

Although, I should point out that it's not a universal principle. Philip K. Dick is one author who managed to make the knowing even more horrifying than the not knowing.

Yeah... that's true. But I just can't be a Dick.

Not everyone agrees, of course...

[Alikat]

There is an alternate negaverse where a wealthy and renowned but terrible science fiction authoress named Phillipa K. Pussy wrote "Stop My Sneezing, the Fireman Wrote" and "The Woman in Low Dungeon."

[EvilMidnightLurker]

I prefer the negaverse featuring seven-foot-tall sf writer Ellen Harleyson, author of "Lifefish Anecdotes" and "I Have a Mouth and I Feel Fine." ...and "At Long Last, Safe Realities."

[Alikat]

I HATED her "Reoffend, Colombina, the DingDongWoman Thought to Herself."

[marinschild]

But I just can't be a Dick.

You make it sound harder than it actually is. It may take a bit of work, but anybody can be a dick. All it takes is an agressive change in a person's belief system. If dicks can be turned into pussies, surely the inverse can happen as well (in theory at least).

There is an alternate negaverse where a wealthy and renowned but terrible science fiction authoress named Phillipa K. Pussy wrote "Stop My Sneezing, the Fireman Wrote" and "The Woman in Low Dungeon."

Don't forget her bestsellers: "Secrets of a Successful Businessman", "Humans Do Dream of Real Sheep", "Kibu", and "The Cross-Passage of Timofey Bowman".

I reached too far for those titles. YoY

[NMcCoy]

Unfortunately, Kaye has inadvertently just destroyed the entire multiverse.

[Fooly Cooly Dreamer]

Is there a reason why Pho left the gun right next to Kaye's body? I'm sorry, but for a tactician of his calibur, it just strikes me that he was holding the Idiot Ball when he made the call not to remove the gun while she was incapacitated.

[Jennifer Diane Reitz]

Is there a reason why Pho left the gun right next to Kaye's body? I'm sorry, but for a tactician of his calibur, it just strikes me that he was holding the Idiot Ball when he made the call not to remove the gun while she was incapacitated.

This will be directly and specifically addressed; Virtue is completely upset about it for exactly your reasons, and he is going to call Pho on the carpet about it.

The question is, does Pho have a reason, or did he just screw up?

Wait and see.

[Dan]

Actually, do we know if he can disable that gun? I'm assuming he knew about the Bigger Gun.

[Jennifer Diane Reitz]

Actually, do we know if he can disable that gun? I'm assuming he knew about the Bigger Gun.

No, Pho cannot disable Kaye's gun; the principles are 400 years beyond his tech level. Pho knows what a gun is, he used a springshooter himself (the cutting edge of his splay's tech), he knows how to aim, he understands ballistics. But Electanic Node Power technology is just magic to him; he wouldn't know even how to open Kaye's gun up to see inside it.

It is unlikely any of the rest of the crew could disable Kaye's gun; Virtue is from a splay where martial prowess dominates and guns are seen as a weakness, Vola has no experience because guns were not a big part of her life, and Wailan, well, he could actually take the gun apart, and put it together again, and in doing so figure it all out... but it would take him a week or two. And there is the chance he might accidentally kill everyone again. Poor guy. He tries.