#tehom

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Creature of the day #13: The Lady Fortune

Come join us for the opening event tonight, 6-9pm at Ellipsis gallery, Level 1, 41 Crown St, Woolloomooloo.

Gan’Eden’s waterfalls were mostly on the outer edges. Those rivers flowing into the caverns and those which fell down cliffs into deeper areas on the far end. Upon deciding that they didn’t really want to go back home yet, because Fang had never seen the rest of the Underground, at least not that he could remember, and Monster Kid was bored, they decided to visit the Dump. From the sound of it, a lot of refuse ended up there that was still good, and all kinds of hidden treasures could be found buried in the garbage. “What’s down there?” Fang had asked when they wandered a path that overlooked it from a distance. Monster Kid had laughed and given him a nasty grin. “Why? You scared of the Beast of Tehom? Coming to get you in the night and swallow you up?” Fang shook his head. “Nah, I was just curious. What’s this beast?” “It’s just an old story. The waterfalls used to fall into a massive pit that was so deep no one knew what was at the bottom, and anyone who fell down there was never heard from again. A story used to say that a monster fell down there once and went crazy in the dark. They say he’d eat anyone else who got stuck down there. But then the quakes that got the roof of Everfall cavern also let a ton of water from some huge lake pour into the underground and flood the whole area, filling up the old pits. Now anyone who swims can live in the upper parts of it. But...” and here Monster Kid had paused, unable to keep the excited grin off his face. “They say the deepest part of the Tehom Lakes hasn’t been explored yet. Who knows what could be down there...” It was an ominous tale, but difficult to take seriously as they continued on over bridges and through the smooth tunnels, laughing and joking at the idea of some terrible beast lurking in the dark, just waiting to grab you and drag you down. As Fang pointed out, even though he could only remember a day back, it was already pretty clear that you didn’t need some kind of mythical beast from a story to kill you. Your neighbors would happily do that on their own to see if you had anything good in your pockets. As they passed through further caverns, Fang was struck once again by how beautiful the Underground was. Several of the waterfalls glowed with a bright turquoise and plunged into a deep lake that stretched out wide, mixing with much darker waters from other falls. Neither kind of water looked like ordinary water before it cascaded into the lake, but the effect of their mixing was eerie and almost surreal. It seemed that the the dark water and the glowing water didn’t mix easily, and strange luminescent bubbles and patches of water would drift in and out of darker areas, sometimes layering one on top of the other, making everything shadowed and dream-like. Parts of the lake were much shallower than others, and in those areas were growing trees. The walkway that passed close by to a cluster of these trees let the boys have a good view of the black bark that seemed to be dusted with something faintly silver and difficult to see in the gloom. But it was not the bark, but the foliage which drew the eye. Bright crimson leaves that gave off a light of their own, in contrast to the blue-green light that sometimes illuminated the grove from the waters below. Tiny star-shaped fruits were growing among the boughs, easily seen as their skins were black and were in stark contrast with the bright color of the leaves. Both Monster Kid and Fang froze in fear when a long set of tentacles emerged from the water and began to reach up into the trees. The culprit turned out to be a sort of bulbous aquatic monster with tentacles like an octopus, though with far more than eight legs. From its body sprouted the first normal eight, then those each split to form a set of two where only one tentacle had been once more, then further up they split again, forming a full 32 tentacles that could wrap around the trunk and gather the fruit from its branches. When they saw the monster carefully adding the fruits to a basket that had been floating on the surface of the water just out of sight, they realized it wasn’t interested in their presence and relaxed. Fang waved to the aquatic creature while behind him the relieved Monster kid was letting loose a stream of profanity under his breath. The monster paused in its work, turning to look at him carefully for a moment. It made no move to return his friendliness or to talk to them, but it didn’t seem inclined to attack them either, watching them silently as they continued on their way across the lake towards the far shore. As it slipped back down into the water, its emotionless expression twitched slightly. But there was no one around to guess at its thoughts, and soon it vanished beneath the waters.

41 Minutes