Now I understand as much: that Balthazar couldn’t possibly be the only cause of the server meltdown, because he wouldn’t want to be discovered and preempted that early in the game.  Something else is amiss, and Eon is the first piece of the puzzle that I lost my job for.

Why isn’t he affected by a delete script?  I can’t think of any reason other than him being a hacker and he exempted himself from the clause.  Still, why is he masked as a non-player when he is still acting otherwise.  No matter how you ponder on it all, it just won’t make any sense.  Nothing will make sense until I talk to him.  So…

“Save all that pondering and find him.”

“Gazpar!  I didn’t know you were there, and that you could read minds.”

“I can’t.  You’ve just been like that ever since you hurt the boy.”

“Yeah.  I don’t know what to do now.  I don’t think he will talk to me anyway.”

“You’ll never know until you try.”

“Tell me – you’re completely different from the other two – why are you banding with them?”

“Then tell me, why are you banding with us?”

“I have my reasons.”

“As I do.”

I have no comeback from that.  And so turned my notice into the desert horizon.  Like an exodus, all the sand monsters are moving away from the city and into the wild, starting to hunt for their victims.

“Eon – he is making his way here, is he not?”

“He is.”

“And those monsters are rigged, am I correct?”

“You are.”

“Then he is walking right into a trap.”

“A maze of traps.  The desert can be a labyrinth when nightfall comes.”

“They’ll soon find themselves walking in circles and eventually surrounded by a swarm of angry scorpions.”

“At least you know now that Balthazar is insidious inside out.”

“What’s his deal anyway?  Why is he this determined to rid this game of players and bring the game down?”

“The answer lies in knowing who Balthazar really is.  And it starts by knowing who Eon is.”

“But I have no way of getting to him.”

“Indeed.  But he has every way of getting to you.”

“What are you suggesting?”

“A Spirit Guide.”  Then he held out a pearl-like gem the size of his palm.

“Won’t Balthazar see me?”

“He won’t.  This one can only be seen by Eon.”

Then he stepped back.

“Throw it as high as you could up in the air.  And like a star, it will illuminate where you are standing.  Hopefully he will notice it.”

I gazed in the clouds.  The nightfall in the desert gazes back.  Peaceful and quiet; nothing like what I feel, or what Gazpar feels, or most likely what Eon feels.  But here goes nothing.

And with all of my strength, I threw the pearl upwards.  Slowly, its outer shell breaks, and with each broken piece a new small light was born.  When it is has completely shed off its cover, out came the brightest star in this dark hour.

Bastion
3rd night of the 7th moon, First Generation (G.T.)
Outside the walls of Ammospolis, the Desert City