After scoring big primary wins and gaining the support of a slew of super delegates, Tom Groff was on track to secure the Democratic nomination. The candidate in second place, Ralph Kitely, was vowing to take the fight for the nomination all the way to the convention if he had to, but the prevailing political wisdom was that Tom would ask the third placed candidate, Kathryn Wendt, to be his running mate in exchange for her dropping out of the race and asking her delegates to support Tom. The country was all set for a general election showdown between Jim Balmer and Tom Groff, and with this being the state of play in US politics it was decided by the Goose that they somehow needed to meet with Senator Groff and explain to him the events that were taking place that he was a central player in.

"He's a presidential candidate, the security around him is air tight, we can't just go up to him and ask him if we can have a chat," Robert said to the Goose.

They were back at home with the penguin and had met and spoken with the owl and the rooster and were informed by them of Sonya's visit and the developments vis-à-vis the incident with Fyodor and the banana and the fallout from Jim Balmer's disastrous press conference with the Russian president. The Raven's coalition was falling apart, like it always did when the members inevitably prioritized their own personal ambitions over the Raven's grand ambition. These developments made it imperative that they find a way to make contact with Tom Groff immediately.

"Just put yourselves some place where he'll be able to see the Goose, if you do that then he'll want to make contact with you, which will make things a lot easier," the rooster suggested.

"Why would that make things easier?" Robert asked.

"Tom Groff is a member of The Church of the Golden Goose, if he sees a suspicious looking goose it'll pique his curiosity," the owl answered.

Robert hadn't awakened the owl and the rooster when they returned to the house and found them there; with the egg being so close to hatching the Goose's advice was that they wait to awaken them and do so in a place where there was little risk of what hatched from the egg being seen by people. Robert asked the Goose again to tell him what was going to hatch from the egg and again the Goose refused, saying that it didn't want to ruin the surprise for Robert. The truth was that the Goose didn't know what was going to hatch from the egg. The creatures that hatched from the eggs varied depending on the energies that the egg had absorbed and the state of the world into which the creature was birthed. The last time that the Goose had done the pilgrimage the egg had hatched into a golden scarab beetle with a bejeweled hide; the time before that it had hatched into a red and white fox with a flaming tail. The fact that the Behemoth had hatched from the red egg meant that the Raven had done everything that it needed to do to make the strongest possible creature hatch from the egg. The last time that the Raven had managed to summon the Behemoth it had won, and if it won this time, with the state that the world was in, the Goose wasn't sure if there would be a way back from what the Raven and its disciples would wreak upon the world. For the Raven to be truly defeated their victory needed to be absolute, because under the current circumstances failure for the Raven didn't entirely nullify it as a threat, there were too many moving pieces involved and unless they were able to ensure that they were all adequately dealt with there would be opportunities for the Raven to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. It was for this reason that the Goose was so anxious for them to make contact with Tom Groff. He was one of two remaining pieces left for the Goose to bring into the fold, the other being Ryan who, with the cloud of the Cat's rape accusation hanging over him, couldn't be brought into the fold just yet; if his leaks were in any way construed to be in support of Tom Groff or Sonya they would be accused of colluding with a rapist which would negate the impact of his leaks. The Cat needed to be gotten in touch with and her cooperation secured, and for that they needed the Oracle, who tradition dictated was not to play an active role in the pilgrimage on behalf of either the Goose or the Raven. The Oracle took this tradition very seriously and had thus far avoided violating it, but with the stakes so high and the Behemoth on the loose the Goose was hoping that it could prevail upon the Oracle to disregard that antiquated tradition.

If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

"ABSOLUTELY NOT!" Was the Oracle's response to the Goose's request.

"I was hoping that you would appreciate the extraordinary circumstances that we are in and set aside your fidelity to this stupid tradition," the Goose replied.

"It's not stupid, it guarantees fairness, which is why it is unbreakable."

"It's only a tradition, it's not an iron clad rule."

"We treat it as if it is an ironclad rule."

"Not always, the Raven's Oracle once spoke with the Leviathan and tried to convince it to go over to their side after it had been awakened by the blue egg."

"Trust me, you don't want to know what happened to him after that."

The Goose realized that it was pointless for it to continue trying to sway the Oracle; she wasn't going to budge on this, and so another solution would need to be found for getting the cat to retract its accusation.

"I've already given the cat assurances that if she left the Raven I would make sure that she was protected, can I have your word that I'll be able to keep my promise to her?"

"As long as I'm not directly involved in getting her to cross over you can do whatever you want, but I would warn you about putting too much trust in the cat, many have believed they could trust her and gotten their fingers burned, none more so than the Trojans. You were there, you saw firsthand the kind of destruction that she can produce with her powers of seduction."

"I know, but this time for some reason things feel different. She's given us something of extremely high value which, if we make proper use of it, could be the final nail in Jim Balmer's coffin."

"I just hope you know what you're doing."

"Why would the cat do that to Ryan after you had agreed to help her in exchange for her helping us?" Jessie asked the Goose.

"The cat is a very complicated character, because of what she experienced as part of the Zodiac she doesn't feel that it's safe for her to trust anybody, which is why she's always playing both sides and why the Raven is able to exercise such control over her by using her past to demean her and make her feel like the only worth that she has is as the Raven's pawn."

"That's awful, we have to help her," Jessie said.

"I've tried helping her, every time she's gone back to the Raven. In the case of Troy she learned during her time in the city as part of the royal court that King Priam always took the advice of his high priest and that the high priest would never stand for the desecration of anything that stood as a monument to the gods. The cat passed this piece of information on to the Raven, who passed it on to Agamemnon who brought it up during a conversation which Odysseus was in earshot of. Soon after the Trojan Horse was built, and we all know what happened next."

"Could she have been sent here as a Trojan horse?" Robert asked.

"What she gave us was genuine, so I don't think so," the Goose answered.

"You know, Kyle may not be of any use to us as Solomon but he can still be useful, and he has been useful. He's still leaking, he's just not doing it through Solomon, he's leaking directly to the media," the owl said.

"If that's the case then all we need to do is establish a channel of communication between him and the owl," the rooster said.

"He has a private e-mail account that he uses only for communicating with his mother, we can contact him through that," the owl said.