Our buffer was largely nonexistent at this point, but we were still outlining pretty firmly, so we knew that this chapter would end with the actual Basin of Foresight. And it wasn’t hard to tell that that was the key Macguffin for the plot.

Although… we could have shown a sky elf mirror with a hint of Best’s hair in it, since him seeing certain truths about himself will be arguably even more important to the story.

Around the time this chapter came out, I lost my web-promotions job at the auto auction. My boss fixed it so I could freelance part-time, but that only lasted about four weeks and then the whole company imploded, thanks mostly to our vice-president’s penchant for spending more than even the highly profitable auction could earn and treating debts as optional. We believe this was tied to a weakness for the ponies. I’m pretty sure he ended up in jail for fraud, but that didn’t help me or any of the other employees, many of whom had made that place their careers.

At that point, Guilded Age was probably the most stable thing in my life, and the value of a Basin of Foresight was suddenly very clear to me.