A parable of the Flotilla
When the Flotilla first sought fresh water, they found two cisterns on the shore.
The first was made of polished stone, carved with the sigil of a single great bird. A keeper stood before it and said: “Drink, but you may not see how the water is gathered. Trust in the sigil, and pay no mind to the pipes beneath.”
The second was a spring, ringed only by stones that any penguin could move aside. Its channels were cut into the open ice, visible to all. When a stone shifted, the huddle would gather to repair it, and the water flowed clearer than before.
The keeper of the first cistern laughed. “Our water is clean,” he said. “Why trouble yourselves with how it arrives?”
But an elder penguin replied: “If I cannot see the source, how do I know it is not poisoned? If I cannot mend the channel, how do I know it will not be sealed against me when I am thirsty?”
The Flotilla drank from the spring. And when a harsh season came and the great bird’s cistern ran sour with hidden fees, the penguins who had drunk there came waddling to the open spring, and the huddle made room for them.
Moral: Water you cannot trace, you cannot trust. A channel you cannot mend does not belong to you.