Sangfielle 22: Whispers in the City by the Sea
Transcriber: robotchangeling
Austin: Sangfielle is a series that draws on elements of dark fantasy, horror, and gothic fiction. As such, a list of content warnings will always be made available in the episode description.
[Music begins: Sangfielle by Jack de Quidt]
Austin (as narrator): When the devils of Al Domina first plunged their colonial dagger deep into the heartland 5-600 years ago, they let it rest for a moment. Cavalry forces camping on high ridges, supply convoys running back to the homeland. When they decided to stay, they ripped that dagger out. And with the blood that spilled, they drafted a curve on the ground. And that long red line, well, that would become the walls of Sapodilla. Don't let them fool you. Before the sea, before it was the glorious tiered city of culture and society by the shore, it was the castle fortress of the dominion, the first real stronghold they built. But they didn't build it, of course. They took what others had built before, tread on what they did not like, claimed what they did, and used whatever came between as scaffolding for a new grand vision. And yes, years later, during the panic, the descendants of those who were pushed off that land and those who had been forced to attend to it, well, they made it a free and open city. But that original sin...well, in times like these, it boils up. Not like water, not boiling over, boiling up. An infection you cannot be rid of, a hidden abscess beyond your reach but eager to reach you. So why would anyone, especially someone so proud to be at the heart of civilization, want to return to those days and castles and cavalrymen? Well, my bet is they're afraid. I can't say I don't understand it. I've been out on the prairie. I've been in the hills. I know what the shadows contain. But also know that a castle ain’t built on confidence. You heard me before: it's built on blood, blood drawn by greed or fear. And those things what run across the prairie at night? Those things on the shaded knoll? They savor greed and fear. And unlike the fancy folk of Sapodilla, they don't need a blueprint to draw blood.
Austin: Welcome to Friends at the Table, an actual play podcast focused on critical worldbuilding, smart characterization, and fun interaction between good friends. I am your host, Austin Walker. Joining me today Jack de Quidt.
Jack: Hi there. You can find me on Twitter at @notquitereal and find all of the music featured on the show at notquitereal.bandcamp.com.
Austin: Sylvia Clare.
Sylvia: Hi, I'm Sylvi. You can find me on Twitter at @sylvibullet and listen to my other show Emojidrome wherever you get your podcasts.
Austin: Ali Acampora.
Ali: Hi, you can find me over at @ali_west on Twitter, and you can find the show over at @friends_table.
Austin: Keith Carberry
Keith: Hi, my name is Keith J. Carberry. You can find me on Twitter at @KeithJCarberry and you can find the let's plays that I do at youtube.com/runbutton.
Austin: [amused] Andrew Lee Swan.
Dre: Hey, you can find me on Twitter at @swandre3000. What's up? Why— what happened?
Austin: I’m just laughing at how many people there are on this podcast.
Dre: Okay. [laughs]
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Janine Hawkins?
Janine: You can find me at @bleatingheart on Twitter.
Austin: And Art Martinez-Tebbel.
Art: Hey, you can find me on Twitter at @atebbel.
Austin: Hi, today we are continuing our game of Heart: The City Beneath by Grant Howitt and Christopher Taylor, which congrats to to them for getting a billion nominations in the ENnie Awards this year.
Ali: Ooh!
Jack: Mm-hmm.
Austin: This got this game is up for Best Art Cover, Best Art Interior, Best Game, Best Layout and Design, Best Monster/Adversary, and Best Online— nope, that's a different one. Best Online Content, different thing. Best Setting and Best Writing and Product of the Year.
Jack: Wowee.
Austin: That's a bunch of nominations. Yeah.
Jack: It’s a great game.
Art: Personally, i think the ENnies might have too many categories if a game can get a billion nominations.
Austin: Yeeah... They’ve all passed the —
Art: How long are we supposed to sit and read these?
Keith: And they've got to do all the TV shows after. [Austin and Art laugh softly]
Austin: That's them. Same awards. In any case, congrats to the entire team over at Rowan, Rook, and Decard. I know a lot of people worked on this game, not just Grant and Christopher, so congrats to everyone there. It's a great game. We're really enjoying it, and we're back to playing it after our little excursion into the world of Inhuman Conditions. I think maybe calling that series of interrogations a little excursion is underselling the terror of it, but that's how it goes sometimes.
Janine: There've been some bad excursions.
Austin: This is true. You know what? Maybe there've been more bad excursions than good ones, all said, in the history of humanity. In any case, our goals are, as always: to ask questions instead of planning, which is good given the amount of prep time I've had this week; evoke an atmosphere of wonder, horror, and humanity. I almost said humility. To break and build tension; to pay attention to what everyone else at the table wants, both long- and short-term; and to play to find out what happens. Can we go over character beats, before we go further? Let's start with Chine.
Dre: Yes.
Austin: And think about these in the in the context of you just got arrested.
Dre: Yeah, no, my major active Beat is “Take major echo fallout.”
Austin: Mmm.
Dre: And my other active Beat, which is minor, is “Gain information on why you have been chosen by the Course.”
Austin: Good. Good question. Great. Duvall?
Art: Yeah, I have the Major Beat “Acquire a renowned piece of equipment,” and we are are...
Austin: On that. This is it. We’re here.
Art: On that. This is...yeah, that's supposed to be here.
Austin: You’re looking for the Zahir or that painting that's here somewhere.
Art: And I have a Minor Beat of “Destroy evidence or rhetoric that proves your task to be impossible.”
Austin: Okay. Es?
Janine: I have the Minor Beat “Have a cocktail, fighting move, or legendary beast named after you.” [Austin and Dre laugh] Major Beat, “Catalog your exploits for an extended period. Either do it yourself or hire a bard.”
Austin: I think it's fair to say that you've been cataloging those, and you also started that conversation with Myron, the journalist.
Janine: Yeah, I've been making progress on that.
Austin: There's little bits, yeah, yeah. We don't necessarily see a lot of that, but you...that may not jump to mind, but you've been making slow progress towards that all season.
Janine: Yes.
Austin: Or since you've taken it. Lyke?
Keith: Hi, my Beats are “Kick someone off a tall structure. They really deserved it.” [someone laughs] and “Slay a beast that's at least five times your size.”
Austin: Two beats we really thought would happen last session.
Keith: Yeah. Neither of them did, yeah.
Austin: And I’ll use this opportunity actually to talk about, like, you kept those Beats, but given the length of the Bell Metal Band session and what y'all did accomplish, I think I ended up giving you a Minor Beat anyway, right?
Keith: You did. That one was “Refuse to back down when it would be beneficial to do so.”
Austin: Right. I felt like...that was like a three recording, it took us three sessions.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: And you didn't get any Beats. And I felt like you’d done a lot of good RP, you'd hit this other beat. Let me toss you that. That's an exception obviously, but like...
Keith: Yeah, we swerved really early on away from what would have accomplished those things. [laughs]
Austin: Right, yes, yes. I mean, well, down to the end, I thought there was an opportunity for either of those, do you know what i mean?
Keith: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: It could have broken that way still. But yeah, and there's another similar thing that we'll get to momentarily. alright. Marn?
Ali: Yeah, my two active Beats are “Mark d8 stress to an NPC bond, and describe what happens.”
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Ali: And “Take a minor supplies fallout,” and those are both minor.
Austin: Alright, cool. Pickman?
Jack: I have the minor beat “Find a heart-touched sapling on a Delve and bring it back to a haven for planting.”
Austin: Uh huh.
Jack: And then I have another minor beat “Damage or sabotage a haven, letting the heart in.”
Austin: Ah, I see. We are in a haven, by the way. Sapodilla is absolutely a classic haven landmark. I have a number of haunts to talk about when we get there. But hey, you know, if you ever wanted to damage or sabotage a haven this would be a place, this would be a haven.
Jack: [sarcastic] I don't know why Pickman would want to take a swing at Sapodilla. She loves it so much. [Sylvia laughs]
Austin: Uh huh. And about that heart-touched sapling. I guess I'll use this this moment briefly—before we move over to Virtue—to say that when you first arrive here, one of the first things you notice, or maybe it's like when you're unpacking your stuff, you take a look at your espignol and realize that something has happened to it. The thing that's happened is that you took a move, right? That's the actual thing that happened, Jack, is you took a move, [Jack laughs] but we're narrativizing it here. You sent a train a letter, and the train in exchange got your gun sick.
Jack: Yeah, my gun has gotten...my espignol has gotten ill. Should I just read what this says?
Austin: Yeah, you go ahead and read the thing of the thing, yeah.
Jack: So this move is a major move. It's called Iron Worm. And it says: “The espignol sweats and itches. A parasite of the structure worms within it. A pilot light swells on one side and snaps itself alight. The espignol can now be used as a ranged D8 weapon [Austin laughs] with tags tiring, ranged, and loud. It can also be used as a D8 melee weapon with tags tiring, brutal, and loud.” So I can hit people with it for brutal or shoot people with it for ranged but I can't do a ranged attack that's brutal or vice versa.
[Timestamp: 0:10:04]
Austin: Right. The Red Zephyr was like, “You have that— you can't shoot that gun? What have you been doing? Let me...I'm gonna fix that for you.”
Jack: By making it sick.
Austin: We should note that this is— by making it sick. We should note that this is a modified version of a major Vermissian Knight move called Dragon Slayer or Dragon Killer, which is about a big sword that is either really good against— it’s kill D10 tiring against trains, against significantly larger things, dragons, and then human size targets it's only kill D6, and like that's not really...the Shape would not give you a weapon to kill big things.
Jack: To kill trains.
Austin: The shape is big things. Right, exactly. So we came up with this. It's gonna have all the same minor beats that dragon killer does, so you can continue to to advance it in that way. So that's what that is. And the thing that actually...the other thing that we talked about the end of last session, it did not make it into recordings, because I think it was after we hit stop. When I was like, “”Oh, yeah, also you were gonna find a fucking heart-touched sapling on that Delve.” And then you still have to do the bit of going to a haven and planting it somewhere, but you were supposed to find one on Red Zephyr, and because of actual play, I just forgot to do that. So instead of finding it there, I think maybe...is it fair to say that you see that this thing is like this and you can see there's something stuck in the barrel of this thing? This big...I'm guessing the espignol has like a big musket barrel. Am I wrong about that? Does it have like a…
Jack: Yeah, i think so, and I think that there is there is some sort of...I think it's like a tangle of wires, and Pickman breaks one of the wires—
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: —and there's fluid inside, like when you break a plant stem and there's fluid inside.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: And…
Austin: Are you able to like get the thing out and basically it is like a little bowl or a little sapling of some sort?
Jack: Yeah, I think it's like knotweed or like a binding plant like one of those ones that sends out little creepers and crawls up and entangles.
Austin: Right, sure.
Jack: And so, you know, quickly it sort of just curls itself around like a strap on Pittman's bag or something.
Austin: Great. Love to be in the party filled with weird plant creatures that you can definitely trust.
Jack: Oh, yeah, you've got the Aterika’Kaal, right? Still?
Keith: I sure do.
Jack: Ah, sick! Does your Aterika’Kaal want to meet my unpleasant train plant? [laughter]
Keith: Yeah, I actually think yes.
Jack: Excellent.
Austin: We’ll get there.
Janine: Very forward.
Austin: Yeah. Well, it's a meeting, you know? It's like a playdate.
Keith: Yeah.
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [Janine laughs]
Keith: Well, I just think it’s...it is a living plant god, and it's sort of been starved for stimuli.
Austin: Mmm. I love where this is all going. This certainly isn't gonna fall apart. Finally, Virtue Mondegreen.
Sylvia: Hi.
Austin: [laughs] The most, uh, I would say maybe the safest of the crew. [Sylvia laughs] The most stable, and…
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: What are your beats?
Sylvia: My current beats are both minor beats. The first is “Dissect or interrogate someone that can shed light on your task.” Very stable, very normal.
Austin: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Sylvia: The second is “Allude to the events that led you to seek forbidden knowledge to achieve an impossible task.”
Austin: Oh, okay. Normal stuff.
Sylvia: Yeah, super normal regular stuff.
Austin: Fantastic.
Sylvia: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Alright, so there's the...okay, so I guess that's the thing, right? That's us. That's what we're all up to. This is a downtime episode in a sense. Heart doesn't really have downtime, but it certainly has wounds that need to be healed, right. And I wanna give you a little bit of color here, a little bit of setup, because we did the Sapodilla introductions and interrogations, so I gave you a little bit of flavor on that. You know that there are three districts. You know that there's a really fancy place, a sort of middle tier commercial and religious hub, and then there's like outside. All of that's true. A little bit more color is that as you come through into Sapodilla proper, the gates that you're passing through are part of an ancient wall, like there's these big massive squared off sandstone turrets, right? Think about like a Spanish or French or English castle, you know, that style of just traditional medieval stonework. Uneven stones, these are not...like, this is...I mean, obviously some work was done to make them fit together. But we're talking about a castle from a period well before what you mostly see in Sangfielle today, so it's fair to say this is probably one of the first big bases of operation that early Imperial settlers established, because it's like from a pre colonial era architecture. And so passing through it is like passing through a sort of structure you don't normally pass there. I know that a few of you have been here before. I think Lyke has been here. I know that Es and Virtue have been here and in fact got chased out of here. And in the time since then, you know—and have noticed, clearly—that the Glim Macula has kind of taken over. I'm gonna say that while you were here last time, Es and Virtue, the Glim Macula was the sort of group...was sort of like a special subdivision of the town guard effectively, or the city guard, or maybe even a group in that was related to the town guard, but was not the town guard, right? They were effectively like a group of, you know, supernatural investigators who tried to figure out what was wrong with XYZ and and get to the bottom of curses, and unlike y'all, they take great deal of pride of being pure of that sort of influence. They very much believe that something is broken in Sangfielle. You know, we talked a lot about this season being about people trying to understand themselves in a kind of ocean of meaning and not knowing how to tie themselves into like...how to dock, how to find some sort of anchor point from which they can identify themselves and the Glim Macula have decided the thing to identify themselves by is in opposition to the weirdness of the heartland. They very much believe that the heartland is broken and that if you could clear that up, if you could get rid of the unpredictability, if you get rid of the...in fact, if you could get rid of the symptoms of the unpredictability, if you could kill all of the werewolf trains and defeat all of the wax vampires and burn down all of the ancient tree gods and defeat all of the...or, I don't really...Mother-Beast is a weird arc. I don't...Mother-Beast didn't really have— I guess there were the White Flower Beast, right? Kill all of those, then things would get normal enough again for you to orient yourself by. And that ideology has been in Sapodilla for a couple of generations now. And, in fact, the Glim Macula are a few decades old and were created...I guess you probably wouldn't know why and when they were created, but they were created something like 50 years ago, let's say. Maybe less than that, 40, 30 years ago. And you know, did a bunch of demon hunting and witch hunting and et cetera here in town. But they were never as powerful as they are now, and in a big way, you can sense this as you move through the town. Not only has this paranoia grown among the city guard and among the Glim Macula, which has risen into kind of a controlling position in the town. But also there is a degree to which, especially if you are in any way outwardly distinct, you're getting glares. You're getting looks. People are shooting glances your way, as if to say, “Are you sure you're in the right place? Are you sure if this is where you're supposed to be? Huh? You need help? Are you lost?” You’re getting a lot of those. And I say “you” here, and I guess I'll figure out who that is now. Remind me if this is correct, people who got in via interview. Pickman you received access to the Sunflower District. Es, Marn, you received— is that it? Es, Marn, and Lyke, you received access to the Hibiscus District, all the way through, Sunflower and Hibiscus. You got the full marks. Good stamp. Duvall and Virtue, you also have Sunflower District access, though you both left dead people in your wake, which means eventually people are going to come looking. I mean, people are immediately going to start looking for who did this. More importantly—
Art: I hear it was someone else. [soft laughter]
Austin: Yeah, probably somebody else.
Art: I got a tip.
Austin: Oh, okay. You send that in? Yeah.
Sylvia: It wasn’t him. It was the bugs.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Oh yeah, that means it’s not his fault.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Art: I mean…
Austin: Virtue, you have a travel pass, a travel visa that will get you in but does have something suspicious about it we've talked about.
Sylvia: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Chine, you didn't make it through.
Dre: Nope.
Austin: Chine, you're in a dark place. We'll come back to Chine in a little bit. [Dre laughs] Like genuinely, you're in a dark place.
Keith: [overlapping] Emotionally or literally? Okay.
Austin: I can't talk to— Chine can tell me. It’s their emotions, not mine.
Dre: Yeah, no, I'm good.
Austin: Yeah. You're in a dank place. Your arms are chained and like lifted above you. You're not in a...you don't have a lot of freedom of movement. And you can't really s— I mean, you can see in the dark now, right? Is that a thing you can do? Am I wrong about that?
Dre: Yeah, no, I can see in the dark just fine.
Austin: Feels like a Chine thing. So, you are chained up and also in a in an iron cage. In a big room that is hard to...you don't you don't have enough context to know what it is exactly, you know? Those of you who just got in regular style, what are you doing? I know we talked about Bucho having a spot for you. Bucho would have been waiting for you on the other side, you know? So Bucho could just lead you to where he was planning on taking you anyway. But what else is going on?
Sylvia: I'm assuming regular style is for the people who didn't kill someone? [Ali laughs]
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: Okay, wanted to make sure.
Austin: Regular style is not the murderers, correct. Yes, yeah.
Sylvia: I thought so. You know, people have different definitions, so.
[Timestamp: 0:20:04]
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: No, I get it, I get it.
Art: I think it's unfairly prejudicial, personally. I'm in agreement here.
Austin: I think it's pretty post-judicial, actually. [laughs] I think I'm pretty much judging based on actions. [Sylvia laughs]
Art: [comedic disagreement] Mmm...
Austin: So yeah, what is...those of you who've walked in. I mean, or did all of you just meet back up on the other side and are like, alright, let's go.
Keith: Sounds ill advised, but not saying that that’s not what we did.
Jack: Yeah, I don't...I think we should, at least not right on the other side, right? Did we set a time and a day to meet in a particular location and be like, “Alright, once we're through, everybody go in our separate directions, and then we will meet on whatever street at four on Tuesday.”
Austin: Did you?
Keith: That sounds safe.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: I mean, I guess the first thing is who is staying with Bucho or who is being put up by Bucho?
Janine: I think Es is.
Keith: Remind me, Bucho?
Austin: Es.
Ali: I will.
Janine: Big Bucho.
Austin: Big Bucho! Big Bucho.
Jack: Two Step Bucho.
Austin: Two Step Bucho? Maybe you know him as Two Step Bucho? Big Bucho.
Keith: Big Bucho.
Austin: Biiiig Bucho.
Keith: This is sounding more familiar the more you say it, so if we… [laughter]
Austin: Buuuchooo.
Jack: Bucho, you know?
Austin: Bucho is, uh...Bucho.
Jack: Spent some time with the waxwork.
Austin: Yeah, was from the the Yellowfield arc, a big train Knight who helped escort—
Keith: Right, yes.
Austin: Shape Knight who helped escort that crew here and gave everybody kind of like tips about the the immigration interviews. And then, you know, was like, “Oh, I can put you up for a few days if you need.”
Keith: Right.
Austin: “I know a place,” basically. But I also know some people answered their questions while we talked during the full interviews that like, oh, no, you're going to go find your own housing or whatever. So I didn't want to step on that if someone had plans to like go to some...to come up with some other place, do you know what I mean?
Janine: I mean...
Keith: Yeah, in my interview, I said I was staying at a hotel which was at the time neither true nor a lie. It was sort of...
Austin: Yeah, mm-hmm.
Janine: You know, sometimes you go to a new place, you got someone who's gonna put you up, and then maybe while you're there, you find something better, but like you don't turn down the free roof right away.
Austin: Yeah, sure. Yeah, that's fair. Well, so the spot—
Janine: Gotta see the state of the bathroom and stuff first.
Austin: Right. The free roof, in this case, is in fact a hotel. It is in the Sunflower District. It is called the Golden Grackle.
Keith: That happened to be the one that was recommended to me by the interviewer?
Austin: I don't think it was. If I stumbled into saying the Golden Grackle…
Jack: Twice. [soft laughter]
Austin: Twice, then then it has to be that, right? And it's specifically like...Bucho has like a long term apartment stay. Do you know how like there's a class of hotel that just has like a long term stay option?
Keith: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: Bucho has that and chooses that over staying in the local Shape Knight HQ. There's another Shape Knight facility here in Sapodilla. It's one of the biggest cities in in Sangfielle. In fact, I think it's the biggest city in Sangfielle, and so of course the Shape Knights are here. But Bucho uses a lot of the earnings of being one of the most successful and out there adventurers to keep a kind of fancy hotel suite on deck whenever he passes back through home. And on top of that, because he's close to the folks at the Golden Grackle, he can also get a couple more suites or a hostel style bunk room or whatever y'all need, he can kind of cover that, you know?
Austin: Golden Grackle does already sound kind of like a weird candy bar.
Austin: Yes, I see what you're saying. I thought you meant a bar that you go to to eat candy at first.
Keith: Oh, not that kind of sweet. [laughter] Hotel suites?
Austin: Hotel suites.
Keith: You said that he gets suites.
Austin: Oh boy. Yeah, I meant—
Keith: It was a genuine misunderstanding of the word suites.
Austin: Okay. I see, this is not—
Keith: Not a pun. This is unintended.
Austin: I get you.
Keith: In the truest way.
Austin: Yeah. So you were led there, and you get a taste of the flavor of the t— of the sweets.
Keith: [laughs] Of the Golden Grackle?
Austin: Of the Golden Grackle. No, you get a sense of what the vibe—
Janine: Get a fistful of pillow mints.
Austin: Uh huh.
Keith: This is our signature Grackle. [Austin and Keith laugh]
Austin: It's just a little wrapped...now I want like, you know you can get like the Hershey's with almonds, which I don't really like that much, but it has like the golden foil?
Keith: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: It's like that. Golden Grackle. Anyway, as you're walking through the town, there is...again, there is that sense of being watched, but there's also just like...if you haven't been in a city before or recently, it is a different experience for you, right? There are so many people around. The Sunflower District is home to just countless little shops, entire streets devoted to market stalls, all sorts of different food smells, people cooking inside and outside. And there's another part of this district that is filled with and dotted with temples and churches to all of these different gods, many of whom you've never heard of, if you haven't, you know, studied the Boundless Conclave, this is a big Boundless Conclave city. And I think that that has been...in some cases, that has been tested with the rise of the Glim Macula as sort of the more out there temples and practitioners feel like there is added stress on them that they have not experienced before, because being part of the Boundless Conclave is supposed to be a sort of like, you're accepted because you're part of the Conclave. And so, you know, I'm sure there's someone who has like a blood god, and the Glim Macula are like, “Ehh, that sounds dangerous to me. That sounds like no good.” And if you are, you know the prioress of the blood god, you suddenly have a lot of negative attention that you did not get before. So, some of that. There are some disconcerting things here and there. You definitely see a person being hauled away by the Glim Macula, not with the wicker basket head, not the the horn of plenty head, instead just the white and blue kind of robes. Or a lot of the sort of like town guard version of the Glim Macula, instead of wearing robes, are wearing kind of more traditional guard wear leather but with the white and the blue, either as like a shawl over just the top of their torsos or as a tabard on the side of their waists. They pull somebody away you walk past who is shouting about the long moon, saying “The long moon is coming. The long moon is coming,” and you see them drag that guy off.
Jack: Have we heard that before? Is that like a…?
Austin: No, that's new. No, that’s new. You think that might be a new one.
Jack: No, but I mean but that won’t mean anything to us?
Austin: No.
Jack: Okay. [laughs softly]
Austin: I mean, you tell me. I don't know.
Jack: I mean, we’re in Sangfielle.
Austin: Yes.
Jack: I think if someone says “The long moon is coming,” and you're outside Sapodilla, your response is like, [concerned] “Whoa.”
Austin: That's correct, yeah, sure.
Jack: “Better keep an eye out!”
Austin: Yeah. And then yeah, you can kind of see in the distance the inner wall that goes into the next district, the Hibiscus District, which is of newer build. It's more uniform in terms of the masonry, right? And you can kind of see through, maybe there's a large gate in, and you can immediately see that there is a “other side of the railroad tracks” thing here. There's much more space. You can hear the sound of the waves, which are much closer. I don't have a map of this place, right? But if I quickly open a new thing—come over here, move us over to it—I can show you the general direction. And this isn't...we're not doing consulting detective, we're not doing Marielda where we need to have a really strong understanding of what these districts are, et cetera. But like, here's a map. I'm gonna draw a quick map of the town. God, how to explain— okay, yeah, so it's like, boop, and then like, booooop, right? [Janine laughs] And so the most inner part is Hibiscus. Then there's the big kind of— okay, so the people who don't, who are listening via podcast, on the far eastern end is the ocean, right? And then you have kind of a half circle up against the ocean, and that is the city. And right up against it, if you draw a half circle, you can then draw another half circle inside of it, like a little C, or like if you imagine cutting a plum in half and there's a pit in the middle of it, or a peach, or the core of a planet, right? That half core is the Hibiscus District, the bigger outer part is the Sunflower District, and so that's the gist of it. So you're looking in there. Which is to say, everywhere has...Sunflower District also has beaches, but they’re at the very north and the very south of this curve, so if you're not near them, you can't just like walk to the beach, whereas basically everything inside of my Hibiscus District, you can get to the beach real quick, and it's the best beaches, and those are closed off private beaches, right?
Keith: Presumably, not many are being dragged away.
Austin: Very few people are being dragged away there, yes, yes. And in fact, that means that there have been people...there's probably...you're able to...maybe you're not able to know this, but you know, rich people get away with more.
Keith: Right.
Austin: If you happen to have a little shrine to the blood god that the the priest of the blood god is getting shit back in the Sunflower District, but you are one of the richest people in town, no one's gonna give you shit for that shrine.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Or, at the very least, you know how to talk about it in the coded way that keeps the Glim Macula from giving you shit.
Keith: “Well, I was brought up in the blood church.”
[Timestamp: 0:30:02]
Austin: Right, right, exactly. [Ali laughs softly] “You know, I donate to the Glim Macula. Very supportive of your efforts.” So yeah, you're led to the Golden Grackle. You don't all get rooms. I think it's probably like...again, it's either...I think it's probably another suite, and between Bucho’s suite and this other bonus suite, you have enough couches and beds for those of you who didn't commit murder or get arrested to crash, you know? [Dre laughs] And that's kind of the—
Janine: Commit recent murder.
Austin: Right, exactly. That's kind of the setup. I will say there's some other people in town who you could bump into who you know. I think Dyre Ode and Chantilly Scathe arrived here ahead of you, so they're around somewhere. I know what haunts are here for you to heal up at. We can just jump right into that, ‘cause I know some of y'all are beat to shit. And I know that some of you have other goals. And you can start to talk to me about how you're going to pursue those. Who wants to kick things off with stuff?
Art: Can I kick things off with just a quick technical question?
Austin: Absolutely.
Art: My echo fallout. That's not...that shouldn't even be here, right? That’s...
Austin: Yeah, but let's leave it. It's not...yeah, it doesn't hurt you in any way, right? That's—
Art: And it’s not healable. I can't go to someone here and give them some—
Austin: We're talking about The Life Not Lived, “You meet someone from your past who should by all rights be dead,” right?
Art: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, that's immediate, which means it's already resolved. It's just nice to have it here. In fact, what we should do instead, Art...in fact, maybe I already did this. Did I do this already? I did. You see under Resources, I've now given you the Jolyon bond? Hmm. So we can delete that now, because I've made mark elsewhere on your sheet that you have Jolyon. [trying pronunciation] Jolyon? Jolyon. Jack, you named this character.
Art: Jolyon…
Jack: I think, Jolyon.
Austin: Jolyon exists. So, there you go. So there's your technical answer. Yeah, you can clear that. And so instead, you just have the Fascination luck and the Take the Edge Off, you can't get your head right. In this case, until you hang with your your bugs, to heal this, right?
Art: Yeah.
Austin: Or not to heal this, but in general, ongoing, “Until you reach a landmark with access to intox— “ this isn't intoxicant, but it's time to render yourself insensible by bug. Roll two dice when marking stress. I guess you do have this time now, right?
Art: Yeah, and to tie it into the new move I'm taking it—
Austin: Ah.
Art: They're gonna they're gonna turn my body into wax paper.
Austin: So is this the first thing that happens is that you're like, “Alright, bye,” and you close the door to wherever you're staying, and then this starts happening?
Art: Yeah, I think so. Also, I think it's also part of them being in charge when I was committing murder before.
Austin: Right. Sure. So wait, actually, sorry. Are you—
Art: You know, they get you through customs, but you’re wanted for murder, and your body doesn't exist anymore.
Austin: Right. So wait, actually, sorry. Are you with the Bucho crew? Or did you go hide off somewhere else while this happens?
Art: I think...well, I thought only the non-murderers were with the…
Austin: I was leaving that open to y'all.
Art: I think Duvall is going to is gonna need a beat here to like go through this little metamorphosis.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: And then Duvall’ll show up, you know, tomorrow.
Austin: Right.
Keith: Are you cocooning?
Austin: Yeah, is that what’s happening? You find a dark alley somewhere?
Art: I think it looks grosser than that.
Austin: Oh, okay. Well, we'll leave it there.
Art: [laughs softly] Yeah, picture cocooning, and then picture something worse. It’s that.
Keith: You are—
Art: Do I know what actually it looks like inside of a cocoon? I do not.
Austin: But grosser. Can you read me this move?
Art: Yeah. [reading] “You're reborn one of the great hives. Your body, though still mortal, is waxen and papery. Gain the Warren domain. You can fit yourself through any gap small enough for a bee by having your swarm chew up and reform your body on the other side. This process takes upwards of six hours. You can rush to get it done in an hour instead, but mark D8 stress to blood as a result.” So I would assume that the first time it takes about six hours.
Austin: I'd say give it seven, just to get it right the first time, you know what i mean?
Art: Let's say ten! ‘Cause they’re—
Austin: Let’s say ten. You know what, twelve. Measure twice, cut once, you know?
Art: Right, ‘cause they're not consuming the hive material right now.
Austin: Right.
Art: They're consuming a lot of…
Austin: You, yeah.
Art: Old legacy material.
Austin: Old Duvall. [laughs] Right. Uhhh. I love this game. Deep Apiarist, great class, fantastic. So, what do you look like when this is done? Should we save that for your debut? Do you still have to...what do you want to do with that?
Art: I mean, I think it's just gonna be, you know, it's gonna look a lot the same.
Austin: [amused sound] Okay.
Art: I sort of...you ever seen like really good paper mâché?
Austin: Yeah.
Art: I think kind of like that.
Austin: The best paper mâché person. Alright, well, you're off doing that.
Art: Yeah.
Austin: Who else is off doing shit?
Keith: So, i want to know...I haven't dealt with this yet, so I actually don't know the answer to this, but I want to try and deal with my fortune fallout. I do have minor fortune fallout.
Austin: Yeah. So, to deal with any fallout, you need to go to a haunt that can heal that fallout. So, we've dealt with this a lot with like, oh you go to the doctor to deal with blood fallout. For...was this minor or major?
Keith: Minor.
Austin: So you need a D6 fortune haunt, I guess. And let me look at my list of haunts to see if there is one here, because otherwise you literally have to stick with that. What is the minor fallout?
Keith: It is Foreboding: “Something bad is about to happen. GM, hint at an ominous future event.”
Austin: Mmm.
Keith: Sounds like the long moon to me. [laughs]
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, weird.
Keith: “Smoke in the distance, the tremors before a pulse, the frantic music of the carnival. This fallout can be upgraded to crisis.”
Dre: Mmm.
Austin: Yeah, so I think that there is a D8 fortune place here. I don't actually have one written down, but given the centrality of the Boundless Conclave, I think there is probably some grand Boundless Conclave hall, like some sort of...you know, we've talked a lot about there being, oh, there's a chapel to the Boundless Conclave, and that can kind of be used by a bunch of different people for different services on a kind of rotational basis.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Austin: But here where there are so many temples already, that means that a lot of those groups just do stuff in their own temple. So this Boundless Conclave one is almost like...it's almost distinct, and I think maybe even the worship here is distinct in that there is a sect of the Boundless Conclave, or this very small group, that does worship the Boundless Conclave as a more explicit pantheon of gods, right? Where you don't specialize into your particular sub god inside of the wide Pantheon. You do your best— and not that not that other members of the Boundless Conclave don't also do this in a broader sense, but it's almost as if instead of there being a sort of like, your patron god—
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: You are taking the whole as the patron, right?
Keith: This is sort of like a non denominational Boundless Conclave church.
Austin: I want to lean towards the kind of polytheistic thing a little bit more, because it is denominational, because it is this specific set. It's not all gods, right? Aterika’Kaal, not on the list. [Ali laughs softly]
Keith: Right, sure.
Austin: It is not like anybody is welcome. I mean, anyone is welcome, but you know what i mean.
Keith: Yeah, I meant within the bounds of the Boundless Conclave, it is...
Austin: Right. Yes. Yes, inside of that subset, yes.
Keith: It’s a more generalist.
Austin: It is the whole set, exactly.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: But the fact that it's more generalist actually makes it more specific, in a way.
Keith: Mmm.
Austin: Because very few people who worship inside of the Boundless Conclave have an encyclopedic knowledge of the Boundless Conclave, do you know what I...there's just too much of it. You might know a number of very important gods, you're not going to know every small minor deity that has been granted access, unless you're a scholar, right? And these are, in many ways, people who take that part of this seriously.
Keith: Okay.
Austin: And so yeah, there's some sort of high temple to the Boundless Conclave inside of the Hibiscus District.
Keith: Sure.
Austin: And that's a D8 fortune. You can you can spend up to a D8 fortune to heal fortune stuff.
Keith: Okay.
Austin: And in fact, sorry, if you're getting rid of minor fallout, that requires a D6 expenditure.
Keith: Alright.
Austin: So you're gonna go off to the Hibiscus District, look around, check things out.
Keith: Yeah, yeah.
Austin: Okay. So yeah, the easiest way to do this, Lyke, is to just tell me what you're spending.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: You need to spend up to a— oh my god, you have so much shit.
Keith: I have a lot of shit. I actually am looking at this list and being like, I don't want to get rid of any of this. That's where I'm at right now.
Austin: You have so much shit.
Keith: I do. And okay, so here's here's where I'm at. I have a new thing based on our last game.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: I have taken a new domain, haven domain. And with that comes the first time...what does it say specifically?
Austin: Mmm. That’s great.
Keith: “The first time each session that you use a haunt, your spent resource counts as one dice size higher.” So...
Austin: Yep. That's very good. So that means you only need to spend a D4 to clear this.
Keith: I only need to spend a D4. My only D4 is the Genburi statue!
Austin: How is this not the best place to spend that?
Keith: Yeah, well, I just like it and so I want it as a possession. [Sylvia laughs softly]
Austin: God.
Jack: Keith, you are over encumbered and you cannot run. [Keith laughs] They are not gonna let you fast travel.
Austin: Can anyone guess how many things Keith has between equipment and resources? [Keith continues laughing]
Jack: Nine.
[Timestamp: 0:40:00]
Dre: Twelve.
Austin: Dre got it. It’s twelve.
Keith: It’s twelve.
Austin: It is twelve.
Jack: Spend your fucking resources!
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: So what are you doing? I'm going to...oh, do they make change here? [Ali laughs]
Austin: [baffled] With what? No. No. [Keith laughs] They do not.
Keith: Okay.
Austin: Not with that attitude.
Keith: If I'm ni—
Austin: People believe this stuff!
Keith: No, no—
Austin: You know this.
Keith: Not with the Genburi statue. I guess it's hard to be like, “Hey, could you heal my fortune fallout? I have a gun, and I would like change back.” [laughter]
Austin: No, ‘cause the thing that's healing the fortune is the Boundless Conclave.
Keith: Right.
Austin: It's the gods.
Keith: Right.
Austin: They are not like, “Oh yeah, we got you. Here's 50 cents.”
Keith: Yeah. I will use the Genburi statue.
Austin: Okay, how do you use it? Do you like to place it up on a thing? What's your imagined...give me the picture of Lyke being like, “Things don't feel right. I need the Boundless Conclave to step in and kind of make things a little more right.”
Keith: So, I think that Lyke is someone who actually knows how to pray. Lyke has been to enough of these places, seen enough of the things, and knows how...as like, not technically a faithful Boundless Conclave...I want to say believer—
Austin: Yeah, uh huh.
Keith: But he is a believer! He knows that it's real.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: But is not like an adherent to the Boundless Conclave thing. But like knows about it, and so knows the basic steps of like, I put this here, this is where I go, maybe I'll, you know, light a candle or an incense or something. Maybe kneel like a little further back and then spend some time like, contemplating my fallout.
Austin: Sure. Thinking about the moon. Thinking about all the weird shit that's been happening around you.
Keith: Right, yeah.
Austin: Yeah. Alright. Yeah, delete that statue, and I will delete this Foreboding.
Keith: [sighs] Goodbye.
Austin: Yeah. The moon is not as not overhead during the day anymore. The sense of foreboding more largely has slipped away from you.
Keith: Right. But not the material foreboding danger.
Austin: Right, right. Alright, who else wants to wants to do stuff? Marn, do you want to talk about your stress?
Ali: Yeah, I was gonna hang back and hang out in the suite with my friend Bucho.
Austin: With your friend and new bond in fact, Bucho, right?
Ali: My friend and new bond, Bucho, and I've added that to my equipment.
Austin: Awesome, yes. So, a bond in this game is interesting. We haven't used them until now, I believe. [reading] “When you make a connection with someone or something in the heart, they can become a bond at the GM’s discretion. A bond represents a strong relationship, not necessarily an entirely positive one, but definitely not an adversarial one. And you can’t have more than three bonds at a time. If you want a new one, replace an older one as the relationship grows more distance. When you visit a bond, you could transfer stress onto them. Mind is the most common example, but other resistances are possible too—work it out with the GM. You can directly transfer up to D8 stress onto a bond each time you visit. You can also remove minor fallout results or downgrade major fallout to minor at the cost of D8 stress to the bond. Make sure to explain how the bond helps you heal or move on. Each time you transfer stress onto a bond, GM rolls for fallout on that bond. If they suffer minor fall out, they have a problem that needs solving and ask you for help. If they suffer major fallout, they're in serious trouble. If they suffer critical fallout, they are removed as a bond. If they are alive, they might really hate you.” [Ali laughs] You're very far from critical fallout with Bucho obviously, but you know, good to know the risks.
Ali: Uh huh.
Austin: So, what sort of stress are you looking to heal here?
Ali: I guess fortune. That's kind of my highest one.
Austin: Yeah, I think that makes sense. You know, the thing that's...I wish it was clear if this was a refresh, or if this was a...I think I would say depending on the bond, you have different things you could do, right?
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Like, I think fortunate and supplies make sense for Bucho, where he could be like, “Oh, are you missing anything from your pack?” Do you know what I mean?
Ali: Right.
Austin: Like, are you missing any key supplies? So I'm gonna say roll this, and if it happens to be high enough, you could split this into both fortune and supplies.
Ali: Okay, cool. So, i'm just rolling a D8?
Austin: So, D8. Give me that D8. Wow.
Ali: That’s a one. [laughs]
Austin: Unbelievable.
Jack: Oh no!
Ali: [laughs] It’s fine.
Austin: Well, and now I get to roll. No, I get to roll fallout for Bucho.
Ali: Good luck, Bucho.
Jack: Oh, great.
Ali: [laughs] Also a one.
Austin: Also a one, also a one.
Ali: What's going on with Roll20 today?
Austin: What's going on with Roll20 today? What happened? What the fuck happened? What happened?
Art: More like roll ones.
Austin: Roll one. Roll one-y.
Dre: Got ‘em.
Sylvia: Got ‘em.
Ali: Mmm.
Austin: Thanks. [laughter]
Art: They’re definitely got, though, don’t...
Austin: Uh huh. Okay, well, let's set up the beginning of this. And then I'll wrap back around and talk about why this...what happened.
Ali: Sure, yeah. The way that I was thinking of setting up the scene is that I think like, in terms of Marn and the work that she's doing—
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: She's probably like, going on each of these missions, you know, figuring out whatever the solution is, and then doing like a lot of note taking and like working through what the situation was to form data about it.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: And I think talking to Bucho is part of that because he was such a— Bucho's he/him, right?
Austin: Bucho’s he/him, yeah.
Ali: Okay. He was such a big part of like the crux of that. He was obviously a big victim to what was going on in Yellowfield.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: So like, there's important context that he has.
Austin: Yeah, so just talking through that has kind of like given you a little bit more. I think that there's a degree to that to where it's like, and maybe this is why it didn't go as well as you'd hoped, is just like, that's hard stuff to talk about. Bucho kind of is not...it's not...I don't think that you've upset Bucho in any way, but I do think that there's a degree to which it is difficult for him to talk about the time that he almost got turned into a candle.
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: And like he's able to give you more information about the place, and when he’s talking about the place, it's fine. When he's talking about Alloway, it's fine, and the people there and the history of the place, and all the stuff that like we've already kind of talked about this stuff. But all that is easy conversation. But when it comes time to like, get into his particular situation there, he clams up a lot. He deflects to go back to other topics. And you get the impression it's not just...it's not just oh, he doesn't want to talk about something because of the physical pain of it, but there's an embarrassment. He doesn't feel like he did...he shouldn't have gotten himself into the situation he got himself into is how he feels about it. He feels sort of like a failure about it. And in this way, I think, you know, we're not talking about mind stress here, but… [sighs] I don't know, you're the person whose organization has a unique relationship with Lady Luck. But I would imagine that it is not a lucky thing to tread on someone else's...to tread into someone else's fear and insecurity by mistake, you know what I mean?
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: So I think that's probably part of the limit. I had to double check the rules, but you have to get under a roll to get a fallout, so he does not in fact take a fallout, thankfully.
Ali: Oh, cool.
Austin: So I think you're good on that. [Ali laughs] I'm gonna look at the thing one more time to just triple check it here. Uh...mmm, wait, no, no, ‘cause it's less than or equal to, isn't it?
Ali: [softly] Noooo.
Austin: Less than or equal to stress, so I'm...huh. [Ali laughs] Less than...the thing is, the rules summary at the back of the book does not agree with this, but the rules themselves do.
Ali: Ohh.
Austin: The rule summary at the back says if the result is lower than total stress, and between blah blah blah, but when you look at the rules as written out in the How to Play section, it's less than or equal to, it looks like to me, so. So let's give Bucho a minor fallout!
Ali: I’m so sorry, Bucho.
Austin: What was this? This was fortune, right?
Ali: Yeah, I believe so.
Austin: There's something very fun about this. Hey, can you put in parentheses next to the word Bucho “Forboding,” and then colon: “long moon”?
Keith: Ahhhhh.
Sylvia: [intrigued] Oh.
Ali: Sure. I'm gonna put that in the tags, just to make it…
Austin: Yeah, that’s fine, yeah.
Keith: And this is why you heal fortune fallout at the Boundless Conclave. [Austin laughs]
Ali: Sure.
Austin: It is...I mean, the thing that has happened in this moment, you know, the intercut here is Lyke putting the Genburi statue up, taking prayer seriously here, Bucho doing his best to help you with this, Marn. There's no fault on Marn or Bucho's side here. But the best the Conclave can do is—
Keith: Move it.
Austin: —slide Forboding around. [Keith laughs] Yeah, exactly. And now it is outside of the window, as you're having this conversation, you feel the moon come up over the horizon early. It is midday. The moon should not be out yet, but here it is already.
Keith: Someone's gonna be forboded here.
Austin: I love Bucho being cursed by a fucking moon. [Ali laughs] The moon is always up wherever Bucho is, and like, that's not how it's supposed to work, but it's working that way. Love you, Bucho. Alright, who else wants to do some stuff?
[Timestamp: 0:50:10]
Janine: I don't know if this is an option, but is there an echo stress place?
Austin: There, in fact, are a couple. And I think maybe...maybe for you, it could be a good opportunity to run into someone you know, to find out that information. You are maybe just walking around town, like maybe you drop your stuff off, and you're like, “I'm gonna head out for a little bit,” like that sort of thing?
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: When you meet up with...you're walking down the road, and you bump into a woman you know, and in fact, I think you probably...you tell me. With a heritrix...if you meet a heritrix who has signed a new contract since you last saw them and they have a new host, can you recognize them? Or is that...does that require some...like, if you specifically know this person.
Janine: I think you can, right? Because to me, heritrix society has to be able to exist without eyes. Like, you know—
Austin: Right.
Janine: If they have unbodied presence, they still have a society. They can still interact and communicate in those forums without any sort of physical, they can't see or hear or conceptualize each other in any way.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: So I think you can still recognize someone.
Austin: Okay, so then in front of you, walking away from you, but you recognize the like, again, wherever that aura is, whatever that is, you recognize that there is someone you've known— you tell me how you how you know her. And you knew her as Sym, S-Y-M. Walking down the road, maybe looking at little market stalls. Looking at like, there's a market stall where someone is selling fabrics, like little, you know...what do you call them? What's the...spools of fabric? No, what's bigger than a spool? What do fabric swatches come on?
Janine: Bolts? Bolts of cloth?
Austin: Bolt. Bolts of cloth, yeah. Rare cloth from across Sangfielle here. [hushed] It's not rare. You know it's not rare cloth. [normal] But that's how they're selling it. And she's leaning over and looking at it. She is a Black woman with hair in braids, dressed not too dissimilarly from you. We're talking like high fashion, or a particular model of high fashion. We're talking about big, you know, a nice, colorful dress, big hat, feather in the hat, you know, kind of frilly. Young, probably mid to late 20s, I guess, somewhere in there. And kind of looking over the fabrics.
Janine: Okay. I think...so, I can imagine Es like sensing her as she comes around a corner almost, right? Like, that's probably…
Austin: Mm-hmm?
Janine: That's probably how on camera, you would underscore the fact that this isn't about physical recognition, is just being like, oh, you know, so and so is here. I say so and so because like, there's probably like a...you know, I have my theory about heritrix naming, and I don't think it's easily expressed in language, because I think it's about like...I think a heritrix’s original name is about the moment and location where they were like born?
Austin: Mmm.
Janine: So it's more like a timestamp than a name.
Austin: Sure.
Janine: It's like… [sighs] What's the information on a like, photo that your camera takes? What’s that called? I forget. I can’t remember.
Keith: Metadata.
Janine: Yes. It's like metadata. [laughs softly]
Austin: Got it, got it.
Janine: So I don't I don't think she has the reaction of like, “Oh, that's Sym.”
Austin: Right.
Janine: But I think like, you know, she comes around the corner and is like:
Janine (as Es): Oh my God, it's so good to see you.
Austin: I think she turns to look at you and is like...I'm guessing, did she know you as Es? Or I guess that's the thing, would she even respond to you similarly without using a name at this point?
Janine: I think it would be similarly without using a name, right?
Austin: Okay.
Janine: She doesn't know what name I'm going by right now.
Austin: Right, right, right. Sure. Your current, right. And she's like:
Austin (as Sym): Oh! You're here! In— I was just thinking about you, last week! How are you...what are you doing here?
Janine (as Es): Oh, you know, I'm just passing through with some with some associates, seeing the sights.
Austin (as Sym): Walk with me. We have a lot of catching up to do.
Austin: And you get...I think it's probably very basic catching up. Very similar situation to yours, you know, young host who wants to see the world, specifically is interested in arts education and like seeing and learning about painting and about music and kind of like the finer things in the cultural sense. And has taken the risk to take on a heritrix here. And in what I wouldn't call coded language, but careful language maybe, it's clear that Sym believes that the two of you need to be very cautious. I think maybe she says outright, like:
Austin (as Sym): How long are you planning on staying? Things right now, I need you to know, are not...they've been better.
Janine (as Es): I've gathered. The entry process has gotten a little, uh...unfriendly.
Austin (as Sym): Dear, the entry process is nothing. Come with me.
Austin: And takes you down some winding roads, until you find your way to a small restaurant with...has like a front room, but there's also a back room, and it’s like one of those...you ever go to a restaurant and you're like, oh, there's a little whole other— there's a whole other room? There's a whole other room in this restaurant? [Janine laughs] It's one of those. And leads you into the back room and sits down and like, you know, says:
Austin (as Sym): Order whatever you'd like. It's on me.
Janine: I think Es orders, uh… I don't know why I'm feeling such shrimp cocktail vibes today. But I am. [Ali laughs]
Austin: Oh, that feels very— you know, we're next to an ocean, so
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: That's doable.
Janine: If you're gonna get a shrimp cocktail anywhere, it should be here.
Austin: Exactly. It's fancy. They're big shrimp. They're like really nice, plump, very spicy cocktail sauce. The name of this place is is the Copperton, copper and then T-O-N. The copper ton, the Copperton. And the way that she's looking at the servers is like, there’s signaling happening here, right? Nonverbal, but not...mmm? Do heritrixes have a way of communicating silently?
Janine: I mean, I think that kind of goes with the like, recognition thing, right?
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Like, I bet it's one of those things that’s like, there's a social understanding that when you're in a body, part of it is like playing the role of being bodied. Right?
Austin: Right.
Janine: Where it's like, you know, you talk with your voice and look with your eyes, and you know, but there is underneath that also, like potential for, you know, other stuff. It’s just a thing that isn't done unless it's like really necessary or…
Austin: Right.
Janine: You know. It's not like gauche, it's not like a faux pas, but it's a little bit like...it's like calling someone on the phone instead of texting them.
Austin: Sure. Then I think that this is the equivalent of instead of calling someone on the phone, it's like letting the phone ring once and then hanging up, as if to signal “Hey, you know I wouldn't do this unless this is someone we could trust.” You know what I mean? And I think this server, you don't know the server, you've never met the server before, but— maybe it’s actually not the server. Maybe it's like the bartender is also a heritrix here. But you know, you get everything laid out and— or, not laid out. But, you know, the shrimp cocktail comes. There's other food. There's other drinks. And Sym kind of explain— I mean, I guess maybe the first thing here is the echo stress thing, right? I think that maybe she can tell instantly that you are...or echo fallout rather, right? You have this physical thing on you, right? What's the...redescribe this?
Janine: [laughs] So the thing I decided was that because it sort of came on as like a side effect of transformation and fighting in her true form—
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: That it was basically the sort of vitreousness of an eyeball has kind of lingered on her skin.
Austin: Right.
Janine: So she looks very...not quite oily, but also more than dewy, right? She looks...
Janine: Right.
Janine: There's like a real sheen there that like—
Austin: And you can cover that up with makeup to some degree, but...
Janine: Yeah, you can put a lot of loose powder on that, but...
Austin: Yeah, but now you're sitting down. You've been walking in the streets. It's a hot day.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: And I think that that she picks up on it and is like:
Austin (as Sym): Darling, are you okay? You look a little out of it, a little touched by something you wouldn't want to be touched by.
Janine (as Es): Oh, you know, I had a rough few days on the way here. The way things go sometimes.
[Timestamp: 1:00:03]
Austin (as Sym): Well, there is someone here in Sunflower who claims he can attend to such things, but I think we need to go out to Scorpion Town and see Old Alamae, get you cleared right up. More importantly, we need to make sure you get out of here as quickly as possible. This place isn't safe for us.
Janine (as Es): I would say it's safer for us than for some.
Austin (as Sym): No.
Janine (as Es): That doesn’t mean it's safe for us, of course, but...
Austin (as Sym): [quieter] I mean heritrixes specifically. They found a way to...we've lost some people. Sapodilla was never a stronghold for us, but there was a community, and now that community has been largely scattered. They never say the word—they find some other reason, some other heresy or illegality or illicitness—but it has torn us apart.
Janine (as Es): Well, that's certainly food for thought.
Austin: I think, you know, she takes a sip of her drink, and she says:
Austin (as Sym): We're trying to get to the bottom of it, but people just disappear. They bring them into the wall, and from there, who knows?
Janine (as Es): In light of that, it is probably better that we don't go to the person who uh, talks a good game about what they can fix.
Austin: She nods. So yeah, I think the rest of that conversation is broad, just about the town and about the safe places to go to and the roads not to walk down and the members of the town guard who are not particularly in with the Glim Macula and who you can kind of...not that you can trust, but that you don't have to worry as much about if you see them. You know, you don't have to like immediately go indoors, that sort of thing. And then yeah, you basically get directions to or say that, you know, she says she'll take you to this woman, Old Alamae who lives outside of the city walls altogether, which you can now cross in and out of because you have your travel papers. You don't have to like re-interview to come back in on this visit, you know? You can go out to Scorpion Town to visit this person whenever. Who else has stuff they want to do here? I guess, Janine, do you just want to wrap that now? Do you want to do that role and take care of this echo fallout?
Jack: Kind of?
Austin: Okay.
Jack: It feels weird to leave and come back to it.
Austin: Yeah, so then let's...you know, to sketch that out, you finish this lunch. You had outside. There are a bunch of little communities outside of the wall, right? Some of them are sizable. They’re towns in themselves or little villages. A lot of them are, you know, kind of ad hoc communities, lean-tos and tents and other small kind of community housing solutions. This is a slightly larger one. Scorpion Town is both one of the broader names for this place outside but also is a particular little village northwest of Sapodilla by, you know, let’s say it's like a 5-10 minute walk past the gates. You can see it from one of the gates, basically. You can look down a hill towards it. And that...it is like a dusty little place. Not a lot of greenery there. Lots of kids running around. Lots of people who are on their way into the city for work or on their way back or on their way back having not found work that day. A lot of people figuring out food for like a large group of people that night. You see a lot a lot of fishers coming back with like...I guess it’s midday so probably no one's coming back, but you can see that there is like fish from the previous day's catch, you know, on the grill, et cetera. And there's a small...one of the small houses just has like a painted eye. Probably not an eye, ‘cause the Glim Macula have now made that such a bad thing here. It's probably instead...what is it? It is a...what's a good symbol for like, you know, a psychic or a sage?
Ali: Like, a circle with some stuff in it? [laughs softly]
Austin: A circle with some stuff in it. Like a crystal ball, is that what we're talking about? Or like a...
Ali: Yeah, I think that's where I'm going.
Austin: That's the vibe? [Ali laughs] Okay, maybe it’s like a circle with some stuff in it, and the stuff is like arranged in a weird and interesting geometric way. And inside is Old Alamae, and she is a local...you know, a local healer but also a local oracle who can sit with you and work through specifically, gather the sort of forces necessary to address something like major stress, major echo stress. But I think it is like an almost...the process is some sort of oracle work. I don't know that she's doing...maybe she's doing...maybe she's doing a card-based, like a tarot style reading for you, but the process of the reading is what heals, do you know what I mean? It's almost like...it's almost like...it's similar in many ways to what Marn and Bucho were doing, right? In which the way in which you can clear a certain type of stress is by reevaluating and ordering something, except as she plays these cards in front of you, it's as if you are being reordered with and by them. So to get rid of a D8 or a major stress you need a D8 resource or up to a D8 resource. What are you looking for here?
Janine: I'm gonna spend my YVE Mining Concern scrip.
Austin: She takes it and burns it.
Janine: Great plan.
Austin: It is the loss...it is the consuming of that scrip and you losing that value which is turned into the sort of fuel for this ritual. Does that make sense?
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: [laughs to self] You know, does that magic thing I just described make sense?
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Okay. So yeah, she does that. She seems very nice. I think your reading is generally...it's the sort of negative you know, you know what I mean? This is like a devil you know situation, in terms of like, you're being told that you just got through a great deal of adversity and yet more adversity is to come. That you ought, you know, cling to those you can trust and whose experiences, who you trust can understand the difficulties you go through. That sort of stuff.
Janine: Be wary of ye lengthened moon, et cetera.
Austin: And be wary of the long moon, yeah, exactly. Yeah. I don't think she specifically is worried about the long moon. I think she's like, “oh yeah, if the long moon happens, I'll have to blah blah blah blah blah.”
Keith: If you’re not worried about the long moon, get real. [Austin and Janine laugh]
Austin: So yeah, there you go. Who else wants to—
Janine: Does that clear or does that just reduce it to…?
Austin: That clears it
Janine: Okay.
Austin: Oh, you know what, sorry. Yeah, that does reduce it, right?
Janine: Yeah, that’s what i thought.
Austin: Majors get reduced, so yeah, so that goes from major echo to minor echo. Hmm. Yeah, I like this. Here we go. It's Siren Song: “You cannot shake the thought of a particular place or person from your mind. The GM will pick a nearby landmark or NPC. If you do anything other than move towards it or remove obstacles in your path, the action becomes risky. Once you reach it, the feeling dissipates.” The sense of...you catch this as you walk back through...actually, I think maybe it started to whisper in your mind as you walked out the gate towards Scorpion Town. And here during this reading, as your flesh returns to normal, whatever this process is also kind of opens the door for those voices to get louder and louder. Or, they're not really voices. Again, we've talked about— we just talked about the way heritrixes can communicate. It is that style of the phone is ringing, right? If I said before, if we said before that it’s doing call when a text would have sufficed, and I said oh it's the letting the phone ring once, this is: the phone is ringing. The phone is ringing. There are people trying to reach out to you. You cannot pick up the phone. You cannot talk back to them, and they cannot send specific messages. But you get the sense that there are many heritrixes who are suffering somewhere in this town. And you think in the walls, in the walls, around the walls, the outside walls of Sapodilla. So, Siren Song. Who else has some stuff they want to do?
Sylvia: I do. I have a question that I feel like I ask every time we do downtime.
Austin: Please.
Sylvia: Which is: does the domain for the resource have to match the fallout you’re healing?
Austin: No.
Sylvia: Okay, cool.
Austin: No, not at all.
Sylvia: ‘Cause otherwise I'm fucked. [laughs]
Austin: What you need is someone to take the the resource, basically, do you know what I mean?
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: But your stuff, you don't have anything that's niche or dangerous or taboo or anything like that, so I think your stuff is all within the realm, you know?
Sylvia: Okay. Perfect. I feel like—
Austin: ‘Cause you're fucked up.
Sylvia: I'm very fucked up. I have...
Austin: Virtue is messed the fuck up, yeah.
Sylvia: Well, one of these was immediate, so I've got three ongoing fallout.
Austin: Okay.
[Timestamp: 1:10:00]
Sylvia: And then I owe something to Agdeline’s crew is another one.
Austin: Oh, right. I forgot about that. That's very good.
Sylvia: Yeah, it's an interesting little wrinkle.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: So, we mentioned the person who talks about knowing a big game about echo stuff earlier?
Austin: That person cannot get rid of major fallout.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: Echo fallout. You will have to also go to this card reader.
Sylvia: Okay. Yeah.
Austin: Which is fine.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Are you just waiting for...do we get the great scene of Es coming out the place, now hearing voices, hearing the calls of the heritrix, the other...heritrices? How do we say heritrix? What is a multiple heritrix?
Janine: So, I think technically it should be heritris.
Austin: Mmm, okay.
Janine: Or something, or like heritri or something. But I just strongly prefer heritrixes
Austin: Alright, then the heritrixes.
Janine: I'm doing it fully in defiance of how language actually works.
Austin: That's fine, listen. [Sylvia laughs]
Janine: I just like heritrixes more.
Austin: That's fine. Then yeah, you are feeling the pains of heritrixes in danger, in pain, and you've come out the door. And there, about to walk in, presumably under a parasol, ‘cause it's daytime—
Sylvia: Well—
Austin: Or are you waiting?
Sylvia: I was gonna actually say that. Is this open at night? Because I was thinking of once she's in the city that Virtue is mostly operating at night now.
Austin: Um…
Sylvia: And if not, then I can do this during the day.
Austin: I think this is open. This is open towards the night.
Sylvia: Cool.
Austin: Then, yeah. Then, you know, instead of that we get the same shot as the sun sets. And now you walk in, you know?
Sylvia: Perfect.
Austin: I just didn't know if we wanted a Virtue and...I mean, we could time that out to where that is the sun is setting as you're getting there.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: The sun’s just set.
Sylvia: I'm fine with running into Es still, I just wanted to…
Austin: Yes, I mostly just want an opportunity for Es/Virtue, if that's a thing that y'all want to do.
Janine: I wish it wasn't while Es was like bummed and distracted. [laughs] That’s not as fun.
Austin: That's opportunity. That's bonding.
Sylvia: Yeah, honestly, I feel like just through the connection that I have with Es and sort of like...there's like a fondness there that Virtue has that she doesn’t really have with a lot of people. [laughs softly] So I think she might actually be like:
Sylvia (as Virtue): Oh, my dear, I'm glad you got into the city okay—
Sylvia: Or, I guess we're out of the city.
Sylvia (as Virtue): I'm glad you're doing okay. Are you, though? [Janine laughs] You look very upset about something.
Sylvia: And Virtue’s face is hidden by like, I've been thinking of like a funeral veil type thing.
Janine: Hell yeah.
Sylvia: To cover like…’cause she's got eyes all over the fuckin’ place now. And I feel like that would raise a lot of a lot of red flags in a place like Sapodilla. [laughs] So yeah, you can't really see her face. But she like...I think maybe if they're close enough, she like puts like a hand on Es’s shoulder or something.
Janine (as Es): Oh, you know, [sighs] sometimes you just don't quite get the cards you want.
Sylvia (as Virtue): Hmm.
Sylvia: She just takes a moment to like think.
Sylvia (as Virtue): Well, let's hope that doesn't happen for me, eh? [Sylvia and Janine laugh]
Sylvia: Gives a little nod and then walks on in. [laughs]
Austin: Alright.
Sylvia: Like, she checked on her!
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Uh huh.
Sylvia: But like, you know.
Austin: Uh huh. Yeah.
Janine: It’s one of those things like, I don't know. You know, she hasn't had enough time to process it in which she could even explain it, right?
Sylvia: Yeah, for sure.
Janine: It's just like, I don't know. [laughs]
Janine (as Es): Good luck.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Like that kind of…
Sylvia: Yeah.
Janine (as Es): See you later.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: If you're with Sym, Virtue does not [laughs] even acknowledge...her? Or their? For Sym’s pronouns?
Austin: Her. Sym is she/her.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: Sym, i think...maybe Sym was waiting out front. Maybe Sym was waiting for you to finish to walk you back.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: That would make sense, so yeah.
Sylvia: Then she might not even noticed that you two were like, coming here together, then.
Austin: Right.
Sylvia: If we were both waiting.
Austin: Yeah, that makes sense.
Sylvia: I'm sure I'll find other opportunities to be rude to people in the episode. [Ali and Janine laugh]
Austin: Oh, definitely.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Alright. Virtue.
Sylvia: Yeah, so I need a D8 resource for this?
Austin: You need a D8 resource, yeah.
Sylvia: So, I only—
Austin: So, up to D8. You can spend multiple things to get up to D8.
Sylvia: Okay. And so, the way that works is I'm trying to...would it be one D6 and two D4 or...two D6, one D4?
Austin: So, important note: we have been fucking up our splits on these, in terms of the way that they add.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: It helps in some ways, but it hurts in other ways, if I remember right. We'd previously been doing it where we kind of did two D2s become a D4, two D4s become D6, two D6s become a D8, et cetera.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: When, in fact, it really truly is just a step. One step is one… [sighs] It's not one. There's one step between D4 and D6. There are two steps between D4 and D8. There are three steps between D4 and D10. And so there is, what, you need a D8? which is a...which basically means that you need a D6 and D4, or a D6...yeah, D6 and a D4, I think.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: ‘Cause they’re one step apart, basically, yes.
Keith: Not a D6 and a D2.
Austin: Not a D6 and a D2, but neither— I mean, this game doesn't even really have D2s. That's a fake thing that we came up with.
Keith: Okay, so—
Austin: But two D6s would be a D…
Keith: Okay.
Austin: Would be a D10, not a D8. But yes, the answer here is that you can use a D6 and a D4 here if you would like to.
Sylvia: Perfect.
Austin: You can't use a D4 and a D4, because the way the math works in this game that's a D— just, a D6 and a D4.
Sylvia: I have a D4 and a D6, yeah.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: I have this Shape-touched chalk.
Austin: Yep.
Sylvia: And the icon of Subsolum, is what I was gonna use.
Austin: Oh, yeah, sure, okay.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: I think that when you hand over the icon of Subsolum, she turns it around in her hand a little bit and like drags a nail across it to like chip away a little bit at it, and then opens a little pouch, a little velvet pouch, and slides it in and then ties off the top of it as if to like seal it. And she smiles a big toothy grin at you and says:
Austin (as Old Alamae): Your reading.
Austin: And begins to do one. So yeah, go ahead and clear both of those.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: The chalk goes in a drawer with other chalk. Shaped-touched, whatever, it's just chalk. I need to use chalk sometimes.
Sylvia: Oh, that’s gonna go great for her.
Austin: Uh huh. [Sylvia laughs] She knows what she's doing.
Sylvia: Okay, good.
Austin: She’s alright. So, give me your...or, i guess just that again decreases from a major echo—
Sylvia: To a minor.
Austin: To a minor. What's...so these are the eyes. This is eyes?
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: This is your eyes become wide black orbs, right?
Sylvia: Yeah, this is the...it's your eyes become wide black orbs or you get like covered in eyes and I think I went with the latter.
Austin: Yes.
Sylvia: Where it was like her wounds from when she died—
Austin: Right.
Sylvia: Basically all the stitching and where everything was like reattached. That's where the eyes are.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: It's kind of like filling in the blank space on her, is what i was thinking of.
Austin: God, it's so hard for me not to make this Follower and give you a little eye monster that follows you around.
Sylvia: I mean, I wouldn't be opposed.
Austin: [sighs] Does anyone have issues with a little eye monster? A little eye guy?
Keith: Uh, I don’t.
Sylvia: Twilight Mirage 2. [Ali laughs]
Keith: That's PARTIZAN. Oh no, not partisan.
Austin: Oh, fu— it’s Twilight Mirage.
Keith: It’s Twilight Mirage, yeah.
Austin: That's gimmick infringement. Gigment infringement.
Ali: Yeah.
Sylvia: Oh my god. Okay.
Austin: Mmm, true.
Keith: I don't mind. It's a different season.
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Sylvia: I do have another idea if we don't want to do the little eye thing.
Austin: Oh yeah, sure, uh huh.
Sylvia: We could downgrade this to Hex Eye.
Austin: Sure.
Sylvia: Which is the—
Austin: We’ve had Hex Eye before, but I don't mind double—
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: We’re at the point we’re gonna have to start double dipping.
Sylvia: There's also conduit, which I still need...I was looking for the like in-book text for.
Austin: “Your best efforts to keep the unreal energies of the heart at bay are futile. Your body is a crucible for strangeness. You cannot use echo protection.”
Jack: Oh, i have that one.
Sylvia: Yeah, and I only have one echo protection, so.
Austin: Oh, good. Great.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: Yeah, let's do that. Let's...mmm. The Hex Eye think is fun, ‘cause it's still eyes. You're still on eye.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: You know? It's still like, oh, well, you got those eyes under control, but your regular eyes, yikes. Let's do that one. Let's do Hex Eye.
Sylvia: Hex Eye? Okay.
Austin: And that means we're still in...you're still in the eye zone, you know what I mean?
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: So.
Sylvia: Yeah, exactly. Everybody wants to be in the eye zone.
Austin: How's your reading go? What's… [sighs] God, I think that the...hmm. [sighs] I think she sees— oh, I think she does...I think she gives you a warning that the one you feed will feed on you.
Sylvia: Ooh, okay. Hell yeah.
Austin: So, you know, just be cautious here.
Sylvia: Yeah. While it's happening, I guess the eyes just sort of like...recede back into her.
Austin: Yeah, uh huh.
Sylvia: It's almost like they kind of just became like a liquid and then everything closed up. [laughs]
Austin: Perfect. Yes.
Sylvia: Yeah. Okay, I'm gonna get this other fallout into my character sheet.
Austin: Alright. Who’s up next? Who else we got? And we gotta we check on Chine at some point. I don't know if that's now or if we want to save that for…
Jack: I would like to...I want to start helping Chine.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: But I think first I would like to talk to Bucho.
Austin: I mean, do you even know that Chine is even gone at this point or have you just not seen Chine? You know what I mean?
Jack: I guess we just haven’t really seen Chine.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Although, Pickman is not an optimist—
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: And so I think probably...yeah, i think, you know, Pickman goes down one morning, and Bucho is...I don't know, what does Bucho do? Bucho’s making coffee in the suite or like what's Bucho do?
[Timestamp: 1:20:08]
Austin: Yeah, that’s exact—
Jack: Worrying about the moon.
Austin: You nailed it. Bucho’s making coffee in the suite, yeah, uh huh. Next morning. Everyone kind of goes to bed, a little ehh. Chine, no one has come to check in on you. You're chained and caged. Lots of space. You start— you make out what you've eventually realized is maybe a long carpet. And there's some shapes on the walls, very tall walls. What else do you have the ability? You can make noise, and so you can hear this very echoey room. It's a big room. So you're starting to piece some little things together at this point. At some point, you think you see movement in the dark in the distance, but then it goes away.
Dre: Okay. I want to make sure we're not underselling my dark seeing ability.
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: Because I can see in pitch blackness as though it were full daylight.
Austin: Oh, yeah, you're in a throne room.
Dre: Okay, cool. That's fun.
Austin: You’re in a throne room.
Austin: You're in an abandoned, like deteriorated, dilapidated throne room.
Dre: [overlapping] For me?
Austin: No, [Sylvia laughs] you're in an iron cage like a pet.
Dre: Mmm.
Austin: Or like a novelty.
Dre: Okay.
Austin: And then also, inside of that cage, you are chained to two like tall metal...god, what do you even call them? Like, tall metal stands. You have your arms up, and then your your legs are shackled also, but your arms are outstretched.
Dre: Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: So that your arms have to be up all the time, which is tiring. It's been hours and hours and hours and you don't know where you are. So. You don't have any like special “I know where I am” abilities, right, that I don't know about?
Dre: Uh, no, I don't think so.
Austin: Okay. Sure.
Dre: I'm checking, but no.
Austin: Yeah, I don't think there's anything here that would give away—without like an encyclopedic knowledge of Sangfielle—where you are necessarily.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: So, yeah. I think you can sense that this place is a place where violence was done. Maybe they're old, old, old. I’m sure the bloodstains have washed away, but you're a Cleaver, and Cleavers have a way of smelling things out a little bit, you know? So, yeah. We'll come back to you shortly, Chine. Anyway, Bucho is making coffee! [Dre laughs] For everybody in the suite.
Jack (as Pickman): Morning, Two Step.
Austin (as Bucho): How do you take it?
Jack (as Pickman): Black, no sugar.
Austin (as Bucho): Ah, just like me. The Shape Knight way.
Jack (as Pickman): How you doing?
Austin (as Bucho): Doing well.
Jack (as Pickman): Worried about the moon?
Austin (as Bucho): No. The moon will be the moon until it is not, hmm?
Jack (as Pickman): Ah, that's what they say. Yeah. Look, have you seen Chine?
Austin (as Bucho): Ah, [uncertain sound] yesterday, but on the way in.
Jack (as Pickman): Mmm. Weird, right?
Austin (as Bucho): I suppose people have things to attend to, Cleavers especially
Jack (as Pickman): Nah. No, we'd have seen...Chine would have showed up. They'd have found something to eat.
Dre: A chair.
Austin (as Bucho): [laughs]
Jack (as Pickman): Like a brick or something.
Austin: [laughs] Uh huh.
Jack (as Pickman): Showed it to us. And I don't think they’re dead, because I don't think...I don't think anybody here would cause Chine enough trouble to kill them. So, I think that they are...you know, being held somewhere?
Austin (as Bucho): Being held? You think they would have been stopped by the Macula?
Jack (as Pickman): Yeah, why not?
Austin (as Bucho): Hmm. We could start asking questions. I'll put out feelers.
Jack (as Pickman): I, uh...you know anything about the Grand Cormorant?
Austin (as Bucho): [thoughtful sigh] Scathe, yes?
Jack (as Pickman): Mmm.
Austin (as Bucho): Not my cup of… [sighs] Something...I crossed paths with it once.
Jack (as Pickman): Mmm.
Austin (as Bucho): Set me off like a red cape and a bull, you know? Something about it.
Jack (as Pickman): And Scathe was with it?
Austin (as Bucho): Yes. Talking a big game, as if—
Jack (as Pickman): Shackled train.
Austin (as Bucho): As if you could leash a thing like that.
Jack (as Pickman): People keep trying, more and more. You got any working theories?
Austin (as Bucho): Hmm. I prefer not to think about things like that.
Jack (as Pickman): Mmm.
Austin (as Bucho): Leave it to the eggheads, hmm?
Jack (as Pickman): [laughs] Yeah, fat lot of good they've been doing. It's in town. I saw posters. And after what happened with the Zephyr, I'm wondering whether it might be in my interest to…
Austin: Did you break down what happened to the Zephyr to Bucho?
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: Was that like last night over drinks? You were like, “Hey, here’s the deal,” over dinner.
Jack: It’s just like a flashback to Pickman saying, “You are not gonna believe what's going on with Red Zephyr.”
Austin: [laughs] Did you explain the whole trip? The whole thing, the whole...like getting exiled from Bell Metal Station and Calen and everything else?
Jack: Yeah, I think so. Yeah, I think so. I think Pickman trusts Bucho and I think is prepared to put that out there.
Austin: Yeah. Okay, so I think that, you know, Bucho says—I think, in this moment, to keep us in the flash forward in the present moment—Bucho says:
Austin (as Bucho): And remember what I said last night. Be careful who you talk to about Bell Metal and Calen and...he's connected in difficult ways.
Jack (as Pickman): Yeah, I mean, once we’ve got...truly, Bucho, once we've got Chine sorted, that's...I don't have shit to do here, you know? People have come here for tasks, and I mostly want to figure out what's going on, with, with Calen, things like that. But it's hard to, you know.
Austin (as Bucho): Mmm.
Austin: Buho puts an arm on your— or, a hand on your shoulder. An arm on your shoulder is such a different energy. [Jack laughs] Hand on your shoulder and says:
Austin (as Bucho): Your friend is safe, yes? And then yes, this Calen thing, but trust me, your friend is okay.
Austin: And the moon hangs long in the distance. So, what do you...how are you investigating this Chine thing?
Jack: Oh, I know what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna go to a PI.
Austin: Ooh, okay.
Janine: Ooh.
Austin: Uh huh. Oh, do you mean, uh...phew. You’ve given me some names here for people that are not PIs.
Janine: Barwig.
Austin: Excuse me?
Janine: Barwig?
Austin: Bar wig?
Janine: [laughs] Like all one word, Barwig is like a first name.
Austin: [typing] Barwig, yeah, uh huh.
Janine: Like, Barwig P...
Keith: I.
Austin: No.
Keith: Barwig P.I., PI. [Janine laughs]
Austin: No.
Austin: Barwig P...
Janine: The only names I can think of are like Rockefeller, and that's not...you can't do that.
Austin: It’s not right. What's that card game? Whist? Is that the card game?
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Barwig P. Whist.
Jack: I mean, if it changes, I don't actually think I'm gonna go to a pie.
Austin: Oh.
Jack: I think I'm gonna go to the fucking constables. I think I'm gonna go to like…
Austin: Oh! Okay.
Jack: Like, a detective. I'm like…
Austin: So not a PI.
Jack: No.
Austin: Oh, okay.
Janine: A PI if the P stands for public.
Jack: Yes.
Austin: [chuckles] Right, public eye. [Jack laughs] Then it’s definitely Hardesty here.
Jack: Like, Corporal Hardesty or whatever.
Austin: Yeah. Uh, probably higher than a corporal, right? Sergeant? Sergeant Hardes— what was it? Hardesty? Yeah, Hardesty.
Jack: Is it like a...you know, like a...what's the police station like? People being brought in and you know, like, filling in paperwork, or...
Austin: No. No. No, no, no, no, no, no. That stuff is all...that's Glim Macula stuff, right?
Jack: Hmm!
Austin: The town guard, the constable—
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: —is like, “Oh, yeah, you mean Herin from down the way?” you know what I mean? It's like, it's a building that has some bunks in it and has some swords in it. And, you know, there's a big jail there that is...you know, I actually think it's a lot like debtors’ prison.
Jack: Oh, yeah, this is perfect.
Austin: Where there's like a little courtyard and like some some bunks for people who get arrested for, you know, being drunk and disorderly in public and get tossed in there. Like, but there are not good records here, you know what I mean? Yes, I'm pulling on specifically the TV adaptation of Little Dorrit and its depiction of a debtors prison.
Jack: Oh, yeah!
Austin: So.
Janine: I thought you were pulling on the [laughs] ASMR workhouse series. That’s where I'm going.
Austin: Oh, yeah. The ASMR workhouse series. Yeah, uh huh. [Janine laughs] Jesus. Anyway, Herin is here. Herin is a ojantani, [clears throat] very put upon. You know, shorter than...I've been projecting a lot of Otani is being tall and wide. We just got a wide one here. We got wide and furry. Sitting down. Not not wide and— like, let's be clear, I'm not like, “oh, this is a fat cop.” This is just like a put upon constable who, you know, has been trying to figure out what the new situation is with the Glim Macula, has given up a lot of...given up a lot of authority in relation to the Glim Macula as things become increasingly tied under this question of, you know, supernatural public safety, curses and hexes and whatnot. It used to be that...it used to be that you know, you got someone...you got a theft, and that was the constable’s job to investigate. Now, the Glim Macula says any theft could be tied to some sort of ritual, and they need to go investigate it themselves. So, you got Herin here. Big buffalo face, brown hair, fluffy, horns kind of turned inward a little bit.
[Timestamp: 1:30:04]
Keith: [laughs softly] A literal buffalo face.
Austin: Yeah, literal buffalo face. Yeah, yeah, yeah, to be clear. They/them pronouns. Harin Hardesty.
Austin (as Harin): Uhh. What do we got here? Shape Knight, huh?
Jack (as Pickman): You got a Cleaver in here?
Austin (as Harin): Cleaver, cleaver. What are you, like a cook? Huh? [loudly] Any o’ you cooks?
Austin (as other cop): [shouting back] I know how to cook!
Austin (as Herin): Are you a cook?
Austin (as other cop): I know how to cook.
Jack (as Pickman): Eh, funny guy. I'm talking about one of the, you know, big guys. Sword, axe.
Austin (as Harin): Ah, capital-C Cleaver.
Jack (as Pickman): Uh huh.
Austin (as Harin): Nah, nothing like that. [resentful] We’d know if it was something like that, because the Macula would’ve come and gotten them.
Jack (as Pickman): Oh yeah, the Macula, huh? You see a lot of them around here?
Austin (as Harin): Oh, they're everywhere, aren't they? Surprised they haven't moved in on your territory yet, Shape Knight.
Jack (as Pickman): What does that mean?
Austin (as Harin): Next thing you know, they're gonna s— oh, you know. Today it's your job to take care of the trains, tomorrow could be could be theirs,huh?
Jack (as Pickman): I don't like your tone.
Austin (as Harin): Oh, you're a big fan of the Glim Macula? You don't like that I'm talking down on them? You know what, maybe I should be careful. Maybe you're secretly one of them, huh, Shape Knight?
Jack: Ha. I can't...Pickman is...Pickman would not pretend to be a Glim Macula agent.
Austin: [laughs] No.
Jack: I don't know that that would occur to Pickman, to be like [exaggerated voice] “Oh, I'm here from the Glim Macula.” [Dre laughs]
Austin (as Harin): I don't have your Cleaver. At the end of the day, this is what it comes down to, is I don't have a Cleaver.
Jack (as Pickman): So, someone comes in, and they're they're a little too spooky for you.
Austin (as Harin): Too spooky for me.
Jack (as Pickman): Yeah, where do they go?
Austin (as Harin): Spooky which way?
Jack (as Pickman): You know what I mean. Like outside.
Austin (as Harin): Spooky spooky. Blick.
Jack (as Pickman): I'm sorry?
Austin (as Harin): I send word to Blick, Macula chief. Blick sends some people.
Jack (as Pickman): You know the Macula chief?
Austin (as Harin): William? Yeah. I know him is strong, but I know how to get a message to him.
Jack (as Pickman): Take me to him.
Austin (as Harin): I can't take you to him. I know how to send a message to him.
Jack (as Pickman): Tell him to meet with me.
Austin (as Harin): Tell him to meet with you? Only reason I can tell him to meet with you is to arrest you. You're looking for that, I could do that for free.
Jack: Pickman just puts her hands on the table in front.
Austin: [sighs] Give me a compel roll.
Janine: I like you said that in character.
Dre: Mm-hmm, yeah.
Austin: Uh huh, that’s...this is compel haven, for sure. This is the most haven place we've literally ever been to.
Jack: Okay, compel. And I don't have haven, so that's two die.
Austin: Two die. Not risky or anything, just two die.
Jack: Does this need hand eye coordination? No.
Austin: Nope. Oh, do you have a thing that prevents that from working for you these days?
Jack: I need to go to the doctor.
Austin: You should go to the doctor.
Jack: Yeah, no, I'm going to go to the doctor at some point. But I'm just gonna try and get arrested by the Glim Macula first.
Austin: [laughs softly] Yeah, you're on it. Great.
Jack: Okay, I'm gonna roll two D6.
Austin: Ooh, look at you with a ten. Extremely good. So is that— wait, what is the outcome you're looking for? You're looking for a meeting with the head of the Glim Macula.
Jack: No, I'm looking for a meeting with William Blick. I don't know if he's the head of the macula.
Austin: He's the chief. He's like the chief of the arm that comes and arrests people. Yeah.
Jack: Oh, boy. I mean, if I've been given this gift. I thought I was just going for some like local guy. I didn't realize that, uh...
Austin: I mean, it's just a city. It's just one city, you know?
Jack: Yeah, it is just one city.
Austin: Like, it's probably one of...again, it’s one of the biggest cities we've ever seen in Sangfielle. I mean, it's not the biggest, ‘cause the biggest is Concentus, right? And Concentus has millions of people stretched across an absurd amount of space, right? So it's not that.
Jack: But this would be like you've got a meeting with Lance Noble Orchid or somebody.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly this. Yes, a hundred percent. Like that's...for people who've listened to the Hieron stuff. That's the...in fact, I would say maybe bigger, because the Lance Nobles were what? They were very, they were like a handful of elites, you know what I mean? In many ways, this is bigger than a Lance Noble or whatever. This is like...this is someone who has lots of people who report under him, William Blick. And so I think with a ten that's a crit.
Jack: Yeah, what is this?
Austin: I think this is like...I think that the thing they say to you...what did I say this character's name was? Herin. Herin Hardesty says:
Austin (as Harin): I'm gonna need something to give, in terms of what the cause of the meeting is. [sighs] What do you got? What do you...what's the...what are the terms? Where do you want to meet ‘em?
Jack: Oh, wow. So, they're not gonna arrest me? They're just gonna figure out a way to make this meeting?
Austin: They’re gonna figure it out. Yeah, they’re gonna figure out how to make it work.
Austin (as Harin): Giving you shit, Shape Knight. Come on.
Jack (as Pickman): I got information. About the activities of the Kay’van spies
Austin (as Harin): The Kay’van spies? I mean, I would like some information about the Kay’van spies. That sounds like it's more my territory, all said.
Jack (as Pickman): Nope.
Austin (as Harin): Magic spies? What's going on?
Jack (as Pickman): None of your business.
Austin (as Harin): [under breath] None of my business. [regular volume] You know, okay. Maybe I'll take a quiet day. Not my business. I'm learning how to enjoy the new order, you know? Maybe it's a little more boring, less to do, but eh, less to do.
Austin: Starts writing a note.
Austin (as Harin): You got a place in mind?
Jack: [chuckles] Where is the Grand Cormorant right now?
Austin: Outside. None of the trains come inside the walls.
Jack: Is there a station?
Austin: Uh, Sapodilla Central or whatever, right?
Jack: Yeah, I mean, okay.
Jack (as Pickman): Sapodilla Central. Let’s do it the old fashioned way.
Austin (as Harin): [mumbles] I need a name here, Shape Knight. What should I put?
Jack (as Pickman): Calen.
Austin (as Harin): Calen. Alright, I’ll write that down here. Calen requests the presence, da da da da da. Okay. Alright, I’ll send that right over.
Austin: They take a second. And then like, with you not leaving, they go:
Austin (as Harin): [sighs] Jana?
Austin: And a young girl, you know, thirteen, fourteen runs over. And they hand her this note, and they say:
Austin (as Harin): Get this to Blick.
Austin: And they go:
Austin (as Jana): Right away!
Austin: And then open the door and head out and run into the city streets to go find...whatever way they have of getting this note into the hand of the chief of security for the Glim Macula. And that'll be like a tomorrow meeting, right?
Jack: Yeah, I think so. I need a little...I got errands to run. I gotta go see the doctor.
Austin: Yeah, of course.
Jack: I gotta figure out how I'm going to kidnap or kill the leader of the Glim Macula. [laughs]
Austin: Uh huh. Great. Good. Alright, anyone else have things here? Chine, you've lost track of time.
Dre: Hey, do I have my stuff?
Austin: No.
Dre: Specifically, is my egg gone?
Austin: You don't have any your shit.
Dre: Okay, cool.
Austin: You don’t have a shirt on your back.
Dre: Cool, okay. If I knew my egg was gone, I would have started doing things a lot sooner. Okay.
Austin: Mmm. Let's put it this way. You didn't know your egg was gone.
Dre: Yeah, no, that's fair.
Austin: Do you know what I mean?
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: Like, you are in a dazed and confused position based on what the Macula did to you in terms of the in media interrogation and then the kind of off screen activities thereafter. You don't feel like...you didn't feel like yourself until this moment. And now you've come to, you're in a weird throne room, you're stuck inside of a cage, you're chained to big metal bars. What do you do?
Dre: Okay. Can I tell...like how are the chains? Are they like locked? Is there like a big padlock on some of these chains, or...?
Austin: I imagine that they are...that they're just like bolted shackles. You know what I mean?
Dre: Gotcha.
Austin: You don't see an easy way to like...I don't even know if there's like a...like, in my mind it is bolted closed.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Not keylock closed, do you know what I mean?
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.
Austin: So, someone could come with like a wrench and un-wrench, you know, wrench them open, basically.
Dre: Yeah. ‘Cause I feel like my only ways out of this are… [sighs] I do have my small insect and animal swarm.
Austin: You do.
Dre: But I don't know how that helps me unbolt chains from the wall.
Austin: Yeah. Can it eat through metal?
Dre: [laughs] It’d be great if they could, but...
Austin: That’s you. You eat through metal. Yeah.
Dre: Yeah, I could eat through metal is the thing.
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: So yeah, I don't know. Can I get my mouth on any of this metal?
Austin: No, because the way you're...again, you...like stretch, make a Y with your arms.
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I got it.
Austin: That, and then you don't have any give.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: Your hands are just up there. So you'd have to pull them down, and in doing that you would have to be strong enough to— and we can make a roll for this. Do you know what I mean? I don't know what that is necessarily. Maybe it's endure, right?
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: But pull that in to try to like...and that's very, you know, it's very strong. It would be an incredible test of might, you know?
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: But I'm not saying— you should be able to roll it. I would let you roll to try to do this. [Dre sighs] I think it’s risky, because you're talking about like, potentially hurting yourself in the
process, but—
Dre: I'm gonna DM you a worse idea.
Austin: Okay, sure.
Dre: And you tell me if this is too gross.
[Timestamp: 1:40:00]
Austin: Great. Love it. Love the season. ‘Tis the season. Um, that’s pretty gross.
Dre: That is really gross.
Austin: I think that should be a— go ahead.
Dre: That's like— yeah. So, I think before we get to that, I think I probably try to shape shift and just see if me shape shifting…
Austin: Loosens the— yeah, sure.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: So what's that look like?
Dre: [sighs] I think it looks like normal shape shifting, as long as these chains...do these chains have any sort of like magic on them that would stop me from doing that?
Austin: You'll have to roll to take this stress to find out, Dre.
Dre: Yeah, that's fair.
Austin: Mark D4 stress to echo.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Give me D4.
Dre: We at heart level one, I’m guessing?
Austin: We are heart level one, yes.
Dre: Okay.
Austin: I'd already lowered all your protections.
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: As a reminder, Cleavers have a thing that give them minimum protection value equal to the tier of heart that they're on, so.
Dre: Okay, I am trying to remember how to roll stress.
Austin: Just slash— this is just— first you just have to get four more stress, so just roll D4.
Dre: Right, okay, yeah.
Austin: Or not four more, but...
Dre: Okay, one.
Austin: There you go, only one more, so put that into echo.
Dre: Well, I take zero ‘cause of my protection.
Austin: Oh, take zero. So then just give me a fallout test.
Dre: Yep.
Austin: No fallout, okay. So yeah, you manage to shapeshift. What's the shapeshifted form look like?
Dre: It's my like...I get longer and thinner and like more shrew-y, right?
Austin: Right. Okay.
Dre: So it's like, I think I get bigger, but it's not like muscley bigger like you wouldn't think of a werewolf.
Austin: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Dre: It is like, long and sinewy. Like I think I am...there's not like a mechanical thing that says I'm stronger. I think I am probably slightly stronger, but mechanically I don't think there's a way where it's like, and now you're so strong, you can break through.
Austin: You do get mechanically more strong. You get brutal as a tag.
Dre: Yeah, that's true. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s true.
Austin: But I guess that strength is...and that strength is—
Dre: And weird.
Austin: And weird.
Dre: Brutal and weird.
Austin: I think weird is bad for you, if I'm remembering right? Right? [Dre sighs] Is weird the one that you take?
Dre: I think when you crit you have to roll something for yourself?
Austin: Right, to make sure you don't...yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I think that that's correct.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: When you inflict stress with this item and roll the maximum amount, mark D6 stress to echo. Great. So, as you do this— I think your hands come free. You're able to get at least one hand free, maybe both of them, from the chains.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: Your feet are still locked in place, but those had a little bit more give anyway.
Dre: Cool.
Austin: But as you do this, a limelight hits you. A limelight is like a...you know, you've heard the phrase limelight before.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: It’s like a spotlight, a non-electric spotlight using heated limestone. From high up in what would be the entry way to this throne room, basically. And it's bright, it's so bright, after especially being here.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: And using your dark vision for all this time.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: It's like, it's dazzling. But you have this moment where you're dazzled, but you are, your arms are free.
Dre: Cool.
Austin: What do you do?
Dre: I would love to try and eat the chains that are binding my legs.
Austin: Okay. Is there a role for that or you just do it?
Jack: I knew it. [Dre laughs] “Out there, Chine,” I thought to myself, “they'll be trying to eat something great.”
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: Uh huh. I mean, it’s probably my—
Austin: Now it is time for an endure cursed check. Yeah.
Dre: I was about to say, it's my Red Feast roll. Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, it is. Endure cursed to avoid causing yourself harm.
Dre: Okay. Is this risky, dangerous, or standard?
Austin: It is not risky.
Dre: Okay.
Austin: Standard. You're good. There you go, nine! Take no stress. You chew through those. And as you chew, there's something weird about it. You chew through them, but the...you expect it to taste like metal. I'm guessing you know what metal tastes like at this point.
Dre: Sure, yeah.
Austin: And instead it tastes...there's a proteiny taste to them? [Dre laughs] Not quite meat. That’s not it.
Dre: Getting jacked here. Okay.
Austin: Yeah, it's not quite...it's not that. But there's some other sort of...this is like an animal product, for sure.
Dre: Okay.
Austin: But it has the consistency and it has— it doesn’t have the consistency. The consistency is wrong too. You pull away from it. Like, it doesn't chomp the way metal is supposed to chomp.
Dre: Is it like stringy?
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: Okay, that's gross.
Austin: Yeah. And in fact, you remember that you had gotten those sort of lines, those sort of like fishing lines, are what immediately detained you in the station when you were being interviewed.
Dre: Mmm.
Austin: When you failed that?
Dre: Yep, okay.
Austin: You realize it's that same stuff. But before you can like start working your way through that, again, you're still in the cage. You now see a figure in front of you, not quite at the cage door yet, but...you can't quite make the face out, but it's a humanoid figure. And they say:
Austin (as Gilium): Chine, Chine! Calm down.
Austin: And this is the voice of Gilium who was your mentor as a Cleaver.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: I think we've talked about this, and you said that you don't necessarily remember Gilium?
Dre: Chine does not remember Gilium, no.
Austin: Mm-hmm. I think in this moment there is something familiar and calming in the voice, though. You can roll to like overcome that obviously, but Gilium's immediate presence is one of like, [exhales] take a breath, calm down.
Dre: Yeah, okay.
Dre (as Chine): [sighs] Okay, are you here to get me out of this?
Austin (as Gilium): Let me take a look.
Austin: And is like kind of moving. What were Gillum's pronouns?
Dre: Um…
Austin: Or Gili— Gilium? Gilium.
Dre: Right, yeah.
Austin: Gilium, Gilium.
Dre: They.
Austin: They, okay. So yeah, I think they move their head around, and they're kind of like looking for a lock or something, is what it looks like they're doing.
Austin (as Gilium): If I can! What's going on?
Dre (as Chine): I'm being held. I’m in a cage.
Austin (as Gilium): I see that.
Dre (as Chine): Yes.
Austin (as Gilium): How’d you get here?
Dre (as Chine): Wait, how did you get here and you not know what's going on if you're in here?
Austin (as Gilium): I mean, I was following a creature and it wound its way up here. I came into a big room, and now I see you!
Dre (as Chine): What creature?
Austin (as Gilium): You ever hear of a kithgroom?
Dre: I probably have, yes, yeah.
Austin: Definitely. Uh huh.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin (as Gilium): Working its way through town and I tracked it down here, and you know. It's not you, is it?
Dre: [chuckles] With what I know about kithgrew, would I know that is possible for one to be here or impossible for one to be here?
Austin: I’ll read you the note that Janine gave me when— or, gave us when she invented kithgroom: There was a rumor about a creature that is born only when an unrepentant murderer disappears on a moonless night named a kithgroom.
Dre: Ah, okay.
Austin: This creature is only visible to those who love the person it spawned from, and it will not stop until it's killed every one of them. Es has not defeated one of these, because her taste in people is inconveniently good. [laughs softly]
Dre: Yes. Okay.
Dre (as Chine): No, it's not me! I'm not a murderer.
Austin (as Gilium): Well.
Dre (as Chine): I mean, I kill things. But I'm not a murderer. There's difference.
Austin (as Gilium): Hmm. Who...what’d you do to get locked up in this cage?
Dre (as Chine): [sighs] I tried to go into the city.
Austin (as Gilium): They arrested you just because you went into the city?
Dre (as Chine): [sighs] Alright, if you can't get this open, stand back and I will.
Austin (as Gilium): No, no, no. No, I think I see the…
Austin: Goes over to the back of the cage and is kneeling down and working on something.
Austin (as Gilium): Are you, uh...you here alone or you got some friends?
Dre (as Chine): No, I'm here alone.
Austin (as Gilium): Okay, well, that's good. Can't trust people these days. Just about got it.
Dre: Um...hmm. Can I see what they're doing?
Austin: Oh, yeah, give me a...I mean, you could see. Well, so yeah, the thing is, you're still a little dazzled. But so give me a roll here. This is a discern haven.
Dre: Gotcha, cool. I'm bad at this. Let's do it.
Austin: There's a five.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Take stress. You're gonna take echo stress. You're gonna take D6 echo stress. I'll roll it. Take four echo— take three echo stress with your protection. Oh wait, your protection went up. Why did your protection go up? Oh, you have a thing?
Dre: ‘Cause I have that In the Blood move that gives me also plus one echo.
Austin: Nice. Nice, nice, nice. Alright, well there you go. So only take two then.
Dre: That puts me at five.
Austin: And then roll fallout test.
Dre: Ooh, minor fallout.
Austin: Minor fallout. Okay. A lot of echo fallout today, folks.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: I think it's Conduit. It's Conduit. You can't use echo protection anymore. You turn to like see what the hell they're doing, and the first thing you notice is that where their face should be, in fact where their body should be, there is instead a sort of wicker marionette. A sort of rattan closely woven wooden person has been moving here in the clothing of your old mentor Gilium. And they look up at you, and their face is...it's not hollow the way the Glim Macula interrogators were, but it is concave. Like, it does dip in where the face part should be. And now, because they moved behind you towards the throne part of the throne room, they are now caught in that same limelight, and so you can see this kind of wooden figure. And when they stand up, now having seen you, it is as if they're being moved by puppet string. It is as if they're being moved like a marionette, and they just look right at you. And as that's happening, the thing that you don't notice is the slow movement of one of these pieces of hair—that is what the chains were made out of, that is what the line that held you down was made out of, that is what the marionette string is made out of—slowly creeping its way up your body and into your ear. And when it enters your ear, you have an experience that is...I would say that in many ways, it is the opposite of approaching the Course. You know, the Course is flowing, and you enter into it, and you catch what you can catch while you're there. Everything is open ended, everything has as many answers as there could be, as many new perspectives. This is a prodding deep attack and an inquisition in your mind that opens you up for lines of questioning that you cannot refuse in this moment, that's digging deep into you. And in fact, here you realize, tickling in your brain, like to the left of your ear, there's a physical sensation to this. You realize that they got Gilium from doing this while you were knocked the fuck out. They like found a way to get you...they found some way to calm you down enough to begin with, as like, that's our first line of inquiry here. Our first line of attack is to find someone that this person trusts enough to put in the room with them so that we can do it again and go harder this next time. And so in this moment, there is...you are wracked with pain. And let me be clear, like this is not the only hair thing. The rest of those shackles have now begun to rewrap around you in this moment. They haven't completely like locked you back down—because this is about removing your Echo stress and allowing you to...I mean, you hard failed this—and getting some questions in, and so there's a voice whispering in your head in this point. And at this point, she just says:
Austin (as interrogator): [raspy voice] I'll ask again. Who are you traveling with?
[Timestamp: 1:51:54]
Dre: Heugh. Gross. Okay. First, really quick. Does minor fallout clear the stress or is that only major?
Austin: Minor fallout clears your echo stress, correct.
Dre: Okay, gotcha.
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: This is actually the first time I've had fallout, so I couldn't remember.
Austin: Oh, wow.
Keith: Wow, I thought I was the last one.
Austin: Wow! Wild. Same.
Dre: Nope.
Austin: Does anybody else not have had fallout? Everyone else has had fallout, right?
Sylvia: Yeah, no, I’ve had so much fallout. [Austin and Dre laugh]
Art: I think I'm still winning the fallout race, but, uh… [Austin laugh]
Dre: Yeah. Okay.
Austin: So, they asked you who you were traveling with.
Dre: Right. And I guess, I mean, I could try to not answer this, but it would be another roll to resist, right?
Austin: At this point you're rolling to resist these questions, yeah. You'll be taking echo stress for each time you resist it. Though I will count a resist as them moving on from the question, do you know what I mean?
Dre: Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll answer this one, and I would like to use the chance of answering that to make another move.
Austin: Yeah, sounds good.
Dre: I want to use...I have a adoring swarm of small animals and insects that are drawn to me.
Austin: Right.
Dre: While I'm answering this question, they start chewing up the marionette.
Austin: Sure, what do they do? What's the effect you're looking for here, basically?
Dre: Tear this thing apart.
Austin: Okay, sure. That starts to happen.
Dre: Okay.
Austin: And what is your answer to the question?
Dre (as Chine): I was traveling with Bucho. It was his idea to come here.
Austin: Damn, everyone just ratting out Bucho.
Dre: I mean, I don't care! [laughs]
Austin: Damn! Alright. They say— or she says in your voice— or in your in your ear. She says:
Austin (as interrogator): Tell me what is the course.
Dre: Boy, I don't even know how I would answer go about answering that question.
Austin: Yeah, uh huh. [Dre laughs] Pain, pain pain. Sometimes people who are torturing you do not care that you don't have a good answer.
Dre: Yeah, no, fair.
Austin: Right?
Dre: Yeah, I don't think Chine can answer that question right now.
Austin: So you don't say anything at all? You resist saying anything? Is this another roll to resist?
Dre: Yeah, I guess so.
Austin: Alright. Take two echo fallout, or stress, and then roll your fallout test. No fallout. The hair has begun to try to wrap around you more tightly now, forming not shackles but a sort of suit of...almost like an iron maiden around you honestly, minus the— not the spiked iron maiden, but like a sort of suit of armor that does not have joints. And it asks you another question. And this time it says:
Austin (as interrogator): What is the Mother-Beast?
Dre: Hmm, okay. I was hoping upon destroying this marionette person—
Austin: Oh yeah.
Dre: —that I would get a moment of not questions, but nah.
Austin: This is— no.
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: I mean, and this is the thing. Maybe she should even say explicitly like:
Austin (as interrogator): [amused] Do you think by killing the puppet you heard the puppet master?
Dre: She does have a good point. Okay. I'll answer that. While I'm answering that, I want to chew through the the bars of the cage.
Austin: Oh yeah. Give me another endure.
Dre: Okay.
Austin: Endure cursed, right? That's the thing? There's a fucking crit! Extremely good. Hard crit, two tens.
Dre: Phew!
Austin: Yeah, you're chewing through these as you're— so, are you ignoring this at this point? Or are you— you’re speaking—
Dre: No, I mean, I'll tell her about the Mother-Beast, that’s...
Austin: Okay, yeah, what do you say? How do you explain it?
Dre: [sighs] Boy, how the hell...how do I explain it? That was a long time ago. [laughs]
Dre (as Chine): [sighs] I mean, the Mother-Beast is just...it is a deified creature back in Blackwick that is worshipped by a group of nuns.
Austin: Mmm. The hair continues to grow tighter and tighter around you. And finally, it says— actually, two things happen at once. Now that you're out of the limelight spotlight that was on you, your vision starts to return. You know, you're in a pitch black place. Not pitch black anymore, ‘cause now the light is bouncing around because of limelight. But you're you're able to adjust your vision back and kind of gain your senses. And now you see, having come in the door in the time since you first, you know, began to free yourself, are eight more of these wicker figures. And all of their arms are outstretched, and you immediately recognize a bunch of them in terms of their outfits. One of them is dressed like Duvall, two of them are dressed like your parents, one of them is dressed like Dayward YVE, one of them is dressed like Bucho. It's like a bunch of people who've been pulled from your mind, and who they would have tried to use on you if Gilium hadn't worked, right?
Dre: Mmm.
Austin: And they they have their arms outstretched as if looking for an embrace. But they're also all like lined up with each other, so it looks like they're also just like arms out like holding each other's— not holding each other's hands, but their arms are like touching, you know? And the question comes into your ear here, and at this point, we see the hair leave your other ear, and it says or it asks, she asks:
Austin (as interrogator): How do I use the egg?
Dre: Okay. At this point, I would like to un-shapeshift.
Austin: Mmm.
Dre: And in doing so, the shape of my skull itself changes including my eardrums and everything.
Austin: Sure.
Dre: And I'm trying to just snap the...
Austin: Snap the hair, basically.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Yeah, sure. I think that is a endure or evade or something to do this right. But I'll let this be cursed. I think it's cursed. I think this is a cursed moment.
Dre: [laughs] It seems pretty cursed!
Austin: You’re in haven, but your transformation i think is cursed, so I would say that this is...and I think this is risky. This is a risky thing to be fucking around with.
Dre: Sure. Yeah, totally.
Austin: That is an eight. Take no stress. You snap back to your regular form. The hair floats down to the ground, breaks off and floats to the ground. The rest of it snakes away from you. And you've broken connection to this puppet master. In front of you, the eight marionettes begin to walk closer and closer to you, and your keen vision can see something moving down the strings that controls them. It is some sort of liquid.
Dre: Hmm. Like, that is on the strings themselves?
Austin: Yeah. You know, without a second...you know, it is…
Dre: But like the strings themselves look wet.
Austin: The strings look wet, yeah. Something is running down the string.
Dre: Okay. I really...I don't know. I think I want to just dodge past these and follow the strings.
Austin: Yeah, give me an evade, an evade haven. Oh, the strings go up. They go up to the roof of this tall throne room.
Dre: Ah, okay.
Austin: The strings are...they're marionettes, for all intents and purposes.
Dre: Gotcha. Okay, well, then I'll just...Is there a door nearby or anything?
Austin: Behind them, yeah.
Dre: Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[Timestamp: 2:00:00]
Austin: So you have to like push through them.
Dre: I just wanna get past them and get to the door, yeah.
Austin: Yeah, give me evade haven. Again, risky. You're deeply outnumbered here. There's a five. Take stress. As you try to push past the first one, you find them much stronger than you expected them to be, and you try to like duck below them, but the moment you do the liquid hits them. And as it does, coming down the line is a sprout of fire. And these wicker figures close their arms around you in a circle, not hugging you, but boxing you in and lighting on fire. And it's a strange blue fire, like the fire of the of the Glim Macula candle was during the interrogation. And it shocks you to your core. The light completely overwhelms you. If you thought you were dazzled before by the light, here is something entirely different. Take six echo stress.
Dre: Ooh.
Austin: And then roll fallout again. You got a five, to be clear. I don't know if I said that out loud.
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alright. And I'm rolling this for all stress, right?
Austin: All stress always, yeah. There’s your major fallout.
Dre: Yeah, there it is.
Austin: There is your echo major fallout! Big echo fallout day, here on Friends at the Table. [someone imitates air horn sound] Phew. Alright, so first things first. We're gonna cut away from you at this point. This is gonna be…
Dre: Yeah, totally, totally.
Austin: You're getting knocked the fuck out. You almost got out but did not manage to. I guess, first of all, take that “Take major echo fallout” beat.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: And then, whew, buddy. Ooh, buddy.
Dre: There's some cool ones on here.
Austin: I was...earlier, I was like, oh yeah, wow, echo, that's really...I said to Janine, I was like, you'll know if it's major. Hey, your organs and bones don't make sense anymore. [Sylvia and Keith laugh] [reading] “You no longer remove stress from blood or remove blood fallout at haunts or through the use of medical kits. This shows itself in some outward fashion: unusual growths bulging under your skin, words appearing as bruises, black blood, and so on.” This is like your immediate...your body recoils from the light, and the pain of it knocks you the fuck out. This fire is built to kill things like you, things that go beyond what they think is acceptable.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: And of course, I think in this moment, you can feel it very clearly that this is power from a thing not like them. They are not using...this is not like clean magic, so to speak, do you know what I mean?
Dre: Sure, yeah, no, why would it be? [laughs]
Austin: Yeah, exactly.
Dre: I've seen bad guys before. [laughs]
Austin: Yeah. Oh yeah, you've heard of bad guys? Okay, yeah. Whoops, I put this under your...I put this under...yeah, you got it over there. I put it as a move. That's not right.
Dre: [laughs] Move: your organs are fucked up now.
Austin: Your organs are all fucked up now.
Dre: You know what, to be fair, sounds like a Chine move. [laughs]
Austin: It does sound like a Chine move. So yeah, Reconfigured Physiology. It's major echo fallout. You can no longer remove stress from blood or remove blood fallout at haunts or through the use of medical kits. Do you know what the outward fashion is? What the medical or the body change is?
Dre: Oh. I think what happens is that in response to that blood…
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Dre: Chines body unwillingly, like starts to shapeshift again.
Austin: Right, sure.
Dre: But like, parts of his body can't keep up.
Austin: Right.
Dre: So I think it's like, bones stretching skin.
Austin: Yeah. So just like a third form, a form that is neither—
Dre: [sighs] Yeah.
Austin: —the comforting and more humanoid nor shrewlike form.
Dre: Yeah. Yeah.
Austin: Asymmetrical and unfinished.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: And yeah. Alright. There's Chine, everybody. Does anyone have anything less body horrory to do?
Jack: I want to go to a doctor just real quick. [Austin and Dre laugh]
Dre: Just real quick!
Art: So no, you don't have… [Austin laughs]
Jack: I mean, just like nice and easy. I don't need a magical doctor. I just need a regular doctor.
Austin: You just need a regular doctor.
Keith: Oh—
Austin: What's the thing you're trying to get rid of here? I have a minor fallout Battered, which I got from trying to board a train.
Keith: I can fix you up.
Austin: Right, sure.
Jack: Can you remove fallout?
Keith: Mmm…
Austin: No, you can remove stress, right, Lye?
Keith: Just stress.
Austin: I think it's just stress.
Keith: Yes, you're right.
Austin: It depends on the fallout, right? ‘Cause the thing you're talking about is not just the heal, it’s the...
Keith: It’s the move, yeah. So the move that I have, I think can remove some kinds of fallout.
Austin: Yeah, I think it's like we play it by ear based on if it makes sense or not.
Keith: Yeah, and I think this one does.
Austin: What's the fallout?
Jack: It's a minor blood fallout.
Keith: For Battered.
Austin: What is it?
Jack: Battered.
Austin: Yeah, I think that Lyke could fix you up for that, if you want to use that move. It’s once per session, right?
Keith: If you wanted to do a scene at a doctor, that's totally fine, but I also could...
Austin: Yeah, if you want to go to Dr. Fergus Alterri's [sic] whirlwind clinic, [Keith laughs] you can do that, but you don't need to.
Jack: I don’t need to.
Dre: If you want to see Dr. Fergie.
Austin: Yeah. If you want to not spend a resource.
Art: Where good patients don’t cry. [Austin laughs]
Jack: Yeah, I don't want to...I don't want to spend a resource.
Austin: Yeah, then just let Lyke fix you up.
Jack (as Pickman): How's it going, Lyke?
Keith (as Lyke): Good, yeah. Good.
Jack (as Pickman): Yep. This again, no spiders.
Keith (as Lyke): No spiders, yeah. It's always no spiders, but it always is spider webs.
Jack (as Pickman): Uh huh.
Keith (as Lyke): Spider web looking. Looking like spider webs.
Jack (as Pickman): Mm-hmm.
Keith (as Lyke): You want it?
Jack (as Pickman): Well, yep. Nope, go for it. Just, uh...mm-hmm. You having a good time in Sapodilla?
Keith (as Lyke): Um, I haven't… [Austin chuckles] I mean, it's...yeah. It's nice to be...it's kind of nice to be in a city, but I wish it was almost any other one.
Jack (as Pickman): Mmm.
Keith (as Lyke): Yeah.
Jack (as Pickman): Mm-hmm. We done?
Keith (as Lyke): I should start charging you for these.
Jack (as Pickman): Oh, no, you don't need to do that.
Keith (as Lyke): No, I don't need to.
Austin: Is this not a roll? I thought this was a mend roll. Is this not a mend roll?
Keith: So, it is not a role. Last time we did this, you were like, “You should really roll for this,” but I—
Austin: I think you should roll for getting rid of fallout.
Keith: Okay.
Austin: Because healing is a roll. I think the thing about the move— the thing about the move is—
Keith: It’s written poorly if it wants me to roll.
Austin: It's once per session. You can fix someone or something in a matter of seconds, even when it would usually take hours of careful work.
Keith: But you're saying that…
Austin: I think it’s fallout. We're not talking about do D4 reduce stress. I guess it's a move.
Keith: It’s a move.
Austin: I think it needs a roll. I really do. I really...to remove fallout.
Keith: It's once per session is why I I'm like...
Austin: Yeah, but that's...but fallout is such a big thing.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: I think once per— because, just to be clear, you can't remove fallout without going to a haunt, normally.
Keith: Right, yeah.
Austin: Like, normally you have to be in a city to get rid of fallout at all.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: You can't do it on the road. So letting you do that and to do it without spending a resource?
Keith: Okay.
Austin: That's already huge. So I think it has to be a mend. And you're good at mend. It's not like you're not good at mend.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: You have haven. This is a full roll. Like, you’re getting a good roll out of it.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: But I don't think you can reduce...I don't think you can get rid of fallout as a freebie.
Keith: Alright, so…
Austin: Mend plus domain to da da da da da...
Keith: And haven.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah.
Keith: And...it’s gonna go fine.
Austin: It’s gonna go fine.
Keith: Hmm, okay. Hmm...I have my—
Austin: Uh huh.
Keith: I do have Sacrifice. But I don't have anything good occult to destroy, so nevermind.
Austin: To get rid of, yeah, to get protection here.
Keith: I do have...you know what? I can always get one of these again—I'm saying—but I have my box of probably useless magical trinkets which is occult D2.
Austin: Uh huh.
Keith: That was...okay.
Austin: Yeah, roll the D2.
Keith: Okay, roll.
Austin: There's a nine, no stress. Look at you. Totally fine. Does it in seconds.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Best doctor we’ve ever had.
Keith: I feel like I've always healing Jack's characters really well, and you can't prove that that's not true. [laughs]
Austin: Oh, yeah. Uh huh, that's never...no, it's never gone bad ever. [Sylvia laughs] Ever! I can't think of a time anyway. So yes, goes great. You can get rid of that battered.
Jack: Done!
Jack (as Pickman): Thanks, Lyke.
Keith (as Lyke): You're welcome.
Jack (as Pickman): I got a meeting with the head of the Glim Macula tomorrow.
Keith (as Lyke): What? You're meeting with the...you're meeting with the bad guys?
Jack (as Pickman): I drew him out.
Keith (as Lyke): You drew him out.
Jack (as Pickman): He thinks he's gonna meet Calen at the train station.
Keith (as Lyke): Okay. Why? Why did you do that? [Austin chuckles]
Jack (as Pickman): Were you in Bell Metal with us?
Keith (as Lyke): Yeah.
Jack (as Pickman): These people cannot be allowed to continue doing what they're doing.
Keith (as Lyke): But they're not here. You're here.
Jack (as Pickman): I don't understand. [Jack laughs] I don't understand what you're asking me.
Keith (as Lyke): You pretended to be Calen to draw out the bad— to draw out the cops.
Jack (as Pickman): Uh huh.
Keith (as Lyke): Because— but they can't arrest Calen, ‘cause Calen's not here, you're here.
Jack (as Pickman): Yeah, no, I'm g— the Glim Macula and Calen are the same entity, Lyke.
Keith: Wait, is that...is that true in reality?
Jack: Yeah, right? Calen's efforts with Zevunzolia are at least adjacent to Macula efforts, right, Austin?
Austin: There— yes. The group by which...it seems as if Calen...Calen received a letter that had both the sigil of the Glim Macula and Zevunzolia, the seventh...
Keith: Oh, sorry. I'm confusing the names. I'm thinking of the short...the leader. What was the leader’s name? Erm.
[Timestamp: 2:10:03]
Austin: Erm.
Keith: I'm thinking of erm.
Jack: Oh, yeah, no.
Keith: Yeah, sorry, yeah. That’s my bad.
Austin: Yeah, no, Erm is fine. I mean, Erm has issues certainly, but Zevunzolia—
Keith: Okay.
Austin: The Wrights of Zevunzolia are like the utopia people.
Keith: Right, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: And and there seems to be...effectively, they seem to be...whether they're part of the Glim Macula, I think it's probably much more likely and you’re wise enough know this—
Jack: They’re like acting alongside.
Austin: Yes. Or have infiltrated or a part of, they have people inside of it also, you know?
Keith: Okay. So, Calen, get it, got it. Yeah, fuck Calen.
Austin: Calen the bad one.
Keith: Calen is—
Austin: Yeah, Calen.
Keith: For anyone keeping track, Calen was the one that I was supposed to kick off a tall structure who would have deserved it.
Jack: [laughing] Kick off the top of a tall structure.
Austin: Kick off the— right, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, uh huh.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Good reason, yeah, uh huh, that one.
Keith (as Lyke): Okay. So, you're luring them out. You're being like “Hey, I'm your buddy Calen. You should come meet me.”
Jack (as Pickman): Mmm.
Keith (as Lyke): And then what?
Austin: Friends at the Table, baby! [Jack laughs] Step one? We got it. Step two? Yikes!
Jack: I mean, I guess Pickman just says:
Jack (as Pickman): I plan to offer him to the Shape.
Keith (as Lyke): Yikes! [muffled laughter] I was gonna do...okay. Can you keep a secret?
Jack (as Pickman): Yes.
Keith: Do you seem like you can keep a secret?
Jack: Shrug. [Sylvia laughs]
Keith (as Lyke): You seem serious— you seem...and I'm sorry if this offends you. You seem serious about your own shit in a way where you wouldn't care to tell our other friends about my shit.
Jack (as Pickman): Yep, got it.
Keith (as Lyke): I have a bad plant. And I'm trying to figure out about it.
Jack (as Pickman): Mm-hmm.
Keith (as Lyke): Do you know what I can do? You know about weird stuff. Do you know what I can do with this bad plant? I'm going to the library, but—
Jack (as Pickman): Nope.
Keith (as Lyke): If you're not—
Jack (as Pickman): Nope, you got the wrong one. Nope, this is Chine. You want to be talking to Chine. I'm the one does the trains and things.
Keith (as Lyke): Oh, where’s Chine?
Jack (as Pickman): I have no idea.
Keith (as Lyke): Okay. That's concerning. You don't know about...?
Jack (as Pickman): Nope.
Keith (as Lyke): [doubtful] Okay. [Dre laughs] You could see why I would think maybe. [Austin laughs softly]
Jack (as Pickman): Not really, no.
Keith (as Lyke): Okay.
Jack (as Pickman): Well, it was good talking to you. Thank you for the healing.
Keith (as Lyke): Good luck meeting with the police under false pretenses. [Austin laughs]
Jack: Okay, I'm done.
Austin: Okay. Duvall. Is that where— who's up? What are we doing? I know we got library. We haven't seen Duvall in a minute. Duvall got turned into wax paper, so I feel like maybe we should get a little Duvall.
Art: Yeah, I've done some research and I'd like to update my appearance ideas.
Austin: Yeah, great.
Art: I've been image searching some really good paper mâché, and it looks pretty bad. There's a really strong uncanny valley here [Jack laughs] that I feel like I'm trying to gulf a little bit.
Austin: I see, sure.
Art: A little bit better.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Oh.
Art: On the other hand, I guess we can just say supernaturally good.
Jack: Also, I just thought of the...Austin you know the mannequins in Devotion?
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Oh, yeah.
Austin: Oh yeah, those. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Not a fan.
Art: Yeah, mm-hmm. See, this is too far. [Jack laughs]
Dre: This is a bridge too far.
Austin: Okay, you want more human than this?
Art: More human than this by maybe honestly two or three steps. So I'm thinking in maybe instead of paper it's more like wax. I think you can get closer to a human with wax.
Keith: Yeah, I was literally just googling wax figures.
Austin: Like a wax— yeah. Like a wax figure museum, like yeah.
Art: Yeah, like a Madame Tussauds.
Austin: Like a Madame Tussauds, yeah.
Jack: Uh huh.
Art: What if a Madame Tussauds came to life?
Austin: Still terrifying.
Sylvia: As someone who’s gotten lost in a Madame Tussauds, that doesn't sound good.
Austin: Oh, Sylvi. That's a nightmare. That's a Bluff City arc.
Sylvia: Yeah, it was a really bad time. I was like twelve, so.
Austin: [sympathetic] Ohh.
Keith: You know, the great thing that they do is, it's great for this specifically, which is there's tons of pictures of celebrities standing next to their wax figures so that you can see exactly how they are different and wrong.
Austin: Yes. I got these wax figures of Brendan Fraser from the Mummy.
Keith: Sure.
Dre: Okay!
Austin: It's bad.
Janine: [displeased] Ohh.
Art: But like that Brendan Frasier, if you didn't know what real Brendan Fraser looks like—
Austin: [laughs] Yeah, that's a person.
Art: —you wouldn't say like that wasn't a person.
Keith: Uh, I don't know. I think I maybe would.
Austin: I would say that isn’t a person.
Art: I think Duvall looks like a very good wax figure, and I think that the real thing of it is, you know, wax figures don't move.
Austin: Right.
Art: And so when it moves, there's like a little bit of like tearing around the joints.
Jack: Oh no.
Austin: [displeased] Mmm.
Sylvia: Oof.
Art: And you sort of like can see it get stitched in very quickly.
Austin: Again, it's wax. We’re talking about wax.
Art: Yeah, uh uh.
Janine: This like some House of Wax stuff at this point.
Austin: Uh huh. [Austin and Art chuckle] Don't worry, the party of you who just finished dealing with a bunch of wax people. It's probably fine.
Jack: Oh yeah, god.
Austin: Don't worry about it.
Ali: Don’t come around Bucho with all that.
Janine: Ugh.
Sylvia: I'm sure we're all very excited to see this.
Austin: Yeah, uh huh.
Keith: Are you like this forever?
Art: Oh, this is a good thing. I did this on purpose.
Keith: So yes.
Art: Yeah, uh huh.
Austin: Yeah, this isn’t fallout.
Keith: Right. [laughs]
Austin: This is a move. You put this under whichever one of these you want.
Art: Yeah, this is a bonus.
Keith: I thought maybe this could be step two of three in a metamorphosis.
Janine: Mmm.
Austin: Right, right. Well...
Art: Yeah, I think step three though is like…
Austin: Probably a Zenith move.
Art: Yes, probably a zenith move where, um…
Janine: You die immediately afterwards.
Art: Stuff’s probably great.
Austin: Eh, it’s probably fine. It’s probably fine! Anyway, are you doing anything as a wax figurine?
Art: Yeah, I gotta go find a painting.
Austin: Yeah. You...okay, so here's what I'm going to give you. Here's what the book says. The book says to you— not literally to you. It doesn't start speaking. It’s not that sort of— wait, how many dice is that book? That book’s a what, D10? Maybe it does start talking. No, it doesn't start talking. If it was a D12. It’s only a D8. If it was a D12, it would talk to you. The book says that the last person to own the Zahir, which is the painting you're looking for, is named Zizilliana Esterházy, rich person here in Sapodilla. That's what you know from this book. I'm gonna paste the name of this. Maybe the book says that her friends call her Zizi, but I doubt it says that. We can know that, but Lady Esterházy.
Art: So, say that full name if I'm not gonna use Zizi?
Austin: This is Zizilliana.
Art: Zillian— Zizilli— I—
Austin: Zizilliana. You gotta hit Z twice. Zizilliana.
Art: Zizilliana. Zizilliana.
Austin: Yeah, Zizilliana.
Art: It sounds like an Olive Garden dish.
Austin: Yeah, then you got a nice cup of— a nice cup of, geez. A nice plate of Zizilliana.
Art: Yeah. Hot potaliano.
Austin: A little Esterházy on the side. [laughs] Yeah, exactly. When you're here, you're family.
Sapodilla.
Art: Mm-hmm.
Austin: So yeah, that's the thing you know, but how do you go about trying to track this person down? I think the book says that she is a well known musical performer and artist and collector of strange and interesting artwork from across Sangfielle.
Art: I mean, I think the first thing I do is I try to find like the fanciest art gallery and try to like...
Austin: Yeah. You find...okay, so you go there. What do you see there? Who has good fancy Sangfielle art for this fancy town of people who like to be the heart of culture but hate the sense...they fear the fact that like...again, the world out there is unsettled and scary to them, because they've so badly built up this idea that they are the beacon of culture, and so in order to kind of lean onto that, they have to make everything else feel worse and be extra scared of it. So what are their art museums like?
Art: My first idea was like, a series of of after pictures of Dorian Gray.
Austin: Oh, great.
Art: Like people go in and get their own immorality painted onto a canvas.
Austin: Love it. As a way of like purifying or like…
Art: Right, I mean, that's...yeah, that's not how the Picture of Dorian Gray worked, but you know.
Austin: No, no.
Art: Yeah.
Austin: But I get it. And that's like one exhibit, right?
Art: Right, yeah.
Austin: Yeah. Love that.
Art: Well, I mean, if it's a...yeah, if it's a...I guess it depends. Is this an exhibit gallery or a sale gallery? Because this could be like someone’s new series.
Austin: Oh, I was imagining...this is an exhibit gallery, because of a thing I have to do.
Art: Alright.
Austin: This is not someone's new series. This is not like a...you're not walking around downtown and finding someone's little, you know, personal exhibit space. You’re in a fancy museum that has a permanent collection and a number of rotating collections. So, we know one of them is that one. Anyone else have any fun art exhibits? Doesn't have to be painting, can be anything.
Ali: Different chairs.
Austin: Different chairs.
Art: Different chairs. [Keith laughs]
Dre: Mmm.
Austin: Give me more.
Ali: Yeah, they’re just…
Austin: Say more about different chairs.
Janine: I've literally been to a museum with a chair exhibit, so stop laughing at Ali. [Ali laughs]
Austin: I’m not! I want to know about— [Janine laughs] No no, no. No, no, no, no, no. I am I rolling out the red carpet. I would like to hear more about the chairs.
Ali: It's like old timey furniture. And like it's kind of darker than the rest of the museum, and you sort of walk through these assembled rooms of like, this is what the living room would have looked like 100 years ago or whatever else.
[Timestamp: 2:19:53]
Austin: Ooh. I know exactly what this is for Sapodilla. So, here this is pre-panic Sapodillan furniture. As a reminder, Sapodilla is a big city, and the thing that made it a source of culture in Sangfielle is that when the quote unquote panic started 300 years ago, when supernatural events started happening, when the kind of connection between reality and unreality grew closer and the wall between the real and the, you know, past, the future, and the present began to fall, people lost it, and many of them fled, and many of them acted hastily, but Sapodilla was taken over by the masses, and also opened its gates. Its old crown was turned on its head, and in its place, a new city state rose that opened its doors to anyone who needed to survive what was happening out there, and so it became this incredible place of blending and survival. Anyone was allowed in. They found places for everyone for hundreds of years. It was truly a place where things were safer and better for most people. And this slowly slipped away, and so now in the middle of this reactionary boom, I think this is the furniture of the kind of ruling class. Maybe not only the ruling class, but like oh look it’s servants quarters from back when everyone had...back when there was, you know, a king or whatever. This is what the king’s servants’ furniture looked like. And so there's a sort of like, nostalgia for this before the melting pot times, do you know what I mean? So it's like old royal furniture specifically, and it's being displayed, like all the write ups are like lovingly about the the purity of craft. You don't see craft like this anymore. You know, this is truly Sapodillan versus the sort of blended contemporary furniture that you find now that mixes Ojantani and Kay’van in with the original Aldominan design, you know what I mean? Like it's very...it's bougie in the worst possible way. So. So yeah, that's two. This is the place you are, Duvall. And then you come across a collection of paintings and stuff by Sapo— maybe this isn't by. I think this is just a permanent painting exhibit. And you see a few that have the name you're looking for. They have the...I think it probably says, you know, “Donated by the Esterházy estate.” Finally, you come to one that gives you some degree of clarity. It again says “Donated by the Esterházy estate,” but on the kind of write up, one of the throwaway lines about the piece is that it was recovered during the great fire at Pledge House, capital P capital H. And I don't know if you do some ask— did you do some asking around? Like, how do you start tracking down what the great fire of Pledge House is? Maybe this is a you go to the library along at the same time that Lyke does, but I don't know.
Art: That’s a good way to link things up.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: I was gonna like, just ask one of the docents, but that's probably not…
Austin: I mean, you can do that too. I mean…
Art: Sure. That can still get me to the library, you know?
Austin: Yeah, totally, totally. The docent tells you, like:
Austin (as docent): Oh, before my time a little bit. 30 odd years ago, something like that, a few decades ago. There was a great house here in in the Sunflower District. There's a huge fire there decades ago. Lady Esterházy died there while attending a concert in the concert hall on the grounds that was composed by her dear friend Davia Pledge.
Austin: And I think that they lean forward, and they say:
Austin (as docent): [hushed, gossipy] Well, and we all know what happened was Pledge after that.
Art (as Duvall): [faking] Yes, of course.
Austin (as docent): I can't stand that these canisters are being listened to across town. Everyone should know she's a mad woman, and anything she touches probably shouldn't itself be touched.
Art (as Duvall): Sure, sure, yeah.
Austin: No idea. Yeah. Yeah, uh huh. [laughs] The canisters, bud. Sure, got it.
Art: Yeah. Mmm. I hate when that happens, personally.
Austin: [laughs] So you got a little bit. You got a little something.
Art: Yeah.
Austin: Though it does maybe answer something, maybe you specifically in the back alleys of town, being turned into a wax figure. It does answer something, which is a thing that you picked up on in your time here in Sapodilla. There are folks who are listening to recorded music on little cylinders, you know, like Edison cylinder style music cylinders, very clear sound and a wide range of musical compositions. And maybe even as you're coming out of this museum, you catch one of them playing. Actually, you wouldn't here, because this is Sunflower. Sorry, this is Hibiscus, and I don't think anyone would dare here, not yet at least. But maybe earlier today you heard some, or maybe later tonight you'll hear some, and it will remind you of the music in the sleeping city. The way it plays with tempo, the way that it kind of dares you to guess at what note will be played next and then surprises you. There's a sort of discursive element with it between the players and the listener. It can be upbeat, but it can also be melancholy. And the sound of it, especially when it's melancholy, is...you know, you're turning into something else, but there is something deeply familiar about the way a sad song in the style makes you feel. So yeah. Before you go check things out, though, Duvall. Marn, I know you have some other stuff.
Ali: Yeah, I do. I took a new move in between the episodes, which is Our Glorious Lady. “You found the goddess at a bottom of a bottle. She turned your life around. Gain the religion domain.”
Austin: Mmm.
Ali: And then once per session I can clear some stress up.
Austin: That's good. Sure.
Ali: [laughing] I should do after this, to be honest.
Austin: Yeah, uh huh. What is this? ‘Cause I know we wanted to change this from the way it was maybe written originally.
Ali: Yeah, it's...it's very alcoholy, because this class is a lot of like, “You drink a lot, and then you're gonna find this goddess.”
Austin: Right.
Ali: But we had talked in character building about the like, repairs goddess.
Austin: Yeah, Felesta.
Ali: Felesta.
Austin: Yeah, mm-hmm.
Ali: So that's what I was thinking. I was thinking like, do I want to do it like going to get a drink, but it's like, a kombucha or whatever, instead of a beer. [laughs]
Austin: Sure, yeah.
Ali: Or is it Marn getting to the bottom of one of her like, special oils or whatever.
Austin: Ooh, yeah.
Ali: And then being like, “Oh, hey,” which I feel like the second one is more true to like, what the deity is?
Austin: Yeah. What if there's a leak in one of the bottles and you have to repair it? [Ali laughs] And so you like carefully empty it out. You put the oil in a different bottle. And you're like, [sighs] like, I really don't want to lose this bottle. It's a good bottle.
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: I don't know how you...I don't know how you repair a crack in a bottle or a leak in a bottle.
Ali: I think what Marn could do is like, get some wax and melt it into the in between and then like cover the bottle in leather or whatever?
Austin: Oh, sure.
Ali: And it's like, okay, this is gonna be an insulated bottle now, but it's still a good size for the thing that I need it for, and…
Austin: Right, right.
Ali: Yada yada.
Austin: It might still leak, but it’ll leak at such a slow rate that it's not even...you'll use it before it leaks in a meaningful way, right?
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Yeah, I like this. So yeah, you're doing when...what is this moment? What's the Felesta reach out and, like, reveal herself to you? What if you think you've emptied the bottle? You fill— you know, you're like, okay, good.You fixed it. You then pour the oil back into the right bottle, the previous bottle, or something, but a little bit lands on the ground, and the parts that land on the ground...talk to you? I guess it's not a fairy, right? This isn't like a little…
Ali: Oh, sure, but it could be like a reflection of a face or whatever, like a voice when you look at it.
Austin: Yes, I love that.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah. And you start to clean it up, and as you clean it, it spreads. You know what I mean? It becomes a shinier surface.
Ali: Right, yeah.
Austin: It's kind of like a reflective surface. Yeah, you can see a face in it. What’s Felesta’s deal? What's Felesta look like?
Ali: Um…
Austin: I’m seeing wavy hair.
Ali: [laughs] Sure.
Austin: Classic fortune goddess stuff.
Ali: Right, yeah. Yep. Maybe like...sort of like a homey look.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Ali: Like I think when you think of goddesses you think of like, young pretty person.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: But if it was an older sort of like…
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: Hair pulled back situation, you know? [laughs]
Austin: Hair pulled back. Sleeves rolled up.
Ali: Uh huh.
Austin: Like, getting work done.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: In the middle of a project, you know, when she sees you there.
Ali: Right. Right.
Austin: And what's this do? Like, are you able to pray directly to Fel— are you able to commune with Felesta in this way? Is this a verbal connection you have now? Or is this just a sort of like, you see that she sees you and there's a short of shared presence?
Ali: Yeah, I mean, maybe it's not like a verbal exchange. I think that I'm able to...so, the way that the move works is that once per session, I can like beseech her—
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: —to, like, heal some blood stress. [laughs] So maybe the process now is like, Marn reali— like, trying to clean this up and then seeing this face and then like, seeing some of the scrapes on her hands...
Austin: Yeah, heal up.
Ali: Heal up, and then being like, “That was weird.” [laughs]
[Timestamp: 2:30:13]
Austin: Yeah. I almost like the idea that like...this might be too much communication, but sees this figure, sees this face. I mean how clear is it? Is it...can you see the face? Or is it— okay. Can you see the face? Or is this a thing where you're like, “Look at this piece of cloth, there's a face on it.” [Ali laughs] And you're like, “Yeah, I guess it's a face.”
Ali: I like the idea of it being like looking into a window for like a second, right? Where it's like—
Austin: If it's that, is that you're like, “Oh no, I spilled this oil!” And then she just gives you a very calming look that's like, “Don't worry, I got it.” [Ali laughs] And then like, wipes it away from her side. Do you know what I mean?
Ali: Oooh!
Austin: Just like a very soft look of like, [sighs] you know, “We all sp— don't cry over spilled milk. We all drop things. [Ali laughs] Don't worry about it, honey,” and then like wipe, and it's gone, you know? And you’re like, [surprised noise] and then yeah, your hands— whatever the blood stress you have, you have one blood stress, so you could roll D4 but it's gonna be...it's gonna clear that one blood stress.
Ali: Okay.
Austin: So, go for it.
Ali: Well, you don’t know.
Austin: Yeah. Well, you only have the one!
Ali: [laughs] Okay, that’s two.
Austin: There you go. You're good.
Ali: Thank you.
Austin: So.
Ali: But yeah, this...Marn sort of panicked, trying to clean this up, but it spreads out more, and then suddenly there's like this vision that wipes itself away is good.
Austin: Mm-hmm. Yeah. [Ali laughs] Alright. Anyone else have tasks of the self care variety?
Jack: Uh, I—
Austin: Yes.
Jack: Third visit to the echo doctor?
Austin: Oh, boy.
Jack: For a tarot reading?
Austin: You know— how do you— you’ve asked around? You asked...oh, wait, how much echo do you have?
Jack: Oh, no, I need to clear fallout.
Austin: Okay, got it, got it, got it, got it.
Jack: I have a minor echo fallout that I need to clear.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah. The vocal, let me tell you.
Jack: Is it just that people are talking about this...like, I have heard from the other people in the Blackwick group that this person sorts this out and also you get a tarot reading?
Austin: I guess so. You tell me. Is that...does the group talk and say shit like that? Like, “Oh, yeah, you'll just go to...just go outside town. You’ll get it all worked out.”
Ali: We should, right? [laughs]
Austin: I truly don't know how often any of you talk to each other, as like…
Ali: Sure.
Austin: Because there's such a professionalism with this group in a way we don't normally get? No offense to past parties. But there's a real “we're here to get the fucking job done” attitude among among y'all, you know?
Jack: I mean, maybe I explicitly ask for it, right? Which is like, oh I need...I'm looking for someone to... [laughs] Pickman doesn't say remove echo fallout, but she does say, you know, I've been feeling bad, and everything's all shaken up, and I need to go and see someone.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: But this being Pickman, I don't think that she can even articulate it like that. [laughs] I think she's just like…
Austin: I mean, can...can Pickman just straight up say like, [imitating Pickman] “I think I've been cursed.”
Jack: Oh, yeah, i think that's what it is, right?
Austin: “I think someone put a curse on me.”
Jack: Yeah, it's like, I've been, uh...yeah,
Jack (as Pickman): I've been hexed. And I need to...I need to get it fixed. Is there anybody nearby?
Jack: And yeah, I guess I find my way to the door of...what's this woman's name?
Austin: Old Alamae.
Jack: Old Alamae.
Austin: Directs you to sit down. You know, requests payment. This is a minor fallout?
Jack: Mm-hmm.
Jack (as Pickman): I got a doll's head that speaks.
Austin (as Old Alamae): Make it say some things.
Jack: I think I just take the doll's head out of my bag, and as I take it out of the bag—
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: It says, like, “I have no awareness of my body below my mouth. What is the sight of the soul?”
Austin (as Old Alamae): Ah, mmm, one second.
Austin: Like walks through like saloon doors or a curtain, a beaded curtain, to a backroom. And you see her reaching up and pulling out a box or...reaching up and pulling down a box and then opening the box. Big trunk, not so big that you have to like lay it down to open it. Opens it up, lifts a doll's body out.
Jack: [laughs] This doll’s body?
Austin: Puts it away. Grabs a second one, puts it away. Ah, third one, grabs it, comes back out, and asks you for the head.
Jack: Yeah, I'm gonna hand this over. This is a D6 cursed resource.
Austin: Uh huh, yeah, and then she attaches the head to the body and places it down on a little, like...there's sort of like a...in my mind, what this is is a bench, but it's not really a bench. It's a...what do you call that? It’s like a trunk? Like a...oh my god, why am I blanking on this? My mom has one in the attic. This is like a cultural thing—
Jack: Uh…
Austin: —that women often are told to build one of. Not build, but like fill one of.
Janine: A hope chest?
Dre: A hope chest?
Austin: Yes, a hope chest.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: I'd written “promise trunk” [all laugh] into google, and that didn’t work. A hope chest. There's like a hope chest that has cushioning on the top of it, with like floral—
Keith: I— sorry.
Austin: Uh huh.
Keith: What are you supposed to fill it with? What is the…
Janine: Linen, dishes, home goods.
Keith: Oh.
Austin: Yes. It's the stuff for when you get married and move into a house.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Yeah. My grandmother used to give me things, quote unquote, to put in a hope chest.
Austin: A hope chest, right, yeah.
Jack: Oh, wow.
Austin: This is a classic…
Janine: Just like, ma'am, who?
Austin: Yeah, uh huh. Anyway, it's something like...in my mind, what I'm doing is thinking of my mother's hope chest. That's why I've gone there. And floral top with a little cushion on it almost, and places the doll on top of it. And the doll like kind of crawls to a corner and sits.
Jack: Does it speak?
Austin: No, it finally gets quiet.
Jack: Ah.
Austin: Mm-hmm. Alright. What is your reading like? I think...how clear— hmm. The thing that she is going...the thing that this reading is going to basically say is not to go to this meeting under false pretenses, that you've built yourself a...like, you are a mouse that's built her own trap. And maybe— so, maybe that's more what is. It does not say “don't go to this meeting,” do you know what I mean? She isn't there to like...she hasn't asked you, “Do you have any interesting meetings coming up? What's going on?” [Dre laughs] You know, she’s not that type of reader.
Jack: Classic cold reading type of...
Austin: Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. “You, uh, going anywhere this summer or…?”
Austin: “I sense that there’s someone with a C name that means something to you. A Ca- or a Ch-?” [Jack laughs] It’s both, actually, so. So yeah, I think that's the general take of this.
Jack: I think that she says that to Pickman, and then I think Pickman says:
Jack (as Pickman): Hmm, yes, I shouldn't go to the meeting.
Austin: [chuckles] Right, yeah, exactly.
Jack: Okay, great, and I'm gonna clear my you cannot use echo protection.
Austin: Love it.
Art: A Ch- or a Sh- name. Do you mean Shape?
Austin: Shape. The chape, yeah.
Art: The chape.
Austin: Chape trains. Train spelled C-H-R-I-N-E. Chrine.
Jack: Hey, we don't know how they spell trains in this world.
Austin: We don’t.
Jack: This is the first time they've encountered.
Austin: Yeah. Ahh. Alright. On your way back, you...I don't know that this is particularly relevant to you, given the direction and kind of the gravity of which of the upcoming arcs you're leaning towards here. But you overhear more of this music that I described to Duvall earlier. It's one person sitting on a swing, on like a bench swing. And then two of their friends in front of them just dancing, like fast dancing, like swing dancing to jazz music as you walk past. And the person on the swing is just swinging back and forth smiling as their friends dance on the porch, outside of the saloon, as the music plays from this little spinning canister. And you see these people. You know, there’s a girl in a long dress, and her dress is spinning all over the place as she's dancing. And it's just like a hot day. And it's like, they're almost in their own little world as they do this, because no one else is part of this, but they're acting as if they're at a dance basically. And you just like, slowly walk past them. And then I think you hear one of...you hear the seated one say:
Austin (as NPC): I sure wish we could get tickets to the show.
Austin: And I don't know, maybe we cut to somebody else at this moment. You see, you know, up on a poster or in a newspaper. I think maybe it sells it as like, [dramatic] “You've heard of the secretive Pledge House concerts. Now you can attend! Contact so-and-so to get your ticket for the grand performance. Davia Pledge’s opus to be performed three nights hence.” So we get we get some some overlap here between whatever is happening with Pledge House, this painting, and this new musical form that's spreading through Sapodilla. Anyone else have big feelings, big things they want to get done right now?
Janine: Yeah, I wanted to have Es, you know, put in a little time towards the cataloguing her exploits side of things. So I think she's probably going to seek out a...like a bookstore or something like that, so she can find like...maybe not the best biography ever written, but you know, just find like a biography to see like, how do people normally structure these kinds of things?
Austin: Right.
Janine: Because, you know, she’s lived a long life, like a long series of lives, but she's never sat down to write about stuff?
Austin: Yeah, yeah, sure.
Janine: So you know, having an example to follow would be helpful.
[Timestamp: 2:40:00]
Austin: Yeah, I think that's totally doable. Are you looking to spend a resource to get something here? You like to trade...like, you want to just do a hard trade of one resource for another equal resource, but now it's a cool book? I don't know what type of...I guess I don't know if they except sexy rat god notebook and pencil. [Ali laughs softly]
Janine: I can't use that, ‘cause that's what I'm putting my stuff in.
Austin: Oh, you're right, you need that.
Janine: That's what I'm cataloging in.
Austin: Yeah, sorry. Yeah, of course. Of course. Then yeah, you're able to—
Janine: The only thing I have...I have a niche hair brooch and then a whistle. And I'm like, I am loathe to let go of that whistle. I don’t wanna.
Austin: You can give me a D4 supply stress to buy a biography book that will help you with this.
Janine: Mmm…
Austin: You just want to browse the…
Janine: Can’t I just stand in the store and read it until someone asks me to leave?
Austin: Yes. [Janine laughs] A dangerous thing to do here in Sapodilla.
Janine: [sighs] I mean…
Austin: As a heritrix.
Janine: Nuhh…
Austin: Listen, this is the thing.
Janine: How much would it cost?
Austin: The cops don’t like you.
Janine: How much would a book cost?
Austin: D4 supply stress. Of course, it's dangerous, ‘cause then you take stress.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: But maybe you only take one stress, you know? Who could say. But I genuinely do think the thing of like, yeah, you can go stand around in a bookshop, but you specifically are going to get strange looks and risk being harassed by the Glim Macula is an important thing about being a heritrix in Sapodilla right now.
Janine: Yes.
Austin: You don't have that available to you.
Janine: Ugh, man, I'm so loathe to take stress, but…
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Okay, so I didn't think I'd be rolling stress. Can I use my one floating protection and put that into supply even though I didn't like declare it at the start? And then roll supply stress?
Austin: Sure, because you declare it now before you do this roll. That's fine.
Janine: Yes. Yeah.
Austin: So yeah, you go and put that in supplies.
Janine: This is just Es like gritting her teeth in the shop, being like—
Austin: “It's fine.”
Janine: “I can endure. I can haggle a little. It’ll be fine.”
Austin: Oh my god. [laughs] Take three supply stress. They charge you more than—
Janine: Am I taking three or am I rolling— oh, did you roll? Okay.
Austin: You're taking three. I rolled four, yeah.
Janine: Damn.
Austin: I rolled four, so put three and give me a fallout check. No fallout. You rolled— well, okay, you rolled an eleven. In any case, yes, you take that stress, but it's not the end of the world. You are...what type of— what's the biography? Who's the biography of? Is it like a really well respected biography? And you’re like, oh, there’s a—
Janine: If I’m paying for it, then I'm gonna say it's decent.
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Janine: If it was just some sort of free garbage, I was gonna say was bad. [Ali and Austin laugh softly]
Austin: No, it's a decent biography.
Janine: I need a random...I want it to be like, you know, The Chronicles of the Intrepid something.
Austin: You're like...like a fun explorer adventurer type thing?
Janine: Firmino Nigel.
Austin: Forni—
Janine: I went to behind— behindthename.com has a random name generator, which I didn't know.
Austin: Ah, okay, sure.
Janine: They do all the cool historical names, and they suggested Firmino Nigel. [laughs]
Austin: Firmino. Firmino Nigel. You know, someone important in Sapodilla’s history. The fou— not the founder. Maybe the… [deep breath] what are we that's not someone who fucking sucks? [Dre laughs]
Janine: I feel like it should be something a little more adventure-y, right?
Austin: Sure.
Janine: Like, she's gonna look for someone whose story’s a little close to her own.
Austin: Like hers, yeah, yeah.
Janine: And not someone who’s like, he signed a lot of papers.
Austin: Then what is that? Is that another like...someone else who's done a bunch of stuff investigating ancient gods and relics? Is that someone who has...you know.
Janine: Maybe someone who like made the first road across the thing or something?
Austin: Yeah. It's tough because like, maybe...I would like you to find a good book and not a book that is like, “Look at the guy who did the colonization right!” you know?
Janine: Yeah, that's true.
Austin: In which case, like, you know, it's this dusty old book that other people have passed by, because it is explicitly not big. I mean, I guess I will say Sapodilla probably also still prides itself on being quote unquote, “multicultural,” but it’s a very particular vision of multiculturalism, which is about sanding down until you are Sapodillan first, you know what I mean? You've given up on—
Janine: Yeah, melting pot shit.
Austin: Yeah, exactly. You've given up your individual and your kind of personal heritage to adapt to and adopt the Sapodillan culture. So yeah, this makes me feel like it's someone who explicitly is not, you know, is not that.
Janine: Maybe someone who did an extensive kind of thing about like, the species or some sort of plants, or like someone who was...someone who was saying, like, hey...and this would be post-panic, this would be like…
Austin: Right, right.
Janine: Everyone left and flipped out, and we've like—
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Janine: —left lot of stuff behind that we need to reconnect with, and...
Austin: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I like that. Okay. Boom, got it. That's progress. You're getting there. Alright. So, where are we looking here and now? We have strange concert at the place where the painting might be plus mysterious fire there decades ago. Coincidentally, around the same time the Glim Macula was founded. Library team can look into that a little bit. We have Chine locked somewhere in a...we don't know where Chine is now, previously had been captured a underground throne room, very clearly a Glim Macula holding place of some sort. We have a bunch of heritrixes in danger in a Glim Macula holding place presumably, having been disappeared. And we have a meeting coming up with Calen— or, with Pickman and the head of the security, the Glim Macula’s kind of public security group. They wouldn't call them public security. That's such a modern phrasing. I'll think about what they're actually being called between sessions. So I guess that's the thing, is at this point, do we want to do a close out conversation? Here are the things that people are interested in, in character. Maybe Bucho has dinner on the stove, is doing a big pot roast style thing. Has told everybody that like, don't worry, I'm gonna have— it's gonna be great. Like just, you know, be back at seven or whatever. Bucho, convinced Chine will show up. Chine does not show up. What’s everyone drinking tonight? What are the beverages of choice?
Art: Tea with a lot of honey.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Dre: Yeah, sure.
Sylvia: I’m just gonna say it looks like red wine.
Austin: Ah.
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Ali: A nice iced tea [Sylvia laughs] with a moderate amount of honey.
Austin: Oh, okay. [Ali laughs]
Art: Duvall glaring at the diminishing amount of honey. [laughter] Oblivious to the fact that it's his problem that that happened.
Keith: I'm having actual red wine, the same hue as the ting that just looks like red wine.
Austin: [laughs] Okay.
Sylvia: Perfect.
Jack: I got like a little tumbler of whiskey.
Janine: A pink lady.
Austin: Bucho’s having a beer, a bottle beer. Good enough for Bucho.
Sylvia: Bottle beer for Big Bucho.
Austin: Yeah, bottle o’ beer for big Bucho.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Bottle beer for Big Bucho? What a great phr— oh, bottle beer for Big Bucho.
Sylvia: Yeah. [Ali laughs]
Austin: I think he calls out from the— he has on an apron, you know, doing work in the little kitchenette. And he calls out to the other rooms, like:
Austin (as Bucho): So, how did everyone's day go?
Austin: Es shouts:
Janine (as Es): Middling.
Keith (as Lyke): I went to church. It was fine.
Austin (as Bucho): You don't seem very religious.
Keith (as Lyke): No.
Austin (as Bucho): Hmm.
Keith (as Lyke): It's part of...gods are extremely magic.
Austin (as Bucho): Ah, yeah, yeah yeah. Okay, sure.
Sylvia: I think Virtue is ignoring the question. [laughs]
Austin: Yeah, I mean, I know Virtue, sure.
Sylvia: Yeah. I want to just make sure people know it's an in character silence. [laughs]
Austin: I appreciate that, yeah.
Art: Just, some people's answers are longer than you'd want to shout into a kitchen, you know?
Austin: Uh huh.
Keith: Yeah.
Art (as Duvall): [hesitantly] Fine.
Keith (as Lyke): I fixed up Pickman again.
Ali (as Marn): Oh, yeah?
Jack (as Pickman): Yep.
Keith (as Lyke): No one has been...no one has needed to be healed of physical damage more than Pickman.
Jack (as Pickman): Yep.
Ali (as Marn): Pickman, what was it this time?
Jack (as Pickman): I tried to board a Shape train.
Ali (as Marn): [concern] Oh my god.
Jack (as Pickman): That was moving.
Keith (as Lyke): You did board it.
Jack (as Pickman): Yep.
Art (as Duvall): Yeah, we got on board that train.
Keith (as Lyke): Yeah, it just hurt.
Jack (as Pickman): Mm-hmm.
Janine (as Es): Oh, that's not trying, then. That's succeeding.
Jack (as Pickman): Yeah, when you put it like that.
Art (as Duvall): Yeah.
Keith (as Lyke): Well, what she tried to do is board it without being hurt. [Ali laughs]
Jack (as Pickman): Mmm. Mm-hmm. Got my fortune read.
Janine (as Es): Oh, you went there too, huh?
Jack (as Pickman): Mm-hmm. Yeah, she fixed my doll.
Ali (as Marn): Oh, the fucked up one, right?
Janine (as Es): Oh.
Ali (as Marn): The cursed one?
Jack (as Pickman): Yeah, the fucked up one. Yeah.
Ali (as Marn): [laughs] What’s it do now?
Jack (as Pickman): I don't know. I left it there.
Ali (as Marn): Oh.
Jack (as Pickman): Uh, sat silently.
Ali (as Marn): Well.
Keith (as Lyke): Hmm.
Janine (as Es): Well, at least it's well behaved.
Keith (as Lyke): Mm-hmm.
Ali (as Marn): Yeah, probably an upgrade for…
Keith (as Lyke): Probably worth something if you… [Austin chuckles]
Jack (as Pickman): Anybody seen Chine?
Keith (as Lyke): No.
Janine (as Es): No.
Sylvia (as Virtue): I assumed he was with one of you.
Janine (as Es): I thought maybe he was eating.
Sylvia (as Virtue): Yes, it does seem to be the thing he does most.
Janine (as Es): There's a lot to eat around here. I just assumed.
Sylvia (as Virtue): Eh.
Jack (as Pickman): So, uh, we're gonna rescue Chine, right?
Ali (as Marn): We should find them.
Jack (as Pickman): Mm-hmm.
Keith (as Lyke): Is that why you're taking that meeting?
Jack (as Pickman): [sighs]
Keith (as Lyke): Are you still taking that meeting?
Jack (as Pickman): The fortune teller said not to take the meeting.
Keith (as Lyke): Are you still taking it? Or are you listening to the…
Jack (as Pickman): I mean, you know. Divination’s powerful magic. I'm not gonna like show up and pretend to be Calen.
Janine (as Es): Okay, that's probably the correct call.
Jack (as Pickman): But.
Keith (as Lyke): Yeah, that was the original plan.
[Timestamp: 2:50:00]
Janine (as Es): But?
Jack (as Pickman): You know, maybe we...we make use of this opportunity. I don't know. I'm not a planner. Maybe we tail Blick. Maybe we...can you curse people, Es?
Janine (as Es): Define curse.
Jack (as Pickman): I don't know. Can you…
Janine (as Es): If you mean like long distance, long term? No. If you mean immediate unpleasantness, yes.
Jack (as Pickman): Mmm, okay. Can anybody here curse anybody? Like, not very long distance.
Ali (as Marn): I don't think we should be cursing anybody.
Jack (as Pickman): We have an opportunity here. If Chine's missing, they’re probably missing because of the Macula. Blick seems to be their head of security. I'm not gonna go out there and offer myself up to him, but you know.
Ali (as Marn): Yeah, but there are…
Art (as Duvall): And where does the curse come in?
Ali (as Marn): There are alternatives.
Jack (as Pickman): Oh, I just thought that we could maybe get the boot in, you know?
Ali (as Marn): I'm not doing that.
Jack (as Pickman): Wait, hold on. Duvall.
Art (as Duvall): Mmm.
Jack (as Pickman): How far can your bugs get away from you?
Art (as Duvall): Probably not as far as you want. Uh, 20 meters?
Jack (as Pickman): What happens if they go further?
Art (as Duvall): I mean, they sort of just can't.
Jack (as Pickman): Oh. [Jack chuckles]
Art (as Duvall): I guess...I suppose if one was far away, and then I suddenly moved...I mean, it's never happened, but I think they wouldn't be able to find their way back. I think they'd have to find a new hive.
Jack: I think the problem for Pickman is that she can't conceive of a situation where her foe is standing in front of her and she doesn't act against them.
Ali (as Marn): That's different from cursing somebody!
Jack: Yeah, I think...remember when I was on board the Zephyr and I just tried to like weaken it for the next time I encountered it?
Keith: Yeah.
Jack: I think that's what I'm trying to do, given this like one opportunity to get Blick out in the open in a station. Which, I assume stations are places of power for the Shape even in Sapodilla, but that might not be right. [Austin chuckles]
Janine (as Es): Is the thing you want poison.
Ali (as Marn): [intrigued] Oh. [Austin chuckles]
Keith (as Lyke): Oh.
Jack (as Pickman): Oh, now you're on board, Marn.
Ali (as Marn): Poison isn’t a curse. [Keith laughs]
Jack (as Pickman): What's your problem with curses?
Keith (as Lyke): Sort of like a physical curse.
Austin: Mmm. [laughter]
Keith (as Lyke): In a way, a curse is just a magic poison.
Austin: Ahh.
Janine (as Es): It's true. It's like an existential spiritual poison, yeah.
Ali (as Marn): I—
Austin: Just as a reminder, Marn, what's your...what is your goal as a character?
Ali: [laughs] My goal as a character is to learn to develop a homemade cure for curses. [laughter]
Janine: Well.
Ali: And listen, I know the difference between a poison and a curse. Like, I've studied this.
Jack (as Pickman): Marn, they're the chief of police for the Glim Macula.
Ali (as Marn): I just, you know, I don't want to get messed up in causing a curse from somebody, because Pickman, you don't know if you're gonna get cursed from doing that. With poison, you know, you give it out, and then you're fine. You know if you've taken it.
Jack (as Pickman): Can anybody here poison anybody?
Keith: I take Tombo out.
Austin: [softly] Oh my god.
Jack: What? [laughs softly]
Keith: I just wanted to know.
Austin (as Tombo): Mm-mmm.
Keith (as Lyke): Tombo, can you poison anybody?
Austin (as Tombo): Mm-mmm.
Keith (as Lyke): No?
Ali: Why do you got me out here? [laughs]
Keith (as Lyke): Tombo can’t.
Austin: Yeah, why am I...what are you doing? Put me away.
Keith (as Lyke): You don't want some daylight?
Austin (as Tombo): Mm-mmm.
Austin: I thought it was like evening.
Keith: Evening.
Austin: We’re evening. This is a dinner situation.
Keith (as Lyke): Evening light, you don't want…? I mean, you're in my bag. It's better out here than in the bag, light wise.
Austin (as Tombo): [normal voice] I was out all day. You missed it, but I went out earlier. [Ali laughs]
Keith (as Lyke): You went out?
Austin (as Tombo): Yeah, I got—
Keith (as Lyke): You can go out?
Janine: Got some drinks with some friends.
Austin (as Tombo): Yeah, I met up with some people that you… [Ali laughs]
Keith (as Lyke): I thought I knew everything about you.
Janine: Meet someone for lunch.
Austin (as Tombo): You don't know everything. I’m my own fish.
Sylvia: At this point, Virtue’s wondering who the man speaking to the fish is, ‘cause she’s never spoken to Lyke once.
Austin: Uh huh. [laughter] Not once! Jack, you were gonna ask a question.
Jack: Like, what's the what's the viability of...I don't think we've ever done like long term remote poisoning of a character on the show before, [Ali laughs] and I don't know how it works.
Keith: Huh.
Austin: What are you talking about? Like...like a blow dart? [Sylvia laughs]
Jack: Yeah, or like poisoning an object that Blick is going to touch. A poisoned message, a poisoned word.
Austin: We would have to figure out what the thing is you're trying to do. If you want to get some poison to poison this person, that feels like a thing you could do ahead of this meeting. Ask around the right quarters, get yourself some poison.
Keith: Could I poison someone with an endless ember?
Jack: I don't want to get—
Austin: I think you're at risk of poisoning yourself with an endless ember.
Keith: [softly] No, I'm fine.
Austin: What is the closest thing we have in our world to an endless ember?
Keith: Uh, nuclear—
Austin: Nuclear power! [all laugh] You got it in the backpack. It's a nice backpack, I'm sure.
Keith: Yeah, it's made of lead.
Austin: Oh, okay, good.
Keith: Tombo, you really should stay out. [laughter]
Janine: But also it’s in the backpack next to other different fucking...
Austin: Yeah. Uh huh, yeah, next to the god. Yeah, uh huh. [Keith laughs] Like, let me be honest, Aterika’Kaal is growing. You're giving it some energy here with this everlasting ember or whatever, so. Aterika’Kaal— I think Tombow probably, at some point, is like:
Austin (as Tombo): It's getting cramped in there. That's why I had to go see some friends.
Keith (as Lyke): Look, I've been trying to take care of it!
Austin: If we're at a downbeat here, and it feels like we are, there's a knock at the door.
Jack: The poison salesman is here!
Austin: In fact, it is...it is someone who starts saying:
Austin (as visitor): [knocks loudly] Is Bucho here? [knocks again] Big Bucho. Two Step Bucho?
Keith (as Lyke): Never heard. No, never heard of them.
Austin (as visitor): [sternly] Open up immediately.
Keith (as Lyke): Is that a dance? Is that a kind of dance?
Austin (as visitor): This is the Macula. We need to talk to Bucho.
Keith (as Lyke): [hushed] Ah, you should go.
Janine: Hmm.
Keith (as Lyke): You should hide or go.
Austin (as Bucho): Eh, uh, I'm sure it'll be...I can just talk to—
Jack (as Pickman): Nope. Bucho.
Jack: I think I have a move that lets me…
Keith: Was it a curse?
Jack: God, I fucking wish. Now that I've realized it, I could probably do a curse, the kind...I could probably work up a curse with some chalk and the Shape.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: But I have the major move Get Behind Me, Austin?
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Which gives any ally within arm's reach blood prediction. Could we use that to narrativize—
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Pickman firmly beginning to be like:
Jack (as Pickman): Alright, Bucho, no, we're moving.
Austin: Yeah, sure. What are you doing? You're trying to like escape this place?
Jack: Yeah, I'm gonna catch Bucho by the arm.
Austin: Uh huh.
Jack: In the way that you see like security...you know when like security agents have to get their client out quickly?
Austin: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jack: They’re just sort of like, alright, here we go. And yeah, I’m—
Austin: What's the road— what's the way out?
Jack: The roof.
Austin: Does this place— wait, how are you getting to the roof from here?
Jack: It's a hotel. It's like a suite. I'm going...uh, hmm.
Austin: [laughs] Yeah, I don't know what suites you've been in that have roof access.
Jack: Well, okay.
Austin: Built in.
Janine: Fire escape?
Jack: [laughing] I thought to myself, well, I just have to go out through the door, and then…
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: You just Assassins Creeded out the window.
Austin: Yeah, are you going out the—
Janine: Fire escape would have roof access.
Austin: Does this place have a fire escape?
Janine: You'd fucking hope.
Art: I've never been in a hotel that had a fire escape.
Jack: I have a move that is explicitly about avoiding full damage, and I didn't take it, ‘cause I was like, when would I ever have to avoid fall damage?
Austin: [laughs] Ah.
Keith: Hey. I could Sanctum us.
Austin: You could. Now we're talkin’.
Jack: Oh shit. Can we get back safely?
Keith: Yeah, yeah, it has to come back to where we left. That’s part of the rules.
Jack: The Macula, what about...can we peep through? I feel like the Macula would absolutely lay a trap in this place, wait for us to come back.
Keith: Mmm.
Jack: I want to make sure—
Keith: But if I were a cop, if I watched a cop show, I would always see it as them surveilling the entrance to the hotel or the entrance to the room, not inside the room where they think that they know that we're not.
Janine: Also, not everyone should go.
Ali: Yeah.
Janine: Because we've been talking to them through the door—
Keith: Right.
Janine: [laughing] And it'll be extremely suspicious if there’s no one in there suddenly.
Keith: That’s fair.
Dre: Uh huh.
Keith: That’s fair.
Janine: And then they will definitely just wait.
Jack: Well, Sanctum Bucho and me out, because y'all have high tier passes.
Austin: Ah, sure. Alright. How's this move work.
Keith: [sighs] “Roll discern and religion to cast this spell. On a success, you find or spontaneously create a path to one of the halls or temples of the Boundless Conclave.” Okay, yep. And that's it. That's the only relevant part.
Austin: Right, okay. Give me your roll, then. Discern religion, right? That's what we said?
Keith: Discern religion. Yeah, does anybody who's coming want to help with the roll?
Austin: Casting the spell, yeah.
Jack: I can’t discern, and I don't have religion.
Austin: [chuckles] Neither does Bucho.
Keith: Okay. That’s fine.
Austin: Bucho has discern, but not doing a spell discern.
Janine: Mmm.
Art: I have discern, and I think I'm wanted for murder, so.
Sylvia: Yeah, I also could have helped with that.
Janine: Ah. Is it...are we just… [Ali laughs] Are we just leaving Marn behind?
Ali: I’m willing to stay.
Sylvia: Oh, no, if people need to stay behind, I'm also fine to stay. I just wanted to mention that I have like both of those things if Lyke needs help.
Keith: I did...yeah, I did miss the help offers. I did roll already.
Austin: Give me one more D6 if someone's helping. Wait, is someone helping?
Art: Yeah, i'll help.
Austin: You got one help on this. Did you already count a help? You did not.
Keith: No, I did not.
Austin: Alright, give me one more D6, and make it good, ‘cause this is a failure right now. Oh, it’s a success at a cost.
Keith: Phew.
Austin: Success at a cost.
Janine: Ah.
[Timestamp: 3:00:00]
Austin: Okay, that's...wait, you rolled a one D6. Roll a one D10.
Keith: Oh. Oh, okay.
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Keith: Seven.
Austin: Seven. That's still a success at a cost. Take 3 fortune stress, bringing you up to six total, and then give me a fallout check. No fallout.
Keith: No fallout.
Austin: Alright, now the most important thing.
Art: Wait, I hate to ask for homework, but I should also be...
Austin: Oh, ‘cause you helped. Yeah, uh huh.
Art: I helped him.
Austin: Yeah, give me the roll, yeah. Give me a...
Keith: No.
Art: Well, you have to roll for...
Austin: I have to roll. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm doing it. Take two. Take two fortune stress.
Art: Still a lower number. Yeah. Uh huh.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Still not great. So, you're good. Alright, here we go. Give me a number, Keith, from one to ten.
Keith: Four.
Austin: Okay. Alright, great. [chuckles] The goddess of rainstorms takes the form of a mature woman. She's tall and has a muscular build. She has wavy white hair worn in an attractive style. Her hooded eyes are cobalt blue. She has mauve skin. [figuring out pronunciation] Mauve? Mauve? I never know how to pronounce...
Keith: Mauve. (pron: maav)
Art: It’s mauve. (pron: maav)
Austin: Okay.
Janine: Mauve. (pron: mowv) It’s mauve. [laughs] Am I the only mauve person?
Keith: It’s mauve. (pron: mowv) It’s mauve.
Jack: I’m also mauve. (pron: mowv)
Janine: Okay.
Art: Feels like a commonwealth thing.
Austin: She's usually portrayed as wearing a plain outfit made from material like solid water. [Austin and Keith laugh] She carries a drum.
Keith: It’s an ice dress.
Austin: [laughs] It’s not an ice dress.
Keith: Solid water!
Austin: We’ve done the solid water bit before. Goddess of rainstorms.
Janine: It’s a gel dress.
Art: You ever know that a character’s gonna be a fan favorite [Austin laughs loudly] just from the first 30 seconds?
Austin: Ahh.
Janine: This sounds like the repair lady’s sister, also.
Austin: It literally does. This is Felesta’s hot sister, rainstorm drummer. Yeah, uh huh.
Janine: In her jello gown.
Austin: [laughs] In her jello gown. [laughter] It’s a plain outfit. It’s not a gown.
Janine: Hmm.
[simultaneously]
Austin: It’s jello overalls.
Janine: Jello overalls.
Art: Jello coveralls.
Austin: A hundred percent! [laughs, claps] Jello-ralls, yeah, uh huh. You got it. What's this character's name? Do we have a name? Does anyone want to take a shot at a rainstorm name, rainstorm drummer? Do the drums make thunder? Is this what we're saying?
Art: Yeah, that makes sense.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: The drums make thunder but not lightning.
Keith: Right. This is a thunder only god.
Austin: Yes.
Art: Lightning is a different—
Janine: I got a name from Behind the Name if you want it.
Austin: What is it?
Janine: Romana Eunomia. Pick one of those.
Austin: I don't know you-a. What are you talking about? We never met before. [laughter]
Janine: Eunomia’s fun.
Austin: Eunomia’s good. Eunomia. Eunomia. Spell that. [singing Muppets song] Doo doo doo doo doo.
Art: [joining in song] Eunomia.
Austin: Doo doo doo doo.
Janine: E-U-N-O-M-I-A.
Art: Eunomia.
Janine: I also redid the generator to see if it gives something better, and it gave Trisha Carrie, which is not…
Austin: [laughs] No, no.
Janine: That’s not what we're going for here compared to Eunomia.
Austin: Well, is Eunomia what I just said or is it something else? Sorry, I missed your...
Janine: E-U-N-O…
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: M-I-A.
Austin: Yeah, so yeah, okay. Eunomia.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Eunomia.
Art: It's also how you ask if someone has ever met a person named Mia.
Austin: You know Mia.
Art: You know Mia?
Austin: What is the...what's this place look like, Lyke?
Keith: Oh, the jello’s everywhere.
Austin: [displeased] Oh. [Sylvia laughs]
Keith: Jello Hall.
Austin: Jello Hall.
Jack: Is it just rain? It's like falling water that that is holding a shape?
Austin: That's holding a shape, yeah. This is like the least of the...this feels like going to Aterika’Kaal’s realm instead of to...instead of Erlin the wet god’s sauna. [Keith chuckles] Like, the spa. That felt like a very clear place on the map, whereas going into this feels different. This feels like you've entered into a divine realm. Eunomia herself, not here apparently, but, you know, we'll have to stick around. People can heal their echo stress here. Who's left behind, again? Marn?
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Who else stayed behind?
Sylvia: I think I'm there.
Austin: Virtue, okay.
Janine: I'm a little torn. I'm gonna stick around.
Austin: Okay.
Ali: I'm good opening the door?
Austin: Yeah, you open the door to see two members of the Glim Macula, both the kind of street enforcer Glim Macula. No wicker faces here. And they look around and then look down at you, and they go:
Austin (as agent): Oh. Uh, I take it you're not Big Bucho.
Ali (as Marn): Unfortunately not, no.
Janine: Rude! [Keith chuckles]
Austin (as agent): Can we come in and look around? We're looking for Big Bucho, Two Step Bucho. You know the guy? Says, uh, stayin’ here, is our understanding.
Ali (as Marn): Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He had to run out, but yeah, sure. Come in.
Austin (as agent): Oh, he had to run out. I see. So are you one of the friends of Bucho?
Ali (as Marn): I consider myself a friend of Bucho, yes.
Austin (as agent): I see. What's your name?
Keith: This is like a secret society.
Austin: Yeah, a secret society. [chuckles]
Austin (as agent): All of your names, please.
Ali (as Marn): I'm Marn Ancura.
Austin (as agent): Uh huh, and you two?
Sylvia (as Virtue): Virtue.
Austin (as agent): Virtue.
Janine (as Es): Syntyche Moil.
Austin (as agent): Can I see your papers, please, all of you?
Austin: This person's partner begins to like peek around.
Austin (as agent 2): Making dinner, huh? Who's the cook?
Janine (as Es): Well, you know, they say too many cooks in the kitchen is a bad time, so we all take turns depending on everyone's specialty. You know, give everyone space but make sure everyone makes their best—
Austin (as agent 2): Isn’t that the opposite of the thing? Wouldn't one person be the cook?
Janine (as Es): You go in one at a time.
Austin (as agent 2): So which one of you’s cooking? What are you cooking tonight?
Janine (as Es): Not all at the same time. We're each cooking our special things.
Austin (as agent 2): What's your special thing?
Janine (as Es): I'm good with desserts.
Austin (as agent 2): Okay, so not you. Who's cooking the meat? Which one of you two?
Ali (as Marn): Uh, that's me.
Austin (as agent 2): That's you. What are you cooking tonight?
Austin (as agent): Papers, please. Hurry up.
Ali (as Marn): I'm just gonna go to my bag.
Austin (as agent): Yeah, go ahead.
Ali: Do we know what Bucho was cooking?
Janine: Es has hers tucked in her sleeve.
Austin: Yeah, a pot roast. Or a...did I say pot roast? Is that what I said before?
Janine: Yeah, it was a pot roast.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Yeah.
Ali (as Marn): Yeah, it’s just a roast, you know.
Austin (as agent 2): [getting more menacing] Yeah? Do you have a little stool? What do you use to get up there?
Ali (as Marn): I— uh—
Austin (as agent 2): ‘Cause I don't see anything. [Ali laughs nervously]
Ali (as Marn): I do use a stool. It's kind of a—
Janine: She can get up there…
Austin (as agent 2): You know we do this professionally. You know this.
Art: Yeah, it’s in the oven. A roast is in the oven. You don’t need to…
Ali: Yeah, Austin, what— [laughs]
Keith: They cook professionally?
Austin (as agent): No, we interview people. Where is Bucho?
Ali (as Marn): He had to run out. It was, uh, Shape Knight business.
Austin (as agent): Shape Knight business, okay.
Austin: Looking at the papers. Virtue, how do you want to roll to see if they see through your fake paperwork?
Sylvia: Yeah, this is something I just realized. Um, I don't know.
Austin: You faked it, so I think it's like...you should do a roll now, and we'll count that as the roll. Do you know what I mean?
Sylvia: Yeah. Would...
Austin: It gets you...it got you in and out fine today to do whatever you wanted, but...
Sylvia: Would a discern work for that if we're doing it the first time? Like, when I made it? or are we rolling it for now?
Austin: Yeah, I think discern makes perfect sense.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: Discern haven.
Sylvia: Discern haven?
Austin: So it was you being like— yeah. It was you being like, “Okay, how do I...what's this look like?” That's a discern to me.
Sylvia: Okay, so I just have discern.
Austin: That’s a two D10, yeah. Give me the…
Sylvia: Ayy!
Austin: You got a ten. Perfect. Critical success.
Janine: Nice.
Jack: Ah!
Austin: Do you—
Janine: Immaculate.
Austin: Absolutely, yeah.
Keith: These are the best papers I ever seen!
Austin: Yeah, these papers look great. Hands ‘em back over. [Keith laughs]
Janine: They usually smudge the ink on them, and they didn’t even do that!
Austin: [laughs] Uh huh. Hands ‘em back over.
Austin (as agent): [sighs] Well, listen, we know that this Bucho fella has a bunch of people staying with him. We knew about you, Marn. We knew about you. You’re Es, right? Uh huh. But we know there's some other folks too, we've heard of. So, you know where they are?
Ali (as Marn): Um…
Austin (as agent): I mean, let me tell you the score. We have two Glim Macula agents dead.
Ali (as Marn): Oh my god!
Austin (as agent 2): [threatening] Don't “oh my god” me. They're not friends of yours. They're friends of mine. And they're dead. And the people traveling, we think, with this Bucho may have been involved. We know that one of them was. We got him already. Killers on the loose with association to your friend Bucho. Now is the time that you can get on the right side of this. Where is Bucho?
Janine (as Es): We did come here by train. I'm wondering if maybe someone overheard us talking, and they're just using whatever names they have to try and get themselves out of trouble.
Austin: Give me a compel role. Compel haven.
Janine: Is this risky, standard, dangerous?
Austin: This is standard. I mean, it's not risky, because I think it's within the realm of...I think it's risky, lowercase R. It's not risky— you're not worse at it in this moment because of the risk, you know?
Janine: Mm-hmm. And I would say that this gets me closer to— ‘cause I've got that fallout that's like everything that's not getting me towards the thing is risky. This feels...
Austin: Yeah, this is still within the realm, I think.
Janine: Yeah, 'cause I know there's an involvement there.
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Janine: Okay.
Ali: Can I assist?
Austin: Uh...you better, yeah. [Ali laughs] That’s a six, so that’ll take stress, so yeah.
Ali: I would like to.
Austin: Give me a one D10 to add to that.
Ali: Sure. Or Janine just adds it and then...or do I roll something?
Austin: Yeah, Janine can roll the one D10. That’s fine.
Ali: Okay. [laughs]
Austin: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alright, does not matter.
Janine: That’s a three, so I do appreciate… [laughs]
Austin: Uh huh. Janine ,take one fortune stress. Actually, take one mind stress. This is stressful, right? This is about—
Janine: I have two mind protection.
Austin: Oh, so you're good on that.
Janine: But yeah.
Austin: Marn takes four mind stress.
Ali: Jesus Christ. [laughs]
Janine: Oh, honey.
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: Oh, and I don’t have the mind protection anymore. Great for me.
Janine: I still need to do a fallout test.
Austin: And you don't have mind protection, yeah. Mm-hmm.
Ali: Do I do a fallout test now? Do I do a—
Austin: Oh yeah, absolutely. No, Janine, you do not, ‘cause you didn't take any.
Janine: Okay.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: No fallout.
[Timestamp: 3:10:00]
Austin: No fallout, Marn. You rolled an eleven versus six.
Janine: Lotta elevens being rolled for the fallout checks.
Austin: Yeah, today. They don't want you to get it now. They're saving the fallout for in the adventure.
Janine: Mmm.
Austin: They like shrug and go:
Austin (as agent): Alright. [sighs] When you see this Bucho, you send him in. If you know anything about the deaths, you let us know. This is the only opportunity you will have to be on the right side of this. Do you understand?
Ali (as Marn): Yes.
Janine (as Es): Of course.
Austin: Looks to virtue.
Sylvia (as Virtue): Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: She's like reading something and doesn't even look up.
Austin (as agent): Stay safe. Let's get out of here.
Ali (as Marn): Have a good night.
Austin: Slam.
Janine: Lovely.
Austin: [sighs] Yeah.
Ali: We gotta warn Bucho.
Austin: And...I mean, yeah. Presumably Bucho, y'all come back from the place after. And, I mean, I could just, you know, as we zoom out here a little bit. Within the day, you know, the word is spreading that someone is killing Macula, you know, agents. This is immediately gone from “there were two dead, you know, interrogators” to “there is an ongoing conspiracy to kill the Macula,” and that is immediately being used to justify tighter restrictions on movement and more surveillance measures, like within the day. So as you move, whatever you do next, expect a little more scrutiny, and expect a little more attention from the Glim Macula.
[Music plays: Sangfielle by Jack de Quidt]