Episode 34
Episode 34: Why'd You Only Call Me When You're Dry?
Book and Ocean head out of the mucky mire of the Stew back to their nice, dry home of Hamlet Opening.
This one is basically a nice holiday gift exchange with some psychological trauma. Just like the normal holidays.
Transcript
Welcome to Oops!
Speaker:All Apocalypses, a show where we explore the collapse of society by playing fun, tabletop role-playing games.
Speaker:I'm your host, Stu Masterson, and I'm joined by two real goobers.
Speaker:Hey, everyone.
Speaker:Oh, shit.
Speaker:No, keep going.
Speaker:I don't know the rest of the song, I'll be honest with you.
Speaker:I just do the, I'm a goofy goomer.
Speaker:Yeah, part of my story.
Speaker:I think he goes, Rock.
Speaker:And that's the only that's the only line you're missing from the song.
Speaker:That is true.
Speaker:That is basically the whole song.
Speaker:Hey, everybody, I'm Brady and I play Book McCready, a super secret sibling sleuth.
Speaker:Oh, alliteration.
Speaker:Who's really questioning his brainpower after learning that he just forgot he has a sister, a baby sister.
Speaker:That's really embarrassing.
Speaker:To be fair, if he was young at the time that his sister came along and his parents didn't really, you know, leave much information, I can see it.
Speaker:He's been through a lot.
Speaker:Mom's just been screaming for eight hours, nothing out of the ordinary.
Speaker:Yeah, and I'm Jacob.
Speaker:I play Ocean, a gentle giant turned chiropractor.
Speaker:Oh, yeah, because you did a hand massage last time.
Speaker:There we go.
Speaker:This week on our Questions to Fall in Love, we're actually out of left field.
Speaker:We're going to skip one.
Speaker:If anyone is really being careful in tracking the numbers, I say each time, which I would be incredibly surprised if that was the case.
Speaker:But we're going to skip one because it's literally the exact same question that was asked three weeks ago.
Speaker:I guess when you're asking it in person, there could be some minor changes that happen between those four questions.
Speaker:No, it's how you differentiate your girlfriends.
Speaker:You have to ask them the same questions, so you get the same answer, and you can realign your database of girlfriends.
Speaker:Yeah, so it's like a survey question where you word it slightly different to make sure it's still accurate.
Speaker:But you swap the words around just a little bit, so you switch the orientation that you say, I strongly agree versus strongly disagree.
Speaker:You swap it, so I strongly disagree.
Speaker:It's on one side instead, so you know everyone's paying attention, and it doesn't skew your data at all.
Speaker:Because love is a survey.
Speaker:Well, this week, the question is, what is something that you just think is plain too serious to be joked about?
Speaker:Plain too serious to be joked about?
Speaker:And let's keep it a little light, everyone.
Speaker:Book takes pretty much everything seriously, so this is a hard one to answer for him.
Speaker:He takes pretty much everything seriously.
Speaker:But as far as things where you literally cannot joke about, it's like if you ask him for help, and you're like, oh, if you say I need a favor to Book, and then what you need is actually a very extremely minor thing, or not really anything at all, literally the worst blue balls that Book will ever get.
Speaker:So you can't be like, hey, do me a favor and pass the ketchup, or he'll be pissed.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Yeah, 100%.
Speaker:That's a great answer.
Speaker:Or like, do me a favor and shut up.
Speaker:Like, he'll be like, oh, you know.
Speaker:What does Ocean think is too serious to be joked about, but that's not too actually serious that we can't actually joke about it.
Speaker:That's a very good answer, Brady.
Speaker:I would probably never leave this in the recording.
Speaker:Can't compliment him.
Speaker:You know how when you get really mad, you throw manhandle your electronic devices or mechanical devices, like your stuff, because you're mad at it.
Speaker:Yeah, you rage at that.
Speaker:I don't think Ocean likes that very much.
Speaker:I think Ocean is very gentle with his tools and very protective and feel like if his drill is just not working well, he's like, that's okay, buddy.
Speaker:Take your time.
Speaker:We can get it.
Speaker:And he would never be somebody to throw the drill because things speak to him.
Speaker:So when he's holding it, he feels the inner feelings of the tool.
Speaker:Oh, and I'm sure he's picked things up where like the last thing that happened to it was it was like chucked into a lake.
Speaker:He's like, oh my God, you poor paperclip.
Speaker:Maybe that's why he records so much junk.
Speaker:I bet if somebody kicks the tire of their car because they're mad, he probably like seeds in rage.
Speaker:Or just to check the pressure.
Speaker:It's like purely utilitarian.
Speaker:Well, mine's not going to be nearly as good as either of those.
Speaker:They're just things people can't control.
Speaker:So like anything that isn't an objective choice about someone, don't make fun of it.
Speaker:Oh, that's so compassionate.
Speaker:Nope.
Speaker:Everyone should believe that.
Speaker:Booksnook of Booktakes.
Speaker:Wow, it's been a while.
Speaker:Welcome back, everybody, to a surprise episode of Booksnook of Booktakes.
Speaker:I don't know what this week's topic is, too.
Speaker:Please take it away.
Speaker:This is a special double feature of Booksnook of Booktakes.
Speaker:Double trouble.
Speaker:If you're just joining us now, you're about to be really confused by probably everything before and after this moment, except maybe this little part here, which is where all we do is talk about apocalyptic media in any form, even though it's called Booksnook of Booktakes.
Speaker:It can include things such as TV shows, film, whatever, as long as there's at least, I believe, a tiny iota of apocalypse in it.
Speaker:Yeah, I mean, I think we've stretched a couple things out pretty, pretty far to talk about it.
Speaker:I would say almost all of them have been complete stretches, but the two today are actually pretty good.
Speaker:I've seen two apocalyptic movies recently that I hadn't before, and one is pretty new that recently came out on Netflix.
Speaker:It's called Leave the World Behind.
Speaker:Kelsey watched that one a little bit ago.
Speaker:It was executive produced or produced, one of the two by Michelle Obama.
Speaker:Oh, shit.
Speaker:Whoa.
Speaker:It's based on a book, isn't it?
Speaker:And the Obamas are like huge book people, right?
Speaker:Yeah, it was a 2020 novel, I believe.
Speaker:It came out just a couple of weeks ago on Netflix.
Speaker:And it was, I would say, pretty good.
Speaker:It's not super apocalyptic.
Speaker:It's taking place like right as the world is ending, basically.
Speaker:And it's very the good parts about it.
Speaker:It's a drama.
Speaker:It's not like an action movie.
Speaker:So it takes place in 2023, current day.
Speaker:Probably.
Speaker:But it's not like a action movie.
Speaker:It's just pretty clear drama that deals a lot with the things that we like to talk about here, which is like scarcity and relationships between people, as everything is going wrong.
Speaker:And it does what I would say is a pretty good job of it.
Speaker:A pretty good job.
Speaker:Yeah, so you're probably never going to watch it again.
Speaker:So you're not satisfied with it, but you're like, okay, that's all right.
Speaker:Yes, it's a, I would say, technology-based apocalypse.
Speaker:A lot of this isn't spoilers, really, but a lot of technology stops working, like cell phones and any way to communicate.
Speaker:And it's all about dealing with how do people in a society where that's very common and necessary.
Speaker:Deal with that.
Speaker:Yeah, I have stress dreams about that exact scenario.
Speaker:The second movie, though, is one that I've roll-launched multiple times, and it's been out for a few years, and I never heard of it, and it's called Love and Monsters.
Speaker:Have you guys seen it?
Speaker:Oh, I have seen that.
Speaker:It's excellent.
Speaker:Kelsey is trying to get me to watch that, and every single time there's a reason why I don't feel like watching a movie.
Speaker:But every single time I'm like, that sounds like it would be a movie I would very much enjoy.
Speaker:It's so good, Brady, you start since I talked a lot about the movie.
Speaker:I don't like as much.
Speaker:Love and Monsters is just like a romp.
Speaker:It's just a fun romp where everybody's largely very likable.
Speaker:And it's just like a feel good movie.
Speaker:It's also emotional at points.
Speaker:Like it kind of hits all the chords.
Speaker:There's good action.
Speaker:And there's I mean, it's definitely there's a lot of tropes that we encounter in that movie.
Speaker:But it's just a good.
Speaker:It's just enjoyable.
Speaker:It's just fun.
Speaker:Just very fun is very cool.
Speaker:Yeah, very cold blooded creatures.
Speaker:So they're all either insects or reptiles or amphibians.
Speaker:And they just are very, very cool looking at it.
Speaker:Giant enemy crab.
Speaker:Yes, I mean, the realism.
Speaker:It's all about a single survivor who's not traditionally very good at doing Apocalypse stuff.
Speaker:But he survived for a while in a nice little safe bunker.
Speaker:And he's a real book McCready.
Speaker:He's a real book McCready.
Speaker:And he decides to go across the dangerous wastelands of the surface to find his girlfriend from like 11 years ago.
Speaker:In another nice little safe place.
Speaker:Yep, absolutely.
Speaker:And it is a very, very good movie, and I can't believe I haven't heard of it.
Speaker:I think it was one of those movies that was supposed to come out like right when the pandemic hit.
Speaker:It absolutely did.
Speaker:It just got pushed a little bit and then came out just on Amazon Prime, I think.
Speaker:Go watch that one.
Speaker:And if you have time, go watch the other one as well.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's also, it's just kind of therapeutic.
Speaker:Like, he deals with stuff.
Speaker:And like, you know, that's always helpful for me.
Speaker:Let's get back to the action.
Speaker:Book wants to go back to the town and see if he can exchange the child's life for his camera and more film.
Speaker:Because I think it would really complete his detectiveness.
Speaker:And Ocean would also like to show the picture and everything to the kid, because to show kid that he was right, that there is somebody at the top, but also warn them never to come back.
Speaker:We can do all of that now as you guys make it back safely.
Speaker:There's not much danger knowing about the sand, so you just go a little bit to the left and you make it back to that nice little gross sandbar between the big ocean of the stew, the big ploppy ocean of the stew, and kind of the city behind it.
Speaker:By now, they have this big bonfire rolling.
Speaker:You were probably gone for like 12 hours, maybe more.
Speaker:I'd say at least, yeah.
Speaker:You see Crinkle Fry's mom run up to you when he comes back and says, thank you so much for saving us.
Speaker:I would like to say that I did wash myself off in the salt water on the way back.
Speaker:We cleaned up.
Speaker:Coated in shit.
Speaker:She is so glad that you brought back Crinkle Fry, okay?
Speaker:She makes Crinkle Fry come up to you and say thank you for saving his life.
Speaker:When Crinkle Fry shakes my hand, the Polaride is in my palm, and I slip it to him that way.
Speaker:He's a child, so he's not super discreet as you hand it to him, and he looks at it and he gets these big eyes and he gets all excited.
Speaker:Then Ocean gets on his knees and is like, I drew what was on the top of the tower for you, so that way you don't ever have to fucking go back.
Speaker:As I hand it to him, I'm going to grab him with the shoulders like, look at me.
Speaker:Look at how terrible I look right now.
Speaker:Don't go to the tower.
Speaker:It's not the tower that's the danger.
Speaker:It's the damn bugs nearby.
Speaker:Tell everybody, stay away from the bugs, Crinkle Fry.
Speaker:Stay away from the bugs.
Speaker:I go, Ocean, you're staring at him.
Speaker:You're scaring him.
Speaker:Jesus.
Speaker:He's absolutely horrified by the end, but he does run off to show it to all of his friends and classmates that he got a picture of it and has your little sketch, which some seem to kind of believe it, some don't.
Speaker:But he does repeat that the strange man pulled everyone not to go there and that it's very, very dangerous.
Speaker:You ask his mom if you can keep the camera.
Speaker:She says, absolutely, that's not a problem, but Crinkle Fry is going to be like heartbroken to not have it.
Speaker:That's his favorite toy, but it's up to you.
Speaker:I'm fine breaking his heart for his life.
Speaker:Can I ask Crinkle Fry if I can have it?
Speaker:Yeah, you certainly can, but he's probably going to cry.
Speaker:We're about to figure out what kind of person Book is actually.
Speaker:I hand her the fucking camera.
Speaker:Oh, Book's actually a sweetie.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:He really does love it.
Speaker:I'm glad.
Speaker:It would have been very useful for my mysteries, but that's OK.
Speaker:OK, did you ever get back anything about those medical supplies that I was asking about?
Speaker:Oh, yeah, they are definitely willing to trade some if you guys got stuff that they want.
Speaker:OK, yeah, we have more than we need here.
Speaker:So there's been a lot meant for trade.
Speaker:I think Neo Tokyo wanted to talk to you about a trade.
Speaker:Oh, OK.
Speaker:Yeah, we'll talk to him.
Speaker:Is there a town blacksmith?
Speaker:I don't know if blacksmiths exist still.
Speaker:We got people who are good at metalworking.
Speaker:I just want them to to reheat treat my cane sword.
Speaker:That can probably be part of some trade you do.
Speaker:OK, they don't do it because I'm nice, because I saved a little kid with them, maybe.
Speaker:Maybe if you tell them that they could.
Speaker:Well, I'm not I'm not like a boastful idiot.
Speaker:So whatever.
Speaker:I write a list of what I would like.
Speaker:I want to know if anybody else has a camera they want with film.
Speaker:I want to know if anybody could fix the heat treat on my sword.
Speaker:And then I add whatever Ocean wants, which is medical supplies.
Speaker:And then whether you wanted something for the spider.
Speaker:One needs to be fixed.
Speaker:And then also he wants something additional.
Speaker:Your agreement before was that they would sponk it out of the water for you for an exchange for killing those bandits.
Speaker:True.
Speaker:So you guys got to negotiate for fixing that, getting enough medical supplies to make Maple happy, setting them up with these new mushrooms to maybe have a renewable source of supplies.
Speaker:And the stuff that Book wants.
Speaker:Is Caltools around?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Caltools is always around.
Speaker:Caltools.
Speaker:He shows up immediately.
Speaker:I was about to say Ocean starts humming Taylor Swift.
Speaker:How are you?
Speaker:I'm doing pretty good.
Speaker:Are you human?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Fully?
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Knee to toes.
Speaker:You don't sound surprised I'm asking that though.
Speaker:Did you say knee to toes?
Speaker:You ask me a lot of really weird questions, so I've decided just to like roll with it.
Speaker:Did you say knee to toes?
Speaker:Yeah, it's a phrase.
Speaker:Is it?
Speaker:He runs off to go look at the pictures with me, with Crankle Fry.
Speaker:That really threw Book off his game.
Speaker:He writes down in one of his dad's notebooks, knees to toes, question mark?
Speaker:Ocean would like to real quick go to the person spelunking out the spider to see if it's actually back.
Speaker:Yep, it has been brought to the shore.
Speaker:It has all of the doors open and water is still running out of it somehow.
Speaker:My boy, my boy.
Speaker:Yeah, what would you like?
Speaker:You want us to fix it up?
Speaker:You got to plan out some trade because it's expensive.
Speaker:No, we're going to have a lot of trade to you.
Speaker:We're going to work on some trade stuff here, but I was just wanting to know if, while fixing it, when we get that all sorted out, how hard would it be to add another wheel in the back?
Speaker:Well, looking at this, it looks like it was originally framed out for four wheels, and some idiot knocked off some of the weldments on the end.
Speaker:I should start sweating a little bit.
Speaker:So I really don't think it would be too bad.
Speaker:We would definitely have to have to get someone in here to fix the frame anyway.
Speaker:So I don't think it would be too hard.
Speaker:I could definitely do it.
Speaker:It will cost you.
Speaker:Okay, well, we'll work out the trade with Neo Tokyo, and we'll get back to you.
Speaker:Speaking of Neo Tokyo, you see him jogging with his long blonde hair up to you.
Speaker:Oh God, you're finally back.
Speaker:Are you down to trade that?
Speaker:I think I have created a little quick application that can actually display the data from it.
Speaker:So I think we're, if you give me the frequency there, we could test it out, and then we would definitely reward you handsomely for this.
Speaker:For this?
Speaker:The, he holds out the strange device.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:How much for the application that reads it?
Speaker:That's mine.
Speaker:But would you sell it to us?
Speaker:Oh yeah, for a price.
Speaker:I'd much rather have that thing though.
Speaker:Yeah, I'm asking what the price would be.
Speaker:When I asked what the price was, that's what I meant.
Speaker:Well, what do you have?
Speaker:This is a barter based economy here.
Speaker:We gotta figure out what you have.
Speaker:I don't know what you have.
Speaker:I look at Ocean and Hamlet, it's up to you whether you want it or not.
Speaker:Book's got a list here of the things that we need, and he grabs it from them and shows it.
Speaker:And it's like, this is all the stuff we need.
Speaker:And it's probably gonna be pretty pricey.
Speaker:If I gave you this, would that cover everything?
Speaker:Does this include the fixing of the spider and the tire?
Speaker:If we can test it out first, I think that would be a fair trade.
Speaker:That's a good amount of medical supplies you're getting, but I think that'd be a fair trade.
Speaker:pollution aside, I just have a good question.
Speaker:Yeah, lay it on me.
Speaker:We could add a fourth wheel back at Hamlet Opening.
Speaker:You and me.
Speaker:We could, but we gotta get the car back to working, too.
Speaker:From when I talked to the guy, it sounds like adding the wheel won't be that difficult, but, I mean, look at the state of the thing.
Speaker:I think it's gonna be a lot of work just for us to get back to Hamlet Opening.
Speaker:Well, I just...
Speaker:we have the light.
Speaker:We brought some other stuff from your place, and we've done these people, you know, we've been pretty good to these people.
Speaker:I was just...
Speaker:that mapping system, I mean, you could use that to go anywhere you wanted.
Speaker:I could, but Book, I don't trust it.
Speaker:I don't trust the frequency.
Speaker:I don't trust that it's transmitting back to something.
Speaker:The fact that I found it.
Speaker:My other thing is, what if by giving it to these people, we're dooming them?
Speaker:That's my other fear.
Speaker:It's up to you.
Speaker:And then Book kind of takes a couple steps back.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:So what you're saying is if we just give you this one thing, then you'll give us all the stuff we've asked for.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Fuck it.
Speaker:Well, here's the...
Speaker:before we do it, can we at least try it out?
Speaker:Yeah, I actually insist on it.
Speaker:I have to make sure it actually works.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Okay, so you go back to his little enclosed million degree room where he has all these electronics running, and he turns around this old CRT screen that he has.
Speaker:He goes, okay, tell me what frequency it's on.
Speaker:We tell him the frequency.
Speaker:He types that in and he goes, okay, pop it on.
Speaker:Ocean turns it on.
Speaker:It explodes and you all die.
Speaker:The second you flip it on, you see it's very low quality.
Speaker:It looks almost just like a plot in like Matlab or Excel, but right when you flip it on, this data starts coming over across this connection he has.
Speaker:You get this massive plot of the whole terrain cavern system, and it expands outward at a almost alarming rate how quick it shoots outwards.
Speaker:You can see, like you can even visually recognize the little crag you took to go to the sandy room and underneath the sand room, this massive chamber that's like bigger than anything else you've seen with all these like messy little areas where you think all those like gears and stuff were.
Speaker:I mean, it just keeps ballooning out and out and gives you a shitty but pretty accurate map of the entire stew.
Speaker:And as it's on, it keeps getting like a little bit more on the edges, and the fidelity starts like increasing a little bit as it goes along.
Speaker:And he goes, holy shit!
Speaker:Ocean's heart starts racing and is like, can we turn it off?
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:No, you proved it works.
Speaker:Is that all you need though?
Speaker:I mean, like this is a pretty, I mean, you have the data now.
Speaker:We want to use this to be able to go find new stuff.
Speaker:True.
Speaker:Can you, you said this is transmitting somewhere.
Speaker:Yeah, it's just transmitting across this to here.
Speaker:It's just transmitting from here to there.
Speaker:Is it, is there a way to isolate it to make sure that it's not transmitting out to an additional source?
Speaker:Like put it in a Faraday cage or something?
Speaker:That would probably make it not work, but I could just change the frequency on what it runs on.
Speaker:I can change it to something that, or we could, we could even use like some frequency hopping things where it's never output on the same thing twice.
Speaker:Are you worried about like things detecting the frequency and like tracking us down?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Yeah, that is exactly what I'm worried about because I got this object and I don't quite, I've, there's some, have you, do you know anything about the wolves?
Speaker:Um, not particularly.
Speaker:I've heard some rumors about them, but I assume it's all hogwash.
Speaker:Well, I can assure you it's not.
Speaker:Book points to the head on his shoulder.
Speaker:It's not hogwash.
Speaker:Ugh, did we, did we make it to the top of the lighthouse?
Speaker:Sorry, I fell asleep on that rock and back and forth.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:What was up there?
Speaker:No, tell me now.
Speaker:What was up there?
Speaker:Vesuvius, we're in the middle of a bargaining.
Speaker:We're bargaining with someone here.
Speaker:Well, I promise we'll give you the full rundown.
Speaker:Go back to sleep.
Speaker:I'm not tired anymore.
Speaker:I got a good rest in.
Speaker:Well, we'll talk to you in a second here.
Speaker:He goes, yeah, that's pretty weird.
Speaker:Um, so, so we want, so anything's going to be able to like, if you have a scanner, you'll be able to find the frequency.
Speaker:It'd be very difficult to like pinpoint the origin source.
Speaker:You need like a bunch of different scanners out.
Speaker:So I'm not worried about that.
Speaker:If you're worried about someone stealing the data, we can just change the frequency.
Speaker:And I'm sure I could probably figure something out to get it to be like, I'm an encrypted frequency or something like that.
Speaker:But yeah, I'm not worried.
Speaker:If you're not worried, you're, you're smarter than I am.
Speaker:I wish you would have told me before the first time we did this, but yeah.
Speaker:I know there's something out there, and it sure seems to be wanting to connect all these areas together in some kind of network.
Speaker:And from what I've seen, nothing seems good to happen when they get connected.
Speaker:So I just want to make sure that what we give this to you, we're not giving them a beeline straight towards you to, you know, incorporate you.
Speaker:I appreciate your concern.
Speaker:But no, I'll go let everyone know that you get everything on this list.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Peace out.
Speaker:You guys find yourself at the bonfire getting medical attention, which is rolled into the cost of your trade.
Speaker:So you're both going to be put under soon.
Speaker:But it's a nice, relaxing, calm scene.
Speaker:Someone's playing guitar on the campfire.
Speaker:All those little lights start sprinkling back on as we're going to do end of session moves.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:At the end of a session, choose a character who knows you better than they used to.
Speaker:Tell that player to add plus one to their HX with you on their sheet.
Speaker:Well, there's only one other player character.
Speaker:Yeah, but it can be NPCs also.
Speaker:All right, then do add plus one to me.
Speaker:Realistically, though, I think Ocean does know Book better after all that.
Speaker:Because we learned a lot about Book's backstory here a little bit.
Speaker:We learned about his parents.
Speaker:But Ocean's never really interacted or seen his parents before.
Speaker:So not only has he seen his parents, he now knows you have a sister.
Speaker:That is true.
Speaker:So I think realistically, Ocean probably knows Book better.
Speaker:But Book, that's a tougher one to figure out.
Speaker:True.
Speaker:Then I'm just going to do Ocean.
Speaker:Okay, I think you know Ocean a little better.
Speaker:I spit into his mouth.
Speaker:Okay, you get plus one with each other.
Speaker:At the end of every session, judge for yourself, are you satisfied with your place in the world?
Speaker:No.
Speaker:I feel like the more and more we go, the less satisfied we are with our place in the world.
Speaker:Does your scavenge choice still hold true?
Speaker:If it does, get one XP.
Speaker:I think so.
Speaker:We can do Books, interrogating realities, end of session moves.
Speaker:Book has maybe a controversial one.
Speaker:Everyone at Brady, fill up these comments with this pic.
Speaker:Okay, Book has had a nagging suspicion that Ocean was following Book's parents prior to losing his memory.
Speaker:Is that your mystery you would like a yes, no on?
Speaker:I'm gonna say, based on your interaction with the old man and some things you've seen and thought about before, you think it is very likely that he was somewhere around your parents.
Speaker:Oh, that's interesting.
Speaker:And Book also believes that that is what drew Ocean to him subconsciously when he first came to rob Book.
Speaker:That's interesting.
Speaker:I gotta say, I'm kind of enjoying playing the character with no memories.
Speaker:It's kind of fun, slowly piecing together my own backstory.
Speaker:Next story.
Speaker:Now that you guys have a little bit of stability here for a little bit, how about we do some beginning of session moves?
Speaker:Let's do it.
Speaker:Just so you guys know, you may not get super satisfying results from this like immediately.
Speaker:This may roll into as you guys wrap up here and make it back to Hamlet Opening before you see some of the impacts of it, is what I will say.
Speaker:That's what I at least expect to happen.
Speaker:But of course, you guys can go do some crazy stuff and throw that all to the wind.
Speaker:As we usually do.
Speaker:At the beginning of session, we're going to live day to day.
Speaker:So all of you give me a barter roll.
Speaker:I failed hard.
Speaker:I got a five.
Speaker:I actually did pretty good.
Speaker:I got an eight.
Speaker:Isn't that like exactly the most mediocre roll you could get?
Speaker:I mean, pretty much.
Speaker:I have negative one barter, so I'll take what I can get.
Speaker:If it's a success, I'm satisfied.
Speaker:To resolve Ocean's roll, I'm going to say that while you guys are relaxing, it's going to take a few days here for the spider to be up and running and ready to go.
Speaker:One of the raiding parties comes back on a speedboat that slides into it, and they've collected some pretty cool stuff that they're potentially willing to open up for trade.
Speaker:We'll get to that in a little bit, though, but there's some new things here that weren't there before.
Speaker:For yours, Book, give me your follower roll first.
Speaker:I roll plus cool?
Speaker:Yes, plus cool.
Speaker:Okay, that's a nine, which is the most frustrating roll, because it's just under a full success.
Speaker:So you guys have been there for a couple days.
Speaker:Not really much to do around here.
Speaker:It was quiet until this last group of explorers came back.
Speaker:You wake up one morning, you've kind of had one of those nice twilight fade-in and outs, as you've been on a lot of medical attention.
Speaker:Both of you were fairly unstable before this.
Speaker:Even if you wanted to do much, there's not much you could have done the last three-ish days On the fourth day, Book, you wake up to a very familiar voice in your ear, and you hear, It's me, Johnny Hertz, coming at you on the fives and tens and fifteens.
Speaker:And as your head snaps up, you see there's a group of people sitting around the fire, which has smoldered as it's early morning hours now, and they have a little radio there that seems to be playing Johnny Hertz.
Speaker:I sit up and I start crawling over there.
Speaker:Am I in a sleeping bag?
Speaker:I'm inchwarming in the sleeping bag.
Speaker:You hear another familiar voice just a few seconds later as a bumbling Crandall comes in.
Speaker:And you hear him saying, Yeah, I really don't know.
Speaker:I feel like a lot of people are saying that Book and Ocean have died and have been dead for the last few weeks even.
Speaker:I think right after the explosion, there's a lot of people who think they may have not made it out or maybe even they're now under control of Hickory Flick.
Speaker:Well, that's like really interesting because I believe yesterday, Crandall, you told us that you were on quite an adventure with them after that happened, where you led a daring attack on a hospital and you were able to take all of their food and fight off a swarm of nanobots somehow, and you rescued Book and Ocean when they were trapped in some sort of tanning bed.
Speaker:Is that what you said?
Speaker:Yeah, but a lot of people are saying they may have died before that.
Speaker:Well, I think I speak for everyone here.
Speaker:When we are very concerned with where they're at now, we have seen no indication that they're continuing their revolution.
Speaker:After the big projection on the side of Hickory's courthouse, we were sure he was going to show up.
Speaker:Something big would happen, but Book's just nowhere to be seen.
Speaker:We have no idea what that even meant.
Speaker:It's just been quiet.
Speaker:There has been some strange things still happening around here though.
Speaker:There haven't been any new markings, no tagging, no beautiful art from friend of the show, Frida.
Speaker:There was that explosion in Subtropolis, and for some reason, I think people are starting to go missing.
Speaker:There are some people I used to see around who I'm just not seeing too much anymore.
Speaker:I'm not very familiar with the composition of the town, but I would just agree with what you're saying.
Speaker:I think we're down to like 10% of the people from before I came here.
Speaker:Well, I think we should go to the weather.
Speaker:Oh, gosh.
Speaker:Book like rubs his eyes and then realizes that he's just been listening and starts furiously taking notes in the newly acquired notebook that was formerly his dad's.
Speaker:Also, what a cool thing that I lost a notebook and then got a new one in like one episode.
Speaker:That was not planned by either of us.
Speaker:No, you technically had already had that notebook, but...
Speaker:It's just good improv.
Speaker:Didn't have it.
Speaker:God, we're so good at improv, guys.
Speaker:About a day later, so you've probably been mostly out of commission for four days now.
Speaker:It looks like the spider is almost up to running order.
Speaker:You hear one of the days you wake up, Ocean, to hear it turning over.
Speaker:And it did that before.
Speaker:My beautiful girl.
Speaker:It has a nice warm hum.
Speaker:It sounds much better, like it's running smooth.
Speaker:And as you look up, you see it has four tires on it.
Speaker:Ocean smiles contently.
Speaker:He can sleep rest now.
Speaker:He can rest more comfortably.
Speaker:He's been concerned and tossing and turning at night.
Speaker:His beautiful baby.
Speaker:And he passed out for 18 hours after.
Speaker:He would wake up in a panic.
Speaker:He's like, is she okay?
Speaker:And then pass out again.
Speaker:Book is so happy because the spider is one million times easier to draw now.
Speaker:No, I didn't.
Speaker:It's my fault because I think like literally after the first episode where we introduced the spider, you guys are talking about it in terms of having four wheels.
Speaker:And I did not let that go because I was so pissed that you decided to make it a trike because I wanted to draw it and I knew that was going to make it harder.
Speaker:I was like, oh no, this thing has three fucking wheels for some reason.
Speaker:And I can't do depth perception that well.
Speaker:On the fifth day, you wake up and Kringle Fry's mom is actually near you.
Speaker:Hey, girl.
Speaker:I'm just kidding.
Speaker:I don't say that.
Speaker:Weird.
Speaker:Hey, I've been talking to some of the other members of the town and I've let them know that you helped save my son and they had a few things that they would like to give you.
Speaker:Oh, sick.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Sometimes just being nice and doing things without asking for a reward eventually pays off.
Speaker:I guess so.
Speaker:Hasn't ever before.
Speaker:Ocean looks at Book and shrugs and be like, kind of like a, see, I told you so, kind of way.
Speaker:Book winks at Ocean and nods in her direction like, I think she's into you, I think she likes you.
Speaker:You want to be a dad, Ocean?
Speaker:No.
Speaker:One of the men who was on the Scouting Run comes back and he has a big wooden chest that he's dragging over with him that has a few heavy things in it.
Speaker:And he reaches down to it and he goes, I think we found a few things that, based on at least the small amount we know about you, that we think you'll like.
Speaker:We didn't vote on what we were able to give up for you guys.
Speaker:And we really did just want to say thank you for saying Crinkle Fry.
Speaker:Like, every person here is so important to having this ongoing society.
Speaker:This is some Zelda shit where you do a quest that has 92 steps and then they give you a chest with like a rock and two soups in it.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:How did you know that I was going to give you guys these two soups?
Speaker:And he pulls up two cans of campus chunky chicken noodle soup.
Speaker:Campus chunky.
Speaker:I'm more of a progressive guy.
Speaker:I've never seen that before.
Speaker:I'm sorry.
Speaker:But here's a good soup for you.
Speaker:And he hands each of you a soup.
Speaker:Thank you so much.
Speaker:Food is life.
Speaker:We appreciate it a lot.
Speaker:Book give me a D26 roll.
Speaker:This is the first time I've rolled my D20 for this podcast.
Speaker:Well, I said D26, so it's not going to be the first time you rolled that.
Speaker:I was going to roll a D20 and then roll a D6.
Speaker:Not how math works.
Speaker:No, it's not.
Speaker:But I thought that's what you meant by it.
Speaker:That makes more sense than saying roll a D26, I will say.
Speaker:So I don't fault you very much.
Speaker:Are you fucking kidding me?
Speaker:I got a two.
Speaker:Oh, that's fine.
Speaker:I hope so.
Speaker:He pulls out an Encyclopedia Britannica, and it's the letter B.
Speaker:So if you ever need to know anything that starts with the letter B, Oh, clever.
Speaker:Oh, that's actually OP as fuck, because I'm pretty good at synonyms.
Speaker:I feel like that's also an extremely valuable piece of knowledge, even if it's just things with the letter B.
Speaker:It's still a lot.
Speaker:Have you seen one of those things?
Speaker:They're huge.
Speaker:It's going to be edited out because of time, obviously.
Speaker:But for the people playing, the reason it took me so long is because it's not just one for each letter, even though B happens to be two.
Speaker:There's some C split between three and four.
Speaker:If you got C, I was going to be like, you get three and four.
Speaker:If you got N, you would have got both N and O.
Speaker:Dude, this is so good.
Speaker:So as far as how we're playing this, is this like I can Wikipedia anything that starts with B?
Speaker:Yeah, anything that has to do with B.
Speaker:And since Book is way smarter than you, I'll let you do some research and stuff.
Speaker:But if you can think of something that comes up with a B, and that includes this is an old book, so it's going to include stuff that's not necessarily specific to the Apocalypse, obviously.
Speaker:So if you run into a case where it's something that you may not be familiar with, if it starts with a B, you can just either use your own real world knowledge on it, or you can look some shit up on the side.
Speaker:So valuable.
Speaker:You know what makes me sad?
Speaker:Is I didn't used to be dumber than Book, but I got dumber.
Speaker:And now I am definitively-
Speaker:Maybe Book got smarter.
Speaker:No, Book has only existed for less than a year, a little bit less than a year.
Speaker:Wow, your intelligence has degraded that much in such a short period of time.
Speaker:No, that's what I'm saying.
Speaker:No, no, no, I'm saying like when I was like in high school, I used to be the smartest book.
Speaker:And now I'm just not at all.
Speaker:I feel you.
Speaker:Ocean, for you, he pulls out, it looks just like a weird small gun.
Speaker:It's like very small, like derringer sized, except the end of it blows out into a huge horn.
Speaker:Like a blunderbust?
Speaker:Like, yeah, the end looks like a blunderbust, but it's like completely hand sized.
Speaker:And he opens up for you and he shows you how it works.
Speaker:And it's basically you load shells of any garbage you want into it, and it just blows out of it.
Speaker:They say they use just like sand a lot.
Speaker:That's sick.
Speaker:So it's really good at super short ranges, and it does three harm intimate.
Speaker:So you basically have to hold it up against someone, but it will really tear them apart.
Speaker:If we go on a convoluted journey to mine diamonds, can we get plus one on the damage for that thing?
Speaker:Yeah, I will adjust all of that based on what you put into it.
Speaker:Kind of with sand, it's three harm intimate, but say you find something a little heavier, like you find a bunch of pebbles.
Speaker:That's a dumb analogy because it's a long step up.
Speaker:Only diamonds.
Speaker:Diamonds may make it like two harm close.
Speaker:So you can like shoot a little further, but maybe it's weaker.
Speaker:But diamonds would be stronger, would they not?
Speaker:You don't know how this thing works.
Speaker:Don't worry about it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I wrote it down.
Speaker:I wrote it down as the garbage shooter.
Speaker:Hell, yeah.
Speaker:That is actually a really cool idea for an item.
Speaker:Ocean turns to the guy and says, thank you.
Speaker:You guys really didn't have to get anything like this.
Speaker:We didn't.
Speaker:We weren't saving your son out of a reward.
Speaker:We're just trying to do what's best for him.
Speaker:Book is hugging the Book, and he says, I love it.
Speaker:It's beautiful.
Speaker:It's beautiful.
Speaker:He flips it open, pops to beautiful.
Speaker:It's beautiful.
Speaker:And then you hold the page that says beautiful.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:And you see a flash as a camera takes a picture of you pointing to B, and he hands it over to you, and it's a camera, but it's not quite like the one that Crinkle Fry had.
Speaker:It doesn't print out instant things.
Speaker:It actually prints on film.
Speaker:It's like a nice little SLR camera.
Speaker:But you got to figure out a way to develop film.
Speaker:Hopefully, there's enough stuff in the B section of the book to fit in.
Speaker:But dark room.
Speaker:He gives you a few rolls of film.
Speaker:Bro, how do I do this?
Speaker:Well, we appreciate what you guys have done for us.
Speaker:Have you guys managed to get the supplies that we're trading?
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:We've actually loaded it all up on the barge, and we're going to be able to drive your vehicle, or whatever that thing is, onto it, and probably get you out of here in the next day or so, if you guys are ready to go.
Speaker:Oh, thank god.
Speaker:I was thinking we were going to have to scramble up those walls again.
Speaker:Oh no, we know how to get out of here pretty safe.
Speaker:No guarantees, like no promises, but we're usually able to get to the surface without casualty.
Speaker:Well, while I have you here, there's something else that I was wanting to talk to you about.
Speaker:My line of work is also scalvaging, and looking around for things and trade.
Speaker:I was thinking, CalTools, are you there?
Speaker:I'm always here.
Speaker:He pops out of the smoldering fire pit covered in soot.
Speaker:Well, I was thinking about setting up a trade route, and we could use CalTools here as a runner between us.
Speaker:So we could bring stuff to you.
Speaker:You can trade stuff with us, and we can trade stuff with you if we find anything, because we got a lot more access to things up at Subtropolis than I imagine you guys would have access to.
Speaker:I will be your runner if you give me one of those two cans of beans and 10% fake.
Speaker:I think that's a fair trade.
Speaker:I'll give you first pick.
Speaker:If you find anything cool that's not something that we're offering for trade, you can pick something out for yourself.
Speaker:CalTools gives a thumbs up, and the scavenger you're talking to goes, that sounds like a great deal to me.
Speaker:I heard you brought something that was absolutely world changing for us, which is why we're giving you all these medical supplies.
Speaker:I'm not thanking you for that.
Speaker:That was a fair trade.
Speaker:But if there's more stuff like that, we'd definitely be down for it.
Speaker:Yeah, I'm pretty good at finding things.
Speaker:I'm able to usually tell when something's special.
Speaker:So if I find something that I think you guys could utilize, or if you have anything in particular that you need, just send CalTools over, and we'll try and work something out.
Speaker:I'll see if I can find it for you.
Speaker:Book spits in his hand, looks down in disgust, wipes it off, and then extends it for a handshake.
Speaker:The man shakes your hand, and then you feel another hand go around you as CalTools grabs across the top of both.
Speaker:I mean, he's with the shake.
Speaker:Book absolutely put it, he absolutely split the difference to double the likelihood that someone would actually shake his hand after he did that.
Speaker:So unless you guys have anything else to do here, we can start heading back to Hamlet Opening.
Speaker:But first, you have a beginning of session moved.
Speaker:Ooh, we do, we do.
Speaker:Ooh, baby.
Speaker:Alright, let's roll my dice.
Speaker:And I think there's a 100% chance you're about to get a vision.
Speaker:Yeah, I think so, because we didn't do one last time.
Speaker:I didn't do one.
Speaker:No, you've probably got quite a snipe, Paul, because it's like, what, if you get to two hold, then you have to start the session by spending three hold.
Speaker:Three hold, I have to.
Speaker:You have to start.
Speaker:And I have to already.
Speaker:It can be a fever dream while you're coming in and out of consciousness while the spider was being worked on.
Speaker:Maybe.
Speaker:Well, that is a five, six, so that's a full ass fail.
Speaker:Hell yeah.
Speaker:So that means you get two instant visions.
Speaker:Wait, did you really have two instant visions?
Speaker:No, it says on a miss, the MC holds three.
Speaker:If the MC now has three holder more, they must begin the session by spending one.
Speaker:So as long as you have more than three, you have to spend one at the start of a session to trigger something then.
Speaker:So I have five and I have to spend one now.
Speaker:Which means I can now interrupt you twice.
Speaker:Oh, this is so good.
Speaker:So nothing else to do in the camp.
Speaker:I can't think of anything at this point.
Speaker:I think we've pretty much.
Speaker:So happy.
Speaker:We've got a whole ton of medical supplies.
Speaker:We got some interesting stuff.
Speaker:We're setting up a trade route.
Speaker:Spiders back up and working.
Speaker:I think everything is coming up.
Speaker:Millhouse book is also excited because there's a 50% higher probability that he has surviving family members.
Speaker:Yeah, it's nice.
Speaker:But it'll be even sadder if they aren't.
Speaker:Correct.
Speaker:Would you like to choose your vision, place and person?
Speaker:Let's see.
Speaker:I've done an interior of a machine bigger than the human making.
Speaker:I've done a place where the stars are visible in a black sky.
Speaker:I've done an unsettled place of constant motion.
Speaker:I've done an unfathomable labyrinth.
Speaker:Done a green and beautiful garden.
Speaker:The ones I have left are a place of human compassion where people care and serve for another.
Speaker:A place of corpses.
Speaker:So it's either a place of corpses or a place of human compassion for where it's going to take place.
Speaker:So let me see what people I have left to decide.
Speaker:I've done a person you loved whom you longed to see.
Speaker:I've done inhuman beings.
Speaker:I've done someone impersonally violent.
Speaker:I've done people chained.
Speaker:I've done a child face half covered.
Speaker:Hold up now.
Speaker:Wasn't the child's face half covered during the same vision that I was in saw the place of constant motion?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And wasn't that place of constant motion the place that we saw in the sand pits?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:And the child half covered was probably the child we just rescued.
Speaker:Holy shit.
Speaker:It's coming together.
Speaker:I just put that together.
Speaker:There's probably something else, but you see the future.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:Maybe I do.
Speaker:Maybe I don't.
Speaker:God damn.
Speaker:Maybe it's something entirely different.
Speaker:I've got someone indolent.
Speaker:Googling indolent real quick.
Speaker:Forced laborers or prisoners.
Speaker:That's not what I thought.
Speaker:Someone caring for you for the sole purpose of returning alive to torment.
Speaker:People overcome by starvation, poison, contamination, or a terrible disease.
Speaker:And then my favorite, because I love the contrast.
Speaker:I've got the person you loved, whom you long to see again.
Speaker:Then I have a person you loved, in whom your faith was misplaced.
Speaker:And that's one of my favorite ones that I'm very excited to use.
Speaker:But I don't know if that's...
Speaker:Yeah, that's definitely a climax moment.
Speaker:My last few visions have been so dark and depressing that I'm going to go with a place of human compassion where people serve and care for one another.
Speaker:Sorry, I'm already laughing because you think this one...
Speaker:Yeah, no, that's true.
Speaker:Watch Stu make that entirely unattainable for you.
Speaker:A place of human compassion where people serve and care for another.
Speaker:I'll go for that.
Speaker:And then, as a contrast, I'm going to go with people overcome by starvation, poison, contamination, or terrible disease.
Speaker:I'm ready to go immediately.
Speaker:That was a good choice.
Speaker:I figured that would make setup for a pretty easy one for you.
Speaker:You load up onto the skiff.
Speaker:There's just the flat bottom boat that they're able to drive the spider up onto.
Speaker:It's like a big barge.
Speaker:They load up all of your stuff.
Speaker:You've put most of the things like in the trunk of the spider and in the back seat, things like that.
Speaker:And there's a small party going with you to help keep you safe.
Speaker:It's some well-armed people.
Speaker:There's a few small lights on the front of this boat, and it starts taking off across the still ocean.
Speaker:This does not go particularly fast.
Speaker:It's a pretty slow barge.
Speaker:So you're slowly crawling across the sea with just this gentle rocking on this boat.
Speaker:And as you're there, you're looking into those deep waters where you guys have thought and you've seen something kind of reaching out or something large swimming through a few times.
Speaker:And you're just staring in there, seeing if anything comes to your mind.
Speaker:But it's really just these little pinpricks of light that keep rocking back and forth.
Speaker:And you feel your vision fade away, and your ears are immediately filled with this just very clear song.
Speaker:It's almost like a hymn being sung in a feminine voice, just a single voice, very loud, leading you through this darkness.
Speaker:It's in a language you don't seem to understand, but it seems very welcoming, and you follow it.
Speaker:And in your vision, you step forward through, just you imagine it's dark tunnels.
Speaker:You just see nothing, you reach out to the sides, and you feel just calm and stone on each edge.
Speaker:And you go forward and forward until a lit doorway opens up, and you step in, and you see this huge bath house with a bunch of just separate pools with people in them filled up.
Speaker:And there's all of these people in these white robes just taking care of everyone.
Speaker:And as you look at each individual, they all seem to have some sort of ailment.
Speaker:They're all either bone thin, or they have some sort of strange disease covering most of their face, or a wound that is open and almost certainly shouldn't be in communal bath water.
Speaker:But all their wounds are being tended, they're being given drinks, and everyone just seems very relaxed, and this voice just keeps drawing you forward.
Speaker:And you see at the end of the room, there's this woman in this long white robe who kind of just beckons you forward to say, hey, walk past all of these people, come to me into this chamber.
Speaker:And as you go forward, you hear more of these people, these caretakers, join the song, and it just gets louder and louder.
Speaker:And on the edge of your peripheral, you start seeing just little flashes of light.
Speaker:As you turn your head, you see they're all slowly pulling out knives, and then they just gut them straight into each person they're taking care of, spilling their blood into all of these pools.
Speaker:And they just continue their song, and the person is still staring at you, smiling, backing you forward, and you wake up.
Speaker:So anyway, that's why I started blasting.
Speaker:That's terrifying.
Speaker:And you wake up and you're on the barge, and you're in a room you don't recognize before.
Speaker:You've somehow made it all the way across the sea while you were out.
Speaker:And it looks like there's a series of locks that are rising it up.
Speaker:Locks, not like the thing on the door, the thing like in a channel.
Speaker:And is there another word for that?
Speaker:Are they locks?
Speaker:Am I going crazy?
Speaker:Honestly, let's ask the person from fish school.
Speaker:He should know about water.
Speaker:To elevate, to climb in a boat?
Speaker:Yeah, those are locks.
Speaker:Yeah, 100%.
Speaker:Hey, by the way, do you think it's, do you think baffles is like somehow a forgotten shorthand for bath house?
Speaker:Bath house.
Speaker:Since we're heading to the baffles.
Speaker:We're going to the baffles.
Speaker:Bath house, bath house, bath house, bath house.
Speaker:Like Hodor.
Speaker:Hold the door.
Speaker:Bath house, bath house, bath house.
Speaker:I would never hear something that hacky.
Speaker:Maybe, maybe.
Speaker:And these locks slowly rise you up a few levels.
Speaker:It takes a tremendously long time for them to work through, and there's a lot of manual interaction.
Speaker:As the barge comes up, a bunch of people have to jump out and unlock a bunch of things.
Speaker:This version of lock is the other sort of lock.
Speaker:Open some gates so you go in, and the water just slowly fills up layer by layer until you reach this last room that is just perfect cylinder going upwards with the one entrance into it.
Speaker:And it doesn't seem like there would be any way of going forward.
Speaker:It's just like the rooms where he came in, where it's just slimy, covered in detritus.
Speaker:But you see one of the men pulls out a stopwatch that he has.
Speaker:Looks like he doesn't really care about the numbers, as he has etched a bunch of different things into different sides of it, and it seems to be running on timer mode, so there's just the second hand quickly going around.
Speaker:After a while, he goes, OK, everyone get ready.
Speaker:It should be coming soon.
Speaker:Just hold on to something.
Speaker:And as everyone grabs onto heavy things, you guys probably hold onto the spider.
Speaker:Ocean looks around nervously and grabs the spider.
Speaker:There is suddenly a torrent of water that shoots in from the top above you and starts filling up this cylinder with water faster than it can flow out of the locks that you guys just came up.
Speaker:And slowly, over the next 30 to 40 minutes, you guys rise to the top of this, where they quickly re-engage the engine and push you out.
Speaker:And you actually end up right back into that first room you entered, where there were three different ways to go.
Speaker:And this is from the right side.
Speaker:Seems like if you went to the right, you would have had a very big fall to deal with, but then not much else.
Speaker:Ocean turns to Book.
Speaker:He's like, we know the routes to pick, don't we, Book?
Speaker:I still don't.
Speaker:I'm so sorry.
Speaker:But you end up getting to hard enough land for you guys, for the barge to get smashed up against it, and they put down a little flap, just like a bunch of D-Day boats, and you can drive off back and forth.
Speaker:And we get eviscerated by G42s.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Alright, well, let's get back to Hamlet Opening.
Speaker:It's been a while since we've been there, and Ocean turns and waves at the people, and starts driving towards Hamlet Opening.
Speaker:I nod at Ocean, and then I nod at Vesuvius, which is very close to my face, so it's more like a nose-to-nose Eskimo kiss type deal.
Speaker:So, while we're driving, Ocean turns to Book, and is like, was I just dreaming that?
Speaker:Or did you hear what Johnny Hertz was saying and talking with Crandall?
Speaker:Oh no, that was fully real.
Speaker:Actually, let's turn on the radio.
Speaker:I dialed Johnny Hertz's station.
Speaker:Yeah, it seems like Spade hasn't been gone for a while.
Speaker:Oh, fuck.
Speaker:Yeah, it seems like they've just completely disappeared, and now Juniper is just completely without security.
Speaker:I don't want to talk bad about my friend's place, and let me tell you, that's my favorite bar to stay at, but I don't know if it's safe to be there anymore.
Speaker:I think if you're showing, make sure you can defend yourself.
Speaker:They still technically have a no-weapon rule, but if you're a listener, I don't have enough listeners to lose, so keep yourself safe.
Speaker:I slapped the radio off.
Speaker:They always let weapons into that fucking place.
Speaker:That rule was a farce from day one.
Speaker:Anybody who was anybody didn't listen to that rule.
Speaker:That's some liberal propaganda, some fake news.
Speaker:Do we still, we have a radio hooked up to talk with Johnny, right?
Speaker:Like, we set up that two-way communication with him, right?
Speaker:Ocean grabs the radio and he dials in for Johnny, and all he says is, Johnny, we're coming back.
Speaker:And if anyone messes with Juniper, they're messing with all of us.
Speaker:And he hangs up.
Speaker:That's intense.
Speaker:Book looks at Ocean like, when you say us, like, do you mean, because I'm not like, I just I need book.
Speaker:I thought I was your follower book.
Speaker:I'm just doing what you want.
Speaker:Solidarity.
Speaker:No, you're my you're my visionary.
Speaker:Oh, OK, I see.
Speaker:I just think there's something going on with Hamlet opening.
Speaker:You heard that last call before when we were in the hospital.
Speaker:It almost sounds.
Speaker:Sounds like there's something bad going on.
Speaker:I feel like we've left it alone for too long.
Speaker:I feel like we witnessed a lot of it firsthand, like the blowing up of the hospital.
Speaker:And then I guess that's pretty much it.
Speaker:At least we have mushrooms, though.
Speaker:I mean, good job, team.
Speaker:Yeah, I think high fives all around.
Speaker:First, we got to get these supplies to to Maple.
Speaker:Maple.
Speaker:Nailed it.
Speaker:And one too many plant names.
Speaker:We got to get these supplies to Maple.
Speaker:And I think after that, we turn into Johnny Hurtson.
Speaker:See if he can catch us up on everything that's going on.
Speaker:Is Caltools with us?
Speaker:Not that you can see.
Speaker:I bet he is, though.
Speaker:I bet he's going to pop out of a wall.
Speaker:He's still probably following us.
Speaker:He's golemed to the ceiling with his gecko hands.
Speaker:Okay, when we get to the canoe, sorry, have we reached the exit?
Speaker:Will we reach the exit?
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:I want to investigate the string that I placed to identify if anyone came in after us.
Speaker:String's broken.
Speaker:Was this Caltools?
Speaker:No, Caltools was with us when we opened it and when I tied the string.
Speaker:Yeah, but he was behind you.
Speaker:He was on the other side of it when you tied the string.
Speaker:So if Caltools can't phase through this, then it's probably him.
Speaker:But I reckon he can do weird things like wriggle into cracks.
Speaker:I would like to investigate the footprints and see if I can identify any tracks that are not Caltools, me, or Ocean.
Speaker:Ooh, give me a Rita Citroll.
Speaker:Totally, totally, totally, totally.
Speaker:Hell yeah, baby, that's an 11.
Speaker:Ooh, nice, nice.
Speaker:You can ask me four questions.
Speaker:No.
Speaker:You may not need all four in this case.
Speaker:I might.
Speaker:Stu, I want you to tell me four things.
Speaker:What should I be on the lookout for specifically in the shape of footprints?
Speaker:Who or what poses the biggest threat to us in the shape of footprints?
Speaker:Who's in control here in regards to creating the footprints?
Speaker:I feel like this was not our best usage of these questions.
Speaker:What?
Speaker:This is great.
Speaker:I'm doing good.
Speaker:You're doing great.
Speaker:You're doing great.
Speaker:I'm doing a whole other than one sniff the windy for good luck.
Speaker:Who here is keeping secrets from the rest in the form of footprints?
Speaker:God damn it, Book.
Speaker:You go and you look at the murky ground here that never really fully dries.
Speaker:It looks like it does flood all the way up to the door every once in a while at least.
Speaker:And you can actually still see your original footprints coming in.
Speaker:Both of you have some pretty chunky boots, so you're able to see both of those clomping through.
Speaker:And then you see definitely a pair of smaller footprints.
Speaker:They probably look like a large child footprint.
Speaker:And after a few steps, it does turn into both footprints and handprints together.
Speaker:Not quite like how a chimpanzee runs, but more of how a spider monkey would crawl.
Speaker:And then a little bit after that, you see it looks like there is something that was getting dragged as well.
Speaker:It looks like something of a pretty geometric shape.
Speaker:There's two hard divots, like a rectangle of some sort of what it looks like.
Speaker:Of course, it could be any shape besides that, but that's all you see.
Speaker:I think I hit all your questions with that.
Speaker:Yeah, I believe you did.
Speaker:That was perfect.
Speaker:Oh, wait, sorry.
Speaker:Can you describe the divots?
Speaker:So you're saying it's two rectangles, but they're being dragged?
Speaker:It's one big rectangle, but you're really only seeing the edges.
Speaker:So you're seeing tracks of some sort.
Speaker:So it's either a big rectangle or a sled.
Speaker:It's hard to tell.
Speaker:And it's straight edges, so it looks manufactured as opposed to organic.
Speaker:So Cawtools pulled a sled out of his butt?
Speaker:Came out of nowhere.
Speaker:Let me see this.
Speaker:Ocean puts his hand on the divots, and he wants to see if it will speak to him.
Speaker:My god, I could roll on this one for once.
Speaker:That is a 11.
Speaker:I rarely ever roll well on things speaking.
Speaker:This is like when Professor Snape taps the thing and goes, reveal your secrets.
Speaker:You know what I'm talking about?
Speaker:I don't remember which movie that's in, but that 100% happens exactly like that.
Speaker:It's in one of the Harry Potter movies.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:I just watched the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth all in one sitting as just half background noise.
Speaker:I don't remember it in that, but I wasn't really paying that much attention.
Speaker:So maybe it was in one of those.
Speaker:It's when he has the Marauder's Map.
Speaker:Oh, so it's the one I didn't watch.
Speaker:Reveal your secrets.
Speaker:That's it.
Speaker:Now it's all coming back to me.
Speaker:And then it goes blulululu, Professor Snape.
Speaker:OK, so I get to ask three questions.
Speaker:The one that I'm for sure asking is who made this?
Speaker:Seems like a pretty good question.
Speaker:I'm going to say what words have been said most recently with this or to this, and what strong emotions have been recently nearby this.
Speaker:You bend down and you touch the ground.
Speaker:You feel the mud oozes around your hands, and you feel yourself going into the track here and just feeling its creation, its history.
Speaker:There's some other little glimpses of just this ground in general, hundreds of people who have tread over it.
Speaker:Years before, where it had an entirely different purpose, just flashed through your mind too quick to hold on to.
Speaker:But eventually, you feel just this warm hope gleaming into your heart for a second.
Speaker:But then a more disconcerting voice kind of contrasts that, and it doesn't sound like any particular voice.
Speaker:It's just almost words being spoken into your head.
Speaker:And it says, I knew you were trouble when you walked in.
Speaker:Ocean turns to Bogansless.
Speaker:I think it's Cow Tools.
Speaker:Pretty sure this was from Cow Tools.
Speaker:I don't know what the tracks are from, but I recognize my girl T.
Speaker:Swift anywhere, and that sounds like what Cow Tools was humming.
Speaker:And those are the only tracks that we see?
Speaker:Where did the thing materialize from?
Speaker:About 15 steps in.
Speaker:After he goes on all fours?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Oh, man.
Speaker:He's got some non-Euclidean shit going on.
Speaker:He's doing something strange.
Speaker:Robot.
Speaker:He's doing strange stuff.
Speaker:I don't know.
Speaker:Hey Vesuvius, you ever seen anything like this?
Speaker:Let me see.
Speaker:Well, I'm not allowed to roll dice, and I don't really have much knowledge about tracks.
Speaker:Oh, don't worry, I'll roll for you.
Speaker:It looks like someone was just crawling on their hands and legs.
Speaker:And then, are you just trying to rub it in that I don't have those anymore?
Speaker:I told you, Vesuvius, we are going to get you that RC car.
Speaker:We're going to get you that bionic.
Speaker:No, we're going to get you that bionic body.
Speaker:I nudge Ocean.
Speaker:I'm like, Ocean, we cannot over-promise and under-deliver on this, man.
Speaker:We have to under-prize and over-deliver.
Speaker:That's our goal.
Speaker:Maybe if the RC car is like an escape pod from the body, and I can hit a button with my tongue, and then I pop out.
Speaker:Like in the thing?
Speaker:And then I can roll the safe.
Speaker:Would you rather have legs like in the thing or wheels like in Toy Story?
Speaker:I turned off the thing when that dog came up.
Speaker:I don't like dogs.
Speaker:You don't like dogs?
Speaker:Not that one.
Speaker:Because it turned into a tentacle monster?
Speaker:Oh, I didn't get that far.
Speaker:You didn't see its face split open and tentacles shoot out on the other dogs?
Speaker:Oh, no, I probably would have liked to roll by then.
Speaker:I guess that dog just gave me bad vibes.
Speaker:Just that dog.
Speaker:Book's shoulder feels disgusting right now.
Speaker:Wow, maybe it was a bad looking dog.
Speaker:Maybe he was mean.
Speaker:It was a husk?
Speaker:What are you...
Speaker:I've never seen the movie, Book.
Speaker:I don't even know what you're talking about.
Speaker:There's something wrong with its eyes.
Speaker:Book's jaw clenches so hard that, like, there's a 50% chance one of his teeth cracks.
Speaker:But I mean, Book, it sounds like if that dog had tentacles coming out of it and split in half, then I think Vesuvius had the right idea about that dog.
Speaker:Maybe he could just tell that was something wrong with it.
Speaker:Not his fault.
Speaker:He's just a little alien dog doing what aliens...
Speaker:You wouldn't understand.
Speaker:As you guys make it through the boat and start driving back to Hamlet Opening...
Speaker:This dude's like, I gotta cut these fuckers off.
Speaker:That's just too much.
Speaker:You get back in...
Speaker:No, because I'm about to make you guys talk to each other again.
Speaker:You guys get back in the spider and roll through this opening.
Speaker:I'm guessing you close it back behind you.
Speaker:Hey, Ocean.
Speaker:If I was a dog, would you still love me?
Speaker:Of course.
Speaker:I love dogs.
Speaker:Didn't sound like it earlier.
Speaker:I don't even...
Speaker:I didn't even know what dog you're talking about.
Speaker:I ain't ever seen the movie book.
Speaker:If I was a dog, would you still love me?
Speaker:It depends on the dog type, I guess.
Speaker:That's fucked, and you're fucked.
Speaker:I knew it.
Speaker:I knew you would love me as a dog.
Speaker:Look, look, we gotta get back to Hamlet Opening.
Speaker:Let's just bottle them up, and let's get this drive done with.
Speaker:We got things to do.
Speaker:You're right, Ocean.
Speaker:I can't let this get the better of me.
Speaker:I've always wanted a dog, though.
Speaker:You peel off into the tunnels and caverns of the Long Dark, twisting and turning until you reach a larger thoroughfare.
Speaker:Starting to kind of recognize where you are.
Speaker:It's not too difficult to get back from the original instructions you had, from cow tools when you got here.
Speaker:As you're heading back, either tell me or talk amongst yourselves on how do you want to actually approach Hamlet Opening.
Speaker:Last time you were here, you were wanted criminals who were kind of keeping it down low on the outskirts.
Speaker:You had a little bit of a smoke screen with those, the caravan, and they're gone now.
Speaker:How sturdy is Maple's house?
Speaker:Pretty good.
Speaker:Does it have a flat roof?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Hey, Ocean, would you say we zip line in onto Maple's roof and kind of descend like a little spider, like an actual spider, just kind of lower ourselves down?
Speaker:Like we kind of zip to the ceiling of the cavern and then lower down onto Maple's roof?
Speaker:I think that'd be pretty fucking sick.
Speaker:It's not a terrible idea to try and avoid being seen.
Speaker:I don't think we can park the car, but I can probably hook the spider up on top and we can just descend in using one of the other grapples.
Speaker:We could even drop the goods down his chimney like Santa Claus and write BO on him for not body odor, but Book and Ocean, or OB for Ocean and Book.
Speaker:I kind of want to talk to him to be honest with you.
Speaker:Yeah, I don't either.
Speaker:Oh, you did want to talk to him?
Speaker:I did want to talk to him.
Speaker:That makes one of us.
Speaker:You guys make it through the tunnels and you're taking the Santa Claus type approach to at least get there.
Speaker:Well, we want to try and stay.
Speaker:I think we should probably try and avoid being seen for sure.
Speaker:When we get close, does it look like he has an entrance into his house from the roof?
Speaker:His hospital in quotation marks is an old, it looks like probably a gas station.
Speaker:That was the whole gas pump side of it has been completely torn off.
Speaker:But a person in modern times would recognize it as a gas station.
Speaker:Convenience store, 7-Eleven type thing.
Speaker:I'm just saying Ocean, like he totally broke into the book cave, so I feel like we should give him a taste of his own medicine.
Speaker:Well, what if we park somewhere?
Speaker:How much is our car loaded up when it comes to supplies and stuff?
Speaker:You're very loaded.
Speaker:So we've got to basically drive the spider over if we want to not make six million trips.
Speaker:You could carry all of them together.
Speaker:You could carry all the medical supplies with both of your hands full.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Ocean is going to park the spider someplace on the outskirts of town, kind of hidden, kind of intentionally park it in like a crevice in the wall that he knows of that is pretty close to town, but you wouldn't outright just see the spider if you're just looking out.
Speaker:Using back alleys, he wants to walk to Mabel's place with the supplies.
Speaker:It sounds like you're taking the lead on this, so you give me a act under fire roll.
Speaker:I got plus two cool, so hopefully I won't fail these as much.
Speaker:That is a seven.
Speaker:Can I help?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh.
Speaker:That is a nine plus three.
Speaker:Ooh, nice.
Speaker:Nice, nice.
Speaker:Both of you get plus one HX, which I believe makes you roll over, which means you get an experience.
Speaker:I have not rolled over.
Speaker:Not you.
Speaker:I have one less until I roll over.
Speaker:So I'm back down to plus one, and I do roll over.
Speaker:How do you keep track of that shit, Stu?
Speaker:That's impressive as fuck.
Speaker:You park the spider a good way away, kind of near Book's place, but not even in the opening yet.
Speaker:And you wait till most of the lights flicker off for the nighttime in quotation marks of Hamlet Opening before you start hoofing it.
Speaker:Both your hands are full.
Speaker:It's a heavy load, especially for you, Book, to carry enough to be able to get this in one trip.
Speaker:You have to be pretty loaded up as well, which, historically, through this tail weep and weaving, I don't think you've carried a single plant for a moment.
Speaker:Can we say that the way that I help is that I follow behind Ocean with a mostly empty sack, and I catch all the things that he's dropping so that we don't leave a breadcrumb trail leading right to...
Speaker:Nope.
Speaker:I feel like that's a fun idea.
Speaker:So I start with a mostly empty sack and then end with a very full sack.
Speaker:Stu, would you love me still if I was a dog?
Speaker:The quick response.
Speaker:Stu knew this question was coming and he was prepped and ready.
Speaker:Unless he could still speak on a podcast, then it would be worth it.
Speaker:Okay, hell yeah.
Speaker:We'd probably get some pretty good press if that was the case.
Speaker:Worth it.
Speaker:Everyone would be like, did you hear about that podcast with the talking dog?
Speaker:And everyone would be like, the one where they don't acknowledge that it's a talking dog.
Speaker:For the first 34 episodes.
Speaker:I mean, the viewers have never seen us for us.
Speaker:As far as we know, Brady could be a talking dog.
Speaker:I've been told I have dog energy.
Speaker:As you're moving forward towards Maples Place, you're mostly in the shadows trying to stick along routes that aren't as easily noticed.
Speaker:Book, you're a little bit further away, picking up some of the things that he drops and adding to your pile to the point where you can almost not hold on to the items.
Speaker:I did it!
Speaker:And as you bend over to pick up one of the, there's a little bottle of ibuprofen that falls out and rolls on the ground.
Speaker:You bend down to pick it up.
Speaker:You see there's this white picket fence that runs alongside one of the buildings.
Speaker:You look down under it, and you realize from your waist down is completely exposed.
Speaker:This fence has been completely half eaten at some point.
Speaker:And you recognize a few people on the other side.
Speaker:Luckily, the only person who notices you right away is Callista, and her eyes go wide.
Speaker:What would you do as your eyes lock for a second?
Speaker:Wink.
Speaker:No, absolutely not.
Speaker:Book's eyebrows raise, and the sides of his mouth pull out really wide.
Speaker:Like the eek.
Speaker:Yeah, like eek been seen.
Speaker:Yeah, I know that emoji.
Speaker:She sees the face you make, and she turns around quickly and tries to make herself a little bit of a distraction.
Speaker:She goes and starts talking to someone who's walking in the opposite direction towards you.
Speaker:Hell yeah.
Speaker:She seems to be asking them a question that gets other people involved in it.
Speaker:You're way too far away to hear.
Speaker:But it seems like they all turn around, and you're able to scurry forward, and you hurry Ocean up to get past this very exposed fence that you're walking along.
Speaker:And you make it to Maples without being seen.
Speaker:Perfect.
Speaker:He's out on the front porch in a rocking chair.
Speaker:Where have you all been?
Speaker:He shakes his head, and he's like, whoa.
Speaker:It's a long story, Maple.
Speaker:We've got some supplies for you.
Speaker:We'll explain inside.
Speaker:Yeah, he opens the door quickly, and closes it and locks it behind him.
Speaker:But basically the second he locks it, there's a knock on the door.
Speaker:Thanks for watching!
Speaker:Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of Oops!
Speaker:All Apocalypses.
Speaker:I hope everyone had a really fun holiday break and is ready for an exciting new year.
Speaker:Seems like we got a lot of fun stuff coming up in this next year.
Speaker:I'm seeing some extra games with different systems.
Speaker:I'm seeing RPG systems written by two of our very own hosts.
Speaker:Man, there's a lot of weird stuff.
Speaker:Guest appearances, can't afford that.
Speaker:But I am excited to see how it turns out.
Speaker:The music and editing was performed by Stu Masterson.
Speaker:Brady McDonough made that logo.
Speaker:And Jacob exfoliates.
Speaker:But dark room.
