S1:E52 – Naming Day

It more difficult to be proven wrong or found not to know something.

Why.

An answer for that right away anyway?

And when I say difficult to be proven wrong, I mean actually swallow the fact that like, ah, I'm wrong.

I up.

Yeah, I understood.

You like totally rewired my brain. I was in the middle of looking for something in my notes and it just like completely disrupted my train of thought. It really got me.

Kind of just happened to. I didn't even think. It kind of just happened in reflex.

I know. It was just like so respond. Responsive, reactive. There.

I want to go to work tomorrow.

I don't mind you either.

Monday's going to be a joint.

Yeah. I'm sorry. For your Monday. All right. We ready?

Yes.

I.

There's something in this room. Like I was when we left for intermission. I was good and I came back and I immediately started sniffling again.

Weird. You might be allergic to one of my candles. These pastors. Do you have a fragrance that is.

Particularly allergic to house this.

Not what I'm aware of. But I'm developing new allergies every week at this point.

It's in the Mr.

Cool. Okay, I'm exaggerating. I'm still mad about the racing.

What if I heard about that? It's such an inconvenient thing.

Yeah. And they put rice in everything. Everything. Health food is off the table for me now.

Yeah.

I cannot eat a single form of granola bar. Power bar, what have you.

Whatever you choose.

That sucks. Yeah.

Do your damnedest to avoid a gluten intolerance.

Oh my God.

Star.

That's all the carbs.

I'll starve.

Live on corn.

I've already talked about this. If I go, if I develop gluten intolerance, I'll just have to die.

Like that's all I got.

She's like, I'll just tap out.

Dude.

It I don't hear.

Not only because I can't eat anything but all the good things I can't eat anymore. Yeah.

I still have cheese and peanut butter. I guess.

So you can become lactose intolerant.

Oh, yeah. She might wish that on her. Wrong with you.

How dare.

Sir.

Don't you put that evil on Amanda.

She's gonna need the ice cream.

Don't even put that out to the universe.

I'm just not. I'm not making dairy free ice that I can get to.

But cheese and I've had dairy free cheese. It's not that great.

It's not as good.

It's weird.

What is it?

Dairy Free cheese.

Oh, that would be.

Not cheese. But we're gonna.

I've had some cashew cheese that is palatable, kind of like almonds, but it's raw. It's not cheese.

It's almond oil.

Yeah.

Yeah. Never investigated whether or not I have a gluten or dairy intolerance. Because I don't want to know.

It's not gonna change.

Yeah, exactly. I live the life I want to live.

I have several family members breaking out in hives.

Yeah. I have several family.

I'm waiting. I'm gonna, like, give. Give a whole nother, like, a little while longer for everything to, like, sort itself out. And I'm gonna go get sushi.

Yeah. Reintroduce.

Reintroduce. And if I do break out, at.

Least I got sushi.

One more time.

One more time.

And you can pick and choose to treat yourself with some bad health after certain.

You can do exactly what lactose intolerant people do.

Yeah.

I'm still gonna have ice cream.

I'll just deal with it.

The hives are fine. They don't itch that bad.

Yeah.

Just depends on how bad the break.

Have you guys had the Safeway Sushi? No, because actually, they actually make the sushi there. It's not fresh sushi.

Yeah, it's not all.

They do it at City Market.

Yeah.

It's solid.

I mean, it's.

It's quick. It's. You grab it.

I want to try that hot pot place.

It's not sushi.

And, like, they just opened. We drove by it when the truck smells so good.

Yes.

Oh, yeah, we drove by that one. It's finally open. Oh, it's.

It's like surf and surf.

I thought it was. Oh, so it's hot.

Anything that does that many things and sushi. I'm not eating their sushi.

No, I don't.

No, you need to do sushi.

I would observe the staff first. Personally.

Koi ramen sushi is very good, though.

It's solid. I still think, personally, I like Sweet Heroes the best. As far as sushi places.

The koi ramen is good. I like their.

I like the sushi place in the mall.

I hated their sushi the least. I haven't tried that one.

I'm like. Again, I. One of the sushi.

They have a pretty good. They have, like, sushi burritos.

One thing I just.

I don't. It's one. It's like, you know, coffee drinkers are always convinced you we're going to learn to like coffee sushi. People Are the same way. Like, I just haven't had the good sushi.

Yeah.

Well, the last place I went to, I was told was the good suit.

Is it the raw fish that gets you.

The flavor is bad.

Okay.

Rolls are just the ones with, like, the rice fish on top.

It has unique texture.

Not crazy about the taste of the rice.

It's kind of a sweeter rice.

Yeah. As someone who does like soup, I like inari. So about, like, having to fight to like something, and you don't really need to like it.

It's just like, I don't encounter sushi enough for this to be. If I lived in Japan, probably get over it.

Yeah.

You might have to just get.

All right. That's one of the, like, also so.

Much cheaper in Japan. So much cheaper.

That's because it's fresh, easy level.

Sushi is like the tempura fried stuff. Like the tempura shrimp. It's like fried shrimp in a sushi roll. It's pretty good.

I like tempura, but.

Yeah, but, like, if it's the rice, then that's. That's.

Also not, like, crazy about seaweed. It's not season a lot of it. I don't love fish. Like, yeah, dude, I am not.

Yeah, no.

Jam.

It's okay.

I will eat the out of ramen.

I don't do jam. I do honey, and I kiss it on the lips.

And on that note, welcome to Theater of the man presents retribution episode number 52. My name is Mike. I'm your dungeon master. And this week's question from the ultimate RPG campfire card deck by James d' Amato is do you find it more difficult to be proven wrong or found not to know something? Why?

Why?

My name is Amanda, and I am playing Mel Kelly. Mel doesn't know a lot and is frequently wrong. So. So let's be realistic here. If she had to choose between the two, though, I think being wrong bothers her more because, like I said, she doesn't know a lot, and she knows she doesn't know a lot, and so she's happy to learn new things if people will actually explain them to her. However, when she does learn something, she stands by that as fact. So if she finds out that she's factually wrong, she gets a little peeved about it.

There's a theme building here, in case you were wondering.

Yeah, I'm Jeremy. I'm playing Elliot Brandybane. Elliott Brandybane doesn't have a problem not knowing things because he is definitely old enough to realize that he doesn't know most things, so. But he's quite sure it's almost impossible to find him wrong, because once he does know it, he knows it and he's not wrong.

I am Brunel.

I am playing all knock Vaga Johnson. And this is kind of similar for both myself and Ulnock. Being proven wrong is quite upsetting, but, like, not knowing stuff's like, I didn't know anyway. Who cares, right? Like, it's whatever. I learned something new today. But being proven wrong, like, you looking up, you're like, wow, I.

Really thought.

That was the correct answer. And then you're just wildly inaccurate. It hurts my feelers. I don't like it. It's not good. Especially when you rub it in my face like an. It's like, hey, that's. That's uncalled for. I was just wrong, you guys.

Hello.

I'm down that I'm playing James O', Brien, and O' Brien is. I always feel like I'm joining an AA meeting.

Hi, James.

It has been 5.5seconds since I've stolen anything. Here's your watch back now.

Anyway, the other ta.

James is a guy who would literally run from problems whether or not he caused them or not. And recently with the whole zombie thing, he was in the wrong. He was told that he was in the wrong and totally accepted it for what it was.

Cats.

He was wrong.

You were being held together by mushrooms. You had no legs to stand on.

Yeah.

I'm Casey. I play Emory Lee. And I think Emory is one of those people that kind of tries to be a little bit of everything. And if she doesn't know it, she will learn it because there is this level of she perceives an expectation in the world that she should know a lot of things and she should be able to do a lot of things. And that's partially how a lot of her skills have formed is just kind of by like, well, someone expected me to know this thing, so I need to know this thing. So I think. I think she is more affected by the second option, which I forget the exact wording of, but found not to know something. Found not to know something. She's more affected by that because she really tries to be a person that is fairly well rounded and knows a lot of stuff.

Amora Tar despises being found not to know something. He has a lot of advisors and a very intricate spy network, and if something catches him off guard, that is absolutely unacceptable. And quite a few people down the chain die.

Challenge accepted.

Recap.

Oh.

Oh, you didn't get the spinner guy.

Roll the 17. The 17 EST goes 3, 9.

17.

Odds are it's you.

13.

Anybody get more of a 17 than a 17?

No. 7.

I got a 9.

I think this is what your like, second time doing this?

I think so. Maybe third, but it's the second time.

Just at the top of your recap here, I want to note that by my calculations, it is June 2nd.

Cool.

All righty. Let's see. So Aunt Granny Ed May, we think, was having some kind of a wild magic surge. We got her to her room, put her to bed. She was glowing. The kids, for some reason, had a brilliant plan to have watch. James clearing his watch, got snuck up behind and got beaten unconscious. Edna May got kidnapped. We've wandered around town trying to find out information, and it is the naming ceremony. And we're going to listen to the naming ceremony and then continue our investigation to find out where the missing people, including Edna May, are.

You forgot something very important. Fried food.

It's not really important at all, but thank you, though.

I think also from these last two watch cycles we have done, we have learned that we need to be a lot more judicious on waking people up. You notice something's wrong, you wake somebody up.

Got it.

Yeah.

That will be the running point. Which also means that if you get woken up and it turns out that it wasn't anything, it was just two cats fighting in the alleyway behind the building. You don't tuck a shoe at somebody.

That's fair.

I would also like to say that if you're on watch, maybe you should be more observant than some of us are.

Naturally, we can't control that. I would love to be more observant. Thank you.

Not my fault the things that beat me up were invisible.

You were observant. You were doing fine until the invisible things.

Just pointing out that you all could have went to bed and she'd have been kidnapped in the morning and you wouldn't have been beaten up.

That makes me feel so much better. If I didn't try, we wouldn't have had to deal with it. She has still been gone. Nothing changed.

Why in the world would we think that the invisible things were going to steal her?

I didn't know why you guys were watching it in anyway, but we were.

Hoping that if anybody tried to steal her, they'd be visible and we could punch them first.

You were just assuming they'd be beaten.

Yes, that would have helped. Yes.

Yeah.

Well, that's why I went to bed.

No, you went to bed because you had too much brandy.

What I'm hearing is that I'm Brandy.

Bane for a reason.

Men.

Dr. Moulder Rouge takes his place behind the podium up on the gazebo. I repaints the picture. If you picture any Midwest small town, city park slash town square, this is that. And picture it for just about any summer holiday Americana stuff plastered all over the place. The white folding tables that have existed forever.

They really have.

Yeah.

Covered with cheap plastic tablecloths. A bunch of the red, white and blue bunting and swoopy bits and cuz.

We learned a new word last episode.

They're stuck now.

Not thousand percent sure what a bunting is, but they are there.

It's the swoopy ribbon part.

Sweepy ribbon bits.

Yeah, that's. That's bunting.

But yeah. He takes his place behind the podium and pretty quickly people stop chitter chattering and turn to face him. You realize this man has got at minimum the respect of the town. They are Mr. Mortar. Rouge is up there. They're listening.

Don't do it.

I'm not going to.

You'll get disappeared next.

We can start a tracking beacon on you or something.

Maybe.

Is that a thing? Can we do that?

I don't have tracking. Can we magically air tag him?

But if he flicks his hat, he's on his own. Damn it.

I will go along with the plan. I got so excited.

Welcome fine people of Carson. I want to thank you for joining us today for this momentous occasion. Before we dive in, I want to thank a couple people for making this occasion possible. First off, of course I want to thank Mr. Lalibear for. For handling the sourcing of our new plaque. You'll see it here in a little bit and I think it is truly a work of art. Also, Mr. Manco, for helping set up the decorations here and for assisting with this fine food. In addition to Mr. Manko, I'd like to thank my personal chef, Henri for assisting. But above and beyond all that, I want to thank you all. The fine people here in Carson have shown a level of hospitality that is beyond compare. In trying times like these, it would have been perfectly reasonable for you all to shut up your borders and drive us outsiders from your fine little hamlet. Instead, you welcomed us into your community and have allowed us to integrate into this new society. It's in that vein that I want to continue forward. A new society. I don't think any of us here would be too remiss to say that the Carson of today is significantly different to the Carson of just three months ago. This naming ceremony, which is an idea I can thank Mrs. Gallagher for, is meant to honor the changes this fine town has gone through. With that in mind, I present to you our new town seal, Bonaventure. Johnson steps forward and hoists the the new seal off of its tripod and kinda manhandles it a little bit onto the front of the podium. You see, it takes two or three tries, but he finally gets it to stick.

Trying to get the nail in that little spot of the real.

Yeah.

And you can tell you're seeing Bonaventure is not a little man and he's. This sucker's heavy. He is fighting it a little bit to get it over there. And then once he gets it situated, he looks up at Leroy, who gives him a quick nod of his head and in a clearly rehearsed display of bravado, whooshes the black curtain off of the new seal. What you see is a matte black pentagonal black stone background dotted with galzy black jewel inlays around the border kind of outlining the pentagon. In the center is a complex looking triangle and circle pattern that is lightly chiseled into the stone faces connecting all the jewels. Think honestly, anime magic circle kind of nice.

I get the first thing that I thought was a tragic magic circle.

Does it look like OO Buggy one?

Still not at all.

Okay, not at all.

That that pattern has been lightly chiseled into the stone's face connecting all the jewels and a light copper inlay has been placed inside that engraving. Okay, now this is Leroy. Now I know you folks are probably thinking there ain't a name on that sale. Has the good doctor lost his marbles? And to that I say no. In the spirit of creating new traditions here, we're gonna try ourselves a little something extra. We all know that magic has been a bit of a taboo subject after what happened to our poor sweet Angelique. However, I fully believe in the power of community and the safety of numbers. As such, I want to try a practice that comes from my old home. Folks, I'd like it if we could all hold hands and focus our collective attention on the center of this here seal. With your focus and some fancy words from Mr. Lally Bear. I think we are due for a special surprise with that Mr. Motor Rouge steps away from the podium and a thin sharp dressed man in a pinstripe suit. You guys saw him this morning. He was one of the guys leading the setup for the gazebo itself. He steps up to the Podium says, why, thank you, Mayor. Now, folks, let's focus our attention forward here and listen to what I say.

Can I do an arcana check on that? See if there's any, like, magic laced into that? Like, he's trying to, like. Like, charm the people into.

Nothing there.

Okay.

Nothing there.

It's just the way.

Don't worry. It's coming.

Patience.

Yeah. You do see, again, people, whether people like these folks or not is one thing. They're absolutely listening to what they're saying. So you see everybody kind of, you know, they're looking puzzled, right? Confused, for sure. But they look at their neighbors and they're like, all right. They all hold hands and focus their attention up on that seal. And just for fun shits and gigs.

What are you folks doing not holding hands?

I'm gonna hold hands with our group, but I don't want our group to connect to their group.

Okay.

I say. I think we've been standing kind of by ourselves. Anyway, we're in the back, so.

Yeah, very in the back.

And once. Once it's obvious everybody has locked hands and eyes, the Thin man starts speaking again. And what's coming out ain't words y' all ever heard of before. He repeats those lines several times, and as he does so, the copper inlays seem to catch fire.

Oh.

Oh, Small fire again. These are real thick. This is honestly, objectively gorgeous work. They catch fire and burn a beautiful blue green color.

Can we stop this? What do we do?

They whip around the etched lines crazy fast, leaving a faintly red glow behind. So again, just the etched inlay is glowing red now against this black stone.

Not allowed to make decisions. Elliot, what do we do?

As he repeats, the glowing gets brighter and brighter until eventually the glow has swallowed the face of the stone. The man finishes with nulli volktmor. Ja. As he does, the glow recedes.

And.

As it does so, a new symbol is clearly visible. This is an equilateral triangle pointed downwards with a small circle on each corner of the triangle. Each circle is a straight line that comes out of it that bisects the triangle into two right triangles. Over the top of that symbol is the new name Maeth Pel, underneath the City of Lights. And that is M, A, E, T, H, base, P, E, L. Maeth Pel. The City of Lights.

When we ran into. I can't think. We said his name earlier, and I can't think of it. The Gruber. Thank you. Mel and I had spent some time with his spell book.

I was gonna ask the same Question.

Yeah, the first portion up until that last line feels very similar.

Okay.

That last line is different.

Did anything about that feel like any of the weirdness that went on with as Raphael in that church?

In. In what way?

Well, I mean, like they were casting spells and things like that. Did it sound like any of their incantations?

No.

Okay.

Any of our magic dominant people can roll an Arcana to see if there's anything more they can gain.

13:18.

I'm not proficient in it.

Oh, really? Okay. Oh, yeah. You're natural magic.

I'm a sorcerer.

Right.

I didn't learn this and I'm still.

Proficient even though I no longer have magic.

You get the vague sense that Mr. 18 over here. You get the vague sense that obviously the spell that was cast and what you've seen don't completely connect. You get the feeling that more magic occurred than what was necessary to change that stone's face.

Yeah, that. That sounded like a lot of mystical mumbo jumbo. Afraid to just wish. How do the people look?

Roll perceptions or insights?

Can't we all do that?

Yeah. Yeah. Damn it.

Terrible at all of those seven.

No, 21. Sorry. I have duty in sight.

There you go. You see an interesting mixture of emotion throughout the crowd. There's definitely. There's been a little bit of an undercurrent of distrust from the townsfolk, which some of that is just natural default for small town folk. You feel that amplified a little bit. You feel a little bit of a. Definitely confusion, you know. But there's also that little bit of like, sorry, our moderator fell asleep. A little bit of. Kid just saw a cool magic trick. 5. Because, I mean, that was objectively cool to watch. Yeah, spooky, maybe.

Is there kind of cool. Is there any whispering about, like, demonic? Because that was also.

You could. The thing that you notice is that with the 221s, the priest does not look stoked, which is fair. But he's got a couple of what you would safely assume are congregants around him. They don't look too comfortable with what just went down. There's a lot of people, like, whispering. That was. That was pretty weird.

I was worried it was a portal, to be honest.

I was worried that they were about to brainwash the entire time.

We don't know that they didn't.

True.

We don't know that.

Still early.

So do you think we could ask what that means?

Is there still magic pulsing off that thing?

Well, I mean, like, what's that mean?

Maybe a little. You're not sure, if it's still actively magic or if it's just residual sticking to it. Magic happened to it recently and. Sorry, what was that, Amanda?

Oh, I think from the back Mel's like. Do you think we can ask them what that means?

Maybe. I don't see why not.

I don't want to draw attention to myself.

Maybe. Maybe not right now.

Yeah, no.

Don'T worry. I'm doing stuff. Everything's okay. This is intentional weirdness.

Hit the spacebar just in case.

Would you do, like, Alt Tab or something?

No, I'm just looking for the right window to access the information I need. But we all have our. I have, like, four different Googles. My Google Theater, the Minds Google, Gail's Google. All have different things on them, so I had to find the right one.

Google upon a Google.

And with that, without approaching the podium, Mr. Mortarus just says, thank you all. Please enjoy the food. How's that?

I'm strangely not hungry now.

He's gonna walk past the fire circle that just made a new. Okay, just gonna go right past. Nobody's gonna say anything.

Whoever was holding Emery's hands during this whole thing has to shake it out after Emery's intense.

Ow.

Ow.

Pain. Ow. Well, your turn.

Do we have to stay here all week, Elliot?

No, we can leave right now and just leave everybody here if we want. That's fine. It's fine by me.

Or we could solve the problem faster.

Okay. You should go up and punch the mayor in the face. That'll solve.

Do it, do it, do it.

Hold on.

Let me get some popcorn first. Kettle corn. Kettle corn. Looking around for kennel court, they probably have.

I almost guarantee there's popcorn kernels.

Really?

Well.

And I'm sure they had decent stock of sugar. If not like this is.

Let me get my snack.

They can either create it for corn or sugar beets.

What's a potential demonic mayor?

I am, I think, clearly got nothing useful to add. And Elliot's being an.

That's right.

I actually.

I don't know what to do either. I want to try to find these girls in Edna and then get out of here. I don't know where the girls are to go get them. I don't know where Eden is to go get them. And the only way I know to find that out is to go talk to people. And if we go start a fight, the middle. In the middle of this, middle of celebration, I don't think anybody's going to talk to us after that.

I was not proposing we start a fight. I'm just.

I want to get out of here.

We shouldn't dawdle.

I'm. I'm okay with that. I'm. I'm perfectly fine with trying to find something else to do.

So who do we. Who do we want? So he mentioned a couple of interesting things in his little speech there. He mentioned magic being taboo after Angelique, who was one of the missing people.

Yep.

He mentioned the naming of the new town being something that Mrs. Gallagher.

And she's one of the missing people.

Yep. She's one of the missing people too. I would. So I would like to try to find the Skyler Rhodes.

Yeah. So who do we want to try to talk to first?

Probably the guy that does.

Well, I guess the question to the DM is do we have time to do things here or do we just need to move to the evening time?

You could do some stuff here.

Okay. I would like to ask around and see if we can find the. Know where to find the other two people. I would like to try to ask around and find the Skyler Rhodes. Or I. I think what. I'd like to look around and see if there's some other people. Most likely they're probably kind of at the edge or outside of it like we are, that look like they're just not as with the. Because I'm sure we look a little out of place. And seeing if there's any other person or persons that look a little out.

Of place as well, we could ask that pasture pastor.

We could go talk to the pastor. Sure.

Yeah.

I know we don't exactly have a good record.

I mean, we're 50. 50.

Pastor Eric was pretty cool.

Yeah, exactly.

That's what I mean. We're 50. 50.

And the first one you encountered was a nice guy.

Oh, is that. That's the one we slept on his floor, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Let's go talk to the pastor and the other people who looked super uncomfortable.

Mostly uncomfortable because it looked very demonic, but worth talking to them at least.

And this guy, this pastor is wearing the very cliche black slacks, black shirt with the white thingy on his.

White.

Thingy where his thought button is his collar. Yeah, but like they got the white thing that goes under their collar.

Yeah.

Okay. He's got that, you know, very bog standard priest look at priest. He's not wearing like the Catholic robes or nothing, just rocking the casual dress.

Priest.

Yeah, yeah.

Priest about town.

He's in portable mode as you guys approach. I mean, you know, newcomers in a small town, he recognizes or he doesn't Recognize you. Which draws his attention immediately in your direction. Sees that you're very obviously walking towards him, so he'll wave. Well, hello there. Howdy. Good afternoon to you strangers.

Yeah, nice to. I'm Emery. Nice. Nice to meet your acquaintance.

Pleasure to meet you.

I am James.

Pleasure.

Hi.

James, your father. I am Olnock.

Okay.

Yep.

Elliot.

Mel.

Hi.

That's me.

Oh, Pleasure to meet you. I'm Father Jasper. Thank you, Jasper.

Yeah, the gasper was a heck of a ceremony. Ceremony.

That was something. That was a thing that.

It was definitely something. Yeah.

Was that.

Is that Latin that he was speaking up there?

It sounded like it started in Latin, but it did not end in Latin.

I don't think.

Think.

I don't think that was Latin.

Esque.

Yeah, I'm not crazy. Well versed in Latin, but it ain't nothing like I've ever heard. That was some new. New speak.

Was anybody expecting that? Like, has this ever come up before?

The magic bit?

Yeah.

No, that's new. That's news to us. I mean, we know there's been some weird shit happening.

Father.

He ate the church.

I ain't in the Lord's house. I'm on the Lord's front lawn and I'm okay out here.

Well, if the Father can swear.

We know there's been some weird happenings around town. But never on purpose and never ceremonial like that.

Okay, what do you mean weird happenings around town?

You know, there's been rumors. Some. Some. Some of our congregants. Yeah, congregants have, uh. Well, they've had some interesting things develop and weird things have happened.

We for one, have been looking into the. The recent disappearances.

Okay. Why, we'd like to help. Okay, well, I mean, that's very kind. No, no, mistake me. You're just not from here.

And he. He mentioned that magic had been taboo since Angelique went missing.

Ah, yes. Poor young Angelique.

What happened there?

He's probably referring to Angelique Curly. That poor family. You know, mom works at the bank. That's. That's Ashton. Ashton Hurley works at the bank there. And Angelique had. Well, she had a bit of a. Call it an outburst and ended up hurting her brother pretty bad. I wasn't there, you know, but they can't. They came to me, asking to see if I could provide them with some spiritual guidance. As the conversation progressed, it turned out they wanted me to do an exorcism. Not a Catholic priest. Not really my domain. But I offered what spiritual guidance I could. Counseling. That's really all it was trying to help the poor young thing handle the grief of harbing her brother. She didn't kill the boy. He's okay, but it hurt him. My understanding is they ended up. Ended up talking with Dr. Laroy. These things seemed to seem to happen when she got particularly agitated. They were concerned that more people might get hurt.

She.

She in particular, Angelique took it really hard. And from what I can gather, the only thing it could be attributed to is magic. She got upset and something nearby exploded. Okay.

Do. Did she disappear in the night? Like they woke up in the morning and she was gone?

That's my understanding.

She didn't like do. I just got up and walked away or.

You'd probably be better talking with the constable about it. They're good people. They were regular attendants, you know.

Do you know a Skyler Rhodes?

Yeah. Yeah. That young. That young boy?

He's.

He's around. Oh.

Can you point him out or.

Who is here?

What does he look like?

He looks around and over at the dessert table. That. That young. That young boy right there.

Young boy. How. How old is he?

We'll say 15, 16.

Okay. Elliot's gonna look very carefully and note so I can recognize him again, okay? Oh, okay.

He's got a small gaggle of friends around him, you know?

Do they all look like teenagers?

Yeah. Oh. Cobbler.

James, focus.

Doing cliche teenage boy stuff. They've got entirely too many sweets on their plate. Elbow and each other trying desperately to get one of them to smash their face into their plate.

And each one of them is holding one plate in each hand. And they'll still be hungry by the time they finish both plates.

Yep. Yep.

That hollow teenage lake put all the food in there.

Well, thank you, father. We appreciate it. I don't know of anything any more questions for you, but hope you enjoy the festival, I guess.

Yeah.

Fair festival.

Simultaneously, more and less than I was expecting this to be.

Yeah.

Agree. Yeah. Yeah.

That's exactly the right way to talk about it.

Yeah. But I'm not gonna be honest. I'm not entirely sure what I thought today was gonna be. This wasn't.

Kind of seemed kind of fast.

Yeah, no, they got it over with. They managed to show me something I've never seen before with the least amount of fanfare possible.

Yeah, I don't know if that's good or bad, but you're right. Very notable.

Well, thank you. Surprise. Out of the way, quick.

I would. Maybe I'm just a superstitious old man.

In this day and age, I wouldn't.

I wouldn't touch that plaque.

I wouldn't touch it.

I'm not gonna touch it either.

I ain't touching anything that goes swirly like that.

I thought hadn't even crossed my mind.

Everybody knows bad gas travels fast in a small town. So I'm not wanting to talk out of school, but I don't know. That was weird.

That was weird.

I'm glad to hear that I'm not alone in this.

We are here, and there's been a lot strange about.

Yes.

How a lot of things are done here.

Personally, I feel like that was. That was quite a lot of words and conjurings just to change the shape of that plaque too.

I I personally, I really wish you folks had made it out to Maeve Pell about three months ago. Things were much calmer out here then. It was much, much. Can I do calmer town?

Can I do an insight check? Because he, like, immediately started calling it the new name. What are you just, like, cuz, like, after the whole weird thing, I figured he would have still called it Carson. So I was just curious if he, like, just completely glossed over the fact that he called it immediately by the new name.

Sure, go for it.

Frankly, Carson's easier to spell.

It is two very simple words.

20 is a lot. 21 or no. Sorry, I could do math. 22. 19 plus 3.

Now that you got that extra.

That single one. Almost let me see the damn invisible.

Well, that's fair. Yeah, fair. It does not register to him whatsoever. That seemed natural.

That's weird.

That was weird.

That is odd because it literally just happened.

Well, and he pronounced it correctly. Exactly the same.

Yeah.

Well, Carson sure seems like a really nice place to be. And hopefully we're able to help some of you folks out.

Yes. He looks at you a little confused. Right Again, I this is a nice town.

He doesn't remember. Yeah, that's fine.

Be with you. I'm gonna get back to work.

All right. Thank you, Father.

Grab some of that fried food.

All right.

I'm gonna.

We gotta go talk to Skyler that already can cook.

Yes.

Yes, he can.

I think it may be worth trying to catch Skyler away from the festivities.

More importantly, away from his friends, away from listening ears.

I I agree with the listening ears. I'm just afraid that if he gets out, who knows where to find him again later. You guys, we might not have to talk to him. But let's at least try to make contact with him.

I I They're at the dessert table. Still just horsing around over there. Easy to bump into them.

Mel.

Yo.

I need you to flutter your eyelashes.

They're like children. Okay, fine.

Well, so are you.

I don't understand the problem.

You know, she is.

We're trying to get the entrance.

I know. And they're like 22.

Oh my God.

Absolutely. On. It's weird for her.

It's weird for her.

Hang on, we're fishing. She's bait.

How did he get into the space?

That sounded so wrong.

Oh my God.

Val's going to grab a plate and go like full perky, bouncy mode.

15 year old.

They're watching you come over in slow mo.

Oh yeah. No, Val comes up. She's got the bow and the swagger. You know the swagger her, she's got the bounce and the swagger.

Hey guys, didn't realize she's gonna kill you after this, right? I'm trying to help her get out of here.

There's just so many to choose from. Like I can't.

I mean, these weird powdered donut things are pretty darn good. I think they call them bednets. They're awesome.

Big, big knit. Okay, I'll give a big knit. Is that Skyler who's talking to me? Okay.

And so these boys are like again, small town in the Midwest. She's skater punks.

So like Valt is not trollerized.

Yeah, like they're wearing pretty tattered. I guess the kids are back to baggy jeans. Pretty tight baggy jeans. You know, black shirt. He's got the long shoes that got a bunch of.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay.

Fair amount of piercings.

Yeah.

More 90s hot topic.

You don't really have seen kids like.

The generic scene Kid towns, but they think they're.

They trying, they're trying to pre on.

The edges of it.

So like that transition between either Peter sings, he doesn't have gauges. He's got a black tone. Not flamingo.

This kid is a whole Hot topic couture.

Yes, yes.

So like what is there to do around here these days? As she b. Her eyes, like.

I mean, what you're supposed to do. Basically nothing. But like, you know, we, we have, we. We have some fun.

How'd you tell?

Well, at what point should we walk out?

I got a buddy who can like Cody, hook us up with our beers.

We gotta go bail this kid out. He's not five minutes.

And you see his friends are just staring at like what?

Mel starts doing that, like curling her hair around one finger.

He's getting redder, but he's trying to keep it cool. I mean like I guess if like you know, you weren't busy or anything.

Frank, he's refusing to make eye contact.

He cannot. He is incapable.

He makes eye contact, his whole body's.

Going to shut down. Yes.

You could, I guess like join us.

Well, like where would I meet you? There's like so many people here.

Oh well, we got. We got a sweet little half pipe behind the movie theater.

Nice meet you over there. Can I bring my friends too?

They're picturing duplicates.

They are, they totally are.

What the hell is definitely behind him. You see the other two like so.

Like the 65 year old man.

They don't know that yet.

Worry I can show something.

Well, you guys are like super cool and definitely the nicest people I've met here so far. And I'm totally looking forward to this. Begnet.

I mean they're pretty good. I'll get my.

We'll.

We'll have some. We'll have some drinks and stuff and like.

Yeah, drinks and stuff and like.

Yeah, full sentences.

Experience.

Well, Tata, she says and then goes bouncing off with her plate full of beet.

He turns around and his buddy is there slugging on like.

Oh my God.

She comes back up to her group. God, I feel so dirty.

Oh you.

You came in way too hot. Way too hot, too fast. They were.

You just.

You shut them down. You shut them down. It was too much.

And you see they are immediately fucking gone. They're trapped in their porch. They are off to find a month.

And a half halfway across the country and the only thing I can successfully pick up is a 15 year old. Humiliating.

Yeah. The vampire had no interest in you at all.

Thanks for reminding me.

Why not just bash your head in with your hammer?

He can pick up granny, but I'm over here picking up.

I was trying to help you. Why are you throwing me under the granny buzz?

Because there you go. It's this big and I want it to get bigger.

Okay, we gotta go save your princess.

Oh Lord, I want to leave.

Okay, I did tell them. They did tell me that I could bring my friends. We're supposed to meet them at the half pipe behind the movie theater now.

Didn't tell them that your friends are perfect.

They didn't ask anything about my friends and I didn't tell them. Okay, but if you want you can try you know, to look a little bouncier and blonder. They seem to be into that.

I mean I do have a. I.

No.

Oh, you're right.

This is Getting far. I am so excited.

So we'll have James and Elliot come in looking like little Minnie Mel. Followed by hulking old on.

I was shooting for a little bit younger, thank you very much.

You know what's super fun, though, is that I can cast it in other people and it's not concentration.

Doing Elliot. Doing Mel.

I'm not doing Mel, but I'm gonna. I'm gonna do my best.

All right.

I have.

I have a ace in the hole. It might work.

If you leave to head over, we'll say that this will be your third activity of the day. If there's anything else you want to do here before you go.

Well, if we're gonna get gussied up.

Yeah.

We probably shouldn't do that in the middle of town.

No, we need to get. We need to get around the corner and get hidden.

You gotta.

Before you hit the sexy jutsu. All right. You gotta get some.

This is wrong, guys.

I am.

This is wrong.

So for it.

This is gonna be hilarious, and I cannot wait.

I mean, realistically, I did not tell them what my friends were like so you could come as yourselves.

It is so dangerous.

Drinks and stuff.

To be doing that kind of.

Oh, God.

Okay. We should bring them some beer. They'll totally be into us then, because, you know, they're just gonna have Bud Light and that stuff.

Isn't that what you ordered?

I don't remember.

I think he ordered a Budweiser.

Yeah, no, no, that was.

I got top tier whiskey. Yeah, yeah, you got the top tier whiskey because he.

Elliot.

Elliot ordered you an extra drink of it. It's like.

Yeah.

Another round. Six Budweiser ever.

It's just. It was just regular Budweiser, thank you very much. It was not Bud Light.

All right.

I really don't have anything against Bud Light, but.

Except the flavor. Except.

Except everything.

Back to that conversation we were having about forcing yourself to like something.

Yeah. Yeah.

All right, so we're going to. I want to go around the corner. And I don't know if James does too, but I actually have. Because of my. I have got the sky self.

I don't think casting is a good idea. I just want to put that out there.

Oh, but it would be.

They just used magic.

Are you guys.

They just used a bunch of magic procuring.

Sure. They're also disappearing other people that use it.

Well, if they disappear us, then we'll know where they're at.

Technically speaking.

We'll speed things up.

Already used magic here.

Yeah. I've already literally waved a Mage hand in front of a normal person's face as well.

Healed James. So he didn't die.

Well, listen, I just. I just want to put that out there that I don't think that's a good idea. But hey, probably not, right? You're adults.

I want to see what this is.

You can turn it.

I'm not gonna lie.

Flirt with teenagers if you want.

Well, when you put it that way, I mean, you're not wrong.

But I just want it on the table. I don't think any of this is a good idea. But hey, you do you man.

Okay, well, we don't.

We can just go talk to him.

Let's just go talk to them.

Just the opportunity of shenanigans is kind of hard to pass up.

But you're probably right.

It'd probably just be more effective to go talk to them.

I don't think it's worth putting putting us in more danger.

It's gonna look like as a 16 to 17 year old girl, I guess I don't know what he was going for. No, listen, I don't know how much younger. Maybe he wanted to be more relatable.

That's what I want to see is I want to see crotchety old man Elliot act like a 16 year old girl.

Let's. Okay, let's look at it this way. The rest of the group is young enough. They try to probably still talk to us. But with Elliot there, they might clam up because, you know, he's one of grandpa.

I don't know. I mean if we establish that we're not super into all the that's going on in town, that might. That might put us in somewhat of their good graces. But I like. Listen, I just wanted to put it out there. I am really like freaked out by what's going on here right now.

That is fair. That is a fair.

Well, somebody. So somebody told us that this Skyler apparently really hates.

Does not like.

So I'm hoping that maybe this kid knows something that nobody else knows.

And I feel like if she shows up with her friends and it's not other Mels, then they're gonna immediately go in the defensive.

Or alternatively, when you were 16 and.

If a bunch of adults showed up and started asking you questions, if they're.

Not off the other way or at.

Least anything else, they're just going to shut down and shut up.

I would have done. That's what I have done.

All right. I mean, listen, you guys do what you want. I just wanted to put that out there.

That I. I don't disagree with you. I. I think you're probably right. I just don't want us to lose this possible good lead.

Okay. Alternatively, what if we discuss the questions we're gonna ask? And as the three youngest Mel, James and Emory go in, I'm.

I'm fine with that too.

Yeah, you guys are a bunch.

You're like. I mean, we're all within a couple years of each other and we can kind of pass off as being more their peers. Mel already looks younger than she should.

Yeah, I don't think. I don't think Elliot knows the lingo.

Oh, I guarantee Elliot does know lingo.

No, I'm.

I'm fine with us hanging back within, like, earshot.

Yeah.

Within one or two rounds to get there, kind of.

We don't run the risk of them clamming up because adults.

Yeah, yeah.

Probably not the best idea.

And we don't catch their magic. That'd be funny as hell.

Especially the huge.

Yeah. 40 year old. And I am a monster.

I. I'm.

I'm good with that. I'm fine. We'll just hang out. We'll just kind of hang out.

Sound fun?

They sound like a riot.

It just sounds like something that's going to make everything a lot more dangerous than we need it to be.

It could backfire royally. Yeah.

So wait, I'm. I'm not casting disguise stuff on myself.

No, you just get to be your regular charming self, James, and try to act younger.

Okay.

And that's for the sake of not having to have this conversation twice. You two come up with questions we can assume that you guys discussed. Yeah, it'll just flash back to. Oh, I remember Elliot telling me this.

Yeah.

Yeah. This way you guys can have to.

Have the conversation twice.

Thank you.

I don't know what this kid knows, so I don't know specifically what line to ask you.

Okay, I'm good. Cop.

Can I be anxious cop?

You can be every. Can be anxious James. You could be like, ask the hard question cop.

Oh, great.

Okay.

Or we could just not be cops.

Okay, fine.

They aren't specifically skater punks.

Okay?

The whole thing. Not have the adults come in because they probably will think we're their cops.

Okay, I was never with the skater crowd. Can you guys fit that?

Yes.

Okay. Yeah. No, I was not with that crowd.

These are my people.

Oh, perfect. Every perfect. See? They will appreciate me bringing my friends. The fact that you're an Amazon woman who's like a foot and a half taller than them is irrelevant.

I think. I do think Emery is wearing her pants that fit right now.

Yeah, There you go. There you go.

Can you poison your female that's coasting up?

They're not that close yet.

All right, let's do this.

Yep.

So, yeah, as you're discussing this, you're getting close. You can tell you're getting closer because you hear the just distinct sound of hard. Yep. Hard wheels on wood.

That.

Crash.

Somebody just eat Tony Hawk?

They are.

Yeah, pretty much. And then I come bouncing up, you.

Come around the corner, and it's actually, it's a decent half pipe, but that's all it is. It's just a half pipe. It's got a little dropping spot. You know, nothing impressive, but it's. It's clearly well used and well taken care of. You can see spots where the. Where it's been repaired, you know, but. And there's. There's, like, we'll say four or five teens hanging out there, a couple girls, the three boys you saw earlier. So five. That adds up too.

That's a number.

And, you know, they're. They're just doing typical teen. There's one trying hard to land whatever coolness he's trying to land, and the rest of them are just kind of standing there looking bored as just. But the boys see you coming, they immediately straighten up, like, you know, being cool now, leaning against the rail. And the guy who just ate is totally trying to not look like he just ate it. Really coolly walks over and tries to do the pop up thing to grab his board, but it up launches his.

Board, you know, splitting glow there, bud.

I'll be all right.

You know it.

I'm fine. Don't even worry about it. Skyler sees you, so he sets up, drops down, does a couple of just like, I don't know, skateboard terms. Does that thing where he, like, rests his truck up on the top of the lift and pops back down a couple times. He's definitely not brave enough to actually try anything comes up to you guys. Hey, you guys made it.

Oh, yeah.

Glad you guys could find the place okay.

But it's not too hard in a town this small.

That's fair.

So, like, everything and nothing at the same time.

Clearly you guys have been taking care of this thing for a while. This is not just new now that there's no, like, Internet.

No.

Somehow, like, 10 years ago, they managed to convince city council that we needed this thing, and we refuse to let them take it back.

Smart.

Give them an inch.

It's the one thing that has united the youths is we take care all five of them. We take care of the half pipe.

Well, that's like super cool.

Yeah.

It's the one place we could stash beers.

Don't tell them about that.

No, that's why we take care of it. You hide your smokes in there?

Yeah. It's kind of unsupervised by.

Exactly. We promised city council we'd take care of it. And we make sure city council knows we're taking good care of it.

So is there like still a city council now that Leroy has taken over?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Or are they the city council now?

Yeah. Well, most of the old city council passed.

Really?

Yeah.

Weird.

The frog dude incident.

That's when a lot of them passed. Yeah, that was. That was weird. That was a weird day.

Yeah.

It sounds night.

Technically. I was still up though, so it was like the day.

Did you know any of the kids that were breaking out of town?

Ah, yeah. It was Freddy Watanabe.

And where are we?

It's the great American melting pot.

Midwest. Everybody could be here, man. Yeah, Freddy and James o'. Connell. Nope.

That's too. Nope.

What a coincidence.

I just happen to have a James O myself.

Oh, wow.

Introduce yourself to the group there, buddy.

John McClane.

That's a. That's a character.

Is that his name?

I do believe so, yeah.

Is that somebody at our podcast?

Yeah. No, no, no.

That's like a diehard.

Oh, right.

Aiden.

Aiden.

Aiden is such a teenage.

No last name. Yeah. He's just so cool. He's the only Aiden.

No last name. That's what I like.

He's the only Aiden in town. He's the only Aiden ever in town. That's fair. He's a transfer. Weirdly, he's the kid who's staying at Freddy Watanabe's house. Watanabes have been here for a minute.

I bet.

He's the foreign exchange student.

He's the fest. He's got the cool accent.

None of us could say Aiden's like last name Holish.

Oh, yeah. That'll do it.

We're not 100% sure his first name's Aiden.

That's just what it sounds like.

Yeah. It's as close as we could get.

So Freddy and Aiden were the ones that were out of. Yeah, that had slipped out of town.

Yeah.

Are.

I'm sorry. Skyler. You're the only one whose name. I know everyone else here.

Do you?

Mel told me your name. You introduced yourself to her?

I probably told her my name.

You totally did she bats her eyes at him a couple more times just in case. The spell is where it was.

Blue screens for a minute.

Analog. Charm person.

But I don't know the rest of your names, so. I know, I'm just trying. I'm just trying. You don't have to come up with it. I'm just trying to confirm that these aren't Freddy and Aiden.

Nope. This is boy A and B and.

Girl C and D.

How funny. I knew a girl named kd.

You got Alice, Barry, Charlize and Denise. That's my mom's name.

Okay.

And.

Named after your grandma.

I was gonna say Dorothy.

Delaney.

Delaney. Charlie. She goes by Charlie and Delaney. Yeah, that's their names.

I was gonna say that the Daeneryses aren't old enough to be teenagers yet. Can him another five years.

Yeah.

Pleasure to meet you guys.

Yeah, yeah. I had a question that completely escaped my mind.

Fair.

So like that whole thing that happened back at the park, that was something, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Weird crap keeps happening around them Cajuns.

Did you. Did you hold hands with the group or like. I don't know, I was a little skeptical. Like I ain't getting cooties.

Hell no. I ain't worried about cooties. Way too old for cooties. But I sure ain't into weird cult.

Yeah, that was pretty whack.

That was pretty weird cult.

And don't forget, he's gonna spit after he takes a puff of cigarette.

And.

He'S gonna smell like claps him on the back. You good there, buddy?

You're getting stale. Oh yeah, fair.

You know, for such a small town, like. Sorry, what's the name of this town again?

Carson.

Right?

Carson. Emery.

For such a small town like Carson, I really just didn't expect to run into stuff like that out here.

Yeah, right.

And it changed the name to so weird.

Well, yeah.

Math pal.

Right.

Well.

And I'm like.

So. I mean, no offense. This is like small town America and you've got all the weird stuff. Like no one else we've ever come across has been attacked by frogs. Or as like random transplant Cajuns or weird cult or like. Well, wait, wait. Well, was coming to a point. It's the train of thought just totally got derailed.

There it goes into a tunnel, never to be seen again.

Yeah, I mean, to be honest, three, four months ago and before.

Oh, the lights. Or like the lights are on. Their lights are not on like anywhere.

Yeah, yeah. I don't trust it.

I mean, it's like super cool. I love having refrigerated things. That's nice.

It's two episodes. Did you put the smoky warning on this one?

Yes, I did.

Good.

The only two episodes now we've had somebody smoke. Just realized. Oh, yeah.

I put the warning on the moment we finished that episode.

Oh, I wanna.

Yeah, sure.

Yeah, sure.

I don't really.

Toss us a brewski.

I'll do that.

Catches a Rolling Rock and.

Well, at least it's not Bud Light.

At least it's not Bud Light.

It is not. We got the good stuff this time.

That's the slogan for the majority of the other beer. It's not Bud Light.

It could be worse.

All right, well, enjoy our Rolling Rock. Sorry, we're from Colorado. Holy beer snobs.

They're warm. Rolling Rocks. Oh, yeah.

Surprise. It's not Keystone or Natty. Those holes are awful.

The kids ran out of four Locos already.

Yeah, but. Well, I mean, why are you guys here?

Just pass.

Not like here, but like here.

Is this existential?

Now, we were. One of our friends was invited by one of Moulin Rouge's horsemen to come. So we were helping her get here safely.

You know, some of the outsiders that he's picking for his new grandfish.

We're not.

We kind of just tagged along with her.

We were making sure she got here.

And she's not here with you now?

No, no, she's.

She.

She disappeared last night.

Seems to be happening here.

Yeah, it's a recurring theme.

Appears we heard that the first visitor that came here before us disappeared too.

Yeah. Yeah, I saw the girl. I didn't catch a name. Just saw her. I don't know, probably like college age, give or take. Brown hair, seemed real nice. They put her up in the inn. Had dinner at More to Reese's house as a welcome gesture. You know, all that put her up in the end next day, nobody knows anything about her.

Just gone, just like that.

According to what everybody says, she left in the middle of the night before the gates closed. I'm pretty positive I saw her in the end. But me and A and B here are the only ones who seem to think that. Everyone else says she left and decided that. I mean, let's be fair here. This isn't the most unbelievable thing. Carson wasn't her speed and she carried on down the road. But we don't get a lot of new people. So when you see a face you don't recognize, you recognize it mighty quick. I'm pretty sure I saw her at the end working for that Maxine lady. Not working for staying with that vaccine lady. Talking with her at the bar.

It'S might as suspicious.

Oh, what about. Yeah, we saw the wanted posters with the other gone missing.

Angelique's a hard one. She was actually one of us.

But.

It sounds like now she was the most recent one that went missing. Right. How long ago was that?

Run amount of time.

Okay.

Did she ever. We. I mean, we. We've heard about all the weird things that happen around here. Does anything weird ever happen when you guys are practicing on the half pipe?

Yeah, Barry keeps eating well, but I guess it's only weird because he sucks.

But you've never like missed an ollie and like got so frustrated just like something happened.

Start skateboarding. Start shooting across the.

Out of Al last week with his hands. Well, hers. Yeah.

Well, you know, there's a good chance he deserved it. Just a guess.

Oh, yeah, for sure. But I mean, if you're talking like, what are you. What are you?

Like weird. Weird magic stuff.

Like. We heard Angeline accidentally hurt her brother. Did that ever happen here?

No, no. I mean her brother. All right. So you guys know you're on. You know a little.

We know a little bit about the outbursts.

It's. That's Dr. Leroy speaking there.

Damn.

Yeah. Yeah, she hurt her brother pretty bad. Something blew up, but there was nothing to blow up. And weird things like she'd have made a book float. She summoned some birds once. It's weird.

Butterflies.

Yeah, she did that one. That was kind of cool. She was. You know, it was already pretty pretty. It's like fairy tale.

That's like Fairy Tale Princess kind of stuff.

Yeah, that's pretty cool. Made her look like totally like an anime girl. What? Sorry, what was the question? So other things. You're never here.

Yeah. No one else in your gang's been?

Not. Not currently, no.

Well, that's good. I mean, if. I mean, I probably don't have to tell you this, but if does start happening, probably don't talk about it.

Oh, yeah. No. Well, we not telling nothing to them.

Yeah, good. Smart.

Who's got the other Rocky talkie?

I do. Yeah, the sending stone. Yeah, it's in my inventory.

Elliot's kind of over listening to it and he's gonna pull out his. Because he's got the other one and ask him, is there any place in town that people are not allowed to go? Like, where's the old power station? I mean, is there a place that they're not allowed to go?

Space Bar?

No, not that. No, the kids reacting.

As we Said we've heard some things about outbursts and such. And every's going to kind of give him a little wink.

Got you.

Bel wraps her hair around her finger and gives him a little wink. Sure.

James is a magic girl.

James, I think you need to get your hair cut.

Evidently, I can't grow a beard anymore, so that ain't gonna help.

Every so often he does a cute little spin.

You are actually green, aren't you? Whoa.

He's kind of on when you do that.

He's trying to skate. As soon as you do that, whack. Skateboard goes off. What the.

Dude, you good?

Are you Charlie and Delaney? Just like.

What did you do?

I missed what you did. I was watching him pitch it.

You did the spinny sparkly things? Yeah. Is that what you said?

No, no, no.

I was joking. That he turns into a magical girl.

I thought you said you'd do that. No, no, no.

He does that.

Gotcha.

I'm gonna spin around and I'm gonna turn into a magical girl. Like from Taylor Moon.

I was joking.

That would be what you do. Completely derail those voices.

If I were to cast disguise help right now and do exactly that.

No, that'd be hysterical.

Does not eat.

Yeah, he could still eat, but for a different.

Yeah, he could just eat.

Just watch the skateboard go.

See, Charlie and Delaney are mean. Mugging the out of metal.

We are in that. So I just wanted to make points.

That.

We'Re kind of on.

I don't know what I did.

We're on the level here. We get it.

You're a girl imposing on territory.

Oh, those are girls, right?

Yeah. Apparently delineated the girls C and D. Oh, right.

Gotcha. And Mel ignores them.

We're truly trying to fix. We don't. Like. There's. There's a lot that's fishy about this. And yes, we don't like a lot of it. And we're trying to figure out some of it and just make sure that these Cajuns aren't going to hurt people here.

You mentioned that. You know, this is one of your guys's, like, spots you guys take care of. Is there anywhere in town that they specifically don't want you guys hanging out at?

Yes, most of it.

Okay, well, I mean, like, are there any, like, if you go here, we'll shoot you without dear Blue Light Special. Which is weird, by the way.

Yeah. Yep. The nice thing is, though. Well, what's this one first? Yes, They've tightened security at the bank. The Laundromat's weirdly locked up at night.

That's a weird one.

Yep. I'm assuming it's because it's the second most cash heavy place in town. Maybe, but that's a guess. The town did kind of agree on focusing on the laundromat functioning to try to protect the Sir. The. The. The grid. So not many folks are doing laundry at home. Pretty much everybody does it at the laundromat.

Interesting.

So there. There's a lot of coin running through there.

Right?

And obviously security up at motor region's place is pretty tight.

But other than those three places, is there anywhere like people aren't allowed to go to?

I mean the gate.

Oh yeah, yeah, we got.

Yeah, we saw what happened there.

And technically, you know, anywhere after dark, but. Well, they're carrying around a big ass lantern. We could see them coming. It's not hard to sneak around at night when the cops are all lit up.

Be careful with that. We saw what happened to that guy last night. Do you guys know who that was, by the way?

You guys heard about that though?

Yeah, I think everybody heard that.

It's crazy. Now the. Do you think the power still comes from like the power plant?

Oh, definitely not.

No. It's coming from somewhere else.

It's got to be power plants outside of town.

Oh, that's a good point. So it's ah, interesting.

I wonder what's coming.

We weren't a big enough town to have our own. We shared. You know there's a lot of. And you guys would know this. Looked at your map. There's quite a few of us smaller towns around here. We shared as far as I'm aware.

Oh, far away.

But why protect the bank and the Laundromat like.

Well, the bank I think.

That useful outside of this town anymore.

I think we might have some more laundry to do.

Guys.

Yeah, they almost. They ruined my suit.

No, you ruined your shops.

Well, no, no, I meant when he got me. When I got turned into a rug this morning.

You are still looking a little rough after that.

You do look pretty rough, bud.

Thanks.

I hope the other guy looks worse.

Why? When I see him, he's going to.

What else do we want to ask these guys?

So like you guys ever tried to pull any pranks on Leroy?

Not yet, no.

No.

On the. Any of the other Cajuns or Boss Johnson?

Yeah, Johnson. We try to just avoid being a cop, man. You know we with Edward a lot. Yeah, this stupid like you know the salt trick and classic replacing the sugar with a lot of salt based tricks.

I mean, you work with what you got.

Yeah, the old timers get pissed when they have salty coffee in the morning.

Maybe that's where the term comes from, being salty.

I explain a lot, actually.

Yeah. But so far, yeah, we'll mess with Maxine a little bit. She's got her. She's got folks in and out of her place all the time. It's kind of hard. And be honest with you, the barber is pretty cool, actually, so, like, we were pretty nice to him. Plus, you know, it's not exactly a lot of options to get a haircut in town. You don't piss a guy. Guy off who with your hair.

Yeah, it's like biting the hand that feeds you.

And I ain't got enough money to eat at the diner, so. I don't mind with him. He ain't going to with my food. But no, we don't. We don't mess with Laroi.

There.

There's something. Something off about that, man.

I agree. Especially after that weird ceremony thing.

Yeah.

What is my accent doing? I don't know.

He got hit you occasion really hard.

I was just thinking about him. Real hard.

He got hit real hard.

So other than like, frogmen and all that, like, all the weird magic things, like, has. Has Leroy done anything? I mean, just like, just kind of the coincidence of it all and not.

That anybody can prove, but, like, dude comes into town, he's the mayor's doctor, mayor goes down.

But he was treating the mayor when the mayor came.

Heart condition. Now, mayor was old, mayor's a big boy. It's genuinely possible the Roy didn't do that.

But that's how you get rid of somebody in the movies.

Yeah. And he's benefited pretty greatly.

Yeah.

For tra. You're traveling healers and you just happen to have a barber, a chef, two.

Chefs, a tailor, a tailor.

A banker.

Banker.

Like, I mean, I guess anybody with a big gun can be a cop.

I mean, like, we've got a metalsmith, a cook.

And a fitness trainer.

And a fitness trainer. I mean, why not? Weird groups get together all the time.

Yeah, but to roll into a town and, like, conveniently take over spots like that, kind of.

There's a. There's.

Hey, maybe they need a fitness trainer here.

Yeah.

Why do I feel. Why do I feel like C and D just glare at me harder.

They definitely do.

Participants.

Al eats it again. Barry's laughing at him. Yeah, you suck, Al. Could have skate if it was glued to your feet.

I literally do not remember being 15 at the same time. Exact Moment. I've got nothing for this.

I don't know. Small towns like this, people don't get to tend to get to the.

Wow.

Words are like, hard.

Yeah, scratch that.

Restart.

Small towns like this, people don't tend to get that lucky that often.

No.

Especially not back to back.

Especially not newcomers.

Yeah. And not from the same group.

And then new. None of them do weird magic in front of the entire town on purpose. Until today. Until today. Especially in a town where magic's been.

Kind of bandish by them.

Right. Like, they're the ones that kind of banned it.

I mean, you know, how do you.

Exactly.

He never stood out in front of everybody and said, hey, stop it. But after what happened to Angelique and then the rumors of magic girls going missing, effectively banned.

Right.

Like he said, banned by Taboo.

Were there any guys that went missing?

No.

Any guys that are doing magic stuff?

See, if they are, they're smart enough to keep it on the down low, you know?

Yep. That definitely would be super smart to keep it on the down low. Wave that magic hand in front of.

People'S faces and he looks intentionally at Emory.

Em. Yeah.

Try to mirror what you did.

Absolutely.

Good.

To keep stuff on the down low.

Yeah, but like. So, like, look, I'm a level with you. There's some weird going on here. It's the cages. I'm figuring out how to prove it.

Do you have anything against them now?

What have you put together?

They came to town, my friends started disappearing and they took over. And then they just did a weird thing.

But there's weird stuff happening nowadays all the time.

Do you have anything concrete to prove that?

They're the ones I'm working on. How Progress. Sneaking around at night, looking at. I'm not supposed to.

Yeah, basic teenage stuff.

We got into city hall a couple nights ago.

Oh, did you?

Yeah. Oh, yeah, Yeah. I mean, we just got to climb up to the roof.

So if you were gonna sneak around and look at stuff you didn't want to look at in Leroy's mansion, how would you go about doing it?

Leroy's place would be hard. I said. He's got heavy security.

Yeah.

Town's got a foot patrol. His neighborhood's got a foot patrol. And the bank's got guards all night in addition to what they have at the gate. So the Roy's would be tricky. However, I understand that boy likes his liquor.

Yeah.

We could catch him on a night where he'd been drinking a lot. I bet you we could sneak in. However, I've noticed that Francois dude is on it. You know we tried when they first moved to town. We tried ding dong ditching their asses. And Chris.

Yeah.

He was there. Ding dong. He's there.

Yeah, he was.

Was he like just sitting at the door?

That's maybe. I don't know what a lurch is but he might have been at the door already. Which is weird.

I guess.

Yeah. Technically made a reference.

He wouldn't have got.

So like that. I mean obviously the town is old.

Yeah.

But was like the mansion and the bank and all those buildings. Do you think those were all built at the same time?

I mean so my. You know like from what I remember from Founders Day.

Yeah.

Is most of main. Most of the main drag is kind of original. Ish. But like they keep you know, remodeling and upgrading the insides. I know from what I remember, I think the bank's been updated several times. You know, as like technology and like I guess doors and get better. They keep changing them there. There was a huge operation where they added a basement back in like the 90s. I think they put a vault down there.

I mean that makes sense.

A pretty tiny one upstairs. But this is kind of like the bank, you know. And so like they had to make it a bigger vault or something. That to my what I remember that's in the basement. The Laundromat was diner and then it was a. Before that it was like a soda fountain. Which seems like a lot of building for a. For, for a soda machine. But whatever.

Kids made a day of it back in the day. I guess.

Yeah.

We're gonna get a pop.

Woo.

They needed that excitement back then.

I guess they had coke in their stuff back then. So maybe it was flat ripping the co. So fountain up. But yeah. You know like.

Huh.

Yep. I forgot the question.

It's age of buildings.

Yeah.

They're all old.

Yeah.

Nope.

Got it. I, I, I, I got. I. Picking up what you're putting down.

No. You, you, you broke into City hall. What did you find anything in there?

Not really.

Not really.

I mean so like some of it was like. Like I don't really know what I'm looking at. Be honest. Whole lot of like math tracking money. You know, with like these crazy like codes and stuff before it. You know. I'm sure if we put enough time we could crack that code. But I don't know if it's worth it because that might turn out to mean trash.

Does anyone really use City hall these days?

I've seen, I've seen Leroy going in and out of there. Every now and again we hold some town meetings there when it's like, hey, we gotta vote on a thing. You know, like, hey, do we want a big ass fence around town? Needed City hall. We voted yes. Because that seemed pretty obvious.

Yeah. Pretty rational on that one.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

That's a lot of yeahs, my man.

Yeah.

Actually it was kind of our idea to make it look like a frontier fort because we thought that'd get it kicked out. We thought we were being funny and then they took us all seriously.

Yeah. Fortunately people like that.

Kind of a historical reimagining the baller looking fence though.

Yeah. I mean. Yeah, you're not gonna like get over it easy.

No.

The only good part was because we came up with the idea we got to get out of having to build it.

Nice.

Yeah.

Yeah. Well, you guys seem to be on the level. We're gonna do some shenanigans tonight. You're interested? You know, leave the blue Lantern at home. Meet us out back of city Halloween. We'll do some.

What's the. You guys have a plan for tonight?

Yes. We got to see if you come back to join us before I let you know. You seem to be on the level.

All right.

All right.

You could be cops. I don't know you.

That's fair.

Can we bring a couple more friends? They're on the level too. They're like ancient, but they're pretty cool.

I rude guys. Can they keep up?

Yeah.

Oh yeah.

I got that covered.

Yeah.

I've been waiting to do this. I just have to so. Oh God. At that one, Elliot will go ahead and step out and come on up.

Immediately. Just like.

Like I said, like ancient. But he's a cool dude.

So he's gonna walk up. You gotta let me try this.

Come on.

This is cinema. He's going to go up and he's going to take his cowboy boot and he's going to hook the one. One of them that's standing over the skateboard. He's going to hook the skateboard and pull it out of their hand and then he's going to jump on it and then he's going to do the half pipe. I've got the acrobatics to do it.

See how you do. See how I do this? I invented one T3.

You're ear like reputation points for Emory too, right?

Like damn.

I genuinely cannot imagine how hard that would be in healed cowboy dude.

Once they.

You ride.

You ride horses. Your balance gets amazing, sir.

Just watching Elliot just go up in the Air like what kind of cool you.

Holy, Elliot, you've been holding out on us.

Then he'll. He'll. He'll land whatever that's properly called and he'll stomp the back that flips it up and catches it and hands it to him. He says, I'll do my best to keep up.

Come on out.

With Jacob right behind Ola.

Oh yeah.

With a freaking accident. He's.

He's our. He's our adopted sibling here.

Yeah.

We probably can't bring the child to shenanigans though. I don't know. That's probably a bad idea.

He's totally coming off where Jacob.

Where I go? Jacob goes.

Okay, I'll protect the boy.

Eddie. And the other remaining questions for the cool kids group.

No, we've got time and place to.

Meet.

So I think we drink a few shitty beers.

Yeah. Yeah.

Here, this will. This is an upgrade from your usual Elliot Bill Hands of a war.

That or we leave them to their shitty beers and we'll go drink at the end.

Yeah, we get a fright.

Yeah.

Dealer's choice. Keep building a relationship with these guys or go strategize.

I think we build the relationship with these guys for one more beer.

I think we chattered us a little bit. So we're not leaving immediately on these guys. Rolling up.

Perfect. So yeah, we'll fade out episode end as you guys chitter chatter with these dudes and we'll pick it up next time. Okay, those of you who follow along, if there's any of you still up with us, thank you. Hope you enjoyed it. If you do, you can find us pretty much anywhere on your podcasting app of choice. We are a couple episodes behind, meaning we record and then a while later we release it.

So you get kind of a sneak peek at the future right now.

Exactly, exactly. But there will be a fresh episode dropping not tomorrow, but next Sunday. And follow us on social medias. Our links should all be in our link tree.

Yeah.

Which should be in the place that those things go on Twitch.

It will be otherwise pretty much everywhere we are. Theater of the Mind presents.

Yep.

And you can always find us there.

Have a good rest of your night. Thank you.