S1:E32 – Welcome to the Flat Lands

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Welcome to Theater of the Mind presents Retribution episode 32. My name is Mike and I'll be your dungeon master for this evening. Our question from James D'Amato's Ultimate RPG Campfire Card Deck for this episode is where do you think of when you hear the word home? Do you believe you will ever return to or reach that place? Why?

My name is Amanda and I'm playing Mel Kelly. Mel thinks of home as the house that she lived in with her family before her parents got divorced. It's located like halfway between Monterey and Santa Cruz. It was just a house, probably in a suburb somewhere. She doesn't really remember. She wasn't very old, but that's what she thinks of as home and she knows she'll never see it again. That was like she was like five when he split up.

I'm Jeremy, I'm playing Elliot Brandybane. Shouldn't come to a surprise to anybody, but Elliot Brandybane feels that his ranch is home. He bought it, he worked it, he put it together, it was completely his and he will always feel that the ranch is home. At this point, Elliot really unbeknownst to his fellow cohorts and he won't let onto this, but he doesn't believe for a second that he'll ever see it again.

Hi, I'm Brunel. I am playing Ulnock Vaga Johnson and Ulnock's home. What he thinks of as home is near and dear to his heart, but it's also a torturous thing that he thinks about and can't stop dreaming about it and thinking about it and stuff. Where he, his ex wife and his daughter lived last was what he views of as home. He remembers the good memories, the things that he felt like he was good as being a father, you know, maybe not the best father figure in the world, but felt like he was doing a pretty good job, you know, and he misses his kid and everything like that, so the memories are there. That last house in Coronado before he got recruiter stations is where he finds he feels like it's home. Will he ever go back there? No, because they're not together anymore and he can't see his daughter anymore. So it kind of tears at him but he knows he's never going back.

I'm downs and I'm playing James O'Brien and for James, home is where the knives are. So James has been bouncing around from so many different places for so long that he doesn't really know of a permanent address anymore. So it's pretty much this home is whenever he's cooking or in the kitchen, something cooking and the smells of it, that's where he's most at peace.

I'm Casey. I play Emory Lee. And Emory's home that she thinks about was when she was younger, kind of like mellow, maybe around 10, 12, before, like, anyone starts to think about anything beyond kids stuff. And she was happy with her family and her parents and her sister pre college. She knows that's gone and she's in college now and her family's kind of excommunicated her a little bit. But, yeah, she missed it.

Fair. That's hard. Let's go ahead and roll. For recap.

Can I make a proposition? I think the DM I am Moritar should have to start answering these questions.

I just want to.

What a fun idea. I actually really like that.

Think of as home to some super brave mortal.

The third realm in which I conquer. Right. Like, that could be very interesting and fun.

Just throw it at us.

There was this valley where I slaughtered tens of thousands of people. It was a great Tuesday. I feel it right there.

Moritar would feel the most at home on the front lines. He's been fighting battles for the vast, vast, vast majority of his incredibly long adult life.

That's not the vulnerable answer we're looking for.

I'm looking for weaknesses.

Like, honestly, though, we now have the backstory of knowing that Imhoratar was recruited probably as a child, like Jacob. So really, he's just a poor, lost, brainwashed soul.

He's eight at heart, Right?

Yeah.

Who has enslaved and murdered countless people.

I didn't think there was very much of it. Like, he doesn't have a lot of.

Soul left, but he brings them back.

As, like, zombies and stuff.

Trauma does not excuse action.

He really likes making friends.

Yeah. From the ground up, if you will.

Sorry.

You will force Farfetch.

So what are we trying to hit for recap?

Let's go for high flock.

8, 6, 10, 10, 18.

What happened last time?

Good thing we just told you.

Yeah, it's a good thing I don't have time.

Explain some notes.

All right.

Do you want to read my notes?

Sure.

I'll try to transcribe more legible.

It's episode 31 that you're looking at.

Good Lord.

That's how I felt when Amanda gave me her notes for that one recap I have.

I was like, oh, my God, Listen.

I write them for my reference, I.

Write them just to keep me from mentally wandering off, honestly.

Unfortunately, Casey, I can't read Sanskrit. So, if I remember correctly, we braved the mountains, made it into town into Estes park, and were kind of guided towards the Stanley. If I remember correctly, we met a guy with a very pretentious quill, apparently, who really wanted stories in exchange for us to stay in the night. We gave him some really good stories. Elliot apparently tried biking a deer home.

So what happened last time?

Did I do it again?

That was two episodes ago.

@ night, we were attacked by shadows and we all had the various dreams of our past come back to haunt us. If I remember correctly, after beating the crap out of them, we all decided to spend the night in the lobby, If I remember correctly. And then we met the actual owner of the Stanley. If I remember correctly, concierge.

Yeah, front desk.

And who insists that he would have been there when we arrived the night before, except clearly he was not. And he was very shocked to find us there.

He's a bit horn.

Liar.

Jesus Christ.

And then he told us that we met Jack.

He was very surprised.

Well, we told him that we met Jack, and he said, you met Jack.

Now that that train wreck of a recap's over.

Yes, we'll dive right on in.

Those things were all in my notes.

For the record, they were there. Legible. Perhaps.

I can prove it if you can read it.

None of those looked like letters.

You met Jack? Yeah.

The guy with a really fancy pen.

Yeah, he had, like, a quill. He was asking for stories and stuff.

Yeah.

There was a very generous bartender as well. Indeed, whose name we never did learn.

That's true.

He made good drinks, though.

Yeah, that's interesting. Where did Jack have you sleep last night?

We asked him for the not, like, least scary rooms on the first floor.

Tell him the room numbers.

You were in the East Bay.

Was that those?

Not the least scary?

Does that pertain to anything?

Oh, it's closed currently due to a flooding issue.

That explains the smell. I didn't want to be rude, but it kind of. It smelled.

I thought that was us.

That could be.

I just assumed it was my normal funk now.

You shouldn't have been able to stay in there. We've removed most of the furniture.

That's fine. We weren't able to stay there.

We.

That's why we're sleeping in the lobby.

Most of the furniture?

Yeah, there were beds and stuff, for sure.

Did we sleep on phantom beds?

They were clean and everything.

Did we sleep on ghosts?

Maybe.

Sounds kind of hot.

What?

What?

Huh.

We did get attacked by some kind of shadow things that were.

Yeah, some Homer Simpson esque things, which.

Is why we ended up sleeping down here in the lobby as a group.

Interesting.

You ever seen any shadow people? We saw shadow people.

Yeah. The Stanley's got a long history of folks dying here. It was originally opened up as a tuberculosis ward. Mr. Stanley had tuberculosis. Came out here because the high elevation and the dry air was supposed to help with tuberculosis. Those suffering from consumption, as they called it at the time, lungers. So it was a weird mix. The Stanley Hotel was a weird mix of a tuberculosis ward slash hotel for the high end rich folks from the east coast of which Mr. Stanley was one.

Hmm, that is an odd mix.

Yeah, it worked. Apparently half of the reason it worked is people hated the man who owned the land before. The man who owned the land before was the single largest foreign owner of American soil at the time. An Irishman owned a huge chunk of the state from whom Mr. Stanley bought the area. So I'm not. I mean we're known for a reason. We're a nice hotel with some spooky stuff. But Jack's not what I hear about very often.

And what's a Jack then?

What's his deal? What's his thing?

Jack. Horace was caretaker back in 82. It was actually the last year that the Stanley shut down for winter. We used to just close for winter. It was too. We're not a ski resort area. We're not Vail, we're not Aspen. We have some cross country skiing that wasn't near as popular. Still isn't near as popular as skiing and snowboarding. So we would just close down during the harsh winters. We would keep a caretaker in house over the winter to, you know, make sure that there was no pipes that burst and caused serious flooding, things of that kind of nature. And we keep kind of a very minimal skeleton crew living in the crew quarters. Jack was our caretaker in 82. He was an amateur writer of his own. Swore that writing by quill was the way to go. Apparently.

He definitely looked very fancy doing and.

He was here to write his great American novel over the course of the winter. The only other thing that's known is after winter ended, when the hotel manager came back, neither Jack nor the barkeep were anywhere to be found. None of the remaining staff would talk. Whether they knew or didn't, they would not talk about what might have happened to them.

Well, apparently they're back. They're serving guests.

Well, seems how you Slept in an uninhabitable wing of the hotel. We're not gonna worry about charging you for your night's sleep.

Yeah, sorry about that.

I mean, we kinda ended up sleeping in the lobby.

Yeah, a very comfy lobby. It is.

It's very nice. There's a fire. Good stuff.

We are getting ready to serve breakfast. If you guys would please make yourselves presentable before the actual guests were to come filtering in.

That would be guests here?

Well, sure.

How.

Why?

Some people were here when things stopped working.

Oh, that's fair.

Okay, that makes more sense.

Very nice accommodations.

How did we not run into any of you or the other guests?

Yeah, like, not a soul.

Like, it's not like we showed up in the middle of the night and.

We weren't exactly quiet when we were fighting ghosts.

No, but at the bright side, we don't have to worry about the hammer holes. We may have done some demolition for you.

Don't worry about it.

It's fine.

We were in an alternate version of the hotel, so it probably doesn't matter.

Oh, well, that's okay. How is that okay?

I don't know. None of this makes sense.

You lost me when you mentioned alternate realities.

Yeah, we. No. Clipped into another place. That's pretty cool.

Like clippers, maybe.

I don't know.

Perfectly serviceable rooms in a wing of the hotel that is clearly non functional functional right now and has had most of the furniture removed. We were sent there by a guy who died 50 years ago. Zach.

That. No. Was that 50 years ago?

Oh, that hurt.

40. 40 years. I did the math bad in my brain.

I'm like, oh, my God.

Everybody at the table visibly aged.

It was only 40 years.

None.

That's much better. But like, clearly. We met the bartender. We were like, it's.

Do we. Do we drink literal spirits?

Oh, good. Then Jeff will have less of a hangover.

I don't necessarily. Are we welcome at breakfast? Do we. We can trade something or.

We've stopped taking payment. We view it more as a service in this point. Just trying to keep people alive so you can. You can eat breakfast with us. But then we would ask you to carry on your way.

No problem.

Planning on moving on this morning?

Yeah, We've done a lot of fighting anyway. It's been not great.

Thank you for the offer for breakfast. We'll happily take you up on that.

Absolutely.

Sounds like the least we can do after our hotel attack.

Us.

Apparently.

That was pretty cool.

I don't know. They seemed quite accommodating. Until we tried to sleep that's true.

Well, were they, though? I mean, am I the only one remembering the frozen ice guy? We fought.

We kind of went out of our way.

Thank you for breakfast. We'll head that way and go get some breakfast, and then we'll be about our way and we'll make sure we clean up after ourselves.

Greatly appreciate it.

We very much appreciate your hospitality here.

However, where would you like the mattresses we drug into the. Since apparently they don't belong in the rooms we got them out of.

We will figure that out.

Fair point. Because they are tangible, so they weren't ghost master's there, James. So they were real. Sleeping on ghosts. That's cool.

Well, at least stack them to the side over here for you.

I appreciate it.

Ghost bedbugs would be murder.

Would you focus, James?

It's one of the very rare times where I don't have to make. Just let me revel in that.

Okay? Okay.

We just hope the cook's not angry.

Yeah.

Is that supposed to be. I'm not that angry when I make breakfast.

Angry breakfast doesn't taste as good as happy breakfast.

That's accurate. Sometimes you get a knife in it.

With that said, though, guilt soup is delicious.

Yeah. Apology coffee is pretty good, too.

Yes. Ooh, coffee. Do you guys get apologies?

What?

You guys get apologies?

Some. Some people apologize when they rob you.

What's that like?

Oh, no, I'm sorry you didn't have a happy childhood.

Anyway.

I'm sorry. Get ready to have breakfast.

Thank you very much. We'll get ourselves cleaned up and packed up here.

He does that like French waiter sharp spin around and about. Very stiffly, briskly, la walks away.

Does he look pompous as he does it?

Oh, yeah. Fuck, yeah. He's the concierge. Nailed it. Stanley. He looks pompous as fuck. He's in a nice suit. It still looks sharp and clean and.

Pressed, even though he's been washing it in the river. It's pretty impressive.

If anyone had told me that the apocalypse was going to be this surreal, I would have laughed at them.

Yeah, that's fair.

That kind of comes with it being so surreal.

Magic and zombies.

And as Emery's saying this, you can visibly see her boxing up this particular trauma and adding it to her collection in her brain.

This goes over here in the right corner. Yes.

I will say, shelf's getting pretty full, huh?

We're taking the end of the world pretty well, I think. Once we run out of coffee, I feel like it's really going to hit.

I have a whole Bookshelf of creepy shit. And it's getting super full. Not a fan.

It's gonna get covered in cobwebs and then that's gonna make it worse.

All right, well, I think we take a minute and freshen ourselves up and get Jeff on his feet.

Jeff's not doing great.

Jeff's.

He's definitely hungover.

Oh, yeah, that's right. He got shit houses.

He's probably got bacon.

Jeff. Bacon makes everything better.

Maybe they'll have biscuits and gravy. That will help.

Do your best at bread. Bread and water, bro. You're gonna need it.

Biscuits and.

Okay, just shovel it in your face. Don't even think about it.

Do it.

All of us are just putting as much food to him as possible. Just like, eat all of this.

Eat this.

He's so overwhelmed right now.

Pull your hood further over your head so you can see less.

He can see sounds right now.

Why are we.

Cause we fought ghosts. It's okay.

There were shadows that haunted our nightmares and chased us out of our rooms.

Yeah, but you were blacked out and you don't remember anything, so it's fine.

Sleeping here was safer.

Yeah, but you're alive, and that's a good thing. That's a win.

Fire is nicely 90% confident on that part.

But how many fingers am I holding up? How many fingers am I holding up?

Would you stop moving them? That is rude.

He's got the mage hand adding fingers.

Oh, absolutely.

The mage hand is just like phasing.

In and out of my hand somewhere.

Between 2 and 30.

What?

How?

How? Oh, I think I drank so much I have a concussion.

Not sure that's possible, buddy. But if you did it, well, you did some science.

If there's a giant head shaped hole in one of the walls.

Honestly, at this point, I think anything could be possible.

Not aliens. I refuse.

Why would you even put that onto the universe?

Ridiculous.

That is ridiculous.

Fighting undead shit. I'm not gonna deal with a again.

Why would you put that out to the.

So you see the. I don't know where they would have a continental breakfast here, but off to the side of the lobby, they have the fake, like, wall doors, but they just open up and you can see that there's a dining area and there is a not angry cook putting out quite the. Quite the.

Spread.

Spread. Thank you. Yes. All I could think was dressing. That wasn't.

I was gonna go feast, but, you.

Know, quite the spread. You've got all the carbs and eggs and fats you could want. They do have the fancy silver carafes of assumedly coffee and tea.

It's a smorgasbord.

So you guys are able to feast. They got the little silver.

Absolutely feast.

Pictures of the syrup.

We eat more than is probably polite to eat at a continental breakfast.

Probably.

Especially considering the circumstances.

Oh yeah. Elliot knows we're gonna go back on trail ration, so he is gonna load up.

Arbelicious.

Yes.

You see, as. As you're loading up your plates, quite a few well to do. Dapper gents and ladies trickle their way. They're all definitely not saying anything, but you're getting some serious raised eyebrow side eye.

We're getting judged so hard.

As soon as they turn her back, Mel sticks her tongue out at them.

Ulnock's gonna crowd one of them and go buy the bread and be like, you gonna get down on this or you want some?

You put like some of this.

It's pretty good.

It was pretty good ghost stuff.

Assuredly, yes. Some of us are trying to watch our figures though.

I mean, it's the end times, but you know, you do what you want to do, I guess.

Any apocalypse.

Well, good luck on you.

Even Mal's like carb loading.

Yes, quite.

I shall chug my coffee with my pinky in the ass.

I think these guys went to finishing school.

Ooh, we all did finish school. Yes.

Oh, it's not the same thing, Dick. Damn, I got roasts.

Okay, okay, we got jokes. Eat your breakfast. Don't get us thrown out. Eat your breakfast.

That is hard.

We're gonna eat our breakfast and we're gonna go get our horses and we're gonna continue on our path.

Yep.

Good luck with the cult.

Really? You're gonna keep us here this much longer? Oh, good lord.

Just. Here, have another sausage.

As you guys are talking amongst yourselves, you do over here at some point. Well, that does explain the smell.

Fancy pants. Rich Miggy over here. Fuck you.

They're edging me closer to a rage. Dude, it's.

We just said we were gonna eat. Get out of here.

But then insulting our hygiene.

Yeah, you know what? When a Moritar gets here, he's gonna eat them. So you know what?

I don't care.

Specifically the rich people.

Why would he eat them? They're all scrawny. Cause they're watching their weight.

They're the toothpicks of the grain.

I don't eat carbs.

Since when? We found out Amoritar is apparently a socialist. Eat the rich.

He employs so many people that do not complain about their job. Must be A great union.

I want you to know I just flipped through all of my spells to see if I had anything interesting to mess with them with, and I don't.

I didn't even think about that.

With that said, we should finish breakfast and leave.

Absolutely.

Elliot's got, like, his mouth full, and he's got, like, toast in his head. Like, I'm going to go start getting the horse's saddle. I'm out of here.

Can I, Can I?

Oh, God. Yep, Elliot's left. He found the door. Getting the horse's saddle.

The moment that I see Elliot leaves, it's like, okay, the getaway plan is working.

Mel grabs Jacob and says, you're really too young to see this. And we leave.

So being an arcane trickster, I can make mage hand invisible and still have it interact with stuff. Can I have the mage hand go over and, like, the moment that somebody takes, like. Yeah. Or like, the moment that they go to eat something with a spoon, just, like, bump their shoulder so that they just spill food all over the place?

Sure.

Yeah.

That's just a couple silly, stupid.

Victory is mine, Franks.

That happens. And you see, my apologies. I've apparently still got some waking up to do. Add some self down.

Oh, they're so pretentious. Oh, my God.

We just got to get out of here. Get the rest of the bacon.

Let's go.

James, do something else because I, I, I, I love seeing this. Do it again.

Joffrey, do we still have the October.

Oh, my God.

Joffrey.

Joffrey. I appear to have soiled my white shirt. I will need the ultra clean to remove the filth.

Can I, like, grab a hold of his bowl and just, like, pull it towards him?

They can't be that rich.

They're using it towards him so that it dumps into his lap.

Knock it off the table.

He's already standing at this point. He stood up. As soon as he stops patting himself down and giving orders. But you can absolutely have the food bowl come sliding at him.

Yep. Just gonna have it, like, slowly start to shake. So, like, the food in the bowl just starts vibrating and then just right into his face.

Joffrey, I think we're gonna need the handyman to take a look at the table. It appears to have come a bit unstabilized. One of the legs must be shorter than the rest.

I'm gonna peel Jeff off the table where I'm sure he's got his head resting just on the table. We'll bring your plate to go, buddy.

Come on. It Just takes a carafe of coffee.

I'm just shoveling bread into my coveralls.

You're not going to have fun on the horse today, bud.

I'm gonna use the mage hand to just grab a handful of bacon and then I'm out the door.

Just watch bacon fly out.

Yep.

Just a wad of bacon just floats up into the air and just starts.

Following me as I leave.

Honestly?

Because they're stuck in a haunted hotel.

This is.

It's probably not that unusual.

Yeah. Hmm. The ghosts are hungry this morning. Jawfrit. That's a new one. Have you seen that before? Ethel.

Goddammit.

It's. Damn it.

No resident. I can't say I have.

The pranks aren't working because they're not getting annoyed.

Damn it. We keep a firm, stiff upper lip the whole time.

I believe the word you're looking for is unflappable.

Un What?

Unflappable. Oh, they are unflappable this morning.

I know. I've never heard that before.

That's a very ridiculous word.

Oh, okay. They're flightliest bitches. Gotcha. Let us go.

They're all penguins.

Oh, yes. With their cute little suits. Yes. All right, let's leave before we do anything uncouth.

Anything else uncouth, Please.

Have safe travels on your way away from here.

Sure.

I'd say thanks if I thought you meant it.

Anyway, your absence will absolutely be noticed.

All right.

I'm sure it will.

Ta ta. Don't let the apocalypse hit you on the ass on the way out.

Yep.

Out the door.

There's gonna be a flying horse coming through here. He's on fire. You might want to watch out for that.

Joffrey blessing you here as you leave. You guys are able to get your horses are well taken care of? There really was a stable? They really were stable. Stabled. The stable hand is definitely confused why they're here. You do know that yours are the only horses here? Everyone else has been foothilled into town. They haven't met anywhere. So when he woke up this morning to have to check on the assumedly empty stable, he was surprised by the presence of horses. I see. We had a late check in last night.

Yeah, something like that.

Well, I have only been able to brush down a couple of the horses, but your Taxol took the liberty of oiling your leathers and making it sure it was road ready. It looks like it's been through hell and back.

Indeed, yes.

Indubitably as they might say, it's well broken in.

Thank you.

You're out of here already?

Yep. Miles to go. Thank you.

He helps. He helps you do the things. Do stuff, Saddle the horses. He starts putting the blankets on under the saddles that have a name and stuff.

Horse blankets.

Is that really all they're called?

What?

They're just called horse blankets.

Yeah.

Oh, are horses ship shape and pistol ready?

There's pads and horse blankets and saddles.

He help puts those things on.

He wouldn't actually saddle the horses because he wouldn't know what saddles go on which horses there.

So he puts blankets to let you saddle and then you're able to away.

So Elliot knows which saddles go on which horses. So he's getting all that while all the shenanigans are happening inside. Just going, them kids are going to get us in so much trouble.

And then you just see us walking out like we're like acting like we're all prim and proper. But then there's a handful of floating bacon coming up behind me.

You just see Bacon chasing him?

Yeah.

Ellie's just gonna look at him and just shake his head and just keep putting. Just keep.

I feel like Charlie has run behind the bacon and keeps showing up, trying to.

The stagehand does see the bacon following them, but it's a new one. Guests are apparently hungry this morning.

Bacon orbs. It's a new thing. Yep.

You know, the apocalypse, who knows what's gonna happen next.

That is fair. When you guys came through this morning or the late last night, whenever it was, did you see anybody anywhere near the frozen dead guy?

No.

Absolutely not.

Nope.

I didn't know there was a frozen dead guy.

Sure.

It's like the thing over that way, but no, we haven't. I don't think we saw anyone over there.

Yep. Nope, nope, nope.

What happened?

Let's go.

Somebody got bored. Tore that place a new one. Dang.

I mean, you know kids today without television and Internet.

A lot of debauchery going on.

There's a bunch of rich people in this place too. Who knows what those people get into, right?

Yeah, quite probably had some bet with themselves.

Some hazing.

Joffrey.

Oh, God. His name's Jeff.

He's done by Jeffrey and forever.

Let alone choir.

More power to you guys working here with them.

Yeah, I don't think you could pay me enough to deal with this.

Normally it's worth it. Cause they leave so much shit behind when they leave. But these ones aren't leaving.

Yep. Yep.

Want some bread?

I ate already. Thank you though.

Bacon orb.

Let's put it back in my.

Don't give away the bacon orb.

I was gonna offer a piece. Alex.

Gonna walk by and just grab a couple pieces off of my chunk.

It's getting definitely cool quickly. Yeah. Awesome. So we are gonna move on down the road, following again the campfire rules.

Can't wait to get home, do it again.

You guys would know there's a nice path, nice road from here to Littleton.

We're not going to Littleton. I was like, we are not going to Littleton.

There's too many fucking hill towns.

Yeah, Denver, literally.

Yeah. You're going to the right one, the.

One that you're supposed to go to.

Is it a ride or a left that this fork?

Pull out the map.

You guys also know that it's about two days of travel.

You know, there's these cool things called road signs that we can still read.

Oh, you're right. I always use Google. It's like I forget about those all the time.

You do see a road bind that says Laramie, Longmont, Littleton and all right.

Which elves are we going to?

That's a lot of elves.

I remember right. We're cutting between Loveland and Longmont.

I think that was the idea.

So trying to dodge is meant many people as possible.

Yep, that's best. We're going to get perfect.

So, yeah, you know that it's only about two days travel to get there. And you know, based off of this distance, it's a three wins before you get three losses skill check type thing. With a total DC of 13, the weather is not bad. Chilly, little bit rainy. Looking at the top of them, you can see clouds up at the top of the mountain. You have one more. One more pass to go over. But it's a very well paved road path. It's very. So what skills are who using to do the things?

Elliot, he'll go ahead and do Take the front because that's his normal spot. He's also in his favorite terrain, so he's gonna just kind of go in the front. I'm figuring along paved roads is gonna be. It's gonna be kind of boring for him. He's not trying to find passes or paths through the forest. So he's just gonna. I guess really at the moment he's gonna concentrate on K keeping an eye up ahead. For honestly, his concern would be ambushes.

That's exactly what I was gonna teach.

But also since he's not having to concentrate a lot, what he's gonna be concentrating on is working with his horse, balancing with his Horse. So the horse is exerting the least amount of energy.

Okay.

So if you're way off balance on your horse, the horse has to compensate for it and hired quicker.

Like an unsettled pack.

Yeah, exactly. So that. That's he's going to. That's going to be a big part of his concentration this morning. Is. Is. We're is basically trying to be the best possible rider he can be.

That would be animal handling.

Sure, yeah. 20. Dirty 20.

Yeah. You more than comfortably pull that off. Honestly, some of it would almost be second nature to you. You've been riding horse for so long, you don't even fully notice the tells of your horse anymore. You just adjust by nature. But yeah, you absolutely succeed at your being the best possible rider you can be.

Oh, I go. Since Jeff still slightly hungover, can I do a medicine check to try nursing him back to health?

Sure.

This way we're not having to stop every mile for him to throw up.

That does slow things down a lot.

Riding a horse hungover is imagine howling back and forth. Worst experience in the world.

Rafting hungover.

That is a 19.

All right, what do you do?

I probably make him some like go juice or something like that. Like a family recipe. I got some hot sauce and some other shit.

Oh God.

He did take a carafe of coffee.

Yep, coffee and hot sauce.

It's an O'Brien's friendly recipe.

Shake up the kale chips in there. Take it a green go juice.

Feel free to take some time to chew.

Kale chip fucking powder.

Mm.

Somehow because you rolled well, that works.

Just take it in slow bits. There you. There you go.

Good job, buddy. Here's some bread. Wash it down.

Face that way. Face that way. Face that way. Okay, now you're good.

The green of the drink offsets the green of his skin and he starts.

To look less peachy.

Perfect. See, I was thinking of the Wake up juice from Back to the Future three.

Oh, okay. I don't remember that movie. Memorable of the three. It's the cowboy one I liked the cowboy one.

I didn't like the second.

I remember the cowboy vibes. That's it.

Now that I've thrown us off, I haven't watched forever.

Yeah, I don't remember that.

That was the back to the time machine.

Yeah, they. They had the DeLorean on the rails and they had to get the locomotive up to like super fast to get.

It all the way up to 66. So what's.

I thought it was 88, cuz that's top speed.

Miles an hour.

You know, I don't know. I would have sworn to you it was 66, but I'm probably wrong.

It's 88.

It's weird that it's totally 88.

Okay. Three against two.

That was the DeLorean's top speed on the.

That's the reason why that was the speed that it had to get to because it took so long for the DeLorean to get up.

Non sports car sports star. In the history of sports sports cards.

Would you make it out of stainless steel? The heaviest sports card ever. Sports.

How long does this journey. Do we think this journey is like this? Until. Do we have an idea of how long it's going to take us to kind of reach the Loveland area? Okay.

They'll sleep once.

Okay.

I want to. I'm thinking of a, like, keeping our gear in good repair, like, facilitating repairs, making sure we can stay moving and not have to stop for super long to fix issues. I'm hoping for a sleight of hand.

Okay, sure.

With, like, tools.

But you're still illegal.

Yeah.

So you've got mending, too.

I do. I do have the mending spell, which helps.

I rolled a 12, so that is one fail. Now I can say it was close enough. You didn't damage your kit. You just didn't improve your kit.

Yeah.

You're. You're a blacksmith, not a sewer seamstress.

Yeah. This thing on my backpack is holding together for now.

Duct tape and staples.

It's hard to do it while you're on the move.

Yes, Especially on a horse. It's not exactly a table.

Yeah.

So that is two successes, one loss, one more win or two more losses.

Could I do a history check to see if. Because if Mel's been to Denver before, then maybe using road signs, she might be able to, like. Yeah.

No.

If we get off here and go that way, it's easier to get over to Longmont. 16.

All right. You point out a good path. There's not a fun description of doing that. You point at the right road signs and make the right decisions.

Look, big green and white sign. Guys go that way.

Ugh. Question mark. Why the caveman?

Oh, I said go that way.

I don't know why. It was like you were speaking in broken sentences.

Look, I'm really bad at navigating things. I was just really excited to do something useful in terms of pointing you in the right direction.

Helpful. Unexpected, but helpful.

Exactly. Thank you.

Awesome.

Okay. For that. When I'm happy.

I don't know.

Big sign I'm not happy very often. Cool.

Listen, right side that way.

Go.

It's like, it's like how Ulna translates the birds.

There's a. A game called Poetry for Neanderthals. Yeah, it's got like a blow up bat in it. So you blow up the bat and you have to. It's. It's like charades. But you're describing the word on the card using only single syllable words.

Oh, no, that'd be say a word.

With more than one syllable or you say a word. That's one of the words on the card. Someone hits you with a.

So it's like taboo, but with a blow up bat.

It's extremely. I played it super drunk with my family in the mountains and we were crying, laughing. It was so funny.

Oh no, they made a game for you.

So Mel's part comes in very first, actually. So really the only time you have a chance to choose is leaving Estes. After that, you're on a road that takes you to Longmont or to Loveland. You pick the Longmontiest road.

Is it the long way around?

You guys have. You guys have comfortable travel. Nice thing is it appears based off of this topographical map, you don't have to go as up to get to Longmont as you do to get to Loveland. It is a bit of a technically longer ride, but you don't have to crest quite as high of a peak. And it's a lot. It's absolutely gorgeous through here. I mean it's. Again, it's back in the forest.

Beautiful landscapes through there.

It's warm enough, you're comfortable. You definitely. It's not like tank top weather by any means, but you're comfortable coming through here. You see all sorts of campgrounds, all sorts of branches for hiking trails, things of that nature. And importantly, what you don't see are any people trying to prevent you from doing anything. You do see human nature being what it is, you guys are kind of sticking to the right hand lane. The road, the west side you would have driven on, probably trying to stick a little bit more to the soft shoulder than onto the actual asphalt. And going the opposite direction is a fairly consistent stream of people leaving the Denver. And I'm not talking like, you know, Black Friday shopping line by any stretch, but you never go longer than 10, 15 minutes without passing another trying to make their way away. The one thing you're noticing is unlike the groups that you've seen that have left the city before they looked okay before they left early enough on that they hadn't really suffered too much or anything. These folks are looking pretty rough. They're skinnier than you've seen. They're filthy. They're clothes are in pretty rough shape.

I feel like most of these people are like one step away from zombie.

They don't look like they're doing well. That's for sure.

None of them really acknowledge you guys. You see some people kind of looking at you quizzically because you're going to the place they're trying to not be anymore. But most of them have just kind of got their heads down. Hand sold into whatever. Whatever version of a backpack they've got on and just very much on the grind. So they're just one step in front of the other is really all they're focusing on. Just marching their way.

Stranger danger alert mode there. It's that they could be fine or they could be junkies that just ran randomly attack you for no reason. You don't know.

Great. Now I'm paranoid. Thanks Mel.

Welcome.

Gotta keep you on your toes, James.

I wanna be on my toes.

Those are sore.

I wanna be on a horse. Damn it.

Nice thing is you guys did successfully accomplish the skill check. Portia. So can I get a team elected D20 roller?

No SCOs.

I'll do it. No. No additions or anything. Just roll it a D20.

It's a straight E20.

All right, here we go. 15.

Weird. That's the one I was reading. Haha. That's cool.

Maybe don't have the three lowest rollers.

Right?

You feel fast. You are speed.

I am speed.

The party member with the highest dexterity ability score can choose to make the next attack that would have hit them miss instead. So who's got the best decks? Probably James. Yeah, Elliot would make sense.

I got a plus three as well.

I've got a plus three as well.

Let's have a roll off between the plus three ers.

Is the. Is it. Are you all plus three with an even number?

My score is 16.

Also 16.

16. I only use a 17.

That fixes it.

Yeah. No, you rolled a nine.

That's funny.

17.

I got a five.

17 takes it. So remember this. It might be a minute but your windfall is because you have the highest dexterity ability score. You can choose to make the next attack that would have hit you miss. The next time somebody hits you. They don't hit you. I guarantee I won't.

This falls along the whole stranger danger thing.

Yeah. Honestly.

Also makes sense that the monk against the speed shit.

Yeah. Kind of.

So you guys are making your way down into Longmont. You pass through the apparently small town of Lyons. Looks quaint for the first time in a long time. Especially for some of you folks. You can see forever.

Right? No mountain in front of us.

There is nothing left. It is. You have hit the prairies.

This is going to trigger a lot of young memories from Elliot because he grew up in the plains. He grew up in Kansas.

Yep. This very much looks like home.

And he also happened to pick up grasslands as his new preferred terrain also. So he's going to. He's gonna look at it and you're gonna hear this big sigh and kind of under his breath like, I never expected to see this again.

Specifically. This would look a lot like I imagine Kansas does during burn season when they're clearing their ditches. That air is smokey. Is. Yeah. You taste it? You smell it.

Now that reminds me of home.

Where were you from again?

East Coast.

You can see a fair clip down to your south about as far as you'd be able to see in this thick of smoke. That is black smoke coming from down there. Those of you who know this area would know that's the Denver. It is black smoke coming from that area. Most of the smoke you're dealing with here is just the windswept from that fire.

It's been a couple months.

I mean Denver was kind of a dumpster fire before the apocalypse.

You're not wrong.

Now it's literally on fire.

Like all long enough for resources to start getting scarce.

We need to avoid Colfax.

We are not going that far south.

I avoided Colfax before the apocalypse.

I'm just saying not safe.

We want to skirt kind of the north edge of Longmont and not actually enter town if we can. That was kind of the plan is like try to avoid population centers.

Conveniently. You're on what appears to be Highway 66 at 36 turns to 66 as soon as you hit it just does go along the north of Longmont in a pretty much a straight line that appears to be Longmont's northern border. So you are. You are. You can see that the Texas is basically south of you as you're passing by. Up directly north of you is all just like farmland, things of that nature. After. You know, you could pass through a couple of small suburbs but you don't see people. The suburbs appear pretty well cleared out. And after riding for a little while, say probably 15 minutes into. So you're passing by a building that's got quite a large group of People around it. You can see a series of tables set up, and you can see folks with large cook pots are doling out food to a pretty steady line.

I'm not gonna lie. I think we need to avoid this. I do think we need to avoid groups of people as much as we can.

I do feel bad hoarding all the bread I currently have because the have.

Nots are gonna want to kill you.

I ate mine. I don't like cheese.

I stuffed a lot in my. I still have bread. Jeff was awful. I stuffed it. I looked like Santa when we left. It was amazing.

I ate the bacon orb, like, the same day.

It's a lot of bread. Okay. When you have 15 French loaves in your jacket.

We're also not doing too badly for resources.

Yeah, we should be good. Let's not stop.

And I feel like some of these people probably need what they're serving. Do. Do the people who are serving the soup, are they wearing robes of any kind?

Oh, fuck. I didn't even think about that.

Make a perception check.

Can I aid her by being observant in her general direction?

Also roll a perception check because I.

Am so, so good at this.

You cannot help her see, but you can look along.

Can I also make one because Mel made me jumpy?

Sure.

I got a 17.

Actually.

That'S 18. I rolled a 19th.

Still not bad.

19.

Cool. Yeah. You don't see ropes.

Oh, that's good.

What you do see are folks in surprisingly good condition. Casual wear with big air quotes around it. People trying to look like they're chill.

Does it look like that?

Like, cool, hip, youth minister vibes?

Does it look like too much effort was put into it?

Yeah, it's not natural. And what you definitely see is they have necklaces on.

Ah.

And at the end of the necklace, this is flail.

God damn.

Why did we have to look?

Damn it.

Hey there, listener. It's your DM Mike here with a quick ad break. I really wanted to just take a moment and leave the goofy characters aside for this one. With the rather interesting start to 2025, I'm reminded as to how important community building is, and I wanted to take a moment and thank all of you for the little community we've got started here. And on that note, I wanted to shout out a couple of our followers. As you've heard for the last couple months, we have a Patreon which gains you access to our bonus content and ad free episodes. I want to shout out Robby Wooten and Buda Boyi, both of whom Follow us on Patreon. If you join our Patreon, you too will receive a shout out. Also, as you've heard for quite some time, we have a deal running with pinecast, our podcast host, where if you use our referral link found in the podcast description, you gain a discounted membership for your first few months. This also gives us a credit towards our own account. Unfortunately though, their program doesn't tell us who signed up. So if you've pounced on this deal and have started a podcast of your own, send us an email. I'd love to pay it forward. To those of you who who are taking on this exciting and difficult adventure by sharing your podcast on our show, you can email [email protected] I know we have two listeners who have subscribed, so please email me. I would love to put you in this epic. As always, we very much enjoy making this podcast and appreciate you coming along this little bit of escapism with us. Here's the rest of the episode.

Okay, I'm guessing you.

What is. Jeff's still in his robes.

Yeah, no, we got him close.

We got him right close.

Kremling.

Okay.

Yeah, we got him out of those.

At and James still looks like a marshmallow satyr cowboy.

Yes.

Yeah. James stands out. James draws attention. James is the opposite of stealth.

And I have Crocs on to my.

Did you actually want this hat? It's been rubbing my ears. Weird.

I'll take it.

Okay, there you go.

So I'm guessing you guys bring this to Elliot's attention.

I. I don't. Wait, hang on. I don't like this. It's. You remember the whole thing with the ministry and the.

I don't like it either. But. But these are starving people that they're getting food. Are we supposed to go kill the people that are giving food and says don't take food from strangers. They're probably starving, but at the same.

Time, they're gonna get brainwashed.

I'm not gonna hang around long enough to eat.

But they're also gonna eat.

Yeah, they're gonna eat and then get their asses literally whipped later.

Unfortunately, I've got a feeling this is happening everywhere that we're gonna go. And I don't think we can stop it by running over there and kicking over their soup kitchen.

I don't say that.

Don't waste the food.

Just kill the people serving we're running.

From and then stay here and keep serving it instead.

No, they can vote on the committee on who serves the food?

Oh, yeah, that always works. No, that won't turn out like Lord.

Of the Flies at all.

And I point at Jacob. We should go.

Fair point.

Yeah.

Is Jacob writing his room the norm?

I think that when we got close, closer to any form of civilization, we coax them off the broom and put them on.

Yeah. Once we started seeing people, we put like a parking brake on.

I'm sure the broom would be fun for 20, 30 minutes, but I'm guessing after that it would be uncomfortable.

That would definitely suck.

The broom's probably stored in your quiver, Elliot.

When there's not a lot of people around, we absolutely let them ride the broom.

Okay.

I don't.

Good points.

I don't like it either, but I. I don't think we gain to gain anything. And I think we stand that we could lose a lot.

Yeah, I guess it would be better to take out the source, not the.

That's what we're. That's what we're doing.

Well, more importantly too, if you're hungry and someone's feeding you and someone's on knives, the people feeding you, what are you gonna do?

It is kind of their plan, isn't it?

That's true. We would actually be helping the cult.

Cause I don't like it either, but I think we need to just keep going.

Let's keep moving then.

Perfect. So you'll see that this community center is up on the north side of the road. You're riding past like right off it. Ah, keep going down the road.

What do you make Jacob put a hat on, look like a different eight year old boy for five minutes?

Yeah, we just.

Here, here, wear this. Just you take the hat that I put on.

Hold on.

I cannot put the cowboy hat on him.

For those listening at home, coming down.

Over his eyes and sticking out like three times his shoulder width.

There.

Now you're a hat stance.

Hey, I can't see anything now.

That's fine.

Just trust your horse, Jacob. Trust your horse.

Why don't you put this nasty.

Gross.

Yuck.

The best part is that he's not even reining his horse. He's on one of the pack horses, which is following behind somebody else.

What was wrong with the fucking hat? Oh, took head. What was wrong with the freaking hat?

As if.

Now we monitor better smells. And you see, you know, this isn't the most subtle way to pass by a community center. So a couple of the folks do look over and oh, travelers, we please come eat. We are. We're feeding the community. There's Plenty. Plenty to go around.

We know. Speaking of English. Bye.

Bye.

That was totally a deception.

Go for it. You can roll with deception. I guess she'll believe. Maybe you don't.

Oh, that. That's a dirty 20.

Do the rest of you want to translate what I said to your companion?

Nope.

We're very well provisioned.

We're.

I would rather that food go to people here who need it, so thank you very much.

It should go to the. To the. Those that do not have.

In that case, we can always use more help.

Nope. We're good.

Bye. Many hands. Makes a little work. Yep.

We got a lot of stuff to do. We're gonna be moving, moseying along, so. Nope.

Trust me, you don't want our help.

We're trying to make some time here, so.

I was really hoping that you'd all pick up on that and you'd all pretend like you didn't speak English.

My deception is dog shit. I'm not gonna chance it.

Plus, you're gonna sound like Dante.

Yeah.

We just tell you like. No, we're making good. We're trying to make good time. Thank you. We're fine.

We got other people down the way that we got to go help.

We just keep walking.

Blessing keep you safe.

Help yours, too.

Quiet enough that it didn't matter.

Wow.

You can't be polite to anybody, can you?

No. He's apparently incapable.

It violates all of my codes of being a cook to use food to deceive people.

That was. That took place.

Hey, wait.

Where'd you get that shirt again?

You gave it to me.

That one. Probably.

But he didn't use food to deceive you. He just stole that out.

It was with the bundle that I borrowed before this that you said that I could keep.

The military term is procured. Yes. Tactically acquired is also acceptable.

Waiting for a lull.

But anyway, as we continue. I'm only nice to good people.

Are you?

That's a really short list for you, then, isn't it?

I. I haven't poisoned any of your food.

None of you. We're all still alive.

I thought you said.

I'm on your side, James.

Food for deceiving people.

Exactly. So I'm following my code. You're welcome.

I worked with you for, like, a couple months, and you were not nice. You were not nice to anyone.

Though apparently, he doesn't think anyone counts as good people.

Why is it.

Why is everyone picking on James all of a sudden?

What is that?

If you remember Ben and his beer collection, you were very Mean to him about that.

That's because he was being annoying. All he talked about was like, oh, look at all my top shelf shit that no one ever drinks.

He'd always bet.

Ha.

That was his name, right? Okay. Yeah, I said it. And then I was like, wait a second.

Good pull. I'll actually give you inspiration. The poll from episode two.

Yeah.

Episode one.

Yeah.

30. 31 episodes. So you guys continue along just out of earshot. You see, Jeff.

I'm gonna be keeping an eye on our. On our back end to make sure that none of them are following us.

And they were very busy. You could very obviously see it's like, ah, whatever. They go back to feeding folks. None of the people who are being fed really gave two shits. They were just fucking focused on the food.

Checks out.

But Jeff is. Jeff's visibly relieved. Moving. That was from our.

Did you recognize some of them?

Yeah, they moved fast.

Good thing that you're great.

We had sent missionaries ahead, so they were already laying the ground. You guys surprised us at three, four weeks before we expected the first train, so to speak.

Oh, that was the advanced party that was supposed to lull people to the actual.

Yeah, they are actively proselytizing right now. They probably. There's an excellent chance they don't know yet what's waiting for them.

That we killed their leaders.

Without them having access to the church, getting message to them is quite difficult. But yeah, no, I know all of those people.

Well, hopefully we can leave them in our dust.

And I am very glad we got you clothes.

Yes.

Yep. Yeah.

You stood out a little bit in those robes.

And honestly, you look like hell today, so good job.

It's day two.

He feels better. Yeah. You've slept once.

Okay. When you get old, sometimes those last more than a day. I'm just saying.

He's not that old.

Also his first wicked hangover.

It was true.

That first one lingers a bit.

All he's got left is a headache. That's a rough one.

That's probably from the goat juice.

Just an ungodly. He did have to stop. The downside was he didn't have to stop to throw up. But he did have to stop to evacuate his palace several times.

Yeah, it flushes your system.

It made him a laxative.

Coffee and hot sauce. He's cleared out.

He's still not feeling hungry.

That is not okay.

Yeah, that's the O'Brien dragon right there.

If you ever feed that to me.

I will stab you in your sleep.

I nominate him for inspiration on that one. The O'Brien dragon.

So you guys get a fair clip away from there. You pass through what was once a Walmart. It's very obviously been cleared out. None of the windows on the front of it are intact anymore. The doors aren't even on it.

And it's weird because it looked like that before the epoxy.

Same thing. You pass by a food center that's obviously been gone through and you're at another, I don't know, 15, 20, 30 minutes you say, and on your south side you're passing by just a. Just a nice like park kind of area outdoors. Not necessarily park with like swing sets, things like that. Parked more like large maintained field that obviously they could use for soccer or football or whatever. And you see a. There's a decent group of people out there, moms and kids and dads, just obviously trying to burn some of the kids energy out. And shortly, just as you're getting kind of close from up above, you see what you think is a pretty good sized bird. But as it drops, it keeps getting there.

Guys, is that an airplane?

I don't know what that is.

And as you look out in the field, you can see that there's a young man who's gone to chase after a Frisbee that missed its mark. And you watch this very clearly now. Not a bird. Grab the child and start carrying him to the south.

Oh God.

I thought we didn't do child. Oh no, it's puppies.

Puppies. Never mind.

Sorry, my bad.

Elliot saying this is gonna spur his horse and trace after him drawing his bow.

James is gonna follow suit like. God damn it. Now we're fighting fucking. What was that?

Whatever that was. We gotta save that fucking kid.

It gains altitude quite quickly. It is almost immediately back smashing up high.

Someone grab the broom.

I'll grab the broom.

What are you gonna do?

Up.

If I remember correctly, it has the same movement speed as a people. I think it's only 30ft.

Why did the not range person go?

What?

That's true. She's gotta be right up on it to attack it.

You are able to see its flight. It stays low enough, you're able to see where it's going. But you know right this moment you cannot catch it.

Yah.

Eliot's gonna keep chasing it.

Yeah, Elliot's gonna keep chasing it. I do. 50ft around is the best we can do.

You did hear as you haul last pass, you hear a mob Bobby.

So the kid's name was Bobby. Benny. I heard Bobby.

My baby.

Benny.

My baby. Get back Care of your baby stealing bitch.

What's. Do we have a. Do I have a feel of how.

How.

What the range is right now at this moment as we're charging towards it.

Where is that? Yeah, like, how far?

How far from me?

Far. Okay. Several. Yeah, so it was quick.

So if Elliot's not catching up to.

It, you're not, you know, confidently favorite terrain, all that good shit. You can track this beast.

All right, well, so if I'm not actively catching up with it, I'm gonna bring my horse back to a.

That was mine.

I'm gonna bring the horse back to a. Speed to pursue like a brisk trot.

Not a.

Just. I'm gonna. I can't. I don't know what it is, but Elliot would know. As fast as he could push the horse to keep a good pace, James.

Will probably come up like, what, are you slowing down? We gotta go get the kid. Right?

He's gonna. He's still gonna be moving, probably at a slow lope or even a trot. He's like, we can't. We're not overtaking him. But we're gonna try to stay in sight. But we can't exhaust the horses or we have to stop.

You think the thing is a nest?

I don't know, but I gotta try hearing this stuff.

I. I think I'm gonna slow my horse next to the lady who's clearly, like, kind of pull up to her, say, listen, we're gonna try to get your kid back. Can you get everyone off this field and inside? Because clearly this is a dangerous place to be.

I'm gonna keep an eye on this, guys and make sure I don't see the other ones.

His name's Benny.

Benny. Okay.

We live right there.

Okay.

Please, please save. I'll get these kids gone. Please save him. Yes.

We will be back when we have him.

Is any of. Are any of your characters familiar with this area?

I grew up on the Front Range. Okay, so not a little further east from here. Not this area specifically, but I'm not. I've been through here. You go to Fort Collins sometimes. You go to Boulder, you go. I've been up to Estes park before, but.

Okay.

Being an urchin, I know city patterns, but that's about it.

I think Mel would have been to probably Boulder. Yeah, Boulder or Denver a couple of times.

Then. Emery, can I have a history?

Sure. It is not my strong suit, but I will give you a roll.

Mel can give one disadvantage.

Nat20.

Hell, yeah.

Mel doesn't need to roll.

That's Good. Mel would not help.

Maybe I played a sport. I played. Maybe I played soccer or something. I've done away games in this area. Been around more than I'd, you know.

With a degree of confidence that's borderline unsettling to you. It's going to dia.

Oh, no.

Ah, okay.

It's almost weirdly exactly southeast from where you are.

Yeah.

You believe in your deepest heart of hearts it is going to dia.

Okay.

That's the only significant thing in that direction.

Yeah, there's pretty much jack all in that area. Otherwise we don't want to go to town.

I assume you tell everybody.

Yeah, well, I have. Now that I've done talking to this lady, I have to catch up to everybody. So once I get back up towards where you guys are loping after the thing, I kind of take a moment and look around. Like the only thing in that direction that is heading is the airport.

On the broom, am I able to like keep pace with it? No, no. Okay.

You've only got. You're slower on the broom than you are on the.

Really at 50ft around.

Oh, it's 50. I thought it was 30.

It's only 30 if that's more than £200.

But you are definitely not.

No.

I would struggle. Yeah. Olanach would have a hard time.

Yeah. You'd be putt putting through the sky.

You're now comfortably keeping pace with the horses. But you're not.

Okay, I'll come back down and join the others too.

But that was the only flying we had. It was worth the shot.

How far is Denver from. Or how far is the airport from this area?

Probably 20, 30 miles.

Is that all?

Wow. I thought we were really far north.

It's way out there.

It's nowhere near 10.

Yeah, that's.

It's in the middle of nowhere.

Yeah.

It went from being smack dab in the center of the city to just the outskirts of everything it is.

At this trajectory, we'll kind of cut from the north side of town through the east side of town and hit the airport. There's pretty much absolutely nothing around the airport except small towns.

Your first 20 miles roughly. I can't get there till the seat.

What exactly is going to be the plan if we do do want to go there? If the thing's got a big ass nest on top of the control tower.

We'Ll worry about that when we get.

Just arc our shots and hope for the best.

We could get up there.

Flashbacks to questions.

I didn't play that game.

Mel would not be having this.

Well, until we.

Let's go save Ashley.

I did not play that game. I watched the movie.

Until we can.

Okay, nevermind then.

Until we can see something, we probably want to try to sneak in and get the kid. Get out if he's still there.

That's best circumstances.

That's the best I can think of to wink to.

Let's just hope that he doesn't have the ears like a hawk or else he's going to hear us coming.

Yep.

Never going to listen.

They do fly. They might have good ears.

Possible it was the animated one.

Well, I mean, maybe if we're moving at a quick, quicker clip today, we'll still have some light left by the time we get there. I don't really like the idea of being there in the dark.

I don't like the idea of being there at all, period.

Just hoping that there's not like a whole hell of a lot of people still trying to stay at the dia.

Oh, there's nothing there.

Wildly.

But what about all of the people who were, I don't know, gonna get on a flight that day?

Yeah, they're probably dead.

It's been months. They're probably all dead or gone by there.

Storing stuff there like it's. There's no resources nearby. Like they would have to leave in order to find food and stuff.

More than likely they. I know it's been the Apocalypse 2023.

When we started, but it's only been like eight, nine weeks or something.

Yeah, it's still May, So it's still 2023.

My point is, is that it hasn't actually been that long. They might not have eaten themselves out of house at home yet because I mean some of those Starbucks syrups last forever.

The syrups do, but the food doesn't.

Just drinking syrup.

This is like some super like bulging mass of a person just chugging Starbucks.

Syrup like food mer.

Unless there really is a CIA bunker underneath the airport, they don't have the food stores to last long there. Like people would have had to leave to survive.

I don't know.

All signs lead to the Denver.

Well, I was gonna say the other part of that too is that the Denver airport was used as like tornado like hide here stuff.

That's generally pretty quick though. Those pass fast.

I don't know. I've only heard about tornadoes. I've never experienced one.

Yeah, they don't stick around. You're not, you're not in shelter for long.

Yeah, you don't, you don't stock up food for the tornado shelter.

I don't know these. I'm a west coast gal.

So if we made a consensus that we're going to the dia.

Yeah, no one's headed that way.

I'm falling.

I guess that'll be our good deed for the day.

High knees, Jake. Let's do this.

You.

Damn it.

Okay, here we go. Yeah. High knees, horse. High knees.

So Elliot is going to sit.

Oh, sorry. I've been trading that one.

What in the hell did you do to my horse?

I taught it high knees.

Elliot's gonna set the best pace for to get there and expecting to have to rest the horse for about a day before they can leave. So he's gonna be pretty fast. Okay.

We'll say if you're pushing, you know how to push safely. The cool thing is property lines kind of don't matter anymore.

Nope.

So you're able to pass the crows.

Line as the crows fly line it. So you're able to get there pretty, pretty briskly. We'll say it's. I don't know, you just passed lunch being served. So we'll say you get there at about 2, 3 in the afternoon. So somewhere around there. So as you're traveling you're definitely, you know, urban sprawl is a mother truck around here. Denver. They have no reason to need to grow up. There's no nothing causing a boundary of any real flavor.

A lot of suburbs that are the same house copy pasted over and over and over and over again.

You're definitely, you're definitely passing through a lot of those. And in the typical density for flavor. It's suburb farm for quite a while. Suburb farm for quite a while.

Probably catch the edge of Brighton. There might be a lot of people in Brighton.

There's a lot of shopping centers.

There's big shopping center there.

The most crow's flyingest way takes you through Frederick. Right next to Frederick. Basically right smack food right down into the Iowa.

We would dodge the shopping center if possible.

So let's say you cut south southwest around Brighton. There's a lot of waterway, weird shaped lake things reserve. Oh, there you go. So you would absolutely walk through that.

Oh, it's gonna be a little bit sad there. There is a. The Brighton feed store was known for a tremendous selection of really good tack.

Yeah.

And it's like ah, I wish I could stop.

You pass near the Adams county fairgrounds.

It's one of the best. It's the. It's the closest shopping center to where I grew up. So I was there a lot.

There you go.

Both in character and out of character. I know that area pretty well.

The one thing for the folks who aren't of the farmer flavor that you might notice is all the farms you've seen up until now are been square. There's a lot of circle farms out here where you see a post dead center with the pivot sprinklers. Yep, one of them. So there's a lot of circles. It's weird.

You're gonna find that's pretty common across Kansas too.

That is the whole plains.

Yes.

They make them look like crop circles.

Yes, actually.

But they're huge. They are literally crop circles.

The most efficient way to water.

Yes, it is. That's anywhere there's commercial fields. That's.

Yeah.

So like I said, it takes probably a good couple hours. You get. You get down because you cut south to get around Brighton. You're coming basically west into Dia, which is interestingly the way most people would access the ia. Anyway, coming in, you end up. Yep. You hop on the road and you are riding right on.

In my parents house.

So you end up on Pena Boulevard. And before you.

It's where all the signs are pointing to the airport. Like there's truly.

That's the way you are out in the middle of flipping nowhere. And you just see this massive compound. Laying before you is a very expansive building right at the front of which you see a large glass building in a vaguely winged shape. I believe it's supposed to loosely resemble a W due to it being the Westin Hotel, behind which you see a building with a unique room. It's very white circus tent ish. Which Emery being the resident expert, Mel's.

Probably been to the airport too, if she's flown to California at all.

Yep. And every time I see it I go, what the fuck is that about? Supposed to be snow kept. Is that what that's about? Yeah, I've often wondered.

That makes sense actually.

Actually, yeah.

I never really looked into it, but that makes sense.

Every time I see that I'm like. Like I don't get it.

Absolutely. It's supposed to resemble the white peaked caps of the rockets.

Oh.

Oh, that's cute.

Elliot doesn't know about this, but I do. It's the stupid demon horse out front.

Oh, Lucifer.

Yeah, you can't really see it that well anymore.

I guess the question is, is it still there or did the sculpture leave?

Right.

It became something. Now it's a problem.

So you guys would probably. Probably be. Instead of riding on the road, you'd probably be riding in the grass. I'd call it a median, but it's a really wide median. Yeah. So whatever you would call that thing.

A trench.

I don't know, kind of. I guess what you do come across is there's a. There's a large circle in the ground filled with gravel. There are two pretty good sized unks around rebar coming up out of the ground.

Is that supposed to be there?

Oh no.

I knew that. I knew this was a bad idea.

Do we see the plaque on the floor that says Lucifer?

We do see a plaque on the floor that says Lucifer.

If any statue was going to come to life and try to kill us.

Of course it was that one with the creepy demon eyes. And it's big blue.

God damn it.

Well, in addition to looking out for weird flags, watch out for a giant blue horse. What if there's a giant blue horse? We need to take cover immediately.

How do you not know about Blucifer? Everybody knows about Blucifer.

I drove here. Do you think James had the. Had the fundage to fly anywhere?

I don't know you in your life. Everybody's been in DIA once.

The blue horse notoriously killed its maker.

Two of them.

Two of them.

So this statue has already got confirmed kills.

Yes, yes, yes. And that was a spirit before it was alive.

That's a flexible.

It has glowing red eyes and is bright blue. And it's very large. So if you see it and it's anatomically correct, we are all going to run and hide.

Well, I was gonna say that'd be really cool to ride it until you mentioned that part. Now I don't want to write it anymore.

If anybody wishes you can make an investigation.

I remember a thing.

I'm do that too. I'm gonna look for help, but I'm gonna roll.

Yeah, no, it will not help.

Yeah. Passive nine.

There's no such thing as passive investigation.

Whatever. Seven. I thought that.

Yes.

Perception. Never mind. It's a seven. No, it's a six. I lied.

Fifteen.

I rolled a seven.

It's a six. Fifteen. Soon enough. You do see distinct monstrous hoof prints making their way pretty much due east out into the plains.

Well, at least it gets to frolic. Let's not mess with it.

Yeah, we're looking for a flying creature.

Yeah, we're looking for flying things. So unless the thing was a pigasy pig. A cease and desist looking for it.

That was bad.

Yeah.

Even. Even for.

I think we need to take his inspiration away.

The man who dominated it is taking it back.

Nope. Give me that Back.

I think I vaguely remember seeing. Reading something when I was waiting for plane. A whole thing that. Something random like that.

Why do you got to put that out there?

A lot of they had a running joke in their construction that it was with all these conspiracy theories. I don't know about any. You know, I never really looked into the lore of the airport.

Neither did I. But I was really bored.

I was. I don't even know if I've ever been that bored in my life.

But I've been on a boat. I've been that bored.

This is Colorado. I would not be surprised.

It was a red eye flight and I did not have wi fi.

Do we see as we're getting closer to the airport, do we see anything flying around? Any of the bird creature things?

You do not.

Did we see any nests like in our little snowcap mountain?

You can't see them. Great. From Lucifer. The. The Westin pretty well blocks your. It's a. It's a big ass. So you can't really see past the message.

Keep an eye out, keep moving. I think.

And as you approach, what you can see is the surrounding. You are just acres of abandoned parks. Acres of abandoned parks.

Honestly, it always looked like that though.

Yeah.

I mean, that's airport park.

And you covered it in tumble weeds a little bit.

Yeah.

You right along the west side of the Westin just to cut around the building. And what you do see immediately is that the airport clearly was not the place to be when the power went out. The back half of the building is blackened and charred. There are bits of helicopter and airplane strewn across the landscape. And there was very clearly a massive fire.

Yeah, I don't think anyone stayed here long.

Oh, I hope so.

Can I get a round of perceptions? That's not better, but all right. Sure.

Passive 1612.

Passive 10 passive 9 12.

Dope. That's episode.

Oh.

We'Re all so blind. The episode ended.

Didn't see that coming.

Theater of the mind is Jeremy Arston as Elliot Brandybane. That's the old guy. Amanda Arston as Mel Kelly. That's me. Michael Burnell as Ulma Barker Johnson. That's the wolf name. Michael downs as James O'Brien. He's our cook. Casey Weingarten as Emory Lee. She's the disco sorcerer and our conscience. And Mike Shock as your dungeon master. We release new episodes every Tuesday. So our next episode will release on February 2nd. If you want to follow us on our social media and our website can be found on our link tree which can be found in the Podcast description Also in the podcast description you can find a link to Pinecast, as well as our referral code to get you 40% off your first four months of paid membership, as well as our referral link to Academic Sound. Pretty sweet, right? That'll also get you a one week trial period with this excellent button. Music this week was sourced from Epidemic Sounds, who we are not sponsored by under the Creative Commons license. The songs used in order all Wait.

By Eric Feinberg, Aurora by Christopher Mote and Levson. Youth is Wasted on the Young, instrumental version by Tella Itch Haik, Homicide by Martin Moses and Burning Assets by Alec Slain.

The Theatre of the Mayan theme, Ad Break and Outro were written by Mike Shock. Very well. All people, places, events etc are used in a fictitious manner. Any similarities to people, places, etc are purely coincident. And myself? No, not myself. I was doing so well.

Also. Also, you said Michael Jones.

You did say Michael Jones.

Why is this so hard?

Oh, that's good.

I'm good with the intro though, right? I don't have to do that again. All right.