Mayday Plays - Tales from the Loop, Ep. 3 - "Pants for a fridge box"

Episode Date: April 25, 2023

The swamp kids take some time to help around town while also figuring out how to hide MORF.

A totally two-wheeler morning to you all and welcome to Mayday's Bitesize Pinesize Tales from the Loop campaign. My name is Lev and I will be your babysitter for this game. As you can see, we've got some new faces and some old, although not so new to you if you have been following along on this little adventure, but we'll talk to them in just a moment. Right now, we're going to work our way through some announcements. If you've missed out on any chapter of Tales from the Loop, do not fear. You can still check us out on Spotify, Twitch, VOD and our YouTube channels as of right now.

If you're wondering how you can get more Mayday in your life, you can usually catch our streams here every other Saturday for our main show. We're taking a little bit of a breath between seasons right now, but I think you'll be happy with what we have coming next. You can follow us on all major platforms as well as Spotify and SoundCloud for podcast-friendly recordings of all our major shows and streams. And finally, you can donate to us on Patreon and join our Patreon Discord. The Discord is where we've had a really nice chance to build a great little family around

our content. We have patrons who have joined each other's games and played with some hosted by ourselves. We've struck up the doom to repeat. Deadpool once again, now that Season 3 has begun recording, and of course, we show off our little loves, be they pets, plants, or shiny little math rocks. In addition to all of that craziness, you get the opportunity to listen to exclusive Patreon content, behind-the-scenes information, and sometimes early access to content. We'd like to give a shout out to all of our handler-level Patreon contributors, just because

of their involvement that our content has been able to take some big-picture steps. So thank you to Ankh, Ozhipan, Bimblewort, CameronS, EricA, JonathanM, Ran, WTF, and AlexJohnson. We so appreciate your support. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts, and hopefully you continue to enjoy all of our chaos. Finally, finally, finally, we just want to give love to our last member, Vince, who is on a little made-a-hiatus, but only for a little bit longer.

We get him back so soon. If you haven't already heard, Vince is also working on creating some expansion material for the new Street Wolves Source Book by TableCat Games, which is out now, which is rad. So look out for Dead Hand when it inevitably hits the TTRPD community. Vince, we love you dearly. We can't wait to have you back at the table. And I think, actually, Eli has just told me that Vince will be back by the time this episode comes out.

So we'll go back, but not for us in this moment, but for future us in the moment you're currently viewing this. We have Vince back. So lucky us. We're missing you now and excited for you in the present. Time is a weird chat. Love you, Vince. As for any content warnings, before we get started today, I just wanted to say that Tales

from Loop is set in the 80s, but this community is pretty isolated, so it may not reflect the 80s that was in the real historical world or any historical world. This is an 80s that never was in a town that could have been, but trigger and content warnings still apply. So for this episode, mentions of hunting, people going missing, reptiles and amphibians including snakes, distant or negligent adult figures, and pretty minor injuries, usually associated with manual labor. Nothing going to be too gory, but there is always the potential of someone getting a

little bit hurt. Okay, I think that's all of my yammering. Let's introduce our players and their characters and then jump into the game. Thank you for watching. Players, please introduce yourselves, your pronouns, your characters, their pronouns, and what archetype you've taken. We'll start with Allison. Hi, I was ready this time.

Hi, I'm Allison or Insight Checked on the Internet. My pronouns are she, her, I will be playing Henry Biggs or HB or Hamburger Boy, all about aliases. He him and he is a jock. Excellent, Lex. Hi, I'm Lex, also known as TitanomicaRPG. I use they, them pronouns as does my character, Chaeyoung Kim. Oh, actually Chaeyoung uses they, she pronouns now.

And they are computer geek. Fantastic, Carrie. I am Carrie Smith, I am playing Peyton, the troublemaker, and we both use she, her pronouns. Perfect, Eli. Hi, I am Eli, I go to Eli on Twitter. I go by any and all pronouns. I am playing Radda that goes by they, she pronouns. And Zach.

Hello, my name is Zach. I go by Zach the drag everywhere it matters. I play Khadijah Mitchell and both of us have she, they pronouns. All right, we're going to have a little bit of a recap since it's been a bit for us. We left our swamp kids in the hideout of their, their creation. It is in the back room of Greta's grub, but before this, the group made their way up a mountain towards the little plateau of a swamp in search of foraging goods for Khadijah's family, as this is the beginning of the fall break where everyone in town is expected to

chip in, keep the town running through the winter, because things are kind of up in the air for you in a mountain town through the winter. So you all made your way up to the swamp and found some strange tracks in the mud. You followed those tracks up the hill and then into the trees, following broken branches up and up and up until you came across Meadow and a strange creature laughing in the middle of it. As you came upon the creature, you noticed that it was some kind of a robot, but not a robot you had seen before.

Robots in your town usually don't speak or have emotions or laugh. So this is a bit of a new revelation to you. You invited it back to your home, your hideout, as it were, with Khadijah calling a bit of a ruckus to distract the guards from the shed. All of this information was found after Peyton and Henry had a standoff with Dalton Concord, the son of the headguard at the shed, whose arm was broken as you found from school friends who were saying that his arm was snapped in half by something in the woods. Now if you think maybe you found the thing that snapped his arm.

But Khadijah managed to get the guards attention enough that the four of you were able to sneak Morph, as you've named them, into the hideout and you all decided to have a sleepover and that's where we're going to pick up the next morning. So the sun dawns. It's a little hard to see in here. There's only one window set pretty high up. It's one of those windows that has like chicken wire in it to prevent theft. But slowly the sun kind of peeks its way through and you all awaken.

A little confused and a little surprised that you're not in your home before the memories of the day before come flooding back and you see the large round form of Morph sitting in the corner. Arms still like long and out because they can't be retracted for some mechanical reason inside them. But legs just kind of propped under the torso ball to fit inside of the fort you guys have built. They've got Peyton's little Spider-Man in their arms and they're kind of jumping it back and forth and making them as close to thwip as a robot can get. I'm Spider-Man. I'm Spider-Man.

As quietly as they can because they know you're still asleep. But upon seeing who's likely the first to rise? Who's an early riser in this group? I think, yeah, yeah. So you're kind of the first one who hears this thwip, thwip, swinging, swinging. Morph, did you sleep? Do you sleep? Sometimes I sleep but not last night. Is it okay that you didn't sleep? Are you tired?

No, no. Okay, well, maybe we can find a way for you to have a Spider-Man moment today. I don't know where we're going but it seems like you like him a lot. He is Peyton's favorite. I see. Then I think she'll help us get to Spider-Man more than I can. I just know what I'm seeing right now. So that'll be good.

Thank you. You're welcome. How did we sleep? Did we cuddle piled, yes? I think that was the general consensus was you guys cuddle piled, yeah? Okay. I'm going to, this is the 80s, there's no googling. This is the 80s. Suppose I will just wonder.

I suppose I will just wonder. I need that, you all need to sell a poster of that in the shop, in the Mayday shop. I can imagine this old school white piece of paper with that red script of the old grocery stores. That's what I'm picturing in my head. I love that so much, actually. There's no Google. I want to start thinking about where Morph can be safe

and still have space to roam around. I want an enclosure but I don't know. Is there anything that I could, that I feel like Cadizia would know about? What's the name of the loop, I believe? But anything about where Morph came from and how to avoid his capture. Go ahead and roll me. You can roll me. Investigate.

Okay. Yeah, just roll me investigate. Okay. So again, through all the D6s in your pool, you just need one six to succeed. That is not a success. Not a success. You're kind of casting around in your head. You know there's a basement at the school, but the music teacher is like in half of that.

There's always the freezer at the school, but no, your grandfather is busy making that ready for the winter. Most everywhere in town that's already kind of spoken for is in use. Every space has a purpose as of right now. There's always exploring around town that you can try and find spots and checking in with people that you know if there's a way you can figure out to ask just, hey, is there an enclosure? No reason. So there are still options for things that you can find, but off the top of your head right now, you're a little like sleep groggy still. Nothing's really coming to you. Morph, do you know how to pretend to be something else?

Can you like ghillie suit yourself into like a suit that makes me look like a tree or like plants? Yes, can you look like a refrigerator or something like that? Just get real boxy and still. Their little feet kind of start to like half fold up in the opposite of a normal toe direction, kind of hyper extend backwards and fold against the body. It's not like it's folding into the body, but it's just kind of flat against it, so it's almost completely round. Their head can't get any smaller than it is. It's pretty much just like wobbling back and forth. The arms make this god-awful grinding.

Okay, that probably wakes a few of you up. Oh yeah, Henry's up at that, like a shot. He's like, oh, I'm here, coach. Hey, Henry. Hey, coach. Hey, Deej. Okay. I didn't mean to wake you up.

I was trying to finangle Morph into something else. My arms are... You don't have to do that to your arms. You just, you relax. They relax on their little arms, like slither along the ground a little bit. Yeah. Maybe we'll make them look like a bunch of cords or something. I don't know.

You have any ideas? A football? Football. And they kind of like swivel their head far to one side. So it's oblong in one direction, but not in the other. Okay, but that is pretty... That's most of the football until it gets to the other side. It's maybe not a football, but is there anything...

I don't know. Maybe we can wrap something around them on the bottom so it looks like a trash can. I don't want to put it in a trash can. And that feels like more damaging than good. Trash. I don't want to be trash. What about pants? Can we put pants on Morph?

And they can just walk around? Pants on Morph. That's a big pair of pants. Pants on Morph. Cheyenne wakes up chanting that. You just hear shush, shush, shush, shush. And Payton's in like a tangle of limbs right now, of her own limbs. Just still trying to sleep.

Morning. Yes, we should put pants on Morph. And then also, what are we talking about? Cheyenne. You're so smart, Henry says. Just like so impressed that Cheyenne is like already engaged in the conversation. He did not even know where he was when he woke up. I have no idea what's happening, but I did hear that we're putting pants on a robot.

So that's... Cheyenne doesn't need anything else except that. That's as much by it as you'll get from Cheyenne or me, honestly. How many pants? That's like a big pair of pants, right? I'm like sitting up, rubbing my face. Like who owns pants that big? They make really big pants for really big people.

Yeah, but who in town would have some? Maybe we could get them custom made. Or like get like a big piece of tarp. And ask someone to make pants out of it. Yeah, you can make custom pants? I was trying to figure out how to camouflage Morph. He's that smart. That makes sense why we're talking about that.

Yeah, sorry. I mean, yes, we pants, but this might be your bag more than anyone else's. But if there's some way we can make it look like another machine or maybe pants. Maybe pants will just do it. I was just already in for the pants thing. So I think we should just keep that on the table and then also figure out the camouflage thing. But maybe we could do... I think the forest is the best place because...

Or we should find like a cave or like make a little... We should make a tree house or something. We can make a tree house, right? It's not that hard. And we could hide Morph in there. And then we could also do this thing where we put pants on Morph. And also maybe a jacket, like a blazer. Maybe make a whole suit.

And then we put a bunch of like branches and stuff on it. Yeah, it's like when you have regular clothes and then you have church clothes. Like maybe the camouflage is like in an emergency. And then the pants are for out on the town. Are we going to want to have Morph outside in the winter though? Oh, true. That's right. That's why we wanted to bring Morph inside. Yeah.

I guess we could get a box and paint it like a refrigerator. You know what? We just put a box on him. We need a big box. And maybe there will be big pants and a big box. We're going to go around the clubhouse because like there's going to be a big box in here. We've got a big box. We'll go for a big box.

Roll me just like a straight up luck check. Evens. There's a box there. Odds. There isn't. So is that what? One D6? That's a D6.

Roll for big box. I got a two. You got a two. Recently Greta has taken a pretty big shipment of what look like buns, but it looks like she's just bought a bunch in bulk so that some can be frozen for the winter and put in the back. And the box is, if Morph doesn't have their legs out too far, the box might fit them. If we get some paint and paint a refrigerator on the front of this box, we could hide Morph

here. And then we could paint also the interior of a refrigerator on Morph's body. So that if someone opens the box, they look inside. It's just a bunch of fruit and yogurt and the other stuff that you put in the fridge. Yeah. Morph, do you have like a flashlight so that when the door opens, it like turns on? Do you have a flashlight? Flashlight.

Flashlight. Flashlight. Flashlight. Oh. And their eyes almost like high beams on a car immediately start just burning. And the light is painfully bright and is usually very dim, which I'm going to call it, a store room. Okay.

Good. Morph, good. Can you can you make like a refrigerator sound like a great, great. No one will want to open that refrigerator. No. That's perfect. We could put a fish inside Morph too. And then it'll smell.

Fish. I like fish. Would you like to eat one? I like fish. Oh, no, like for food. Oh, do you want to live? We can get you a live fish. What's inside of your chest look like we can like, can we do refrigerator shelves?

Can we do a fish tank? Can we do just paint the illusion of it? Yeah. That's what I'll say. But maybe. Do you think putting a fish in the dark in the center of a robot's chest is a good idea? I bet. Yeah.

I can tell me this one thing that could possibly be bad about what you just described. I don't know. I know they don't need to breathe, but I feel like what if it wants to see the sun? Morph has the sun in their head. At this point, their lights have kind of dimmed. They've dimmed their lights seeing your discomfort. I bet they could do. I bet they could grow plants in the tank and then they could slosh around.

That doesn't help us in any way, but I think it would be cool. It is cool. It is cool objectively. Okay. Okay. No, I think the fridge idea, the camouflage is a good idea. Morph, do you need to go for walks and stuff? Do we need to take you out like a dog, or can you sit in one place for a really long time

and it doesn't bother you at all? Do you get bored? Yes. I don't like sitting still. Oh, sort of the fridge idea is still good because then, oh my god, the prank calls we could do with Morph and a refrigerator painted like a refrigerator. It's your refrigerator running. Don't let me drop the street.

Well, we should prank our bully. He's got a broken arm and he's going to just be like, bro. Yes. Yes. He's going to look side-long at Peyton at the mention of Dalton and just say, I don't know if that's a good idea. It would be. It's like a fun joke, right?

Is it, is your refrigerator running? Classic. It's a good joke, but maybe not with those guys. They're kind of jerks. Yeah, they don't deserve good jokes. You're right. Maybe my mom will like it. I don't think she would find it very funny.

She does take her food very seriously. Do you think she would also take a robot very seriously? I don't know. Maybe. I think I mean, I vote that we don't find out. Okay. Okay. Okay.

I don't think she'd like it if we put food and wasted the food. That's for sure. I think she might get mad at Morph for like wasting the fish and the other stuff we put in there. True. We won't be doing food fish. We would maybe be getting alive fish from not here, from the river or the creek. She might like that.

Yeah. The fish in Morph is not for your mom, but it's also not for anything. So I guess it could be for your mom. Okay. Your birthday is coming up. So it's good to keep in mind. Okay. Let's write this down.

We should, I think, Deej should continue leading because as soon as I woke up, nothing happened. No. No. Okay. We reached some good points. I mean, camouflage needs to happen, but we're going to paint a box, look like a refrigerator, and we might put a fish in your chest more and we'll revisit that.

The pants come first though. I forgot about pants. Pants. Pants. But that can be part of camouflage. Yeah. I'm just laughing, thinking about if you, because like his robot legs under a refrigerator is pretty funny, but imagine a refrigerator with pants on running down the street, like

with slacks, pinstripe slacks under this refrigerator running down the street. That's funnier than robot legs. I don't know why. I think this is what we have to do today. You do know that there is like a, there's the town swap meet that sometimes has clothes, but usually that's for like bigger items. And then there's also the kind of like thrift store where people kind of cycle out their clothes between the town when you can't make it all the way to Whitefish.

So there is a chance that there may be pants in either one of those locations. Pants chance. There is a pants chance, depending on which direction you want to go. Oh, actually, I do have to dig holes for my parents. So we should all go do the stuff that we got to do. And then maybe we meet back here to do the, or maybe we should bid you the painting first just so that there's a semblance of a disguise. Yeah.

We should make the refrigerator for now. And I guess, I don't know, HB, are you going to be here today? I can be. I was going to help my mom with the orders. Okay. And then I guess you will have to watch more for the most part while the rest of us are working. All right.

Morph, you're going to be my study buddy today. Dirty buddy. It's everyone leaving. Are you all going away? A little bit. We have to work today. We'll be back. Yeah.

I'm going to be going and coming back a whole lot today because I have deliveries. So you'll see me sometimes. Okay. Good. At this moment, there is a knock on your, on your door. I got to grab the cardboard box and try to like throw it over. Once I got every blanket, every pillow, every sleeping bag, just lean up again. And Greta's voice kind of echoes through the metal door.

Kids, are you, uh, are you away? It's, it's, it's pretty close to the time to start. We're not awake. We're sleeping soundly. Oh, are these some sleep talkers I'm hearing? Darn. Well, I guess I'm just going to have to eat all this French toast by myself. I'm awake.

I'm awake. I'm awake. I'm awake now. You fling open the door. Greta's there. She's smiling. She's got a plate, uh, in one hand and you can see behind her that the phone is off the hook.

Um, French toast is ready for you all. I figured she's kind of looking past you at the, just like mound of blankets. Uh, not too closely, just kind of seeing what you guys were up to. Uh, I see that you guys are changing things in here. Very interesting. Maybe I can have a tour later for, for, unfortunately it's under renovations. So we, it's, it's a whole coding thing. Yeah.

It's not ready for civilian approval. The boys at city hall, you know, hard hat ready, you know, permit. I understand. Well, when the boys at city hall are done signing off, I would love to see what you're doing in my store room. We haven't touched anything valuable. Oh, I know. Yeah.

We've only been in the part that's our, our part. We didn't, we didn't touch anything important. I know. I, I was mostly playing with you kids. I took boxes. Nothing is in there. Just the empty ones to make it for it. Okay.

That's, that's fine. So if the boxes are missing, then you know that it's because we were using them. Thank you. I just kind of elbow to young. Just keep adding more layers of truth on top of the line. And then it's fine. We're going to forget. For some whole layers of truth.

I don't know what you kids are up to. I'm not trying to get into your business, but Deej, your mom is calling to see if you've, you finished all your foraging. She says, she knows she told you she wouldn't be worried until tomorrow afternoon. But she wanted to check in anyway. Okay. I'll call it. Well, if, if we're leaving, I'll just go see her.

She's on the phone. If you want to talk to her, huh? Oh, I should go. I'm going to go right now. The rest of you see that one of your, your, your usual table is already set out with a few plates of French toast. There's a little bit of bacon in the middle of the table too. And you can sit down to eat while Deej goes to check on the phone.

You pick up the phone your mom's on. She's kind of humming to herself as she does something that sounds like maybe sharpening one of the meat cleavers. Yeah. For the sake of audio, I won't, but Deej is definitely the person that like went on the phone with her mom, shouts the name mom as loud as possible. That just know that that happens. She's, she's waiting for it.

And you can hear her distant. Deej up. Before she pulls the phone back. I'm sorry. Hi. Hi. Did you find everything I was looking for? Yes.

Yes. We got everything. Great. And as she's saying, she turns to look at more. We got everything and more. What more do you need it now? It's about fun. Do you need the one I have now or?

I mean, I wouldn't say no to it, but also I know you're busy and getting some help around the house would be great because you know, tomorrow is the day we're going out on our big hunt. So it's your choice. You can go scavenge some more. You can come help me with sharpening of things. Okay. Let me make.

Also grandpa's else at school still. So if you want to go back to, or he's not, he didn't stay there overnight, obviously. But if you want to go help him try and figure out that damn freezer, you're more than welcome to. Okay. I'm going to make sure everyone gets out of here. All right. Which is, I think something that she's just heard her parents say it's just children leaving

a diner, but she's like, I'm going to make sure everyone gets home safe. And then I'm going to, uh, I'll probably check on grandpa sometime. Great. All right. Well, um, no need to use the BB gun. I'm presuming. Oh, no. And about that, we haven't even used it.

So there's, there's, if there's anything that is heard or witnessed or that you even heard, it is false and fiction. And that's for you to hold on to. That sounded incredibly honest. Thank you. My child. Of course. Yeah.

Just want to make sure you're up to date. Thank you for that. Very insightful. No. All right. Well, um, I will want those by tonight. So if you can come by tonight, great. I would love to kiss my child on the head.

Um, you know, but do what you need to do, I guess. Um, yes. Tonight for sure. Great. Um, okay. Well, listen to your gut, listen to your heart, listen to your ancestors, listen to your brain, you know all that. Yes.

Yes. And it's, it's not a comforting. Yes. It's a still thinking about that BB gun. Yes. Good. I love you so much. I will see you later.

Bye. Bye. You guys hang up. Hang up the phone. You go to have your, your breakfast with your friends. Um, is there anything you guys want to resolve as a conversation right now? Or shall we move on to things that are going on during the day? Great.

Um, so you have your breakfast, um, and you each have some kind of responsibility today. It's not going to be an all day kind of a thing. Adults understand you guys are still kids. Uh, and your help is important and necessary to keep the town running, but it's not a constant thing. So, uh, I guess we'll start with, um, I can, I can make this dice related. Who? Well, that die fell in the ground.

Uh, Rada, you all, uh, finish up your breakfast. You say a goodbyes. Um, and where are you working today around town? I think I'm going to the swap meet. Uh, I think I have a couple of hours. I have to sit at the stall and sell my parents's refurbished appliances. Absolutely. Uh, you kind of take off across town.

Uh, the swap meets in an old barn that's been repurposed. Uh, there's a new barn in town where all of like the livestock, uh, that's currently alive and in use in town stay, but the old barn, um, is still pretty close to the middle town. Uh, you make your way over there. The, the sign that says swap meet in yellow, uh, yellow paint on a purple background, um, is a little faded. No one's really retouched it in a couple years. Um, and there are people kind of milling about outside.

Outside there are large pieces of machinery, scrap metal, um, bicycles, old cars, just kind of an amalgam of things that didn't really either fit inside or didn't need to go inside. Um, and as you kind of peek your head inside, there are a few stalls of folks. Uh, there's one of some people with some clothes. The, I think one of the families in town has a member who works in whitefish. Um, so they, they go to the thrift shops in whitefish in the city about an hour and a half away and pick up just winter clothes for the town, uh, for people to use. There are books, there are toys, there are kitchen appliances, some folks bring in food.

Uh, it's really just like, you know, an opportunity for people to take and borrow and use whatever is needed. Uh, your family's stall is kind of near the back. Um, they have some appliances. They have a few things out front as well, um, that people know to go talk to, uh, your family about. Um, but when you get there, your mom has kind of posted up, her table is out front. She's got her legs crossed on it. She's got a book open on her lap. Um, it hasn't, it, people haven't been at the SWAT meet for more than maybe 30 minutes at this point in the day.

Uh, and she looks up as you come in. Hey kid. Hey, um, I'm here for my shift or to relieve you. Thank you very much. I need to, uh, what does your dad ask me to do? Frick. Uh, canned goods. Your dad wants me to pick up canned goods, that's right.

Um, alright, you're good here. He'll be here in four or five hours, probably. Sure. Alright. Uh, you know not to let anyone take anything without proper- No proper payment, yeah, I know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alright.

Uh, good luck kiddo. And she kind of like pats you on the head, like she doesn't really know how to do a parenting thing. Um, and close her book and kind of slinks out. Yeah. I like wait, and then, yeah, rather we'll just go and sit in the stall, kind of like tidy up things a little bit. And then just put it out there like journal and just start drawing because it's going to be a boring next couple of hours because no one really comes by. Um, but they're just skadoodling, drawing like maybe pictures of morph and stuff like that. Just trying to get a new, try to see what they could be like reconfigured wise if they were able to like shift them into something else.

Like how they could get away with making them sneaky, um, building the schematics and stuff for it. Amazing. Uh, so you're pretty deep in your, in your schematics when a shadow kind of falls across your table. It's not very bright in here. It's just those big like lantern like barn lights. Um, but someone is standing directly in the light and you look up. It's been probably three hours since anyone talked to you. Uh, but you see a young woman with kind of dirty blonde hair pulled back in a braid.

Um, she's probably in her early twenties, gray eyes. Um, and she's kind of just looking at the, um, the appliances that your family has set out. Um, and you recognize her, uh, from around town, this is Adelaide Drake. Um, the Drake family in this town are kind of, they're the town. Um, I don't want to say charity case because that sounds bad, but everyone works together to support the Drake's a little bit extra. Um, because 10 years ago their 12 year old was, uh, ostensibly abducted but went missing. Uh, and this is, this is his older sister Adelaide. Uh, you guys have seen Ashton Drake's missing poster on different parts of your town for as long as you can remember.

Peyton is probably the only one who even vaguely remembers when he met missing. Um, but, uh, yeah, this is, this is his sister. They, after, after Ashton went missing, the family kind of, you know, as a family is wants to do kind of found their own ways of coping. None of them particularly healthy. Uh, Adelaide, who was a couple years older than Ashton kind of had to raise herself. Um, and they all kind of have this almost like haunted, empty look as they wander around town. Uh, so Adelaide's half focusing on the objects that you have. Uh, her hair's, her hair's a little bit messy.

She's clearly been working since before the sun was up. Hey, how can, how can I help you today? Are you looking for something in particular? Um, yeah. Yes, um, sorry, I've been up for a while. Do you, do you have any toasters I think is what we need? Yeah, I think I have a couple toasters in the back of one second. Uh, and I'm going to go like rummage through the back and try to find that one toaster that I know my dad fixed.

Um, yeah, you have one, you have one that's completely fixed and works pretty well now. Uh, you have another kind of defunct one where the little plunger doesn't work, but all the like heating coils in it still function. Um, so you can bring up both of those. Yeah, I'll bring both of them up. And it's like, um, well, I think my dad like, um, okay, so we have this kind of one that doesn't work, but if you stick like a stick in it, it'll hold it in place. And that's like, I don't know what money is here.

Uh, you guys, uh, at the SWAT meet in particular, money is rarely changed. Money currency rarely changes hands. Sometimes it does if people don't have anything really to offer. It's more barter trade. Yeah, it's more of like a barter trade kind of a system at the SWAT meet at least. Well, okay. Well, okay. So like this one is like not the greatest one.

And then this is like the one my dad actually fixed. So depending on what you have, we can trade for either one of them, right? Um, she's looking down at the one that's a little busted. Do the, uh, do the heating coils still work in that one? Yeah, perfectly fine. You just got to put like a little stick in the plunger thing so that it can go. And then you also have to like watch it because if you don't watch it, then the heating coils just keep going.

So you got to know when to pull the stick out. Yeah, that's it. Small mechanical flaw. Um, I don't know. Let's probably give my dad a project. I'll take the busted one. Dad's always looking for something to do, I guess. Sure, sure, sure, sure.

I've got, uh, let's see. And she kind of pulls a bag over her shoulder and she pulls out, um, a couple of cans of like tuna and like one of salmon. She's got, um, some chamomile that looks like it's been in her bag for a little bit, a little bit dried, but not a little bit wilted, but not entirely dried. Um, she's got an extra notebook. She's got, um, is there anything that you would be looking for specifically,

Radha? Does she have pants? Um, she does not have pants. She, she's got like, like a tarp that looks like it's seen better days. Um, but that's just, that's like kind of wrapped around her pack. It's almost like a drying mechanism. Like to keep it dry if it starts raining kind of thing. Cause you, and you know that she works out, uh, in the barns usually,

uh, mucking stalls, feeding horses, uh, making sure that chicken eggs are gathered, all that good stuff. So two cans of food, uh, fish, a journal, um, some dried chamomile. Mm-hmm. Was that it? Uh, that's, that's all you can, that's all she kind of brings out right now. I'm sure you can ask her for something else and see if she has it. Um, I mean, my mom will definitely take the two cans out.

I think that'll be part, can part about it. Um, is the, how, uh, is the journal filled with anything? Uh, let me look. And she kind of pulls it open and there are a few pages that are, pages that are scribbled on. Um, make me a comprehend or investigate. I'll make an investigate. That's my big pool.

Wow. No successes. No successes. Wait, I can, um, you can use a luck or you can push in either direction. Uh, pushing, you'll likely get it. Yeah. They'll, they'll, they re-roll anything, anything that is in a six. Luck you can do without the threat of a condition.

Uh, pushing will probably give you a condition if you fail. I'm going to expend one of my luck since I saved the other one for a special day. Um, so that I can see what is in this book. Yeah, go ahead and roll again. Oh. All your dice that weren't sixes. Oh, two successes. Two successes.

Okay. Um, you can see that only like four or five of the pages are really written on. And there's a, there's a couple little drawings. Um, you can see that it is her brother's, uh, her brother's old notebook and she's flipping through the pages and her shoulders kind of tense up. Um, and she says, uh, yeah, yeah, it's, it's mostly empty. There's just these, um, these old notes. Can I, I can, I can take them out and you can.

Oh, no, no, no, no, no. I mean, that's fine. I just wanted to make sure how empty the book was. Um, cause my mom's not going to want like a full page, you know, um, um, um, um, um, they're, they're just like school notes from my, uh, from my brother weird. Um, I can, I can take them out there. No, no, it's, it's, it's fine. Um, you know what, I think all of this here is probably enough.

So yeah, we'll just take this, I'll like start like wrapping the cord around the toaster like and try to hand it out to them. Yeah. She, she takes it, uh, tucks it under her arm. Uh, thanks Rada. Of course. Um, if you, if you read any of those notes and you, um, I don't know. Don't tell my parents that his notes are in there if you can.

Okay. I'm sure they'll, uh, they don't want, they want to keep all this stuff and it's just, it's cluttering the house and it's getting to the point that it's not safe. And I, I could, I take little things where I can, but you, you get it, right? And she's, she's talking to you like you're an adult and like she's kind of confiding in you almost in a way that not a lot of adults really do with you. I, I think so, maybe. I mean, my parents like to hoard things all the time and stuff.

They have like things everywhere, you know, but they're kind of remaking into new stuff. So I guess I get it. Great. Uh, thanks kiddo. Thanks kiddo. And she flips you like a quarter too. Thanks. I was like a tip almost.

Um, and she kind of smiles tiredly and waves, uh, makes her way out of the SWAT meet. Um, yeah, your, your, your time continues. Is there anything you want to do? Yeah, I want to, I want to flip through those pages of whatever those notes were. Yeah. I want to turn the remaining of my time and see what's in there, what he, what he wrote if it's just school notes or if there's something interesting. Um, as you flip through these five pages of the life of Ashton Drake, um, he, he was

kind of a weirdo too. Kind of like you. He, uh, he liked drawing their little like doodles of different kinds of monsters. There's like a Sasquatch in one corner and like a lake monster in another. He was like definitely into like weird shit like cryptids. Um, there's also a little like Spider-Man drawn in the corner and like some little spider webs. Um, most of the notes are like, like half written school notes.

Like you can see that he's like the war of 1812 happened in 1812 for some reason. I don't, and like it's, it's like that classic kid. Like I don't really want to be taking notes on this, but I guess I have to, uh, not too careful notes. Um, interspersed are some kind of little gen, uh, journal entries, um, about like, let me see what I need to look at the dates. Um, December 7th, 1976. Um, and it says, it's something along the lines of like mom and dad were out late at work

tonight, Adelaide made grilled cheese and we watched, um, wait, or wait until dark. It scared me so I slept on her floor. Um, the idea of people breaking into my house is scarier than anything I can imagine. Like it's, it's pretty like, it's, it's little kid stuff. There's another entry from December 10th. Um, and it's, it's like, I think there was something outside my window last night. Maybe Bigfoot's coming to take me away, uh, to join his family. I haven't seen mom and dad in a couple days again.

This sucks. Um, and then the last one is from December 12th, 1976. Uh, and it just says, saw mom and dad today. I miss how it used to be. And that's it. And that's the last thing that's in the journal, in the journal. Hmm. We have known when he disappeared.

Uh, yeah, it was on, it was on most of the posters. Some of them are pretty, pretty faded by now. Um, I'm going to say you're 13 or 14, remind me. Uh, I'm 13. You're 13. Okay. I'm going to say, roll me a... I'm going to say a contact check to see if either someone told you about it or if you

remember seeing one of those posters before they got super faded. No successes. No successes. You can't remember. You know it was sometime in the mid-70s. You were really little. Uh, and you've only kind of, like, tangentially heard people talk about it. Uh, something that happened in town, but you can't remember exactly when it was.

Because maybe no one told you exactly when it was. Yeah. There are still posters around town. You're welcome to go and see if you can, like, find any of those. But as of this moment, you don't know. Okay. Um, if that's the case then, like, Grata is just going to, um, take, like, keep that in mind and maybe share it with everybody once we all reconvene that I got this book.

But, um, I'm just adding it now to my journal collection and trying to wrap out my shift here, um, going back to Morph's disguised designs and, like, trying to have, like, different options to see which one we are, which one, like, fits the best for Morph's aesthetic. Um, I want one that's an evening gown where Morph is in, like, this, like, hot pink, like, designer, like, off the shoulder, one big spike on the other, glimmering. Yes. Done.

You continue your drawings, some of them a little more outlandish than others. Um, only one other person comes by, they're looking for mixer inserts, uh, which you find pretty easily and you get, um, a couple D cell batteries. Nice. Um, a water, like, pure, like, a charcoal, that's what it is, some charcoal to, like, purify water. Um, and, uh, what's the, what's it called? Oh, my brain is shorting out.

Oh, a cassette tape of, um, the, the Beatles, like, the first Beatles album. Nice. Um, um, so your, your shift closes out pretty calmly. Unless there's anything else you want to do. No. Great. Then we're going to jump over to Peyton. Peyton, you finish up your, uh, your meal, your friends all scatter to their jobs.

You stay behind at Greta's Grub, um, and after probably 15, 20 minutes, are you back in the hideout or are you hanging out in the dining room area? Well, once everyone leaves, like, after all my friends are gone, I would like to head across the street. Great. You head across the street. Uh, what are, who, who, or what are you looking for? I am looking specifically for Axel.

You, uh, you check first at the, at the general store, you know, that sometimes they help stock there. Uh, they're not there right now. Um, but the owner of the general store, um, I think I said it was Peter's grandfather, uh, or maybe it was Brian's, one of them, one of the, one of the numskulls, uh, grandfather's tell you that Axel is working over at the greenhouse right now. Beautiful. I will head straight there.

Great. Uh, you head over to the greenhouse. Uh, greenhouse is a, is a loose term. It's a couple of sheds that have been extended and like the, the, the ceiling panels on all of them have been replaced with clear plexiglass. Some of the side panels have been replaced. Others are still wood. Um, there's a, um, robot sort of a construct pushing a, a till through one of the fields.

Um, so that the, the ground is tilled before it freezes. Uh, so that when spring comes, things will be a little bit easier to plant. Um, and a little further off, you can see another robot, uh, doing, doing the same in a further field. Uh, but it's, it, one of its arms is kind of hanging off weird. Uh, so the, the, the till isn't getting as deep as it needs to. Um, there's a, uh, four wheeler outside that is, that has maglev. So it, uh, it's, it's kind of hovering a little bit like someone just got off of it.

Uh, and a little trailer behind that has garden supplies. And in the greenhouse, usually meant four vegetables, you see, uh, two silhouettes. One of them is, uh, Paloma King who runs the greenhouse. And the other is, um, axel, red hair in a mullet, uh, pinched face. Uh, very much like the classic white kid in a small town, um, backwoods vibe. Uh, their mullet is kind of like falling across there. Like the front part of their mullet is falling across their eyes a little bit. Uh, and you see the symbols that they use in drumline are propped in the corner.

Will they see me approach? Um, there is a, uh, there's a portion of the, of the side of the greenhouse that is wood that you can probably creep up on the side of, but as soon as the, as soon as you get to the Plexiglas side, it's going to be pretty visible. You're going to be pretty visible. I think I want to do my best to like shield my actual face behind that piece of wood. And then I just want to say, Hey, Axel, come over here for a sec. Roll me a,

You can choose contact or charm. They're both the same. So great. That is, that's, uh, that's, that's no successes. Uh, you say, Hey, Axel, come over here for a second. It's loud enough for Axel here. You're not sure if they recognize your voice, uh, but they kind of like half look over their shoulder and go, hold on a second.

I'm fricking busy. Um, and you see that they've got kind of like a satchel over there, over their side and they're picking what looks like maybe cucumbers or zucchini. Um, and, uh, da, da, da, da. Paloma is right next to them. So it's, it's a little bit of, Oh, my boss is here. The person in charge of me is here. I don't want to like skip out on my job kind of vibe.

Cool. Cool. Cool. I weigh that for a minute and then I just would like to just walk up to Axel. I would like to take the two rotten snake eggs that I have in my pocket. And I would just like to break them on either side of his face, their face. Sorry. Incredible.

Um, their back is to the door as they're continuing. They've got this kind of simpering quality to them where like adults think they're very like put together and kind and all of this stuff. But like they're very, they're very much a teacher's pet kind of a kid. Um, so Paloma is kind of doting on them as you walk in. Um, I'm going to say you can roll, you can roll force or sneak, whether you're trying to, if you're trying to come up upon them stealthily, roll me sneak. If you're just bull charging in, roll force.

Um, I am going to do sneak. Great. That is eight dice. Come on. Yeah. Uh, that is one success. Can I push for absolutely. Yeah, you can.

You're more than welcome to push. Okay. So that is four successes. I'm going to hand this narration over to you, Carrie. You blew this out of the water. This wasn't a hard one, but you, you can, you can do pretty much whatever you want to axle within the realm of pot like child possibility. Uh, so you sneak in expertly.

Uh, the door closes behind you with an area creek and you know that you can, you can fucking get them. Awesome. So I know, you know, the adult is in here also. So I know I have to do this quickly and I know I have to get out as fast as I can. So I just come in, I have both of the rotten snake eggs in my hand. I just walk up right behind him or right behind them, slam the snake eggs on either side.

And as they're cracking, I say just quiet enough for them to hear me. I don't really want the adult to hear me too well, but I just say fuck with Rada again and I use something solid next time. And then I dart out of the door. In. Freaking incredible. You smash the eggs on the side of their head. Some sulfurous, horrific smell immediately engulfs most of their face.

And as they're screaming and retching and trying to wiggle around and see who the hell did that to them, uh, you turn and run. They hear your threat. And as they turn and swivel, a little bit of snake egg gets in their eye and they start screaming and Paloma barely pays attention to you. She glances up long enough to see that it's another kid and then immediately is on Axel trying to like wipe their eyes and take care of them as you make it out with no consequences to seemingly, uh, where, where would you like to go after this?

Yeah. And then I would like to go actually do my work for the day. Um, the only note is on the walk back. I am looking for small, like palm sized rocks for something solid just in case. Uh, yeah. Um, you find a few very easily. There's, there's a bunch of like potholes in town and rock, uh, star, what is it called dirt roads?

Uh, so they're, they're super easy to find. They're those little like kind of shiny ones that are a little bit crumbly, uh, but you stick them in your pocket. And as you get back to Greta's grub, you see inside having a meal at a table. One of the very few people sitting down to have a meal at a table are the two guards that Khadija, uh, let away last night. Um, having, it looks like some kind of egg sandwich on a bun. Um, and as you walk in there, they're kind of going over the events of last night about

Khadija and these damn kids, what are they doing? Don't they know there's, there's things out in the woods? Don't they know that they're in danger coming around here messing with us? And they're, they're just kind of bitching back and forth about the children of the town being, uh, rambunctious little fools. Um, but you do get the sense that they're, they're aware that something is out in the woods and that there was a purpose for them being in town. Uh, and one of them sees you, uh, and kind of nods.

Uh, he's a younger man, probably early twenties. Um, almost nondescript. Um, just like average height, average build, dark skin, short hair, nothing really to set him apart from anyone else. Um, and he gives you a nod. He goes, y'all be good. Sure. Not knowing that you're just kind of like knowing you're a teen in town.

Yeah. Yeah. I just slammed my skateboard down on the floor and go to look for orders. You skateboard through the dining room. He shakes his head. Uh, and Greta's got a couple orders for you. Um, she hands you one paper bag that she's written the name, um, uh, Gearheart on. So Lucinda Gearheart, the mayor.

Um, and then there's another one, um, that says Concord. Um, so there's one order going to the mayor and one order going to the Concord house. Uh, Greta says, okay, so the mayor is over at the, uh, the movie theater. Um, there were a couple holes in the roof, so she's helping with that. So take her this first because it's going to be harder to get her, uh, down off the roof otherwise. Um, and, uh, Mr. Concord, uh, you notice that none of the adults in town call Dalton's father by his first name, Jerry.

Uh, he is just Mr. Concord to everyone. Um, and she says Mr. Concord is, um, oh, I had it in my notes and then I moved my notes. Hold on. Mr. Concord is at the, um, at the jail cell right now. Um, one of the, one of the Mansfield's, one of the Mansfield's had a wild night. So, um, he's over there right now. Awesome. Is that it?

And I'm just scooping him up. Um, that's all for right now. Thank you so much, Kido. Yeah. Uh, are you good? Are you hungry? Do you need any snacks before you go? Any water?

Uh, yeah, I'll take a snack. Uh, okay, great. Um, she comes back with like a, like a pop tart in a, in this little silver foil package. Uh, and she kind of sticks it into the, um, the outside. Oh my God, the word, all words have left me apparently. Like the little pouch on the back. Like the water bottle compartment on your backpack. Yeah.

There it is. Um, and she kind of pats you on the head and sends you on your way. Uh, where do you want to go first? Uh, I will do as I'm told for once and I will go to the movie theater. Uh, the movie theater is a short skate away, uh, up on the roof. You see Mayor Lucinda Gearhart. She is a, um, stout, uh, black woman with an asymmetrical haircut. Um, she's pretty like loud and happy to be working on stuff with the rest of the town.

Uh, she's kind of throwing jokes back and forth with the head of carpentry, uh, the head of carpentry in town, Ezra, Ezrin, Ezrin King. Um, and they're kind of passing a hammer back and forth and like want to hold and like a board at the top and want to hold the board at the bottom and they'll pass the hammer back and forth as they nail it into place. Um, and she looks down and says, oh, little Peyton. Hello. Good morning.

Just hold up the back delivery. Oh, you beautiful child. Thank you so much. And she, she turns to Ezrin and goes, Ezrin, I'm so sorry. I have not eaten all day and I just, I need about five minutes and then I'll be back and Ezrin kind of laughs. And she goes, please, please feed yourself mayor. There is nothing that can't wait for a little bit longer, especially for you.

Um, she's well liked around town. Um, almost too well liked in a weird way. Um, but not in a, not, not, not in a terribly sinister way, just in a like, she can't be this nice kind of way. Um, she easily kind of climbs down the fire escape off the roof, jumps down next to you and says, oh, thank you. I have been dying for one of Greta's club sandwiches all day. I have been up since 4 a.m.

I've had three cups of coffee, kiddo, never start drinking coffee. It will be the only thing that gets you out of bed in the morning and that is dangerous. I just kind of hold out the bag. Uh, but then when she reaches for it, I just kind of do the thing where I'm just moving it out of her grasp as she's reaching. You, you stinker. And you, you move it around. It takes her a minute.

She's fast, but she's like a little bit like out of sync with time almost from all the coffee. Eventually she grabs it. She goes, do you go to school with my Colin? You go to school with my Colin. Of course you do Peyton. Yeah. And I'm like thinking.

You know Colin, he's like the most like head down. Don't pay attention to me. Wants nothing to do with anyone in town. Wants to just be left alone. They're, they're on like the, the, the two person tennis team. Like it's, they are not crazy about the attention. Um, but she goes, well, you know, he is working around the edges of the forest. Kind of taking down limbs.

So if you see him, you tell him that I said to go get some lunch right now. Okay. Okay. All right. You're older than him. You have authority. That's, I wish that was true sometimes, you know, they're doing a great job. They're doing such hard work, but bless them.

They forget to eat and, and she's like actively shoving like French fries in the side of her mouth as she continues to speak to you. All right. Well, I have some more deliveries to do. So enjoy your room. Be safe, sweetheart. Be safe. All right.

Bye-bye. And she's like getting louder. You're not going anywhere yet. And she's like, as you skate away, she shoves like a full bite in her mouth and goes, Ezra, have you eaten today? And then you kind of get out of your shop before she, uh, she can, uh, she can get the answer. You had, where do you head next?

Are you looking for Colin or are you going for Mr. Concord? Uh, which one is closer? And I will also add, is the swap meet close to this area as well? Um, so this, the, the, the, the movie theater is kind of at the edge of town. So you're probably closest to the forest right now. The SWAT meets kind of in the middle of town and the jail is on the other end of town. The single, the single jail cell is on the other end of town. Okay.

I think my plan is to start heading to at least finish this delivery. I want to stop at the SWAT meet first, finish the delivery for, uh, Concord and then head to the woods. Great. Um, you start going, uh, north on the main road, uh, and quickly find the SWAT meet. Um, what are you looking for? I'm looking for Radda. Uh, Radda is easy enough to find at their family stall.

Cool. Um, I just, I think you're just drawing and then you just see a package of Pop Tarts like set down on the tablet. Oh, like, oh, thank you. I like kind of like open it gingerly and then I'll all go and reach for Rugsby at the same time while that's going on. Cause Rugsby loves Pop Tarts. I don't put them on the stall stand.

Start handing in Pop Tarts as you're talking. Little Pop Tart crumbs going everywhere. Um, I also like take out, um, my, I have like a pocket of rocks. And I take one of them that just looks a little smoother and like shinier than the others. And I'd be like, and I found this and I thought it was cool. And I just set it on the tablet too. And you see me shove the other rocks back into my pocket. Um, yeah, Radda is like, like trying not to smile, but like we'll go and like grab the

rock and start like, yeah, this is a really nice rock. Where did you find this? I found it on the way back to the diner when I was looking for something solid. Do you know that like the erosion on this rock is caused from just constant like freezing and unfreezing of the, of the, of ice and stuff. And it rubs up against it and it makes it smooth. I did not know that, but I figured you would. Thanks.

I'm so fascinated by this rock. Um, how's deliveries going? It's fine. And I hold up the other bag that I have. I should probably go. I just wanted to stop by and say hi. Well, um, hi. I'll like, um, before, before they go, um, I think Radda will like quickly go through

one of their pages and then show them, um, one of their designs of like morph. But as they're like flipping through the pages, there's like a bunch of like scribbles of everybody, like HB, uh, Khadija and stuff like that. And also Peyton with, with Radda. Um, but then we'll show them like, look, I'm doing stuff up, uh, making morph designs. You should just pull it closer and like looking through these designs. I'm like, they're, they're also good. I think we should let morph pick though.

Maybe. Yeah. But I, yeah, just, but let me know if you like any one of them. Cool. Cool. Cool. Oh, we should find pants. Yeah.

I was hoping somebody would trade me something for pants today, but no, no luck. Um, but I might walk around the stalls really quick before I meet up with everybody later. So maybe I'll find pants. Um, yeah. Cool. Well, this is probably cold. I should get it to, to, uh, and I look concord. Good luck with that.

Thanks. I'll see you later. Yeah. Enjoy your pop parts. Thanks. And I like give, uh, give, uh, rugby a little scratch and then head out. You guys have your cute little exchange of friendship. Um, and you head up the high street back, uh, towards where the jail is.

Uh, the jail, as I've stated, is a single cell in, um, the most historic, the most historic building in town. Uh, it's, it is historic is their way of saying it's old as balls and crumbling around them. Uh, there are a few other like offices around, um, but you can see, uh, Mr. Concord is there as well as Morris Ellis, the head of the cops, um, of town. And they're kind of, uh, as you enter the door, they're gathered around the jail cell where a screaming Erica Mansfield, the owner of the SWAT meet, who has been ostensibly absent this morning, uh, from the SWAT meet is yelling at the top of her voice. And she's saying, I swear I saw it. Concord, you think I'd be in here?

You think I would let myself be in here if I were lying? I would just say no, I was lying so I could go the fuck home. And, uh, Mr. Concord kind of chuckles and sits back in his chair and like his son, he is massive and intimidating. He is intimidating in a way that Dalton doesn't know how to be yet, but you can tell he is learning at the knee of a master. Uh, and his, his sunglasses are pulled low on his nose and he's looking over them at Erica Mansfield. Uh, they're like a middle-aged kind of mousy woman with a big fucking voice. Um, she's, she's, she's one of those people that you see her in size and you're like, okay, you're, you're, you're nothing very like intimidating,

but when she opens her mouth it is the opposite. Um, and she's still just railing against Concord like, why are you keeping me in here? I've told you everything I know. I'm not drunk anymore. Let me go work. The entire point of this week is that we're getting the town ready and Concord is laughing to himself like, I'll let you go when you tell me everything you know. Um, and they hear the door kind of thud shut slowly and turn around. Uh, and Morris, who's an old forest ranger, uh, looks extremely uncomfortable.

Uh, but he says, oh, uh, hey there, Peyton. How's it going, kiddo? What's up? And I'm, I'm just kind of like kicking myself for letting the door close because I wanted to hear more of the conversation. So I'm just standing awkwardly. Uh, Mr. Concord, it ignores your what's up and instead focus zeros in on the back in your hand. Is that for me? Yeah.

Yes. Yeah. Great. Come on. Hand it over. Just walk over and slap it down on the desk. Yeah. Uh, he takes or you, you slap it on the desk and he kind of looks at you for not handing it into his outstretched hand.

And, uh, and you look up at, uh, at Erica and she's just dagger is glaring at, uh, Mr. Concord before turning to you and saying Peyton, uh, is the Swatman open today? With like controlled calm. Yeah, I just came from there. Great. My wife was able to get the keys. That's fantastic. Well, if you see Molly, let her know that I'm talking to Mr. Concord and that I'll be home as soon as I can be. Um, Molly was also not at the Swatmeat, you remember.

Uh, she's usually somewhere near the front and Molly has not been there. Yeah, I'll think for a moment. Uh, well, she wasn't there when I, when I just came from there and Molly wasn't there. So. Interesting. Thank you, kiddo. I'll talk to you later, I guess. And she, it is an obvious effort to keep her temper in check when talking to you.

Um, and Mr. Concord turns and goes, all right, that's enough. Get out of here. You don't need to be here anymore. We're in the middle of something. I thought these holes were supposed to be for 24 hours. Hadn't been 24 hours, has it? I don't know. Has it?

How's the sending of your business, young lady? Uh, you know, I mean, we're, we're all members of society, right? Absolutely. We all have a duty to protect each other and keep each other safe. That's why I'm here, to keep you safe. And we're very thankful for that. I know you are. Go on.

And he is, he is actively watching you to see you get out the door. I test my luck a little bit, but then eventually just turn and drag my feet out the door. He does not blink. He stares at you the entire time as you get out the door. And as, as you take a last look over your shoulder, he's got his heels propped up on Morris's desk, which is impeccably organized and is digging into this sloppy Joe that Gretta sent his way. It looks a little sloppier than most of her sloppy Joe's are.

May or may not have been intentional. As soon as the door closes, I'll just say asshole. Mr. Concord continues his conversation with Erica, though you can't hear it anymore. And you eventually get back on your board and head down toward the south of town, I'm assuming. Yeah. All right. You make it down to the south of town. It's pretty easy to see where they've been working.

Limbs have been lopped. Things are like brushes being cleared. Dead trees are being felled. And there's like the sound of a chainsaw somewhere kind of further off. But eventually you do see Colin. He's loading logs into a trailer to be stored for Firewood. And he has his little Walkman headphones on and seems to be just kind of zoned out. I think as I come up, I'm like, Colin, Colin.

And then I have to actually go up to Colin. I pull one, like, headphone off and say Colin. What? Geez. Hi. Hi. What's up? We're working.

What's up with you? What are you talking to me? Cool. Your mother instructed me to tell you to eat lunch. That's literally why I'm here. So I would like for you to do that, please. Really? She's like, you know?

Listen, I'm as happy about it as you are. Look, I don't like have a problem with you or whatever. I just couldn't come to myself. I mean, same. I think this is the first time we've ever talked to each other. Yeah. Thanks, I guess, for being my mom's message runner or whatever. Roll me a...

What do I want you? Whatever you want me to roll, it's going to be bad. I'm going to say I'm good at punching things. Great. That's actually not too bad. That is one success. Great. You can see that he is looking over his shoulder.

They're like... They don't like having their back to the woods, it seems like. And they're kind of always circling so at least they can look out of their periphery. Hey, you ever see anything? And I just nod to the woods. What? No. No, I mean...

Well... It's stupid. I thought I saw a monster like a week ago, whatever. Make fun of me all you want. I don't really care. No, I'm not going to make fun of you. What kind of monster? He's kind of like taken aback by the fact that you're not going to make fun of him.

Even being the mayor's kid, he doesn't keep him that safe. And they say, I don't know, it was big and it had some red light. It looked like glowing red eyes or something. It was like a week ago. And then Dalton got his arm fucking... My mom says not to say that. Then Dalton got his arm freaking snapped by a... Something, I don't know, whatever.

It doesn't matter. No, there's no monsters in here. It's not real. Monsters aren't real. Whatever. I mean, I don't think you should let people tell you you didn't see what you saw. First of all, if you saw something, you saw something, right? That doesn't...

It's kind of problematic. But probably nothing to be afraid of. Cool. Thanks. Anything with red eyes? Fuck you, dude. I'm trying to be nice. Yeah, I don't...

Whatever. Are you done? Are we done here? Yeah, I'm done. We're done, yeah. Great. Have fun with your lunch. Thanks.

And he heads off towards the home kitchen. Is there anything else that you would like to do around town, Peyton? I don't think so. I think just check in, see if there are any more deliveries and then just kind of wait for my friends to return. Yeah, you have a couple more deliveries. None of them are very strenuous or anything like that. We're going to continue with...

Henry. Henry, your friends have their breakfast. You guys all kind of have a nice little time together. And then everyone's kind of scattering off on jobs. You know that there are a few people around town who will need help with like construction stuff or lumbering like Colin is doing, but you're also free to stay and work with your mom at the shop. Yeah, I think Henry will kind of turn to talk to Peyton and see that she's already

on her first skateboarding exit and be like, all right, all right. Good luck, Peyton. He says like to the completely closed door and then quickly eyes the French toast that she left behind and like slides the plate over and eats some of the leftovers, clearing the table in a way that his mom had not intended. And then I think he would spend the first part of the day working in the kitchen with his mom, you know, in the sweaty heat of the burger production line or however he can kind of be hands on with the food.

And when he does so, he gets in like this Zen mode where he almost seems... I feel like in other aspects of his life, he seems a little not competent, but on the grill line, he just looks maybe like a little bit older than he is. Yeah, a confidence kind of takes over Henry as he flips burgers, drops fries into the deep fryer, mushes up some plants for plant burgers. He is in the zone. And before you know it, probably half an hour or an hour has passed and the door swings open and it's the two people who were watching Khadija.

And you see your mom goes out, seats them and lets you know their order. They both want breakfast sandwiches, some fried potatoes. One of them wants grits, which you've only made a handful of times, but you do... You make some pretty solid grits for having only made them a few times. And your mom is kind of elbow deep in soapy water washing a big pan out. When the food is done, she goes, oh honey, can you just take this over to those guys and they're the only ones that are in here, so you won't have to worry about it. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Sure thing, mom. He'll take off the white apron he had on and the spatula he was using to flip the burgers. He carefully wipes it off on the apron, almost like with a reverence of someone sheathing a sword. And then he'll drop it in his backpack that's leaning up against the counter. And he'll bring the order out to them kind of with the, I don't know, the poise of a regular server with the tray on the arm, but I don't know, he's just this muscular, awkward-looking kid. So he's kind of linebackering it over, just like, food, food for you, he says to the folks. The two dudes kind of look up from their conversation.

And as you walked up, they were kind of discussing something about a signal. And it sounds like one of them was going, the radar cut out. It's in the area, but that's not helpful when, and then you come up and they see you and they go, oh, great food. Thank you so much, kid. And you set the food down. The grits are one of the first things eaten. And they go, oh man, great job on these grits, kid. These are out of this world.

You got any more coffee back there? Oh yeah, we always have a pot on. Did you, who are you? Oh, my name's Castillo. The guy with the dark skin and short hair points to himself and he points across the table and goes, that's Everett. We work at the shed, but we thought we'd come down into town and give you fine folks a hand. A hand? You're eating our food.

That's not helping. I mean, I guess it is helping because you've paid my mom. Yeah. Never mind. We're going to be around town too. We've heard there's some, and he kind of gets this like smirk on his face because we've heard there are some monsters in your woods. No. No, the box is empty and there's nothing in the woods.

What box? Nothing. And it kind of leans forward and puts his elbows on the table. Kiddo, we're here to help, you know? This is our job to find things that are a little scary, but take care of them for you. What's in the box? I could take care of the box myself.

You don't have to do anything alone. I mean, the whole point of your town is a community living and they kind of give each other like a look that maybe Henry can entirely parse, but it's not a kind one, if you had to guess. Henry does the classic like brow furrow where he's trying to think of something like really hard and he turns around from them, doesn't move away, just turns around and says, What would Jae Young do? He turns back around. I need to go program this. I'm sorry, what? Your program in the box?

Yep. Well, you show us the box. No, no, it's not ready yet with the beta. I need you to roll a charm check for me, please. They are a little bit wary of this weird big kid who is, especially after their encounter with Khadija. One success. One success. They kind of look at each other again and chuckle.

All right, good. You program your box and when you're feeling up to it, you let us know. Let us see your programmed box. All right, I'll get that coffee. He walks away and he's just sweating profusely now, like little beads of sweat. And like his mullet is like flat against his neck and he's just like, oh, okay. I think that's good. Yep, mom, coffee.

She looks up. She's kind of drying the pan now. There should be some, the decaf's out right now, but the regular is right there. You know where it is, honey. Go on. I just wanted you to say something to me, mom. I got a little nervous out there. Oh, sweetheart.

There's nothing to be nervous about. Right. What's got you all, what's got you all in a tizzy, huh? Um, just, you know, some stuff with my friends and I don't want to mess it up. I want to be a team player. Oh, you're the best team player there is, sweet pea. What's, is everything okay? Is everyone safe?

Is there something going on you need to tell me about? Um, can I only answer one of your questions, mom? She's like in the midst of like a parent trying to understand how to support their kid. And it looks like she's going to say no answer all my questions. And then it looks like she's going to say yes, that's fine. And it waffles between the two for a while. And she finally says, as long as no one's hurt and that's what makes you most comfortable or and no one's in danger, you can answer just one of my questions.

Yes, that's fine, honey. Okay, then no, no one's unsafe. Great. All right. Go on and take their coffee out to them. Okay. And then mom, um, can I have a study break after this? A study break, sweetheart.

Oh, I'm so proud of you. You're taking your academics very seriously. Oh, honey. Oh, I know, I know you love working here, but I just want, I want you to have all the options out there. And you're an incredible sports player, but really without the grades, it's going to be kind of hard some in some circles. So yes, absolutely. I'm so proud of you. Please take any study breaks you need to.

I can handle this. Okay. Good. Good. Yeah. Thanks mom. I know it's important to you. So I'm trying with my grades and everything.

My little man. But I do really like the diner mom. I do. I know you do. I'm not, I'm not taking it away from you. It's just there's more out there, you know, there's more than just this town. What do you need more than this? He gestures around to all the food and just the sizzling noises and the grease splatters.

And he like kind of lovingly wipes it up with a finger. See, it's home. She looks at you with tears kind of gathering at the edges of her eyes and she just kind of touch cups your cheek. This is home. You're right. And she kind of pats your cheek and nudges you off towards the coffee and wipes your eyes a little bit.

Henry will fill up the cups and with a steady hand, he gives himself a pep talk. When wins go and he picks up the mugs and walks out into the diner area again. Yeah. They're there for you. They kind of ignore you now. They've they've made their assumptions about you and about who this kid is and now they're just kind of brushing you off like, yeah, yeah, thanks kid. And they go back to their conversation.

Yeah, they're still talking about some kind of radar and how it's not specific enough, but you're not really that tuned into their conversation. He'll make a note to discuss with the group later. I think he has a good memory, but not a good comprehension. So he generally will take things back to the group for discussion. Great. You drop off their coffees and I'm assuming head toward the hideout. Yeah.

Yeah, he'd like some study time with Morph. Great. You open the door. Morph is still kind of in their little blanket box pile that you all left them in. There's the little Spider-Man action figure. They've got a like a He-Man one and a She-Ra one all gathered together on the floor. And they're kind of just nudging them around like they're flying. And Spider-Man's is doing like wide arcs.

And She-Ra and He-Man are just kind of floating, kind of. It's very quiet in there and they're kind of humming to themselves as you come in. Henry will do the thing that he's seen adults do, where before he walks in the room he will say, like make a bunch of noise and kind of like hit the wall absently. Henry! Henry! Henry! Hello! Hey Morph! Close the door behind him making sure his mom's not around the corner anywhere and sit cross-legged in front of Morph. And he's like a big guy so it doesn't look like a very natural position.

Like he has to really position his legs to like get all the right stature. And then he kind of hunches forward so that he's right in front of Morph. Hey buddy, are you still okay to be my study buddy? Yes, I can't be a study buddy. Can we go outside soon though? I think so. I think we have to make you into a refrigerator first or something. Refrigerator. Yeah. I'm not the artist though, that's Rata so we'll have to wait for them to come back. Rata. Art.

Do you think they can teach me how to draw? Probably. Rata's really good. I think I like drawing. That's awesome. I'm not too good at it. I'm not too good at a lot of things. I could teach you how to throw. Ah, throw. Ah, throw. Yes, I would like to throw. Yeah, maybe we can all teach you something and then Morph you can be good at five different things. That is very kind. Thank you.

And their long arm kind of slithers along the ground and comes up to very carefully pick up the Shira figure and drops it in your lap. Would you like to play with me? Yeah, I do but Morph I told my mom I would study and what if she asked me something that I'm supposed to know that I didn't know before. I know all about playing. What do you want to know about? I might know things. He leans forward and kind of like looks at the eyes that Morph had shown light out of before and says very seriously. I actually want to know more about you Morph. You're the most interesting person, robot I've ever met and way cooler than anything they try to tell me in school.

Thank you. I'm cool. I'm cool. I am Morph. I had a name but I lost it. I don't know what it was. What more do you want to know? Do you like remember anyone else that was like nice to you Morph or were we the first people that were nice to you? Morph. Morph has not had many friends. Morph has not remembered many kindnesses. But, but I think I was loved at one point. Oh yeah?

Yeah. By who Morph? I don't know her name or its name or their name. I just remember it was nice. It was warm. There were lots. That's good Morph. I'm glad. I was a little worried about you. You know it's good to have a group. I mean you're part of our group now but swamp kid Morph. Swamp kid Morph. I mean maybe if you can be a fridge you can stay with us for a long time but I don't know Morph. I think there's people looking for you.

Yes. That seems likely. That's why you have to be a fridge before you can go outside. I don't want to be anything but me. I feel that my mom wants me to be a football star and I just want to be me and make burgers so maybe you don't have to be a fridge. Maybe you could be yourself and they won't notice. Yes. Yes. They won't notice. And you notice one of their big three pronged hands has come up to kind of cover the red light on their chest. And it's a little like the bits of their arm are like many jointed so it's kind of like curled in around itself until it covers the red light.

Make me a... Make me a comprehend check. Or yeah comprehend or investigate. Which we're using a lot. I'll go with investigate. That's one success. One success. As you're watching Morph and they're kind of like almost in a self soothing way rotating their body in a way.

It shifts once probably like not quite 180 degrees maybe like 120 degrees and then it stills and then it shifts again and it stills. The third time it shifts you notice a little plate on what's usually probably their back. Probably like four like a four by six index card would fit in it. And it looks a little bit like the the wear of the elements has scuffed away a lot of the information on it. But as you lean closer you can make out on the top the letters ASDR-012. And then beneath that are the numbers 280764-131276. And everything else on there is kind of scratched and faded. You can see like the logo of the loop and then underneath it the logo of the shed.

But bits of them have been like scraped through with what looks like rock or worn away by the elements as I said. There's a name underneath it but that is almost entirely faded. It starts with a D it's a doctor and then there's really like the doctor is the only part you can really make out and then everything else has kind of been faded. But then they kind of self-soothe shift again and their body turns and that's that's about all you can see on that little plate on them. I think Henry will make a note of that for the rest of the group to weigh in on and he'll say to Morph. Well, maybe be yourself and not notice was the wrong thing. Maybe we got to be ourselves and have people notice you know? Like I don't want you to have to hide your light Morph.

What does it do? It holds my pain. Yes. I don't think I know the word for it. Like a soul? My mom says everybody has one you just can't see it. Maybe that's what it looks like he says pointing at the red light. Are you a soul?

He kind of dings one little finger on it. Are you a soul? I think it's a soul Morph. People spend a lot of time thinking about these things. Do I have a soul? Yeah, it's right there. Who told you about it Morph? Why is it important?

The people at the place. They said it's important. They kept me inside. What did you say? Sorry. Oh, did they say why? No, no one explained things to me. No one wanted to explain to me. Why?

Well, you're really smart Morph. So if they explained it, you would understand it. Sometimes people tell me things and I don't know what it means. So maybe between the two of us, we can figure out what the soul is for. What is your soul for? What do you use your soul to do? Henry sits back and scratches his head and he seems way more relaxed than he did earlier where he was sweating about the agents.

He seems kind of like re-poised and the mullet has refreshed. And he runs his hand through his head and he's like, I use my soul to make friends. I was on a team and they had to be my friends, but not really, you know? And the Swamp Kids, they really like me. That's what I use my soul for. Oh, and to make hamburgers taste really good. My mom puts her heart and soul into every burger.

That sounds nice. I want the soul. You have one, Morph, it's right there. Oh yeah. He kind of like, not pokes it, but like puts his finger right in front of it like he's going to boop it. Henry has a soul. Morph has a soul. Mine must be really deep inside.

I don't know how it fits in me. Yours is pretty big. Oh, thanks, Morph. I do work out, so maybe my soul gets bigger too. You know what? I think if it's okay with the rest of the group, maybe we can all go on a walk or something later. I feel like you've been stuck in here all day, buddy.

Yes! Walk, please. Okay, I'll make sure it's okay with the rest of the group, and yeah, maybe we can fridge you up real good. Awesome. Oh, and we could put you on a dolly, and that way it makes sense that you're a fridge outside. I have so many ideas.

Oh, hold still, Morph. I'm going to take some measurements, and he like looks around for this measuring tape and starts to like take all of the numbers, and he's really bad at math, so it's pretty much a futile exercise, but he will hopefully have a piece of paper with a bunch of numbers on them for the rest of the group.

Absolutely. You take your measurements. Morph is not a good help at this. He does also not seem to understand math, so they'll snake one arm out all the way straight, and the other one they will leave kind of like curled up, and then they'll switch them. They get taller sometimes

and also shorter because they get excited. It's all very, it's all very the blind, leading the blind kind of situation here. So they, yeah, you guys spend your time taking measurements and kind of existing in the same space together. Is there anything else you want to do? I think if I could begin to construct some of the refrigerator so that when the rest of the group gets back,

there will be something physical there for them to assess. Go ahead and make me a tinkering roll, I think? Yeah, go ahead and make a tinkering roll, or? Sure. What if I don't? I think you can do a lead roll so that you have like pieces ready for your friends. If you want to have pieces ready for your friends, do lead, and if you want to actually start construction, do tinker.

No, I would love to have some little bits and pieces. Maybe like a long arm variation and a short arm variation. Fantastic. And if I could find like a frozen fish from the kitchen, I know there's a talk of fish. I'm still not sure what that was all about. Nope, none of that. Can I use my luck point?

Absolutely, you can. One success. One success. So when it comes to building a little camouflage for Morph, you have two dice to give to your friends. So mark it down in case it doesn't happen this session, but you'll have two dice to give to your friends who are building the actual suit. Yeah.

So you and Morph spend a wonderful little study break together in the back of Greta's grub. You check in with your mom every now and then you drop some fries in the fryer. She is very happy that you're talking about studying right now. So anytime you come back into the kitchen, she takes the help for maybe 10, 15 minutes and then kind of shoes you out and says, keep studying if you need to keep studying. By the time you get back, the guard agent folk have left

and it's pretty empty in there except for the role of Peyton's skateboard every now and then as she comes to get more deliveries. And with that, we're going to jump over to Khadija. Khadija, you have your breakfast. It's a great time with your friends. Where would you like to go now? I believe I would like to go to the school to check on grandpa. Great.

It's a pretty quick ride to the school. The front is locked up. You know, one of the side doors is left open so that people can come and go from the library, which doubles as the town's public library. And around the back by the cafeteria, the back door of the cafeteria is propped open. And you can hear a couple of older folks around town. Kind of that wheezy old people laugh that they have. And the first person you see is Victoria Moan,

who is this like tall, stout, older, kind of like Middle Eastern woman. She's got a headscarf on and she's got like a smattering of freckles across her face. She's probably in her like 50s or 60s and she's laughing at something your grandfathers just said. And looks like she's turning to retort in kind when she sees you rolling up. Khadija, hi honey. Oh, hi Miss Moan you said? Moan. Moan.

Miss Moan, nice to see you. Nice to see you. Oh, so again. I'm just dandy. Your grandfather here, he's causing all kinds of trouble in here. And from the depths you hear, I ain't the one causing trouble. And I said that's exactly what he says when he causes trouble. Are you helping him with, I believe, the phrasers today?

As much as he'll let me honey. He just, he's a stubborn old fucker, isn't he? Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, sweetheart. I forgot who I was talking to. Oh no, no, no. Honey, I'm so sorry. He's a stubborn old fool, isn't he?

Now, Khadija's never wanted to say fucker more in her life. No, no, it's fine. Yeah, he's something. What does it look like he's doing? Does it just seem like they're sitting and like talking shit? Or like is he like? It seems like they've been doing things previously, but it has kind of fallen by the wayside of talking shit.

There are pieces of like the freeze, the freezer. What is it right on that goes in freezers? Free on. Free on, that's it. The little free on dispenser, I don't know how freezers work, is kind of pulled out away from all the pipes that go into it, go around to keep it cold. And it looks like your grandfather is trying to like use an awl

to push holes into the aluminum and just like widen the holes so the free on can get around more easily. But the awl is kind of tucked in his back pocket and the free on holder is just kind of left on the ground. You assume that he's been telling some kind of tall tale and gesturing wildly, which doesn't lend itself to holding an awl or a free on dispenser. Not at all, not at all.

Okay, I think she's just, she just addresses them both from the entrance of the room and it's just, I just wanted to check on y'all. Have you guys seen or heard anything weird lately? Victory kind of sighs and settles back against one of the serving trays. And you can see off in the corner that Splatter, the lunch robot is powered down, kind of hanging loosely in the corner. And she says, well, not of late.

There was some kind of ruckus last night with some of the folks keeping guard. We've had too many of those dang, those shed people need to stay where they belong over, over in the shed. We don't need them around town. They're just causing trouble. I saw them chasing someone down in the middle of the night. Can you believe it? Did you?

Did you? Yes. What did you, what did you even, what did you see? I couldn't tell who it was. They were, they were fast little speeder though. And these, I mean, it's probably just you, you're a, you're a, you're a young person. You know how young people like to enjoy their time off of school. And she kind of looks at you for a second and goes, what were you doing last night actually?

Last night, I was actually, I was at a sleepover at the diner. Yeah. It was so fun. And additionally, and sort of without even needing to say it, there were several witnesses. So it's, it's a very good time. But I'll keep an eye out for that person. You said was running really fast. So fast.

Uh, well, that's the craziest thing I've seen lately. And your grandfather chimes in from the other room and he goes, well, I've seen another big foot and this is, this is a common, this is a common joke with him. Uh, he, he, almost every time he goes out hunting or is without someone in the family, he talks about seeing another big foot. Um, and he, uh, he just kind of looks at you with a twinkle in his eye and goes, yep, coming down from the mountain, eight feet tall, red glowing eyes. Swing in his arms like nothing you've ever seen before.

The laugh is, is funny, but also the pieces start to click about a morph and the laugh becomes a little hysterical. That's, that's crazy. You're crazy. I can't believe that. Child, do you see your first big foot? You'll never forget it. The Sasquatch are a kind noble people living in our forests and he goes off.

You've heard this so many times as a kid and as a kid, it was like very fun. And then as a teenager, I got a little old and now as you're kind of in this kind of weird state of flux with things out in the woods, it's, it may feel, you can tell me how it feels to you. It feels, it's so, I think it's infuriating because it's like she knows that her grandpa has no idea what's going on, but in the way that elders know exactly what's going on and all he needs is like one clue to put the whole thing together and it sucks. Just like literally cannot have any peace.

So she's just kind of frustrated and in awe of this confused man being brilliant still and lets him weave his tapestry while he's talking. Is there anything, do they have refrigerator boxes? Do you think? Ooh, very interesting. Roll me, roll me another lock check. Okay. Evens yes, odds no.

I rolled a five. You, as he's on his classic Sasquatch talk about how they are the protectors of our forest and all this kind of good stuff, you're looking around and it looks like the lunch lads and ladies have done a good job of breaking down their recycling and taking it over to whoever's going to use it. A lot of the folks in the greenhouse use big pieces of cardboard to like support the bottom of some of the planters. You know, there's a couple smaller boxes that it looks like they're using to store different

spices, but no refrigerator box to be seen unfortunately. Okay. Zalmar eventually kind of peters out on his talk when he notices that you're not paying attention and he's being heckled by victory. Oh, yeah, I'm going to, like I said, I just wanted to make sure that everything here was all right. If you do get any more, I don't know how close you are to being done. I don't really know what I'm looking at, but if you do get any more big boxes, don't give

them to anybody else. Just tell me. You add into that hideout of yours, kiddo. Yes. Renovations. I have plans. I love to hear about it. Well, when you get a chance, you show me that and I'll have some thoughts for some fortifications.

Good, good, good, good. Yes, yes. Weatherproof. We can always use it. It'd be great. I know your mind. I believe in it. I believe in you.

I'm so proud of you, kiddo. Did you find everything for your mom? I did. That's actually where I'm going next. That's my girl. All right. Go on. I'm sorry.

Not girl. That's my sweet grandchild. I love you so much. I'm very sorry. Thank you. I'm still working on it. You know how us old folks are. We can learn new tricks.

It just takes a hot minute. That's okay. That's it. And if it helps, I sort of like, I'm not bigfoot, but what's the difference? You know? Mm-hmm. I do understand that. And it kind of looks deep into your eyes and you feel very seen for a moment.

Good. Good. I hug him. Biggest hug I can give. You're getting so strong. My old bones. They can't take it. And then I hug victory and head out.

Oh, she, she pats the back of your head and kisses the top of your head and says, Now sweetheart, you be careful out there. They're Sasquatch about. Of course. Of course. More than one. From what I've heard. And you go on your merry way back home.

Is there anything you want to do through town as you go home or are you going straight home? I think I just want to go straight home because I don't know that the people I ran away from are in the diner. Great. So yeah, I'll just go home. Yeah. You head home.

Your mother isn't there this time, but your father is. And he's, you can see that there's like a role of like a, like a butcher, but you can call it. You know how. Butchered paper. It's not butchered paper. You know how chefs have like rolls of knives? Oh yeah.

Fancy knives. Yeah. He's got one of those out, but it's got a couple meat cleavers and like one like nice finesse knife and he's like polishing them down and like wiping the blades off and setting them in and kind of just like checking it out, taking it all in. And he's got a list next to him that he looks like he's making sure he has the proper tool for each cut of meat that needs to be harvested. Yes.

Yes. Good. He is up in the very small portion of the house that hides the much larger part of the house, essentially because your mother told him you were coming home. Yes. Yes. Good. I think she, there's like a section of the table that is very much like raw meat will

never go here. And that's important that they have that section. And she just starts like unpacking all of the stuff that her and her friends foraged. And I don't even think like they start a like workflow before they begin talking because that's, that's where they sort of meet in their relationship, meet in their relationship. He barely looks up from his, from his paper, not in a way that's dismissive, just in a way that like you have your things, he has his things. And he just kind of like knocks twice on the table to acknowledge you.

And you guys begin like setting up, you start, you know, stripping leaves off of things, a piece of cat tail to be used. And eventually he kind of speaks up in a low voice, good sleep over. Yeah. Yeah. That's great. We were sort of redesigned in the fort, it's becoming a project. It's a good time.

You told Grabs? Yeah. He's excited. He's very excited. Good. I got everything that Mom asked for, but I know we're getting a hunt together soon. Is there anything else you need me to do other than, you know, be here? Let me think.

Let me think. Run, run by Red Star and Home Kitchen and Gretas to see what all they're going to be needing. I know, I know vaguely what's up, but might as well get a full check, see what everyone's looking at right now. That's about it. You know how to prep all this and put it away, right? Yeah.

Yeah. I know you do. You're a good kid. If there's anything, if there's any, like, not necessarily, it can't be super big because I do get scared, but if there's a smaller chop that's just like really cool, like chopping the head off, I want to do that this time. Not too big, but yeah, like just like a, I've got a deer head in my hand, like that kind of thing.

You're going to get blood on you if you hold it over your head like that. Yeah. You okay with that? Yeah. All right. Make sure we'll save one for you. Good, good. Yeah.

Good. Oh, do you have a big box and also a bunch of, like, mechanical equipment maybe or like fixing equipment? I need a first aid kit before a robot. A first aid kit for a robot? Yeah. Because like I have a first aid kit for my friends, obviously, but like what if we find, what if we're by a robot and it doesn't, and then it gets hurt?

What do I do? I can't put a bandaid on metal, right? So just where do you, do we have that? I mean, we got a handful of tools. There's some pliers. There's a couple of wrenches. Nothing first aid kit like, but I suppose you could take some grease. Okay.

Don't, don't, don't deplete too much focusing on those rust buckets, but. No, it's. There's one you really need. I guess go ahead and take it. It's just for emergencies. It's not. Honestly, if I don't need it, I'll put it right back. One thing I do need that I probably won't give back.

You know what? Never mind. I'll be right back. I'm going to go to grandpa's bedroom. Yeah. You go to grandpa's bedroom. I'd like pants, please. Absolutely.

Grandpa, grandpa is not especially tall, but he's a little bit wide. Uh, and you pretty easily find some sweatpants of his. Uh, and he, and that you haven't seen him wear in, I don't know, a couple months. They're probably fine if he doesn't see him for a while more. Okay, good. She rolls them up so small into her ridiculously large backpack and like leaves like a cool rock they found on the desk because murder. Yes, of course.

Yeah. And goes back to the front room with her dad. Your dad again doesn't look up. Do I want to know what you're doing? No. All right. It's fine. It's fine.

Like if anything catches on fire, you'll know. That was a metaphor. That was a metaphor this time. And he kind of actually looks away from his work and raises an eyebrow at you. And then just kind of laughs and shakes his head. Worse than I was growing up. Good. Okay.

I think, I mean, I'll be back tonight. I need to check in with everybody again. But if anything, you know, if anything, shoot up a flare. I'll see it. It's fine now. Go on back to business. Good. Good.

And then I, while I'm making it seem like I'm going to leave, I'm going to surprise attack hug him from the back. He puts everything down and really like reaches around and gives you a firm hug. Okay, bye. All right, get out of here. Sprints away. Good. You head back towards town having put away all of the foraging you did.

And as you're on your way, we're going to make our way to the last of our swamp kids. Cheyong, how are you spending your few hours of work today around town? Cheyong is definitely not going to talk to their parents. They go home with Samus. Samus is running alongside them. They grab a shovel from the side of the house, head to the back and dig the holes that were the, the specifications and measurements were repeated so many times to them in previous interactions that it's, I know exactly how much, how big these holes need to be.

And then there's already like some of the like kimchi jars that have been packed. So the ones that are done, I grab and I put them in some of the holes and pack the, the dirt over them. And, you know, this is like the last time before the ground gets too hard to dig in it at all. So we, we set it in there, they ferment over the winter. And it's also like, it's a refrigeration in the ground. So we can, we like take, take from it throughout the, throughout the winter. And at the end, it gets really sour and makes soup out of it.

So yeah. And so I do all that kind of do like, if the, if the parents show up at some point, it's like, you go inside and pay your respects and then try to leave that conversation as quickly as possible. Yeah. Because it's going to be the same conversation you heard about the holes that you already, like they're done. They've been dug and you're going to hear it again for no reason.

So I just try to very slippery, do get everything done and do my part and try to head back to the hideout as, as quickly as I can. Yeah. You, you, you're digging for probably an hour before you hear your parents car kind of pull out of the driveway and they stop when they see you're on the side of the house and they kind of like wave absently and say something about going into work for a couple hours before they drive off. And kind of in your second hour of digging, you hear someone else digging maybe a house

or two away. And as you kind of peek over the fence, you see one of the other drumline kids, Yiminta Greenlee is digging in her backyard as well. Yiminta is tall, indigenous kid. I'm sorry, she's not tall. She is one of the shorter kids, but she's pretty like long in life for a short, for a short minute, round face, light brown skin, long black hair, up in a ponytail. Her, like she is deeply focused on the digging going on here, but at one point she kind of

looks up to brush hair out of her face and sees you. And unlike all of the other drumline kids, she kind of smiles when she sees you and like gives a little wave. Are you Korean too? What? No. Sorry. Why?

I know you're not. Yeah, you do. I was just digging a hole. My parents come and talk. Never mind. What's up? Are you digging for family or for fun? For family.

I don't know anyone who digs for fun. I've got a lot of statistics for fun and I point over my dinosaur who has been helping me dig and is continuing to dig holes that do not need to be dug in just not the right place at all. See? They're like, you know. Okay, that's a fair point. No, I'm digging for family.

We're trying to like install like a laundry line, I think, or something. I didn't, I wasn't paying attention. They just told me to dig a couple of post holes. So I'm digging some post holes. Yeah. My parents ask you to dig a hole. You don't. There's no reason to question that because at the end of the day, you're going to dig

that hole. There's no way around digging that hole. I swear. I've been able to get out of a lot of stuff in my life and I've never been able to get out of digging a hole. Adults will just not. They refuse to dig a hole so they make the kids do it. That's my theory.

Uh-huh. Well, I mean, your mom's like really good at making kimchi. So I guess that makes sense why she wants you to dig holes, right? Because it's like kept underground. Yeah. It's. Cool. It's fine.

It's better than like not than other stuff, I guess. What are you digging for? The post holes? You said that already. Yeah. Are you. Are you okay? And she kind of like props against her shovel.

You didn't come home last night. Um, what are you, my mom? What are you? My mom police? The mom police? No. Your bedroom. You a cop?

No, gross. Your bedroom faces towards my bedroom. Sometimes I look over and see you. Not because I'm looking. I just see you playing video games at night sometimes because there's not at all like the movies where you look across and see someone that's around your age and there's weird music playing that makes you feel things.

Anyway, yeah, video games. Do you feel things? Are you feeling things right now? And now she's put it back on you and it's like leaning in a little closer. Yeah, because I was digging a hole and if you don't have feelings after you dig a hole, are you alive? Is there a beating heart? If you've never had a breakdown after digging a hole, I pity the.

I wasn't talking about the whole digging feelings. I was talking about the feelings that you brought up when you were talking about. I was talking about seeing someone of a similar age in their window. I was talking about how you probably do that to feelings about neighbors. I mean, not all neighbors. Oh, yeah. Well, yeah, because like your bedroom only faces like my window,

which is like so not even a little bit romantic and cute. No, it just is the way the houses were built and the way our parents gave us our bedrooms. Yeah, no, for sure. I could do you want to help? I don't know if you need help digging a hole. I mean, I just did a bunch of them and they're really good. Are you done?

Yeah, pretty much, I guess. I don't know what Samus is doing most of the work anyway. If I combine all the holes that she's dug, it probably adds up to one of the holes I'm supposed to dig. And I could probably measure it and add it up and I could probably make that argument to my parents and then they would sigh and then go just sleep. Okay, then I love some help. Cool.

Cool. She kind of shows you which side to dig on and they kind of go on the other side and you guys are, you know, not that far apart digging in the same hole. And you kind of find a pattern of like she digs, you dig, they dig, you dig. And there's a kind of an awkward silence. You're like really good at digging. Have you been doing this long? You know, just been trained by the best who would be people in my family that

I've never talked to you about. So it's kind of a weird reference to me. It's just the thing that people say to me around me, like in movies and stuff. Yeah, you're really good at digging holes too, obviously. Thanks. And that is a cool thing to be good at because we're both good at it. So obviously it's a cool thing for us to be good at. Like forums from the snare.

So like, yeah. Yeah, no, I definitely have never thought about your forums before. Oh, really? Ever? Never? Never. Why would that? That would be such a weird part of the body to like think about, right?

Like, I mean, like there's nothing, nothing super duper attractive about forums of a snare drummer who digs holes before wintertime. You know what I mean? Yeah. Just a cool thing that exists in the world and is a type of person or a not a specific one that I'm talking about right now. And did you know Samus is a girl? I did know that.

You did tell me that the last time we talked. I remembered. Cool. Cool. Because like, yeah, that's a cool fact that for, for her girls to know, because we got to, you know, stick together. Yeah. Weird.

Don't say some weird girl power stuff that I don't know if I'm fully about. But yeah, no, I am going to finish out this hole. And you should like next time you see me play video games, you should just like knock on the door and like it, like my parents are always working. So it's fine. And like they don't, they don't care. Or maybe they do because they like, but they don't,

they're not around to enforce the law. It's not that whole judicial executive thing. Are you asking me to come play video games with you or not? Yes, please. I'll consider it. And she kind of flips her hair and gives you a last look and then goes inside. Tracking dirt surely into the house. And you were left standing in her backyard.

Just wait till she's inside and then like run over to Samus and then just like scream. And Samus takes off and does like one of those, just like a victory lap in the sky. And I think there's a freeze frame before it cuts back to the diner. Absolutely. You have your freeze frame moment and then a hard cut to you pushing through the door of Greta's grub with a smile on your face. Woo!

I just dug some holes. Anyway. From the back, you hear Greta go, well done, sweetheart. Do you need a snack? Uh, oh God. I like first, like being in my body again for the first, someone asking you about your body after like being really like excited,

like, you know, nervous or excited or something like, I don't know. I don't know. May probably. Okay. I think probably his answer. A couple of minutes later, there's like a grilled cheese. Oh, thank you.

And you are a saint. Saint Greta diner. Slowly over the day, the five of you are able to reconvene. Is there anything else anyone wants to do around town before we're reconvening? Any scenes you want to play out? Any places you want to investigate? We good? All right.

Uh, you all come back together eventually in the hideout. Morph has, um, kind of moved, moved, moved around enough that the blankets and things are falling. Uh, but you see that more of your action figures have joined them. Princess Leia and Han Solo are there. Uh, there's a Chewbacca. Um, and they're all kind of like laid out together. Uh, in a way that like the Chewbacca is on one end and all the other people are on the other end.

And there are some popsicle sticks around the Chewbacca. Um, but when you, as, as each of you enters Morph, Morph delightedly kind of squeals your name, um, and kind of waves a floppy little arm at you. Um, but yeah, you eventually all come back together and have your, your things to discuss. I have pants. Oh, we got pants. We got pants.

Today is a good day. We got pants. Morph, we got pants. You got pants. Pants. Morph. Morph. Morph pants.

And I put them on. Yeah, you better. Who holds them out for Morph? Uh, Morph, like a toddler, uh, tries to step into these pants and it takes longer than it should. Um, their, their little three pronged feet have to snap closed and then work their way slowly through the pant leg before opening up again and planting on the floor. They barely look like they have any balance to stay on one little leg for much longer than it takes. Spotting them. Yeah.

Oh, but eventually the pants do get on. They, you pull them up. Um, and they don't like, they sag a little bit. Um, even after you've tied them up because it's hard to keep things on a round thing. Um, but they look like they're, they're staying up. All right. Morph needs suspenders. Suspenders.

How did we not think of that? I had suspenders. I could have taken the suspenders. I will get you suspenders. I think Rad is going to go and put out all the designs they had spent all day working on in front of Morph. Oh my God. Yeah, it was kind of slow at the shop today, but I made this so that we can, we can make your disguise box, but you're the one who's got to pick which one we do. Oh.

Hmm. And Rad. Insane different designs. There's one actual fridge one and the rest is just imagination. Morph's head. The giraffe guy from One Piece Design. There's a rat design. Yeah, there's like a bunch of, there's a swamp kid edition, you know, it's like foliage and stuff.

Morph's head rotates forward and they give a good look at each design and their little eye lights go bigger and smaller and bigger and smaller and they move to the next one. And eventually with their, with their kind of extended arms, they point out three that they like. One of them is the evening gown with the long gloves. One of them is the closest to a person one with pants and a flannel. And the third is the foliage one with trees and plants and all that kind of stuff. I like these, but if you don't or want something else, I guess I can be persuaded. See what I love about these choices, Morph, is that there's like a casual everyday look, there's an evening look, and then there's like an outdoorsy look. And I think that like you've really, I think any of these are a fine choice.

Thank you. Henry's head pops up from behind the hideout blanket apparatus. And he holds up some cardboard pieces that he's been soldering all day, working on random pieces. And he's like, Oh, I think these can be incorporated. Maybe. I don't know. I just wanted to. Hey guys, well, hi waves with the pieces.

Oh, you almost got ash catch them there. I was like, oh, like, hi guys. So which one should we pick first then? Like, do you want fancy evening gown? Do you want flannel jacket? Or do you want to look like the tree? I want to be a tree. I want to go outside.

And we take a walk now. Please. Soon, soon. Let me, let me pay all of these trees so that we can put this box on you and then we can finally take our walk. We'll take our tree on a walk. Yeah, that makes sense. Okay, cool. I'm going to go over to Henry where they have gotten all the assemblage of different pieces.

And since they're all in like little pieces that we can make little leaves or like make it a little three dimensional. So I'm going to start arranging and making a ghillie suit out of cardboard. Cadizia has duct tape for days. And I'm just like, yeah. So you can paint it. I'm like duct tape paintbrush. Mad scientist concocting something. Henry's pieces are very modular.

It's like the Ikea of cardboard. So he just hands you all these random ones that can be twisted around. It's just like a hamburger. You guys, there's bread. There's lettuce. There's tomatoes. Peyton's just skating around. So it seems like she's helping, but there's really not a place for her right now.

So she's just adding to the chaos by skateboarding around everywhere. Morph is watching. All of this happened, but mostly their eyes are trained on Peyton going back and forth and doing like all these or like doing like the little step on the back turns. And is just watching you and all lifting their arms when they need to for the for everyone else to add on to their their form. Is there anything anyone wants to share with each other? Any information you found out that you want to share? Henry is always a font of things that he didn't understand that he heard during the day. So it's almost like a when Mr. Rogers comes in and sits down, there's like a ritual to it.

Like he does this like very definite like, all right, guys, here's what I heard today. Are you ready? Yes. Well, okay. Good. Yes. Okay. I heard that.

Well, first of all, Deej, I saw those people that chased you at the store at the diner. They ordered grits. That's weird. No one orders grits. Very notable, he says, and like almost a detective type of voice. Also, they talked about a radar that wasn't working. And they were kind of mean. Their names are Castillo and Everett, and they think I'm building a box.

I think it went okay. I'm so glad that word ended in the letter X. Because you said, they think I'm building a box. I thought we have something to do first, then pause the trees. Yeah, I think I annunciated enough. I think we all were talking about a box. I think so. Yeah, but they were here.

And also I saw that there's a card on the back of them or on a part of Morph. And there's a doctor name on there, but I couldn't read it. It was all scratched off in some numbers. And in all of his reams of random paper that he's been taking measurements on, he's highlighted the numbers that he read. But it's surrounded by all these other numbers. He made it really confusing for no reason at all. And so he's like, it's just these though, not the other ones,

not the ones that were right there, just these with circle. Okay, I think I see it. I mean, if Morph is something that was made somewhere, then that has to be something you can track, right? It's like a serial number. Is that something I can say? No, I think so. Yeah, like Cheerios.

Yeah. Yes. I learn a lot from those serial boxes, Deej. Yeah, I mean, there's so many. They should assign something to track them also, yes. Well, yeah, that's what I learned today. And he like going to sit back and cross his arms. And that concludes story time.

All right, thoughts. Well, I mean, the radar. I mean, is Morph a radar then? Is that what that is? Is that what they're looking for? Are you thinking that they're after Morph? I thought they were, I thought they were trying to find Morph, but they couldn't because their stuff is busted.

Okay, but I don't know. But they still know Morph is in the area. They're still here. So what we should do, Morph, do you, if it turns to winter, will you freeze? That was sort of an assumption we made. Like if we found you a cave and then like made it a really cool hideout with some leaves in it and you could go for walks

and you could put the disguise on and you could walk around a bunch of people will never even know that you're there, except that they'll think you're a walking tree, which is marginally less interesting than a robot. Anyway, could you be okay outside? Like we could just hide you away from these people until they forget about you? Question mark?

Morph says, I have been outside before, but I don't remember how cold it was. There was snow. Roll me a tinker check, Shea Young. Tinker, I got some in that. You want the extra dice on this? Oh yes, I have.

Add two dice to your pool. That'll be seven. Seven? Not successes, I was like. Total dice. That is four successes. As you're circling Morph, as the others are putting pieces on them,

you obviously take note of the glowing red something in the middle of their body. You kind of peek in through the little gaps where the arms come out and it looks like something hydraulic maybe in there, but it's probably stuck right now and you can even worm your little hand in there and start pulling out a couple of twigs

and leaves and things that are kind of blocking the hydraulic that doesn't look like it's completely ruined and you do the same thing on the other side. By your estimation and seeing everything that's in there, you think that Morph could survive the cold. You don't know how functional they would be, so how much mobility they would have,

but they could make it, their form would make it through the winter, just maybe not fully functional. Well, first I'm going to need some WD-40, some forceps, a scalpel, a machete, $500,000 of Coke. I got you. Tosses a Coke.

Thank you. I was just trying to put my hand in. I just grabbed a fan full of twigs. I'm like, there's shit in here. I just dropped on the ground. Your hands are small enough that you can reach in. Some things are a little more stuck, so you have to borrow DGIS pliers

and different pieces. Cheyong's probably the smallest of all of you, so she has the easiest time getting their hand in. But some of you can reach in with forceps and other tweezers like items that you have. Probably tongs in the middle of the night. Oh, sure, definitely. Yeah, forceps was not there.

A telescope, a microscope, a periscope. You guys have the necessary tools to clean it out. A gyroscope doesn't help you look at stuff. A gyroscope for sure. Once that's all cleaned out, though. As this is happening, I would just say, as all our heads are together, and we're all working on this in kind of close quarters,

Henry would just look up at everyone very seriously and say, be careful, you guys. Morphe and I found out this is their soul, so we have to be careful. What? Who told you? Wait, what? Souls are...

Cheyong's choosing their words very carefully right now. You know what? Maybe. Like, let me not... Maybe I don't... There's no reason to... I'm not going to die on this, though. Cheyong is not convinced that souls are real,

but that's not relevant right now. Okay, this is a really important part of their body. Could we put it into something else? The soul? I don't know. I just know that they have one, and that it's important, and that someone told them that it was important. Yeah, it's probably the source of their energy and life force.

What if it's whatever the radar is looking for? What if it's Mothman? Mothman! Immediately upon hearing the words Mothman, Morphe's head whips over. I love talking about Mothman. Yeah, the red eyes. Right?

You kind of like already could like do a casual cosplay of Mothman if you wanted. Yes! I would love to dress up as Mothman. Can we turn me into Mothman? Is that what the blazer is about? And the like pants? Is it like a casual Mothman? Mothman! I would have two little eyes and wings. I start doing math on a napkin.

Like, do you realize the kind of economic boost we could bring to this town if we said that there was, if we provided evidence that there was a Mothman in our little town? Mothman! And then we could really dress them up as a Mothman, and they could run down the street, and then we could also do a different one with the refrigerator bit, because I still think that's a really good idea, but maybe we could turn us into Point Pleasant,

but in the West or North. I mean, it all sounds good as long as the radar doesn't work, right? And each has a point. Maybe if we fix the soul, they'll be able to see his soul. Adults don't do the right thing in situations like that. I don't know. I don't know. You're right.

Okay, Morph, do you feel worse when this isn't at 100% and she refers to the soul? I... I think... I think I feel worse. I think my soul feels worse. But with you, I have my soul saved. Okay, then I think it might be worth fixing if you're not feeling good. If it'll help you feel better, that just means we got to be super on our game.

I need to get my machete back. And as you say, I need to get my machete back. There is a pounding on the door, not like that of Greta, not the gentle knocks of a mother coming to check on her child and their friends, but a forceful knock on the door. And that's where we're gonna end. Oh, no! No!

We actually did go long. What? I said, it's a cop. We all just keep role-playing. Lev's gonna feel too bad to leave. Nope. Look, we hit the boundary of time. I didn't think we were gonna hit.

We're new today. But yeah, that's where we'll pick up for our finale next week. Thank you so much for joining us for Tales from the Loop. I hope you've been enjoying it as much as we have been enjoying playing together. Let's go back through everyone. Shout-out projects you're working on, whatever you want to plug. Go ahead and hit that shit. Not shit, but like that good stuff.

Cary, go. Hi, I'm Cary of Crossroads Games. We may produce actual plays of all different genres and game systems. The end. Lex! Hi, I'm Lex, Titanomica RPG. I'm a game designer. You can make your own game with Caltrip Core in minutes before you go to sleep.

You can be a game designer before you go to sleep tonight. Everything you need is at titanrpg.com. Beautiful. Also, I'm Dashie Shijak on the Etherlog. If you want to go check out that actual play podcast, we've been having a blast with the new episodes, and I just say more wild stuff than I say here even, so go check it out. We love chaos.

Allison, what you got? I am Insight Checked, Variety Streamer and TTRPG content creator, doing a lot with actual play production, GM interviews, limited series stuff, and mashups like Crafting Needs RPGs. So yeah, check it out and come be nerdy. Yeah. Zach, Eli, anything we need to... Anything you're working on separately from Mayday or anything Mayday that I missed that we need to drop?

We feeling good. I was going to say I would redirect you right back to Crossroads. Yeah, yeah. Back to Crossroads. We've all been playing together lots of different ways. Yeah. Well, then that's it. Thank you for watching our penultimate episode of Tales from the Loop.

Next week, we're going to be finishing this out, so stay tuned for that chaos and take care of yourselves. Bye, friends.