The Adventure Zone - The Adventure Zone: Amnesty - Episode 13

Episode Date: August 9, 2018

The holidays have descended upon Kepler, West Virginia. While the town prepares for its annual festivities, the Pine Guard prepares for the coming Abomination. Ned gets under the hood. Aubrey does some risky sleight of hand. Duck gets two fateful phone calls. (Thanks to Evan Palmer [@evantickles] for our new cover art!) Happy MaxFunDrive! Right now is the best time to start a membership to support your favorite shows. Learn more and join at https://maximumfun.org/jointaz

Winter has come to Kepler, West Virginia. It is late December, and the reliable crowd of out-of-state tourists has nestled into Kepler's hotels and resorts, seeking an authentic snow-bound holiday retreat. Twinkling lights cover the town's buildings and streetlights, and a freshly cut, garishly decorated tree stands in front of City Hall. It's nighttime, and not a creature stirs in Kepler's festive streets. But up the road, to the west, a van speeds down state route 66.

The vehicle emblazoned in the ancient logo of the Monongahela Forest Service is driven by one Rick Dannen, the agency's chief arborist. With his working day of tending to the forest's trees behind him, he has packed up his tools and left the forest to head home. But through his windshield, the winding highway begins to vanish before, for his eyes as a sudden furious snowstorm materializes in front of him. Thick white flakes whipped into a frenzy by a powerful wind blanket his vision in seconds. Panicked, he bears down on the brake pedal and wrestles with the steering wheel

attempting to maintain control of the vehicle and pull over to the side of the road. And then, as quickly as it appeared, the storm passes. The van's wipers kick on. revealing the road before him. Rick breathes a sigh of relief, then turns the wheel, pulling back onto the highway to continue his commute. The van pulls away down the winding highway. It passes out of view behind the mountainside.

Moments later, a crash echoes through the pines. Duck Newton is pulled from his slumber shortly before sunrise by the ringing of a telephone. On the other end is Ranger Juno Divine. She informs him that Rick Dannon died last night in a car accident on State Route 66. No foul play is suspected. But I guess any time you call Duck Newton, there's some foul play. Oh, that's pretty good.

See? Is it my time, Griffin? Is Justin finally coming into his own? Yeah, Justin. You're going through some wonderful changes. means of life. Okay. That was not my role. That was my get the command in there. But I need to do my, I need to have a vision. That is true. Why don't we roll 2D6 plus weird or I guess in your case minus weird. I love that you keep taking stat upgrades, but you've never upgraded your weird because

you're still so spooked out by all this shit. Here's the thing. The only thing it's good for is use magic and I don't have magic powers. So what's the point? Sure, sure. Not so I, so in fiction, I guess like, I woke up, they called me and said, Daanamo is dead. And I said, ah, shit, I'm going back to sleep. I have to have a vision about this. Hold on, let me do a prophecy about it. And I will be back on here around 8.30.

You guys, I had the strangest dream that I got a phone call that Daniel was dead. Go ahead and give me a 2D6 roll. Oh, my God. Justin. Oh, my God. Starting our three off with a fucking bed. It's a two, ladies and gentlemen. It's a two minus one.

It's a one. It's the worst possible vision that I could have. I mean, here's what I'm going to say, canonically, Griffin. I feel like with a role of this caliber, Duck will have something bad to him. I feel like he's also pissed himself. I think if he has a vision that is this bad, he has to have wet the bed. Oh, my God. Like maybe in the vision.

he has a vision about using the bathroom. Yeah. And in real life, he just lets go. No, this is going to be a bad vision. And it also means I get to take a hard move on you in the future, which last time was quite bad. So, yeah, I don't know exactly what I'm going to cash in that shit. But here is your vision. I think this is the dream you were having when you were awakened by the phone call for,

from Ranger Juno to Vine. And it came to you, like sort of all of your visions come to you. There's something about it. There's something about this thing that you can see in your dream that makes it different from sort of the other dreams that you have. There's something very, there's something very vivid about it, but there's something also kind of artistic, for lack of a better term, about it. There is something almost like you're looking at a painting or something like that. And the vision that you see is just stars. Not necessarily like you are, you know, laying on the ground and looking up and looking

at the stars, but it's just stars. And there's no moon above. You're just looking up into the stars, almost like you're in them. And you see this for like a long time. I think this is a long vision. For several minutes, you just see these stars. and then one of them appears to be getting larger, and it's kind of at the center of your view,

and it's getting larger and larger still, and then you realize that it's not a star at all. What is approaching you is a meteor, and it is coming at you faster and faster, and as it collides with whatever your point of view is, you wake up to the sound of a telephone ringing. It's about as bad as these visions get, I think. Yeah, it's like not great.

So it is December. We are about to start our third arc, our new hunt, our new monster, and I think just sort of like to set the scene and get some of that good character juice. I'm curious, like, what the holidays are like for each of you. Obviously, Aubrey, this is your first sort of holiday season in Kepler and you're living in Amnesty Lodge and you've been there for now for, you know, four months or so. So I think you're pretty well settled in there. But Ned and Duck, you've lived in Kepler for some time. And I'm just curious, like, what the holiday season is like for each of you? It's kind of weird for Ned.

Growing up, he was always very much big holiday guy. I love, you know, family get-togethers and, you know, all of the cousins and uncles and aunts and grandparents getting together and enjoying a meal. But, you know, the way his life has developed, you know, kind of a life on the shady side. He's kind of had to give that up. So holidays are not a big time for Ned. He wishes they were. But, you know, he's usually ends up watching the Macy's parade and, you know, eating a cup of gruel. Jesus Christ.

You know, sitting in a gruel. Why does he even find gruel? He makes it himself. He makes it an old sad recipe. Hot Pockets gruel. I don't know if you've seen those or not. They're really. nasty, but he just sits there in the dark with TV on watching Macy's and, you know,

hating on that Al Roker guy. Yeah, good. It's just, they're just not a lot of fun. Dig that beef deeper, dad. Go for it. Yeah. What about the, what about the kryptonomica? Is it, do you do anything special for your, for your local business in the holidays?

Well, you know, a feeble attempt to, to decorate, try to have, like, some special events. It's even sadder. sadder to put up with a few strands of lights. It does make it even sadder. And, you know, nobody comes, you know, Ned's trying. So most of Ned, he's decided he's going to have a, he's going to have a Christmas special on Saturday Night Dead. And so he's kind of, you know, concentrating his energies there so he didn't, you know, see how sad his familyless life is on the holidays. So he's going to, he's going to have a.

special couple of movies on the Saturday Night Dead and just kind of throwing himself like what movies Dan well there's that what's the one that MST 3K did about like Santa Claus versus the Martians would be a good choice. Maybe Jack Frost but the scary one the Michael Keaton one I don't remember being especially scared I mean I guess he dies and that that is inherently kind of scary but he does come back and learn like a very valuable lesson about you know family and neglect he's a ghost that haunts a snowman Griffin yeah no it's pretty spectacular duck what about out you? So Duck's sister, Jane, is not in town. He would usually spend the holidays with her,

but she's doing mission work in Honduras. So she is not here currently. So he kind of hung out with friends. He didn't feel too sad about it. It was never like a real big thing for his family. A lot of friends were in from out of town. He spent a lot of time doing, uh, doing like bar trivia and karaoke and just kind of hanging out with with pals that had come back into Kepler people he'd kind of lost touch with. But so, I mean, he didn't feel too bad for himself. Like I said, it's not normally a big deal. But with Jay not there, it wasn't really a chance to do like family kind of stuff. He just kind of paled around with folks.

But it was, you know, it was nice. It was good to see some of those. folks that he hadn't seen for so long. So, all right. And Aubrey, what about you? Well, Aubrey doesn't really do Christmas. Aubrey celebrates Yule or the winter solstice. That it started when she was kind of a teenager and it was like a rebellion against her parents

and like leaning into the magic persona. So I would not say that Aubrey identifies as Wiccan, but over time as she grew older, she actually did the research into it and found that it seemed to be a purer form of the things that we associate now with Christmas. Sure. And so it became more traditional in her mind and a lot more about like more of the spirit of it without all the stuff piled onto it. Okay.

That kind of thing and a lot less about, you know, family. And I think a lot of that now is because she does tend to be on her own a lot more. So she doesn't really have a lot of traditions that kind of date back to family times. Boy, we are a damaged bunch, aren't we? Yeah, no kidding. That's good stuff, though. And I think that's kind of the aesthetic of Amnesty Lodge, just a lot of sort of festive, warm, welcoming sort of wintertime decorations. And in fact, let's jump to that.

So it's a few days before Christmas, I want to say it's like the 21st or so. and in the afternoon, Mama has called you all into Amnesty Lodge to discuss your next hunt. Duck and Ned, as you arrive and Aubrey as you go to greet them, you all enter a very festive scene in the lobby. It's decorated with garlands and wreaths and the hearth is roaring in the center of the room, providing some much-needed warmth to combat the very cold weather outside. Jake and Danny are hanging up some more decorations here in the lobby area, and Moira is tinkling away at the piano, trying to figure out some holiday standards sort of by ear. They probably don't have those. I mean, they definitely don't have those in Sylvain, so she's trying to sort of master them on her own.

And Mama emerges from her office, and she's walking with a cane made of this dark sort of gnarled wood. It wouldn't surprise you if she made this cane herself from some stuff she gathered in the woods behind the lodge. And she gives you all sort of a faint smile as she sees you all. And she says, well, it looks like we got the band back together. How are y'all been? Good. You know, my sister Jane was doing missionary work in Honduras, and normally I would spend the holidays with her. But I had some friends come in from out of town.

Oh, that sounds nice. And I wanted to communicate this to anybody who might be listening somehow, and I thought this might be a more organic way of doing it. Yeah, sure. That's a strange way of just sort of conversing with another human being. I'm doing well. They have two-for-one a bogo sale down at the A&P on Gruel Hot Pockets. All right.

Aubrey looks out from a podcast, everybody. Aubrey looks up from her book and says, I celebrate and like, it's not really traditional so much as it's my tradition. And back to the book. All right. I feel like I knew all that about all y'all already somehow. I don't know if maybe it's because we knew each other for a while

and just I sort of bump on some sort of psychic link level with y'all. But thanks for coming. Well, we got to talk and I'm thinking we might want to have a change of venue thanks to the proximity of our special guest. And she sort of gestures towards the dining area where you all see Agent Stern. We haven't killed him yet? No. Man, we are slipping.

Yeah, it's a different age from the balance age where you all, maybe it's just because you can't find like a good cliffside to huck a body off of discreetly. But he's drinking some cider and he's going over a lamp lighter with like a red sharpie circling what you assume to be leads for her. for his own monster hunt. Oh, not just like corrections? He's probably doing a little bit of that also. It's sort of a one-man operation with Kirby leading up the publication, and so, you know, there's probably not much copy editing going on there. But she leads you all down into the cellar, which looks completely transformed from the

first time that you saw it, thanks to sort of your own modifications in Barclays' general cleanliness. And you catch him down here as you enter. he's sliding a tray of food under the net that is sort of covering the kitchen area where you see Thacker, who still looks unkempt and like vaguely inhuman, but he appears to be a lot more docile than he was just a, you know, last month. He doesn't seem to respond as the tray slides to his feet. He just kind of sits perfectly still in the center of the kitchen, just kind of clutching his knees and looking down. And after you all settle here in the secret HQ of the Pine Guard, Mama says.

All right, so a couple updates. First of all, Thacker hasn't really gotten any more lucid since I brought him back. So no real developments in the find what's bringing monsters to Kepler and stop it department. I don't really know if he knows anything that he didn't write down in his journals. But until he snaps out of it, we're just going to have. have to remain in the dark on that subject. Have y'all, y'all managed to get any leads on, you know, seeing where all this stuff's coming from?

I should have put some time into it, honestly, but I, uh, I was real busy with family over the holidays, so I didn't make much, uh... You literally just said you didn't have any family in town over holidays. Damn it! It's fine if you couldn't dig anything up, but you don't have got a lot of old mama, you know? Damn it! Damn it, duck You don't have to beat yourself up about it duck

I mean, Pobut, no Pobit is nerfic you gotta calm down, all right Damn it! All right, well, Duck's having an episode. I tried to lie, and it just don't, I just don't flow. I don't know how y'all do it. Oh, it's easy. I mean, Ned, I was trying to be kind. All right, well, it'll probably be a lot easier to investigate that stuff

when we, you know, actually have a monster on our hands. And that kind of brings us to our next subject. It's three days to the full moon, so we're in the window now. And I keep my ear to the ground when we're in the window, you know, looking out for police chatter, you know, freaky shit coming into St. Francis, social media. I'm all plugged into all my sites. What's your follow count?

Are you verified? I'm not. And I got about 31. Is that good or bad? How many do you follow? That's really, you have to do kind of, it's a ratio? Yeah, I follow about 300 or so. Ooh.

Ah, yeah, no, I know, I ain't gone viral yet, but they ain't seen, I ain't seen nothing on, you know, blue buzz or nothing like that. You were really popular on Vine until that shut down. I'm sorry about that, Mom. Yeah, it's a shame. Yeah, I did it a lot for the Vine, so I haven't, I haven't seen or heard nothing especially abominable yet. So, y'all, y'all got any ideas on? Y'all heard anything that might be kind of out of the ordinary? Is it safe to assume that like, well, you know what?

It's probably nothing. I don't know. It didn't seem particularly spooky to me when I heard about it. But a friend of mine, sort of friend, Rick Dannon, he died last night. There wasn't any foul play or anything suspected, which is not. that big of a surprise, I know, in this region. The thing that kind of tripped me out about it was that Rick and I used to work together, Rick Dan, and we called him the Danible.

We used to work together, and he's the one, when I was first coming up, he's the one who taught me to, like how to handle the vehicles and how to be safe in the snow and always put your chains on and everything. and it just, I don't know. If somebody was going to have that kind of accent wasn't like brought on by some junk driving idiot or something like that. It seems, I don't know, it's probably nothing. I don't know. I'm just kind of talking out my ass, but it's the only sort of thing that has stood out to me recently is like, I don't know, a little weird. Mama shrugs and she says, I mean, and right now, I think it's probably the best lead we got so far.

If we got a death that you think is even a little bit suspicious, I think we should probably check it out. You know, honestly, Mama, even if it isn't ghosts and goals or whatever, I would like to know what happened. Rick and I had a rough patch there at the end. And I don't know. I just like to know how it all shook out. I am sorry about your friend, Duck. And I think that's a good idea. I think that's probably our best lead we got right now.

So how about this? I'll keep pounding on the pavement and keep my ear to the ground and keep my eye on, you know. That's three metaphors you got any more? I'll keep sort of my head to the grinds, my nose to the grindstone. Ow. Maybe head on a swivel? I'll keep my head on a swivel. you know, keep my ear open for anything else I can hear that might sound kind of freaky.

But why don't the three of y'all go go check out the, yeah. Can I go to Sylvain? Yeah, I mean, if you won't too. I just, I, in that last thing, I accessed some new stuff and I've been reading these books trying to make sense of it. And I feel like I'm just reading like the same sentence over and over again. And there's the, you know, Minister of Magic over there. and I have so many questions.

Yeah, no, I think it'd be a good idea. I mean, you won't be able to go through the gate until tonight, but I think if you want to head over to Sylvain, you should. You're free to come and go as you want now. I don't need, like, a permission slip or anything? No, you just need to get the moonlight on the gate and head on over. Okay.

But for now, why not the three y'all and Barclay go check out the scene of the crash and see what you can find out, See if you see anything that looks particularly monstrous. Is it snowing, Griffin, in Kepler? I don't think it's snowing right now, but it's going to be pretty cold outside for a while. And so all the snow that has fallen is still kind of on the ground. Oh, so there's snow.

That's what I mean. There is snow. Yeah, I think public works, like, does its best to keep it off the roads and the highways. But I think, like, this is probably an area where snow tires are kind of a necessity. And yeah, there is snow. I got new chains on the Lincoln, my friends. Okay, Jacob Marley. Mom, I have a quick question, or a suggestion, maybe idea?

Barclay's great, but maybe we should take someone who also knows about, like, snow and, you know, kind of winter terrain and maybe see if Jake's free? I mean, we don't usually take Jake along on Pongar business, but if you think we need a snow expert, I guess so. I wouldn't send him into the mouth of a dangerous situation. I wouldn't send him into the lion's mob, but if y'all are just going to check out, you know, the scene of a crash, I guess you could take old Jake. You okay with that, Barclay?

And Barclay, like, nods. He's just been a little bit down. We had a run in with some neighborhood tufts, and they kind of gave him a hard time, and I think it really got to him. Yeah. I just want him to feel a little bit more part of our group, you know, Yeah, for sure. I think that's a sweet gesture. Why don't you'll take Jake Cool Ice down to the scene of the crash and I think he'll cheer him up to see a place where a man recently died.

I like your instincts there, Aubrey. I think that it'll be real good for him. It just sort of confront sort of the terminus of the mortal coil that we're all standing on and sort of realize that. Look at the way he leads his life. I mean, he's reckless and he doesn't care. He needs to have an approach. Appreciate him up death. Shake him up. I'm Jake Kulis and I'm an injured salesman. You know, death could come at any time. I had to confront that thanks to a dear friend that was trying to cheer me up once.

All right, so the three of you head back upstairs at Amnesty Lodge. I want this scene of, I think Jake Koolice is like walking to the door. He's just finished helping Danny decorate. And he's got his board and sort of his gear on. His goggles, his boards freshly waxed, and he sort of waves. He's like, oh, hey, guys, what's going on? You all look like you're in a hurry. Well, Jake, we have got a very important mission.

We're going to go investigate, and I don't think we can do it without a snow expert. I mean, I know a lot about snow, and he leans in close because Agent Stern's still kind of in the adjoining room, and he says, is this Pine Guard business? Yes, it is, Jake. yes it is you're getting a call man he looks fucking psyched he's like oh man i fucking yes i knew it i've told mama for such a long time like i've got i've got what it takes to to save the day what we're doing is there like a is there like a mummy or something you need to slow down rook we're just getting started this is the beginning but we'll see you know you keep your head on a swivel

your nose to the grindstone you keep your ear to the ground keep reaching for the stars you for the stars. And we'll see how it all plays out. He says, all right, let's go. And he sets his board down. And the four of you now head outside towards Ned's Lincoln. And as you step outside, it's the weirdest thing because you just sort of walked in the front door as you came back up from the cellar. And this wasn't there before, but now it is there.

There is sitting in front of the door a small card. and as you sort of approach it, you sort of survey the card. It is written on sort of a fancy white stationary with a lacy red trim pattern around its border. And at the bottom right corner of the card is a stamp in red ink. And that stamp has a design of a paw print inside of a thick red circle. And written on the card are three bullet point items that... Oh. Yes, if you remember, that's sort of how we're doing the economy in this game.

It was just such a threatening and scary way for it to pop up. Oh, was it? Yes. I would fight you were about to introduce a serial killer character to the show. The Red Paul. Written on the card are Heathcliff's bounties, which are a lawkeeper's symbol, a seer's spectacles. The first one's a badge.

A seer's spectacle. Glasses. glasses and a victorious seed some seaman from a really good sports guy get hunting gum shoes go get michael jordan's seaman michael secret stuff get michael secret stuff dad hey guys it's me michael jordan i just moved to town dad met joan hamith at san dieger so we got an end there if we want his champion seed Hey, everybody. This is Griffin McRoy, your dungeon master, your best friend, and your plumber. Where do you keep the shitter? I'm running out of those. Thanks for listening to The Adventure Zone.

Amnesty is the first episode of a new hunt, a new arc, a new chapter. I don't really know how to separate the stuff in Amnesty, but I hope that you're enjoying it. I hope you sort of enjoy the monster we got ready for you this time. I've got a couple Jumbotrons here. This one's for Sarah, 5'5-7, in 3 foot 11 and bucket huge and it's from jolline six foot five i'm not making this up uh joleen says to the other three folks of various sizes thanks hashtag bard times for empathizing with my feelings about dragons and very tall women making teafling and sarah playlists with me that's very good encouraging my consistently terrible seduction based ideas and being this plane's most fun outlet from my imagination. Your enthusiasm for reckless creativity inspires and alarms me. I love you.

Hell, friends, have dreams. It's a very good message. Sounds like a very good, I'm guessing, D&D party, although it could be some other role-playing thing, or this could be their real lives, in which case, that's pretty cool lives that you have. Got another Jumbotron here. This one's for Kindle, aka Daddneport, and it's from Josie, who says, surprise, Daddy, remember how you told me, it's hard for me to say that word unironically, which I think this is, but I can't be quite sure. Remember how you told me once that it's impossible to get a Taz Jumbotron? By now, you should really know better than to tell me when something can't be done. I'm either in Wyoming or Panama when you read this, but at least I know we're still doing the same

thing every other Thursday. I miss you and love you lots, love your kiddo Josie. It's a very sweet message that really does drive home just how valuable these Jumbotrons are. They are, they're worth their weight in gold, which is probably accurate because a podcast weighs nothing. I want to thank everybody who's been tweeting about the show using the Zonecast hashtag. If you do that, you might end up as a character on the show. Characters like Eugene, named for Eugene Archibald on Twitter. Thacker, name for Sam Thacker on Twitter.

Janelle, named for Cruzey Art on Twitter. A lot of characters there. So if you want to get your name on a character on this show, use the Zonecast hashtag when you tweet about the show. And we really appreciate us right in the word because that's how we have built up this audience that we have for this show. And we are just so appreciative of all the work y'all do to put it in front of other people. I also want to thank Max Fun for having us on the network. You can go to MaximumFun.org.

Check out all the great shows there, shows like Bubble and Story Break and the Beef and Dairy Network. And so many more at Maximumfund.org. So it is around sunset and the four of you, arrive at the scene of the crash on State Route 66, which is just sort of around this like sharp hairpin turn around a hillside. And about halfway through the turn, the guardrail has just been demolished. And next to it, you see a Forest Service van that has been hauled out of the woods sort of beyond the guardrail. The front of the car is just crumpled. There's bits of woodland debris that are sort of stuck to its grill and sort of in its shattered windshield.

There's no body that has long since sort of been carted away. Instead, there's just sort of the remainder of this crash. And parked just in front of the van is a Kepler Sheriff's Department vehicle with its lights flashing. And as you all sort of arrive without any troubles because of Ned's expert driving and good snow tires. I couldn't think of a great adjective there. Great chains. You all exit the Lincoln and the...

Before we do, I want to prepare Jake. Okay. Yeah, let's have that. Jake, have you had driver's head classes at your school? I didn't really go to school and we don't really have... I'm 43. Yeah, we don't have cars in Sylvain, so you recognize what like a wild... They show these films.

Yeah. In driver's ed class that I thought might prepare you for what you're about to experience. But never mind. Never mind. It'll be fine. Okay. Is there going to be a monster when we get there, though, or what's up? You never know.

That's why you got to keep your head on swivel, kid. He looks, now you've made him worried, and he continues to look worried as you arrive and get out of the vehicle. And as you do, the driver of this sheriff's department car steps out. Duck, you and Ned maybe, depending on, you've probably had run-ins. I think we've established you've had not necessarily criminal run-ins, but sort of distrust from the sheriff's department. You all recognize him as Deputy Dewey, Zeke's second in command. He's just this, like, tall, awkward, kind of young guy. and he's not especially well dressed for the cold.

I think he's just like wearing a short sleeve shirt and he does not look especially comfortable out here. And he approaches you as you all step out of the car and he says, Folks, I'm going to need y'all to keep moving down. Oh, shit. Duck, what's happening, man? Oh, shit. Why do I sound like this? Hey, Dewey, what's going on, man?

You know, just sort of camping out in front of the scene. Oh, damn! Oh, that's right. you knew Rick, didn't you? Oh, sorry. Oh, man, that's a bad beat. I'm sorry, dude. Yeah, it's all right, Dewe. Are you still doing that thing

where you pretend with all your friends to do, like, dungeon hunts and stuff like that? You throw tennis balls at each other? Oh, Larpin? Yeah, yeah, Larpin. That's shit. Yeah, we do a little, you know, creative anachronism here from time to time. Head down into the park when we

do, like, I do a woodland elf, his name's Zefzefius, and he is a warlock. So I do a little bit of that on the side of hand. You want to come do that with us sometime? Yeah. First, though, I love the sound of this Woodland elf character. Can you tell me 70 hours of stories about him and his friends and all their kind of adventures? I mean, maybe.

I got time. It's fun. All right. Well, are you trying to fucking make it so that balance? is a creation of Deputy Dewey's mindscape. No, I just want to try to please everybody. You know, some people prefer that, so I figure, here, you could have... There's a, there's a shocking amount of our listener base that, like, once there

to be ties between all of the different universes we make. I think, I think if this is the tie between, if Amnesty is just, if Balance is just the fever dream of Amnesty's new side character, Deputy Dewey, uh, that would maybe not be the most satisfying. There are connective ties that it is one coherent planer verse. Okay, no. It is. The painer verse.

I like planer verse, though. Dewey says, yeah, I mean, we can talk about that some other time when I'm off the clock, but I kind of do need y'all to, I mean, this is like, I don't know if it's a crime scene or what, but we're, you know, we got to investigate and look into it and wait for the tow truck to come and take the car away, take the impound. so we can take a look at it there. But, yeah. So it's nice to see all y'all. I'm going to head back in the car because I'm freezing my nards off. So do you all need anything, though?

Is there any trouble? Coffee? Are you saying you want coffee? Because I'm not equipped to give you coffee. I don't know about that. I mean, you asked, I'm going to try to think if there's anything useful. Hey, Dewey, let me just say, I'll just straight up ask you before I have to start spinning dice.

Dewey, anything seem, I don't know, off about this. You've seen some crash sites and stuff like that in your days. Anything seem weird? I'm trying to decide if, I think that you, I think that sort of just by your conversation, I think Dewey kind of knows you and he knows that like, this is your buddy who died. and so... Let me say this, though. I do think, though,

that you can make a rational argument, and I don't know why I'm trying to make it harder on myself. You could make an argument that, like, I think you can make the choice that if maybe you don't have a lot of authority, you're a cop in a small town, like, maybe you don't have a lot of power.

You might tend to get kind of territorial about other, like, branches of, you know, officials or however you want to put it. I think if this was Sheriff Zeke, I think that'd be true. I think Deputy Dew, I don't think you need to convince him

just to talk to him. I think if you want to actually like investigate the car and investigate where the car crashed and see what like visual clues you can find, you'll definitely have to. But I think this is just a role in investigative mystery talking to Dewey to ask him questions about what he knows. I think he'll just tell you. Okay. I will say that a lot of my, a lot of my investigative mystery, though, questions are specific to the creature, which he's not going to have any sort of insight into, yeah? Well, there is a what happened here. Maybe he can interpret the accident.

Yeah, I mean, I'll tell you this. Do he may not know much, but he may know one or two things. And if you ask the right questions, you'll get that information. If you ask the wrong questions, he won't. I want to grill him. Six plus two, eight. Okay, that's a mixed success. On a seven to nine, you hold one.

So you get to ask one question. What happened here? What sort of creature is it? What can it do? What can hurt it? Where did it go? What was it going to do? What is being concealed here?

This doesn't have to be the only investigative mystery. thing that you guys do here. In fact, I sort of envision you doing a few. Let me ask the broadest possible, and it seems obvious, but you've seen a lot of crash sites and stuff like that. What do you think really happened here? I'll tell you, just because, you know, it's your, as your friend, it might be hard to hear. Are you sure you want to know about this, duck? Yeah. All right. I mean, I took a look at sort of the tracks in the ground. Obviously we need to get a detective out here or something, at least the sheriff to come out and give me his opinion. But my opinion would happen.

He drove through the guardrail, went down the hill a bit, went into the trees, hit the trees at considerable speed. And that he probably died on impact. So I guess that's at least the one benefit to this. Didn't hurt much, I guess. Okay, but wait. What was the weather like when this happened? It was, you know, there's snow on the ground. The road was relatively clear.

There's a little bit of dusting on the ground. But, I mean, there seemed to be no issues with, I mean, it wasn't snow and in Kepler when it happened. So I don't really, I don't think weather had anything to do with it. It just doesn't make sense. As a weirdest thing, though, Duck, is there weren't any skid marks on the ground. There weren't any skid marks on the ground. There wasn't a second set of, you know, of tire tracks. So it's not like they had to dodge out of the way of something.

It wasn't like they slammed on the brakes to get out of the way of like a deer that was in the road. They just kind of just like, they just went. They just went through the guardrail. And that was, that was it. They went through the guardrail real fast and that was it. So it's hard for me to discern like a cause. And yeah, I don't know. Is the brake fluid intact and everything?

I mean, the car got pretty fucked up. But it's hard to tell about the brake fluid. Griffin, could I try. Right. So I wanted you read a bad situation, not because I want to read a bad situation, but because I want to use my third eye. Is that sense? Because it's like tied together. Sure. Yeah. I think you could still ask like a question here off the list. And yeah. Not great. What'd you get?

It's only a five, so I can't read shit. On a five, I make a hard move against you. I would say unless somebody wants to help out, but that would only give you a plus one and would open them up to sort of another bad thing that could happen. So you don't really notice anything, you don't really notice anything bad, Aubrey. You don't seem to notice anything sort of magical. You get the sense that you didn't, you weren't necessarily attuned, but you don't notice anything. Then instead I'll, I'll turn to my friend and rookie partner Jake Coolice. So what's the plan?

You need me to take the deputy out so y'all can get a look at the crash site? Not yet. Here's my question for you, Jake. You know this area, you know the weather, right? You know snow and the woods and stuff. Do you notice anything? Like, you know, trees, broken limbs, you know, anything like that.

There's something weird. and he points to the snow and he says, I know snow. I know what a nice sort of, a nice sort of coating of fresh powder looks like, right? Cakes down and it just forms sort of a solid surface. He points kind of down the hillside, not really where the car crash, but just off to the hillside. And you do see like just sort of this carpet of snow just everywhere. But it's not like, it's not flat. It's not perfectly flat.

It almost looks like pockmarked. It almost looks like there's just kind of like there's little very, very small divots that you definitely would not have noticed if Jake had not pointed them out to you. But there's something sort of peculiar. It's not just this perfect flat sheet of snow. There's there's there's there's there's pockmarks. So not like not like footsteps small. No, no, no, like way, way, way smaller than that.

Is it in any kind of trail? Nope. It's just kind of all over. I think that's it. Ned, you want to do anything? I have questions about the body. I have questions about what killed the d'animal, but I don't know if this is the place or, you know,

if Dewey would have any, if Dewey would have any inside. That seems like it would be a stretch for Dewey to, like, reveal the... Yeah. Well, Dewey did say he died from impact of the car crash. He did say that to duck. Yeah, I mean, he was probably, he probably saw the body. Right, okay. Ned's kind of a car guy, right?

Yeah. Have we established that? Yeah, for sure. Hey, Ned, take a look at this van. And I know it's a little bit fucked up, but do you see any reason that the brakes in this van would not have worked? As you all approach the van, Dewey kind of steps in front and he says, no, hold on, guys. That is a, we do need to still sort of do a proper investigation. Yeah. Dewey, do you like magic?

Hell yeah, like magic. Blaine fucking, uh, yeah. Yeah, he does the thing where he spits up, he barks up the frog. I see that makes her, you want to barf. Yeah, right. And like, would you like to see, I'm, I don't want to brag, but, uh, they're having this conversation. I'm, I'm going to, I'm in a, I'm going to need, I'm going to need operative role to,

to, to, um, probably manipulate someone. Yep. Uh, and that is the reason that you're doing, once you've given them a reason, the reason is, do you want to see some cool magic? Yeah. And, uh, what you want is to distract. them so that net you investigated. I rolled an 11 plus one.

Holy shit. Machia has some good fogger magic. So they will do it for the reason that you gave them. Oh, shit, yeah. Where are you, like, leading them to? I'm basically just like, you know, whatever keeps his back to the car. That's what we're doing. I also will say, how distracted is he?

Oh, I know what trick I'm going to do. I'm going to make his badge disappear because it's a lawkeeper symbol. Okay. Oh, shit, I love that. Oh, it's so good. Let's play that out. Okay, now, Dewey, I'm going to need something from you, something important. What on you right now is something that you would not only hate to lose, but maybe get in trouble?

Oh, my gun? Well, maybe not, Dewey. Maybe not a gun. Oh, yeah, no, you're right. I'm sorry, that was dumb. I can't get you my gun. Yeah. I don't know what kind of David Blaine trick you're going to do with my gun, but I got my, um, I got my, um, I got my,

my wallet, I got my keys, I got my badge, I got my phone. Let me, uh, let me see the badge. That should be just about the right size. He hands over. He says, all right, but be carefully. I'd say, I don't think I could get a replacement one and Zeke'll be piss as hell if I, if I lose that. Oh, I totally understand. I've never blown this trick before. So while this is happening, Ned's investigating the car, right? All right, yeah, we can jump over to that. Ned and Duck are over by the van. Okay, so Ned, Ned takes off his big puffy red yellow and blue vest. Okay.

And does an investigate check under the van? Yeah. Go ahead and investigate a mystery. I'm going to give you plus one forward because, like, you have this driver tag that hasn't especially come in handy ever. Okay. But you do have, like, car auto experience. All right. And plus, so I rolled a six plus the one would be seven, plus two for Sharp.

which I get to use here too. Brings you up to nine. Duck, if you want to help him out somehow, we can get that up to a 10. If you want to roll help out and explain how you are helping out. Or Aubrey, if you want to roll help out as sort of your distraction. But you all, I don't think we've ever done help out, but you can get this from a mixed success, from a complete success. If you can tell me how you are helping, Ned. Yeah, let me try, let me, do you only see if it works first before I waste the time telling him?

No, I mean, here's the thing. If you decide to help out and it doesn't work, then there is still a thing that happens. It's just probably not going to be great. Ned, you should know that Rick was a real safe driver and he would have taken really good care of his car. So I'll tell you what I'm thinking. I just don't believe that he would have done something this reckless. It just doesn't seem like him. All right, yeah, telling him a little bit about Rick, I think will help.

Go ahead and roll. I did. Plus cool for help out. A 10. Okay. On a 10, your help grants them plus one to their role. So that brings you up to a 10 on your investigative mystery. That allows you to, oh shit.

Cool. So hold two, Ned, and you get to ask two questions off the investigative mystery roll. Keeping in mind that, like, you're just looking at a car. And so there's a lot of stuff on here that's probably not going to be especially relevant. All right. Tell me, I'm, how do I word? I'm going to really check out. the brakes.

Okay. Check out the brake line and the pedal and every, just the whole brake system. The whole brake thing. Okay. So that would be like, God, it's like listening to car talk over here. Why don't we got into the pads? Check the pads. Are the pads all right?

I'm going to look at the brake gum and the sticky widgets. I think that would be what happened here. So, yeah, you check out the brake system. underneath the car and under the hood, there is, there's nothing wrong. The brake system is totally fine. There's the, you know, the brake line is working. There's brake fluid. Everything seems very well in just a good operating order, mechanically speaking.

You go and you check out the actual brake pedal, and the brake pedal is also fine. But while you're down there sort of looking around, and again, like the front of the car, is pretty pretty well, well crumpled up. And I think you probably even have kind of a hard time even getting into the driver's compartment to look at the pedals. You see something, I think even actually it's been moved over to the passenger side. There's some bottles of, like plastic bottles of like Gatorade. I think Rick was a big Gatorade fan. And so there's just a few bottles of Gatorade.

And there's one that looks peculiar that is, it's over in the past. passenger side floor and you pick it up. And it's been kind of, it's been kind of crushed. It's been crushed right like at the center of the bottle in like a very specific way, almost like it looks like it got stomped on. And as you are sort of looking at it and you look at the brake pedal, you kind of surmise that the indent of the crush of this bottle is the exact same height as the brake pedal. And so you figure out what happened here is this bottle got wedged under the brake pedal and probably kept Rick from being able to break. And so just this freak accident kept him from being able to break the car and sent him sent him to his demise. Wow. You have one more question.

That's some Colombo shit right there. Well, you rolled a 10. You got one more question. What about the grill? As long as I'm, you know, in full-blown Columbo mode, Let me check out the grill. Okay. I don't think there's, yeah, there's nothing really supernatural about the grill. There's nothing especially, like, weird. It just kind of looks like, and again, you're not like a forensic analyst, but it just kind of looks like this van hit a tree very hard and was,

got very messed up because of it. One thing, Duck, you are sort of there talking to, Ned. One thing I think you noticed through the window into the van, and I don't think this is like an investigative mystery because it's just very, very apparent. It is not something that you would have to, like, dig especially deep to realize. The van is empty. And he was an arborist, which meant, like, he was responsible for if there was something

like seriously wrong with a tree or some sort of rot that was, like, plaguing the trees in the Monongahela forest, he would have, like, a lot of tools that he would use to, you know, safely scale the trees and prune it. or, you know, help deal with it, there's nothing in the van. All of these, like, all of these supplies and all of these tools are gone. They are not in the van. Duck, my friend, I, I'm afraid that deep down body thirst cost your friend, Danymel, his life.

Looks like, looks like a bottle of Gatorade went behind the brake pedal. And so this really does look like an accident. And I think it also goes to prove that trying to stay in shape is bad for you. So the sour milk is claimed another victim. The sour sweat potion. I, Ned, I appreciate it. I really, we do need to talk about your still-held belief that Gatorade is part of a healthy lifestyle. But we'll get, I think there's time for that.

I appreciate you checking. anyway, you know, it's just, it's just a thought. It does look like an accident, though. Yep. Aubrey, let's finish your badge theft. If this is something you want to go through with, again, keep in mind, these are side missions that you don't have to do. It just helps you later on with your enchantment role, but...

I'm a fucking completionist. Yeah, I know. You want to 100% this. You want to get all the towers. I'm going to get all the feathers. I'm going to get all the flags. All right. So what's this trick look like?

Because I can't just let you say, like, I do a magic trick, and now I have his badge. Like, there has to be some sort of challenge to it. So I would say that there is a lot of, like, palming. But mostly it's like, oh, sorry, I thought it was here. Oh, is it there? You know, like, misdirect, like, his keys are now where his wallet was and his wallet is now where that was and that kind of thing. Okay. And there's just a lot of patter.

And I will say that since he has already introduced the fact that he is a David Blaine fan, I'm going to go for kind of a David Blaine-feeling reveal. You're going to eat the badge? No. I mean, that's what David would do, but okay. And, but more the reveal, well, the lie is something along the lines of, all right. And boom, there you go, Dewey. There, what goes?

Where is it? You're supposed to, like, teleport it into an orange or something. And I cut open the orange to have myself a little citrus snack and then, damn, there's my badge. Dewey, I guarantee you by the end of the day, you, your mind, it's going to be blown. What does that mean, though? Because I do, I do. David Blaine. No, I'm tantalized.

I just like, you've been blamed. I just freight your bean. No, totally. But by the end of the day, you're telling me that I'm going to find my badge again and Sheriff's each time. Well, I think you'll be very. surprised. Wink-wink. She says wink-wink, but she doesn't wink. Okay. All right, well... And, like, maybe there's a little, like, flash. But it's flash paper. This isn't, no, this isn't real magic. No, no, no. He says, all right, well, I'll keep an eye out. I guess I'll be in

Texas. Okay, all right. That actually hurts my eyes a little bit when you do it that close. Yeah, magic. Ooh. Dolly magic. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. Sure. All right. Why don't you all hit on back to town? I'm seriously going to get my car because I'm just so fucking cold. And as he sort of turns to walk back to the car, I think Ned and Duck, you all are already on your way back from the van. And he tips his cap. He says, all right, you all have a good day, Duck again. I'm real sorry. I hope this doesn't ruin your holidays, pal. Yeah, thanks. I appreciate it. And he gets in his car. Pst, Duck, I stole his badge? Am I going to get in trouble? Oh, man, I wish you had to. done that. It's for the, it's for, because on the card, you said it was a badge.

He's a nice guy. I don't know. I'll make it up to him. All right, but Zeke's going to have his ass. I don't know how we're going to fix that, but then I'll steal Zeke's badge and I'll give Zieg's badge to Dewey. Great. Yes. Oh, this web of lies. You all drive away from the scene of the crash and Dewe gets back in his car and sits there for a while. I think he looks around his car for a while, looking to see if maybe he teleported his badge somewhere in his car, but he doesn't find it, so he kind of sighs and smiles,

like, oh, no, where is it going to show up? And then we sort of, we see the crash from the woods, up the hill from above the crash. and there we see a figure on a snowmobile, and this figure is wearing a helmet, and was watching this scene intently as it played out, saw everything that happened, saw the Ned and Duck investigating this car crash that they probably shouldn't have seen, sees Aubrey stealing the badge of a sheriff's deputy, and as you all drive off in the Lincoln, they turn the snowmobile and drive off back into the woods. Is it one of them fucking hornets? Hard move. So, uh, night starts to sort of descend as you all drive back down state route 66 and

into town. Uh, you, you pass the turnoff into the kryptonomica and sort of drive into Kepler's riverside. Um, and those Christmas lights are sort of streaking by as you drive across the main drag toward the ascent, uh, back up to Amnesty Lodge on cliffside. and the temperature now that the sun is down, it has just plummeted. The streets are clear. Nobody really wants to be out when it's this cold.

And then a single flake falls on the windshield of your car. And then it is followed by a sudden, frenzied storm that starts to just completely cover your view. Outside, through the windows and the windshield, you can just barely see this storm being whipped about. These flakes are just being flung almost horizontally in the air. your direction. And through this, you all see a figure just for a moment on the side of the road. It is a humanoid figure wearing a brown robe that covers its entire imposing frame. And from a distance, you'd estimate it to be easily eight feet tall with broad shoulders and thick,

muscular arms. It's got these two large bags of some sort slung over its shoulders, and you can't see its face behind the hood of its robe, but it stops and it turns to face you as you pass, just as the storm outside finally and completely covers your view. And then Ned, the engine of the Lincoln sputters in this storm, and then it backfires a few times, and then it just dies, and your car rolls to a stop. And then, moments later, the storm just completely disappears. What do you do? Was it the crampus? I'm not going to tell you if it's the crampus or not. But it's, it's not, it's probably not the crampus. Okay. That's what the crampus would say. I would have to tell you, I would have to tell you if I was the crampus or else it's entrapment. Okay, thank her. I can tell you

who it was. It was Michael Jordan. How are you? Masturbate him. Jake Cool-Ase actually says, so you all saw that too, right? That had the two scary bags? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Did anybody notice if the bags were moving or not?

Because that would be so much more creepy. No, I didn't see anything like that. Ned is the car? Dunzo? I don't know. You know, a lot of this, me-knowing cars, is such hogwashed anyway. I mean, let me, I mean, it looks like it's full of gas.

I mean, the radiator thing has got radiator juice in it. God, where is the hood release? I can never find the hood release. Okay, Aubrey gets out. Okay. As you step outside, you see that indeed, just like, there is no storm. It is, it is just gone completely.

Ned's car has rolled to a stop in the middle of the street, sort of right in the heart of Riverside. You just passed City Hall and the massive Christmas tree out in front and the few municipal buildings surrounding it. And on the other side of sort of the main drag that you're on is a handful of like the town's staple businesses. There's like a winter sports supply store. Dave's Dehumidifier Depot is here.

Leo Turkijian's general store is here. The Pizza Hut is here with its like, it's got this like towering, illuminated sign, beckoning in drivers off the highway. and everything is just quiet. And so we don't see the figure now, right? It is gone. But you are fairly close by to where you just saw it.

Okay, well, I guess we go check out that area. You say we? Is it you and? Well, Duck, are you heading with her? Yeah. Yeah, I don't even think you need to investigate this because I don't think you necessarily need to... Again, I think it's...

When there are things that are just, like, obvious that you can just see with your eyes and don't require any sort of additional sort of investigation, you don't need to roll. You see tracks in the ground. You see hoof prints in the ground. I knew it. And as you're sort of standing there,

looking at these hoof prints that just kind of disappear from the place where they were standing where you saw this figure, there is a pay phone, not too far away from where you are, about 10 feet away, and it starts to ring. I look at Duck. Yeah.

You get it. You get it. Somebody get the phone! Okay, I get it. You pick up the phone, Aubrey, and a sort of pleasant, sort of lelting voice answers. And this voice says, Hello, Aubrey. Can I speak to Duck Newton, please?

Let me see if he's here. It's for you? Uh, go for duck. You take the phone and the voice says, Hello, Duck. In three minutes, your friend Leo Turkisian is going to die. He will be crushed to death, as will the two customers currently shopping in his store.

You might want to do something about that. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture. Artist-owned. Listener supported. Hi, I'm Allie Gertz. And I'm Julia Prescott, and we're everything's coming up Simpsons. We're a Simpsons podcast on the Maximum Fun Network, and we've got some exciting news.

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