The Adventure Zone - The Adventure Zone: Dust - Episode 1

Episode Date: March 1, 2018

The Graysons set out to solve a murder in the streets of Dry River before sunrise. Augustus pulls some spectral pranks. Errol follows his nose. Gandy meets Death. 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

Previously on the Adventure Zone. I'm playing a ghost, whose name is Augustus Parsons. My character is called Gandy Dancer. She's a wizard. His name is Errol Ryehaus. He is permanently half transformed between human and werewolf. We found Jeremiah Blackwale dead in the street. It has every sign of an attack by one of the furors, Dylan Mathis.

The three of you work for the Grayson agency. Abigail Mathis, Dylan's mother and owner of the silver mine south of town, Had hired Grayson's as Arbiters, but didn't state in the telegram what it is you'd be handling. When Connors first brought Dylan in, he wouldn't shut up about his innocence. Now he's keeping quiet. Abigail and Connors have agreed to bring y'all in on this to try to sort it out. It's midnight now. At 8 a.m., the whole town is going to be awake.

Once they find out what's happening, all hell is going to break loose. You have eight hours. Good luck. Here we are. Episode 1, A Fish. Um, wait, the, the arc is called fish, fish now? A fish. Welcome to the Adventure Zone, fish.

What's going on under? No, that'll be the sixth one, if I know my alphabet correctly. We are doing that, right? The next one is extravagance. So I was going to just jump straight into the story, but last night, as I was figuring stuff out, I came up with a mechanic that I really, really like that I'm going to share with y'all. because I set a kind of time limit on the story,

I was trying to figure out a good way to work that in to the game. So what it's going to be is I have mapped out a certain number of beats in each hour. So you can go to different locations, you know, so for example, during the hour of midnight, you could go to two or three locations. I love that.

Then the time will move forward. Now, the reason I think two, the two or three is, the other part of the mechanic is you have the option to either completely separate or go to places together. If you go to places together, you only have time to do two. But if you separate, you have time to do three beats. And the problem is, is that if you're by yourself, you're without the faction help and the skills of the other people, but you have time to do more investigating. And I'll miss you. It's funny that you came up with that independently. There's a, I think a Sherlock Holmes Powered by the Apocalypse game.

I've heard it a couple times on the Friends at the Table podcast that has basically this exact mechanic in it. And I always thought it was really neat. Excellent. Well, I'm a genius. Or a thief or an idea thief, a copyright thief. One of those two. No, I definitely did not steal the idea. Came to me last night in a dream.

And as he was listening to his favorite sleeping podcast, friends at the table, to add a little bit more kind of pressure to this Old West police procedural I have written, certain characters will be unavailable during certain times. Either they've gone to sleep or they are at work or whatever. And certain locations will be unavailable during certain times. So like if you don't go talk to somebody and say like midnight or one to three, You won't get a chance to talk to them after that. Killer.

Cool. So, everybody's asleep. Because it's midnight to eight. It's midnight. What are you all doing? That'll do it, folks. So we're going to start in the sheriff's office, and this does not count towards your time. We are probably going to only get to the midnight beats, I think, in this first episode,

because there will be a lot more to talk about here. Yeah. So, also, I should also say that in Urban Shadows, usually at the beginning of a session, the players will go around and say who they distrust what other player character they distrust the least, and there's a whole thing about setting up. But the master ceremonies has the option to skip that if you're starting in the middle of a chaotic situation where there's already a lot of information revealed. Yeah, let's do that. Yeah, I'm going to invoke that only because, like, we already have a lot

to figure out. I don't want to add more stuff to that and complicate it. I'm going to say I don't like Jeremy, the silent fifth member of the Adventure Zone podcast, who's playing the character of Purvis. Take that, Purvis. We'll know one trust Pervis. We'll take that Jeremy, you big donker. So, scene, smash cut. So you're in Sheriff Connor's office.

It doubles as the jailhouse. There are three cells across the backside of the building. in cell number one, which is to the far left as you're looking at them, you can see a shape that you know is Dylan Mathis curled up on a cot. Dylan is facing away from you, so it's hard for you to tell if he is sleeping or simply trying to stay as still and silent as possible, trying to keep himself out of the world. I should also say that you have been briefed by your agency before you came here. So there will be certain things that you already know about the inhabitants and the town. And there will be other things that you will have to search out and find out on your own. I assume you're going to tell us the first things when they are relevant.

Absolutely. And those will be the things that you know from like putting a name to a face or that kind of stuff. Like that I can tell you like who has the business interests and where things are in the town. But as far as like the interpersonal connections and who distrusts who and all. all the gossip, that's stuff you're going to have to figure out on your... Broadstrokes, it's been about three weeks since we recorded this setup episode. Remind me, the Mathis's run the copper mine. Yes, the Maffis are the lead fur family in town.

They run the silver mine. The Blackwells are the Thang leaders in town, and they run the copper mine. Sheriff Connors is the sheriff. His deputy is Deputy Rosa. And they kind of constitute the leadership of the fleshes. But the fleshes aren't as, I mean, if you think about the nature of a pack or a family, the fleshes aren't as like tightly knit as either the fangs or the first. Sure.

So when we start the scene, we actually kind of start in media res, as they say. And Connors has been explaining to you that they found Jeremiah Blackwell's body in the center of town at the intersection. that's like the main part of town and over him covered in blood was Dylan Mathis. So they took Dylan in under the cover of night. There was only a few witnesses and Conners was able,

Connors and Rosa were able to talk to people and kind of keep it quiet, but they know that once the sun's up and everybody's up and getting ready to go to work, they're not going to be able to keep this quiet and it's going to be out of their hands. so they've been able to brief you a little bit about who was there and we can get into that when you're exploring your options of where to go next

but when the scene starts Rosa is kind of nervously looking out the front windows Rosa come come away from there you're making me jumpy I know I know Sheriff it's just I'm got a bad feeling well yeah yeah of course you got a damn bad feeling they're There's a murder. Now come away before someone sees you. All right, now, you three. What do you need to know?

I want to keep this quiet and I want to get it done. What do you need to know from me? Well, first of all, hi. I don't think we have to be, you know, cut out the pleasantries. Well, I would, after we talk to whoever we're talking to, I'd like to inspect the body. Yeah, I was going to say looking at the body would be pretty choice. All right. Well, we already sent that, that headed to the church, well, specifically graveyard. We don't really have, you know, coroner. Michael kind of serves as undertaker and grave digger and kind of, I guess, groundskeeper at the graveyard.

But he's there around the clock. So anytime you want to go talk to him, Michael's going to be there. My Michael or your Michael? Oh, you have a Michael too. my my mic why would your michael be there well he's named michael so you confused me with your okay but there's lots of michael's it's a pretty common name yeah like we didn't okay there people named conner i don't know about gandy you might be the only one of them but any who while you're at the church you might also talk to father dante he's been at the church all night as far as i know so he ain't like a witness or nothing but he might be able to give you kind of information.

Oh, so as far as witnesses go, we know, so it happened like right in front of the Sterling and by definition there because of, you know, how space works right in front of the full moon saloon. So you might talk to Wilder there or you could check in with Isabella at the Sterling. Oh, I think you might check and see if Mr. Silverwood. was working late. He usually does that. That's right down in the square two.

Sorry, I haven't been here that long. There's a dude named Mr. Silver here in the town where you mine Silver with werewolves who are allergic to silver. Well, to be fair, I don't know if that's his real name. His shop is called Silver's Linings. He's the tailoring town. Is his first name, Hio? No.

That would be funny, though. Dandy owes me a debt for having to listen to that joke. That's fair. Pardon me, as much as it mortifies me to interrupt a genuine lawman such as yourself. I do have one query. If we're so hot to find out who killed Mr. Blackwell, then why do I not just ask his ghost, which is standing directly behind you. Nah, that's just a little ghost humor.

It's a pleasure to meet you. I try to keep things light. One of my classic ghost bits, it's a pleasure, Augustus Parsons. I'm going to, so take a quick second here to tell you what you know about Sheriff Connors. He loves ghost jokes. It will explain to you why that didn't maybe have a little. the impact you were hoping for. Why it didn't land.

Yes. Sheriff Connors belongs to a group called the law. And the law exists in these unincorporated territories where there is no kind of government established. And the law is more of like a powerful sect, if you will. They are all tainted, but not in the way that you think. They are connected to a demon, but it is a demon whose specialty. is justice.

But kind of justice in the terms of like judge dread justice. This is not about right and wrong or morality. This is about the letter of the law. And so with that, he has been granted certain perception abilities, certain abilities to be able to discern whether someone is lying. It's not so much a, you know, the ability to say, oh, the truth is blank. but more of like, I get the feeling you're not telling me something. Can I change characters in play as Sheriff Connors because he sounds rad?

Yeah, it's pretty rad. And as such, that is why, and because you have to imagine people who come through any kind of sheriff's office door will say, I'm innocent, I'm innocent. But there was something about Dylan saying, I didn't do it, that kind of rang true to Conner's It's the only reason he's giving us the benefit of the belt. Sheriff Connors tell me, you got a time penciled in to hang old Dylan Mathis by the neck until dead. Listen, this, it, it ain't up to me. I want you to understand that, but there will come a time.

There is such a, like, tenuous piece here in town that, like, there will come a demand. and if I don't, it's going to, it's going to be bad for everybody. And it's, listen, one way or the other, it's going to be bad.

Yeah. Either I'm going to piss off the fangs, I'm going to piss off the furs, or I'm going to piss off both. And I want to avoid that at all costs. That's why I need you. I'm going to try to keep this quiet. But if I'm out there,

you know, pounding the pavement, I'm, I'm going to draw too much attention to this. I need you all as strangers out there asking questions, but for God's sake, keep it the fuck quiet. Well, why don't we start off talking to Dylan? Because if he was there and covered in some blood, we don't know who's probably his. You know, we're not detectives.

But let's talk to him and see what he's got to say. You can try. I mean, you know, fur to fur, I feel like we can find some common ground. Cool. So you want to go talk to Dylan. Wake up, Dylan. Dylan wake up. Dylan doesn't move.

You can see that Dylan is still breathing. So he's definitely alive. And that's about all you can tell from him lying there. Is he wearing the same clothes he had on? Is he wearing the same clothes he had on when he was incarcerated? Well, he's kind of taken off his overshirt that was the most soaked in blood. He's down to like, you know, kind of an underclothes as far as his top goes. But you can still see that there are some blood stains on it.

This is a lot of blood. But, yeah, I mean, he was incarcerated about 20 minutes ago. So it's still pretty flush. Pretty fresh. I don't think that this may not come up, but just for the record. I can be heard and seen now, but can't currently touch or be touched by anything. Fantastic. And he's not responding as I yelled, wake up Dylan, Dylan wake up?

No. You might have to, let's say this would be like I hit the streets kind of faction move if you were trying to leverage your fur night faction. With his fur night faction? Sure. Is he, I should ask, because we don't really know how werewolves work in this world? and it's midnight. I don't know if it's a full moon. I don't know if he's in full for form. It is not a full moon. So basically, well, let me ask you. Yeah. How do you think werewolves work in this environment?

I think it's probably around the full moon. I think it's like a couple days. And maybe at the full moon it's like at its strongest. But I don't think like one night a month they take this form. I think it's like a couple days before, a couple days after. which is kind of bullshit, because that's kind of the amnesty rules, but I think that's, I think that makes the most sense to me. We can have coherent, coherent multiverse, rural rules. It doesn't affect aural, because aero's always half-transformed, but I think that's how it works. Could it maybe waxen wane with the moon, like the full moon, their full-blown wolf? Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, and I was also thinking, and tell me if that, if this drives with her, did it, like,

that at the peak of the four moon, it is a compulsion. you know, that it cannot be avoided. But on the days before and after, it's more of like, just be careful, don't get too worked up. Sure. Like, that kind of thing of like it's a risk, but it's definitely controllable, especially for elders. You know what I mean? They're a little bit. But when you're looking at like young people with all their hormones and hula hoops, it's a lot harder for them to control it.

They're yo-yo's and their Pepsi colas. Let me hit the streets to try to wake this little dude up. Cool. Give me a roll. That is a six plus one, a seven. Great. So, uh, that's a mixed success. So you hear, what do you want? Um, I want to keep you from getting, you know, massacred in the middle of town when everybody wakes up. How's that for an answer there, deal? I can't. I can't.

Can't, can't just a won't with a pretty, pretty fair. face on it. No, listen, that's nothing. Dylan, you, I don't care how you feel about it. You're actually the only one who can in this situation. So,

I need you to get up and just come talk to us. I'm not going to force you to do nothing. You don't, what? She wouldn't want me to. I promised. Who's, I don't know who you're talking about. Dylan, you can't sort of start a conversation in the middle of a sentence, bud.

I'm just so tired. Yeah, I mean, it's midnight. We're all pretty tired, but there was a murder. I'm not. I don't sleep. Yeah. I'm a ghost.

Yeah. Fantastic. Specificity in all things, young man. Specificity. Dylan, listen. Leave me alone. Well, no, I'm not going to do that. You're like in a little cage,

and so I can just stand here and talk all night if you want. My buddy here apparently doesn't sleep. So he could keep that going for, God, I don't know, eternity, Gus. Yeah. It's Augustus. And also, yes, I could also, look, I'm in your cage now. This could get very annoying for you very quickly. I'm not saying anything to you.

To which one? Any of you. Oh, leave me alone. alone. So, um, the mixed success here, just to be clear,

is you did find out some thing, right? She, she wouldn't want this. Right. But he's not, I don't, he's not going to give you much more than that.

Um, you can try to persuade at this point, but it's going to be a pretty high role. Yeah. Can I try, can I try something else? Sure. Um,

so I have a thing called bloodhound. when you hunt someone roll with blood on a hit, you know exactly where to find them and follow their scent until you do. Uh-huh. Can I use that to, in full-blown sort of werewolf-wolf instinct style, sort of get the scent of the blood on his shirt, and if it leads me to him, I know it's his.

And if it leads me to the church, I know it's Jeremiah. You got it. Okay. That is a seven plus two, blood, nine. Okay, so it definitely doesn't. leads you to him. Okay. It leads in the direction of the church.

But it's hard to track kind of that far out. Church is outside of town, but you can just, it is definitely leading away from him. Okay, so I could follow the Senate and figure out where it goes and find out whose blood it is. You would, but I mean, that would be, you know, a beat, you know what I mean? Right. Yeah, sure, sure, sure. I'm just saying now we have, now we have two pieces of information. All right.

You have a piece, and let me say, and I don't think. think this has been a thing that we have pushed in any of our in any of our arcs up now, you probably want to take notes. Yeah. There's going to be a lot of information. Also, a wolf corruption move when you start a hunt for someone marked corruption. So I think that's, I just did that. Hey, first corruption.

Hey. I thought, I thought for sure Augustus was going to be. All right. I have one corruption. And you can spend that at our store right outside the gates. This is the information you have, right? I'm going to fast forward a little bit and just kind of collect. So here at the start, your options are this is what, this is what Cher tells you, right?

The Sterling is an opportunity. You know that that is the vampire kind of hangout tavern in town. It is also the casino. Then there is the, and this is another thing you know from your briefing. Isabella Slate is now the proprietor of the Sterling. She took it over from a man named Marl. Marcus two years ago. Marcus disappeared mysteriously. And basically, Isabella kind of turned power back over to the people working there. Marcus was not a good person. So the Sterling is a possible

beginning location, the full moon saloon, which is the werewolf hangout tavern. You could also head to the church and the graveyard, the Mathis home, and Silver's linings to take. To talk to Mr. Silver. We were brought on by the Mathis matriarch, right? It was her. Abigail Mathis. Because that's the only she I could think of that would be the obvious sort of answer here. Let's give it a shot.

Gandy really wants to take a look at the body. I mean, since her, you know, her skill set kind of is in the analytical, you know, magic kind of thing. I really think she feels a compulsion to go look at. of the body. Yeah, let's get, that's, that's, that's, police work 101. Get the clues before you get the clues. You got to talk to the coroner, find out about the autopsy, got to slide over the hood of a car. Yeah, let's head to the church. All right, we're going to go to church, do some Hail Mary's, and crack the case. All right, I want, um, we're going to be here. Um, so feel

free to stop back by here anytime. If you need to bounce anything off of us or need any guidance or anything, we're going to be here. We'll see what we can get out of the boy. And if you need us, just let us know. Yeah, that sounds, oh, shoot. Hey, Augustus, are you even going to be able to go into church? I don't know if there's some sort of like holy warding or something that keeps you out of there. I can.

I just don't enjoy it. But to be fair, that is no change from my life. All right. We're going to church. So as you make your way through town, the town doesn't feel right. It feels tense in that way that it might just be completely placebo, but in that way that buildings and wood seems to absorb the negative emotions of the people within it,

and it kind of bleeds through, like a whiskey as it picks up the flavoring of the barrel. And so as you move through town, hell yeah, that's a vocative as fuck. Thank you. You have a hard time not looking over your shoulder. You have a hard time not keeping your eyes on the windows to make sure nobody's watching you. And as you leave town and make your way towards the church about 50 yards outside of the last houses, it eases a little bit. You can see all around you the ravine of the dry river. In the distance, you can see the mountains.

You can see the stars in the sky and it starts to loosen up, but still at your back, you can feel the tension. And you're just breathing a little easier out here. And then as you approach the church, you see above the door the symbol of the church, capital T, capital C. That's all we got out here in the Crescent territory is the church. If you're exactly a specific religion or denomination, it's just a group trying to spread some sort of morality.

and then you have two options as you approach the church. You can either head into the church and talk with Father Dante or you can head in the graveyard and look for Michael. Graveyard, right, Gandy? Absolutely. Let's go and see what's shaken, baby. Now, these are my people. So as you head into the graveyard, it's silent as the grave.

But you can see in the middle of the grave. Less evocative. Yeah. You can see in the middle of the graveyard, a small house with the lights on inside. The lights are flickering. It's very clearly either some kind of lantern or candles. I assume you want to approach. Yeah.

Imagine me kind of, I want to keep following this, like following the wafting scent of the pie through the air as I follow the scent. Is it heading towards that house? Indeed, it is. All right. So as you approach the door... As you approach the door and raise your hand to knock, the door opens before you can make contact. Ah, Gandy, Gus, Errol, was it? Come in.

Yeah, it's E-R-R-O-L. I know a lot of people on Twitter have trouble with that. Yeah, thank you. Absolutely. Come in, come in. And you see before you a very broad and frank. frankly, beautiful man. He has a warm smile and kind eyes and immediately, like, gives you a feeling of peace that's only

slightly thrown off by his blood-stained apron and gloves. Yeah, that's one of my main turnoffs, is if they're covered in blood. When you enter, you can see laid out on a slab is Jeremiah Blackwell. You can tell that Michael has been in the process of cleaning the body and preparing it for funeral rights. Sorry to bother you, sir. Could we take a look at the stake? We're conducting an investigation. Oh, no bother at all.

I expected you. Of course. Of course. But it wasn't a steak. That's archaic. It was clause. No, I think he meant like, S-T-E-A-K, like the meat. Yes, this has all made me very hungry, this advertising environment.

Of course. No, I meant the... So, see, here I thought... Serves me right from believing all those fantasy novels. I thought they could only be killed. with a stake through the heart. Bear in mind, I've never attempted it. Um, I mean, they can pretty much be killed, same as you or me, well, same as a regular person, I should say. No, well, that's very kind of you, sir. Thank you. So few people take into account my phantasmagoric nature.

I make the same mistake about myself all the time. It's so easy to forget. indeed can we can we pick this up please i am very very uncomfortable in this setting of course after your parents death this was probably very unsettling for you i gotta stop you right there but are you like some sort of psychic what's the what's what's your whole deal we're very very short on time and i love sort of the spooky thing you got going on but we need to get to the bottom of it as fast as possible well let me help let me help I would like to figure someone out. Okay.

I would like to figure Michael out. I roll with mind. Go for it. All right. I'm rolling with mind. And it is a zero. A nine plus two for mind. So it's an 11.

So Michael is giving you incredibly strong, immortal vibes. Now, this is an option. for NPCs only. So this is an old one, an angel, a god, something along those lines. But Michael is most definitely and has never been not human,

has never been human. Isn't Faye. Isn't power, isn't night, isn't anything. Something else. Well, he also... He's his own thing. He has to ask two questions

as part of figure someone out, right? So let's say that's one. answer. Give me another question. Okay. What do you, Michael, what are you afraid might happen from this situation? I worry about the people in town. It's not their time. What's their time? Michael, I just want to cut to the quick here. What's the, what's your, what's your deal? You some, you, uh, you some sort of eldritch sort of deity. What's, what do you? No, no, nothing. nothing quite so unseemly.

I make sure that they move from one side to the other seamlessly when it is their time. Oh, shit. Gandy is not

digging this guy at all. He's death. He's like the boatman. The... Oh, fuck a duck. Now, those at home who may have studied theology, will know that Michael is the name of the angel of death.

Yes, that works. Yeah. Oh, wait a minute. Gandy goes in the corner of the church and barfs. Oh, God. Oh, God. I'll clean that up later, I guess. Gandy, it's not your time.

You vomited through me. You have nothing to fear from me. Mm-hmm. Listen, my friend, it has nothing to do with fear. I hate you. Sorry. I can't. It's a compulsion.

Absolutely. I understand. Maybe perhaps, Ganda, you should begin your investigation on the body, see what you can derive. Oh,

fine, fine, yes, okay. Yeah, I'll go over and check out the dead body. This is not my wheel.

This is not my wheelhouse. You said you were anxious to get here. You were dying to come here. I was, but I didn't know. was gonna be hanging out. Oh, you knew there'd be a dead body. You can't be like, ooh, gross.

Well, dead body's already dead. Okay. While, before this or during this or whenever, I'm not picky. I would like to commune with some ghosts to see if I want to hit, I'm going to hit the streets with the ghosts that might be inhabiting this graveyard. Okay. Seems even money that there be some hanging around. I like this. Can we all take one action, right?

If we're like exploring this place on it, I want to talk to Michael whenever it's whenever You got it. Okay. All right, I'm going to do mine first. So hit the streets. I roll against, what was it? So you're rolling. Yeah.

That's ghost, right? Yeah. Yes. Oh, cool. I got a nine plus two, so 11. Okay. Let's see. So, doing this specific, I don't know what ghosts are here.

But I'm kind of wanting to go out into the graveyard, look up some ghosts, so you see how I can scare up and see if they saw anything. Okay, so as you kind of, I assume, well, you describe, what do you do to commune with ghosts? I float out into the graveyard and I extend my hands up into this air and I say, are there any ghosts here? If so, I want to do them. And you feel a tap on your shoulder. No, I don't. I can only be seen and heard. But another ghost could tap you right on that there shoulder.

You are fucking playing Calvin ball with ghost rules, my man. But I'm into it. That's fine. You can put a little English on this ball if you like. Yes, I'm tapped on the shoulder by ghost. My assumption was when you're talking about seeing, heard, or felt that that was too. the corporeal world. But does that apply to?

That would imply that the spectral plane has physics. I love it, dude. That's that soul, that's that soul reaver shit. Let's grant it, yes. Okay, yes, I am tapped on the shoulder by a ghost. Hi. If only so, someday, I might be able to fight a ghost.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Do you need, uh, do you need some help there, a fellow? Uh, yeah. So, what's your name? I'm Augustus Parsons. Pleasure from the, Posson's Cashew Company.

Jonathan. Pleasure. Jonathan. And you turn and you see a man a little bit grizzled, but with a twinkle in his dead, dead eyes, a warm smile, but an eye patch across one of said dead, dead eyes. And, yeah, other than that, pretty nondescript as things go. Five foot eight, you know, fairly regular-looking person. Uh, is there something I can help you with or Jonathan, was it? Yeah.

Uh, yes, I'm investigating the murder. Were you alive during a, uh, the, uh, to encounter any of the Blackwell family? Uh, yeah, I'm, I'm very familiar with the Blackwell family. I, but I, I had to tell you, if you're looking for information, I've, I've been here about 10 years. So I, I don't know how much. Help I could be. Well, I understand that, but one of the Blackwells, Jeremiah, was, took a little poorly tonight, by which I mean he was murdered.

Ah. And we, there was a blood trail leading this way to the church. And I was just curious if you had seen anything unusual tonight. Well, I mean, honestly, that does explain a few things. Go on. I'm all ears. Well, I didn't know who it was. I mean, it was just in passing.

You know, after you've been here a while, you get kind of attuned to things. I felt, sure. I did feel, you know, kind of a spirit move from here to there, if you know what I mean. And the overwhelming feeling was, and you can see him kind of squirm. like he's trying to pin down that feeling in his body. I'm sorry it's been a long time since I

felt in the human way, you know what I mean? So I'm trying to confusion betrayal you wouldn't you'd expect murder you expect anger of sadness but this was just

confusion. So you'll think of maybe the they weren't prepared for the attack sort of came out of nowhere, perhaps, or they were confused by the assailant? I mean, hard to pin down. Might be both.

You know, I didn't, I didn't talk to the boy. I just felt. And all I know is... And you didn't see anything, per chance. No, I mean, just... Not from here. I just felt the spirit go. All right.

All right, well, Jonathan, I will let you return to your eternal slumber. I'm sorry to have disturbed you. It's been a pleasure. It's rare I get to talk to anybody. Well, I got to go. Thank you so much. All right.

So let's cut back into who wants to go next, Aero or Gandy. Gandy, why don't you go? Well, give me some advice here. If I'm investigating the body, if I'm checking out the body, I'm not sure which of the moves applies to that. Well, so there's an investigative place of power. No, I can tell you what this is. So in Power Bay the Apocalypse, and specifically, I don't know if this applies to Monster the Week as well, there are certain things that, like, you can do.

Like, I know that Gandhi has studied this. She is very learned. So this is not so much a move, so much as just a thing she's doing. So I can give you information. I don't think that this is a challenge you have to overcome so much as just this is like, if you wanted to sit down and eat a sandwich, I wouldn't make you roll for the thing. that. Yeah, but if you have any kind of like magical abilities that you could, we want to enhance this investigation, that would be probably a, a move. Yeah, I want Gany to look at the body and investigate the wounds. Okay. But I don't, but you got to tell me what I see, Trev. I will

tell you what you see for I am the master of ceremonies. Um, so what you see is you see, um, two like kind of cross sections and because I can't think of a better way to describe it, like Wolverine's claws have been pulled across his gut. I've solved it. Okay, hold on. And those wounds, though fairly razor sharp, very clearly went deep, and he bled out his, Michael has packed his internal organs back into the wounds, but he was eviscerated. Yeah, okay.

Yeah, that kind of does look like. like werewolf stuff, if I'm being honest. And that's not great for us, I don't think. So do just a straight up and down investigation. What's your mind, Clint? Plus two. Okay. So do an investigation roll plus mind for me.

Okay. That would be eight plus two, ten. Great. So what you can see as you investigate past just kind of surface level is a long, kind of the edges of the wounds. There's some trace of like metal dust, some kind of powder. And it's,

it looks to be a mixture of silver and copper. It's hard to tell exactly which of the two it is. I mean, there's dirt in the wounds too, but there's definitely a glint to it. I would like to take a sample of this. These scabs or, whatever they are, back to my sanctum, sanctorum to do a little bit of checking, maybe getting to the bottom a little bit.

I have an assistant there who might be able to tell me a little more. Okay, so that's, just so you know, if you go back to your sanctum, that's going to be like your beat for the next one, you know? I'm cool with that. Great. Hey, can we, for the essence of like, for efficiency of storytelling. Can we just assume that if we derive information from any of these sort of little beads, that we have passed that information along to our cohorts to say what's like reiterating everything. And then, so we go to Arrow.

Yeah, I want to talk to Michael. Absolutely. So you deal with the dead here in the dry river, right? Yes. By definition, that is correct. I don't really know how it works. I don't know if you got some big hourglass or something counting everyone down. I haven't been at this very long, but I kind of understand this is, well, it's wet work that we're doing here.

And before we go any further with this investigation, I think it would be helpful to know. You got an idea of whose time's going to run out tonight? It's not quite that easy. I see stretched before me three different possibilities. And the problem is, if I were to give you any information about those three, I would affect which three came to pass. And I am not permitted to do so. I can only discuss the present and the past with you. I'm sorry, Errol.

I want to help. I want to give you the information that I can. It saddens me to see Jeremiah here. Yeah, it's a bummer. I want to try to persuade just to ask one specific thing. Go for it. Yeah, persuade an angel. Should be easy

It should be easy There should be no problem Okay are we So I have a territory That I have named Carian Street Which is kind of like the residential area Of Dry River

And that's where I have like My cool bonuses and stuff I assume we are not in Carian Street We are not That is a 7 minus 1 That's gonna be a I guess that's going to be a six. But I still want to ask the question, and you can tell me to fuck off.

Can you at least tell me, Michael, and how many of those three possibilities? How many of them does Dylan Mathis live through the night? I can't tell you that. But what I can tell you is in all three of them, you succeed. Well, that's fucking great news. All right. Success, as you may well know, Errol, isn't always the outcome you expect. Well, don't take the wind out of my sales.

You just gave me a nice little confidence boost there, Mike. I will give you one more piece of information, but in exchange, I will need help from you in the future. You want to debt. Yeah, I'm a, you know, I'm the helpful sort. What do you, uh, what do you got for me? When I was cleaning the body, I couldn't find any trace of fur on him. Hmm. May have been one of those nude werewolves.

Um, okay, uh, that's, well, that's great news and it's also kind of confusing news. But, uh, I appreciate the help there. Keep a, keep a, keep a eye out for us, uh, say a little prayer, I guess. That might be weird. You are an angel. You'd be praying to yourself or something, but... That's not how prayer works, but I'll get right on it. Hey, everybody.

This is Griffin McElroy, your werewolf president, your best buddy, and thank you so much for listening to this episode of The Adventure Zone. I don't even know how we're numbering these anymore, but it's the first proper episode of the Adventure Zone Dust, and I hope that you're really enjoying it. I don't think me and Juice and Dad really knew what to expect from this arc, but, uh, This first episode was really cool to record, and we hope that you have enjoyed listening to it, and we'll continue enjoying listening to the rest of the thing, the rest of the thing that Travis has made for all of us, because he's such a kind and giving boy. I have a few Jumbotrons to read in this episode here in the little commercial break. First one is, I want to tell you all about essential NPCs.

You can find it at essential NPCs.com or on iTunes or on iTunes or on. YouTube or wherever. If you like Taz and art being forced to listen against your will, blink twice. Try Essential NPCs, a podcast that samples some of the best and possibly some of the worst tabletop RPGs. Save the Fantasy, cyberpunk future and shadow run, patrol deep spaces uncharted realms, join a steampunk race around the world of Tefra, or explore the post-apocalyptic atomic highway. More than 100 episodes featuring a rotating cast of role players no one's ever heard of. that's not me being mean. The copy says that.

Are yours for the listening? Go to essential NPCs.com. This sounds fun. I actually checked out Uncharted Realms. It's funny they mention that. It's like another cool Power by the Apocalypse space game that I've wanted to maybe do, but I've never heard anybody do it before. So this would be a great opportunity to dip your toe into all these other games here. I also want to tell you all about Steel Empire.

That's S-T-E-L-E Empire, which is a production company that produces podcasts, including the D&D podcast A Quest for Magic and Steel, and they have a new first-person sci-fi audio drama experience. Unravel the mystery as lawful good searches for his family in post-apocalyptic Arc City. Getting into Arc City changed them forever. Getting out will change the world. Hold on. Let me do that in my trailer voice. getting into Ark City changed them forever. Getting out will change the world.

Start your adventure through any podcast player or at steelemire.com. That's S-T-E-E-E-E-L-E. Don't forget the last E for entertainment. I was wondering what the extra E stood for. And now I know it stands for entertainment. I want to thank everybody who's been tweeting about the show using the Zonecast hashtag. We really appreciate all. all of the feedback that we've done that we've gotten on all the experimental arcs that we've been

trying out here. And I'm sure Travis appreciates the feedback on dust as well as we continue moving forward with the mystery. I know Travis is naming some characters after people who tweet with that hashtag, but I don't think he mentioned any in this recording, so I'll try to press him more on that next time we record. But yeah, we sure do appreciate you spreading the word. We don't pay to advertise the show.

And so word of mouth is the only way that we get new listeners. And you all have been so supportive of us in the past. and we really, really, really appreciate it. We also really appreciate being a part of the Max Fun Network. You can go to Maximumfund.org and check out a bunch of great shows there that are all free, all waiting for you to become just avid listeners of shows like stop podcasting yourself and shows like the greatest discovery and the Beef and Dairy Network and Switchblade Sisters and so many more all at maximum fun.org.

And if you want to hear the other stuff we make, the other podcasts and check out the other videos, stuff that we do, you can find all of that at mackleroyshows.com. Oh, one last thing. We're making a graphic novel adaptation of the first arc of the balance campaign. Here there be Gerblins. And you can find out ways to pre-order that at theadventurezonecom. I think that's it. We will be back next week, next Thursday, March 8th for the next episode of Taz Dust. So I will talk to you then. Goodbye. So you now have one more beat in midnight. Now, here you can separate into a group of two and one or all stay together.

Well, we'll need to do two and one for Gandy to go back and do her research, yeah? Yes. And Gandy wants to take the body with her. Is it possible? Okay. Then... I should say in character, Michael would not allow that. Yeah, that's wild.

Yeah. not that's not just me being like no like it's that is the only duty Michael has is to shepherd people as they cross and like that would go against everything all right then I have I have something I want to do I think it would be actually a magic spell I don't it's not a magic spell go on wizard spells

yeah not zone of truth not gonna I'm not gonna go there I mean that's barely a spell could I Could I do some of trams? No. No. No. What I want to do is, I want to take as much information back to my assistant, my homunculus.

I had this idea of maybe that Gandhi would have these, what are they, how do you pronounce it? Pinchnez, the little glasses that, you know, go on your nose. You know what I'm talking about? I've never heard this word in my life. You need to read. You need to read PINC NAS, which is Pinch knows, that are actually an artifact that when she puts them on, they kind of take in data about what she's looking at, and then she can take that back to her assistant and have him analyze stuff and give her some ideas. Is that workable? Dad, here's what I will give you because that was not one of the artifacts you wanted, but just to kind of make transferring information a little easier.

We're going to say that those are Michael's Pins-Niz that you can then put back on him when you return, and it just transfers everything you saw to him, and that will save us on exposition. It's a homunculus flash drive. Yeah. I was thinking more of like a homunculus GoPro, but... Yeah, sure. Well, then I'll take that. I'll take that and some of the scabs from the wounds.

Perfect. Yuck. You take a few scrapings and do a good sweep of the area. So Gandy is going to head back to her tower of power. What's it called? Sanctum Sanctorum. And what's... The Black Mariah.

The Black Mariah. And what are Errol and Augustus going to do? What do you think, Giff? We could go talk to the Mathis matriarch, but it seems like we should have our ducks in a row before we sort of confront her about her son's potential murder. Makes sense to me. It was killed outside the Sterling, right? Maybe somebody there saw something that could help us out.

Well, that's possible. I would worry, though, that Sterling, being a house of ill repute, might be more inclined to discretion than the patrons of the saloon. Yeah, I mean, Full Moon Saloon, that's my folks there, so we might have a better chance of getting some actionable info there. Indeed. All right. Also, I'm thirsty as heck, and they got a root beer there that'll knock your socks off. It would probably fall right through you, which is a dang shame. Speaking of, give me a moment.

Augustus is going to be heard and felt, but not seen. Creepy. Hey, I got a big, too, baby. Yeah, Gus, he got to warm me when you do stuff like that. Pallet is disconcerting to have somebody just vanish right in front of my eyes. Augustus is silent. Excellent. I'm still here.

Oh, God. Let's resolve Gandy's first. So, describe to me and our listeners the inside of your Sanctum Sanctorum. It's a black Mariah is what it was called. It's a very large, in this case, a very large one that the police used to use to collect prisoners. Yes, but what does the inside look like? I want to know, is it like, you know, like Tesla coils and Frankenstein, you know, machines, or is it like potions? Do you have a Frankenstein?

She calls it her library. It's part labs, part library. There are a lot of books. There are a lot of artifacts laying around. It's almost divided in two. There's like a main part full of books and artifacts. and then there's a secondary part that is laid out with like a table for doing work and for alchemy and for analysis and stuff.

And there's a shoot at the very front with some steps that the homunculus, who is also the carriage driver can clamber up and down and still have access to all of this. I'm thinking very much like the train car that James West used in the TV show, The Wild Wild West. The only canonical Wild Wild West. In my book, yes. And she has this assistant. I mentioned before the homunculus, but now since I have to change his name. You don't have to change his name?

We're not going to have two Michaels in the show. In the real world, people have the same name. That's true, but this is not the real world. People go to the bathroom and they have the same name. I have a nickname. This just happened on Terrace House, boys, ex-girls next door where another Teichon showed up at the house. There was already Teichon at the house.

So they call him Oji. Well, that means Prince, which is the most wild. I'm going to call you Prince now. And he actually says, like, I would prefer you not call me Prince. And then literally next scene, everyone is calling him Prince. Well, Tara's House was my inspiration for this. Good, good. Actually, I mean...

The illegal fan subbed Territ House, Boys and Girl Victor, was Dad's inspiration. She has this homunculus that is basically homunculus is a doll or an artificial construction, sometimes possessed by something else. So she calls him Uncle Oni. He's about two feet tall. He's a Boon Raku puppet. And boomeraku puppets are these elaborate, beautiful puppets that have been an art form in Japan for centuries and centuries. And this is possessed by a demon. And Uncle Oni is very powerful.

And we already know that she has a debt to Uncle Oni. And that's who she goes to when she needs advice. Is this something, you said in. the setup episode that Gandy was like a world traveler. Is this something that she picked up while like traveling in Japan? Yes, absolutely. Yeah, she has artifacts from all over that she's found as she is. And it was particularly interesting to her the fact that basically a demon, you know, is alive after death.

And so this is kind of one of the ways here you have a disembodied spirit placed back into a form that was very very interesting to her. Yeah, I think that'd be interesting to pretty much anyone. Yeah, that'd be interesting. I would be fascinated by that. Okay, cool. So I'm going to say, um, you can ask three questions of Michael a day, right? So you can't just keep coming back here. This is what your debt to him. This is the arrangement that you made, or to Uncle Oney, excuse me. Uncle O'Ne. So you can come ask three questions, but once you've used those three questions, you're done for the day. And I think of those questions, Uncle O'Ne is going to have kind of final say as to how much information your debt has earned you. And I'm also going to put the limit on them that they're going to be who, what, where, when, and why questions.

So Gandy walks into the Black Mariah. There are like wards and things that would keep people out. She goes into the back part and calls. out. Uncle Oney. Uncleoni. Yes. Hello. And Uncle One visually has this sweet cherubic little fat

little face, but when Uncle O'Ne is in kill mode, it switches to this really awesome mask. This is a hostile action on your part, Ed. This is a hostile action you're taking against me. I've seen some pictures of some pretty scary

looking puppets like this. Do you have a question for me, Gandy? Travis, what is this voice? You know how sometimes you open your mouth and like a voice comes? I think that's the voice of the little like Forest Wizard character from I've only seen on Mystery Science Theater 3,000 of like Jack Frost and there's the character and he turns the character into a bear because he like doesn't carry him. I can't remember, but that voice is always stuck with me.

I thought it was reminiscent of Coily from MST3K. also there. No springs. No springs. Yeah, let's lean into coily. I like that. Okay. What can I do for you, Gandy? Uncleoni, I brought some scabs for you. Disgusting. These are from a wound. And I want to ask one of one question, my today's one question. What is this substance in the wound? What is this powdery substance? Well, give me my glasses and let me look. I hand Uncleoni, his pinznez, and they look really cute on his little face, and pops them on and is like looking through them like there's some kind of VR kind of thing. And I also put the scabs down on one of the tables. Listen, I've watched enough police procedures.

I do need to crack you here. You wouldn't get scabs on a dead body. You would get dried blood and you would get powder. I just don't want anyone tweeting at you. Yes. Okay, William Peterson, here you go. I'm just saying the dead bodies don't coagulate. I need to know if Uncle Oney ever says enhance.

Enhanes? Well, I look at your blood. Ah, what is the... Let me see. Yes. Ah. This is refined, processed, silver.

It has been mined from the local mine. This is local silver dust. From the area. Yes. So it's both local and from the area. Yes. That narrows it down. Candy, do you have any other questions?

Hi, I'm another puppet. You're paddy wagon. It's just there to get on your nuts about stuff. It's a ventriloquist dummy that just sits there. Okay. No, Uncle, I'm going to save my other questions. You can dig right into the... dried blood if you want.

If you'd like, I could just tell you who did it. No, no, that takes all the fun out of it. You know me, I'm all about gathering information. Okay, just know I'll be here. If you want to exchange me any more of your soul, I can just tell you. Uh, no, I'll hold off. Getting rid of my soul, I'm not quite prepared for that. And I'm getting a little nauseous, just thinking about it.

it, but I need, may I wear your pinch niz again? Of course. Do you come back and see me. And let me tell you one thing. This situation is extremely dangerous. And I know we've been through some dangerous times before, for those of you who don't remember the prequel, uh, Gandy Dancer and Uncle Oni in the pits of despair. Um, so be prepared, be ready.

Um, this is a very, very. hostile situation, I would hate to see anything happen to my sanctum sanctorum. Oh, I will protect it, and what will you give me? Well, I actually was concerned about you, so that's the only reason I suggest. If I lose this form, I just find another. Not without my help, you don't. Oh, the hubris. I will look forward to being free from this body.

Go ahead. Hope springs eternal. We shall see. Can we do a... Another scene, are you guys going to just keep dropping one line or something? Okay, so let's move on to Aeryl and Augustus. You are heading to the full moon saloon. Is that what you have said?

Right. When you arrive at the full moon saloon, it is now, let's say, about 12, 30, and it's a school night. So there's not a lot of people there. You see the bartender, wilder. an older fur he's gone gray he has a gray beard long but well kept the bar is clean he is well dressed aged but still clearly he could kick your ass if he needed to at least you air maybe not augustus are you corporeal at the second are you touchable we've covered this okay I'm corporeal, but I'm invisible, basically.

Got it. So until you speak, and let's make sure we keep this in mind, until you speak, it's possible that no one knows you're there. That's the idea. Yeah. That's the idea. And also sitting at this bar, there are two women. They are not sitting together. They are fairly far apart.

It's clear that they are not with each other. but one you recognize as your employer Abigail Mathis Shit Okay I'm gonna float over to Abigail Mathis Not float I guess slowly walk Within earshot Okay

Yeah are they having a conversation when we walk in Or is she just kind of drowning her sorrows right now Well she is both drinking but also waiting I think she kind of expected you sooner I walk up to the bar and sit down at the stool next to her and I say, um, let me get, uh, two root beers. Let me get one root beer, please, uh, and, uh, you can put it on the Grayson's tab. About goddamn time. No need to take the Lord's name in vain, uh, Abigail. We're out here, you know, busting our humps, trying to find out

what we can find out. It, my son has been locked in that cage for almost, oh, my, my son. an hour, you better be close to solving this goddamn thing. Wheels of justice turned pretty slow, and that root beer is... Listen, Abigail, here's what we know. Your son's covered in blood, and we found out that it is Jeremiah's blood, and he's got claw marks across his gut, and we can't just release your son. He's the most likely suspect still, so I know you're frustrated and everything, but... My son would not...

do this. He is a good boy. He would not have done this. He's a good boy, but he's a shit suspect. He wouldn't really tell us much when we were in there talking to him. He always has been quiet. Yeah, that's, again, and not super helpful. And again, that root beer, though, is it, what do you do? You brew in the sasparilla back there? What's the... Wilder just kind of glares at you and continues polishing cups. What's... You got beef, bud? Wilder watches as one of the mugs floats over to the root beer and begins to fill itself. I'm doing that with my mind.

It's placed in front of... Wilder reaches underneath the counter, pulls out a club with a silver tip, and you can see engraved upon it is the symbol of the church. And he points out. You see the mugs start to float back over and bend itself? And then it goes over to the sink and is washed. and his place back in place. Show yourself, ghost.

First off, I have a name. I materialize in front of him. What to? What? I can be seen and heard, but not felt. That's a good call in this situation. We didn't come for any trouble, my goodman. We are here to investigate a terrible crime

and to free one of your Lupine brethren from the shackles of injustice. We just need a moment of your time and we'll be on our way. In fact, I'm going to say he sounds like this. Get behind my bar again and you won't be walking out. Or should I say floating out? And he kind of like gives you a bit of a smile glare.

He smiles, but not with his eyes. There he is. There he is. He smiles. I appreciate the concessions made to my phantasmagoric nature. Not the threat, but I do appreciate that you recognize I am a ghost. All right, I'm going to give up on Operation Root Beer. Abigail, listen, when we were talking to Dylan.

Now, I've almost got it cracked. Just give you a second. When we were talking to Dylan, he's mentioned something about her not wanting to, not wanting him to talk. just curious if you know who that might be i can tell you there's only one her dylan cares about and it's his sister let me add that to the old clue book what's uh what's the deal there they close they are twins from the same litter what's her name anne uh where might we find Dan here at this late hour. Probably still to sleep back in my house.

Well, I may need you to go wake her up and get her here in town because we got to ask her some questions. Do it yourself and she slides to the key. I need to be here. Send her a town in case something happens. I'm not leaving my boy. Abigail, I feel like maybe you don't really understand the situation that we find ourselves in. You see the back of Abbas.

Abigail's arms start to get a little hairier, her nails start to grow, and she turns and glares at you and says, No, I don't think you understand, Errol. I am not leaving my boy. He is next in line to take over my place. I am not leaving him alone. Do you understand me, Errol? Yeah, I understand. You. I understand. You. don't want to lose your boy, but things go south here, you're going to lose a lot more than that. The gravity of the situation is this, and I'm surprised because I would think somebody who's been living around the mines for as long as you have would know a powder keg when you saw one. This town's about to blow up, and we're trying to stop it. We're on the same side here.

We're just asking for a little bit of help. You stop it. I'm plan B. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture. Artist owned. Listener supported. Judge John Hodgman ruled in my favor.

Judge John Hodgeman ruled in my friend's favor. Judge John Hodgman ruled in my favor. I'm Judge John Hodgman. You're hearing the voices of real litigants, real people who have submitted disputes to my internet court at the Judge John Hodgman podcast. I hear their cases. I ask them questions. They're good ones.

and then I tell them who's right and who's wrong. Thanks to Judge John Hodgman's ruling, my dad has been forced to retire one of the worst dad jokes of all time. Instead of cutting his own hair with a floby, my husband has his hair cut professionally. I have to join a community theater group. And my wife has stopped bringing home wild animals.

It's the Judge John Hodgman podcast. Find it every Wednesday at maximum fun.org or wherever you download podcasts. Thanks, Judge John Hodgman. by Dude Bro movie podcasts. Only one podcast is brave enough to call bullshit. Who Shot You? The podcast that dares to say that white dude's opinions aren't the only opinions.

If you have a movie pass, like, get a ticket to it to support Taraji, then go home. Ant Man seems so unnecessary at this point. Ant Man is like a ketchup packet too many. Who shot you? with Ricky Carmona. I wanted to see Wolverine Kickass and eat some popcorn and have a good time. Alonzo Durrallde.

Is this Andy Richter? Yeah. Andy's a job. And April Wolf. I love Wild Things because I get to see Kevin Bacon's day. Who Shot You? Listen every Friday on Maximum Fun or wherever you get your podcasts.