S3 Ep4: Broken Bones

[00:00:31] Speaker A: Hi, I'm Aubrey, and I play Isabelle, the entrepreneurial. [00:00:37] Speaker B: Hi, I'm legacy, and I play Rosanna, the faithful. [00:00:43] Speaker C: Hi, I'm Scott, and I play Arthur, the faithful. [00:00:47] Speaker D: Hi, I'm termite, and I play Piper, the underground. [00:00:52] Speaker E: And I'm buddy porcelain. I'll be your storyteller for the evening. Every hunt is both a means and an end. Every eliminated threat is a link in a chain, leading us to another link, and then another, and then another. All in the hope that the chain will ultimately tether our hunter to an ultimate good that most people couldn't begin to define the danger. And isn't there always? Danger? In this approach, though, is mistaking an end for the end. [00:01:24] Speaker C: When a momentary lapse puts the whole journey at risk. [00:01:28] Speaker D: When the loss of a goal leaves you wondering what it's all for. [00:01:33] Speaker B: When there are too many goals and you risk losing all. For failing to pick one. [00:01:39] Speaker A: When you choose a road apart from your fellow travelers and find yourself alone. [00:01:45] Speaker E: Tonight, we find our hunters building their chain link by hard won link and unsure if it will lead them to a greater good or somewhere altogether darker. Tonight, let's continue our hunter story. Good evening, hunters and audience. Before we begin tonight's story, we're going to rewind the clock a little bit and check in with a member of the cell who was missing last. During last week's session. Find out exactly what Isabel got up to. Isabel? Yes. You were contacted by your. Well, your contact, who informed you that they were ready to make another swap. You've been at this for close to a year now. It's been 910 months since you met them and made this connection and have had this little arrangement going. The process has always been pretty straightforward and has rarely taken more than, you know, like, a night. Usually you have to, like, leave the house and drive the hour and a half, 2 hours to San Diego, make the swap. You usually end up, like, crashing at a motel or something up there and then coming home in the morning. Typically, that's about how it goes. You never take patty or tov because your contact is paranoid and is not comfortable with other people coming with you. Um, I would like you to tell me and the audience what your contact is like. Who is this person? [00:03:49] Speaker A: Isabelle. Shortly after she came back, she, through some means of they're literally her skills, managed to find a kindred in the area. Who. [00:04:13] Speaker E: There's a lot of background noise. What is going on? [00:04:18] Speaker A: Give me a sec. [00:04:20] Speaker E: Okay. [00:04:38] Speaker A: I'm still getting used to the how noise works in the new apartment, but yes, Isabelle found with her skillset, was able to find a kindred in the San Diego area. Correct. Who she managed to work out a deal with. This kindred. This kindred will bring her kindred vitae and various parts from kindred, and in exchange, Isabelle will supply this kindred with blood and keep their name out of any records. Or. And if, you know, the name pops up, she'll, you know, do her best to make sure that it vanishes. It's a bit of a dangerous deal, you know, knowing kindred, but it pushes her closer to her goal. And this person is rightly paranoid. You know, this is what little amounts to, at least in the beginning, was almost a standoff of a deal of, you know, expecting the other to. Expecting the other to just screw them over at any point. [00:06:10] Speaker E: Okay, can you describe what this person looks like? Are they male, female, nonbinary? You don't know, like, what their clan or anything is, but, you know, you know, their name, what they look like, that sort of thing, or at least the name that they gave you. [00:06:31] Speaker A: Yeah. They are a person who probably wouldn't look too out of place in sort of the seedier areas of San Diego. You know, currently, you got the sort of, I hate to say, bad boy aesthetic, but it is certainly, they look like they, if they were not turned at the height of punk rock, they probably at least kind of revere the era and have styled themselves after it. [00:07:11] Speaker E: I see. One more of Isabelle's type is what I'm getting. Bad boys with probably piercings and tattoos and leather look. [00:07:24] Speaker A: You know, it made it very easy to find this person. [00:07:27] Speaker E: You know, Isabelle has a type. It's fine. Okay, cool. So you meet up with your contact. It is not the usual place that you. That you typically meet up at. Not that it's always the same place every time, but there's usually, like, a pattern to it. And this is a little out of the norm. They have you meet them at a diner, and unlike the diner where Piper met her partner, um, a few days ago, this is a. A pretty rundown, um, hole in the wall like, greasy spoon style of diner. Um, it is in one of the poorer parts of the city. And, um, it's one of those places that you walk in, and, like, the laminate on the tables is not so worn that you can see the particle board underneath, but so worn that it's hard to tell if there was ever a pattern to it. It's just kind of like this weird smudged blur of color that just sort of looks more brown than anything else, all of the, you know, what few salt and pepper shakers there are are like the. The really cheap, like, thick plastic that is supposed to look like glass, but nobody thinks that's glass because it's very obviously plastic, that sort of thing. Like, the metal caps are not really metal. They're also plastic. And the place is pretty much empty with the exception of the cook and an incredibly bored, like, waitress who comes over when you first sit down. And can you make me a wits and awareness or no? Let's go. Wits and insight. [00:09:46] Speaker A: Wits and insight. [00:09:47] Speaker E: Yep. [00:09:48] Speaker A: All right. There we go. That is three successes. [00:10:06] Speaker E: You look up and she is either stoned or under some sort of mental effect because her eyes are completely glazed over. She is operating as if she's totally fine, but it's clear that mentally she's not exactly all here. So she's either super fucking stoned and so used to doing this job, stone, that she can do it without any issues, or there is some sort of, in effect, going on her perceptions and whatnot. You have the feeling she's probably not gonna remember you when this is all over. [00:10:44] Speaker A: And, hey, if she doesn't remember me, it's better that way. And I'm not exactly sure of this person's full, like, power yet again. It's not exactly a conversation that we've had, so we'll nod and sort of file this away in the back of my head as maybe it's just this person covering their tracks. So, you know, gonna be on keeping my head on a swivel, but I kind of do that anyways at all of these meetings. So it's just kind of my normal level of paranoia. [00:11:21] Speaker E: Gotcha. Okay. Do you order anything? Coffee? Yeah. Toast, anything. Okay. She brings you a coffee along with a little bowl full of those little, like, packet creamer things, and then wanders away and disappears into the kitchen. And your contact kind of comes around the corner from, not the kitchen, but like a little mini hallway that you realize leads to the bathrooms and probably like a manager's office. And as he comes out, he is wiping at his mouth with a sleeve. And he comes and he sits down across from you. What's up? [00:12:24] Speaker A: Normal. Whatever day of the week it is, I guess. What about you? [00:12:31] Speaker E: Well, same night, different shit. [00:12:35] Speaker A: Isn't that the truth? And I imagine I brought the small cooler in with me, and I probably set it down by my foot when I took a seat. And I'll just, with my foot, sort of push it over to him. [00:12:56] Speaker E: You hear the faint thud of one of those heavy ass boots that he's always wearing. And he reaches into the inside pocket of his jacket and pulls out a manila envelope that's been folded in half and then slides it towards you. When you touch it, you can feel the outline of what is probably three or four small vials. You have learned from experience that getting blood from a kindred is difficult because their blood tends to curdle in their veins and go thick. So him managing three or four vials and then being, you would assume viable, is a pretty significant amount. More than you usually get. You usually only get one or two. [00:13:57] Speaker A: Yeah, well, I sort of feel that so many, and just sort of say, I guess it's been a good time for business recently. [00:14:13] Speaker E: I suppose you could put it that way, if you want. Listen, I've made it a point not to ask what all of this is for, but, uh, you haven't called me off as far as making these trades. But it's been almost a year. You in? Um, some kind of debt I should know about? [00:14:46] Speaker A: No debt like that. Um, a lot of it comes down to a bit of a. We'll say, scientists. Curiosity. [00:15:11] Speaker E: I get it, I guess. I mean, I don't, but. And now shrug a little bit. [00:15:20] Speaker A: I mean, I help you, you help me. [00:15:28] Speaker E: Yeah, just, uh, unusual. Usually people want a few vials to run some tests on, and then I never see them again. We've been at this for a while. [00:15:48] Speaker A: Maybe I enjoy your company. [00:15:52] Speaker E: Yeah, sure. Just cause you look like you could hang out around here doesn't mean you ever would. [00:16:04] Speaker A: I've been known to slum it occasionally. Don't let the fancy medical degree fool you. [00:16:18] Speaker E: The use of the word slum it, though, make it clear where you stand, which is fine. [00:16:25] Speaker A: Yeah, well, in the end, it's a lot of curiosity. And there's always something new to learn, I guess. [00:16:42] Speaker E: My name come up in any files lately? [00:16:45] Speaker A: No. No files. [00:16:49] Speaker E: Sure you got as much access as you think you do? [00:16:54] Speaker A: I have a decent amount of access and anything I can get my hands on, I always making sure. Have people been poking around? [00:17:12] Speaker E: Maybe had some weird stuff come up lately? Can't be sure if it's your people or somebody else, but, um. Listen, the reason why there's more in there than I usually ask for is because I need another favor. [00:17:43] Speaker A: Oh? [00:17:47] Speaker E: I need somebody with your skill set. [00:17:58] Speaker A: Or what? [00:18:02] Speaker E: Somebody, uh, in my care got hurt. I could use a doctor. I can't take them to the hospital. [00:18:13] Speaker A: Understood. [00:18:14] Speaker E: They're not exactly like me, but they're not exactly like you. Either, if you get what I'm saying. [00:18:18] Speaker A: I think I do. Where are they? [00:18:30] Speaker E: Follow me. And he stands up, reaches down to grab the cooler, tucks it under an arm like it's a football, and heads for the door. [00:18:45] Speaker A: I will, keeping my head on a swivel. Follow. [00:18:50] Speaker E: Okay. Make me wits and awareness. Or is it perception? Awareness. I have too many. No, it's wits. Okay. [00:19:02] Speaker A: Wits awareness. [00:19:03] Speaker E: I have too many game systems in my head. I'm sorry. I'm forever forgetting which one's which. [00:19:09] Speaker A: I get that. I do the same thing. That is only two successes this time. [00:19:21] Speaker E: Would you like to willpower? Um, you do not have to. It's just a question. [00:19:29] Speaker A: I think. I think Isabel will let it ride. I think a bit of her, uh, you know, this is serious, asking for medical help and feel like this person would only do it if there was an emergency. So I think her mind is shifting more into doctor mode. [00:19:51] Speaker E: You got a car with a kit, or are we just relying on what I have? [00:19:58] Speaker A: I've got a bag in my car. [00:20:03] Speaker E: He lets you lead him to the car so that you can grab your bag and then continues on foot, leading you across what you realize pretty quickly is like, a five block walk. Like, this isn't a short walk. He purposefully met you somewhere that's a decent distance away from wherever he is taking you. [00:20:28] Speaker A: Do you think he would object if I brought the dog? [00:20:31] Speaker E: No. [00:20:32] Speaker A: Okay. [00:20:33] Speaker E: He is accustomed to Guzer being with you. Yeah. And while Gozer doesn't normally come inside with you, it's not like you've ever made it a secret that Gozer is always there. [00:20:42] Speaker A: Yeah, Gozer needs a walk. [00:20:46] Speaker E: He just sort of glances at Gozer, and Gozer kind of gives him, like, a huff and, like, a little half growl, but it's very well behaved otherwise, Gozer's kind of like, this is my human fuck with her, and you fuck with me. Like, that's the vibe you get off the dog. But he doesn't. He doesn't make any. Any big moves. And he leads you into what you realize pretty quickly is a pretty rundown apartment building. This is. This area is kind of the slums. Leads you down a long hallway on the ground floor and into a door that doesn't even have the numbers on it anymore. Although from the way that the place is laid out in the other doors, you're guessing it's probably like 104, maybe 105. None of the doors have all of their numbers, but some of the doors have some of their numbers. So an educated guess is it's probably 104, 105. And he leads you inside. And the apartment on the inside, while a little drab, desperately in need of a new coat of paint and new flooring, is surprisingly clean and cozy feeling. It feels like somebody has gone out of their way to make it feel like home, even though it's in the worst part of town. And he leads you back into a back bedroom where you can hear the kind of low hum of a tv going. And in this bedroom, which has floor to ceiling blackout curtains over what you are pretty sure is not a floor to ceiling window based on the outside of the building. And only two small bedside tables with little lamps on them. And one of the lamps is turned on, but is kept on the lowest setting. And he sort of stands aside and gestures you in. Um, and on the bed is a, um. A young man who looks quite a bit like your contact. Um, just much younger, um, and. And obviously dressed more modern, modern era than something out of, like, the eighties. Seventies. Eighties. Like your contact is. He is incredibly pale. And not in that I just don't go outside kind of pale way. He is pale in the. He's probably lost a lot of blood kind of way. And is laying so still and so quiet that at first you're not sure if you made it there in time. And the blankets are pulled up around his chest with his arms laying over the top of them, but at his sides, if that makes sense. [00:24:32] Speaker A: Yeah, I think seeing that, I'll instantly sort of pull on a pair of gloves and gently set my medical bag down by the bed as I move in to just understand what has happened to this person. They look like they've lost blood. Why did they look like they lose blood? Is this a stabbing? Is this a gunshot? Is this something else? [00:25:02] Speaker E: Okay. Make me. An intelligence and medicine role in pathology does apply. [00:25:20] Speaker A: That is five successes with a critical. [00:25:22] Speaker E: Good lord. Isabelle. Miss Isabelle. Um, you put a hand for. The first thing you do is you put a finger to their. Their pulse point, looking for a pulse. And you realize after a few moments that it is there, but it is very slow. Not in the way that, like, um, Rosanna's was in season two when she passed out, where it was almost supernaturally slowed down. This is like somebody whose heart is working very hard to keep going. [00:26:06] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:26:07] Speaker E: And you pull the blankets back to try and get a better look. You don't see any immediate outward signs of injury, like they've been stabbed or shot or anything. What you do, really, what you do see, though, is that the veins in their neck are dark. They almost look like grayish black under the skin. You check a few other things you do. Things like you pull their lips back to check their gums. Their gums are very pale, which is usually a pretty good sign of, at the very least, some deficiencies, if not, like out and out, you know, not having enough blood in their system. And your contact sort of grunts a little bit from the doorway. Yeah, he was hurt, but that shouldn't. The hurt that he had shouldn't have done this be. [00:27:16] Speaker A: Yeah, it's. How was he hurt? Any information will help me figure out what's going on. [00:27:26] Speaker E: When we got into a fight, some weirdos and, I don't know, some sort of suits, I think I got there as they were leaving. I didn't have time to chase them down and help him at the same time. [00:27:48] Speaker A: Business suits or, like, combat suits. [00:27:53] Speaker E: At least one of them was in a business suit. [00:27:56] Speaker A: Okay. [00:27:58] Speaker E: And they stabbed him, but it healed like it was supposed to. But then he passed out, and he hasn't woken up since. [00:28:13] Speaker A: I'm trying. Would that give me enough to maybe understand that maybe some sort of poison or something like that? [00:28:27] Speaker E: Was this could be some sort of poison? That is absolutely a possibility, though it's not one that you would have ever heard of, given what it's done to his veins. Make me a let's go int and occult, and I'll allow your specialization in kindred to help. [00:29:03] Speaker A: That is five successes. No, critical. [00:29:06] Speaker E: You continue to be on a roll. [00:29:09] Speaker A: I'll take it. [00:29:11] Speaker E: Given what you know of kindred and all of the testing that you have done on your contacts, blood. If this person is a ghoul, like you think they would be, um. If they have managed to, um. If whatever this is, has managed to do this to them, um, it is probably. If it is poison, it is something that has been formulated specifically to attack kindred, if not specifically to attack this particular bloodline. Um, and the only reason that they're alive, you suspect, is the fact that they have a vampire blood in their system. You go about a few things. You strip off the guy's shirt so that you can get a look at where he said the stab wound was. Your contact helps you with whatever you need when it comes to, you know, moving the body around to make it easier to work all of that. He is tense and quiet and has the look on his face that suggests that this is all incredibly serious to him. You can see that there is a scar on his side that looks like it should be years old. The skin looks like it's fully healed. It's just scarred over and puckered and that sort of thing. But you realize. But your contact makes it very clear that this is not. This is not old, that's new. That's what healed. And it shouldn't have healed with a scar at all. [00:31:01] Speaker A: Yeah, if only I had just like, a laboratory for somewhere to, like, take a look at the blood. [00:31:14] Speaker E: Tell me what you need. [00:31:17] Speaker A: Do you have any kind of. I mean, ideally, you know, Isabel would start listing off, like, things like centrifuges and, you know, anything one would need to, like, isolate things from blood that should. Shouldn't be there because if it's in his blood and it's kind of a poison, that's probably what she would need. [00:31:39] Speaker E: He sort of considers for a minute, how do you feel about working out of a drug lab? [00:31:46] Speaker A: I worked out of worse places. [00:31:50] Speaker E: All right, let me make some calls. But he disappears down the hallway for a few minutes. You can hear the kind of murmur of a voice on the phone. And then he comes back. [00:32:04] Speaker A: Yeah, I will. [00:32:05] Speaker E: Yeah. [00:32:05] Speaker A: Okay. Yeah. Well, during this time, I will have collected a couple of blood samples and probably set this person up with fluids. [00:32:18] Speaker E: Listen, where we're going, it's not completely my territory. This isn't a much more. I don't want to say neutral, more contested area. And I'll do everything I can to keep you safe, but there's only one way I can guarantee they won't fuck with you. [00:32:41] Speaker A: If you say I'm your goal. [00:32:45] Speaker E: Yep. [00:32:48] Speaker A: If that's what we have to do, that's what we have to do. [00:32:55] Speaker E: And if you get hurt. I can't. You're still just a human. [00:33:03] Speaker A: I. I understand. I. I don't want to say necessarily I can take care of myself, but I've been in situations like this before. I understand the risks. And, you know, I keep gozer around for many reasons. [00:33:28] Speaker E: All right, he shrugs a little bit and leads you out. Makes it a point to lock the door behind him. You realize that there are two deadbolts in the normal doorknob. Lock on this particular door. Leads you out of the building, actually climbs onto the back of a motorcycle. Oh, no, wait, he wouldn't do that. Because, you forget, goes there, climbs into an old kind of run down, like, kei car from like the fucking late nineties. Lets goser into the backseat. You climb into the front seat and he, uh, drives into a different part of town. It is not nearly as rundown as this one, as this area. It is pretty solidly middle class for San Diego, or at least as close to middle class as San Diego gets, because it's one of those cities that tends to go from either extremely poor to, you know, pretty wealthy. Um, but there's. It's in as close to middle class as you can get. And it's in this kind of unassuming, uh, kind of bland, gray, um, not high rise, but like. Like, you know, multi story office building. And he parks in the, uh, parking lot and starts to lead you towards the building. His head is far more on a swivel here than it was in the worst part of town. You would think that in the most dangerous, one of the most dangerous areas in the city, that's probably got the highest crime rate. He would have been a lot more, like, on guard, but he's far more tense here. And you can see his hands kind of flexing at his sides like he is ready to get jumped or ready to have to jump somebody if he needs to. And you hear the rumble of multiple suv's, like heavy engines coming around a corner. And all you hear from your contact is fuck. And he grabs your arm, not hard, but grabs you and starts to basically pull you along at a pretty brisk run. Gozer is obviously able to more than keep up towards the side of the building. And any door that you almost miss in the side of the building because there's no knob on the outside, it's one of those emergency exits doors. And he bangs really hard on it a few times while watching the road. The door cracks open and he immediately, like, yanks it open and pushes you inside. Go. I got this. [00:36:41] Speaker A: Good luck. [00:36:45] Speaker E: Inside you are confronted by a young woman who looks about five years younger than you and is wearing a badge on her lab coat that suggests that her name is Becky and she is an intern. And she just looks a little wide eyed. Hi. [00:37:09] Speaker A: I need to borrow your equipment for a few hours. [00:37:14] Speaker E: Yeah, chase mentioned. Okay. God, I'm gonna get fired. As she turns and, like, leads you up a set of emergency stairs. [00:37:29] Speaker A: Well, I will try to stay out of your hair. [00:37:34] Speaker E: It's not your fault my stupid ass brother is in debt. I'm just helping to pay it off. Um, and she leads you upstairs and into a. What you realize is actually like a sanitized lab. This looks like, basically like a place that you would see it, like a pharmaceutical place or whatever. It takes you a few minutes to realize that while her badge says that her name is Becky and that she is an intern, like, the picture on the badge doesn't match and the lab coat is not fitted well to her. And that this is all probably a front to look very legitimate because as soon as you get inside, you realize pretty quickly that this is a lab that is meant for synthesizing, you know, drugs. They are making the kind of stuff that has caused, like the opiate crisis across the country, that sort of thing. [00:38:38] Speaker A: But it is compartmentalized. Put that in the back of my brain. [00:38:44] Speaker E: But it is, it is very high tech. They have most of the toys that you could possibly want. And she swipes a card to let you in after you have a moment to put on a lab coat yourself and tie your hair back so that it's not at risk. You know, you're not not at risk of cross considering and lets you inside. Listen, you've got like half an hour tops. My boss is on break. [00:39:14] Speaker A: Yeah, I will be quick. I will be in and out before you realize that. [00:39:20] Speaker E: Okay? And she disappears because she wants nothing to do with whatever the fuck it is that you're doing. Because, you know, she's learned. You don't ask questions when somebody calls in, calls in the debt. Okay. While you are throwing on gloves and heading towards one of the counters to get to work, you hear the distinct sound of. You hear a distinct popping noise coming from outside. [00:39:58] Speaker A: Hmm. And I just don't imagine this place is got a lot of windows. [00:40:05] Speaker E: No, you are, for the moment, not like there's one window, but it's on the other side of the room. And it's, do I want to take the few minutes to walk over there and look, or do I want to use my precious time doing what I came here to do? [00:40:19] Speaker A: I have very little time. I'm going to do that, and I'm going to tell Gozer to guard. [00:40:23] Speaker E: Okay. Gozer immediately takes up his guard stance. [00:40:27] Speaker A: Yeah. While I get to work. [00:40:30] Speaker E: All right, guess what? You get to start rolling me. Intelligence and science. Chemistry applies. And. And I will allow desperation dice to play into this because you are entrepreneurial. [00:40:52] Speaker A: What is. How many desperation dice do we have? [00:40:55] Speaker E: Three. [00:40:56] Speaker A: Three. [00:41:00] Speaker E: That's why I wasn't sure if I needed to, like, adjust that. [00:41:08] Speaker A: You know what? I feel very desperate right now, and I really, really want to help this person out. So that's going to be what? Intelligence? That'll be twelve. It'll be twelve dice. [00:41:29] Speaker E: Mm hmm. [00:41:38] Speaker A: Umm. Come on. And that is no failures on any of the desperation dice. With seven successes with a critical. [00:41:49] Speaker E: That's excellent. Very good. Okay. I love that. When you are by yourself, you get onto roles like this, with the rest. [00:42:01] Speaker A: Of the cell, it's just like, I got two. [00:42:09] Speaker E: The first thing you realize is that there is something off about the blood that you're dealing. You would expect it to be a little weird because it's not quite human, not quite vampire, but this is something else entirely. It carries strains of what looks like it might be some sort of synthesized venom. You see markers that you have seen in other samples that you've managed to get from both from like, hunts that you've been on, where you've just managed to get a couple of drops here and there because, you know, curious. And some stuff that you've seen, like, while working with Alison, this reminds you vaguely of, um, like byproducts that you have pulled off of some of the, um, some of the. The less classified, like less easily classified beings that have been hunted. Um, they're not. They're not lupines, they're not one of the changing breeds or anything like that. And they're not kindred. They're something else that the SI has kind of struggled a little bit to classify because every time they run into one of these things, it's something slightly different. Um, so they've just sort of fallen into this kind of catch all umbrella of other. Your time with Rosanna has suggested that this might be synthesized based on something from the Fae category. Yes, I know about the Fae, but they don't know a lot because the fey are all kind of wildly different. So this reminds you of some of the stuff that you have been able to kind of test and look at in an effort to help them classify stuff like that. But it's almost like they tried to recreate an effect that they found on one of them from chemicals. Does that make sense? [00:44:54] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:44:56] Speaker E: Um, from what you can see, it is designed to take the blood and have the blood, um, do something the blood doesn't typically do, which is rot, for lack of a better term, and it is meant to try. It is effectively what you, from what you can tell, it, is trying to rot whoever that is in that bed from the inside out. [00:45:24] Speaker A: Okay. [00:45:26] Speaker E: And it's probably only the fact that they have kindred blood in them that has kept them alive. [00:45:40] Speaker A: Ideas of essentially the idea that jumps to my head first is something like dialysis. [00:45:53] Speaker E: In theory. Yeah, that could work if you had enough blood. Yeah, it wouldn't be easy because, like, as you have this stuff, like, you just drew this blood fresh before getting. Right before coming here. And you are watching on the slide as it starts to, you know, go kind of jelly and thick and viscous. [00:46:25] Speaker A: Say, if fresh blood was introduced into, like, a person, the sample, like, what might happen? [00:46:40] Speaker E: Um, I mean, it would depend on the amount, and it would depend on how much of this stuff was still in them. Um, in theory, if enough blood was introduced, enough, like fresh blood that's not tainted was introduced, um, in theory, their body would probably be able to fight it off. It would take time. It would not be comfortable. It would probably be pretty fucking painful for them. But it is what it is. It's either pain or death. A dialysis machine would definitely help, because if you could rig one where instead of pulling the blood out and then cleaning it and putting it back, if you had one that pulls it out and then replaces it with just fresh blood, and whatever is in them gets moved out, that would be better. [00:47:32] Speaker A: Yeah, but exactly. That's not exactly an easy thing to come across. [00:47:36] Speaker E: It is not an easy thing to come across. You think if you had somebody who could get you this stuff, you could make it, though? You know enough about how the machines work. You're not Piper, but you know enough about how the machines work, and it wouldn't be that difficult to do. [00:47:57] Speaker A: And. Well, Isabelle certainly has a lot of blood in her body. [00:48:05] Speaker E: He does. [00:48:07] Speaker A: Yeah. So the idea that she did jump to initially, was at least to buy this person more time is blood transfusion. [00:48:16] Speaker E: Yes, that is absolutely an option. And that would almost definitely help. At the very least, it would help to dilute the gross that's in them. [00:48:24] Speaker A: Yeah, because there's. I mean, that's gonna be her. Her plan is she's going to give this person a blood transfusion, while sending this Jace person to hopefully get the things she could make. This sort of the bootleg dialysis machine. [00:48:40] Speaker E: Okay, very cool. While you are here, and you have access to a state of the art lab where nobody is looking over your shoulder, and there's nothing that anybody can do to stop you, really, as long as you're done in time. Is there anything else you want to do? [00:49:00] Speaker A: If I have a few extra minutes, are there. Would I think that maybe using something like a blood thinner on this person would help as well? [00:49:25] Speaker E: Yes, if only because it would help to break up what's probably solidifying in their veins. [00:49:32] Speaker A: And if this place is making drugs, they probably have some sort of blood thinner. [00:49:38] Speaker E: Yeah, plenty. [00:49:40] Speaker A: Give this person a blood thinner, you know, if there are any, because, I mean, I probably have, like, some basic stuff. I have a relatively good bag. But, you know, anything extra that I can just sort of shove in my pockets as I'm gathering my stuff so. [00:49:56] Speaker E: That we are adding theft to trespassing in an illegal drug operation. [00:50:03] Speaker A: What are they going to do? Report it to the police? [00:50:09] Speaker E: No, no. You'd be lucky if that's all they did. Excellent. I'm not gonna make you roll for that. You know, enough about the drugs and things that are around you that you are easily able to find some blood thinners. Cool. You slip out of the lab in time to see definitely not Becky busily talking to an older man who is kind of a little gruff in how he's talking to her. He's not rude, but he's clearly a little frustrated that she won't stop talking and won't, like, let him get back to what he was trying to do. And you kind of tiptoe out of the room and past him and down the hallway, and you hear Becky go, okay, sorry. Thanks for explaining that. All right, well, yeah, I'll go get you your coffee now. As soon as you were out of sight. [00:51:04] Speaker A: You know what? I don't feel so bad about taking things anymore. That guy seems like a dick. [00:51:10] Speaker E: I mean, she was obviously trying to keep him busy to give you time. [00:51:13] Speaker A: To leave, of course. [00:51:18] Speaker E: So he turns and heads inside. After a few minutes, you hear footsteps, kind of hurrying down the hallway towards the doors to the stairs. And you see Becky tell Jace that we are even. [00:51:36] Speaker A: Message received. [00:51:40] Speaker E: This is crazy. You hear another, like, pop, pop, pop. And she jumps. And obviously it didn't hit her or anything, but she's obviously surprised. [00:51:51] Speaker A: A little jumpy. [00:51:52] Speaker E: A little jumpy. You head down the stairs. I assume she does not follow you. You can get yourself out. You don't need somebody to come open the door for you. Yeah. And you get to the bottom of the stairs just in time to hear, like, that heavy fist banging on the door. Which sounds pretty close to what Jace did when he brought you to the door the first time. Do you open the door? [00:52:26] Speaker A: Yes. I am going to open the door, but as a precaution, I will pull. So, essentially, the way I'm opening the door is like, I'm gonna open it, and then on my left side, I will have my gun out. So it's like hidden behind the door. So if this is Jace, he doesn't see me holding a gun at him. If this isn't, I have quick and easy way to point said gun at them. [00:52:50] Speaker E: Okay, you open the door. You do see Jace? There is a lot of blood on Jace's face and neck. His eyes are dilated. His pupils are pretty dilated. He's not breathing heavily because he doesn't have to breathe. But you get the feeling that if he did, he would be you. Good. Can we go now? [00:53:15] Speaker A: Yes, I think I know what I need to do. [00:53:18] Speaker E: All right, let's go before those fuckers show up again and again. He grabs your arm and starts pulling you back towards the car as you are running. I need you to make decks and athletics roll, please. [00:53:51] Speaker A: Okay, I will spend a willpower on this one. [00:53:59] Speaker E: Okay. [00:54:06] Speaker A: That is three successes. [00:54:08] Speaker E: All right? You barely get a chance to look up and realize what is happening. There is another rumble of multiple engines coming from around a corner. Jace grabs you and kind of swings you, and your body is kind of in this weird position where you can either go with it or you can fight it. And thankfully, your instincts don't force you to fight it like most people's would. So your legs don't get caught up in each other or anything like that. However, you are not quite graceful enough that you just like managed to move like this was all orchestrated and planned. So Jace grabs you and swings you around to put himself between you and what you realize as his whole body kind of jerks multiple times were bullets. And he just sort of grunts a little bit. We have to go. And, you know, thrusts you towards the car as he is following. There is that familiar smell of blood, but it smells kind of old because, you know, vampire gozer is growling and snarling and barking. And you all dive into the car. Jace turns it on, turns over the engine. The window closest to him gets blown out by a bullet that hits the car. And he slams on the gas and he reaches for where you realize that earlier when he was taking you to the apartment, he had put the cooler. The cooler is not there. He left the cooler at the apartment. You can see his fangs are out and he is kind of trembling from head to toe, like he is fighting, probably hunger as he is driving. And you are being rapidly pursued by multiple suv's out of this, out of this area. It is a good thing that this is not a residential neighborhood. Very good thing, because there would be cops everywhere. Oh, yeah. He manages to get a couple of rolls just to double check that they don't catch you. [00:57:05] Speaker A: I will also, I have a gun and they have tires. I will take a couple of Paul shots at their tires if that helps. [00:57:12] Speaker E: Sure. Give me decks and firearms. You are going to be at a negative one because you are in a moving vehicle and they are also moving vehicles. Okay, normally, I would make it a negative two, but you have a very hungry vampire next to you. I'm gonna say that Isabelle is well aware of the danger and is taking pains. That's two. Do you want to willpower? [00:57:43] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm gonna willpower. Still two. [00:57:49] Speaker E: Still two. Okay. You managed to blow out some headlights. Unfortunately, Jace is not exactly driving in the smoothest banner. He's a little erratic. He's swerving around. What look like they were probably potholes. He's whipping around, turns. It is not easy to hit the tires of a moving vehicle when you are in perfect conditions. It's far harder when you're moving, but you do manage to blow out a couple of headlights. It is a several minute, very intense drive before the two suv's split off in two separate directions. It's almost like there's a. There's. It's almost like there's a magic line. And they don't. They don't cross that. That intersection. And they turn off and go in opposite directions rather than pursuing you. And Jace is. There is the faintest, but still audible kind of growl coming from him as he drives. And he is white knuckling the steering wheel, which you can hear kind of creaking under his grip. [00:59:19] Speaker A: Yeah. Is he like, holding the vials? [00:59:26] Speaker E: You have the vials, babe? [00:59:28] Speaker A: Oh, I meant the vials of my blood that I gave him. [00:59:31] Speaker E: Oh, no, no, no. Those were all in your cooler, which are back at the apartment, because he took them inside with him. He did not bring them with him when he left. That was one of the roles I had to make, was to see if he had remembered, or if he had thought to bring them with him, or if, out of habit, he had taken them inside. [00:59:50] Speaker A: And at this point, as he's driving, I guess to try and calm him down. I'm going to explain what I've learned in a bare sense. I'm not going to go really into this. Technical, scientific aspects of it, of your friend was poisoned. I believe this is what we need to do. I'm gonna. When I get there, I'm gonna give them blood thinners and a transfusion to get the process started. But I'm gonna need you to get these kind of things, if possible. That'll make my job a lot easier and faster. [01:00:23] Speaker E: He kind of nods. Just make me less. Might take me a bit. I have to eat. [01:00:39] Speaker A: Well, do you need more than what I gave you? [01:00:43] Speaker E: Yeah, it's not gonna. Yeah, I'm gonna have to go out for it, won't I'll? Do my best. You keep him alive, and I'll make sure that you get whatever you need. If I don't show up, it'll be there during the day. [01:01:04] Speaker A: Okay. [01:01:06] Speaker E: And he gets you to the apartment. He does not get out with you. He just hands you his keys. There's food in the kitchen if you need anything. I gotta. And he locks. He is visibly staring at your throat for a moment and then forces his eyes away. [01:01:36] Speaker A: At least let me bring you the cooler. It'll help you take the edge off. [01:01:40] Speaker E: No, it won't. It'll make it worse. I have to get enough to really take the edge off. That'll just make me more likely to lose control. Just go. [01:01:53] Speaker A: Good luck. [01:01:56] Speaker E: And he turns and walks away. He is moving pretty stiffly. You get the feeling he's probably hurting. The back of his jacket has holes visible. You and Gozer managed to make your way inside. Make me. In intelligence and medicine, pathology does apply. And I will allow your desperation dice again if you would like them to not only administer blood thinners to a body that is actively starting to curdle on the inside, but to also start a transfusion on your own. I'll even say that you have a moment to stop and make a sandwich or something so that you've got some food to get in you at the. [01:02:43] Speaker A: Same time, because I already did draw blood from myself today. Okay, we're gonna do. We're gonna. We're gonna do it again. We're gonna use desperation. [01:03:01] Speaker C: As. [01:03:01] Speaker A: I definitely. I feel very desperate in this moment. [01:03:07] Speaker E: Oh, overreach or despair. [01:03:13] Speaker A: I really want this to work, so I am going to overreach. [01:03:19] Speaker E: Excellent. Wait until we start on. Wait until we come back on Friday and they realize that their danger is up to five. Yeah. Amazing. Okay. That is a lot of successes, though. [01:03:39] Speaker A: Is a lot I did not want to lose. Seven successes. [01:03:44] Speaker E: You manage everything. Unfortunately, what you realize as you are working is that despite the fact that you have eaten well, you've taken the steps to do the things that you need to do to promote your body's ability to create more blood. You're just not as hearty as you need to be to do this without it being a very real danger to you. [01:04:14] Speaker A: You. [01:04:17] Speaker E: However it occurs to you, as you are sitting here watching your blood slip down this tubing into this other person, into this young man, that you may have the key to fixing that in your pocket. [01:04:32] Speaker A: I do. [01:04:33] Speaker E: You do. So your options are to do this and accept that you are probably going to pass out at some point and not be conscious and God knows what'll happen while you are out. [01:04:47] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:04:48] Speaker E: Or you could take that. I don't want to say easy fix, but basically the easy fix that's in your pocket. [01:05:00] Speaker A: I think it's very much of the Isabella's thinking about this as she's watching her blood sort of slip away and is in her head. She is weighing all the pros and cons of this. There's many of them. But I think the thing that wins out in the end is I don't know what's going to happen in the long run. And if I pass out, I don't know how long I'm going to be out. I don't fully understand how kindred vite works, but I hope at least that just one taste isn't enough to completely bond me to whoever. And that maybe there's because it is a vial of blood. It is enough to keep me going and to give me this boost. So, of the couple of vials that are in my pocket, I will look at them and see which one looks probably the most healthy. The blood that looks the least old kind of idea. [01:06:08] Speaker E: Well, there are two that look like they were probably taken within an hour of meeting you. The other two look like they were probably taken a few hours before that. So none of these are old. Jace has always made it a point to try and get you has always made it a point to try and get you the best that he can, even though you're pretty sure it's not always his. You're relatively certain that these are because he seemed pretty desperate when he asked you for your help. [01:06:42] Speaker A: Well, I will take the one that looks the newest and hope that it is Jace's blood. Because then that'll be easier to deal with. And I will uncap it and I will knock it back just quickly. Just drink it. [01:07:04] Speaker E: Selen. Amazing. Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. Now, you are a little bit more familiar with the five rules than I am. Is there a special role that you have to make for ghouling somebody? Or does it just happen? [01:07:27] Speaker A: I believe the rule is you have to taste the vampire's blood a certain number of times within like a short period of time. Okay, I can have the rules somewhere really quick because I know it's it for kindred. I'm on corporal book. Open up, pastor. Okay, we got the blood bond. Okay, ghouls, any immortality? Something less for a time. Uh, gulgens. Uh, okay. Um. So aroused. Checks worth of vitae bestows the following benefits to a mortal or animal. For approximately a month. [01:08:40] Speaker E: Okay. [01:08:41] Speaker A: So it just happens, I pray. Yeah. [01:08:44] Speaker E: Yeah. Okay, cool. All right, then. Uh, Isabelle is officially a ghoul for at least a month. Yeah, very cool. Well, with that in mind, we're gonna do a little bit of a time skip, because not a whole lot happens for a while. Yeah. The blood helps you get through this and keep your head long enough to finish the transfusion. You give him a couple shots of blood thinners, more than you would ever give a normal person. But you know that ghouls are much hardier than normal people, which is something you can feel just on your own, having just taken what you took. And you finish off the transfusion, go to get more food, and you spend a good chunk of the day with this young man's body before there is a knock on the door. Probably at about one or two in the afternoon. You've fallen asleep a couple of times. You've taken a couple of short naps, but you never let yourself pass out for very long. And a knock on the door wakes you up. And when you look outside, there is. There are a couple of guys who look to be in, like. Like, you know, the jumpsuits that, like, delivery people tend to wear. And they're from some, like, you know, corporate delivery service. When you kind of crack open the door, looking very confused as to why people like this are in a neighborhood like this, they ask you if your name is. Did you give Jace your last name or just your first name? [01:10:42] Speaker A: I think you probably would just know me as is. Or is Izzy. [01:10:48] Speaker E: Okay. They ask you if your name is Izzy Smith. [01:10:55] Speaker A: Yep, that's me. [01:10:57] Speaker E: We have a delivery. Could you sign for it? [01:11:01] Speaker A: I will sign for the package. [01:11:05] Speaker E: And they bring in a large kind of heavy box. One of the guys makes kind of small talk, asks if you're like, oh, are you a nurse? Or whatever? And you realize that they are delivering some sort of medical equipment as you talk to them. These machines are not light, so they help you get it all the way back into the back bedroom. And then you kind of, as casually as you are able, get them the fuck out of the apartment so that you can get to work. Make me an int and science roll. [01:11:41] Speaker A: All right. My chemistry. [01:11:45] Speaker E: No, but you do get. Oh, wait, no, you can't, can you? I did just over. [01:11:52] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:11:53] Speaker E: Yeah. I will, however, let you add one extra die. [01:12:03] Speaker A: That is seven successes with a critical. [01:12:08] Speaker E: That's awesome. You are able to convert this machine into what you need it to be with very little issue. And you set it up to get it working. You remain at some point during all of this, you get the notification from the cell that they are leaving and you put out. You send word to your boys and ask one of them to come pick you up. Ewan Gozer. They say that they'll both come up because one of them has to get their car and take it home. But Tov is on the schedule and there are just not enough people to make it work that both of them can leave. But Patty can take a couple of days. Yeah. So you see Jace later that evening, shortly before you're due to leave. Jace does not seem to immediately clock that there is something different about you yet. But he also, you know, is very clearly not 100% yet. He has not fully healed. From what? From what happened to him. So he's moving pretty stiffly. He's in fresh clothes. But, you know, you can still kind of tell that he's not 100%. He thanks you for your help. It is obvious that the young man in the bed is making a pretty significant recovery. You give him instructions on having somebody who knows what they're doing with a machine like this come out and, you know, just bagged blood of the right type is probably fine. We're gonna, for the sake of ease, say that Isabel is a universal donor, which I think we've established in past seasons anyway. [01:14:13] Speaker A: I think I gave somebody blood in season two, so. Yeah. [01:14:16] Speaker E: Yeah. So you make it clear that he needs to get the right kind of blood. And he needs to get somebody who knows how to operate one of these machines. And if he keeps at it for a few days, the young man should be fine. And they need to be careful about not tangling with whatever the fuck it is that did this. [01:14:37] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:14:40] Speaker E: Jayce sort of nods and does something very unlike him, from what you have noticed. And he puts a hand on your shoulder, and it's like he's just gonna pat your shoulder, and then he kind of pulls you in and just barely pecks your forehead. Thanks. [01:14:59] Speaker A: Yeah, no problem. I'm glad I could help. [01:15:04] Speaker E: If I can do anything, need anything. It might be a while before I can get you samples, but you have my number. [01:15:15] Speaker A: I do. I'll let you know if I need anything. Just focus on helping your friend. [01:15:21] Speaker E: Do me a favor. Let me know if you figure out who the fuck did this. [01:15:26] Speaker A: I will. I have some hypothesis, and if they prove correct, I'll let you know. [01:15:34] Speaker E: Okay. He sees you to the door. He doesn't let you go outside until patty texts and says that he's outside. And then Jace lets you go. It's clear that he's a little concerned about you walking around in a strange, shitty neighborhood where you could get shot. [01:16:02] Speaker A: Do my feelings about Jace feel weird and mixed? [01:16:06] Speaker E: Yes. Yes, they do. You feel loyal in a way that you didn't last night. But of course you're loyal. Look at all the things that you've been through together. He took bullets for you. Of course you're loyal. Of course he was loyal to you. Why wouldn't you be loyal to him? [01:16:28] Speaker A: This is the way it goes. You know you can't trust him. You know? Who can you trust? [01:16:34] Speaker E: Exactly. Following the events that we just witnessed, Isabelle was picked up by one of her boys, and they got on the road the same time, maybe a few hours later than the crew in the RV. They do not do quite as much of a straight drive as the crew in the RV just because they don't have as many, many people. It's just. Just Isabelle and her boy and Gozer in the. In on the bike with the little sidecar. And whoever is in the sidecar kind of has to cuddle with the dog because there isn't that much space otherwise. [01:17:24] Speaker A: It's fine. [01:17:28] Speaker E: Everything's fine. While they were on the road, the rest of the crew were on their way into the midwest to find the latest victim of the darksome anatomies book and its resulting curse. They manage to find the woman's address and go into her apartment, which they found to be closer to a hoarder's apartment, with piles and piles of books and newspapers and a kitchen full of miscellaneous monster bits stored, and everything from Pyrex and tupware containers to old jam and pickle jars. The whole place smells a little musty in some rooms. Other rooms smell distinctly bloody. Arthur found a discarded knife that still had blood that hadn't been cleaned off of it. And in a spare bedroom, they found a panel in a wall hiding what is effectively a little storage crawl space. And in that space, they found the body of what looked to be a staked vampire. Arthur and Rosanna made the choice that the vampire obviously had to die. They couldn't just leave it there. Piper withdrew her drone after finding out that that's what they were up to. She didn't necessarily want to witness the kill because she wasn't sure how it would affect her ability to withstand the curse on herself and its effects. Unfortunately, Rosanna and Arthur were not as, um, lucky as they may have hoped in their abilities to draw the body out of the storage space. They dragged it. Neither of them are particularly strong, despite being the group's heavy hitters in combat. Turns out that just because you have a lot of faith and your particular gods might gift you with the ability to deliver a punch against the supernatural, you really shouldn't skip leg day. Because as they. As Arthur was dragging this body out of the crawlspace, he managed to knock loose the stake that had kept the vampire in a state where it couldn't fight back and at least seemed to be unaware of its surroundings. Where last we left off, Arthur and Rosanna watched with dawning horror as a pair of blood red eyes opened and lips curled back from broken teeth to show the that the vampire was missing a fang. Alrighty. Arthur, Rosanna, Piper. Isabel, you're not there yet, so I'm gonna hide you for a few minutes. Uh, Rosanna, Piper, and Arthur, I require all three of you to make me initiative roles. [01:21:38] Speaker C: Oh. [01:21:41] Speaker B: What are those roles again? [01:21:47] Speaker D: Dexterity and wits. [01:21:49] Speaker E: Hold on, hold on. Goodness. There should be other isn't awesome, right? Because fifth edition is weird. Yeah, let's just do it. Let's just do decks and widths. We'll use that. I mostly just need to know how. How reactive you are so that I can figure out who gets to do what. I will tell you that I rolled. Oh, boy. Six. That's not bad. Not enough to be first, but it's not bad. [01:22:33] Speaker A: Oh, good. [01:22:37] Speaker E: I'm sorry. Frenzying vampire gets a, gets a. Gets a lot of fucking dice on the ability to move fast to. [01:22:45] Speaker C: A little disappointed that a bunch of crits came up in my role, though. [01:22:50] Speaker E: I mean, you get to go first out of the players, if that helps. [01:22:54] Speaker C: Yeah, I just would have liked those on a roll that. That would pertain to not quite dying. But we'll see how it goes. [01:23:01] Speaker E: I mean, when you get to go in the order of. This may have everything to do with whether or not you die, so. [01:23:07] Speaker A: Fair? [01:23:07] Speaker C: Fair. [01:23:09] Speaker E: All right, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. Arthur and Rosanna, you both watch as these eyes snap open and lips curl back and you realize with perhaps a dawning dread that you are staring down a very, very hungry, half out of its mind vampire. And neither of you have actively hunted a vampire in a hot minute. You're both a little out of practice. You've been more concerned with werewolves and wraiths and random gods and even Fae. You haven't had to deal with a vampire in a bit. And your vampire expert isn't here. And maybe that's why you both hesitate. Because, Arthur, before you can do anything. The ankle of this thing is wrenched from your hand, and it is on its feet. And we are going to do a contested roll because it is going to attempt to grapple you, and then we will go into proper combat. Well, everybody, everybody gets one reaction. Basically, its reaction is to try to grapple, and then you two both get to do something, and then we launch into combat. [01:24:49] Speaker C: Okay, I'm contesting it with. [01:24:54] Speaker E: Uh, buh buh buh. Should be. I believe it's strength and brawl. Because it's a grapple. Check. [01:25:03] Speaker A: Fun. [01:25:04] Speaker C: Fun. I assume the boxing specialty doesn't apply here. [01:25:07] Speaker E: No, not unless you're planning to punch it and you're not really contesting the grapple itself. [01:25:13] Speaker A: Could he, I mean, do Dex athletics to dodge it? [01:25:19] Speaker E: Um, I mean, I'm not. [01:25:22] Speaker D: I'm not sure if that's how grapples. [01:25:24] Speaker E: Work, because grappling rules are always weird. Grappling rules are always weird. It's the same number of dots either way. [01:25:31] Speaker C: Well, yeah, for me, that's the same. So unless. Unless I'm hauling off and punching it as it tries to get me, that's a different role. [01:25:39] Speaker E: But otherwise, yeah, just give me four dice. All right. [01:25:48] Speaker C: Do the desperation play into a factor here? Probably not, but either way, it's three. [01:25:54] Speaker B: Physical education is what ours is. [01:25:58] Speaker C: A direct conflict. Actually, slightly different. [01:26:02] Speaker E: I would say that this qualifies as a direct conflict. Arthur, if you want to. If you want to use desperation. [01:26:12] Speaker C: Hold off for now. We'll see how it goes. [01:26:14] Speaker E: Okay, just as a general reminder, your danger is at five. Your desperation is at three. [01:26:26] Speaker C: Yeah, three successes. [01:26:28] Speaker E: Okay. Going to have vampire one. I'm just gonna use the hunter dice. Y'all don't get to know all the secrets. Ooh. You win. Barely, but it works fine. [01:26:58] Speaker B: I'm sure. [01:26:59] Speaker D: Only most of those are hunger dice. [01:27:05] Speaker E: For everybody at home. Arthur rolled three. The vampire rolled one, despite having far more dice than Arthur did. [01:27:12] Speaker C: Oh, by, like, a lot, but that's one. [01:27:15] Speaker E: That's pretty good. Nice. All right, Arthur, you have one action before you're in proper combat. What would you like to do with that? [01:27:26] Speaker C: Can it be an attack, or do you want me to do something non attacky? [01:27:31] Speaker E: This is non attacky. You don't have time to, like, shift fully into combat mentality. This is just a. You have a split second to make it to make a decision. [01:27:42] Speaker C: Hmm. I. Let's see. What would Arthur do besides throwing up his hands and trying to hold the thing back with his power? Which is more of the combat y stuff. [01:27:59] Speaker E: I mean, if you're going to try and do something purely defensive, I think I'd allow that. [01:28:05] Speaker C: Yeah. Well, I would think the defensive thing that Arthur does is in this case, would probably try to throw up his repel ward to build that gap between them. But, I mean, he's already on top of it. But keep him from being able to go further toward Rosanna kind of feel. [01:28:23] Speaker E: Okay, give me your role and I'll let you know if you succeed. [01:28:28] Speaker C: Alrighty. Let's see. [01:28:32] Speaker E: It'll be fun to see how this interacts with the fact that frenzy makes them a lot less prone to mental stuff. Did. [01:28:40] Speaker C: Did I empower the thing last time? I don't know if I did. I don't think I failed to death, but that's what I was saying, and I didn't think I did. All right, in that being the case, he's a vampire. [01:28:56] Speaker E: Swoop. [01:28:59] Speaker C: In. Plus the desperation, which is three, so 14. [01:29:09] Speaker D: You didn't add them as desperation dice. [01:29:11] Speaker E: Which means one of those is a. [01:29:13] Speaker D: Is a one on a desperation die. [01:29:15] Speaker C: My bad. [01:29:16] Speaker E: Yep. [01:29:17] Speaker B: Oh, I thought that you weren't using desperation. Oh, wait, that was for the. [01:29:20] Speaker E: No, he did use desperation for this. [01:29:22] Speaker A: Yes, it did. [01:29:23] Speaker E: Okay, not bad on that one. Do you want to go into despair or overreach? No, I'm not going to tell you if that succeeded. No, wait. This is to activate, isn't it? Yeah, you have to activate before you can do your. Your defensive stuff. [01:29:43] Speaker C: That, no, that was the. That's the role to throw up the war. Do I started just trying to throw out the. [01:29:49] Speaker E: Tell you if it succeeded or not. You have to make a choice before you know. [01:30:02] Speaker C: All right, so the question is, do I go into despair or do I push our danger up? [01:30:06] Speaker E: Uh huh. [01:30:08] Speaker D: If you go into despair, this fails automatically. [01:30:11] Speaker A: Right. [01:30:12] Speaker D: But I don't want to go above five danger this early. [01:30:17] Speaker B: Episode four is the perfect time to go up to ten. [01:30:20] Speaker E: All right. I mean, you guys did go from, what, like two to two to four left? [01:30:27] Speaker D: It went from one to four. [01:30:30] Speaker E: Yeah. One to five in one week. Awesome. [01:30:34] Speaker C: Yeah. I'll go ahead and go into despair and just automatically fail. This attempt to throw up the ward. [01:30:40] Speaker E: Awesome. I will say that that will bump your desperation up to four. [01:30:49] Speaker A: Awesome. [01:30:50] Speaker E: So at least you get something good out of it. You're not completely like everyone else gets. [01:30:57] Speaker C: Something good out of it. [01:31:00] Speaker D: Half of the cell gets something out of this. [01:31:02] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:31:02] Speaker B: Yep. [01:31:04] Speaker E: All right, Rosanna, what is your single reaction going to be? [01:31:12] Speaker B: I am going to try to get as far back as I can. And I want to throw up my repeal of the unnatural. [01:31:22] Speaker E: Okay, I'll say that you can get out of the room and down the hallway. You don't get super far because the place is super cluttered. It's misty. You're trying not to trip over things, but you can get out of the line of sight of the vampire, which is probably a good thing for you. [01:31:45] Speaker B: Yeah, I do better from a distance. [01:31:49] Speaker E: Now make your dissolve in a cult check. Huh. Again, I'm not going to tell you what you have to be. You can use your desperation. [01:32:12] Speaker B: Not right now. [01:32:13] Speaker E: Okay. [01:32:23] Speaker B: Wrong. Wrong bot. That's the. That's the v 20 bot. [01:32:37] Speaker E: Would you like to willpower that so that you have more than. Yeah, yeah, I'll throw it. [01:32:46] Speaker B: I'll throw a little time. Four. [01:32:53] Speaker E: Okay. [01:32:54] Speaker B: Not bad. [01:32:55] Speaker E: Your reward is up. You do not, for the moment, know how effective it was. Because you can't see the vampire. And the vampire's not coming after you right now anyway. [01:33:02] Speaker B: Cause it's busy with question. [01:33:05] Speaker E: Yes. [01:33:06] Speaker B: As I'm moving back, can I call out for quiet? [01:33:10] Speaker E: Um, I'm gonna say no, because you've already done two things, okay? With this. With this little mini turn that I'm giving you guys. But next time, if you would like to try and call for him, I will let you make a roll to see if you are loud enough. Cool. I saw that look. All right, uh, Piper, you don't know what's happening inside. What are you doing? Sitting. [01:33:46] Speaker D: Probably, um. Probably just. [01:33:49] Speaker E: Piper is making coffee. Piper has no idea what's going on. Piper trusts that her cellmates are competent. [01:33:58] Speaker D: Um, she. She is like. Okay, I'm gonna give them a couple minutes. If they're not back, then obviously something went wrong. Cause that thing wasn't fucking moving. [01:34:09] Speaker E: What? [01:34:12] Speaker D: Not gonna do anything right now. Yeah, they just went in there. Odd. How could they possibly have fucked it up this quickly? [01:34:22] Speaker E: Uh. Ugh. You hurt me, Piper. You hurt me so bad. [01:34:30] Speaker C: Because it's Arthur. That's how, pretty much. [01:34:34] Speaker D: But, yeah, probably starting coffee. [01:34:39] Speaker E: I love it. Cool. Piper has learned her lesson about not having coffee already made. Because then Arthur tries to make it. It always ends. Pointing Arthur. [01:34:59] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:35:01] Speaker E: There's a vampire who's practically on top of you. He's not holding you right now, but he's, you know, not. Not trying to. Trying to fuck you up. I'm so sorry. Cool. [01:35:21] Speaker B: He just wants to give you a little kiss. A little. [01:35:24] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:35:25] Speaker D: Little necking. [01:35:29] Speaker E: Hmm. [01:35:33] Speaker C: I mean, Arthur's gonna react by trying to throw his bracer arm up between him and the thing, and just do a body blow to it, to the side, to just. [01:35:44] Speaker E: Well, hold on. He gets to do stuff too. [01:35:46] Speaker C: He's doing a thing. So that's why I'm. Who's waiting? [01:35:49] Speaker E: I'm looking at Duff Carl Carr. He is going to attempt to grab you again, and you can see he is going for a bite. [01:36:18] Speaker C: Yeah. In response. Arthur's not gonna try to dodge it. He's gonna throw. Like I said, throw his arm up and just swing at the guy. Cause, you know, things are getting intense. [01:36:29] Speaker E: Well, you're welcome to try. [01:36:31] Speaker C: Yep. Without some desperation. [01:36:37] Speaker E: Make me a Dex brawl. I'm sorry. Strength brawl. My bad. Boxing will count because you're trying to take a hit at him. [01:36:51] Speaker C: Ah, so I'm not doing my magical punch, just a regular punch. [01:36:55] Speaker E: Wait, you have to sell. You have to tell me what you're doing. Activated that. [01:37:00] Speaker A: It's. [01:37:01] Speaker C: It's not. It's not activated. It just does when I do the thing against the super. [01:37:05] Speaker E: Okay, okay. You just said, I'm gonna throw up my arm and try to body block him or whatever, and I was like, okay, that doesn't. All right, cool. [01:37:12] Speaker C: You're gonna potty punch, hit him in the side with my fist of glory. This is my plan. [01:37:18] Speaker E: Okay. Go for it. [01:37:20] Speaker C: All right, so, yeah, he'll do his thing too, though. That's all right. [01:37:24] Speaker E: I'm aware. I'm rolling with physical dice. [01:37:30] Speaker C: Make sure my numbers are right. [01:37:32] Speaker E: Can't read. [01:37:34] Speaker C: Yeah, I can't read with the sunglasses. [01:37:37] Speaker B: It's true. That's not gonna stop me. [01:37:40] Speaker E: I can't read. [01:37:45] Speaker C: I'll accept it with the six successes. [01:37:49] Speaker E: All right, all right. All right. Yeah. Okay, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. Two things happen at once, Arthur. You take two levels of health damage, aggravated cause vampire, but you also land a really fucking solid blow. So while he is certainly damaged and he staggers back a little bit, he's still got hands on you, if that makes sense. [01:38:37] Speaker C: Got it. [01:38:39] Speaker E: So he's still in physical contact with you, but you managed to basically wrench his fangs free. Now, the downfall of that is that he was actively clamped onto you when you hit him, so you're bleeding a lot. [01:38:54] Speaker C: Quick, quick question. Is it two after it's halved, or is it one because of the half damage that I take from the artifact? [01:39:06] Speaker E: How does your effect work? [01:39:09] Speaker C: Physical damage is halved. [01:39:11] Speaker E: Always have. Again, for someone, physical damage is halved. Okay, so then it would be, what? My bad? [01:39:16] Speaker C: Okay, no, that's fine. I just wanted to clarify while I was clicking the boxes, I am attempting. [01:39:21] Speaker E: To manage multiple sets of mechanics. So I apologize. [01:39:26] Speaker C: I'm with you. [01:39:27] Speaker A: I'm following. [01:39:28] Speaker E: I will do my best to remember and give you the half amount in the future. [01:39:31] Speaker C: Okay, that's fine. All right. Okay, so he's clamped on, and I'm bleeding. [01:39:41] Speaker E: He has basically, his hands are wrapped around, like, your sleeves, your arms. His mouth is no longer clamped onto your neck, but you are bleeding because he had already bitten down when you knocked him off. [01:39:55] Speaker C: Got it. [01:39:55] Speaker E: Gotcha. [01:39:56] Speaker C: Yep. [01:39:57] Speaker E: You are effectively on a timer to get that taken care of, or you're gonna suffer more damage levels just because. And know your power won't save you from. [01:40:08] Speaker C: No, of course not. [01:40:10] Speaker E: Well. Cause that's just residual bleed damage. Like, there's nobody hurting you now. All right, all right, all right. Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. [01:40:24] Speaker A: Rosie. [01:40:26] Speaker C: And if I. If I can move back, I will, but just, like, one step. Not a full. Not a full. Yeah, that's fine. I am stuck. [01:40:34] Speaker B: A little love bite. It's just a little love bite between friends, between bros. Just a little gun. It's just. It's just. Listen, it's like when you kiss the homies good night. He's just kissing the homie goodnight. [01:40:47] Speaker E: All right, what are you doing with. Your turn. Okay, are you calling for quiet? [01:40:54] Speaker B: I think I'm going to kind of, like, knock my head back and. [01:41:00] Speaker E: Get. [01:41:00] Speaker B: Just, like, yell at her. [01:41:02] Speaker E: We're gonna need some extra help in here. [01:41:06] Speaker B: And then my bow. I'd want to. I want to get an eye on lover boy and take a shot. [01:41:15] Speaker E: All right, make me a d ten roll. Just a single d ten roll. Let's see how lucky you get about whether or not quiet hears you from all the way outside. [01:41:26] Speaker B: Okay, sounds good. [01:41:27] Speaker E: Because you're up the stairs in an apartment building with several walls between you and him. [01:41:31] Speaker B: No, that's her. So I'm gonna assume. No, no. [01:41:37] Speaker E: Yeah, no, he doesn't. Well, you're not sure, but pretty safe to say you weren't loud enough. No. You may have alarmed a neighbor or two, which I'm sure could only go well. [01:41:50] Speaker B: It's fine, it's fine. [01:41:53] Speaker E: Now, what are you gonna do with your actual actions? [01:41:57] Speaker B: I want to get an eye on him, and seeing as he's kind of in a struggle with Arthur right now, I'm going to pull back, keep an eye out on him, and shoot. My weapon is already empowered, so. [01:42:11] Speaker E: Okay, I'm going to tell you that you are going to be in a negative two, because Arthur is between you and him. [01:42:16] Speaker B: Okay. [01:42:17] Speaker E: And it is very crowded, so. [01:42:19] Speaker B: All right. [01:42:20] Speaker E: You have very few clear, clear paths here. [01:42:23] Speaker B: Sure. Okay. Then I'm going to probably use that desperation. [01:42:27] Speaker E: All right, go for it. Go for it. Let me see here. How many levels of danger could we get in one episode? [01:42:39] Speaker D: And how many ones come up on this desperation roll? [01:42:45] Speaker B: And you said minus two. Okay, sorry. I'm bad at math, but you didn't hire me because I'm good at math. [01:43:02] Speaker E: It is also just worth noting that moving to take the shot, you have to put. Move to the point where you could see him, which means he's also going to be able to see you. [01:43:10] Speaker B: That's fine. And we're at desperation 4554. [01:43:20] Speaker E: Yes. No, I was like, where did that. [01:43:23] Speaker C: Extra desperation come from? [01:43:25] Speaker E: No, no, no. Danger five. Desperation four. My bad. [01:43:29] Speaker C: Arthur got hurt. It's worse. [01:43:31] Speaker E: It's real desperate. Woo. Critical. [01:43:39] Speaker B: Eleven successes. [01:43:41] Speaker E: All right, very cool. [01:43:44] Speaker B: And he's, uh, he's a focus on Arthur. So I assume that that hopefully means some penalties because he's, uh, he's neckin well. [01:43:54] Speaker E: He's not neckin anymore. Arthur knocked him off. [01:43:57] Speaker B: Oh, right. [01:44:00] Speaker C: With some egg. [01:44:02] Speaker B: Love that for you. However, I believe my weapon also does ag. [01:44:09] Speaker C: Yes, it does. [01:44:10] Speaker E: Yes. However. Weird vampires are. Weird. Doo doo doo doo doo. Sorry. I'm finding the right page. All right, you see your arrow, it flies and it hits true. And you are so certain that you. You're like, there's no way this doesn't kill him. There's no fucking way this doesn't kill him. And it nails him almost, almost dead center in the middle of his chest. And you watch as wounds begin to or as it creates this hole, because essentially, your arrows aren't. They look and feel physical to you, and they seem physical when they hit the thing, when they hit an enemy. But as soon as it hits it, it, like, disappears, right? [01:45:27] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:45:27] Speaker E: Yeah. And you watch as this wound opens up in the middle of this thing's chest. And green, like, moss and vines almost seem to, like, grow out of the edges of this wound, like they are trying to sprout up from within him. And you see this grimace on his face. And again, he bears bloody, broken teeth at Arthur and then at you, and his eyes glow red. And there is a moment where you expect to see him topple. But after a moment, some of those vines start to recede back into the wound like they didn't exist in the first place. And you get the feeling that your hit was not as effective as it should have been. He's got something that makes him exceptionally good at dealing with damage that is dealt to him. Alright, guys, Rosanna had her shot. She definitely did a good chunk of damage. It just wasn't as impactful as she was hoping it would be. As if there's something strange and unusual about this particular kindred compared to others. Piper. Still casual as fuck. Making coffee, maybe prepping to see if something good, just in case. [01:47:09] Speaker D: Polishing the robot. Make sure she's in good condition. [01:47:14] Speaker E: Excellent. [01:47:14] Speaker D: Probably listening to Abba. [01:47:17] Speaker E: Arthur, you experienced something unusual that you've never experienced before. This vampire that's holding on to you just got hit really hard. You're really close. You got blood splatter on you from that arrow hitting this thing. Somehow his grip seems to have gotten stronger. [01:47:40] Speaker A: Mmm. [01:47:46] Speaker C: Don't like that. Don't like that at all. Well, shoot. [01:47:56] Speaker E: Well, shoot. I'm sorry. I love you so much. All right. You and the kindred get to get to act at the same time. [01:48:09] Speaker C: Yep. We're gonna. We're gonna have another little dance of this game here. Cause even with this realization, I don't think Arthur would back off quite yet. Not unless something bigger or major happened or things changed. Status quo. Maintain, essentially. Which means he's gonna do another attempt to strike this guy. [01:48:40] Speaker E: Yes. [01:48:46] Speaker C: Yeah. Eight successes. [01:48:48] Speaker E: That's pretty good. And that's egg. Yeah. [01:48:51] Speaker C: All of it. Yeah. Well, however much applies, this egg. [01:48:56] Speaker E: Cool. Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool. Making some notes, doing some math. I love weird powers. His turn. You definitely heard him. You could tell that you heard him. But I also have to see what. How. How successful his thing is. Get your sheet. All right, I'm going to give you an option here. Do you want to. Do you want to attempt to shake off the physicality of what he's doing, or do you want to try to avoid it, knowing that if you fail to avoid it, it's going to be really damaging. Effectively, I'm giving you the option to either dodge or soak. [01:50:27] Speaker C: Which one is that? [01:50:28] Speaker A: Weird. [01:50:29] Speaker C: Which one was the first option? Was that the dodging or the second? Okay. Of whatever he's about to do. Neither one is a good option, for. [01:50:42] Speaker E: You can either attempt to avoid it altogether, which is dodging, but if you fail, it's really, really gonna hurt. Or you could attempt to soak, which means that you'll get hit, but you have a chance to make it less effective. [01:51:05] Speaker A: Hmm. [01:51:09] Speaker C: I guess. I guess we'll soak it. Cause dodging is not one of Arthur's strong points. Also not. [01:51:22] Speaker E: I'm gonna throw it out there. That soak isn't either. [01:51:24] Speaker C: I know either one. All right, I mean, I guess. No, no, he'll try to dodge it. He'll try to dodge it, and I'll just deal with the consequences if I fail. [01:51:43] Speaker E: Cool, cool. Give me your decks and athletics. [01:51:57] Speaker C: Three. [01:51:59] Speaker E: Okay, I will roll this because it is more directly contested, and I don't want anyone telling me that I'm fudging if I beat you. It would help if I could type, and I wasn't typing in letters where there should be numbers. Okay, that is a four to your three. Something unusual happens in the moment that he's got his grip on you. He bares his fangs again, and he leans in like he's about to, to bite into you once more, and you feel a bone in your ribs, which is nowhere near. His hands crack. You take one level of egg that's already had, and you can feel the blood running down your throat a lot more plentifully. You are not going to take a level of damage from that just yet, but you are going to suffer a negative two to any physical rolls going forward because you are losing blood. So you dizzy? Okay, he looks like he's still about to bite you, but hasn't quite done it. It's like. And there's a moment where the look in his eyes, as feral and kind of mindless as it seems, almost seems a little confused. Like he's not entirely sure what just happened. Like he was gonna do one thing, but some somehow managed to do something different and isn't sure. You know what I mean? Like, he just doesn't, he doesn't know what happened exactly. Rosanna, you feel at the, at the same moment that this is happening, you feel a tug kind of at your core, like, like at your heart, where that tattoo usually is when you don't have the bow out. Um, you can feel a connection to your magic. Um, that is putting a lot of stress and strain on it. Like, whatever you shot into this thing is still there. It hasn't dissipated, and it's battling with something. You can tell that you can either maintain what you've already done by holding on to that connection, or you can release it. If you release it, you have the sneaking suspicion it's going to undo a fair bit of the day damage that you did. But you also don't know what maintaining the connection exactly means for, means for you. You just know that if you let go of that connection to this monster, it's gonna be able to heal a lot of the damage that's been done to it. [01:55:46] Speaker B: Okay, then just out of curiosity, while holding onto it, do I get a chance at another shot? Or is it like I just have to not fight? [01:55:59] Speaker E: Think of it a little bit like. Think of it a little bit like witch bolt in D and D five E. You can either maintain what you're doing, which you know is hurting it, or you can let go and hope that you don't undo everything you've already done. [01:56:17] Speaker B: Okay. If I know that I'm actively hurting it right now, I'm not going to shoot again. Can I attempt to call out to quiet one more time? [01:56:33] Speaker E: Yes, absolutely. [01:56:34] Speaker B: Okay. [01:56:37] Speaker E: I obviously don't need your screaming into your microphone, but what kind of a call are we going for exactly? Are you trying the same volume? Are you pulling out your phone? Are you screaming? [01:56:57] Speaker B: I'm gonna pull out my phone. [01:56:59] Speaker E: Okay. [01:57:01] Speaker B: I'm gonna call him, and the moment that he answers, I'm just gonna scream, so's upstairs and hang up. [01:57:14] Speaker E: Okay, cool. Neat. I need you to make me a resolve and a cult, please. Okay, I will allow desperation dice if you would like to use music. Eight successes. Good, pretty good, pretty good. You hear this thing give a screech, a feral screech of pain and anger and frustration, and you see its eyes go from Arthur, who is rapidly losing blood, to you. At the same time, you hear pop, pop, pop, and the entire apartment goes dark as a flood of magic manages to knock out the power to the building. Isabelle? [01:58:51] Speaker A: Yes. [01:58:53] Speaker E: I need you to roll me two d ten. [01:58:57] Speaker A: Two d ten. Cool. That is one success. [01:59:08] Speaker E: Okay, neat. I will tell you what that means in a moment. Okay. [01:59:19] Speaker D: How long has it been at this point? [01:59:21] Speaker E: Hold on, hold on. I have introductory, introductory talking to do before I get to ask you what you are going to do. You see, quiet for the first time since he left the rv earlier when you guys first arrived, he kind of emerges. He almost seems to materialize as you were casually looking, looking out the window at the building wanting to know where the fuck your friends are. It kind of casually materializes out of, like, foliage that's been planted around the edges of the building. Not like literally magically materializes, but, you know, somebody who's really, really good at disappearing and reappearing. It always seems magical when they do it. It's weird. And you kind of watch him and he's waving with one arm towards the rv like he's trying to get your attention. You can't hear exactly what he's saying, but he's yelling something and that's in the same moment that you watch all of the lights go out. In the same moment, the electric in the rv flickers. As the lights go out inside, your sensors go fucking buck wild for me. You're not entirely sure what just happened, but that was a really big pulse of magic. Even you felt it, and you're kind of a dead zone for it. Um, a moment later, and your phone rings, and Isabelle's face pops up on the Facebook. [02:01:09] Speaker D: Yeah, she'll answer the phone. Uh, hey. [02:01:16] Speaker A: Hey. [02:01:19] Speaker D: Please tell me you're close to where we're at. [02:01:21] Speaker E: Isabelle, you are, in fact, pretty close. You were actually calling to find out, like, the specifics? You just know a rough location. [02:01:30] Speaker A: Yeah, I think we're close. Close by. We just. Where are you? [02:01:37] Speaker D: She will give the address of the apartment complex that we're at, get here as fast as possible. I get the feeling that something went incredibly wrong. [02:01:50] Speaker A: Oh, lovely. [02:01:54] Speaker E: Isabel, I am assuming that you give Patty the address. [02:01:58] Speaker A: Yeah, well, after, like, literally, as I was told that I was. Would say it back to Patty. [02:02:05] Speaker E: Okay, Piper. In the background of Isabelle's call, you could hear the roar of a motorcycle engine as Patty takes off again at a pretty breakneck pace. You also look out the window and not Piper. Quiet is nowhere to be seen. Piper. [02:02:30] Speaker D: Did whatever happened also fuck the drone up? [02:02:35] Speaker E: Like, its lights flickered? It almost shut off, but it's fine. You get the feeling the rv, everything flickered but managed to stay on kind of thing. It's one of those little. Oh, there was a minor power surge somewhere, so my house's lights got weird for a minute. [02:02:51] Speaker B: Yep. [02:02:54] Speaker E: What would you like to do? You don't have. You. You don't have a full round. You basically, like, have enough to do, like, one thing. [02:03:14] Speaker D: I assume we have, like, combat knives or something in the rv somewhere. [02:03:20] Speaker E: That is safe to assume. Yeah, you guys have little. Have little things kind of stashed everywhere. You also have the weird murder knife that was inside in a plastic bag. [02:03:28] Speaker D: Yeah, we're not grabbing that one. [02:03:30] Speaker E: Well, okay, I considered it. I considered it fine. I guess don't do the fun thing. [02:03:39] Speaker D: No, she will grab a knife and then basically have the drone follow her for as long as it can as she starts making her way inside. [02:03:52] Speaker E: Cool, cool, cool. Arthur, it's dark. You can't see shit. All you know is that you're pretty sure you have at least one broken rib and you're being held onto by something that is preternaturally strong, and you could hear it growling in the dark. [02:04:14] Speaker C: It's still holding on to me, though, right? [02:04:16] Speaker E: Yup. [02:04:17] Speaker C: Means it's very, very close. [02:04:19] Speaker E: Mm hmm. [02:04:22] Speaker C: Hmm. [02:04:25] Speaker E: And you are fucked up right now. [02:04:27] Speaker C: Yeah. Not doing so good. My options are to try to pull away from it and move around in this hoarder's apartment in the dark. [02:04:41] Speaker E: Or to hit it. [02:04:42] Speaker C: Try to hit it. Yeah. Could try to let my arm bracelet glow to help Rosanna see better, but that would mean that also not taking, like, giving the creature spaced attack shoot. Well, yeah, I think. See, in Arthur's hud, there's two things happening. It's too much time. So he's just gonna have to choose. He's gonna swing because the other option is to just accept that he's about to die, but help Rosanna. Potentially, but he doesn't know what's going on, so I think he's just gonna attack because he doesn't know where Rosanna is. She went back somewhere and disappeared in the dark, so. [02:05:59] Speaker E: Okay. Just gonna try at negative two. [02:06:04] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. And while he's doing this, he's gonna be thinking very much about Caitlyn's face and trying to get back to her for date night and how he can't die here because he has to make up for the Zoom date night they had. [02:06:28] Speaker E: Did I or did I not give you an advantage? [02:06:33] Speaker C: You gave me the ability to basically do reroll on the willpower things. [02:06:40] Speaker E: Okay. Okay. [02:06:41] Speaker C: Yeah. Which is what I was prefacing, because I'm gonna do that right now. [02:06:46] Speaker E: Okay. [02:06:49] Speaker C: Yeah, kind of helped. That's five successes. [02:06:55] Speaker E: Eight. Oh, it's dark, so you don't know how much damage you did. You know, you hit him. It was a really solid hit. But you don't know how much damage you took. [02:07:10] Speaker A: Mm hmm. [02:07:16] Speaker E: Roll. My own dies. Not great. Okay, okay, okay. What are you at for damage right now? [02:07:31] Speaker C: Too aggravated so far. [02:07:33] Speaker E: Okay, you take one more. You're getting very lucky that he's rolling so low. He's not rolled. Well, he's not rolled. Great. You feel fangs sink into your shoulders. He is struggling to find your neck in the dark. [02:07:57] Speaker C: Well, that's good, Rosanna. [02:08:02] Speaker E: You feel after that burst of magic, that the connection is gone. You can attack again if you would like. [02:08:09] Speaker B: Wonderful. I will. Wrong dice, bot. [02:08:30] Speaker E: Are we using desperation? [02:08:35] Speaker B: Yes. [02:08:37] Speaker E: Okay. Let's hope you continue to get lucky. Let's hope. [02:08:56] Speaker B: Ten. Still growing the desperation. [02:09:02] Speaker E: All right. [02:09:06] Speaker C: I mean, ten is ten out of ten. [02:09:08] Speaker E: Actually, I was gonna ask, do you want to spend a willpower and reroll some of those failures? Okay. 14 critical. Okay. All right. Arthur? [02:09:30] Speaker C: Yeah? [02:09:32] Speaker E: You feel something hot buzz by the side of you. It's like getting a sunburn because you were out in the sun all day in the middle of summer. It is that kind of not unbearable, but deeply uncomfortable kind of burn as something goes by your side. And you feel the body of this thing twitch and jerk as whatever it is impacts with it. The fang and teeth dislodge from your shoulder. You feel another gush of blood. And then the hands that are holding on to you loosen and you hear a thud. As you assume this body hits the ground, you can't see anything, but you assume that that's what's happened. Immediately afterwards. I need you to make a willpower roll of your unspent willpower. [02:10:54] Speaker C: Sure. [02:10:57] Speaker E: To see if you can stay on your feet. [02:11:00] Speaker C: Either way, I'm gonna stumble and hold my neck as I make this roll. [02:11:06] Speaker E: And your shoulder. You're bleeding from both places. Now, your neck is the more dangerous option, but I want to see if you could stay upright. Two. Okay, barely. You are swaying on your feet. You are. I'm going to say that you take bashing because now that you are not worried about the thing holding on to you, you are trying to stem the bleeding the best that you can. So you're not taking ag right now, but you're still not in great shape. You're still actively taking damage from the blood. Rosanna, you hear something crash. Well, you hear the thud of something hit the floor, but then you hear a crash and the stumble of human footsteps. Well, of footsteps. [02:11:59] Speaker B: All right, I'm going to throw on my flashlight and run towards that sound. And do I see Arthur clinging onto bits and pieces. [02:12:10] Speaker C: He's holding onto his neck as best he can and just kind of leaning against the wall. [02:12:16] Speaker B: Okay. Okay. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit. [02:12:19] Speaker E: This is around the same time that the front door of the apartment bursts open and a light from what you realize is probably a flashlight that's on. Quiet's rifle is on and sweeping, sweeping the apartment as he is with the rifle at his, at his eye. [02:12:39] Speaker B: I'm going to run to Arthur and, like, have him study himself on my body. All right. All right. We're going to get you safe. We're going to get you quiet. [02:12:52] Speaker E: That's not. [02:12:53] Speaker A: Or cat as well as I'd hoped. [02:12:55] Speaker E: Quiet is going to. He hurries over and he basically thrusts the rifle at you, Rosanna. And then bends down and literally hauls Arthur over his shoulder in what you realize is a combat carry and starts to tote Arthur out of the apartment. [02:13:17] Speaker C: The only thing Arthur's gonna say as he's being carried is, I'll try not to bleed on you. [02:13:22] Speaker E: Eh, you wouldn't be the first. Certainly won't be the last. Although it's funny that you got jokes. That's, that's, that's never a bad sign, which is not a convincing, convincing. [02:13:36] Speaker C: Uh, I've got maybe two more before I go out. [02:13:42] Speaker E: You shut the fuck up. You're not going anywhere. Um, Rosanna, I'm assuming that you follow. [02:13:53] Speaker B: Yeah. [02:13:55] Speaker E: There is blood all down the hallway. You see blood coating the back of Quiet's shirt from where he's holding Arthur, but he's moving as fast as he can in cluttered and very cramped and dark surroundings. Quiet. Quiet is remarkably good on his feet, considering he can't fucking see much and is depending on your kind of shaky flashlight that is mostly being blocked out by his own body to get him from one end of the apartment to the other. You guys get out into the hallway. People are bursting out of their apartments. Well, I don't want to say bursting, but they are opening the doors of their apartments to look out at you guys. And there are alarmed faces when they see the blood. And people are clearly pulling out their phones like they are calling 911. Is there anything that you want to do about that? [02:14:59] Speaker B: She's just going to turn. And, ladies and gentlemen, it's okay. He just got, he just got attacked by a really, really, really bad dog. We're gonna take him to the hospital, I promise. There is no need to put out your phones. Just, just please, just go back. We've got this taken care of. We have a paramedic in our friend group. He will be okay, I promise. Just put your phones away. [02:15:28] Speaker E: Um, make me a let's do manipulation and subterfuge roll. [02:15:40] Speaker B: Okay. Can I add my looks for this. [02:15:44] Speaker E: Or no, I will allow you to add one extra dye for your looks, mostly because you're a mess, so you're not getting the full effect. Yeah, and there's blood everywhere. You've got a lot working against you here. [02:15:59] Speaker B: Fair? Fair. Sex critical. [02:16:11] Speaker E: That's pretty fucking good. Rosanna's on a goddamn roll. During the mini session. It was Isabelle during. During the session. It's Rosanna. All right. Very cool. It seems like for the most part, people listen. Most of the doors close. You're not sure if it's just because people don't want to get involved in the weirdness that's going on or if they genuinely believe you and you don't know what's happening once the doors are shut. [02:16:43] Speaker B: Okay. [02:16:48] Speaker E: I assume, following that, you rush downstairs to see what's going on. [02:16:53] Speaker B: Yes. [02:16:54] Speaker E: All right, cool. Piper, you are halfway across the parking lot. Well, I don't want to even say halfway across the parking lot. You've crossed the parking lot. You were at the front door in time to see quiet coming down the last few stairs with Arthur slung over his shoulders. Blood is everywhere. You're not sure if any of it is quiet, but, you know, a lot of it is Arthur's. Based on the way he looks, he is gray. [02:17:30] Speaker A: Damn it. [02:17:31] Speaker D: All right, get him into the rV. [02:17:32] Speaker E: Get him into the stairs. Your room. [02:17:33] Speaker D: Isabel's almost here. [02:17:35] Speaker E: Thank fuck. All you hear, is he. Is he rolling? That's good. [02:17:41] Speaker C: That's good. [02:17:42] Speaker E: Shut up. [02:17:46] Speaker C: Yep. [02:17:46] Speaker D: Piper immediately turns on her heel and runs towards the rv to start getting things at least kind of set up. [02:17:52] Speaker B: Okay. [02:17:54] Speaker E: Um, Piper? [02:17:58] Speaker D: Yeah? [02:17:59] Speaker E: Do you have anything in medicine? [02:18:06] Speaker D: No, she's mostly just making sure the place is clear. [02:18:09] Speaker E: Okay. All right, cool. Make me a composure, and I guess we'll go insight check. [02:18:20] Speaker D: All right. [02:18:21] Speaker A: Okay. [02:18:22] Speaker C: Arthur's gonna point at something. He has one dot in medical. Pretty sure he needs some of that. That's not all he's gonna do. [02:18:30] Speaker E: Arthur vaguely points at a roll of gauze that happens to be sitting on the counter. [02:18:37] Speaker D: I got three successes. [02:18:39] Speaker E: All right, you managed to get them inside. You get the lights on in the little surgery half ass surgery room that you guys have built. You grab the roll of gauze. You remember to unwrap it before you try to use it here. [02:19:02] Speaker B: Doesn't have a kind of bashing. [02:19:06] Speaker E: And then press this wad of fresh gauze to the side of Arthur's neck. There isn't a whole lot that you. [02:19:17] Speaker B: Can do, but beyond that, I'm going to rush to. I assume that we have him lying down somewhere. [02:19:27] Speaker E: I mean, he is sitting in, effectively, one of those, like, he's been laid out on what is effectively like, a rolling gurney that's been locked into the middle of the surgery room. [02:19:38] Speaker B: Yeah. Okay. She's just gonna rush and kind of cramp to sit by his side, and I'll take his hand. You aren't allowed to die yet, boy. [02:19:55] Speaker D: Hey, before we talk about people dying, what's the situation on police? [02:19:58] Speaker A: Are they coming? [02:19:58] Speaker D: Do I need to stop them? [02:20:00] Speaker B: I think I got them cut off. Pass it off as a dog attack. It's fine. [02:20:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [02:20:08] Speaker C: And then gozer shows up. [02:20:10] Speaker E: Perfect. I'll do me a favor. Just roll me, like, five dice. I'm gonna have you roll to see if quiet can help with triage at all. Yeah, he can't do much, but he has a little bit of combat medic training. [02:20:32] Speaker C: Not much, just enough to rip that gauze out and throw it in a hole, that kind of thing. [02:20:40] Speaker E: He basically barely manages to prevent Piper from cutting off Arthur's air in an effort to try to stop the bleeding on Arthur's neck. He's just like, whoa, he can't breathe. And that's kind of how that goes. [02:20:59] Speaker C: It's fine. [02:21:02] Speaker D: Shut the fuck up. [02:21:07] Speaker E: Isabelle, you and Patty pull into a completely dark apartment complex. The lights outside aren't on. The building is completely dark. It's all really fucking unsettling. And perhaps what is most unsettling about it is that the only source of light is coming from the rv. And if you didn't know that that was your rv, it would be almost like aliens. You'd be like, what the fuck? [02:21:37] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm gonna head towards the rv. Seeing light there. I don't want to call out, because I don't want to draw attention to us, but, yeah, I mean, I'm sure pretty much everyone heard the motorcycle pull up. It's not exactly quiet. [02:21:52] Speaker E: Oh, yeah. [02:21:53] Speaker D: Piper kind of pops her head out. Get the fuck in here. [02:21:57] Speaker E: Piper is covered in. [02:21:58] Speaker A: What's going on? Okay, what the fuck is going on, Piper? [02:22:03] Speaker E: The second Isabel gets close, all your sensors go ballistic. You hear the tone that suggests that something, um, undead ish has come up. It's not as strong and loud as a vampirestone is to you. Um, but it's definitely there. [02:22:25] Speaker C: Yeah. [02:22:26] Speaker E: Let me. [02:22:26] Speaker A: I will. [02:22:27] Speaker D: I will do the role for, uh, sense the unnatural, because at this point, Piper is, uh, on edge. [02:22:34] Speaker E: Oh, that's fair. I didn't. I forgot that there was a role you might hear to then. Sorry. My bad, guys. [02:22:40] Speaker D: No, you're good. [02:22:41] Speaker E: I think before. We just always rolled that you had it up at the beginning of the fucking session, and I haven't thought about it a long time. [02:22:47] Speaker A: I think we've used it this season. [02:22:49] Speaker E: Nope. [02:22:50] Speaker D: Nope. Has men used this season? [02:22:51] Speaker A: All right, I have. [02:22:53] Speaker D: Don't have a great pool for it. I don't think that's enough to get shit. Yeah, that's nothing. I need three to five. [02:23:03] Speaker E: Awesome. For the moment, you don't hear shit. You just. [02:23:07] Speaker A: You see, Isabelle, my secret stays. Secret pearl, that would have been something. [02:23:12] Speaker D: That she just kind of did. Like, while everything is happening, like, okay, do we have people coming for us that are going to try to kill us? [02:23:20] Speaker E: Immediately. Right. Gotcha. Okay. Isabelle, you burst into this tiny little surgery. It's very cramped because Piper is here, Rosanna's here. Quiet is here. Here. Quiet is holding gauze on the side of Arthur's neck. It is rapidly becoming soaked in blood, but he at least is not pressing in a way that is going to damage Arthur's windpipe. So that's something. [02:23:46] Speaker A: Yeah, we'll definitely look at. Just saying, if you are not a medical professional, please get out. [02:23:52] Speaker C: What's up, doc? [02:23:54] Speaker D: That's not a request. If you're not a medical professional, get the fuck out. [02:23:57] Speaker A: I need space to work. [02:24:02] Speaker E: Quiet looks like he wants to go, but is also the only one keeping Arthur from bleeding out on the table, so he just sort of stands there. [02:24:09] Speaker A: Does Patti have any medical experience? [02:24:14] Speaker E: About as much as quiet does. [02:24:16] Speaker A: No. I at least have one of them in here to hand me things. And if I need somebody to hold. [02:24:24] Speaker E: Gauze down, Patty kind of pokes his head in, realizes what is happening and. And holds a hand out to Rosanna. Come on, love. It'd be all right. Let the doctor work, chill, get up and go. Hey, Rosanna. [02:24:44] Speaker C: I'll be all right. [02:24:47] Speaker A: Please don't talk, Arthur. [02:24:52] Speaker E: Patty throws an arm around Rosanna's shoulders and just sort of leads her away from the rv to give her. To get some space and give her the opportunity to break down if she needs to. Rosanna, you catch the look from quiet that he's. That effectively says he's not going anywhere. He's not just going to bail the second Isabel shows up, he's going to stay and be whatever help he can be. Plus, you know, bleeding. He's got to stop that. Yeah, Piper, I assume you shuffle out too. [02:25:28] Speaker D: Piper is going to wash her hands and then he probably has some security footage that she needs to scrub. [02:25:34] Speaker E: Well, so you wash your hands in the other part of the rv because there isn't enough space for you to do it in the surgery. Yeah. Okay, cool. [02:25:45] Speaker D: At least to get most of the blood off before she starts doing shit at her computer. [02:25:50] Speaker E: Yeah. Well, I will come back to you in that case. Isabel, I need int and medicine, please. [02:26:01] Speaker A: Pathology count as well? [02:26:04] Speaker E: No, this is emergency medicine. [02:26:06] Speaker A: You're not diagnosing anything. And do I get bonuses from having the surgery? Surgery? The thing for the safe house? [02:26:13] Speaker E: Yes. [02:26:14] Speaker A: Okay. How many dice is that? [02:26:16] Speaker E: Uh, just one, I believe. It's not a full. It's not a full surgery, so. [02:26:21] Speaker A: Great. [02:26:24] Speaker C: Uh, doc, what are the chances I actually make it out of this? [02:26:28] Speaker A: Probably very high. Stop talking yes, but also, please stop talking. [02:26:34] Speaker E: It's real hard to keep you from bleeding out when your neck keeps. Keeps moving. [02:26:41] Speaker A: Is this a thing I can use desperation on? [02:26:50] Speaker E: You know what? If you really wanna, I'll allow it. [02:26:54] Speaker A: What is our desperation up to? [02:26:56] Speaker E: Four. Yeah. [02:27:04] Speaker D: This is like repairing. [02:27:09] Speaker E: Human body meat repairs. [02:27:12] Speaker A: I mean, that would push me up to force. [02:27:14] Speaker E: I let Zephyr augment himself with a ghost on the fly in the field. I'll allow Isabelle to repair a meat suit. [02:27:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [02:27:27] Speaker E: Even if its name is Arthur. [02:27:30] Speaker A: I. Oh, God. I think I'm going to not use desperation because it would be great for have 14 dice, but I don't want to risk it. [02:27:44] Speaker E: You don't want to risk it for the biscuit? Really? [02:27:47] Speaker A: I really don't bisquick. [02:27:53] Speaker C: While this is happening. That is trying to respond, but he can't speak or nod, so he just kind of using his eyes. [02:28:00] Speaker E: Oh. [02:28:01] Speaker A: I probably would have started off by giving you some sort of painkiller. I got seven successes with the critical, but just because I want to see how far I can push it, I'm going to spend a willpower to reroll some of the dice. [02:28:13] Speaker E: Okay. [02:28:15] Speaker A: Seven successes with a critical. [02:28:19] Speaker E: All right. Not bad. Not bad at all. Let me double check. Because there's rules for healing egg with medicine. How many levels did you hit, Arthur? [02:28:43] Speaker C: I had three egg. [02:28:49] Speaker E: Okay, Isabelle, what's your medicine at? How many? [02:28:54] Speaker A: My medicine is at four. [02:28:57] Speaker E: Okay, Arthur, two of those levels of ag are converted to convert aggravated damage to superficial. So two of them become superficial. [02:29:29] Speaker B: Okay. [02:29:35] Speaker E: You are able to stabilize Arthur. He still has, I believe, what, one level of ag? And now he's got, what, three levels of superficial? [02:29:50] Speaker C: Two. [02:29:54] Speaker E: Didn't he take a level inside? [02:29:57] Speaker D: I think he took one on the way out from the bleeding? [02:30:00] Speaker E: Yep. [02:30:01] Speaker C: Oh, okay, then. Yes. Three. [02:30:03] Speaker E: Okay, cool. [02:30:04] Speaker C: I missed that. [02:30:05] Speaker E: Anything more than that, and he needs proper hospitalization or long term risk even. This is gonna take time to fully heal. But you've gotten him to the point where he's not at any risk of dying. He's gonna have a nasty scar. Multiple nasty scars, really. And it's gonna take a hot minute for him to recover all the blood that he's lost. But he's stable. And you can get him hooked up to the fluids. [02:30:41] Speaker A: Yeah. [02:30:50] Speaker E: Rather than draw the scene out to discuss everything. You get him stabilized, you get him cleaned up the best you can with what little you have. Quiet washes most of the blood off of his arms and hands. And then he. Eventually he will call for Patty. So that they can move him inside. But first we're going to transition over to Rosanna and Patty during the surgery that is going on. He's gonna be all right. You know, Iz, she's the best. Breath, love. And seeing Rosanna break down, he just sort of wraps his arms around her and rubs her back. I should have done more. [02:32:28] Speaker B: I should have done more. I should have done more. I couldn't protect him even if I wanted to. [02:32:37] Speaker E: He might have been the only reason he survived. Something tells me he wouldn't have made it out there, out of there, if he'd been by himself. Listen, I've been in a fair bit of scrapes, kind of what I've done my whole fucking life. You can't dwell on what you should have done after the fact and blame yourself for every little thing that goes wrong. You'll just rip yourself apart and you won't be any good to him later when he needs you. You did what you could. Yeah. In the moment, you did everything you could think of. [02:33:27] Speaker B: Yeah. [02:33:28] Speaker E: Yeah. Put everything you had into it. And is he alive? Then? You did everything you could do and there was no should. You already did more love. That's why he's living, right? [02:34:03] Speaker B: Sorry. [02:34:04] Speaker E: Don't you apologize. You need to break down. You can break down. Break down on me. Just don't go blaming yourself for something you couldn't tell. [02:34:21] Speaker B: It's just a year ago. He's in the same position as him. [02:34:32] Speaker E: Hi. And I bet he had similar thoughts. That he should have done more, should have been faster. [02:34:39] Speaker B: Yeah, maybe. [02:34:42] Speaker E: But you've both walked away. That's a blessing. Take it. [02:34:54] Speaker B: I should. He's got one of the best damn doctors in there. I swear to go. [02:34:59] Speaker E: He does this lot of things. And I know she can come across as cold, but that coldness is what makes her so fucking good at what she does. Doesn't get emotional. [02:35:14] Speaker B: Yeah. [02:35:17] Speaker E: I could never do what she does. I think you could. I think you do in your own way. From what I've seen, you're the glue that holds these fuckers together. Yeah, well. [02:35:46] Speaker B: I just. I love them all so much. [02:35:57] Speaker E: I don't think we'd be here if a lot of you didn't love each other. I know. I wouldn't be. No offense, but I think we would have been able to drag Izzy off if she didn't. Uh, loves the Latoya as much as she does. [02:36:17] Speaker B: Yeah, probably. Thank you for keeping her safe. [02:36:27] Speaker E: Drag a little bit. Not that she particularly needs me to. She's, um, pretty damn defective. But, uh, as long as she needs me, I'll be there. Piper. Insub int and technology security systems, please. [02:36:52] Speaker D: Hell yeah. [02:37:01] Speaker A: I'm on discord. [02:37:17] Speaker E: Let me go. Let me go look at my edge real quick. [02:37:22] Speaker D: Let me go see if I need to. [02:37:26] Speaker E: Oh, this isn't to gain access. This is for something different. Remember the powers that you can't gain access to? Shut the turned off? [02:37:41] Speaker D: No, I'm not going to use a willpower on this. [02:37:44] Speaker E: Okay, well, you go in to the rv, to the main part, clean yourself up, and then sit down, thinking, oh, I'm gonna go scrub, scrub some security footage, only to realize belatedly that if there's any security security footage to be scrubbed, you can't get to it because there's no power to the building right now and everything inside is turned off. That said, you realize very belatedly as you are just kind of doing your general checks to see if there's been any emergency reports or anything that you. You need to be aware of, that there was at least one call made from the building after Rosanna to talk people out of making calls to 911. It was directed to 911. It is unclear to you if the call went through, however, something went weird with it after it connected? [02:39:01] Speaker C: Yes. [02:39:05] Speaker D: She'll kind of look towards the surgery. Hey, Isabel, is he in a state where you can be moved? [02:39:13] Speaker A: Is he in a state where he can be moved? [02:39:19] Speaker E: Piper rolled me in d ten. Just one. And yeah. You realize this around the time that Isabel is putting in the last stitch that is preventing Arthur from bleeding out? Arthur, you are unconscious. My dude. [02:39:43] Speaker A: You have the good pain drugs, though. [02:39:45] Speaker E: Yeah, you do. You have good drugs. That's part of why you're unconscious and you're not, like, in and out because you're in agony. [02:39:52] Speaker C: Got it. [02:39:56] Speaker A: Yeah, I'll definitely answer. Just like he is now. [02:40:00] Speaker E: Cool. [02:40:00] Speaker D: We need to leave now. [02:40:03] Speaker A: Okay, let's get him into the bed. [02:40:11] Speaker E: Patty looks down at Rosanna, gives her one more hug, a quick squeeze, kisses her on top of the head, and then hurries over to the RV to help quiet move, effectively remove the top of the gurney from the legs that it is attached to so that they can carry Arthur up and into the proper part of the RV. It is as they are getting him into bed. And I'm assuming Piper is climbing into the driver's seat to start to pull out because there just isn't time to wait for people to get settled. That a pair of headlights from a single sedan pull into the, um, parking lot and park kind of sideways across the entrance to effectively block it. [02:41:17] Speaker A: You said sedan? [02:41:19] Speaker E: Yes. [02:41:20] Speaker A: Like a police. Not a police car. [02:41:23] Speaker E: It does not have police markings on it. No, it is a. It is a basic ass black sedan. [02:41:32] Speaker A: Hmm. Seeing that, can I see that from where I am? [02:41:44] Speaker E: I'll say you can look out the window. You can't see who's in it, but you can see that there is a black sedan parking and blocking the exit. [02:42:00] Speaker A: Yeah, gonna clean up the surgery faster. [02:42:11] Speaker E: I mean, you could be in the surgery. They could pull away. It's just gonna be really uncomfortable for you once things. If things get moving. [02:42:18] Speaker C: Oh, no, I just didn't want them. [02:42:19] Speaker A: To walk over to the surgery and. [02:42:21] Speaker E: See these random people. [02:42:22] Speaker A: People walk through the surgery and see a table covered in blood. [02:42:25] Speaker E: Understood. Is anybody gonna do anything? Are you guys just gonna stare at the. At the sedan that's blocking the way out? [02:42:39] Speaker D: It's probably gonna be more suspicious if we don't go talk to him. Viper is gonna flick bikini to. So the RV is on but not. [02:42:49] Speaker E: Running, and move to leave. [02:42:52] Speaker D: Make sure the knife is not on her person. Her hands are up. [02:42:57] Speaker A: She walks out the door. I think Isabel will also go because she has kind of an idea of who this could be. And if it is who she thinks it could be, having her connections would probably be a good thing right now. [02:43:16] Speaker B: And Rosanna will also follow out after looking back to Patty and quiet and just make sure he's good, and then she'll follow them. [02:43:35] Speaker E: You guys climb out of the suv or not out of the suv. Out of the RV in time to see two men in suits climb out of the sedan to Piper and Isabel, specifically, but also a little bit to Rosanna. These guys have government written all over them. These are cheap black suits, comfortable, but still professional. Shoes. You know, the kind that they can run in if they need to, that sort of thing. One of them pulls out a badge and holds it up as you guys get closer. It is an. Hold on. I have to double check something because I have to see who showed up. Sorry, sorry. It's almost like I've statted out a bunch of these guys, and I have to figure out who's gonna show up for this particular part of the country. Um, gonna go ahead, pop. He's not here right now. Right there. [02:45:20] Speaker A: It's epi. [02:45:21] Speaker E: He is epi. Big. Y'all can't see it at home, but Scott is nodding at us vigorously. I apologize, Isabel. Make me an intelligence and academics. Yeah, actually, Piper, I will allow the same thing. You're in despair, though. Right? [02:45:51] Speaker C: Yep. [02:45:51] Speaker D: So I can't do. [02:45:52] Speaker E: What do you need to get out of despair? [02:45:54] Speaker D: Uh, let me go pull up the actual wording. [02:45:58] Speaker E: Right? You have to. You have to. [02:46:01] Speaker D: Uh, yeah, let me go pull up the actual wording on it because it's weird. [02:46:06] Speaker A: It's funky. [02:46:09] Speaker D: The cell must hurt their quarry or a similar creature, either directly or by proxy. [02:46:13] Speaker E: Oh, you're no longer in despair. [02:46:15] Speaker A: Yeah, I have three successes. [02:46:19] Speaker E: Okay. I will also allow you to make an INt in academics. And if you would like to add desperation, you are allowed to. [02:46:28] Speaker A: Maybe you should have stayed in the rV. [02:46:32] Speaker D: Oh, 100%. But nobody else seemed to be going out. Um, no, no, that. [02:46:44] Speaker E: Uh. [02:46:45] Speaker D: Fuck yeah, I'm gonna do it. [02:46:47] Speaker E: Okay, let's go. Oh, shit. Immediately rolls ones on their desperation dice. Do you want to overrate your despair? [02:47:04] Speaker D: So here's the problem. This will put us up to danger seven. [02:47:07] Speaker E: Yep. Yep. This is. [02:47:18] Speaker D: This is not a decision I'm gonna make on my own. How do y'all feel about danger seven? [02:47:22] Speaker B: Please don't put us at danger seven on episode four. [02:47:26] Speaker E: Cool. [02:47:26] Speaker D: Looks like I'm going back into despair then. [02:47:31] Speaker A: We'll fist fight someone later and we can get you out of despair. [02:47:34] Speaker E: Yeah, let fist fight someone later. [02:47:37] Speaker B: These guys may end up being our query next. So there you go. [02:47:41] Speaker E: All right. Click. All right, cool. You choose to spare. Yeah, that just looks like it. Like somebody with an FBI badge. FBI agent. That's weird. But, hey, you're not dealing with FBI. From what Rosanna told you about the second acquisition and first light, that's NSA and CIA. Isabel, how many did you roll? [02:48:07] Speaker A: Three. [02:48:10] Speaker E: Something about the badge looks off. You're not entirely sure what, but it looks weird. [02:48:18] Speaker A: Um, I definitely think Isabelle will go. How can we help you? [02:48:31] Speaker E: Well, you all got lucky. Out of curiosity, what's your name? [02:48:44] Speaker A: Oh, God. I was like, if we were working with second inquisition. [02:48:51] Speaker E: Well, you are. You're, like, kind of directly employed, so. [02:48:57] Speaker A: I was just having a moment of. Would Isabel lie here? I don't think she would. [02:49:02] Speaker E: Okay. [02:49:04] Speaker A: It simply is, because if we lie and they figure that out, that's gonna cause more problems for us later. And if these people are people who I think they might be, it'd be better for me to tell the truth. And I'll just say, I'm doctor Isabel Moran. [02:49:20] Speaker E: And you, ma'am. They look at Piper. [02:49:28] Speaker A: I realize. [02:49:28] Speaker D: I don't think I ever actually establish. I think I established that Piper is her mask name. And she just goes by that constantly. [02:49:37] Speaker E: Huh. [02:49:39] Speaker D: So, yeah, she'll introduce herself. Piper ash. [02:49:45] Speaker E: And they look at Rosanna. [02:49:53] Speaker B: Doctor Rosanna Labelle. [02:49:59] Speaker E: Character. Does Rosanna have her doctorate? [02:50:02] Speaker A: She does. [02:50:03] Speaker B: It's in her backstory. [02:50:05] Speaker E: Oh, right. We just never talk about it. I hadn't thought about that in three. In almost three years now, basically, since we started running this. Yeah, yeah. [02:50:15] Speaker B: Nope, she's got her. She's actually got her doctorate in occult science, so. [02:50:21] Speaker E: Love it, love it, love it. Okay. One of them steps away, back around to the other side of the car. You could see them put their phone to their. To their ear, and we're talking quietly into it. The other looks over the three of you, sees the blood on Piper's shirt and on Isabel. Because Isabel just did surgery, there's no way she had time to change. [02:50:53] Speaker A: Sadly, the shirt. I liked this shirt. [02:50:55] Speaker E: Things get dicey. [02:50:59] Speaker A: Someone, one of our friends, got a little injured. They'll be fine. Just one of those places that bleeds a lot. [02:51:16] Speaker E: Uh huh. [02:51:19] Speaker A: Just needs fluids and to sleep. [02:51:28] Speaker E: There's a moment where he's just sort of staring at all of you, and the other one comes back around and murmurs into his ear, and he looks at Isabel. Would you like to explain to us why you are at the apartment complex of one of our, and why the neighbors are making panicked calls to 911 about a bad dog bite? [02:52:06] Speaker A: Isabel's gonna, like, look at the others about that. She knows basically why we're here. We've been tracking a item that we think may have fallen into your Un subs possession recently. And I believe that one of our friends found something a little more than they bargained for. I'm not exactly 100% sure of the details of what happened. I only just arrived in time to help the others. [02:52:49] Speaker E: Does your friend require hospitalization? [02:52:59] Speaker A: Trying to decide if, in the end, she is a doctor. She has made some sort of hippocratic oath. [02:53:10] Speaker E: He'll recover on his own without going to a hospital. It's just gonna take a lot longer. [02:53:15] Speaker A: If he doesn't go. Yeah, if she felt like he was in danger, she might say yes, but she'll just be like, I. More than capable of patching up someone. They'll be fine. [02:53:39] Speaker E: Okay, well, we find ourselves in an awkward moment, ladies. You're on the payroll. And he points at Isabelle. You're not. And he points at Rosanna. You're definitely not. [02:54:11] Speaker A: There are specialists that I. Oh, we. [02:54:15] Speaker E: Know who you are. All three of you. Okay, here's what's going to happen. Normally. Normally, we'd bring you in right now, process you, get you on the track to either being a part of the payroll where we can keep an eye on you or making sure that you are no longer dangerous to the public. But seems someone like a word with the members of your little group. And they're a lot higher up the food chain than it's worth my time to fight. So I'm going to provide you all with cards. And over the next week or two, you should be receiving individual phone calls and meeting times. One of them will also be provided for your companion. Mister Dent, is it? [02:56:03] Speaker A: Yes. [02:56:08] Speaker E: Do yourselves a favor. Don't conveniently lose these. We can and we will find you if we have to. And it'll be a far less pleasant conversation if that's what it comes to. And the one who made the phone call goes back to the car, comes out with three or four business, what look like business cards, and hands them over. [02:56:45] Speaker A: What do they say? [02:56:50] Speaker E: All they have is a phone number on them. But the first thing you notice when they're in your hand is that they are very, very thick paper. And they feel. They feel heavier than they should for paper, not by a ton, but like, you know, it's like the difference between printer paper and cardstock is effectively what you're dealing with. [02:57:17] Speaker A: It's not a number I recognize. [02:57:20] Speaker E: No. It is recommended that you all make sure that you have secured lines available. I'm sure Miss Ash can make that happen, or, you know, don't and just make it easier. That's fine, too. Now, you all should get in your little bus and get out of here. We'll deal with the mess as we usually do. [02:58:06] Speaker A: Have a wonderful night. [02:58:13] Speaker E: The one that was on the phone gets back into the car and pulls the car out of the way, while the one that did most of the talking heads towards the building. And you all are free to get back into the rv and leave, if that's what you would like to do. The boys will climb onto the bikes so that they can get them out of the way. [02:58:44] Speaker A: Yeah, I'll go in and I imagine, yeah, I'm gonna monitor Arthur's condition, and I feel like I'm going to be getting a phone call. So I think I'm mentally preparing myself for that phone call. [02:59:08] Speaker E: All right, who's driving and whoa here? Better question. Isabella is mentally preparing herself and probably looking in on Arthur to make sure that Arthur is stable and good. Piper, what are you doing? [02:59:27] Speaker D: If Rosanna looks like she's not in a state to drive, then piper's gonna drive. [02:59:34] Speaker E: Rosanna, are you gonna drive or are you gonna do something else? [02:59:40] Speaker B: Considering she did majority of the driving and just kind of dealt with trauma. Her plan was to just kind of stick by Arthur's side and just watch over him. She knows that Isabel's gonna do all the medical work, but, like, Rosanna is Arthur's guard dog right now. Just kind of, like, sitting beside him and just keeping a hand on him. [03:00:07] Speaker E: Okay. Patti gets on the bike and pulls the bike out. Quiet. Loads up onto the rv, sees that Rosanna is busy with Arthur and. And busies himself with breaking down and looking after any weapons that were used to make sure that they are. You know, chambers are cleared, and they're disassembled and cleaned and put away so that others can focus on their things. Piper pulls the rv out onto the road and into the night. And you guys have some time to roleplay. Otherwise, we can either on the road, or we can fast forward to piper finding a place to park for the night. And then you can role play while you're all in one room, and we can even say that Arthur wakes up. [03:01:06] Speaker D: I will say Piper does have a phone call if he's going to me. [03:01:11] Speaker A: Yeah. Isabelle will probably also make a phone call. [03:01:16] Speaker B: Not Rosanna. She doesn't have a phone call. Okay. [03:01:20] Speaker E: All of Rosanna's people are already in the rv. [03:01:26] Speaker D: I wouldn't necessarily say that what's going on is one of Piper's people. [03:01:30] Speaker B: I will be right back. [03:01:32] Speaker E: Okay, um, in that case, Piper, who are you calling? [03:01:46] Speaker D: Piper's gonna take that letter that she got out and see if she can get things set up in a way that she can make this call properly. [03:01:58] Speaker E: You can either make a secured call or make an unsecured call. If you're gonna make the secured call, you have to stop driving. So this will. [03:02:07] Speaker D: It'll probably be after we park for the night then. [03:02:10] Speaker E: Okay, cool. In that case. Isabel, who are you calling? [03:02:14] Speaker A: I am going to call Alison. If I don't and she hears about this through the grapevine, I'm going to definitely not hear the end of it. [03:02:31] Speaker D: Gonna tell you to stop hanging out with your weird, unemployed friends again? [03:02:34] Speaker A: Probably. [03:02:38] Speaker E: You make your phone call to Allison. She answers on the second ring, which is really quick considering the hour you would expect her to be in bed. What the fuck did you do? No, better question, what did your weird, unemployed friends do? Yeah, well, because there are people at my door. They don't come to my door unless they need me to work. But they don't have work, Isabel. They have questions, and I don't have answers for them. [03:03:09] Speaker A: That's why I'm calling you right now. I'm still catching up because I had something to take care of back in San Diego, and I only just got reconnected with my weird and unemployed friends. But we had been tracking this book called the Darksome Anatomies. [03:03:27] Speaker E: Okay, what does a book have to do with the people at my door? [03:03:32] Speaker A: Well, so I'm getting there. We attract it to. This book is cursed. I'm just gonna let you know that. Jesus Christ. [03:03:40] Speaker E: Okay. [03:03:41] Speaker A: And we have been tracking it and to deal with a curse that was on one of my weird, anonymous friends. And so they attracted to here, and I put, say, the city. Apparently this was one of the last people we were able to find out that had this book. And I really don't know the full thing that happened in the apartment. I got there at the tail end to just see a bunch of blood, and I really don't know what's in that apartment. All I know is that this person had the book and the book is cursed. So this person was cursed and. Yeah, that's about as much as I know. [03:04:28] Speaker E: Huh. Okay. All right, I. Oh, boy. All right, um, well, I'm just gonna go and tell them what I was already telling them, which is that I don't really understand what's going on or why they're at my door, or exactly what you did, because that didn't enlighten me at all. [03:04:54] Speaker A: Look, I'm still getting the full picture of what's got what happened from the rest of my unemployed friends. [03:04:59] Speaker E: Listen, I will tell you that for the past couple of weeks, someone has been asking after you. And I have been covering for you because I knew you didn't necessarily want to deal with the people higher up in the organization. I don't think I can hold them off anymore. Not if you guys have gotten this level of attention. [03:05:19] Speaker A: Yeah, we met the people there. And yeah, I've been told to expect a phone call in the next week. [03:05:31] Speaker E: Great, so you meant the local field agents. [03:05:36] Speaker A: They were lovely. [03:05:38] Speaker E: They usually are. Okay. All right, well, I. I wish I could help more. [03:05:49] Speaker A: I understand. I wanted to let you know what was going on as soon as I had the chance. [03:06:00] Speaker E: Okay, next time, text me the second something happens, because they move pretty quickly when they wanna. [03:06:07] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, I was a bit busy stitching up one of them. [03:06:12] Speaker E: You know the saying, the wheels of government grind slowly? Yeah, that doesn't apply to these guys. [03:06:20] Speaker A: I've noticed. [03:06:22] Speaker E: All right, I gotta go. Um, uh, have a. Just. Jesus Christ. Stay safe. Stop trying to piss people off. And she'll hang up. [03:06:35] Speaker A: Yeah, and then you get a text. [03:06:37] Speaker E: Message and really rethink your friendships with weird, unemployed people. [03:06:42] Speaker A: There's a text back being like, uh, you know, there's a. We will see. [03:06:57] Speaker E: Piper, you set up a secured line. I'm not going to make you roll for that. It's not difficult. You have the time, so it's not really something to bother with. You are calling the number on that letter. [03:07:17] Speaker D: On the letter. [03:07:19] Speaker E: Okay. You call and immediately get a doo doo doo. The number you've reached has been disconnected or is no longer in service. [03:07:33] Speaker A: Of course. [03:07:50] Speaker E: Okay, does anybody have anything that they would like to do, or can I let Arthur wake up now? [03:07:56] Speaker A: You can. [03:07:57] Speaker B: I guess you can. [03:08:00] Speaker E: Arthur, you are awake. You are very groggy. Your neck hurts real bad, but you're awake. [03:08:08] Speaker B: Rosanna would still be bright next time, so. [03:08:10] Speaker E: Yep. [03:08:14] Speaker C: I guess Isabel's right. Pretty good chances I live. [03:08:23] Speaker E: I guess so. [03:08:28] Speaker C: Ow. [03:08:30] Speaker A: Take it. [03:08:31] Speaker B: Take it easy. Take it easy. [03:08:34] Speaker A: Somewhere in the rv, you hear? If you rip your stitches, I will murder you. [03:08:39] Speaker D: I don't think you'll have to. [03:08:44] Speaker A: I'll just make it faster. [03:08:47] Speaker C: Yeah, well, they killed it, right? [03:08:54] Speaker B: Yeah, you killed it. [03:09:00] Speaker C: I don't think I killed it, but that's fine. [03:09:08] Speaker E: You got it. [03:09:13] Speaker C: Good. See, this is kind of what I was worried about. But whoever it would have encountered probably couldn't have heard it like we did. [03:09:29] Speaker E: Ah. [03:09:33] Speaker B: She'S just going to rest her hand on top of his and just give it a squeeze. [03:09:44] Speaker C: But, uh. [03:09:52] Speaker B: I'm sorry I couldn't protect you. [03:10:00] Speaker C: I mean, you killed it. I was just holding it at bay the whole time, so. Can't blame yourself for that. But, uh. I guess I'm sorry that I thought we could kill it easy and didn't do any kind of preparations. [03:10:35] Speaker B: It doesn't matter. I'm just happy that you're alive. [03:10:48] Speaker C: Yeah. [03:10:52] Speaker A: I don't know. [03:10:56] Speaker E: What I would have done if. [03:11:04] Speaker B: But you're here, you're not, and you're here. And you're gonna get better. [03:11:11] Speaker C: Yeah. Might be a while before I try that again, though. [03:11:20] Speaker A: It will most definitely be a while before you try that again. [03:11:26] Speaker D: Ideally, you're never in a situation where you get to try that again. [03:11:32] Speaker C: True. Like I said, probably should have prepared a little bit better. [03:11:39] Speaker A: So please fill me in. What exactly happened? [03:11:46] Speaker C: Dead guy on the wall. [03:11:49] Speaker D: Vampire on the wall. [03:11:51] Speaker A: I was guessing was staked. [03:11:56] Speaker B: The stakes move fell out? [03:11:59] Speaker C: Yeah, he came up. [03:12:01] Speaker B: He was angry and hungry. You talked? [03:12:06] Speaker C: Yeah, it, uh, couldn't really get it inside the wall. So we had to pull it out. And that's what made things go real south real fast. Unless we burned down an entire apartment building with it inside. Sure wasn't ready to do. [03:12:29] Speaker A: So. Okay, look, I don't want to argue about what we could have done. That's. Well, it won't get us anywhere good. Well, at least in a little bit more. Yeah, the. We definitely attracted attention of the second inquisition. [03:13:00] Speaker B: Hate to break it to you, we always had the attention of the second inquisition. We decided to do something about it. [03:13:07] Speaker D: Yeah, we weren't on their radar enough until now. [03:13:10] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't quite think you are aware of just how on their radar we always have been. [03:13:19] Speaker A: Someone's apparently been asking about me for a couple of weeks now. According to Alison. [03:13:29] Speaker C: Isn't rin in the second inquisition? I thought that was the entire angle. [03:13:33] Speaker A: We've been looking at the other. The religious branch. Allison is in the government branch. [03:13:43] Speaker C: Sure, but are you saying the two branches don't talk to each other? [03:13:50] Speaker A: Kind of. They do and they don't. [03:13:53] Speaker B: But if they have a target that they want extra eyes on, they will. Yeah, is all I'm saying. [03:14:00] Speaker C: Wow. [03:14:06] Speaker A: I also have some bad news. So I. On my delivery, I had a contact ask for my help. They had someone that was really sick with something they hadn't seen before. And I took a look at it, and I think whatever it was that this person had been poisoned with has connections to your thing. And I point at Rosanna. I haven't gotten to study your fae thing, but this poison seemed to have some of the same hallmarks. It was essentially causing this person's blood to curdle in their body. I managed to kind of create a bit of a bootleg dialysis situation to flush it out of their blood, but, yeah, they were attacked by something. My contact was a little late to the scene and didn't exactly see what attacked them. Someone in a suit. So I think someone in the second inquisition may have learned to harness fay stuff. [03:15:49] Speaker C: Wait, I was thinking. You were about to tell us that there's some kind of supernatural that curdles blood in people's veins when it attacks. [03:16:05] Speaker A: It is kind of exactly what I told you, but it's not a person. It. Look, I think it was a poison of some kind. It could be a person. I don't know. I. It's. [03:16:23] Speaker C: But the attacker was a person in a black suit. [03:16:27] Speaker A: That's what my contact told me. [03:16:29] Speaker B: Okay, wow. Okay, we just. [03:16:36] Speaker D: Question one. Why do you automatically assume it's a member of the second inquisition. [03:16:45] Speaker A: It could be other ones, but my contact is a supernatural being. [03:16:56] Speaker C: Ah, that's what I was trying to understand. [03:17:00] Speaker B: Okay. And to. Why do you assume that? Ooh, I. [03:17:09] Speaker E: Sorry. [03:17:10] Speaker B: I'm just. I'm just trying to get. I'm just trying to get. We have too much on our plate. I don't want to come off as mean, but we have him to make sure he gets better. We have a book that we need to find. We have the second inquisition that is on our backs. My sister could appear any moment and try to kill me and therefore try to kill all of us. [03:17:48] Speaker A: I think this is connected to. I have a. Quite possibly is connected to your sister. [03:18:02] Speaker B: I can't even ask. I can't ask. [03:18:09] Speaker A: I know. [03:18:10] Speaker B: If I do, she gets punished. I can't. [03:18:16] Speaker E: I can't. [03:18:16] Speaker B: I can't. [03:18:17] Speaker A: I know. I just. This is something that we should be aware of. Okay, I'm going to. I will describe to the rest of the cell the symptoms that I saw in this person, like the black veins and all of that, and say, if it's this, it could be that. And I worry that we're gonna see it more. [03:18:41] Speaker E: Okay. [03:18:44] Speaker C: As a weapon of the second inquisition. [03:18:48] Speaker A: Yes. [03:18:51] Speaker C: So just so I'm understanding, the person who had the symptoms was not a person at all. No. [03:18:58] Speaker A: They were a ghoul. [03:19:02] Speaker C: Okay. That is a terrible weapon. [03:19:13] Speaker D: Okay, so what do we do now? [03:19:18] Speaker A: I think we need to find the book. I think that is really what we need to do. I haven't had a chance to look anymore for the book or where it might have gone. [03:19:28] Speaker B: We're on trail. [03:19:29] Speaker A: Yeah, we continue with that. I wanted you all to be aware of this because it seemed very important. [03:19:35] Speaker B: And it is very important. [03:19:37] Speaker A: It is a thing. We will table it. We will deal with this later. But I want you all to be prepared if we come across it. [03:19:43] Speaker E: Okay? [03:19:44] Speaker B: Thank you. [03:19:45] Speaker A: Because hiding secrets from each other has never worked well for us in the past. [03:19:52] Speaker B: Exactly, which is why I should be honest when I say I think I'm the one that caused that power outage. [03:20:01] Speaker C: What? [03:20:02] Speaker D: Oh, and in the future, um, if we're going to kill things, I don't care how fucking cursed I am. We're not splitting up. [03:20:10] Speaker C: Yeah, you. Yeah, fair. [03:20:26] Speaker B: In a. No more. No more splitting up to five. [03:20:38] Speaker C: That's what I was saying. I handled that badly by thinking I could handle it myself. [03:20:44] Speaker B: Well, like I said, we just gotta pick up, dust off and keep pushing. You need to focus on healing. [03:21:01] Speaker C: If I'm trying to make sure we're all a team here, I think. I don't want it to seem like the revelation that Isabel just gave us doesn't matter because something occurred to me. If it's related to the thing going on with you, Rosanna, then. And it's come from the second inquisition, then is it possible that Rin is doing something with the fae thing that you're connected to and using that to kill ghouls? [03:21:35] Speaker D: I'd say it seems more likely than not. [03:21:37] Speaker A: It does. [03:21:38] Speaker C: Yeah. So they are all interrelated. I just want to make sure we're all recognizing that we play for the same team. [03:21:46] Speaker A: Yeah. Look, I work for the second inquisition, but I have my own agenda. I don't side with some of the things they do, but there's someone in there. I just want to get out. Then once I get out, when I say get them out, I'll figure out what's next. [03:22:17] Speaker B: And I just want to put it on the line that. What if this is Rin's doing? The fae's not doing it willingly. [03:22:29] Speaker A: Didn't think they were. [03:22:50] Speaker E: Stupid. [03:22:50] Speaker B: Fucking come on. [03:22:53] Speaker A: Sounds about right. [03:22:53] Speaker D: So where are we going next? You said you had a lead on where we're going next, right, Rosanna? [03:23:01] Speaker B: Yes. Yes. Yes, I do. In the morning. And then I'm gonna pull out the precise address that we need to go for that shopping center that I found in my premonition. [03:23:20] Speaker E: I'm just gonna throw it out there that you actually failed that role. You don't know exactly where it is. [03:23:26] Speaker B: Five successes filled the roll. [03:23:31] Speaker A: Okay. [03:23:34] Speaker E: You managed to narrow it down a lot, but you hadn't actually finished because everything went sideways with the stuff inside. So you stopped and went into the apartment. Now, that being said, you have hours. You can find it. I'm not going to make you roll. It's just going to take time. Time. All right. However, we need to address a few things to figure out what you for sure want to do, because you can stay on this trail and you could go after her. Arthur, if he tries to go out and hunt the way that he is, is going to be at a pretty severe disadvantage in everything he does. This is not going to be an overnight heat heal. He's got at least a couple of weeks of time that he needs to completely get back to full health if you guys are on the road. And he never gets proper rest because he spends all of his time in a moving rv and dealing with the fact that he's probably not going to be sleeping very much if you guys aren't around because he's not going to know what's going on, or he's going to want to go with you. It's going to take even longer. So you can continue on with the hunt, but you have to understand that it means that Arthur is not going to be as useful as he could be. Or we can do some downtime, and you guys can take Arthur home and give him a week or so, a week or two in Louisiana. Everybody can get some downtime. Everybody can have a moment to breathe, and then you get back on the road. It just means that you might lose your quarry. So that's the. Those are the options that you have in front of you. Do you get Arthur home and allow him time to rest and recuperate, which will take a lot less time? Or do you stay on the road and accept that Arthur is not going to be able to do much for you? And so if you guys get into a scuffle, Rosanna's kind of the only heavy hitter you have. And none of you are good up close. And you have to remember, the boys do not have hunter powers. They can help, but they're not going to be as useful to you. [03:25:53] Speaker A: Yeah, we should. Yeah. As a medical professional, Arthur needs rest. A lot of rest. Especially cause we're not taking you to a hospital. [03:26:10] Speaker C: Mm hmm. [03:26:12] Speaker E: Arthur, I will also say that you know your wife well enough to know that if Katie Lynn hears that you got this hurt and you didn't go home, it's probably gonna be even worse than missing date night. [03:26:25] Speaker C: Yeah. See, one part of Arthur's thinking, no, let's go find this person. Person. See if we can get the other book, take care of this problem, and not. Don't worry about me. But on the other side, he knows just how bad it will be if he doesn't go home. [03:26:48] Speaker A: If we have the information. I know we don't want to. I can pass it off. I can have Allison and them, all of that group follow up with it. I know it's not ideal, but we can try and make sure that this person doesn't get away. That way, we can make sure Arthur gets rest in his heels. We don't have to. We can at least hope that this person doesn't get away if they have a better chance of not getting away. [03:27:40] Speaker C: Piper? [03:27:42] Speaker D: Yeah? [03:27:44] Speaker C: Thoughts? [03:27:49] Speaker D: Every day I go without finding that. [03:27:52] Speaker E: Book. [03:27:55] Speaker D: The closer and closer I get to becoming that. [03:28:07] Speaker E: It. [03:28:10] Speaker D: Taking nearly everything I have to be able to not give in to the curse. And I don't care how much time of how much downtime we're gonna have. It's not gonna get better. [03:28:32] Speaker A: Yeah, I know. Ophelia said something about possibly getting a lure. [03:28:57] Speaker C: So we call up the mage to fish. This person. [03:29:05] Speaker A: I do not give a fuck about the person. [03:29:08] Speaker C: We need the book. Right? [03:29:10] Speaker D: We need the book. [03:29:14] Speaker A: Did the person even have the book? Don't think they did. [03:29:20] Speaker E: No. [03:29:20] Speaker D: All we were hoping is that by following their trail, we might randomly stumble on it. But at this fucking point, that doesn't even fucking matter. [03:29:35] Speaker C: I really, really that I'm about to say this. I think we need to call the mage then, and see if she can help. And in the meantime, I can offer you all some delicious homemade pie made by one of the best chefs that's ever existed. [03:30:10] Speaker A: I guess we're setting course for Louisiana. [03:30:17] Speaker B: I'll be making some phone calls. [03:30:19] Speaker A: I'll also be making some phone calls. [03:30:30] Speaker C: And I guess I'll make friends with the mage. [03:30:35] Speaker B: What you're gonna do is rest and not worry about the mage. [03:30:45] Speaker E: Can't help us, fat. [03:30:46] Speaker B: If you keep getting yourself into deeper shit because you don't want to run. What good is a man that can't hold himself into battle when we get faced with bigger dangers than what we face today? Right? [03:31:12] Speaker E: So you rest. [03:31:17] Speaker B: And until we get to Louisiana, you need anything? I ain't leaving your side. [03:31:26] Speaker E: Cause. [03:31:29] Speaker B: That'S what friends do. And she'll take out her phone, and she'll make that call. [03:31:41] Speaker E: You go to pull out your phone and quiet, who, as it turns out, was just sort of hanging out, waiting for somebody to make some decisions, reaches over and very gently taps the button. Babe, it's like three in the morning. Call her in the morning. You all need to go to sleep. [03:32:05] Speaker C: I've been sleeping for a while myself, though. [03:32:08] Speaker E: You've been sleeping for about 2 hours. Dude, go back to bed. Well, close your eyes. You're already in bed. You know what I mean. Everybody here has been up for way longer than they should have. Most of you have been through some pretty significant trauma. Everybody needs to rest. We're gonna drive and do it safely. That's gotta happen first. [03:32:35] Speaker A: Yeah, I do. [03:32:38] Speaker E: Call. You can call Ophelia in the morning. She probably won't answer at this hour anyway, considering time. I can't hear you. [03:32:51] Speaker B: Legacy acid. You might be right. [03:33:00] Speaker E: I know. Bed. All of you. You too, when he looks at Piper. [03:33:12] Speaker D: Yeah, I'll get there eventually. [03:33:14] Speaker C: I was just like Arthur looks between quiet and Piper wonders who's gonna win this battle of will. [03:33:21] Speaker E: I'll dose you if I have to. [03:33:26] Speaker A: Isabella is not going to fight that. She's going to go find Patty and on her way, she is going to text Jace real quick and just ask. How's the patient doing? [03:33:46] Speaker E: Lines are gone, but he's not awake. He's not awake yet. [03:33:52] Speaker A: It's good progress. Just keep doing what I told you and let me know if anything changes. [03:33:58] Speaker E: Will do. Are you okay? [03:34:03] Speaker A: Yeah, just a little lightheaded and tired and traveling a bit, but I'll be fine. [03:34:13] Speaker E: Rest up and get something to eat. [03:34:17] Speaker A: Yeah, I plan on it. [03:34:20] Speaker E: Okay. Rosanna, do you stay with Arthur and sleep in the main room? Are you gonna go with quiet? [03:34:34] Speaker B: I think tonight she's gonna stay in the main room with Arthur. [03:34:42] Speaker E: Quiet settles himself into the driver's seat of the rv just to make sure that nobody gets any stupid ideas, like trying to drive while everybody's sleeping and leans the seat back and conks out there. Like most dudes who have been in the military and in the field, he could sleep basically anywhere. It just needs. Just needs a minute to close his eyes. [03:35:12] Speaker B: Get some rest. [03:35:17] Speaker E: Arthur. You get back to sleep. It takes no time at all. [03:35:22] Speaker C: He barely manages to type out a coming home text before falling asleep. [03:35:28] Speaker E: Excellent. Katie Lynn gets a text, typo ridden text that might say something close to cloning tone. [03:35:42] Speaker C: Yep, sounds right. [03:35:48] Speaker E: Piper, are you gonna go to bed or are you gonna make one of the boys drug you so that she'll sleep? [03:35:57] Speaker D: She'll eventually go to bed. She just needs to spend some time alone. [03:36:02] Speaker E: Okay, so we're talking like an hour or so to get your head right, and then you're gonna conk out. Okay. [03:36:07] Speaker C: Yeah. [03:36:08] Speaker E: Isabel. [03:36:09] Speaker A: Yes. [03:36:10] Speaker E: Patty draws you out of the rv, away from the others, and helps you climb up on top of the rv where he has set up a little, like, camping spot so that you guys can look at the stars. [03:36:22] Speaker A: Yeah. [03:36:25] Speaker E: Will you please roll me a single d ten? [03:36:41] Speaker A: That is a nine. [03:36:45] Speaker E: Cool. You guys are laying there talking quietly. He's stroking your hair. Things are nice. It's real dark, which is lovely and comforting. And at one point he makes a joke and you both laugh a little bit and you tilt your head up to look at him and his eyes go wide and you get, fuck is wrong with your eyes? And that is where we're gonna end it for the night.