Faeries and Feces

0:00:00 Brennan: We find ourselves opening night. Misty Moore, Lady Titania and the Seelie Dance Fighters take the stage.

0:00:08 Misty: The show must go on!

0:00:12 Brennan: You will be making death saving throws (Siobhan rolls in box of doom) with your Performance checks.

0:00:16 Pete: What the fuck do we do?

0:00:17 Misty: Let's kill Titania!

0:00:18 Kugrash: I'll become a brown bear.

0:00:20 Murph: I would like to throw Stephen Sondheim at the pixie.

0:00:23 Titania: I, Titania, command that you kneel.

0:00:26 Brennan: You Dragonball Z, jump into the air. [imitating punching] Titania crashes out of the sky with you on top of her.

0:00:34 Siobhan: That is a nat 20. [everyone shouting]

0:00:37 Brennan: Titania has been slain. You wear her shoes, you hold her crown, and your ritual was a success.

0:00:44 Misty: I mean, who am I to refuse the crown, when it's placed so deftly upon my head? [END RECAP] [upbeat tempo] Zac, Emily, and Ally are holding d20s extremely tightly.

0:00:56 Brennan: Welcome one and all back to The Unsleeping City. My name is Brennan Lee Mulligan. These are our intrepid heroes. Say hi, intrepid heroes!

0:01:03 All: Hi, intrepid heroes!

0:01:06 Siobhan: You gotta make the impression of twenties on your thumbs, otherwise the luck  doesn't happen.

0:01:09 Lou: That's the dream.

0:01:10 Zac: I do them on my pointer fingers.

0:01:11 Siobhan: Ooh, mixing it up, 'cause you spicy.

0:01:13 Ally: [at the same time] Ooh, ‘cause you roll like that. [makes twirling motion with their hands]

0:01:14 Brennan: Gang, last we left off— Siobhan rolls dice, they fly off the table behind her. The music abruptly cuts out.

0:01:16 Siobhan: [while laughing] Oh, fuck!

0:01:16 All: [laughing]

0:01:17 Zac: Come on.

0:01:18 Brennan: Oh no!

0:01:19 Siobhan: Oh no!

0:01:20 Murph: Where'd it go?

0:01:21 Brennan: Ill omens.

0:01:22 Brennan: Last we left off, our intrepid heroes had just slain Titania, the Queen of the Seelie Faeries, on stage at the premiere of Midsummer Nights, starring Misty Moore.

0:01:34 Siobhan: Who's she? I don't know who that is.

0:01:36 Brennan: Who the hell is Misty Moore?

0:01:39 Brennan: Misty retreated to her dressing room, where she is enveloped in a cocoon of light, and the rest of our gang we left on stage, after their holidays and various adventures in Nod and beyond. You all are on stage. The audience is being led out. You see the critic from the New York Times going—

0:01:57 Dupree St. Croix: A smashing success! Perry, you were a vision!

0:02:01 Brennan: You see Perry LaFev going,

0:02:04 Perry: [through gritted teeth] Oh, I'm so glad you liked it!

0:02:08 Brennan: You see that Em, the Angel of Bethesda Fountain turns over to you and says,

0:02:12 Em: Wow, I can't believe it. Does this always happen at Broadway shows? I don't make it out a lot, 'cause I live on a fountain.

0:02:19 Sofia: Yeah, I think so.

0:02:20 Kugrash: I assume so, this is my first one too.

0:02:22 Sofia: I've only been to a couple.

0:02:24 Pete: [while laughing] Absolutely not! No, this is, something else is going on.

0:02:27 Kingston: I'll have to agree with Pete, no.

0:02:28 Em: Alright, well I—

0:02:29 Sofia: Well, I agree with Kug, so you know.

0:02:32 Kugrash: Two and two and two so—

0:02:33 Em: Well listen—

0:02:34 Ricky: I will have to say that I think this happens a lot.

0:02:35 Pete: Alright, well.

0:02:35 Kugrash: It's three to two.

0:02:37 Kingston: Ricky. put your pants back on, God damn.

0:02:38 Sofia: Or don't.

0:02:40 Em: Well listen, I've got a lotta free time because the fountain's still broken so if anyone wants to come to Washington Square Park and get coffee, you know, talk to me.

0:02:47 Sofia: Oh yeah, that sounds great.

0:02:48 Em: Do you? Uh, I hate to do this—

0:02:50 Brennan: And you see that Esther's over in the corner cleaning some like blood off of her magical silver bat, she's like,

0:02:55 Em: I heard you saying that you were going to go out for coffee with Esther. I don't want to be like a third wheel but if I like, came by and got coffee...

0:03:00 Sofia: Oh my God, no you should totally come.

0:03:03 Em: I would love that, that would be so fun.

0:03:05 Sofia: Yeah.

0:03:06 Brennan: You see that she—

0:03:07 Sofia: Oh my God, we should start our own like first wives club.

0:03:09 Em: I would love that because I don't ever get a chance to do that, and like its kinda been fun, a little fun little adventure around the city, I've been off the fountain for a while. When they fix the fountain I'm gonna hafta be like kind of stuck there again, so if we like do something there.

0:03:21 Sofia: Oh yes, so just come out while you are out, yeah.

0:03:23 Em: Yeah, I'm happy to host,when I'm back at the fountain. So just like—

0:03:26 Sofia: Awesome, I love that.

0:03:27 Brennan: She does a little (mwah, mwah!) kiss and takes off flying. You see that Esther and Wally both walk over. You see that Steven Sondheim at the edge of the stage turns to you all and says,

0:03:39 Stephen Sondheim: Incredible work. You're all heroes, heroes of New York.

0:03:47 Brennan: [bells chiming] Vanishes.

0:03:47 Ally: What!

0:03:48 Sofia: Oh my God, I didn't even get to do my Little Red Riding Hood for him!

0:03:52 Brennan: You see Esther gets Don Confetti. She looks at you guys and says,

0:03:57 Esther: I'm gonna head back to the Clinton Hill Chantry. I'll see you all there. I’m gonna make sure that he, I'm gonna put him in a magic circle basically.

0:04:05 Brennan: She vanishes.

0:04:06 Ricky: Awesome, bye. Ricky looks down and makes a sound of disappointment.

0:04:10 Brennan: Wally goes,

0:04:10 Wally: Wow, Dad, this was the, this was the best show ever. I didn't know it's like a open mic where you could jump up and do stuff.

0:04:17 Kugrash: Yeah. Wally you gotta be careful, we both got knocked out there for a second, huh.

0:04:22 Wally: What?

0:04:23 Kugrash: We almost died. There’s a long pause.

0:04:25 Wally: When?

0:04:27 Kugrash: [laughing] All right bud,

0:04:27 Murph: I just pat him on the—

0:04:27 Kugrash: Good show man!

0:04:29 Wally: It was great, where's Ricky's dog?

0:04:32 Ricky: He'll be back. He's gone right now.

0:04:35 Pete: He died. Someone killed him immediately.

0:04:39 Kugrash: He didn’t. He didn’t— Pete.

0:04:39 Pete: What?

0:04:39 Sofia: But it's okay when he dies, [overlapping]

0:04:39 Sofia: I learned that the hard way because I tried so hard to defend him and then he just disappeared and no one really cared.

0:04:43 Kugrash: He’s made of light.

0:04:45 Pete: [loudly above the others] He’s an adult!

0:04:45 Ricky: Yeah.

0:04:46 Wally: Oh okay, he went to a farm upstate.

0:04:51 Ricky: A farm made of light, yes. You'll see him soon.

0:04:55 Kugrash: This technically isn't a lie.

0:04:56 Pete: This is really sad.

0:04:58 Wally: Okay, well I better go back to the apartment, I gotta—

0:05:00 Pete: How old are you, Wally?

0:05:01 Wally: Huh?

0:05:02 Pete: How old are you?

0:05:03 Wally: I'm 38 years old.

0:05:04 Pete: Okay (laughs) great.

0:05:04 Ricky: 38?

0:05:05 Pete: This is, I mean, okay, great.

0:05:08 Wally: Yeah, I'm 38, I work for the MTA.

0:05:10 Pete: Cool. That's cool man.

0:05:11 Kugrash: Pete, tell me how to deal with this. What is the right way to navigate this?

0:05:16 Pete: I'm thinking, just honesty, right guys?

0:05:18 Wally: I better go take care of Dad, bye guys.

0:05:21 Kugrash: It's his other dog. It's his dog. I gave him a dog. He named his dog Dad after me.

0:05:28 Pete: All right, actually maybe you are handling this right, you're probably handling it right. All right, I'm sorry.

0:05:33 Brennan: You guys are, so it's just, basically the five of you minus Misty that are left on stage right now. See Alissa, kind of concussed, wanders off to go to Misty's dressing room.

0:05:43 Kugrash: What do you guys think’s going on with Misty here, because that was weird?

0:05:46 Kingston: She's definitely got some explaining to do.

0:05:48 Pete: Yeah, she was saying there's a lot that she hasn't told us, but that it was really important that the show went well. So I think everything was fine.

0:05:55 Sofia: Well I do think that we helped the show go well.

0:05:58 Kingston: And everything is not fine, people got very hurt.

0:06:01 Kugrash: Should we go bang on her door?

0:06:02 Kingston: Yes we should.

0:06:03 Sofia: We could politely knock first. [overlapping]

0:06:05 Kingston: Nah, I'm with this, let’s have Kugrash approach.

0:06:06 Kugrash: I think we could bang. Let’s have a vote on politely knocking.

0:06:10 Sofia: Youse can bang. I'm going to politely knock while you all bang.

0:06:13 Ricky: You can check the knob first and then you can bang on it, I think.

0:06:16 Sofia: I'm going to politely knock.

0:06:16 Kingston: All right, so we're gonna have a three step process.

0:06:18 Brennan: Gotcha. You guys walk up and see Alissa already politely knocking on the door. Alissa cannot see it, but you see that just light, pure golden light is like. [imitating engine pulsing]

0:06:31 Zac: I rush up and get Alissa to stand back.

0:06:34 Ricky: Sorry, clear the way, I'm a firefighter.

0:06:37 Alissa: Oh, is there an emergency? Do you need water, coffee?

0:06:42 Ricky: We're good, just need you to stand clear,

0:06:43 Zac: And I check the knob.

0:06:46 Brennan: The knob is a little bit warm but not dangerously so.

0:06:49 Kingston: Great, so can we bang now? We've done the other first two steps.

0:06:54 Ricky: Feels like we can bang.

0:06:55 Sofia: Let's kick it down if we're going to do anything. [overlapping]

0:06:56 Pete: What? That was a hard 180! What the fuck?

0:06:59 Kugrash: What? What is this? What is she?

0:07:00 Sofia: We kick it. [everyone laughing]

0:07:01 Brennan: Rad, you guys—

0:07:02 Ally: So Jersey.

0:07:03 Brennan: Go ahead and give me an Athletics check.

0:07:05 Kingston: Yeah that feels right.

0:07:06 Kugrash: From politely knocking to kicking down.

0:07:09 Emily: I got a 12.

0:07:11 Brennan: Bang! You kick the door open. Boom. As you turn around you see, Misty is hovering about three feet off the ground, light is oozing all around her. She has stripped herself of her skin and is just down to this like platonic primal form. What is Misty, all the glamor stripped away? As her like raw faerie form look like?

0:07:39 Siobhan: Just sort of an uncanny valley version of a human. Just everything is a little too big, a little too spiky.

0:07:49 Brennan: Huge eyes, long spiky ears.

0:07:51 Siobhan: Yeah, like places that should be thin are too thin, like everything's just a little off. Too much.

0:07:58 Zac: She's like an anime character?

0:07:59 Siobhan: Yeah, or like a video game.

0:08:01 Sofia: Oh my God, she's beautiful.

0:08:04 Brennan: Misty, you're like deep in this extremely vulnerable process and your door to your dressing room is kicked open.

0:08:09 Misty: Excuse me?

0:08:10 Kugrash: Let's close the door. Ricky, can you pick this back up? Put it back up?

0:08:14 Zac: Pick the door up.

0:08:16 Sofia: Can I stay and watch? I know you like an audience.

0:08:20 Brennan: As you guys kick the door open, you see that your magic. [imitating mysterious chiming] Hold on one second. Brennan turns and rolls something behind the board.

0:08:26 Sofia: Oh no!

0:08:27 Brennan: And 100% of you are sucked into the room in a swirl of light.

0:08:33 Ricky: Aah!

0:08:39 Ally: What?

0:08:40 Brennan: And you guys, you appear. Pete, you immediately are able to protect everyone because you guys are zapped into Nod. [classical music]

0:08:51 Brennan: As you appear in the Sixth Borough, you are very close to where Broadway is. You guys are near the old FAO Schwarz building that was shut down. But you see here in Dream, this giant toy store is there. Misty, you feel all of the joy and passion and love and adoration that you've harvested is now filling your body. You're in a volcanic state but you are somewhat settling. So you're kind of like making your new body but you're in Dream so it's a little bit chimeric still. And you appear with all of your friends, as you look around and see little sprites and nixies and griggs and pookas and brownies, and little fair folk all in the Dream realm, kind of rushing over to FAO Schwarz and doffing their caps and waving and bowing as they walk by you. All of you are here in Nod together.

0:09:56 Pete: Do you want some privacy?

0:09:57 Kingston: What is happening?

0:09:58 Kugrash: What's going on here?

0:10:01 Misty: I mean, look I didn't think that… [stammers] Hi guys. This was supposed to be a private little thing that was happening to me anyway and, I wasn’t really anything—

0:10:11 Sofia: In our defense, we helped save your life.

0:10:14 Misty: Yeah, look.

0:10:16 Ricky: Is this like that movie Cocoon?

0:10:19 Sofia: Or The Fly?

0:10:20 Misty: No, it's—

0:10:21 Pete: Is this like that show Wife Swap? But you're both wives?

0:10:25 Misty: That is like, no, I just. this is what I do, every seventy, eighty years I come back. Although this time like, I just have never had to deal with the DMV before. Like this has never been...

0:10:36 Ricky: You sound younger.

0:10:38 Misty: Yeah, I just, every seventy, eighty years, I just reincarnate my body into a younger form and then I start over.

0:10:45 Ricky: But you sound younger, like a young p—

0:10:48 Misty: Yes because I'm in a young person's body.

0:10:49 Brennan: As you say that you see that your body does start to, it gets a little bit taller although you're still quite short. Your skin begins to coalesce, it's young and vibrant. all of your skin like begins to like move up into your body. Your cheek bones raise up. like your eyelids and lips and everything becomes a little bit plumper and more moist. and just natural vibrant color begins to flow into your skin in the Dream realm, but your hair and eyes like shifting colors here. And you begin to feel all that tiredness and liver spots and the shifting of the hips and everything like that. Your body feels, like, good again.

0:11:28 Misty: [wiggling] I'd forgotten what that felt like to not have that ache. This feels great!

0:11:31 Pete: Sorry, you're still Misty?

0:11:35 Misty: Yeah, I've been Misty this whole time. But before I was Misty, I was other people, and then before that I was living in Faerie.

0:11:41 Sofia: Wait, so is this like Misty Moore, my favorite Broadway singer and star just died?

0:11:49 Misty: To the outside world yeah.

0:11:51 Sofia: [crying a little] Oh my God.

0:11:51 Pete: [long, drawn out] Wow. You're gonna fake your own death.

0:11:54 Sofia: Oh my God.

0:11:56 Misty: Well, I mean, the body that I was living in, I mean, it is kind of like a rebirth so it's not a faked death exactly.

0:12:03 Brennan: You guys look back through this pulsing, this after pulse of the teleportation that brought you here. And you see, you guys are all gone, but you see that Alissa peeks her head around the partially open door and sees Misty's body on the floor and goes. [discordant, spooky chords]

0:12:20 Alissa: Miss Moore! [screams].

0:12:23 Brennan: And like screams and goes over and she says,

0:12:26 Alissa: Oh my God!

0:12:27 Brennan: And starts doing CPR. But you see that Misty's skin is flaking off into just like leaves and birch bark. And she goes,

0:12:34 Alissa: Help! This is so bad. This is so bad.

0:12:38 Sofia: I mean Alissa was really dumb, but I feel bad for her right now.

0:12:44 Misty: She was bad at her job and now she's finally doing something right. I don't see what the problem—

0:12:48 Ricky: Oh.

0:12:49 Pete: Wow.

0:12:50 Misty: All of you guys are taking this very poorly. This is cool.

0:12:51 Sofia: No you're right, you're right.

0:12:53 Misty: I just did a very cool thing.

0:12:54 Kingston: This is not cool!

0:12:55 Sofia: You're right, it is. It's only because I loved you as Misty Moore. But you know what, now I'm gonna know you before you were, whatever you were—

0:13:01 Misty: Exactly.

0:13:02 Sofia: So that's very cool.

0:13:03 Kingston: You brought someone from the Fae into a populated Broadway show.

0:13:07 Misty: No, no, no, that was not me. Somebody else put that mirror on the stage.

0:13:11 Kingston: Well did you know? Did you— To what extent— Why couldn't we get anyone out, this seemed to— This thing happened, did you think it might happen? Did you know that Tatiana was after you?

0:13:18 Misty: No!

0:13:24 Kingston: When we were in the Fae, in that bar in the Fae.

0:13:27 Misty: Yes. So Robin Goodfellow did send me the mirror, that... Titania and I may have had a little few words.

0:13:36 Pete: What haven't you told us? It feels like it could fill a book.

0:13:40 Misty: I really, no, no, no. I mean look, should I have written my autobiography? Perhaps. People were.

0:13:44 Pete: Oh my God. I'm going to kill you. I hate how attractive you are now. Ugh!

0:13:47 Sofia: I would have bought it.

0:13:48 Kugrash: Because it's only going to get worse now she's young.

0:13:50 Siobhan: As I'm telling everybody this I'm just gently touching everybody.

0:13:53 Pete: Don't fucking— dont touch my heart like that.

0:13:56 Kingston: Don't touch me.

0:13:59 Ricky: We should all come clean, right? I have something.

0:14:04 Sofia: Yeah come clean.

0:14:04 Pete: I fucking doubt it.

0:14:05 Kugrash: Is it that you have a crush on Esther?

0:14:09 Ricky: I should tell you guys that and—

0:14:11 Misty: No, we know. [chorus of ‘we know’]

0:14:15 Sofia: I'm probably going to become really good friends with Esther so I can try and put in a good word for you.

0:14:21 Ricky: [stuttering] If it comes naturally.

0:14:23 Sofia: Oh, it will come naturally.

0:14:28 Ricky: Don't f-force it or whatever. Anyways. I just wanted to be honest. [chiming music]

0:14:31 Brennan: You begin to hear the chiming of the big floor piano over at FAO Schwarz and the ringing of bells. You can feel a little tug on your fae heartstrings of some kind of conclave or something being called over there and you see, creepily floating through the mist, their black eyes wide open, is Nod who floats through the mist and goes,

0:14:55 Nod: [cheerfully] Hey Pete!

0:14:56 Pete: Hey.

0:14:57 Nod: [whispering creepily] The conclave.

0:14:58 Pete: What's going on at FAO Schwarz? What is? Oh.

0:15:00 Nod: Oh, the conclave. It's a— It's a Fae conclave being called because one of the monarchs of Fae has been killed.

0:15:06 Brennan: And you see that Nod looks down at the crown in your hand and says,

0:15:13 Nod: I'm afraid only Fae and the friends of Fae are welcome to come, but that might be all of you guys.

0:15:18 Misty: I don't know, I mean you seemed pretty mean to— I'm just kidding.

0:15:22 Pete: God, I hate you. I hate you.

0:15:24 Misty: I love bits!

0:15:26 Brennan: Oh, incredible.

0:15:27 Misty: [dancing a little] Ooh this new body loves bits, this is fun. Finding out new things.

0:15:33 Brennan: An exuberant, Misty for the moment, walks by, you see the beautiful courtyard, you look out and see a whole row of wintery trees, ash, and birch, and rowan, out in Central Park. You walk to FAO Schwarz, you walk in. Huge toys everywhere and jangling things. You see that the faeries have kind of set themselves up into little minor courts here and there. There's a couple of very bashful-looking members of the pixie mafia who are looking around kind of scared of not having heard from their Don and knowing something's gone very bad.

0:16:07 Murph: I just point threateningly at one.

0:16:10 Pixie: Oh.

0:16:10 Murph: But just keep walking.

0:16:11 Pixie: [hands up unthreateningly] Hey, it's no problem. I don't got no beef with you. I got no beef with you. Go ahead. Come on, you're a rat, we're pixies, we're family.

0:16:20 Zac: I just start pushing Kugrash forward, like come on, come on. I'm just like, come on.

0:16:24 Pete: He's not worth it, dog.

0:16:26 Murph: Creepy little rat points.

0:16:28 Ricky: It's all right, we're okay.

0:16:29 Siobhan: Waving at people like I know so many people here it's been such a long time. It's like,

0:16:33 Misty: Oh my God, how's your cousin? Oh my goodness. (screaming with happiness) Oh my God!

0:16:38 Brennan: Everyone's being, it's of course like your big day, so everyone's being very deferential.

0:16:42 Murph: Wait so she's young and she's gonna become a queen now? Misty just rules.

0:16:49 Brennan: You see that, well that's what you get for a whole fight of me forcing you to make death saving throws and you rolling a nat 20. You guys see that there are also a little patch of kind of gross little sewer goblins and then there are also neon butterfly-winged faeries flitting around and spreading neon light everywhere. You see standing by this giant teddy bear, leaning against it, smoking a little thing of purple smoke out of a cigarette in his long camel-haired coat is Bobby Goodfellow.

0:17:24 Misty: Bobby, darling.

0:17:26 Bobby: You look great, what should I call you? Or do you want a second to figure it out?

0:17:29 Misty: No, I've been thinking about it. I was thinking Rowan.

0:17:33 Bobby: Ooh.

0:17:34 Pete: That's such a hot, ah God, Fuck, I hate you now. Can I cast Minor Illusion to make you look like you used to?

0:17:41 Siobhan: I cast Counterspell on your minor illusion.

0:17:43 Pete: Ah, fuck you.

0:17:45 Siobhan: I'm burning a third level spell to get rid of your cantrip.

0:17:48 Brennan: You see that Bobby says,

0:17:49 Bobby: You look fucking good, babe.

0:17:51 Rowan: Darling, you look good.

0:17:53 Bobby: Hey, so, we should get drinks after if you want.

0:17:56 Rowan: I'd love that.

0:17:57 Bobby: I'll be happy to. I mean, I'm here for business right now, I'm sort of envoy of the Unseelie, but we'll talk later.

0:18:02 Rowan: I mean, look, business and pleasure, that's what we do.

0:18:05 Bobby: Hey, business is pleasure.

0:18:06 Rowan: The business of pleasure.

0:18:07 Ally: I'm gonna barf, can I peel off? I want to check out something else.

0:18:11 Brennan: Sure, you can peel off. You see also that all—

0:18:13 Sofia: Can I come?

0:18:14 Pete: Yeah.

0:18:14 Brennan: All by themselves is Nod, who is seated on a little cushion by themself sort of as their own court. But kinda looks up at you and waves. Pete waves back.

0:18:27 Brennan: You also see the last little court that appears is a little jack-in-the-box opens up and a bunch of little wind-up toys and chattering teeth come out and a bunch of the clock gnomes come out and all gather, you see Bilbry goes,

0:18:38 Bilbry: Oh, hey there friends. How's it going?

0:18:41 Rowan: Yeah but how's that oil, Bilberry?

0:18:42 Bilbry: Oh, it's much better now.

0:18:43 Brennan: You see the High Priestess Hib-Hob comes out, she's got a huge priestess hat, but it's just a bunch of clockwork and gears all kinda stacked on one of those little water-dipping birds is on it. She goes,

0:18:54 Hib-Hob: Hello. Yes, drinking a lot more oil, Kingston you're right I do feel a lot better.

0:18:59 Kingston: I'm glad.

0:19:01 Ricky: Wonder if they have your motorcycle?

0:19:03 Kugrash: How’s the motorcycle?

0:19:04 Sofia: Oh and mine!

0:19:07 Brennan: You see that Bilbry looks over and says,

0:19:09 Bilbry: I was thinking about an initial design of, and here we go over here.

0:19:14 Brennan: He says,

0:19:14 Bilbry: So most motorcycles have wheels, right? But I was thinking, why not mix it up a bit. It's a pogo stick motorcycle. So it's a pogo stick on the front and a pogo stick on the back.

0:19:26 Rowan: I love it.

0:19:27 Kugrash: Yeah, I mean, yeah.

0:19:29 Sofia: I like that. Can I have a special request for mine?

0:19:32 Kugrash: I'm good, got it.

0:19:33 Sofia: Can mine instead of wheels, have like arms so it looks like a person crawling?

0:19:38 Bilbry: Now is that arms on the front and arms on the back? Like a four-arm no-leg monster nightmare?

0:19:44 Sofia: Yeah.

0:19:44 Bilbry: Yes, I will get to work on that right away.

0:19:46 Sofia: I just made this a new friend and I feel like it would be a really good impression to show up to her place for the first time on it.

0:19:52 Bilbry: 100%, more of a quad really. It's like an ATV but instead of wheels it's arms.

0:19:59 Ally: Nightmare. Imagine reversing, it's like. [waves their arms, imitating a hands bike]

0:20:03 Zac: Sounds like a Miyazaki...

0:20:07 Brennan: You guys see that, Pete did you want to peel off and go do something else? Or?

0:20:12 Ally: There's something I want to check out.

0:20:13 Brennan: Sure.

0:20:14 Ally: If this is, can I do an Insight check to see if this is just a crowning ceremony.

0:20:17 Brennan: Sure, yeah.

0:20:20 Ally: 8, no 11.

0:20:22 Brennan: 11, you don't think it's necessarily a crowning ceremony. It's probably that in addition to some other stuff.

0:20:28 Ally: Okay, cool. I think I wanna talk with everyone.

0:20:31 Pete: I wanna go and check out, I might have some new spells, so I wanna check out that weird thing at Hell. Like the Hellmouth that you guys found.

0:20:38 Sofia: I would think that's fine.  I want to interrogate, I want to go and meet up with Esther at some point to interrogate Don Confetti but I'm thinking that won't happen anytime soon.

0:20:49 Pete: Maybe we can do both?

0:20:51 Sofia: Yeah, let's see what's going on.

0:20:52 Brennan: Cool, so who's going to go peel off with Pete and who's going to stay with Rowan?

0:20:55 Emily: I'll peel off with Pete.

0:20:57 Brennan: Cool, Sofia and Pete peel off.

0:20:58 Murph: I'll chill.

0:20:59 Brennan: The rest of you guys remain here.

0:20:59 Ally: I'll be the muscle.

0:21:01 Brennan: You see that Nod stands. You guys head off. Nod stands and says,

0:21:06 Nod: The conclave is now called to order. As a neutral party and monarch of the realm of Dreams, I invite our faerie guests here to witness the rebirth of Miss Rowan… [stares questioningly at Rowan]

0:21:19 Rowan: Berry.

0:21:20 Nod: Berry. And the creation of a new Fae realm. [somber, dream-like music]

0:21:27 Brennan: You see that, Nod looks to you and says,

0:21:32 Nod: As you have defeated the Lady Titania with the assistance of your heroic mortal friends, I would offer to you that your new position is yours to make. These courts have assembled and ask on behalf of what they represent for the right to petition you and give council before your decision is made.

0:21:59 Rowan: Sure, speak out.

0:22:03 Brennan: You see that a tiny little neon faerie, [bzz!] little buzzing wings says,

0:22:11 Aquamarine: [very high voice, cutesy] Hi, I am Aquamarine and as a representative, as a representative of the Seelie court I bow to you as that as the one who has defeated the former queen of the Seelie.

0:22:33 Rowan: Just to be clear to everybody here, she attacked me. This is not me attacking her. I didn't want to kill her, but she was very actively trying to kill me and all of my friends.

0:22:45 Aquamarine: Straight up? No hard feelings, because I will be very honest and I don't liked and I'm not—

0:22:53 Rowan: Oh no, we don't mean to speak ill of the dead but also we're among friends.

0:22:57 Aquamarine: And I feel really hard, especially hard to say this because obviously as someone, like I respect Titania so much and obviously—

0:23:05 Rowan: Oh, I respected the shit out of Titania.

0:23:06 Aquamarine: And all she accomplished. And this is such a, this is a thing that gets said about a lot of powerful female spirits and forces of nature...

0:23:14 Rowan: Trill, she was very—

0:23:15 Aquamarine: She was very hard to work with.

0:23:17 Rowan: Yeah.

0:23:17 Aquamarine: She was very hard to work with.

0:23:19 Rowan: Hard to work with, just like my way or the highway.

0:23:22 Aquamarine: Yeah, and there's just no room for kind of talking about things and other idea because like, my whole thing is like anyone in the room could have the idea.

0:23:30 Rowan: Right. It's like delegation is so important in leadership I feel like and she made so much more work for herself while being like I only have this one idea.

0:23:39 Aquamarine: It's so amazing that you're this beautiful and so down to earth.

0:23:42 Rowan: [touched] Stop!

0:23:44 Brennan: You see that Bobby Goodfellow goes,

0:23:46 Bobby: All right, all right, I gotta. My name's Bobby Goodfellow, as representative of the Unseelie court I come from Lord Oberon with his—

0:23:57 Rowan: Is he bad?

0:24:00 Bobby: I mean, I've heard things about—

0:24:02 Rowan: Because it's not like he didn't cheat. You know what I mean? Like he's not, it's not like a marriage that was good. Again, I don't want to speak ill of the dead.

0:24:11 Bobby: Listen, they opened it up hundreds of years ago and then—

0:24:15 Rowan: Okay, right, but was she happy about that?

0:24:17 Bobby: I don't know, I think it was one of those things where it was kinda like we either open it up or we end it.

0:24:22 Rowan: Right.

0:24:23 Bobby: So it's like, that's not fair, right?

0:24:24 Rowan: Yeah.

0:24:25 Bobby: That's why I'm never getting married. In any case—

0:24:29 Ricky: Hey Kugrash, what do they mean by open it up?

0:24:32 Murph: (laughs) I explain it for a long time. And while I just like—

0:24:40 Ally: You get like deep into compersion.

0:24:41 Murph: I might as well explain to both of you and I take Wally and Ricky aside.

0:24:45 Multiple: Wally's here?

0:24:47 Brennan: No, Wally is not here.

0:24:48 Murph: Okay, just Ricky then.

0:24:49 Brennan: You see that Bobby Goodfellow says,

0:24:51 Bobby: We would ask that because the Unseelie depend upon the Seelie to both define and oppose ourselves, we would ask that you return the crown to us, and in exchange we will acknowledge and recognize the sovereignty of New York as your own realm and Lord Oberon would be willing to grant you three boons.

0:25:15 Rowan: I'm sorry, let me get this right. You want me, the person who doesn't believe in the monarchy, but is still of the Seelie, to give the crown over to the Unseelie court and then I just get three favors.

0:25:36 Bobby: I mean they're full boons so, you know.

0:25:38 Rowan: Yeah, I hear you. But again, I’m an immortal being. Three for a lifetime doesn't seem like that many.

0:25:44 Brennan: You see that Bobby says,

0:25:46 Bobby: I personally question whether you are fully Seelie or not.

0:25:51 Rowan: Well I question whether you are fully Unseelie.

0:25:54 Brennan: You see that the Seelie faerie speaks up again, Aquamarine, and goes,

0:25:58 Aquamarine: I just again want to say that, no our offer would be that you keep the crown and just refound the Seelie court here in New York as its queen and sole monarch.

0:26:10 Brennan: You see that Bobby goes,

0:26:15 Bobby: Let's make it clear. Rowan Berry is a vampiric entity. She feeds off of the hope and joy and passion of the worship and adoration of mortals. She's Unseelie if anything.

0:26:33 Rowan: Oh please. I give people hope, I give people courage, I lift people's hearts when they live in darkness. That's the most Seelie thing for somebody to do.

0:26:48 Brennan: You see that Nod stands up at this moment where you say this and Nod looks at you and goes,

0:26:56 Nod: You're right. Miss Berry, I'm not Fae but I would like to show you something if I can.

0:27:05 Rowan: Mm-hmm.

0:27:06 Brennan: And you see that Nod says, or Nod goes and magic courses from their hands and they say,

0:27:16 Nod: To rebut the words of the honorable Bobby Goodfellow, I dispute the claim that Rowan Berry or any of her former incarnations were parasites or vampires.

0:27:30 Brennan: And Rowan you see visions from all over the world of young kids in their bedrooms singing into the mirror with your poster up.

0:27:43 Rowan: [wiping the very corner of her eye] I do it for them. I do it all for them.

0:27:45 Brennan: (laughs), You see girls in the back of a minivan on the way to a summer camp asking their mom to put the CD of the original cast recording on. I don't know if Rowan or Misty actually believed that line, but you see incontrovertible proof that you have not taken more than you've given. And you look out and you see that Nod speaks and says,

0:28:12 Nod: It is true that, like many entities, Miss Berry has sustained herself on worship. But it is a cynical and small soul that believes that worship diminishes the soul of the worshipper. All of the people who have loved Misty Moore and who will love Rowan Berry have had their hearts and—

0:28:35 Rowan: We'll see.

0:28:36 Nod: (laughs) Have had their hearts enlarged and their lives enriched through the act of their devotion. It does not diminish a soul to give worship or adoration and everything that has sustained Miss Berry has been given back tenfold to sustain those who found their strength through her.

0:28:59 Siobhan: I stand up and give a slow clap.

0:29:03 Rowan: Nobody else? No? Just me, alright.

0:29:05 Brennan: Nod looks over and says,

0:29:08 Nod: I believe the clock gnomes have a rather intriguing offer as a third option.

0:29:13 Rowan: Wonderful.

0:29:14 Brennan: You see that the High Priestess Hib-Hob says,

0:29:16 Hib-Hob: Well, if you wanted, we would be happy to take the crown and if you wanted a Fae realm of your own to shape it into something more to your liking if you wished.

0:29:32 Rowan: Why are we talking about what I want? I'm so, this is America this is the land of hope and dreams of democracy. And we're coming here and saying that I get to create a court and I'm leading this court and no. Absolutely not. The will of the people must stand.

0:29:55 Brennan: All of the faeries are looking around. There's a big hubbub. You see that there's one weird pile of leaves just literally going,

0:30:00 Pile of Leaves: Hubbub, hubbub, hubbub, hubbub.

0:30:02 Ricky: [scared] Ah!

0:30:04 Pile of Leaves: Ah!

0:30:06 Brennan: You see that Nod stands up, raps their fist on this little table next to them and says,

0:30:12 Nod: Then let there be a vote!

0:30:14 Brennan: A bunch of little wisps of paper and a little ballot box in the middle open up. You see that there are three options on it. One is to return the crown to the Unseelie. The other is to wear the crown and become Monarch of the Seelie here. And the third is to found a Fae court, with the blessing of Nod and have the crown reshaped by the clock gnomes into something else. You see that Nod distributes ballots to Kugrash, Kingston, and Ricky,

0:30:51 Ricky: I have a question about this. Hi, I'm Ricky. I'm not sure what any of this is. When you say reshaping it into something else what does that mean?

0:31:06 Hib-Hob: Like a gun or a watch or a bicycle or really sort of anything you want.

0:31:12 Ricky: But could it be a democracy or does it have to be a—

0:31:16 Brennan: You see that Bobby Goodfellow speaks up and says,

0:31:22 Bobby: The Unseelie and the Seelie have been monarchies forever because that is the nature of how they were created. If you were to found something new and to found that as a democracy that's the business of this new realm, whatever it would be.

0:31:37 Ricky: Okay, thank you.

0:31:40 Bobby: I don't want to go too fast for you, does that all make sense?

0:31:42 Ricky: I think so. Bobby?

0:31:47 Bobby: Bobby, yeah.

0:31:48 Ricky: Ricky, sir.

0:31:49 Bobby: Ricky, how's it going?

0:31:50 Rowan: Also I just wanna say, whatever happens, I just wanna still be an actor. I love the stage. I don't wanna, whatever situation that we find ourselves in I don't know if I wanna do that forever. Maybe I could pull a Glenda Jackson and be in politics for and go back and do Lear.

0:32:15 Brennan: You see that Aquamarine says,

0:32:18 Aquamarine: Well if you were queen of the Seelie we would kinda need—

0:32:23 Rowan: Right.

0:32:24 Aquamarine: You to be queen.

0:32:26 Brennan: And you see that Nod says,

0:32:29 Nod: I don't have any input on what the shape of the Fae realm in New York would look like after your decision.

0:32:37 Emily: [quietly] Install Wally.

0:32:41 Siobhan: I'm so glad you're not really here. (everyone laughs)

0:32:46 Siobhan: My inner Sofia is whispering all of the worst advice in my ear.

0:32:50 Rowan’s Inner Sofia: Wally for Queen of the Fae!

0:32:55 Brennan: You see that faeries start putting their votes in the ballot box.

0:33:00 Rowan: It seems to me that the suggestion to build a Fae world of our own, it worries me that I'm the only operative but that could also be a democratic process.

0:33:15 Brennan: You see that Nod affirms that and they say,

0:33:23 Nod: Being the founder of something is a manifestation of the powerful magic you've created. But being the founder is not the same as being a leader. You could create something and step away from it if that was your heart's desire.

0:33:40 Rowan’s Inner Sofia: Wally World.

0:33:43 Ally: It's a real place in Holland.

0:33:44 Emily: [excited] Really?

0:33:46 Kugrash: Let's just make sure we don't split the vote, I feel like right now the third party candidate is making you the queen of New York and we don't want this crown to go to the Unseelie so maybe we should all get on the same page here.

0:33:58 Brennan: Yeah, go ahead and let me know how you guys vote.

0:34:01 Kingston: I've generally found the relationship to the Fae as it has been to be beneficial for New York. So I will vote in favor of giving the crown to the Seelie.

0:34:13 Zac: That's an option too?

0:34:13 Emily: You mean to the Unseelie?

0:34:14 Lou: No, to the Seelie.

0:34:16 Brennan: So their option is that you would become queen and rule the Seelie here, so it's option two.

0:34:22 Zac: And would you have to live in their realm?

0:34:24 Siobhan: Yeah, pretty much.

0:34:27 Murph: I guess I'll vote for the, Kugrash votes to give it to the gnomes.

0:34:31 Zac: Same with Ricky.

0:34:34 Brennan: Ricky votes for the gnomes, you voted for the gnomes. How does Misty vote?

0:34:39 Siobhan: I mean, I'm going to go gnomes.

0:34:41 Brennan: You see the ballet's created. You see that Bobby Goodfellow says,

0:34:46 Bobby: Hey, it was worth a shot. I'm staying at the plaza, so.

0:34:50 Rowan: Yeah, no fuss, no worry.

0:34:53 Bobby: No worries.

0:34:54 Brennan: You see Bobby—

0:34:55 Rowan: I respect your hustle, Bobby.

0:34:56 Bobby: Hey, you know, I gotta make moves while I can, I'm not in New York for that long.

0:35:00 Brennan: You see, he goes over, you see that Aquamarine flies over to you and gives a little kiss on your ringed hand, sort of crying.

0:35:10 Aquamarine: [sniffs] Well, I don't—

0:35:13 Brennan: The ballot comes out and the clock gnomes start celebrating as the clock gnome option wins. You see that Aquamarine cries a little bit and wipes her tears away. You see that she looks up to you and says,

0:35:27 Aquamarine: I understand why you made the choice you did.

0:35:30 Rowan: Aquamarine, I would love for you to come and be a voice in the formation of this new Fae. I think it's really important to have all of the voices represented, not just the voices of change but the voices of stability.

0:35:44 Brennan: You see that Aquamarine's eyes light up and she says,

0:35:49 Aquamarine: I will serve you, may I ask of a favor of you in exchange for my service, for as long as there shall be time.

0:35:57 Rowan: [shaking her head] Ooh, a faerie asking a favor. Sure, just this once, go ahead.

0:36:04 Brennan: You see she says,

0:36:05 Aquamarine: I will gladly serve you, the favor I ask, if you have taken Lady Titania's crown as is your right, if her shoes could be returned so that they might choose a new leader for us in a leader's absence.

0:36:25 Rowan: I'm so sorry. You are asking to create a second monarchy within Faerie. I think that we did not vote for that.

0:36:39 Zac: Can I do a Perception check?

0:36:41 Brennan: Yeah, do a Perception.

0:36:43 Zac: [casually] Okay, nat 20. (group exclamation)

0:36:48 Brennan: You see that—

0:36:49 Ally: Another day another 20.

0:36:50 Brennan: You see that there doesn't appear to be anything foul or wicked happening here. You see that Aquamarine says,

0:36:58 Aquamarine: You're right, we didn't vote on it, but.

0:37:02 Ricky: Are you worried about what will happen to the Seelie place?

0:37:06 Aquamarine: Without a monarch, there's nothing to protect us from the Unseelie. And I know it's sneaky but [wiggling a finger on her face] you did give me a favor.

0:37:16 Rowan: But we didn't agree that we would. (mumbles) Fucking faeries.

0:37:21 Brennan: You begin to feel the magic of Faerie closing in on you.

0:37:23 Rowan: Shit. God these fucking people. Here is what I will agree on. Fuck. Um—

0:37:35 Rowan’s Inner Sofia: Give the shoes to Wally.

0:37:39 Ally: You are not here.

0:37:40 Rowan: Goddamn. Why is the only thing that I can think—

0:37:42 Ally: We're at a coffee shop.

0:37:43 Rowan: Is the bad ideas that Sofia would have.

0:37:45 Zac: She’s the leaves.

0:37:48 Rowan: Tell you what. While I am the leader of the court I need the shoes in New York.

0:37:59 Aquamarine: If you get something to replace the shoes and don't need them anymore, then a deal’s a deal. How does that sound?

0:38:07 Rowan: On the other agreement that the leader of the court in New York is the leader of the court of Seelie, and anybody who sets themselves up as a leader of Seelie is a pretender.

0:38:23 Aquamarine: Okay.

0:38:26 Rowan: And they're committing an illegal act.

0:38:29 Aquamarine: Okay.

0:38:31 Brennan: You see that she says,

0:38:33 Aquamarine: I'm just not gonna see my people destroyed because both their artifacts are gone. That's all.

0:38:38 Rowan: I get it. I get it.

0:38:40 Aquamarine: And I know that I'm small and cute but I'm not a pushover and I'm not a dummy so.

0:38:43 Rowan: Please. Hey look. You think I haven't been ignored because I'm small and cute.

0:38:47 Aquamarine: You're small?

0:38:50 Rowan: In comparison to these humans, absolutely.

0:38:52 Brennan: She shrugs and says,

0:38:53 Aquamarine: Okay, take whatever time you need but let me know when those shoes become free.

0:38:59 Brennan: And you see that she flits off. You see the clock gnomes come over and say,

0:39:04 Clock Gnome: Well, let us know what you want us to shape the crown into and we'll be happy to do it.

0:39:10 Rowan: Oh yeah, no, I'll have a little thought, how about… Ooh.

0:39:14 Clock Gnome: No rush, take your time.

0:39:15 Rowan: I just don't want it to get passé, you know? You want something that has some lasting oomph to it.

0:39:23 Clock Gnome: I understand.

0:39:24 Rowan: What if you get a snap band and then snap bands aren't cool anymore?

0:39:28 Clock Gnome: Snap bands will always be cool. [slaps a snap band on their wrist]

0:39:30 Rowan: You know, you're right. Snap bands will always be cool.

0:39:34 Brennan: You guys walk from this place as the conclave ends, you bestowed with this new power.

0:39:41 Siobhan: Can I have a look at this crown? I don't know what it does except for.

0:39:45 Brennan: It doesn't have a trigger on it to shoot spells out of it.

0:39:50 Lou: Bang!

0:39:51 Brennan: It does just have the power of that station. Of being like a lord or lady of Faerie. We're gonna cut over to Sofia and Pete. You guys are dipping out into Nod. What do you guys do as you go out into Nod?

0:40:05 Emily: I mean, I'm in general just kinda acting aggressive.

0:40:11 Ally: What! [cast laughing]

0:40:13 Emily: Because I'm your escort.

0:40:15 Ally: Oh, because you said you would be my muscle.

0:40:16 Emily: Yeah.

0:40:17 Pete: Look, Sofia, I've been working out a lot okay?

0:40:21 Sofia: I know.

0:40:22 Pete: I even worked out with Ricky once.

0:40:23 Sofia: You look awesome.

0:40:23 Pete: And it was a nightmare. Thank you.

0:40:24 Sofia: I honestly wanted to join you guys, it sounds super fun.

0:40:26 Pete: You should definitely come.

0:40:27 Sofia: I used to do Zumba, and then my favorite teacher left because she had a kid.

0:40:31 Pete: It makes all the difference who's the teacher.

0:40:33 Sofia: Exactly.

0:40:33 Pete: Absolutely. Okay, I want to check out where that growth is that Kugrash told us about.

0:40:40 Brennan: You see it spreading throughout the city but you can follow it to the heart of the infection. And yeah, you see it spreads from the golden door hanging over the city, the rectangular golden light.

0:40:52 Ally: Cool.

0:40:53 Brennan: And you see that this weird, suspended in plasma and blood crumpled and strung out dollars and cents, sludge of money moving throughout the Dream realm. But you arrive at the heart of the infection near the middle of Manhattan.

0:41:14 Ally: Cool, can I do an Insight?

0:41:16 Brennan: Yeah, go for it.

0:41:20 Ally: Great, that is a 22.

0:41:24 Brennan: Awesome. What is Pete trying to glean? You definitely see it in its fullness. You're using your Vox Phantasma authority to look through the Dream realm and see all the places that it's going.

0:41:34 Ally: I wanna see who put it there and what purpose it's serving.

0:41:40 Brennan: With a 22 you can see that people put it there. It does not appear that some single malevolent force created this but rather some malevolent forces have taken advantage of this being here and propagated it. In other words, it is this weird psychic growth on top of this dream of the golden door. In other words it's not like, “oh the Dream world was great and lovely and then some evil money thing came and made there be a money infection”. It's like no this poison has always flirted around the edges of what this dream meant. But rather than forces creating it, you can see they're forces tapped into it that are siphoning energy and power off of it. And there's a couple throughout this city but a bunch of the deepest most powerful roots are way downtown.

0:42:50 Ally: Where Moses is.

0:42:51 Emily: I take out, I have a lip gloss that's almost done. So I just wanna scoop up the very last of it, put on a layer and then I'd like to scoop some of the sludge into my lip gloss file.

0:43:03 Brennan: Cool.

0:43:04 Emily: So that I have a little bit of it.

0:43:05 Brennan: Yep, you get a nasty little vial of this toxic money sludge.

0:43:09 Ally: So this is running money to where and like from?

0:43:13 Brennan: Yeah, exactly. It's basically this thing, like before when we were talking about the rat race that you guys found in Hell. Basically what this is is it's like the archetypal dream here is prosperity, happiness, thriving, a home, this and that. All the stuff that people want. And then this infection is like, oh you need me to get that. And then eventually blinds and corrupts people where they're like, forget the thing they were getting money to get.

0:43:46 Ally: Can I see what happens if I shoot it?

0:43:48 Sofia: I was gonna say maybe we should eat a little bit.

0:43:50 Pete: [horrified] What the fuck?

0:43:51 Brennan: By the way—

0:43:52 Sofia: Just a little bit, like a little taste to see if it has an effect.

0:43:55 Pete: Are you? No that's too scary for me but go for it if you want. I'm gonna shoot it and then maybe a slice will—

0:44:02 Sofia: Okay well let's shoot it first, I'll Mage Hand it you shoot it and we'll see what happens.

0:44:05 Brennan: You go to shoot some of it with your gun and—

0:44:11 Siobhan: Don't eat it! I have a much more sensible idea, I'm gonna shoot it.

0:44:15 Brennan: You see by the way that as you go to collect some you see that some of this stuff is coming out of you. You look at your backpack and see all the bricks and stuff that you reupped from 53V3N and a strong—

0:44:30 Ally: This is capitalism. So it's just, I'm seeing a—

0:44:34 Emily: Is any coming from me?

0:44:35 Ally: Physical manifestation of capitalism.

0:44:37 Brennan: There's a tiny little thread or tether going to your purse. But it's not, there's like a thick nasty root coming out of the block. You got a 22 on your Insight right?

0:44:49 Ally: Mm-hmm.

0:44:50 Brennan: You look down at it, you see that like some of the—

0:44:54 Ally: (gasps in realization) Sorry, go on.

0:44:56 Brennan: No, no, no. You see that it appears to be connecting to some of it more powerfully than others.

0:45:02 Sofia: The cherry tomatoes… Ready to play the contrabassoon.

0:45:03 Brennan: There's like a little bit of, there's like some of the weed in your bag has like a very thin little trail to the thicker one. You see the cocaine and the heroine have these thick rooted things. And as you look down you take out your gun, blam, blast one of the thick arteries and you look down and see a wall against a warehouse somewhere, someone being pushed up against it and being shot in the back of the head. As you can see that they were dragged out of a jeep for trying to escape from this cocaine harvesting operation.

0:45:42 Pete: Great. Okay, yeah. Fully like late capitalism. Okay cool, I've found what I want. Did you wanna go do something?

0:45:50 Brennan: Go ahead and make a Wisdom saving throw for me real quick.

0:45:52 Ally: Great. What do I add to that?

0:45:57 Murph: Add two, so 16.

0:45:58 Ally: 16.

0:45:59 Brennan: 16, cool. You see that this fuckin’ brick of shit in your bag, the thing you're seeing is not unrelated, that's like the history of this brick of cocaine. It's like, oh someone made this, tried to escape, and the people—

0:46:16 Ally: They're forced to scrape plants and they were, yeah, fuck.

0:46:19 Brennan: And then ran the fuck away and was shot and killed for trying to escape. What's going on with Pete right now?

0:46:26 Ally: I'm bummed. By my life choices. I'm confused and I'm also really bored. Because I haven't been high in a really long time.

0:46:36 Sofia: I mean, I've got honestly a lot of nips on me if you want something.

0:46:40 Pete: I would, but I just am like—

0:46:41 Sofia: Be my guest.

0:46:42 Pete: Am I bored or am I running away?

0:46:43 Sofia: You're right, sometimes you need to be bored to figure out what's going on.

0:46:46 Pete: It's true, thank you. Do you have like a Malibu rum though? The alcohol content—

0:46:50 Sofia: I do, I do.

0:46:51 Pete: Is so low, I would love just a sip.

0:46:52 Sofia: The coconut one is pretty much cocaine.

0:46:53 Pete: It tastes like sunscreen.

0:46:54 Brennan: What was the revelation Pete had a second, it looked like you and Pete recognized something. You went like, (gasps).

0:46:58 Ally: Yeah, it sounded like some of the stuff that 53V3N got was infected.

0:47:03 Brennan: Yeah.

0:47:03 Ally: So was this a specific thing or was it just tied to the cocaine because that's like the least ethically harvested and spot and sold.

0:47:10 Brennan: It seems like that's the thing you see.

0:47:12 Ally: Okay.

0:47:13 Brennan: And you see it also in a lot of other, as you're just looking through Nod, you see it coming out of some forms of retail stores like it's attached to like fucking—

0:47:22 Ally: Slave labor?

0:47:22 Brennan: Yeah, exactly. You see there's like a diamond—

0:47:24 Ally: It's the ethics.

0:47:25 Emily: I was gonna say like can I have some diamond earrings that I swear to God they're real diamonds, can I hold them up and see?

0:47:32 Brennan: One of them has a thick nasty root of evil. There's a diamond on your ring that has a thick nasty root of evil and then your two diamond earrings have got nothing.

0:47:41 Sofia: So I guess some diamonds are bad and some are—

0:47:44 Pete: Some diamonds are real.

0:47:47 Sofia: Oh my God.

0:47:48 Brennan: Yeah, you see two pieces of glass—

0:47:49 Pete: Your ear is bright green.

0:47:51 Sofia: (laughs) I thought that was because the diamond was just—

0:47:54 Pete: Diamonds don't do that.

0:47:54 Sofia: Casting a green—

0:47:55 Pete: No, no, diamonds don’t do that.

0:47:56 Sofia: A green kiss of the real diamond.

0:47:58 Pete: The green kiss of a real diamond? Is that what you were just saying?

0:48:01 Sofia: Yeah, that's the thing we say in Staten Island. Okay, let's head back. [whimsical, chiming music]

0:48:06 Brennan: Cool. You guys head back, as you guys are catching the L train back out of Nod, heading towards, I presume the Clinton Hill Chantry where Esther is. What do you guys go ahead, what do you guys say when you meet up at the train station?

0:48:26 Pete: What happened.

0:48:26 Rowan: Wild day.

0:48:28 Sofia: Oh yeah, how did it all go?

0:48:31 Rowan: So, I think that we're gonna instigate some kind of faerie democracy, we'll see how it goes, I don't know, sometimes you instigate a democracy and it goes well and sometimes it doesn't.

0:48:41 Kugrash: Yeah, the gnomes are doing their work.

0:48:42 Rowan: Yeah, I like the gnomes, they seem pretty stable.

0:48:45 Ally: Can I roll to hide how big of a crush I have on new Misty?

0:48:48 Brennan: Yeah, absolutely.

0:48:51 Ally: What would that be, Deception?

0:48:53 Brennan: That would be Deception.

0:48:54 Ally: 18.

0:48:54 Brennan: 18, cool, go ahead and give me an Insight check. Miss Rowan Berry.

0:49:01 Siobhan: Do I get advantage on seeing other people's Deception?

0:49:06 Brennan: No, I don't think you do.

0:49:11 Siobhan: Insight?

0:49:11 Brennan: Insight.

0:49:13 Siobhan: 21.

0:49:15 BRennan: Pete is hornt up.

0:49:18 Siobhan: I take Pete's cowboy hat—

0:49:18 Emily: What's the height difference?

0:49:20 Siobhan: And I put it on.

0:49:22 Pete: Stop it, give me that back. God, you're so dumb!

0:49:25 Rowan: Doesn't it suit me? Don't you think it looks cute?

0:49:27 Ricky: Pete, why do you think she's dumb?

0:49:29 Pete: I don't know, I'm just, it's weird when your friend all of a sudden is completely different.

0:49:32 Rowan: Ricky, put some clothes on.

0:49:34 Pete: Yeah, Ricky you were naked in that whole judge— Sofia Okay, okay, let him come around to it on his own time.

0:49:38 Ricky: I keep forgetting, sorry.

0:49:40 Pete: (laughs) You keep forgetting.

0:49:42 Rowan: It's all right, you're fine.

0:49:43 Pete: Oh, I forgot.

0:49:44 Brennan: Lovely, you guys get to the Clinton Hill Chantry, you walk up.

0:49:49 Frank: Oh, hi Ricky, how's it going man?

0:49:50 Brennan: Frank.

0:49:51 Ricky: Hey Frank, how's it going?

0:49:52 Frank: Good, you know. Can't complain. Getting pretty cold out here, a little frost behind the old knocker but you know, it is what it is.

0:49:59 Ricky: I said I'd bring you a sandwich, didn't I?

0:50:01 Frank: Hey, man. It's not a problem.

0:50:04 Ricky: Next time I come, I'm gonna bring in two sandwiches, I'm sorry about that.

0:50:06 Frank: Oh man, see this is why I like you man, you're such a good guy. You're real, New York's bravest man, I love it. It's great. You know it's funny, the other day I was talking they got a—

0:50:16 Ricky: Yeah? (knocking on door) (Brennan coughing)

0:50:18 Ricky: Keep going, I'm sorry.

0:50:19 Brennan: Door swings open. You guys walk in, see that there's a large room in the chantry, Esther's moved one of the tables so that in the center of the floor there's this runic magic circle. And Don Confetti with his hands tied up behind his back, is sitting [plops down in his chair] in the middle of this little circle. Very unimpressive looking now that he's not surrounded by his pixie mafia. He looks at all you guys as you come in, he goes,

0:50:50 Don Confetti: I'm not talking with nobody. I'm not saying nothing without my lawyer.

0:50:54 Brennan: The door closes (door squeaking) and he goes,

0:50:56 Don Confetti: I will fully cooperate with everything you wanna do, I will spill all the beans, please, please help me.

0:51:04 Rowan: Darling, I'm so glad that you're being sensible about this.

0:51:08 Don Confetti: All I wanna do is help. I regret my life of tiny crime.

0:51:09 Ally: Tiny crime… [laughs]

0:51:11 Zac: Can I just add, cast Zone of Truth on him.

0:51:14 Murph: That's a good call. Emily Oh yeah.

0:51:15 Siobhan: Yeah.

0:51:16 Brennan: Sure.

0:51:20 Zac: Yeah, I cast Zone of Truth.

0:51:23 Brennan: You feel him fail. You feel the spell come into effect. So Ricky, you stand up and command this zone of honesty around you. What does Ricky creating a zone of honesty look like? [laughing]

0:51:39 Ally: How big is the zone?

0:51:41 Zac: It's a 15 foot radius.

0:51:44 Lou: Oh sweet.

0:51:44 Ally: Are we all in it? I'm like I'm trying to back up a little bit,

0:51:46 Siobhan: Oh no.

0:51:47 Brennan: I think we need some Wisdom saving throws from you guys.

0:51:50 Emily: Oh, I got a nat 20.

0:51:52 Lou: I'm all good, 22.

0:51:54 Siobhan: Yeah I’m good, 21.

0:51:55 Murph: 21.

0:51:56 Emily: What a waste of a nat 20 though.

0:51:57 Ally: 19.

0:51:58 Brennan: I'm gonna say roll with disadvantage because you're rattled by Rowan over here.

0:52:01 Ally: God damn it. um 14, 13.

0:52:05 Brennan: 13. Pete, you fail. You fail to save.

0:52:09 Pete: Rowan, are you gonna start studying—

0:52:11 Siobhan: I scratch the back of your head.

0:52:12 Pete: Stop. Are you gonna start studying acting again or what's your schedule gonna be like?

0:52:16 Rowan: I don't know, isn't it so exciting?

0:52:18 Pete: That's so exciting.

0:52:19 Ricky: [very seriously] Don Confetti. [cast laughs]

0:52:21 Siobhan: I cast Minor Illusion so we all look like the really ultra hot DAs from Law and Order. Just like really well-fitted lawyer suits.

0:52:28 Pete: Oh my God, cool.

0:52:30 Don Confetti: Yeah, yes sir, so sorry.

0:52:32 Ricky: [a little similarly to a lawyer] I command you to tell the truth!

0:52:36 Pete: Did you get southern all of a sudden?

0:52:38 Ricky: To tell the truth.

0:52:39 Brennan: You see him—

0:52:40 Siobhan: He is but a humble southern lawyer.

0:52:42 Brennan: You see--

0:52:43 Zac: He's got suspenders on.

0:52:45 Brennan: He then goes

0:52:47 Don Confetti: I don't know if you're speaking on behalf of the fire department or if you're legally allowed to make these demands but I accept, I submit to your authority and I agree. What is it you wanna know?

0:52:57 Rowan: Ducky, what's going on? [suspenseful music]

0:52:58 Don Confetti: Okay, here's basically what's going on. I was sent here a long time ago by Titania to basically oversee some faerie business here in the city. You had run away and you were here with the shoes and that was the thing I was maybe supposed to consider, you know looking after. But when I got here, very quickly Robert Moses, he was at that time not a businessman, he was actually the head of a lot of civic organizations that had to do with infrastructure and he was responsible for building all the major highways in New York.

0:53:38 Rowan: See, the banality of evil. That is so Goddamn boring.

0:53:44 Don Confetti: Yeah he got all of the—

0:53:44 Rowan: Course the most evil guy is the guy that built the highways, so dull.

0:53:48 Don Confetti: Yeah he's real bad. But he built the highways and pretty soon the highways made it so that the tiny little people like that couldn't come here, you know what I mean? So I—

0:54:00 Rowan: Potato, Potahto.

0:54:02 Don: So when the cat is prevented from accessing you because of a series of highways in a shape of a hex, the mice will play! And... so you remember how Faerie pays a tithe to Hell, about 10% of what faerie makes has been paid to Hell part of an old agreement. I stopped paying my taxes to Titania when the highway hex was finished. And Robert Moses has found out and they did me for tax evasion, can you believe it? Me, a mafia boss.

0:54:40 Rowan: [stammers] I get it.

0:54:41 Sofia: So you were working with Hell because they had something on you?

0:54:46 Don Confetti: I was working with Hell because unlike Faerie, they had somebody on the ground here in New York.

0:54:51 Pete: Who, Bob Moses?

0:54:52 Sofia: Bob Moses?

0:54:53 Kugrash: Was it Robert Moses?

0:54:54 Don Confetti: Isabella Infierno, who was working for Bob Moses. So that bag I gave to your brother that was them, Bicicletas have been ferrying my tenth, my tithe to Isabella. Unbeknownst to me, I found this out in the last day or two, she wasn't giving any of that back to Hell.

0:55:12 Sofia: Where was she bringing it to?

0:55:14 Don Confetti: Well a lot of those magical stuff and ritual gear and yada yada yada.

0:55:18 Sofia: She was just spending it on herself.

0:55:19 Don Confetti: On herself and on Mr Moses.

0:55:21 Rowan: See this is what you gotta do. You go in, you get the gig, you say pay me half as a check and then you get half of it in cash and then you pay the taxes on the check.

0:55:29 Ricky: You're kinda sounding like your old self again.

0:55:33 Kugrash: It sounds like Robert Moses is trying to play both sides and then protect himself—

0:55:40 Rowan: Really he's just.

0:55:41 Sofia: He's just trying to create his own realm that he has ultimate control of.

0:55:44 Kugrash: And stop Hell and Faerie from getting in here so that he can kinda rule everything or rule New York unopposed.

0:55:51 Rowan: King of New York, huh?

0:55:53 Don Confetti: Looks like it.

0:55:55 Rowan: I don't like it.

0:55:56 Pete: So then that would put you against him, probably.

0:55:58 Rowan: I mean I've been against him. Oh, I should tell you, he did come and visit me on Christmas Day.

0:56:05 Pete: What?

0:56:06 Sofia: Like for what reason?

0:56:07 Rowan: Real big boy, I'm the boss around here, kinda moves. Nothing solid. He didn't say anything real.

0:56:13 Sofia: We should go visit him.

0:56:15 Don Confetti: But you're all right. Robert Moses didn't try to play Faerie and Hell against each other. He successfully played Faerie and Hell against each other.

0:56:23 Sofia: How does Heaven factor into this? Is Robert Moses playing them at all?

0:56:27 Don Confetti: No, not that I'm aware of.

0:56:29 Brennan: But, he says,

0:56:31 Don Confetti: That was the one kinda hole in his plan was the idea of, he knew how to play this game with Hell and Faerie, but you can't sell your soul to Heaven, they won't buy a soul. So, basically he had to find someway to square his soul with Heaven that wouldn't have to do with--

0:56:51 Ricky: The list! [dream-like, somber music]

0:56:51 Sofia: The fountain. Or the list.

0:56:54 Don Confetti: Oh, yeah that'll work. That for sure.

0:56:58 Kugrash: Do you know where the list is?

0:57:01 Don: All that stuff that we took went to Moses.

0:57:05 Rowan: Oh, so you did take that.

0:57:07 Don Confetti: The list we took.

0:57:08 Sofia: And the pixies that went down for that, was that just a favor, you just threw those guys under the bus.

0:57:14 Don Confetti: They'll be well taken care of on the inside. Sometimes members of the family gotta take a fall for the organization.

0:57:18 Rowan: What about the clock gnomes? Was that you guys too?

0:57:22 Siobhan: I pull out the little baggie of pixie dust. (magical chiming)

0:57:24 Brennan: As you pull out the pixie stuff, you can automatically see that it sort of sprinkles off. (magical chiming)

0:57:29 Rowan: Oh yeah, this looks right.

0:57:32 Brennan: You see he shrugs and says,

0:57:34 Don Confetti: Moses wanted the [his accent makes this even harder to pronounce] Big Book of Bits and Bubbas.

0:57:37 Rowan: The what?

0:57:38 Kingston: Moses wanted the Big Book of Bugs and Baubles?

0:57:40 Sofia: The Big Book of Bits and Bubbles.

0:57:41 Don Confetti: Are you making fun of my speech impediment?

0:57:43 Kingston: No it's called the Big Book of Bits and Baubles right?

0:57:46 Don Confetti: The Big Book of Bits and Baubles.

0:57:46 Ricky: Yeah the Big Book of—

0:57:50 Rowan: The Big Book of Bits and Baubles?

0:57:50 Kingston: We all know about the Big Book of Bits and Baubles.

0:57:52 Rowan: We all know what it's called and we know how to say it.

0:57:54 Don Confetti: Yes. Exactly.

0:57:55 Pete: So he has everything now right? He's got the list, he has the ability to make a stone.

0:58:00 Sofia: He has the key to the city.

0:58:01 Kingston: He has a key to the city.

0:58:03 Rowan: The time stone.

0:58:03 Sofia: He's got the time stone.

0:58:04 Kingston: Where is he?

0:58:06 Don Confetti: Your guess is as good as mine, he doesn't give me his location. We had drop off points.

0:58:10 Ricky: Do you know where he's—

0:58:11 Sofia: Esther, you got a read on where he might be?

0:58:14 Brennan: You see that Esther shrugs and goes,

0:58:19 Esther: [sighs] I wouldn't know where to start looking for him, but.

0:58:24 Brennan: She goes,

0:58:26 Esther: If only we still had it, but it's been missing for years.

0:58:28 Rowan: What?

0:58:30 Esther: The Sardinian Eagle.

0:58:32 Rowan: The Sardinian Eagle?

0:58:34 Sofia: I like that.

0:58:35 Esther: The Sardinian Eagle was an artifact. It's an extremely powerful artifact that can help locate and find areas of extreme magical importance. If we think that there's a chance that Moses is going to do some kind of ritual or cast some kind of important spell then the Sardinian Eagle would be able to help us find that location.

0:58:57 Kingston: What's it look like?

0:58:59 Esther: I believe the Sardinian Eagle was— Emily is staring at Lou knowingly, giggling. Lou looks resigned.

0:59:01 Kingston: Looks like a bird?

0:59:03 Ricky: Was it up someone's—

0:59:04 Sofia: Someone’s ass?

0:59:04 Rowan: Someone's butt?

0:59:04 Kingston: I know where it is, y'all ain't gonna like that. Y'all ain't gonna like where it is, but I know where it is.

0:59:09 Esther: You know the Sardinian Eagle? We need to get our hands on it as soon as possible.

0:59:12 Kingston: Oh we don't wanna get anyone's hands on it.

0:59:13 Sofia: I think we wanna cover—

0:59:14 Kugrash: Why? Well, I'll put my hands on it.

0:59:16 Ricky: Grab it as soon as we can, what are you talking about?

0:59:17 Kingston: No we're not, nobody wants to put their hands on this.

0:59:18 Pete: Can I ask the question? Where is Bob Moses from? Which realm is his, where he's from?

0:59:25 Don Confetti: From my understanding, Mr Moses is a powerful form of undead.

0:59:32 Rowan: Wow, but he's not a vampire. Because I can see him.

0:59:34 Sofia: So the undead aren't necessarily from Hell. That's kind've like their own breed.

0:59:39 Don Confetti: Exactly.

0:59:40 Rowan: They're from our plane, right?

0:59:41 Don Confetti: The undead--

0:59:42 Sofia: Oh, perhaps they're creating an undead realm.

0:59:44 Don: You might say that the undead are more committed to being from Earth than even the living are. They sure have a hard time letting go.

0:59:53 Kugrash: That’s really insightful.

0:59:55 Don Confetti: I wanna point something out.

0:59:56 Rowan: No judgment or anything.

0:59:57 Don Confetti: I know that I got clowned pretty hard in the last fight. I've been running a very successful mafia organization for decades.

1:00:02 Rowan: Look darling, who are you talking with?

1:00:03 Sofia: You threw your daughter a beautiful wedding.

1:00:04 Don Confetti: Thank you, I actually put a lot of thought, and she's my fifth daughter to be married and we didn't skimp on an expense because—

1:00:10 Rowan: It was really beautiful.

1:00:11 Sofia: You could feel that when you were there, it didn't feel like you chose favorites.

1:00:14 Rowan: It was truly magical.

1:00:15 Don Confetti: I am a bad man. I'm a bad man.

1:00:18 Sofia: I know, I think you're a fucking piece of shit.

1:00:19 Don Confetti: I won't--

1:00:20 Sofia: After this I am going to beat you up.

1:00:21 Don Confetti: I am a piece of shit—

1:00:22 Rowan: No!

1:00:23 Don: And you are welcome to beat the shit out of me.

1:00:23 Sofia: Yeah, I'm going to.

1:00:24 Don: I can't stop you.

1:00:25 Sofia: I've got a fucking spell slot left.

1:00:27 Pete: I'm like, hey, come on Sofia.

1:00:29 Don Confetti: Everyone should feel like a princess on her special day. [points to the Zone of Truth] And I believe that 100%.

1:00:34 Pete: That's... great. Okay, so Bob Moses really wanted me to work with him. Should I pretend like I've flipped? Should I go meet him?

1:00:43 Kingston: I can also get the Sardinian Eagle.

1:00:45 Kugrash: Yeah, let's get the, I think trying to trick some crazy primordial being is just gonna blow up in our faces.

1:00:53 Kingston: We have knowledge that he knows about us. He probably at some point knows that you just said what you just said.

1:00:59 Kugrash: Pete, you can't even hide the fact that you've got a crush on Rowan.

1:01:01 Pete: I fucking don't.

1:01:03 Rowan: What, no, Pete would never!

1:01:05 Ricky: Hey, you're under the Zone of Truth right now.

1:01:09 Lou: Can I text like somebody in clerical stuff—

1:01:12 Pete: I do, I have a huge crush on you, who are you?

1:01:13 Lou: At the hospital—

1:01:15 Rowan: Fine, you know who I am.

1:01:16 Lou: To Lowell Master's address?

1:01:18 Brennan: You shoot a text over to Emiko, Ricky's sister, and she texts back and says.

1:01:22 Emiko: Yeah, he hasn't been in in a while. Why, are you worried about something?

1:01:23 Pete: Fuck.

1:01:25 Kingston: Yeah, based on our last visit I just wanna check up on him.

1:01:28 Rowan: He's probably lives pretty close to the location of your hospital, right?

1:01:32 Kingston: Yeah, well I just wanna get his—

1:01:33 Rowan: I have a spell.

1:01:35 Kugrash: You have a bag, the Bagel.

1:01:36 Kingston: I can text somebody and get an address real quick.

1:01:38 Brennan: Yeah, you get—

1:01:39 Rowan: Oh but you can use magic.

1:01:41 Kingston: Nobody asked me. Nobody needs to use magic, we don't have to use magic.

1:01:43 Kugrash: But why wouldn't we use a magic bagel?

1:01:46 Rowan: We can use magic all the time.

1:01:46 Emily: I cast Hellish Rebuke on Don Confetti, (fists thudding)

1:01:49 Don Confetti: Wow, stugots! Bada boom.

1:01:54 Rowan: Do you know—

1:01:54 Kingston: We don't need to beat up every—

1:01:56 Emily: It was just a bit, it was just a bit.

1:01:57 Rowan: Who was it that took care of my friend, Sofia's husband?

1:02:02 Don Confetti: That was Isabella Infierno who did the deed.

1:02:04 Sofia: [softly] Yeah.

1:02:06 Kugrash: Did she kill him? Don Confetti nods.

1:02:09 Pete: Do you want to know?

1:02:11 Ally: I like, Mind Link with you privately.

1:02:13 Pete: Do you want to know details?

1:02:14 Sofia: I'm pretty sure I know the details. I suppose when I saw his spirit it was intact, and so perhaps that gives me the illusion that he had a sort of peaceful, honorable death. I guess if he was put through a garbage disposal I don't wanna know that. I'm gonna take five.

1:02:33 Pete: Cool, I'll walk with you.

1:02:34 Emily: I walk to the bathroom.

1:02:35 Pete: We can go get coffee or something.

1:02:36 Sofia: Esther you wanna grab that coffee?

1:02:38 Brennan: Esther nods and says,

1:02:40 Esther: That sounds like a good idea, let's do that. It's also very late and you've all been through a knock-down drag-out fight. Maybe we do tomorrow, we'll grab a cuppa Joe and you can rest. We have a bed here if you wanna crash here?

1:02:50 Sofia: Yeah do you wanna, like, snuggle and watch Killing Eve on a laptop? It sounds really soothing right now.

1:02:56 Kingston: I've heard about that Killing Eve.

1:02:57 Esther: I wanna be very clear about something. Sandra Oh is the most underappreciated actress of—

1:03:02 Sofia: She's fucking amazing.

1:03:03 Esther: Why is no one? Oh wait, we're gonna watch Killing Eve, I'm gonna run down to the bodega, I'm gonna grab a pint. What's your favorite flavor of Ben and Jerry's?

1:03:11 Sofia: Oh, I thought you were talking alcohol.

1:03:13 Pete: Ricky loves Killing Eve, weren't you just talking about that?

1:03:15 Ricky: I'd love it, I haven't seen it but I love it.

1:03:18 Ally: I look at you like ‘you fucker’.

1:03:19 Rowan: I gotta say, I don't wanna make a big deal out of this but when Sandra Oh was very young, she did take a workshop with me and she already was incredible.

1:03:27 Pete: That is so interesting, tell me everything.

1:03:30 Brennan: Esther looks over, Don Confetti says,

1:03:32 Don Confetti: It seems like my business here is concluded.

1:03:35 Brennan: Esther turns and says,

1:03:35 Esther: Alright.

1:03:38 Brennan: Lowell Master's address pops up on your phone right away, you have like a little nurse app on there that you can pull up. Emiko sends the records to you. You see that Esther turns and says to you, Kugrash, and goes,

1:03:50 Esther: But wait a minute, does Moses have everything he needs? Because the door can't be opened, it's locked without a lock on it. So even with the key there is no lock to put.

1:04:06 Kugrash: What about the—

1:04:06 Rowan: But isn't he trying to—

1:04:07 Kingston: Well the time stone.

1:04:08 Rowan: Create a lock.

1:04:08 Kugrash: The bits and bobbins.

1:04:10 Brennan: You see that Esther goes,

1:04:12 Esther: No, Nod has forbidden a lock to be created.

1:04:16 Ricky: But what about, sorry go for it.

1:04:18 Rowan: But if the lock was created on Earth and not in Nod, Nod wouldn't have jurisdiction over it, would they?

1:04:26 Esther: To my understanding, they have also barred the entry of a lock into—

1:04:32 Sofia: But Sinatra's Law?

1:04:33 Ricky: Yeah, that thing you explained to me.

1:04:34 Rowan: Yeah, Sinatra's Law, if you can make it here you can make it anywhere.

1:04:38 Brennan: You see that Esther looks over to you and says,

1:04:39 Esther: Sinatra's Law?

1:04:40 Ricky: Yes.

1:04:41 Brennan: You see that she says,

1:04:42 Esther: Right, an object...

1:04:46 Brennan: She goes and gets the big tome down and she goes.,

1:04:49 Esther: “An object that is barred or abjured from being conjured or created in a given locality can be conjured created in that given locality if it is first… [slowly, alarmed] conjured or created within the Five Boroughs of New York.” Sinatra's Law of the Imperial Axiom. If you can make it here...

1:05:08 Rowan: You can make it anywhere.

1:05:10 Esther: Oh no.

1:05:11 Rowan: So they're going to make it and then bring it to the door.

1:05:13 Rowan: Or they'll make it here, and then they'll be able to make it in Nod.

1:05:16 Sofia: Yeah.

1:05:17 Brennan: You see that--

1:05:19 Pete: [to Rowan, breathlessly] You're so smart. (Brennan laughs)

1:05:22 Kugrash: We all figured it out, Pete.

1:05:24 Pete: Ah, God.

1:05:26 Emily: Just so I have a clear visual of this. How tall are you and how tall are you?

1:05:31 Ally: I'm 5’9 pushing 5’10 actually.

1:05:33 Siobhan: I'm like five foot one and a bit.

1:05:36 Emily: Oh, I thought pixies were like two feet tall.

1:05:38 Brennan: No, Misty was like 4’10”. And Rowan's like 5’1” 1/2.

1:05:44 Emily: Okay, cool, cool.

1:05:46 Siobhan: Pixies are small, faeries are a little bigger.

1:05:48 Brennan: So you see that Esther says,

1:05:53 Esther: [whispering] That's so bad, the Imperial Axiom of course. [normal] Alright, coffee tomorrow. Kingston—

1:06:00 Kingston: I'm gonna go now.

1:06:01 Esther: Alright.

1:06:02 Brennan: It's late at night, so rolling up at Lowell's might be a little tricky at this time of night but—

1:06:06 Lou: No, I'm going.

1:06:09 Brennan: You guys head off, cool.

1:06:10 Ally: Is there a way to find out what was in the Big Book of Bits and Bobbins that they need to create this stone? Because maybe that's a process—

1:06:19 Zac: Materials-wise?

1:06:20 Ally: That they're in the middle of right now. Yeah, maybe there's something.

1:06:22 Brennan: You see that Esther says,

1:06:25 Esther: Do you wanna hit the books with me here in the Chantry?

1:06:27 Pete: Sure, yeah.

1:06:28 Sofia: Oh I'll hit the books, that sounds good.

1:06:30 Pete: Yeah? We can just put on Eve in the background. I'm not gonna watch, I'm gonna be working.

1:06:35 Sofia: It'll be a rewatch for me.

1:06:36 Pete: Cool.

1:06:37 Brennan: Esther's gonna give the help action to you; go ahead and make an Arcana check with advantage.

1:06:42 Ally: Cool. Seeing Ally’s roll, Murph gasps and covers his mouth with his hand.

1:06:47 Ally: Two nat 1s. What the fuck! That's insane!

1:06:54 Brennan: That is a one in 400 odds, to roll two nat 1s. On a roll with advantage.

1:07:03 Pete: [to Rowan] You're just so hot now. What?

1:07:06 Brennan: Make a Wild Magic check for me.

1:07:10 Ally: 13.

1:07:11 Brennan: Okay.

1:07:11 Lou: If only we could have kept it going.

1:07:13 Brennan: Incredible.

1:07:15 Emily: Maybe I can step in with my Arcana to help.

1:07:18 Brennan: No, with two nat 1s nobody can step in with any Arcana.

1:07:22 Ally: Jesus fucking Christ.

1:07:24 Brennan: Esther immediately regrets her decision. Pete tries to do this sorcerer supreme research shit.

1:07:34 Siobhan: The whole point of sorcerers is they don't read books.

1:07:39 Brennan: Incredible. You're also exhausted. Pete you pass out. Esther snuggles up with you and you guys end up watching this.

1:07:43 Sofia: Hey, girl. [snuggles]

1:07:48 Zac: I'm just so confused.

1:07:51 Brennan: What do Rowan, Kugrash and Ricky do?

1:07:56 Rowan: I'm knackered, I'm going home.

1:07:57 Kugrash: Kingston, are you going tonight?

1:07:59 Kingston: I'm going tonight.

1:08:00 Kugrash: You don't wanna go tomorrow?

1:08:01 Kingston: I don't wanna wait. All of this that's going on--

1:08:05 Kugrash: Alright I'll go with you, then.

1:08:07 Brennan: Alright, cool.

1:08:08 Ricky: I guess I'll go too. I feel weird here.

1:08:12 Sofia: You can watch Killing Eve.

1:08:13 Ricky: It's okay, I'm gonna go with the boys.

1:08:19 Kingston: Alright, little boys adventure, alright.

1:08:21 Sofia: Are you sure?

1:08:22 Ricky: It's fine.

1:08:23 Ally: I wake up and go,

1:08:23 Pete: What the fuck.

1:08:25 Ricky: You're a couple episodes in.

1:08:26 Sofia: Step in!

1:08:27 Ricky: I think—

1:08:28 Sofia: I can walk you through what's happened already. We've got a snuggle going.

1:08:33 Ricky: Alright, I'll stay.

1:08:36 Rowan: Fine, I'll go and do the chore. I'll go with you, but I have to say—

1:08:41 Kugrash: Old people crew. What's up!

1:08:45 Brennan: So the old people crew, Ricky are you staying?

1:08:47 Zac: I'm gonna stay.

1:08:49 Emily: He’s snuggling.

1:08:50 Brennan: On the bed that has Sofia and Esther there, go ahead and make a flat Charisma check.

1:08:57 Ally: To find out which corner of the bed you sit on.

1:09:00 Zac: That would be 17, wait saving throw or just a check.

1:09:07 Brennan: Just a check.

1:09:08 Zac: Okay then 13.

1:09:11 Brennan: Cool, you lie down fully hanging off the side of the bed so you're not making body contact at all.

1:09:22 Zac: I'm like, have one foot on the ground.

1:09:26 Emily: You also can't really see the laptop.

1:09:29 Zac: But not complaining about it at all, just tolerating it.

1:09:33 Ally: So uncomfortable but you're like, I am here.

1:09:36 Ricky: At least I'm—

1:09:38 Ally: Am I asleep on the couch somewhere with my cowboy hat on?

1:09:40 Brennan: Yeah, you're like snoozing over there.

1:09:43 Ricky: What's that character's deal?

1:09:46 Emily: You say that with every new character.

1:09:48 Ricky: What are they doing? Oh that's what they're doing.

1:09:53 Brennan: Wonderful, wonderful. You guys head all the way uptown. Lowell lives in Washington Heights. Train immediately pulls through the station. You go through the turnstile.

1:10:05 Rowan: Oh wait wait wait. There's a great tamale lady right here that we just have to get a couple for the road!

1:10:09 Kingston: No thank you.

1:10:10 Rowan: I never come to this neighborhood, [pouty] come on Kingston please.

1:10:13 Kingston: You are more than welcome to go Miss Berry, I have no interest.

1:10:17 Rowan: Kingston you're so boring now! Fine, we'll go and do the chore.

1:10:22 Brennan: You guys arrive in a little apartment building, like six unit, three story apartment building in Washington Heights. As you arrive there you see a little thing on the buzzer that says Masters on it.

1:10:34 Lou: I press it.

1:10:35 Brennan: Pause.

1:10:36 Lowell Masters: Hello?

1:10:39 Kingston: Hey, Lowell? It's Kingston Brown from the hospital.

1:10:45 Lowell: Hey, Kingston, can I help you, is everything alright?

1:10:53 Kingston: Yeah, the city is in danger, Lowell, and I believe you're one of the few people who can help us.

1:11:01 Lowell: I've been waiting for this moment my whole life.

1:11:04 Kingston: Alright, buzz us in.

1:11:05 Lowell: Come upstairs.

1:11:06 Brennan: You guys are buzzed upstairs. You arrive up at the sixth apartment, all the way at the top, little marble stair walkup. It's one of those marble staircases where the marbles actually buckled a little bit, it's been walked on so many times. You get to this door, you knock on it, it opens. The rich smell of spices and incenses and an unmistakable plastic smell of lube wafts out of the apartment. It looks like a wizard's incubation chamber. Every square inch of the apartment is dangling gems and a Balinese demon mask and a tall standing suit of armor and a little pile of gold. It's like the inside of a dragon's hoard if it was all glued to the inside of a little two-bedroom apartment. Lowell opens it, you see he's wearing a blue buttoned-up short-sleeved shirt and some khakis. He looks a little bit wet like he just showered. He goes,

1:12:14 Lowell: I've been waiting for this day a long time.

1:12:16 Kingston: Well, I'm glad. These are my friends, Kugrash and—

1:12:20 Rowan: Rowan.

1:12:21 Kingston: Rowan Berry.

1:12:22 Rowan: I love your place, so eclectic!

1:12:24 Brennan: He looks at you and says,

1:12:25 Lowell: My God, I'm sorry it's a little bit messy right now, did I see you in an episode of Law and Order, or am I?

1:12:31 Rowan: No, I get that all the time, but no.

1:12:34 Lowell: You're great, are you, this is a crazy thing to say, are you represented? Because my cousin is a—

1:12:40 Kugrash: This is happening already?

1:12:43 Kingston: Lowell this is not the same—

1:12:44 Lowell: I'm sorry, it's crazy.

1:12:44 Rowan: This is not why we're here.

1:12:45 Lowell: You just got such a look, do you do modeling?

1:12:48 Rowan: I've been thinking about it, actually.

1:12:50 Lowell: You should get headshots.

1:12:50 Rowan: I maybe am too short, but maybe that's a thing.

1:12:54 Lowell: No, I think—

1:12:55 Kingston: Alright. Lowell, how you been, you good?

1:12:59 Lowell: I'm good. The past month has been the best month of my life and I owe that to you Kingston.

1:13:05 Kingston: Oh stop, you don't owe me nothing.

1:13:06 Lowell: Come on in, take a look around.

1:13:08 Brennan: You guys see this place is filled with these incredible artifacts. You see that there's a jade statue of this ancient emperor king. There's all this crazy stuff. There's a box of Spanish doubloons with a gilded dagger on the top of it. All this wild shit is here.

1:13:27 Lou: Can I turn around real quick to these two?

1:13:29 Kingston: [quietly] Don't touch nothing, it's probably been in his ass.

1:13:31 Lou: And then turn back around.

1:13:33 Lowell: So, what can I do for you?

1:13:37 Lou: Have I removed an eagle or a bird from his asshole?

1:13:41 Brennan: You have removed a bird from his ass.

1:13:42 Kingston: Okay, great. Hey Lowell, on one of your appointments I believe there was like a bird that needed to be taken care of. Do you still have that bird?

1:13:58 Brennan: You see he goes,

1:13:58 Lowell: The bird, oh the bronze eagle I found?

1:14:02 Kingston: Yes, I believe so.

1:14:03 Brennan: You see he goes,

1:14:03 Lowell: You just want anything to drink or anything while we're here?

1:14:07 Kingston: Earl Grey Tea.

1:14:08 Brennan: You see he goes and makes some tea. Comes over and goes,

1:14:09 Lowell: Bronze eagle, take a seat. (groans in pain)

1:14:16 Rowan: What's in your butt?

1:14:21 Lowell: (breathing out harshly) I'm good.

1:14:23 Rowan: No.

1:14:25 Brennan: You see he says,

1:14:25 Lowell: I've found a very old granite pentacle moss-covered, the circle is not part of it, so it's just a five-pointed star.

1:14:46 Rowan: [clearly uncomfortable] So the texture of granite and moss and it's a pointed star?

1:14:54 Lowell: I've developed quite a thick interior hide.

1:14:58 Kugrash: So you showered before all this?

1:15:01 Lowell: You think I'm gonna put an incredibly potent religious relic in my asshole without being cleaned up first?

1:15:04 Kugrash: Sort of a, shower in the beginning, shower at the end sort of thing.

1:15:08 Rowan: You're right that is the respectful—

1:15:14 Kingston: Anyway, it's good to hear—

1:15:15 Brennan: You see he looks and takes out a little notebook and seems to write some notes in it, puts it down and says,

1:15:22 Lowell: I know about the eagle, the Sardinian Eagle.

1:15:27 Kingston: Yeah.

1:15:29 Lowell: When you gave me that talk I actually discovered that I'm more magical than I originally thought. I have the power to basically identify these magical objects.

1:15:47 Kugrash: Could you stick this crown up your ass?

1:15:50 Murph: I take my rat crown out.

1:15:52 Brennan: Spiky fucking crown. He takes it and says,

1:15:54 Lowell: Yeah, I'll need about a day and a half.

1:15:58 Kingston: Also, wait, real quick. What is that?

1:16:01 Lowell: Hmm?

1:16:02 Kingston: This man, what is this man?

1:16:03 Lowell: He's a rat, he's a rat man.

1:16:05 Kingston: Oh you see this rat man.

1:16:06 Lowell: After you gave me that talk, because I was finding these weird artifacts and I was seeing things out of the corner of my eye and stuff like that, but yeah.

1:16:14 Kingston: So you have the ability to cast the Identify spell with your rectum?

1:16:20 Lowell: It's about the size and shape of it, yeah.

1:16:23 Rowan: I actually don't want to think about size or shape, when we're talking about—

1:16:26 Lowell: The important thing is this, I already sold the Sardinian Eagle.

1:16:29 Rowan: No.

1:16:30 Kugrash: To who?

1:16:32 Lowell: I sold it to a collector.

1:16:34 Brennan: You see he, hold on one second.

1:16:37 Murph: [defeated] I think I know who he sold it to.

1:16:38 Siobhan: Yeah.

1:16:42 Kingston: You're killing me Lowell, you're killing me.

1:16:47 Brennan: You see he goes—

1:16:48 Ally: Share.

1:16:49 Brennan: He says,

1:16:49 Lowell: I sold it to an elemental named Buddy.

1:16:54 Rowan: Oh.

1:16:54 Kingston: No.

1:16:55 Zac: The shit guy!

1:16:56 Kingston: No you didn't. Okay Lowell.

1:16:59 Ally: Which guy?

1:17:00 Siobhan: Buddy Buddy. (Ally gasps)

1:17:02 Brennan: Make a History check for me.

1:17:05 Lou: Nat 20.

1:17:06 Ally: Wow.

1:17:06 Siobhan: Nice.

1:17:07 Brennan: You have a text on your phone from Willy about the card game tomorrow night. He sent you a list of who all's gonna be there. Buddy is gonna be at that card game.

1:17:16 Kingston: Alright, fantastic. Well I know where to find Buddy. But Lowell, it's good to see you doing well man and really nice place, it was good to drop by, good to see you.

1:17:28 Lowell: Good to see you too, my life is turned around and you're a decent man. Enjoy the tea, take a look at any of the wonders. Ooh let me show you this.

1:17:36 Brennan: You see he reaches up onto his shelf and takes a full Russian Czar's minx coat and says,

1:17:44 Lowell: This is actually something very interesting, maybe for you Kugrash. Do you wanna go ahead,

1:17:49 Brennan: And you see he hands it out for you to handle.

1:17:52 Kugrash: Yeah.

1:17:53 Lowell: That took a long time. That was a while.

1:17:57 Rowan: Sleeve by sleeve.

1:18:00 Brennan: But he said,

1:18:00 Lowell: But you probably don't get that cold, even though you sleep in the sewers. It's not that magical I just thought you might want a warm coat.

1:18:07 Kugrash: Yeah, yeah, sure thanks, appreciate it.

1:18:09 Murph: Just put on this ass jacket.

1:18:13 Kugrash: What do you think, Kingston?

1:18:15 Kingston: I mean—

1:18:16 Kugrash: Hey guys!

1:18:16 Murph: I'm like coming over.

1:18:17 Rowan: I think it's cool.

1:18:18 Kingston: Get off of me!

1:18:19 Rowan: You smell better now honestly.

1:18:20 Brennan: He says,

1:18:20 Lowell: Can we not be children, everything gets washed.

1:18:26 Kingston: Yeah, of course it does.

1:18:27 Kugrash: I smell like lube now instead of trash.

1:18:29 Kingston: I think in that way, it is an upgrade.

1:18:32 Brennan: Wonderful. So you know where Buddy's gonna be.

1:18:36 Kugrash: I think I'm actually gonna need that crown, so I'll keep it for now but we'll link up at some point.

1:18:47 Lowell: Hey, got your back, Kugrash.

1:18:49 Kugrash: Appreciate it.

1:18:50 Lowell: You guys, thanks for coming by, have a great one. [moans] Oh no, oh no, no, no, we're good. [stands up]

1:19:00 Brennan: You see that you guys head out. The next day, you guys wake up in your various places, some belated gifts with a little note on them that says, sorry I couldn't get it in time for Christmas, arrive to some of you guys. Kugrash, your apartment with Wally, you find a lovely little watch, a fucking dope Rolex. Brennan hands Murph a spell card.

1:19:26 Murph: Whoa.

1:19:27 Brennan: Which you haven't had since your businessman days, appears in a little Christmas gift for you.

1:19:33 Murph: Hell yeah.

1:19:34 Ally: Hey, ah that's sick.

1:19:36 Brennan: Kingston, we already know what your gifts were. Rowan, you actually probably have to crash somewhere else that night because Rowan doesn't have the thing, but you swing by your lawyer’s office the next day, deal with all of your inheritance, and you arrive at a freshly cleaned and wonderful penthouse and a little Christmas gift is waiting for you. Brennan hands Siobhan an item card.

1:20:03 Rowan: You know Long Island City is the new place to be living.

1:20:05 Brennan: It has a Tiffany's wrapping on it and you feel it has a similar arcane energy to Titania's shoes on it. This beautiful silver necklace.

1:20:20 Siobhan: Do I still get Irresistible Dance?

1:20:22 Brennan: You do not get Irresistible Dance with it.

1:20:23 Siobhan: Begone Irresistible Dance, I resist you.

1:20:31 Brennan: Ricky, you wake up at your home and see a giant bow on top and Ox in the passenger seat of a fire engine red Maserati.

1:20:37 Emily: Oh hell yeah!

1:20:40 Siobhan: Oh my god. Jesus Christ.

1:20:44 Emily: Why was I even trying to help you get laid? You’ve got it under control!

1:20:49 Siobhan: Because Esther's definitely gonna be impressed by a car.

1:20:51 Ally: The suicide doors open up.

1:20:53 Brennan: You see Ox goes,

1:20:53 Ox: Woof, woof, wow, what a cool car!

1:20:57 Ricky: This is dope as hell.

1:21:00 Brennan: And Sofia, you wake up in the chantry, and next to you all packaged up, are a pair of red Louboutins.

1:21:08 Sofia: Oh my God, are they real?

1:21:09 Emily: I bite it.

1:21:11 Ally: [laughing] You bite it?

1:21:12 Brennan: Bite it like an old fucking prospector. Cool. So the next day's happening. You know where you're gonna see Buddy. So that day, let's just go around real quick and see what y'all do that day. Sofia, you wake up in the chantry. These awesome red Louboutins and—

1:21:32 Emily: I think, oh.

1:21:33 Brennan: Oh yeah, what are you gonna do?

1:21:34 Emily: Well, I was thinking maybe I would just do some Krav Maga. Just keep fresh. [song that sounds suspiciously like the Rocky theme]

1:21:40 Brennan: Yeah, there's plenty of room, there's some dojo spaces within the chantry for the wizards to practice. You practice for a while. Your Louboutins allow you to spring huge distances, incredible distances. After a little while you see that Esther walks in.

1:21:58 Sofia: You wanna spar?

1:21:59 Brennan: You see she says,

1:21:59 Esther: Sure, I'll spar a little bit.

1:22:02 Brennan: Go ahead and just give me an Athletics check. You gotta beat a 20.

1:22:07 Emily: I did, 23.

1:22:09 Brennan: You see that Esther is pretty cool as a martial wizard caster. She takes out her bat, blocks some of your stuff with the bat and does a lot of stuff to throw obstacles and wards, she's very good at putting these Tenser’s Floating Disk shields around.

1:22:24 Emily: This is like the perfect sparring partner for me.

1:22:26 Brennan: It's awesome. Esther's like,

1:22:27 Esther: I can't believe that it's taken us this long to hang out, It's been a crazy month but.

1:22:32 Sofia: I know, well honestly I was kinda going through something and then I came toward some sort of closure and it just feels, when you were nice to me in that fight it just felt really nice to feel like someone wanted to be my friend and that meant a lot.

1:22:47 Brennan: You see that she smiles and says,

1:22:50 Esther: This is a hard city and I don't think you can get through without having some pals. Wanna get that coffee?

1:22:54 Sofia: Yeah.

1:22:55 Brennan: Cool. You guys head out to go get that coffee. Kugrash, we're actually gonna cut over to you real quick. What do you do, you wake in Wally's that next day, Dad is there. [barking]

1:23:05 Murph: Dad the dog. The game is tonight right?

1:23:10 Brennan: Yes.

1:23:11 Murph: The poker game? Okay. I wanna have a little talk with Wally around the breakfast table. What do we have for breakfast? Cheese?

1:23:19 Brennan: String cheese and hotdogs.

1:23:20 Murph: String cheese (laughs) so their breakfast is string cheese and hotdogs.

1:23:24 Kugrash: Hey Wally, so before you and I started hanging out, who were you hanging out with around here?

1:23:34 Wally: My friends at work.

1:23:35 Kugrash: Your friends at work, cool. Generally, kinda happy guy? How are you holding up Wally, do you ever get lonely out here or?

1:23:46 Wally: Yeah, I guess sometimes. You know it's hard. It's hard to meet people sometimes too, I work for the MTA and I tried to make one of those OkCupids?

1:23:53 Kugrash: Yeah.

1:24:01 Wally: But it's hard, because it's hard to meet people sometimes and I got like a busy schedule and stuff. And I ask David for help with it, but me and David don't get along sometimes.

1:24:15 Kugrash: Why don't you and David get along?

1:24:18 Brennan: You see that he looks at his phone and says,

1:24:20 Wally: He's actually on the way over today, he yells at me a lot, he worries about me because I live by myself, and... he worries because he thinks I shouldn't have two dogs because he thinks I'm not gonna be able to take care of them both.

1:24:35 Kugrash: But you have a job, you can do it, you can.

1:24:39 Wally: No, I know, I think he just thinks I'm a little dumb.

1:24:42 Kugrash: Oh, you're not dumb, Wally.

1:24:43 Wally: Thanks.

1:24:44 Kugrash: Yeah, you're a good guy. Do you want to, this OkCupid stuffs confusing, I've heard a little bit about it, I haven't really used a computer since the '80s but maybe you and I can figure it out together.

1:24:57 Wally: Yeah, you wanna do that?

1:24:58 Kugrash: Yeah, let's figure it out, I don't know what the fuck’s going on either.

1:25:01 Brennan: He pops the laptop open, give me a flat Charisma check to try and help him make an OkCupid profile. Murph groans nervously.

1:25:10 Murph: I'd like to really focus on non-flashy stuff, he has a job, he's a good guy. [rolls] Uh… 11?

1:25:18 Brennan: Cool, so he says,

1:25:18 Wally: Okay job, work for the MTA. Interests. [sighs]

1:25:25 Kugrash: You like movies.

1:25:26 Wally: Die Hard, Die Hard 2, Die Hard 3.

1:25:30 Kugrash: We don't have to get that into it, why don't you say you like action movies.

1:25:35 Wally: Action movies.

1:25:38 Kugrash: Movies in general.

1:25:39 Wally: Movies in general.

1:25:41 Kugrash: Maybe delete movies in general, get rid of movies in general. We like the Lion King.

1:25:48 Wally: The Lion King! Hobbies, Mufasa, Simba.

1:25:52 Kugrash: Wally, those aren't hobbies, those are characters.

1:25:55 Wally: No, because they're like hobby.

1:25:59 Kugrash: Discussing films.

1:26:02 Wally: Disgusting films, I don't like them. I only like it when it's nice.

1:26:07 Kugrash: Wally, let me type. Discussing films.

1:26:10 Wally: Oh, put down falling in love with a lady.

1:26:13 Kugrash: Falling in love with a lady. Looking for something serious, let's put that in the appropriate section.

1:26:20 Wally: What like, serious, like not funny? I like jokes.

1:26:24 Kugrash: I know you like jokes.

1:26:25 Wally: Put joke books.

1:26:26 Kugrash: You know how David has a serious relationship?

1:26:29 Wally: Yeah, he's not fun at all.

1:26:31 Kugrash: He's not fun at all.

1:26:32 Murph: I start laughing hysterically,

1:26:34 Kugrash: David's a fucking ball buster, he should be, I ruined his life, but.

1:26:39 Brennan: You hear a bang bang bang on the door as you say that.

1:26:41 Murph: Oh God.

1:26:43 Brennan: You see Wally gets up and opens the door. David comes in. David has an immediate haggard look, he goes,

1:26:51 David: Hey Wally, how's it going, got you some bagels and some food and I got you some cleaning stuff and paper towels.

1:27:00 Brennan: Wally says,

1:27:00 Wally: Oh yeah, I forgot to get that stuff.

1:27:04 Brennan: Are you Wild Shaped right now or no? [tense music]

1:27:07 Murph: Oh God, he's probably gonna like think I'm a giant rat and try to kill me if I don't say something. Yes, I'll Wild Shape into a dog.

1:27:17 Brennan: Roll initiative for me.

1:27:23 Murph: 13.

1:27:25 Brennan: David spots you before you can change. He goes,

1:27:27 David: Oh, Jesus Christ, Wally, what the fuck! You got a fucking rat in the middle of your fucking house!

1:27:33 Kugrash: He doesn't have a rat.

1:27:35 Murph: I cast Dispel Magic on myself to try to break the—

1:27:41 Brennan: Umbral Arcana. Yeah, I'm gonna say third level or lower. You appear to David. He goes, (panicked screaming)

1:27:52 Kugrash: David, it's okay. David takes several quick, panicked breaths.

1:27:55 Kugrash: Okay, this is a lot to unpack here. But I'm sorta a shaman type deal. I can do magic, let me just, magic is real.

1:28:07 Murph: Do like a couple of cantrips, just right off the bat.

1:28:10 Kugrash: I'm not a rat. I am your father. I didn't run away. I was cursed by a witch. Who turned me into a rat. You know I'm a rat, you're a ball buster, you can kinda believe that right. Magic is real,

1:28:30 Murph: I show him like my—

1:28:33 Brennan: You see Wally goes,

1:28:33 Wally: Also I don't have two dogs. One of my dogs was Dad who's a rat, and he's not Jesus.

1:28:49 Brennan: David goes catatonic, he passes out. As he comes to he's in a fugue state. [dreamlike, soft music]

1:29:00 Murph: I have the Bagel of All Things, it kinda lets me do divination. I wanna try to help give him some kind of connection to this other world. I wanna just pop off a couple of poppy seeds in his mouth while he's knocked out.

1:29:14 Brennan: He takes it, his pupils dilate so much that they disappear and he only has irises. So his hazel eyes have no pupil, he's just gazing straight ahead, whole universes are appearing to him. Wally goes,

1:29:27 Wally: That's a good bagel.

1:29:32 Brennan: After a few minutes, you can start king of like, pick up explaining and he needs you to repeat things over and over again.

1:29:39 Murph: Right. I think I also bring up, I know some real people saw the bugs thing so if there's any conspiracy websites or something I'm like, here's proof that it exists.

1:29:53 Brennan: After a while, he's got like a blanket around him, he goes,

1:29:55 David: Okay. So you lied, you lied, because you did run away.

1:30:07 Kugrash: I did, yes. I did it, I know you think I ran away to a tropical island and that my life ruled or something but I'm a rat and my life sucked until very recently when I moved in with Wally here.

1:30:21 Brennan: You see Wally goes,

1:30:21 Wally: Yeah, it's better now he's with me.

1:30:24 Brennan: You see David goes,

1:30:24 David: Shut the fuck up, Wally. So what is it you've been doing for the past 20 years, 30 years?

1:30:34 Kugrash: Well, for the first few years I pretty much just hid out in the subway tunnels feeling sorry for myself and blaming the person who cursed me. But after a while it gave me some perspective and in the end I wish had been the type of person who was naturally empathetic but I had to have something bad happen to me before I could learn to help other people.

1:31:26 David: And are you still helping other people?

1:31:28 Kugrash: I'm trying to, yeah.

1:31:32 Brennan: Here's a question for you Murph, has Kugrash been tending to his duties with the homeless since he's been with Wally?

1:31:39 Murph: Probably less so.

1:31:40 Brennan: Probably less so, cool. I think that you have a very high Wisdom, I think it probably occurs to Kugrash that that is the truth. You see that David looks and goes,

1:31:54 David: Alright, okay, magic's real, everything I know's wrong.

1:32:00 Kugrash: David, do you know Robert Moses?

1:32:06 David: Yeah, power broker? Yeah I know him.

1:32:09 Kugrash: Yeah I'm actually going after him at the moment, because part of the bad side of all this magic is being controlled by him.

1:32:27 David: So you're asking me for a favor.

1:32:29 Kugrash: I would like to help you if I can. Honestly David, the reason I came to Wally first is because I think Wally needs me, Wally likes having me around. But if you want me around, I'd like to have a relationship with you but I don't wanna be selfish about it, don't do it for me. But I'd like to, I don't want a favor from you I wanna work with you.

1:33:12 Brennan: He looks at you and says,

1:33:18 David: If Wally needs you, he can have you.

1:33:22 Kugrash: Alright, you don't have to forgive me but I am very sorry.

1:33:26 David: I don't have to forgive you? I don't have to forgive you. Well it's nice to hear, that's nice to hear. There was a time in my life when I needed you. That time's gone, and for you to waltz back into my life now? As a rat wearing a cape? I don't give a fuck. I don't give a fuck. I don't think that you'd be talking to me or Wally if it didn't help you. Have a nice rest of your life, you fucking rat.

1:34:03 Brennan: And you see David walks out of the apartment. Wally's just crying. He looks over and says,

1:34:08 Wally: David's a J-E-R-K sometimes. I'm sorry, Dad.

1:34:16 Kugrash: You spelled it correctly, J-E-R-K you said?

1:34:20 Wally: Yeah.

1:34:21 Kugrash: That's good.

1:34:22 Wally: He's a real jork.

1:34:26 Kugrash: You got it wrong in a different way than I thought you might. No he's not. Look Wally, you're just exceptionally, you're doing me a favor that you don't need to do and David is within his rights to be mad and that's okay for him too.

1:34:46 Brennan: Wally nods, yeah I think, Kugrash you actually feel that it has been like Christmas and there's probably some homeless and people that need tending to out in the world. Wally says,

1:34:58 Wally: I'm gonna talk to David. It's probably a lot for him, I have a hard time understanding everything right when someone tells me and probably David's the same way.

1:35:08 Kugrash: Yeah, cool. Wally you go talk to your brother, I got some things I gotta do.

1:35:16 Brennan: Kugrash you go hit the cold streets, tending to people that need food and care. Going back to your duties as a caretaker of the dispossessed. Sofia, you and Esther get together in a little coffee shop. It's lovely. You see that Em shows up outside and waves. Huge statue angel comes in and goes,

1:35:41 Em: [sighs] Oh my god, I'm happy to chip in, I gotta pay in quarters and pennies and things that people throw in the fountain.

1:35:47 Sofia: That's so off-putting. Let me just get this.

1:35:52 Brennan: So you see Esther sits down with you and goes,

1:35:56 Esther: Yeah, Sof, thank you so much for suggesting this. It feels nice to have someone that's just a friend, someone that's not gonna be talking to me about Arcana and wizardry and yada yada yada. Nice to have someone just to bond with as a pal.

1:36:13 Sofia: Yeah.

1:36:14 Esther: How are you holding up?

1:36:16 Brennan: And you see that she just very tenderly reaches out and puts a hand on your arm, as like you're going through a lotta stuff.

1:36:22 Emily: Yeah, think I'm blushing.

1:36:27 Sofia: Sorry, Ricky, she touched me!

1:36:28 Zac: I'm not here.

1:36:30 Sofia: I'm holding up. I mourned him leaving me, now I'm mourning his death. I don't know, I guess maybe at least now it feels like more closure. And I burned my house down.

1:36:50 Esther: You are fucking wild.

1:36:52 Sofia: What can I say? And honestly it kinda felt good to get rid of that. And just close the door and I don't even know what my fucking future is but it's whatever right now.

1:37:06 Brennan: Esther's eyes goes wide and she says,

1:37:08 Esther: Yeah, the future is whatever.

1:37:12 Brennan: Make an Insight—

1:37:13 Sofia: Why, what's going on with, oh.

1:37:14 Brennan: Yeah, make a little Insight check.

1:37:20 Emily: 15.

1:37:23 Brennan: You see her eyes kinda go wide as she looks out and she says,

1:37:27 Esther: Yeah, what do you think about Ricky?

1:37:37 Sofia: Oh. [clears throat, suddenly speaking very loudly] I think he's just the greatest guy ever, any girl will be so lucky to have him.

1:37:43 Brennan: You see Em goes,

1:37:43 Em: Oh my god, you're like looking out like you're performing for a packed theater.

1:37:49 Sofia: No, I'm not! I'm doing a good job.

1:37:52 Brennan: You see that Esther laughs and goes,

1:37:56 Esther: I… I took Ricky to see my mom and grandma at the holiday.

1:38:06 Sofia: [with distaste] Family on the holidays.

1:38:08 Brennan: Em says,

1:38:08 Em: You're not even dating, this feels fast to me, family and Christmas.

1:38:13 Brennan: You see she says, [somber, gentle music]

1:38:13 Esther: No, not like that. I am... My family's been cursed for most of the history of New York. I am meant to become the third of the furies of Tompkins Square Park. We, not we, not me, I’m... I found Alejandro because I wanted to study magic to find a way to break this curse and the truth is that I don't need to study magic, I am magic, but the part of me that is an alien magic I've never tapped into because once I do, I can't go back.

1:39:10 Sofia: Oh my God. But if we could remove this curse then you would have access to a whole wealth of no longer cursed energy.

1:39:18 Esther: Yeah.

1:39:19 Sofia: Who cursed your family?

1:39:21 Esther: Powerful spirits a long time ago. Back early 1800s. It goes in order, my mother is the current Fury of Rage, my grandmother is the Fury of Despair, and my mother—

1:39:41 Brennan: Kugrash, you're walking down the street and going from garbage to garbage and finding people. You come outside of this coffee shop and overhear this conversation happening. You see she says,

1:39:57 Esther: We change into the Furies if we ever experience our emotion powerfully enough. My mum wanted a better life for us and she tried to leave the Unsleeping City. She swore off magic. She entered the Waking World. She became a businesswoman and she started a financial company, basically a hedge fund with this rat bastard piece of shit who sold her out and destroyed their company to profit himself and it ruined her and she fell to her curse. She reached in for that magic and I lost her. Murph is looking down at the table.

1:40:52 Brennan: And you see she looks like she's about to cry and then quickly a little cantrip ticks on herself and she [little gasp] gets it back.

1:41:01 Emily: I reciprocate the tender touch.

1:41:05 Brennan: She's like,

1:41:05 Esther: Oof, I think I need to be more careful talking about this because of my curse.

1:41:10 Sofia: Would you say that's why romantically you have to hold yourself back?

1:41:15 Brennan: You see she says,

1:41:15 Esther: My curse is sorrow and sadness, psychologically speaking, is the experience of loss. And so I've studied magic to find a way to break the curse and I've lived my life under the presupposition that you can never feel sadness if you never have anything to lose.

1:41:45 Sofia: I'm honestly not the girl to be talking about this right now because I am currently trying to follow your path a bit, if I'm being honest. But we're gonna find a way to get rid of that curse.

1:42:01 Brennan: You see she smiles and says—

1:42:03 Sofia: You've got Sofie, you got Sofie Bikes, aka Sofia Lee, no longer Sofie Bikes, I have disowned my family, Sofie Lee on the case.

1:42:11 Brennan: You see that she smiles and says,

1:42:14 Esther: Well shit, that's been my hold up this whole time, now it's all engines go.

1:42:19 Brennan: She smiles, she says,

1:42:19 Esther: Cool, well if we keep talking about this sad shit I'm gonna turn into a literal monster, so let's not.

1:42:30 Brennan: You and Em and Esther have a lovely time and Kugrash you hear all that out in the street.

1:42:37 Murph: I just go to sleep in the trash.

1:42:41 Brennan: Cool. Kingston, it's card night over at Willy's.

1:42:47 Kingston: Oh finally.

1:42:50 Brennan: Obviously you guys have been hanging out for weeks and days and stuff, who all would show up to the card game.

1:42:54 Ally: I would definitely. I would definitely be a gambling—

1:42:57 Emily: I feel like I definitely would.

1:42:58 Brennan: Sofie, hell yeah. Sofie, Pete, Kingston, cool.

1:43:01 Emily: I know it's gonna come down to rolls, but I feel like Sofie would be really good at cards.

1:43:04 Zac: I think Ricky will go just to see what a card game is like.

1:43:08 Emily: Ricky will be--

1:43:09 Siobhan: Rowan's definitely going,

1:43:09 Rowan: Strip poker. We mean strip poker, right.

1:43:12 Pete: What? No! What?

1:43:14 Brennan: So you guys go over, Willy being made of brick actually has a very nice apartment—

1:43:20 Murph: Can I actually, I have a spell called Conjure Elemental that I really want to use but it's a casting time one minute can I bring a plus one elemental too because I can't do it in—

1:43:30 Brennan: What kind of elemental would you like to bring?

1:43:32 Kugrash: Oh man, I guess. Kingston what do you think would be most appropriate?

1:43:36 Kingston: Like for Willy's place? I don't know, something earth maybe, something stone, cement, that's kind of his vibe so.

1:43:44 Murph: I find some dirt and rocks. [scratchy folk music]

1:43:46 Brennan: Cool, you create a big earth elemental out of stones and earth from one of those tree planter places. You guys head to Willy's in Brook, opens up, he's got some very old phonograph playing, got some great jazz, little of like klezmer notes in there. You see he goes,

1:44:08 Willy: Kingston Brown finally we see what the game can—

1:44:13 Kingston: I know it's been a while and I've brought all my friends.

1:44:16 Brennan: Oh you see he goes,

1:44:16 Willy: Oh, come in, we've set up two tables.

1:44:19 Kingston: Right.

1:44:20 Siobhan: I bring in two six packs of PBR because when in Williamburg, that's what you drink.

1:44:25 Brennan: Exactly, you bring some PBR. You see Willy has like snacks laid out. It's like got a very old world, there's like cigars and ashtrays and chips on the felt tables.

1:44:36 Sofia: Ricky, did you just bring boiled chicken in a Tupperware?

1:44:41 Ricky: It's a party, right?

1:44:43 Pete: Gross, man.

1:44:44 Sofia: So healthy.

1:44:45 Brennan: Willy sets up some tables and says,

1:44:47 Willy: You gonna take all of our money again?

1:44:49 Kingston: Okay, alright, well let's not start from that place alright? Everybody can win no?

1:44:56 Brennan: You see that he says,

1:44:56 Willy: Go on, take a seat.

1:45:00 Brennan: He looks over at the earth elemental that you've brought and goes,

1:45:02 Willy: Well, hello, hello, hello there. Oh my name is Willy. Pleasure to meet you, enchanté. [kisses hand]

1:45:17 Brennan: The elemental kind of like. (groaning)

1:45:22 Lou: Can I give him just a hard elbow, like I actually need to put force into.

1:45:28 Brennan: So you go boom, brick into his body and you see he goes,

1:45:32 Willy: What, do you see what I see?

1:45:34 Kingston: Okay, I thought you were about the Statue of Liberty.

1:45:38 Willy: Oh listen, that's on a back burner, I'm playing the long game. [steeples his fingers and winks]

1:45:45 Kingston: Oh the long, alright Willy.

1:45:46 Brennan: You see he goes,

1:45:47 Willy: This woman, she's something else.

1:45:52 Brennan: You see that, you guys sit around. At the table there's a couple of people here, you see Buddy the shit elemental is there, he sits next to you Kugrash.

1:46:01 Buddy: [burbling] I'm needing a lawyer, I don't know about you.

1:46:03 Kugrash: Yeah, I'm sorry, I was tied up.

1:46:06 Buddy: No worries.

1:46:08 Brennan: You see Willy says,

1:46:08 Willy: Okay, we start to play. Anyone at any time can feel free, here's the Febreeze, you can just hit Buddy with that if the smell gets too much.

1:46:19 Brennan: There's other people here. You see that there's a stained glass saint from a church. Looks like he's jumped out of a window just going,

1:46:26 Glass Saint: Fucking, I can't get anymore into the house I've lost so much fucking money here.

1:46:32 Brennan: And you see that also, they're at a nearby table, Willy says,

1:46:36 Willy: You remember Green and Red right?

1:46:39 Brennan: And you see there is a little green stick figure made of light and a red hand both sitting in a chair. And you see they both go,

1:46:49 Green and Red: Hi, how's you, Kingston good to see you.

1:46:51 Kingston: Good to see you, Green, good to see you, Red.

1:46:54 Brennan: You see that Green looks up and says,

1:46:55 Green: By the way, we're not doing tournament style tonight because I actually have to head out a little bit early.

1:46:59 Brennan: You see the hand says,

1:46:59 Red: You're leaving early? What the fuck, I thought we were staying, can you not stay for longer?

1:47:06 Brennan: And you see that Green goes,

1:47:06 Green: I've gotta jet, I'm sorry I've gotta be somewhere.

1:47:10 Brennan: You see that—

1:47:12 Ally: Brennan. (laughs)

1:47:14 Brennan: You see that (laughs) you gotta forgive me.

1:47:19 Ally: [shaking their head] I love it. I love it.

1:47:22 Brennan: Cool. You guys start to play some hands of poker. Go ahead everyone and just make a, I'm gonna say this as just a flat Intelligence check.

1:47:34 Zac: Oh no.

1:47:35 Siobhan: Oh no. Oh dear.

1:47:37 Emily: I got a 4.

1:47:38 Brennan: A 4, cool.

1:47:40 Siobhan: I got a nat 1.

1:47:42 Ally: 3.

1:47:43 Lou: 6.

1:47:43 Brennan: 6.

1:47:44 Murph: Fucking 6.

1:47:45 Zac: 9.

1:47:45 Lou: Wow, we're getting taken.

1:47:46 Brennan: You guys are getting--

1:47:47 Lou: Ricky.

1:47:48 Zac: Is this worth using a luck point?

1:47:50 Siobhan: Can I—

1:47:51 Murph: Let's wait till the stakes are up.

1:47:52 Siobhan: Do some real fun card tricks though while we're playing and I’m  having all of my money stolen.

1:48:00 Brennan: Yes, you do some very fun, you're great at dealing. Willy is cleaning up. You see Willy has this big cigar and you see it has to work really hard. He vents the cigar smoke out of swiveling bricks out the side of his chest. He goes,

1:48:14 Willy: You see poker is not only a game of chance it's a game of skill. You're playing the predator not the cards.

1:48:22 Pete: True.

1:48:25 Brennan: Buddy is looking hurt. He coughs a bunch of shit covered coins up onto the table. You see that Willy polishes and cleans them off to put them into the center pot. Another hand comes around. Are any of you going to use any magic or abilities on this card game?

1:48:44 Siobhan: I will absolutely do Deception-based Performance checks since we're playing poker.

1:48:50 Brennan: Yeah, you can go ahead and make a bluff check go ahead and give me a Deception roll on the next one.

1:48:53 Kingston: Can I cast Enhance Abilities on myself (magical chiming) to give myself advantage on Intelligence checks?

1:49:02 Brennan: Yes, absolutely.

1:49:04 Murph: I'm going to, I know Kugrash doesn't have the best luck and Ricky's a lot luckier so I'm like,

1:49:11 Kugrash: Ah I'm out, I'm gonna go sit with the kid.

1:49:14 Murph: And I put my hand on Ricky's shoulder and I cast Guidance, a cantrip.

1:49:19 Siobhan: I'm just gonna also cast Minor Illusion to make my breasts slightly bigger.

1:49:23 Murph: So you can roll a d4 and add it to—

1:49:25 Pete: So stupid.

1:49:26 Murph: An ability check.

1:49:27 Zac: Okay.

1:49:27 Brennan: Green looks over and you as you do that and quickly looks away. And you see that Red turns over and goes,

1:49:32 Red: [whispering judgmentally] Wow, really, okay.

1:49:34 Kingston: Things look really bad between them but I don't have the heart to say anything.  It's like really bad and we can all see it but it's like we're friends with both of them so I don't know which one I can talk to.

1:49:47 Ally: I'm just gonna play this straight up because I have a ton of money from selling a lot of my cocaine to children today. It was a rough day.

1:49:56 Brennan: Cool.

1:49:57 Emily: Can I cast Unseen Servant and have them go round and write down what other people have?

1:50:04 Brennan: Yes, you can. Go ahead and give me your guys’ rolls.

1:50:07 Zac: Just one more roll?

1:50:08 Brennan: One more roll.

1:50:10 Ally: 4.

1:50:11 Emily: 7.

1:50:12 Siobhan: Oh my god, on advantage I rolled a 1 and a 3.

1:50:14 Lou: 21.

1:50:16 Zac: I rolled a 12, maybe I'll just use a luck point on this, it just—

1:50:19 Brennan: Yeah go for it.

1:50:21 Siobhan: Go for it.

1:50:22 Ally: Don't you get something with Guidance?

1:50:23 Murph: Yeah he got a d4, he added it.

1:50:25 Brennan: Cool, go ahead and roll.

1:50:28 Zac: That's a 20, not nat.

1:50:31 Brennan: Ricky, you go in and clear a bunch of people out of the round early on before the flop.

1:50:38 Zac: I have huge sunglasses on.

1:50:41 Pete: Where did you get those, dude?

1:50:42 Ricky: Found them.

1:50:43 Brennan: Kingston, it ends up just you and Buddy before the river. Buddy's still in and you're still in. You have a bigger stack than Buddy right now. Buddy goes,

1:50:55 Buddy: [fart burble] All in.

1:51:01 Kingston: Now Buddy buddy, that won't do. You're gonna have to match all of this.

1:51:08 Lou: I push mine in.

1:51:10 Brennan: He goes,

1:51:10 Buddy: Oh, it's gonna be like that is it?

1:51:13 Kingston: Yeah, hey you're the one who called.

1:51:15 Brennan: You see he goes, looks around, see sweats of little weird poop oil.

1:51:21 Emily and Ally: Eugh, no.

1:51:22 Kingston: Buddy I know that you're a collector aren't you?

1:51:26 Buddy: Yeah, a collector.

1:51:27 Kingston: Okay, why don't you put one of those on the table?

1:51:31 Brennan: Go ahead and make a Persuasion check.

1:51:34 Lou: Great, Persuasion, there it is and I have advantage on these, thank God. That's gonna be 6 plus 7, so 13.

1:51:45 Brennan: 13. You see he goes, (imitating puking) and a bronze eagle thumps into the table.

1:51:56 Kingston: Now that feels right, doesn't it? Doesn't that feel right?

1:52:00 Pete: Do you even want that man? It looks like shit.

1:52:02 Brennan: You see he says—

1:52:03 Kingston: Come on! Come on, Pete!

1:52:05 Pete: This thing is a piece of shit, you're a collector right?

1:52:09 Buddy: Oh, I am a piece of shit.

1:52:12 Siobhan: Can I do an Insight check on Buddy to see if he's playing straight?

1:52:16 Brennan: Yeah, make an Insight check.

1:52:18 Emily: I also wanna send my Unseen Servant to spy on Buddy's hand.

1:52:21 Siobhan: 16.

1:52:23 Brennan: 16. Oh, 16, you think he's playing straight. He coughs the eagle up. Kingston, what kind of cards do you think Kingston's holding?

1:52:35 Lou: Pretty good but not like a definite, it's like you know.

1:52:43 Brennan: So you throw down a ten-king, suited of hearts. You see that Buddy throws down pocket aces and there's already an ace on the board. He goes,

1:52:59 Buddy: Looks like some bad luck.

1:53:03 Brennan: You see Willy turns over the last card and it comes up jack of hearts.

1:53:09 Kingston: Oh I'm sorry Buddy, I'm so sorry.

1:53:12 Buddy: No, [burbles grossly] you're kidding me!

1:53:14 Kingston: You know you've been having a rough month, and I hate to do it to you but that's the game Buddy. That's the game Buddy. Now somebody give me a damn hose so I can clean this eagle off.

1:53:24 Brennan: You see that Willy laughs and claps. He gives you a cigar and lights it for you.

1:53:31 Kingston: Alright now, you know I can't be smoking this. Come on.

1:53:34 Brennan: He goes—

1:53:35 Rowan: I'll smoke it.

1:53:36 Brennan: Wonderful. You've got your bronze eagle.

1:53:38 Pete: Wanna share it? [Rowan passes the cigar to Pete]

1:53:40 Brennan: Great. You clean out at the poker game. Esther grabs the eagle from you after the poker game and says,

1:53:47 Esther: Great. I'm gonna get to work on this right now, this should be able to find Moses for us. Well, you should be able to get Robert.

1:53:54 Pete: Oh, right, now I get it.

1:53:56 Kingston: Damn, Pete.

1:53:58 Pete: It was ugly as fuck.

1:53:59 Kingston: Okay.

1:54:00 Pete: It was like a gaudy eagle statue, I was shocked.

1:54:03 Brennan: It is the morning, Esther goes to work on getting the eagle functional. It is the morning of December 31st. You—

1:54:17 Siobhan: 9 a.m.

1:54:17 Ally: I'm making deliveries all day.

1:54:19 Brennan: Okay. Just fucking hustling. So you guys are all, you're probably like with Jackson and doing stuff and Esther also comes and checks out the monastery as well.

1:54:30 Sofia: Oh sweet, do you wanna go get our New Year's Eve dresses after?

1:54:33 Brennan: You see she nods and says,

1:54:33 Esther: That'd be great.

1:54:35 Sofia: Or pantsuits.

1:54:36 Esther: I don't necessarily, yeah, I'm more of a pants person, I don't really rock a dress.

1:54:39 Sofia: I'm honestly these days, yeah me too, let's get pantsuits.

1:54:42 Brennan: You see that, Pete you're making deliveries. Kugrash what are you getting up to on New Year’s?

1:54:49 Murph: What am I doing on New Years? Seeing Wally, Wally what are you doing?

1:54:54 Brennan: Wally's working, he's working at the MTA. He says he can take you round the trains and show you his job.

1:54:58 Murph: Yeah, follow Wally around.

1:55:00 Ally: Cute.

1:55:00 Brennan: Rowan, Alissa shows up New Year's Day and says,

1:55:03 Alissa: Hi, [wipes a tear] are you Miss Berry?

1:55:07 Rowan: I am, you must be Alissa.

1:55:10 Alissa: I am, I'm just here to drop off some stuff from the late Miss Moore.

1:55:14 Rowan: Oh that's so nice of you. Do you think you could go to the DMV for me, is that how that works?

1:55:21 Brennan: You see she looks and says,

1:55:23 Alissa: Well, I—

1:55:23 Rowan: As a last favor, I'm sure Misty would have wanted that.

1:55:26 Brennan: You see that she looks and says,

1:55:28 Alissa: Sure, I'm unemployed at the moment so I have time.

1:55:30 Rowan: Oh, great. Oh, I mean oh no. Wow.

1:55:35 Ally: She's such a bad fucking person.

1:55:39 Brennan: You've got a bunch of fucking cartel cocaine in your bag.

1:55:43 Zac: You're selling drugs to children.

1:55:44 Ally: I'm selling drugs to literal children and still you are a bad person and I should not like you.

1:55:50 Brennan: Incredible. Yeah, she agrees to go run to the DMV for you.

1:55:55 Rowan: Oh and before you go, who was it that told you to put the mirror on the stage?

1:56:03 Alissa: One of the benefactors of the theater, it was from the Robert Moses foundation.

1:56:10 Rowan: Of course it was, oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. Alissa I can offer you a job, but just so you know if anything like that ever happens again.

1:56:21 Brennan: You see she says,

1:56:21 Alissa: Oh, I learned my mistake it will never happen—

1:56:26 Rowan: Never again.

1:56:27 Pete: Aren't you younger now than Alissa? “I can offer you a job.”

1:56:31 Rowan: Money's money.

1:56:33 Brennan: Ricky, what are you getting up to.

1:56:36 Ally: You're a nightmare.

1:56:37 Zac: It's 31st. I guess Ricky's at the fire station just—

1:56:41 Brennan: Doing his thing. You see the questing blade says,

1:56:44 Questing Blade: Sire, this new Maserati is extremely dope. What swagger in this vehicle.

1:56:52 Ricky: [holding his axe like a phone] What's wagger in the vehicle?

1:56:54 Questing Blade: No I'm saying, what swagger as in remarking upon the swagger.

1:56:57 Ricky: Oh yes, it is full of swagger. I feel honestly terrible for driving it.

1:57:05 Brennan: Kingston, that morning Claude actually asks if you can take your niece and nephews. They have a project over the holiday, he's working but they need to do a report on the Met and so they need to go to the Met and be shown around basically.

1:57:22 Kingston: Yeah, let's do it

1:57:26 Brennan: You go to the Met you're walking around, the nieces and nephews are having a ball. You see that your niece looks up, Eliza, and she goes,

1:57:34 Eliza: Uncle Kingston, we had such a fun time over Christmas. Pete, how long is Pete gonna be staying with you?

1:57:43 Kingston: Well Pete's in between, I guess, places in his life right now, which is something that adults do and so until he figures himself out he'll probably be crashing with me.

1:57:54 Brennan: Nods, you see that Jamil and Cooper both go,

1:57:56 Jamil and Cooper: Oh, look at this!

1:57:58 Brennan: And they run off towards the Temple of Dendur.

1:58:00 Kingston: Okay, no running, no running, especially towards that thing.

1:58:07 Brennan: You look and you see there's a bunch of kids and families in here. You're kinda looking around, this is where you had your climatic battle all those years ago, where the mummy of the Met said those words so long ago. You hear a voice next to you go, [tense string music]

1:58:24 Robert: I— uh, I love places like this, where you see a little bit of old history.

1:58:31 Brennan: And you see Robert standing beside you as your niece and nephews run around, he goes,

1:58:37 Robert: Good looking kids. [beat] Not yours of course. But, you know what I mean.

1:58:45 Kingston: What do you want, Mr. Moses?

1:58:48 Robert: Well, I thought I'd take in the museum here on this special occasion. Vox Populi, that’s a rough gig.

1:59:01 Kingston: I said, what do you want, Mr Moses?

1:59:05 Brennan: You see he says,

1:59:05 Robert: I'd thought I'd come talk to you because you're the reasonable one of your companions.

1:59:14 Kingston: Fine, then speak on it.

1:59:21 Robert: Things are gonna change in this place. This city's gonna change. I know that you are gonna go down with the ship. I know that about you. You love these people, the Populi of which you are the Vox but there's a version of New York without them. 150 years ago, none of these people were here and this city was still New York, and 150 years from now they'll be gone and it'll still be the bricks, the buildings, and the roads. I know that you value people over things and that's not a delusion that I'm here to cure you of. However, if they don't leave, I'm gonna kill the kid. I'm gonna kill Sofia. I'm gonna kill Ricky. I'm gonna kill young Miss Berry and your little rat friend too.

2:00:34 Kingston: You said leave, what do you mean?

2:00:37 Robert: I mean leave New York. I am not presuming to ask you to abandon your position, but none of those people need to suffer the fate that awaits them if they try to get in my way.

2:00:51 Kingston: Well, I hate to say it, Mr. Moses, but they're all free-thinking adults who can make their own choices. As is every person in this city. Well not every person, but every adult.

2:01:05 Brennan: You see he says,

2:01:05 Robert: You think people make choices?

2:01:08 Kingston: I do.

2:01:10 Robert: No. People think they make choices. They think they're gonna steer right or steer left but they didn't build the roads. The big choices already got made for them a long time ago.

2:01:29 Kingston: Well Mr. Moses, how about this? How about you have a choice, right now. Where you can leave this city. You can walk away. And I will not come for you. You can choose to stay here. You can choose to continue on this course of action and me and my friends can choose to stop you. Clean and simple. And that's much easier than me trying to get the five of them to go one way or another.

2:02:05 Brennan: He nods.

2:02:07 Robert: It's your message to give as you wish. You have a pleasant day.

2:02:12 Kingston: Take care.

2:02:13 Robert: Give my regards to Liz.

2:02:16 Lou: [sighs] You said, can I slap him?

2:02:17 Brennan: Yes. Make an attack roll.

2:02:20 Lou: Great. Just plus Strength?

2:02:29 Brennan: Strength and proficiency yeah.

2:02:30 Lou: That's gonna be a modified 19.

2:02:34 Brennan: You front hand, pow! And leave a singed hand mark of ash on the side of his face. You see he goes, Robert’s face snaps back away from Kingston’s slap. He raises a hand to the handprint, takes some of the ash, and licks it off his finger.

2:02:44 Robert: Check your phone, Mr Brown.

2:02:51 Brennan: And he walks away. Your phone blips, it's a text from Emiko saying,

2:02:58 Emiko: Need you at the hospital.

2:03:01 Kingston: Hey kids, I'm sorry I know you're having fun here at the museum but we have to go.

2:03:07 Brennan: You head out, normally you would I imagine escort them all the way back home but Eliza's old enough that she can take Jamil and Cooper back to the place, she knows and she looks up at you and you see a little flash of something that was in your eye as a child as she goes,

2:03:21 Eliza: Oh, Kingston, I can do it. I'll take care of it.

2:03:25 Kingston: Thank you so much, ‘Liza.

2:03:27 Brennan: She takes off, you rush to St. Owen's. You arrive at the intensive care unit. You see Liz in traction on life support. Black and blue, unconscious breathing extremely shallow. And you can see bits of Umbral Arcana off some of the wounds that are clearly claw and fang marks.

2:03:55 Kingston: Emiko, who brought her in? What's going on?

2:03:59 Emiko: 911 picked her up, she was in the neighborhood with family, she got jumped in the street. We didn't get a description of the attacker she came in like this. Police are investigating right now but it looks like they tried to kill her. We're trying to keep her alive as much as we can, but her lungs are filling up with blood.

2:04:21 Lou: Can I do a Medicine check—

2:04:23 Brennan: Yes.

2:04:24 Lou: Like to see, what is possible, what can I possibly do. That's gonna be 27.

2:04:31 Brennan: [impressed] Jesus. Kingston you immediately go, you see that you can heal the broken stuff, the stuff that's most immediately medically... you like, start going to work. You see that other doctors know your history with Liz and everyone is like, you're not supposed to be doing this and they're looking. You see the head medical guy, Dr. Simms comes over and says,

2:05:00 Dr. Simms: Nurse Brown, I'm gonna need you to step away.

2:05:01 Kingston: Hey, I'm sorry, that's not gonna happen. That's not gonna happen.

2:05:04 Dr. Simms: This hospital we have—

2:05:05 Kingston: I'm sorry, no you need to step back, friend. You really do.

2:05:11 Brennan: You see that he looks and your voice reverberates through the hospital and he, although he can't tell it's happening, is just like moved out of the room. You take her to a point where she is not stable but no longer in critical condition. There is some piece of necrotic undeath magic that is worming its way from her injuries slowly towards her heart. With a 27 medicine, probably like a few hours away. Maybe like eight or nine hours away.

2:05:48 Lou: Would something like Death Ward or Greater Restoration do something for this, or?

2:05:55 Brennan: Yeah, potentially. You're not sure, it might be something bigger like a break curse or something like that. Greater Restoration might do it. But you're not sure because this thing is like a tangled little piece of magic and it appears that someone’s like actively concentrating on it from a distance.

2:06:14 Lou: Can I text the group and say,

2:06:17 Kingston: Hi, I feel like somebody is trying to attack me. They have attacked my ex-wife, and just a little bit about there seems to be some kind of spell that somebody's concentrating on somewhere else in the city. I don't know what to do.

2:06:37 Rowan: Where are you?

2:06:38 Kingston: I am at St. Owen's.

2:06:40 Zac: I fly there on a Maserati. Peeling through traffic.

2:06:45 Brennan: (imitating tires screeching) You arrive up, yet your sister is there, she says—

2:06:50 Ricky: Firefighter on duty, let me—

2:06:52 Emiko: Ricky what the hell are you doing? Where did you get a Maserati?

2:06:55 Ricky: No time to explain, where is Kingston?

2:06:57 Brennan: You rush through to find Kingston.

2:06:59 Ricky: Please park my Maserati.

2:07:00 Emiko: What? I'm on-call! I'm here at work!

2:07:03 Ricky: Whatever.

2:07:04 Ally: I think I take like a Bird scooter as fast as I can from wherever I am. (Ally imitating electric engine revving) It's really not going that fast but I'm like, Kingston! I'm mindlinking and I'm like,

2:07:15 Pete: I'm coming, man, do you want any food or soup broth?

2:07:18 Kingston: I don't need—

2:07:19 Pete: I'm bringing you broth.

2:07:20 Zac: I'll run into the room wherever Kingston is.

2:07:24 Siobhan: I'm gonna gypsy cab over there just like I have lived in New York for such a long time, I can just spot from 1000 yards away the fastest, most crazy driver out there.

2:07:33 Ally: You're like, you have one eye—

2:07:35 Rowan: Follow that cab, I mean it's not actually what—

2:07:37 Brennan: A guy pulls over and goes,

2:07:37 Cab Driver: [snorting something] Hi!

2:07:40 Rowan: Hi.

2:07:41 Cab Driver: I'm the cab driver of this car.

2:07:42 Rowan: Yes you are, we're going to the hospital!

2:07:44 Cab Driver: We're gonna take the river.

2:07:49 Brennan: You see as he peels off you peel out of there. You guys arrive in the room with Kingston as you get there a message appears from Esther. You also get messages from some of you saying,

2:08:08 Message: Shit’s going down in Astoria.

2:08:10 Brennan: You get a message from Ana and Emilia, like,

2:08:11 Ana: Someone’s attacking the old bodega.

2:08:14 Brennan: You get another message, you see Esther [magic shimmering] appears in your small nurse's office. And it's her literally flying through the streets as a vid screen of magic gets her face. You see she says,

2:08:26 Esther: They're attacking the library. I just got word from Alejandro listen, the eagle, the eagle got back to me. There's a spell happening tonight at the stock exchange. That's where Moses is gonna be, that's where he is.

2:08:43 Ally: Okay, I'm gonna go immediately that way.

2:08:46 Zac: Before I leave I'm going to touch Liz and cast Remove Curse on her.

2:08:53 Brennan: Awesome. You cast Remove Curse. Go ahead and give me a flat Medicine check. This is a powerful curse, Remove Curse is going to have a chance to get rid of it but I want you to roll just a flat Medicine check.

2:09:10 Murph: I'm gonna cast Guidance on him.

2:09:11 Brennan: To add a d4.

2:09:12 Murph: To add a d4.

2:09:13 Lou: I also cast Guidance on him.

2:09:14 Brennan: Yes. You can add 2d4.

2:09:15 Siobhan: And I'm gonna very flirtily say,

2:09:15 Rowan: Ricky, we believe in you.

2:09:21 Ricky: Hold on.

2:09:22 Siobhan: And give him Bardic Inspiration.

2:09:23 Zac: So that's a d8.

2:09:24 Siobhan: Yeah.

2:09:25 Zac: Okay, all right.

2:09:27 Ally: So d4's a d8 and a d20.

2:09:34 Zaac: 18 plus five, 23.

2:09:38 Brennan: 23. You cast Remove Curse. And you feel like the questing blade shines bright and you hear a voice in your ear and you see a flash of Yankee Stadium for a second and have this sudden urge to go to Yankee Stadium. But it goes away for a second, you just hear a voice saying like,

2:10:02 Voice: Champion, holder of the questing blade.

2:10:06 Brennan: And you see that Liz's heartbeat settles a little bit.

2:10:14 Murph: Go to Yankee Stadium?

2:10:17 Brennan: It was a momentary blip of something that doesn't necessarily feel urgent but you just got a vision of Yankee Stadium for some reason.

2:10:26 Ricky: I can't explain it, but I just saw Yankee Stadium.

2:10:30 Kugrash: Do you guys think there's any chance that that wasn't really Esther and we were getting—

2:10:36 Sofia: Like they're sending us to the—

2:10:37 Zac: Can we text Esther, I'll text Esther a selfie of, nevermind, I don't do a selfie.

2:10:42 Murph: I'm gonna use the Bagel of All Things and ask New York where the person, although, I wanna know if we're being setup, I think the stock exchange is the place we wanna go anyway but I'd like to ask if that was really Esther.

2:10:59 Brennan: The Bagel confirms that it was Esther.

2:11:01 Murph: Okay.

2:11:02 Siobhan: Can I, is there anyway to use Locate Creature to see who it was that cast this spell. Because if this happened locally this person is still pretty close probably.

2:11:14 Brennan: Potentially yeah, you can cast Locate Creature.

2:11:16 Siobhan: Okay.

2:11:17 Brennan: You get a faint sense of them leaving the area of your spell very briefly.

2:11:23 Zac: I'll cast Divine Sense as well.

2:11:25 Brennan: Undeath, is the nature of the curse. But the thing you detect is a vampiric magic and something fleeing.

2:11:38 Siobhan: And they're going south.

2:11:39 Brennan: That south, yeah.

2:11:41 Rowan: Well, the vampires are at it.

2:11:46 Kugrash: Let's go to this stock exchange.

2:11:49 Ricky: Can we just--

2:11:50 Rowan: I don't know what else to do.

2:11:51 Zac: I'm trying to think of what would happen at Yankee Stadium.

2:11:54 Siobhan: I know.

2:11:55 Murph: Wait, can we check her for bites.

2:11:58 Lou: Yeah there was claws—

2:11:58 Siobhan: She's been clawed.

2:11:59 Emily: Claws and bites.

2:12:00 Murph: Oh, so there were bites.

2:12:02 Brennan: That's the other thing you see, the reason this is so complex is there's like a trace of vampirism within.

2:12:08 Murph: Yikes.

2:12:11 Rowan: What could happen at Yankee Stadium?

2:12:12 Pete: So should we split up a little bit or?

2:12:14 Ricky: I think that's--

2:12:15 Kugrash: I think Yankee Stadium might be for another day maybe? I don't know what you guys think?

2:12:22 Rowan: I mean I've always just been a Met's girl myself, so.

2:12:24 Pete: The Yankees are trash.

2:12:26 Ricky: Maybe we could call the front desk of the Yankee stadium to see if there's a—

2:12:29 Rowan: Excuse me, is this Yankee Stadium?

2:12:30 Emily: Okay, I'm on the phone.

2:12:33 Brennan: That blip, that disappears from you after the moment you felt it. It doesn't feel like a pressing urgent thing within you. It feels instead like something that just occurred for a moment and then went away.

2:12:45 Zac: Maybe it means we should go to a ball game, I don't know.

2:12:47 Siobhan: Maybe, maybe it's the curse of the bambino but that's not here, that’s in—

2:12:50 Brennan: What do you guys do?

2:12:51 Lou: What's the level on Liz? Because I'm not 100% comfortable leaving right—

2:12:56 Brennan: That last thing where you all joined forces feels like she is partially stable.

2:13:01 Lou: For now.

2:13:01 Brennan: For now. That you at least have until maybe like 12 hours. She'll be good for a while, she's gonna remain stable for at least another—

2:13:12 Kingston: You said that you felt him going south.

2:13:14 Rowan: Yeah maybe we can text Em, have her come have a look at her.

2:13:18 Kingston: Great.

2:13:19 Pete: Watch over her, yeah.

2:13:20 Rowan: Yeah.

2:13:21 Pete: That's great. I wanna get there and I wanna get a look at Robert Moses. I wanna see, I wanna congregate.

2:13:28 Emily: I wanna get to this New York Stock Exchange area, I wanna cast Jump on myself.

2:13:33 Brennan: Cool, you cast Jump.

2:13:34 Emily: Oh wait, is that only a minute.

2:13:36 Murph: I wanna conjure my elemental again, when we get close because it lasts for an hour.

2:13:41 Brennan: You conjure your elemental—

2:13:41 Emily: Nevermind, I don't cast Jump. But I do create an Unseen Servant.

2:13:46 Zac: Can Misty ride in my Maserati and get the benefits from that?

2:13:49 Brennan: Can't bump over 20.

2:13:50 Zac: Okay, gotcha.

2:13:51 Siobhan: [to Zac] Oh, it’s a Charisma thing?

2:13:52 Brennan: Conjure Elemental.

2:13:52 Zac: [to Siobhan] Plus two Charisma.

2:13:53 Ally: Do we see Robert Moses when we got to the stock exchange?

2:13:55 Siobhan: [to Zac] I’m already the most charismatic in our group.

2:13:56 Brennan: Hold on one sec guys. Let me narrate what happens. You guys get there. There's an express Harlem to Wall Street. You arrive, you rush up, you go to the stock exchange. Kugrash, it's been a long time since you've been here. You walk in, it is about now, after all the running around and Liz and everything else, it's about seven, eight o'clock at night, which around this time of year means it is pitch black. You walk up, the doors open for Kingston, even though they're usually locked at this time. Nobody perceives you, all the guards are looking the wrong way to notice you guys walking in. You get to the floor of the stock exchange. Kiosks everywhere, with the screens and the ticker. Up in the balcony with the bell you see Robert looking down at you.

2:14:50 Robert Moses: Welcome. I take it that Kingston's offer was either not given or rejected.

2:14:57 Kingston: You son of a bitch!

2:14:58 Pete: You're going to hell.

2:14:59 Kingston: I'll kill you!

2:15:00 Ally: I point at him too and cast True Strike.

2:15:04 Emily: I cast True Strike also.

2:15:06 Brennan: Roll for initiative.

2:15:07 Lou: Great.

2:15:10 Brennan: That's all for this week on The Unsleeping City. Tune in next week as the battle of high finance where the stakes [wiggles eyebrows] and stocks couldn't be higher.

2:15:20 Zac: Oh God.

2:15:21 Siobhan: Money, money, money.

2:15:22 Brennan: Money, money, money, money. Later!

2:15:25 Siobhan and Ally: Money. [NEXT EPISODE - Episode 14: Showdown at the Stock Exchange] [NEXT TIME ON DIMENSION 20]

2:15:26 Brennan: Robert Moses is here concocting a ritual on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.

2:15:36 Kugrash: Gonna burn it down!

2:15:37 Brennan: Those are vampires piloting kiosk mechs.

2:15:40 Zac: Incredible, but I'm so mad.

2:15:42 Brennan: He reaches out and sucker punches you in the stomach and you are paralyzed.

2:15:47 Rowan: Are you enjoying this?

2:15:48 Robert Moses: Take it easy, Miss Berry.

2:15:50 Kingston: You stupid motherfucker! You come for my family, you come for my friends, I will fucking drop you.

2:15:56 Robert Moses: If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere. Edited by matzoballmonk, rowan solsys