The Adventure Zone: Amnesty - Episode 8/Transcript

Transcript by the lovely volunteers at TAZscripts.

Griffin: Previously, on the Adventure Zone…







Griffin: Uh, you can tell that this light that was in the water is now… just gone.

















[Theme music (The Adventure Zone: Amnesty Theme by Griffin McElroy) plays]

{1:41}

Griffin: Y’all know Anthony Bourdain came to West Virginia? [Travis: Yeah.] For an episode of his show Anthony Bourdain Taste the World?

Clint: Yeah, where did he go?

Travis: Was he very— was he complimentary?

Griffin: He was. You know he did all the stuff that we love. Um… eating— he probably, like, ate a rattlesnake at one point and was like, “Mm, now this is real country,” and y’know, probably played ping pong at a church or something like that, but I’m trying to figure out how to, like, [making a list] is he gonna show up in the middle of a monster hunt, or is he gonna—

Travis: Ooh, okay.

Clint: That would be like—

Travis: Maybe he’s the monster!

Griffin: [continuing list] Maybe he’s the monster…

Clint: That would be, like, our third Bourdain reference in the whole series! That’d be very cool.

Travis: That would free us from the podcast, y’know.

Griffin: Yeah, okay. [Justin laughs] So, the three of you arrive back at Amnesty Lodge, and it’s nearing sunset, and as you enter the lobby, you realize it’s a bit emptier than usually? As you—



Griffin: Yeah, and then Aubrey says that. And then you see Barclay through the kitchen window, he’s doing some dishes. Dani is sitting in a recliner by the front window, and she’s reading a Lamplighter. And both of them seem slightly on edge, and it only takes a few moments to figure out why, as Agent Stern enters the lobby from the doors leading out to the hot springs behind the lodge. And he’s wearing slippers, and a robe, and it’s— [Clint laughs] He looks so refreshed, and just happy as a clam, and he says,









[Clint laughs]











[stifled laughter]







Griffin: He says, and he goes to retire to his room. And Barclay enters the lobby from the kitchen, and he’s drying his hands with a rag, and he says:





Travis: And Aubrey, like, makes sure that the agent is gone.



Griffin: He’s gone.





Travis: No, that’s my nickname for Barkly. [crosstalk] Barclay, Barkly.

Griffin: [crosstalk] Oh, cute!

Travis: ’Cause he’s… Ahh, I got nothing.







Griffin: I think, in the effort of making this not a, like, extended in-fiction repeat of what happened in the last episode, I thought it would be a good time to talk about what you all actually learned about the monster during the— about the abomination during your encounter with it.

Travis: It’s Alex Mack, one.

Griffin: It’s not that.

Travis: It is Alex Mack! It’s a puddle—

Griffin: [crosstalk] I mean, it’s a shapeshifting…

Travis: [crosstalk] A living puddle?

Griffin: …Yes.

Travis: That’s Alex Mack, dude.

Justin: It has the ability to just like, self-replicate, I guess you could say? Or like, change its mass. But it does seem to be vulnerable to weapon attacks, right? Like we did seem to damage it with— by attacking it, right?

Travis: This is the thing that I’m trying to figure out: is the creature the water, or is the creature using the water?

{5:49}

Griffin: There was the light in the water, that Aubrey, you could see, and Ned could see when he got very, very close to it. When viewed from outside, the light in the water is invisible, and seemed to only be controlling the water that it was connected to.

Travis: So to Justin’s question, are we hurting it with weapons attacks, or are we just separating it from the water it’s controlling with weapon attacks?

Griffin: I think you lay all that out to Barclay, and he, especially when you mention the light, he kind of perks up, and he says:



Griffin: And he walks you into Mama’s office. And her office has changed in her absence. It’s much, much neater and more orderly than the last time you were in here. The maps and books that were once scattered all around the table and her desk have been organized into neat piles, there’s no dishes laying all about. You get the distinct impression that Barclay has been wanting to clean this room for a very long time, and finally got the opportunity to do so. And he walks over to a chest in front of Mama’s desk and reaches in, and he withdraws an old Macintosh PowerBook. And he kind of sighs as he pulls it out, and tries to get it to boot up.



Griffin: He says, as he’s like, waiting for this thing to turn on, he says,





Clint: [exaggerated] What’s a computer?



Justin: [imitating this GI Joe parody] What’s a compoo-tuh?

Griffin: He says,





[Clint laughs]

Griffin: And he like, kind of slaps his palm against it, waiting for it to start. And he says,



Griffin: And he kind of sighs, and he looks around the office, and he says:



Griffin: And then the computer plays its startup noise, and a few moments later, Barclay says,









Griffin: He taps around, and he says,





















Griffin: Barclay puts on some glasses— actually, some reading glasses that were already on Mama’s desk, and he says:









Griffin: Barclay says,



Griffin: And he opens up a new, like, document on this very, very old computer, which probably takes like, 45 seconds just to do, and he starts taking notes on the water elemental, and says:



Griffin: And then he clicks back to the fire elemental, and he says,













[Justin laughs]













Griffin: He says:













Griffin: There’s a flash that sways back and forth across the ceiling, a reflection of light against water from outside the window immediately behind Barclay. And he says:









Griffin: That light on the ceiling now, it’s swaying even faster now, like a bright light reflecting against the surface of water, shining in from the outside.





[The Water, Arrival fades in] {13:15}

Griffin: He stands up and faces the window, and through it, you can see down to the tall wooden fence surrounding the hot springs behind the lodge. And while normally this angle wouldn’t allow you to see the waters, you can see them quite clearly now: they are floating in a perfect 8-foot-wide sphere, hovering above the fence’s perimeter. And trapped inside, thrashing ineffectively… is Jake Coolice.



Justin: Uh, when I said “We gotta figure this out,” that was me leading into attempting to Read A Bad Situation, [crosstalk] so I would like to do that now.

Griffin: [crosstalk] Okay! Yeah, please.

Justin: And I got a seven, plus one… Eight.

Griffin: Okay. You…

Justin: Let’s see… that gives me one question. Um… “What’s the best way to protect the victims?”

Griffin: You need to get Jake Coolice out of this floating sphere of water. You can tell that the fact that he’s thrashing and stuff means that he’s not like, unconscious or dead, but you do not know how long he has been in that water, and you assume that he will be one of those two things if you do not get the fuck down there and get him out.

Travis: Let’s do that.

Griffin: One thing that we need to keep in mind with Read A Bad Situation is while acting on the answers, you get plus one ongoing while the information is relevant. So if you do anything to get Jake Coolice out of the water, Duck, now you have a plus one to do so.

Justin: Okay. Just so I— I’m trying to clarify the situation for myself. It’s outside, right?

Griffin: Yeah, yeah.

Justin: Out like, above the Jacuzzi, and we’re inside, right?

Griffin: [amused] It is not a Jacuzzi, it is like, a hot spring. [Clint laughs] This is not like, a Motel 6.

Justin: It’s God’s Jacuzzi, Griffin.

Griffin: It’s God’s, it’s the Mountain’s Jacuzzi, yes.

Justin: Uh, I’m going to run outside.

Griffin: Okay. Aubrey and Ned?

Clint: Oh, yeah.

Justin: Is Jake Coolice, um…

Clint: Important?

Justin: From Sylvain?

Clint: Oh.

Justin: Sorry! [laughing] Is he essential personnel? No—

Travis: ’Cause we were kind of getting into a groove, just discussing what was going on, and I’d hate to lose that.

Griffin: Yes, Jake Coolice is from Sylvain. The three of you, and Barclay, go running out of the office towards the door that leads out to the hot springs behind the building. I think Agent Stern actually like, pokes his head out his bedroom door as he sees you all running, and he’s like,













Griffin: Barclay’s just like, gone, while you all are… he does not want his precious boy Jake Coolice to die.



Justin: I’m saying this is as we’re, like, running past him, like—

Clint: Yeah, like. [imitates voice trailing off into distance] “Coyotes…!”



Griffin: He nods and shuts the door, and the three of you follow Barclay down into the— through the door that sort of branches off the lobby down to the hot springs. You pass by a dressing room as you run down a set of wooden stairs and exit out into the hot springs. It has sort of a stone perimeter around the actual— well, where the water used to be, with like, a wooden base actually inside of the pool. And it’s surrounded by this tall fence, which is kind of lined with stacks of towels, and some buckets, and you are now face-to-face with the water sphere that Jake Coolice is trapped inside.

Clint: I need to investigate— I want to know something really important that maybe we can see by just observing, but is the water— is the sphere of water just free-floating, or is it connected?

Griffin: It is free-floating, off the ground.

Clint: It hasn’t done that before! It had— I mean, before, at the pool, it was connected to the water, whatever shapes it made— this is not connected in any way.

Justin: Yeah, do we see the sphere of light in the sphere?

Griffin: I think, yeah— I think this— that’s a good point, I think this water is disconnected enough, and not, y’know, deep enough, that you do see this light, and it is almost like, swirling around Jake Coolice’s form in the water.





Griffin: He’s like, looking around.



Griffin: He picks up a bucket and like, throws it at the water, and it just like, gets sucked up into the form, and he like shrugs, like, “I don’t know, I threw a bucket, what do you do?”



Griffin: Jake is now clutching at his throat.



Justin: [crosstalk] Okay, that’s it! I’m going to— I pull out Beacon.





Justin: And I extend him from his coiled position, and I tell Beacon:



Justin: [laughs] And I chuck him at the yellow light.

Griffin: Uh… Okay. I think this is going to be a Kick Some Ass roll.

Justin: My main goal is to protect someone. I’m trying to distract, basically. I don’t intend on like, trying to damage the thing.

Griffin: Hm, okay.

Justin: But I’m trying to protect Jake Coolice with this move. So like, even if it’s not a direct hit or whatever, I’m trying to draw the heat, basically.

Griffin: Okay, how about this, then it would be a Protect Someone roll, right?

Justin: [crosstalk] Right, that’s what I was thinking.

Griffin: [crosstalk] Since you are not intending to actually hurt it. So go ahead and roll plus Tough.

Justin: Okay, that is seven, plus… two. So nine on that.

Griffin: Okay—

Justin: Plus one, because I am acting…

Griffin: Acting Under Pressure! Good.

Justin: Acting Under Pressure, yes.

Griffin: Okay, so. You protect them okay—

Justin: No, not Acting Under Pressure, acting on my Read A Bad Situation roll.

Griffin: Right, right, right. So, on your Protect Someone, on a 10-plus, you protect them okay, but you suffer some or all of the harm you were going to get. So on a 10-plus, you get to choose an extra effect: you either suffer a little harm, minus one harm; all impending danger is now focused on you; you inflict harm on the enemy; or you hold the enemy back.

Justin: On your read of it, would “you hold the enemy back” pull him off of Jake, like in this particular situation?

Griffin: Yeah, I think— I think here’s how we could— ’cause I don’t know how to do it like, you free him by just like, hitting him with a sword and you knock Jake Coolice out of the water as you launch a sword in his direction. Here’s what I think happens: I think the water fluctuates as this magically-imbued sword, like, jabs into it, and you get this thing pretty close to the yellow light, close enough that you don’t actually hit Jake Coolice with your very good roll. And I think, as a result, Jake Coolice kind of like, unnaturally just like, falls out of the water, and lands on the wooden floor of the hot spring. And the water, like, shifts in the air, and it moves around you and then closes and sucks you into the center of it now, and now you are floating inside of this 8-foot sphere. [crosstalk] And Jake Coolice—

Travis: [crosstalk] So Duck is extra tough, right?

Griffin: Uh, so he has armor, and what you have to keep in mind about armor in this game is it works in fiction like everything else. So like, if he gets pounded by a big bear, his armor is going to help him out there. If he starts drowning, or is crushed by, y’know, a supernatural weight of water, or is burned by a magic fire spell, or something like that…

Travis: Uh-huh, uh-huh. [laughs] Go on.

Griffin: Armor won’t help him.

Travis: Ohh.

Clint: Okay, Ned, while Duck was doing that, Ned has been knotting towels together, and he has tied one end of it to one of the deck chairs sitting around the hot spring area.

Griffin: [laughs] Okay.

Clint: I’m going to take one of these chairs with the towels tied to it, and throw the chair as hard as I can towards Duck.

Griffin: Uh, yeah, I don’t even think you need to roll for that, and I think because you saw Barclay throw a bucket into the water, and saw it just got absorbed, that you know that that is exactly what happens here. And that is what happens; the deck chair goes into the water, and gets sucked into its form, and is now floating next to Duck. Now, if you want to try to use this to retrieve Duck from the water, I think you’ll have to roll Act Under Pressure or something like that.

Clint: Yep, that’s what I’m going to do.

Griffin: Okay, why don’t you go ahead and roll Act Under Pressure, then.

Clint: Uh, seven plus one, for cool, so that’s an eight.

Griffin: Okay, as you do this, the deck chair goes into the water and you see Duck kind of recognize what you’re doing. As you are trying to achieve this, and you are, you know, gripping on tight to the towels, you see a few almost like, wire-like tendrils, these like, gnarly-looking tendrils, like six of them, reach out of the water in your direction, and if you, y’know, hold put and try to pull Duck out of the water, these things are going to whip at you. Do you move, and compromise your rescue mission, or do you take the hit?

Clint: Ooh. Uh, well that… That changes things. Um… [Griffin laughs] Yeah, I’m not sure Ned is as dedicated to, uh… to old Duck as he is to, you know, not getting pierced by water-needles. So…

Travis: That’s the thing, man, reflexes! Reflexes are hard to shake!

Justin: [laughing] Yeah, in the moment, you want to do the right thing, but in the heat— to save your old buddy Duck— the heat of the moment…



Clint: And then Ned gets out of the way.

Griffin: All right, I like that. I think your fight-or-flight response kicks in and you roll out of the way as these six tendrils like, stab— you described them as “water needles” and I like that, they just like, stab in your direction, and you roll out of the way and avoid the damage, but as you do, you let go of the towel-chain that you built, and now, Duck, you were holding onto this patio chair inside of the water, and the towels connected to it are just kind of like, hanging down from the sphere, and Ned, you are safe from this danger. [crosstalk] Aubrey, what do you do?



Travis: Aubrey is going to hope, and pray, that Duck’s toughness wins out as she blasts the sphere with some fire.

Griffin: Interesting, okay.

Travis: Well, so I’m trying to be really controlled. I looked this up— water turns to steam at 212 degrees, and so I’m hoping, since it was a hot springs to begin with, it’s not going to take much. So I’m not like, aiming at Duck.

Griffin: I get what you’re doing. So go ahead and— this would be a Kick Some Ass roll.

Travis: So I rolled a 10, minus one for Tough— Aubrey, the physical is—

Griffin: No no no, you roll with Weird for your Kick Some Ass-es.

Travis: Oh! Then it’s an 11— then it’s a 12, it’s a 10 plus two then, for Weird, for magic.

Griffin: Okay! On that, you and the water deal damage to each other, but with its—

Travis: On a 12!? Oh.

Griffin: Yeah, on any Kick Some Ass, you and your enemy deal damage to one another. On a 10-plus, though, you pick an extra effect: you gain the advantage, take plus one forward; give plus one forward to another hunter; you inflict terrible harm, plus one harm; you suffer less harm, minus one harm; or you force them where you want them.

Travis: I would like— can I force them where I want them and push them off—

Griffin: Uh, I don’t think that’s how that would work, right? I get that—

Travis: Okay, then I want to grant one forward to Duck.

Griffin: Okay.

Travis: Yeah?

Griffin: Yeah, I like that.

Travis: So like, use it to create an opportunity for Duck.

Griffin: Sure, for him to escape. Right, okay. So you blast this thing, and— how much harm does your fire spell do?

Travis: Two harm, plus two harm fire. And if you get a 10+ on a combat magic roll, the fire won’t spread. So, four harm.

Griffin: That’s fine, I don’t know how it would have spread, you’re… you’re blasting water. It’s like, essentially, it is dousing your flames as you put them out— as you launch them. You actually get the feeling that you are not doing as much damage to this water with your fire magic than you should be. You are creating a significant amount of steam, which looks fucking rad, like it— it hits the surface of this water sphere, and you know, as the fire contacts it, like, there’s a ripple that travels through the sphere. But it does not seem super effective to combat this thing with fire in the way that you are used to. And I think those needles that were going after Ned like, whip around, and instead of piercing you, they just whip towards you and lash across you, and you take two harm.

Travis: [sucks air through teeth] All right.

Griffin: Duck, you are up. Now, this thing, because it like, turned its attention to Aubrey, some of the water— it’s not like a perfect sphere any more, it’s a bit misshapen, and you get the impression that, if you did want to escape, you would have an opening to do so, [crosstalk] if you can figure out a way to.

Travis: [crosstalk] Did I steam some off, too? Like, did the surface…?

Griffin: Yeah, I think you definitely steamed some of it off. It’s hard to tell, right, you can’t like, identify how much volume of water is floating in the air—

Travis: But I can tell that Duck’s uniform— no wrinkles.

Griffin: No wrinkles. Perfect, perfectly pressed.

Justin: Where am I in relation to Beacon right now?

Griffin: You see Beacon, you’re right next to him.

Justin: And is he within the light? Is he near the light?

Griffin: Yeah. You’re both pretty close to the light.

Justin: Okay. I’m going to grab Beacon and try to stab it into the light.

Griffin: [crosstalk] That’s… radical.

Travis: [crosstalk] What’s that plus one forward do?

Griffin: It just gives him plus one on his next roll, [crosstalk] whatever it is.

Travis: [crosstalk] Oh, excellent.

Griffin: You would not get your Read A Bad Situation bonus because you are no longer saving Jake Coolice. Jake Coolice right now is like, climbing out of the empty hot spring, and he’s like, coughing up some water as he does so, but he is safe.

Justin: Okay. A non-great roll, I rolled a six. Which isn’t—

Griffin: Plus tough, plus one.

Justin: Plus tough, so plus two. So, an eight.

Griffin: Plus one, for—

Travis: Plus one.

Justin: Oh. So nine.

Griffin: Okay! What does this look like?

Justin: I reach out and basically grab Beacon’s hilt with my fingertips, I think it’s just in reach, and I sort of— it’s tough, I can sort of make out where the light is, and I can’t really build up much speed at all, I’m still kind of underwater. But as much as I can, I kind of grab both hands on the hilt and just kind of jam it in the direction of the light, hoping that I can get a piece of it.

Griffin: How much damage does your weapon do?

Justin: So that’s one harm for the handle, and then one harm for the blade, so I guess… two?

Griffin: And your weapon has the “Magic” tag, so it does magic damage.

Justin: Yes.

Griffin: So, you—

Justin: And it’s a Area tag, so I don’t know if that assists me in this case, but—

Griffin: That’s for if you’re fighting like, multiple things.

Justin: Right, okay.

Griffin: You stab this thing forward into the light, and as you do so, the light like— you’re right up against it, so you can see it pretty clearly. It like, spasms, in a strange way— I think actually the whole— oh, this is great. Ned and Aubrey, you actually see all the water kind of like, spasm outward, and the sphere actually goes up in the air another few feet, and it forms this weird, abstract shape in the air, almost like this thing is, like, losing control a little bit. And then it all in the blink of an eye, like, sucks back in. And Duck, as it sort of reforms, the pressure inside this water gets like, so intense, it is crushing you like you are, y’know, very very deep in the ocean without a suit. And it actually also gets kind of hot, and you take two harm, ignoring armor as it kind of like, crushes you. But after it does so, Ned and Aubrey, you see the sphere of water now just sort of succumb to gravity, and fall and splash back down into the pool. And it obviously splashes up quite a ways as it does so, and Duck, you see the light quickly zip away and into a vent in the pool, and disappear.

Justin: Perfect!

Clint: [dubious] So the hot springs is connected to the water supply?

Travis: Listen, okay, we could… [stammers] How they eat and breathe, it’s just a show, just relax. [laughs]

Griffin: Technically, the waste water systems and the regular water systems of a city are not connected, and so like, there’s a lot of ways to figure it out. But yeah, maybe you get the idea that this thing doesn’t— it can j— it… is weird, man. [Justin laughs]

[Theme music fades in]

{30:27-40:40 ad break}

Justin: Duck pokes his head out of the water, and he kind of like, puts two fists sort of limply up in the air, and says,



[Travis and Clint laugh]



Griffin: Jake Coolice laughs, and he’s like,



Griffin: And he throws up some water, and he goes,





Clint: Duck’s hat is floating on the water [Justin laughs] and Ned sheepishly picks it up and hands it to Duck.













Travis: To be fair, though, Brawny paper towels does advertise that like, Niagara Falls, it sucks it right up.





[Clint laughs]

Travis: While this is happening, Aubrey is just like, staring at her hands, and she says,









Griffin: Barclay hands all of you some towels and says—

Justin: Dry ones, I hope?

Griffin: Yeah.



Griffin: He says:









Griffin: He says:







Griffin: It’s a few moments later now, you’re back in the office drying off with these towels, making sure not to track water in to the very clean lobby of Amnesty Lodge. And Barclay enters after the rest of you, and he is joined by a woman you’ve seen in the lobby several times now. She is always dressed very proper, almost always sitting at the piano. And as the two of them enter and shut the door behind them, she pulls a hairpin out of her hair, and as she does, she takes on a ghostly, translucent form, and she says— What does she sound like? Should I do British on this one?

Travis: Yeah! Do it!

Justin: Sure.

Clint: Oh, yeah.

Griffin: She says, uh…



Travis: That’s British?



Griffin: Should I go full cockney?



Travis: It just seems like when you went “British,” you just kind of got very airy.

Griffin: [crosstalk] Wait, yeah, I think British people just speak very airy.

Travis: [crosstalk] You went more like, Downton.

Clint: Yeah, go Eliza Doolittle, Eliza Doolittle.

Griffin: [crosstalk] I’m not gonna—

Travis: [crosstalk] [extremely breathy] Oh, my.

Griffin: I’m not going to maintain British, I’m just going to do airy.

Travis: Okay.

Griffin: And Barclay says:



Griffin: And Moira laughs, and she says,









Travis: Is Moira a ghost?

Griffin: Yeah, it certainly seems that way. [pause] Uh, yeah, she’s a ghost, I don’t know why I’m being cagey about it.

Travis: Yeah, I do want you to picture like, Aubrey running her hand through Moira just— at least once, ’cause that’s what I would do.

Griffin: She says,







[Aubrey gasps]



Travis: And I do it again.



















[Clint and Justin laugh]

Justin: [laughing] Stupid, stupid.

Clint: [laughing] Ah, I love this show.

Griffin: She puts her hand through you.

















[Justin and Clint laugh]

Griffin: The four of you are walking through the forest, toward the gate, and it is indeed lovely tonight; the sky is clear, allowing the moon to pierce the canopy of the pine trees overhead, illuminating your passage through the woods with ease. The remnants of the summer cicadas are singing a quiet song from deeper in the forest, backed by the sound of the fallen pine needles that crunch beneath your feet with each step. And Moira explains,



Griffin: She reaches into a handbag she’s carrying. She is in her human form, she reaches into a handbag she’s carrying and she retrieves a set of pearl earrings, which she hands to Ned. And she says,



Griffin: She says:



[Clint mimics wind blowing]



























Griffin: The four of you arrive at the clearing, and you find a familiar scene. Amidst a blanket of pine needles stands the archway, lit from above by the dazzling moonlight overhead. And Moira reaches into her handbag, and retrieves a small compact mirror, which she catches the moonlight in and directs it towards the gate. And as she does so, the span of the archway is filled with white light, and she says,



























Travis: Aubrey is just like bouncing to go through the big, glowing doorway.

Griffin: Sure.





Travis: [giggling] She runs through.

Clint: Aubrey rushes in.

Travis: Yeah.

Justin: [laughs] Yeah. Yeah, I follow behind.



Griffin: The three of you step through the gate. Ned, you last, and I think you see Moira giving you like, a kind of condescending thumbs up, and that’s the last thing you see as you step through. And for a moment, the three of you are all weightless in this bright, white expanse. You feel wind whipping through you, almost as if you’re falling through a long tunnel, and these rings of light are pulsating around you as you fly. And then the three of you step out of an identical gate and into another world: into Sylvain.

[Elegant, mystical piano music starts] {52:46}

Griffin: You’re standing in a large, circular pavilion, surrounded by large stones columns holding up a solid stone roof 20 feet overhead, and through the columns directly in front of you, you can see the city. And, as you might expect, you’ve never really seen anything quite like it before.

There’s a long, dust-covered road that extends outward from this pavilion and serves as a main drag through the town, and it’s lined with shops and restaurants, with outdoor seating, all occupied by diners of shapes and sizes that you can’t quite discern from a distance. And off the road, to the east, the town scales up the side of a steep hill, where these small, colorful cottages are piled on top of one another, leading up to the peak, where a quaint-looking park sits. To the west, a series of several large buildings are arranged.

Just off the main drag, you see what looks like a school, a large library, what appears to be this world’s version of a hospital, more functional buildings, as opposed to the residential district built onto the side of the hill. And though you find something kind of relatable about the layout of the city, there’s something decidedly alien about the architecture. To put it succinctly, where most of our world’s architecture is based around like, clean angles, and rectangular geometry, buildings in Sylvain are more round. Not Seussian, but like… with far more curves, and far less uniformity than any city you’ve ever seen before.

And so the main drag, it cuts across a bridge spanning a small river that cuts the town in half, and beyond it, you see something more surprising still— a castle of gray cobblestone. It’s the largest building in sight, with these huge gardens that extend from its walls, reaching nearly all the way down to the river. And immediately in front of this castle is a large courtyard, which hosts the most eye-catching feature of the entire city: a crystal [Travis gasps softly] jutting up through the ground, standing 15 feet high. There’s a bright orange light pulsating from within this shape. It is an impressive thing, even though the side of it appears to have a large chunk missing, almost as if it’s been cleaved off completely.

And as you all enter through the gate, two guards approach you from the columns in front of you, and they’re both holding spears. One of them has sharp fangs that they’re baring, and bright orange eyes, not unlike the features you’ve seen on Dani in her undisguised form. And the other guard simply has a squirrel head for a head.





Griffin: The squirrel hears you say this, and says,





Griffin: [laughs] The other guard kind of sighs as the other guard says this very dramatic thing, but raises their spear towards you nonetheless.





Griffin: They look at each other, and then look back at you, with their spears still raised.







Justin: I dig out my wallet and take the patch out.









































Griffin: The squirrel turns to the other guard, and like, kind of chitters in its ear, and they like, shake their head, like, “I don’t… I don’t… I don’t know?” But their conversation is broken up as a familiar face climbs the stairs to this pavilion. And you hear a voice say,



Griffin: And it is Vincent, the goat man.



Griffin: He listens to you. As soon as you said you were in the Pine Guard, you see a big smile across his face, and he says:





Justin: I’ve still got the patch in my hand, so I show it to him.

Griffin: He nods, and he says,













Griffin: He smiles and he says,



























Griffin: He says:





Griffin: He looks surprised when you say that.



Travis: Snaps fingers, thumb lights on fire. Boom, there.



Griffin: He gets very close as you do this, and you see like, the light of the fire like, flashing across his face, and his eyes get wide [crosstalk] as he sees that—

Travis: [crosstalk] In his weird, goat eyes.

Griffin: His eyes— his goat eyes are beautiful. He says,





Travis: And then, like… card trick.

Griffin: Okay, you do a quick card trick. He says—



Griffin: He says,



















Griffin: He smiles, and he says,











Griffin: And he nods, and the other two guards like, lower their spears, and step back.







Griffin: And Vincent starts walking you down that main drag, toward the hill, the residential district on the east side of town. And you pass by several blocks of these colorful, round buildings, and as you do, you get a clearer picture of the folks who reside here. A lot of them are like Dani and the guard by the entrance, similar to what our world would consider vampires, with these fangs and bright eyes — some of them have that kind of ghostly form that Moira showed you all, but they seem to just be like, conducting their business in the same way as everybody else here. You see a ghost float out of a bakery, carrying a box of freshly-made pastries—

Travis: [singing Belle from Disney’s Beauty and the Beast] “There goes the baker with his tray, like always…”

[Clint laughs]

Griffin: And this ghost is chatting happily with the shop’s corporeal owner. But you also see a lot of beings with various Earth animal characteristics. You see people with the fur and fangs of wolves, you see more squirrel-like people, you see some bipedal bird people. There’s a lizard person busking on the streets, playing a beautiful song on a harp.









Griffin: And as he says that, he like, nods to just a… a dog person. A person with the head of—

Travis: I’m a dog person!

[Clint laughs]

Griffin: This is a literal, literal dog person. And finally you reach the foot of the residential district, where Vincent directs you towards a large stone circular door built into the hill which he slides open, and then lights a torch mounted by the door, and leads you down several flights of stairs into the catacombs under the city. And you walk for several minutes through stone-carved tunnels, and the sound of the street and music from the city above fade behind you, until you can only hear wind that is growing louder as you navigate the twists and turns of the catacombs. And finally, you turn a corner, and you see no tunnels in front of you at all; just a platform overlooking a large chasm that swallows the light of Vincent’s torch, expanding into what seems like infinite darkness. And he motions you forward, and he says,



Griffin: And he kind of smiles.



















Travis: And Aubrey’s just fucking with Ned. [laughs]

Griffin: Yeah, sure.









Griffin: As you all step out onto this platform overlooking the chasm, it is silent for a moment, and then… I think your footsteps like, kick off some dust that you hear fall down the chasm. And then you hear really loud breathing coming from below. Loud, rhythmic breathing, almost like the purring of like, a gigantic cat.

[Clint bursts into laughter]

Griffin: And you hear a voice say,



[Clint chortles]

Griffin: And this voice just echoes through the whole chamber.





















Griffin: The wind picks up from below you as you speak, almost knocking you off your feet, which is probably pretty scary, given your position, as a massive shape lifts up from the darkness below you. And suddenly, the light from Vincent’s torch illuminates two great yellow eyes with narrow slits for pupils, [Clint chuckles] which eye you over quickly before the figure fully emerges. It is a cat. An unthinkably gigantic gray anthropomorphic cat, and it says:

[Theme music starts] {1:07:38}





[Justin, Clint, and Travis burst into laughter]