Transcript - Episode 25: Horror at the Innsmouth Inn (Part 3)
Audio for Horror at the Innsmouth Inn Part 3
Horror at the Innsmouth Inn Part 3
Wed, Jan 28, 2026
“Push the Roll with Ross Bryant” is produced for the ear and includes emotion and emphasis that's not on the page. Transcripts are generated using a combination of speech recognition software and human transcribers, and may contain errors.
cuppycup 00:00
Oh, and Ross, just before we dive back in, I want to remind you we do have a second title available if you want to push the roll.
Ross Bryant 00:07
Oh, god, yeah, I'm always. Yeah. Why not?
Mary Lou 00:10
Let's push the roll.
Paula Deming 00:11
Push the roll.
Ross Bryant 00:13
Yes, I will push the roll, so to speak. Get this secondary title.
cuppycup 00:17
All right, just roll up a d100.
Ross Bryant 00:20
45.
cuppycup 00:21
Okay, our second title comes from Vovina. Thank you, Vovina, and the title is, [laughing] it's good we're already hungry: "A Feast Fit for a King."
Paula Deming 00:35
Nice.
Ross Bryant 00:36
[MUSIC: melancholic guitar theme] The cosmos is a cyclopean infinity of chaos, infinite branching paths stretching off to vistas in the distance that will drive the mind mad. Shall we shrink in the face of all this? Or will we climb aboard the chaos and ride it to the end, letting chance guide the way? This is Push the Roll. We're rolling dice against your Patreon suggestions to create improvised Call of Cthulhu adventures in real time with themes of eldritch horror, the weird, the transhuman, the transmundane, the cyberpunk, the splatterpunk, the anything punk. We don't know until we roll. Anytime, anyplace, anything can happen when you push the roll.
Ross Bryant 01:29
Let's go back to the Lobster Conference Room.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 01:35
It's so weird. It's almost like, as he walked away, maybe I should have stopped Val, like he had kind of weird-colored skin, like, um, like a fish or something. Strange.
Oscar Montoya 01:45
My head darts to Lou.
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 01:47
What do you mean?
Oscar Montoya 01:49
Absolutely focused, completely changing in tone.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 01:54
It looked kind of like when I saw the back of his neck, like he had makeup, speaking of, I mean, his mom probably is here for the conference. And where the makeup ended, it looked like, you know what like a fish's belly looks like? That's kind of like what the back of his neck looked like.
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 02:12
You know makeup. What kind of makeup?
Lou Griffith (Paula) 02:13
Well, I guess it would be probably like a thick foundation. Maybe more like what people wear like for a play or something. Maybe some of that Ben Nye.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 02:21
Well, maybe he just had, like, a rat tail or something, and cut it and it's a tan line, right?
Lou Griffith (Paula) 02:29
Possible. He'd be real pale, but it is possible.
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 02:34
I saw someone,
Lou Griffith (Paula) 02:36
Oh?
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 02:37
Outside in the rain, standing, turning, looking. Its face was rotting, but not. Makeup streaming down, revealing dead, putrid flesh.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 03:03
Oh, well, maybe, I mean, there is...
Ross Bryant 03:06
That's pretty horrible. Lou and Doogie, can you make Sanity rolls, just based on what Gerson Myers is telling you?
Paula Deming 03:13
Yeah.
cuppycup 03:14
I think Doogie is backpedaling with his hands out, like
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 03:17
You're, like, scaring me, Mister,
Paula Deming 03:19
What a funny story for you to tell. I'm fine. That's a 17 under 65.
cuppycup 03:26
I failed. 77 over 45. You can hear him swallow like, almost like he's fighting his gag reflex,
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 03:32
[gulping] Nope, nope. Don't like any of that. I don't like any of that.
Ross Bryant 03:34
I think that's no points of Sanity loss for Lou, that's 1 for you, Doogie.
cuppycup 03:43
Okay.
Ross Bryant 03:43
How do you think that just 1 point of Sanity loss affects you? It sounds like you're just backing away.
cuppycup 03:45
Yeah, I think he's backing away and he'll probably trip, right? He kind of falls over backwards.
Ross Bryant 03:54
Oh, gosh, much like a little faux pas, much like Gerson had earlier in the conference room. When you hit the ground, Doogie, because of your proximity to the ground, you hear something, [squelch, squelch, squelch] Sounds like wet and soggy footsteps out in the hallway coming closer and closer.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 04:19
Shh, shh, shh! Do you hear that? Someone's coming. Someone's coming.
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 04:25
They're already here. They've been here.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 04:29
My God,
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 04:30
We're the ones that were coming.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 04:33
What are you two talking about? What? Now everybody calm down. It's just a scary, stormy night with some weird photos of people who look like they have the plague or something. And a strange little boy, it's just like in the movies. You can be calm.
Paula Deming 04:46
And I will go over to the hallway. I will open the conference room door.
Oscar Montoya 04:50
I grab Lou,
Lou Griffith (Paula) 04:51
and I will show you-
Oscar Montoya 04:52
I grab Lou by the shoulders and shake her,
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 04:56
Hey, hands off! She's with us.
Oscar Montoya 04:59
And I'm screaming,
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 05:00
You have makeup! They have makeup! You know something we don't know.
Oscar Montoya 05:06
And I push her to the ground,
cuppycup 05:10
And Doogie is gonna jump up and punch Gerson,
Paula Deming 05:13
Oh, here's that PvP,
Ross Bryant 05:16
Okay, wow. PVP already.
Mary Lou 05:18
It's happening.
cuppycup 05:19
He wants to be a hero for Lou Griffith.
Ross Bryant 05:24
You're fighting amongst yourselves. Doogie is going to make a Fighting (Brawl) roll. And you have two options, Gerson, you can attempt to dodge, get out of the way of his attack, or you can fight back.
Oscar Montoya 05:35
Great.
Ross Bryant 05:36
And you're looking for the relative level of success: failure, success, hard, extreme, et cetera. So what are you going to do? Are you gonna try to dodge Doogie Wilson's blow? Or are you going to attack him?
Oscar Montoya 05:46
I'm dodging it. Yeah.
Ross Bryant 05:47
Okay, great. So Doogie, roll your Fighting (brawl). Gerson, roll your Dodge.
cuppycup 05:51
He's not great at this. I failed. I think we both failed. I failed with a 59 over 35.
Oscar Montoya 05:59
We bonk our heads.
Ross Bryant 06:00
Gerson squirms out of your way, and you just punch the floor. Bam, like through that carpet.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 06:07
That was a warning shot, mister. Next one's going nearer to your face.
Oscar Montoya 06:13
This doesn't faze me at all. This is all part of my sort of nightmare realm. I knew he was not going to hit me at all. But my gaze is completely focused on Lou right now.
Ross Bryant 06:26
And I want to say that you can also, because your gaze is focused on Lou, you can now see that the little sea captain with something coming out of his torso in the painting, it is moving. He's now swimming through the water, towards you, in the painting.
Paula Deming 06:44
I'm like trying to get back up.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 06:46
Ger- Gerson. I just- everyone needs to calm down. Everyone needs to calm down. All right?
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 06:53
He's swimming towards us.
Oscar Montoya 06:54
and I point...
Ross Bryant 06:55
[squelch]
Oscar Montoya 06:56
...back to the painting again.
Ross Bryant 06:57
[squelch, squelch]
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 06:59
Somebody's coming. [squelch, squelch] I'm not staying here to be murdered in a conference room, okay? I'm getting help, like the police or a maintenance guy with a big flashlight!
Oscar Montoya 07:08
And I talk to the painting. I say,
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 07:13
Who sent you here?
Paula Deming 07:17
I look at the painting.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 07:18
There is nothing in this painting. It's a painting!
Paula Deming 07:20
And I will go right over to the painting, and I will point out how there's nothing happening in this painting.
Ross Bryant 07:27
Yeah, there doesn't appear to be anything happening. Doogie, you said you're getting help. Are you opening the door?
cuppycup 07:32
Just like a two-inch peek.
Ross Bryant 07:34
And you see there [squelch, squelch, squelch] staggering towards you, shambling wetly towards you, is Scarlett, and she is covered torso to toes with blood.
Scarlett (Ross) 07:51
I ca...[struggled incomprehensible attempt at speaking]
Ross Bryant 07:51
There appears to be an enormous wound in her torso. I'm sorry to get all splatterpunk on you, but it looks like a rib is jutting out, looks like maybe an organ is missing. Blood is like oozing onto the floor.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 08:10
What the heck?
Ross Bryant 08:11
She stumbles and falls, her feet by a little recess by the hallway that she just turned around, and as you watch, Doogie, suddenly, her body is pulled backwards, leaving a trail of blood behind it, where you cannot see it, into the hallway.
Paula Deming 08:31
Holy smokes.
cuppycup 08:33
I'll roll SAN, yes. Oh my god. I started at 45 I rolled a 44, I've lost one. So it's an exact success.
Oscar Montoya 08:41
That's how high your Sanity was?! [laughing]
Ross Bryant 08:45
That's more common. Once again, it's terrible, terrible violence, but there's nothing supernatural about it.
cuppycup 08:52
Doogie is gonna cling to denial, like,
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 08:55
Right, right. Okay, This is just regular murder. I'm not involved. Cool.
Ross Bryant 09:00
You're just taking 1 point of Sanity loss.
cuppycup 09:03
Yeah, Doogie is going like full citizen mode, like,
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 09:06
Help! Front desk! Somebody call the cops! There's a woman bleeding out in the hallway.
Ross Bryant 09:10
Great. What a lot of commotion. Gerson is still on his back like a turtle. Lou is looking at a painting, which seems utterly banal, but Doogie has just seen something horrible. Let's go back to Room 155,
Paula Deming 09:23
Oh, Val!
Ross Bryant 09:25
Pete is showing you his true face. The flesh of Pete's torso is seemingly spilling out over his waist and another face with a mouth of jagged anglerfish-like teeth, is sort of writhing upwards with two wide set eyes that sort of goggle up at you.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 09:54
Oh, my God.
Ross Bryant 09:57
Now the voice is coming from two mouths at once.
Pete (Ross) 09:59
So. Hungry.
Ross Bryant 10:03
And it's going to take a bite of you.
Mary Lou 10:05
Yeah, yeah. She's gonna Dodge. She's gonna try and Dodge.
Paula Deming 10:09
I should never let you go off with that kid, Val.
Mary Lou 10:12
Oh, normally, I love failing in Call of Cthulhu, but my Dodge is a 70, and I rolled a 74 and I'm gonna spend some luck to at least just...
Paula Deming 10:25
Do it. Do it, do it.
Mary Lou 10:27
...match it. So I'm gonna spend 4 Luck.
Ross Bryant 10:30
Okay, so you've lucked your way down to a regular success,
Mary Lou 10:34
Yeah,
Ross Bryant 10:35
Of a Dodge?
Mary Lou 10:36
Uh huh.
Ross Bryant 10:37
It also got a success. But you dodged. I want to say, maybe you're reeling back into, because he kind of put himself between you and the open door...
Mary Lou 10:46
He did.
Ross Bryant 10:47
...backward into Room 155, which is pitch dark.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 10:51
Oh, my God! What's wrong with you, Pete?!
Mary Lou 10:57
So, she dodged his torso-chomp, and she's gonna try and sort of juke around him and just flee. She still thinks of him as like a child, so she can't bring herself, it's not her instinct to attack, but she is gonna try and get around him.
Ross Bryant 11:15
Okay, so you're gonna juke around him to get away. I think this would be another Dodge...
Mary Lou 11:20
Yeah.
Ross Bryant 11:21
...to see if you can do that. I'm just gonna let you know, though, in the darkness of this room, it's sightless, but the ambient light from the hallway creates this column of light that just hits the back wall, but you can't see what's on the bed that suddenly talks to you.
Oscar Montoya 11:37
No.
Voice from the Dark (Ross) 11:39
Baby, when are you gonna give me a grandchild?
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 11:43
Mom? No! Unh-uh, no!
Mary Lou 11:48
And she tries to Dodge and, oh, that is a hard success! Oh, it is an extreme success. 14, I rolled a 14.
Ross Bryant 11:57
Oh, my God
Mary Lou 11:58
Under 70.
Ross Bryant 11:59
That's another regular success. You succeed. You juke out of the way of Pete, his human face is kind of looking, staring up at the sconces on the ceiling, while his other face turns like the head of some blasphemous fish and sort of moves around looking at you with its goggling, wide set eyes.
Pete (Ross) 12:24
... hungry
Ross Bryant 12:27
And as you run down the hallway, you can start to hear its footsteps like, [trot, trot, trot, trot, trot, trot, trot] behind you.
Mary Lou 12:33
Oh no, no, no, no, no. Yeah, she's running. She's running. She's gonna try and run back exactly the way she came.
cuppycup 12:42
A quick teacher's pet moment, Ross. Mary Lou, did you roll SAN when Pete changed?
Mary Lou 12:47
No, I didn't.
Ross Bryant 12:50
Golly. Thank you so much, Cup. Thank you for reminding me to assign homework.
Mary Lou 12:54
Ah, man,
Ross Bryant 12:56
Please roll Sanity.
Mary Lou 12:58
Okay, but I love that, though. This is good homework. Ooh, that's a failure. That's a failure.
Ross Bryant 13:03
I'll say. You have seen the change. You have seen Pete's true face, and I am afraid I have rolled 5, so you're losing 5 points of Sanity. So this means that something kicks into effect now. I need you to roll Intelligence to see if you understand what you have seen. This is a roll you want to fail.
cuppycup 13:26
Oh.
Mary Lou 13:29
[gasps] Oh no, I just rolled a 6 under 70...
Oscar Montoya 13:36
Dang!
Mary Lou 13:37
...so I know exactly what's going on.
Ross Bryant 13:40
Great.
Mary Lou 13:41
I know this is real and I'm fucked.
Ross Bryant 13:44
Val, you are now experiencing, much like our friend Gerson did, a Bout of Madness.
Mary Lou 13:50
Okay,
Oscar Montoya 13:51
Oh, shoot.
Ross Bryant 13:53
How the hell could your mother be there? What was that voice saying? What your insecurities sometimes say to you, in your deepest nightmares? This can't be this can't be happening. This has to be a nightmare. And the center of the nightmare is you. You have a palpable sense of it. Your navigational skill is so good. You know exactly where you need to go. The center of the nightmare. You are inexorably drawn to it, to the center of this space, to the unseen room in the center, in the very, very center of the Innsmouth Inn.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 14:29
I am the compass. I know where to go. I know the way to the center of it all, of course!
Mary Lou 14:41
Yeah, and she's gonna go there as fast as her like scrunched-up leather boots in her opaque, red tights and giant sweater, can take her.
Ross Bryant 14:51
Wonderful. We cut back to the Lobster Conference Room. Doogie, you just saw the legs of Scarlett, or rather, I should say, the head and hair of Scarlett, get dragged behind a hallway opening. Blood is still on the floor, and you can hear the sort of chatter of Gerson and Lou back in the room.
cuppycup 15:11
Doogie looks over his shoulder like wild eyed.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 15:14
Did they hear me? Did they hear me scream? Are they coming? I'm not gonna die alone in this beige hallway.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 15:19
Oh yeah, what? Doogie? What's going on?
Paula Deming 15:22
And I'll run over to him.
Ross Bryant 15:24
You're in the hallway. You see the blood on the floor.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 15:27
Murder.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 15:28
What's happened? What?
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 15:29
Murder. Someone got murdered. The lady we saw earlier, the one who wanted to, um, do drugs with us.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 15:34
Oh, my goodness. Oh my golly me.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 15:37
She just wanted to party, but now she's dead. I think her husband or boyfriend or whatever-
Lou Griffith (Paula) 15:40
We don't do drugs, everyone. This is why we don't do drugs! All right, okay-
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 15:44
You gotta help her. I mean, she wasn't totally dead, but she was definitely on her way.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 15:47
Okay. Well, should we- we gotta go to the front desk [squelch] for help.
Ross Bryant 15:50
[squelch, squelch, squelch, squelch]
Lou Griffith (Paula) 15:53
Where's th- what is that?
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 15:55
No, power in numbers! Mr. Myers, we gotta follow her.
cuppycup 15:58
Where's the squelching coming from?
Ross Bryant 15:59
Yeah, you can hear it coming from around the corner that you just saw her disappear.
cuppycup 16:05
Okay.
Ross Bryant 16:06
Yeah, it sounds like you want to go back to the lobby.
Paula Deming 16:08
I think so.
cuppycup 16:10
He kind of wants to help her, but also feels powerless, so I think he's gonna follow whatever Lou and Gerson decide to do.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 16:18
We gotta go get help. We gotta get to the lobby desk, and we got to call the police or something, right? Gerson-
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 16:23
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you're right. You're right. Of course,
Oscar Montoya 16:27
I was on the floor looking at that painting. What's that painting do? [laughter]
Ross Bryant 16:32
What that painting do? And again...
Paula Deming 16:33
[emphasis on each word] What that painting do?
Ross Bryant 16:35
...as if it were no longer a painting, but images from a magic lantern. Gerson, you're watching the little dumb show taking place there. And you know, the only reason this is happening is that it's a nightmare. That's the only way something so improbable and illogical could be happening. That the man swimming and now wading out of the water away from the bay is moving through the forest now with this bulk of flesh dangling from his torso, sort of pendulously, rocking back and forth as he moves through the trees and coming into a space, a clearing, a grove in the trees. You're just watching the painting resolve and show you these images as he comes out into a clearing where many, many people are tearing their garments from themselves, revealing their true faces as they sort of dance and dance around a central locus, hand in hand, dancing, dancing for they know a feast is prepared. A feast is prepared just for them. A time for feasting. As the sun turns blood red in the sky, and then every eye in the clearing turns to you, the guest of honor for the feast. You're free to make a Reality check if you wish.
Oscar Montoya 17:59
Okay, I kind of- I don't want- Gerson is... it doesn't make sense for Gerson to sort of like have that moment of clarity. I feel like he's absolved of sin. In this moment, he understands, or trying to understand, these people don't feel pain anymore. They come to me because they're in so much pain, and look at them, frolicking, dancing wherever they are, wounds undulating from their stomach area, the cause of their pain, maybe... maybe it's okay. And as I get up, I sort of start swaying with the painting, moving with the creatures.
Ross Bryant 18:54
All right. It's as though you can hear the music of their dance. It's not coming from the painting anymore. It's deeper in the building, deeper in the center of the nightmare you're in.
Oscar Montoya 19:07
I turn around and sort of do a little waltz - da da da... da da da... da da da - over to the center- I sort of like, don't even listen to what- I don't see anymore. All it is is darkness, and I'm following the siren call of the center of the room.
Ross Bryant 19:32
And just to gauge how much this is affecting, I'm afraid I've got to ask for another Sanity roll here.
Oscar Montoya 19:38
Of course!
Mary Lou 19:39
Yeah. That feels right.
Oscar Montoya 19:40
That feels correct.
Ross Bryant 19:42
If you lose any Sanity, you will have another Bout of Madness
Oscar Montoya 19:47
Phew! I rolled an 11...
Mary Lou 19:50
Whoa.
Oscar Montoya 19:51
...of a 20.
Ross Bryant 19:52
Okay, great. I'll be extremely kind and say that it sounds like you're just riding the vibes here.
Oscar Montoya 19:58
Yes.
Ross Bryant 19:59
If anything, there's a part of this experience that has been comforting, in a way. And you're going deeper, deeper for greater fulfillment. You're not having another Bout, but you are still having this underlying, delusive experience of being in a nightmare. But Lou and Doogie, you were moving towards the front desk, I believe.
Paula Deming 20:22
Yes, I think that's where we-
Ross Bryant 20:24
Gerson is gone. He's behind you. Lost.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 20:27
Yeah, let's just leave him. We gotta go call for help.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 20:30
Yeah, yeah.
Paula Deming 20:31
As we're going to the front desk, like, how much blood am I seeing from Scarlett?
Ross Bryant 20:38
Well, you see, of course, the puddle that Doogie drew your attention to. And as you move back through the hallways, you move down a hallway that is apparently empty, you pass another hallway and look down at an enormous splash of blood up against the woodwork. And you, maybe disturbingly, realize like this, the red hue of the woodwork in here and how many coats it may have received over the years.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 21:05
Oh, uh...
Ross Bryant 21:06
Down you go, down another hallway, and you can see the light of the front desk in front of you now.
Paula Deming 21:14
Oh, gosh, I kind of think we're seeing all this blood. I mean, I've had a baby, you know? I've seen some gore, but not like this, not in this kind of a way. And I kind of think I might need to roll for Sanity as we move through.
Ross Bryant 21:26
Yeah, yeah, probably so.
cuppycup 21:28
Oh yeah, Doogie is gonna pull out his handheld tape recorder and hit the big red button.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 21:33
Okay. This is Doogie Wilson, Kingsport College, Marketing, 225: Ethics and Workarounds. Time and date unknown, because something weird is happening in this hotel with time. If you find this tape, please tell my mom I was not doing drugs, and I forgive her for, for never getting to meet my dad, no matter what I said last time I talked to her. [click]
Lou Griffith (Paula) 22:00
Well, we are not gonna die because I have seen blood, I tell you what, and it's fine. We're gonna be fine!
Paula Deming 22:06
And I compartmentalize this away because I got a 25 under 65.
Mary Lou 22:09
Nice.
Paula Deming 22:10
It is okay, unless you make me lose something.
Ross Bryant 22:12
No points of Sanity loss. But then as you're approaching the front desk, suddenly a peal of thunder [thunder crashes] and the lights go out like [electrical noises] struggle back on, go out again.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 22:25
Hello? Is anyone working? We need help now!
Lou Griffith (Paula) 22:27
Hello, we need help! We need to call the police. There's been a terrible accident or something.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 22:33
I'm pretty sure there's a murderer on the loose.
Ross Bryant 22:36
You hear a voice,
White-Haired Front Desk Attendant (Ross) 22:37
I'm sorry, was Mr. Gerson not in his room? I gave you the number after all?
Lou Griffith (Paula) 22:41
No, no, he was and now he's in the Lobster Conference Room. But there was some- someone else. There's- we saw- there's blood everywhere. We gotta call for help!
White-Haired Front Desk Attendant (Ross) 22:49
Oh, dear. Haven't you noticed lights are out? I don't think we can place any external calls.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 22:56
Someone's been murdered. What do you have a-
Lou Griffith (Paula) 22:58
Why aren't you reacting?
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 22:59
You have to help us. This is your hotel.
White-Haired Front Desk Attendant (Ross) 23:03
I'm afraid you'll have to get in line, dear.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 23:05
What?
Ross Bryant 23:05
And as your eyes become accustomed to the dark, you can see that that white-haired woman is behind the desk, but there are a couple, maybe three, other people, and as they turn towards you, you can see that their faces are sort of like melted away. The makeup that was on it has run and it has this disturbingly sort of melted-clown effect, as red lipstick kind of wilts off, and eye shadow kind of like runs down their faces. And you can see the deathly pale, slick skin underneath, as they stare at you, their mouths agape, and you can see it's not just rain water, but like drool pouring like a faucet from their mouths.
Paula Deming 23:51
Ugh...
White-Haired Front Desk Attendant (Ross) 23:52
Well, I've got to help them first, of course, but now you've come. Ah, you're so kind!
Ross Bryant 23:59
As the three of them are, like, now, lifting up their shirts.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 24:02
No! No! This is inappropriate! I'm a married woman. Val!
cuppycup 24:07
Doogie sees all this, and he's like,
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 24:08
Nope! Okay, we're leaving. We're checking out.
cuppycup 24:11
He grabs Lou's sleeve, and he's basically trying to panic jog her toward the front door.
Oscar Montoya 24:15
Oh.
Ross Bryant 24:16
Okay, great. They, of course, are going to try to stop you,
cuppycup 24:19
Of course.
Ross Bryant 24:20
Great. Go for it. Roll your Dodge.
cuppycup 24:23
I have failed my Dodge with a 66.
Ross Bryant 24:28
One of these fellows looks like a, he's tall, kind of stocky. Looks like the sort of fellow that'd be working on lobster boat who was used to standing up there, wading in the water. It's not as though he's lifting a shirt, he rather unbuckles two straps of overalls that sort of slump forward, and suddenly something rises up off of his body, and you're staring at his true face. And I'm afraid he succeeded, and you suddenly feel teeth in your arm.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 24:56
Argh! [wet sound of toothed mouth closing over Doogie's arm]
cuppycup 24:59
How much teeth? [laughter]
Oscar Montoya 25:02
Just one.
Mary Lou 25:02
How much teeth!
Ross Bryant 25:04
Great question! How much teeth? How much teeth?
cuppycup 25:09
Tell me!
Ross Bryant 25:11
Tell me!! Ooh.
Paula Deming 25:11
Uh oh.
Ross Bryant 25:15
Eeh [laughing]
Paula Deming 25:16
What did you roll, Ross?
Oscar Montoya 25:18
Not a full set!
Ross Bryant 25:20
Not full set, you got the business. You feel a chunk of flesh being sort of detached from your arm...
Oscar Montoya 25:29
Oh my gosh.
Ross Bryant 25:29
...as these knife-like teeth kind of sink into your arm [wet fleshy sounds]
Mary Lou 25:33
Oh, my God.
Ross Bryant 25:34
...as you attempt to scoot by and you lose 5 points of HP.
cuppycup 25:41
Okay, well, you know, fortunately, Doogie is a pretty big boy. He's got that freshman 15 durability, so it's not a major wound, but I did just go from 12 HP to 7, so doing great.
Ross Bryant 25:55
Great. You these teeth, I want to say, are still kind of latched onto your arm as they're gnashing at your upper bicep.
cuppycup 26:03
Doogie goes pure animal. He's not even thinking heroics anymore. He's just like, get it off me. And one hand's bracing the desk. The other's gonna be clawing at this wet jaw that's latched onto his bicep. Like,
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 26:14
Get off! Get off!
cuppycup 26:15
No matter how much flesh they take, how much muscle they rip out, he just wants these teeth off of him.
Ross Bryant 26:20
Oh, cool. [laughter]
cuppycup 26:23
Sorry to tee that up. [laughing]
Ross Bryant 26:24
Oh, yeah. Oh wait, by the way, have you rolled Sanity for seeing these guys yet?
Paula Deming 26:28
No!
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 26:28
I have not.
Mary Lou 26:29
Then ya better do it!
Ross Bryant 26:31
Yeah, let's have you both roll Sanity. You gotta do it.
Paula Deming 26:34
Oh, I failed that.
cuppycup 26:36
I failed.
Paula Deming 26:36
This is horrifying. I rolled a 93, yeah.
Oscar Montoya 26:40
Oooh.
cuppycup 26:40
54 over 43.
Ross Bryant 26:43
Sometimes you roll a d6 and you get a 1. You each get 1 point of Sanity loss.
cuppycup 26:49
Oh, okay.
Paula Deming 26:49
Oh, just a 1? I thought you were teeing up that you had rolled a 6. I was about to be,
Ross Bryant 26:52
No.
Paula Deming 26:53
[sigh of relief] Oh, okay.
Ross Bryant 26:55
Just to let the listeners know that I'm not always a terrible guy. [laughter]
Lou Griffith (Paula) 27:01
It's fine, I've got-
Ross Bryant 27:02
Maybe it's the pain and the shock that is keeping you from fully succumbing to madness at this moment, as you watch these inhuman things now, sort of like, take shape in front of you. And even the woman behind the desk, you see her two hands, like, hit the surface of the desk. It's like,
White-Haired Front Desk Attendant (Ross) 27:19
Yeah, you can't check out yet, dear. You have to stay for dinner.
Ross Bryant 27:26
Eyes roll back, and from underneath her dress, something is rising up.
cuppycup 27:33
So, yeah, the room to him is like tilting like he's on a boat. His vision's tunneling. His brain is screaming "This can't be real." But his body's saying, "Run!"
Lou Griffith (Paula) 27:43
No, I gotta go get Val!
Paula Deming 27:44
And I'm gonna try and run off toward Room 155 because that's where I think Val is.
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 27:49
Don't leave me here!
Lou Griffith (Paula) 27:51
Doogie, we gotta get Val!
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 27:53
I'm being eaten alive! [laughter]
Lou Griffith (Paula) 27:55
Sorry, I just met you. I gotta get my cousin.
Ross Bryant 28:00
Yeah, I'm deeply sorry, Doogie, but I did say there were two other fellas there.
cuppycup 28:06
Well, you did, and my Dex is only 45
Ross Bryant 28:11
Here's what I'll say. Let's do instead of a Dodge, I'm just kind of doing this on the fly, a Strength roll. If you can roll, a successful Strength roll, you wrench your arm free, and that's the compromise, is that you flayed your arm, but you will have dodged out of the way.
cuppycup 28:25
Okay, Strength's one thing I'm decent at, so... Ah, nope, I fail, but I am gonna spend Luck. I'm gonna burn 7 Luck, because Doogie has got, like, all this adrenaline, and hopefully that'll carry him into not dying.
Ross Bryant 28:41
Okay, terrific. You wrench free, [sound of flesh tearing] and I'll say this, you would have gotten 4 more points of damage if you'd been bitten, but because you just wrenched your arm free, I'll say you're going to take half of that.
cuppycup 28:53
Okay.
Ross Bryant 28:54
2 points of damage to rip your arm free from the anglerfish-like teeth of this thing that is consuming the flesh of your arm, and you can see its bulbous eyes, sort of like rolling in its second head as it looks at you hungrily.
Paula Deming 29:11
Oh, boy,
cuppycup 29:12
Yeah. Panic is like way beyond thought now. He's not choosing. His body's choosing. It's just instinct, and the second he's free, he's gonna take in a breath and his lungs unclenched, and he's gone like pure flight out the door.
Ross Bryant 29:26
Great. You are now kind of in the clear, so to speak. You could fast break and 23 skidoo,
cuppycup 29:33
Yeah.
Ross Bryant 29:33
But of course, the old woman behind the desk is rising up behind it and a rather long appendage with ghastly teeth on it is making a lunge at you, Lou,
Paula Deming 29:46
Oh no.
cuppycup 29:47
Oh no.
Paula Deming 29:48
Oh boy. Let me just look at my stats here. Oh, no, Dodge is better, so I'll try and dodge out of the way, because I've got to get to Val. I have to get to Val. Okay, come on. Oh yeah, that's a 10. I'll spend 2 points of Luck. That's an extreme success.
cuppycup 30:11
Wow.
Ross Bryant 30:11
Ooh, lucky, lucky. She got a hard success. [gasps of surprise and relief] So you successfully dodge out of the way. You feel the grotesque, blasphemously moist and hot breath of this second mouth as it hunk chomps down just by your face. A horrible aroma of fish scale and death and rot is wafting off of this thing, but you dodge out of the way as you swivel backwards.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 30:44
I'm coming for you, Val!
Paula Deming 30:46
And I'm gonna run off toward where I think Room 155 is.
Ross Bryant 30:51
Off you go. What are you doing, Doogie?
cuppycup 30:55
I am gonna make a break for my 1970 Buick Skylark. [laughter] I'm gonna try to get the hell out of here.
Ross Bryant 31:03
Okay, great. I'm gonna say, you successfully with that Strength roll, pulled yourself free. But if you can make a successful Dodge roll against their attack right now, I'm gonna say that you're able to do it.
cuppycup 31:14
Okay,
Ross Bryant 31:15
It's just a matter of getting out of the doors and slip sliding through the rain to your car. So let's go Dodge.
cuppycup 31:21
When you say you can do it, you mean I can get to the car, not that I can get to Kingsport College, right?
Ross Bryant 31:25
That's right, that's right. [laughter] You can get to the car.
Paula Deming 31:28
You can get to the car, and then we'll see. We'll talk about it when we get home.
cuppycup 31:33
Okay, so I did fail. This feels important, though. Oh my god. What level of success do I need? I need to tie them. So, 73. Oh man,
Oscar Montoya 31:46
Push the roll.
cuppycup 31:47
Well, you can't push combat.
Oscar Montoya 31:50
Oh, damn.
cuppycup 31:50
I am spending 36 Luck...
Mary Lou 31:53
Damn!
Paula Deming 31:53
Yes, do it! I like it!
cuppycup 31:57
...to cash in Doogie's entire future to not get eaten in this moment.
Ross Bryant 32:01
Our friend got a success, but not a hard success.
cuppycup 32:06
Okay,
Ross Bryant 32:07
You feel just like Lou did. Those teeth closed just a centimeter from your back, as you burst out of the door into the rain. Your curly hair is frizzing out and matting to your forehead. Oh, man, do you feel it in that wound on your arm, limp and flayed, by your side...
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 32:31
Jesus Christ,
Ross Bryant 32:32
...but you were able to dash across the parking lot towards your car.
cuppycup 32:36
I'm gonna say this. So I I get in the car. We don't lock our cars anyway, I'm gonna get in the car.
Ross Bryant 32:42
It's the 80s.
cuppycup 32:43
Does Doogie have his car keys?
Ross Bryant 32:45
This is the moment...
Ross Bryant 32:48
...what this is, Doogie, is the moment in the horror movie where you're in the car, you're fumbling for your keys, and then you turn the ignition, and we hear [engine struggling to turn over]
Oscar Montoya 32:50
Oh no! Are you serious?
cuppycup 33:00
Of course!
Ross Bryant 33:01
Roll Luck...
Paula Deming 33:02
Yeah, your 12 year old Buick!
Oscar Montoya 33:05
Classic.
Ross Bryant 33:05
...to see if it kicks on.
cuppycup 33:07
Can I get this to turn over? Oh, man,
Paula Deming 33:10
What's your new Luck stat after spending 36 points?
cuppycup 33:13
I have 16 points of Luck.
Oscar Montoya 33:15
I believe in you. I feel like...
Ross Bryant 33:18
[engine struggling to turn over]
cuppycup 33:21
Oh no!
Paula Deming 33:24
What'd you roll? I can't see it! I've gotta start looking at the-
cuppycup 33:29
I rolled a 20!
Mary Lou 33:31
20 over 16.
cuppycup 33:32
I rolled a 20, I missed by 4,
Paula Deming 33:35
So close.
Ross Bryant 33:37
Here's how I'm gonna roll this. [engine continues to struggle] You see the doors of the inn open and something is shambling towards you. You see their faces, their human faces, tilted back, sort of waving, lifelessly, staring at the sky. And you see their true faces looming out of their torsos moving towards you, and then suddenly, [engine turns over and revs to life] the car kicks on. The floodlights go on, and you can see now their faces, their true faces, just like in picture perfect clarity. It is absolutely horrible, and it is because that you're so distracted that rather unluckily...
Mary Lou 34:19
Oh no,
Ross Bryant 34:20
...you have not noticed that you're not alone in the car. [laughter]
Oscar Montoya 34:24
Of course not. Of course not!
Paula Deming 34:25
Nooo it's in the backseat!
cuppycup 34:30
[laughing] You bastard. That's amazing.
Mary Lou 34:30
Oh, my God.
cuppycup 34:32
Oh, I love that.
Ross Bryant 34:33
And teeth are now closing over the entire headrest. See them groping around your throat and plunging into your head,
Mary Lou 34:42
Oh no!
cuppycup 34:45
I'm never gonna get that A. [laughter]
Ross Bryant 34:52
Doors, carpet, wood paneling, hallway. Doors, carpet, wood paneling, hallway. It seems to stretch off and twist and turn, up and down. You feel as though you're lost. But Val, you know this nightmare. It's your nightmare. You are the compass. You are the North Star.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 35:10
That's right,
Ross Bryant 35:11
You can move to its center. You are compelled. Suddenly, a door is in front of you, and you know that right behind it is the center of the Innsmouth Inn. It is the interior antechamber. You can feel as though you may be in a subterranean space. You've gone down so many flights of stairs.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 35:31
I know exactly where I am. I'm exactly where I'm meant to be.
Ross Bryant 35:39
The lights are strobing on and off as the generator of this hotel kicks on and off and on and off, and you're plunged intermittently into total darkness and then back into dim golden light.
Mary Lou 35:52
She's gonna reach up and she's gonna knock on the door. [knocking]
Ross Bryant 35:57
Okay, great. At that moment, I want to say maybe you feel a presence behind you. It's Gerson Meyers.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 36:04
Mr. Meyers.
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 36:08
I found my compass.
Oscar Montoya 36:10
And I go up and I give Val a big hug.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 36:14
I knew. I knew a part of me recognized a part of you. We're at the center of it all. We made it.
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 36:25
Yes, yes, behind this door. Answers, clarity, surrender,
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 36:34
Shhh, listen. Listen.
Ross Bryant 36:36
Make a Listen Roll.
Mary Lou 36:38
Oh, my God, I have such a high Listen. 75 but I rolled an 86
Paula Deming 36:45
Spend that Luck!
Mary Lou 36:46
And I think I will. I want to hear whatever it is.
Paula Deming 36:49
Do it!
Mary Lou 36:55
[laughter] Okay, Oscar rolled way worse [laughter continues even harder]
Ross Bryant 36:59
Yeah, Oscar, interesting. But we've established that you kind of, you heard music, dancing, and you kind of still vaguely hear that, but that's, is that just a nightmare? But you actually hear something if you luckily spend that Luck, Val.
Mary Lou 37:17
Yeah, I'm gonna spend 11 points of Luck.
Ross Bryant 37:20
And behind the door, you hear a rhythm. [rhythmic percussive sound] It sounds like a tambourine, and maybe like the spoons being played, and like wood blocks. It's a lot of like, kind of percussive, like [higher-pitched rhythmic percussive sound]
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 37:43
Do you hear that, Mr. Myers? Do you hear that music?
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 37:47
Music?
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 37:49
Yes!
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 37:50
[chuckling] We found it. It's here. Hurry, hurry, open! Open the door.
Ross Bryant 38:00
Open the door. Lou Griffith, can you just roll Navigate for me to see if you can make it back to Room 155?
Paula Deming 38:08
Sure. [dice rolls] I sure don't.
Ross Bryant 38:11
You don't.
Paula Deming 38:12
No, I don't do it.
Ross Bryant 38:15
And that's why, when you open the door, Val and Gerson, you see Lou Griffith there in the center of a space.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 38:24
I'm not sure how I got here, but...
Ross Bryant 38:26
Where she has been brought
Lou Griffith (Paula) 38:27
...here I am.
Ross Bryant 38:28
There are children, children dancing, clacking spoons. They've got what looks like little scrimshawed bones in their hands, [clack, clack, clack, clack, clack, clack] as they sort of caper and dance around this space. And this room does not look like any other room at the Innsmouth Inn, the floor is dirt. It is cavernous. The walls are lit by torchlight, and in the center of it, standing there is a boulder, but the boulder has been worked and carven and shaped, and there appears to be some curious writing chiseled on it. And standing next to it is Lou Griffith, and standing next to her is that tall man with the umbrella that you saw talking with the woman at the front desk, who kind of gives you a polite nod.
Tall Man (Ross) 39:21
Welcome! Welcome, our guests of honor, our guests of honor for the feast!
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 39:30
Oh Lou! I'm so glad that you could make it.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 39:34
I don't think I want to be here. I thought we were just gonna be here to talk about Beauty by Sylvie. But there's something about this I don't like. I don't even know how I got here!
Ross Bryant 39:45
Why don't you roll Sanity for me, Lou Griffith? Why don't you roll Sanity for me, everyone?
Mary Lou 39:49
Yeah.
Paula Deming 39:52
Oh no. I super fail. 93 over 64
Oscar Montoya 39:58
Oh, wow. I rolled a 12 over 20.
Ross Bryant 40:01
Excellent. And Val?
Mary Lou 40:04
Yeah, failure, 72 over 60.
Ross Bryant 40:07
Now this is a very uncanny scene that you have stepped into, perhaps, as Val and Gerson know, the center of the nightmare, the dance, the children leering at you. Their eyes kind of wide-set, and you see the bulges flapping underneath their garments. All of you now know what that means. So that is why I'm sorry to say that those of you who failed are taking 7 points of Sanity loss right now.
Mary Lou 40:36
Yikes.
cuppycup 40:37
Holy mackerel.
Mary Lou 40:39
I'm at 53 I go insane at 52.
Paula Deming 40:46
Yeah, same. So one more, and we're both indefinitely insane.
Ross Bryant 40:50
Let's get Intelligence rolls off the both of you to see if you know what you saw or are experiencing.
Paula Deming 40:57
No, I failed. I failed.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 40:58
No, no, this is...
Ross Bryant 41:00
All right,
Lou Griffith (Paula) 41:00
...these are just customers to... to sell to. This is just part of the... this is part of the experience. This is just a fun, you got to sell in every situation. ABC always be closing.
Mary Lou 41:13
Val did succeed on her Intelligence check. So...
Ross Bryant 41:18
I'm sorry to tell you that you are going to have a Bout of Madness.
Mary Lou 41:21
...Yeah.
Ross Bryant 41:23
I mean, you didn't inspect that lobby antechamber as much as Lou did, but I think it's safe to say that Lou now definitely sees an uncanny similarity to this man in the raincoat and the rather priestly-looking gentleman in that photograph.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 41:41
Oh no.
Ross Bryant 41:42
And also to the woodcut of Delmore White, who colonized this patch of Maine back in the 1700s, as he, looks at you all. And of course, now you probably also both notice Grace Sylvester in this room, her pink suit standing out in stark contrast to everything as she's just sort of like,
Grace Sylvester (Ross) 42:02
I'm sorry, you understand, but there are certain bargains one makes to get to the top of the pyramid.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 42:08
Oh, Grace! I always knew I was just a line in someone else's story.
Lou Griffith (Paula) 42:18
Well, I always knew I was actually the top seller. You only got that title through nefarious means.
Grace Sylvester (Ross) 42:26
Don't take it too hard.
Ross Bryant 42:27
This is Grace talking.
Grace Sylvester (Ross) 42:30
I made a negotiation, because what they understand, what they commune with...
Ross Bryant 42:35
And here she's kind of stroking the boulder
Grace Sylvester (Ross) 42:37
...lets you bring the outside in.
Ross Bryant 42:40
And you see now the man kind of turns to you. It's like,
Delmore White (Ross) 42:46
Yes, our patron. Our patron swims the seas, but not just the seas out there. He swims the seas of dream itself. Makes the veil thin. There is a leviathan in the waters of the dreams. We are his children, but we must nourish ourselves to keep the dream alive. Let us let the inside out, the inside out.
Ross Bryant 43:26
As he lifts up his coat and the true face of Delmore White is revealed, and all the children, as well as they dance, are looking at you hungrily.
Delmore White (Ross) 43:38
A time for feasting, a feast fit for a king! Our king has many names,
Ross Bryant 43:48
And the children are moving towards you all. I ask you, are you surrendering to this? Val you're in a Bout of Madness, though, yes?
Ross Bryant 43:57
You understand precisely what is happening right now. Though, these maybe went by the name of English colonists, they ain't from England.
Mary Lou 43:57
Yeah,
Mary Lou 44:06
I think she's going to sort of toddle forward and go,
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 44:11
Does the king need a CPA?
Mary Lou 44:14
And sort of give herself over to this feast.
Ross Bryant 44:21
Interesting. You're offering yourself, but in an interesting way. I think that's very cool. How is Lou reacting to all this?
Paula Deming 44:29
No, she, mm mm, no, no. She's going to try to break through the circle of dancing children and attempt to escape.
Ross Bryant 44:40
She's going to check out?
Paula Deming 44:41
Yes.
Ross Bryant 44:42
Well, unfortunately, you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave. [laughter] So, yeah, go ahead and make a Dodge roll and see if you can get away from the group of like a dozen children who are now closing around you.
Paula Deming 44:55
There's no way, she's not going to give in, even though I don't think there's any way she gets out. No, I rolled a 70 so that's definitely a fail. Yeah.
Ross Bryant 45:07
Gerson, I don't know if you've ever seen like a piece of meat lowered into a tank full of piranhas.
Oscar Montoya 45:13
Oh my gosh, yes, I have! [laughing] No.
Mary Lou 45:16
I can imagine.
Ross Bryant 45:17
That is what you currently see happening to Lou Griffith...
Lou Griffith (Paula) 45:19
[sound of many hungry mouths chewing] No! Get off!
Ross Bryant 45:23
...as the serpentine true faces of the children of Innsmouth, Maine skeletonize Lou Griffith in front of you. What are you doing?
Oscar Montoya 45:39
I walked into the room with Val, found Lou there. It's jarring. It's I think before this, the nightmare made sense in the context of Gerson's psyche breaking. It all felt very sort of smooth, wavy, even with the painting swimming towards him. It all felt like being underwater, and he was quite comfortable with that. This is a completely different tone. It's bright, it's jarring. It's like sharp. It feels sharp in a way that it hasn't felt before. Wait, is this meant for me even? There is a moment where it's like, none of this feels like a personal nightmare. I'm inhabiting someone else's nightmare.
Ross Bryant 46:24
You've strayed out of your own nightmare and into another.
Oscar Montoya 46:27
Right. Can I do a moment of like pushing for clarity now at this moment, or is it too late?
Ross Bryant 46:34
I think what might be more appropriate here is a Power roll.
Oscar Montoya 46:38
Okay.
Ross Bryant 46:40
Yes, in a way, you're waking up from a nightmare and seeing the truth. You've been in a dream your whole life. This is the first time you're waking up. You're kind of talking about surrendering to this thing, or getting on top of this thing, or kind of understanding your relationship between your nightmare and what you're experiencing. Let's make a Power roll to see the nature of your communion with the forces at work here.
Oscar Montoya 47:02
So I rolled my POW is 25...
Mary Lou 47:07
Yikes.
Oscar Montoya 47:08
...and I rolled a 71.
Ross Bryant 47:11
You can, of course, push.
Oscar Montoya 47:13
I'm going to, why not?
Mary Lou 47:14
Push...
Oscar Montoya 47:15
I'm gonna push the roll.
Mary Lou 47:17
Push the roll.
Ross Bryant 47:18
Tell me how you're trying to, kind of, like, engage with this nightmare space in a way that makes your mental state even more vulnerable.
Oscar Montoya 47:26
Yeah. So I think I see the duality of where my psyche is at. On one side, I see Val who I treated as my compass, my guiding, my North Star, in a way, sort of give herself over to this powerful being. If I am playing by the rules of the nightmare in which I'm living, I should be able to follow her, right? She is the sage for me. On the other hand, there's Lou being consumed by these children. Lou, who I didn't trust in the first place, had the makeup thing. There's a lot of distrust. It's like an angel and devil, right? And in a way, to me, the angel is sort of winning. I should, but something doesn't feel true to me, to the person that is still tethered to Gerson Myers, to the person who drove all the way from Chicago to Maine to escape. There is something. There's still a thin string tying this Gerson to the Gerson that lived 53 years before. And that's what I'm wrestling with right now. I am trying to push it so I can, like, pull myself from this untethered place, this nightmare realm, back into the anchor that was, that was Gerson.
Ross Bryant 48:50
Pushing into this, I love this idea of like an anchor. A nautical image, your compass, your anchor, your line. It's almost as if the rope is yourself. A rope may be dangling from the ship in the painting that you saw. As you reach forward to grab this object of your dream, make your Power roll and tell me if you succeed.
Oscar Montoya 49:14
Oh my gosh, here we go.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 49:16
Gerson, come with me.
Oscar Montoya 49:20
I rolled a 23 against a 25
Mary Lou 49:23
Yeah. Oh my gosh, you did it!
Ross Bryant 49:26
Oh my god! You succeeded.
Paula Deming 49:30
Is Gerson gonna be the lone survivor, then?
Oscar Montoya 49:34
[laughing] Probably not.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 49:35
Gerson, come with me. Jump in. Won't this be great? Won't it be great?
Ross Bryant 49:43
You succeeded. And I think, yeah, the line in your hand goes taut for a moment. You don't see this room any longer. You see Val, your compass, your North Star, and then she literally becomes a star in the firmament. And the rope is in front of you, and you are on like a little boat in a lipid dark sea with the moon overhead, with a line trailing away into the water. And then something heaves its bulk up out of the water, connected to that line. It is a titanically enormous aquatic creature. It seems to have like, snarls of eyes on it, like a spider's eyes that kind of, like roll up out of the water and look at you. You realize that this is whatever these people were referring to as their patron, as their king, whatever totem this boulder represents, it's to this. This thing. And for the very first time, you are waking up and you are being shown what the real world is, a place where entities like this once dwelt and had kingdoms and continents long forgotten. Where people danced to strange music to do them homage, where it offered its life force to them, changed them, made them the children that you see before you in the room. And whatever part of Gerson Meyers is still there, is powerful enough to see the truth of this, the clarity of this, that the tragedy of your life, it's tragic, but you're not responsible. You're not responsible. Someone else put those drugs into that bottle, and it's a totally understandable oversight. That is true. This is true that the water that you're in is the water of dream that is just as real, perhaps realer than the waters of the ocean of life. And you are being asked if you want to step over a threshold into the real world, the world of dream, where this thing dwells, where it really sleeps, exerting its will into the world that you've been sleeping in your entire life. You've been living your whole life under the influence, if I may say, of a painkiller. Do you want to wake up?
Oscar Montoya 52:11
Yeah. I look at this leviathan of a creature, and I understand it for what it is, and I recognize that that's guilt. That's guilt talking to me, speaking to me, and I'm at the precipice of choosing to submerge myself in the waters of guilt and let it consume me, in a way, purify me, absolve me from continuing to live a life that way. Or do I rebuke it, banish it if I can, if I even know how to do that, to reject this invitation and address this dream life that I'm living.
Ross Bryant 52:52
You succeeded on your pushed Power roll. So you kind of understand these things, and you kind of have this rather ethereal choice that we're talking around here. This thing is so titanic to call it a creature isn't quite right. This is a god. It is making an offering to cross a threshold. Do you want to be beyond guilt, beyond good and evil, beyond every petty moral system that the feeble and insignificant mind of humanity uses to hem in its fragile and debased consciousness? Or will you become like the god itself and live eternally in the ocean of dreams in a continent that has no name?
Gerson Meyers (Oscar) 53:40
That would be too easy. That would be simply too easy for someone like me. I see what you're offering, and I reject it with every ounce of my soul. I will reject you, and I will go back and face myself again,
Ross Bryant 54:02
You see, like not interest, not confusion in the face of, could you even call it a face, this writhing mass in front of you, as you reject its offer and it sort of begins to sink back, the rope in your hand goes slack, and you are back in the room. You have disregarded it, to become like them, to swim in its waters. And the man, Delmore White, is kind of staring at you.
Delmore White (Ross) 54:34
You have made a curious choice. You cling to yourself. And I suppose that will be some comfort to you. As you perish.
Ross Bryant 54:48
They move in on you. And Gerson Myers is well and truly consumed. But perhaps for the first time in a long time, strangely, and not just because he's indefinitely insane, but because he has chosen to take a stand on principles, however feeble in the face of a god like the one he has come face to face with, that he can be secure.
Oscar Montoya 55:16
Yes, I feel the teeth sinking in the bites. [noisy, hungry feasting] I feel them and I want to and I know that, this time, I didn't run away. I didn't drive away. I didn't seek solace. I didn't seek peace. By facing guilt. I'm allowing myself, I fully freed myself as I'm being consumed and I smile.
Ross Bryant 55:44
And the smile on Gerson Meyers' face is the thing you see Val Jansson as he is skeletonized by these children. It sounded like, in maybe less weighty terms, you are maybe surrendering to this ritual in some way,
Mary Lou 56:00
Absolutely.
Ross Bryant 56:00
The man turns to you with his human face and his other face, and this is gonna get gross.
Paula Deming 56:12
Oh, just now? Just now? It's gross? Cool.
Oscar Montoya 56:14
It's going to get...
Paula Deming 56:15
Thank you for the heads up.
Ross Bryant 56:17
Uh huh. And he brings out, like suddenly reaches into this kind of writhing mass of flesh on his torso, and is pulled out like a little glassy orb. And you realize that this is a piece of roe. [sounds of general disgust from everyone] and he's inviting you not to be eaten, but to eat.
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 56:42
I-I'm sorry about my friend Gerson. I'm sorry he said no, but Grace, you told us "no" is just an opportunity that leads to the next "yes." Lou, I hope you're proud of me,
Mary Lou 57:04
And she's gonna take that orb and swallow it whole.
Ross Bryant 57:10
Great,
Oscar Montoya 57:10
Sick.
Ross Bryant 57:12
Slurp! See the light scutter as those two windows up front that look rather like eye sockets shedding their beams of light out onto a comfortable, mid-sized car that is rocking and shuddering there in the parking lot. [laughter]
Oscar Montoya 57:28
Oh my god,
Mary Lou 57:29
If the Buick's rockin' don't come a-knockin'. [laughter]
cuppycup 57:34
Okay, if you'll indulge me, Ross, I think...
Ross Bryant 57:36
Yes, please.
cuppycup 57:37
...Doogie is attacked in the car, but manages to open the door and just falls out onto the blacktop. We'll see this wide overhead shot of the parking lot and the rain and the headlights buzzing like they're about to die on this Buick that's still rocking. And Doogie, I mean, he's overwhelmed, right? There are multiple things here. So he's down on the pavement. The tape recorder clatters out onto the ground and keeps running. His blood's mixing with the rain, and he's in shock, and he's just gasping, just trying to breathe like [struggled rapid breathing] and the storms like pelting him in the face, just cold rain pouring and getting into his mouth. And instead of choking his lungs, do this, like relief thing, where the wet air makes him kind of calms him for a second [breathing steadies and slows] and the lightning flashes. And then we get these, like smash cuts to Doogie's, memories. Falling asleep in a bathtub as a kid, the only place where he really felt safe. It had nothing to do with how big the family was. Filling the tub with water because he liked that, that glugging sound, it made his brain stop buzzing. His mom addressing his skin condition like, "Oh, you just have allergies, honey. It'll be okay" and never meeting his real dad. And now in the present, with these creatures just looming over him, their torsos ripping open and their second mouths yawning wide, he's like,
Doogie Wilson (cuppycup) 59:15
Please, please. I'm just a guy.
cuppycup 59:19
And the camera tightens on his torso like something's rearranging under his skin. His fingers spasm in the puddles, and his whole body arches up, and this line forms down his stomach like a seam, and his abdomen splits.
Mary Lou 59:42
Doogie, he's one of them! He's got the Innsmouth look,
Oscar Montoya 59:45
Dang.
Ross Bryant 59:47
One of us!
Oscar Montoya 59:50
[laughing] Should have known by that bowl haircut.
Ross Bryant 59:53
My boy, my boy! [laughter]
Mary Lou 59:54
Should have known.
Ross Bryant 59:58
Let's go to a conference room in a hotel in Grand Rapids, Michigan where a group of women wait with bated breath. Grace Sylvester is on stage in a purple power suit, just enormous jet wing shoulder pads and a huge string of pearls. She's working the crowd with her microphone,
Grace Sylvester (Ross) 1:00:20
[sound of applause] ...because that's what it takes. That's what it takes. We all have choices to make, and you got to choose to be your best self, to let the inside out. Let the truth of the inside out. [applause] Yes! Oh, life is a great feast, just waiting for you to enjoy it. But I'm not the one to tell you about it. Let me turn it over to my star saleswoman, top of her downline, the peak of the pyramid! Let's all give a huge Beauty by Sylvie welcome to Val Jansson. [cheering and applause]
Val Jansson (Mary Lou) 1:00:57
Oh gosh. Gee. I-I'm not used to all the attention. [microphone feedback] You know, before I met Grace, I was always at the back of the crowd, the quietest voice. But now I understand that there's beauty in that. There's strength in the body, in the group, and when one of us eats, we all eat, isn't that right, Grace? [applause]
Grace Sylvester (Ross) 1:01:31
Yes, that's right. That's right.
Ross Bryant 1:01:34
And you and her look out at the crowd, beaming, and your suits are beautiful, so well-tailored that almost no one in the crowd can see the strange bulk that seems to shift somewhere underneath your ribs as she looks out over the crowd, microphone in hand, she's like,
Grace Sylvester (Ross) 1:01:51
Well, it's almost noon. Who's hungry?
Ross Bryant 1:01:57
And that's where we'll leave it.
Paula and Mary Lou 1:01:59
[cheering]
cuppycup 1:02:03
Amazing,
Mary Lou 1:02:04
Horrible. I loved it!
Paula Deming 1:02:06
Oh my gosh, incredible.
cuppycup 1:02:09
You're so gross, Ross [laughing]
Mary Lou 1:02:10
Yeah, Ross.
Oscar Montoya 1:02:11
Oh my gosh, you freak! [laughter]
Ross Bryant 1:02:15
Yep. Sorry!
Mary Lou 1:02:15
That was gross.
Oscar Montoya 1:02:16
Wait, you like made this up? There's you just sort of based on the title?
Mary Lou 1:02:16
Yeah, he's insane.
Oscar Montoya 1:02:16
This is crazy.
Paula Deming 1:02:19
Yes.
Oscar Montoya 1:02:20
You're insane.
Paula Deming 1:02:22
None of that was planned. It's wild, wild.
Ross Bryant 1:02:25
Only this group of five weirdos to blame. [laughter] We made it all up, folks, it's all made up.
cuppycup 1:02:32
That's really good.
Ross Bryant 1:02:34
Oh my god, that was so, so fun. What fun characters. I got to give it up to my wonderful players: Mary Lou, Paula Deming, cuppycup, and our special guest, Oscar Montoya.
Paula Deming 1:02:48
Yaa!
Mary Lou 1:02:48
Yeah!
Oscar Montoya 1:02:49
You're awesome.
cuppycup 1:02:50
Oscar, you were great.
Mary Lou 1:02:51
That was awesome.
Oscar Montoya 1:02:51
Thanks for having me! That was so fun.
Ross Bryant 1:02:54
That was a blast.
Paula Deming 1:02:56
Yeah, oh my gosh, you're incredible.
Mary Lou 1:02:58
What do you think of Call of Cthulhu, Oscar?
Oscar Montoya 1:03:01
It's great. It's like, right up my alley. Are you kidding me?
Mary Lou 1:03:03
It's so good, right?
Paula Deming 1:03:05
It's so fun.
Oscar Montoya 1:03:07
Horror, body horror, gross, squelchy stuff.
Mary Lou 1:03:10
Yeah,
Oscar Montoya 1:03:10
I'm in.
Ross Bryant 1:03:11
I was very influenced by our little chat about Basket Case and Frankenhooker.
Mary Lou 1:03:14
That was great. I'm glad you talked about that.
Ross Bryant 1:03:14
Yeah, run, don't walk to see those.
cuppycup 1:03:19
Yeah, I was gonna say I need to go watch these now.
Mary Lou 1:03:23
Frankenhooker is top of my list.
cuppycup 1:03:25
Amazing.
Ross Bryant 1:03:26
Well, great. Thank you so so much for joining us, and thank you for joining us for Push the Roll with Ross Bryant, we'll catch you next time.
Paula Deming 1:03:32
Bye everyone.
Mary Lou 1:03:33
Bye!