The two of you enter Valerie's coffee.
There is nobody here save a uh lone barista looking bored behind a counter.
You must be Valerie.
That's pretty funny.
Uh no, I'm I'm Richard.
What can I get for you?
Well, Dick, uh I was wondering.
Sorry.
Uh Richard Dick.
It's an old fashioned thing.
I know you're young.
nobody does that anymore.
Oh, okay.
All right.
Richard, um
Yeah, could I get a Americano with two extra shots?
What do you want?
Why do they do flat whites over here?
Yeah, yeah, we can do we can do a flat white.
Sure.
Yeah, right.
Uh that's gonna be eight fifty.
I'll get your get your drinks ready.
Yeah, we'll I'll pay and then we'll sit down how you pay enough.
I'll I'll pay in cash, so I'll give him a ten and just say like keep the change buddy.
So thanks.
And he makes yeah, uh
Good flat white and a good Americano.
Yeah.
Or at least a fine flat white and a fine flat Americano.
Yeah.
We'll drink until Mole comes in, unless you're doing something else magpack.
Mole arrives, I would say opens up the door.
Ding ling ding.
He is, you know, uh camera shot I'm imagining is that from above door opens up and we see Mole walk in.
This what was once I just I think I described him as Will Arnett, right?
Um he now is in a destroyed suit covered in stains, some rips put in it.
He is grabbing at his hair, he's grabbing at his five o'clock shadow.
Um he's muttering to himself things like milk is for babes, solid food is for the mature.
And uh you all can give me an alertness super quick.
Fifty nine pass.
everyone but Morrison.
Yeah.
Sixty four pass.
Sixty seven fail.
Um the moment Mul comes in.
Richard gets his phone out and sends a text.
Anyways, please continue your over the top of Mole's head.
Not at all seen at this point.
I think Mole is in he doesn't know what's real, I would say.
so he the only thing I will ask is when he steps in muttering to himself, the layout of the store of the coffee shop
Is there a back room of some sort, like a manager place or something like that?
For sure.
Well, I mean there's a bathroom and then there's a door behind the counter that goes somewhere.
Cool.
'Cause I think that had there had it just been truly a kiosk of some sort, I'm not sure that mole would have been ready to go, you know, in, but seeing at least something there,
um he makes his way over
Goes over to Miles and Magpie, grabs one of the the flat white, we'll say, um, takes it, slams it down, puts it back on the table, and says, He puts it back on the table, starts
walking, and then turns around and points at Magpie and says, Do not cast your pearls before swine.
And then walks towards the coffee uh front, the kiosk, the front area, and says, I will take two creamers.
Please, what kind of creamers are available?
First off, your name is He waits for you to tell him your guess.
Jezadiah.
I knew it.
See the worms tell me quite a bit.
Alright, man, yeah, you can't be in here.
I've already texted uh my manager and he's calling the cops.
You gotta go.
Your manager?
Your manager.
Yeah?
Your manager is a friend of mine.
A close compatriot.
We've discussed over and over.
He said when I come in, I am to get two creamers.
Two only.
Not three.
Not one.
Two only.
The door rings and Morrison walks in and just kind of stands there looking at the scene.
Look, here you see look, okay.
You can have two creamers.
Here they are.
Please leave.
He puts them on the counter in front of you.
Not the deal.
I'm able to go sit at the table.
I can drink these creamers.
Your manager who
I spoke with yesterday.
No man, you can get the screamers and you can leave.
The cops are on their way.
I don't know what to tell you, buddy.
You can either get trespassed or you can leave.
There is only one cop in this world.
And do you know who that is?
God?
Our Lord and Savior.
Okay.
Hey, hey, are you Leon Tusk?
What are you doing?
Mix around.
Leon Tusk, you say?
Hey
You you kinda look like him, but I don't think you're him.
Stop giving these people a hard time.
Get out of here, man.
let's see.
How in the throes of Megalomania do you think that Leon currently is?
you, buddy.
We're not in a fight fighter freeze, so I think that there is this moment where you see Mole looks at Morrison and winks, and very quickly he turns around and throws both of the
creamers at
The face of the barista.
So you don't have to roll for that, and you nail him, and uh he throws the towel that was on his apron down and storms off back through the back door.
Hey, you gotta get out of here, man.
And I like grab you and like try to wrestle you out.
Minimal amount of fighting back.
I look at Miles and I'm like, Yeah, Miles will stay there and say magpie like
Check it out.
I'll watch the door.
And then if the cops come, I'm just gonna tell them a homeless dude came in here, caused some trouble, and left.
get mole out of here.
So Morrison's getting mole out of here.
Yeah.
It sounds.
my inclination, if it's okay, is to uh like mole kind of like flashed a little bit of like the the dregs of this drink on me.
And so I'm like a little bit disheveled.
I am interested in getting uh
my drink remade.
I think I'm going to try and follow that man back to wherever he's gonna get cleaned up and I'm gonna try and just like kinda body him in.
if you want to go and look around for anything that's here.
If sure if that's counter to what you're trying to do, that's okay.
No, yeah, I'll I'll come in the back with you and I'll be like, okay, clean yourself up, buddy.
Um and then Yeah, I'm just imagining like there's a an employee sink in a uh hallway that is just too narrow.
And I'm kinda like trying to force myself in there um to him like uh to where he's uh ostensibly getting cleaned up.
and just trying to uh cause a bit of a traffic jam so that Miles could have free reign.
Yeah.
Where do you want Miles to have free reign?
in the coffee shop or behind the coffee shop?
Wherever I think a managerial office so I'd like to that door.
Sure.
Body body incording him off in like
you know, broom closet territory compared to wherever the important Yeah, for sure.
Yeah, I'll look I'll watch him go toward follow the kid, and then I'll go if I see another room to that other room.
So Miles and Magpie dip behind the counter of Valerie's coffee and step through the employees only door.
You enter a narrow hallway.
There's a corkboard
With all sorts of notices on it about here's the Fair Labor Act, here's next week's schedules, here's how you report sexual harassment, here's you know, th it's the cork
board.
There is a door to your left and a door at the end of the hallway, which you see swinging shut.
I'll take the one to the left.
Be like, I think he's going that way, Magby.
If it looks bathroomy, I'm yeah, I'm following him.
Okay.
Um Miles, yeah, you step into
Um yeah, manager's office.
Um there's it's a manager's office and then it through the manager's office is like a converted walk in freezer.
So they have to keep all like the cold brew and and shit in there, but they have to walk it through the manager's office to get it into the storefront.
there's a a really crappy computer, there's some paper records.
what are you up to?
Yeah, straight to the paper records.
And flipping through alphabetical order first, and then if I remember anything the pay stub, like a TIN or social security number, like look for that.
So yeah.
you can find him.
He was employed until twenty twenty.
he was not officially fired.
Okay.
He is still on the books.
He has not been scheduled for a shift since dis since uh what date
was uh Operation Helo Legacy.
Does anyone have that handy?
It's like August August something.
He had I think they had mid August twenty twenty.
Does that sound right?
Yeah.
His last scheduled shift was for late August twenty twenty.
Uh which is conceivably he was scheduled before or just after Operation Helo Legacy.
Yeah.
My guess is after and just never showed up or they forgot.
I don't know.
Yeah, or they forgot, right.
That's like the hard part to that.
I would also see if I can wiggle the mouse on the computer.
Yep, turns on.
Yeah, and then try to do some searches with like the information I have from his pay stubs and see like why the payroll system is still sending him stuff and if there's another
address or something.
So Yeah, totally.
Um as far as the ADP system is concerned, Anthony Hayden is st still employed.
By Valerie's coffee.
um There are sections and easy drop-down menus to uh terminate an employee.
Um the system sets it up so that you can you can easily send that sort of information out to the system.
Anthony Hayden was not selected for termination for no call, no show, or for quitting, or for anything of that.
nature.
It does not show any address other than the one you have been to.
Sure.
Okay.
Yeah, I would go in and see if I could backdate a termination to write around when he disappeared in San Juan, just in case people start remembering.
Okay.
Yeah.
Um give me a computer science.
Give it give it to me straight.
I don't know if ADP will like you doing this.
Twenty seven under sixty one, so.
Yeah, w the system's old enough that it lets you commit financial crimes.
Hell yeah.
Yeah.
I don't think those are real crimes in America.
That's true.
It's uh only a crime if you go to jail for it.
Yeah.
No, it's it's if you're poor.
It's just if you're poor.
Fair enough.
Yeah, I forgot.
Maybe but the poor don't commit financial crimes, so that's okay then.
That's correct.
Yeah, so I'll do that and then see if there's anything else I can quickly get from the office and then beat feet and
do a tap on the wall as I'm leaving for like magpie to hear.
So for sure, for sure, for sure.
Yeah, we're gonna switch over to Magpie.
Um Magpie, you see uh this guy walking down a uh a hallway.
it looks like maybe he's headed towards uh that uh lit up room you guys saw earlier.
You watch him go towards a staircase and go up the staircase.
if you had to surmise perhaps he's going to get the on site security.
Uh you are in the Bonmarche proper, and I would like everyone else to take their headphones off.
Fuck yeah.
Whoopsie daisies.
So there's a couple of things.
the first is I'd like a power check from you.
You mean that thing I've been degrading this whole session?
It's thirty eight, which is still good enough.
Love to hear it.
You're all set.
The second thing is that yeah, this place is abandoned, but it's still got infrastructure in place, right?
You know, it's got
like wall conduits and shit and like HVAC and whatever.
but some of it looks weird.
there are running uh along high in the ceiling corners and low along the baseboards there are uh have you ever seen like expandable air piping?
So it's sort of corrugated and it's used
Yeah, like a dryer tube or something like that.
yeah, it it looks a lot like that fully extended and maybe a sort of flat grey.
flat grey, maybe possibly faintly textured.
And you can hear there's something s yeah, no, you hear something.
Um it sounds like like moving air, like a like an HVAC system.
And are you gonna look closer at these grey
Weird things.
How am I feeling?
I think there is a double take for sure.
I don't think I immediately rushed Sure.
Uh will you cautiously approach?
I will get a little closer.
They are yeah, they're full of holes.
And uh the no the the HVAC noise you're hearing is is uh coming from them.
And when you
Get closer, you can see that the holes are like maybe changing size and shape.
They're opening and and closing and sort of forming apertures.
And what you hear is uh the noise of air being pushed and pulled through the through the apertures.
Uh and it is maybe almost even recognizable.
did you ever read
The pamphlet on the ascension of the soul.
Did anyone ever show you the chant?
I think I was remarkably removed from most of that.
Okay.
Alright.
Uh it sounds almost like words.
And it it is definitely it has a cadence and a rhythm of speech being produced by the pushing and pulling of air through these shaped
apertures.
Like like as though uh a flute and an organ combined were somehow able to create human voice.
Right.
Some yeah like if somebody took a church organ and said I would like this to be able to vocalize.
Whisper a little.
Yeah.
Okay.
I think that I cast my hands over my ears and I backpedal as fast as I can.
I think that's reasonable.
Yeah, for sure.
I'm I'm booking it back down uh the hallway.
I am giving one final glance to if there's any activity happening from the direction where Richard just ran off to and then I am uh going to find Miles.
Yeah.
Um are you running running?
Uh as soon as I round a corner.
So through the door?
You you basically stepped out from the door, looked around, saw the thing, got a little closer, went
Fuck that.
Covered your ears and left.
That's what I did.
So you you you bop through the door and uh let's get everyone back in.
Uh I'm gonna take a second and find out what everyone was chatting about.
Sure.
That is a lot of E doop, Edoop, Edoop?
Yeah.
Uh-huh.
huh.
We've been chatting.
You know girls.
We'd be chatting, so we be chatting.
Girls be discordin'.
There you go.
One more.
Bif that's what you guys want to do.
I don't know.
It might work I'm bad at being a player as this is my like fourth time ever, so I'm bad at this.
That's very funny.
Yeah, so um Miles, you exit the ah manager's office only to see Magpie dash through the door.
Back into Valerie's coffee, the opposite door than he came in through.
Back at the opposite end of the hallway.
It's he is exiting before you are.
and Magpie
Busts back into Valerie's coffee's where Morrison and Mull are.
Yeah, I'll be hey, Magpie.
Um, I mean just like we expected, he's still on their system.
You okay, man?
Yeah, I think um you see that my hands are pressed over my ears and I'm muttering something to myself.
Um, I'm just saying uh something like, uh not today.
Not today, not today.
You're not coming in here today.
um
And I'll peel a hand off and I say, um I don't know what I say.
Um I l I like that you're just like struck.
Yeah, I'll I'll I'll I'll I'll peel my hand off.
my face reveals that it is safer than when it was first put on there, um, but it's just a bit of b bewilderment.
So you're worried about something crawling in your ears?
Heard him.
I heard He was talking to him.
Oh you heard him.
The worms.
Yeah.
We've we've all heard him, brother.
They're here to save us.
Well, me.
And me, you, so.
No, no.
This this this this wasn't the worms.
This was like uh this was like um this was like the walls.
This was like um it was like it was just it was the whole thing.
Huh.
Seems like they're growing.
I get it.
Mole does not get it.
Okay.
y you felt them and heard them, but you didn't see Why s I don't know what I saw.
Okay.
But you saw something.
Yeah.
It
Yeah.
Where's where's Richard?
He went to the to fetch someone.
Um he went strolling on past him.
I didn't seem to pay no mind.
Hmm.
Okay.
If you did not already have luck, you would be getting it back.
I liked that a lot.
Hmm.
Okay.
Well fuck.
Can I do a out of character check who has the um tattoo stuff on them?
It's I know I obviously I know Miles Morrison, me, and then Magpie doesn't.
Yeah, I was wondering if that has an effect.
Hmm.
how you feelin', bud?
Like how shaken are obviously shaken, but like you you okay?
I mean I I thought I heard him all the way down the hallway.
Uh and I I kept on moving on account of I I I I don't know what I would have done if I turned around and they was there.
Um but it's it se it's it seems like I left him behind.
Hmm.
Okay.
And it was worms in the walls or the it was a wall of worms, is that I'm just not sure.
Just heard It it was bigger than the other ones we seen.
It was pulsing.
And it was well it had all the mouth.
Like all of 'em.
Yeah, that's n never a phrase one wants to hear or a sight one wants to see.
I heard 'em.
I heard all the mouth.
What were they saying to you?
Don't ask me that, Mom.
Okay.
Is there any alcohol in this?
They have like Irish what is I Bailey's?
That's fucking racist.
Bailey people put Bailey's in coffee, that's what I'm getting at.
Yeah, I'm I'm Irish, so.
Yeah, I know.
I lied.
Alright, are you?
I am?
Because there is no unless the like flavored syrups for some reason have alcohol in them, there's no liquor to be had in this coffee shop.
You are steadily getting more and more out of focus.
It's very strange.
I know.
My thing does this.
Yeah, it's focused yeah, right there.
Like four inches.
It's getting worse.
It does that.
It gets bad and then it gets good and
If I can turn the camera off and turn it back on, it fixes it.
But once we're recording, you can't switch it.
So I'm just this is just how I look.
I'm just a fuzzy.
Yep.
I'm a blob.
I turns out I'm the real creature in this scenario.
Woo the vector.
See the worms.
So guys, okay, we have magpie.
Do we have to go back in there?
I mean can we?
Like we're in like a public coffee shop and the cops are coming.
I that that thing's the reason why we Okay.
So we gotta get in.
Do you guys wanna s see if we can quickly look around and see if there's a better way in or should we try to trek through here with a canister of highly illegal gas?
It's just a canister.
What's that?
You guys have a bunch of bottles of this.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
You're the only one who says it's highly illegal.
It's just a canister.
Don't get stopped.
Yeah, what is the law of man?
When speaking the law of worm, right?
Canisters mean nothing to her.
I'm I'm moving towards where we parked the car.
Whoever is coming with me is coming with me.
Yeah, I think I'm going along.
We uh we circled the block, we saw their other entrances.
Let's just pick a different one, you know.
Don't want to get seen by the cops.
Sure.
also we got those gas masks in the back of the van, right?
I mean they're old and crappy, but we've got Uh which of you has had experience with
gas masks in the past.
Definitely not mole.
Definitely Miles.
Yeah.
I think Morrison and Magpie both.
I mean he would he would have you not necessarily a gas mask, sorry, but like he would have used like suits and gone into with his chemical physics work.
So labs.
Yeah.
Sure.
Anyone who does military stuff is required to like get basic training with that.
Okay.
So would either of you be would any of you be more or less familiar with
Cold War era canister masks.
Miles is a bit of a hobbyist, so he in off case.
No, no, I wouldn't know at all.
Yeah, actually that's the one thing we've all bonded over, weirdly enough.
Speaking of bonds, um I think y'all are bonding through trauma.
Um, and I'd like you to add a D4 of bond with each of all of y'all and subtract that much from your bonds.
okay.
And you do three.
You do one yeah, one role and I get three for everybody.
Like it's I get magpie, Miles, and Morrison, or is it one group?
I always forget how moments ago and then totally failed to You know what's a little wild?
It's actually pretty fucking crazy.
Is the the three that I just siphoned off puts each of the three of you exactly equal with both the people that I don't like the longest in my life.
I that seems pretty reasonable to me.
I I agree with that actually.
I think the scene of all of us driving after Morrison's wife being killed is like now this is reality and there's not other reality.
It what it reminds me of is the other game we played where we realized we were all gonna die and now this was reality and that's not reality anymore.
So So okay, don't do that thing I just said.
Instead everybody make a sand check.
Because I have now read the rules, so we will play by the rules.
Oh seven.
And I pass.
Okay.
Fifty one on an eighteen, so I do not pass.
Okie doke.
Seventy-nine, which is a fail for the first time, I think, on a sand check.
Well, lucky for you, this isn't actually a sand check.
okay.
Uh after the crisis, uh, your agents make a sand check.
There is no effect if it succeeds.
If it fails, your agent gains a new bond with each Delta Green teammate per ren up to five, present for that disaster.
And increases any bonds that were already there.
Blah blah blah.
For each teammate with whom your agent does not already have a bond, the failed sand test adds a new individual bond.
Write the character's name and a note saying Delta Green next to it.
Its value is half your charisma.
Your agent immediately loses 1d4 points from one other delta green bond of your choice.
Do this for each huh.
Other delta green or non delta green?
Non delta green.
Got it.
Uh for each teammate with whom yeah.
So you lose that D four.
You lose a D four from uh it's gonna be three bonds.
Is it rounded down for my charisma or up?
And then so you're also gonna lose three D four bond spread across however you like.
Mm-hmm, the only one affected by that then.
No Morrison.
Yeah.
if we fail we do that?
Yes.
Okay.
And it's a
Does seem right.
Okay.
And it's a D so for all of our D G agents we gain like everyone who was there, we gain D four?
No, you have magic.
And then you subtract a D four individually from e three other ones.
So I suppose I could hit the same bond a bunch of times.
I'm not sure I would recommend that.
I mean I only have one bond, so like no, what?
Well, my wife is dead and I only have my brother, so You got new brothers now, man.
Yeah.
Yeah, you do.
That's pretty cool.
Yeah, that's sick.
Mole's your brother.
Uh so I roll a D four three times and take that from my brother.
And then and then I do half my charisma did we say round it up or down?
Up.
Okay, for the new ones.
Okay.
I mean that's actually a net.
gain for me, I guess, in terms of like bond points total.
It should be a net gain.
Yeah.
Um be cautious about uh ruining your bonds with your teammates.
Yeah.
Yeah, don't fuck with Mole.
How much does your brother lose?
Uh eight from nine.
So Oh he's down the one I know.
Yeah.
You're gonna kneecap him when you meet him next.
Yeah, you project, project, project on him.
Just say fuck it.
Delta Green's your life.
Cut those ties.
I mean, if you survive though, your wife dying and this happening, this is Delta Greens your life.
Yeah.
Yep.
Yeah.
Okay.
Okay, question.
It's nine thirty.
Yes.
Do we what what did we decide timing wise?
I have nothing, so I'm cool with whatever.
But I just wanted to make sure uh and figure out where we were going with things.
I'm clear there might be a a cool place to stop in a couple of minutes.
We could also stop here.
I mean, if there's a cool place to stop in a few minutes we can
Go there if everyone else is open to it.
So you want to have hard time constraints.
I I think s Nick, you said you wanted to be out about fifteen minutes ago.
No, about now ish, but if we c we can keep rolling.
If it doesn't push past another half an hour, I'm good.
So Okay.
Then we will make sure to stop before then.
Where are you guys going?
Everyone's in the van now.
Magpie has made a concerted push towards action.
Could I maybe after our circle of the block and seeing multiple other entrances around the building and knowing where that door is that Magpie went through and then came back out
of, can I maybe do a navigate roll to like try and guess which entrance would be closest to where that might end up?
You don't have to.
It's on a city block.
Okay, sure.
Yeah, for sure.
It's the north entrance.
Okay, sweet.
So then we drive around to the north entrance.
Is that where you want to be?
I thought you were trying to avoid the potential security slash cops.
Are we already on the north entrance?
It's the closest entrance to Valerie's coffee.
Okay.
I I guess I want the one that's not on the same side of the building, but closest to like the back entrance to Valerie's, if that makes sense.
South that?
Okay.
are we um we're gonna take these gas canisters in there, right?
I mean, there's only one person in this world who should have a worm.
And you guys are staring at him.
So let's get these gas canisters in there, I think, right?
Think so.
I don't know else how else we could defeat this thing, so or stop it.
But yeah.
Should we take it to where that supply dock was to make it easier to get things in and scope that out?
Yeah.
I mean, especially if there's any kind of like equipment for like loading and unloading.
Because I don't know as us trying to manhandle three of these canisters in there is gonna be particularly uh subterfugey.
Then I guess next question, do we go in to figure out what that looks like before we just start rolling the gas in there?
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean if we I think the gas is a last resort because if that becomes unstable in any way, like we're dealing with basically a terrorist attack, so on downtown Seattle.
My opinion is that once we make a a concerted move in, it we don't necessarily know if we're
Coming back to regroup.
My instinct is that everything needs to be primed, and if someone needs to go ahead and be the tip of the spear and tell us which way we're going, that's fine.
But I think we roll the cannons in right on our heap.
Yeah, I would second that.
Based on just kind of the way you looked coming out and what you said, Magpie, I I think we're gonna know as soon as the door opens if this is the place or not.
And we may not, you know, have fifteen minutes to
come back and load these things up and wheel in.
And it's either gonna be all shit, balls to the wall, do it, or it's gonna be nothing, right?
Like it it's gonna be obvious.
So and if it's not all shit balls to the wall, we just wheel back out.
Okay.
All right.
Let's get it prepped.
I I'm not the tip of the spear.
Sorry guys.
I don't Yeah.
Yeah, fuck it.
I'll go.
I'm the coach.
My wife's dead.
I don't care.
I think we are the big boys
Moving the conisters in the back.
So wh where are you going in through one of the side doors or the loading dock?
Um does the loading dock look like we it would would it be where is it e where is it easiest to get canisters in?
I think that's what we would be looking for.
Certainly the loading dock.
then I think we would be doing the loading dock unless anyone else feels differently.
It is there is a platform the right height to unload from a van sized vehicle.
Sounds like the move.
I think so.
Then um I think Mole gets in the driver's seat unless anyone stops him.
actually I think Mole gets in the driver's seat at this point and then um pulls the the car around to the um to the the loading dock and backs up the van.
Inexpertly.
yeah, you guys are backed up to the loading dock.
Uh you're able to has have any of you in real life ever had to manhandle a gas cylinder?
Yes.
roll in it?
Yeah, acetylene cutting torches.
Yeah.
Those things are painful.
It is.
The specialized carts with the little like groovies in them that sure is nice.
Would be nice to have.
Instead, you guys are stuck spinning hundred and fifty, two hundred pound cylinders onto this dock.
it is slow going.
Guys, let's just take one of the canisters and two people carry it so we're not dragging it and making a bunch of noise.
Let's hoist it.
I mean
You tip it towards and we're doing it.
What's everybody's um just from looking at everybody, what is their physical capacity?
I would say Mull's physical capacity is not great.
So magpie and miles.
You also got kneecapped a little while back.
Yeah, I'm still limping from all that.
Magpie and Miles can grab one of them, hoist it.
And if we if Morrison, if you really think we need a second, like you can drag it into the door, but I think I don't know.
If you're the spear, you need to be the spear.
No, if if we were just able to pick it up that easy, we're picking it up and we're loading all of them just on on the side of the loading dock where all the innocuous junk is.
There's cardboard, there's this and that's.
Nobody knows this is important.
It's staged here, it took us an extra 30 seconds.
Okay.
Great.
And then did we figure out any way that we would release it if we need be?
I guess I'm trying to think about what we're gonna do if something happens, right?
This is me, Mole is not thinking about any of this.
I think Mole's thinking about
being the spearhead along with Morrison.
When the guy we got it from showed us he put that regulator on there, but we don't really care about this like being directed anywhere, right?
Like if this is just walls of mouth tentacle worms, it would just kind of fill the space?
I d I don't know, Miles or I I don't know.
Miles, you're the like the chemical expert.
Yeah.
I mean if we do something like that, like one, we're gone unless these gas masks work.
And two, again
There's the risk of seepage out and potentially killing people on the street, which is what we want to avoid.
So, like I said w earlier, I know we want to go balls to the wall, but balls to the wall means like that's it.
Right?
Like the yes.
So so maybe assessing a little bit before we trip the gas is important.
Yeah.
Yeah, I wasn't gonna like open the canisters and then walk in.
You know, maybe we open the door and take a peek, see what we see.
Should uh, you know, all of God's creatures deserve to live.
Well, excuse me, all of my creatures deserve to live.
W my question is, should we if we see this as imminent, should we be calling, you know, a bomb threat in to get people evacuated from the area as an idea to prevent loss of life?
I know that that's gonna put us on the radar, but it could prevent civilian.
Death.
Should you heads up your handler?
That had crossed my mind.
I was like, no.
I don't know.
What do you think?
Do you would you I mean I I think that that can happen very quickly, right?
I don't think I think that as Magpie and Miles are, you know, up hupping things in there, if you wanted to give uh the handler a call, that seems like a reasonable 'cause I think
we all feel like we need to get something done very quickly here, right?
But at the same time, I don't know if we're all fully as a group committed to what we're, you know.
Exactly what that looks like.
So I guess it makes sense to give a call while they're doing stuff, because otherwise we're just sitting around.
Yeah, I know I didn't like fail my I didn't hit a breaking point 'cause of my wife dying technically, but I feel like as a player, fundamentally, Morrison's motivation and his
sense for recklessness is different now.
Um we we we you can you can take a payday loan on this debility.
Yeah.
What are they called?
Fuck me.
Disorder.
Christ.
Miles is gonna be like Morrison, can I get the burner?
I'm gonna call her.
Yeah, that's fine.
And I hand it to you.
Yeah, I'll dial her up.
Does she answer?
Uh it is what, six AM now?
Yeah, probably.
Yeah, she does.
Hello.
Hey, um, this is Miles.
Yeah, I do.
Okay, great.
Um we're gonna might have to miss that meeting, unfortunately.
we've ran into a few things that we gotta take care of.
but being that those things are beyond the scope of our knowledge, except for maybe mole for some reason.
I don't know.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, what what's going on?
Okay.
We are we need some cover and to evacuate around the 300 block of pine and pike.
Okay.
Wha how how big an evacuation?
We might have to use the gas
On got it.
Okay.
Yeah.
And so we're not sure we're gonna use all three cylinders, but my guess is four to five blocks, or something.
Okay.
I'm not sure.
I'll call in a gas main leak.
Okay.
Thank you.
And so Bainbridge is still a question if there's somebody else out there, even local police that you can notify there's a threat on that, like we I don't know if we're gonna
get out of here.
uh do I
Can I can I meet you?
Do you need help?
Do you need anything?
You should stay out of this and write all of this down.
So yeah.
and yeah, if if it comes to that, there is a safe deposit box at a US bank in Renton, Washington.
And I need you to get access to that and pull all that information out and give it to my wife.
Thank you.
Of course.
Okay.
Yeah, we're gonna go see if we can handle this thing and hopefully we don't have to use the gas.
Alright, you have three H size bottles of phosgene gas on a loading dock.
There is a freight elevator, there is a door through the sort of wire glass you can see into the darkened building.
There's another door to the left that you can see through the wired glass into a stairwell.
Going up and down.
I guess uh Morrison w given where the coffee shop is and where we're at now, which direction do you think we would go?
To do what?
To find what Magpie saw from here.
Or the central actually, how do we get to the center of the building?
We'll navigate for the right answer to that question.
I don't know that it's a it's a building.
You go inside and then you walk in the direction and we're away from you, Kane.
And we can't see in words to like what that would look like to get in before we open, because I think we're just gonna have to.
It looks like it uh it goes into like this was a department store, so there's a sales f floor, except you are at the loading dock, so you're sort of behind everything.
There's sort of corridors and storage facilities and that sort of thing.
So we were we would have to navigate either stairs or some sort of corridor area with the gas.
Correct.
Or the
Figure the freight elevator.
Because you that's sort of where you're at right now.
Sounds like freight elevator is trying to carry these things up and down stairs.
Yeah.
This is where I think we're committed to to one only for starters here.
Okay.
Wait, what?
One canister.
We'll leave the other two uh on the dock.
We're really only moving one.
Uh for speed and efficiency.
Aren't you taking the freight elevator?
Yeah, can we get all of them up on the freight elevator?
All three up there first?
Okay.
If you if you're coming back on the freight elevator you can just take off of it.
Ignore me.
Yeah, I mean we can load up and put on there and then like go up, but I'm still carrying mine with you, Magpie.
Just like we're we're ready.
So yeah, like I've two pall bearers.
Yeah.
'Cause I imagine that we at least want one in case we have to do some shit.
You know what I mean?
Like to like I don't know, if you guys have to fucking just take off and run towards something or I don't know.
Yeah, I guess all I'm saying is like when w we'll set
Two of them down whatever the the right location is, kind of h home base, whatever we call it at.
And then we're the two of us are trucking with one behind Mort.
Right.
Whenever we get to a point where we can't get them up, that's where it's gonna be one canister with Magpie and Miles, and then us two, I think Morrison and Mole leading the way
on that, right?
Sick.
So up on freight the elevator and then get out and then what are we I guess what do we see?
Buttons?
Six five four three two G B.
If this were video game rules, ba B would be probably the target.
I mean there's a light on up there, but that's there was no lights on in his apartment or anything, so And then from where is this like a level surface where like if we what's the
level that's um equal to the coffee shop?
We we can't tell.
Okay.
G?
I mean, we walked in on ground level for the coffee shop, right?
Cool.
Cause I think that it's either in my mind the top floor, the bottom floor, or whatever is level with the coffee shop are like the three options in my head.
I don't know why we would pick any of the other ones.
So I think I think I went up a couple stairs, but not a lot of Ba basement sounds fine.
Yes.
You know, usually HVAC systems are are in basements, so Ooh, that's a good point.
Sound.
All right.
Down you go.
Ding.
Uh it's a fairly short uh trip down to the basement.
the doors open into a cavernous space.
this place used to be both storage and also an enormous uh like boiler heating room.
Uh it's cavernous.
There's a ceiling as high as like an auditorium or a theater.
the bases of the giant pillars that climb throughout
the rest of the building, uh sink into the ground here.
The air is very cold, chill, and damp.
There are wooden pallets and cardboard boxes lining the walls, and PPE supplies and hand sanitizer stands pushed to the center as overfloor storage.
Suspended from the ceiling is a man.
He appears Bucky.
Surprise.
A man appears hanged.
center of the ceiling head suspended about ten fifteen feet above the ground.
A closer inspection reveals that it is not rope, but instead hundreds of squirming tentacles sprouting from the back of his head, neck, and spine and climbing up, up, up,
wrapping across the ceiling and the pillars and the walls and the floor.
In a multi layered carpet of writhing, squirming tendrils.
The air itself is moving as the holes in these tendrils open and close like apertures, pushing and pulling air through them, uh making almost recognizable vocal noises.
some of you may recognize it.
It goes Ah shut.
Which of you encountered the chant in any form?
Read only Miles has read it.
Yeah.
That's hilarious.
Well, you know what that is.
It is performing the chant itself.
The body turns towards you, suspended, twisting on the ropes of flesh, and it is Anthony Hayden, and he is weeping openly.
He says, Get it off me, please.
I'm sorry.