Welcome, my little critters, to Tales from the Crit Season 2, The Level Up.
We're an actual play podcast with an ever-changing cast of players making our way through a bunch
of different RPG systems, from micro-RPGs to some of the more well-known role-playing
games out there, and the occasional highly narrative tabletop game.
Content warnings can be found in the episode's description.
My name is Riley Groves, and I am the Crit Keeper on this episode of Tales from the Crit.
Last time, on Crit's on Bikes, we broke into the school to get some information, and Josh
saw the art teacher.
She was on fire again.
I don't know how someone burns twice.
And then, when Danny went to get his fortune read at the tarot shop, both the Kitty Lady
and Shelley were acting really weird.
Welcome back to Tales from the Crit.
My name is Riley Groves, and I'm joined by a lovely bunch of coconuts here.
Derek.
Hello.
Connor.
Hey.
How are you?
Good.
How are you?
We're good.
What's the next question?
We're going to answer a question from our Ultimate RPG Campfire card deck.
These are questions about our characters, not ourselves.
So the question for today comes from your present state.
Do you consider yourself an optimist or a pessimist, and how does this perspective guide
you when taking risks?
Maxwell is forever the optimist, for sure.
There's always a way to win any situation.
I mean, you can't be good at business without being optimistic.
That's the first rule of business right there.
Be optimistic.
Danny also tries to be an optimist, though there is lots of realism that creeps into
his thoughts.
But he tries to look on the bright side and think that things are going to be able to
turn out a good way, despite his history in this town with things going into weird directions.
How does it guide him when taking risks?
You know, he always feels that there's a way forward, so he's optimistic to keep trying.
And he tries not to let himself be pessimistic and just give up.
What about Josh?
I believe Josh is having an issue right now where he is falling into becoming a pessimist
with everything that's happened to him over the last game in this game.
I feel like he started out more as an optimist, but he's having issues with trying to see
the bright side of things at the moment with his friend disappearing and another strange
thing happening in the town and watching the twins burn the teacher.
I think he's having a real rough time trying to be positive at the moment.
Things are just piling on this poor 11 year old.
Yes, definitely.
All right.
Well, then from there, let's get into it.
And we're going to jump immediately back to the Tarot Shop.
Danny, you were running out of the Tarot Shop, yanking Shelly by her arm.
Her eyes still rolled up into the back of her head.
You hit the street and all of a sudden you hear the tires of a car screech to a halt.
And as you look, you are almost smacked by a Toyota.
Andy leaps out of the car.
Is Danny dragging this girl?
By her arm, yes.
Is she on her feet?
I mean, like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
He's not like dragging her like a dead body.
So I really wanted to hop out and be like, Danny, I'm not dragging you.
I'm dragging you.
I'm dragging you like a dead body.
Are you dragging a dead girl?
No, she is still standing.
OK.
Danny, what are you doing in the middle of the road?
Oh my God, Andy, we got to go.
There's a bunch of cats in there and cats.
Yeah.
In the Tarot Shop.
You remember Shelly.
She's not listening or awake anymore.
I'm not sure what happened.
Let go of me.
Why are you pulling me?
Danny, what the fuck?
Oh, you just like passed out in there, don't you remember?
Like, do you not have a recollection of how we got outside?
I don't know what you're talking about.
Did we almost get smacked by a Toyota?
No, I totally saw you guys.
Hi, Shelly.
Hi, Andy.
So this is weird.
Do you guys want to get in my car and go?
Well, I definitely want to get away from this Tarot Shop and now.
Yes, let's go.
Let's get in.
I thought we were having a nice time.
Oh, well, you didn't see the, you know, your eyes rolled in the back of your head and the
Tarot Shop lady, her eyes rolled into her head.
Are you guys like on a date?
Am I like interrupting?
We're investigating.
Oh, I thought we were hanging out.
I don't know what you're talking about, though.
My eyes were fine.
You just kind of freaked out there and ran out the door and then grabbed me by the wrist
and dragged me out.
Anyway, my car's in the middle of the road, so we go and or what?
I might go this way down here.
Maybe I should just go home.
Are you sure you're going to be okay?
You definitely didn't seem okay just now, like a few minutes ago, you know, before this
Toyota thing happened, but when we were in the shop there.
I don't know what you're talking about.
I think it went fine.
She read you her your fortune and then you just kind of freaked out after you heard the
last card and started pulling on my wrist.
You didn't you didn't see and hear all those cats.
I mean, yeah, there was a cat, but this town's full of cats.
Fucking cats everywhere.
Look, there's a cat right there.
All right.
Yeah, maybe maybe you could just.
Okay, then I guess I'll see you later.
Maybe yeah, I'm sure we'll run into each other again.
I'll have to see you soon.
Andy's super like awkward and trying to kind of look up at the sky like she's not really
listening to what they're talking about.
This is awkward and weird for her.
Okay.
Yeah, I'll catch you later then.
And Shelly begins to walk off.
All right.
I'm going to walk back over to Andy and like, you know, that was definitely weird.
Her eyes definitely roll up into her head.
And so did the terror lady and they were not speaking to me and they were non responsive.
And now she's saying she doesn't remember it.
So that's kind of weird.
I mean, you don't really have to explain yourself to me, I guess.
Okay.
But I'm also your brother's grounded and we broke him out of being grounded.
So be aware of that when you go home and see your mom.
I better put the sheets out the window for him.
We'll probably appreciate that.
So what's going on in town?
There was like this newscast at school and it doesn't seem like things are good here.
Yeah.
Um, so your brother and Josh and their friend Max saw some of these new kids push a teacher
in the fire and push a teacher?
That's what they said they saw.
I wasn't there.
I was with Shelly in the woods when another friend, well, another person, Dale got attacked
by something and he's definitely not okay.
And I don't think it was a bear.
Uh, so you're hanging out with Shelly in the woods a lot, huh?
Yeah, that has happened a lot in the past few days.
Okay.
So that explains why you don't answer my calls, I guess.
Um, I mean, I haven't been home a lot.
I haven't been getting any messages.
Okay.
Well, not any messages.
That's weird.
That is weird.
I mean, I've been sending letters.
Have you got those?
No, no, I haven't gotten anything from, you know, you or my family or my friends or anybody
really.
It's been, um, cool.
That is suspicious because me and Billy have both been sending you messages, letters in
the mail.
Your mom says she's been delivering them to the post office at least.
Well, I haven't heard from anybody.
Um, but maybe we should try to go find Billy.
I assume he's with Josh and, um, with my sister.
Maxwell is their new friend.
Oh, what happened to, um, Jack?
Oh, yeah, Jack, you know, after the events of last year and his father's continued disappointment
with him, they sent him to military school.
Oh, yikes.
And you're still hanging out with the kids?
Uh, they've been lonely.
And like I said, scared since the, they also had dreams about these girls.
They said pushed the teacher in the fire before they met them.
I don't know.
Well, that's all very strange.
It's been strange days here.
Yeah.
I mean, I guess it's getting to be normally strange here this time of year.
A normal level of strange for the town.
That is true.
I mean, we've had a lot of strange things, but still.
Well, I'm glad you're keeping Billy company and he's not totally on his own.
And it seems like what him and Josh are good friends now?
Uh, yeah, they're, they're pretty good friends.
I mean, he's still pretty beaten up about Jamie leaving him, but I mean, that was one
of the strangest things that's happened in the town at all.
Well, they were together to begin with, but he's really broken up about it.
Are you guys in the car yet?
Are you?
Yeah.
Okay.
Yep.
And Danny's just standing talking to himself.
Just picturing this whole thing just sitting in the middle of the road.
Now we've moved on.
Okay.
You did a burnout and splashed mud on Shelley in there.
No, I'm not that overtly mean.
Much more subtle.
All right.
It is about 1 PM Saturday, October 14th, just for some reference for everybody.
Uh, and we're going to jump to the kids in the library huddled around a computer.
So it seems like this guy is still here in town.
This Mr. Zahn.
Uh, yeah, we should be finding them with the information that we found.
I wonder if it was his footprints that we saw with the, the two tracks of identical
ones.
I don't know.
We'd have to ask him.
He's got something that he'll just tell us.
His shoe size?
Maybe we could be traveling salesmen.
You like business?
Sell him some shoes.
We could, we could do that.
What was the, what's your whole full thought on this?
I'm not.
I don't know.
I don't know where he lives either.
Do you have shoes to sell him?
Yeah.
I have this shoe.
We're going to need a couple different sizes.
Well, if you loan me one shoe and I loan one shoe and, and we sell them on pair shoes,
that's good.
I'm sure that I could figure something out.
I got your mom to give me a donation toward an animal foundation that doesn't exist.
My mom gave to animals?
Yeah.
She gave to a cat foundation.
She hates cats.
I know.
That's why she donated.
Maybe she just hates me.
Oh, I don't think that's the case, buddy.
I was a businessman.
It wasn't like she was just given some strange boy money.
Well, I mean, except that it's okay, buddy.
Yeah.
All right.
Um, anyways, I guess what else, what else should we do?
Well does it have his address on here?
Does it have his address on here?
No.
Okay.
Well then I guess like maybe we should go back to the school and try to find records
on him there.
Maybe there's an address in the paperwork.
We can go through the locker room again and this time I won't fall.
What about the phone book?
Yeah, that's probably a smarter idea.
I just forgot about them.
I don't really look for numbers often.
Yeah, we have his name.
We should be able to find him in the phone book.
I think that's a great idea.
We're in a library.
There's got to be a recent phone book here.
Let's go find that.
Excuse me.
Where are the phone books?
To the left, honey.
Down the stairs.
Come on guys.
Is there a specific spot down the stairs?
You'll see them.
They're all yellow.
Big fat thick phone books.
You ever see one?
Yeah.
Well, then you can't miss them.
Okay.
Thank you.
They're in the phone book section.
There.
Thank you.
They're right down here.
All right.
Have a great day.
Yeah.
Stay quiet out there.
In here.
Okay.
So, I want you guys to head over to the well-named phone book section of the library.
And yeah, there's several phone books for the area and the surrounding towns.
I grab one from this, specifically for this town and start flipping right to the Zs.
Is it Z-A-N or Z-O-N?
It's Z-A-H-N.
Oh.
I went with the O version.
All right.
I don't know how to use one of these things, but let's crack them open, boys.
He's looking at Allentown, Pennsylvania.
Not Bethlehem's.
Just look for this name.
Hey, there's no pictures in this thing.
Oh, I found them.
Pizza.
Mmm.
That's good.
You're doing a good job, Billy.
Did you have any luck?
No.
I got pretty close.
I found Zohan and Zoltan, but I haven't found just straight Zan.
Going down the list, you do come across Erick Zahn's name.
And for an address, it just says Silk Mill Apartments, Bethlehem, PA.
What apartments?
Silk Mill?
Silk Mill.
I found it.
It looks like he lives over at the Silk Mill Apartments, which if I remember my ride into
town, it was right before the hotel.
So I think it's across from the school.
Do you want to head over there now, or should we try to get ahold of Danny before we do
that?
Well, yeah, we should probably get ahold of Danny.
At least we don't need to go very far.
Yeah, it's a pretty short walk.
Where did he go?
The Silk Mill Apartments are where Kerry lives as well.
Oh, okay.
I'm not sure where he went.
That's not something we knew, did we?
Yeah, you guys knew because Danny literally told you his plans to go with Shelly.
You were together and he said, I'm going to go this way with her and you guys go do your
thing.
He abandoned you.
Okay.
It hurt emotionally.
That's why I don't remember.
I think he's hanging out with Shelly today.
I'm sure he'll find us.
It's not a very big town.
Why don't we just head over to the apartments and see what we can find?
Well, yeah, let's go over.
If he's hanging out with Shelly, he's not going to want to hang out with us again.
Like ever again?
I mean, like right now.
Oh, okay.
I mean, they have been together for like 20 minutes now.
That's good.
We could just break the whole thing up.
I'm not super comfortable with him and Shelly anymore.
I wish she was with my sister, but she's not here and never writes her calls.
I mean, we all wish that she was here to hang out with and that she'd answer us.
It would have been nice.
So yeah, let's go saddle up.
Let's check these bad boys out.
All right.
So when we get there, we are looking for shoes.
And I guess since we didn't take any prints or photos or really anything, maybe we just
look for mud on muddy shoes.
And then I thought we were going to try and sell them shoes.
Well, yeah, but we're trying to find evidence that he's potentially the man in the woods.
Or I guess we could just ask him if he has relatives that recently came to town.
And then we'll know if he hangs out with the twins.
We could do that.
But I still thought we were using the shoes to get in to talk to him.
Yeah.
So that's what we'll do to talk to him.
And then we should be looking for the evidence while we talk to him.
Kind of like a two for one.
Two birds with one shoe.
Sounds good.
You ready, Billy?
I'm ready.
I already got my shoes off.
Perfect.
All right.
Do you think we're the same size?
I think he's an adult man.
So he probably used to have shoes your size, but I don't know if he would anymore.
And if he did, he wouldn't be the guy we're looking for.
So I guess if he does want to buy your shoes, then we're good.
You know what?
I'm going to try to trade shoes with him, whether he likes it or not.
I'm leaving with a new pair of shoes.
Well, I think that's theft, Billy.
I've done worse.
Oh.
When we do talk to him, maybe you should just kind of hang around in the back and be our
observation man.
Josh and I will sneak around.
We got it.
Wink.
I'm going to assume that there is some sort of manifest or last names with doorbells either
outside or inside.
Oh, yeah.
So when you guys get to the Silkenwell Apartments, you definitely recognize that this is the
same spot that you guys were chased out of the night before by a lot of angry adults
because of what Josh and...
The button pushing.
That's the button pushing.
Hey.
Oh.
Yeah.
I didn't realize.
I think it's this one.
It was this exact.
Yeah.
Nope.
We can't do that again.
Remember last night?
Briefly.
It got really late and boy, my memory goes fuzzy after 8 p.m.
So tonight or today, right now, we're not going to be button pushers.
We're shoe salesmen.
So we have to act professional.
That's why I got my shoes in my hand.
Perfect.
So when I come to this door, I'm going to say, do you want some shoes?
Just like that.
Perfect.
So no more buttons.
Josh?
No, I'm good.
Okay.
Or Billy.
No more buttons.
And then we should be good because if we hit buttons, they're going to know who we are.
But if we act professional, we might get away with it.
Well, all righty then.
Let's go sell some shoes.
Are there names in the buttons or just a bunch of buttons?
Just a bunch of buttons.
Oh, man.
Is it an intercom thing?
Yes, there is an intercom.
Okay.
So I guess that's good.
So we'll be going inside.
So I guess we haven't heard anything back from the first ring that Billy made.
Not yet.
All right, guys.
So I'm going to hit a couple of buttons to see if Mr. Zahn responds.
But we're going to be patient and wait for a response and I'm going to do all the talking.
Okay, Billy?
Yep.
Do you maybe need to take three giant steps back?
That's like out the door.
It's okay, Billy.
We'll be okay.
Go ahead.
Okay.
Hey, yeah, man.
Is that you?
Hello.
Is this Mr. Zahn?
No, this is Josh.
Oh, I'm sorry.
I have the wrong door.
It must have been the next button down.
Sorry for your time.
Do you have my pot?
Oh, we sell shoes.
Are you me from the future?
Oh, shit.
Your name's Josh too?
Yeah, but are you me?
I don't know how these things work.
I don't know, man.
Do you have my pot?
No, we have shoes.
Oh, I'm all tied up with shoes right now.
Are you selling any?
No.
Okay, thanks.
Huh, that was weird.
Yes?
Hello.
Is this Mr. Zahn?
No.
Oh, I'm sorry.
I have the wrong button.
Have a good day.
Okay.
Bye.
Okay, guys, I don't, I kind of thought it would work quicker for some reason.
There's a lot of buttons here.
I'm going to go ask the man behind the desk.
Excuse me, sir.
Where's the desk?
Oh, it's just a poster.
Oh, shit.
It's a real big poster.
I wouldn't have, I didn't, I guess it's all about perspective.
Oh, new plan.
Remember when we first met?
Yeah.
I think that's a great plan.
So we'll go to the first floor and you guys are going to run and knock on every door.
And when they open, we go, Mr. Zahn.
And then he'll say what?
And then we go, we need to talk to you.
I mean, that's about as good as plan as any.
That's what we normally do when presented with a bunch of doors.
All right.
Let's do that one up the stairs.
And onto the first floor.
I'm going to put my shoes back on.
That's probably a good idea.
I think we'll need them.
You know, maybe we should start on the third.
How many floors?
There's quite a few floors.
Maybe we should start on the top floor and because then we can run down.
But if we start on this one, we won't be able to hit as many doors.
Yeah.
Sound logic.
All right.
Yeah, let's go.
All right.
Right to the top.
You guys head up to the top and let's jump back to Andy and Danny.
It's a lot of awkward silence.
Long awkward silence.
Where are we driving?
We were at the tarot place.
That's true.
So wouldn't we have seen them go by?
Or like be calling it.
It depends on where you were going, I guess.
There's not that much space between the tarot shop and the library.
So you guys could have missed each other like ships in the night, depending on what minute
it was.
You are in a car.
We're on the way to the library and then we get there.
Walk like, are there a bunch of young men here?
Yeah, they're down in the phone books, I think.
The phone books.
OK.
OK, thank you.
We hustle down and find the phone book section.
And you see there's just like several opened phone books laying around.
Well, they've definitely been here.
Yeah, nothing's put away.
OK, I'm going to put away a couple of the phone books and then actually, we're going
to look at what the phone books are open to.
One is open to the page Z in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
Another is open to the yellow pages.
What was the advertisement part?
The yellow pages in Allen's town and has like a chunk ripped out of one of the pages.
And the other one is just kind of open and is open to the letter P.
What do you think they're looking for?
Well, this one's open to the Z section of our towns.
And I think when we were at the high school earlier, we found out that the last name for
those transfer students was Zahn or there was a something, there was a Zahn that they
were looking for.
And that happens to be on this page that this phone book's open to.
And the address listed is the Silk Mill Apartments.
Do you think that they went there?
Oh, they definitely went there.
I'm going to guess they're causing a lot of trouble over there.
Oh, they already made a lot of friends at the Silk Mill Apartments last night pressing
everyone's doorbell.
Oh, good.
I'm glad they're there again.
Maybe we should just go there and wait outside and see when they come running out, we can
be there.
Yeah, that sounds like as good a plan as any.
We head back up.
Okay.
And back to the Silk Mill.
Starting on the third floor, Billy kind of cracks his knuckles or pretends to.
They don't actually pop or crack.
And he looks at Josh, I've got the right side if you've got the left.
I got this.
And they take off down the hall banging on every single door before heading down the
stairwell.
Several adults pop their heads out.
Two women and one man.
Mr. Eric Zahn?
Are you the kids from last night?
No, we're shoe salesmen.
We were looking to follow up on our sale with Mr. Eric Zahn, but the intercom system seems
to be broken.
Oh, things always on the vritts.
You said you're selling shoes.
Yeah.
You got any steel toes?
Oh, unfortunately, no.
We only have a small selection of athletic fill wear.
And unfortunately, it's more for smaller feet.
You look like a pretty big fella.
I am.
We can always stop by next week when we've increased our catalog.
That would be pleasant.
I need another pair of shoes for work.
Yes, sir.
We'll swing back next week.
Come back on Wednesday.
Okay.
And he slams the door.
And by this time, the other two ladies have popped their heads back into their doors.
I guess I should have asked if he knew where Mr. Zahn was, but at least we know he didn't
open the door.
Hey, Maxwell.
Maxwell, did you find him?
No, we're going to go down to the next floor.
All right, come on, let's go.
And there's an equal number of apartments on the floor below as the top floor.
All right, guys, you know what to do.
And go.
Billy and Josh race down the hallway, seeing who can make it to the other end first.
Billy trips, getting rug burn on his cheek and stands back up, hits the last door and
runs down the stairwell.
And several more adults pop their head out.
Mr. Eric Zahn?
I don't believe there's any Eric Zahn here.
Do you know where he is?
We're trying to do a follow up.
It's kind of important.
I've never met the man.
Oh, what does he look like?
I'm not sure, but I kind of thought he would sound like you.
Are you sure you're not Eric Zahn?
I'm not.
And a large busty lady steps out into the hallway.
I am not Eric Zahn.
Oh, excuse me, miss.
I apologize.
That's all right.
Would you like some soup?
What kind of soup?
It's a Hardy Minestrone.
Um, no, thank you.
You should take it to your mother, Claudia.
Come on, come on in and sit down for a minute.
Chuck, I have something for your mom.
Oh, I'm sorry.
I'm not, I'm not Chuck.
Don't fool with me.
Come on in.
Come in.
I've got your mother's Tupperwares.
Maxwell is just going to start backing up.
Have a great day.
It's a Hardy Minestrone.
It sounds like I'll be back in an hour.
It will feed your whole family.
Thank you.
Come get your mother's Tupperwares.
Okay, in an hour.
I'll see you in an hour.
In an hour?
I'll see you.
Oh, this is so awkward.
I'll see you later.
I gotta go.
Say hi to Claudia for me.
And her door slams.
Uh, I hope we don't have any more of that situation.
I've never had a stranger offer me soup before.
Have you guys?
I don't know.
I don't, soup?
No.
It's not like a local town thing?
No, I don't think so.
No, the town soup is a, definitely an Italian sausage soup.
It's not a Hardy Minestrone at all.
Oh.
It's Minestrone, not Italian?
Yes, it is.
It definitely is, yeah.
All right.
Um, yeah, that sounds good to me.
I don't know a lot about soup.
I got more into cookies recently.
Um, well, tomorrow during the Harvest Festival Parade, they have the annual soup off, and
you get to taste everybody's different types of sausages.
All their sausage soup.
Oh.
They call it Sausage Fest.
That sounds like fun.
It's a, yeah, it's down one of the alleys of Harvest Fest.
It's down a random alley?
Not a random one, it's down Soup Alley.
Oh.
Your town has a lot of interesting traditions.
I guess.
Um.
Yeah, I don't know.
All right, let's-
Seems normal to me.
It's fun.
I don't know.
Where else can you go and taste 24 different sausage soups?
They make balloons too.
Oh.
Long ones.
Any kind of sausage balloon you want.
I, uh, yeah, I kind of thought that's maybe where we were going.
It's a very interesting-
They twist them into links?
Oh.
They even made me a patty once.
Oh.
I've had sausage patties.
Anyways, why didn't you want that lady's hearty minestrone?
Um, well, I just don't know if it's a good idea to take food from strangers or pretend
to be someone I'm not, even though we were just selling.
I just didn't want to be Chuck.
It is quite terrible of a name.
Well, no, she just seemed too obsessed with Chuck, and it just seemed like one of those
movie situations where some lady shuts the door and then you never leave her apartment
because she ties you to a chair and feeds you soup all day, talking about your invisible
mom Claudia and how she always leaves her Tupperware there.
No, it's just a terrible name.
Oh.
Well, all right, let's go down to the first floor and see if we can find this Erexan that
way.
All right, first floor it is.
I raise you.
All right.
Billy trips immediately again.
His shoes are like completely untied because he took them off to sell them earlier.
Billy, you got to take care of that.
Andy tied my shoes before she left.
I haven't untied them yet until right now.
And now I'm a big dumb idiot.
Anyways, let's pound on these doors.
Pounding on the doors, several more adults pop their heads out into the hallway.
Mr. Zan, Mr. Erexan.
You two, I know you.
You two are the ones we were chasing last night.
Get the fuck over here.
I work nights.
And an adult begins to chase you down the hallway.
Run, Billy, run.
Are there any other males in the hallway or was it just him that kind of poked out?
There is also a smaller, less aggressive male that's poked his head out and is just watching.
Excuse me.
You wouldn't happen to know where Mr. Zan lives, do you?
I have never heard of the man.
Oh.
Do you have a brother in this building?
I don't believe so.
Wow.
I haven't had a brother in quite some time.
Oh.
Yes.
I'm sorry.
I absorbed him in the womb.
Oh.
That's how I got an IQ of 230.
I have two people up in here.
Thank you for your service.
Have a great day.
You're welcome.
Are you selling shoes?
No.
Sold out.
Fresh out of shoes.
Got to make a fresh batch tonight.
See you tomorrow.
Shucks.
I needed some new pointy shoes.
You hear down the hallway, Billy, give me your shoe.
Billy throws both of his shoes behind him as he continues to run.
Danny and Andy, you see Billy bust out the front door barefoot of the Silk Mill Apartments.
Oh, I leap out of the car.
Billy.
He runs straight into the hood.
What?
Billy, you've got to look where you're going.
Andy, you hit me with your car.
No, you hit me.
Okay, there's another old chase that goes, and he scrambles into your car.
All right, guys, hop in.
Josh has already ran around the car and dove into the back.
Where's Maxwell?
He kind of sped walk down the hallway to the stairs and then just real nonchalant through
that lobby as though he is not a part.
Maxwell!
Andy, get Max.
He doesn't seem like he's in much of a rush.
He's in worse trouble than all of us.
Soup.
Soup?
Yes, Soup Lady tried to abduct him.
What are you guys even doing here?
Selling shoes.
Why are you selling shoes?
Selling shoes?
Yeah, we're selling Billy's shoes.
For how much?
He's still got me.
He didn't do a very good job, I guess.
No.
He doesn't have his shoes.
Yeah, that's true.
I don't have my shoes.
Now that you mentioned it, I do see he is barefoot.
So he must have done a good job.
How much did you get?
I don't know.
I kind of just tossed him behind myself.
Yeah, we're being chased.
Skyworks nights.
He was very upset.
I thought Maxwell was teaching you guys about business.
If you don't have the shoes or the money, I don't think that you did a good job.
He's doing a great job.
Except for getting in his car.
Come on!
All right, guys.
I don't think that's an apartment building.
I think it's some sort of hospital.
Hi, I'm Andy.
Oh, hi.
My name is Maxwell.
Hi, Maxwell.
It's nice to meet you.
He does business.
Oh, you're awfully young for a shoe salesman business man.
You're never too young to learn.
That is true.
Anyway, things are crazier than I expected them to be when I got back here.
What?
Andy?
And Billy leaps from the back of the car and scrambles and jumps, giving you the biggest
hug.
Oh, I hug him back.
He's so cute.
I didn't even realize it was you.
Well, you said my name and then I crashed into you.
But okay.
Yeah, it was kind of like a shock situation.
What are you doing home?
And he kisses you all over your face.
We gotta go.
That guy was still chasing us.
God, I have no shoes.
We'll get you new shoes, I guess.
And the guy's just kind of standing at the opening of the silk mill doors.
We're driving away.
Shouting at you as you drive away.
Shaking Billy's shoes.
You'll be back.
Billy, did they come untied again?
Is that why you got rid of them?
No, they were a distraction at the end to keep the man from killing us.
But originally, it was so that we could sell somebody the shoes.
Why are you selling shoes?
Well, it was a really good plan to start with.
I didn't realize there were going to be so many different people at the apartments.
So it didn't really work out.
Was this town not always so crazy when you were still here?
Well, it was a little crazy last year.
And that was like the first time it was crazy.
Usually it's boring.
Oh.
Max, this is my sister that I talked about.
Oh, it's that Andy?
Yeah.
Okay.
Uh, nicer to meet you, I guess.
I've heard a lot about you.
I haven't heard anything.
Billy, are you ever going to call me at college?
Yeah, he said that you never call him and you never write back or answer any of his
letters.
It's true.
I've sent a ton.
Okay, well, I've been calling like every day and I just figured mom and dad were like
don't care anymore or something.
Dad's not home anymore.
Oh.
He left like literally right after you.
So I go where?
At work.
Okay.
Also, I didn't get any letters from you.
I don't know what you're talking about.
I said I put them in the post office myself.
I just kind of hucked them in the door.
Well, I have heard nothing from you or mom or anybody else.
Mom's checked out.
I wrote that in a letter.
Again, I didn't get the letters.
So well, you should have checked our Instagram to see all of Billy's letters to Andy.
I tried.
Okay.
Well, Andy doesn't have Instagram because it's 1992.
Oh, well, yeah.
So I sent a bunch.
I don't know about mom.
She checked out pretty quick after he left.
That's not very good.
I moved into your room.
Again?
Yeah.
Okay.
I'm going to have to reorganize all my shit.
I put it all in the hall.
Oh, come on, Billy.
Nobody else was using the hall.
It was kind of pet-pop-hiled, everything on top.
People don't just like use hallways.
They're not.
Okay.
It doesn't matter.
Anyway, so what's the plan here?
What are we trying to figure out?
What do we already know?
We need to find a man called Eric Zunn.
Yeah, he's a music teacher.
Did you guys look at the mailboxes for the apartment building before you started ringing
all the doorbells?
There's no names.
I believe that.
I also need some shoes, so let's add that to the list of things, of needs.
I think I have a spare size that might fit you.
Oh, shoes, buddies.
When I find that Eric Zunn, I'm stealing his shoes.
You said he's a music teacher?
Substitute music teacher.
We think, but Josh and I aren't in music.
Danny, did you take music?
Not anymore.
Ah.
Well, I mean, there might be records of him at the school.
Yeah, we were just in there earlier yesterday.
No, this morning?
Yeah, earlier this morning.
Yeah.
No shit, yeah, we just broke in there.
Okay, and you didn't find any-
Josh saw somebody burning to death.
What?
Yep, the teacher.
By the way, yeah, a teacher burned to death last night.
She was hawked into the fire, discarded like a piece of trash.
Yeah, the creepy twins, they're in our dreams too.
Yep.
I told you they were dreaming about these twins.
It's a common dream.
I read in a book once.
Seems like it's normal for boys that age.
There's a lot more fire.
I don't know if this dream was normal.
Okay.
There's a lot of fire and some violins and some scary chicks.
Our theory is that Erikson is the father of the twins, so we wanted to find him to see
if he does know those girls, and then maybe we can figure out why and how they became
murderers.
Okay.
Or just tell the police- oh wait.
The police never fucking listened to us.
I forgot about that.
We saw everything happen last night.
Danny was almost eaten by a bear.
That wasn't a bear.
Huh.
Oh, and he has a thumb.
Might be in his pocket.
And he keeps getting attacked by skunks.
Mm-hmm.
Lots of skunks.
The skunks is interesting to me, but also Danny, you should have two thumbs, right?
He has three now.
He has three.
What's in his pants?
Guys, don't talk about the thumb in my pants.
What?
Oh yeah, did we leave it in the freezer?
I honestly don't remember if we left it in the freezer if I was able to retrieve it and
throw it in the woods.
He may not have the finger anymore.
I've been checked out for a while myself.
I'm pretty sure that I threw that thumb away.
Well, that's good.
Yeah, we don't really know.
He was with Shelly for a while.
We were looking up for the name.
Hmm, yeah.
It was a poor decision to pick the thumb up.
Should have picked up the bloody clothes.
So you found bloody clothes and a thumb and the cops were like, whatever?
Yeah.
They were just like, okay, they saw the bear.
There was a lot going on last night.
It seems like there's a lot going on.
So what can I do to help?
I don't know.
Well, I've been studying.
I have an investigations class, so I can investigate.
I'm only doing okay in it.
You know what goes really well with investigating?
What?
Milkshakes.
Yeah, I don't think that could hurt.
Milkshake montage.
Bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum.
Everybody just say what kind of milkshake they got.
Double chocolate with candy.
Chocolate peanut butter.
Brazzelberry.
Peanut butter.
Curries and cream.
Oh.
So you're all sitting around a table drinking milkshakes.
It is now later in the afternoon, about mid afternoon.
Yeah, so that's everything we know.
Well that's a lot of stuff.
It seems like going to the apartment really wasn't helpful in any way other than getting
rid of your shoes, which yes, not helpful.
But I did hear some weird violins.
So you know, that does give some merit to this Zon guy.
Hey, I heard some weird violins in my dreams.
In your dreams?
Yeah.
I don't remember you telling me about that.
Just the twins in the fire.
No, there's definitely violins in my dreams.
There's violins in yours, right?
It's kind of mixed in with the crackling of the fire.
It was very spooky.
They were some eerie sounding violins.
And they do seem somehow connected.
I feel like I heard them earlier today when things started getting weird at the tarot
shop.
You guys weren't there.
But after getting my, you know, tarot reading, I looked over at Shelly and her eyes were
glazed over.
She was not responsive.
And I looked back to the tarot woman to see if she could see this.
And she was also just looked like, you know, she wasn't there anymore.
Her eyes rolled back up in her head.
Neither of them were saying anything.
Then I, you know, grabbed Shelly and ran out of there and ran right into Andy.
And then Shelly said that none of that happened.
So that's kind of weird.
It also made me feel like a dick.
This wasn't a dream?
This was not a dream, no.
Now they were definitely together when I found them.
I feel like we're in danger.
Yeah, I also feel that way.
But at least we're having milkshakes.
Yeah, those twins are in our class.
Yeah, thank God we don't have.
Yeah, thank God we don't have school for next week.
Don't tell your mom that though.
She thinks you're going back to school on Monday.
That bitch.
Doesn't she?
Billy.
I'm sorry.
She's been rude.
I put two cats in the laundry room the other day.
Billy, you know she's allergic.
Uh huh.
That's why I put them in the laundry room, because then they could help with the laundry.
And then she got real mad.
Why don't you just keep them in my room with you?
Well.
And then she wouldn't have known at all.
Hmm.
Sometimes you could just take one more second to think about things and it'll really help.
I'm going to start putting little pauses in there before I act.
Good thinking.
Anyway.
Another milkshake?
Did you see the pause?
No, I don't think we need another milkshake, Billy.
I think we need to figure something out.
Is there like a public notice board or something like that in the, we're in the diner?
You're in the diner, yeah.
I at least assume.
I don't know where else you go to get milkshakes.
You know like where people can put their business cards or like you know a flyer for their lost
cat or if they were giving violin tutoring lessons.
Yeah, there definitely is.
Okay.
So I think he's going to go look around at the bulletin board specifically to see if
there's anyone who is offering violin tutoring.
Okay.
Give me a brains roll.
Or lost cats.
There's literally hundreds of lost cat posters.
Just kidding.
There's only a dozen.
Brains?
Yeah.
Uh, we'll set it pretty low at four.
That's a one.
All right.
Um, token.
Token time.
Oh yeah.
Those are my tokens.
He actually gets two.
So you don't find what you're looking for or at least nothing that you can tell is helpful.
So you just grab a bunch of things off the board and come back to the table with them,
slapping them down.
And there's just like a pile of business cards and notices mixed in with your milkshakes.
This is what I found on the board guys.
Here, take a look.
See if any of this rings any bells for you.
Man, a lot of people around here lose their cats, huh?
There's a lot of stray cats around here.
We're the stray cat capital of the world.
I'll bet if you had more witches, they'd have more homes.
Don't say that here.
Oh.
Do you have witches back wherever you're from?
Um, the last place I was at, there were a lot of weird things.
I can't remember if there was a witch.
I don't really remember those dinosaurs.
It kind of left an impression on that scary lady with the portal gun.
Andy gives Danny a look like these kids are highly imaginative and weird.
Josh is staring at you like you're adding witches to the frogs and everything else that's
tormented him for the last two years.
We had frogs too.
This guy murdered one of the frog people.
So we brought him to the frogs and then they took him under the water and we never saw
him again.
Um, okay.
Our frog people were actually just in costume, I think.
Yeah.
They were just weird, culty people.
Oh.
Maybe there were a lot of witches here and now there aren't and all their cats are abandoned.
Frog witches.
Oh, someone's murdering the witches.
It's the twins.
Wouldn't that make them good guys then?
Oh.
Yeah, pushing, I mean, but is it bad if you push a witch into the fire?
I don't know.
Was Mrs. Melburn a witch?
No, cause she burnt.
Oh.
But I thought that only witches burn.
Witches don't catch on fire.
Oh.
Innocent people catch on fire, but unfortunately at that point it's really too late to do anything
about it, but at least we all think better of them.
I thought dumping water on witches was how you killed them.
No, they float.
Oh, you're talking about drownings.
If you drown a witch, well, you can't drown witches, witches float, but.
Cause they float.
Well, their souls are so unclean, pure water will melt them.
That's a wicked reference.
See, a lot of things could have happened to the witches that may or may not have been
here that led to all the stray cats that Billy chases around.
And I think that that's a bit of a reach in doesn't really help us with what's going on
too much.
Nope, but it's a fun part of the town lore that now is concrete.
We'll tell everybody that's how it happened.
Maxwell give me a brain's roll of a six.
Seven.
All right.
Awesome.
With everybody talking about witches and all this paper material on the table, you are
looking over it quickly and you recognize something and you can place it after a moment.
You see just a small card, kind of like an invitation.
It's about half the size of a piece of paper and it says history at the hotel, exploring
the hotels, forgotten speakeasy and underground.
And then the rest of the notice is ripped off, but it does have the hotel B address
at the top.
And it reminds you that when you picked up the itinerary yesterday that you did see an
event or several events listing the hotel's happenings, one of which matches the description
on this piece of paper.
Oh, this this looks just like the paper I have in my pocket.
And I pull a piece of paper out of my pocket.
But doing some stuff over at the hotel later at three, we can explore the hotel's forgotten
speakeasy and underground tunnels.
I knew that hotel had a tunnel under there somewhere.
And then I guess everyone's going to go hang out and be happy at the hotel around five.
Oh, for like an hour.
Oh, OK.
So there's drinks.
Oh, is that what you do around a happy hour?
Yeah, it's for drinking.
Oh, so refreshments at five.
Five more just in that tunnel has nothing to do with this violin guy.
Well, it sounds promising.
I guess we'll get tickets to the speakeasy.
I don't know if they'll let you youngins in, but we can try.
It's just a historical tour, right?
It's fine.
Yeah, we'll just be quiet.
It says explore.
I don't know if it's a guided.
I think we might just get to go crazy.
Well, respectfully look around.
Yeah, I mean, maybe we don't want to draw a lot more attention to ourselves.
Are people watching us?
Well, no, but you just knocked on every door in the hotel for this or the apartments for
the second time.
We were pretty polite about it, though.
Well, this time around, we had a better game plan.
I didn't do it the first time.
This was all part of the strategy.
My second plan would have worked if we didn't have school closed for a week, which I was
going to say we should put a small amount of food poisoning just a little bit to make
the music teacher sick.
And then the substitute teacher, Mr. Zahn, would have to show up the next day.
I think that's a felony.
Max doesn't go to regular school.
He doesn't have the Internet.
I don't think that that matters with the felony thing, though, but it doesn't matter, I guess,
if there's no school.
Oh, not food poisoning.
I'm an Ipacac.
Oh, that's less illegal.
Yeah, it's just a prank.
It's not just regular.
It's like the parent trap.
But if there's no school, I guess it's still irrelevant.
But a good idea, Max.
Yeah, thank you.
Well, let's get headed over to the hotel.
I think what time did you say that was at three o'clock?
Yeah, it starts at three.
We just have to go to the front desk first.
Sounds good.
It's like two fifty now.
Yeah, let's head over.
You guys scoot across and enter into the hotel lobby.
And there's a single sign pointing to the front desk that says register here.
I had read up.
I would like five, two, three, five tickets, please.
Five tickets.
That would be fifty dollars.
OK, you could charge it to my room.
Excellent.
What's your room number?
Room 310, Maxwell Cowell.
All right.
Excellent.
Here are your tickets.
Head down the stairs and wait.
Do you have a gift shop or anything before, like on the way there?
No.
OK.
I mean, you can pick up hoodies, scarves and hats.
I don't have any flashlights.
I have no flashlights.
OK.
Don't worry.
The tour is guided and is well lit.
OK.
Um.
Litten's not even a word.
It is well lit.
It's been a long day.
Eighteen hour shift.
Oh, that's that's that's terrible.
I'm glad you're going to you children will be taking the tour.
There's lots of people down there.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Thank you for the tickets.
You're welcome.
Such a sweet lad.
And I'm going to head right down where she pointed.
We will all head down.
Yep.
We all follow.
OK.
Heading down the stairs, you guys come into a group of about 10 other adults waiting.
And as it gets closer to three o'clock, about five more people filter in.
And then in front of the group pops a man named Darren.
You can tell this by his name tag.
It says Darren.
Josh, don't forget to keep an eye on everybody's shoes.
You seemed to really remember what that footprint looked like that we were looking for.
OK.
I remember you rolled like two critically, you know, you blow up your dice twice to identify
the yeah, the shoe print.
You're like, no, I have this implanted in my mind.
Wait, Billy, get any shoes yet?
No.
Billy's barefoot, as I thought.
Billy doesn't have any shoes.
Do you want me to keep an eye on him, too?
Yeah.
If you see anyone who has the same size shoes, you know, that'll be an important thing to
remember.
OK.
Yeah, if we could get me some shoes, that'd be swell.
My dogs are barking.
I forgot about your missing shoes, Billy.
Try not to draw too much attention.
I don't want us to get kicked out.
He tries to like tuck his feet up into his pant legs, kind of.
No one can see my feet.
Yep.
He's just awkwardly walking on his tiptoes with his pants pulled down just a bit too
far.
Billy, I don't think you have to try that hard.
OK.
Gather round.
Everybody and welcome to the tour of the Hotel Bethlehem Speak Easy.
Can you all hear me in the back?
Yeah.
That's good.
There's not that many people here.
Well, there would have been in 1920 to 1933.
Oh, yes.
Oh, indeed.
Do you know what happened in 1920 to 1933?
No.
Prohibition, which for adults means no fun.
What did it mean for the children?
Not much changed.
Maybe more aggravated adults led to more discipline.
Oh, well, that doesn't sound nice.
No.
Prohibition was a terrible thing for many, but it did make Speak Easies, what we're
going to see today, or secret bars, a lot of money.
There were social gatherings and places where people could go to let off steam once the
regular bars were closed.
See during Prohibition, alcohol was banned in its entirety, a dark time in American history.
And luckily, last year, something good came out of that horrendous earthquake.
Several sets of lockers fell from the wall, exposing a long forgotten hotel secret.
It's hidden Speak Easy.
We have now restored and preserved it back to what it would have looked like back during
its heyday in the 1920s and 1930s.
Come take a look as we head through the tunnels and down to the Speak Easy.
And you guys head into the locker room where you spent some time previously in the year
before and where there used to be lockers is now a ornate door opening with a velvet
rope in front of it.
And Darren opens it and leads you in.
If you will follow me in here, we will take a look at what the Speak Easy actually would
have looked like when it was open.
And you filter in and it's a pretty decently large space.
It's decorated like it would have been in the 1920s and 1930s.
Dimly lit, but a very cool space.
Damn, Danny, we could have found this if we just tried a little harder.
Yeah, I mean, we just had to knock over some lockers and break down a wall.
Really could have done it last year.
This would have been a great place to smoke cigarettes.
Does Josh see anything shoe wise?
You see some pointy shoes, some square toed shoes.
You see sneakers, work boots.
You even see a pair of water shoes.
Walking through that old locker room, do I see anything that I can grab for Billy?
What the fuck?
What kind of role would that be?
I was thinking brains, but that's just because I can't think of anything else.
I think that's a whole other role anymore.
You could try to charm the shoes off somebody.
Not there yet.
I only can roll a four.
Yikes.
Yeah, let's do brains as you walk through.
Let's see if any of these lockers are.
All right.
That is a three.
You find a locker that's open and inside is just one large pair of galoshes.
They're bright red.
They're definitely not Billy's size.
I grab them.
Billy.
Yeah.
Put these on real quick.
Just tie them tight.
And he puts on these giant rubber galoshes that now make the noises.
He walks around.
These are great.
Yeah, they're super enjoyable.
It's just kind of clopping around.
And Darren continues his tour.
Like any good secret bar of the time period, there were of course several secret tunnels,
entrances and exits into the tunnels that run under the town.
These tunnels were only rediscovered when the speakeasy was being remodeled.
Now unfortunately, these tunnels have not been remodeled to the same level as the speakeasy
as the project did not have the necessary funds to explore the tunnels further.
They were however able to explore just a small part of the tunnels and discovered that they
led to several prominent locations throughout the town.
You can glimpse into the tunnel through the small window provided in the back of the room.
Now for anyone of legal age that would like to join me at the bar for the complimentary
cocktail, please head over and saddle into your seat.
For those who were younger, feel free to get a water.
Can we go into the tunnels?
The tunnels are blocked off.
No, I'm not asking him.
I'm asking him.
I would just ask the guy, hey, can I sneak into these tunnels?
Everywhere you are now, there's no obvious way directly into the tunnels.
There's a small window that's like carved off that you can look into the tunnels that
has a light that's shining, but like it's not really lighting up too much of it.
So it is barred off at the moment.
I feel like these tunnels would be really good to investigate.
I wonder if one of the spots they lead to is the bookstore.
That would be interesting.
It is an older building in town and was a popular spot throughout our town's history.
And it could be part of that secret basement that the cop said wasn't there.
It would kind of explain those footprints that just left but never came in.
Oh, that's true.
That is true.
So maybe we can find a way into the tunnels from there.
Well, we went by the bookstore earlier and there was a lot of police who would not let
us back in.
Not that we let them know we were in there before, but.
So maybe we go at night?
Yeah.
Maybe we sneak in and see if we can get that drink?
I think we should definitely try and see if we can get the drink.
I mean.
We could probably get away with it.
I didn't see him IDing anyone up there.
Josh walks up to the bar.
Ah!
Andy keeps her distance from that situation.
And a water for the lad.
I don't want a water.
I'll take an apple juice.
And he slams a couple of coins on the table.
And any information you have about these tunnels.
Well, apple juice I can't do, but I can.
I do have a ginger beer mixer that I could give you.
I don't know what that is.
You love it.
And he gives you a tall Tom Collins glass filled with ice and some ginger beer.
And what do you want to know about the tunnels?
I've always been curious.
I live in town.
There's secret tunnels everywhere they go.
They go all over.
However, like I said, we haven't explored them, but we do know that there were several
places that they that they headed.
They had both ways down Main Street.
So naturally they head towards the bookstore and the historic Bethlehem buildings.
And they also head down the other way towards the residential area and down that way.
But we weren't able to explore that section too much.
It was very vast and we did not have the resources necessary to continue on exploring.
And it didn't seem quite safe.
So we stopped.
I wonder if it goes under the old tower.
Which tower?
The old watch tower.
There are witches.
The old watch tower.
The old watch tower?
Probably not.
That was installed earlier than you would have expected, but does not have any way into
into the tunnels.
It's pretty flat built right on the ground.
Huh.
Wait, where did you see the tunnels go?
The bookstore, the residential area?
Historic district?
I was putting a little X's by it.
How far did you guys find in the tunnels?
They go for quite some ways.
That's for sure.
We did find the end down closest to the library.
It does end at the historical buildings.
It does veer off towards the cemetery and the bookstore and then it ends.
We did not follow it any further down to the north side of town.
Did you find any bones by the cemetery?
Like do they fall through into the tunnels?
No, the tunnels are quite a bit deeper, which is good.
The bones don't just fall through the ground.
Well, that is good.
Yes, very good.
That'd be cool though, right?
So I would hate to find an old thumb bone or something falling into a tunnel that I'm
walking down.
Yeah, but it would make the Halloween tour so much scarier.
Yes, but I'm part of the historical society, not the Halloween society.
I thought the historic society was an offshoot of the Halloween society.
The Halloween society did come first.
It is much bigger and has more funds than the historical society.
However, the small portion that they carved out for us was almost entirely spent on remodeling
this room.
It must be because their priorities are on giving out candy.
Probably.
That is true.
I mean, it would make it a lot more popular.
It would.
I don't have any candy budget.
I have liquor budget.
Now who wants a bathtub gin cocktail?
Well, I love bathtub gin.
Yeah, I would try some.
All right, saddle right up.
Danny begins to mix several ingredients together in a shaker and goes about his thing, dispensing
drinks for the roughly 17 adults that are in here.
And Andy and Danny blend right in with them.
You are two of the 17.
Sweet.
This is delicious.
Yeah, it's great.
It's gin that we made ourselves.
In a real bathtub?
In a real bathtub.
You can really taste the bath water.
That is the staple Hotel B tap water.
Mmm.
Available by the pint.
The tap water?
Yes.
You can order it while you're at one of the hotel's signature restaurants.
The tap room named after the water.
You're like really good at doing tours.
This, believe it or not, is my first time.
And you can hardly tell.
Thank you.
It's good you started with a place that just has the one main attraction.
You didn't have, you know, not too far to go for it.
Well, this whole hotel is historic.
It's hosted many presidents, dignitaries, and celebrities over its time.
Oh yeah?
What kind of celebrities?
Any famous musicians?
Have you ever heard of Eric Clapton?
I have, I believe.
He may have stayed here.
Oh.
In the speakeasy?
I thought you just found it.
No, no.
In the hotel.
The speakeasy has been closed for quite some time.
Probably around 1950s.
That's when the lockers were put in.
Eric Clapton, you say?
Yes.
We're trying to find information on another Eric.
Have you heard of an Eric Zahn?
I have not.
Is he famous?
Apparently not very.
He might be Steve Zahn's like third cousin.
A young Steve Zahn?
Yep.
He's an up and coming actor.
I'll keep an eye out for him.
You do that.
So is there any like scandalous information about the speakeasy?
Yes, absolutely.
As you can see right over there in that booth, that's where famous vaudevillian actor Greg
Gregerson was shot and killed.
Oh, not Greg Gregerson.
Yes.
You may remember him from such things as Dolls and Guys.
My great grandma loved him.
Was she a big vaudeville fan?
She created it.
Interesting.
I'll have to add that to the historical records here in town.
You should also try and get the Historical Society to add this to the stop on the ghost
walk.
If you had a murder happen right here in the basement of the hotel, surely there might
be ghosts in the speakeasy.
Well, that's where he was shot.
He may not have died for several minutes, but they probably drug him out into the tunnels
or the gutter.
Oh, yeah.
Huh.
Sounds brutal.
They were a different time.
Well, thank you for your time.
I think that there's like 15 other people here at the bar who are waiting to talk to
you as well.
That is true.
Move along.
You guys have taken up some time, but I appreciate your curiosity.
We will tell the receptionist that you gave us five star service.
Excellent.
Please do.
That'll keep us coming back year after year.
I would like to look at that window again.
Please feel free.
It's right in the-
I'm not talking to the guy.
You keep responding with carrots.
This is me.
You're GM.
Please feel free to look out the window.
No, you can look out the window.
Thank you.
Yeah.
Is it big enough that I assume Danny is the largest of all of us that Danny could get
through it?
It's big enough to drive a bus through.
The window or the tunnel?
Oh, sorry.
The tunnel.
The window to the tunnels was what it was.
It's like, so it's carved out of the wall and it's got several bars that'll keep you
from getting through.
Oh, okay.
So it's like a solid wall with just like jail window in it?
This part is, yeah.
I'm going to start just looking to the sides and see this way where there's not a barred
off way to get into this tunnel from the speakeasy.
Excuse me, Mr. Bartender?
Yes.
I was curious.
When are we actually going to move from taking the tour of the speakeasy to taking the tour
of the tunnels?
So the tour of the tunnels had to be postponed because we never actually got the funds to
do that, hence the light in the window situation.
But I have an invitation, an itinerary from my room upstairs that says you're going to
be touring the tunnels tonight.
Unfortunately, that would be a typo at this point.
See, we printed them optimistically.
Oh, well, is there another entrance that you can give us a tour from?
Not me.
Oh, who do we speak to about that?
I don't know.
Oh.
But there are other entrances, but I would not suggest going down there.
The tunnels, structurally, are questionable.
Oh, okay.
No one's been down there in quite some time besides us who, you know, surveyed a little
bit but then quite frankly got a little spooked and ran back.
Who was the group of people that went and explored the tunnels?
There were some surveyors that were making sure that it was safe that we even continue
this project.
So was you in the surveyors?
I was not there.
Oh, I'm sorry.
You kept saying...
I say we, figuratively, to include the people in the group with me.
Oh, okay.
It encompasses contract workers.
It's a real good way to be inclusive.
Well, we were all looking forward to seeing the tunnels.
So it's a bummer that that's not a thing.
We are probably all upset about it.
What was it that spooked them?
The general spookiness of it.
Just the dark.
Oh, okay, so there wasn't like...
Spiders.
Plenty of spiders.
Okay.
One man claimed to see a scorpion.
Okay.
However, we don't have those in Pennsylvania, so he was kicked out of the Historical Society
for not keeping up on his naturalist badge.
So it wasn't structural damage.
There's nothing technically wrong with him, no.
It was just scary.
It was, it's large and foreboding.
Oh, okay.
The Historical Society only has about four flashlights.
Oh.
So you guys are more like a club.
You're like the Historical Club?
We are actively seeking a place in the government town hall.
Just like a nice 2 to 3 p.m. slot to be official.
Oh.
Okay.
You may have seen our work on the old watchtower.
We're the ones that wrap the tape around it to keep people out.
Oh, well, it's good to see where all of those donations go.
You think a town named Historical Bethlehem would have a higher budget for these things,
but...
I'm sure they have a budget for more of the actual government...
Do you have sarsaparilla?
That's like a soda.
I have some ginger beer.
Oh, that sounds great.
Can I have...
Here you go.
Thanks.
A nice tall Tom Collins glass.
I'm gonna walk away now.
Have a good night.
So do you guys think we should bail on this and go to the bookstore?
I mean, I got my drink.
I'm good.
I haven't been able to find any way around this window with the bars or anywhere.
There's no like...
Look behind this curtain over here, but it's just a wall.
There's no other...
Yeah, I think a lot of people might see us too if we tried to...
There are other people here.
Yeah.
Like 15 of them.
So bookstore?
Or...
I think it'd be worth seeing if the police have moved on.
If we can gain access there, I think we have a pretty good idea of where the entrance should
be.
Great.
Well, we also have the Hotel B and the historic Bethlehem buildings that we can try if the
bookstore doesn't work.
I think that the bookstore is the closest.
It's right across the street, right?
We're in the Hotel B. We're in the Hotel B right now looking at the one entrance in that's
blocked off.
Okay.
All right.
We'll head to outside or upstairs at least and...
Yeah, we'll call it about four o'clock in the afternoon.
It's a pretty long tour for just like one room.
Yeah.
They really keep you down there.
Told you guys there was a tunnel.
I can't believe there was a tunnel.
I thought you were crazy.
Well, you know, that still might be the case, but let's go see.
I don't see any cops from here, but might need glasses.
So let's get a little closer to the bookstore and see what it looks like over there.
Oh, we should go through the woods again.
We'll get to work and then no one will see us near it.
That's a great idea.
And that's where we're going to end this episode.
And we will see you next next Tuesday.
Bye.
Tales from the Crit is part of the Wolfbeard Games podcast network.
We hope you've enjoyed today's episode.
And if you have, please subscribe and leave a review wherever you get your podcasts.
To stay up to date on any news about the podcast, follow us on Instagram at Tales from the Crit
podcast.
Check out our YouTube channel with the same name and most importantly, tell a friend.
Yeah, we should be able to find him with us.
I'm not doing the diner guy's voice ever again.
I hated that voice.
I hate it.
I hated the way it felt coming out.
Excellent.
What's your room number?
420.
I'm just kidding.