Trash Planet contains themes of desperation and
poverty. We portray a comedic absurd and violent
world. For a full list of content warnings, please
see the episode description. Casting live from
the inside of a porcelain teacup. Oh, listen
to these cavernous walls. Behold the spoon hovering
overhead. We are Trash Planet, the podcast that
beats ass and eats trash. I am your host, Rabbit
Sullivan. My pronouns are he, him, and she, her.
With me today are four of Cincinnati's sick nastiest
improvisers. Everybody say hi, and please tell
me your vibe today. For instance, my vibe, ooh,
ooh. I really like. A big sugar cube falling
to earth with the force of a bomb exploding.
Incredible. Okay. I love that. Thanks, y 'all.
You're very sweet. I'm Maddie Shide, and today
I'm feeling like 40 bucks that you find on the
ground outside of a gas station. It's like a
happy, happy day. You're like, oh, look at that.
That just brightened my whole fucking day. That's
a lot of money to find by a gas station, but
yeah. One of my castmates found $80 yesterday.
Oh my god, what a good day for them. Yeah, I
thought it was 20 bucks, picked it up, it was
a wad. Karma's doing some crazy shit. Hi, I'm
Nihar, he, him, and my vibe today I think is
a very long intact quartz crystal. You can unpack
that yourselves. I don't care. Is it on a chain?
No. I've never heard of a crystal being described
as long. What do you mean a long crystal? Well,
when you actually draw them out from the earth,
they grow very directionally, Quartz says. Yeah.
That. Crystal mommy knee -har. You have a crystal
wand. I know what I mean. I am Devon, and today
my vibe is the Swiss Alps, just the general feeling
of the cool mountain air, the green plains, not
during the winter when, you know, everyone's
skiing, but like... Yeah! Oh, that's nice! Off
-season! Meadows and wow, you're like the middle
of a Toblerone. Yeah Exactly. That's exactly
what the Swiss Alps feels like I Feel like the
Swiss Alps in the Swiss Alps feel like the center
of the Toblerone We are not paid by Toblerone
Hi, I'm Natalie today today my vibe is chibi
-robo from the hit video game chibi -robo Wonderful.
Natalie, that's so wonderful. We don't know what
that is. It's a great game. It's like a Wii game
where you're like a little robot and you run
around cleaning a house, but you're like this
big. It's so much fun. Oh my god, Natalie, that's
really nice. I love it. That sounds so cute.
That is beautiful. Wow. So, you can find us on
all socials at HyperGallant, or our website,
hypergallant .com. We would like to give special
thanks to The Drin, The Surfs, Crime of Passing,
and Perverts Again for their music. We would
like to thank A -State, The Game, Which Rules,
which we are playing. Now, let us set our sights
on the landfill at the end of the universe. Last
we left off, y 'all were recovering from a long
and exhausting mission out in the wastes. You
were preparing to go deal with a series of problems
that you yourselves have created. we open to
connie waking up in bed drenched in sweat mask
on you sleep in a tent uh What's your vibe? How's
it going? It's early morning. Well, I do sleep
on a roof, so it's never terribly comfortable.
But it's been doubly uncomfortable these last
few nights since I can't get rid of the nightlight
that is my head. For those who may not remember,
I do have a juice burn that causes the top of
my head to glow. But I wake up this morning with
it no longer glowing and feeling reassured that
the care and time I put into getting rid of this
thing. has paid off. I'm no longer juice -burned.
And by the way, one of the things that happened
off, Mike, since I maxed out on stress, I'm actually
traumatized, and the trauma that Connie is dealing
with is vicious. All right, you feel the threads
of the universe closing around you in a good
way, hopefully. It is early morning. What else
is everyone up to? What are we doing? Normally,
Lottie would be in her little greenhouse working
on her small business, but... She is currently
in the kitchen scrounging for stuff to eat because
her juice burn is not gone. What are you eating?
Spider webs. Someone has to. Someone has to.
Halbert comes in and is like, wow, it's really
clean in here. When did that happen? Halbert
wanders by sleepily just like, Lottie, God, you
always really put in a lot of effort. Really
putting in the extra mile. I mean it looks really
good. Thank you Lottie. I appreciate you You
know slap on the back friendly slap, you know.
Mm -hmm. Set in your mouth The spiderwebs on
trash plan are too sticky for Lottie to open
her mouth right now Halbert goes woman a few
words I can't appreciate that. Yeah, you know,
you just have such a comforting presence. Like
I just really feel like I could say anything
to you, you know, like And think that, man, I
mean, like, I just got a lot to get off my chest.
You got a second? Mm -hmm. Four hours later.
SpongeBob clackered. Yeah, for sure. What is
everyone else up to at this moment? Inlet is
probably still sleeping or lying in bed just
like thinking about what happened. You've still
got that necklace that you took off of the corpse
of Nestle Getty. Yep. You got it like twisted
between your knuckles, like between your fingers.
Yeah, just like holding it on my chest, looking
at the top of my of my tent, just thinking about
the universe. Man. What's the top of your tent?
What is the view from where you're lying? The
tent has been passed down for a minute, so it's
all patchworked together with different fabrics
that are all crazy patterns. And there's a crude
drawing that Inla has done of the giddy girl
that she killed up there. She's just torturing
herself. No! Wow. Drawing is not her skill, so...
It's fun to have a scary serial killer drawing
of the person you killed just kind of on your
scene. Listen, I've got trophies already. It
helps to know how to normally emote, okay? Just
kind of process this shit. Tank, where are you
at this morning? Tank is looking for every edge
that he can get to improve his performance, and
he read about stoicism. Whoa! So today he is
outside in a public area meditating, but he really
has no idea what he's doing. He's just kind of
like, stoicism, stoicism, stoicism. It gets bored
really quickly. This lady walks by and she's
like, hey, do you want fried peanuts? They're
like one coin each. Lot This nebulous currency
system Coin is an abstraction, you know, we don't
want to be caught up in like oh, it's $61 It's
$37, you know, so like we're just like big purchase
little purchase So anyway, she is trying to overcharge
the fuck out of you. She's like, yeah one coin
fried peanuts. They're really fresh. They're
really good. They do smell pretty good that's
good source protein right yeah uh -huh she says
to you unconvinced yeah can we can we work out
a deal usually I do random menial odd jobs for
for random food that people offer me we smash
cut to you're eating peanuts but you're doing
an odd job what are you doing I think Tank is
just walking a bunch of vertebes. He's got one
of those belts that you clip all the leeches
to. He's got the peanuts in one hand and he's
tossing them up and catching them in his mouth.
You drop one and you have like 30 vertebes below.
Amazing. All right. Well, hey, today is the day.
Today is the day we deal with the meat pod. Today
is the day we deal with the woman in our locker
who we haven't really been paying a lot of attention
to. So what we have here is the pre -mission
moment. So we're going to identify our approach
and our crossing point. So the approach is like,
are we going loud? Are we going whatever? Are
we going stealth? Crossing point is the moment
when we jump to the actual mission. And before
we go into the mission, we are going to choose
our load and you have one where you can info
gather or acquire asset. Before we do all this,
I want to regale you with a tale of my misspent
youth in Boston. When I was cutting through,
I was trying to get somewhere, so I was walking
through Blue Line Wonderland area, and there's
really expensive department stores there, and
I had to pee, and I was like, oh, this is fine.
I'll just go use the department store bathroom
and then keep walking. Walk into one and this
man in a three -piece suit goes. Hey, can I help
you? And I say yeah, I was just gonna use the
restroom and he goes no you're not Okay, I guess
I'm not. And then he just maintained intense
eye contact until I turned around and left. So
that is what you, like, you guys would know that
what you're trying to do today, dealing with
a tender mercy, that is your equivalent of going
to a department store in Boston. Fancy department
store. Yes, yeah. I was in like jeans and a t
-shirt too. Like I didn't even look that weird.
I was mad. It was great. It was very rude. It
was wild. Like, I don't know. Like it was one
of those stores where like they're selling like
real Givenchy or whatever, you know, like it
was like the real deal. So any hoodle. Yeah.
there are rich people who do not want poor people
in their nice part of town so you have kind of
the dual missions of you have to get to the tender
mercy and then you have to negotiate once you're
there like you would know that that's what you're
in for so the way frescoes laid out is the more
protected you are by the chips that's more desirable
real estate because that means orbital trash
hits you less often and you know you're less
affected by the weather so there's really built
up really expensive stuff in the very very center
of the city and then everything out of it gets
like like cheaper and cheaper, like as it radiates
out. Are there distinct rings and like checkpoints
through those rings or is it more of just kind
of like it slowly fades? I think it's, it's not
like distinct rings and checkpoints, you know,
in game terms, like, like, you know, I knew when
I was walking into that department store, you
know, like I was like, well, this is a nice place.
Yeah. Okay. That's fair. Okay. It's like going
on King street in Charlotte. Not sure. Reference.
We all know. We all go. Charleston in Charleston,
South Carolina, right next to the old market.
Now it's all these like really fancy stores.
It's all like Louis Vuitton and like all this
crazy shit that I would never even step into
because it's just not my world. And they always
like all the people like whip their heads to
you when you walk in the door. It's not fun.
I don't like going there. We could talk to you
could info gather from mo gitty like that's a
thing you could do you could info gather from
the universe at large You could acquire asset
to try to look rich. You could try to I don't
know like there's there's different ways you
could go about this What is your plan? You know,
you need to go to the rich part of town. What's
the deal? All right, guys. Um, I mean, let's
just Do this fucking thing. I don't know. Why
are you guys so nervous? My big point of contention
is I mean Some people may stare at us, but they're...
these yuppies, they hardly ever even raise a
finger. They'll just faint or something. We need
proof that we have the meat pod to show to the
Tender Mercy. I think we can just take something
off of Mogiti, like, because she has... I'm sure
she has, like, accessories that we can reappropriate
as, like, a token that says that we have her
and therefore the pod. As far as getting in,
yeah, I think we... just go for it. I don't know
how much of a struggle this needs to be. Yeah,
I think I agree. I'm not sure that we're going
to pull off anything convincing them that we
belong up there no matter what we do. So we don't
need to convince them. Yeah. As far as I'm concerned,
we don't need to convince them that we belong.
We just need to get in and out. Okay. So how
would you like to spend, uh, you have one role
that it would be wise to use. So this could be
info gather, acquire assets, something else.
Yeah, unless anyone else has any other ideas,
I think I'll just probably hang out at a bar
with one of the guards, one of the Tender Mercy
guards or someone who's posted near the Tender
Mercy. Okay, yeah. You want to give me some kind
of roll here? Yeah. And tell me, so this is gonna
be a risky standard. Very normal. I would like
it to be a charm, because basically, again, like
I'm being super friendly, getting drinks with
this guy. What are you rolling? Charm or Persuade.
because i think it's probably charm yeah probably
yeah that's a four all right okay um so devin
what's the name of this bar this is like middle
chips like it's like a kind of tony area but
yeah a tony area tony we know tony right like
it's tony it's fancy shut up i've never heard
that what is this phrase you guys are crazy i'm
normal hold on Is this some rich Bostonian shit
that we don't know about that us Cincinnatians
aren't privy to? Yeah, I'm not crazy. This is
real. He lives in a Tony neighborhood in LA.
Uh, yeah, Tony, well, okay. Uh, Tony's real.
Y 'all can go fuck yourselves. That's a real
thing. Anyway, it's in a pretty nice area. It's
called the real Tony. Tony's bistro Tony's bistro
Okay Connie you are posted up in Tony's bistro,
which is it was like a nice little spot in the
middle chips Which is like kind of high rent
for you kind of low rent if you're rich, you
know But it's like a little coffee shop and they've
got like clean good food here which is crazy
like just a lot of bakery options and i don't
know some of them even seem to have real like
dairy involved with them which is crazy like
expensive are you buying anything while you're
in here see i don't think i can afford anything
but i think i do i think i'm sneaky enough to
like you know when someone leaves behind half
a cup of coffee i can re -appropriate it as my
own Alright, so you're nursing like a hand -thrown
mug that is it's beautiful. It's nice. It's well
made and you're chatting with a security guard
And this guard says like yeah, I don't know.
I've been with contigo for Two or three years.
Yeah, it's not it's not bad I mean if you're
looking for security kind of work, you know,
of course I am I mean, I'd like to be able to
drink more of this coffee and actually Do you
know what it takes to be posted at the tender
mercy or somewhere in the upper chips? Cause
you know, not trying to brag, but I am something
of a go -getter myself. Have you drunk out of
the thing in your, have you drunk your half drunk
cup? Like probably. Yeah. What's it taste like?
Probably tastes like coffee with some kind of,
you know, non -dairy creamer has a faint. smell
of cigarette ash because this previous person
was probably a smoker you're clamping down on
some kind of facial expression you're like it's
not the worst thing oh yeah tender mercy that's
crazy right i was only there one time uh you
know they were like short on shifts like normally
it's the same guys over and over uh but yeah
i mean well we don't really get inside the building
unless you're part of like merrick's like like
you really got to be In with Merrick if you want
to be inside, but I mean I was just in a skimmer
tunnels You know like where they get the deliveries
in so yeah Yeah, that that doesn't sound as exciting
as being in the tender mercy itself Well, yeah,
but I mean, who can afford that, right? Hey,
do you get a pay bump when you work in the skimmer
tunnels? Only if it's overnight. Oh, okay. Yeah.
And what, there's just, what, two of you posted
down there? Yeah, it's just the two of us most
times. I don't know, like, it's not just us.
Like, we also have the guys from the skimmer's
trust down there, you know, different checkpoints
and shit. It's not bad. It's pretty boring. I
mean, people don't try stuff. Do you know there's
actually a bunch of fox fingers down there? That's
what sucks the most. You would know, fox fingers
are a type of creature. Yeah, give me a little
bit more about Foxfingers. Yeah, so Fox on top,
tentacles on bottom. So Foxfingers, yeah. Oh,
that sound effect. Does that help? Yeah. That
makes me nauseous. Yeah, they're real little,
but they're like fast and sneaky and like they're
pretty common underground. But yeah, they're
your classic juice creature where you're like,
why would this exist? But it does. Am I wrong
in picturing like a land jellyfish? Yeah. No,
that's, that's about right. Yeah. Fox fingers.
When I was a kid, I used to shoot them or shoot
at them with BB guns. You know, sometimes they
explode if you hit them in just the right spot.
I know, that's what we were doing! I never got
one to explode myself, but some of my friends,
they were real sure shots. Yeah, you can handle
that iron pretty well. Oh wait, you're carrying
right now? No, it was a BB gun, and no, I don't
have any guns on me. I mean, they want you to
have your own gun if you're... Contigo, you know.
I'm sure I could get one. It seems like a great
opportunity, though. Thank you, Mark. Yeah, yeah,
of course, man. Hey, I'll be rooting for you.
Yeah, you come by around. I don't know. Come
see me up there. Whatever. OK, so to be clear,
the information I got is that there are usually
two people posted in the skimmer tunnels and
that the skimmer tunnels seem to be the best
way in. Yeah, the impression you get is there
are utility tunnels that stuff is transported
to. So if you were going over land, it would
be like, and then I walk down the really big
street where everyone can see me, but like tunnels
are, you know, tunnels. Tunnels are tunnels.
Yeah. You also learned that there are skimmer
trust people down there. Like you would also
be aware that in universe, the skimmers trust
controls a lot of like transportation and what's
that called? Just like logistics, like moving
things around. So it sounds like they've got
people in the tunnels and there's critters. Oh,
a classic Trash Planet conundrum. That's what
you got on your four. Complication of getting
a four is that Mark seems to think you're genuinely
gonna be friends after this, so. You're gonna
crush him. Oh no, Mark! No! Listen, we need cohorts,
guys. This isn't a loss. So, what is everyone's
load level for this little mission? Also, you
have a bonus when there's survival gear because
of Enla. I believe that's a thing you chose.
Relevant corner upgrades for this are we have
two free load we can spend on anything that counts
as survival gear, regardless of how we load ourselves
out. And then also group actions are crits when
we get sixes from multiple people. That's gonna
be so awesome when it happens. There are other
upgrades we have, but they're not relevant to
during a mission. Cool. Wonderful. Connie's gonna
go with a normal load for this one. A normal
load for a normal man. Tank's going heavy, baby.
Yeah, we got muscle. He has the happiest to follow
his namesake. What does a heavy load look like
on such a scantily gladdened... I was really
feeling that when I was drawing you. I was like,
there's not a lot of clothes on this guy. It's
just one giant backpack. Like the kid from Neds
Declassified who like carries around the giant
backpack. I love that, yeah. You have to go like,
as you're just walking normally. I'm gonna go
load normal load. Okay. And Lottie. Normal. Just
a lot of normal guys. Okay. Where is the entrance
to the tunnels? Or are they like an interconnected
all sorts of tunnels? So there's tunnels all
over the place. Okay, great. So we can get to
the Tender Mercies tunnels through somewhere
in the lower chips or even the food court. Yes.
Oh, yeah. Wherever. Fantastic. Yeah. So you're
not worried about the beginning of this part.
Wonderful. So the camera is on, you guys, you're
walking all cool, it's like that cool shot of
four people and they're walking towards the camera
like, yeah! Yeah early morning good vibes heading
out into the town and as you're going there's
a radio nearby and we hear through crackling
static and screaming guitars Hello trash planet.
It's your boy. Mind your mic with a little news
update I got to go quick before this edible hits
not to worry I get the whole next hour on autoplay
cuz ooh, baby. I'm gonna fall the fuck asleep
All right, whether we know there's whether we
know it's hot, but did you know it's real? Fucking
hot. I just got word from Vopertinger out in
Mousetown. They say we're looking at a couple
days of extreme UVs. Maybe two minutes burn time.
Get your fucking hats on. Get your fucking gloves
on. It's hot, hot, hot. Speaking of hot nights,
our local maniac, the birthday boy, partied all
night long. Word is he fucked up the trust convoy
on their way to Dutch Cross. We got skimmers
all busted, shipment delays, and apparently not
a scratch on him. Skimmers trust has increased
the bounty to $1 ,500, so hey, maybe take your
shot and it'll be you partying all the way to
the bank. And finally, we got three confirmed
cases of smiling rot out in Eastside Farragut.
That ain't quite an outbreak, but we're keeping
an eye on it all the same. If you got the means
to donate some plasma, head on down to the PeaceWorks
at St. Selena. I know they'd really appreciate
it. Alright, y 'all. I'm gonna leave you with
this dirty little number. It's gonna be kinda
like, cool Ohio kinda stuff, you know? Alright,
this has been Manja Mike. Remember, get strange,
get brave, and you get going, baby. Sláinte.
And we cut to BAM! You are in the tunnels! Alright,
so we're seeing these tunnels and they're pretty
lousy when you're in Bugtown area like Some of
them you really have to wedge through like your
skimmer is pretty large and there are places
where you have to like get off the skimmer and
then go single file behind it as you like wedge
on through this little It's scary like these
are all shored up with like There's big pieces
of trash that are poking into the dirt. There's
stone on the walls. There's, like, spray paint.
Like, there's not a lot of measurements or markings.
Like, there are maps and things, but you have
not acquired any. I don't think any of you are
familiar with this. So unless you wanted to spend
load on maps exactly, you are just kind of going.
So we're seeing these hand -carved tunnels propped
up by junk. uh some of these are lit in the dirt
sections by like patches of phosphorescent fungi
um which are cared for in some places and in
some places they just seem random and some places
are dark as fuck um there's lights on your skimmer
so that's okay but this is the vibe like the
vibe is very like close packed dry earth um just
scuffling into stuff uneven ground and so we
are rolling forward can laddy steal some of those
mushrooms Wow, yes, of course she'd want to do
that. We stop and scrape some off the walls.
Where do you have them? I probably just added
like crumbly bits of broken up mushroom, whatever
they look like coming out of the wall. I'm just
like in one of my like overall pouches or something
like that. Amazing. It might be slightly glowing
through the fabric. Nice, nice. And so as you're
coming into Midtown, like Middlechips area, the
tunnels widen up. They're shored up by concrete.
They seem a little bit more cared for. And this
is when you're going to start seeing, like, I'm
skipping over, oh, yeah, let's engagement roll.
Somebody, not Natalie, give me the engagement
roll. And give me any bonuses or negatives that
you can argue for. Bonus, we have mo 'gitty.
Yeah. OK. So two dice at current. Anything else
you can make an argument for? I have no your
way, so in visiting new locations I get a plus
1d and 1d resist on any consequences of an involving
breach of etiquette. Oh, fuck yeah. Okay, so
I'll take three dice on that. This is a new place
to you, but you're good at new places. But I'm
also gonna give you a negative because none of
you have ever been here before and you don't
know anything about this. So we're down to two
dice. That is a six. Holy shit. The other one
was a one. Ugh, another incredible roll. All
right. So on a six, what does it look like as
you guys perfectly navigate right towards the
inner chips? You do know which way you're going.
You are going the right way. How do you know
that? Who does that? I would like to say that
Connie, as a scholar of the weave and of the
position of everything, There are real people
who are like this, where you just know the cardinal
directions no matter where you are. I'm sure
Connie is one of those people. Those people fascinate
me. I don't understand. Do they have like magnets
in there? That's so cool. Are they like with
the universe in magnets? This may come back later
when we need to navigate. I might have just like
overpowered myself but for the moment I think
this works. No I'll take it yeah that's pretty
cool. So what does it look like when you are
directing your team? I think since we are on
the skimmer every time there's a like a fork
in the road or you know an intersection or something
I'm immediately just able to go we're going right
here we're going left. uh take the upper portion
of this this interchange oh man okay and tanks
just on the back doing like the bike uh turn
signals it's beautiful we can make that jump
at this speed very placid look very calm no problem
um so it is honestly so smooth that you get all
the way up into Like the tunnels open up. Like
these nice tunnels, they had been maybe six foot
and they're like round. They're perfectly round.
Concrete, shored up, well made. Fun fact, I used
to work with a guy who worked in the tunnels
in Atlanta, I think. And he said you could take
a scooter down there and just sort of like, whew.
Like all the way around, which yeah, I'm sure
it was bullshitting me, but boy, doesn't that
sound fun. So anyway, the tunnels open up. They
go from a six -foot round thing into big old
clearing with a lot of directions. So you see
these tunnels snaking off different ways. You
also see a checkpoint. You see, like, looks like
a couple of guys, looks like skimmers people.
Like, there's a big icon on the wall. It's like
a bird logo. So somebody kind of waves at you
from across the way. You would anticipate this
is a big interchange for the skimmers trust.
And, Connie, you know which direction to go.
You know, like, okay, that's the, you know, direction.
Now it's just dealing with it. Yeah. I think
right now is a great time to use a flashback.
Oh, shit. OK. So when we were talking with Mo
Giddy, she had like obviously a way for us to
get in that she wasn't she was withholding until
we could release her. So I would like to flashback
to that moment where we're negotiating her like
payment, I guess, for a lack of better terms.
She reveals that she has like a skimmer's pass
to get us past these checkpoints and to up to
where the tender mercy is. That's dope. OK, let's
play that out. So where are you talking to Mo?
Like, what does it look like? OK, so we get into
the tunnels and we kind of like. go a little
out of our way and there's almost like a hostage
exchange situation uh with some of the other
giddy girls uh i'm gonna say you didn't contact
the other giddy girls okay i think it would make
you would just like like drop her off yeah okay
okay that makes sense okay they they don't they
don't like us Okay, so you guys are like riding
through the tunnels at extremely slow speeds
and Moe is I think in the back with you I think
you've probably like tied her onto the skimmer
or something like she's like can't get out right
now and she says Really fucking sucks that I'm
gonna ride my own skimmer out here and I'm never
gonna see it again. God that blows you're pathetic
I Can't even say fuck you The slicers like what
is that? You don't even slice people One of us
does All right Because you killed my sister She
looks over and look with her eyes like dead and
you're like, oh It was less of a slicing more
of a stabbing but sure All right, guys. Let's
not make this worse I'm just trying to make sure
she says what the correct whatever it's fine
Take things like, hmm. Really specific about
the way she wants people to know she killed someone.
Nothing if not pedantic. That's in the Megatech's
mind from now on. Take, you've heard some rumors
of someone, a mysterious person named Shankshank.
He was an out of control serial killer in Bugtown.
You're like, huh. One red thread appears on the
bulletin board of your mind. Moe says like, okay,
are we done? Like, what are you? Well, yeah,
but you said you would give us some stuff. before
we let you go? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you're really
just gonna leave me here to die, like, in the
tunnels by myself? Like, you're not even gonna
let me, like, take the skimmer back? We need
the skimmer. Yeah, but I also need it. No, you
don't. You can walk through the tunnels. If your
reputation is what you say it is, then you should
be able to survive these tunnels fight on foot.
Exactly. The fucking smug. What's up with you,
bluehead? What's your deal? Just give us what
we need and we'll undo your bindings. All right,
so I got a skimmer pass Take that show it to
Mercs. He'll be fine. Um, and you know, just
make sure that whenever you're Dealing with them
that you're just really pro. Okay, I'm really
on top of your shit. So they sense weakness.
I'll eat you alive She's looking at Enla But
they didn't eat you alive No Funny, isn't it?
It's almost like I'm a survivor That's a big
talk for somebody who's tied up on their former
skimmer. Let's not make this worse. I literally
wanted to break out into, I'm a survivor, I'm
not gonna give up. Inlet takes offense to you,
like, well, I'm a survivor too. Staring back
down. Hey, you also said something about the
juice list? Tank breaking the tension. Mo looks
at you and says, like, right, right, okay, well,
I think as soon as you let me go, then I will,
you know, that will indicate goodwill because
I've already given you the thing that I said
I would give you. And so if you would just sort
of untie me and let me walk away, then we can
part as equals. If I let you walk away, then
are you going to shout the juiceless at me? Yeah,
I'm going to yell it really loud. It's going
to blow out the microphone. It's going to be
fine. It sounds like you're trying to play a
fast one, so why don't you just give me that
now? You have no leverage. Can you hit us with
that, I'm not a business guy. I'm not a business
man, but I don't think you have any leverage
in this negotiation. That led into cousin Greg.
I don't think you have any leverage in this.
Okay, it's Big Eve Boulder with Highlife Adventure
Tours, but he's off planet a lot, so you're really
gonna catch up with him. So, Happy, you're never
gonna be able to afford him, you're never gonna
be able to find him, so there you go. You said
Big Leaf Boulder? Big Eve Boulder. Big Eve Boulder.
And it's Eve like French, like Y -V -E -S. Oh,
okay, fancy, fancy. Like French. Actually, yeah,
France doesn't exist in this universe, but French
does. Yeah, there we go. It makes the whole dressing
situation really confusing. Damn. The nice thing
is Helica doesn't have dairy, so they can't have
French dressing. They only have French the language.
Thank God we avoided that. Thank God all of our
world building is internally consistent. There's
absolutely nothing about it that is a little
bit uncanny. All right, so you have gotten a
good thing to write down. Big Eve Boulder with
Highlife Adventure Tours. Um, that's your clue
there. All right. Do you let her go? Important
moment here. You're at a crossroads. You could
kill her. Um, Connie, like you feel the little,
little knife in your pocket, just real sharp,
real small. And you're like, it would be so fucking
easy. Like, and you know, like the way she's
looking at Enla, you're like, she's going to
kill Enla like a hundred percent. Like you are
absolutely sure that's what's coming. So most
like, all right, big Eve boulder. Um, and then
we're good, right? So you can just untie me.
And I will leave. And what's stopping you from
killing us? Tank is writing it down. Tank, it
feels like a burning bright spot in your mind.
Like, you just have this vision. It's like an
angelic, like, oh, like the buffest, biggest
person, like impossibly wide, swole beyond reckoning.
Just like, like floating in midair, crackling
with the power of the juice. And you're like
Big Eve Boulder. Yeah. I write it on my hand.
With what? Using what material? We have charcoal
pens probably, right? You put it on your hand
in charcoal, it immediately smears. Anyway, Mo
Getty is like, Ed, let me leave. How can we guarantee
that you're not gonna come back for retribution?
Fair's fair, right? You got me. So we call it
even, right? Equals. Yeah, that seems fair. Seems
fair. um i'm going to pull out my knife my my
nice knife that i got from halberd and her hands
i assume are tied in front of her right i think
so i'm just gonna say you you attacked us you
ambushed us in our home i don't think that's
forgivable and i'm going for this step uh tank
is gonna try to stop and tackle uh connie shit
okay Tank's big enough, I think that absolutely
happens. I don't like PVP, so yeah. Yeah, okay,
Tank, what do you do? What are you doing? She
tried to kill us. We got what we needed. Okay,
we also tried to kill them. That's not how this
started. We simply stole their stuff. If they
stole something of ours, that would be fair game.
But they tried to kill us. They tried to kill
me. I was killed in self -defense. Exactly. And
we left loose ends. One other one to tie up.
Look, we said we were gonna let her go. I think
it's important to stick to our word. She is the
only one who would know. No one's gonna find
a body in the tunnels. The weave would know.
Damn. Connie, how does this strike you? I think
about who I'm meant to be. Is this a thread you're
willing to cut, Connie? I dropped the knife.
I think you got me on the ground. Oh, cute! That's
so good! That's so good! Internally, this is...
Is this who I want to be? I don't think this
is who I want to be. Lottie, what are you doing
right now? Lottie, for this entire conversation,
would probably be clutching her arm that is in
a sling because it was hurt by this woman and
is just totally on board with her death because
she is... She's feeling a little bit of malice
towards her. I think you were at, like, the front
of the skimmer, like, all this is happening at
the back, and you're just kind of watching, like,
oh, boy. Just kind of glaring at her, like, yeah,
like, if I speak up, I'm just going to stay stubborn.
Yeah. Oh, man. OK. Connie, you've dropped the
knife. Moe looks at you, Tank, and you see that
flicker. Like, she's been very tough through
all this. She's just been in a locker for over
24 hours. she looks not rattled but like you
get that moment of sincere clarity you just saved
her life just there and like she remembers that
so you guys untie her yeah tang's gonna pick
up the knife and cut her loose yeah you cut her
loose she doesn't wait she doesn't say anything
she just sprints like she wait wait i i was gonna
give you a coupon atomic pizza She runs back,
she grabs a coup, and runs back away. Can't anymore.
Somewhere, somehow, Albert is like, fuck, Jake's
giving out coupons, we can't afford that. He's
the only one who doesn't work for that. Did he
make the coupons himself? 100 % And they probably
say, from Tank. It's got like a smiley on it,
like ee. Trying to drum up business. But yeah,
all right. So Tank, you've got the knife. What
do you, I don't know. What do you say to Connie
or anything? I like flip it so I'm holding it
by the blade and I. I hand it back to Connie
and I'll solemnly put it back in its like hidden
compartment that's probably somewhere in the
chest area and Bring my eyes back up and go.
All right. We got a job to do back on the skimmer
Yeah, all right, and zoom we whoosh out of the
flashback back into the tunnels Who has this
skimmer pass who who would have been holding
on to it? It would make sense. Whoever is Lottie's
probably driving yeah yeah i'll hold on to it
i love it you're just the de facto driver i drove
once so uh Lottie this the skimmer pass as she
called it it's like a leather medallion it's
like how cop badges are in 90s movies you know
um so it's leather on the back and it's got a
crest on the front of like a skimmer bird And
so you like, with no fear, like moving slow,
acting cool, you just zoom up to this checkpoint.
And this guy waves at you, he goes, Hattie! And
we see a guy who is bright red, skin completely
red, like you have no idea if this is tattoos
or juice burns or what. And he's got little devil
horns that you're like, okay, that's a body modification.
People don't have devil horns. And he goes like,
Hattie, what's your name, stranger? What's going
on? Hi, it's Lottie. Love the horns. Thank you.
I do, too. Lottie's going to make a little show
of holding up her badge, trying to seem like
she's done this before. Oh, you're in the family.
Hell yeah. All right. Yeah, just passing through.
So what, are you new shipment people? Who got
a badge? Where'd you get your medallion? Yeah,
I'm new. I've just been kind of taking deliveries,
mostly to the pack this way, but this is the
first time they've got me, me and the crew kind
of coming all the way up the tunnel. Yeah, where'd
you get your medallion though? This is a moment,
like this is a, you got to roll something here,
you got to make a decision about what you're
going to say. Yeah, let me think for a moment.
This is the Skimmers Trust, right? Yes. But it
would be a pass issued by the Skimmers Trust
for some sort of business to operate, right?
It's like taxi cab medallions where it's like...
Yeah. It's not like we're trying to pretend we're
in the Skimmers Trust. It's like... No. Yeah.
If I just showed up with a new taxi cab medallion,
it would be like, that came from somewhere. So
that's what he's asking. He's like, where'd you
get it? I'm actually going to play a little close
to the truth here. I'm going to say, so the Ten
of Mercy has been having a little bit of trouble
getting their deliveries reliably lately. So
we're just the backup in that regard, bringing
some stuff that couldn't make it through the
normal channels. Like it. I like it. Damn those
bougie fucks. They got a lot of money up there
damn, right? I love to see them eat and shit.
Hell. Yeah, brother Hey, tell you what, uh, you
tell them all mercs said hi. All right, they
hate my ass. That's fine Hey, a lot of you good
people you keep an eye out out there. All right
Hey, there's a bunch of Fox fingers like between
here. Are you going you going north? Where you
which way? Mm -hmm Yeah, okay this Fox fingers
like big hive watch out. Yes, all right Even
bothering too much. I mean, yeah, we don't we
don't like go there. But yeah, I mean, you know,
stay fresh Thanks for the heads up. Yeah. Yeah.
All right. Hey, it's lunch a baby. See ya It's
like I'm gonna say that I don't even know if
there was a role necessary because um You told
the truth and you had a pat like you kind of
like you rolled for it when you spent the stress,
you know Yeah, so I'm okay. It was too stressed
for a flashback. Yeah So you're heading further
north deeper into the tunnels Did you bring the
gunk snake? What do you got? Oh, yeah. My gunk
snake is just always in my pocket at this point.
Oh, no. I can't remember what I named it. I think
you said Goliath. Goliath, yes. Yeah, Goliath
and I are basically inseparable. But he just
kind of stays in like one of my like pants pockets.
But he is a backup weapon if I need him. You
see his big fat head just like poking up. When
Endlet needs to deploy them, she just opens up
a can of fake peanuts and screams it out. Exactly.
How did you know? I pull them out of my pocket
while we're in the skimmer and just kind of like
I'm petting it, like using one finger to just
pet on his head. This is not a domesticated snake.
Like this thing is just sort of like, I don't
know. It's just. But I know how to wrangle. Yeah.
I gotta wrangle. Wrangle the fuck out of the
snake. Yeah. All right. So you guys are zooming
through the tunnels, big nice tunnels. You see
a couple other checkpoints with folks. You just
hold up your badge every time and they like wave.
Like they're kind of assuming that you cleared
the big checkpoint. So whatever. And you make
it all the way down to this big open space, which
is. It's concrete, it's kind of like, it's a
dome, it's like a Quonset hut kind of vibe. Like
hard packed earth ground, really well cared for,
it looks tidy. You see crates, you see stuff
stacked up, you see people coming and going,
they're in uniform. Crisp little uniform, dark
green. You see people with guns. Connie, you
would immediately know this is Contigo Security.
These are the people who are watching the loading
bay for the tender mercy. So as you like come
into this clearing, people immediately are, you
know, people... Notice you people stop people
are looking at you. The two guys with guns are
like right on you So what do you want to do?
I do want to point out that I think is his tank
as we get into the like the upper chips section
He has he has a hoodie on but it's obviously
a crop top But he still has the hood and he like
puts puts it up and damn yeah trying to obscure
his face Also, are your masks on? Like, you are
outside, technically. Like, this isn't ventilated.
Yeah. Okay, just for my own mental picture. Yeah.
Okay, we got masks on. We got a bunch of visually
crazy people. What are we doing? Guys are getting
noticed. Yeah. Again, they won't raise a finger,
hopefully. I'll just quickly talk to the Contigo
security people and say, hey, um, we're just...
Doing a backup late delivery for the tender mercy.
Can we just get through the store? You're gonna
have to roll for that buddy So we're calling
this desperate standard This is a desperate roll.
It is a standard reward. There you go. That makes
sense to me Yeah, you can mark your XP as well.
I love getting XP and resolve. Okay, I'll say
The shipment is late already. Do you really want
that being on you that the tender mercy doesn't
get their fresh produce? Give me a roll Persuade.
Desperate standard. That's a crit! Holy shit!
Double sixes to me! First crit of the game, baby!
Damn! Oh, the siren goes off! Cha -ching! Wow!
Hey, I did the thing I was good at, and I was
actually good at it! So, all right, so you're
gonna nail it. What's the one extra thing you
say that really pushes it over the edge? You're
looking at these two guys. They're like put together.
They got crisp suits on. They got, it looks like
standard gear, which is pretty crazy. Like honestly
having matching standardized anything is like
a big class marker here. So these guys, like
they got nice haircuts. They're put together.
They're looking at you, this like scrappy dude
on his weird skimmer. What do you say? I think
the easiest thing is most people who don't have
standard gear on wouldn't have name tags. Oh,
I know their names and I know exactly who to
blame for when we're late. Yeah. Devin and Natalie
and those names are. I had one. I love to punt
it over to you guys and the dodgeball just hits
you in the face. One of them is called Michael,
but it's spelled with a K in the A and E or backwards.
So Michael and Stanifer, I'm sure Merrick will
be really happy to learn that you two are the
ones responsible to keep the Tender Mercies shipment
delayed for this long. Nice. Okay. They look
at you, your death gleam in your eye. They look
at the pod, which they've seen these before.
This is like normal and they're just like, Okay,
right this way, sir. They wave you. So somebody
waves at a guy and somebody hits a button and
a big chain link gate just goes rolling up. And
you guys are into the inner. Outer parts This
is a real like loading bay this is the inside
of the warehouse you see stuff being like Unpacked
and moved around you see what are those call
like a forklift or a jack or whatever? I'm just
picking stuff up people are looking at you quizzically
like do we? Grab that or like somebody somebody
on a forklift like sort of wanders over like
hey, can I help you unload or what's this? No,
this is a sensitive bit of hey And you see, like,
rushing down some stairs towards you guys, you
see the most rumpled man in the world. This guy,
ooh boy, he's rumpled. He looks like, he looks
like in a 90s movie when you've got the cop who
is made of mostly cocaine, and he's tired, and
he's like Al Pacino but cheaper. Like, we see
that guy. Al Pacino but cheaper. God, he's such
a good movie. So, this guy... He looks rumpled,
he looks tired, he's like middle -aged, but you
just take one look at him and you're like, oh,
okay. He's the real deal. Like, he got that vibe
of violence on him where he's just like, he'll
kill y 'all right now. He doesn't care. Like,
and he says, who are you? What is this? Uh, this
is your pod, I take it. It's a pod that we retrieved
for you because the giddy girls were too incompetent.
Okay, give me some kind of role here. Are you
going aggro or are you going friendly? i'm definitely
going friendly okay like i i'm saying yeah we're
the the people who got this for you since we
care about your business and the goodie girls
fucked it up all right so we're gonna call this
yeah risky standard oh that's a three that's
a fail okay So, he just pulls out this long,
lean gun and fires right next to you. It doesn't
hit you, it was on purpose, this is a warning
shot, but he just, like, it's so fast, there's
no hesitation. Connie, the whole world just,
like, slows, and you feel your heart in your
chest, and, like, have you been this close to
being shot at before? Like... No, I don't think
so. Like, I've never had a gun this close to
me like that. Yeah, like, long, lean gun, like,
beautiful gun, expensive gun, and, like, that
death and that beauty is just, like, awful. Fuck,
yeah, Tank, someone just pulled a gun on your
buddy. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Hey,
man, I thought maybe we could negotiate some
better terms for your business. The Giddy Girls,
they fucked up, all right? And I think we can
beat them in the marketplace with our services.
Better service for less. Increase your profit
margins. What say you, sir? And the note jumps
in and is like, we are businessmen. We want to
help. You hear another voice say. All right,
let's take a moment, take a breath, all right?
And descending the stairs after Marek, we see
a woman who looks real good. She is wearing this
very well -tailored asymmetric outfit. They're
like, ooh, you know? And she's got very complicated
braids in her hair. She is a little bit kitted
out. You see a very small shoulder holster that's
got some kind of weapon in it. But she's also
got... clipboard or something equivalent like
it looks digital you're not really sure what
it is and she's wearing little kitten heels like
you know she looks together and you're immediately
getting a sense of management off this woman
and she says okay so I suppose that you have
done away with the giddy girls or what is this
who are you you didn't do away with them they
came after us but no no we are here because we
wanted to bring you your your pod back Simply
put, the Giddy Girls, when they were trying to
retrieve your deliveries as they want to do,
they lost their radio transponder, and so they
couldn't find it. And we took this opportunity
to get you what was rightfully yours. Okay, so
we're starting two clocks here. We're starting
a six clock called Convincing Shreetha. um that
is the clock that you need to fill for this you
rolled real bad so far so you have no ticks in
it at present um there is also a six clock called
maric convinces shreetha this clock is three
full um so just so you know that's three out
of four three out of six so maric says like i
mean come on dude we can do this in house like
why do we need like he's he's talking to her
now like he's ignoring you completely he's just
like It's fucking jokers week. We never needed
people to do pickups. We can do pickups like
So this side conversation is happening. This
woman is looking out at you. She's got like brown
skin. She looks real calm and collected. This
is an unusual type of person to you. You have
never seen a rich woman before maybe. I've got
an angle again. But also you haven't made a roll
on her yet. So yeah. I think since we all talked
to Shreetha just now, that could be a group action,
right? I would take that. Yeah. Except Lottie.
Lottie's got to say something. Yeah, Lottie.
Lottie didn't talk to him. No, I actually did
have some way that I thought Lottie could jump
in. Kind of like the angle of like, because he
just said that like, yeah, we have people or
whatever, right? To try to like get around that,
I feel like a really good opportunity would be
to like take advantage of the fact that we're
like injured and be like, yeah, this is what
happens to the people who go out there. You want
that to happen to your people? I had another
angle for the same thing. is I know for a fact
from Mark that they are short staffed. Ladi's
going to speak up after Merrick says that and
say, listen, none of us here are trying to say
we're more capable than the excellent staff you've
got here. But look at us. I've got a broken arm
and a big swollen up snake bite. Like we're not
doing great. And the giddy girls are worse off.
I'll tell you that much. You don't want that
happening to your people. That's why you send
other people out, don't you? And, not to mention,
I know from some of my friends who are part of
Contigo that you happen to be short -staffed
right now, so some of the people here may as
well be the B team, and then the people who you
send out getting injured on top of that? I don't
want you to have staffing issues when you can
just outsource this to someone more capable.
Marek says, hey, I don't hire B team, but Shreetha
is looking thoughtful. Please make a group role.
Who is leading this group action? Probably Connie,
right? I think so. Do we want to persuade? Is
that? That sounds like what you're doing. Yeah,
it's not charming. It's persuading. Yeah. Persuade
group action. I think everyone touched on this,
right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So this is risky standard.
Three. Two. Six. God, no two sixes? No two sixes.
Okay, but we did get one six. Damn, okay. And
I got a five. Okay, six, five, and then I take
two stress, don't I? Yeah, okay. I'm zero on
stress, so I'm fine. Yeah, right. He's chillin'.
He's vicious, but chillin'. So we did get a six
on that, though. Yeah, that's two ticks on convincing
Sharitha. So Sharitha cocks her head, and she's
making a lot of eye contact with Connie. He's
the leader of this... Little crew it seems. Um,
she kind of smiles. She says alright, so you've
taken care of it then it's in good shape Shall
we take a look? Please we haven't touched it.
We haven't tried to open it or anything Okay.
All right You know that Connie's lying, actually.
Yes, I do know for a fact that he's lying. So
we see some employees wander over and tap a code
into it, and we see this... I gotta. I gotta
examine. What is the code? I gotta know, right?
Ooh, ooh, okay. Give me a roll, actually. Examine.
Yeah, okay. So we're gonna call this controlled
standard. This cannot fail, fuck us up. Okay,
that's a four. That's a four, so that's success
with complication, right? Okay, this is fun.
The code, you get it, you feel it, you're just
like, yes, okay. And it's 66482. I have a question,
so when it's like a... Controlled like risk level
does that lower the that lowers how bad it can
get like nothing bad happens If like Connie doesn't
see a code being entered, you know, so like something
bad could happen Well, for instance, the thing
that happens is this because you do get did get
a complication So the pod like opens up dry ice
steam comes out the pod opens tank. You've never
seen so much meat in your life Like, this is
more protein than you had even imagined. This
is, it's a beautiful, like blood red, marbled,
incredible, like these little jewels. Like you'd
know also that this is all safe and clean, cause
it's from off world. Your chops are watering,
your body, like you take a step forward without
even realizing it. You have now, the condition,
hungry. You would really like to get some meat
out of this. Yeah, that is your complication.
Tank wants meat. Be strong, Tank. I know it's
hard. Lottie's actually repulsed by actual food.
She wants to eat the door off. She doesn't want
the food, but she sympathizes with your hunger.
She looks at the pod, she's like, mmm, looking
pretty good. Lottie's having the exact same experience,
but for everything that's not the meat. Sharitha
looks over with a calculating eye and she's like...
All right, that's nice. It's all there. So what's
to stop me from killing all of you right now
and just taking it? I have my people here and
you look around and you see guys with guns, you
see Merrick, like his feet are wide, like he's
planted, you know? So, yeah, this is another
role. I think I would say in response to that
is, well, you could do that. Nothing's stopping
you. But you already had a deal with the Giddy
Girls that presumably was worth your time. Otherwise,
you wouldn't have made such a decision. And we've
done their job better and potentially for cheaper.
We could do it again, but we can't do that if
we're dead. Lottie. Give me a roll. This is desperate
standard. Well, OK, you know what? I should have
said this is a time where you could take a devil's
bargain or you could push yourself like because
I just gave you a desperate roll. What is the
bargain? She's gonna ask a favor of you and you're
not gonna like it. Is it like she asked me to
do a favor and I have to accept before she tells
me or like what? Basically, the cost of this
maneuver is gonna be that you have to do this
favor. Yeah. Is it like a favor you can call
upon at any time? No. So it's just immediate
favor. Yeah. No Lucifer rules. Well right now
the alternative feels like bullets, so yeah.
Okay, all right, so you take an extra dice on
your roll for this and then if you want to push
yourself You could take stress to get even more.
I could try to assist. Yeah, you could So she
asked why shouldn't I kill you right now? Lottie
gave a strong answer like you're making convincing
arguments now Connie it occurs to you that this
is not really about The logistics of like yeah,
there's some kind of emotional component here
that you need to figure out Lottie's covered
the logistical aspect. I think I'm gonna cover
the the sort of reputation side. Okay. I will
say, um, what sort of reputation would the tender
mercy have if someone, if a good citizen, just
trying to help them, ends up dead on the ground?
I don't think that that's very good for business.
Especially after your whole kerfuffle with the
giddy girls. I'm sure they have choice words
to say about you after this. Cool. Okay, so you're
lending a dice to Lottie's roll. So Lottie, you're
up to three dice here. Do you want me to keep
the roll result from the first die roll? No,
let's do it again because I should have queued
you up for that first. So that's three dice?
One from the bargain, one from you helping, and
then my persuade roll. Wow, that's terrible.
That didn't go well at all. Is six total anything?
Oh my god. For the listeners at home, Natalie
rolled the dice and a ghost came out and said,
you suck. They were all toots. They were all
toots. You could resist some consequences here.
Some consequences here are we're going to tick
Marek's clock. So that's one consequence. The
other consequence is Goliath the Gunk Snake is
going to launch himself at Shreetha. I'm obsessed
with this, yes. I don't know how he gets the
momentum, but I'm into it. Yeah, snakes can coil,
you know, out of that peanut can that he lives
in. That's right, it's a peanut can. Yeah. I
have to resist at least one. If he's already
three out of six, I gotta stop that from going
further. Okay. Not that we're behind his clock.
So I'm gonna resist that one. You're going to
allow Goliath? Can I resist Goliath? No, because
it was my roll. I don't know if I have the stress
to do two resists. We'll see what happens after
the first. Yeah. I have to roll... So it's the
column of... Oh, right, right. Resolve, probably.
Well, I have great skills in Resolve, so a lot
of dice. Okay. Wow, still bad rolls. I got a
three. All right, you take three stress. Shreetha
remains unconvinced. However, as you are speaking...
There's no warning. There's no sound at all.
The gunk snake strikes as silent as the wind.
And we see a snake just launching itself towards
Shreetha. She is going to lunge backwards. Goliath
is loose. He's on the loose. And, like, your
beloved pet is... Yeah, like, whoever wants to
can do something here. Otherwise, Merrick's gonna
shoot it. So, yeah. No, Goliath! No, no, no!
Oh, baby, I'm so sorry. I haven't let you play
for Ultae today. I'm so sorry. I've been a bad
pet parent. I'm coming. I'm coming, baby. I'm,
like, just following him around the floor, like,
trying to catch him. You need to roll and move
quick, because otherwise... Okay. snake will
die. Um, so I guess this is scrounge. Oh, um,
or touch. I think I call it touch to like grab
your snake out of the. It's like kind of like
scrounging around for me. Yeah. Okay. Fine. Touch
works. I got a six. Oh my God. Okay. I get Goliath.
And I'm like, I'm so sorry. I put it back in
my pocket. Okay, so what happens is the craziest
moment of your life so far, where, you know,
you're in this heated negotiation, Snake launches
itself at Shreetha, Merrick goes for the gun,
like the wind, and just, like, hand snaps out,
grabs it in mid -air, is like, I'm so sorry,
and then just, like, stops it in her pocket.
We're still getting used to each other. It's
it's a it's a newer pet parenting situation My
apologies Sharitha is off balance. She her stance
is a little bit like but you she's looking at
this and you see something new on her face and
she She likes it. She likes what she just saw
and Connie you just you get you're like, oh we
need to be caricatures. That's what she has been
looking for. She didn't hire the giddy girls
because they were the best people at the job.
She hired them because they marketed. Capitalism.
On your six, you're gonna tick one on convincing
Sharitha. So congrats. Um, Marek, Shreetha, you've
been very kind. Can you give me a moment to reprimand
my crew for that outburst? Marek respects this.
He's like, mm -hmm. Shreetha hasn't said anything
yet. Yeah. All right. Huddle up. Huddle up. Hi,
guys. I'm really sorry. I don't know how I got
that. Goliath also sticks his head in the huddle.
I'm like just holding in my hand. Okay, wait.
There was something really awesome that happened
there. That was awesome? Honestly, no, but for
some reason they think so. So she seems to want
us to be the way rich people see us, the way
they make little shows about us. Okay, okay.
So we were trying too hard to be them. We have
to try harder to be a worse version of ourselves.
Roger that. And like you immediately flash to
that mural of you covered in blood, shake, shake.
You're just like, ugh. I'm like, all right. Does
anyone have any ideas? I think we can play into
some of my, I mean, I already like tamed Goliath,
right? But like, I could pull out my knives and
just do my like. Oh God. This seems risky, but
I can always pitch my side business. Very true.
Okay. This is good. I've got more coupons. this
is why i love you guys i'm the most proper one
among us i'm not like a rich person i don't know
how to play all this can i just say how fucking
funny it is to be like i need to reprimand my
subordinate and then you all go in for a football
huddle and you're like yeah as we're breaking
the huddle i'll give like edla like a slap on
the back of the head you know like pretending
it was a reprimand yeah You turned back. Enla
pulls out two knives. What? Immediately. She
pulls them out and says, just play with them.
She's not stabbing anything. She's just playing
with them like a butterfly knife. You're twirling
one on your finger. The other one's a butterfly
knife. Right. Just fucking with them. Lottie's
going to go and say, so I know we've made a great
case for our capacity to get the job done, but
you don't seem convinced completely. What if
we offered... extra benefits alongside. We do
have a wide array of talents that we can perform
services with. Oh wow. Such as what? Well, I
am quite the talented botanist, if you know what
I mean. I really don't. You don't? No. A lot
of problems. She means drugs. But like really
cool ones. Ladi's probably just gonna grab like
a bag of manja out of one of her pouches and
be like... You can always increase your selection
of goods. Inlet finds, like, a little, like,
beetle on the ground and, like, throws one of
her knives at it. Do you hit it? Yeah, perfect,
perfect. Looks so cool. Merrick, like, jumps
like this. Alright, this is gonna be the last
roll. We're deciding this right now. Um, so,
I think we have a group roll with Lottie and
Enla. And Tank, yeah. Anybody want to touch this?
You're leading the group roll. Okay. I mean,
I could touch it a little bit. I'm gonna use
one of my load to get rare spirits and just blow
out a bottle of something and be drinking in
the background. I'm gonna say it's actually in
a can of spray paint, and so you have to like
spray it into your mouth. And it's like, it's
this alcohol, it's like Grappa, like it's such
high proof that like you just open it and everyone's
eyes start watering. It's like, oh! Sorry, just
a bit of liquid confidence for you. It's a tough
negotiation. All right, Lottie, go for it. Is
it still persuading or am I trying to charm at
this point? I think now it's a charm. Yeah, I
think he did it. Awesome. Here goes. I got four
and a five. I'm abstaining. A five and you take
two stress. Can I take stress for Lottie? We
do have trust. Yes, absolutely. What does it
look like in character? While Lottie's giving
her a pitch, she's like, the stress is starting
to overwhelm her. She's like starting to break
in her voice a little bit and Tank picks up on
it. I'm just going to walk up next to Lottie
and just pat on the head. In response to that,
Lottie's going to feel like a bit more reassured
and just kind of be like, and look, we've even
got great muscle to get the job done. I'm flexing
and posing like I'm Arnold Schwarzenegger. Incredible.
Your calves are not as good as his though. His
calves are famously bad. That makes me feel bad
outside of the game. We end our real life friendship.
Do I take half the stress or? You can split it
up however you'd like. Do you want two or do
you want one? I will take whatever you want to
give me. Uh, then you please take both of them.
All right. So Sharitha is looking at this array
and she's looking at you guys and there's just
this little smile and she thinks you're so funny.
Connie this hits for you in particular that like
she thinks you're so funny and so cute and like
and that this is part of the story of the tender
mercy is that they they source the most dangerous
meats out from the waste and isn't it wild and
wacky and you look over and Lottie's arm is very
much broken and this gunk snake really could
kill you if you hadn't treated it you know and
I don't know it's just a strange moment like
to be impressing this woman with like the the
clown show of your life yeah and Tretha says
You know, I really can't argue with results.
I will thank you so much for this. Wow. It's,
it's a relief to see a different variant than
what we grow here. Like you can tell more samples
for the rest of the group here if they would
like. Okay. You're passing out samples to the
security guards. Absolutely. You go to pass them
out. Like I think the truth is like, Tank is
falling behind, passing out a coupon to everyone
who gets a bag of manga. I make eye contact with
one guard that like seemed kind of hopeful that
I would have gotten to him. And I just like,
I just mouth the word later. You have to like
weirdly underhand toss it like in his direction.
How can I argue with such a convincing display?
All right. All right, I suppose we can work out
some kind of a trial basis, um, so you'll be
interested in doing the monthly pickups then,
I assume. That's what the Giddy Girls were doing,
and of course we do have other work. Do you know,
in fact, I think before we give you a radio transponder,
there is something I would like you to take care
of. We'd like you to source for us a jailbird.
And when she says this, the camera crash zooms
on Enla's face. Enla, you are shocked. Um, zoom!
We are way back. We are way back in the past,
and we are seeing jagged shapes glinting in the
dark. We're hearing metal scrape on metal. We
hear labored breathing. We hear, like, footsteps
clanking around. We are climbing on the side
of Seltzer Mountain. We are going straight up.
There's maybe 10 or 12 of us here. Some of us
are family and related. Some of us are random
people. But honestly, with the Rovens, when you're
here, you're family. Especially Enla. Enla is
extremely family, because right now she is seven
years old. and she is with her people. Emily,
what do you look like as a seven -year -old?
I mean, I'm just like a little squirt. I'm a
little chubby, and I still have the curls, but
it's more like a little cut right at my chin
instead of super short. Oh my god, okay. Also,
it's super dark. It's very late at night. It's
like 2 a .m. And you are riding on the shoulders
of your uncle Reddy. Everybody else has big bulky
backpacks on. Reddy got you because he is like
big and strong and slow and heavy and so that
makes him a very careful climber. So they gave
him the wiggly seven year old, you know. So you
got to climb when you were closer to the bottom.
You were climbing on your own, but this climb
started hours ago. So it's deep in the night.
You are tired. It is high enough that the wind
is howling through your hair. You're on the side
of a mountain. You can barely see just like little
glints of light in the dark. Like, are you scared?
Yeah. Yeah. At seven, yeah. All right, so Reddy,
like, he's like 20 -something. He's not older,
you know? But he's strong and slow and careful.
And on top of, like, big, bulky clothes, he's
wearing dozens of silk scarves. They're just
wrapped everywhere, all over his limbs, flashing
in the wind. They look like the Nick Cave sound
suits, if you want to give that a Google thing.
Very beautiful. And Reddy is saying to you, just
really low, so only you can hear it. He's just
saying... Yeah, I don't know if you remember,
because you were real little, but last year Hatchback
had eggs in her nest, so we might get to see
some babies this time. You know, there's only
seven jailbirds in the whole southern reach,
so if both our eggs made it, that'd be huge.
But already jailbirds are scary! They're not
scary, Bugface. They're just big, okay? I mean,
I'm big and I'm not scary, right? Well, yeah,
I guess that's true. But why do we have to climb
Seltzer Mountain? I mean, it's New Year's, so
we gotta go see a jailbird. But why? Uh, I don't
really know. It's just kind of... Hey, guys!
What do you like about seeing the jailbirds?
I think my favorite part is when we, uh, when
we paraglide back down, because I feel like a
jailbird myself. Yeah, I like that. Yeah. Yeah,
I like just seeing the majestic beauty of one
of nature's finest beasts. Makes me feel in tune
with the planet. Look at this guy. He's in tune.
Well, for me, I think, I just, I think it's such
a lovely tradition to start off the year and,
you know, to start off the year with some, some
like coldness on a mountain and then almost dying.
It's definitely a way to perk you up. It's a
real special thing too, just to be able to see
an animal that, well, really no one else gets
to see. They're so big and so free and it's so
hard to find them. Like it's crazy they're surviving
at all, you know, like they're just out there.
being cool. So if we get to see a jailbird, that's
a real good year. And everybody's like, yeah!
Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! And so you guys are climbing
for what feels like forever. Every so often,
the group stops to pitch hammocks right off the
edge of the mountain, just clamping onto whatever's
around. And Enla, the wind is so loud, you can't
hear yourself think. You were just this little,
little kid on the side of this big mountain.
And you're so tired, you're like sandblasted
and windswept and crazy. And when you reach the
summit, you barely even notice. Reddy just dunks
you into a hammock and lets you sleep. You have
never been so tired in your life. But your dad
shakes you awake right before dawn with a hand
clamped over your mouth. You don't panic because
you've woken up like that a lot. That's common
for living out here. Everybody's being real,
real quiet. They're just creeping around, clambering
down on the edge of the summit. And Enla, it's
right before dawn. You can just see the sun crescent
over the horizon. And you look down and you see
everything. You see the whole southern reach.
You see Fresco and Tezacal and the shimmering
dome over Medallion. You see mist rising off
the low point. You see this trash like glinting
in the morning sun. How are you feeling? Wow.
It's more than seven -year -old Enla's ever seen.
So Reddy kind of like smacks you on points and
you follow his finger. And maybe a half mile
down, you see this gnarled mass of bones, like
big fucking rib cages and barbed wire and metal
pipes, shaped into a nest. And poking up from
that nest, blinking, lizard slow, you see a jailbird.
And even from this far away, you're like... My
god, she's huge. She's somewhere between like
an albatross and a pterodactyl 9 foot 12 foot
wingspan big mean beak It's like a jagged pair
of pliers and the pattern on her back is like
a Rorschach test like black on white And you
really get to see it because she snaps those
wings open and let you stop breathing. It's just
crazy It's like nothing you've ever seen before
and hatchback leans forward and dives She makes
this piercing, throaty cry. You feel it in the
bottom of your stomach. Wow. I mean, I think
she is in awe and completely just enamored with
this creature. Would you say you're in tune?
Oh, absolutely. Oh, that's good. That's good.
You're in tune, Enla? I feel like it, yeah. She's
in tune! Woo! Wow. And the silence breaks and
then everybody is whooping and hollering. People
are whipping out little flasks, handing it around.
Yeah baby! One more year! We made it! We made
it! Happy fucking New Year! And from there, it's
the same memory every year. Everybody spends
three days shooting off fireworks and getting
drunk. And then eventually they break out the
parachutes and they just ride the fuck back down.
They're shooting fireworks the whole time. The
whole thing is such an ordeal. It takes forever.
Climbing seltzer mountains sucks. By the end
of it, everybody's cranky and low on resources.
But man, you never forgot your first jailbird.
You never forgot how it felt to be so small and
so tough and so lucky. And so we snap back to
the tender mercy and Sharitha saying, yes, our
chef has developed. a really special piece of
gastronomy, you know? We're so excited for the
chance to serve a real jailbird, you know? I
don't think anyone's ever done it. Why would
you want to do that? No one's ever eaten one.
I mean, won't it be fantastic? I mean, they're
so lovely, you know? We can only imagine what
we'll make with one. But there's so few of them
left, and there's... Yes, and that's why it's...
I'm very glad that you've all agreed to bring
me one. So, before we give you the radio transponder,
I'd like to see you bring in a jailbird. We've
got a VIP coming in sometime next week, and so
we would love to have it then. And after that,
we can talk about your future arrangements. And
let's just try not to fuck it up, but she's very
upset. Okay. Tank has no idea the rarity of this
bird, and he's... Yeah, let's go bird hunting.
Tank... Thank you. We will get back to you. Tank
cocks his invisible shotgun. Merrick looks at
you with suspicion. Even invisible firearms stress
him out. I guess we're adding bird hunters to
our list of services. One jailbird coming right
up. So bird hunting it is, but for the job at
hand now, I think we deserve what the giddy girls...
got when they did their deliveries? Shwetha nods.
She's like looking at her tablet and you can
tell she's already just like, all right, cool,
done. Like, whatever. She's like, yes, all right,
Marek, if you would take care of that. Thank
you so much. And just as an added little bonus,
because this thing would have been lost in the
wastes and then probably rotten away if not for
us, could we have four or five ounces of that
red meat? Just a small amount. Nothing to upset
your business. Oh, okay. we're gonna call this
y 'all have done extremely well so far so i'm
not gonna punish you for this this is gonna be
controlled standard um so controlled risk standard
reward uh persuade persuade or charm whatever
you think i i like persuade because i have more
can't argue with that don't fuck me That's a
six. Hell yeah! This is crazy town. You've rolled
like nothing but sixes. This is great. And Shreetha
just looks at you and she's like, fair enough.
Tank starts levitating. Tank, what kind of cut
do you point at? What do you want to get? part
of a like a real marbled fatty piece of like
ribeye oh man the best part about giving him
the choices i think tank is the only one who
would know what a good cut of meat actually looks
like yeah yeah tank you haven't seen these in
so long it's been a long time it looks like it's
out of a fucking magazine like ah your mouth
is actually watering like you can feel the saliva
and you're like Um, and so Merrick just whips
out this crazy Bowie knife and just like goes
for it like no food safety Whatever and just
hands it to you with a look of like disgust Like
he thinks y 'all are gross. Um, so all right,
we're done here for credits. That's what the
giddy girls were getting sounds Lottie he's lying
For the listener at home Lottie has an ability
where no one can lie to her he's absolutely super
cool Very helpful. However, Shreetha is walking
away and Marek is not your buddy. Yeah, I think
I'm gonna save that information for the future.
I don't think I'm gonna challenge Marek. Right,
we don't want to push it and also this is more
money than we've ever gotten for a job. What
is your reaction when you hear four credits just
among the group? It looked kind of like... Oh,
um, mm -hmm. And he's like, and I nod. It's like,
yeah, that tried to cover up the fact that she
was shocked by that. That could give me like
four peanuts. Stop drooling, Hank. You're getting
it everywhere. I won't have to walk the dogs
anymore. I've heard of these. Sorry. Lottie's
face is kind of cycling. But I will because it's
fun. We've developed a bond. Lottie's face is
kind of cycling because she's kind of thinking
like, that's so much money. But he's lying to
me. He's ripping me off. But it's so much money.
With no intervention, Marek is going to hand
Connie four credits. 38 minutes of bargaining
in universe. We don't care. You get four credits.
And Tank, you have been handed this incredible
rib eye. Are you going to take it home and cook
it, or you just go for it? Play your truth, buddy.
I've literally pictured Tank like salivating.
He also knows how good it would be cooked, though.
Oh, that's true. I'm I'm just gonna like rip
off a little piece of fat. Oh my god. I just
suck on it It tears like you know when you pull
apart a cheese pizza, and it's like stringy like
I think oh Just even that like you listen to
the sound it makes you're like oh Yeah, you have
an incredible meat moment just over by yourself
Tang is transported to the meat dimension. Where
am I? It's death metal in the back. You see a
big rib eye staying just like, WELCOME BROTHER!
Are you my god? I AM THE GOD OF MEAT! AND YOU
ARE ONE WITH ME AND I'M WITH YOU! I've never...
I've never believed in... any sort of deity,
but I believe in the meat. The meat leans down
and like does like the Simba thing on your forehead,
like smears blood on your forehead and goes like,
Tank, the meat believes in you. We snap back,
Tank is just like, like a fucking Doberman, just
like with saliva everywhere, just like this hole
in this little shred of fat. Anyway. Do we just
create another religion? I'm a meat warrior now.
As we're driving the skimmer back through the
tunnels, I think I'll just say to our group,
so that went better than expected, but um, so
are we actually gonna hunt a bird? Yeah, we're
gonna have to talk about that. No, I don't want
to hurt a jailbird. They're majestic, beautiful,
magical creatures. I can't even fathom eating
one. It makes you nauseous. Haven't you killed,
like, so many animals? Tank? Yeah, I kill a lot
of animals. I've taken a lot of animals' lives,
but the jailbirds, they hold a special place
in the rovings. I'm having a hard time. So Connie
you're hearing this and you're feeling those
four coins in your pocket and you just keep thinking
about the way that Shreetha didn't even notice
like Shreetha was just like whatever four coins,
you know Just threw it away and it occurs to
you. She could have paid you double that it wouldn't
have mattered Put no dents. Yeah Well Emma we
do have one thing to our advantage here. She
said it herself. No one's eating one They have
no idea what to expect You're listening to a
HyperGallant production. If you like what you
heard, leave us a rate and review. Check out
our website at hypergallant .com. Thank you to
The Drin, The Serfs, Crime of Passing, Perverts
Again, and our own Rabbit Sullivan, that's me,
for the use of their music. Thank you to Morgan
Davey, Malcolm Craig, and Gregor Hutton for the
use of their game, A -State. Hold on, we're opening,
we're opening the document. We're opening the
document. We're gonna cut all this later. This
- That's going at the end. This document is 65
pages long, okay? Like, I just have a lot of
shit in here, okay? Control F. Control, go fuck
yourself. That's going at the end.