Episode 2

Episode 2: Electric Cuddles

Book and Ocean get acquainted with the dangers of Subtropolis. Book tries to make friends and Ocean has a shocking revelation.

This episode is basically an instruction manual for large flashlights.

Email us with all those good questions, comments, and suggestions at oops@stu.cool.

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Transcript
Speaker:

Welcome to Oops!

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All Apocalypses, a show where we explore the collapse of society by playing fun tabletop role-playing games.

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I am Stu Masterson, your master of ceremonies, and I am joined by two of my okayest friends.

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Hey everybody, my name is Brady and I play Book McCready.

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I really enunciated that mick for obvious purposes.

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Book is a kind and nitpicky detective type who is still reeling from the decades-old trauma of his youth.

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That one was really in-depth compared to your other ones.

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A lot of story there.

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I was about to say, he does a good job summoning them up.

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It might feel so pedantic in comparison.

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Well, if we're ever going to make people try to be invested in these characters, it's got to happen early on, because God knows we're not going to put effort into it later.

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Jacob, who are you?

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My name is Jacob.

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I'm going to be playing Ocean, the gentle giant whose past is entirely shrouded in mystery that will hopefully uncover more about as we play the game.

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Very mysterious.

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I like the small changes you guys have made.

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You guys should keep doing that in every future episode, which I don't know if this is just you guys not being able to remember what you said last week, but if it isn't great initiative changing up that intro.

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It's a little bit of A, a little bit of B.

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Yeah, I was going to say, I have a feeling that if you listen forward to Episode 3, our intros may sound a little nostalgic to Episode 1.

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Worse audio quality, I hope.

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I want to play a game, but not the normal game we play here every day, at least to kick things off.

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So there's this game.

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Brady knows this game, but I have not warned him about this at all.

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There's a game we've played like a million times called, I call it 123 because I never have more than three friends, but some people call it Superlative.

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So if you don't know how this game works, someone says some sort of Superlative, like the types of things you'd have in high school, but we usually go with a little deeper questions.

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So it'd be like, most likely to be president would be a really lame question.

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And then we go 123 and each say a number.

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Your rating where you think you would rank out of us three, out of three.

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So if you think you're the most likely to be that person, you'd say one.

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You think you're in the middle, you'd say two.

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If you think you're the least likely to be that thing, you'd say three.

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Does that make sense?

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I think so.

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That's super fun, Stu.

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Do you remember playing this for seven hours on that hike, Brady?

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Yeah, I do.

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Was you, me and Brian?

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This is gonna be one, one question because...

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Canonically.

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Oh, wait, what?

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So meaning not that we're never gonna play this again, but just that we're gonna play exactly one time in this...

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One time in this intro, because we ended on a cliffhanger last time, so everyone's just wanting to figure out, what did Ocean really see in that glass?

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No one knows yet, and you guys are gonna figure out today, so I don't want to waste too much time in this intro.

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But we're gonna play this fun game, and the Superlative, since I came up with this game, I get to ask the question.

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The Superlative is out of us, us three humans, not Book, not Ocean, who would be the most likely to survive the longest in an apocalypse?

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Three, two, one.

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Two?

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One.

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Oh, we got a champion over here.

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Let's see, Brady.

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Defend yourself.

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I've thought about this a lot.

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And I spent, like, as a kid, my mom, when I told my mom about this podcast, because, spoiler alert, I have a mom, and she's very heavily involved.

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Humble brag.

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Well, I know that not everybody has a mom, and my heart goes out to those people.

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I have a mom, and she gives a shit, and I'm very lucky in that way.

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But my mom, when she heard about this podcast, was like, oh my god, Brady, this is perfect for you.

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Do you remember when you were seven, and you wrote a list for what you would have to gather, the supplies you'd need to get in case of an apocalypse, and the plan that you made, and the drawings you did for how you're going to fortify the house and all this shit?

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And I was like, yeah, I do remember that, because I did it again yesterday as a 25-year-old adult.

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So, you know...

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You have both copies on your medical records as they were submitted for your anxiety medication.

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Yeah, they are laminated.

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My birth certificate is not.

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And I think, in all honesty, I think the three of us together would be a pretty formidable team, because Stu is scrappy as all heck, and Jacob has medical knowledge, so if any of us got hurt, he'd be able to help us out.

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So I think that we'd be a very good team, but I definitely think on our own, I have thought about it enough to have a pretty good shake.

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I gave myself a two, because yeah, I do work in the emergency room.

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I am a nurse in the emergency room, so I feel like I got a decent grasp of first aid situation, kind of life or death, immediate care to cover basic wounds and injuries.

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And I do a lot of backpacking, so I have a lot of camping supplies, and I'm pretty good at going out in the woods and surviving out there-ish.

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I mean, with camping supplies, of course, but I think I would not last very long in the long run because I don't think I could effectively hunt.

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Man?

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I think I would probably hunt men or acromals, and I think I would probably eat a plant that is probably poisonous as I am starving and die.

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Most of the reasons you listed there is why I said I was too, because I put you at one.

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No shade to Brady.

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I think what you said is also accurate, Brady.

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Who did you put at one or three, Jacob?

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Or did you not think about us?

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Did you just put yourself in the middle?

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I'll be honest, I just put myself in the middle.

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So I'll let you guys make your case about why I should make you the worst or the best.

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I agree, you definitely are way more prepared than me, Brady, but I viewed myself as able to gently slide into a cult leader type role where I wouldn't have to do much.

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You have the charisma for it.

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Okay, I can see that.

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So you have to get to that point of...

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See, yes, yeah, that's what I was just about to say.

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I think if we got into a situation, if you lucked out and got in a situation where that became relevant very early on, you could be one.

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Yeah, I agree.

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But if you don't, then you'd be in trouble.

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The first medium-sized dog would just take me down.

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It would take me down too because I would not be able to hurt it.

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In real life, Stu, you have survived things.

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There's kind of two different...

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There's two sides to that coin because you would absolutely...

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You have the charisma to absolutely jump into that leadership role and make bad decisions for people.

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I would also say that you've survived things in real life that would lend yourself to being able to handle that type of stressful situation.

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However, my goal for an apocalypse, for any event like that, would be to not have to rely on that, to never get to the point where I need the medical care that Jacob could provide or to have to surround myself with people that would provide for me because I'd have my little garden, and I'd have my big fucking fence, and I would just be off the grid.

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You'd be Bill from The Last of Us.

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Yeah, I was going to say the same thing, so you'd be Bill.

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Except I have none of the resources of Bill.

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Also, canonically, this is going to mess...

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We've kind of given up the jig there, boys, because I'm pretty sure like two episodes from now, we acknowledge that you hadn't seen The Last of Us.

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We haven't seen The Last of Us.

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I think technically, in all likelihood, when we recorded this episode, The Last of Us hadn't even aired yet.

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Okay, with that, let's end this tension-filled cliffhanger that's been going on for over a week and move forward with another very exciting episode.

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Oh, shit, that's the-

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I'm going to turn to Book and like, Book, don't freak out.

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But I think I saw something behind you.

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I don't know what it is.

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Some kind of dog, maybe?

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And over the walkie talkie, I respond, Hey, I appreciate the heads up.

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I'll keep an eye on.

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I don't I don't see anything, but I love dogs.

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Even if they're about to eat me.

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You know, you see nothing, Book, you look around, there's definitely nothing right near you.

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There's no signs that anything was close by.

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OK, I guess I'm going to keep trying to go up the stairs.

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Yep, you make it up the stairs.

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It's a just forward and back staircase.

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You know, you know how stairs do.

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Yeah, you know, you know the stairs I'm talking about.

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And it leads to the top floor looks like it was a mix of storage and a few residential areas.

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The window above the light that you're trying to get, it's about eight feet up and you're able to go to it and you look down and you see that light there shining.

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When Book reradiated you, the lights flashed back on and it's providing illumination once again.

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But it's about eight-ish feet below you.

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How safe does it look like to like step out over the ledge and try and just pull it back?

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Like shimmy my way over to it.

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Is there like an obvious platform to get up to or is it pretty much just dangling there?

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No, it's like drilled into the wall.

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There is a mostly decorative trim on the building that you could walk out, but it is thin.

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It's like just wider than one of your feet.

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I'm going to look and see if there's anything in the room that I can use to kind of like grab onto it.

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Do you have your shovel with you?

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I always have my shovel on me.

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Something to grab onto from in here and like lower yourself down or something you want to try to like poke it with.

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I want to try and see if I can like, like maybe like a rope or a chain or something that I could kind of toss around.

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There's some bedsheets in one of the residential beds that look very dusty, but they're not as quite as awful as I was hoping.

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Let's see.

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OK, I'm going to Mythbusters this shit.

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I'm going to look.

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I'm going to get the sheets.

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I'm going to tie them all together to make like a big rope.

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I'm going to tie it around my waist.

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And I'm going to tie it off to like a sturdy tie off point inside that I can like use it as kind of like a belay to get to the light.

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Yeah, there's some load bearing columns in here.

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Let's do a try something challenging roll.

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All right, let's see.

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For you to successfully belay down here.

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This is for you actually getting it not for you.

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You successfully did everything you said.

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You tied those together.

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To see if I don't break my neck.

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Yes.

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All right, let's take a look.

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Let's see if this is the end for Ocean already.

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As I fall to my demise.

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Oh, that's a seven.

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Hey, that means you can do it.

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But it's going to cost you something.

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What will it cost me?

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You tie this off around a load bearing column inside of the building.

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You're able to shimmy your way down the eight feet.

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It looks very impressive from the outside book.

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You see him kind of tie it off, and he starts slowly letting out some slack and going down to right where he's at.

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But while you're down there, you realize you do not have the necessary tools to get this off.

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It's using some very concrete grade bolts connected in here.

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You think you could pry it off, and it would either be, I'm going to give you an option here, it's either going to potentially damage it in some way, or it's still connected to live electricity, it's going to potentially shock you in some way.

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Potentially with quotes?

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Potentially shock you in some way.

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I ain't taking harm yet.

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I'm going to try and pull it off.

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OK, so you're just going to try to, you're OK with damaging it?

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I'm OK with being electrocuted at this point.

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OK, you're OK with being electrocuted at this point.

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OK, so you shove your shovel in it and start prying it off the edge.

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And you're a strong boy.

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You're able to, you pop this, you pop the first two bolts just out and they go tumbling to the ground.

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It looks like they were actually broken off about like three inches in.

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And as you go to try to pry the bottom half off, you discourse of electricity just shoots through your shovel.

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And you take two Armor Piercing Harm.

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Okay, all right.

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Which is going to also give us the opportunity for the Harm move, which is fun.

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Oh, I didn't know there was a Harm move.

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I don't know if you want this.

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Okay, so looking at the clock.

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Yes, so you're, this is the first time we've taken harm.

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Somehow you guys did not take any damage during the first little action outing, despite being somewhat on fire and your vehicles plummeting off cliffs.

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Yeah.

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So the clock is a little different than what I'm used to with like the bubbles that you fill in.

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It's a literal clock.

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Yes.

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So there's different segments in the clock.

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So the first three segments are big chunks, right?

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They're like three hours each.

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And then near the end, they start getting smaller and smaller.

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So the way it works when you take to harm, that means two of those segments get filled in.

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It doesn't matter that it's twelve to three.

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That doesn't count as three.

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It's still two full segments.

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Harm up to six p.m.

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six o'clock on the chart.

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I don't know why I gave it a p.m.

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I think because midnight is more horrifying than noon.

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But harm up to six heals by itself with time.

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So if you're just chilling over time, you'll eventually get those back.

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Harm from six to nine is serious but stable.

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So it doesn't heal with time, but it won't get worse either.

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You'll have to seek medical attention to get it better, but you're not deteriorating.

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When you get from nine to 11, it's serious, potentially life-threatening.

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So you need medical attention to stabilize, and it will worsen with time, and you will need more significant medical attention to actually heal it.

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So that's the type of thing where when you're in that range, doing things that would normally be difficult, but very doable for you could just incur more harm.

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So say it's like you got shot by a shotgun and you're trying to climb a fence.

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Normally, you'd be able to just hop that fence, but if you do a bad job in this time, I'm going to say, oh, you start bleeding out more as you feel your muscles tense up and the blood start coursing out.

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You get lightheaded as you tumble over the top.

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That would be taking additional harm because you're unstabilized.

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And then when you hit noon or midnight, your life becomes untenable, and that's when bad things or interesting things happen.

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That's when you have to check one of these boxes.

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Yeah, so for this harm, you take two, which will bring you to six o'clock, I believe.

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Yeah.

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Okay, so that's significant, but it will heal with time.

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Yeah, and you feel it course through you.

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We're also going to roll the harm move, which does not necessarily happen each time you take harm.

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I'm allowed to basically choose, or I'm allowed to forget, it even says, which is nice of the creators.

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So when you suffer harm, you roll minus the harm you suffered.

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So you roll your 2d6 and subtract the harm you've taken.

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If you have armor or anything, that affects that roll.

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In this case, it is armor piercing because you're getting electrocuted by a light.

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So you're going to roll 2d6 minus 2 and tell me the result.

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Okay, 2d6 minus 2.

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Oh, there's some really bad ones here.

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Yeah.

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All right.

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Oh, that is a 6.

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That would be a miss.

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Okay, so I'm allowed to do a couple things here.

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This was a bad plan.

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I can take you out of the action.

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I can make you unconscious, trapped, incoherent or panicked.

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That doesn't sound very fun in this situation, so I'm not going to do that.

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I can make it worse than it seemed, which is a nice, easy one, where you just take one more harm.

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I may do that.

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Still thinking.

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Or I can choose 2 from the mix success list, which is losing your footing, losing your grip on whatever you're holding.

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You lose track of someone or something you're attending to, or you miss noticing something important.

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I think I'm going to do 2 of those because that sounds fun.

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So I'm going to say you lose your footing in the sense that this sudden jerking causes this blanket that is kind of a half eaten blanket to tear.

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And you also lose your grip on what you're holding, which is this light you have just brought out.

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Book, you see this happening.

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You see him tumbling down, starting to fall.

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He's kind of being slowed by this slowly tearing blanket, but it's not going to hold on much longer.

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Simultaneously, the light is hurling towards the ground.

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I'm guessing you're right underneath him.

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Does that make sense?

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Okay, so I'm going to let you, if you want to.

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Yeah, which one do you want to help with?

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Do you want to try to catch the object dropping, or do you want to try to stop him from taking a bad turn?

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No, the object.

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I'm going to help.

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I'm going to help Ocean.

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Oh, that means so much.

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I'm going to try to break his fall and probably get crunched in the process.

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Oh, no.

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Ocean, you're going to act under fire, and then Book, if he needs some help, you can try to help him.

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So let's see that roll first.

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Let's act under fire.

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So this is you to try, this is you trying to land gracefully as this is tearing, and you're about to take a tumble.

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I need some help.

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That's a six.

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Are you going to try to help him?

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Yes.

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To act quickly enough.

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Sorry, go ahead.

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Yeah, your history has re-rolled or rolled over back down to only plus one.

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And also to act quickly enough, I'm going to have you act under fire to get in the right position to be able to even help him.

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My act under fire roll is a nine.

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Nine, so close to a full success.

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Do I also roll to help, or is it just an act under fire roll?

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Yes, you can also roll your help to one roll.

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That was a seven.

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Oh, a seven.

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Okay, so a seven, no, a seven is still very good.

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It bumps your roll up to a mixed success.

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But Book, you have put yourself in danger as well to get into this situation.

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You acted a little slowly.

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You hesitated for just the second you saw.

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You clearly care more about Ocean in this object, but you saw it tumbling first.

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So for a second, you took like a half step over to try to catch it before you saw him and heard this ripping sheet with a concerned Ocean start plummeting downward as well.

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So you're a little bit behind him.

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So when you go and reach out and try to catch him, you are not in a good situation.

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You're spread out kind of far.

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You feel this tearing in your back as this very heavy man lands in your arms.

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You're going to take one armor piercing harm as well.

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And then with your mixed success for your try something challenging, you're going to also take one additional harm as you hit the ground.

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So we're both at two harm.

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We're both at six p.m.

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Because I have my cane.

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Yeah, I don't think your cane is going to help with this.

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It's a third leg.

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OK, so do I take two harm?

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I'm going to say no.

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So I take one harm.

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No, you take one.

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And Ocean takes an additional harm.

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Ocean would take an additional one, but his armor is going to help him with his fall.

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So he's going to actually take zero.

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OK.

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I like that.

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So both of you are collapsed on the ground on top of each other.

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Just muscles aching.

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Oh, you.

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The light is currently off.

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You're just in this pitch dark.

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I expect so because we just find it out of the wall.

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And as you guys slowly start coming up, the light actually flashes on.

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Oh, shit.

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Oh, this Book, does it still work?

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Considering that it is blinding me right now, I think it still works.

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Oh, that's good because I can't really see anything besides electricity.

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Are you okay, Ocean?

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I've been better.

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He's gonna slowly start pulling himself back up, and is gonna make his way over to the light.

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I know that you're hurt worse than me, but can you help me up?

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Yeah, he reaches down and pulls you up.

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So is that light still wired into the wall?

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Is it dangling from some wires right now?

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No, it's on the ground, but it's low.

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It's magic.

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I'm gonna come over to it and just look at it and see if I can see anything about...

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If it has any batteries power source or anything like that, which I assume it would have to.

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Yep, you turn it over and you see there is a battery backup on it.

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And there are some pretty hefty batteries in here.

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They actually look like they're rechargeable, which are actually very valuable.

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There's a couple large lithium ion batteries in the back.

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Don't know how long it'll last.

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Is there a switch to turn it off?

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Yep.

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There is a switch where on one side there is an O shape, and on the other side there is a line.

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And as you press that switch from the line to the O shape, O is for off, and I is for ion.

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The question is, do we just take the batteries out, or do we try and take the whole thing?

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Hey, Ocean, let's turn that off for now, because I think we should save those batteries.

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Let's pop the batteries out, all hold on to the batteries, and I know we said we were going to stash the light, but I think we should just hold on to it.

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I don't know why, but I'm getting a feeling that we should hold on to it.

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Just hold on to the light?

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Yeah, but let's...

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I tend to agree after seeing the weird creepy thing following you.

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But I think we should...

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Well, maybe we shouldn't separate the batteries.

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A functioning light is useful, but I figure if we get separated, at least one of us would be able to fence that for some cash.

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But you're right.

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Let's keep it functional.

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Let's leave the batteries in, and we'll just leave it off for now.

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Yeah, it fits in your bag.

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It's not like giant, giant.

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It's a big light, but it's not like giant, giant.

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So you have the light, and you're putting it in your satchel?

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Yes.

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Do you got like a hiking backpack or like a cool messenger bag?

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What does your bag look like?

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I assume...

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Let's talk about bags for a little bit.

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There's too much excitement.

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I imagine it basically like...

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It's not cool at all, for one.

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But like those...

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Kind of like what a postman carries.

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Except as a backpack.

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Yeah, a messenger bag.

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Yeah, like a really big backpack.

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That's like kind of more...

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It doesn't have anything fancy.

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It's kind of like just a big old satchel with straps to carry on your back.

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Okay, I like it.

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You can fit a lot in there.

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I'm looking up a picture to see.

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Yeah, I was following you for a second, and then you lost me entirely.

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But then I think I came back around at the end.

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Specifically, I'm thinking of Death Stranding, the backpack that he has.

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Okay, I know that backpack, yes.

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So the light is in your bag.

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You guys are on the street.

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You think you're still probably like three hours away from their area as marked on the map by Johnny Hertz.

Speaker:

And you've already been traveling for about three or four hours.

Speaker:

This is a very, very big city.

Speaker:

Do we know what time is it about?

Speaker:

Well, time is very complicated underground, Brady.

Speaker:

I guess there's not a lot of.

Speaker:

Yes, I'm trying to figure out is the city still lit and will it stay lit for a while?

Speaker:

Yes.

Speaker:

Yeah, the city is probably halfway through its lit period.

Speaker:

Well, I don't think we should try.

Speaker:

So it's it's their equivalent of new.

Speaker:

OK, yeah, because I was going to say, like, if if we're because we're both we're both hurting a little bit.

Speaker:

It might be a good idea to try to rest and, you know, work off those those wounds.

Speaker:

But I also think we need to be conscious of the light and trying to make the most of that.

Speaker:

Then again, we do have this giant spotlight.

Speaker:

Then again, if we do, if we do try to navigate, if we take a little rest and the lights go out, we could be sneakier.

Speaker:

There's probably more things that could hurt us, but we could be sneakier.

Speaker:

Yeah, that's not a bad time.

Speaker:

Not a bad idea.

Speaker:

Wait until nightfall.

Speaker:

Yeah, Stu, is there anywhere that we could pack in for the night or for the for the noon?

Speaker:

There's this diner that you're right near that already had some tables kind of set up in a defensive fort.

Speaker:

Looks like someone had used it previously for probably the same thing you guys are doing.

Speaker:

And this light, have we?

Speaker:

Let's investigate the light.

Speaker:

Is the motion sensor on the light, or do we no longer have the motion activated capability?

Speaker:

Now that you have the light down here, you can see that there is a motion active setting, and there's actually a sensitivity knob that you can change to make it more or less sensitive.

Speaker:

So you don't know if there was anything more advanced wiring the camera up to it as well, or if they're just two different things.

Speaker:

But based on what you have here, there is a motion sensor on the light.

Speaker:

It was on a pretty low setting, and then there is the on and off switch.

Speaker:

Okay, I would like to, let's set that up.

Speaker:

Let's point the motion sensor at the door, and try to use that as a sort of an alarm in case anyone interrupts our sleep, and let's catch some Z's.

Speaker:

So it's a very smart idea.

Speaker:

I think that's a really good idea.

Speaker:

I'm glad we have a super sleuth on our side.

Speaker:

It's the smartest thing I've ever heard from you.

Speaker:

So there's, I missed one setting, so there's also a timer for how long it stays on when it's triggered.

Speaker:

So those are the things you can set.

Speaker:

There's on-off switch, there's the motion sensitivity switch, and then a timer for how long it stays on before it shuts off.

Speaker:

How do you want to set all those things?

Speaker:

I want the, what's the first one?

Speaker:

Well, I don't remember the order I set them in, but there is an on-off switch.

Speaker:

There's the motion sensitivity, oh the on-off.

Speaker:

Okay, so it definitely needs to be on, I think.

Speaker:

You're working your way through my light puzzle.

Speaker:

I think it should be on.

Speaker:

Let's put the sensitivity at medium, right smack dab in the middle.

Speaker:

Let's put the timer, I'm trying to figure out.

Speaker:

Let's crank that timer all the way, as long as possible.

Speaker:

I don't want to burn out the battery.

Speaker:

Okay, so when it comes on, it just stays on.

Speaker:

So here's the thing.

Speaker:

If motion gets activated, I don't want to be in a situation where somebody creeps up on us, the light goes on for half a second, wakes us up, and then we're blind, because we just got blinded by the light.

Speaker:

So I would rather use it to blind them and leave it on, and hopefully not burn out the battery.

Speaker:

Can I test the motion activation?

Speaker:

Okay, so before I do that, can I crank the time to on, or the timer all the way down, test it to make sure the motion activation actually works, then crank it all the way up?

Speaker:

Yeah, so when it's all the way down, you actually notice it looks like it's maybe some sort of alert mode, where it flashes like three times and then goes off.

Speaker:

When the timer is all the way down, it's just like boop boop boop, and then it goes back off.

Speaker:

I like that.

Speaker:

If you move it even a smidgen up, it looks like it stays on for like 10 seconds, and then goes off, and then the knob after that is just more sensitivity up to probably about 10 minutes.

Speaker:

Alert mode sounds fun.

Speaker:

But you do have, you get a very good grasp of, through trial and error, of how the sensitivity works.

Speaker:

It's not like I've mastered it, so now I know when I throw an acorn here, it turns on, but you're like, okay, this knob kind of sucks, but this is what the sensitivity means.

Speaker:

Okay, great.

Speaker:

So I'd like to make it so that like us turning in our sleep is not going to set it off, but somebody creeping up on it, it will.

Speaker:

Okay.

Speaker:

And let's put it on alert mode, because I think three flashes is probably enough to blind them for a little bit, but also enough that it might not affect, if we're just kind of getting startled out of our sleep, it might not affect us as bad.

Speaker:

Cool beans.

Speaker:

We're putting a lot of effort and time and effort into the sleep setup that might not actually be useful, but I'm here for it.

Speaker:

We can use it in the future at minimum.

Speaker:

So you guys are actually trying to go to sleep, get some rest, heal up, right?

Speaker:

Yeah, because I think I will die very sorely.

Speaker:

You said that this diner is completely empty, there's nothing for us to grab a quick bite.

Speaker:

No, it has been looted out entirely.

Speaker:

You have some like trail rations, not tasty food, but things that you would normally bring when you're out scavenging that have a pretty long shelf life.

Speaker:

But yeah, you can do some rudimentary first aid on yourself.

Speaker:

I guess actually not.

Speaker:

For you, you probably can, Book, because you just like got scraped up a little.

Speaker:

But for Ocean, you're electrocuted.

Speaker:

I have some residual twitches that just don't seem to go away.

Speaker:

All right, yeah, let's try to get some rest.

Speaker:

Good night, Ocean.

Speaker:

Book, give me a weird roll.

Speaker:

I have zero weird, so this should be interesting.

Speaker:

Where's my mouse?

Speaker:

Oh no.

Speaker:

That was a five.

Speaker:

Plus zero would be...

Speaker:

A five.

Speaker:

Ocean falls asleep a little bit quicker, even though he has a nice twitchy sleep.

Speaker:

But just as you're hunkering in to go to sleep, you're at that moment where you're kind of fading in and out, and you kind of jump awake a couple times.

Speaker:

But you're just on the edge of consciousness, and you feel like you hear for a second a wolf's howl.

Speaker:

But as you jump awake, you hear nothing.

Speaker:

Just silence.

Speaker:

Interesting.

Speaker:

I wish I had rolled better on that, because that sounds like a really cool thing that I could have seen.

Speaker:

Yeah, I mean, that's concerning, but we have our little alarm system, so I might just scooch a little closer to big strong Ocean and see if I can...

Speaker:

We snuggle up.

Speaker:

Ocean's the big spoon.

Speaker:

Very cute.

Speaker:

When you snuggle in, your hairs all start standing up from the static electricity coursing through him.

Speaker:

Residual electricity from his shocking experience.

Speaker:

You are able to fall asleep, and you doze off.

Speaker:

Could I have read that situation?

Speaker:

You could try to.

Speaker:

Do you want to?

Speaker:

Maybe.

Speaker:

I don't want to fail another roll, though.

Speaker:

What a predicament.

Speaker:

Well, let's think.

Speaker:

What would Book do?

Speaker:

He thinks he heard something for just a second, but then it's gone.

Speaker:

No, Book trusts himself.

Speaker:

I want to read that situation.

Speaker:

Okay, give me a read a situation roll.

Speaker:

All right.

Speaker:

That was, luckily, that was an 11.

Speaker:

Okay, ask me three.

Speaker:

Stu, I want to know what should I be on the lookout for?

Speaker:

And I would also...

Speaker:

That's an apt question.

Speaker:

Do I get two questions?

Speaker:

No.

Speaker:

You get three questions, actually.

Speaker:

And you actually ask me all three right now.

Speaker:

I want to know what I should be on the lookout for.

Speaker:

And I want to know who or what poses the biggest threat to me.

Speaker:

And then finally, what represents my best opportunity to befriend that wolf?

Speaker:

That is a much different question.

Speaker:

Intriguing.

Speaker:

Okay, I like it a lot, though.

Speaker:

Okay, so you hear this howl right as you're about to fall asleep, but it seems to be like cut off as you wake up and you're kind of confused about the situation, but you are certain you heard something.

Speaker:

So you kind of think about going back to sleep for a second, cuddle in a little closer, but then decide you got to at least check out to make sure you guys aren't in danger.

Speaker:

So you move up and you're trying to just peer over and get good vision on anything.

Speaker:

The lights are still on in the town, so it's still daytime.

Speaker:

Like I mentioned before, this strip of road here was predominantly lit by the light that you have since stolen.

Speaker:

So it is dark out there, very dark.

Speaker:

And you're peering and you can't really see anything, and then your light flashes on.

Speaker:

It goes flash, flash, flash, flash.

Speaker:

And you don't know if it was your movement.

Speaker:

You did move like a little bit, but you were being pretty careful.

Speaker:

But at flash, it's back off again.

Speaker:

I'll get to your answers, but I want to hear what you do first.

Speaker:

Hmm.

Speaker:

I...

Speaker:

Oh, man.

Speaker:

I think that I'm at the point where I wake up Ocean.

Speaker:

I'm a little jumpy.

Speaker:

What's going on?

Speaker:

I said, Hey, don't move, don't move.

Speaker:

But I know you mentioned you thought you saw something.

Speaker:

I just heard something, and I'm going to go check it out.

Speaker:

Was it like a dog or a wolf or something?

Speaker:

I think I heard a howl.

Speaker:

I'm going to go check it out.

Speaker:

Don't go anywhere.

Speaker:

Don't worry about it.

Speaker:

Try to rest.

Speaker:

But if you don't hear from me on the walkie talkie, in five minutes, something might be wrong.

Speaker:

And then I step out into the street.

Speaker:

OK, as you step out, flash, flash, flash, flash.

Speaker:

Do you move a few more steps?

Speaker:

And you're just now out on the edge of the street, and you get another flash, flash, flash, flash.

Speaker:

And this time you think you see on the edge of your periphery something sitting, staring at you.

Speaker:

You see the glint in the last flash.

Speaker:

You just see this glint in a pair of eyes.

Speaker:

But as the light goes out, it's gone.

Speaker:

That is probably what poses the biggest threat to you, whatever this thing on your periphery is.

Speaker:

OK.

Speaker:

So I'm holding my cane, and I choke up on it because I want to make sure that I can I can use it to defend myself if I need to, because again, it represents one armor.

Speaker:

And I also try to take out some food because I like animals.

Speaker:

And I'm thinking that this is just some kind of big, like stray dog is what I'm hoping for.

Speaker:

And I like dogs, and I don't want to hurt it.

Speaker:

But I also don't want it to eat us.

Speaker:

It's truly the dichotomy of mankind right there.

Speaker:

Just in a nutshell.

Speaker:

Okay, what food do you have that you take out?

Speaker:

I kind of sift through.

Speaker:

I have some trail mix.

Speaker:

I don't think it would be interesting that, but I do have some beef jerky.

Speaker:

Okay, so you lay out some beef jerky, or do you like toss it forward?

Speaker:

No, I'm holding it in my hand right now.

Speaker:

I don't want to ditch it if I don't need it, but I definitely saw some eyes over there.

Speaker:

And I want to see if I can lure whatever it is closer to me.

Speaker:

Where you're looking, you see no eyes.

Speaker:

You're staring.

Speaker:

It's just darkness.

Speaker:

It seems to be even darker than it was a moment before, but you're holding it out.

Speaker:

Back over at Ocean.

Speaker:

Oh.

Speaker:

Book doesn't see this at all for some reason.

Speaker:

He doesn't seem to be reacting.

Speaker:

He's just out of the view of you.

Speaker:

But Book, you don't react to this at all.

Speaker:

The light is just flashing incessantly.

Speaker:

It's like flash, does that like five times.

Speaker:

And then it's just dark again.

Speaker:

Do I see anything illuminated with the flashes?

Speaker:

Kind of like still see Book?

Speaker:

No, Book's around the corner for me now.

Speaker:

I just keep seeing the flashes.

Speaker:

Yeah, you just see the flashes happen like five times, like five alerts.

Speaker:

But you did not see anything, especially after the first one, like you're looking and you do not see anything.

Speaker:

Okay, despite Book telling me to remain here, I'm going to go out and try and see if I can figure out what's going on here.

Speaker:

Like, where has he been and everything?

Speaker:

Because something's not right here.

Speaker:

As you start moving further out towards the door, you trigger some of the flashes.

Speaker:

It goes flash, flash, flash.

Speaker:

And then again, one more time right when you get right to the door.

Speaker:

It's kind of how the pacing was.

Speaker:

Flash, flash, flash.

Speaker:

Book, you see these flashes as you're appearing into the darkness.

Speaker:

You see, you notice these flashes and look behind you, and Ocean is there.

Speaker:

When you see Ocean, you notice behind him, about ten feet, you see a whole pack of these wolf-like creatures.

Speaker:

And they are just, they're staring through him to you.

Speaker:

Well, it sounds like they are interested in my beef jerky.

Speaker:

Or they want to kill us.

Speaker:

And you get this feeling that the only way you could possibly make them be your friends is to open your mind to the psychic maelstrom.

Speaker:

Ocean, don't make any sudden movements, but I need you to move to your left, get away from the door, and whatever happens, please don't let them eat me.

Speaker:

And then I opened my mind to the psychic maelstrom.

Speaker:

Subs www.zeoranger.co.uk Thank you so much for listening again.

Speaker:

Last week, I told you to tell your two nerdiest friends about this podcast.

Speaker:

If you've already done that, please go tell your two coolest friends to give us a listen.

Speaker:

And if those happen to be the same two people, just go let your nerdy friends know and it'll make them very happy.

Speaker:

You can email us suggestions at oops at strew.cool, which is O O P S at S T U dot C O O L.

Speaker:

Music and Editing by Stu Masterson.

Speaker:

And that cool logo and all the art is by Brady McDonough.

Speaker:

Love you.

About the Podcast

Show artwork for Oops! All Apocalypses
Oops! All Apocalypses
An exploration of the collapse of society, via TTRPGs

About your hosts

Profile picture for Stu Masterson

Stu Masterson

Plays the Apocalypse. Also does music and editing.
Profile picture for Brady McDonough

Brady McDonough

Plays Book McReady. Draws the things. Lacks experience.
Profile picture for Jacob Cecil

Jacob Cecil

Plays Ocean. Has questionable knowledge about monkeys.