Stories with Dice
Stories with Dice is an actual-play podcast where a fellowship of everyday gamers explores fantastical worlds, distant futures, and parallel realities through tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs) from Free League Publishing, Chaosium, Modiphius Entertainment, and more.
Over the years, we’ve told stories around our virtual table in the worlds of Tales from the Loop, Pendragon, Mutant Year Zero, Star Trek Adventures, The One Ring, The Electric State, Forbidden Lands, Legend of the Five Rings, and Symbaroum. Going forward, we’re focusing on a smaller lineup of games, giving us more opportunities to return to each story sooner. As campaigns reach their natural conclusions, we’ll add new stories from the worlds of Twilight: 2000, Vampire: The Masquerade, The Walking Dead, and more.
We’re not voice actors, professional entertainers, or trained performers—just friends from around the globe sharing virtual dice, stories, and a laugh or two as the game unfolds.
Stories with Dice
The Cartography of Memory Episode 1: An Actual Play of The Electric State
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In an alternate 1997, across the abandoned outposts and fractured broadcasts of a forgotten California, a half-remembered signal draws together an unlikely trio: Roger, the mute bus driver bound for a past he can’t recall. IG-88, a battered gaming drone steered by an unseen hand. And Raymond, a private investigator haunted by a woman he can’t forget. Together, they set out on a road trip across memory and meaning. Every step writes a story. The question is—whose?
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Welcome to the Cartography of Memory, an actual play of the electric state from Stories with Dice. If you're enjoying our actual plays, please subscribe to Stories with Dice so you'll never miss an episode. Don't forget to rate and review us. It really helps others discover the podcast. Follow us on social media to stay updated. You'll find the relevant links in the description of each episode.
SPEAKER_03Welcome to another episode of Sources of Dice and Us. I believe we're the Star Trek crew.
SPEAKER_02We are we're the Star Trek crew, that's right. Except you're the GM now. I know. We're gonna do something very different, and it's not Star Trek. Well, actually, actually, minus Tony. Tony was in this our Star Trek game here, wasn't he? Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Good point. Okay, no Tony. So it's uh it's Star Trek Light. No captain, sorry guys. So what we're doing this this session or this this next few sessions, we're gonna be doing the Electric State from Freak. Some of you may have seen the film. It's not really like the film, but the film does take a slice of the electric state and kind of runs with it in its own way, as am I going to in this one. It's an art book, or it was originally an art book by a visual artist named Simon Stalinhag, who's done quite a lot of really cool artwork for this and for Tales from the Loop and some other stuff. So it's got some really nice visuals, which hopefully we can kind of, I'll do my best to kind of give you during the course of the story. But yeah, essentially it's about a game of, or it's a story about a journey of people in this sort of alternate 1997. Things have happened, the world is going to shit. Armageddon's just around the corner, but instead of it being a big bang, it's more of a slow dying whimper as everyone is kind of just slowly dying. So this really kind of explores finding out who you are, finding out what's going on in the sort of like history, I suppose, and just asks odd, weird questions. So we're gonna try and do that. I've listened to a few other actual play podcasts which I really liked with The Electric State. I hope I can do as well as them, but we'll try. It's a very different sort of take to that. So we're gonna do something a little bit different. Hopefully, you'll enjoy it. The people who if you're listening to this, you're gonna enjoy it. If not, switch off now, do something else, do the washing up, I don't know, maybe uh paint a room, or do that but listen to us. Well then it doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_00So yes, listening, that's the main point.
SPEAKER_03That is the key thing, like subscribe, all the usual stuff, right? Well, I'm not gonna say that. Wait, I've said it. Damn it. So, yes, I think we'll kind of make a start. It's a sort of a limited sort of number of sessions. We'll see how well we get on, and hopefully we'll we'll do that. So let's uh go all weird and melancholy and we have none of us have ever played this game before.
SPEAKER_02Ed has never GM'd it before. So, and we are all gonna stumble our way through this and have a good time doing it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, we're gonna actually play the shit out of this. Yeah. So, right, let's start then. So I have a primer feeble. The name of this journey is called The Cartography of Memory. I'm just gonna read this to you. This is something I've really passed to the players previous to this. Across the abandoned outposts and fractured broadcasts of a forgotten California, something says, a signal half sung, half remembered. You've each heard pieces of it, fragments of lives not quite your own, echoes that bind you in a mystery older than your recollection. Your journey begins with voices hidden in static and deepens into choices etched in forgotten identity and possibility. You'll traverse a landscape shaped not by geography, but by emotion and memory. What you remember will guide you. What you forgot may define you. This is a road trip across memory and meaning, where the terrain itself shifts in response to what you feel and who you're becoming. Every step writes a story. The question is, whose? That's our introduction to the uh to the story. At this point, I'm gonna ask each of the players to just give me a little bit of background behind them and just give us a little history, a little something. And now I know that Marco has prepared something earlier, so uh Marco, shall we start with you?
SPEAKER_02So I'm a drone pilot named IG eighty eight. Yeah. I named myself after that blink and you missed it Assassin Droid from the Empire Strikes Back. Do you see where I'm going with this? No? Well let me spell it out for you. I'm on a bus with a guy named Roger. Haven't let him out of my sight since Raymond, the private investigator I hired to find him. Tracked him down a month ago. Why Roger? Well, I was a drone pilot in the war. Some politician thought it was a good idea to send war machines to police a civilian protest. Things went sideways fast. It was a massacre. Roger's father was there. I'll never forget the look in his eyes, just before I killed him. After the war I tried everything, therapy, meds. Nothing worked. Nothing except the neuroscape. That's why I stay inside this gaming drone. I feel safe with my mind inside this device. More importantly, other people are safe from me. I mean, look at me, I'm a stupid toy, totally harmless. I do wonder what'll happen to my mind when my human body dies. And I want to find out. But not before I try to set things right with Roger. That's why I'm here. He doesn't know what I did. Neither does Raymond. I'm here to try to fix things. It's the least I can do. But lately I've been picking up something on the broadcasts, fragments of data and memories, voices, lost in static. Some caught the day of the massacre. And there's something else. A memory, not my own. A civilian in that crowd, someone who survived. Someone who knew my missing mother. I don't know what it means yet, but I'm going to find out. Amazing. Douglas.
SPEAKER_00Okay, so I'm Roger. I've for the last quite a few years, I've just been traveling around Pacifica. Used to be just driving by myself, but then when the money started running out, I thought I would try my hand at making some money from my traveling, whereas why I got hold of a bus and started just trucking people around this state after everything started going to heck in a handbasket. Many, many, many years ago, I used to have a proper job, proper sort of like white picket fence, that sort of thing. Then it all kind of went wrong and I started travelling. Fortunately, things are a bit hazy from back then. And since he started traveling, he just doesn't speak anymore. He's gone mute. It makes things awkward for him, but he gets by and he's learned how to deal with it. Yeah, there's this recently when travelling around in the bus and that sort of thing, he's been picking up these radio signals on the radio late at night, which he doesn't really know why, but they're making him reflect back on his like life from before when he the white picket fence life, and he doesn't really think about that time anymore, but he feels for some reason drawn back to sort of like go back to that time in his life. Now, the house he originally had is long gone, or at least however, but there is like a holiday home that he used to have up in the sort of like mountains of California, which he feels sort of like that would be a good place to maybe go to try and reconcile these feelings or whatever. And but all of a sudden a month ago, this robot turned up and hasn't really left him alone and he's a bit unsure about it. But he's not letting that bother him at the moment. And as he said, he's once again he's going to make a journey, but he might as well make some money from it. So he's put around some adverts saying, I'm heading off to Lone Pines, which is where near the near sort of like town where the cabin used to be. And the robot has decided to come along. He doesn't know why. The robot just seems to stick around. And then also this Raymond guy who turned up like a month or so ago, is also coming along with a few other people. Thank you very much. Come alo.
SPEAKER_01Raymond Axelrod. Once upon a time I was a proper gumshoe back in San Francisco pounding the beat. I remember how it was before. Or do I really remember? I'm not sure. But I do remember she was there. Or was she there? I don't know, I would wake up some days, and she would be gone. And I would spend time searching for her in between jobs. I would go down to the bay, watch the vessels against the glittering silt banks, glittering in the light of a low sun as though a handful of stars had fallen from the sky and accumulated on the shoreline in clusters. The ocean water would ripple back and twinkle in response like a silent conversation. But she is in the back of my mind, in my memory. Sometimes these days, since the big shit happened, I might hear her on my hand radio. Batteries aren't about to die, or I think I hear her, I don't know. But there's IG-88. I knew him before as well, before the big shit. And well, I guess that's his story to tell. But he called me up, found me actually, down and out as I usually am, drunk in a bar. Or what's remains of a bar and what they call whiskey. Sure what it's made out of these days, sent me on course to find Roger. For a particular reason. A reason that is all his own. Me, I'm just along to try and put the pieces back together again of what was in my head and who she was if she even existed. So I take the job, I go where I need to go. I'm pretty good at what I do, and everything else, if it falls into place, it falls into place. But let's go deeper into the shit. Here we are.
SPEAKER_03Okay, well, thank you very much. Now, Roger, who has the bus, you have enough space for everyone to sort of bring a couple of items with them with you. You are currently driving from Pismo Bay, which I believe you know well-ish. Um Pismo Beach, I believe. Pismo Beach, sorry. Pismo Beach. Thank you very much. Well, there we go, we'll start off with that. And you'll be making your way up through into Lone Pine, which is under normal circumstances or before everything turned to shit. Probably a half a day drive. Now though, with the wonders of your bus, is more like a couple of days' drive. If you're lucky, you might be able to make it in a day if everything goes well. If not, then you might uh stop at a motel or something along the way and park up for the night. But anyway, I digress. You have with you two other people on the bus who is also coming along on this journey. Uh, but we'll talk about them in a bit. There is a list of items that you've that you've got. You've already created characters, you've already created backstories for you. But before you go on this journey, the key thing I want to do is uh there is a list on page 63 of the book. You can pick one of those items to take with you. And this is just some gear that you can have to hand that anyone can access that'll might help you during the course of this journey. What is that gear that's that IG-88? Because we don't know what your real name is, what what what's IG-88 gonna take?
SPEAKER_02Maybe I'd take tools for my neurocaster so that I could uh use I could repair it.
SPEAKER_03Okay, that's brilliant. So you've got tools for your neurocaster. What about Raymond? What's Raymond gonna take with him?
SPEAKER_01Raymond is wavering between binoculars and a bottle of hard liquor. Dude, you're taking the bottle of hard liquor, come on. Yeah, I'm taking the bottle of hard liquor. It's it's sort of like the metaphor for my whole life.
SPEAKER_02After that character intro, you're taking the bottle of hard liquor.
SPEAKER_01No problem.
SPEAKER_00And Roger. So shared shared stuff. Maybe I was gonna say is there tools tools general?
SPEAKER_03Do they just work for the general tools for pretty much repairing most things?
SPEAKER_00I'll just take tools general, I suppose then.
SPEAKER_02There is a vehicle tool, tools vehicle.
SPEAKER_00Well, uh I would like something that would also work for the other stuff as well, just in case. Okay. But uh Okay, that's brilliant.
SPEAKER_03Well, on a uh in fact, Douglas, having never been to Pismo Beach, but you have, give me a description of Pismo Beach, but add a electric state feel to it.
SPEAKER_00Okay. So Pismo Beach, from what I remember of it, is it's a small smallish town that at least when I visited it, is kind of past it. No offense to anyone who's listening to podcasts who lives in Pismo Beach. I am apologising for There you go. Disclaimer It's kind of past its prime, like even before you put on the sort of is electric state aesthetic. It used to be sort of a very popular surfing sort of thing, but that was more in the 60s and that sort of thing. It does sort of have like these sort of like small town shops and that sort of thing, but has seen it's all a bit out of date, even by like the 90s standards. So now that sort of like out-of-day stuff is now pretty much decrepit and whatnot. But once again, maybe like it would have been an ice surfing spot, but nowadays they have the remnants of like those big drones just sitting in the surfs that you find all the way down like big surf on the sort of like coastline that are from like the war. Yep. Which probably just ruined the sort of like surf economy because it's a big sort of like wave breaker. Everything's a bit run down. The sort of like people who are left around here are like the people who are here forever, pretty much.
SPEAKER_03Everyone who's who was gonna uh go up and coming, not that that's much of a thing anymore, probably has moved to San Francisco or Los Angeles.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, or LA's just down like a couple hours down the coast, maybe, or something else. Just down the coast. They also used to. The other thing that used to be here, but has kind of fallen away, is it used to be I believe it there's a special sort of breeding group for a certain type of butterfly. Mm-hmm. Whatnot. But that sort of like nobody cares about that sort of thing in the sort of like fallen thing. But you can see sort of like lots of things in the town, maybe to do with like butterflies or like that sort of aesthetic. So maybe like this you could get from like the sh local stores or the tourist things, you'd get surfer stuff, or you'd be able to get like these pictures of butterflies.
SPEAKER_03That probably is something that is still going on, but now they have digital migrations instead of actual migrations. So there is uh small robots of butterflies that they that kind of work half the time, which people can go and see. But uh as you said, it is a little rundown. It is a little past its prime, which is probably a a good way to describe it.
SPEAKER_02Robot butterflies is probably operated by the CIA.
SPEAKER_03Probably.
SPEAKER_02Or more likely Centro. Right, yes. Who owns it?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. The CIA. And our one it is, let's say.
SPEAKER_03It definitely is now butterflies. But that's where you're gonna get onto this bus. Now, is that because, Roger, this is where you live? Which is where you come from, or are you just passing through?
SPEAKER_00This is probably just the latest stop on his sort of like tour of just whatever. So this is probably where he's been for like three or four months, maybe. Which has probably m been why he's people have been able to find him. Cause he's usually pretty mobile.
SPEAKER_03Okay, that makes sense. And so what have you put in your poster or or your advertisement to say, hey, I'm off the Lone Pines, where do you need to go or where do you need to get to?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Probably just let's say. It'll be probably just pretty basic information on it, just like bus there will be a bus trip leaving from Pismo Beach to Lone Trees and the thing. If you wish to, please turn up uh outside to the whatever tourist shop at this time on this date.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_00Please bring your own food and whatever.
SPEAKER_03Sure. Well, it's this time and that date when you arrive. Now, under normal circumstances, this is where you would ask the other players what their goal is to get to Lone Pine, but we already know from both Margo and Cormelo that they're basically stalking you. So they're going there because that's where you're going, which is pretty straightforward for me. Now, in Pesmat Beach, it's it's raining. It's it's that horrible light rain that comes in off of the shore. It's it doesn't make it any cooler. It's still hot, it's still humid. When you are at your bus, which is sort of off-red colour, it's a short bus. You are waiting by your bus and waiting for the I guess it's the five people who or four people who said they were gonna come along. When you have someone turn up. Carmelo, can you describe your character and what do you do when you're getting on board the bus?
SPEAKER_01Well, I'm a thin uh scarecrow of a man. My mid-40s, slightly grey at the temples, bit of a Roman nose, and I kind of scowl and smell like cigarettes, even though I haven't smoked one in a long time, you know. They aren't around very easily. They're not easy to get these days. When I'm getting on uh getting on the bus, I'm waiting for further direction from IG-88. I've I've accomplished the mission that I was originally hired for, which is to find Roger. So now, beside my own personal desire to go to this place, I'm coming along at the assistance of uh IG-88 for further help along the way. I maybe needed to look into things that may be beneficial to us or save our lives.
SPEAKER_03Is there any interaction between you and Roger?
SPEAKER_01At the moment, not much. We just sort of kind of like acknowledge each other's existence at the moment, but we haven't really spoken a lot yet.
SPEAKER_03Presumably, Roger, you'll take said money that is owed for the trip. But you presumably aren't very engaging because you're mute. So yeah, you go and sit down. You're followed very swiftly by a short man who is fairly stocky, but he's got a bit of a cheeky grin to himself. He's wearing all black, he's got like a black bomber jacket, black jeans, and he has a large grey tanned dog with him. Tells the dog to sit, and the dog very obediently sits, and he says, Good daddy. He says, Is this the uh is this the bus to Lone Pine?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, Broadrill just uh nod and then just sort of give a sort of gesture over to him to be like, and do you? If he if I don't know exactly who this person is.
SPEAKER_03Um yeah, he hands uh he goes into his wallet and hands you some cash for the trip. It says, uh I'm Paul. And uh you don't mind the dog coming aboard? He's very great, Daddy, uh and the dog looks at you with these bright, bright blue eyes. The dog has an intensity that you have not seen. Since well, since the she hit the fan, you've kind of figured that if the dog wanted to, it would quite easily rip your throat out and at at the at the lightest you know indicator from Paul. But large dog. It is it's a friendly large dog. It is probably it's sort of when it sits down, its head is probably at Paul's, just above Paul's weight. Like I'll station German Shepherd size. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the press is the name of the dog. And it kind of gets up, it makes its way onto the bus, has to see, and it says, Thank you very much, shakes your hand. If you need a thing, just ask. And he walks to the back of the bus aware the dog and him sit down. And then you're followed by IG88. He waves.
SPEAKER_02So Douglas, does Roger have like a notepad that he writes on when he's communicating with people? No.
SPEAKER_00Very often. It varies in the situation. He just doesn't really not very talkative person, unless. Yep. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So IG88 is a a gamer, a gaming drone. He's an elite trooper gaming drone. So he's he's probably about, I imagine, hobbit sized in terms of height. You know, small. He's he's got a round, totally round head. He's his his his metal body is like all white but it's got a bunch of you know scratch in it and his he has like one red eye that kind of looks like like that Hal Hal 9000 kind of plate with the with the red red dot in the center that's sort of that's what he has for an eye and he's got a gun he has a machine a machine submachine gun which he has strapped to you know on his shoulder and he just comes on board hands you some cash and sits on the in the chair directly behind the driver's seat kind of like where a kid would sit kind of thing yeah and then just afterwards uh a lady comes aboard and she says hello I'm Tiffany nice to meet you and she shakes your hand she says uh lone pine is that correct Roger nods uh excellent that's really good I can't wait I I haven't been on the bus for such a long time and I saw recommendation that you did a really good job with a friend of mine she's really really happy with with your service and so I'm really happy I it it's really nice to meet you and she sort of like shakes your hand yeah thumbs up and she hands over some money you very quickly notice there is a lot more money in in that purse that she's got but she kind of gives you the money and she goes and sits down one of the uh one of the chairs.
SPEAKER_03Okay. That is your full compliment of people for the bus.
SPEAKER_00Alright I'll hang around outside until like give it another like 15 minutes to see if anyone else turns up. What is the vehicle like? As you said it's a sort of American style school busy short bus thing but it's red colours. The paint's probably at this point peeling a bit you said it was does it have any sort of like writing on the side of it or anything specific unless you put something on there. I was gonna say correctional facility but that would be a bit too much.
SPEAKER_03I mean maybe maybe deep down underneath the red that there is some like um there's some odd odd writing that maybe comes through that might say correctional facility that's fine. Possibly does it mean does that mean there's still mesh on the windows?
SPEAKER_00If it was from a correctional facility why not it it does feel some some of the windows still have the original mesh and some of it's just fallen off maybe. Okay. What not as they how is it decorated inside? Well based on the like the original sort of thing it's probably pretty sparse with these weird sort of like hooks on the floor. Okay I like that wonder what those were about what does this smell like inside the bus? Probably like a bunch of people have like been s lived inside this bus for a while sort of like petrol diesely smell as well from the engine maybe and how does it handle it? It's probably a bit of a bit of a pig to drive whatchamacallit maybe the power maybe if there was power steering on this thing it's kind of not a hundred percent working anymore so it is a bit of just like a million turns to get anywhere okay right well you wait for the last amount of time no one else turns up and you start your journey.
SPEAKER_03What music are you putting on the radio?
SPEAKER_00I'll just tune it to whatever I can find a frequency for in the area. Okay there's a local Pacifica radio?
SPEAKER_03Okay. What's playing on the radio?
SPEAKER_02What's playing on the radio probably you know all the grungy hits that you would expect from the 90s Nirvana Soundgarden Pearl Jam the cranberries yeah it's a move it's there's there's a there's a mixture of all those as you sort of make your way out of Pisno Beach.
SPEAKER_03And yeah you kind of get onto the uh the the main road that kind of comes out of Pisno Beach very quickly go onto some of the smaller streets. The reason for that being that a lot of the larger motorways are one strewn with a lot of uh leftovers from the war but also the bits of road that are clear you have to end up paying tolls for which the the government or what's left of the government costs quite a bit of money. So a lot of people then take a lot of their time and take a lot of their vehicles off of the main roads which means you have to find your own way around and you do you you take off in the sort of like misty rain it's humid I'm imagining the air conditioning does not work great on the bus. So unless some people have got some windows open you might get the odd breeze but it's it's a fairly bumpy and warm ride. And this is why it's good not to have a human body indeed. So you are you drive and you drive for a while and as you're driving every now and then on the radio it crackles through you lose connection to whatever radio station you're listening to and a low static hums through the radio you have to turn the radio off and on do this a few times every now and then you hear the sound of what sounds like a pulse or slightly louder static and in between the sort of like static you can hear the odd word mumbled by someone out somewhere in the distance somewhere over the airwaves you drive out of the uh out into sort of the arid grasslands of the uh Carrizo plains this is on your way out towards I guess the central part of Pacifica as you're getting closer and you're driving this this is the direction you need to drive the static and the pulses become stronger and in the distance you can see glinting steel and as you get closer you can see a whole selection of silos on top of the silos are all these radio antennas in the center of the silos you can see an old church. As you're going past this your bus suddenly starts to cough and choke and you lose power to the truck or to the to the bus. Which means you have to pull over you pull over onto the side of the road probably no more than a hundred meters away from the silos and this church and you can feel the static as it hums in your bones.
SPEAKER_00I'll stand up and point to the front of the thing and be like engine thumbs down we and then sort of gesture as in we hear for a while time. Yep and then you're opens the door and goes to have a look at the engine. Okay.
SPEAKER_03IG88 will follow him yep you hop down as you stand on the side of the road it's very different to Hesai Beach. It's sort of arid winds long grass and the the the soil is sort of of this really pale brown and your feet your metal feet crunch the stones and the gravel underneath all you can hear is wind and this haunting harmony of static as it rushes through at the tops of these silos.
SPEAKER_02While while Roger is looking at the engine is it possible for IG88 to just sort of scan the area the immediate area for any potential danger? Absolutely shall we uh do the first roll of the of the game?
SPEAKER_03I think we shall let's let's set the precedent for the rest of this uh campaign exactly so you want to look around that's fine you've got four stats strength agility wits and empathy this absolutely falls under the wits category you don't have any skills this game doesn't have skills uh what it does is it have talents those talents allow you to add bonuses to to the role so if you had a specific talent that would allow you to observe things in greater detail it might give you plus two or something to that role also if you've got any equipment that also might give you a bonus like binoculars like binoculars for example right well I have no talent and I have no equipment that would help me so I'm just gonna roll a straight witch roll that would be great okay it's gonna be the kind of game where we get no successes okay now under normal circumstances because you are a drone pilot you're already in if you were using if you were using this neurocaster to do something in the near escape and you failed you would gain what they call a point of bliss. Essentially every time you fail when you're doing something in this ethoscape this neuroscape when you get to your level of hope and they both level out it means that you're then caught within the near escape and you stay there forever. So hence if you were to look at the book there's lots of pictures of a lot of dead people with with uh these these uh neurocasters on and that's because they could never leave the the near escape and so they stopped eating they stopped drinking and they just basically died. But thankfully this is not happening for you because you're a drone. But yes you look around and you do not see any any threats whatsoever which is why it's very alarming to you that when you turn your back to look at a project fixing or attempting to have a look and see what the problem is with the bus, that a woman says excuse me.
SPEAKER_02I'm assuming my drone can speak by the way so uh yes you drone can speak yeah yeah I I so I turn around and I I I look to see who just who just said excuse me.
SPEAKER_03You can see a woman wearing looks like a nun's habit but instead of the white and black it's black and red. That isn't creepy at all.
SPEAKER_02Hello there how are you we're just fixing our bus and then we'll be we'll be on our way we're fine we're fine.
SPEAKER_03Thank you for asking except with the the rest of the people who are sitting on the bus or or potentially getting off the bus.
SPEAKER_01What's Raymond doing well I was sitting on the bus but I need to stretch my legs and it's getting kinda stinky in here so I'll just come out and poke my head around through the door what's going on?
SPEAKER_02Raymond the uh the we're not sure yet Roger's checking out the engine and And then this this none showed up out of nowhere.
SPEAKER_01None well I think we should have none of that yeah long story short they spook me I think uh we better be uh better be a bit careful here she's looking at you you heard you heard you heard the man on on your way on your way miss on your way bye sister first okay I was gonna ask if you'd like some lemonade can you uh have a way of testing this thing out to make sure it's just lemon and water and sugar? No I don't think so right okay well so who's gonna be the first victim to try it she says she puts a hand out to you Raymond and says hi I'm Sister Coyle nice to meet you. Raymond Axelrad not so sure just yet but let's wait a while.
SPEAKER_03Can you please make a twitter roll for me? Yeah I'm left clicking nothing's going on just gonna quickly refresh now try again.
SPEAKER_01Okay doesn't seem to be doing anything. Well I will do it for you yeah okay yeah blame Ed if it's a failure.
SPEAKER_03Yeah I blame me 100% Well if it's if it's a pass that means you want me to roll for everybody. Nah then we just accuse you of fudging the dice okay well you need to know there is there's no no successes either. Yeah okay she she immediately says okay well that's your choice and she sort of like takes a couple of steps back and just shuts her eyes and she's sort of like listening. You can feel the wind the warm arid wind as it kind of like gets up some of the dust and it kind of blows through the grass and you can hear that static and that sort of noise as it kind of whistles through all the silos with all the creaking metal antenna on top and she um she's just sounds like she's actually just listening to the sound of the the antenna and everything else. Roger how's the engine looking so Roger can you also please make in fact you don't have to make a roll there's nothing wrong with the the engine it looks like there's an issue with the electrics and you're trying to figure out what the problem is.
SPEAKER_00I just kind of look back and just be like shrug and just go back to looking through the engine to try and figure out what's wrong with the actual electronics.
SPEAKER_03Okay. Paul gets off the bus as does his dog he basically takes the dog for a short walk down down the road to stretch the dog's legs and to go for the you know obligatory poop. Tiffany is still on board the bus and it looks like she is just relaxing. Okay. The nun smiles at you and walks back up the little path towards the church.
SPEAKER_01Well that was weird IG idiate yeah that was really weird exactly sure what she was listening to whatever it was I certainly like to have whatever she smoked.
SPEAKER_03I got a bad feeling about this can you please make a empathy roll for me empathy probably like the strongest suit no sir uh no you're fine maybe someone will succeed this session yeah well you kind of you can feel something sort of in your electrodes when you kind of like stop and listen the sound of the humming and buzzing of the antenna sort of start to sort of creep into your subprocessors and within the subprocessors you can hear the sound of singing. What kind of voice is it male female? It's a it's a it's a choral kind of like almost like a heavenly kind of quality? Yes yeah yeah something along those lines can I make out any words no they sound maybe sounds maybe like Latin potentially but you don't really understand Latin so it's kind of a bit like that it's not quite it's words but you can't quite grasp it I guess is the right but it is it is strangely soothing.
SPEAKER_02Is anyone else hearing this?
SPEAKER_01I'm picking up some kind of strange religious type singing the only thing I felt was a strange prickling up the back of my neck. However maybe I should try turning my portable radio on and see if I can hear that hear that there's that well that's a good idea.
SPEAKER_03So just hearing static at the moment wait thought I heard something in the background kind of like play around with the tuning yeah and yeah you kind of you kind of like switch between all the different channels and behind there you can hear a lullaby you can hear the sound of a child giggling and just behind that child giggling you can hear the sound of maybe a mother cooing to her child and then it kind of goes back into static and it keeps coming backwards and forwards.
SPEAKER_01Well I certainly didn't hear any choral singing but did you hear that IG8?
SPEAKER_02Did I hear it coming out of his radio?
SPEAKER_01Yep you did affirmative Okay I don't like this place. No and I haven't even had a drink this morning.
SPEAKER_02Roger Roger how long do you think we're gonna be here?
SPEAKER_00Roger kind of turns back and then gives a shrug and then just sort of like points at his watch and then puts up like multiple fingers as in he's saying like who knows a long time maybe any chance I can poke my head in there and see if I can give you a hand? Yeah he he steps away and sort of like gestures towards it as in help yourself.
SPEAKER_03You're gonna have to like pick the drone up because he is little the truck is the bus is target.
SPEAKER_00So you'd have to like pick him up like a child with a toddler to basically put him up over the sort of like edge in here's the question is is IG and AG88 going to ask for this when he gets up to the vehicle? Yes I'm gonna have my hands up like pick me up give me a boost give me a boost Roger just kind of like sighs and then just like grabs him by the way the two hands around his waist and then picks up like a sort of like cat or baby.
SPEAKER_03As you pick him up you can feel the static coming from IG88 it kind of like goes and radiates out of his body down into your hands and into your arms and you can at that moment you kind of hear on the wind is the best way to describe it for you. One of your parents are calling you by your nickname when you're a kid it's just really soft and it's really in the background but it is really weird.
SPEAKER_00Yeah he kind of like he hasn't quite pulled AG80 all the way up before he stops and then is kind of like looking off into sort of the middle distance for like a few seconds and then just kind of like shakes head and then pick put puts AG88 all the way up okay right yeah I mean IGA8 you kind of look in you can't see anything wrong you know it looks like an engine of a bus and you reckon you're gonna have to like spend a bit of time trying to figure out what's wrong.
SPEAKER_03And that's fine you can do that. Okay. So yeah you and Roger can kind of work on that. Raymond you're gonna stay outside you're gonna get back on the bus. Paul is off down the way kind of like walking his dog um and Tiffany is just sitting on the bus reading a book.
SPEAKER_01I'm gonna stay where I am and and try and observe this situation see if I can see anything untoward part of my um part of my gumshoe intuition to keep keep keep aware of my surroundings.
SPEAKER_03Okay yeah that's fine you continue to do that and you can see that as as you probably not long after the nun has gone back into the sort of like little church the the intensity of the buzzing increases through the silos and you can definitely feel that static picking up the the hairs that were on your back that were starting to raise are now really raised. The static on your radio continues to blurt out small snippets of things it's almost like someone's captured maybe three seconds of a snapshot of something and it's kind of overridden by the static but every now and then something comes out the baby giggling the mum cooing there's potentially maybe a sportscaster telling telling you that one of the teams have scored a touchdown or a point it could be what sounds like maybe air traffic controller. It's just these little tiny snippets that kind of come out of the radio here and there but all underneath this sort of low hum and every now and then it kind of hums and pulses and it has like a beat it has like a sway there is some kind of musicality to it.
SPEAKER_02Are you hearing this IG88 Roger IG's sort of got his head stuck under the hood of the car. He's like on his hands and knees at this point so he doesn't need Roger to hold him anymore. You know he's got his knees his little robot knees or drone knees on the edge of the bus and then he's sort of right inside poking around under the hood.
SPEAKER_01Whatever you're doing IG88 I would suggest maybe you try and quicken the pace if you can there is a I feel a distinct static buildup my radio's picking it up we need to be very aware that this could lead to something something might happen in any minute and my gumshoe intuition is saying run like hell.
SPEAKER_02And he looks up at that point and he he pokes his head around the hood to Raymond and a clip of Empire Strikes Back he plays it in you know it's our Darth Vader's voice telling Boba Fett no disintegration so did I learn anything poking my head around in there?
SPEAKER_03There's obviously something wrong with the electrics and you'll have to like kind of like follow the electrics around it's gonna take a little it's gonna take a bit of time. But you'll probably find it could be a connection that's probably missing there's nothing intricately intricately intricately intricately wrong? No intrinsically wrong intrinsically wrong with the engine itself so you reckon somewhere along the line it's just basically you two have to kind of like find a used connection get it right that's pretty much it. And that will take a certain amount of time to do and I'm more than happy you'll half the time if both of you do it which I'm guessing you're gonna go ahead and yes okay meanwhile okay I'm no longer touching IG so I'm not hearing everything anymore. No but you've definitely you definitely can feel like a the static in the air and so that your hair is sort of like you know that just kind of like um like before a storm or something like that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah just like before a storm yeah does it look like there's a sign of a storm on the horizon like clouds the sky is completely clear.
SPEAKER_03There's sun beating down on you it's warm there is a breeze but it's just a warm breeze. So between the static the creaking of the uh the metal and the sound of the wind going through the long grass there's probably in excess of maybe 60 70 towers that's sort of like on the plane and it looks like these old silos and it looks like at some point the silos have been turned into some kind of radio antenna.
SPEAKER_00Oh actually rather in a storm this is like when you you stand too close to a substation or a transformer yeah that that that is exactly it yeah. Okay. I guess he'll turn Roger'll turn to Raymond and then just sort of like Roger's wearing like a very short sleeve sort of Hawaiian shirt all the time. I never described him, but yeah. And he'll sort of just like point to like all the hairs standing up on his arm and then just point to the tower.
SPEAKER_01Raymond says, You tell me about it. I know we're standing too close to this and not exactly liking the situation. A suspicious person, you know, maybe it's not a loose uh loose wiring under there. Maybe that maybe the towers had something to do with us draining electricity from the from the bus. Don't know, but we need to figure out this problem right away. Electricity and flesh don't really go together very well.
SPEAKER_00Roger shakes his head and he just sort of like makes a gesture of like two wires, fit puts his finger together as two wires, and then does as broken and then points at the bus.
SPEAKER_01Okay, fine. That's fine, Roger. But like I say, electricity and uh flesh don't go well together. I'm not exactly sure if these what these towers are gonna do. I would be loath to think if they discharge.
SPEAKER_03There's sudden barking from down the road, and you can see Paul and the dog coming back towards you.
SPEAKER_01Are they running or are they in a hurry?
SPEAKER_03No, they're they're they're they're they're walking with purpose, but they're not running.
SPEAKER_01Notice they're walking with purpose, then I believe. And I might ask them, what did you see? What's going on down there?
SPEAKER_03So as you walk to the end of the bus to go and speak to them as you're coming to see them, pull points in a direction that obviously you wouldn't have seen because of the hill. And you can see this maybe 20-foot-tall robot walking towards you. Large, kind of circular body, but it's got sort of rudimentary arms and legs, and a whole lot of cables. All the cables are sort of spread out, and they kind of like rain down like large, like a large beard, but with like thin strands. And at the end of each strand, you can see a person with a neurocaster on. And you can probably make out 12 or 15 people all connected to this robot through these long strands coming off its face, essentially.
SPEAKER_02So I IG88, he turns his head and when he sees that, he plays another clip from Star Wars. Obi-Wan's voice plays over the speaker, I guess, that he has in his head. Yeah, that isn't creepy at all. Uh, and he says, That's no moon, that's a space station.