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 3: An Actual Play of The Electric State
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Within the vast Museum of Forgetting, a long-buried message from IG-88’s mother lures the travelers into a treacherous Neuroscape—and toward a hidden vault.
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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 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_01So, yes, welcome back to The Electric State. With me, as always, I have my well, I was gonna be mean to you there for a second, but I just thought, no, no, I have my wonderful co-host with me. As usual, Marco. Thanks. Thanks. And best GM ever. Yeah, yeah. And and and and it's a family affair, so we've got Marco's brother Carmelo. Hi, hi, Carmelo.
SPEAKER_02And I actually neglected to mention that he has a for all of our listeners out there, he has an ebook that is out. Can you tell us the name of the book, Carmelo? It's an e-short story called The Clarity of Ice from Zama Shorts, which is bringing lots of short stories to your Kindle or any other device. Well, there you go. Shameless plug of the evening. So shameless, shameless.
SPEAKER_01Pick that up. Might as well do it while you can, right? And uh Douglas, as it seems to me you used to be on quite a lot of them. What? Books? Podcasts. Maybe. I mean you could be on book, you could be on books under there.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and then I'll have to write a book by next week and then I can chill on the last episode of this.
SPEAKER_01We'll we'll both have to write a book, because then we'll all like kind of like be in the club, right? So, back to uh our wonderful game. Michael Handley uh updated me as to what we did last session because I've been lazy, denying it. So we'll just go where we left off. I believe Roger was unhappily playing with a broken pinball machine. Raymond was listening to some some music which was quite nostalgic for him, and our drone pilot, IG88, name still we don't know, heard find out that there was a message on the computer system from his mother from many years ago saying, Come and find me, which is where we leave you, which is where we left you all last time. So So wait, that message was from years ago?
SPEAKER_02Yes. I thought it was like real time, okay.
SPEAKER_01Well, it it it it stand from years ago.
SPEAKER_02Okay. That I think that was a detail that was lacking in the at the very end there. Yes, yeah. Last episode. Okay, cool.
SPEAKER_01Yes. So uh yeah, so you you're you're in this this museum of forgetting, a uh labyrinthian archive of things from the past, you know, from pretty much the old vinyl records, the pinball machines, to old cars sitting in the car park, uh, to the old leather sofas, dusty old books, as well as various other things. There is a plethora of things from an olden time. And it's all housed in this massive hanger. The only person that's with you is a lady by the name of Jell, who you vaguely recall having worked here when you were younger, and you kind of remember sort of this feeling of trust and and and sort of someone that you could cling on to. And as you've been kind of doing the things you've been doing, you've slowly been re-remembering things from your past. One of the things that you've just remembered is that she doesn't look all that different to when you remember her, down to sort of like the clothes she's wearing. No wrinkles, no grey hair. No.
SPEAKER_02She hasn't aged a day, is what you're telling me. She's like Bilbo Baggins. A bit like that. Interesting.
SPEAKER_01And it only just comes to you. It's that kind of like slow understanding of Oh right, okay, yes.
SPEAKER_02Is there a way, this message, is there a way to track where it came from? Probably. That would be an internal thing though, and I can't do those things.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you'd need someone to sort of like well, you'd need someone to sort of plug in through a neurocaster for them to do that here. Which means you'll have to ask one of your compatriots to do that. So you do know that there is actually a a local neuronet. Yeah. So it does actually it is actually on a neuroscape. So not only does it have the old stuff that's physically here, there's a neuroscape that goes along with it. If you wanted to plug into that, you could. Okay. Unfortunately, not she. Not me.
SPEAKER_02No, no, no. What about Jel? Maybe Jell will do it for us. She says, sorry, what now? This message from my mother. Yes. Can you tell me where it came from? You'll have to go into the Neuroscape for that.
SPEAKER_01Sure, she says, I can do that. She wanders over to sort of a counter. She pulls out an old neurocaster, and she goes over to sort of the uh the plug-in near the sofas. There's that sort of like a large rug in the middle of this large room. And she sort of sits down and she sort of adjusts the neurocaster onto her head, and she locks in and she goes quiet.
SPEAKER_02So while she's doing that, is there any way to determine whether or not she's like a real person? And how would you do that? I don't know. How would what how would a drone go about just finding out if someone is a robot or Presumably she'll bleed if she's a real person?
SPEAKER_01Are you suggesting that I should cut her? I'm I'm saying that, you know, there is g you're gonna have to figure out how that someone's a real person, and presumably no one's gonna put real blood in a I will check her pulse. I will check her pulse on her wrist. Okay, great. Unfortunately you have metal fingers, which doesn't help.
SPEAKER_02Oh right. Or do you have a sense of touch technically? No. Hey Roger. You go over there and you go, yeah, if you call Roger, he'll just sort of look over. Roger, Roger, come over, come over here for a minute. Okay. He puts the broken bit of the pinball machine down on the thing. Stop messing about with that busted pinball machine. I don't know what you think you're trying to do over there. Okay. And then he walks up to you and just looks at you, being like, yeah. Check this lady's pulse for me, will ya? He sort of raises an eyebrow at you. As in why? Because I want to know if she's alive or not. He kind of like looks at you a bit weird as in you were just talking to her. Yeah, come on, humor your old pal IG-88. He shrugs, and then I suppose he has a think, what's the best way to sort of like, hmm, check her for. So I guess he'll probably try and take the pulse on the neck.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, he You gotta sort of like touch her neck, and she sort of like flinches from you sort of like putting it up into the neurocaster. She takes off the neurocaster and looks at you and goes, What are you doing?
SPEAKER_02Oh he was just checking your fit to make sure you had a pulse. We w you were, you know, you went stone cold when you put that thing out. We thought maybe you died or something. She looks at you funny, and she sort of, I'm fine, thanks.
SPEAKER_01And you know, while we're at it, how is it that you don't look a day older than when I last She looks at you and says, You don't look a day away, you don't look like yourself at all. You don't even know who I am. Fuck. We've never met before today. We have never met before today, but you seem like you've never aged. Weird, right? Uh so Raymond, you're sort of quite happily listening to music that's sort of very nostalgic, and it's really sort of like taking to a happy place.
SPEAKER_02Yes, certainly is back when before all the shit happened. The song really is reminding me of times when I actually had a place to live. And I had somebody living with me. And the music just played through the room like it owned it. And we were just it's a companion.
SPEAKER_01Could you please make a roll for me?
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_01You could make me an empathy roll.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_01So you should be able to go onto your foundry and click on empathy. Mm-hmm. There's no bonuses or modifiers. Just make a roll for me.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Oh. That's a success. First time I've been good at something.
SPEAKER_01You kind of hear a sort of like faint static in the background. Just kind of like going over the over the radio or the or the or the speakers. And just in that sort of in that space between the sound and the static, you can hear your other half's voice. Just maybe doing a soft giggle or or something nice that you you used to listen to and enjoy. Just just in between that space. And if you want, you can give up a memory. Just a memory just a fleeting memory. And I can give you something in return.
SPEAKER_02Any fleet That sounds devious. Sorry. It does sound devious. What what kind of fleeting memory? Any kind any memory that you like. Good, bad, indifferent. I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna bite this. Let's do it. Alright. I'm gonna give up a memory of just a casual memory of her and I walking across a small footbridge over a river. For our listeners, Ed has got out a pad of paper and started writing, which is a bad sign. Usually is, but we'll go with it.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Okay, you do that. Piece of paper, how quaint. I know, I thought I'd uh keep it completely offline. Okay, you kind of just sort of slip into the memory of of this very nice memory of the the laughing and the the giggling, and and you kind of you almost kind of absorb that memory. It's a weird way to describe it, everything's a little bit odd, but you give up this memory of you and her walking across this little footbridge. When you do, the feeling that you had of of that moment that you you were sharing with her in that sort of moment of joy just really sort of fills you with just this very nice feeling. I would say if you had any if you had any sort of like hope that you wanted to get back, you could do, but I don't think you've lost any hope, so that's fine. You also can bank a success for me. So you just need to remember that you've got one free success that I'm gonna give you at a later stage.
SPEAKER_02One free success, okay.
SPEAKER_01Now, this is nothing to do with the actual game itself. There is there's a there's a there's a bunch of different things you can do within the system. This is one thing that you could potentially do. And it's something that we've got for the story. Random thing. So yeah, if you exchange that memory, and I'm gonna give you a free success later on. If you need it.
SPEAKER_02Okay, agree. Okay. Ed, I realize I told Jell that that message was from my mother. Yes. Yes. Interesting. Hey, I IG88 is not using his brain today. Of latency between the brain and the drone today. Yes, yes, there's a latency. Yeah. Is okay, so did she find anything out in that short time before no. Okay. Is she gonna go back in or what is she doing?
SPEAKER_01She she's willing to go back in, but just she says, Can you just not touch me, please? Yes. She says to Roger, she obviously uh doesn't say it to you.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. Okay. Can I take your name, please? IG88. Do you have another name? I'm just asking you to track that message back to where it came from. You don't need my name.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_02She goes back into the nearest game. Okay. Right. While she does that, are you gonna do anything else? You're just gonna wait around? I'm just gonna wait around and watch her. And I start playing the day I tried to live. Through the speakers, you know, through my drones. Yeah. Speakers, right? Soundgarden song. Yes. Because he's been screwing everything. Like, does he he's now worried that this guy, that this woman knows who he who he is, and now he's thinking about what he needs to do to rectify that situation. Roger doing. Well, AGA8 kind of snapped him out of his malaise in regards to the pinball machine, so he's kind of just over that, wherever that was, now. And I suppose he's just gonna have a look around. Maybe try and find what the what's the sort of like most newest looking thing that's in this museum? The newest looking thing. As in, like, it's got stuff from like the 70s, 80s, 90s. Yeah. But what's like, hmm, what's the most like newest our newest exhibit, let's say?
SPEAKER_01Okay. So you make your way to So I guess, yeah, the the newest things. You kind of follow, you track the different the ages, and you kind of it kind of goes in sort of five-year increments, I suppose, is that for the way the displays are set up. And you kind of have to like go a fair distance, you know, down into sort of like this large aircraft hangout type building. And you're sort of like making your way through sort of like large shelves and there's boxes of things, and you come to a whole heap of robots, and there's various different robots and drones from the last couple of years. Next to them is a door, and on the door, written in this really fun comic sans kind of writing, it says the future, and there is a uh a big, sort of like push door handle, almost like an uh an emergency exit door. Okay, which then goes next to it. Yeah. So the latest thing they have is a large robot and the robot's head is partially open, and there is a smaller robot inside that, and that robot's head is partially open, and there's a smaller robot inside that. Kind of like, you know, a Russian doll sort of robot.
SPEAKER_02Oh. Interesting. So any sort of like plaque or anything describing what it is? Or is it just a bunch of drones and a party?
SPEAKER_01Just a bunch of stuff. Yeah, so there's there's no sort of there's there isn't any real kind of plaques. It's just like someone has got a whole load of stuff and they've just dumped it in this museum, and it's just there's stuff everywhere. And and it's it's roughly curated in in sort of those five-year segments, but there is sort of like you might find something from the 1930s, which someone has moved and dropped into the 1980s, or you know, it's just that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Well, Roger doesn't really know much about drones, so they don't hold that much interest for him. Like, I'm sure it looks neat, but the door to the future, however, looks far more enticing. Yeah. So I guess I'll go through the door to the future and see what the feature holds.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you push the um you put you push the uh the sort of um large door handle in the middle of the door, and the door swings open, and you see sort of like this kaleidoscope of colours. I mean, it's a really cheap effect of lights and paper, and it's kind of going around in a cylindrical kind of drum shape. There's a walkway that goes through the middle, and then it sort of like turns to the right and then heads down like an escalator. And this drum thing goes all the way down the escalator, and you can see it's sort of like turning, and as you're moving, there's obviously some kind of light sensor, and there's like a large conk noise, and a light will turn on as you get to just before the the next section, and the the the barrel around you starts to tumble and all the paper and lights kind of like come on.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_01Maybe this is what the future looks like.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, like it's a nice sort of like carnivalesque attraction. He'll just sort of live in the moment and enjoy his little ride down the escalator and along the sort of and see to see where this ends up. Maybe maybe there'll be a big payoff at the end.
SPEAKER_01Okay, you make your way down the escalator. You get to the bottom of the escalator, and there is a very different look. It is a grimy, grotty metal and sort of ridded sort of like floor, and then there's pipes and sort of all sorts of manner of sub-abasement stuff down here. So it looks very different. It looks like the the ride takes you down and it just dumps you into essentially the guts of the building. You realise that there's no escalator up. And there is a corridor which leads you further in underneath the um.
SPEAKER_02Rothell kind of like look back up the escalator and then look back down and just kind of like thinking to himself, is this did they just have they just not finished this part of the attraction, obviously? It looks like should I be here, but there's no like signage saying in construction or not. Nothing like that. So I guess you'll just Is it can you see anything like down the corridor? Like like a design or something?
SPEAKER_01Sort of in a fixture, and there's looks like a door or something. Okay. Well, if it's partially illuminated.
SPEAKER_02Well, you'll you make the assumption that if if it's if it's lit down here, it must be in use. Oh no, I know if it wasn't locked then. So you'll carry on down to the light of the end of the corridor and see if there's another maybe it's like the further future. Or the gift shop.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you kind of make your way down the corridor and you kind of come to like the I guess this is almost like almost like the end of the corridor. There's another little portion of the corridor, maybe another 10 metres or so, and that stops at a door. So there's two doors, it's essentially one right at the end of the corridor, there's one on your right hand side as you've kind of come to it. The one on the right-hand side, there is a sign that says the archive. And then someone has basically drawn like flowers and little stick people underneath the um the words the archive.
SPEAKER_02And uh what's the other door say?
SPEAKER_01Well, she take you take a step over to there. Yeah. Uh and it just says, well, there's a plaque that was on there, but someone's peeled off, and so there's now a blank square that's a different colour to the rest of the door. You have no idea.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Well, I suppose archive looks inviting. It's got little flowers and stuff on it, and it seems to be like a logical route. As in, it's not, once again, not cordoned off, it's just at the end of this corridor. So rather than just going through the mysterious door that might have had like staff only at some point. Yeah. Or do not enter, let's go through the door that definitely is something and is somewhat inviting.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Yes, you kind of like open up the uh the door that looks vaguely inviting, and you go into the archive. Meanwhile, back upstairs, IGAGH and Raymond are sort of like hanging around waiting for Jel to finish. You wait a while and she doesn't seem to be coming out of the neuroscape. Can you speak to someone who's in the neuroscape? Can, yeah, they they can actually. They are vaguely aware of what's going on around them.
SPEAKER_02Uh I say, Jel, Miss Jell, are you okay? To be answering. What happens if I take the helmet off?
SPEAKER_01You will c probably crash her, but if she has if she's faded into the neuroscape, she might never answer you, and that might be the end of her. If you if you take the helmet off, she could crash, but she uh will potentially survive. Is there a way for a drone to enter the neuroscape? I do not believe so. Because essentially you're the one going into the neuroscape when you're sort of like going into sort of like the global neuroscape, so you're not locally in in the in the area.
SPEAKER_00So no, as far as I'm aware, a drone cannot.
SPEAKER_02Hey, hey, uh, hey, hey, hey Raymond. I think there's something wrong with this lady over here. Can you can you go into the Neuroscape and maybe help her out? Get her to come back? Yeah, I'll I'll give it a try. If if she if she can't or won't come back, just find out where that message came from. She'll she'll know what I mean, and then leave her. Fuck it. Okay. Easy enough. Okay, so I've got it. You're a p you're a pal, Raymond. Yeah. Always have been for you, IG88. Alright, so I put my neurocaster on.
SPEAKER_01Okay. You put your neurocaster on, and you sort of link it in. All of a sudden you'll find yourself in the exact same place that you just put the neurocaster on, but you don't have a neurocaster on. You can see Jel is sitting down on the exact same place that she was sitting in the real world, and this neuroscape mimics the real world. And she is she's she's standing there, and she's sitting there, and she's standing there. She seems to be glitching.
SPEAKER_02Jell? No, it's Raymond. Hello!
SPEAKER_01You're like, hello! She appears to not be interacting with you.
SPEAKER_02I walk up to her. And if she's glitching, it means actually I can't touch her, can I?
SPEAKER_01Oh, you probably can, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Well, I try and give her, you know, a pat on the shoulder. Hello, Jill. Hello.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you kind of time it so when she's sort of like not seeing, she's standing or standing and not seeing.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And you kind of tap her, you tap her and she sort of like looks at you and she goes, Oh thank goodness. What happened? Where have you been? I was trying to I was trying to see if I could get some information for your friend, but I I seem to have come across something.
SPEAKER_02W w okay, what is it? It says it's listening.
SPEAKER_01It's listening. As you say that, you hear this pulse and the static start. To grow. As the static started to grow, you can see that there's a darkness that's kind of edging in from the edges of the building. Or the edges of the near escape. And it's coming closer and coming closer. And she says, Oh my god, oh my god, it's coming.
SPEAKER_02Quickly, did you find out where the signal was coming from?
SPEAKER_01Yes. Where? It's coming from here. Here. In the vault. It's coming from the vault.
SPEAKER_02Well, while that thing is coming at us, you know it's coming, you know the signal's coming from the vault. So let's get out of here for the moment. Can you get out? I can't seem to get out. You're stuck.
SPEAKER_01Think so. And I think she sort of like puts her hand up to her mouth and she looks behind you. Okay, I swing around. You swing around. You can see these formless grey creatures shambling towards you. They're bleach, bleach-white, they don't appear to have any kind of eyes. What they do seem to have is sort of data, sort of like in their head. It's it's a weird kind of thing. Unless you're sort of looking at the near escape, it's difficult to describe. But things are changing. The face is changing, it's swapping, it's turning to multiple different things and faces and people, and they sort of like are starting to shamble closer to you. Dare you use the word zombie? But they're shambling closer, and there's probably a good handful of them.
SPEAKER_02Hey, I think I'm gonna try and exit the neuro the neuroscape. I'm gonna take it off.
SPEAKER_01Okay, that's fine. You uh you exit the neuroscape.
SPEAKER_02Hey, hey Raymond, what did you what'd you find out? Well, she said the signal's coming from inside there in something called the vault, but there was some seriously strange uh stuff going on in there. She says she's trapped, she can't get out. Well, and then I I rip the neuroscape helmet off her head.
SPEAKER_01Okay, yeah, you you pull the neuroscape helmet off her head, and she starts to sort of violently shudder, and she seems to be having some kind of fit or or something, as Jill sort of like slides off of the sofa and hits the floor as she shudders around on the floor.
SPEAKER_02And the the Soundgarden song stops playing and he plays a clip of Darth Vader, I find your lack of faith disturbing. Keith. Okay. Where's this vault? Let's go check out where this vault is. Well, if it's inside if it's inside the Neuroscape, we have to go back in. Well, no, I I think she meant this vault. Does that do I think she meant in in this building somewhere? In this building somewhere, right. Okay. Well, can I just like check her pulse for a minute? Let's see if she's we're still around, because that was a that was a serious dick move guy.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, sure, right. Do you want to try and do some kind of first aid for her?
SPEAKER_02Well, I gotta check her pulse first. And if she's alive, then I'll do then I'll try something.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you you check her pulse. She is she's alive because she's still like shuddering and twitching. Yeah. She's twitching.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. She's having a seizure. She is. Okay. I I see like a small like stick on the ground, and I put it in her mouth so she doesn't swallow her tongue. And her eyes are like rolling in the back of her head.
SPEAKER_00There's like some f some like fluff or some stuff coming out the side of her mouth.
SPEAKER_02Well. Okay, I'll well she may come out of it soon. She's got this thing in her mouth, and she's not gonna swallow her tongue, so she has a good chance of surviving that way without choking on her own uh appendage. So I I think uh the best thing we could do then is is just leave her for a moment. We don't have any medication, we don't have anything to stop this. IG88, that was rough. Yeah, whatever. Come on, let's go.
SPEAKER_01Tiffany comes running over and uh like grabs her. Wait, who's Tiffany? There's two other people with you. Paul and Tiffany. Right, right, right, right. I forgot. You lot! I can't remember you guys. Paul also kind of comes over and Tiffany sort of starts to make her more comfortable. Paul says, I'll go look for a medical kit. Wanders off to sort of like the back areas of behind the counters and stuff. The dog just sits there looking at you all.
SPEAKER_02Well, Raymond, at least Raymond feels a little bit better about somebody trying to actually get some medical help for. He still has a little bit of a heart.
SPEAKER_01Meanwhile, IGATA is walking where?
SPEAKER_02I'm gonna try to find where this vault might be.
SPEAKER_01Okay. You go for a bit of a wander around, and just sort of like, and you realize that uh that Roger is missing, go to try and find the vault. Meanwhile, Roger, you open the door. And inside you can see a long line of what look like tablets, and on the tablets there's these these orange runes that are kind of all flashing. And if you look at the VTT in the top left-hand corner, there's a picture of of a load of these tablets with all this data on.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Have I seen anything like this before? Well, have you? Maybe you have. Does it look I can't quite remember, but it does ring a bell. It does ring a bell.
SPEAKER_01As in, I have definitely seen something like this before. It's quite state-of-the-art memory pads. These all contain memories or datas or or or some kind of information on, and they're top-notch.
SPEAKER_02Weird. I know that, but okay. Let's see. Let's uh walk down the aisles and see if there's another way to continue the tour, if that makes sense, if there's a way. Like uh, because this it doesn't look like this is an interactive exhibit per se. It looks like storage for a bunch of tech. That's exactly what it looks like. Some kind of storage. So. But if I can't find a way out, maybe it was the other door that was the feature feature.
SPEAKER_01Maybe. Yeah, you kind of like have a look around. It seems like the storage archive has a lot of this, and you kind of follow it, it kind of goes into like a T-shaped room, and then you can make your way back around. There is no other exits out of here. This is the only exit, is the one you came in.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_02Is it just it's just more and more storage, is it all everywhere? More and more storage. Every nook and cranny. Does this feel more organized than the exhibits upstairs? And more like care in the sort of Absolutely, it does. So this feels like, yeah, interesting.
SPEAKER_01Okay. You also notice that all of the the tablets all have a stylized S on it. That's their brand. Okay. It looks familiar. You know, like you might see a a brand out in the world, you think, well, I may have seen that in an advert somewhere, but you can't recall what the actual remember which store I saw it in or where I saw it.
SPEAKER_02No. No. Oh no, but definitely okay. I guess I'll go back to like the entranceway. And then out of interest, when I'm about to leave, I'll look back at the tablets and I'll be like, yep. Okay, you know what? I'll just have a quick look at one of these things. Just just just so I'm like just to sort of like remind myself where it may be. Maybe if I pick up this thing, I'll remember where exactly what exactly it is. So I'll just sure go up to the closest one and be like, okay, off the shelf.
SPEAKER_01It seems that as you pull it off the shelf, there is a cable attaching the uh the tablet to a cable behind it. So it is attached. There's a data kit there's a data cab cable. There is also a uh a port to put a neurocaster into.
SPEAKER_03Hmm.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_01I'll uh have a look at this front of the tablet and see if uh wants to say it. It is this sort of like this orange and black background, and uh it's asking you to insert your neurocaster.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Can I see if there's any way to bring up like a settings menu for this thing? Yeah, you start messing about with it.
SPEAKER_01Can you uh can you make a wits roll for me, please? Okay, let's see. If you've got any kind of technical skills that might work with that, feel free to go ahead with it.
SPEAKER_02Unless it's to do if I don't think we can uh argue that this has anything to do with a car.
SPEAKER_01No. Let's try. Okay, three days. Yeah, you do actually find the settings on there. You you can do, and it kind of comes up with lots of code. Which isn't really your forte.
SPEAKER_03No.
SPEAKER_01But there is a lot of code that it kind of comes up instead of being able to go into a neocaster. So there's no sort of handy Windows drop-down.
SPEAKER_02It is So this is this is a professional. This isn't like you've got like a nice handy-dandy user interface. This is No, it does not. Once again, vaguely familiar, this kind of thing, but Yes. No I've yeah, I've seen it, but I don't think ever used. I don't know. You'll just kind of like stare at it for a wee while longer, and then So they're all seems to be plugged into something. Did I notice when I was wandering around where all these plugs actually went?
SPEAKER_01Well, you sort of like start moving the sort of the data, uh, the data things, and it's not looking behind the shelves. They all seem to be running into various clusters, and all the clusters are going into sort of like the piping and in the background of the book. It seems they all seem to be attached.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Can I just sort of like follow the point up and kind of follow the piping on the top and then be like, okay, that seems to go deeper into the room. I wonder where that goes.
SPEAKER_01So while you're doing that, Raymond and IG-88, you kind of come across the same door that Rogers has already come to, which says, To the future. This appears to be the only door apart from a couple of fire alarm fire doors that take you back outside.
SPEAKER_02Something tells me IG-88 that this might be uh the way he went.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I open it.
SPEAKER_02Okay, I push it open.
SPEAKER_01Again, you get the same thing, this sort of barrels type device that turns on as you go down this walkway in front of you, with lots of coloured lights and coloured paper, and it sort of like starts to rotate as you have to walk through it. Like a carnival ride.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Well, here we go. After you, IG88. He turns and looks at you and says, We seem to be made you know, in uh C3PO's voice, we seem to be made to suffer. It is our lot in life. And he steps to the door. And I say it's not a lot, but it's life.
SPEAKER_01You go down the escalators, and you come out into this very utilitarian corridor at the bottom. And as you as you do so, a door opens to the other s down down the corridor, and you see Roger sort of like looking and following this piping down the corridor.
SPEAKER_02Yo, Roger! Where you been? He kind of just like looks down from the pipe, looks over, and then just sort of like nods, and then like gets back to what he was doing. Um, he seems to be going away from you towards the other end of the corridor. We need to catch up with him. Yeah, we're gonna go I'm gonna go after him.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Yeah, you catch up to him as he gets to the door without anything on, you open that, you guys get to follow soon, and uh you come into another set of these sort of like winding corridors. You follow this all the way through and you come to a set of stairs. The corridors carry on. It's like a maze down here. But the actual trunking that you're following goes down into the ground and then goes underground to another level.
SPEAKER_02Roger, Roger, I'm looking for a place called the vault. Roger just kind of looks at you then shrugs. You haven't you haven't seen a room-marked vault anywhere down here? You s he sort of gives a sort of look like he thinks to herself and then not shakes his head. So what have we got here? And like pointing at this piping that he's been fixated on. He points back in the direction he came with, and then makes sort of sign of a square, and then makes a sign of like p sort of like book almost, and then sign of like cable coming from his book, and then points up to the pipe. It's like a fucking game of charards with you, isn't it? I have no idea what you're trying to tell me, Roger. He just shrugs and carries on following the pipes. You don't care what HG thinks.
SPEAKER_01You go through the door and you come into a staircase, which is going down. It's also going up as well. But there's a as you get to the open the door into the sort of like staircase, there is a list of various different floors, and it says museum, ground floor, and then it says archives, and first minus one, minus two, it says maintenance, minus three, it says vault.
SPEAKER_02Someone tells me that's our destination. Roger just kind of looks at the pipe and sees is it going down? It goes down. And I guess he just starts keeps following the pipe.
SPEAKER_01Okay. You follow the pipe, which means you go down the you go down the stairs. As you get down to the sort of next floor, it says maintenance. And then you're gonna the the pipe seems to continue going down.
SPEAKER_02Roger will keep following the pipe. The other two can do whatever they want. He's interested in this pipe.
SPEAKER_01Are you both following Roger or are you?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'm following Roger and you know, playing random clips from Star Wars. Mainly like the sort of snarky comments from Han Solo.
SPEAKER_01Sure. You kind of get to the sort of minus three which the stairs stop at. So this is the bottom of the of the building, and there is a very ordinary fire door, which leads you into the vault, apparently. You make your way into you go through the door. As you go through the door, you kind of come out into this large warehouse, which is yet another massive vaulted room. Was the door marked vault or anything like that? It didn't have anything written on the on the on that. Alright. And it is a very large, open, empty space. And it's one room, much like the same sort of size as the ground floor building. It almost mirrors that, and it's just this huge, open, football-sized kind of field-sized area. And right on the other side there is a light and a door. Is my pipe leading that way? Yes, your pipe appears to sort of come down to this floor, and then it goes into the ground and then disappears.
SPEAKER_02So wherever whatever it is is underneath us, maybe, where that pipe goes. Potentially. But there doesn't appear to be anywhere only one exit of this room, really, at the other side. What is so interesting about this damn pipe? Ah. He just waves you off and he starts going toward the l that light.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_01As you start going towards the light, a spotlight comes on. As you walk about ten meters, a spotlight comes onto you. Then as you carry on, another spotlight comes onto you. It's almost like it's following you across the um the room.
SPEAKER_02That's me in the spot. Light, losing my religion. I guess Roger will just kind of watch IG-88 until he makes it to the other side just to see if anything happens. Okay, what's Raymond doing? I'm just gonna follow uh IG-88 for the moment. A few steps behind him then. The side a bit.
SPEAKER_01Off to the side. How far off to the side?
SPEAKER_02About three or four feet off to the side of him. Okay. Look at the GM asking for specifics. Like Ooh! A giant empty space with nothing in it, so that's okay.
SPEAKER_01It's a mimic. Yeah, so you're sort of like following IG-88 and pretty much staying in the periphery of the spotlight for every single step that he's taking. As you're moving forward, you suddenly start to see movement to your left and to your right. You suddenly start to see people milling about. You can see a child running around. There's a group of kids playing in one side of the of the room. Looks like with like some kind of like gravetic cars or something that they're sort of like playing with. Well, I see this or is this Raymond seeing this? This is Raymond seeing this, not you. Okay, okay. You can make out just various different scenes from various things. Just from life. Nothing nothing special, you know, just small little snippets. And just off to the left-hand side, you can see a couple walking across a little footbridge. Oh, well, well. It it kind of catches your eye, but you then give it no mind. It's not a memory you've ever had or seen or done.
SPEAKER_02Okay. So all these other people that are milling about, actually they're projections of memories then? It looks that way. Okay.
SPEAKER_01There looks to be some may maybe it's some kind of like 3D hologram kind of thing going on, but you can just see it. Just just as you look around, it's it it's not solid right in front of you, but it's just just on the edges.
SPEAKER_02Like on the periphery of my vision.
SPEAKER_01Yes, absolutely, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Okay. IG88, are you catching any of this? What? What who? On the s are at the periphery of your vision. Are you catching any of this movement, any of these images?
SPEAKER_01You do not see anything, IG88.
SPEAKER_02No, I don't see anything.
SPEAKER_01Your senses do not pick any of it up.
SPEAKER_02So if I move my head quickly enough, it disappears? It fades rather than disappears.
SPEAKER_01Fades rather than disappears. Right, okay. It's like the more you concentrate on it, or it disap the more it fades and then but you but then you notice something on this periphery or that periphery, rather than just right in front of you.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Well, cons considering the fact that it sort of fades as I look at it, going towards it to see what it is would be useless. I think maybe I'll just keep following IG-88 for the moment.
SPEAKER_01Just just on the edge of his light, essentially. Roger.
SPEAKER_02Yes.
SPEAKER_01They appear to be like wandering straight across the uh. Do I see them kind of stop for a second? And then they stop. They have like obviously a conversation. You can make out obviously like you can't really make out what they're saying. Because neither of them are shouting. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I'm gonna just have a little poke around to like the center of the hangar and just uh see if there's anything that wasn't immediately obvious when they're just down here. Like maybe walk to like the far right edge.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you follow to the far right edge, as you kind of like how far into the hangar, or do you just gonna follow the wall? Well, I assume I'm just yeah, we're at the wall, the far end of the wall.
SPEAKER_02So I'll just I'll just keep the wall on my right and then just walk until I get a wall in front of me. Just to gauge how big this place is.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you kind of uh you realize it's obviously bigger than you think it is, and you make your way towards the uh right-hand side. You're looking around, you can see there's various ductwork and just all the kind of trappings that you would have of an underground facility. There's probably water pipes and that sort of thing that's here as well. And you kind of come across like a wrench that's kind of been left that might have fallen out of someone's um maintenance kit, just kind of like on the floor just next to the wall. Other than that, it's empty. There's nothing.
SPEAKER_02So there's some dirt and dust and stuff from I was gonna say, what is does it look like it's well maintained, this place, or does it just look like it's been kind of abandoned? It looks like it's been abandoned for a while. Yeah. Okay. I guess I'll go and have a look. Is it a wrench you said? Mm-hmm. Okay. I guess I'll pick it up and have a look at it. Like, does it have like a name or anything? Like a John's wrench?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Do not touch. Says uh it says Birch or something on the wrench. It's kind of like the brand.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the brand. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Okay. But other than that, it's a it's a it's a it's a red wrench with a black kind of grip to it.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Well, you know. Never know where I might need a wrench, an extra wrench in my toolkit. So I guess I'll just uh pocket that and then just look back over and see how they're getting on with their trip across the hangar. It turns out they've got the the door on the other side of the hangar. I guess I'll just stick to the wall and just sort of like walk along the wall to join them.
SPEAKER_01Rather than going through the middle. So IG-88 and Raymond, you get to the other the other door. It is a single door. It has a similar setup as the other emergency exit doors that you've seen. Um it's a metal door with a push bar in the front, and there is nothing out of the ordinary for this door other than it being a door. Do I still have that spotlight on me? The spotlight is now behind you. You're out of the spotlight. Okay. I open the door. Yep, you push the bar and open the door, and as you do that, a bunch of light comes flooding in, and you can see three stories of junk and stuff that has been stored. The three stories is topped by a skylight, and the skylight is letting in all the sort of like air and all the light, but there's there's very light various lights and various things flashing, and you can see that there is sort of three floors, but they're on three mezzanines, and every conceivable place is covered in junk. And as you're sort of looking around, you can also see dotted around in all the junk is various stages of decomposition are people connected to Nerocastas.
SPEAKER_02I turn to Raymond and I say, you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. I I should say I didn't say that it was a cliff from Star Wars. If you take it for granted, though. And they've seen better days, I'm sure. So the humans seem to be in a state of physical decay.
SPEAKER_01Some of them are, some of them look relatively fresh. There's probably, if you were to count, just under 40, maybe 50. And they're and they're on various levels and sort of things, and and they're covered in detritus, and it looks like some of the panels above have kind of like broken, and so sort of pigeon poop and various other stuff has blown in and covered everything in here. Years of rubbish. Are they like seated in chairs or? Yeah, some of them are seated in chairs, others are kind of like sat down in a spot that obviously probably would have been vaguely comfortable. I start checking each individual person. As you go over to each individual person, they're all wearing neurocasters from various different time periods over the last sort of like 10 or 15 years, or at least until since since Neurocasters have been around, I think it's about 10 years or so. And you can see that they have all got maybe some of them have got bottles of water, or at least they did have. They look like they've sat down here to do something with their Neurocasters. The Neurocasters do not appear to be attached to anything, and they are just sitting here.
SPEAKER_02There's no way to know if anyone looks familiar because the helmet is on, right? For those individuals who have not decomposed, for the fresh ones, I should say. Yes. There's no way to know or to to like recognize anyone because they've got the helmets on, right? Correct. The neurocasters. Okay, so you'd have to take it off to see their face. You would. And they're not where like there's no nameplates wherever they're sitting, there's no like Nope, nope. You know, jumpers with their name tags on them or anything like that.
SPEAKER_01Not that you can see, but if you want to go to some of them and sort of like rummage around in their personal belongings, like I'm not sure. I want to do that for as many of them as I can, yes. Okay, that's fine.
SPEAKER_02I'm going to the quote unquote fresher ones. Yes. And I'm seeing if trying to speak to them is seeing if they can react and respond. So I'll say, hello. Hello. Kind of tapping them a little bit.
SPEAKER_01One kind of like twitches.
SPEAKER_02They say, hey, hey you. Take off the neurocaster.
SPEAKER_01They kind of like move their hand to sort of like push you away. Right, okay, so they're probably are they But they're not touching you, they're just kind of like they're flailing around in the air.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Right, okay. So I'm probably no more than a bug to them in that ner inside there. Something bothering them. Okay. Is it possible that they're all sort of living a shared experience? It could be, but they don't appear to be attached to anything. Is there wireless neurocaster technology in this world?
SPEAKER_01Uh yeah, there is there is there is wireless neurocaster technology, I believe. But they but they would need some kind of like router or you know, something to kind of like do that to connect it with. But they don't appear to have that on them or see that you can see. And as you're um as you're fiddling with this person, Roger, you're outside. You've kind of like followed the edges of this large structure. No lights come on for you, you kind of stick to the edges. But what you do see along the edges, there are a lot of projectors.
SPEAKER_02You'll have a look at that and then just kind of be like, hmm, I wonder what that's for, necessarily. Do they look do they look at the same sort of level of Nick of all the maintenance here as in not great? Yeah. Yeah, not great. Rusty. Yeah, they're probably dust on some.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, some of the bulbs could be changed. Some of the, you know, some of the well they definitely could be like wiped clean, because there's like dust and stuff on some of them. Yeah.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Are they is there like cables running into the floor for those as well?
SPEAKER_01Uh no, they all appear to be embedded into the walls. So there must be something on the other side that projects out or or something like that.
SPEAKER_02Keep on going to the door and see if I can track down where those ads were placed.
SPEAKER_01As you do that, a door opens right in front of you, and a tracked robot comes out. The tracked robot is holding a data pad, or something like a tablet, with orange and black background, and it trundles past you and it heads towards the door that IG-88 and Raymond went into. Okay.
SPEAKER_02So that they didn't come from the door where AG8 and a door that I didn't see has just opened up. A door that you didn't see, just the the side of the wall just opens up. And he had one of those tablets. He did. Okay, so lot mmm, the the rest of the the origin of the tablets might be through this door then. So I guess I'll just go through this door which has appeared.
SPEAKER_01Uh yeah, you go through you go in this room, you have to bend down, because the the the robot's about half the size of a person. And it just came out of that same sort of size door. You know, it's like the mini door opened up. And you go in that way.