The Intern: Welcome to Coffee, Cults, and Empires. I'm the Intern, back on my chronoscope grind. I don't know why I said it like that. Uh, the chronoscope is really cool, and I'm having a lot of fun learning to use it. But it's true that it is pretty difficult to use in a way that's precise. Like, big eras are easy. The other day, in 20 minutes on the 'scope, I watched Klaoil grow from a small settlement to the bustling city that it is today.
But, like, finding the point where Harmony and Don first showed up in Klaoil, I- I just couldn't manage it. Did maybe see the end of the bad date though, I think? Harmony was livid and Don was looking so dejected. He kept on saying, "I don't know, I just don't know." And then he paused for a bit. And then kept just not saying anything.
Finally, he said, "I don't know if this relationship is gonna work out. We're like, Klaoil and water." Then he tried to explain the joke that the place was named Klaoil. I don't know. I don't get it either. Then she stormed off. So, unfortunately, no hot goss, or I guess it would be pretty cold goss at this point.
That was a long time ago. Cold goss. Phrase sounds gross, like something Ruffort would cook. Yeah, oh look! A transition! Speaking of things Ruffort would cook, and the dire consequences of that process, the crew is still holed up in Georg's room, hoping that the Sorceress doesn't come for them, and they've just heard a knock at the door.
Is it the Sorceress? Let's find out.
Vafrus: Hey everyone.
Harmony: Hello.
Tanam: Hey.
Don: Hey.
Tanam: Oh no.
Vafrus: Oh man. Rozafeen's out again. Oh, she needs a new glaze or something.
Tanam: oooch.
Don: Give 'er a minute
Vafrus: Yeah, she always figures it out.
Harmony: Yeah, she just needs a meditation. I'm gonna meditate for her right now.
Vafrus: Ooo! Is that how that works?
Don: No.
Harmony: Yeah!
Vafrus: Could I like hire someone to meditate for me?
Harmony: You can... You wanna make sure you're vibing at the same frequency, but yeah.
Don: What happens if you're not vibing at the same frequency?
Harmony: Well, you want someone who can vibe at a higher frequency than you, but it's your responsibility to be open to it.
Don: That sounds fake.
Harmony: Yeah. You're not an actor. I tell this to all my acting students, and it helps them to really like listen to my lessons.
Don: Does it help them vibe at the same frequency?
Harmony: It helps them vibe to a higher frequency and they're always on time.
Vafrus: I think, I think Harmony is always on the higher frequency. Right, Harmony?
Harmony: Yes
Don: Yeah.
Tanam: Oh you are the one on the higher frequency, and then they vibe with you?
Harmony: Exactly. I bring them up.
Vafrus: Helping them up. To vibe.
Harmony: Yeah, like Ruffort, you know, brings people down. I bring them up.
Vafrus: I mean, fair.
Don: I just set 'em straight.
Tanam: So I haven't heard it talked about as vibing and frequencies before, but, but there is some similar stuff that I was reading a paper about yesterday that just used, use the word "Connection", and they were really-
Rozafeen: Hi everyone.
Tanam: Hi. Hi Rozafeen. Okay.
Harmony: Hi Rozafeen!
Don: Hey Rozafeen.
Rozafeen: Hey, sorry I'm late.
Vafrus: Oh yeah, we just assumed that your, your glaze was broken again.
Harmony: I didn't.
Vafrus: Harmony thought you were late. I thought your glaze was broken.
Rozafeen: I hate you sometimes.
Harmony: And when you put it that way,
Tanam: Okay, let's get started.
Vafrus: So last time we went to sleep and woke up? I think that was it.
Harmony: Ooh, can I hit my long rest?
Tanam: Oh, "long rest." I heard, I heard "long dress," and I'm like, you did get a long dress out of it, apparenty.
Don: I mean, there was the whole thing about, uh, getting a long dress, from a sheet that we were gonna give back, but now we can't.
Harmony: I mean, we don't want to; obviously she'd be honored and flattered to receive it, but it's made for me.
Don: Oh wait, is it a curtain or a sheet I can't remember. I think we had this discussion, I just don't remember which side it came out.
Harmony: Sheet.
Don: Important knowledge that I will use later.
Harmony: Okay. So do I get a long rest and get more hit points? Still waiting for my answer.
Tanam: Yes. I'm assuming you're using your quick change to make the dress happen?
Harmony: I sewed it at night, but didn't take me a long time.
Tanam: Yeah, that was, like, if it was like a, a four hour process, then that's not a long rest anymore, but, if-
Harmony: Oh, I'm fast. It took me 20 minutes.
Tanam: Did that come along with the quick change, uh, skill?
Harmony: ...Yes.
Vafrus: Whatever skills she needs to have made this dress, let it be so.
Harmony: Yeah, did anyone else help me? Did anyone lose any hit points helping me make this?
Don: I added the, um, lizard... tails to the dress. I assume that there are lizard tails on it.
Tanam: Just as a warning?
Don: Yeah. Or an invitation. Like, would you like your tail added to this dress? This could be you.
Tanam: Imagine yourself here.
Don: Exactly.
Harmony: Thank you.
Vafrus: So there was a knock on the door, right?
Tanam: There was a knock on the door. It was a somewhat forceful knock on the door, and everything is all still sealed up. I believe it is webbing over the door then ropes over the window?
Vafrus: That's probably just the sheets that we didn't actually get around to ordering, but they know by now.
Harmony: Okay, yeah, I believe that. I didn't order room service, so you must be right.
Don: Yeah, I don't think any of us had, uh- I think. What, last session I had time to make coffee in the bathroom, right?
Vafrus: Oh yeah!
Tanam: And then you woke everybody up, uh, when you-
Don: Oh yeah, I like tripped over my armor. Uh, I was stealthed. Which, coincidentally, is like ringing church bells in a, uh, in a hotel room.
Tanam: Church bells? That's a pretty deep cut. Uh, have you been secretly going to the Church of the Bellists or something? Uh, I didn't realize that there are any still practicing. I had done some research about them though. They, uh, apparently they imbued bells with magic and the process was extremely, extremely loud.
Don: Wait, wait, no. Let's go back to imbuing with magic. That's, that's not how that works at all. That's not at all. So you can't just go, oh, I wave my hands over a bell and there's magic in it now that, no!
Tanam: Okay. Okay. Wait, sorry, sorry, sorry. Nevermind. Um, let's just move on.
Vafrus: So we all kind of awkwardly look at each other because nobody apparently wants to answer the door and also there's webbing all over the door. I will just call out, "Nobody's home."
Harmony: Good one.
Rozafeen: Did we put all the shit back in the bags?
Tanam: No, I don't think you did.
Rozafeen: I think that last time we were together, I yelled, "put all the shit in the bags!" But then we had to go.
Vafrus: Okay. So after that I yelled, "Nobody's home... Try again later."
Rozafeen: Are you yelling "nobody's home" before or after we actually accomplished getting the shit back in the bags?
Vafrus: It sounds like nobody's moved yet, so I guess before.
Rozafeen: I'm just frantically piling shit in bags
Harmony: I'll chime in. "Yeah, no one's home."
Tanam: What, what?
Don: No, "It's really good, you disguise your voice," I say, loudly in the hotel room. "We're really good at this, guys, really good at this."
Harmony: Yeah, high five.
Don: Uh,
Tanam: This is Georg's room, right?
Don: Yup.
Tanam: Another knock and through the door you hear the Captain's voice, saying, "Sorry to bother you, Georg. Seems like everybody else is out?"
Don: Um,
Tanam: "I'd like to talk to you. And it's- maybe everybody else is possibly in there, too? From the sound of it?"
Don: Uh, no, I'm just really good at throwing my voice.
Harmony: "Like this."
Vafrus: "Me too!"
Rozafeen: Hellena, with her face just in her hands.
Don: How many disadvantages do I have to roll?
Rozafeen: DM, do I have to roll for, like, how speedily I succeed at getting all the shit in the bags?
Tanam: It's taking quite a long time to have this conversation.
Rozafeen: Okay, 'cuz I'm fine with opening the door as long as we don't have a bunch of incriminating evidence around. Like, this is our hotel room, we're supposed to be here, I doubt the sorceress is here. We're probably cool.
Vafrus: I will find out whether Prestidigitation is helpful for removing web.
Don: I believe I can just pour some particularly strong coffee, uh, over the web, to disintegrate it.
Vafrus: That's probably smart, because me casting spells is dangerous, and it might take a lot of them. How many do I get off before you realize that you...?
Don: Um-
Vafrus: And also how, does, does it seem to be working, DM?
Tanam: What? So you are actually trying to Prestidigitate it?
Vafrus: Yeah, yeah, I'm going to cast Prestidigitation to try to remove some of the web from the door, because we're apparently not scared of the captain.
Don: I'm gonna say I realize that this is bad after 3.
Tanam: heh heh heh I think those are probably instances of the same one. I'll say you do it once. With, like, several, like, gestures.
Vafrus: Okay. It's fine. I got a, I got a six. I made some hypothetical rolls. If it had counted as three spells, I would have had a weirdness explosion on number two. Y'all, thank the DM for mercy.
Don: So I call out to the Captain. "Uh, give us just a minute, I'm messing with you, we'll be right out," uh, and I de-web the door with some strong coffee. It leaves a bit of a stain on the floor.
Rozafeen: What about roped window? Did we discuss that yet?
Don: Oh yeah, I should probably, should probably take that down too.
Rozafeen: It doesn't look suspicious at all.
Don: I pour some strong coffee on it, but it does not just go back in my bag, so I have to take it off the window.
Tanam: In addition to the stains on the floor from the dripping coffee and the dripping web that has been disintegrated, it also leaves a weird smell.
Don: I mean, yeah, it's like, really strong coffee. Like, I mean, you know, coffee, uh, coffee is acidic, and I have distilled this coffee down to the point where it kind of maybe eats through some of the carpet.
Tanam: And also whatever the magic webbing is made out of is also apparently kind of gross when it gets, uh, dissolved in coffee acid.
Don: Yeah.
Tanam: So, taking down the ropes as well is taking some time. It has been more than a few seconds.
Rozafeen: Okay, can he leave a few of them up and I will climb up them and put my legs through and dangle down and look like I'm doing calisthenics?
Don: Sure, yeah.
Tanam: Okay, give me either an acrobatics or an athletics.
Vafrus: This is normal.
Rozafeen: That is a fair question. Just a second for me to get my thing out.
Don: Do I get to help on this by leaving the ropes in, like, an easy to use configuration?
Vafrus: Also, how strong is this wall?
Don: Um, structural integrity was not my field of engineering.
Rozafeen: It's fine.
Tanam: Well, it depends on how you roll.
Rozafeen: I got a 14?
Tanam: Yeah, that's fine.
Rozafeen: All right.
Don: I'm so glad that you didn't roll so poorly that you actually collapsed the entire building.
Rozafeen: It was not my greatest roll, but I'm pretty good at acrobatics.
Don: Nice.
Rozafeen: For the record, I will be conducting my part of this conversation upside down.
Vafrus: So that's all, like, taking some time. Hey, Urekas, you want to put on, like, an audio puppet show while, uh- can entertain the Captain while they're waiting?
Harmony: Yeahhhh! Well, actually, I like that. I was going to maybe juggle some cups of coffee, but Georg used all of them on the floor and the walls.
Don: You also have cup of coffee in your hand, because I made coffee for everyone.
Vafrus: So-
Tanam: I, I like, I like the description of "used it on the floor." That's the-
Vafrus: So Urekas, you juggle and I'll just tell the Captain how great it is because they can't see it. That should be very entertaining.
Harmony: I'm juggling right now.
Vafrus: Oh, it's so cool. You should be here. You're really missing out.
Don: Why are you giving Ruffort a impromptu juggling show?
Harmony: Um, to charm the Captain, duh.
Don: Captain can't see it.
Tanam: How loudly you say that?
Harmony: I raise my voice a little bit, I'm angry.
Rozafeen: Ruffort's explanation is magical, so I'm sure it's working.
Harmony: Yeah, and my yelling is part of the performance.
Tanam: Is someone going to let the Captain in?
Vafrus: Once, once the rope thing is ready, yeah.
Rozafeen: I can't; I am doing my calisthenics. Georg, open the damn door.
Don: on it! Um, okay. Out of character. How much stuff's still on the floor?
Rozafeen: We established that I got all the shit back in the-
Tanam: Yeah,
Don: we did it! Oh, oh, I missed that part.
Tanam: yeah, no, the only thing that's still on the floor is the acid slowly burning its way through the carpet.
Don: Oh yeah, that's not a problem. It'll stop eventually when it gets to, like, the third floor or something. We're on the what floor?
Tanam: Second.
Don: Yeah. Weird.
Rozafeen: Wraps all the way around.
Don: Anti gravity acid.
Harmony: I'll keep juggling behind you so they'll be noticing the juggling and not the floor.
Don: I'm actually gonna probably mentioned to not step on the, um, floor.
Rozafeen: So you just tossing a one cup up in the air and catching it over and over again?
Harmony: Yeah, but with both my hands.
Vafrus: Also it was one of the cups that still had coffee in it.
Harmony: Uh-huh.
Tanam: So it's much more impressive than it looks.
Don: Yeah.
Vafrus: Used to have coffee in it.
Harmony: It still has coffee. The coffee is falling into the cup as I catch it.
Tanam: Uh, okay, I'll have to have you roll, uh, for that then.
Vafrus: Don't worry, every time you miss, I can use magic to fix it, and since it's a cantrip, it has no cost whatsoever.
Harmony: My performance is a plus ten and I rolled a four, so fourteen.
Tanam: it's, it's, it's fine.
Harmony: Ooh, and I take a small sip in between each juggle.
Tanam: Okay, roll again
Vafrus: That part should be easy, right, like, it's just the one cup.
Harmony: Okay, that would be a twenty six.
Tanam: Okay.
Don: I like how you're barely making it into the cup each time, but you nail it taking a sip.
Harmony: Priorities.
Vafrus: And then the door opens.
Don: Uh, Georg, Georg does, in fact, open the door. He kinda blocks the door, though, with his body, cause his body's covered in armor, uh, and he's large, so.
Tanam: Does he have his helmet down, or is-
Don: No, the helmet's up.
Tanam: Okay, okay.
Don: It's retracted.
Rozafeen: I yell, "Hiiii!"
Don: And then Georg steps kind of sideways and says, uh, "Mind the- mind the puddle,"
Tanam: The Captain is standing there, at attention, but head slightly tilted, in confusion, and they look down at the floor and presumably see the acid eating its way through the carpet, and calmly steps over it into the room. Gives a brief nod to Hellena, as an acknowledgment that she is there, but no more than that, and they give the same to everybody else in the room as well.
Vafrus: For once, most of the shenanigans were not me.
Don: "Uhhh, can I get you some coffee?" Sorry, I, I bet they're here to talk about you.
Tanam: "No thank you. I try to skip the coffee while I'm on duty."
Don: Okay.
Vafrus: Get out. Sorry. Continue.
Tanam: They look around to each of you and say, "There are a number of things that I'd like to speak to you all about."
Harmony: Great! We love numbers.
Rozafeen: I make a thumbs up sign, but it's upside down because I'm upside down, so it's confusing.
Tanam: "I'm not going to do the thing where I ask you to guess what they might be. I'll just lay them out for you, and maybe we can have a conversation about that. Beeb's restaurant was broken into last night, and I can't say whether it was arson, because if it was, it was a really bad arson attempt; the stove was left on. After that, there were reports of Urekas and ' an extremely handsome man' heading through the Hall, yelling 'There's a fire, you might want to fix that.'"
Harmony: Excuse me, I have a bad cold, that's why, um, all of us were coughing just now. Yeah, I happened to notice a fire last night. I tried to call for help.
Tanam: " Hm."
Rozafeen: I hope you have really good Deception, which, I mean, you probably do.
Harmony: Plus ten.
Tanam: So, it's kind of not a lie, but, yeah, I think you're obscuring a bit there, so go ahead and roll Deception.
Harmony: Twelve.
Tanam: Twelve total?
Harmony: Yeah.
Tanam: Hmm.
Rozafeen: I mean, to be fair, I wasn't convinced.
Tanam: Yeah. The Captain does not look particularly convinced either, and says, "Yes, we can discuss that. And also, there are approximately- we haven't been able to count because they're kind of moving around a bit- but I'd say approximately at this point, a hundred birds outside of your window."
Harmony: They have the right to be there.
Rozafeen: The person is keeping the birds down.
Don: I mean, I think we know why the birds are outside of our window, right?
Tanam: Is this out of character?
Don: No, this is out loud. And I turn to everybody, "You know what the explanation is."
Harmony: I politely nod.
Vafrus: I rolled rather bad on a Wisdom save I just imposed on myself.
Rozafeen: Oh, no.
Vafrus: So, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be like "What do you mean extreme? Did nobody recognize the man that was with Urekas?"
Tanam: The Captain looks at you and tilts their head a bit-
Vafrus: Urekas and an extremely handsome man? I'm heartbroken. I'm like, there's no- nobody remembers me?
Tanam: The Captain is really, really looking at you and tilting their head a bit and doing this thing where they're like closing one eye, then switching which eye is closed, and shakes their head a bit and says, "Anyhow."
Vafrus: I distracted them from the bird thing, guys.
Harmony: Good work.
Rozafeen: I do a flip down off of the ropes, not a complicated one, but just a boop boop.
Tanam: Just a baboop, okay. We'll the earlier one slide for that one.
Rozafeen: I look at the Captain and I say, I genuinely don't know what happened at Beeb's, but I am a huge fan and, uh, new though I am, a loyal customer of Beeb's breakfast. About how many Mend spells do you think that we're looking at to improve this situation?
Harmony: We love Beebs. And the feeling is mutual.
Rozafeen: Roll deception!
Tanam: I think, uh, roll a Deception there, Urekas, for that "and the feeling is mutual."
Harmony: That hurts my feelings. Thirteen.
Don: Wait, did you just roll a three? And then two, and then a three? You need to get your dice checked.
Harmony: Agreed. That's why I'm usually so confident. I think maybe my dice are broken.
Tanam: "There's just, there's a lot of stuff here. Tagak didn't show up to open this morning."
Don: Well, that's not good.
Tanam: "There's a bunch of birds staring at your room, and I wouldn't have noticed that Tagak wasn't there except for the fact that, of course, I was spending quite a bit of time listening to Beeb talk about the violation of their stall and, there were some remnants of some very, very badly cooked food."
Rozafeen: Well, that is the worst thing you've said so far.
Vafrus: Poor Beeb, making bad food. What's the world come to?
Tanam: I'll need a Deception there.
Vafrus: Sure. Throw my lot in.
Harmony: Yeah, I thought that it tasted great. I mean, not that I had any.
Vafrus: right. Here's how it's done, y'all. Uh,
Rozafeen: Well, we've had breakfast at Beeb's and it was
Don: Yeah, and it was free.
Vafrus: That's a 26
Don: That's the best kind of good.
Rozafeen: Ruffort, did you say 26?
Vafrus: Yeah.
Tanam: 26 Deception.
Vafrus: As I'm like, reminiscing about how sad it is that Beebs has apparently made bad food somehow.
Rozafeen: So, I direct the Captain's attention back to the birds because I just don't even know what to say about this Beebs thing. "Captain, I know that it can be difficult to take Tagak seriously sometimes, but have you considered the possibility that she was not lying about the sorceress and the birds watching her because-" and I gesture out the window.
Tanam: "Yes, I had considered that possibility The birds staring into your room got me thinking that perhaps you had taken her up on her offer to show you where the Sorceress lived.
Vafrus: Yeah, we did that.
Rozafeen: Yes, we met the Sorceress and we have come to believe that the Sorceress is very powerful and, potentially, a serious problem.
Don: Well, at least to Tagak she's a serious problem.
Rozafeen: Yes, we are uncertain at this time whether she is a threat to the city, but we do believe she is a serious threat to Tagak.
Don: She's a serious threat to us, too, at this point.
Tanam: "Well, yes, it would seem that."
Vafrus: Ah c'mon, we can take some birds.
Don: And I glance at the birds.
Tanam: Now that you can see them, because Hellena is no longer blocking the view window.
Don: "Uh, alright, Captain. Give me just a second. Um, I need to do something, and then we can talk a little more freely." And then, I, uh, uh, do I want to do this? This is horrible. I did roll really low on that Wisdom.
Vafrus: Those self-imposed Wisdom checks are always a good idea.
Rozafeen: Face. In. Hands.
Don: Georg's sense of honor is kind of, um, holding out. Alright.
Rozafeen: Wait, I walk over to Georg, and I say, "Georg, just a moment, please."
Don: Uh...
Rozafeen: "Captain, excuse us." I pull Georg aside. I turn my back to the Captain and I look at the closest bag and I very subtly shake my head no.
Don: I kind of, like, try to gesture back at the birds that are behind me, or, wait, no, gesture towards the birds in front of me, I guess I would be facing the window at this point, uh, and then I make a little, like, dagger across the neck kinda gesture.
Rozafeen: I turn around and I look at the Captain and I say, "Captain, with your permission, we would like to spend our day, as a community service, doing what we can to improve Beeb's fine establishment and searching for Tagak. We genuinely believe that she might be in danger. I pulled Georg aside here, just to confirm that we were on the same page about that, and if we cannot find Tagak, we would like to come back to you and perhaps ask for some assistance checking to see if she is at the sorcerer's place of abode, and perhaps in a bad way there. I understand the city has many priorities now, and we wouldn't want to take too many people away from the main task, but the reason that we agreed to go with Tagak at all is because we think that it's possible that a powerful Sorceress might know something about the spider situation, and unfortunately meeting with her last night- let's just say she was not very interested in talking."
Tanam: "Okay. As the head of safety and security here at the Hall, I can't have people who are working for me breaking into people's stalls."
Vafrus: Yeah, that sounds terrible. We'll keep an eye out for that. We'll watch out for Beeb, too.
Don: Beebs gave us free breakfast, we're just helpin' 'im.
Harmony: Yeah, which is why we wanted to put out the fire.
Rozafeen: Just to sweeten the pot on the thing that I said, I rolled a nat 20 on Persuasion.
Tanam: okay-
Harmony: I bat my eyelashes.
Rozafeen: Are you their type?
Don: That pretty much counts as a charm spell.
Tanam: The Captain looks defeated, and says, "Look, there's two major portions of my job. One is that I want everyone who stays here and who works here to be safe. The second important part of my job is that the people who work here stay here feel safe."
Harmony: That's important to us as well.
Tanam: "Well, that's good. Y'all did a great thing by fighting off those spiders. I'm hoping that with your help, we can figure out why you needed to do that, why those spiders were there in the first place."
Harmony: Maybe the spider started the fire.
Tanam: Okay, I'm not going to make you roll a Deception, because you're just saying a hypothetical-
Harmony: 28.
Don: And she rolled it anyway. The good one of the night.
Vafrus: Yeah, no, I'm gonna jump in on this. "It's clear there's someone trying to mess with us, sending birds and setting things on fire. We'll get to the bottom of it. Spiders, birds, and fires, these things must all be connected somehow. We'll figure it out."
Tanam: "Just do me a favor and please do your best to have a light touch over the course of your investigation."
Vafrus: "We always have a light touch," I say as, like, a little bit more of the carpet sizzles away.
Tanam: LAUGHS
Rozafeen: I cast Mend on that.
Harmony: Heh Heh heh Heh. Heh.
Don: "Thanks. I was gonna repair it later, but..."
Rozafeen: I smile; I smile really big.
Tanam: "Beeb is a little bit scared of y'all. So, maybe just one of you can go over there to help with the mending. Don't all show up together."
Harmony: Is he open right now or is today just a mend day?
Vafrus: Let's all go to Beeb's... for some breakfast!
Don: I mean, like, yeah, Beeb could use all the help he can get.
Vafrus: Alright, I, yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna give the Captain a warm smile and be like, "We understand your concerns; we will take care of it. We're so sorry that you had to deal with all of this stuff. It won't be a problem again, Captain." I'm going to try my best to reassure them.
Rozafeen: And as part of that, could we maybe start ushering the Captain out the door and move on to the next scene?
Tanam: "Please let me know if you find out anything else. I'll talk to you later."
Harmony: Okay.
Tanam: And they walk away.
Vafrus: All right. Does the Captain have anything valuable looking on their person? I'm kidding.
Rozafeen: It's been a while since I've slapped you with a thing.
Harmony: Well, that went well.
Vafrus: Yeah.
Rozafeen: I have Mending, does anyone have Repair or something a little bigger than that?
Don: I also have Mending. I have Magic Missile. Thunderwave, Shatter. I can break a lot of stuff.
Tanam: Do you have magic missile, Don? Or do you have-
Don: Well, ok, look-
Tanam: Science Missile?
Don: I call it "Magic Missile" because that's what it's called. It does not, in fact, use magic, but yes, it is a Magic Missile. I feel like the term "magic" is often used incorrectly in a lot of circumstances, but I don't want to get into talking about, "oh, this is magic, and this is science, and this is the upper point at which science becomes magic and magic becomes science," but what it does, oddly similar to when people cast Magic Missile as a wizard or a sorcerer, it just happens to be very colorful in my particular case, largely because I used hallucinogens in the crafting of it.
Vafrus: I can go talk to Beeb if y'all want. I can, I can sort that out.
Harmony: Maybe I should talk to Beebs.
Vafrus: Sure, if you want.
Rozafeen: So, love the charm offensive. Between the two of you, do you have anything that will repair the damage?
Harmony: Uh, no.
Don: Whoa, hey, wait. Okay, since we're all basically just evil people now; illusion spell?
Vafrus: Yeah, I do.
Rozafeen: Noooooooo.
Don: All right, well that'll last until Beebs figures it out.
Vafrus: Oh, no, I can do much better than that. Wait, I can, I can fix this. Don't worry. done, I've done this sort of thing all the time.
Rozafeen: Ru-ffort.
Don: Mostly because I actually know how to build stuff. Like, that's sort of my thing. I artiftict stuff.
Harmony: Ooo, well, if Ruffort does talk to Beebs, then I can use a quick change to dress like I work here and just keep an eye out.
Rozafeen: Wait, are you and your 5 million followers planning to blend?
Don: try to convince Beebs that you work at Beebs' stall.
Vafrus: It's perfect! What could go wrong?
Don: I mean if you could pull it off, sure, cause I'm basically subscribed to, now I'm a horrible person, um, "
Rozafeen: Normally I don't like splitting up a team like this, but perhaps we could send our two gentlemen to charm and repair, and the ladies-" and I pat Justice on the head, "-can go try to find Tagak and make sure that she's safe."
Harmony: Yeah, that's probably better. I want to keep my dress, though.
Vafrus: Sounds good!
Rozafeen: Oh! I don't think that I've covered this before, but it's important. I remove Justice's nightcap and I that the curls are looking good and that ready to face the day and look fierce.
Don: I dust some coffee grounds out on the, the carpet.
Rozafeen: Thank you, Georg. That's very thoughtful and she is all about it.
Tanam: Okay, Hellena and Urekas are going to go try to find Tagak. How are you going about that?
Rozafeen: Well, why don't we start by Urekas being charming as hell and trying to figure that out?
Harmony: I definitely know how to do that. Do I just ask everybody if they know where she is and someone will probably tell us because of charm?
Tanam: I don't know that random people walking by the hotel would know.
Vafrus: But can they be recruited until eventually somebody does?
Rozafeen: Who would know where somebody who makes fun metal art lives?
Harmony: I could try talking to the birds, since I have Talk to Animals.
Rozafeen: I do love the talking to birds idea.
Harmony: alright, well then maybe I just go to the window and start up a conversation.
Tanam: Stick your head out through the ropes?
Harmony: Maybe offer some coffee grounds?
Tanam: like, sprinkle them out the window?
Harmony: Um, I open up the windowsill and I, uh, the grounds are in my hands, like a offering? And I go, "Would anybody like some coffee?" I have Speak with Animals, right?
Rozafeen: She had a very passionate conversation with a lizard not that many hours ago in game time.
Don: Oh yeah, Speak with Animals is certainly on there.
Tanam: Is that, uh, Brutally Interrogate Animals, is that the-
Harmony: Oh, know what? I'm going to change out of this dress that has the lizard tails on it before I talk to the bird.
Tanam: Oh, does it actually have the lizard tails on it, is that canonical?
Harmony: Definitely.
Don: I was just joking.
Harmony: if you're joking, then never mind, I'll keep wearing it. I'm very gullible. I just woke up. I haven't finished my coffee.
Rozafeen: I think in the interest of Justice not being like really torn all day long, probably not lizard tails on the dress.
Don: Oh yeah.
Vafrus: Switch to something that has feathers instead.
Harmony: Oh no!
Rozafeen: Urekas would look so good feathers.
Harmony: I do look hot in feathers.
Tanam: don't take, don't take fashion advice from Ruffort, although I guess Ruffort is extremely fashionable.
Vafrus: It's one of the only things I pay attention to. I notice what everyone's wearing.
Tanam: So you stick your head out and you, and you say, "does anybody want some coffee?"
Harmony: Yeah, and I'm holding some coffee grounds.
Tanam: There are, as the Captain guessed, at least a hundred birds out here. It's possible that there have been more since they counted. There are a lot of birds out here. Were your followers sleeping in the hall?
Harmony: No, they're sleeping outside.
Tanam: Okay, so your, your followers are sitting there, looking extremely awkward, looking up at your window, but they turn when they hear you speak. They look a little uncomfortable being surrounded by that many birds.
Harmony: Oh, I just yell, "it's okay, Georg is making all of you coffee right now."
Tanam: You stick your head out, you see them and when you offer the coffee, uh, they, they kind of, "Oh, Oh," you can hear them like, " Oh, oh, okay, um, uh, you can, you can talk to us."
Harmony: "Hello!" And I smile at all of them and wave.
Tanam: They all look at each other and are kind of whispering to each other, you can't hear, but one in the back is like, "Hi!"
Harmony: Oh! We have enough coffee for all of you.
Tanam: "So this is kind of awkward, but we're supposed to be, uh- like, thanks for the offer, but, but we're, um, we're, we're supposed to be watching you."
Harmony: Oh, okay, so anything I can do to help you?
Tanam: "Uh, well, I guess you being outside is kind of helpful, it was kind of hard to see where you were exactly, so we've been just kind of staring at all of the windows, but, But, once we saw the ropes go up there, that was, uh, we figured that was probably the one we should look at, so we've been staring at that one. Glad to see that we were right."
Harmony: Hey, do you like what you see?
Tanam: " Um I don't really understand what you mean. Um But, I guess, um, you were saying if there's anything you could do to help, and, and, like, not being inside is, is, is definitely helpful. Cause it makes it a lot easier to watch you. Um, oh, well, hm. So we're also supposed to be watching you ominously. So, um, I don't know, can you tell us, uh, we're gonna try some configurations, and you tell us which one is the most ominous, okay?"
Harmony: Okay!
Tanam: And they flap around a little bit, and like, they try looking at you, and, the first time, they're scattered sort of randomly, and they're mostly pecking at the ground, but then they occasionally will look up at you at different times. And then they fly up a little bit and reconfigure, and they're in these, like, perfect rows, and they all are looking down and they all look up at you at the same time.
Harmony: Perfect rows, wow.
Tanam: They say, "So which one was... Was it more ominous if we're kind of just sort of haphazard or is that that kind of unison thing, is that, is that spookier?"
Harmony: I think the unison thing, I think it'd be the scariest if you formed a smiley face.
Vafrus: The most ominous thing would be to go around stealing people's trinkets and making a big pile right here.
Rozafeen: Wait, we established before that we actually can't hear the birds, right? We just hear her going, "cheep"
Vafrus: nor am I even here to have this conversation. This is just what your inner Ruffort would say.
Rozafeen: You two are one, huh?
Don: like that now, now she's got an inner Ruffort.
Rozafeen: I say, "hey cheep cheep lady, why are they making a... are they, what are they doing?"
Tanam: They make a smiley face.
Harmony: "Oh, they're asking for, um, fashion advice."
Rozafeen: And told them to smile?
Harmony: yeah, yeah, they want, they were going for a more ominous aesthetic.
Rozafeen: I mean, actually, smiling is good advice in so many ways. Okay, you got this. Go on.
Harmony: Thank you. "Yeah, that looks super ominous. We're all really afraid of you right now."
Tanam: "Oh, good, good, good, okay, thanks,"
Harmony: You're welcome. Um, now if you could do me a favor, since I just did you a favor, um, who sent you?
Tanam: "What?"
Harmony: what? Who Sent you?
Tanam: is the, the first, first thing that Urekas learned when she learned to Speak with Animals is "who sent you?"
Vafrus: For every ten seconds I don't get an answer, another bird will fall.
Tanam: "We don't really know, honestly. We just kind of hear this voice that tells us to do stuff, and it generally goes better when we do, and so we do."
Harmony: Okay, yeah nah I hear voices, too. I get it.
Rozafeen: Super wish I had been able to hear that.
Harmony: You could listen to my voice if you want. I bet things would go really well if you listened to me.
Vafrus: Yes! These five followers follow you around each laden with, uh, 50 birds. The-
Tanam: I guess, roll a persuasion.
Harmony: Okay. Rolling...
Vafrus: The cult is growing.
Harmony: oh, dang, 8?
Rozafeen: Oh no.
Tanam: "We'll, uh, we'll just keep following the one that we've been following before, um, but I mean, you know, it's, it's, it's, you know, no offense or anything, we're just- we're good."
Rozafeen: Have they seen the daughter?
Harmony: Oh!
Rozafeen: I actually ask.
Harmony: I can translate.
Rozafeen: Oh yeah, they're not going to understand me, but I ask you if you've asked them.
Harmony: Oh, no, let me ask them now. "Chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp."
Tanam: Okay. So you're asking them if they've seen Tagak?
Rozafeen: Tagak or Teep, right?
Harmony: yeah
Tanam: do you just use their names, or do you try to describe them at all?
Harmony: both. "chirp chirp chirp chirp chrip chirp."
Tanam: Oh, that's a really good description! They get out of the, the smiley face shape. To go, of, huddle and chat a bit. And, uh, they do actually go back into the smiley face thing, and all look up at you at once and one of them says, "Yeah, we think it's probably okay if we tell you things, it's... uh, that doesn't, you know, stop us from standing here and staring at you, ominously. We actually spent quite a bit of time staring at that one, well, the first one you mentioned, uh, kind of on and off for a while, , people kind of do tours of duty on this sort of thing, but, we saw her over where she lives, this morning."
Harmony: Where does she live?
Tanam: "Oh, , can you fly?"
Harmony: Yes. No.
Don: It was a good bluff there, til you thought, maybe you'd have prove it.
Harmony: That was exactly what happened.
Tanam: They're making this weird sound, all of them. Although you've been communicating pretty well with them, you can't quite get at what it is at first. Everybody else in the room can hear the sound too. And then you eventually realize that they're laughing. They, like, "oh, oh, that was a good one. That was a good one. Oh, oh, oh, I wanna, oh, oh, oh, oh, um, ask me, ask me."
Harmony: Oh! Can, can you fly?
Tanam: "No!" And all of them just, just, laugh and laugh.
Harmony: You're all so funny. I'm glad we're friends.
Tanam: "Okay, um, I guess, uh, Oh wait, what's that? We're supposed to stare at all of you, and some of you going to the place where we can get food is... It's good for us to be able to get food, but it's also kind of annoying that we have to split up..." and half of them fly away over towards the Hall.
Harmony: Okay, well I just yell "I'm so sorry. He's trying to make sure Beeb's can be open as fast as possible so you can have more food." Which comes across as a "caw, caw."
Rozafeen: I didn't set this up in advance, but it would be so fun for the story. Can we say that the druid carries seeds?
Tanam: sure.
Rozafeen: Yay! Alright, I toss, I toss them some seeds.
Harmony: Nice.
Rozafeen: I tell Urekas, "Sorry to be distracting. They just looked hungry. Sometimes you know, right?"
Harmony: Yeah, they only had coffee today. Oh, and I also tell Hellena the entire conversation we just had.
Rozafeen: Oh, okay. Yeah. I tell them, I, I agree that I'm sorry that we made their job harder by splitting up. We won't be doing that often.
Harmony: Okay, I report to the birds.
Tanam: "okay, so I guess... we could probably show you where she is."
Harmony: Okay! I'm glad we're friends.
The Intern: This episode featured
Chelsea Burns as Harmony as Urekas.
Harmony: Great! We love numbers.
The Intern: Find her on Instagram @ChelseaComedy.
Chris Grumbles as Don as Georg.
Don: I artiftict stuff.
The Intern: Find him on Instagram @ChrisGrumbles.
Desiree Phair as Rozafeen as Hellena and Justice.
Rozafeen: For the record, I will be conducting my part of this conversation upside down.
The Intern: Sylas Silver as Vafrus as Calumn as Ruffort.
Vafrus: "We always have a light touch," as the carpet sizzles away.
The Intern: Check out his RPG at readysetrole.org.
Mark E. Phair as Tanam the dm.
Tanam: I need another take of you saying long rest but without mentioning pushing a button.
The Intern: Find him at markephair.com.
And me, Damian Lichtenstein, as the Intern.
Back on my chronoscope grind.
Find me on Instagram @thatdamlich, or check out my drag king account @woody.banter.
Thank you for listening to Coffee, Cults, and Empires.
Edited by Mark and Desiree.
Music by Kevin Vitz-Wong, hear more at kevinvitzwong.bandcamp.com.
Character art and logo design by Carmanda. Find her at carmandaartsthings.com.
Sensitivity consulting by Dominique Dickey. Find links to more of their work at dominiquedickey.com.
Support us on Patreon for access to outtakes, worldbuilding, and more!
Find all these links in the episode notes or at coffeecultsandempires.com, where you can also find transcripts and more.
That's coffeecultsandempires.com.
The Intern: I don't know. I just don't know." Chris, what are you doing here?