15th Session

Darla left a letter for Martin explaining that she couldn't continue doing what he and the others were doing.

Darla's Letter to Martin

Meanwhile, folks had tried to contact Drs. Walker and Keaton and their patients Douglas Henslowe and Edgar Job, as they had become aware that Luc Fauche and his group were trying to kidnap them for the (now deceased) Savitree Sirikhan. They'd managed to grab Dr. Cecil Walker, but weren't accompanying their victim, for whatever reason. Folks intercepted the crate currently holding the unconscious alienist and brought him back to their suite. Lillian teased him when he woke up about being captured by a crazy woman with a knife, as opposed to being captured by some other crazy woman.

Cecil found out about Joyce's blueprints and worked with her on those, not entirely sure why she was building a mechanical man, as she wouldn't tell him, but intrigued by the idea.

(N.B.: I don't know whether or not folks are actually using the word "robot" in character. If they're not, I'm not sure what they're using instead.)

Eventually, Lillian dragged Cecil away and informed him that he was taking her to dinner. She'd arranged things so that it looked to anyone watching them that he'd made any necessary reservations at a fine Bangkok restaurant, arranged to have flowers delivered, and so on.

Joyce did a bit of relaxing, I think, playing on her banjo.

Vito: Did I actually hear you say, "yippy kay yi yay"?

Martin decided to talk to Vito about Vito's mistress, Hillary Quarrie, who worshipped Shub-Niggurath.

I gather from what Vito's player said that Vito told Martin something along the lines of, "Yes, I will introduce you to her, but I need you to answer a question. If it came down to a choice between Jeremiah and the world, which would you choose?" and that, when Martin couldn't give an instant answer, Vito said that he understood that, but that he would need an answer before long. I think he also said something about Martin being the most dangerous of them all. And maybe he said something about liking Martin, but not being about to have mercy on someone who was an active threat to the world -- I'm not sure. I will update if I get more information from the players.

Cecil and Lillian spent the night at a different hotel room from the others. The next day, Cecil eventually got Lillian to explain about Jeremiah's status as a brain in a jar, pointing out that if he were going to help with Joyce's project, he needed to know details, and if those details actually involved helping someone, like, oh, someone Lillian cared about, then he really did need to know the details so he didn't get anything wrong.

Lillian brought Cecil back to the hotel room and introduced him to Jeremiah. There was some small talk.

Lillian: Jeremiah, do you know where Vito went?

Jeremiah: The man who until recently was in the lovely sarong?

At some point, Lillian and Martin had a conversation about sex, as they often did. Lillian realized, to her surprise, that Martin is monogamous where Jeremiah is concerned. Jeremiah was alive, as far as Martin was concerned, and about as safe as he was going to be for the foreseeable future. Lillian tried to explain "ethical non-monogamy" to Martin. I have no idea how that went.

Eventually, Lillian realized that Martin had no idea of Joyce's plans for Jeremiah. She left Cecil with Jeremiah and went to gather Martin, Joyce, and Vito (who might have been in the same place) and make Joyce tell Martin what was going on.

Martin: Joyce, you want to tell me?

Joyce: Martin, have you ever read The Wizard of Oz?

Vito: Have you ever read Superman?

Martin: No and no.

Joyce: I thought every girl in America had read those books.

I forget Martin's rejoinder, but I think it was good, going beyond the obvious statement of his gender.

Joyce protested that she knew what she was doing and that everything was just fine and under control. After all, she flew her plane, right?

Lillian: How many boyfriends' brains are connected to your plane?

Joyce: Well, I don't have a boyfriend, so none.

Vito tried to make suggestions for the robot / waldo. After all, if Vito were a brain in a jar, he knew what he'd want.

Vito: I want guns and mobility and armor.

He also made a comment about "nothing to schtup with".

Vito: Sorry, Marty.

Lillian: Do you want me to make them stop torturing you? Cuz I could do that.

Martin: Um...

Joyce: Please don't let her hurt us.

Vito talked about trying to rig things up so that Jeremiah could smoke.

Lillian: Do not put Nicotine into a life preserving fluid!

Undeterred, Vito suggested pouring a drink into the brain cylinder.

Lillian: I will make your deaths -slow- and -lingering-.

Vito: I'm already married, so that won't work.

Martin: Even -I- know enough biology to know that pouring alcohol on a brain is a bad idea.

Lillian noted that there were three things Jeremiah could use.

• Someone who knew how minds worked, like a doctor for the mind. Oh, look! Cecil was an alienist!
• Someone who knew how machines worked. Oh, look! Cecil was a mechanic! Sure, Joyce was no slouch herself, and she was the one who'd come up with the plan and the blueprints, but there was a third thing.
• Somewhere not in Bangkok during the rainy season nor in sandy, hot Ethiopia during any season, but in, oh, say, some modern, state of the art medical facility, like, say, the one they'd all worked to set up in Johns Hopkins, where Cecil now worked and where he could do his best to help Jeremiah somewhere not in the center of the whirling chaos that Joyce, Vito, Lillian, and Martin tended to create.

This made sense. Cecil and Jeremiah started their 3 week journey back to the USA, which I gather would be about the same amount of time regardless of whether they took a plane or a boat as their primary means of travel. And, a plane would probably be safer.

I know that Joyce's route towards Ethiopia went through Delhi. I forget whether Cecil and Jeremiah went with the group that far, though of course, Fred, Joyce's co-pilot, largely oblivious to what had happened in Bangkok, was going. Lillian's aunt, Anne, had collected Martin's sister Isabella, and they would likely rendezvous somewhere with Darla, but they would not be going to Ethiopia. I suspect Anne had convinced Isabella that they weren't done with Siamese temples and princes and kings, and perhaps intended to take her to Paris.

Meanwhile, folks decided that they needed to get leads on Mi Go technology, particularly brain fluid, as that was the main hard limit on keeping Jeremiah alive, and on Luc Fauche, as he might know where to find some, and, in any case, I think folks are considering him a loose end that needs to be dealt with in a permanent fashion.

My notes say that Lillian spent 1 point of Bureaucracy to get a message to Fauche and they also mention a 1 point Credit Rating spend, though I'm not sure what that was for. My notes also say that Vito asked Remy to check on brain fluid. Remy, I figured, had probably corresponded with Savitree, albeit without either of them ever knowing who the other was.

Janet Winston Rogers sent Joyce a telegram asking for a quick update and whether Joyce needed her to do anything on her end. She was well aware that Joyce and the others might not be returning to the USA for some time. Joyce sent a quick update, asking for more money, something Janet could certainly send. The telegrams were sent encoded, but we didn't work out an actual code, so we're clearly working with the decrypted text.

Janet Winston Rogers's Telegram to Joyce in Bangkok

Joyce's Response to the Bangkok Telegram

Ethiopia was where George Ayers had gone in 1924, before Ramon Echevarria's fatal ritual. Ayers had been skeptical about Echevarria's claims about who the cult was worshipping. He had joined Bartolo Acuna's dig, apparently expecting to find some answers there.

Acuna was working for Universidad Complutesne in Spain at that time, so folks contacted the institution. The university sent them a copy of a letter Acuna wrote. He complained about all of the problems plaguing the dig.

Vito: Almost as if the dig was cursed.

Martin: Like that farm in Los Angeles.

Lillian: Oh -hell-.

I think she was thinking of the Mouths they'd thought they'd destroyed, but would need to deal with, as Puey Pramoj had explained what he'd theorized about how to destroy Mouths properly. By Lillian's count, there were five mouths to deal with:

1. Los Angeles (attempted destruction)
2. Mexico City (attempted destruction)
3. Savannah (theorized, under Joy Grove)
4. Los Angeles (theorized, under farm)
5. Malta

Puey Pramoj was staying in Bangkok, keeping an eye on the site where the Bangkok Mouth had been, looking for unnaturally quick settling of the ground. (He was also serving as at least a part time body guard for Ravee Natanee and, between the two of them, they could collect mail sent to Savitree by anyone who didn't realize she was dead.)

I'm not sure whether there are folks keeping an eye on the collapsed Trammel Mansion in Los Angeles or on the destruction sit of the Mexico City Mouth, although I know the group has someone watching Jonathan Brooks's post office box in Mexico City, in case anyone sends anything to it, such as the man Brooks sent to lead a team into the Yucatan.

Lillian got a letter from her ex-boyfriend-sort-of.

Richard Cooper's 2nd Letter to Lillian

Lillian's been occasionally very close to deciding not to dump Richard, but that letter made her regrets for having done so vanish. Richard has occasionally been surprisingly perceptive, but this letter broke that trend.

Martin got a letter from Samson Trammel:

Samson Trammel's 4th Letter to Martin

Martin (probably to himself): He's getting worse.

Martin may be the only one worried about Samson. Joyce has the Echevarria's former accountant, Abraham Buchwald, gathering information on where Samson has his money, and she seems to be enjoying what she sees of the slow deterioration of his mind. If the mafia withdraw their protection, she might well try to kill him. Vito certainly would.

Joyce got the plane as far as Asmara, in Eritrea. From there, folks took a train to Massaua, arriving 27 July 1937. The message sent to Luc Fauche told him to arrive somewhere from the 1-5 of August, giving him a window.

Martin's Letter as Savitree Sirikhan to Luc Fauche

In Massaua, the entry inspector was Carlo Salvatore, an Italian man who noted that the group had no one who seemed

• dangerous
• unsavory
• African

and did have two people fluent in Italian, so he signed travel papers for everyone. Joyce, or rather, Josh Summers, and Vito convinced him to keep an eye out for Luc Fauche, their friend, who was coming to Massaua, as they wanted to throw him a discreet surprise party. He was happy to agree to that, but adamant about not taking a bribe / gratuity. Vito suggested that the group take him out to dinner, but when he agreed to that, said that, as they didn't actually have time for dinner, perhaps he would accept the money to cover the dinner and treat himself.

Folks checked into the Hotel Internazionale, which was pricey, given that the Italian army was taking a lot of the area's resources, but then, they had sufficient funds. Martin and Lillian went shopping. I'm not really sure what kind of shopping 1937 Massaua had, but I figured Lillian would have no trouble finding a shawl. As for Martin, he started poking around antiques.

Joyce and Vito started talking to people, and Joyce started looking for contacts. She found Hakim abd al Malik, a man she (as Josh, I think) had worked with in Cairo, years ago, via the special dilettante ability. (NB: There's an interesting line between total player agency, not letting the ability kill plot, and not letting the ability whiff because the player isn't able to read the Keeper's or author's mind to figure out what kind of contact would be most useful.)

They also spoke with the Italian Captain Guido Sighorile, and, when I asked for some academic person Joyce might know who just coincidentally happened to be in Massaua, her player suggested the British archaeologist, Dr. Marcus Brody, who, as a certain Dr. Jones said, once got lost in his own museum.

Between all of these people, Joyce and Vito learned that the next logical step, if they wanted to take a look at the site of Bartolo Acuna's 1924 dig, in the Dallol area, was Mersa Fatma, a place easily reached by dhow. That would also be the best place to hire a local guide, as all qualified parties in Massaua were part of the war effort.

Joyce asked Hakim if he didn't have a cousin. Now, Egypt isn't Ethiopia or Eritrea, but after mentally reviewing what I knew about the Mersa Fatma situation, it occurred to me that, yes, actually, Hakim might have a cousin (in some sense of the word, possibly on his wife's side) who worked for the CMC at Mersa Fatma. The CMC was the Compagnia Mineraria Coloniale, an Italian company that was pretty big in Mersa Fatma. And, the company had built and still owned a rail line that went from Mersa Fatma to Iron Point, near Dallol.

Dr. Brody had interesting news. It just so happened that he'd run into Professor Bartolo Acuna in Massaua a few weeks back, at the Internazionale Hotel, where the group was staying. Joyce and Vito spoke to the hotel staff, and between what the man behind the desk could say and what they could find flipping through the hotel registry after bribing him to take a short walk, they learned that Acuna had left Massaua about two weeks ago. He'd boasted of having secured a contract to transport the archaeological spoils of war, and said he'd be travelling with a column of infantry men.

Captain Sighorile was happy to drink with Josh and Vito. He confirmed that there had been a column of soldiers leaving Massaua at that time, heading west towards Adua, which, unlike Massaua and Mersa Fatma, was not in Eritrea, but in Ethiopia proper. He was happy to tell them about the route, disposition, and so on of the column. After all, they had travel papers, signed by Carlo Salvatore.

Meanwhile, as Martin looked through various antiques, he heard someone advising him about the ones he was looking at. He recognized the voice as that of the man who had shown up in the Los Angeles jail when Joyce had contacted Nyarlathotep. So did Lillian, and she gave a full curtsey. Nyarlathotep said he was just double checking to make sure that Martin was turning down the offer Samson Trammel had made. No hard feelings -- it wasn't as if Martin had contacted the Crawling Chaos or vice versa; if anyone had screwed up, it was Samson. Nyarlathotep departed after reiterating the advice on the antiques to Martin, who said thank you, quite cheerfully.

As Martin's player noted, Martin's underestimating Nyarlathotep. That is, he understands that the Crawling Chaos is dangerous and could squash him like a bug. But, so is Vito, and so could Vito. Therefore, Martin reasons, there's no major difference in danger between the two. Mobster, Great Old One or Outer God, either can kill him dead or hurt him a lot, and if he can deal with one, he can certainly deal with the other.

Folks reunited the next morning and decided to go to Adua before Mersa Fatma. They may have been concerned about just what archaeological spoils Bartolo Acuna was planning to transport. There was some debate between taking camels and taking motorized transportation, as I explained that the Italian military had commandeered all motorized transportation. But, I was confident that if they wanted to, they could find a way to get a ride in a van to Adua. After all, Joyce / Josh had made a lot of friends, as had Vito, and friends sometimes do each other favors. The group had travel papers. The group had a lot of money and could bribe people. And, the group had the skills needed to steal a van, if folks so chose.

Joyce: Let's get ourselves on a captain -- er, on a van.

Lillian: I need a drink.

Martin: I need several.

As ideas started flowing a bit fast and thick, Martin was the one who called for order.

Martin: Everyone! Let me work!

Lillian: Thank Kali for competent pimps.

I figured we were going for "My friend here will have sex with you if you'll give us all a lift to Adua." Not the approach I expected, but perfectly viable. Martin spoke Italian, so he'd be doing the talking. If the captain preferred guys, well, Martin might be willing to compromise his stance on monogamy for the sake of not having to ride a camel, and anyway, it was getting late, and I wasn't about to add extra complications to get the core clue infodump this time.

As it turned out, I didn't have to. Martin's player cheerfully did it. What I expected to be a simple, straightforward sex-for-transportation deal turned into --

Martin: So, my friend here read a silly desert romance novel and wants a fine Italian captain to pretend he's kidnapping her and have sex with her and then drive her to an infantry column so it can pretend to rescue her because her uncle here is going to send her to school when he gets back --

Captain: Her uncle's here? He'd kill me --

Martin: No, it's fine, her uncle is totally behind this plan because he also wants her to have some fun.

Once Vito, pretending to be Lillian's uncle, finished mentally facepalming, he explained that she had a thing for one of those, er, jazz musician types, and he'd rather her first time was with a fine Italian man who knew how to treat her. And, Lillian's player spent a point of flattery, and...

Well, that's one guy who's going to be telling stories about weird American women for a long time.

Vito: Next time, camels!

Lillian: Next time, let -me- do the talking!

Joyce: Next time, Lillian can have sex with the camels.

Martin: Complexity addiction. I admit it.

Lillian: Also, you're a pervert. I don't mean you're gay!

Joyce: It's a fair cop.

Martin: I'm copping to it.

I suspect that what the captain lacked in skill and respect he made up for in enthusiasm and confidence, and Lillian wasn't exactly looking for a soulmate.

Once folks reached Adua, they asked around and were quickly pointed to the tent of "the sour Spanish academic", Bartolo Acuna. He was willing to talk to people who knew something about his areas of expertise and who had decent alcohol. Acuna was willing to tell what he knew, though not pleased that Martin reminded him that, compared to ground waking work he'd done at Dallol, he was essentially being the glorified errand boy of the Italian army. The player has since taken to calling Acuna the "Glorified But Pissy Archeologist Deliveryman".

Acuna became interested in the Universidad Complutesne's copy of the Revelations of Glaaki. It had been translated before, but Acuna did new work on the fragments "concerning an ancient deity concerned with orgiastic ritual". According to his interpretation, the fragments indicated that Dallow had been "an ancient focus of worship".

Acuna needed funding, of course. George Ayers contacted him, and Ayers got Ramon Echevarria to pay for almost all of the expedition's expenses. Acuna arrived in June of 1924. Ayers arrived in Massaua by July. By late July or early August, they were on site at Dallol. They found the outer walls buried under the earth, but right where the Acuna's interpretation of the Revelations said they'd be, vindicating him.

The reliefs on the doors sealing the inner complex of he temple were different from other works of the same period. Acuna thought that they were protective. By now, Ayers was there and quite interested. He insisted that they send a fragment back to Ramon Echevarria in Los Angeles. They did so.

Acuna showed the group the picture he had taken of that fragment. It was the same rock that Douglas Henslowe had stolen from Ramon Echvarria. The rock was now in a safety deposit box in Los Angles, supposedly protecting Douglas's journal and Samson Trammel's Testament of the Dripping Mouthes Emanates.

Unfortunately for Acuna, at that point, everything slowed to a crawl. There was trouble with laborers. The Compagnia Mineraria Coloniale was unreliable in delivering supplies. Bandits destroyed equipment. It wasn't until 1926 (and Echevarria's disastrous ritual was in August of 1924) before they finally managed to get inside the inner complex, and then inside the sanctum at its center.

At the center, Acuna said, was a statue of a mouth, carved in great detail from some kind of rock they hadn't seen before, probably quarried from the brine fields. Acuna showed them his sketches of the "giant, screaming mouth, all tongues and a dozen kinds of teeth and lips that were… well, obscene."

Folks realized, but did not say, that this "statue" was not a statue, but a calcified Mouth, like the one Genial Brooker showed them, but of a size comparable to the ones in Trammel's mansion, beneath Brooks's stronghold in Mexico City, and beneath the Labyrinth in Bangkok. The one Brooker showed them was supposedly calcified when he threw his mother's cross into it. They believed that this was not because of the priest who had blessed the cross, but because the mother had been extremely strict and ascetic.

Regardless, after getting to the inner sanctum, the dig ran into more problems. The CMC cut off their supplies. So, Acuna and Ayers went to Mersa Fatma to talk to the "pinheads" at CMC in person.

While they were negotiating with the company, there was a volcanic eruption at the dig site. The entire site was destroyed, having fallen to the bottom of a crater about thirty yards across. Many people died. Ayers decided he had to see the destruction for himself, so he took the train at Mersa Fatma, heading for the Dallol dig site.

Acuna sketched a map of the rail line for them. But, he himself had never returned to the dig site. He saw no reason to look on the site of failure. As for Ayers, as far as he knows:

“the last people I know of to see him are the tribe who travel the area near and around Dallol village. They worked for the CMC back during the dig, hauling salt to the railhead on their camels. We usually traveled with them between the railhead and the dig, for safety and their knowledge of the desert. Some even worked for us at the site.”

Acuna has no wish to return to the dig site. He's back in Ethiopia because he considers what happened in Spain to be madness. His current mission is to oversee the transportation of the Obelisk of Axum to Rome, and as Joyce's player noted, this was indeed a real thing. Cf.: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obelisk_of_Axum

There was an attack on the camp as the session ended, but I'm viewing that particular atttack more as chrome / atmosphere / reminder that there's a war going on. We'll pick up with folks back in Massaua that evening or the following morning.