5th Session

Chris and Alessandro missed this session.

We picked up with Joyce, Lillian, and Martin each planning to visit one of their Sources of Stability. Joyce and Martin planned to visit their brothers. Lillian planned to visit her possible-fiance-material cousin.

The women did not sleep easily. Both had nightmares. Joyce dreamed of the ground trying to swallow her up, while Lillian dreamed of being back in Joy Grove, only the patients had mouths where their eyes should have been.

Cousin Richard Cooper was happy to see her, but more than a little worried, as she looked fairly shaken and unfocused. This was hardly surprising, given that Lillian had lost 6 points of Stability discovering that studying Nectar was as addictive as taking it, and her Drive was Thirst for Knowledge. Richard learned none of this, of course. He chatted and asked for her opinion on houses. After all, given he was investing in orange groves, it made sense to live nearby.

It was clear that he was seeking Lillian's opinion as a way of sounding out whether she would be amenable to a proposal. She temporized by suggesting they go for a drive. He agreed. She made vague comments that he could take as expressing at least some tentative opinions. When they parted, Richard thought the day had gone well. Lillian, on the other hand, was ambivalent. She knew what Richard was offering; she did not know whether or not she wanted it.

Meanwhile, Joyce's brother Charlie asked his sister to talk about anything except oranges with him. He needed a break from the oranges. She was happy to oblige.

Later on, however, he found her with maps and charts and papers. I think at first she said that this wasn't for a client, but he eventually got her to admit that she was working out a route for a client and that it would take her into danger. I think she admitted to planning a trip to Bangkok, but I'm not sure. She also said it paid badly, which was odd only because it wasn't actually true; Janet Winston-Rogers is actually paying them quite well. OTOH, perhaps it was true in the sense that no money could possibly be enough.

Her brother was not happy to here this, especially when she tossed him a crate of stuff and shows him a sealed envelope she wanted him to give to her maid (actually lover) in case she died. Charlie dropped the box in surprise and dismay. Joyce probably padded its contents for just such eventualities. Charlie remained dismayed band displeased.

Joyce and Lillian returned to the house the were sharing with Martin, Ida Lupino, and Lucille Ball. Martin had not returned from his visit to his brother Henry, but the actresses had taken a message for him from a man named Samuel Jenner.

Joyce immediately phoned her friend, Bernie Ohs in the LA County Sheriff's office and asked him to use his old PI skills to find out which hotel room Jenner was staying in. He asked for a little more information, and I think we decided that the name of the hotel or the phone number or both was on the back of the sheet, where Joyce hadn't yet looked. With this information, finding the room number was easy.

Lillian: What's the plan?

Joyce: I'm gonna knock on the door, and then I'm gonna stick a gun in his face and tell him to leave Los Angeles.

She went out to the car to find Lillian waiting, demanding Joyce either stop and tell her what was going on or take her with Joyce. Joyce chose the latter, let Lillian get into the car, and then drove off in her usual terrifying manner.

Joyce (about Martin, as she drives) It's like he puts his life at risk in the most ordinary situations. <SCREECH>

Lillian: Ah, Joyce, I think that cop wants us to pull over.

Joyce: Well, that would be a bad idea. I don't even have a license to drive anymore.

Samuel Jenner was Martin's ex(sometimes)-boyfriend. Joyce didn't like him.

Joyce (about Samuel and Martin): Those two are not good together in most situations, except for a couple you don't have to worry your pretty little head about.

They got to the hotel and started arguing overvwho should distract the hotel detective. I hadn't even realized there should be one.

Lillian: Both of us are carrying concealed weapons!

Joyce: Yes, but mine's illegal!

Lillian: Mine's terrifying!

I think Lillian was referring to her kukri. By now, they were worried that the argument was attracting the detective's attention, so Lillian grabbed Joyce and kissed her "like an aggressive gay man", according to Alden, which I think means that Lillian was kissing Joyce the way Martin kissed Lillian when she asked him what Nectar was like. Joyce was a bit taken aback, but this had the desired effect: Now that the women were kissing instead of yelling, he saw no reason to pay any great attention to them.

Lillian: I need to have lost my purse.

She gave it to Joyce, along with her kukri. Joyce headed into the hotel lobby as Lillian started to cry very loudly about her lost purse. A Flattery spend got her the full attention of the hotel detective while Joyce walked by.

Lillian then pretended to remember being, oh, such a fool, and leaving the purse in the ladies' room. As the detective was a man and currently bought the story, he was not about to follow her in. However, I noted that, Flattery spend or not, the detective would notice if Lillian left the ladies' room without her recovered purse. Cat suggested making a Streetwise Spend for Joyce and have Joyce retroactively remember to plant the purse in the hotel lobby bathroom. That worked for me, and the women met up.

Lillian: Ahem. I think you have something of mine.

Joyce: What? Oh, right. (returns Lillian's kukri)

Joyce preceded Lillian, I think, taking the service elevator. Samuel had ordered room service, and Joyce bribed the hotel staff member to let her deliver it, saying that it was a surprise for her friend. Lillian caught up with her, and they proceeded to enter Samuel's room, wave weapons around, and tell him to pack and get the hell out of Dodge, er, Los Angeles.

Some explanation of all of this:

Eternal Lies works on using Sources of Stability as more than just "So, I see Ol' Source #2 between sessions. I'm back up to full Stability." It's got a lot of advice on how to do this with the particular focus of the Eternal Lies campaign. So, I've been trying to make sure to pay attention to everyone's sources and get as many into play as possible. Sure, not every source for every PC need be in play all the time, but they should not be static.

One of Martin's sources is Samuel Jenner, described as his abusive ex-boyfriend. It was clear from dialogue when Martin first appeared that the "ex" status came and went. I asked for more details, and discovered that Betsy had a completely different kind of person in mind for Samuel than I did, and that "abuse" meant more mental abuse than physical. Her Samuel was far more interesting than my vague ideas.

He was from a wealthy family whose business had prospered, rather than declined during the Depression. This was also a business that clearly had use for an antiquities expert. We weren't originally sure what kind of business that would be, but Betsy decided on discount department stores, which did indeed thrive during the Depression. As the Jenner family was wealthy, I figured he and Lillian had probably met at some social function or other, and he probably made, at worst, a neutral impression on her. Despite that, Lillian wasn't waiting for a full explanation before taking Joyce's side, which was amusing.

Samuel had hired Martin as his secretary some time ago, and, at that time, the head of his antiquities department was Jeremiah Rhodes. Jeremiah and Martin became lovers, and Samuel fired Jeremiah for that reason. Jeremiah and Martin were very happy together, but then, Jeremiah died.

I asked how he'd died, and Betsy told me that he'd been stabbed, and that she hadn't created any details about that. Now, I ask you, what Keeper worth her salt could resist that kind of juicy hook?

The two things I wanted to keep in mind here were:

-- This shouldn't have been Samuel deciding to kill Jeremiah or have him killed. -- This should tie into Eternal Lies itself.

There is a character in the campaign whom the PCs have yet to meet who goes to extreme lengths to gather occult and mythos information. This person has a team of people charged with acquiring the information, which might take the form of books, objects, or even scholars and experts.

Jeremiah was an antiquities expert. So, he had been hired to authenticate something or other by someone, and that turned into a kidnapping attempt. Jeremiah got away, but was fatally stabbed.

He clearly hadn't had time to say anything about what was going on to Martin. All right. He wrote a letter. Betsy had already asked if there could be that kind of post-death communication, and had also asked that Jeremiah not turn out to have been secretly evil, something I didn't particularly want to do, anyway. This covered both of those nicely.

But, why hadn't Martin received the letter? It couldn't have been destroyed. It was unlikely to have fallen into a crack in the floorboards, although that was a good enough back up plan if I couldn't come up with something else.

The something else was Samuel. He'd been approached by the folks wanting whatever-it-was authenticated, and knew none of his current employees had any clue about that. So, he decided to show that he didn't hold grudges by kicking some small business to Jeremiah. He genuinely had no idea that he was putting his rival in any peril whatsoever.

After Jeremiah died, Samuel took the letter. I'd vaguely planned for it to have been written in a cab or something. Jeremiah might have found an NYC cab driver who either didn't notice the bood or didn't much care, right? But Betsy and a friend of hers, Aili (whom, I gather, originally played Jeremiah?) had him writing it from a hospital bed, which made much more sense.

Me: Thank you for plugging the plot hole I didn't know I had.

Samuel took the letter to protect Martin from getting into trouble trying to track down Jeremiah's killer, or at least, that's what he'd tell anyone if asked. Jeremiah may have mentioned Samuel in the letter as well, and if so, while Samuel neither intended things to turn out the way they did nor had any inkling that they would, it still looked rather awkward.

He kept the letter, and would probably tell anyone who asked why that it was because he was always intending to give it to Martin, just as soon as Martin was clearly stable enough not to get himself into trouble because of it. And he waited for Martin to come back to him, which Martin did.

Betsy offered to play Samuel, and I agreed. This was a good idea for two reasons. First, she did a better job than I would have. Things got surreal and hilarious. Second, since Martin was curretly offscreen, it gave her a character to play. I tried to write a quick note with what she needed to know, but my handwriting was, of course, utterly illegible, so I just told her privately.

Joyce and Lillian didn't start off well disposed towards him, and he didn't exactly improve matters for himself.

Lillian: Now, Joyce, you know Vito won't like it if we ask him to help hide another body.

Lillian called Henry, Martin's brother, to ask if Martin were there, as Joyce seemed to think Samuel might have done something with Martin. Samuel, of course, had called Henry (having met him as his brother's boss) earlier, but saw no reason to tell this to the two women who were threatening him, one with a firearm, and one with some kind of martial arts hold and statements about which bones were more painful to break.

Henry told Lillian that Martin wasn't there, and that he was worried. He also told her about Samuel looking for him.

Lillian: Really? He called you himself? You'd think he'd have his secretary do that.

Henry: Martin _is_ his secretary!

Lillian tried to calm him down, assuring him that she'd keep in touch, and telling him not to call the police just yet. I forget whether I had her make a Reassurance Spend, but I certainly should have.

Samuel: What the hell have you gotten him into?

Joyce (realizing): Oh right -- this is my fault.

Okay, that was probably before Samuel's full story about how he'd been protecting Martin came out. Given that the person he'd sent to Jeremiah worked for someone in Bangkok, and given that Joyce and Lillian knew that there was a cult branch in Bangkok, they were even less happy with Samuel.

Still, they brought him along as they searched for Martin, possibly after getting his parole. That is, Joyce asked for it, and Samuel may or may not have given her the equivalent of it, but Joyce wasn't sure to what degree it counted, given it was under duress.

As Joyce had spent a lot of time cultivating a Los Angeles network, Oral History allowed her to use it to find out who'd seen Martin's car where. Eventually, she learned, Martin driven to Pasadena instead of to his brother's home. In Pasadena, he'd driven to the mansion of Samuel Trammel, which had mostly been cleared out. Folks just needed to deal with the libary -- and the giant mouth in the basement which was spewing out Nectar. Martin was addicted to Nectar.

Lillian: Why didn't we just go there first?

Betsy: Well, now we have Samuel with us. Samuel makes things so much worse! Samuel makes _everything_ worse!

Joyce was already preparing for the worst.

Joyce: Lillian, what if we find him, but he's not _there_?

Lillian: That's what my Derringer's for.

Joyce: I just didn't want to say it. (offers Lillian a bigger gun)

Lillian: A .22 uder the chin works just as well as a .45.

Samuel: Look, I know you hate me. But, can you please tell me what Martin's gotten himself into?

Joyce: Lots of sex and drugs.

Samuel: Yes, and?

He chalked that up to business as usual for Martin.

Samuel: He has an addictive persoality.

However, he settled in for the ride.

Samuel: Where are you taking me, and will I be conspicuous in these clothes?

Joyce: Hell on Earth -- in Pasadena!

They arrived at the mansion and found Martin's car parked there.

Samuel: Would you mind hading me a pistol?

Joyce: Sure. (empties one of ammo and hands it to him)

Lillian: Joyce.

Joyce: Oh, all right. (hands him fully loaded revolver)

I'd never actually statted Samuel out, but I gather he's got about a point in Firearms, which at least means he's not a hazard to himself and his allies. He was also not intended to be doing any fighting, although Joyce did consider showing him the hidden part of the basement.

Joyce: Samuel, are you a brave man?

Lillian: Joyce. Joyce. Martin needs him. For a little while longer.

Joyce, of course, was extremely competent with firearms.

Lillian: Joyce, if you need to shoot something, and I'm between you and it, I usually move left and then right.

Joyce: Okay. That's what I used to tell my wingman, only in Russian, although this was in Spain.

And Lillian had to remind Joyce or Samuel or both what Samuel was doing there in the first place.

Lillian: We'd like a pair of arms to throw him into.

Joyce (unspoken): Or what's left of him.

The women entered the hidden room, where the orgy of Nectar addicts was still in full swing. There was also a record playing eerily repetitive music and a woman's voice singing refrains in Spanish and crooning. Martin, naked and drenched in Nectar, was wrapped in the six foot long tongue of the huge mouth, a look of bliss on his face. Stability rolls were made or missed at this point.

Lillian gingerly lifted the needle from the phonograph. Joyce went into the room to get Martin out and managed to extricate him -- or perhaps the mouth simply chose to let him go, as he was almost shoved at her.

Lillian wanted to slice off the tongue, but realized it was likely too thick for her kukri to be assured of doing that. She took the record. Joyce took Martin. They left, closing the door on the mouth and the addicts.

Joyce, Lillian, and Samuel made their way back outside, whereupon Joyce handed Martin over to Samuel.

Joyce: You addicts. Always got to have some drugs. (lights a cigarette)

She also hosed both men down. After all, Martin was covered in Nectar, and some of it had gotten onto Samuel's clothing. Getting Samuel's nice suit soaked was merely a pleasant side effect.

I forget the context, but Samuel did something at least somewhat helpful.

Lillian (to Samuel): Thank you. (to Martin, displeased): You _see_ the position you put me in!

Now that Martin was safely retrieved, Lillian started pulling out dynamite.

Joyce: Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!

After all, there were still people inside.

Lillian: No one I care about!

Joyce: It's a captial crime.

Lillian: You don't to blow up the house?

Joyce (clarifying): I said it's a capital crime. We have to be careful.

Martin and Samuel were both horrified at the idea of blowing up people, Martin probably more empathically so, as they were only doing what he'd been doing until he'd been pulled away. Lillian reluctantly put the dynamite back.

Everyone went to Henry's home, and Joyce warned Henry that Martin was, er, on the sauce, yes. Henry and Samuel helped him recover bodily and mentally. Joyce and Lillian took a trip back to the mansion to look at the library.

Joyce spotted the painting.

Me: You can a 1-point Astronomy spend, if you like.

Cat: I have been wanting to make an Astronomy spend all game.

On realizing that the star field in the painting showed the constellations from a perspective far, far removed from Earth, Joyce smashed the painting, destroying it completely.

Cat: But not before the image of that star field is etched in her memory!

Meanwhile, Lillian broke into the desk and found Samson Trammel's magnum opus, the Testament of the Dripping Mouthes’ Emanates, a physically disgusting compilation of papers and folios bound in various ways or not at all, with many pages "soaked in bodily fluids" or "supplemented with thin shavings of organic material". The women needed to make a 2 point mythos Stability check just looking at it.

Lillian put it into a pail. She decided that the book was almost certainly a trap, just like analyzing the Nectar.

Lillian: This book should go with that rock.

Joyce: I knew there was a reason I keep you around.

Lillian: To beat people up.

Lillian tried to figure out how the library was organized, i.e., where the Clues or the Good Stuff (i.e., Mythos-increasing stuff) was to be found. While there is a later case where an entire library at least as badly organized if not more so can be taken as a whole for mechanical purposes, this is not the case with Trammel's library. I'm not sure why, but given what I know about it, I'm not going to change that for this run. (I am querying one of the authors, however.)

Folks were willing to work with me on the simple plan: the library was boxed up, except from the Testament, and sent to Vito's old comrade in arms, Remi Piper, in Canada. He can do an inventory without forcing a PC out of play to do the boring stuff.

Martin read the Testament, and everyone went to visit Father Vincent, the "holy father" that Genial Brooker said had blessed his mother's cross, the one Brooker threw into a much smaller mouth than the one in the basement of Trammel's home. Apparently, the cross had calcified the mouth, neutralizing it. But, Joyce knew that religious mumbo jumbo just didn't work against the mythos.

The text explains what happened, and that gave me enough to go on to invent the "holy father". He assured Joyce, Lillian, and Martin that there was nothing particularly unusual about the cross or his holy water setting them apart from any other cross or holy water. He spoke of how Genial's mother was a very strict woman, very ascetic, in her way. So, if Genial were telling them odd tales about mouths in the garden, and these friends of his didn't want him going to take a look, as there was, of course, nothing there, well, rather than assuming Genial was going mad, surely it was more likely that Genial had been trying to hold himself to his mother's standards. So, if he had lustful thoughts, that would be as if he were sinning, and perhaps out of guilt, he convinced himself he saw this mouth, and the cross made it go away. Or perhaps, he had lost the cross and convinced himself that he had used it for protection.

The others nodded and smiled, and talked with Genial again, confirming Father Vincent's take on his mother. Given that the large mouth was all about lust, perhaps the cross's apparent effetiveness against the smaller mouth was due to the mother, not the blessing. Her personality seemed completely the opposite of what the mouths were.

Lillian wanted to find a monastery. But, really, if it were that easy to counter a mouth, many problems would not even exist for the PCs to solve.

Lillian: Well, we're going to Bangkok, aren't we? You can't throw a stone there without hitting a temple.

I told folks OOC that yes, they were on the right track, but no, they should not have their characters search every monastery or equivalent for artifacts that countered the mythos. The cross was an oddball object. Mind, if the PCs are desperate, they do have the rock that seems to protect items from whoever the Liar is. The rock is currently in a bank safety deposit box, along with Douglas Henslow's journal.

Joyce: So, let's move using the rock up from Plan Omega to Plan Omicron.

Next was the question of what to do with the people in Trammel's basement. Lillian set up some kind of rehabilitation clinic with funding to take care of them. Then, she and Joyce went to the basement to haul folks out, one by one. We didn't play this out. Possibly we ought to have, but I was more intersted in what the moral call would be than in tossing in extra combat just to have combat and slow the wrap of the act.

I'm not sure what, if anything, Lillian thinks of Pizner's situation.

Lillian probably did this while Martin was reading Trammel's book, so both were kept busy.

Joyce: Just me and Ida.

Martin: And Lillian.

Lillian: I'm going to take a walk. I'll call when I reach San Francisco.

That left the Thing in the Basement. Vito had suggested dynamite, and Lillian does have some skill with explosives. The players discussed whether to use dynamite or some other explosive. Napalm, they confirmed, was not yet available. They decided to hose the room down with loads of gasoline and set it on fire.

This broke down into a few rolls. First, they needed a sufficiently high Explosives test, as I was treating this as basically similar to the dynamite plan. That is: Yes, the explosion would go off / the fire would be set. The question was: Could this be done safely?

I allowed Architecture, and Chemistry spends as well as Explosives spends. The roll was nicely high. The explosion would be effective and safely contained.

Next, I had the mouth, which had grown hungry since the party goers had been removed, take a swipe at Lilly. I spent no points, figuring I had a reasonable chance to hit and was willing to leave it to fate to decide. I missed the roll by one point. Lillian barely managed to swing the door shut just in time.

She waited for gasoline to pool outside the room, then dropped a lit lighter onto it. I called for a Fleeing or Athletics roll from those who were there, i.e., Lillian and Joyce. Both made it.

That left folks updating each other. Janet Winston-Rogers wanted a status update, and she'd already asked the group not to leave the country until she'd been filled in. Martin needed to fill people in on what he'd read in the Testament.

GM: So, is anyone going to update Martin about what you learned from Samuel?

Cat: We both have unpleasant truths to tell each other.

Trammel's Testament revealed that there were branches of the cult, with their own Nectar-dripping mouths, in Bangkok, Valetta, and Mexico City.

• In Bangkok, the Nectar seemed linked to violence, not sex. A woman whose initials are S. S. considered Trammel her equal wrote regularly to him (at least one of her letters was included, and it has a return address). She does not believe that Nyarlathotep is the Liar.
• In Valetta, Montgomery Donovan tripled the output of a mouth by offering it some kind of sacrifice. The mouth now produced international quantities of Nectar.
• In Mexico City, J. B. and de la Luz did experiments with music and the voice of the mouth. They produced a record, and their mailing address was the same as that found on the label of the record Lillian had taken from the basement. J. B. grew increasingly resentful of Trammel and, by his last letter, referred to "your god" instead of "our god".

Janet Winston-Rogers was brought carefully up to date. Elaine was with her, making sure she stayed safe. Janet had letters, one from Douglas Henslow to her father, whom he still didn't realize was dead, warning him that Lillian might be a spy. After all, she'd checked herself out as soon as his visitors, clearly sent by Walter, departed. The other letter was written by his doctor, Dr. Keaton, to Janet. The doctor asked if they should enlighten Douglas about Winston's death, offered condolences for the same, and angled for a donation to the institution of Joy Grove. Joyce said that she'd write to Douglas Henslow, and she did.

Martin summarized the highlights of Trammel's book, then came to the disturbing part: Trammle had written to him at the end of it.

Joyce: He left _you_ a note?

Martin: What, you don't feel special?

Joyce: No, I'm just very, very frightened for you.

I thought this was a very cool line, cutting to the heart of the matter, avoiding a certain type of dumb comedy with which I have little patience, and showing a side of Joyce which is always there, but often below the surface.

(Digression: Another example of this is in the second Ghostbusters movie, where Peter Venkman half teases and half accuses his ex-girlfriend of being fond of her art instructor. In many dumb movies and sitcoms, this would lead to dumb No, I'm not"-"Yes, you are" dialogue. Here, she completely ignored the comment and said that she thought something strange was going on. Immediately, Venkman drops the funny guy act and the trying-to-get-the-girlfriend back strategy and asks for more details. You know, like people with a clue do.)

Joyce explained to Janet that the best route would be Mexico City to Malta to Ethiopia to Bangkok. Ethiopia was where George Ayers from the inner circle of the original cult had traveled to and last been heard from. The other places were where branches of the new cult had established a base and a mouth. Joyce had chosen destination order based on what made the most geographic sense from Los Angeles.

Lillian's aunt was last heard from in Mexico. It is not unlikely that she might turn up in Mexico City.

Meanwhile, Lillian asked Janet if she'd ever seen anything strange. At least, I think that's what she asked. It was something that no one had asked her at the first meeting, and after being assured no one would think badly of her, she said that she had once believed that her father's house was haunted. She thought she'd seen odd stains and things in the walls.

I think she was asked if she'd seen a mouth. If so, she said that she had. But, it was surely her imagination. A young girl's imagination, nothing more. Well, nothing she'd seen often or since her father had died.

Joyce's hands started shaking as she noted that mouths appeared around cultists. And mouths had apparently appeared around Walter Winston. Sure, they had also appeared near Douglas Henslow, but that was because Edgar Job, a cultist, was also at the asylum. Lillian tried to figure out whether they appeared nearer to Henslow or nearer to Job, but that was meaningless, as they appeared in places where everyone walked.

Joyce: There's a slight chance Winston survived because he betrayed them.

Someone made a comment which I don't recall.

Joyce: That would be ridiculous. Ridiculous. (her hands shake as she lights a cigarette)

Janet said that, whether or not her father had betrayed his old friends, and regardless of the truth about the supernatural (and she would try to keep an open mind), it was clear that her father had tried to stop bad people from doing bad things, and that the work had been left undone. She needed to finish it.

She didn't argue when Joyce told her that she needed to stay safe, with Elaine to protect her. Janet was well aware that she was a patron, not an adventurer (well, at least not unless someone needs a replacement character and decides to play her). She agreed that the investigation should continue outside the country, to find the truth, whatever it was, and to defeat the evil that her father had once fought. On a practical level, she wrote a very large check for expenses, most certainly including fuel.

Martin decided to visit Samson Trammel. In a moment of self preservation, he asked Lillian to go with him (or perhaps he told her he was going, secure in the knowledge that she would decide to go with him?).

Trammel: Every time I see you, you're with another woman.

Martin laughed, if perhaps a bit hysterically. Trammel's lawyer and Lillian both though, silently, that Trammel was likely to dig himself deeper. Trammel was aware that the mouth had been attacked, and at first was impressed that Martin had done it, and he congratulated Martin for growing a pair. Martin (I think) told him that it was Lillian who'd dealt with the mouth.

Trammel stared at Lillian, or rather, at her breasts, and she pointed out that the piece of anatomy he was interested in was much lower down. Trammel told Lillian that her breasts were lovely. Lillian wished aloud that he had not been the first man to tell her that.

Trammel: It's not my fault they're all blind.

Lillian: Not blind. Polite.

Trammel had written that Martin reminded him a bit of Edgar Job, and Martin asked why. Trammel wasn't really sure, and given his erratic state of mind, might not have remembered writing it. He thought maybe it was because he found Martin interesting for no particularly good reason, just like Ramon Echavarria found Job interesting.

He also that Martin wasn't looking that well, which was perfectly true.

Trammel: It's never going to be that good again, is it?

Lillian wanted to know why she and Martin were even there, and what Trammel had to say to Martin. Martin wondered that himself.

Trammel: Shall we find out?

Lillian didn't really want to leave him alone with Martin, but I think Martin asked her to, perhaps thinking she wouldn't like what she learned about him if she stayed.

Lillian: There's nothing I can find out about you that will change what I already know about you.

Martin: I want to go back so badly. Lillian, I could have died in that place, and I would have been happy. Henry and the rest of my family would be better off without me, pragmatically, even if they feel some sort of familial responsibility.

Lillian decided to suggest a reason to stay alive.

Lillian: How about revenge?

Martin: What?

Lillian (pulling Martin out of Trammel's earshot): This has to do with Jeremiah, and I don't want him to hear.

She pointed out that they knew Trammel got information from the Liar, and she wasn't at all sure it didn't work the other way around as well. Trammel mad a point of backing away further and not eavesdropping.

Martin: Tell me why I shouldn't go back until I die.

Lillian: Because it killed Jeremiah.

There was a long pause while the player looked absolutely stricken and we just let it sit there for a moment.

Betsy: This is the sound of a Pillar of Sanity crumbling.

The specific pillar was Cyrenaicism, aka Pleasure is the Highest Good.

Lillian: That's why.

Martin: I only wanted one thing in my life. And then he died, ad there was no way to fill the hole in me.

Trammel (aware he's not yet on the same page, but also aware that Martin's looking considerably worse): Sit down before you fall down!

Martin basically dropped into a chair. Trammel sent Lillian to get him tea, and his lawyer left the room as well.

Trammel was aware that something had just drastically changed the emotional (and power) dynamic and asked what was going on.

Martin (still in shock, I think): Apparently... your Nectar killed my boyfriend.

This was not what had happened, but Lillian hadn't given him any of the details, and it was a logical assumption to make. Trammel asked a few questions and learned that Jeremiah lived in New York City.

Trammel: We don't have anyone dealing Nectar on the east coast. (remembers something) Well, there's that artist, but that was an anomaly.

Perfectly true. The artist was also my B-plot, if I'd actually needed one, i.e., if Los Angeles had wrapped an hour or two into the game and I needed something small to round out the session. To Alden's chagrin, and my amusement, Martin never did follow up on that. He also didn't ask any of the questions I'd thought and / or feared he might ask, although I had decided that a) Trammel could refuse to answer a couple of questions if answering them would make things too easy, b) there weren't that many questions falling into that category to which Trammel actually knew the answers, and c) even the ones I initially pegged as "it would give away too much if he answered them truthfully" probably don't give away all that much. That said, I'm both relieved they weren't asked and impressed that there was a narratively good reason for that.

Martin: It's never going to be that good again.

He said that he'd been love with Jeremiah, and that that was better than Nectar.

Trammel offered to make discreet inquiries, still puzzled about how Nectar had reached Jeremiah in the first place. He's probably wondering whether it's a strange anomaly or whether there actually is some group on the East Coast that he doesn't know about.

Martin accepted the offer.

Martin: Jeremiah Rhodes, antiques dealer.

I think this was when I first found out Jeremiah's last name.

Martin: Everyone else sees this as a noble quest to save humanity from a drugged haze.

He wasn't sure that humanity didn't want or deserve to be in a drugged out haze. But, he'd once had something far better than Nectar. Jeremiah was gone, and he needed to know why.

Trammel offered to set up caches of Nectar for Martin, who was going to need them if he was to succeed. Martin agreed. Trammel said he could get people to set them up locally, which would mean Martin would have to figure out how to get to them, or he could get people to set them up along Martin's route, but that would mean Martin would have to trust him enough to tell him the route. He told Martin not to try to make that call right then, something Martin had no intention of doing.

Trammel then suggested that they push the table against the door and have sex. Martin turned him down, but was tempted.

Lillian and the lawyer returned, Lillian with tea for Martin. Martin drank it down fast, scalding his throat.

Trammel: Next time --

Lillian: I know. Milk in first.

Trammel: What?

Lillian (patiently): Milk in first.

Trammel: Just stick some ice cubes in it!

Lillian: What kind of barbarian are you?

Trammel undressed her with his eyes. Lillian said something along the lines of how she knew he was an uncivilized and nasty person, but --

Lillian: What kind of barbarian _are_ you? Ice cubes in tea!

Betsy: Martin doesn't say it, but he thinks that Jeremiah put ice cubes in tea.

As Lillian and Martin left, Trammel blew Martin a kiss, and Martin returned the favor, just as at their last meeting. Lillian was sorely tempted to kill Trammel there and then, but refrained from making the attempt. Lillian has not killed anyone to date, unless one counts the Mouth in the Basement, and she and Joyce aren't entirely sure they killed it yet. They intend to check up on it.

Joyce was also sorely tempted to kill Trammel. Surely, he'd be taken out to a prison yard at some point, or transferred somewhere that involved him being outside and exposed.

Joyce: I can get him from over a quarter of a mile away. I'm just putting it out there.

When the session ended, I told Betsy that I was fine with her switching Martin's Drive from Ennui to something else. Cat and Alden were thinking Revenge might work, but Betsy said that Martin just wasn't the revenge seeking type. No, what Martin needed was Closure. Perhaps that could be a Drive?

Me: Can I use it to get Martin to do stupid things?

Betsy: Hell yes!

Me: Okay then.

We thought about writing up a description for Closure, but concluded that it's really simple. Closer is like Revenge, but without the violence. Alden may want to keep Lillian's Drive as is (Thirst for Knowledge) or swap it out for something like Protection (from Dreamhounds).

Cat and I negotiated Joyce keeping Cissy as a Source of Stability despite driving her away, on the grounds that knowing Cissy is safe will keep Joyce going. I don't want a Source with which there is no meaningful interaction ever, but we agreed that having Joyce set up folks to keep an eye on Cissy and check in on them from time to time would suffice. There's no way that could _possibly_ go wrong, and it's not the slightest bit creepy stalker! I suggested she add Douglas Henslow as a source, given they're corresponding, and she liked that idea.

My interior monologue for this session went something like this:

=

I should've have the mouth attack when they went for Martin. I should've had the mouth attack when the others were extricated -- but I really didn't want to draw that out. Wait, what? They're doing Mexico City first? No Bangkok Arena of Death and Lillian doing the River Tam scene from the movie? They're going in what order?? They --

[At which point Lillian does the perfectly timed reveal and Martin responds with the sound of the splintering Pillar.]

[If this were a cartoon, I'd have tossed my notes in the air, deliriously gleeful.]

-- Never mind. Fuck my plans. This is awesome!

=

Folks found Trammel creepy and disturbing, and I asked why, both so I could do that sort of thing again, but also because Eternal Lies has a number of creepy and disturbing characters, and why to make them creepy and disturbing in at least slightly different ways.

Alden said:

I think it might have been the Martin/Trammel parallels that were doing a lot of the work.... The hedonism and nihilism (neither of them would call it that) and seductive, addictive personalities....The calmness was also part of it...like, Betsy managed to make the idea of surrendering to the ecstasy of nectar actually sound attractive, and Trammel's encouragement of that was pretty disturbing and all the stuff he shouldn't have been able to know but for his connection to the mouth or Narly or whatever that was.

Betsy said:

I found Trammel disturbing and lovely! Martin rather liked the man, by which I mean identified with him far too fully. I think Martin is (eek) now a little protective of Trammel, since he knows how easily he could have gone down that path.