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First bubble made by Cass.

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And the last bubble made by Cass.

___________________________
> UPDATES?
Once a day if I can.
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https://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive.html?tags=The%20Drunkard%20And%20The%20Alien%20Quest
> OTHER QUESTS?
https://pastebin.com/raw/7uyemPdY

>>5387464
> [Write In]
She's starving to death isn't she? Draw pictures indicating an equivalence between our food and alcohol, she must be from a world where organisms like yeast that produce alcohol are large enough to support populations of creatures who can only metabolize alcohol.

And she had the rotten luck to land here during prohibition. She's been leeching our alcohol to not starve all this time, and she can't help herself because she's extremely hungry.

If this is the case, we just need to get enough drink to get her full and us plastered. Let's try to indicate that we're going to bring back some booze for both of us.

>>5387466
A reference to the weather? A starry night with a couple clouds?

>>5387464
> How did she even get into your house when all the doors and windows were locked anyway? Sketch that question somehow.

I think the second drawing is maybe One Two's car trailing her ship, or vice versa.

>>5387464
>>5387502
Supporting this! This makes a heck-of-a-load of sense-- let's drink!

>>5387502
Supporting

>>5387502
>>5387650
>>5387682
>>5388242

“Is it another of those clouds you showed me?” you asked. “Was One Two trailing behind your … what am I going to call it, a zeppelin? Or was it you trailing behind him?”

You got no solid answer; Cass made a few more bubbles—each in diminishing size and duration—until the water in her illusory lungs was gone and she dithered her moistened lips. Could it be possible Cass was living on alcohol and feeding it off you as if for her you were a bee and your house a beehive? You sketched a picture of a sandwich, and yourself, as well as a bottle of whisky and the way Cass looked then, in her figure-hugging dress. The empty refrigerator was useless in showing what you wished to show: the act of eating a meal.

“This is the type of stuff I eat to keep myself alive, and when my stomach is full, I can drink more and for longer,” you said, pointing at the image of a sandwich and then mimicking the way you would eat it. You then waved the pen from the bottle to her mouth. “Do you feed on alcohol? I don’t assume your kind has a brewery or a distillery or even knows what a still is, so is it yeast that you want?”

Cass walked forward to fix her unchanging gaze on the things you drew. She tilted her head, focusing her floating shapes from you to the illustration. She opened her mouth to utter.

“Need another drink?” you said with a smirk. You leaned against the table, adding some of the notes Cleopatra asked of you to the notebook. “When I offered you the drink, you gave it back to me; I remember. I should buy you a pack of yeast to be sure. Hmm, so what, you need to leech off things already drunk? Why is ‘Volstead Act’ liquor not to your liking? Not too great, not too tasty? Yeah ...”

Her gums flapped.

“Listen, if you were really just desperate and extremely hungry and couldn’t help yourself, I will forgive you.” You turned another stiff page. Would Cleopatra be the type to appreciate your sketches? “Now, what I want you to do is stay here, and lay low.” You outlined the narrow house and two figures: Cass’s inside the house, and yours outside it. Near you, you depicted a pile of bottles, twice as big as you and in no way possible for you to bring back on your own, even if you had the cash. When dreaming, dream big.

You underlined the pile. “I am going to leave and then come back with some booze for both of us, sounds good? To me, girl, that sounds like the bee's knees. And all you have to do is stay here and wait, deal?”

Cass dragged her soft fingers over the sketch. Her eyes vanished and then reappeared as she raised her head to catch your gaze. You sighed and walked across the kitchen linoleum floor to the entryway. To your relief, Cass did not follow you. You rose your thumb and nodded—if not then, eventually, she had to catch up on their meaning. You left the house and freed yourself of Cass with the closing door’s deathlike sound. You pushed the key, the lock echoing much louder across the asphalt road. You kept the key on you.

> Go directly to the Hourglass speakeasy.
> Take a longer circle and visit a nearby Auto Repair Shop; who knows, maybe Mary will be there if Cleo managed to get a hold of her.
> Take a turn and visit the house of your not-really-anymore preacher friend. It is not too far from the Hourglass speakeasy, and you need a word of advice.
> [Write In]

>>5388375
> Go directly to the Hourglass speakeasy.

>>5388487

You crossed over the petite garden and, after walking across the street, you legged into one of the thousands of alleyways; very soon, the narrow house was out of your sight. You paused, looking past several grimy brick walls that stood between you and Cass. If you left, and never looked back, no one would have known. She wouldn’t tell—even her best impression of you looked like a pair of quivering lines. And if she could return to her outer space zeppelin without any help, you would have felt no remorse. But, even if you had never learnt, you would have continued guessing if she was captured by One Two until the end of your days. Including broken friendships and jealousies in error, you felt enough fettered mistakes to be adding new ones. You would have preferred if she never appeared, but, here and then, you no longer had a choice. You were going to help Cass.

Without Cass, you no longer avoided the morning owls walking the Ashtray’s streets; you no longer worried about people noticing her outlander skin. Without the whooshing adrenaline, you forgot the legitimate dangers of Ashtray Avenue: the lawlessness and decadence, not much of a change since Prohibition started.

*** *** ***

If only you had Mary with you: cabbies knew their way around the town, and around addresses. It took you half an hour, give or take, to find the place; it was like looking through a rearranged phone book. Standing on the fridge between Ashtray and Pet Cemetery—a district where the police didn’t close their eyes and the middle-class lived in sandstone-hued sleeping quarters and had a cinema, a theatre, and a baseball field—you found a building with a grey brick exterior and aged cooper roof cramped between similar unremarkable others.

You leaned on a timber door, the wood cracking from intentional neglect, boarder up by a bunch of planks and bolts. You put your ear against the door.

“Snacks as usual."

You waited for a response, but there was none. A few people passing by gave you the look as you lingered and waited. You scrutinised the door and the sides of it, spotting a small slit after your thorough search. Once the avenue was empty, you slipped the speakeasy’s card inside and then repeated the words. Your body like your nerves softened when you heard the door unlock.

File: NoLiquorPeople.jpg (81 KB, 700x580)

81 KB JPG

A doorman with a square face and a wildman’s beard wearing a black bowler hat motioned for you. As soon as you stepped over the threshold he locked the door behind you. With a rough large hand, he returned you the card and nudged his head; he knew well why you were here. Within a few steps through a dimly lit entranceway, he stopped in front of a narrow wooden staircase with thin straight rails. With one hand he grabbed the first step and pulled it from the ground and above himself, revealing a set of steps downwards. The things a regular fellow had to go through just to get a drink … you risked a bit more, but you always had it on hand. You had the fruit of your labour, as Founding Fathers would say.

“If you can’t lift it, knock, and I will,” he said with a gruff voice and insulting instance.

You didn't take the man’s insult to the heart; the stairs looked heavy, how was a drunk man supposed to do what he did? You climbed down the steps as another flight of them fell behind you. Sconces of yellow light accompanied your short descent until you could hear sputtering Jazz, smell the miasma of alcohol and, as you entered the large ex-cellar, see a brown wooden ceiling painted in char of the cigarette smoke.

Momentary laughter, singing and yelling drowned the sound of the phonograph that stood in the corner of the expansive room. Painted in dark green the walls were stencilled with golden and black geometric shapes: squares and triangles. They lead to a piece, covering the entire wall, of a man and a woman dancing on each side of the symmetric hourglass as tall as each of them.

It was busy. Those yet drunk stood in front of a bulky bar with glasses hanging above and bottles, very few bottles, displayed proudly on the shelves recessed into the wall. Those tipsy sat on chairs behind coffee tables or less comfortable stools behind smaller round tables, a greenish tablecloth, a tall glass, and an ashtray present on each. Those fried were swaying their arms and trotting like foxes on the space near the drawing of the hourglass left furnitureless for their unbounded dances. Lastly, you noticed, that those who were blacked out or needed a minute of rest, were provided such: several men and women slept, and nothing more, on a large pile of cushions and pillows.

The friend of the man who gave you the card finished his dance. He lifted his hat and scrubbed sweat above his brows. Gasping for air with a large grin, he noticed you. He apologised to the woman next to him and, pushing through the crowd of at least twenty people, he came to you. The crowd paused to catch their breath. The moment the next song started, they continued their dancing.

“Hey there,” the man with a pencil moustache said with a smirk. He took out a white stick of chewing gum and offered it to you, “You want some?”

"No, thanks."

He laughed. He unwrapped the foil and put the gum in his mouth. “Hides the taste better than any soda. We both know why you are here, fella. Come, let us find you an empty table and a company.”

> Tell the man that you can’t stay for long, and you wish to purchase a few bottles, and that’s it.
> Accept the man’s invitation, thank him, and be seated. Enjoy a few drinks away from Cass’s touch.
> Tell the man you are not here for long, and you don’t want to take a table from another. Go to the bar to have a few drinks and then buy the bottles there.
> [Write In]

Sorry for no update yesterday, this quest takes some research to be authentic!

>>5390430
> Tell the man you are not here for long, and you don’t want to take a table from another. Go to the bar to have a few drinks and then buy the bottles there.

>>5390431
The dedication is appreciated!

>>5390430
> Tell the man you are not here for long, and you don’t want to take a table from another. Go to the bar to have a few drinks and then buy the bottles there.

Finally a goddamn drink!

>>5390429
>> Tell the man you are not here for long, and you don’t want to take a table from another. Go to the bar to have a few drinks and then buy the bottles there.

>>5390530
>>5391250
>>5391784

You lowered your voice. “I was hoping I could buy a few bottles, and that’s it.”

“Applesauce,” he waved his hand and then grabbed your shoulder to pull you to the bar. “You have to have a drink -here-, else how will we know you are not a dry sent by the feds to sniff us out?”

He had a point, and your longing for a drink has been gnawing at you all night. You let him steer you to the countertop that looked both worn out and new: many of the dents and scratches had been scuffed off with sandpaper and then, as if yesterday, glossed with musky-smelling beeswax. In addition to glasses empty and full, and newspaper punnets with chips and peanuts, there were green glass bottles covered in beehives of dried wax put across the top with a burning shoddy and unscented taper candle in each.

You put your hands between the pair and looked up to make acquittance with the bartender. He was bald and cleanly shaved yet, in contrast, past his sleeve and up to his knuckles, his arms were apelike. He rolled and then took out a metal spoon from a virgin mix of gin and soda, picking and placing it in the hands of your other neighbour. A few drops fell on the top as the bartender waved the spoon at you.

“Soda, buttermilk, or coffee?”

You kept your lips in awkward silence.

The bartender's thin eyebrows looked not much different from the wrinkled lines on his forehead.

“Give him the cheap one,” your "friend" advised you with a smile.

The bartender looked at you as if readying to spit. He frowned and swallowed, then turned away to kneel behind the bar and pick a large jug of gin.

“How about this … what’s your name?”

“Elmer,” you said. Would the ‘cheap one’ bathtub be mixed, at least?

“And I’m ‘Sweet Tooth’ Mike,” he swallowed the gum, “like I was saying, Elmer, I’ll make you a deal: stay here for a few more drinks and I’ll pay for your first one.”

The hairy hands poured a fifth of the glass with gin and the rest with water before dipping two spoonfuls of sugar and mixing the cheapest cocktails. You could stay for a few more drinks; you took the glass and nodded. You watched closely as the man took out an eagle quarter and gave it to the bartender. You raised the glass and drank the oversweetened ethanol in one go. The prickly juniper scrubbed your throat as the flossy sugar tendered the scratches. The poor quality and rank of bathtub gin was the same from place to place, from a clay jug to a bottle.

The jazz turned quiet and began to echo in your ears as if played in another room. From all the dancing and smoke the cellar was lukewarm, but from head to toes you sensed a sudden heatwave.

“One more?” Mike said with a smile, accepting a cocktail that cost him fifty cents.

“Like I promised, but something else. Soda and the others he” —you nodded at Rick— “asked, were those mixers?”

“Yes, most popular ones, but that’s for babes! We don’t have a cocktail menu, but Rick here will mash you anything you'd like.”

You returned the empty glass to the table. You closed your eyes for a second to enjoy and wallow. Cass -could- wait. You opened your eyes to find Mike leaning at you.

“Swear to God, you are the first person to enjoy the cheap one to this extent. You -sure- you don’t want to just tip a few of them? You'll get a lot more bang for your buck.”

You shrug your shoulders. “No. I’ll have what you have for my second,” you motioned for Rick—he grunted and nodded. “So, who do I talk to if I want half-a-dozen or more bottles to take away?”

“Rick can help you with that,” he said, leaving his glass untouched and the melting ice cubes floating. “But, there’s a tax on each if you want to take them inside of here, Elmer. One dollar for one bottle.”

You grimaced, and as if he knew you would, Mike started laughing when he finished his sentence. You paid for the second cocktail Rick put to you. Mike raised his glass to cheer and wave it near yours. This one you drank slower, making an effort to overlook the stinging bite and instead flavour the sparkling bitter soda, the zesty zing of the lemon juice, and the cold-biting ice. And the alcohol as well, growing and spreading through your body like blackberry; yes, it’s a weed, it grows damn everywhere, but the ‘berries taste nice, and you’d rather have them in your life than not.

Sitting behind a table you noticed a woman in a long-sleeved white blouse with a high lace neck and shiny yellow embroidery, a white sequin dress with a fringe trim baring her ankles, a featherless-flowerless cloche hat, and at least seven—if you counted right—pearl necklaces. She held an empty ivory cigarette holder and, practically untouched, cocktail glass. She turned her head to notice you, but what she gave in return was neither disgust nor a smile; her green-yellow eyes stared at or through you like a far-away lion: desiring for a bite but lazy to hunt. Concealed by her long blond bangs—a wig—you recognised a face on one of the photos the D’Addario suppliers gave you as a warning to burn your cottage if she visits. Theresa Coarse—an notorious Volstead agent.

If it was her, that meant the Hourglass could count its last days, if not hours.

“See the legs there?” Mike nudged your elbow at Theresa. “She’s a first here too, poor thing got dizzy from thirst. She was pale when we got her in here, but she’s now all rosy red—don’t thank me.”

> Not your problem. Drink a few more cocktails and then buy as much alcohol as you and your wallet can afford and then leave.
> Ask if Mike can rethink the tax if it’ll go through him instead, imply you can give him a dollar note or a few bottles instead.
> Warn Mike about Theresa, and who she is. Would he believe you?
> Approach Theresa and take your drink to her table. Quietly tell her that you know who she is.
> Approach Theresa and take your drink to her table. See if you can make a dry-in-hiding break.
> [Write In]

>>5391805
> Not your problem. Drink a few more cocktails and then buy as much alcohol as you and your wallet can afford and then leave.

>>5391833

Not your problem. Slower is a relative term, and while this cocktail and the next you drank with more care, you hurried to get booze bang regardless. Theresa observed you almost unblinking for no least than a minute before she lowered the empty cigarette holder—placed it on the cocktail glass— and turned away to others. She didn’t touch the drink made.

“I’m not interested,” you said, licking your lips from the bitter acid sweetness: they mixed it all.

“Right, you were with a girl when we saw you,” Mike continued to wave his hand for the bartender to keep adding the sugary mixer above the average. “A wife—a girlfriend? Hey, I’m not asking you to sleep with the legs over there, fella. Have a whoopee, enjoy the fun, ya follow? I won’t tell anybody and look the other way if you neck her, it’s part of the night.”

That was the -last- thing you wished to do with a government agent, a -prohibition- agent. You refused with a nod, instead whispering out for Rick to lean closer.

“I want to buy unsealed and uncorked bottles, Mike said to ask you?"

Rick peered at the sitting, drinking, dancing, and sleeping crowds. Frowning, he nicked the fedora off Mike’s head and put it on his.

“If someone comes for a drink, you make it, Mike,” Rick grumbled.

Mike complained, but Rick did not linger to hear it. He trudged through the long bar to briefly forfeit his role. He didn’t beckon but you knew to follow him. Theresa’s falconry gaze watched as the two of you left, and not until she was gone from your view could you gulp. Not a single person here realised they were on borrowed time. Through the door, Rick returned to the steps you recently descended—steps with a blocked exit—but instead of going up, he checked behind his shoulder, and then pushed one of the bricks on the opposite side of the speakeasy’s entrance to reveal a doorway. He pushed you inside another, much dimmer room, as big as the one you were just in. Obviously, he closed the door.

The muffed jazz from the speakeasy’s floor sounded like a shot singer, his neck cut, caught in the middle of a performance. Thick dust covered the pallet floor and settled on slate-green unpainted walls. Instead of electric lights here were very few wishy-washy lanterns, either kerosene or oil, stolen from abandoned mines—or so they looked, rusty and flickering. Rick picked one of the lamps and made the moonshine shadows dance. This was not a room for show. Large wooden barrels, some standing on top of another to form obelisks of Temperance, covered the whole floor. On the fire side of the cellar, there were unopened crates and sizable boxes; from ten to twenty bottles in each, you knew. Near, jugs and jars stood in all sizes and quantities. One of the walls was dedicated to the wine racks, and the wine: mostly red, some champagne, and like a fly in a soup bowl, a few rare white wines.

“What do you want?” Rick said, not changing his tone.
You had a little less than 28 in green.

> See if you can afford and buy rum from Cuba, whisky from Canada, or wine from the past (pre-Prohibition).
> Buy the expensive stuff, the crafted whisky, the sacramental wine, or the homebrew hard cider (technically legal!). Quality over quantity.
> Buy the cheap bathtub gin, moonshine, and jackass brandy; what they have. The more the merrier.
> [Write In]

Do you guys think the quest suffer from lack of mechanics and/or rolls? I really tried to come up with a way to incorporate one, but just could not.

>>5393388
> Buy the cheap bathtub gin, moonshine, and jackass brandy; what they have. The more the merrier.
We're not the choosiest, and most of this is just to keep Cass alive.

>>5393434
Nah, not every quest needs them.

>>5393388
>> Buy the cheap bathtub gin, moonshine, and jackass brandy; what they have. The more the merrier.

>>5393455
>>5393485

Just for you, something legit from Canada would have been the best option. It’s not something you can brew with the stills, mash and time you can afford. It would cost a lot, even for the cheapest kind you would have to bargain. Whiskey. You ate half of the word. What you leaned towards was the expensive stuff, the stuff you could favour and not have to mix with root beer or tonic. The wine, stuff you rarely touched—it was weak and tasted like grape juice, which it was—cost about the same, and the cults and churches had fewer issues brewing and selling them damn things. With the dough in your wallet, you could have bought half-a-dozen bottles of first and a few of the latter, and had a good, even great, evening!

You felt a biting headache as you turned your eyes from the booze you liked, and the stuff that could-possibly-maybe-ifyouwereevenright sustain and further assist Cass.

“I want the cheap stuff, in bottles not in jugs. Give me the bathtub gin, the moonshine, the jackass brandy, and similar.”

Rick’s chapped unibrow rocked. He sat before one of the crates and picked a bottle without a label or shine. ‘You sure?’ was the look he gave you.

You swallowed the bitter phlegm. When you went to buy a drink you bought something you could not make yourself but now you were buying amateur stuff you contemned making.

Rick pulled a cloth, and raised all the dust with it, from a crate to reveal twelve bottles. He removed a couple of them and replaced them with ones containing shimmering amber juice: brandy. He waved his hand, “A legal tender for the gin, and two for the brandy. An expense on each of the bottles, so that will be twelve on top.”

He left the crate as a windfall. After paying all the green and nickels you had on you, you picked the slatted rickety case into your hands and above the floor. You followed Rick, barely managing to see even half of his head. As he switched the lantern from one hand to another, you saw what looked like an army of black ants. Beneath your boots there was an infestation of drunk termites, waving and zigzagging along the floor’s surface. You stepped on them, unintentionally, but they didn’t scramble away. You smelt sulphur, those were no ants nor termites; gunpowder. Tossed and spread over the room from the door to one keg to another. If you were right, those few barrels contained no alcohol, they were powder kegs.

You lifted your head to look away: to show Rick how ignorant you were of what you saw. Newspapers told of many ways speakeasies tried to conceal the dead evidence of their lawbreaking …

He opened the secret passage in the wall and let you out. The sudden semi-bright electric light present along the end of the staircase momentarily deprived you of sight. The bottles wobbled and rang. You clutched the case, leaned your shoulder against the cold brick stone, and closed your eyes to return them to health. You heard another set of steps, a knocking of small heels, as from the entrance to the drinking floor a person stumbled on you. With your vision a blur, you unearthed that it was a woman in a milk-white dress.

“Are you leaving?” Rick asked, like a dog barking at a distant relative of its owner it did or would never acknowledge.

“I was looking for a powder room,” Theresa Coarse said. When you saw her, she looked ten years younger than you—her voice now sounded ten years younger than that.

“It’s not here,” Rick said. He pointed back into the bar and to somewhere inside of it. “There’s a room left of the wall there.”

Her snake eyes looked you over. Noticing the crate, her short innocent smile turned wicked. She misstepped and stumbled.

Rick watched with his hands crossed over as Theresa fell on her rear, her knees touching against each other and her legs twisted.

“I-I think I might have overdrunk. It was a good night, thank you, but I think I will be calling it quits.”

She closed her eyes in a sinless wink, “This man here, are you withdrawing as well? Could you escort me, please? It won’t take much time, I live very close.”

> Call out for Mike and ask him if he can give the “girl” company. Tell or don’t tell Mike who Theresa really is.
> Agree to escort her but the moment the doorman closes the door behind you, run with the crate away from her.
> Agree to escort the woman back to her house. Act innocent and clueless as you accompany her to her home.
> [Write In]

>>5394165
> Call out for Mike and ask him if he can give the “girl” company. Tell or don’t tell Mike who Theresa really is.
"Hey, wait a minute, don't I recognize you... Oh, hey, you're a prohibition agent!"

>>5394219
I'm confused in what order you want to do those two.

>>5395112
Call out to Mike to "keep her company". Reveal her identity then, but play dumb so they don't realize we actually recognized her a while ago and just didn't say anything.

I'd say we could escort her ourselves, but we're going to be carrying a lot of contraband, and visiting an alien, so I don't want that hassle.

>>5394219
>>5395516

Escorting a prohibition agent with a crate of contraband in your hands? You weren’t crazy, you didn’t want the hassle, and you had an alien girl waiting. You put the hamper into Rick’s large hands. “Hold this for me for a moment, bubble-man. You too, dame, wait a second.” Sparing the yearning crowd sight of a crate full of alcohol, you snuck into the speakeasy to approach the bar from where Mike did not move.

“I didn’t think you were coming back, changed your mind?” Mike smirked.

“No, I’m still lamming off with all my booze,” you said. You peeked at Theresa’s one-time table—the glass was empty of the cocktail mix. Had she drunk it; was she not dry? You nudged your head to the entranceway, “The legs is trying to leave, you know? She wants an escort and said she lives close. I would do it, sure, but I didn’t lie, I am in a hitch. You mentioned she came alone? It wouldn’t be safe for a dish to go walking alone, it’s Ashtray after all. Think you can do it?”

Mike sipped on the cocktail he had and licked his lips. “I sure can, Elmer. I wouldn’t mind a side squeeze if you don’t want to … and she, too, doesn’t mind.”

You winced. Was it right to set up the man with a prohibition agent? You and Mike said your goodbyes to the counter and the dancing crowd, withdrawing back to the badly lit staircase together with the thick stale smoke. As you returned, Theresa’s gaze slithered off the crate to the smiling Mike. Her back was reclined on the stone.

“I can’t accompany you but my friend agreed to. You can trust him, he’s a good man.” You knew nothing about Mike.

Her lip wobbled. She looked at him and gave both of you an individual nod. “So he is. I understand if you have other places to be.” Theresa pushed herself off the wall and strolled at you. With her face leaning to your chest, she touched the cigarette card Cleopatra gave you between her fingertips and pushed it up your front pocket by an inch. She straightened her back and tapped the empty cigarette holder against the card’s tip. “Garden Gold, I see. Could you butt me a loosie?”

You looked down at the card and then at Theresa. “Sorry, doll, I’m on the nut with those. Seem to be popular with the ladies, you are not the first to ask,” you lied.

She had a vacant stare and slackness on her face. She muttered something you couldn’t hear.

“I can offer you chewing gum, but I don’t think you want one,” Mike said. He approached Rick and, with a simple sweep of his hand, he nicked a cigarette from the pack in Rick’s trouser’s back pocket. He slid it into Theresa’s holder.

Her grip tensed on the trembling holder as she tolerated Mike’s cigarette with a pout, quickly changing it to a smile. “Much appreciated,” she said.

No, the damn agent deserved to be exposed. “Hey, wait a minute,” you said once her cigarette was lit. “Don’t I recognise you?”

Theresa took a calm and long exhale and let out a thin stripe to intertwine with the smoke rising from the tip of her cigarette. “I have never met you before.”

“Of course you don’t. We never met. You’re a prohibition agent!”

Theresa paused, lowering her holder and sucking on her lips as if she was soft kissing herself. Her youthful voice cracked, “That came out of the left field.”

Mike looked at you as if you just swallowed a dead rat. “Elmer, you don’t like that drunk; what are you talking about? Why would a prohi be in here, drinking.”

“Probably to bust you, that’s how they do it. They are not dry, they are frauds and hypocrites.” You pointed at the girl, “She’s Theresa Coarse.”

Mike narrowed his eyes at Theresa. He rubbed his chin. “I think I’ve read something about her in the papers, but she’s not in Compostela.”

Rick lowered your crate to stare down the woman. “I saw a photo of her, Mike. She had short blackish hair, she looked nothing like her.”

> Apologise and say that, yes, the cocktails were stronger than you expected. Maybe it’s not your business if they don't believe you.
> Mention the fact that she did not touch her cocktail until she was about to leave. Offer her a sip of moonshine gin you bought.
> Approach Theresa and pull on her wig to expose her to Rick and Mike.
> [Write In]

>>5396295
> Apologise and say that, yes, the cocktails were stronger than you expected. Maybe it’s not your business if they don't believe you.
...Huh. Maybe she just has one of those faces? Apologies, doll.

>>5396295
>> Apologise and say that, yes, the cocktails were stronger than you expected. Maybe it’s not your business if they don't believe you.

Update tomorrow, sorry for the delay.

>>5397831
No worries, QM!

>>5396322
>>5396367
>>5398519

You open and closed your mouth—the same way Cass did. They called liquid courage, not liquid folly. You knew for certain that this girl was a prohibition agent, but this knowledge of yours … was based on what? Your drunken intuition? An unclear black-and-white photo you looked at a couple of times and a few news articles? Mike was right, Theresa was not a local policeman, she was a fed, travelling across the states. The chances of you guessing wrong rather than Theresa Coarse visiting this rotten apple were considerably higher. You could yank on her hair to see if it was a wig, or you could force an already drunk woman to drink some more … neither would dignify you.

Your eyes shifted from Mike, who was looking at you with a slight headshake, to Ther- the smoking woman. You tucked on your collar and looked away from her eyes.

“Guess I was wrong,” you no longer forced others to keep on with the awkward silence. “My apologies, doll. I guess the cocktails here were stronger than I had expected.”

She nodded to both Mike and Rick—he put a hand on his neck and lifted his chin. She touched and then slid her fingers off your left should. “Bo. You are paranoid, I can’t blame you. I hope you are not one of those fellows who think every 19th bird hates” —her eyes rolled from the roof to the echoing music from the open door, and back to you— “the drums.”

“No, I know at least one gal who does not,” you said.

“Make that two.” She closed her eyes and inhaled her cigarette. “If I never told you my name, stranger, I'm tipsy you see, it is Lena.”

“Elmer.” You took the bunglesome crate back from Rick’s hands.

With his hands freed, Rick came to Mike and grabbed his shoulder with his hand; the size difference was as if he was holding a golf ball. He leaned to his ear, whispered, and left. Mike watched the bartender as he vacated the bottom set of steps. He unwrapped another stick of gum and put it in his mouth.

*** *** ***

“Make sure, when you visit next time, to stay for longer, Elmer,” Mike said as the three of you abandoned the speakeasy and the leaden door closed behind you.

“You’re invested a lot in this blind pig, Mike. Are you sure you are not trying to hide the fact that you’re some big cheese of it?”

He laughed. “I wish I was, but I’m just a friend of the owner. It’s still in my favour if you become a regular, so help a friend out, will you?”

You changed your hands to get a better grip on the crate. “We’ll see, Mike. I’m not a cocktail guy, but the ones I tried here weren’t half bad. See you sometime.”

You turned and walked across the street; the cars were no longer an abnormality, roaring and speeding over the avenue tarmac with just enough time for you to hear and slip past. The street lamps were switched off alongside the road and the sidewalk but the factory spewed, grime bloated, and deluge dense clouds choked the weak morning sun, darkening the surrendered city. In a few hours, closer to afternoon, it was going to be brighter … but, like almost every other day, wet, windy and grey.

“‘Blind Hour’, eh? We do have the quilts for people loaded to the muzzle, babe,” Mike said, his voice barely reaching you.

“Maybe another time,” Lena said with similar quietness. “Still, even a few yards isn’t safe for a girl alone. It’s not far, come with me.”

> Take the quickest way to the narrow house, through dark tight alleyways and undesirable urban backstreets.
> Take the long way to the narrow house, following the sidewalk and the houses and shops facing the avenue. Hopefully, the police on the border are as blind as those in Ashtray.
> Find a space to hide the crate of alcohol and then slip to follow Mike and Theresa-Lena. You can’t rest unless you are sure there is nothing suspicious or wrong about her.
> [Write In]

>>5398643
> Take the quickest way to the narrow house, through dark tight alleyways and undesirable urban backstreets.
We've been leaving Cass alone a while, yeah? Kind of worried about that...

>>5398688
Support, let's make haste

>>5398688
>>5399198

Mike and his flame soon vanished out of your sight, their voices flatlining too. Moving onward the urban road, you passed an automobile parked in one of the many alleys. You heard the clutch pedal’s quiet grind and then a rich heart-like pulsating of the engine as the rubber tires rolled against and over the cobblestone sidewalk and onto the disfigured roadway. You looked away when the shadows of people inside came close—you sheltered the smuggled—and then by you. The four lights, large and small, stabbed into the darkness before sunlight could. Just as a miner in a bottomless mineshaft with soon-to-dowse flame—the only lukewarm presence and paltry glister within reach of you and him—the car thawed into cavernous air.

You walked into the alley, trudging the unpaved streets and tight alleyways to take the same finger-snap route you took to get here to get back to the narrow building. You left Cass all on her own for a while; you had a reason to worry. Ashtray’s boulevards had not turned any darker than hours prior, street lamps or lack thereof. Instead, in the hour you spent drinking and hanging about, the number of windows unveiled of curtains and flooded with light doubled. Today was Tuesday, wasn’t it?

Pushing the ribs of the wooden crate against your own and up to your chin and nose, you walked through the routes formed by shadows and brickstone with only a small window of your own to look around. You wished not to tumble over, or come across, another person who would have, unless very late for their work, taking interest in your possession. You wished on a monkey paw, for a man stumbled upon you a few arcs before you would leave the alleys and return to the narrow house. Wall-eyed, the man meandered from one brick-red wall to another, stopping to lean against each. The man in a peaked fisherman’s hat wallowed. He swayed his arms just as you tried to pass, smacking the crate and making the glass bottles tremble and sing like a choirboy carol. You pivoted the crate away from his frenzied swings.

“Sorry about that,” you said.

“Wa-wait,” he swallowed his words between hiccoughs and yawns. “Wait for a damn … a damn second,” with a trembling hand he pointed at the crate in your hands, “what is that? Wait … wait … wait …” Both his hands and his head fall down as he began to slap and feel around his high-neck jacket and high-waist trousers. He searched for several minutes until he, finally, pulled out a policeman’s badge, waving it around like a lottery ticket that won him a grand prize. “That’s … hick … illegal, give me what you got.”

> Ignore the man—he’s barely standing—and continue hurriedly walking back.
> Offer the man a bottle or two if he’s willing to look the other way, and so will you.
> Put the crate on the floor and then knock out the man with a hard right.
> [Write In]

>>5399810
> Offer the man a bottle or two if he’s willing to look the other way, and so will you.

Update tomorrow. Voting still open. I overslept today, sorry! Really trying with consistency here.

>>5399810
>> Offer the man a bottle or two if he’s willing to look the other way, and so will you.

>>5399837
>>5400680

Those bastards can’t even follow the law they enforce; they don’t want to, they think they are above it. The man wobbled. He took a few steps back to lean his back on the cold featureless wall. The copper edge of his insignia scrapped the cured clay as he attempted to keep himself dead still. With a growl, he raised it again.

“Are you … deaf? Give me … hick … what you … you are holding!”

“Aren’t you a live wire? It can’t be a good sign for a copper to be half seas over. Listen, you’ll just drop the crate the way you are, and break it all. I’m just a hardworking man, on my way home. If you’ll do the same for me, I’ll look the other way, John.” You tucked the cloth to slide out a bottle of gin, “You -can- carry just one.”

Your voice, his steps, the delving from the windows above, the hollow howling, like a strong wind, from cars beyond the apartment labyrinth—all made a sound; none were as loud or resounding as the hammer he pulled back of the revolver he drew out with his left hand. With juddering grip, he pointed the muzzle at the ground and then heaved it at you. He gasped for and then barfed with the same air—as if wishing to free his lungs but unable to do so.

“Damn crook … hick … I am the officer of the law! Follow what … I say! I’ll arrest you … I will! So put down … that crate! Beat it!”

> Toss the crate at him. While he’s distracted, grab his gun and tell -him- to get lost.
> Toss the bottle you are holding at his head, and jump if he’s still conscious after that.
> Put down the crate and walk away. When he turns his back on you, knock him out.
> [Write In]

>>5401668
> Toss the bottle you are holding at his head, and jump if he’s still conscious after that
Our hapless MC is more of a lover than a fighter so far, and mroe of a drinker and a runner than a lover. Let's skidaddle!

>>5401668
>> Toss the bottle you are holding at his head, and jump if he’s still conscious after that.

>>5401668

What others have said with a "You left the safety on" bluff to start. Then run like hell.

>>5401746
>>5401755
>>5401881

“Alright,” you said, “alright, I’m savvy, officer. I’ll put it down, and then” —you clutched your fingers around the labelless bottle— “you left the safety on.”

Turning your body to allocate more of the crate’s weight on your left side, you curled your arm and then threw the spirit at him. The man opened fire: his drunk aim was miles away from maiming or injuring you. You had no time to check whether a gunshot would trouble the residents of this alley. The bottle cracked against the apartment wall, hurling low-quality alcohol—like burning acetone—and a flake cloud of glass into his face. It was not pretty; he screamed and obscured his bloodied face.

You grasped the corners of the tottering box, pushed it against your chest, and hurried past the man; left, left, and right, you scampered to escape the tangled knots of Ashtray’s streets. From the backstreets, you ran onto the shadowed roadway separating you from the narrow house like a wide unseen river. An automobile without lights gained momentum and, as you heard it and jumped a few feet back, charged past you. With your heart beating, and your breathing difficult, you crossed the damn road with smallish care.

You stumbled towards the iron fence and onto the outdoor steps. Leaning on your shoulder, you rummaged to find the key and finally opened the door. You pushed the contraband above the threshold, crept inside, and bashed the door close to lock it. You sighed with ease; your head was empty of headaches thanks to the cocktails you had. After drinking in unbottled oxygen, you stepped inside.

“Cass? I brought the stuff.” You walked inside the kitchen floor to rummage about for the alien girl. Not here, not there; she wasn’t even lingering near the refrigerator. With your elbows scratching against the invisible interior wall you climbed the confined unlit staircase to the second floor. “Cass?” you asked as you clambered into the room and, with the first chance you got, lowered the crate. Your aching muscles weren’t something your tipsiness had enough of a punch to hide. Sure, the wares you carried to D’Addario trucks were sometimes—often—heavier, but you only had to bring them from one room to the next, not across the full morning boulevard.

“Cass? Where in God’s name ar—” you stalled in front of the bed without sheets or pillows. An unmoving shapeless membrane, like a deflated tire, outstretched over the bed. What the … ? You first grabbed about and then, once found, reached for the switch, turning the blinding light on. You covered your eyes from the immediate flash, gently lowering your arm to get used to electric lumination.

The lit barren room revealed a glimmering sheet, as thin as a cellophane wrap, half-bent over the bed frame. Unfurling as you would after a night of drinking—with only the top of your body lying on top of the bed, and your feet on the floor to keep alcohol spins in balance—what you saw looked like orange paint, without the bucket, had been splattered across the bed, spilling over the mattress and onto the residential floor. At a look, the fallen drops held to the puddle like a delicate membrane: with petite threads. With the uniform firmness of jelly, the thin layer bubbled, rolled, and moved around.

> Open a bottle and pour alcohol on top of what remains of Cass.
> Bring your head closer to connect with Cass’s gelatine body remains.
> Quickly drink as much alcohol as you can manage and then lay on top of the bed to have your intoxicated body and her remains touch.
> Don’t do anything rash. Step and sit away from the gelatinous sheet, and watch closely what happens next. Maybe it's suppose to be this way?
> Leave Cass and the crate and run back to where Cleopatra lives, does not matter if it risks One Two’s attention or not. Inform her about the situation.
> [Write In]

>>5402885
> Quickly drink as much alcohol as you can manage and then lay on top of the bed to have your intoxicated body and her remains touch.
It's the main way we've seen her feed.

>>5402904

“Don’t tell me you are dead!”

Cass’s flattened and squashed form wavered and shifted, just so, like empty flames on the last log of yesterday’s campfire. You paced from one side of the bed to another. You heaved the crate closer to you and tossed away the draperies concealing alcohol. You uncorked one of the bottles; the numbing smell of dabbler booze shot your nostrils and watered your eyes. You drew back the bathtub gin and heaved a sigh. Yes, you forgot the mixer, and you knew mixing gin with water wouldn’t make it any pleasanter.

“Don’t think this is an excuse I’m making to start drinking the stuff I brought,” you said as you waved your arm at a sheet of alien paraffin. “I would rather be drinking the stuff from Canada, or at least something -better-.” You clutched your nose to hide it from the nauseating bitter; you opened your mouth wide and, swinging, you pushed the bottle’s neck into your mouth. You drank the potent rank the way no man would or should; you had no enemies, but you would even spare them this torture.

You managed two and a half bottles before your throat scalded from every high-proof drop rolling against it. Your lips first and then your face swelled and turned beet red. In a dozen minutes of unrelenting drinking, you were drunker than if you had drank fifty cocktails. The room no longer had its visual sharpness, the headache boomed as if you were in a repair shop, and drowsiness shadowed you like a maniac with a knife.

You made several attempts to cork the half-full bottle, missing each one. It fell from your hands and, as it struck the ground, the liquor burst from it like a fountain in drunkard’s Heaven. The bottle fell—rolling onto the stairs and pouring out the spirit—and so did you, clothed and drained.

Cass’s body no longer had the properties of rubber, and instead of bouncing you off, your exposed face and arms stuck to her soft and thin flesh. It felt as if you were trying to swim in a puddle of oil. Coiled tendrils appeared from beneath your and Cass’s coupled form and blindly began to fiddle and twitch. Bubbling touch crept against your sides and everything turned white and then pure black as you lost—or she forced you to lose—your consciousness.

*** *** ***

From the empty darkness, shapes began to sharpen their contours and forms. You felt a passing breeze carrying a current of fallen orange leaves before the autumn trees themselves emerged into view. Large hands slammed the car bonnet shut and turned to a terrace of houses coming into view. He, the man you were looking through the eyes of, clapped his hands free of dust and grime. It was one of the rarest types of evenings in Compostela—a cloudless sky with the sun high and welcoming. You remembered this dream well, you had it many times.

The man, your father, climbed the steps and opened the white door. “I will be leaving now,” he said with a rough joyous voice, sounding as if he was chewing on his moustache. “Remember, you can stay awake until I am back!”

Your sister, her long voluminous brown hair reached her shoulders and curled above her neck, sneaked and then jumped at your father’s arm from the corner of your family room. She was twelve. She held it with a tight grip, rumbling with her tongue like a car.

“Caught you! No way, don’t go, take me out for a ride instead!”

From his eyes, you saw your father sigh and then smile at her. “Mary, you know it’s -my- day today. Besides, there are too many cars on road right now. You have motorcars in your room, play with those.”

Mary pouted, clutching at his trousers and jacket with an even stronger grip.

“I won’t crash, have I crashed before? No, I didn’t, and I won’t,” she said. “I can’t sit in a toy car!”

“Mary, you don’t have a license, remember? How about … tomorrow, we’ll wake up earlier before the sunrise and I’ll take you somewhere where we’ll be alone?”

You felt her grip lessen before she snapped away her hands. She frowned, folding her arms over her stomach. “You promise that, right? You -promise- that.”

He laughed like a Santa Claus that came many months earlier. He nodded. “However, if you wreck it, or something gets busted, it’ll be up to you to fix it. If you love to ride a sledge, then you have to love carrying it uphill. So, if you are finished with your homework, grab my car books and go practice in the garage, automobilist!”

“Of course, I’m done with my homework,” she lied. She rushed outside, stopped before the doorstep, turned around, hugged your father, and then left for the garage.

A sixteen-year-old boy—it was you—descended the steps down, fumbling on his way due to the oversized jacket and a large fedora, that covered his innocent mercury-hued eyes, he wore. Once your younger self slid down the last step, he took out a tinplate pistol and torn paper with scribbles on it. “Private Detective Elmer Holmes,” he said. His voice was hoarse and nasal. “You’re well-groomed, well-dressed, well-scented. I am going to use my deduction to guess… no, to say: you are leaving to the saloon.”

“You got me.” Your father raised his hands. Every week on Friday he would ride to the Without Mirrors saloon, drink for a few hours, and then drive back home. “I don’t think that’s a crime, private?"

“It should be.” You lowered the toy revolver and huffed.

“Elmer” —your father cleared his throat— “Private Detective Elmer Holmes, I mean. I have a task for you, please. Can you make sure that citizen Mary finishes her homework?”

You mumbled. “I can …”

“In return,” he continued, “is there anything you want to do tomorrow?"

> What did you tell him?

> “I want to go to the saloon with you!”
> “Take me and Mary to Luna Park.”
> “Take me to the theatre hall with you.”
> “Take me to the roller skating rink with you.”
> “I’m fine to go anywhere you would want to.”
> [Write In]

>>5405007
> “I want to go to the saloon with you!”

>>5405045

“I want to go to the saloon with you,” your boyish self said.

You, as your father, felt his eyebrows briefly lower. He shook his head and smiled.

“You know you can’t Elmer; a saloon is a place for men, not boys. They won’t let you in.”

Larger-than-life fedora was downcast on your head. You lifted it high enough to let you see, but low enough to let its shadow obscure your eyes.

“You said it before, father: it is a place for great men to laugh great laughs. You never told me when will -I- become a man,” you said, “doesn’t even have to be great.”

“It’s out of the question,” father said before clearing his throat. He slapped his shoulder as if he was slapping yours. “You will be a great man ...”

“ … when I am older? I’m not a kid, you know I’m already working evenings in the bowling alley. Have been for the last few years.” And drinking hard liquor after work, you left that part unmentioned.

You felt your father's body stiffen; his chest caved and his shoulders fells. He stared your down, “You don’t have to do that.” He looked to the corner of the living room to you and sighed, “But I can’t stop you from working, and I can’t lie and say your wage is not a big help to me. Still, I would like you and Mary to focus on school and schoolwork.” He approached your younger self and lifted the hat off his head. “Yes, you need to be older, but it’s not just about your age, Elmer. I could always drink at home, or in some backyard, for cheaper. When you feel like a great man, you enter the saloon, and when people inside agree, you stay and drink and enjoy your time.”

It sounded, it likely was, a lot of hogwash, harsher than a simple no. You paused and then sighed. “We’ll be waiting for you to come back,” you said.

Your young self held the door as father exited the house, climbed down the stairs, waved goodbye to Mary busying herself in the garage, and then did the same to you. He sat behind the wheel—the engine exploding into life with a shimmering black smoke—and then, in his vision, your house, Mary and you would sink over the horizon line to disappear forever.

The cold distant voice of the policeman that came to your door in the early morning would echo in your mind—the words he said you could barelly recall no matter how hard you tried. Black fog would cover the landscape and the scenery, everything would turntarnished and vague, and you would wake up. That’s how it happened, but now the dream continued.

> Wake up yourself forcefully.
> Continue to linger on the dream.
> [Write In]

>>5405787
> Wake up yourself forcefully.
Solid flashback, QM. You do some of the more evocative writing on the board.

>>5405787
>> Wake up yourself forcefully.

>>5405794
>>5406029

Your father kept his hands on top of the wheel, turning it on the corners and detours with a nudge of his wrists. Like a stone tossed to skip off the flat surface of the water, the sights you saw from his eyes jumped in barrelling skips. The muffled voice that normally came to accompany the last seconds of your dream thundered like soddening, sinking in the river waters, phonograph. Your father parked in front of the saloon of a street-sweeping building with a flat roof—where windows exposed the shadows of men a decade ago or so, those holes were bricked and sealed. Dream leapt. He came inside of the saloon, crowded with men just like him in a room with grazed wooden support and arches like in a coal mine.

You did not need to see it; you didn’t want to see it. Each time your tired mind thought of and recalled this half-memory half-dream, it stopped and shattered on the moment he left your house. The explicit flashback always tore open and unravelled. Not now.

You weren’t there. There was no point in scrambling on your suspicions and guesses. You knew what was about to happen, you didn’t want to know how. You weren’t there. Nesting inside your father’s head you muttered and then yelled for the dream to cease to exist; to wake up. With liquor of whisky in his tilted hand, he froze. Men with groomed beards and lavish moustaches stiffened as if the alcohol they drank was quick-setting cement. The smoke of the cigar and cigarettes and alcohol splish-splashing from a pint glass hung in midair as if in a still photo.

Pale orange light basked the immobile visage like a goaded sun; it wasn’t concerned with the absence of windows or the thick stone walls, the flaming red-yellow washed and illuminated the saloon regardless. Then, as if lit wax and tallow candles, your father’s hands, the people around him, the furniture, the ceiling and even the smoke started to melt. Orange of all hues, shapes and warmth melted and mixed with others. Small-few bubbles spread like steaming water reaching its boiling point. Growing blobs and fermenting foam ruined everything into a visual cacophony.

You felt a push, like accidentally stepping into cold shower seconds before the hot water mixed in the nozzle. A second of clarity. If you were in a dream, it was a lucid one. You wobbled in place. Your feet sank into a slushy soft mud covered in green-yellow ferns with a slimy dew. Growing above them, compared to bushes in size, were leafless spirals surrounded by a flock of white butterfly-like things—a couple of those insects settled around the stalk and, just like that, their bodies deformed into flower buds with their wings reshaped into petals. The lowered ground raised your feet. Hung above was a sun, golden-blue yet still recognisable. To you, the clouds were like blue ripples and waves, crashing and trembling as if you were under the water and they were the sea's surface. The blue-green air had the look of dense bright water.

You heard a ruffle. Cass passed through the fern grove without her dress, the way she first appeared before you. The ground sank and rose with every one of her steps until she was at arm’s reach.

“Wel-com-ings!” your voice left her petite rubber lips.

... Did you just talk?

You had no voice. No -sound- came from you. Leaping from the bottom of your lungs, a bubble forced itself through your teeth and emerged from your lips; the bubble grew in size, wobbled on your mouth, and then detached to raise into the air and drift above you. The glowing symbols inside of the bubble -you- made were unclear and cryptic. The bubble popped, staying no more and no less than the bubbles Cass had made previously.

“We comm-uni-ca-te thro-ugh yo-ur bra-in,” Cass said. Her bottomless eyes gazed at the same things you had, jumping from the ferns to the butterflies and the sky.

> Ask Cass if she can talk with Mary’s voice.
> Ask Cass if she can talk in Cleopatra’s voice.

> [Write In]

I left this update without prompts as I have like 50 potential questions/talking points to suggest, and you guys will probably want to ask them all, so instead it's up to you.

>>5405794
Thank you, I only QM to hear compliments like that! ... Okay, that's 5% of the reason, but still, very appreciated!

>>5406899
>> Ask Cass if she can talk in Cleopatra’s voice.

>>5406899

> Were you dying? Or just asleep?
> Do you understand me when we talk outside of my brain?
> How do we get you home?
> How do you eat?

>>5406899
> Ask Cass if she can talk with Mary’s voice.

Ask:
>Are you okay?
>Is this real?
>What ARE you?
>Where are you from?
>Why have you been breaking into MY house, stealing MY buzz, specifically?
>Why is One-Two after you?
>What do you want from me?

Rolled 1 (1d2)

>>5407063
> Ask Cass if she can talk in Cleopatra’s voice.

>>5407327
> Ask Cass if she can talk with Mary’s voice.

>>5407063
>>5407101
>>5407327

‘You just can’t leave my brain alone, can you?’ A bubble manifested into existence with every sentence you finished. ‘Where even are we?’

With a loud stolen voice, she said, “I do-n’t know."

Like talking to a mirror, but worse. Together with scrunched eyes, you held your mouth agape. ‘What do you mean you don’t know?! This is not -my- dream.”

She trailed aside. Her eyes dipped and emerged from one part of her head onto another. “This is a first for me. I ha-ve-n’t ex-pe-ri-en-ced any-thing li-ke this.”

‘For real? You don’t dream?’ You waved your head at the surroundings. ‘Does this look like the place you came from?’

“So-me-what,” she paused and then added, “it lo-oks mo-re li-ke a jum-ble of my ho-me-world as well as all the pla-ces I had be-en to. So, this is … a dre-am. This is what yo-u se-e when yo-u sle-ep?”

‘Sounds like a dream, it’s always a hooey mix of your memories. We are chained together like prisoners sharing the same one.’ You waved one hand at her. ‘Before all else, can you shift and change your voice? Can you make yourself sound like, say, Cleopatra?”

“Who is Cle-o-pat-ra?”

'The one that gave you the dress' —you paused— 'the last one.'

Glyphs and runes danced in the bubbles you made; you watched, trying to make sense of how your words translated into her symbolic language.

“Remind me!” Remind her? You thought of how Mary’s close friend spoke; without a pause, Cass started to speak with a sultry voice of an over-mature woman, with the voice of Cleopatra. “O-ur in-ter-co-ur-se with her was bri-ef. Is this sa-tis-fy-ing?” She looked as you gave a short nod. She moved her gelatinous hand from her stomach to the left side of her body and then stopped it on her neckline. “Is -my- form sa-tis-fy-ing to yo-u? Sho-uld I re-sha-pe in-to a dif-fe-rent one?”

You looked from down her knees to her thighs and over the rest of her other feminine curves sculpted out of her fleshly ooze. ‘No, keep it.’

“The thing yo-u re-fer to as dress. It chan-ges yo-ur sha-pe with-o-ut the ne-ed to re-form, and it al-so gives an end-less u-ni-que touch against my ou-ter form.”

‘That’s just any outfit or a piece of cloth. Have you been visiting other worlds and unaware of something as simple as clothes?’

She nodded. “I un-der-stand, but it is not a phy-si-cal ne-ed. My bo-dy che-mi-cal-ly a-dapts to most en-vi-ron-ments and re-fa-shi-ons and re-sha-pes for o-ther sma-ller ne-eds. I had no ne-ed for a ‘dress’—I tho-ught. But I am chan-ging my mind. The hu-man world, I am dis-co-ve-ring mo-re than I e-ver ho-ped to find.”

‘Hoped to find? What -are- you exactly? An alien, right?’

“I ca-me from ou-ter spa-ce, so what yo-u re-fer to as an ali-en is cor-rect, yes!”

‘How far away?’

A thin long line formed on the edges underneath her lips. “In my ye-ars, in hu-man ye-ars, in light ye-ars … Sor-ry, but I ca-n’t sa-y.”

You blinked. ‘How are you planning to return home if you don't know? Where are you even from?’

“Ano-ther few of my, yo-u wo-uld sa-y, ra-ce kind, are in con-trol of that. We tra-vel from pla-net to pla-net and-”

You felt a cold shudder. ‘The-re a-re mo-re of yo-u? How ma-ny?’ You can’t cross a sea with a boat alone, and you have never heard of a ship with only one sailor; the idea didn't calm you.

“The-re a-re se-ven of us, but on-ly fo-ur co-me to earth to ex-pe-ri-ment whi-le the ot-hers re-ma-in in The-Spa-ce-Clo-ud-A-bo-ve, or O-ver-hang.”

‘So you did fall from a freakish cloud. Wait, experiment? What do you mean by ‘experiment’, doll?’

“Each e-arth da-y, the fo-ur of us co-me to e-arth to find and then fo-cus o-ur atten-tion on a spe-cific de-finite por-tion to watch, over-see, and ex-pe-ri-ment if we de-ci-de it is the best op-ti-on.”

You crossed your arms and dug your fingers deep into your skin. ‘Am I your experiment?’

She nodded. “Yo-u a-re!”

Heat flushed through your body. You frowned and stared at her. ‘Why have you been breaking into my house, stealing my buzz, specifically? I thought you were hungry?’

“It’s tru-e, I fe-ed on y-ou; cle-an-sed yo-ur bo-dy at the sa-me ti-me. I did it not be-cau-se I was hun-gry but to le-arn on why you be-ha-ve that way.”

‘In what way?’ you spat out the emerging bubble. It bobbled in the air for a couple of seconds and then popped.

Cass approached. “It’s what I wan-ted to ask, let me ask so-me qu-es-ti-ons to-o!”

You answer with silence. You flinched and made your gesture by stepping away from her forthcoming form. ‘What’s your question?’

She didn’t close the distance between you a second time. She nodded. “Do you not fe-el be-tter when I rid you-r bo-dy of to-xins? You should be, it is po-i-son to -yo-ur- body. When I did it at first, on my se-cond vi-sit I saw that you we-re po-i-so-ned a-ga-in, and on the ot-her da-y a-ga-in. On-ce cle-an, you po-i-son your-self on pur-po-se. W-hy, was my ex-pe-ri-ment?”

> Why do you drink?

> Tell her because it makes you feel bolstered up -and- relaxed, it dulls your senses in a pleasant good way.
> Tell her every (second) person in Compostela drinks, you’re not unique. Everyone does it because a little poison is sometimes good. It’s an enjoyable time waster.
> Tell her you drink for the taste. Since Prohibition, it has been harder to find a good brew so you are happy to be able to make it yourself in good quality, and also earn enough money to buy high-quality booze produced outside the great US or stored away basement.
> All of the above and more.
> Tell her nothing, she’s obviously oblivious of the benefits and will remain so.
> [Write In]

Questions on the back burner:
> Were you dying? Or just asleep? Are you okay?
> Do you understand me when we talk outside of my brain?
> How do we get you home?
> How do you eat?
> Why is One-Two after you?

>>5408830
> All of the above and more
> But honestly I don't really know

>>5408830
> Tell her every (second) person in Compostela drinks, you’re not unique. Everyone does it because a little poison is sometimes good. It’s an enjoyable time waster.
>Gets tough to stop after a while, too
>I guess I'm not really sure, in the end, but I like it

>>5408830
>> Tell her every (second) person in Compostela drinks, you’re not unique. Everyone does it because a little poison is sometimes good. It’s an enjoyable time waster.
>>Gets tough to stop after a while, too
> But honestly I don't really know

>>5409123
>>5409323
>>5409355

Honestly? You didn’t know … not really. Loads of reasons and all of them were kind of true. Taste, pleasant numbness of senses, relaxation …

‘Every second person in Compostela—and I can bet a tooth in this entire country, drinks—I am not unique.’ You delayed another of your bubbles until the first one popped. ‘Every human does it from time to time because a little poison is sometimes good.’ You “said”. ‘It is an enjoyable time waster. I don’t know how to answer you, just that I like it. Gets tough to stop after a while.’

“Yo-u call it pur-po-se-ful po-i-son?” She approached the thicket of ferns and picked one of the feathery fonds with one of her hands. She kept it within reach as she dangled the flaxen flower and sprinkled the dew all over her hand. It began to melt through her springy skin and her semi-liquid flesh like acid; her drizzly separated fingers and part of her wrist curdled and turned greenish-yellow. The fingers fell on the springy soil together with the flower they held, dead and washed out. She grunted. “I tri-ed to de-mon-stra-te, but this is un-ple-a-sant. Yo-u can still fe-el dis-com-fort in a dre-am? What if o-ne we-re to di-e he-re?”

You made the distance from the alien plant life. ‘It’s nothing, you would just wake up. You wouldn’t kick off outside of a dream. Anyhow … demonstrate the fuck what?’

She waved up her distorted hand. “If I had a che-mi-cal sub-stan-ce flo-wing thro-ugh my hand my bo-dy was not strong en-o-ugh to pro-cess, on a mis-take or ot-her re-a-son, then se-par-at-ing my limb the way I just did wo-uld be the on-ly wa-y to stop it spre-ad-ing thro-ugh my bo-dy. A pur-po-se-ful poi-son. But I wo-ul-dn’t do it for no re-a-son.”

‘I told you, there are many reasons. I don’t know, maybe the human mind is too smart for our human body. We think too much, the alcohol helps us not to bother doing that.’

“Yo-u sa-id it is an ad-dic-ti-on.” Cass’s shoulder swelled up. Spumes swished down her arm to restructure her missing joints—one of her arms became if only by a few inches, longer than the other. “But what I had be-en doi-ng to y-ou on my vi-sits and all thro-ugh the da-y sho-uld ha-ve cle-a-ned yo-u of yo-ur phy-sic-al re-lian-ce on it.”

‘I don’t know how much you can mess up with my brain, or with my body, but it’s not about biology. I drink because I want to.’

“I do-n’t un-der-stand." She sighed. Her numb rubbery expression was plain with no necessary emotions to support her voice.

‘It’s not important, just stop trying to sober me up unless you need it.’ You waited a second. ‘Were you dying, or just asleep?'

She shook her head, “No, I was in no dan-ger of dy-ing! My cur-rent body re-qu-i-res a by-pro-duct of alco-hol cal-led a-ce-tal-de-hy-de, but if I am with-out it my bo-dy will sus-pend me-ta-bo-lism and re-a-dapt to my sur-ro-un-dings; this is what was hap-pen-ing. It is not the wa-y my bo-dy was o-ri-gi-na-lly, if you want to know, it’s re-a-dap-ta-ti-on to the con-di-ti-ons of the O-ver-hang.”

‘The cloud-like spaceship of yours?’

“Yes! The-re is a lot of ac-et-al-de-hy-de in-si-de of it.” Her lips quivered as if trying to smile, “That is the re-a-son we sho-ul-dn’t sta-y o-ut-side for lon-ger than a few hu-man ho-urs. Yo-u stop-ped my re-a-da-pta-ti-on, so my bo-dy sho-uld not cha-nge much. Thanks! I en-joy this phy-sic-al bo-dy, and it wo-uld ha-ve ta-ken me a pro-por-ti-o-nal a-mo-unt of hu-man ho-urs to fi-nish my me-tab-olic sta-te first he-re and then back a-gain on the O-ver-hang.”

Not to mention, she would be defenceless to protect herself if found out by others while she's a flat sheet of jelly. ‘How do you eat?’

“Do not worry abo-ut my un-der-no-u-rish-ment.”

You shrugged your shoulders. ‘Do you understand me when we talk outside of this dream?’

“Ve-ry lit-tle, yo-ur hu-man form of com-mu-ni-ca-ti-on is in-co-he-rent to me … but, I un-der-stand this,” she raised two thumbs and rapidly nodded her head.

‘Just one of the three is enough. Shake your head and put those thumbs down when you are -against- something.’ You put your hand underneath your mouth and whispered: ‘Elmer.’ A petite bubble with glittering like gold dewdrop specks inside formed on your palm. You bounced it like an inflated balloon. ‘That is my name.’

“El-mer,” she said your name clear. “I un-der-sta-nd now.”

‘What’s yours? I have been calling you Cass.’

“I can on-ly u-se words and terms yo-u know, and the-re is no word for my na-me.” She tried to chuckle but failed. “On-ce o-ut-si-de the dre-am, I’ll re-pe-at it in my lan-gu-a-ge. Cass ... Cass ... Cass ... Ok-ay!”

‘I’m not sure how useful that will be. Why is One-Two after you?’

“Who?”

You sighed. ‘The guy in the hat, in the black car, who has been following us for the last five hours.’

She looked around and then looked up at the sky. “I do-n’t know, when I was le-aving yo-u for the se-venth time, he ap-pe-a-red in front of yo-ur ho-u-se. I had no way of es-ca-pe, it all hap-pe-ned to-o qu-ick-ly. I was be-fo-re yo-ur do-or, and he stir-red yo-u a-wa-ke. We a-re told not to in-te-ract with the sen-ti-ent li-fe, but you ca-me to the do-or and found me. I did-n’t know what to do! It was-n’t sup-po-sed to be that way, I was told not to let my-self be no-ti-ced. By the time I ca-me out-side the do-or, the ra-in, my wa-y of with-dra-wal, was go-ne.”

‘Rain? Is that how you will get home?’

“Yes, if I can in-te-ract with the ra-in I will be ab-le to re-turn to the O-ver-hang … if it’s a-ny-whe-re clo-se a-bo-ve.”

‘This is a lot to take in.’

“For me as well! We a-re me-ant to fo-cus on o-ne pla-ce, but on-ly to-da-y I had explo-red so much of e-arth!”

‘The forecasts are iffy and outright wrong, a lot of them times—the quality of Compostela’s news—but it should be correct at least a day before. It should rain tonight.’

“That is gre-at,” she said. “I was with-out op-ti-on on-ce the ra-in was go-ne. I did-n’t know what to do, but you see-med to be helpful, so with-out much of a-not-her cho-i-ce, I fol-lo-wed you. Can I ask? Well, I can ask but, can yo-u ans-wer? Why ha-ve you de-ci-ded to help me? Con-ti-nue to do so, but I am in-te-res-ted in yo-ur re-a-son!”

A cacophonous ringing forced you to your knees. You covered your ears as the powerful trumpet drilled inside them. Was it coming from outside? An alarm? No, it sounded like a telephone. Damn it, that is one way to wake up from a dream; your surroundings distorted and became blurred and fading. You would wake up soon …

> Would Cass even see your bubble?

> Tell Cass that you are helping her because she was lost and looked like she was in trouble.
> Tell Cass that you are helping her because you have nothing better to do, so, in a weird way, you are thankful to her as well.
> Tell Cass that you are helping her because One Two looks suspicious, and you don’t want to be regretful if he catches her.
> Tell Cass that you don’t know why you are helping her.
> Say nothing, you can use this rude awakening as an excuse.
> [Write In]

>>5409757
> Tell Cass that you are helping her because One Two looks suspicious, and you don’t want to be regretful if he catches her.

File: e18b8f315cab431079e0fd7bb(...).jpg (69 KB, 564x752)

69 KB JPG

I am curious what did you all think of those last two updates. Please tell if you don't mind.

>>5409777
It was very nice being able to proeprly communicate with Cass, and to get a better feel for who she is and what she's about. Makes her easier to waifu, certainly.

>>5409757
>> Tell Cass that you are helping her because One Two looks suspicious, and you don’t want to be regretful if he catches her.
> Tell Cass that you are helping her because she was lost and looked like she was in trouble.

>>5409777
Nice trips. Very nice to finally communicate with Cass. Heightens the intrigue of the story.

>>5409763
>>5409803
>>5410317

The unearthly island on which you stood shattered and split by an invisible crevice. The undergrowth wasted away into glowing coal and then vanished into white ash. With each ringing sound, louder than the last, the dream faded further. The edges of Cass’s figure spasmed—her body softened and soon was left empty of its colour and solidness as if it was only a reflection.

‘You were lost, and looked like you were in trouble.’ You mumbled into the dream-void you shared. ‘When One Two came looking for you, he seemed suspicious and dangerous.’ Rigid bubbles oozed through your lungs and throat before you spewed them out like spoiled milk. The two malformed lumps, bulky, heavy, and washed out, hovered to Cass. They swelled and burst. ‘I don’t want to be remorseful if he’ll catch you, Cass … Cass, are you still in here?”

*** *** ***

You woke up to the muffled ringing of the phone. Through the dizzy darkness, you limped your hands at the mattress to try and lift yourself only to clutch upon a smooth rubber surface. Gelatinous skin bounced away your grasp; your hands got tossed up her body and underneath her spongy see-through neck. You rested on top of Cass, her body again reformed and likewise inflated. Drowsiness switched around with your usual alcohol-induced headache. Your neck cramped; you rubbed your face against Cass’s bouncy stomach until you could finally raise it and slide off her hard foam flesh. You threw yourself on the carpetless floor and climbed up the steps.

You rubbed your eyes and then leaned your ear to the hinges of the locked red oaken door. Like a hungry infant with teething pains awakened in the middle of the night, the phone cried behind the door.

> Try to break the door with kicks to get into the room.
> Motion for Cass to come over; could she open the door?
> Leave the phone and the top-last-floor alone. Wait until the phone stops ringing.
> [Write In]

>>5411703
> Motion for Cass to come over; could she open the door?
Maybe, having been in our head, she will be able to better intuit out intentions now?

>>5411703
>> Motion for Cass to come over; could she open the door?

>>5411753
>>5412206

“Cass, damn it, give me a hand.” You waved your arm towards yourself.

Cass slithered off the bed and collapsed onto the ground, slumping on top of a shapeless mass replacing her gabs. Reforming the lumps into long legs, she staggered up and footslogged at you. The phone continued to ring, ring, ring. Cass slapped the door with a faint thump and then dragged her boneless palm against it. She paused; she turned her head, with her hand still pushing against the oaken wood, to stare at you.

“I want you to” —you looked at the door and then back at her.

> Ask Cass to help you search for a key. It must be hidden somewhere close … right?
> Ask Cass to try and replicate a key with her gelatinous fingers.
> Ask Cass to stand a few feet behind you. Bounce off Cass’s body for some additional momentum for your kick (or shoulder slam?).
> [Write In]

>>5412765
> Ask Cass to stand a few feet behind you. Bounce off Cass’s body for some additional momentum for your kick (or shoulder slam?).
She seems too goopy to form a solid key easily.

>>5412765
>> Ask Cass to stand a few feet behind you. Bounce off Cass’s body for some additional momentum for your kick (or shoulder slam?).

>>5412765
> Ask Cass to stand a few feet behind you. Bounce off Cass’s body for some additional momentum for your kick (or shoulder slam?).

Thank you all for playing! I really appreciate you for reading and participating. and so does Cassiopeia I apologize for so many days without updates, and today is going to be another one, and I am working on fixing this problem.

>>5414118
You're one of the more reliable QMs on the board. I trust you to finish a quest you start.

>>5412772
>>5412828
>>5413730
>>5414816

“—to stand here.”

You took Cass by her wrists and pulled her five steps away from the door. Her black eyes steadied beneath her face without sinking as to blink in her alien way. You motioned for her to outstretch her arms and then nodded your head. You took a quick look at the door and turned to it. You stretched your shoulder, grit your teeth, and clenched your fists. With some run-up, you tossed your back at Cass’s rubber cradle and then, with momentum, bounced off to kick the door. The layer of wine-red paint severed off the wooden shell and the hinges creaked.

Cass tilted her head and lowered her arms; you waved at her to strike back the pose. Her stomach and chest barely wobbled. You had to remind yourself she was not a real woman, and there was nothing to say sorry about. With an aching knee, you kicked the door again, and again, and again, until you heard a loud snap and your firm boot wrecked through the surface scuff and smashed a hole. With your foot stuck inside the door, you, fidgeting on your free leg, hit the door with your shoulder to try and fail to free yourself.

Cass eased towards you and, from behind your back, placed her fingers on your leg. Her hands turned into jelly and warped and then stretched out across and over your leg and inside the fracture. Once her rubbery flesh reached your booth and covered it like a thin leather wax, it swelled up and went deep into the cracks, crackling the timber and breaking it deeper. The door’s dying grip loosened and you stumbled back and fell on Cass’s shoulder. She stepped further: she pushed you against the door as her fingers excavated more room in the door until it resembled an ant farm. Then, like a piece of glass, the door shattered into dozens of pieces and exposed an entrance.

Not the way you planned it to happen. You kneeled past the hanging fragments to come into the room, not unlike the one below in its stripped comfort. You saw a blunt difference between the rooms walking toward the candlestick phone.

There were paintings, animal horns, animal tooths, watches, jewellery, necklaces, porcelain vases, delicate glasswork shaped like fish and dolphins, gilded tableware, elbow-sized marble sculptures, antiquated coins, several busts, and other stuff—everything was tossed either on the bed on the floor, in half-opened crates or wrapped in cloths. You dithered as you picked the receiver off the hook and to your ear.

“Hello?” a voice crackled from the earpiece.

“Dear, I have been calling you for ten minutes. What’s the dry up?”

“Cleopatra.” You sighed. You picked up the steel phone and, walking over the cases and coffers, you sat on the bed’s empty edgy. You watched as Cass followed you into the room and, reshaping her arms, muttered something in silence. “Yes, Elmer talking. The door was locked, and I’m not a yegg, so I had to use some force to get inside.”

“ … “ Cleopatra waited, “It was locked? It wasn’t supposed to be. Is there anyone in there with you?”

“No, not right now, but someone left the house and hid the key when we reached the house. I didn’t see their face.”

“I see," she said, "someone on the inside has been flimflamming me; doesn’t matter right now. Are you safe, darling, what about Cass?”

“We are safe,” you said.

You practically heard her smile; it became a scoff. “I wouldn’t be dropping a dime just to check on you, darling, there’s is a problem. I got a call from the shop Mary rode to fix her cab to, and they said another person left with her on her flivver. Dear, from what they described of him, it was your guy, Roddy. He’s with your dear Mary.”

“Does she know where I am?”

“No, I haven’t. They don’t know where the two of you are.”

> Ask Cleopatra for the address and telephone number of the repair shop.
> Ask Cleopatra about all the inventory in the room.
> Ask Cleopatra what she suggests you do.
> Ask Cleopatra if she can come to assist you.
> Thank Cleopatra and then drop the call.
> [Write In]

>>5415170
> Ask Cleopatra for the address and telephone number of the repair shop.
Also...
> Ask Cleopatra about all the inventory in the room.

>>5415488

“That’s a relief, let’s keep it that way. Can you give me the address and the number of the shop?”

“I can’t suggest going there, darling,” Cleopatra said; a drumming noise came from her tapping her fingers against the phone. “However, I am worried for Mary, worried for Mary, just as well. Very well, darling, listen: the shop is called Lenny’s A+ Garage on 36 Chassis Street. As for the phone … 4125550172, got that?”

You used the notebook given—still almost empty of comments and findings about Cass that Cleopatra wanted—to write down both the address and the number.

“Dear Elmer, if you go check there do it yourself, I’m not sure, not sure, if bringing Cass with you, darling, will be a good idea.”

You nodded, blinked, and then said, “I understand.” Your elbow touched an encrusted vase. You wanted to know. “Cleopatra … what is all this stuff in this room?”

You heard a muffled sigh and then a long monotone beep. After a few seconds, there was a deaf click, then the telephone hum came back.

“Thank you, dish.” Reserved hollow voice came from the blackish receiver as if speaking to another—it then turned to address you, “Elmer Briant, it’s been a while.”

> Drop the call.
> Ask One Two about Mary, what is planning to do with her.
> Ask One Two what is he planning to do with Cass once he captures her.
> Act confused and innocent, talk with him but pretend you never met Cass.
> Tell One Two that you want to meet him in Lenny’s A+ Garage.
> [Write In]

>>5416192
> Ask One Two about Mary, what is planning to do with her.
> Ask One Two what is he planning to do with Cass once he captures her.
Too late to play dumb.

>>5416233
seconding this

>>5416233
>>5417216

“One Two.”

“You are not the first person to try and get away from me, Elmer Briant; you are not unique. I will not put it on your criminal record, but I hope you are ready now to admit the lies you told me, confess your crimes against the federal government, and accept the punishment that shall be imposed on you and Mary Briant according to the law.”

You looked at Cass and bit your lip—it was too late to play dumb. “Keep my sister out of it, One Two. She did nothing wrong. What are you planning to do with her?”

“Ignoring all her previous wrongdoings and lawbreakings and taking into account only tonight, Elmer Briant, she did enough,” he said, “but as long as you, like your sister, acknowledge your crimes and tell me the truth—everything I want to know—I am willing to bury the hatchet. I am only interested in the thing that fell from the sky.”

“What are you planning to do with her?”

“Her?” One Two asked a question, but his voice was absent of surprise. “It has a gender?”

It was something even you forgot to ask Cass in the shared dream. “Answer the question, One Two.”

“Very well. The thing will be treated like an unlawful non-citizen, and a foreign spy. What will happen to it later is … classified.”

“You are going to experiment on her.”

“It is only right that we are informed whether it came for any wicked purpose, Elmer Briant, by means necessary,” he said, and then paused. “Mary Briant wishes to speak to you.”

There was a second of pause before Mary’s familiar voice echoed off the telephone. “Elm’?”

You sighed in relief; she didn’t sound hurt. “Mary, are you alright?”

“Are -you- alright in the head, Elm?” she shouted, deafening your ability to hear. You moved the receiver inches away from your ear. With the same loud voice, Mary continued, “Why are you -still- with that thing, Elm’? Was that what we agreed on? Let me help you out: no, no we did not!” She interrupted as you tried and failed to respond. “Elmer, the hombre here promises to let us go and look the other way if you give him the thing. We are problem free, so give him the alien and let’s lam out!”

> Drop the phone without a response.
> Tell Mary that you are sorry but you can’t let One Two get a hold of Cass.
> Falsely promise Mary and then One Two to meet them somewhere else, and to buy you time.
> [Write In]

>>5417424
>TRUTHFULLY agree to meet with One Two
Sorry, Cass, but he has our sister.

>>5417424
> Falsely promise Mary and then One Two to meet them somewhere else, and to buy you time.

Cut and run baby! He doesn't give a fuck about Mary, he'll cut her loose to chase us.

Rolled 1 (1d2)

>>5417481
> TRUTHFULLY agree to meet with One Two

>>5417902
> Falsely promise Mary and then One Two to meet them somewhere else, and to buy you time.

>>5417481
>>5417902

You looked at Cass who, watching you with her deep black eyes, joined you by the bedside. You knew she couldn’t understand a thing you said.

“Elm’? Are you listening me to?” Mary shouted again.

“I hear you, Mary,” you muttered into the receiver. “Some things changed, there is a reason I am still with Cass …”

“And what’s that reason?”

“It’s too long to explain,” you said. You met Cass’s gaze and sighed—your sister and her safety was more important to you. “Where are you right now?”

“We are in the switchboard centre, the fed hijacked your call,” she said. One Two’s broken low voice mumbled from the outside. Mary yawned, her voice remaining unchanged. “He said I shouldn’t have told you that.”

One Two took the phone off her hands, “-you shouldn’t had, but now that she did, I think it’s only fair you tell us where -you- are, Elmer Briant.”

Your eyes circled the, obviously illegal, trove of items and supplies. You didn’t wish to surrender Cleopatra’s treasure cove to the police and the feds.

“I can’t tell you, let’s meet somewhere else,” you said, “does the Retiree Park sounds like berries to you?”

One Two paused. “Good enough, Elmer Briant. In thirty minutes I expect you there with the -thing-; don’t make your sister wait.”

And then his voice hung. You kept the phone, as heavy as an empty funeral casket, in your hands. After a long beep there was another click, and the call came back.

“Um … Darling?” Cleopatra asked with a frustrated voice. “This is the first, I wonder if one of the switchboard sisters fell asleep.”

“No, don’t blame them,” you said. “One Two somehow got a hold of our call, and he knows I have Cass. I have no choice—I agreed to meet him in half an hour.”

“Had he hurt dear Mary?”

“No, she seemed alright, just pissed off that I didn’t give her up sooner, or left her with you,” you said.

“One Two is suspicious of me, darling, but maybe we should’ve, although she seemed, she seemed, attached to you. Dear, you resolved to cede her to Roddy?”

“What other choice do I have, Cleopatra? He has Mary, he knows who we are and where we live. He’s a damn G-man, he has all the power in the world to get me.”

“You are correct, darling, but think of this, think of this, this way: if she is harmed, there’s a chance her kind will come, will come, to take revenge.”

“That’s an argument I’ll have to put forward when I’ll meet him,” you said.

“Dear, I would never hurt Roddy, we have history, but you have a question, a question, to answer, darling: whose life you value more, Roddy’s or your new friend’s.”

“What are saying?”

“Think about it, darling.”

Cleopatra ended the call, an endless beep-beep soon replacing her flamboyant voice. Think about what?! You tossed the phone on the bed, put the hands on your head and groaned. You looked at Cass as she kneeled before you. “I’m sorry.” She tilted her head and then wobbled away, her hand, like snake, leaping down to pick up Cleopatra’s dress. Or try to. Her fingers slipped along the silk and passed between the thick chiffon holds. Struggling for a few minutes, she picked it off the ground and approached you again to then look at you with unmoving stare. Her hands shook as she raised them, the dress falling through her loose grip and into your hands.

> Help Cass get dressed and then drink some brandy before leaving to meet One Two.
> Call D’Addario Family to ask for help to deal with One Two and then drink some brandy before leaving to meet One Two.
> Ask Cass to stay in the narrow house, you don’t want to betray her to her face. One Two won’t be happy, but you’ll tell him where she is when you’ll meet him. Drink some brandy before leaving to meet One Two.
> [Write In] and then drink some brandy.

>>5418534
> Help Cass get dressed and then drink some brandy before leaving to meet One Two.
Feels like shit, but it'd be worse to get our sister killed or stuck fleeing the law forever, all for an alien we barely know... Even if Cass does seem nice.

>>5418534

> [Write In] and then drink some brandy.

Let's concoct a plan. Going to need to stretch our art skills a bit here.

1. Illustrate that we are going to go meet One-Two.

2. Illustrate Cass attacking us and leaving visible marks, cuts, burns w/e she can manage. Illustrate an indication that Cass has fled the area.

The plan is to make it look like Cass caught onto us, attacked us, then fled. We go to One-Two with our best "she seemed so nice then look what she did to us" story.

In reality Cass just stays holed up in this house, preferably in the attic or something. We go to One-Two, he berates our incompetence, hopefully we and Mary walk free.

Bonus points if we drop clues that she's going for the nearest large body of water, a nice big hard to verify wild goose chase.

Drink the brandy. So much Brandy.

>>5418703
Hm. May be worth a go, actually!

>>5418534
I am >>5418578, and I support this plan to fake an escape.

Update tomorrow!

>>5418703
>>5418534

This is good. Support!

>>5418578
>>5418703
>>5418732
>>5419826

You picked the dress off your knees. Sighing once more you stood up from the bed and raised your arms, motioning for Cass to do the same. You tossed the neck cowl over her head, slipped her rubbery hands into the sleeves, and then squeezed the whole bunch downward. Cass’s malleable flesh corrected to fit into the dress as her head popped out of the neckline, her orange face nearly brushing yours. You bucked away from her touch, leaning down to steer and stretch the fine chiffon down her chest to her stomach and then to her ankles. You tucked the shoulders and stood up. Cass’s orby eyes slumped inside her jelly membrane and came out on the opposite side of her head. She looked around, her half-hair flapping like molten glass. You followed her relentless gaze. She stepped past the bed, oozed past the chest and crates, and then continued to rummage about the room.

You snagged an encrusted and gilded mantel clock with a walnut finish ticking close to you: 11:07 AM. You rubbed your neck. “What are you searching for?"

Cass’s hands fell on the painted wall and dragged her wobbling fingers against the veiled cement joints. She turned her head, moved her lips in silence, and then resumed her searching.

“If it’s a mirror you want, I don’t think there are any here", you guessed.

You grabbed a crimson sash from the same place and went close to Cass to throw it around her waist; the alien halted as you did so. You wrapped it into an overhand knot, the simplest and the only one you knew, and halfheartedly looped both its ends. You tucked the edges and rolled your eyes. I don’t know any others, your face said to her.

Cass's head moved up and down, her hands flubbing with the bow.

“Your hands and feet are exposed, and there are going to be a lot of mugs and buttons outside,” you said, more to yourself than your alien companion.

You slid out a bottle of brandy, the better one of the two you picked from the Hourglass, from the crate and uncorked it, a diluted and fermented smell of grapes greeting you like your late grandmother’s homecooking. You sipped the warm caramel liquid: your drool turned fruity white and trickled off your tongue tip into your throat like cinder fire. Brandy was better alcohol, it had all the benefits of vintage wine—and according to the pharmacists, there were many—with a distilled punch.

Liquid courage inspirited your body like a sign of deer to a famished man; it weathered your bones, heated your blood, steeled your nerves, stupefied your worries, repressed your pain, and bonded your soul with your flesh. A sip of brandy was all you needed to break the chains of hysteria and make sense of the circumstances with a serene mind.

You needed Mary safe and left alone by One Two, a complete bystander of this affair; you needed One Two to get off your back due to your “incompetence” as if you washed your hands off Cass and his pursuit; you needed to make sure Cass returned to her space cloud uncaptured. You would do all three.

You reached for and opened the notebook, grabbing the pencil and raising your voice. The alien turned around. Her eye floated up and down and her arms were limp and hanging to her thighs.

“Don’t worry about the mirror,” you said, “you look swell … swell enough. Come here, we need to do some chinning.”

She came and stopped before you and then sloped her head to look from above at the ruled paper. At the bottom of the page, you sketched a thin narrow house with just enough space to put Cass inside of it. You checked if she was looking—she was—and then returned to add the second half of the sketch: yourself and One Two on the far end of the page. Cass’s opaque fingers touched the two figures; she stared at you her eyes unblinking and her lips unmoving.

“One Two knows you are with me, and he has Mary,” you said. “I will go and meet him, -but- you will stay here.”

She shook her head and then pushed both of her gelatinous thumbs on the roughed paper.

“I have thirty minutes” —you lifted the clock again and pointed at the thick hour hand— “you understand? It’s all we have to work with, so -work- with me here.”

You ignored her look and returned to the journal. On the space above the house, you illustrated, the best you could, a figure of Cass attacking a drawing of you with her stray tentacles and dumping you with marks, cuts, and burns. You thought of a way to sketch an indication that Cass has fled, but you didn’t want her to flee …

You looked straight into her starless eyes. “Sock me, Cass. I need you to make it look like you dusted off after roughing me up.” You fingered at the second sketch.

She oozed back, again shaking her head and refusing with her two thumbs.

> If Cass is not going to do it, you’ll make her. Assault Cass and make her defend herself.
> Approach her and keep pointing at the pages until she does what you ask her to do.
> Injure yourself. Kick the furniture, punch the walls, toss yourself down the ladder.
> Injure yourself. The kitchen must have a knife, take it and then slice your clothes and a tad of your face.
> You’ll find a way to injure yourself once you leave the house—maybe get into a brawl or something else.
> [Write In]

>>5420445
> Approach her and keep pointing at the pages until she does what you ask her to do.
But if that fails...
> Write in

Slam a door with us half way through it. We don't know quite know what violence from Cass would look like, so make it something fairly plausible like she slammed a door on us and ran.

Make sure to get some proper bruises and clothing damage.

>>5420589
Do we have the gumption for such a self-inflicted assault? We've failed to accomplish prompts before due to Elmer's softer nature.

>>5420445
> Approach her and keep pointing at the pages until she does what you ask her to do.

>>5420589
>>5420643

You lurched at Cass. You raised and then pushed the logbook at her face, tapping the drawing with your fingertips.

“Come on, do something. You can slap me, punch me, kick me, I don’t care, just make it believable!”

She yanked her twisting arm from beneath the journal and swung her mucous palm at your temples. You flinched. You let go of the journal, making it fall, and raised both your hands to shield your forehead from Cass’s caress, her soft sludge squeezing your fingers instead.

You tightened your teeth so much that your jaw began to hurt. You pushed down your arms to toss away her immobilising and alcohol-sipping hand.

“I don’t want you to knock me out, Cass!” you yelled. Your voice, a glue in your throat, tensed and tightened. You looked back at the clock and the minutes wasted.

You kicked the journal out of the way and beneath the bed. You bumped against Cass, the silken dress frustrating the rubber quality of her flesh, and then scrambled at the door. You poured a deep crimson waterfall down your throat and then placed the half-empty bottle at a safe reach so as to not knock it over. You grabbed the door and, after a long exhale, you slammed it at your elbow and chest with all the strength you had. The aching burn of the pummel mixed with the drunken warmth of the alcohol, lessening the pain; still, you felt it, the twisting discomfort in your elbow, the ringing in your ears, and gasping in your chest.

You let go of the door and then grabbed it again. Your fingers scrapped the hardwood as you breathed in and out. Your fingers doubling from ten to twenty and then tripling to thirty, you spread the door open—hitting yourself twice should have been enough, you wagered.

The door didn’t move. Your fingers slipped off the sanded wood as you then stumbled into the door frame. A silhouette in a black dress grasped the door with her opaque hand, stopping you from reaching at it like a house fire.

> Push away at Cass and then slam at door at yourself a second time, make it more believable.
> One is enough, you can’t fake being hurt now.

> Leave the door open and the key with you.
> Lock the door and put the key in the mailbox.
> Lock the door but keep the key to yourself.

> Visit Cleopatra’s place on your way to the Retiree Park.
> Go straight to the Retiree Park without any interruptions.

> [Write In]

>>5422540
> One is enough, you can’t fake being hurt now.

> Lock the door but keep the key to yourself.

> Go straight to the Retiree Park without any interruptions.

>>5422540
> One is enough, you can’t fake being hurt now.
> Lock the door but keep the key to yourself.
> Go straight to the Retiree Park without any interruptions.

>>5422540
>> One is enough, you can’t fake being hurt now.
>> Lock the door but keep the key to yourself.
>> Go straight to the Retiree Park without any interruptions.

Hello all, sorry for the silence. I have been having some issues with sleep, finding free time to write between work, and other things. I'll try and update soon.

>>5424320
I feel you, QM. Take it easy, take your time. We'll be here when you're ready. You've proven yourself to be no flaker!

>>5423102
>>5423107
>>5423135

You met Cass’s suffocating gaze. You grouched and then let go of the door.

One Two was acute: to act like you were hurt by Cass, you needed to be hurt for real. Snatching the second bottle of brandy, You staggered down the tight stairwell, first into the bedroom, and then to the entranceway and the kitchen. You rummaged through the white set of cupboards decorated with tight metal handgrips. You slid open one of them and copped a thick carving knife by its walnut handle. You threw off your jacket on the linoleum floor and kneeled before many weeks of hard work in cash and sweat; you began to cut the sides and front of your thick velour overcoat, dragging them knife to force uneven slashes. To make your story even more credible, you clumped and tossed the coat around the floor to wrinkle and cover it in grime.

Cass struggled from the wall to where she put her hands, to the railing, and then back, slipping on the staircase’s every second step. Her trembling legs straightened from their misshapenness imprinted by the stairs. With very little reason to be happy nor satisfied with your work, you put on the dirty jacket and turned to the source of your problems.

“You are going to stay here, and wait for me,” you said, first pointing at her and then at the floor below. “Keep those gams away from the street, do you understand?”

She nudged her head and oozed at you. Her gelatinous body was only a few inches taller but she still towered over you. She blabbed her lips but had no way to shape her bubble.

You turned away, tossed the door open with your knee, and shut it behind you with—a reckless—bang. You pushed the key inside to lock the door. No one was going to enter or leave the house. Glancing at the mailbox, you put the key firmly in your pants pocket instead. Unless broken into, the only way inside was in your hands, no matter how the situation would worsen.

You put your elbow against the dry wood and leaned on it, sighing. The easy way out tempted you like Eden’s serpent, whispering to abandon—to betray—Cass. Echoing in your mind, as if your thoughts, all its reasonings—the danger of the situation and you owning nothing to Cass and having nothing to do with her plight—made sense. You uncorked the bottle and let another barrel-matured stream cascade down your throat; it was something poor Adam didn’t have on him.

You heard a slight creak. You turned to the window where Cass’s mucous face was pushed against the glass. Pressed that way, her bubbling hair became a flat puddle and her black blob eyes lost their form and enlarged like a pancake on a frying pan. Her formless lips smooched the sheet of glass, her breath was nonexistent to fog it up.

Sharing in her gaze, you stepped down the porch and into the garden. You quick-emptied the bottle and then threw it into a bush, the branches and leaves, like pillows of feathers and cotton, softened the fall. The bottle didn’t break, instead vanishing in the trackless greenery; if only it was that easy for you.

You pointed your finger at her. “Bee’s knees, Cass."

You hid your anxiety behind a window glass separating you and her, the silhouettes of the two taller buildings concealing the daybreak, multiple drinks of brandy, a language incomprehensible to her alien mind, and if that wasn’t enough, some jargon.

*** *** ***

The was a fedora or a cloche hat on every corner of the street; while often called a street for the undeserving, Ashtray Valley was a significant part of Compostela still, and was brimming with life like the rest of its more captivating parts. Crowds were forced onto the tiny sidewalk and the road verge by the black endless flood of automobiles on the avenue roads, many men with their heads buried in newspapers and many women too ungallant to push their way past them. Pigeons rushed and scrambled between leather boots, shredding the remains of yesterday's newspaper like yellowed corpses, swallowing the tabloid and, unsatisfied, hurrying away for another.

Clouds, like massive mountains, stretched and flowed into one another, as if crashed once thousands of years ago, and only squirmed since. The grey snowfall hung above Compostela the way it always did, like an undisturbed avalanche; someday it would fall, and Compostela would be sunny and blue bright ... as likely as Prohibition being overturned.

You wobbled with the crowds until you noticed a repetition of sneers and glares either at your tipsy self or your tarnished jacket. You turned into the nearest street to hide away from them. It would have taken you longer, but the maze of alleyways seemed much more welcoming.

Chewing on tobacco, a figure following spat it out and then clicked his tongue. “Wait, you!” he said and stopped, following his own demand.

You turned to see him. You recognised him as the man who gave you the Hourglass card; he was with Mike, but absent from the speakeasy.

You nodded to greet. “Yes, fella?”

With narrow eyes, he looked at you for a second and then let out a long sigh. “I knew I would find you around, Sheik. You mentioned you and your girl live close by.”

“You were gunning for me why? I went to the Hourglass, paid my bill, and left with my share. Don’t tell me there’s -another- `tax.”

“No, there isn’t,” he said. Mike’s friend licked his yellow teeth and spat. “I just want to ask you a few things, even if you mind it.”

“I really don’t have the time right now.”

He tapped the inner pocket of his unbuttoned black high-waisted suit jacket. “You’ll have to make a minute or five, fella.”

He likely had something in his pocket you did not.

You raised your arm at him. “What’s the question?”

He cleared his throat, then took out a small smoky-smelling pack of chewing tobacco and began to grind on it. “You left with Sweet Tooth and the girl that was with him, is that right?”

“That’s the crop. We got our separate ways as soon as we left the Hourglass. I went home and Mike went to accompany her home," you said. "Why, has something happened?”

“He didn’t come back and hasn’t dropped a dime. I assumed he had an open bank with her, but then one of the boys told me you joked she was a prohi? How so?”

> Say you made a mistake and assumed so from a photo from a very old newspaper you read.
> Say you are a brewer for the D’Addario Family and she looked like one of the people they warned you about, but there were dissimilarities.
> Apologise but say you -really- don’t have the time to be talking with him right now. Continue going to the Retiree Park.
> [Write In]

>>5425216
> Say you are a brewer for the D’Addario Family and she looked like one of the people they warned you about, but there were dissimilarities.
"You're making me think my first instinct was right, fella, but what can I say? I tried to warn him, and he comvinced me I was just being paranoid... I hope he turns up."

>>5425222
Support

>>5425222
>>5425361

You scratched your neck and all the craggy hair growing above it.

“I wasn’t joking, but I thought that maybe I got the wrong face,” you said. “If it was Theresa Coarse, she was wearing a wig, and I don’t know how she acts, only the way she -suppose- to look. You’re making me think my first instinct was right, fella.” You closed your eyes and took a hollow breath. “What can I say? I tried to warn him, and he and the squad in there convinced me I was just being paranoid. I didn’t want to ing-bing and pull on the skirt’s hair to see if I’m right; I still had my doubts, you know? I hope they were right, and he turns up soon.”

“ … and if not? How were you so sure?” The man licked up his tobacco droll and nudged his head.

You couldn’t care less about Theresa or Mike! Not right now. You looked at the alley that would lead you to the Retiree Park.

“I’m a brewer for the D’Addario Family,” you explained and warned as his eyebrow peaked and head rose. “She looked like one of the people their hired goons warned me about, they showed me her photos, but like I said: the wig.”

“There’s no way,” he said choking on his snuff; at the end, he spat it out. “You are one of the D’Addario busters—and you didn’t know where a speakeasy was?”

“No, I just brew alcohol for them,” you said. “And I don’t visit Compostela that often; I know where D’Addario joints are, but I needed alcohol right away, so thanks for that.”

“Yeah … of course … ”

“If there’s one thing I know is that the real Theresa doesn’t play around. The Hourglass is going to get eaten by her and other brass moths if it was really her.”

The man grabbed a real cigarette from the pocket of his pants, ripped it open, and stuffed all of its contents straight into his mouth. “Damn it, that’s not fucking good.”

You shook your head. “You won’t be the first, else her name wouldn’t be so infamous.”

“We have a safety measure” —the gunpowder, yes— “but that’s in case of an unexpected raid, not one we -expect-”

> Suggest that they get rid of the alcohol the best they can and then blow up the cellar, they don’t have any other choice.
> Suggest that they sell the alcohol, at a discount, to a D’Addario speakeasy, you can give them a number and an address, and your name to use.
> Stay silent and wait until the man comes to his conclusion.
> Suggest that perhaps your intuition is wrong. You are not taking responsibility if she’s the real Theresa, or not.
> It was a good talk, but you have no time to waste. Apologise and then push past the man and to the Retiree Park.
> [Write In]

>>5426105
> Suggest that perhaps your intuition is wrong. You are not taking responsibility if she’s the real Theresa, or not.
>>But if he's worried, he should either blow up the cellar or sell off the alcohol on the cheap to the D'Addario
>>He can name-drop us, but we're not really a member of the family, so it may not do any good

>>5426111
I'll support this. Offer the help we can, but shirk responsibility as much as possible. I don't want them coming after us if they sell at a loss and no raid drops on them.

>>5426111
>>5426105

Support!

OP?

>>5427990
Yes, hello?

>>5426111
>>5426176
>>5426601

“There’s also a chance my intuition is wrong.” You shook your head. “I am not taking responsibility if she’s the real Theresa, or not.”

The man hummed. He adjusted his fedora to shield less of his forehead and then placed his hand over his mouth and chin, leaning on the wall.

“If you are so worried, you should bl-” —you bit your tongue— “use that safety measure of yours, or sell off the alcohol on the cheap.”

“At worst, they’ll be planning their raid this very night.” He grimaced, raising his leafy eyes at you, “That’s a whole cellar of booze to get rid of in just six hours, that’s a tall order even if we knew who to sell to."

You rubbed your wrist and pinched your skin. You raised both hands to tuck under your chin. “The D’Addarios will not mind buying it off you.”

He picked a clump of over-chewed tobacco from his mouth and, with his arm lowering, squeezed and unsqueezed it above the wet cobblestone. After a minute of silence, he tossed it on the ground and kicked it into the nearest puddle. “Are you going to organise that for us? You want green?”

“No, I’m in a hurry, and already running late. I can tell you where to find them, and you can use my name to break the ice, although like I said, I’m not part of the D’Addario family. They’ll be happy with a cheap deal, but you’ll have to barter the price yourself.” You exhaled the tipsy air between your fingertips and knuckled. “I feel like this needs repeating: if nothing happens, it is not my fault. Don’t blame with hindsight.”

His laugh was empty and gruff. “That’s a lot of dough we are talking about, and gallons of varnish. Me and the boys will have to use our clear heads to think about this. Damn it, Ashtray is supposed to be safe from the bulls and their nonsense, and especially the revenuers."

“Hourglass is one of a few dozen blind pigs not under the D’Addario family’s pizzo; almost no raids happen to ‘their’ speakeasies.”

He tilted his head. “Almost?”

“I heard that there was one, a few years ago. The agents and the copper came one night, broke the door, beat up the drinkers, destroyed the bar, arrested every soul, and then poured out all the alcohol on the streets and sewers of the rotten apple; they shattered the bottles and broke down the barrels. All and all, it was a usual raid. Throughout the week, the officers' bodies were found around the town.”

“I have to” —he swallowed— “tell them your name, right? What’s your name again, fella?”

*** *** ***

You leapt over a swallow channel filled with rotten water and then climbed over the boulder fence. The Retiree Park had proper gateways and passages—about half a dozen—to correctly enter it. Still, it was likely it the time was past the thirty-minute mark and you didn’t want to make One Two wait; who really knew what kind of man he was? You walked through a meadow of uncut bushes and thorny undergrowth—your trousers unable to protect you from their sting—until you reached a proper cobblestone pathway of the park.

This place could never compare to New York’s Central Park, or even to thousands of other parks in the dry country of the USA, and you were an infrequent visitor, but it was still a place of relative quietness in the Ashtray Avenue. You knew the homeless slept and made their refugee in here, but like the park compared to the rest of Ashtray, they weren’t known for being troublesome, at least not as much as the folk outside. You entered a meadow of marble headstones and granite plates marking the dead; it was also a cemetery.

You hurried your walk. You looked left and right to try and spot One Two. The short and scraggy oaks, cypress, and beech trees were eclipsed by the towering height of the apartments surrounding the park, only the white mellow sun hiding in the clouds turning away their shadows.

For God knows how long you wandered through the Retiree Park without any trace of One Two or your sister. Eventually, you ceased. Was -he- the one making you wait? Spotting a long curved bench with no armrest, you sank into the withering wood and stared into the sparse copse. A sudden cold breeze, like a pair of choking hands, gripped your neck. You leapt away, looking at the empty furniture with a superstition. There were stories, not one or two, of old-timers coming to this very park, resting on the bench, perhaps even this one, and then never standing up from it alive.

As you caught your breath and turned away from the bench to look behind you, a burst flooded you with a burning light. You stumbled back. Right in front of you was a black automobile, its engine silent as the buried around it. You heard a click, and one of the front doors opened to reflect your sunken darkened visage like a metal polished by a slave dedicating his entire life to that one task. Your eyes narrowed.

“Elmer Briant,” One Two said from the opposite side of the opened door. “A seat for one?”

> Approach the car and take sit inside, do not make One Two angry at the very beginning.
> Ask One Two to join you by the bench instead.
> Approach the car but do not sit inside, look if Mary is inside, and then talk with him that way.
> [Write In]

>>5428203
> Approach the car but do not sit inside, look if Mary is inside, and then talk with him that way.

>>5428624

You swallowed, rubbed your hands together to recapture some warmth, and then approached the opened door. You placed your right hand on top of the automobile and leaned inside.

With a black veneer interior and slate velvet upholstery, the car’s inside seemed swallowed in illusory darkness. Parts of the Sedan, like the metal door handle, the lock, the lever, the seatbelt, the pedals, the wheel, and the dashboard, had a ghastly luminous glow, not unlike the watch of the man inside. Wearing his black suit, he mixed in with the shadowy black seat. Touching the steering wheel’s ridges with his hand, he turned towards you with an empty facial expression.

“Where is Mary?”

“There are not many places she can be in here, Elmer Briant.”

He barely moved his lips, placing his shoulder to look at the back seat, where your eyes followed. There sat your sister, her hands gripping her knees with her legs pushed against one another. She jittered, her teeth chattering as she looked at you with her grey glare.

“E-E-Elm’,” she forced a relief smile and then leaned forward.

“Mary?” You looked sullen at One Two. “What did you do to her?”

“She will suffer no injury or harm, Elmer Briant, I promise you,” he said, his voice as empty as before. “I would prefer if you would join us in the car.”

You looked at him then at Mary and back; you couldn’t see any bruises or bleedings on her body, but the way she acted was as if she was standing outside in the cold winter night, freezing.

“I wish you were a better man, for both our sakes, Elmer Briant,” One Two said. He shook his head. “I would prefer if you were the honest type. Where is ‘Cass’?”

> Tell One Two you will answer his questions when he’ll step outside the car.
> Refuse to answer until he rehabilitates Mary from her strange condition. Was she on some kind of drugs?
> Tell One Two that Cass understood what you said on the phone and attacked and then escaped from you.
> Tell One Two that Cass can read minds, and that’s how she understood your intent to give her in and escaped from you.
> He's alone, still alone. Jump into the car and try and assault One Two with your hands, grabbing his neck and hitting him against the window.
> [Write In]

>>5428984
> Tell One Two that Cass can read minds, and that’s how she understood your intent to give her in and escaped from you.

The best lies have some truth. We did mind meld with her. Just rearrange the events in our mind, we dropped off Cass, got booze, came back and answered the phone, then accidentally mind melded with Cass, where she discovered our treachery. She attacked us and bolted.

>>5428984
>Tell One Two that Cass can read minds, and that’s how she understood your intent to give her in and escaped from you.

No update today, sorry.

>>5429040
>>5429099

You gripped the door panel with your hand and raised your chin. Your chest tightened. “Cass escaped from me after your call.”

One Two edged his head, his eyes concealed. “You do disappoint me, Elmer Briant. I favour the honest folk, so do be honest. Have you let this thing escape on purpose?”

You swallowed.

“No, I have not,” you said. “I’ll tell you about her, but -only- about her, One Two. There’s no reason for you to know about my personal life.”

Clack. A compartment near the steering wheel came open. He took out a notebook and a pen from inside, extending them both towards you.

“I’ll decide that, Elmer Briant,” he monotoned. “Write down the answers you will give me, and keep your hands busy with the notepaper. Now, be honest with me.”

You gripped the notebook and snapped away the pen. Darting your eyes from it to the figure of One Two, you inhaled the cold morning air and then started writing.

“The canary can read minds, from what I understand now. I dropped her in a house, it’s unimportant which house, and brought her alcohol, it doesn’t matter from where, because she sustains on it. She was dying without it, and I know this because she had to be fed from the alcohol in my body which I put down prior. -That’s- the only reason.

“After I answered your horn, I accidentally mind-melded with her,” you said. “She was reaching for the Ameche, likely curious by the thing, and fell on me, forehead against forehead. If you make a contact with her, trouble happens. She could see-read-hear what I was thinking, and fresh out of our call you know what I was thinking: to give her in.”

You paused, raising your eyes from your writing to the federal agent. He tapped the wooden veneer. He waved his hand. Continue, he unuttered.

“That’s when she jumped on me—attacked me. She socked me, she turned her fingers into shivs, she even tried to use some kind of safe soup to burn me.”

“And you didn’t tail after the thing?”

“I had two choices, and you only gave me half an hour. I realised I was no match, and you were waiting for me, so I went with the second.”

“Anxious you were, Elmer Briant,” he said after a hearkening breather. “I am going to echo what Mary Briant told you: I will forgive and forget your offences before the Volstead Act and every other law if you bring that thing to me. I can act and arrest on those laws, but I am only interested in ‘Cass’. Get in the automobile, and tell me where to drive.”

> Insist that One Two lets Mary out of this, and leaves her here; her car should be nearby, all things considering.
> Tell One Two that Cass is likely hiding in Ashtray Avenue, to probably attack and feed on the drunks there.
> Tell One Two that Cass is likely hiding somewhere in the middle-class district: the Pet Cemetery.
> Tell One Two that Cass likely went to the centre of Compostela—the richest neighbourhood in town—the Nebula.
> Tell One Two that Cass likely is trying to run away from the city to the swamps and lakes of the Corndump.
> [Write In]

>>5430711
> Insist that One Two lets Mary out of this, and leaves her here; her car should be nearby, all things considering.
> Tell One Two that Cass likely is trying to run away from the city to the swamps and lakes of the Corndump.
>>Clarify that we don't really KNOW, but we're only guessing, and that he probably doesn't need us for this bit

>>5430711
> Insist that One Two lets Mary out of this, and leaves her here; her car should be nearby, all things considering.
> Tell One Two that Cass is likely hiding in Ashtray Avenue, to probably attack and feed on the drunks there.
> Tell One Two that Cass likely is trying to run away from the city to the swamps and lakes of the Corndump.

Dump both ideas on him, so whichever he chooses we can assume it's the other when we fail.

>>5430761
>>5430780

“First, you should leave my sister out of this. I repeat, she has nothing to do with this … How long she’s going to be like that? If not for long, could you leave her here?”

He turned his head to look at your sister. “Afraid not, Elmer Briant. Unless I'm able to capture that thing, your lawbreaking is still on record.”

The cold sweat bit into your flushed face. You grit your teeth and then looked at Mary, who gave you an unenthusiastic shrug and nod.

“Alright,” you said, not willing to argue. “I don’t really know where exactly she went to, One Two, but I am going to make a guess or two here.“ You pecked graphite dots on the pearl-grey paper. “From what I learnt and can make my conclusions on, she is either hiding in Ashtray Avenue to attack and feed on the abundance of smoked and canned people there, or she decided to run away from Compostela altogether, to the Corndump; I can’t imagine anywhere else.”

“Corndump; is it because that's where it first appeared? Why would it try and return to your home, now that you had ‘betrayed’ her, Elmer Briant?”

“No, I doubt she would come to our dump now. No, she’s some kind of sea-ish creature-being: she needs liquid. The closest would be the swamps and lakes there.”

“You drove the thing quite far from those ‘swamps and lakes’, Elmer Briant.”

“I didn’t know, and my main attention was to hide her, and myself, to avoid you,” you told the truth. “If you supposed there was nothing, I was hoping you’d let us go.”
One Two watched silently as you stepped inside the chilly car and pushed the door towards you—it closed like a heavy coffin lid.

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This will be the last post of this thread.

As you have already realized with the infrequency of updates, I am having a problem. There are issues such as this quest not being the usual fantasy writing I am used to, the research needed from fashion to cars to slang, and me having a problem with dialogue (it is the hardest part for me to write).

I am going to take a break before I can continue, and I'm not sure yet for how long. I am either going to take a week to work on my notes or make a oneshot quest (a real this time, just one thread) for the sake of my writing bone.

That is all. Thank you all for playing so far.
Please up-vote the archives.

>>5432001
Thank you for running it, QM! I look forward to your one-shot, and to this one returning.

>>5432001

Thanks for running! Your dedication to authenticity is admirable.