Archie and Fred at Dragon Camp
MutantsMichael — 9/1/24, 7:50 AM
To Archie's first impression (bolstered by an Empathy roll I'll make in secret), Fred Merrill's mannerisms and body language are gentle, quizzical even, as he extracts Archie from Edgar Bergen's somewhat baffled company. Edgar didn't seem too familiar with Fred per se, but seemed to have a healthy respect for him regardless, as he came to Dragon Camp from "the Big House," the one Carl Wheat described in his feverish final ravings as being full of weird maps of forgotten histories. "It's a delight to have you here, Elder Ransom... or 'Archie,' if I may call you that? You know, I've been hearing about the work you've been doing for years now. I was expecting us to meet at some point, perhaps thanks to John Ritchie..." Archie considers the implications of Fred mentioning an E Clampus Vitus member this early in the conversation, "But upon second consideration, he is only a convert, after all. They're not going to understand who we are. Anyway, you've been doing stellar work, and now this production company in Los Angeles! Very busy indeed." "I like to meet new guests at the Grove—I consider my position in the Club to be very much in the vein of 'public relations, very much in line with my work with the Firemen's Fund—and especially when they come with a pedigree like yours. Of the Church, a God-fearing family man, a veteran, a believer in healthy media that serve to strengthen our country's moral fiber, a self-made man and entrepreneur, and a man with a moral backbone of his own to show for it. You've come a long way in forty-four years, young man. Been a lot of places, and you have a lot of wisdom and experience to show for it." Fred and Archie, who have been rambling physically as Fred has been rambling verbally, find themselves now at the Lake at the center of camp, looking at the giant Effigy looming over it, ready for its Cremation tomorrow night. Archie does find Fred enormously difficult to get a read on with his empathy; maybe it's a side-effect of that dead/non-existent aura Mitch said he saw. All the words he's saying are clear and easily understandable, there's zero NLP at play here... but Archie just cannot get a solid assessment of his motivations, underlying emotions, or agenda. Some of what he said could be interpreted as him knowing about Archie's career as a Sandman, or it could just be his cover stories. But considering Fred knows his age and CV pretty accurately, Archie leans towards thinking Fred knows Everything and is being coy. (edited)
September 2, 2024
Rob MacD — 9/2/24, 9:24 AM
Archie is friendly, seems charmed by the Grove, appropriately oohing and aahing at the natural beauty of the place and smiling at the summer camp touches. "Oh, you know John Ritchie?" Not surprised, just casual, pleased to make one more connection. "You must be familiar with the Clampers. They're a swell bunch of characters, ha ha. I was wondering if this" - gesturing to indicate the Grove, the Bohemian Club generally - "wouldn't be a lot like that. Just on a, a different level." He shrugs off the praise for his work and character, his usual aw-shucks modesty. "I don't know about all that. We're just trying to do our part." Shifting from I to we there, the barest acknowledgment that Archie is part of an organization, and is that what we're talking about here? "But it's nice to know the work is appreciated. So much of it is 'behind the scenes' - it's nice to think there are people who can see." As they arrive at the lake and the effigy, they'll hopefully see a couple of CEOs running off to pee on a tree together, or roughhousing, or skinny-dipping or whatever. Something juvenile but harmless. "What a place," Archie says with a chuckle. "Who says you can't be a kid at play forever?" ('You can't be a kid at play forever' being something Merrill said to Carl Wheat as he was poisoning him.) (edited)
1
MutantsMichael — 9/2/24, 10:37 AM
When Archie mentions the Clampers, Fred indulges in a game chuckle. "Oh yes, well... you've got to keep a sense of humor about it all, haven't you? Thank goodness for those jesters who keep us all humble, who have the prerogative to mock the monarch! Of course those Clampers are a hard-drinking bunch, not the right crowd for Saints like you and me." Fred faces north from the Lake and says, while gesturing to the Swimming Pool Road, "The few Clampers we have as members still, I think they camp up at Silverado Squatters, you may even see a couple of them in their trademark red union suits this week!" As Archie lands his knowing comment about "being a kid at play forever," Fred casts a keener, bolder eye at Archie. "When you were a kid, Archie... did you ever... invent worlds? Take out some scrap paper from the kitchen drawer and a stub of a pencil, say, and start... drawing maps, inventing kingdoms, dividing them up between dynasties, between scions loyal and treacherous? Maybe narrate a war or two?" "This is one of those things—well, it's universal, surely; boys love coming up with false histories, outsized legends—but I think you also take with your mother's milk when you grow up in the Church. Reading the Book of Mormon... gosh, it's just such an exciting prospect to take a land like this one, where nothing at all happened before the white man arrived, and divide it up between warring factions, secret combinations." Fred pauses, his owlish eyes behind his glasses growing softer, less predatory. "Sure is better now that it's all one country, eh?" Fred gently pats Archie on the back. "No wars and traitorous sons here anymore. And if we do end up with one, a king of fierce countenance, who might destroy wonderfully, why, we can always impeach him, or impel him to resign! That's the beauty of democracy."
Rob MacD — 9/2/24, 12:55 PM
"I don't know about war, but I used to play All-Star Baseball for days on end - do you remember that game, with the spinner, and the little disks for each hitter? I guess we all love playing at 'make believe.'" Slight pause between make and believe, so it's not make-believe, one word, but a phrase, '(we) make (people) believe.' Archie doesn't react to Merrill's remarks about the white man or the Book of Mormon, but he fills in the Bible verse: "A king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences..." Alluding again to his work, to what they both know. Letting Merrill know he can go ahead and speak plainly if he's going to. And then, "Well, you know what they say: democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others." A beat. "Say! The President is a member of the Club, isn't he?" Still referring to Nixon as the President. "Or... is he? I don't suppose he's likely to be here this year though." (edited)
2
MutantsMichael — 9/2/24, 1:19 PM
So the combination of Fred's concerted obliviousness and Archie's inability to read him properly with Empathy probably means that these little hints to get Fred to open up need a little oomph from a skill roll out of Archie at this point. Archie could think of any number of reasons that Fred is speaking so obliquely at this early point in the conversation, but it probably makes sense for us to see if Archie can actively maneuver Fred into some kind of open discussion on the topics of Archie's work, "make believe," Carl Wheat's final words, and/or Nixon's fall. It feels to me like a Fast-Talk-18 roll; Archie has sensed Fred's resistance, and is trying to get Fred to open up despite this resistance. But I would also at the same time like a Savoir Faire (Corporate America)-16 roll, to act as a kind of sensory roll against what Fred has said already and might yet say in response to all this subconscious prodding at Fred to speak plainly and openly. Think of this as a combination exploratory thrust and complementary shield parry, social combat-wise. Both skills, for the record, are Corruption-boostable. Oh, and while we're at it and thinking of Corruption, this definitely falls under the broad umbrella of "counterintelligence" (and, given the mentions of Mormon History, maybe even "magic" as well), so: Archie needs to make a Self-Control roll against his Stoneyian Overconfidence at this moment at a success on a 9 or less. One could definitely argue Archie is kinda already in the Overconfident zone from your RPing, Rob, but we'll see how the Self-Control roll goes and see if it demands any further prodding of Fred's defenses. (edited)
Rob MacD — 9/2/24, 1:25 PM
Ok, here goes:
Rob MacD used
roll
Dice GolemAPP — 9/2/24, 1:26 PM
@Rob MacD rolled
3d6Self-control (Overconfidence):(2+4+1)= 7Rob MacD — 9/2/24, 1:27 PM
I don't think I'll spend Corruption on the other rolls. Archie's not determined to crack Merrill open, just trying to signal that he can speak openly if he wants to.
1
Rob MacD used
roll
Dice GolemAPP — 9/2/24, 1:27 PM
@Rob MacD rolled
3d6Fast-Talk-18:(1+4+3)= 8Rob MacD used
roll
Dice GolemAPP — 9/2/24, 1:28 PM
@Rob MacD rolled
3d6Savoir Faire (America Inc.)-16:(5+2+2)= 91
MutantsMichael — 9/2/24, 1:56 PM
At the mention of Nixon, Fred says, "Well, you must understand he could never visit the Grove while he was actually in office. Far too much publicity... the press corps demanding to come along, can you imagine? Weaving spiders right here in the nest! But yes, Dick is a member; a Cave Man since 1950. We had our eye on him for a long, long time." Archie can sense the disappointment—nay, annoyance—in Fred's voice as he speaks of the disgraced "master of stratagem," as if all the Owls' quarter-century of plans around the former President are now in the shitter thanks to Dick's premature resignation. "Look, Archie, this is something you need to understand. My line of work, as diverse and varied as my many board memberships and chairmanships have been, is still ultimately the same as yours: public relations. I'm here to be the face of the Club. It's the same work I did for the Fireman's Fund and for American Express; put a smiling face on the institutions that keep the country running. People need that face, you must understand. It's much easier to speak with a gentle old man than to an abstraction, a logo, a computer." "In any event, these next two weeks are meant as a respite from all our work—yours, mine, ours—" At "ours," Fred's first acknowledgement that he and Archie are on the "same team," Fred sort of sighs slightly. "No Brother Owl is meant to make any deals here, any hiring decisions, do any business at all. Tomorrow night we'll burn all our Cares in a great conflagration and enjoy the unburdened Brotherhood of Bohemia for a fortnight. Hmm, that vow may be 'more honored in the breach than the observance,' perhaps. Well, there always will be those who break the rules. Jester's prerogative again, eh?" "So I suppose if there is any time to talk turkey, it'd be here and now, while we still have a Care in the worlds." Sitting down on one of the benches in the main Theatre area, he invites Archie with a gesture to have a seat. "If I told you we had a little problem at our Club in the City, a... problem in need of... well, skilled exterminators since, oh, around Tax Day... would that make any sense to you?"
September 3, 2024
Rob MacD — 9/3/24, 7:33 AM
"No shop talk after the Cremation," Archie agrees. "I understand. That's good. That's smart. Lets everyone relax, meet on an equal footing." He takes a seat on the bench too. "I did hear about a fire, back in April. But... what is it you need exterminated?"
MutantsMichael — 9/3/24, 7:50 AM
Archie's business-class social acuity penetrates, for a split second, the aura of unreadability around Fred, and Archie sees the look he's seen a hundred times in board rooms and fancy restaurants over the past decade-plus in advertising plus the tense personal negotiations he's experienced while at the Project: generally speaking, the smug look of a client who thinks he's gotten the better of you, who's led you onto what he thinks is the primrose path for a good Deal. As if concentrating on the tale of the Sterling Suite is taking this conversation into a cul-de-sac that Fred wants it on. But Archie can see this. And react accordingly. "The communist terrorists in question destabilized things in a way we couldn't predict, Archie. There were... old connections, blood connections, between them and the Club. A man killed himself in that room in 1926, in a symbolically loaded way, and he must have done it because he was, well, one of them. A madman, a poet, a radical, trying to strike out at us. What did the Bard say? 'The lunatic, the lover, and the poet/Are of imagination all compact:/One sees more devils than vast hell can hold.' The room is haunted. It's a delicate piece of business. I know your seer was out on the street having a look at it. A little bird told us." Fred smiles ruefully. "We... I warned your team away from the Club for our privacy, which we consider sacrosanct. And you followed those rules. Coming here invited by Edgar and by that denim merchant... well, a loophole, surely, but a legitimate one. We have to follow the rules. But if we were to... invite your team in to our Club. I understand you have a skilled witch doctor, an exorcist, someone skilled with dealing with the echoes of the dead. Combine that with your team's usual commendable skill in reasserting Our world's primacy, and cleaning up that mess should be a pure breeze."
September 4, 2024
Rob MacD — 9/4/24, 9:00 AM
Archie nods, like now he gets it. "Of course! Fallout from the Hearst business. Yes, there were a lot of ripples from that. Unpredictable connections, just as you say. We're still following up on some of those threads, tying off the loose ends. That's what brought us here." He's fine playing along with the role Merrill wants to see us in: exterminators, plumbers, competent tradesmen called in to do a job. See, here's your problem, ma'am. "Our San Francisco office is very good at dealing with this sort of thing. Very experienced. I'm sure we can make short work of your pests." (edited)
MutantsMichael — 9/4/24, 9:21 AM
Fred gives Archie a broad, winning smile. "Excellent! Just grand. If you need to reach your colleagues, feel free to use the phones or Telexes in the guardhouse at the west gate." The implication here being that Fred and the Owls want this pest removal done at the earliest possible convenience. "The trust We put in you for this assignment, Archie, could mean great things for you and yours. Membership here? It's not out of the question for you and the good doctor. What you're both doing in the culture could be of enormous help in re-establishing a stability that the average American desires in the face of all this madness. The Project is a source of recruitment for some of our most imaginative helmsmen, and I think We'd be delighted to see if you've got the stuff for it." Fred looks away for a moment, at the Owl Shrine, as if pondering Archie's other mentions of loose ends. "As for the loose ends you came here to investigate, to tie off... We'll be making some decisions on those actors," Fred says this with a very deliberately-implied double meaning, "in due course. As someone in the entertainment biz, you must know that sometimes, in the lead-up to the show, you need to change your cast suddenly. Lack of chemistry with a co-star. A petulant cocky attitude. Or maybe they're meant to be a B-actor, simply just not up to snuff for the leading role you've eyed them for. All the world's a stage, Archie, and the stage at the Grove even more so. We have to be rigorous in our auditioning process, especially with all the, heh, bad actors out there right now trying to sabotage the studio. And when the bad elements do get in, We've got the best old-school studio fixers on retainer to make things right." An unwelcome pat on the back again.
September 5, 2024
Rob MacD — 9/5/24, 8:26 AM
Archie smiles impassively.
MutantsMichael — 9/5/24, 8:35 AM
"So... I'm sure We'll see you at the ceremony tomorrow night, Archie. And what happens afterwards? It's not to be missed." Fred winks, and pats Archie's thigh and stands up, breathes deeply the sequoia-scented air, looks out over the lake. "Have a good night's sleep, Arch. Tomorrow's a big day." Fred sees a cluster of other Bohemians and wanders over to them to have a chat, leaving Archie alone facing the massive, moss-dotted Owl. It looks back at him like a giant dead puppet.