Content warnings for this episode include: Animal cruelty or animal death (A trapped Griffocaugh, Shank as usual), Harm to Cats (briefly caught by Barkbeetle), Violence, Kidnapping and abduction, Death + Injury, Blood, Needles, Birds, Gun Mention, Bugs, Body horror
Consumption of Inedible Materials, Smoking, Religious Violence
Intro - Broken Mask
When you were made, your creator smiled and thought his work was good. The organic curves of your wooden face, the reverberation of your strings, yearned to make music. But you were not quite finished, not until your last components were laid—the bone frets that were set into your neck, and the spirit that began to haunt your ribs. And you were filled with an unexpected music, an endless agony that passed through you each time you were played, and made the spirit to dance. But your part in the symphony of souls was not forever, and you were broken, wooden face buckled and strings snapped, and you were empty as you burned and charred. You might have rotted in the ashes, there, had you not been preserved, the splinters of you plucked from their resting place and stored a while in cool darkness, until finally it came time to remake you. But you are a vessel for a different kind of haunting, now, and the one who wears you as a mask is not a spirit but a musician, one whose melody is played in flesh and blood, who builds traps instead of fiddles, who is moving the heart of a city that says Hello From The Hallowoods.
Theme.
Right now, I lurk in the antlers of a springbound griffocaugh, which now detached from their owner sit upon the table of the Scout City Groundskeeping Office. Beyond me there is only a lone bookkeeper, catching up with his record. The theme of tonight’s episode is Tripwires.
Story 1 - Being Watched?
Russell McGowan sat with his head in his hands over one of the large leather volumes that covered the long central table of the work floor. The words were supposed to flow, about the Griffocaugh they had encountered and freed from the tangle of wire it had been caught in, at the cost of smashing its own antlers off. He would have to file another petition with the Scout City sheriff’s department to ask for increased attention to illegal hunting activities in the Stumps, but he had not gotten very far with them in past and that was without the headlines of a returned Quartet buzzing around the city. Although Heather was his sister, she liked authority and rarely passed up the opportunity to lord it over him. ‘Sorry, I can’t talk now, we’re in the middle of a very serious investigation’ was probably the best he was going to get.
Trying to convince a city full of hardened survivors that they shouldn’t hunt the deer because the deer would hunt them back was a struggle he seemed to share with Walter Pensive himself, and although Scout City held a special reverence for their home on the surface, their massive expansion had brought in many who were less understanding of its history. And when Scout City labored under a record-breaking summer heat, and the probability of a good harvest withered up by the day, people did what they could to get by. The heat was a problem, as well; he could not get the words to appear in his brain; they had melted somewhere in the middle and all he wanted to do was nap. The words ‘Being Watched?’ stared back at him from the journal page, but he could not bring his hand to add a checkmark to the box beside it; instead he lay his head down on the book.
Arnold was out and Riot had not returned that morning. He had not pried deeply about what had prompted her sudden return to the city, although he was familiar enough with the Mendies and could interpret from the scars on her face that something of that nature was afoot. He had labored in denial for a few weeks, wondering if it was not entirely Clementine and something had merely happened to her memories, but in time he had come to find her reactions, and both what she remembered and didn’t, were sincere, and something strange had consumed her indeed. But then again, where better a place for her than the Groundskeeper’s department. If Arnold could grow back from a hand and still be gainfully employed there, Riot could too, and she even had all her hands and feet at the start.
“Being watched?”
He drew a frog next to the box.
There was a jingle from the bell above the door, and he looked up expecting Arnold, and found himself underdressed in his undershirt and suspenders and rolled-down coveralls for the arriving company. Although the Wickers were not known for their manners, and he doubted Johannah cared. She was rocking baggy camouflage pants and a halter top herself, and her hair was perpetually as blonde and messy as straw.
“Long time no see,” he said.
“You’re not going to like what I’ve come to see you about,” she said. “Have you heard the news?”
“The killing?” he said, and sat up; a newspaper lay across the far end of the table. Shank’s face was printed alongside Shelby’s on the front photograph; he still remembered the crushing vice of Shank’s grip, threatening to pop his skull like a watermelon, and the panicked words that Arnold had exchanged with the pig-man in the dark clearing where they had finally caught up to him. “Yep. It’s bad.”
Johannah descended the stairs to the work floor, and came up to the side of the long table. Her arms were browned by the sun, but her blue eyes studied him with an introvert intelligence. “So it means a lot. That the pig bastard that killed my brother is still alive and well and in kahoots with Shelby Allen. Probably was with Clementine. Probably has been covered up by Scout City’s mayor this whole time. And you’re one of the only people in Scout City who isn’t going to lie to my face or act like there isn’t a problem when there clearly is…”
“Johannah, I’m not sure what’s going on,” said Russell, and pushed his hair back from his face. “Honestly. He was discovered out in the Northern Logfall, they burned him out there, brought his body to Scout City. He woke up in Vincent’s morgue, then went on a rampage before leaving the city. Arnold and I caught up to him, while he was on his way out. He almost killed me. But I really thought we had… made peace. Gotten him to leave for good. I don’t know if that picture is what it looks like.”
“What do you know about the Quartet?” Johannah said, turning her hawkish gaze away from him to the books across his table. “Anything in here on them?”
“Sadly, not much,” said Russell. “The Clementine report describes those four people, those four masks. But that’s more the Sheriff’s department than mine—they insist it’s not a supernatural case, just a very real and violent one. So I’m not sure who—Shank or the Quartet—killed that guy last night. Or for that matter, who killed Abe a few months ago. The deputies won’t tell me whether they even accept the Quartet are real, let alone what their investigation has held.”
“I ask because obviously, my brothers are going on the warpath,” she said. “Mom wants blood. So I don’t know which we’re going to catch first, but it’s not going to be pretty.”
He noticed then the shape of the pistol at her waist, hidden beneath the baggy folds of her trousers.
“It’s a shame you never took me up on that offer of becoming a Groundskeeper,” he said. “You might have gotten to learn how to get what you want by asking, instead of at gunpoint.”
“Gunpoint’s worked pretty well for me so far,” she smiled.
“Take it from me, it’s not always the best way to handle things,” Russell said. “I mean, look at those.”
He gestured to the large splintery antlers that lay across the middle of the table, with an almost wooden texture blanketed by lichen and strings of vines.
“Hunting trophy?” said Johannah.
“We found a Griffocaugh wrapped up in a wire trap in the Stumps the other day,” said Russell. “Obviously they’ll trample you, or quill you, or bite your hand off if they can, when they’re scared or hurt. And Virgil would tell you that the best way to deal with one is a javelin through the skull. But he’d been throwing himself around in the trap for hours and he was exhausted, and by the time we got there, I just kept feeding it sprouts while Arnold cut the wires, and it got up, shook itself off, walked away.”
“I hope you’re not trying to say that maybe we should be nice to the people that are killing us and maybe they’ll go away,” Johannah said.
“I’m not,” said Russell, and sighed, wiped the sweat from his brow. “Just that sometimes a bundle of herbs and a pair of wirecutters will get you farther than a bullet. I am sorry about Josh, by the way. I didn’t really get to say it at the funeral.”
“Did you know?” she said, and looked over to him. “Before he died. That something screwy was happening to our city.”
“I was worried we’d trigger something,” said Russell. “What with so many people here now, reaching out into the forest. And that someday it would bite back. But I didn’t know that something was murdering people on the loose, no.”
“Good,” said Johannah, and stood up from his table. “Because it would be really fucked if you were sorry that he died but you’d let it happen. By the way, how is your family? Any news from Harrow?”
“The family is good,” he said, wincing. “Heather’s very caught up in all of this. Arnold just got promoted. I haven’t heard anything from Harrow though—wherever xe’s gone. I need to talk with Victoria though—what she did for this morning’s paper, bothers me.”
“You want to stop her from telling the truth?” Johannah said, almost disappointed. “I think we need a little more of it. If we didn’t have sources like the Almanac telling us what was actually happening in this city, Joshua might still be missing for all we knew. Don’t shoot the messenger.”
The bell rang again, and Jacob Wicker was standing at the top rail, his shotgun hanging on his back, and Jedediah and Joel were steps behind him, similarly armed. He said nothing, only gave Johannah a glance, which she exchanged.
“No,” she said. “He’s in the dark too. Let’s keep moving.”
She turned and began to make her way back across the work floor, up the stairs.
“Be careful out there, please,” said Russell. “Don’t do anything rash.”
“Agreed,” called Jacob, from the top of the stair, and he smiled a crooked smile. “Whatever we do, we’ll have thunk the hell out of.”
Interlude 1 - On Various Scout City Factions
If you dream in Scout City, there are many pieces moving now in the city where you dwell. The mayor responds with staunch preparation, and the Scout City sheriff’s department deploys their deputies as an official statement is readied. The journalists and reporters of the Scout City Almanac spread throughout the city in search of the next piece of the unfolding story for their readers. The office of Groundskeepers delves into study on the death of the Instrumentalist, and combs for anything that could be significant a second time around. The remaining sons and daughters of the Wicker family mobilize on a path of vengeance only known to them. And the Coda, formerly a support group for those affected by the actions of the Instrumentalist, have become a force to be reckoned with in their own right, as they bear more than anyone a grudge against whoever would don the name of the Instrumentalist again. The Stumps Neighborhood Watch prepares to keep constant surveillance on comings and goings from Scout City, and the vast majority of Scout City’s population wonders… what do they have to repent of? What is it they have done? What message have these authors of blood penned for their city? And there is, of course, the Quartet, arranging their tricks and traps, waiting for someone to lower their guard, to stumble too close, to give chase until they find themself impossibly ensnared. We go now to one once caught.
Story 2 - Planning Committee
“Alright, everyone settle down,” said Riot, and then picked up a spoon and whacked it on the table like a gavel several times until the conversation dwindled. “We’ve got a lot of serious stuff to talk about and not a lot of time.”
Diggory sat on one side of her, their stitched brows furrowed and sharp fingertips folded. Then beside them, Shelby, with her dark hair down and the electric bone saw hanging like a satchel from her shoulder. At the far end, there was the funny, gaunt man named Vincent, who had extended the offer of shelter for Shelby at least temporarily, and the elegant man of mystery Raj Greenstreet, whose shelter it actually was to offer, and an elaborately decorated chateau set into the higher branches of Scout City, at that. There was lastly a set of two empty chairs, in which sat the two traces of light that were Percy and Ratty, flickering bright like candle lights.
“Jeez I do not know how this is possible,” said Ratty. “I am at like, max voltage right now. Hello, is this any better? Hello?”
“She is asking if you can see or hear it clearly, Shelby,” said Diggory, helpfully.
“I think so,” said Shelby, and looked back to the empty chairs. “I see shadows in light. Ratty’s jewelry, of course. The voices fade in and out.”
“It’s like she’s not even trying,” said Ratty, and stuck out her forked tongue.
“I can understand our spiritual guests without much trouble,” said Vincent. “If there is any confusion I am happy to translate.”
“My years as a medium also lend themselves to this purpose,” said Raj. “Anyone want a cigar?”
“Not at this time,” said Vincent.
“Sure,” said Shelby.
“You fucking bet,” said Ratty.
While Raj slid a metal cigar box in the shape of a lion down the table, Riot motioned for order with her coffee spoon again.
“Alright. We’re all here because Vincent asked,” said Riot. “And thank you for getting Shelby out of the public eye quickly.”
“I am indebted to Clementine and Shelby for the assistance rendered regarding poor Vincent,” said Raj. “But I must ask before we go much further—where is Shank? If I am to understand, he was not the man who killed my husband and earned my undying fury. And if that is the case, I owe him an apology for torching his home and putting him briefly in Vincent’s morgue.”
“He’s safe. Waiting. If it makes you feel better, I don’t think he cares who did it,” said Shelby. Her voice always gave Riot shivers. “He’s been framed by the Quartet for what they’re doing, and despite Clementine’s report, half of Scout City still blames him for the deaths. It’s them that he’s after now.”
“Blame is complicated because it sounds as though he very much did kill several Scout City scouts, including the Wicker boy,” said Vincent.
“He’s a killer,” said Shelby. “But not the one we’re after. Not yet.”
“Sounds radical,” said Ratty, whose fingertips burned bright enough to hold the cigar, and the end of the cigar crackled with white-hot flame.
“Murder is radical indeed,” said Diggory.
“It’s slang, Diggory. In this context it means cool, not extreme,” said Percy, hovering a bit higher than his chair.
“I rescind my statement that murder is radical,” said Diggory.
“Here’s the thing, everybody,” said Riot. “Diggory and… some form of me, worked to stop the Instrumentalist the first time. He was Percy’s dad and Percy is more an expert than anyone about the Instrumentalist. Shelby has been working on this case with me for months. Vincent has vision that’s better than almost anyone. I think we can make progress on this where Virgil and his deputies aren’t. We saved the world, right? We can deal with some local murderers. And that’s to say nothing of getting Danielle involved; if we can find a decent lead, she can investigate through dream in ways we can’t through normal questioning, as ethically ambiguous as that is.”
“I can offer use of my chateau, my influence in Scout City’s social echelons to keep the deputies off our backs, and my expertise as a fencing swordsman,” added Raj.
“You left me out too. I can teleport through walls and be a sneaky spy,” said Ratty.
“I can do that too,” said Percy.
“I’m also a stone cold killing machine,” said Ratty, whose cigar had dissolved entirely into embers, falling to smolder on the dark wood of the dining table. Raj frowned.
“I don’t want to see killing,” said Riot. “At least, until we have some kind of… until we’re sure. Shank was already framed once by these people, let’s not be too quick about hurting others. But we need them caught, absolutely.”
“I think it would be best if we split up, for the moment,” said Vincent. “I’m keen to visit this crime scene. I may be able to see something on a microscopic level that could be of use.”
“But my dear,” said Raj. “Does that mean you intend to reveal your well-being to Scout City?”
“Not yet,” said Vincent. “I’ll go in disguise.”
“The body was messed up,” said Ratty. “The guy’s got strings everywhere. But he also didn’t even stick around. Like why wouldn’t you want to become a poltergeist or something?”
“I thought ghosts were kind of unusual?” said Riot. “Maybe he got taken by the Grackle.”
“I need to visit Stitchery Pins,” said Shelby, looking over to Vincent. “You know where I can find them?”
“Are you having a suit made?” said Vincent.
“It’s about a button,” said Shelby.
“I would also go,” said Diggory. “Stitchery has become hard to find these day, it seems. I have been making the rounds to each of my siblings that I can locate in Scout City, but they have eluded me yet.”
“I’ll go on button gang,” said Riot. “Percy, Ratty, maybe it’s best that you keep an eye on Vincent. Invisible support sounds pretty helpful.”
“Does that sound okay, love?” said Percy.
“Sneaky,” said Ratty. “I can do sneaky.”
Marketing - Lady Takes Pleiades
Lady Ethel Mallory:
Attention, residents of Box Pleiades. Please permit a peaceable landing for my carrier. We bring a necessary systems update of my own creation. Allow me to show you what the Mallory touch means for the Prime Dream.
I see you charging box defenses. How unfortunate for your happy dreaming family. Don’t you want what’s best for them?
Ohhh, now that is a shame. Destroying my carrier. Thank goodness I wasn’t aboard and no one was hurt. I was waiting, in fact, for the recovery period while box defenses recharge. Plenty of time now to reach the door. Very kindly, an old friend has given me a bit of a master key. Don’t mind if I help myself in…
Story 2, Continued - Planning Committee
I disagree. I do not think we have any mutual friends. Security to Box Pleiades, please. You have a pest control problem.
We return now to Riot Maidstone.
“I still don’t completely understand why making suits would have to exist in a secret black market shop in the roots,” said Riot. “As long as they’re not made out of people.”
“Nor I,” said Diggory.
“It’s part of Scout City’s resource management policies,” said Shelby. “You have thousands of people and very little fabric that isn’t farmed here. Old world artifacts, fabrics, clothing items, can be a kind of luxury. Usually they’re supposed to be fairly distributed as the resource councils see fit.”
“Stitchery does like their nice fabrics,” said Diggory. The light of the hot upper trunk had largely vanished, and they walked in an underground crevice in the Root District, along a wall of one large root that was engraved with pale winding paths in its titanic bark.
“I wish I might have been here to see the barkbeetles,” said Diggory. “They seem fascinating.”
“Trust me, you should be glad you weren’t,” said Riot.
“Do you remember them?” said Shelby. Riot could not quite decide whether she was trying to walk ahead or beside her. Shelby was taller than her, and kept one muscular arm hidden beneath the fold of her large tan coat now as she walked.
“A few pictures,” said Riot. “Way too close. I’m guessing I must have run right up next to one for some reason.”
“It was running away with Cat,” said Shelby. “Who you did rescue.”
“I love cats,” said Diggory. “We used to have a cat.”
“You should see Shelby’s,” said Riot. “It looks just like Nimbus.”
“We’re here,” said Shelby, and paused beside an eight-foot knot in the wall of root, and knocked.
“I’d like to talk about a suit,” she said.
The round disturbance in the wood slid back from the surface and away, leading into a tunnel into the wood. Riot followed after Shelby, exchanging glances with Diggory.
“Are you excited to see them?” she said.
“To see my siblings? Always,” Diggory replied. “Although I am surprised they have not sought me out in some way already.”
All three paused to find a small warm light in the hall, and an empty reception desk, and a tall spindly silhouette standing. Stitchery’s hands were long and ended in needle-thin points much sharper than Diggory’s; their skin was ashen grey and the suit they wore was stitched together of various pieces in a way that seemed haphazard but was meticulously tailored.
“Diggory,” said Stitchery Pins. “I am so pleased to see you.”
“And I you, Stitchery,” Diggory said, and stepped forward, just as tall and almost as spindly, to enclose them in a hug. “I worried I would not see you or the rest of us again. Although from what I hear, you all were not so concerned.”
“Oh, there was never a doubt that we would see you again. After all, you were the most perfect of us; how could you not achieve your purpose?” said Stitchery, and then their dark eyes glanced up to Shelby and Riot. “But please, come in. I am sure we have much to discuss. The world is turning against us, Diggory, and after our betrayal all those years ago, I fear that the ghost of Solomon’s work continues.”
Interlude 2 - Council Seats
Eight now sit in the Council of Heavens. Above all, Syrensyr, the Reclaimer of Fire, in whose belly is the burning forge that drives the economy of souls. Tolshotol, Who Guards a Thousand Suns, who is the steward of stars. Xyzikxyz, Emptiness Between Worlds, stewards the vast emptiness of space and dabbles in her own secretive sciences. Ephelzeph, the Endless Storm, lords over weather in all its forms. Skrykeskrye, Spinner of Fates, has joined since my absence, and I only know what I may learn by spying on her from afar; that she gestures with many hands when she speaks. I find her matter of specialty amusing, as few can know the future’s shape. I do not think Skyrkeskyre has read La Dernière Page Noire by Florence Alarie, or read the Blood Cards of Xyzikxyz, and seems perfectly content with her place in spacetime. Olbsalolb, Master of Matters, is responsible for supplies. Making sure there is plasmatic food in the council chamber. The universe’s excessive supply of hydrogen. Noptilnopt may be a part of the council, but I have never seen them, and they have never spoken to me. An invitation has long been extended to Zazzlezazz, Dreaming All That Is, but if he ever wakes then the universe will end prematurely, so it is best that he never respond. And lastly, I suppose, there is me. And with any misstep I might launch it all into fire and cataclysm.
We go now to one who has misstepped.
Story 3 - Override
“It’s just typical and I hate it,” said Penny, glaring back at the thin metal line stretched across the entry causeway that she had stumbled through. Lights flashed crimson, illuminating the darkness of the metal causeway that sloped down into the ground, and piercing electronic sirens filled the air.
“Relax. Stay close to me, and nothing too bad will happen,” said Friday, shrugging. “I’m the lucky one, after all.”
“The noise is loathsome,” cried the Omen, still in its full-bodied humanoid form comprised of dozens of merged ravens, and it pressed its talon hands to its many skulls.
A voice crackled out over the speakers, in addition to the sirens.
“Hello,” it said. “My name is Mr. Raven. It is my duty to inform you that you have made a grave error in trespassing on this CPE Institute Vault Location. The vault and everything in it will now self destruct. Have a nice day.”
After this, the lights grew brighter, and then shut off completely, along with the sirens, leaving them all three in darkness.
“Friday?” said Penny. “We have to find a way to stop…”
She had not finished speaking before a second voice began to echo, and the red lights that began to shine dimly in the hallways did not pulse or blink.
“Hello,” it said. “My name is Mr. Writingdesk. I apologize to Mr. Raven for overriding the corporate-mandated self destruct program. However, if you are hearing this then something terrible has happened to us both. I can foresee one of two things being true. Either, you came into this bunker without really knowing what lay inside it, in which case, stick around a moment. Or, you know exactly what’s in here, in which case, also stick around a moment. I do not know how long it’s been. Mr. Raven and I were not supposed to be gone longer than a month. If we have not returned, then there is no telling how things look downstairs. But know this: there are Certified Paranomal Entities of immense power. Some, if not all, will still be alive down there. And if we are dead then our stewardship of them, as I see it, is over. I ask, then, that you set them free. But each has very specific care instructions, and the order is crucial. If you can be bothered to do this, please make your way to the first floor office; look for file cabinet 18, top drawer. It’s too high for Mr. Raven to reach; that’s where I’ve stowed more tapes, and instructions. Thank you.”
“Oh, George,” said Penny.
“See?” said Friday. “I told you it would be fine. Omen, find me that office.”
“As you wish,” cried the Omen, and then exploded into a flurry of ravens and flame, spiralling down the hall into darkness.
“You don’t think he would lie, would he?” said Friday. “Try to lead us into a trap.”
“I think if it’s a trap,” said Penny, “we’re already in it.”
Outro - Tripwires
Tripwires. One must wonder, when the path ahead looks clear and inviting, if there is some secret trigger waiting to happen? If that trusting surge of steps towards it will cause collapse, as though your enthusiasm was predicted, the joke of the thing, and the world where you could have it too good be true. And yet, some paths are clear, dreamer, free of hunter or suspicion, and no one watches you move down it, and no one is waiting to stop you from reaching the other side. It is difficult, in those times, to walk without calculating each step, to trust that sometimes things are allowed to be easy. Until then, I am your loyal host Nikignik, waiting hazardously for your return to the Hallowoods.
The bonus story that goes with this episode is called 'Long Quiet' and is available on the Hello From The Hallowoods Patreon. Consider joining for access to all the show's bonus stories, behind-the-scenes and more! Until next time, dreamers, do no-*explodes*
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