Episode 11 – Idle Blades are the Devil’s Playthings

Pickaxe You've seen them around, they sell sweets by the pound Their wares are famously tasty So here I sing, singing to you Of crimes involving pastry Clover's the whisper, she makes all the sweets She has a corndog addiction Benton's the slob, he sleeps in a safe And he writes vampire fanfiction Franklin's the cutter, his fighters strength Despite his stance His heart's a knife Best and brightest, they may not be But that's my favorite part So gather round, friends And listen close For the tale's about to start Jessica, you pick a song.

I only know like five songs. Are there any 80s Christmas songs? Yes. Oh, yes. Yeah. What? Really? What do you mean? I don't know. Here we go. Oh, yeah. Ugh. Is there any 80s songs for Christmas? This one's technically the 80s. There's just one thing I need It's shaming Of course, no surprise I just want you to kiss me All you would ever know Is my love for you My love Pretty good.

Shame is all I want for Christmas Horrible's got his hands over his keytar Charles Eve is You Horrible's going nuts Boo, boo, boo, boo Franklin All I need to do is dance right Then I can get all the respect I could do all the things I want to do I couldn't get from my real parents Cause they died and abandoned me I just think it's a good time to Put your worries aside And celebrate a bowl of meatballs In a bigger bowl of Pepto-Bismol And the best thing about the holidays of Christmas Let's wait for the next verse.

I was like, okay, dude, just hold, slow down, slow down. Yeah, Borba was directing us. Now.

Best thing about Charles Eve Is when you get your Christmas treats Thrown into the front window Of your house And it is fun Walk on broken glass To get your gifts And cut your feet up and But that's okay Because in the gifts There is alcohol swabs and band-aids And that's what it's up And that's what it's up And when we get extra stuff We will eat the meatballs Cause Charles Eve is about meatballs Food Now you. Borba! What is up, you kids?

It's time for Charles Eve You don't have to worry About Charles getting in here I'm gonna see you next time Stop that guy This thing ends tonight I'm gonna kick the fucking shit Out of Charles He goes into like A hard guitar riff He drives his guitar Picks up a guitar An electric guitar Oh man It's alright You better watch your ass Charles I'm gonna be nearby If you fuck with these kids Charles you're gonna have to Deal with me Me Me I mean finally does the dance move Borba Borba And we're like kneeling We're all on one knee And like pointing at Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba Borba That was the opening montage of this episode of Spoutmore Mall Brats.

How you doing, everybody? I'm your game master, Sean O'Hara, and playing Fenton Beasley, the slide, Abdul Aziz. Hello. Playing Franklin Stein, the cutter, Paul Oppers. Hey. And playing Clover Ivy Fern, the whisper, Jessica Tai. Hi. When last we left our cool treat kids, Big Market Part 3 came to an end.

They sabotaged the good name of the wizard-themed restaurant, Poofs, by releasing a bag of rats into their kitchen so Clover could attempt to sell treats to the hungry people fleeing the swarm of rats to varying degrees of success until they were approached by rival treat sellers, the Wild Nogs, a mobile offshoot of the Nog Hogs. And Franklin attempted to convince people that treats were the way to go by taking over a fitness class before being absolutely schooled by an overweight uncle.

Out of fitness. But ultimately, the cool treat kids won the day. They sold all the things they needed to sell. They more than broke the mall-wide record for kid gangs making money during Big Market, which they then donated to Doris of Shitty Foods in a heartwarming donation to the emotional, mental, and food-based well-being of the High Spear Mall. And now a number of times have gone through the clock and calendar to get us to where we are now. A later date. Charles Eve is on the way.

We don't know when, because that's how Charles Eve works, I think. Apparently, it's on a random day every year. So it sounds like the tradition of Charles Eve is to commemorate a near-supernatural burglar who comes to everybody's house in the middle of the night and is lured to the window by meatballs before smashing the window and throwing in a bunch of presents as penance for his past as a thief. He is a reformer. A grand thief. Yeah. Who now travels the world returning his I'll-gotten gains.

It's kind of like just con man Santa Claus that we created. Yeah. It seems like a couple hundred years ago, maybe a guy went on a crime spree. Yeah. Seems to sneak up on us. Yeah. But the Cool Tree Kids know when it's coming because people start putting up Charles Eve decorations, which look like, Abdul? Bowls of meatballs. Mm-hmm. You take sausage links, like long strings of sausage links. You're putting them over things, like stringing them all around the place.

It's mostly meat, it sounds like. Those are my contributions. Paul? A lot of pink. Pink streamers. Pink everything to symbolize the Pepto-Bismol. I love that we're just going with Pepto-Bismol instead of some other… Pepto-Bismol is a place. It's a mall, a competing mall. Pesto-Bismol. It's made out of pesto mostly. Oh, God. Pink Pesto-Bismol. And candy glass. Mm-hmm. Little trinkets everywhere. And stockings. Stockings. Aw.

Are still a big thing because you put them on before you walk into the living room because of all the broken glass. Oh, yeah. Totally. It's a good idea. And that's why you fill the stockings with little health-related things because it's like, you're going to cut yourself up, so here's some little things to make it easier. Some nice Band-Aids and stuff. Exactly. Jessica? Lots of tinsel and string lights to represent the broken glass and also the stars because Charles comes at night. Um.

Under the cover of darkness. Yeah, we must light his way. Um. Also, tons of baking. All the grandmas are doing a ton of baking. Mm-hmm. They're forced to do baking this time of year. But it's like specifically a lot of like the honey cookies. Mm-hmm. Um. Oh, the ones from the honeybee. The honeybees. Oh, yeah. The uh. The smoky ones. The secret. The secret. Cookie factory. Yeah. What's it called again? Uh. I can't remember. Oh. It's Eldorand Bread. Oh. Oh. Oh. Right.

It's like a Coke Consolidated. So those are a hit. Uh. We leave those out for dessert for Charles. Um. He loves the flavor. A glass of milk and a glass of pesto bismol. And to stay aerodynamic because there's like a lot of windows to visit. He wears like crop top and like cut off jean shorts. Uh. Stays cool. Stays cool because he sweats a lot. But don't worry. He's super buff. He has like abs underneath the beer belly. So he's just like hydrating with those uh.

Those water bottles you wear on the beach. Yeah. And they're on a belt. Yeah. Tiny ones. Running. Yeah. He's got a big oily black beard too. We established. From all the grease from the meatballs. Oh yeah. Totally. And it's got like pesto bismol in it. And like cookie crumbs. Yeah. That's why they say that on Charles Eve when you hear smashing glass and smell pine nuts you gotta go right back to sleep so you don't scare Charles away. Yeah. So that you don't get attacked during the B&E. Oh.

Charles isn't an aggressive figure. You still want a bunch of like glass in your face. Yeah. Exactly. And you. You don't want to be near that. You don't want to be near that window. And you don't want to startle him because he's been to jail a bunch of times. Yeah. So he's got fucking crazy reflexes. Yeah. He's not going back. Uh. And that is where we join our cool treat kids now. I guess decorating the sugar shack. Totally. What's. So what's everybody doing? Uh.

Fenton's got a nail gun and he's like stapling up tube socks to the walls. What's Franklin doing? Uh. He's uh. Got a bucket of uh. Uh. Paint. Pink paint. Pink paint. And he's just. Slash. Splash. Jackson Pollocking the. Singing his favorite Charles Eve. Which of course the name of is. The um. Um. Silent sauce. Silent sauce. Spicy sauce. Spicy sauce. This is actually how it goes. It's like you know when you do a round. It's like a recipe. Yeah. You're in your ass. Round yawn meatballs.

Tender and medium. Cup of bread. Crumbs preheat to 350. It's a recipe. It's how you. It's the. It's how you remember how to make Charles Eve meatballs. What is that? Totally. Time. Wow. By onions and garlic. Rosemary and chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle.

And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. And chipotle. Oh, no. I like the idea that the Cool Treat kids are all decorating and singing. Wait, what's Clover doing? So we can get this full image. I've decorated like the windows and roof with tinsel. And I have so much extra because I got it from a shop where they're like, this is old. We don't want it. I'll take it all. I have so much left over.

So I'm like taping it to our furniture, too. Just taping it, covering every piece of furniture. Yeah, just like, we're going to look so festive. I imagine you all singing Silent Sauce, but different parts. So it's just a cacophony. Yeah. What's Borbo doing? Oh, yeah. Borbo is, he's practicing his keytar on the futon outside for the big Charles Eve talent show. And that's why we all started singing because we heard him practicing the keytar. Yeah. But we just came in at different points.

Also, we finished three fucking episodes of the big market job. So it's time to do some downtime. Right. I think because that job was so long, I'm going to be generous and give you guys three downtime activities instead of two. Each? Each. Yeah. Okay. Of course, each. So the options that you have for downtime activities are clear one harm box, indulge your vice to clear three stress, tick a long-term project clock or start a long-term project, get a new asset or gather information on whatever.

Can I clear stress? Yep. Okay. How much does Clover have? Six stress. Yeah. So you could use two of your downtime activities. Okay. Clear stress twice, which is a total of six. Oh, sweet. Yeah. Okay. So yeah. Downtime. I, of course, I'm going to go with the meat cart. Let's be serious. Is there a specific one that you go to? Just the one in the Yesterland or whatever? Yep. Yeah. And it's draped with tinsel and sausage links. It's so beautiful. Yeah.

The hot meat boys are, they have little hammers and little panes of glass that they're smashing like jingle bells to try and attract. People. Yeah. Charles Eve. Charles Eve. Corn dogs. Hi. Hi, Clover. Hi. You guys always greet me like I'm a problem. Well, because you are a problem for us frequently. I'm if you guys were nicer to me, I wouldn't be. I'm just defending myself. What do you want? The usual. The usual for corn dogs. I can do that. Yeah. Yes. You don't have to say it so loudly. And he.

What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? And you hear them go, what are corn dogs? I'm bringing it to my friends. It's not for me. It's not for me. They're looking behind you as they're really far away, and they're still looking over their shoulder at you. And I turn to the corn dog guy, and I'm like, they're for me. They're all for me.

I know. And he holds out a piece of cardboard that has four corn dog sticks in it, and the corn dogs are sticking straight up. Thank you. It'll be five spear bucks. Okay. So, Seamus has been talking about you. What? What's he been saying? Just some stuff. He's mentioned you a couple times. Like what? Tell me. Not that I care. I just want to make sure that he's not saying anything embarrassing about me. No. It was more like, what was the thing that you fucked up for us most recently?

What, Big Market? Yeah. Yeah. We were having a lot of trouble making money on Big Market, and we heard that you guys fucked up. And he was just like, Whoa. So, he was talking about me getting near his skin? Wow. Yeah. He was kind of mad, but he also seemed impressed. Impressed how? What was he doing? He was like, Whoa. What? Just zero subtext with this kid. Yeah. There's so much emotion is flowing through Clover right now. Understandably. And I'm just like, just shoveling corn dogs in the mouth.

Like, holy shit. Yeah, like Shaggy, dude. Yeah, I'm just like. What's your name? Sorry, I should know by now, I guess. I come here every day. Yeah, I would think that you know that my name is Miki. Okay, sorry, Miki. That's okay. I get you confused with like Mikey and Mickey and stuff like that. There are a lot of us with very similar names, yeah. Totally. Do you think like if he says anything else, you could let me know? Oh, I mean, maybe. Are you serious? I am your best customer.

Well, I mean, yeah, but you're the hot meat boy's best customer, not my personal best customer. If you give me two spirit bucks personally, every time you come here, I'll start putting in a good word for Seamus, maybe. I don't need you putting a good word for me. Okay. That's not what I was asking for. All right, no deal. Okay, I'll bring the spirit bucks. Hell yeah. I'll see you later. Bye. Bye. And Clover clears six stress through a combination of hot dogs and elation. Wow.

I'm like, I'm just like running home. I'm so excited. Your arms are straight. Yeah, my arms are straight. Guys. I come back and I'm like, guys, guess what? What? Are you okay? What happened? What's happening? Guys, Seamus was talking about me. He said he said he heard that we like took down the fudgies and that he was impressed and that I was in. In or under his skin. His skin. I mean. So close. That's how close he wants me. That's not necessarily what it means. Awesome.

I mean, Fenton doesn't have a crush on her anymore. So he's just like wants to be supportive. Yeah, totally. When Franklin is like kind of just like that's not maybe what it means. He's just like, no. What the fuck are you doing? He's like, no. Yeah. Yeah. With the way that you cut open that lock. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I bet he loved how liberating you look. You think? Yeah. Wow. Right, Franklin? I mean, he's just such a fucking prick. Franklin just hates him so much.

I mean, I mean, if that's what you're into. I don't know. I just can't get him out of my mind. His beautiful muscles on his tiny arms. So tall. He's like. He's like five foot five. Clover's just staring into the space now. I just wave my hand in front of her eyes. She doesn't respond. Franklin and I go like. Okay. Walk backwards out of this seat. We move on with our day. I just bring in your diary and put it in front of your face. Oh, thanks. There you go. And then you still have one left.

A downtime activity. Mm-hmm. I just don't know what we're like wanting to do this episode. Yeah. Okay. So let's. Let's talk about that. Because I was thinking that you would have access. You would have the option of doing three things and then you can just pick what it is. Mm-hmm. So it's all stuff that your patron would be asking you to do. Okay. So one of the things is fix the Charles Eve talent show. Ooh.

Go into the abandoned chocolate factory to steal some really valuable ancient chocolate for this hot chocolate that your patron wants to make or trash a bunch of pet stores. Is another option to find and kill Charles? Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Like Barbos. Who our patron is. This is a great time to go back into that. Yeah, totally.

One of the other options for a downtime activity is gather information. Okay. And that could be like try and gather some information on where this Charles might be. I think I'd like to do that instead. Okay, cool. Get an asset. Yeah. And we'll hold on to the gather info roll until we get the job. Sure. Yeah. Okay. Franklin. Yeah, I want to relieve some stress times two as well. Okay. So stress times two. What am I doing? Yeah, the stress thing. And then what's the other part of it?

You have one more available. You can get an asset. You can gather a clock. You can gather information. You can start a long-term project. Did you have a harm too though? Yeah, what's the harm? How do I have less effect? Yeah, so you would use one of your downtime activities to clear that. Do you just rest? Do you go to a doctor? Oh, no. I repair my own shoes. I took the soles off of them. That's how he fixes them by ruining them. Wow. Makes them more like a ballet slippers. Oh, okay.

I'm in there ripping the soles off my chucks. So cool. He's basically got like dancing shoes that look like fucking chucks. Yeah. Yeah, I love that. Cool. You're fighting fit ready to go. Wow. Useless, but ready to go. I mean, I would I will say that clearing your stress and harm is not useless. No, no, no. With less effect, you would literally be doing more poorly on every role totally until you were able to clear that since you're the fighting guy. You always get like so fucked up.

So like, yeah, you focusing on like getting healthy is like the most important thing, which is why Clover and Fenton are always like giving you massages like we're walking wheels. Yeah, scalp massage face mask. We do like, you know, exfoliation. He's always bad anyway. Like get the fuck off of me. I'm fucking stressed. I don't need you rubbing my head. You guys just roll a rolling pin over his back like he's pizza dough. That's totally sleeping. What are you doing? He only lets us.

We can only do it while he's sleeping like how we have to like brush Clover's tea while she's sleeping. He's so against like people seeing him as vulnerable that we have to like administer health care. I like that. We're also we're mashing up vegetables and spooning them into Fenton's mouth while he's sleeping. Yes, blowing them in through a tube down the safe icing bags like every time he snores, it's just like squeezing a glob in there. Yeah.

That was a really good fart noise and you're clearing the stress devices. Just you dance in the hell out of stuff. Yeah, fight dancing like he's he's moved from cry dancing into laugh dancing. He's doing this new laugh dancing thing. Are you doing that mostly around the fudgies? He's just really rubbing it in their face like really like ha ha ha ha ha ha. Yeah, I imagine a static shot of like a bunch of different places in the mall with Franklin dancing through it.

It's like Franklin dancing through the food court, Franklin dancing through the theme park, Franklin dancing through the fudgies booth. Just like a lot of finger dancing to flip them off hucking birds all over the place. Perfect. Fenton I'm going to clear harm and I'm going to clear stress and I'm going to work on my project clock. Well, how long how many pie pieces was your it was a okay, cool. Yeah, so you have two left. Okay. How does it Fenton work on this?

I think he because he's trying to find out who their patron is and like this job is going to be all about like our patron wants us to find Charles the mall Charles because he makes money off of the photo shoots. So like he needs to find out where that money goes and who's putting this thing together. Okay. And the last things we learned about him is that he's in the food court and that he's positioning us because there's like tension between orange Julius and the Dairy Queen.

Yeah, there's tensions in the in the higher ups and that a lot of the food court members will work through smaller gangs like as deniable assets basically. How do I find out info? I just had this funny idea, but I mean this isn't but he part of finding out who it is is finding out who it isn't is it you know that that's yeah going to broadband going to everybody in the mall. Like a survey. Oh, I have an idea. That's a good idea. And I have an idea based on that idea.

Franklin Stein and I'm going to need you for that idea. Can you help me? Yeah, buddy. Okay. I need Mr. Gilbert to go to the booth where they're taking bookings for the photos. Yeah. And then he walks up a trench coat fedora weird lump in the middle where it turns into Franklin. Uh-huh. Okay. And you're talking to one of Charles's helpers. Yes. He's just like a guy in a in a white tank top and a ball cap. Yeah, got a ski mask on a ball cap over the ski mat. Oh God. And he's like, hello there.

I would like to book some photos for a all of my children. So yeah. Okay. It's a good time to start booking because we're filling up pretty fast. Yeah. I have a pretty big order. So I was wondering if you have any bulk. All right. Okay. So packages. Yeah, we could do. I don't know how many kids do you have? Fifty fifty Jesus. He's like, he pinches his face. Six sixty. Wait, sorry. You say you have sixty children? Yeah, sixty that I want photos for. I don't think we could.

He starts flipping through a little book that he has. I don't know if we have a time slot big enough for sixty kids. And I lean forward. I put my hand on the table and I'm like, Hey, fifty prints. These are fifty. And I, what did you say? There's fifty princes. No, damn it. These are very important kids. I am willing to pay top coin for this. I'm a man. I'm telling you, like, I don't I just work here. I'm not the guy that makes the rules. Like, I'm trying to find the time slot for fifty princes.

Look, and I can't seem to find one. If your boss finds out that you turned away this much cash, you're going to be fucked. You don't know my boss, kid. I'd like to. I'm going to say, like, he is not you're not going to be able to mesmerize this guy with your absolutely bullshit story. I'd say the smartest thing that you could do is grab the book and run. Wait, you have an idea? No, I just said Franklin grabbed the book. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Because Fenton's doing such a bad job.

So, yeah, Fenton's like, he's leaning in. He's like, come here, come here. I have something to tell you. What? I put my arm around his shoulder. I'm like, all right, I got a secret for you. And then I grabbed the book and bolted. And Fenton's still stuck around his shoulder. Fuck! So then Fenton, like, drops and then he's like wrapped up in the trench coat and stuff. And then he, his feet poke out of the bottom and he starts running away. And the guy's like, hey, kid, come back here.

And he tries to get around the table, but you're lost in the crowd. Cool. And you have a little ledger full of all the booking appointments for the Charles photo booth. That's pretty good. So, yeah, you could like study the book. Like, because it's not like the job has already arrived. As of right now, Charles is still around taking pictures every day. Yeah, he was there actually. Yeah, Charles was there and he was like, get off me, kid. And he pushed a kid onto the ground.

And the kid laughed because that's the classic Charles experience. Yeah, when you, like, you kind of jump on him, pretend you're wrestling him to the ground. Yeah. Because he stole your shit. And then they take a picture. Oh, no! And then he pushes you to the ground. Yeah. Kids cry when Charles is nice to them. Yeah. It's like the opposite of Santa. Hey, man, I just wanted to say you're being way too nice to these kids. You got to start like hitting them or calling them names or something.

Parents are getting pissed. I'm not allowed to hit kids anymore. Not after the last time. That's why we hired you. What do we learn from the book? What do you learn from the book? It was very full. Very full. Really popular. But it's supposed to be about the identity of our patron. Contact numbers for these people. And then the back cover. A slot with business cards for the manager. Oh, yeah. Okay, all right. And the manager is… Grind Penderson. Grind Peanerson.

This is what the Cool Trick kids are doing. Looking at the card. Yeah, we're in a stairwell, like, huddled under the stairs. Like, you know when you get to the bottom of the stairwell and we're, like, flipping through trying to find information. And Clover made that funny joke and we all lost it. Grind Peanerson. Even a janitor walking by goes, Pretty good. Yeah. And walks up the stairs. I mean, make grind, that guy is a dick. Yeah, so that gives you one more tick and another lead to follow.

Fenton puts that up in the, like, crime board where he's like, who's at the top? And then there's, like, Orange Julius. Yeah. And question mark. And then Dairy Queen question mark. And then we're just drawn as a penis with a mustache. And we just were like, That's so funny. We love this joke. If we ever meet this guy, we gotta call him Grind Peanerson. And there's just a bunch of chewed up gum strung between tacks on a board. Yeah, that is the thing.

Olive Clover's old gum that she's like, this is too old to use now. Yeah, this is too old to use. We had to chew it to get it to be bendy again. Our jaws hurt so much after that. We had to chew it to get it to be bendy again. Our jaws hurt so much after that. Our jaws hurt so much after that. Hello, everybody. This is your favorite director, Grefg Smushlin. And our sponsors for the next season of the DeSorme Creek Theatre Society have demanded we play their advertisements now.

Hey, Johnny here from Johnny's Exotic Pet Emporium. I'm coming here with a PSA to tell you that we have lost the snakes. If you see snakes, those are our snakes. Yeah, if you see snakes, do not approach the snakes. I cannot tell you how important that is. Call us. Do not get close to the snakes. Do not look at the snakes. Do not have a positive body temperature around the snakes. If a snake lies down next to you in bed, it is not trying to cuddle up with you.

It is measuring you to see if it can consume you whole. Thank you, and good night. Good luck. Good luck, High Spirit Mall. It's gonna be a rough weekend. Good luck. I give you the snacks I give you or give you snacks I give you or give you snacks I give you or played. Fare thee well and see you upon the stage. Okay. Now, I'm going to roll your heat and entanglements and that will determine some complicating factors. Sick.

So you get one die for heat and entanglements because it was a high profile target and another die because it was loud and chaotic. How so? I don't know. I think we played that one pretty smooth. Guys, I'm rolling dice. I'm so excited. John's rolling dice. John. John. John. John. John. John. John. John. John. John. John. John. Is that bad? Fuck. Six. And one. And one. Oh, great. Okay. Good thing it wasn't two sixes. Two sixes is gang war. Oh. Oh, no. Oh, no. It's going to be a gang bang.

Guys, run. But six is a crew member gets interrogated or the crew suffers reprisals. Oh, interrogation is fun. Yeah. We can Corb Green back on the board. Can we please have Corb Green back on the board? Yeah. So you are sitting in the sugar shack. You're just doing your shit. You're preparing for the day. Humming our Charles Eve. Yeah. In the vents above you, you hear thump, thump, bang, bang, thump. And Fenton's like, the elf is back. Oh, the elf on the shelf. He's on the shelf.

The elf's on the shelf. Fenton shoots a crossbow into the vent. We have crossbows. So you shoot one into the roof. Fenton is not a good shot. Yeah. And he's also panicked right now. So it just hits like a different vent than the one. It just goes wild. Between. Between. And you hear what? And you hear. Thump and then straight down that vent that the elf went up and then shooting out of the vent is Corb Green, halfling detective.

And Fenton throws the illegal crossbow through the front window of the sugar shack. And he dusts himself off. He straightens his little tiny cloak. Puts his sheaf of wheat back in his mouth. Well, hello kids. I thought I recognized those tiny footsteps. I thought I recognized that rank smell. Cool treat, kids. When he says I recognize that rank smell, Fenton sharts. You were gonna say fart and then you decided to up the ante with a shart. Yeah, he is just looking at each of you in turn.

So, I hear you all been making some trouble lately. What? I wouldn't say that. We've been minding our own businesses. Rumor has it that during Big Market, the fudgies booth was knocked over. Oh, yeah. We heard about that. It's so unfortunate. It's crazy. Some dancer. Yeah, I heard the girl was really pretty. Well, I heard that the culprits screamed out the name Cool Treat Kids. They're trying to frame us. We've been framed. We're victims.

I'm just glad you came here so that we could say we need to find these kids who are trying to frame us. That's right. Do you take contracts? Do you take direct work? You were going to say MasterCard. Do you take credit cards? Do you take credit? We don't have any money. I was giving you an opportunity to come clean, kids. I was there. I saw it. I saw this little one with his grubby little hands covered in fudge and full of I'll-gotten gains. That doesn't sound like me at all.

I saw this one say whoops and push over a cauldron of molten fudge. I slipped. I mean, she probably just slipped. Back. Back. And I think I don't have to explain what I saw Franklin Stein doing there. What? You don't know me from a hole in the ground, you toadstool of a man. I'm sorry. I'm a bully. I hope that you understand that I am amongst the tallest halflings in my family. His house. My mother was knee-high to a toadstool. And she was one of the greatest women I've ever known.

Stop laughing. Probably is going to be the only woman you've ever known, huh? And he throws his corn sheaf on the ground and he stamps it out with his foot. That is beside the point. The point is, is that you kids are causing too much trouble. You are getting in tussles above your pay grade. I want to know why, who you're working for, and I want to caution you to rein it in. I might push you around once or twice because it is my job as a detective to find out crime and the criminals.

This is Corbin Green's voice now. I've changed it. But I also know that you are a bunch of children and I do not want, to see children get hurt in my mall on my watch. I kind of love Corbin Green now. Is he our dad now? Yeah, that's what we say. Are you our dad now? He be our dad? Or at least our uncle. Well, now, that is a big, that's a big question. And then we yell outside, Borbo, we have a new dad! Borbo rolls in like, what's going on? Whoa, look at this little guy. Meet our dad!

Get the hell away from me. Borbo's trying to pick him up like, come here! He doesn't know about halflings very well. Borbo's never seen a halfling before. Oh, no. Come here, little guy. Come here. No, no, no. I'm not a little guy. I am a deputized law enforcement officer of the mall. And he turns to you. All I'm trying to say is I want you kids to be careful. You do not know the forces with which you meddle. Well, we're trying to know the forces of which we meddle. What do you mean?

What do you mean? What forces are you attempting to discover with which you meddle? Recruit. We could try and get him to… He's a detective. What if we put him on our clock and find our patron? Yeah. Maybe we should. And we're… We're huddling. We're huddled. Should we show him the information that we've gathered on the patron? Yeah, I think so. Oh, and at least end the business? I think so. If he's… I mean, if he's our dad, he wants to help us. Yeah.

I've wanted to have a dad for a year now. I didn't think I'd ever see my dad again, so I forgot what he looked like. Yes. This could be my real dad. And he's looking out for us. Other than Doris, who's our mom, hopefully. We could get them to kiss. Get them married. Oh, my God. Oh, wait. All we have to do is trap them in the same building and then you hear, now what is this? And you turn around and Corb is standing in front of Fenton's crime board. And I… Fenton walks up and he's…

He's looking around for something that looks like a sheaf of wheat. And he can just find tinsel. So he grabs some tinsel and he puts it in his mouth and he starts chewing on it the same. And he walks up and he's like, clink, clink, clink, clink with his mouth. He's making it with his mouth. He's like, this is my crime board, father. I do not call me that. Is this… Are you trying to determine the identity of the food court? Just the patron that gives us our food. Our jobs.

Yeah, the guy or person or woman who hires us to do all the things that you don't like. We've never met them. We get their… Our message is secret and we're hoping that you can maybe help us figure it out. And we already have a clue and I grab the Charles book. You're gonna be so proud of us. What? What is it? It's a book we stole. You stole… You stole one of the Charles? Yeah, from the photo shoot. We're gonna give it back. Oh, children.

I really wish that you would not tell me the things that you steal. Okay, but how will you know what's going on if we don't show you the things that we steal which is everything? He swipes it out of Clover's hands. Puts it in his coat but it's like huge because it's basically as long as his torso. Anyway, our patron who hires us also hires the Charles. So we took the book and we found out the manager whose name is Grind… Peterson. Peterson? Grind Penderson. Yes. Yeah. I know Grind.

I know Grind. Grind Penderson. What do you know about him? I know that he manages some of the seasonal photography booths. But he also… He wore… He… I think he reports directly to our patron. Hmm. He absentmindedly strokes his chin while he pulls out a little handful of wheat sheaves and bangs it on his hand so one comes loose and he grabs that one and puts it in his mouth. Quite a mystery we have on our hands, children. We felt like we've been pawns on a board for a long time.

For far too long. Fenton's looking out the window. He's like, we… That's why we started looking into this. We feel like we've been maneuvered into these situations and we… What we know is that there's a lot of tension at the upper levels of the food court. Orange Julius and Dairy Queen are butting up against one another and our patron is making us do stuff to make that happen. And we… Holy shit! Oh my god! Yeah, Cor whips his head around and looks at Clover for a second. Franklin!

Nice drag. He keeps all the money. Like, we don't get anything. Look at our house. We live in squalor. And a pole falls down. A pole falls down. They point at the mess of pink paint that Franklin fucking just tossed all over the place. All the swiftly cooling meats that have been hung up. The only thing of value in here is us. And our hearts. And our minds. And our feet. Cor looks at the crime board and looks at the three of you and is like, I have known. I have long suspected.

I've long known that I have suspected. He's done it this many times. So well spoken. That the machinations of the food court reach from the highest of the highest to the lowest of the lows. And now I have an idea. Just how low. Below low. Like lower than low. Like you start at zero and if one is low, you're like minus one. Lower than low. You're not that short. He takes that in stride. He does not respond. I will attempt to help you with this investigation.

But in return, I need you to not tell me about any crimes that you are doing. And also try not to tell me about any crimes that you are doing. And also try not to do any crimes. Because I cannot keep you safe any longer. We agreed to the first one. Yeah. And we do a four-way handshake where our hands like just are flat together. Are smashing together. Make one hand. And our hands make one hand and then we shake his hand. Yeah. Okay. Please, please, please, kids. Do not make any more of a fuss.

I can… There is a lot of eyes being cast in your direction. Be careful. Thank you. We will. See you later. Thanks for looking out for us. Bye, Dad. He just turns around and starts walking away. You hear a clink, clink, clink of his spurs as he leaves. So I'll tell you that what that means is that whatever your job is next, you're going to get an additional die for heat. Because a lot of people are paying attention to you. Okay.

But also I'm thinking that maybe you get an additional tick on that clock because Corb's going to help you. Cool. Powerful. Yeah. He's going to start tapping his sources. And don't we get rep because we really fucking succeeded at the last job? That is Blades in the Dark, not World of Blades. Oh, rep. I mean, I could say that you are now considered tier one instead of tier zero. That'd be cool. You've got a lot more experience.

Ooh, actually, you know like your gear, how you can like check things off? Let's put your candy on there. Oh. So now you all have access to candy that you can use to boost up your effect if you're trying to like bribe somebody or convince them to help you. Because your candy's getting around too. People like the Cool Treat Kids treats. Yeah. Extra thing on the list. Cool. Candy. Candy. Okay. So your job is the mall Charles is missing.

Your patron has requested that you track them down and locate them and save Charles Eve for the mall's children. He's probably just drunko back again. I think so. So this is our opportunity to talk to you about that. So you get to use Clover's gather information. Oh, fuck yeah. Can I roll for it or anything? You do. It's a straight roll. So you can't fail it. It just determines the quality of the information. So you get to use, you use one of your skills. I would say that you could use a tune.

Yeah. To like ask the elves and stuff like that to help you out. Yeah. So you would roll one die. Six. Okay. Holy shit. Six on a gather information is like you get really high quality information. Nice. Nice. I would like you guys to help me with this. If you're feeling it. Um, I thought maybe a rich dad stole the Charles because his daughter, his spoiled little shitty daughter wanted her own Charles.

Oh, maybe there's a bunch of dad, like somebody found a side business where they can get like a black market, um, Charles market. So there's like a bunch of dads. I don't know. Rather than just one guy. I mean, my idea was also stupid. Your idea is like the plot of like Willy Wonka. Yeah. Christmas movies when we were a kid, like where that muscle guy had to get that action figure. Yeah. It's like the plot of jiggle all the way where it's like a dad has to kill a man to open a mall.

A cabal of dads has kidnapped him to cut the line because there were so many bookings. So a cabal of dads kidnapped the Charles so they could get their kids the photos. Charles is basically like a tickle me Elmo. Like there's so much high demands of this path, this group of powerful, people are using their influence and money. Oh yeah. I like that. It's a cabal of dads. The barbecue Kings. Oh, the dad gang, the dad gang of them all. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

The barbecue Kings and the Mario Batali's. Yeah. Okay. The leader of the barbecue Kings is named Guy Fierro. So that we all, I, am I wrong? I'm thinking that we all feel like there's just one little thing missing. We like this cabal of dads. We like it because they're Guy Fierro is in charge. Guy and Guy Fierro. And he stole the mall Santa Claus because there were too many bookings and they were shitty dads that like their wives were all like, Hey, can you book it in advance?

And they're like, they all forgot. They all forgot. They all forgot. It's like Charles Eve Eve. And, um, yeah, they all forgot. It's Charles Eve Eve. Like we don't want our wives to fucking divorce us. Like she's already so close. So the true cabal is the wives. Yeah. Oh, there's another cabal. Yeah. Great. Great. Cabal. And like the Charles be really funny. If the Charles kind of like went willingly because they're like, look, she's something comfortable. Well, they're barbecue kings too.

So he's like, Oh, that's how they lured him. It's a conspiracy. Yeah. What are the moms? What's the gang of moms? I'm all moms. Yeah. The first thing I thought was like the vineyard. Like they have a very fancy name for the wine women. Yeah. They're a, they're a wine club. They're a wine club. They're a wine club. It also orchestrates crimes. What a fucking cool setting that we have created. I love it. Red wine pairs well with me. Yeah. It's the, Oh, I kind of love it.

It's the vineyard and they orchestrate crimes and the barbecue kings are basically their enforcers. Like it's like they're the direct action. And it's an inside this gang like, like eat, drink and stuff. Yeah. Oh, there's so much bickering between the two. Oh God, they're such idiots. Makes sense why we couldn't book 50 slots too. Yeah. Yeah. And I, you know what? Now that you guys have set all this up, I really like this. The vineyard is definitely way higher tier than you.

I'd say two or three tiers above you. So fucking watch out. Ooh. Oh yeah. Yeah. The barbecue Kings, probably a bunch of dopes, but yeah, there's tier two. It said that Guy Fierro is really good at taking a beating. I wish I was good at taking a beating. And then Fenton, he grabs a handful of tinsel and he taps it like he saw Corb tap that sheaf of wheat. And then he grabs a handful of tinsel and he taps it And then he grabs a handful of tinsel and he taps it And then he pulls another bit out.

Don't put that in your mouth. And then he swallows it. God damn it. All right. That's the end of the downtime. We know the job. We know the target. And we know the factions. Let's do it. And so ends the tale of the cool treat kids. Always up to no good.

So tiny and greedy And angsty they be As they navigate crime and puberty And though our journey may belie a conclusion We'll never be free We'll never be free We will not leave you without a resolution Return next week to the chocolate store As the cool treat kids plan their next score And for you I'll gladly spout more I'll be back in the next episode of the!