Episode 4 – The Journey of a Thousand Blades Begins With a Single Dark

Pickaxe You've seen them around, they sell sweets by the pound Their wares are famously tasty Here I sing, singing to you Of crimes involving chemistry Clover's the whisper, she makes all the sweets She has a corn dog addiction Benton's the sly, she sleeps the same And writes vampire fanfiction Franklin's the cutter, his fighters strength Despite his dance, his heart Best and brightest, they may not be But that's my favorite part So gather round, friends Endless in clothes For the tale's about to start Alright, welcome to Spoutmore Mall Brats I'm your game master, Sean O'Hara Joining me as always playing Fenton Beasley This last week I'm your host, Sean O'Hara A bag of bats from someone they met That Jessica just offhandedly introduced Called The Batman And stole a jello shroom fragment from Greg To turn Clover translucent at a key point Got some Victorian swimwear In the form of old-timey jail outfits Because Clover didn't know what a swimsuit was Oh yeah, we were dressed up and weren't nary seen Yeah, yeah Yeah And the smoke machine Powered by Randy Beefs, the elf Yeah Yeah, we met the Batman Which was a great opportunity for me to workshop My Christian Bale impression Awesome And Kessaron Ropes And all of the other pixie sticks Nog, Wild Nog was there Penny was there, unfazed Yeah And they were all absolutely terrified Because Clover emerged from the fog And a wall of bats With chains drangling Chains drangling And an absolutely translucent head With her skull and eyeballs The visible man And her And absolutely monstrously terrorized these kids Breaking up Seamus and Kessaron And then following that We joined our friends at the Sadie Hawkins dance Franklin had been asked by his erstwhile love interest Minty Cart to attend the dance with him Fenton revealed that Penny had asked him to the dance weeks ago She asked me every time I asked her if she wanted to dance with me Every day for like six weeks And I said yes every day She just kept asking And Clover prepared to reveal herself Through the use of a blonde wig Which she effortlessly used to infiltrate this group Everybody apparently only recognizes Clover by her lavender hair Honestly that makes sense Because it's such a defining character thing That it's like if you saw Clover with like blonde hair You'd just be like It's just a blonde haired girl Actually that raises a question I've actually thought about Are there any other kids in the mall with lavender hair?

I've never seen anyone with lavender hair Nope It's super rare I was just curious about it Because I know it's natural And it's cool Sweet Franklin smashed a music bottle Said hey everybody look over here Oh yeah And Fenton and Franklin revealed That they had chosen King and Queen of the Sadie Hawkins dance Introduced the premise of King and Queen of the Sadie Hawkins dance Confusing and alluring All of the kids at the dance To the dance And Clover said A lot of hurried like adjustments to their outfits Like okay here we go I hope it's me Crowning Seamus Seamason And then surprisingly Clover Ivy Fern Who revealed herself Yes as not dead As not dead Further terrifying Kessaron Robes Who was then revealed to have ratted out Clover Breaking the golden rule amongst The High Spear Mall's kid gangs Don't tell Nobody tells me Tells Yeah She's been outed as a tattletale She ran off home screaming and crying Yeah And then confided in her mother Member of the vineyard That the Cool Treat Kids had been the reason for her downfall Yeah And we got perhaps a glimpse at the future of the Sugar Shack And the Cool Treat Kids themselves And that is where we find our kids now It's been a couple days Maybe a week or two Since the Darkest Night And the Sadie Hawkins dance Have Seamus and Clover Continued this relationship?

Yes Wow Yeah I know Dating for real I know Exciting How's that been for Clover? Um She's playing it off like it's no big deal But she's very excited inside She's gone through three diaries In the last week Diarrhea Amazing And what have What's Franklin been up to?

I was gonna say Also Seamus is being like Almost two PDA After his thing of like Not being P enough Right Cause Seamus was like Sorry Seamus was like I'm sorry that I blew you off like that If we're going to get through our lives in this mall All the kids have to work together Yeah So he's been very upfront about the fact That he is now dating Clover Ivyford Telling too many people Yeah Yeah Everyone that comes to the corndog stand He's like I just want you to know that I love Clover Ivyford And I'm taken And it's an old man that's like Just give me my fucking corndogs You little freak Yeah If your corndogs weren't the best in this mall I wouldn't put up with this shit It got to the point where Borbo had to go to the stand And he was like Look Clover is still wanted You can't keep telling people that you are dating her Yeah And what has Franklin been up to now That he's had a date with Mindy He put up He put up Posters with little tear offs In all the In around where he knows where all the gangs Hang out Of like We gotta do this together It's like Fight together Fight together Together we are strong He has like a picture of One pencil broken And then a whole bunch of pencils that are unbroken He's like We can be a bunch of pencils that don't get broken Take Take one And then he's been Going around and training And training with all the different gangs Fettering them up and making friends A lot of those posters are getting torn down I'm gonna say that right now Like you You put as many as you can up And you notice that maybe a quarter of them are getting through Yeah Corb Could be I feel like it's probably the food court Cause we're It really could be anybody Like if we're starting a union The food And the food court doesn't know why They're just like Whoa Like what the fuck are the kid gangs doing What's uh What's Fenton been up to Now that he had his uh His hand in ruining One of their many rivals Kessler and Robes He's really gotten a taste for ruining people's lives Whose life has he ruined in the meantime Uh no one No one He's not doing any of that But he is um I think maybe Uh He's kind of following Penny's lead Uh Who's following Seamus' lead In terms of the PDA department Oh So there's a lot of Uh Public make out sessions Make out?

Why? The budget With a couple nine year olds How old do people start making out?

I didn't make out at nine That's for sure I mean I remember it being a kissy time But I don't think it was a make out Yeah It's like Like Make Quote unquote make out A lot of kissing Once every 20 seconds To him it's like We both have a kiss We've been making out pretty hard But it's a lot just It's like holding hands Yeah totally It's 100% what that That is And also like It's the kind of thing that Penny Sort of just worn him down He's like I guess we're dating then Like Cause he likes her It's not bad He likes her And he's fine And like There He's like kind of into Everything that she's about Cause she's so weird And he's into all of that But it's just like He was always just like I'm sort of like I don't know I don't want to date her really But then I also don't know What the difference between What we're doing right now is And dating Well it's funny too Cause both his friends Are now seeing people And they're going out on dates So it's like One of those things too You're like I'm dating someone too Yeah So that's part of why Cause he was like I need someone to hang out with When these guys are out on dates And also When they're out on like Double dates I don't want to just be like A fifth wheel Yeah And Penny always comes So I guess Technically we're dating Cause we always keep going on dates We keep going on triple dates With people I'm dating this fifth wheel I like the idea that That Fenton was like Wow I think I like Penny And then he started dating And knowing what it was like Being in a relationship And he's like Maybe I don't like people Maybe I just don't want to be Relationshiped at all Awesome So we are in downtime That's what's going on Everybody Welcome to downtime First things first Pay off in coin I don't know if this was a job That you got paid for necessarily Or do we think that maybe There was like Some Some coins coming in From the other kid gangs When they heard that you were organizing I think maybe what it is Is the pixie sticks have disbanded So we've absorbed their territory Oh That's cool I like it Yeah because they've been ousted From like the kid gangs Yeah Like they're not allowed To operate anymore This actually helps Cause in my head Planning for the future When we start playing Blades in the Dark This is you guys Locking down your initial territory Cause there is a territory game In Blades in the Dark Where you can like Take over different parts of the mall Cool And you guys are building An actual gang gang With like Multiple kids Yeah You guys are actually You're accidentally becoming A Blades in the Dark crew Cool An actual gang That's sick Okay so let's say You got Six coin Sweet Worth Six coin worth of money And then you have One worth of spear bucks To kind of Spread amongst yourselves Oh And remember You can spend one coin To buy an extra Downtime action Oh Yeah So we all take two?

Yeah let's each take two And putting them in the actual Like coin section Of your sheet Is important Because that two Is the amount That you can have on you I have two from last time Yeah Same Which means that you would Have to spend up to two Or they would just Or put them in the The crew stash Or they just kind of Go away I'll put one in the crew stash Yeah I'll put Both mine in the crew stash Okay I'll put I'll put one in the crew stash And do an extra Downtime activity Uh cool So then we're gonna roll Entanglements Uh We're gonna roll one die Plus one die If the target was high profile Amongst the kids Kind of But Do we think that counts enough?

Like the pixie sticks Are fairly They're pretty high profile Yeah And we know that they're Entangled with the wine mums The vineyard True Alright So One more die And also Like the relationship Between Seamus And!

Kestrel Was quite high profile Everybody was talking about it That is true TMZ Yeah Plus one die If the score was loud and chaotic Um I mean the Not really Yeah The scaring was though Yeah That's true But it wasn't like so much a It was on secret time Smash and grab on the street You know what I mean? Yeah Okay So two dice So we're gonna roll 2d6 Who's gonna roll it? You wanna roll? Sure For entanglements Roll em Holy shit Six and Four Wow Nice Okay Is that good? No You want it low Oh god What?

You guys know I've been rolling the worst He's like Hey you broke your streak You broke it You broke your streak And fucked us Is there anything I can do?

No This is just kind of Uh How things Progress Fuck Uh So the two choices here We get this one a lot Which almost makes me want you to Want to do something else But it's the crew gets interrogated Or suffers reprisals It feels like a reprisal Kind of Right Cause Kessarin went to her mom Okay so what happens is You're all hanging out in the tunnels In Greg's tunnel And Borbo comes ripping down the corridor On his skates And he's like Oh my god Kids Oh no I'm so sorry Oh my god it's awful It's horrible What happened?

I just I don't know I don't know how we're gonna Oh my god Oh my who was it? He's got his hand on his side How did they die? No Oh my god Let me see the wound And he pulls his hand off his side And he's got a piece of paper Oh it's terrible Paper? It says zoning on the front of it Okay Right? Development What does this mean?

Greg rolls up on his chair Greg rolls forward And he takes it from uh From Borbo And he looks at it And he goes Oh they're They're zoning your uh Your sugar shack What does that mean? Oh cool Means it's being zoned for uh Residential They're gonna tear it down Tear it down? What the fuck?

They're gonna tear it down And they're gonna build Condominiums Whatever the fuck those are Let me see that He hands it And I read it So it says Application submitted by Tanya Ropes LLC Fucking son of a bitch Fuck Tanya Ropes Kessarin's mom Fucked us from a distance She's trying to get rid of our Fucked us from a distance Fucking house Capitalist pig I knew it We have to go protect our home We can't let them win But what are we gonna do?

We can't beat zoning regulations No Not alone Cut to Uh It's date night For the three of us The six of us? Yeah Um Where are we? Let's set the scene a little bit Oh we are at Chili's It's Thursday night It's Thursday night Yeah It's Chili's night It's our new poofs Yeah Um So I tell Seamus about What we found About Kessarin's mom Wanting to bulldoze our home Wow And it's only time before they come after your home too No The hot meat boys?

Yeah But how we're so powerful Yeah but you're now associated with us And they know you're on our side You think they give a shit about carts Mindy?

I mean I'm Rich Alright So I guess you are too Penny Yeah Wait Penny's mom is in the wine moms Oh Oh right Oh yeah Okay Right Penny doesn't know much about what's going on No She's got like a Like a chicken satay Like a stick with chicken on it And she's just like shoving it all the way into her mouth And then pulling all the chicken out Oh my god She's done that about three or four times Ow Those are sharp Penny Uh huh She's biting the Stick off Stick off Stick off Stick off Stick off Stick off Well then What are you gonna do?

You mean what are we gonna do?

Yeah This is all of our problems It's not just us It's not just you It's everyone All the kids in the mall Yeah if the wine moms get away with this Then they're gonna keep going Like We all live in dilapidated pieces of shit That are full of rats and garbage and shit And Those are prime targets for these Fucking Total Sluts Slags To turn into To turn into condominiums Whatever the fuck those are They sound scary Whatever they are Yeah You don't want the bourgeoisie Coming up in here Taking all of our good places What do you think life would be like If we didn't have our dilapidated homes and our rats?

Yeah Horrible Can you imagine our lives without rats? I mean where I live there's not a ton of rats I don't know What the fuck are you talking about dude? All the hot meat boys live in like an apartment building So Must be nice It is What if the wine moms come for your apartment building though? They wouldn't dare They might dare They would dare So what are we gonna do?

We have to fight together We have to come up with a plan I mean maybe there's something in the candy jungle that could stop them Candy jungle? You don't You don't mean the chocolate factory I do You've been in there?

Yeah Yeah a couple of times And also to shit a lot We've been in there to shit a lot And then we went Really far in one time Holy mackerel Yeah Basically go in there every day you know no big deal Yeah Wow You're so much braver than I thought you all were Thanks You especially Fenton Thanks I definitely am now realizing that that was sort of an insult Okay so what is the Is this a downtime activity? Or are we gonna see like a collection of downtime activities as you plan?

Can you use downtime to plan out this situation? Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah One of the downtime activities is gather information Oh that might be a good thing to do Yeah Yeah About like where they're sitting and what they're Cause wasn't there something else like Tina Durger's in on the buying? What else do we know about this buying situation?

You don't know much You know that they are making a deal with someone outside of the mall Do we know that they're going after something that they want deep in the chocolate factory?

Yes We know that The dark chocolate for sure The dank chocolate Yeah They want the dark chocolate in the chocolate factory And they are planning on rezoning Like they're going to do something like that Like the whole area that the chocolate factory is in So A they can get access to that during the like bulldozing renovations And then also they're going to turn it into like condos And sell that out so that they can then usurp the food court I think is like what Tina Durger's plan is Yeah Yeah And yeah that's why she's like hooked up with the vineyard to like be their kind of go between Yeah What if we got hold of some of that dank chocolate?

That dark chocolate? Yeah Yeah!! I would give it a give give give Because right now they're getting little bits of it. It's like black truffles. And it's associated with fancy restaurants. If McDonald's had a black truffle and french fries, nobody would give a shit. Flood the market. Okay. If somebody spends a gather information on this, I'll give you some info. I will spend a gather information on it. Okay. So you ask around. You ask Penny.

You go to Penny's house and you dig around in her mom's shit, which she's not around. And a large part of the reason why the vineyard is so wealthy is because of this super rare dark chocolate. They get little bits of it and they control the supply of it. So the fact that it's like diamonds, the fact that it's so tightly controlled and hard to get, that's why they're so rich. So if you were to flood the market with this chocolate, it would seriously undercut one of their main sources of income.

And if they don't have that source of income, they wouldn't be able to like… Afford to demolish? Yeah. Afford the territory that they're trying to demolish. Yeah. Totally. Yeah. So they fronted, they were like borrowing on blood diamond, blood chocolate. Blood chocolate. Pretty much. Like most rich people, it is a string of IOUs with nothing backing them up. Yeah. So we could make like shitty counterfeit, like black market chocolate. Maybe like call them like little turdlets or something.

Yeah, totally. Yeah. But that we have to go into, that we do have to go into the chocolate factory and mine it. And we could take our like select crew of weeds, pull together. I know we don't have everybody on our side yet, but we do have some of the people on some of our sides. Yeah. Yeah. Some people don't hate us. Like Greg. Greg will help us. Yeah. Seamus? I'm in. Seamus is in. Penny? I'm a cactus. Penny's a cactus. That's kind of in.

And I know Doris would fucking help with this because she's… Oh God, we got to talk to Doris about this. This is like way above our hands. Oh yeah, we should tell Doris about all this. And what about you, Mindy? I don't know. This sounds pretty intense. But I, I mean, I guess I could probably at least get you all like a cart, like a goat cart. Will that help? That could probably help. That would help. It would help us like truck a lot of it out of the fucking chocolate factory. Yeah.

Maybe something with a roll cage in case we get jumped by a licorice velociraptor or something. I don't know. I'm just making that up. Okay. If somebody, uh, if somebody ticks a thing. She says somebody, uh, somebody in Frank, Franklin closes his eyes and like slowly moves in for a smooch. Yeah. If somebody marks the thing off to gain an asset. I'll do that because it's, she's my, I'm, I'm, yeah, I'm like trying to, um, how many like of these slots do we have to tick off? Oh, sorry.

No, it's not a clock. This is a downtime activity. So you're using one of those downtime activities to gain temporary access to an asset. Okay. Which is the goat carts. Yeah. Uh, you have two normally, and then you can spend coin to get further downtime activity. So I'm, I spent that coin, that kind of gather information. That was a coin that I spent. So I still have two. Yeah. He has two left and you have one unless you spend money on more. Okay. I'll spend one coin on the Mindy. Get in a cart.

Cool. Yeah. And giving her that money helps her, you know, grease the wheels a little bit, make sure that she can pay people off. Like she's got, you know, one of her dad's friends, she just gives him some money. He's like, all right, here's a cart. Make sure that goes full up when you bring them back. Full up a what? Our goat stuff. I mean, there's all that candy grass. Oh, that's true. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, perfect. So you got a goat cart. Great. That's going to help.

We're in the process of planning an expedition into the chocolate factory. Yeah. Um, Safari. This is great. I want to recruit the rest of the hot meat boys to help us out. We have Seamus on our side. He's basically like, they're leaving. Yeah. Yeah. He's like the leader. Mm. Uh, that actually is not true. He said this multiple times. Yeah. I always forget it though. Seamus. He's like culturally their leader. He is. He's definitely the leader of like, uh, you know, like the mafia.

He's like the leader of a crew. He's like a cop. Oh, he has like his team, but he is down on the ladder. The hot meat boys. I think I, as I described them in Spout Lore and at the beginning of the show, is there a big gang with like, basically adults at the top, but they have younger members and by basically adults, I mean people in their late teens, early twenties. Okay. Uh, but Seamus definitely has a crew. He thinks that he could get his own crew to help out. Hell yeah. Sick.

Which, uh, that'll be another downtime activity, but you're going to have to talk to, we're going to have to, let's see a scene of this, I suppose. Okay. Okay. So I just want you all to know that these guys can be a little intense. There are a lot. All right. Fine. Let's do some pushups to like, pump ourselves up. That's a great idea. Cause I guarantee they're doing pushups in there. Okay. Actually, I'm going to hop down and he jumps down and he starts doing a bunch of knuckle pushups.

Are we in like a hallway outside of a, where are we? I think you're outside. What was the, what was their fortress? Their fortress is, isn't it in like the adventure land area? Yeah, it is. Is it? It's a fortress in Yesterland. Okay. So he's taking you to that place. Okay. So yeah, we, we dropped to the ground, like just in the middle of a, Yeah. Yeah. We're just wandering in the adventure and like a bunch of adults are walking around and we're like, what the fuck is wrong with these kids?

We gotta, we gotta stop coming to this mall. Cause of fucking weirdos. So we do our pushups. Okay. I feel brave enough now. All right, let's go. I sprained both my shoulders. How do you do that? No. You didn't try and do a real pushup, did you? I did. No. Fenton, you're not strong enough yet. By real pushup, I mean from my knees, but I did sprain both my shoulders. And my knees. I need somebody to keep me up. I need somebody to keep me up. I need somebody to keep me up.

I need somebody to carry me. I'll carry you. Okay, we carry you. Queen's chair. Yeah. We call it the Fenton chair. Carrying the Fenton chair. I'm gonna poo poo. And Seamus walks up to the door and he knocks once and then he knocks three times and then he stops and knocks one more time and then he runs his hand in the circle around the door and he slaps it a couple of times and then he barks and he goes, oh, and then a thing slides open. He's like, I wasn't sure you were going to get that. Right.

He's like, it's just me and some guests. And there's some whispering. And then he goes, just do it. Open the door. He slams it shut and then creak. You are welcomed into Fort Corn Dog. Oh, whoa. Holy shit. Look at all those corn dogs. Oh my God. Okay. Yeah. It's like in a fucking, uh, like movie about drug dealers. There's like, there's corn dogs coming down conveyor belts and people packing them up. And then they're like, oh, I'm gonna go get some corn dogs.

And then they're like, oh, I'm gonna go get some corn dogs. And then they're like, oh, they're like guys with like gloves on, like sticking the sticks and they're just like somebody off in the corner, like with chainsaws and like full gear, like a full suit of armor chainsaws and sticks down to like people counting like stacks of spear bucks and people eating corn dogs like quality testing. Wow. A real operation. Yeah. You guys have been here before. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And you rode a, uh, a cart off a roller coaster. Yeah. Into it. We're having flashbacks to that. So a bunch of hot meat boys look up at all of you and they're like glowering. Good afternoon all of y'all. I don't usually talk like that. I'm so sorry. I'm just nervous. And they're not listening to you. They're like working and Seamus stamps his foot and he's like, hey, listen up you fuckers. Whoa. Eyes up. Just hear them out. I love this woman. With all of my 13 year old heart. Continue. Okay.

We have a problem at our hands. And this affects all of us. All of us kids in the mall. The wine moms are coming for our homes. The wine moms. And one of them stands up and goes what do you mean? Why is this our problem? Well they're coming for ours first but what happens when they succeed? You know how the rich are. They're always hungry for more. It's true. It's true. And you know they're going to come for you next. Look at that conveyor belt. And those sticks.

The wine moms are going to want them for something. Not the sticks. Yeah. The Yesterland amusement park is on its last legs. You guys know that this is prime real estate for them to turn into like something called condominiums. Condominiums. Oh my god. None of us know what they are. From what we know there's something that can be sold off to the rich people and they may or may not live in them. But we don't know. Yeah.

And they'll be empty most of the time but somehow they'll go up in value like really fast. They're really really small and there's a lot of them. And they leak. Leaking? Yes. We need to fight this together. We don't want condominiums anywhere in the mall. We might not be able to stop progress but we can help shape it. One of them stands up and says How do I know I can trust you guys? We've been doing nothing but fighting with you all this time.

And Fenton goes I'll prove it to you by making a blood pack. And he takes a knife and cuts his hand. Wow! Wow! Blood brothers! No! That's good too! We trust you. My shoulders are sprained. I can't reach that far. Seamus takes the knife gently out of your hands. I second this papoose. Okay boys do you understand they're quite serious about working together. I got blood on my papoose. And they all kind of nod. They're like oh yeah. Okay. Okay. You's got a deal. We'll follow you boss.

And Seamus is like good. Good. Good. And. And scene. Yeah. So the hot meat boys this crew is going to help you out. You're going to have access to something called a cohort. Oh sick. Cool. A new thing. Yeah. In Blades in the Dark you're going to have temporary access to a cohort of. Wow we made friends for once. Yeah. I know right. So I checked off a box for my down time. For that. Perfect. Oh nice. Yeah.! Hey what's this button do? Do you have kids? Do you need to get away from them sometimes?

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Check out Dungeons and Randomness wherever you get your podcasts and join our incredible community for the adventure of a lifetime. Oh fuck shit. Holy shit that played a bunch of ads. Whoa what am I what is my voice coming over the sound system? Am I on the PA right now?

Okay so you're gonna have uh yeah you're gonna have access to a tier zero uh tier zero uh crew of thugs sick for the next job which means you can just kind of direct them around sweet yeah okay okay I have a thing I need to do all right what do you need to do and I'm talking to you guys and I'm like okay it's good that we got the hot meat boys on our side but I feel like to pull this off we're gonna need information and the hubberstone twins have always been like really cool with us and it feels like they're sort of on our side here yeah because there was that weird conversation that you had with them at the party yeah the sadie hawkins dance they they said that they they wished us luck or that they were on our side something like that I don't know it's safe if we talk to them and they saw that you were back and they didn't tell anybody no they I know they knew it was me even though I was pretending to be otherwise with this and he pulls the wig out of him yeah you don't have to carry it around anymore yeah well I mean I don't want to lose it it's not doing anything it weighs anything I'm pretty strong and I carry it what's one wig I'm a grown boy totally anyway we should probably talk to the twins you guys yeah okay because they they're kind of like rich rich kids right yeah they're rich kids and they hang out in an arcade so they would have like a different perspective from us too yeah yeah okay we go to them gather information it's a get together information for me yeah okay so what brings you here ski ball and I'm I'm still in the papoose uh we are kind of in a weird situation and I show them the zoning permit like do you guys know about this yeah we might have heard something what'd you hear we heard that there was a zoning permit oh anything else we're not in the business of giving away information for nothing so what do you want to know and what can you offer in exchange we need to know we need to know okay we'll tell you what we know and then you tell us what you know that is related to it how about that I think that sounds more than fair okay so what we know is that the wine moms are working with tina durger to redevelop the part of the mall that we live in and they also are doing it so that they can put something called condominiums there and also they are trying to do it to get access to a bunch of dark chocolate that is in the chocolate factory behind our sugar shack and we think that tina durger's trying to oust the food court and like and the wine moms are trying to do that too they put their hands up and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and give people snacks and they just both look at each other.

Okay. What the fuck was that? What's confer? Wait, can we try that? All three of the cool treat kids take turns staring at each other. Sorry. Oh, confer. So what would they know? What would they know? So you told them, and they're not going to tell you what they already knew. So that's something to keep in mind, because they do know a lot of stuff. You told them that the wine moms are pushing this development with an outside deal to get the capital and the influence to overthrow the food court.

You told them that Tina Durger is connected. She's kind of helping them out, unbeknownst to the food court and to mall security. Okay. So the Hubberstone twins, yeah, they look at each other for a second, and then they nod, and they turn back to you. Okay. So something that you need to know is that the food court is aware. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. The food court is making a play against their power base. Oh, fuck. Okay.

But something that you don't know is that the food court is too afraid to move against the vineyard at this time. What? Why? Why? There is, as always, much tension within the food court. They are always constantly working against and with one another. That's like us, the kid gangs. But we're learning how to be together and fight together. Maybe they can learn too. Maybe they can learn too. At this time, it is impossible for any of them to know who is a part of this plan and who is not.

So if we were to uncover who the liars are, then we could bring them together? We could close the loop of the food court. Interesting. It seems, from what we're able to find out, that the key to this plan currently is Tina Jerger herself. Right. Right. She might be the only person who knows who's on the up and up in the food court and who's in cahoots with the wine moms. She also, from what we are understanding, is slowly turning into a vampire.

And then you feel Fenton lock up with you in the Bjorn. All of your joints go back into place. No. That's how he heals himself out of terror. Like a rag doll. Yes. Crack. Oh. No. No. Not a vampire. Oh, thank God. A werewolf? Fenton's shoulders dislocating. Is it her moon cycle? Is it their cat turn time? No. No. And no. Okay. She is slowly turning mall security into her own personal army. Fuck. Whoa. Whoa.

So once the vineyard has mall security, which is the only organization within the mall that has outside authority, they believe that that might be enough to make a play against the food court. So right now there is an uneasy tension where each side is pretending they don't know what the other side is up to. We need to talk to Doris. Fuck yeah. We need to take this to Doris. All right. Well, if you need anything else, you know where to find us.

Before we leave, I just grabbed one of their shirts with the bloody head. And I'm like, why are you helping us? Why have you always been so cool to us? Um, we are not more cool with you than we are with anyone else. We're information brokers. You come to us with information in trade and we offer you information. We are completely neutral in this and we will remain so. Nah, you like us. We will remain neutral in this. Nah, you came up to me at the dance. I know you like us. Get out of here. Yeah.

No, you get out of here. Get out of here, you little nerds. Yeah, you're the nerds. And they both turn around and they go to a whack-a-mole. Or a whack-a-nome machine and then just start slamming it with those foam hammers. And you leave the Hubberstone twins to their court. One other thing that we sort of can intuit from that is that there's like more unity between the kid gangs than we might have thought. I think so too. Even among the riches. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, the only real tension, I mean, it's, you guys seem like you're in constant competition with the other gangs. But that's just because we're pieces of shit, okay? Yeah. You guys are kind of a destabilizing factor in the gang world, which is pretty funny. Yeah. Yeah. So that's what you learn with that gather information. Sick. Pretty good. There's some tension in the food court, but also Tina might be making a play to kind of take control, greater control.

Probably, you would guess, using some of the capital that the wine moms make available to her. Oh. They're greasing each other's palms. Like if she's got a bunch of extra cash, then she's probably paying off a lot of people. Mm-hmm. All right. To Doris. All right. So you find Doris in shitty food. Mm-hmm. In the bad food court. And we run up because we're like, this is like big news. Like it's full in our heads. And we're like, we're going to forget it if we don't tell her right now.

Hello, children. Welcome to Shitty Foods. You all seem so sweaty. We are so sweaty. There's so much we have to tell you. How much do you know about your own shit? Now, hold on one moment, children, please. Is this something that we should speak about in private? Probably. Yes. In fact, it goes, it's the biggest secret I've ever heard. Grr! Get us somewhere safe now! All right, all right, children, hold on. And she turns to a young man that's with her and she says, Emilio, watch Shitty Foods.

I will be back. And she takes you through the food court, through the crowds, to what seems to just be like a back room that some of the people that work in the court go to. What is it, children? Please have some waters. Oh, God, this is shitty water. Have some shitty snacks as well. Thank you. I'm so hungry. We've really stretched out this literal 19-year-old. 1990s-era South Park joke over so many different episodes. I love it. So, what is on your minds? Oh, my God. Oh, my God.

Okay, the Y-Moms are trying to get the dark chocolate. And then they're trying to build condo maximums. And we don't even know what that is, but that probably sounds bad. We got some of the friends, right? Some of the friends, some of the kids are our friends. And they think that the hobby boys, at least the little guys that are pretty tough. And they told us that we saw them make the whole thing. It's all they got. Corn dog sticks. Oh, my God.

And Franklin breaking down is making Fenton really worked up. And he's getting emotional and starting to cry. And he's like, oh, so Tina Turner's in on it. And she's trying to turn both security into her own gang. And she took Clover into the toss. And she made her an emo. Clover's emo now. And Clover's having flashbacks and is so triggered by all this. And she remembers, like, that chunk cut of her hair and that she stupidly dyed it black.

Like, in that one streak, she's like, my hair is ruined, Darce. And all because Tina Turner. And Tina Turner turned on everyone in the mall. And she's working with the wine moms. And the food court. They don't know what to do either. And everyone, like, knows something. But they're not telling each other. And because of that, we're going to lose our house. And we can't afford to lose our house. And everybody's really scared. And you're the grown-ups. You're supposed to know what to do.

And you don't know what to do. And nobody knows what to do. And we think we know what to do. And I just don't know what to do. Everyone's stupider than us somehow. I don't. That's not good. We're so dumb. We're so dumb. Okay. All right, children. Okay, calm down. Calm down. It's okay. It's all right. Here. Come. Come. Come in. Come here. Come here. And she gathers you all into a big hug. A big mom hug where she hugs all three of you at the same time. Oh, that's nice. It's okay.

I can't hug her back because my shoulders are dislocated. It's all right. It's okay. I will look into things. And I will see what I can do to help. Okay? Make sure that, you know, you stay safe from the food court because there's a rat in there. I will. I will. Thank you so much. Now, here. Have some more shitty snacks. Wait. What is it? What is it? Is this a downtime activity? Yeah. I have a project clock that is what is the food court doing? Oh, nice. Can I fill this? You can take it. Yeah.

Yeah. How many can I take? You can only take one per. That's why we made it four. Okay. That makes sense. One per downtime activity? Yeah. Okay. So, that's all my downtime activity. All right. Anybody else got some extras? Anyone want to clear stress or anything like that? Anybody take any stress? I took some stress. Oh. Fenton has that less effect thing still. Oh, shit. Yeah. What's that mean? So, he's got to clear that. I got to clear less effect.

You would need to use a downtime activity to clear it. Yeah. Okay. Fine. I can use my last downtime for more info if you want. Yes, please. Okay. Is Millie still on our side at all? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's a great question. It's kind of conflicted. I think she's conflicted. I think she's the kind of person. She's young. She's really in debt. I know what to do. Great. Okay. If you want, you guys can be with me for this. Yeah.

I guess we're all kind of together for this. You guys are kind of together all the time. Yeah. We have panic attacks when we're not together. I don't want to be a broken pencil. Please don't take me. Leave me at home. Okay. So, guys, I know when Millie gets off her shift, and I know it's kind of creepy, but I promise it's not. But I know the way she walks home, too. So we can just wait for her to walk by and ask her some questions. Okay. Okay. I'm into it. Lead the way. Yeah. Okay.

So we're hiding between a fruit stand and a vegetable stand. It's dark in the mall. Light comes from a single light post. It's raining. Millie comes out of the security depot with her coat closed. She pulls the collar up. She looks around. Man, it's so shitty here. It's raining because one of the sprinklers is just- A sprinkler broke, so it's raining right now. She puts on her fedora. I step in her way. The two of us circle her around. Her hand goes to her waist. No, don't. Millie, it's me.

Clover? Yeah, it's me. What are you doing out here? And she runs up, and she grabs you by the collar, and she drags you into the alley. Okay. I gotta talk to you. I'm sure you know all about it, but Tina Durger, she's an- Shh. I'm sorry. You can't. What? She could be anywhere. Okay. She has ears everywhere. Ew. Ew. You know who is in a deal with some W moms? I can't be hearing this. No. And you shouldn't be thinking about this. I have no choice.

You know who is after our- Well, you know who- Whatever. We both know what you're talking about. Yeah. Anyway, our home's in danger. Millie, you gotta help us. Millie, you're the only person on the inside that can- Get us information on what's happening. You're the closest thing to an adult that we know. Remember all the scrunchies I made you? Oh, Fenton, because he knows how to sew, holds out a handful, and there's a spear buck and a whole bunch of scrunchies.

She reaches out, and she closes your hand. What do you need? Just any info. Is there a meeting place where you know who and some of the- People meet up? Like, where do they go? Okay, great. I am really into this, like, fake rain, darkness, kind of, like, noir vibe. I think there's a club that she knows that Tina, like, has a stake in. With her, like, new, I'm kind of getting powerful and rich money, she's bought a club in the mall.

I like that the idea is, like, a secret club within another club that we know. Like, it's in the dad's basement. Right. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Yes. Yes.

Yeah it's like okay so in I really shouldn't be telling you this this place is dangerous tina I mean you know who uh she owns a club a secret club in nogwizers just speak easy it's called the nog hole how do we get in there is a there's a secret entrance there's a blank wall next to the bathrooms it's just got uh like a like a post like a painting of the nog miser and that's where the that's where the door to the place is if you're gonna go in there and I really don't think you should you have to be careful but if you're looking for information on tina's dealings that might be a good place to start have you ever been in there I shouldn't say say yes I like the music okay okay okay fair enough I was there a theme should we dress up what do we need is there a theme and she kind of gestures to herself in like a trench coat and a fedora perfect perfect I know exactly the guy for the job cut to no wait wait wait as you guys are leaving like getting ready to leave you're like thanks thanks millie she stops you because clover I'm not a bad person I know you're not that's why I found you and she takes off down the alley be safe you too cut to mr gilbert walking down the alley the hall it's hotter because it's the three of us in there it's all three of us all three it's a nine foot man in a fedora this isn't just mr gilbert this is master gilbert master gilbert private eye and corrupt politician I think that's good it looks like a slender man yeah definitely really creepy is the one in the middle it sucks you think you suck no are you kidding me I'm doing all the ab work yeah and you're the one that's dealing with fenton's sweaty knee pits oh my god tiny little arms massive torso so much torso little head kind of yeah fenton has a very small head maybe we dressed fenn up as his entire head he's like this with the blonde wig on hello I'm master gilbert I'm private eye yeah I made a paper mache head and I'm gonna do a little bit of a head job I'm gonna do a little bit of a head job I'm working the mouth in there terrifying thank you for joining us I think that's where we're gonna wrap it up for this episode this has been our downtime episode of spoutmore Mall Brats I've been your game master Sean O'Hara joining me is always playing fend invisible the slide of dual z's so long everybody playing franklin stein the cutter Paul Oppers take your hair and playing clover ivy fern the whisper jessica tye bye everyone we've been playing world of blades by duan figueroa based on the The Magnificent, Blades in the Dark by John Harper.

Both of those games are excellent and can be found online. Thank you to Samuel Quinn Morris for our intro and outro music. Stuns me every time. And thank you to all of our supporters around the world without whom this show would not be possible. So thank you to you, and we'll catch you next time.

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 be like a conclusion 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