104: Attic Window

Synopsis

The episode opens the morning after the investigators’ disastrous attempt to search Bernard Corbitt’s property. As they leave the area, rookie police officer Billy McConnell approaches them. Although his partner Detective Kovach accepted Corbitt’s explanations, Billy admits that Corbitt seemed nervous during questioning and that something about the situation still feels wrong. He agrees to accompany the group back to Dr. Simeon Cantstandya’s home to discuss what they saw.

When the investigators return to Simeon’s house, Detective Kovach arrives with the missing Dominic Druncard, who had apparently been abducted during the previous night’s events. Dom recounts that he woke up in the trunk of a car with a rat-faced man threatening him with a knife; he managed to beat the attacker with a tire iron and escape. He also managed to memorize the car’s license plate before fleeing.

Back inside the house, the group resumes examining the strange bone they had previously recovered from Corbitt’s garden. Initial attempts to identify it fail despite repeated biology rolls and a lengthy search through Simeon’s extensive library. The investigators eventually conclude that the bone most closely resembles a human humerus, but it contains unnatural socket-like structures along its length suggesting that additional bones were once attached to it.

While Simeon and Major Bakersfield continue researching the bone, Dom and Billy begin “peeving” on Corbitt’s house from a window—attempting to covertly watch it for suspicious activity. Their surveillance is less than graceful, with Dom tripping and crashing into the window while trying to remain stealthy. Despite the mishap, they notice a curtain moving in the upper floor of Corbitt’s house, suggesting someone is inside.

The investigators split up to pursue leads. Billy takes Dom to the police station to track the license plate, while the others continue their research. At the station they discover that the car belongs to Randolph Tomaszewski, an orderly at Central Hospital who had previously been suspected in a series of disturbing pet mutilation cases in Arkham. Although he had once been questioned by police, the case never resulted in an arrest.

Meanwhile, Simeon and Bakersfield bring the bone to Dr. Puerto Rico, a colleague at Miskatonic University specializing in biology and anatomy. After examining it, Dr. Puerto Rico confirms that the bone resembles a human arm bone but possesses impossible anatomical features—joint-like growths that appear designed to attach additional bones. He concludes that although it likely originated from a human body, the structure is unnatural and cannot be explained by known medical procedures.

At the same time, Tallahassee develops a photograph taken when Bakersfield accidentally dropped his camera from Simeon’s roof the night before. The blurry image reveals something disturbing: in the attic window of Corbitt’s house, a woman’s face can be seen staring outward.

Seeing the image triggers a flood of memories in Dom. He realizes that he had indeed entered Corbitt’s house the previous night. After sneaking past Corbitt in the kitchen, Dom went upstairs and opened the attic door, where he saw the same woman’s face staring back at him. Moments later, Corbitt appeared behind him chanting in an unknown language. Dom’s body went rigid as if under a spell, and Corbitt whispered commands that forced him to move into the attic.

Dom remembers sitting helplessly in the attic for hours while his friends and later the police searched the house below without ever opening the attic door. Even more unsettling, he recalls that something else was moving in the attic with him, though he could never clearly see what it was.

The episode ends with the investigators realizing that Corbitt may be practicing some form of supernatural control—and that there may still be someone, or something, trapped inside the attic of his house.

Transcript

00:00: [Music] Welcome to The Arkham Files, an actual-play Call of Cthulhu RPG podcast, featuring Seth Morrison as Tallahassee Turner.
00:33: Tallahassee: I think he’s dying, but if he does, are you available?
00:39: Peter Morrison as Dominic Druncard.
00:42: Dom: It was like I, you know, had a fair amount of spirits.
00:46: Donovan Ballard as Dr. Simeon Cantstandya.
00:50: Simeon: I’m not a psychologist tonight.
00:52: Sam Morrison as Major Frederick Aloysius Bakersfield.
00:56: Bakersfield: Still really into guns and ammo and… shits.
01:02: Evil Morrison as Officer Billy McConnell.
01:06: Billy: You can’t do anything drastically illegal.
01:08: Someone: I blow one up his business.
01:10: GM: And I’m your game master, the keeper of arcane lore, Alex Morrison. Now grab onto some dice and your sanity. Let’s roll.
01:22: [Gentle music]
01:29: GM: Back in Louisiana, as you guys come walking out into the dawning early morning light, you look around, maybe start walking up the street a little ways.
01:38: GM: Once you get past the edge of the corner, you hear a voice.
01:48: Billy: Hey, hey fellas, over here. Hey, you remember me?
01:51: Group: Yeah.
01:53: GM: You look over and see the face of Officer McConnell.
02:01: Billy: Sorry about holding the gun on you last night, but you were just making me really nervous.
02:07: Tallahassee: You made me poop my pants.
02:08: Billy: Man.
02:09: [Laughter]
02:12: Billy: I’m pretty new to the force and everything, but I think you guys might have been onto something with Corbitt last night.
02:20: Billy: You know, my partner Rourke, when we were interviewing Corbitt, he was just buying everything he was saying, but the few questions that I asked, he seemed to get really nervous.
02:34: Billy: He just seems kind of fishy. I think there’s a little bit more to this.
02:46: Billy: I know he kind of checked out on everything — he had alibis for his stories, and they found the stick in the icebox there, which was kind of strange — but I wanted to find out what you guys saw.
03:07: Simeon: We saw a hand. It was definitely not a finger-shaped branch. I rolled an eight on Spot Hidden. I clearly, as a psychologist, saw a hand.
03:27: Billy: Is that enough proof for you?
03:30: Someone: You’re a doctor, so you can recognize your… candestangements.
03:38: Simeon: I got a 20 in Biology.
03:44: Billy: Okay. Anyway.
03:46: Simeon: Why don’t we head back to the neighborhood? Come with us. I have non-alcoholic water, and Major Bakersfield has a lot of really nice cups.
03:58: Bakersfield: It’s true.
03:59: Someone: He already broke down the door in the back, and Mr. Corbitt says so it’s open.
04:03: [Laughter]
04:06: Billy: All right.
04:09: Billy: Yeah, so — I’m off duty. I can, you know… I’d like to come with you and maybe give this a rest.
04:15: Someone: Have a few nice cold waters.
04:17: Someone: Tallahassee promises he won’t take it down to your car.
04:21: Billy: I’d be very grateful for that.
04:23: Someone: Boy still needs to change his pants.
04:24: Billy: I don’t have a car.
04:25: Someone: It’s true. It’s all dry.
04:26: Billy: Oh. You know, I don’t really have that much money.
04:30: Someone: All right, well, let’s just start hoofing it again.
04:32: [Laughter]
04:33: Billy: Okay, I’m gonna call it.
04:36: GM: All right, so you guys make your way back to — whose house are you going to?
04:45: Group: Dr. Simeon Cantstandya’s.
05:02: [Music / transition]
05:27: GM: You guys have the bone set out on the table, and you’re all sitting around talking about this thing you found in the garden.
05:39: [Knock at the door]
05:41: Simeon: I’ll be right back, boys. I’m gonna go answer the door.
05:43: GM: You open the door, and standing there is Detective Kovach. And next to him is a very disheveled and haggard-looking Dominic Druncard.
05:59: Kovach: Hello, gents. You see, friends, yes? You guys have been looking for one of these.
06:07: Dom: I’m okay. I can calm down.
06:11: Someone: All right.
06:13: Simeon: As a psychologist, I know that that means you can’t dangle around and eat people.
06:18: Someone: Oh, do I hear Kovach’s voice?
06:22: GM: Yeah.
06:23: Someone: Okay, one — stay on site.
06:25: Someone else: Stay back in the kitchen.
06:27: Someone: What’d you tell them?
06:29: Someone else: I missed you so much.
06:32: [Laughter]
06:33: Someone: I hug him.
06:35: Someone else: Also, I’m doing your history.
06:37: Someone: This is a group hug on the top of the stoop.
06:40: GM: You obviously told him where you were at, and Dominic, you were lucid enough that the detective was able to figure out who you were and that you were the guy these guys were looking for.
06:55: GM: So he gave you a ride, I guess, to be nice and maybe put the rest of this to bed.
07:02: Dom: So, detective, this is what I remember. I’ll admit we were kind of prowling around, you know, those guys told me some things, so I had… we were prowling around his backyard.
07:17: Dom: I was near his back door, and honestly it was like I had a fair amount of spirits—
07:27: Someone: Wait, that sounds bad.
07:29: [Laughter]
07:31: Dom: So yes, you guys all saw a hand from a mysterious tree, which turned out to be a branch, which admittedly, I suppose, if you look at it from across the street and you’ve been sucking down a bunch of—
07:43: Someone: What? No, he did drink some water.
07:48: Dom: Anyway, y’all basically got liquored up and decided to go running around because there was no alcohol involved, believe me, I would know. I mean, anyway—
07:58: Dom: But I was near his back door and I honestly to heaven don’t remember anything that happened after that.
08:06: Dom: I woke up in the boot of a car, and a rat-faced man pulled a switchblade on me. I beat him with his own tire iron and I ran for it.
08:20: Kovach: Hm. Like Mr. Druncard, nothing you tell me is not lining up with an “I had too much to drink” story.
08:28: Kovach: All right, so I’m gonna take you back to your friends. Maybe if you remember something more, don’t call me.
08:37: Kovach: Not even if you drown. All right.
08:41: GM: So he drops you off.
08:48: Someone: Don’t fucking make us.
08:50: Kovach: All right, unless maybe you want my badge and my gun, you can be the cops now. I’ll go home. I’ll love my neighbors.
08:59: Someone: Oh, that would be wonderful.
09:01: Someone else: Can I get that gun right now? It’s a nice piece.
09:03: Someone: You gotta shut the inside—
09:04: Someone else: Here we go.
09:06: Someone: Don, what happened?
09:08: Someone else: I’ve got to tell you—
09:11: Someone: Don, switch to the British.
09:14: Someone else: Do the expressway of donkeys.
09:15: Someone: You guys are right.
09:18: Someone else: What about the exposition?
09:20: GM: So he tells you what happened in the alley.
09:22: GM: The only thing he has is that he doesn’t remember anything from the time he was standing at the back door of the house.
09:27: Someone: So you don’t remember seeing the girl in the attic?
09:29: [Laughter]
09:32: Dom: No, no, no. What girl in the attic?
09:34: Someone: The only thing I had is that Corbitt’s sneaky.
09:37: Dom: The only thing I have is that I got the license number.
09:42: Someone: All right, focus. Back on track.
09:45: Someone else: All right guys, let’s go back into the house.
09:48: Someone: I thought we were in the house.
09:49: Someone else: They literally threw me into that house.
09:51: GM: Yeah, you guys are back in the house. You’re standing around a bone.
09:57: GM: Now that it seems like we’re just looking at it, this is a weird-looking bone.
10:01: Someone: I’m gonna roll Biology again.
10:02: Someone else: Hey y’all, I’m gonna try not to—
10:04: Someone else: Hello.
10:04: Billy: Do call me Billy, though.
10:07: Someone: I’m gonna roll up around you. Where can we take this bone so that someone can examine it?
10:13: GM: You guys are near Miskatonic University.
10:15: Someone: Okay, let’s go there.
10:18: GM: You guys are in Arkham, Massachusetts, home of the world-famous Miskatonic University, which you are very familiar with because that’s where you, Dr. Simeon, went to school. And you still kind of work out of there.
10:34: Simeon: Let’s go there.
10:35: Someone: All right, guys, I don’t think any of us are going to figure out what this exactly is. Why don’t we head on over to the university and maybe—
10:42: Someone else: Or to my home lab. If there’s anything weird, maybe it goes with the bone.
10:50: Someone: I don’t see enough.
10:54: Someone else: I guess you can roll for it.
10:56: Someone: Ooh, I have five.
10:58: Someone else: You get to roll it.
10:59: Someone: Rolling my five.
11:00: Someone else: I’m rolling a five, too.
11:01: Someone else: You guys, let’s do it together.
11:03: Someone: I’m marked. Let’s go.
11:05: Someone: 12.
11:07: Someone else: 52.
11:08: [Laughter]
11:10: Someone: It’s close.
11:13: GM: It’s weird-looking.
11:14: Someone: Does he roll another Biology check?
11:18: Someone else: Yeah, you got 84.
11:20: Someone: You’ve had enough of that.
11:21: GM: You can roll Biology or Medicine.
11:23: Someone: How do you have Biology?
11:25: Someone else: Hey, when you sweep people on these rolls over here, you’re not gonna need to do that.
11:37: Someone: I’ll do Medicine because you’re gonna do Biology.
11:38: Someone else: You’ve got a 24, dear. What do you want to do?
11:44: Someone: So you go Biology.
11:46: GM: Outside at night, so you want to try Medicine this time?
11:49: Someone: Yes.
11:50: GM: Okay.
11:51: GM: Well, it would be in the…
12:09: GM: …Biology, but not enough to really — I mean, you know enough to know this is really strange-looking.
12:17: Someone: Does he not have any books in his house?
12:19: Someone else: I got libraries, yeah I do.
12:23: Someone: No, as a psychologist he’d have medical books.
12:26: Someone else: Can we go check out your library?
12:28: Someone: You got a lot of bone books?
12:30: Someone else: In my house.
12:31: GM: Where are you guys, by the way?
12:33: Someone: Where am I? Out in the library section?
12:34: [Laughter]
12:39: GM: I don’t care — what room?
12:41: Someone: Well, I got shoved through the house, which was my entryway, which is very large and beautiful alabaster as far as I can see.
12:51: Someone: Where’s Mary Beth Beth during all this?
12:53: Someone else: Where do you go, my wife?
12:54: Someone else: She’s upstairs.
12:55: Someone else: It’s “where are you.”
12:56: Someone: Where are you, Beth Beth?
12:58: Someone else: The actual name.
13:01: Someone: Is that what’s on your character?
13:04: Someone else: I’m not saying that.
13:06: Someone: What? It’s not her name?
13:08: [Laughter]
13:09: Someone else: It is her name.
13:10: Someone: Mary Beth?
13:11: Someone else: That’s not even my last name, because her married name is Shafer.
13:15: Someone: Okay, that’s Shafer.
13:16: Someone else: My wife — her name is Mary Beth Cantstandya.
13:17: Someone else: She’s married.
13:18: [Laughter]
13:20: Someone: But I married that Cantstandya.
13:22: Someone else: Is it what?
13:23: Someone else: Depends.
13:24: Someone else: That changed it when you came over from…
13:25: Someone else: Former language.
13:26: [Laughter]
13:29: Someone: Formerly Cantstandya.
13:30: Someone else: Okay.
13:32: Someone: Let’s go to the library. I got a good library.
13:35: Someone else: And I got 70 on that, so—
13:37: Someone else: Also, what is language?
13:39: Someone else: But what are we going to do?
13:42: Someone else: We are in—
13:43: GM: We’re in the city, we’re off to the side of downstairs. Yeah, first floor out of three.
13:54: Someone: What is language, like skill?
13:58: GM: It’s like a foreign language. Your language skill is basically how you… at some point it’s the same as your education. If your Education is bad, you just use your Education to put your language skill.
14:19: Someone: Okay, I don’t think these are okay words.
14:22: Someone else: Okay guys, gents, let’s go ahead and head off to my library.
14:25: Someone: Oh, look at this human anatomy. Oh my gosh, I bought a book.
14:31: Someone else: You have a study upstairs or whatever that is — looks in it.
14:36: Someone else: Yeah, a bone book called “How You Can Make an Extensive Weird Box You Find in the Backyard.”
14:41: [Laughter]
14:42: Someone: I like Tallahassee. I like Tallahassee.
14:46: Someone else: Oh, you are fun.
14:48: Someone else: There’s like one reference to a bone and the rest is all about topless names.
14:52: GM: Okay.
14:55: Someone: Okay, okay. I need his help.
14:57: Someone else: I do need his help to roll with the book.
15:00: GM: Okay.
15:01: Someone: I need his help. I’m gonna roll my 70 for Library Use—
15:06: Someone else: And then I roll again for his?
15:07: Someone else: What is your library?
15:10: Someone else: Why does his book have—
15:12: Someone else: It’s not really my book.
15:13: Someone else: Yeah, it is.
15:15: Someone else: It is what I say it is.
15:18: Someone else: Oh, you do have, like, human anatomy?
15:20: Someone else: Okay.
15:27: GM: So you go into the sitting area, and then there’s another room next to it.
15:36: Someone: Okay, that’s the library down there on the ground floor?
15:42: GM: Yeah, on the ground floor.
15:51: Someone: Ooh, 83.
15:53: GM: Okay, all right. So you can tell it’s a—
16:00: Someone: I need his help.
16:01: Someone else: So I got 65 Library Use.
16:05: Dom: I want to look out the window toward the Corbitt house. I just want to see if anybody’s spying on us.
16:12: GM: Okay. Does he roll for it?
16:15: Someone: He can roll. He can be helping.
16:18: Someone else: 65.
16:21: Someone else: Yeah, that’s a fail for me too.
16:27: GM: So as far as Library Use goes, it’s not necessarily that you guys fail and don’t figure anything out — it just takes a lot.
16:32: GM: It takes you a lot of time.
16:33: GM: If you guys were to roll really well, you could maybe figure it out really quickly.
16:37: Someone: And as a psychologist, it takes me both.
16:40: GM: So you’re going through it, kind of page by page, comparing it to the other bones in the book.
16:46: GM: This is taking you kind of a while, because you guys don’t exactly have a great system going on here.
16:52: Dom: I’m hanging out over by the window with my new pal Billy, keeping an eye on what’s happening at the house.
16:58: Dom: That’s a 35.
17:03: Someone: You said it was an 80! I saw it, it was like an 83.
17:07: Dom: It was an 80. I saw it. It was like an 83.
17:25: Someone else: I seem to have gotten a three.
17:26: Someone else: Oh. One again. Oh my.
17:27: GM: Okay, you guys looking out the window, roll me Spot Hidden.
17:30: GM: Are you guys being covert about it, or are you just standing at the window in plain view?
17:33: Dom: No, yeah, I’m kind of pulling the blinds down there, holding the space, going right there.
17:38: Billy: I’m being covert.
17:40: Dom: Definitely.
17:42: GM: Okay.
17:48: Billy: Yeah, I got 80 Spot Hidden, so good, because mine sucks.
17:54: GM: Okay, you got a 70, so you got a success.
17:57: Someone: Awesome.
18:01: GM: But both of you guys also roll me Stealth.
18:05: Dom: Oh.
18:05: Someone else: My Stealth is 80, so—
18:07: Dom: I’m trying to be covert about it.
18:08: Someone else: 90?
18:08: Someone else: 80.
18:09: Someone else: I’m all out.
18:10: Someone else: It’s so…
18:11: Someone else: Dom’s a stamp.
18:14: Dom: 64, which is a fail for me.
18:16: GM: Okay. You two bumblers.
18:19: GM: Dom actually trips over Dr. Simeon’s feet and just face-plants.
18:27: Dom: I just very slowly…
18:30: Someone: That’s why he sees nothing.
18:43: GM: As you guys — everybody in the room just pauses and watches that entire display.
18:47: Someone: My guy might need a little rest.
18:49: Someone else: You’re off your book.
18:50: Someone else: Don, you all right?
18:51: Someone else: Can you clean my window now?
18:52: GM: You guys both know you succeeded. You’re just spying.
18:56: Someone: But not my Stealth.
18:57: GM: Yeah.
18:58: GM: As you’re looking at the window, you see one of the curtains upstairs.
19:04: GM: You actually see one of the curtains kind of flutter, flutter, flutter.
19:10: Someone: Hey.
19:13: Someone else: I don’t trust this, guys.
19:15: Someone else: So let’s watch this guy.
19:17: Someone else: Major Bakersfield—
19:19: Someone else: He’s drinking water.
19:20: Someone else: He’s basking.
19:22: Someone else: He’s getting more money.
19:23: Someone else: He’s looking at this bone with these guys.
19:30: Bakersfield: Okay, I know how much it looks like a bone. I’ve got 20%.
19:36: Someone: This don’t make very wrong.
19:43: Someone else: Zero-zero.
19:45: Someone else: That’s a hundred, buddy.
19:46: Someone else: Hundred.
19:47: [Laughter]
19:48: Someone: It’s an accident.
19:49: Someone else: He missed the book.
19:50: Someone else: It’s smooth.
19:52: Someone else: He lights it up there.
19:54: Someone else: Yeah, he has no electricity.
19:57: Someone else: So these are books.
20:01: [Laughter]
20:03: Someone: So after looking out the window, I just stroll by them, looking through the book, and I look at it and I recognize what it is. I rolled a 46, which is a success for my Library Use.
20:13: Someone else: You’re like—
20:14: GM: All you guys are just doing style, like hanging over this whole—
20:17: [Laughter]
20:18: Someone else: See you in hell, though.
20:19: Someone else: Rocking the lighthouse.
20:21: Someone else: All lined up.
20:22: Someone else: I didn’t roll. I’m still laying on the ground.
20:25: GM: Yeah, you are in the game.
20:26: Someone else: You still stuck to the window?
20:27: Someone else: You fell asleep.
20:29: Someone else: He’s cleaning my window.
20:30: Someone else: Look at this.
20:33: [Laughter]
20:35: GM: So again, since you guys seem to be taking forever, Officer McConnell goes over and decides to help, starts kind of peeking through.
20:43: Billy: Hmm…
20:47: GM: Again, this is still going to take a little while.
20:51: GM: So I’m just wondering if the two of you guys that aren’t peeking through the book—
20:56: GM: I’m just saying, you guys are doing research, so this is probably going to take like an hour or more.
21:01: Someone: Is he peeving on Mr. Corbitt again?
21:03: Someone else: He’s like laying around.
21:05: Dom: Well, was he attempting to peev? I missed him.
21:07: Someone else: Yeah, I was.
21:08: Dom: I fell, right. I like to peev Mr. Corbitt. I’m done peeving.
21:12: Dom: I saw the curtain flutter, and I’m pretty sure he was spying on the house, guys.
21:19: Dom: I want to ask — I mean, so Billy, it’s Billy, right?

21:24: Dom: Yeah, Billy. Do you know anything about — being a police officer and all — do you know anything about license plates?
21:26: Billy: Yeah, a little bit. You can kind of track cars by them. I mean, there’s a whole lot of details, but—
21:38: Dom: There’s a little bit on the rat-faced man.
21:45: Billy: Yeah, I think I could probably take a look at it.
21:51: GM: Also, really, just to point it out here: in this game, in this kind of section of the game — which is the investigation phase — splitting up is not a bad idea. It’s also an option.
21:58: GM: So if you guys are digging through the book and you want to go off and do something else and follow up on some other leads, that’s fine.
22:09: Someone: We want to follow up on the—
22:11: GM: Yeah, like split it.
22:13: GM: It’s not like some roleplaying games where it’s like, “Never split up the party,” because you’re all doomed.
22:18: Someone: During that—
22:19: GM: That’s the case for—
22:20: Someone else: You’re the only one who’s died.
22:21: Someone else: Struck.
22:22: GM: During action? Maybe not the best idea.
22:25: [Laughter]
22:26: GM: Or dangerous things.
22:27: GM: But during the investigation phase, this kind of stuff — splitting up — is usually going to go way, way more calmly.
22:34: GM: But also, you never really know what can turn into a situation.
22:39: Billy: So I’m kind of enamored by Dom’s accent.
22:44: Billy: So I’m like, hey, you want to come back to the station with me? We can look at that plate.
22:47: Someone: What do you mean by “enamored,” exactly?
22:50: Billy: I like it.
22:51: Billy: I like it.
22:52: Someone: Hello.
22:53: Someone else: I’m in psychology, Jack.
22:54: [Laughter]
22:58: Someone: Hey, idiot.
23:01: Someone: 88.
23:02: Someone else: 88.
23:03: Someone else: Yeah.
23:04: Someone: My Psychology is 10.
23:06: Someone else: That is his only motive.
23:08: GM: Okay.
23:08: [Laughter]
23:11: Billy: All right, so we’ll go back to the station.
23:13: Someone: This is how you gotta be weird, is that people are gonna be like, “Why are you hanging out with this—”
23:17: Someone else: Pick your—
23:19: Someone: So does that mean—
23:20: Someone else: I just decided not to look through the book with these guys.
23:23: Someone else: I thought of— no, after.
23:26: Someone else: Well, look at you.
23:27: Someone else: Look at you.
23:27: Someone else: You’re gonna stay looking through the book.
23:29: Someone else: Yep.
23:30: GM: Okay.
23:31: GM: All right, so a couple hours pass, just digging through, kind of doing some comparative anatomy in here, looking over everybody’s books.
23:40: GM: And you guys, once you go to one of the pages, you do find what looks like it’s probably the match for the bone.
23:46: Someone: I think you see it. This is it. But I think the narrator is gonna tell us.
23:55: Someone else: I don’t know. I’m adding dialogue in the background. Let’s see.
24:00: Someone else: Listen to that voice in the air.
24:03: Someone else: That we’re all listening to.
24:05: Someone else: Yeah, it was getting actually kind of really direct and intense.
24:12: GM: Okay, so.
24:13: [Laughter]
24:15: GM: So you guys are flipping through the book, and you do find one that actually looks like the closest match you’ve been able to find.
24:22: GM: And you actually passed it, kind of looked to see if maybe there was a better match, and then came back to it.
24:30: GM: It does look like — well, of all 1,267 pages, this one looks the most like the bone in your hand.
24:42: GM: So yeah, looking at it, it looks like — sorry — it looks like it’s probably a humerus.
24:53: Someone: You mean a funny bone?
25:03: Someone else: I did it. I said it to you all. Perfect.
25:08: GM: Yeah, it looks like a human arm bone.
25:12: GM: But like I was saying, like you noticed before, instead of just having the two joints on it from where it might hook into the elbow and the shoulder, there looks like there’s almost sockets for it to attach to several other bones all the way down it — like there were other bones attached to it also.
25:33: GM: So that’s the closest you can see as far as a human bone goes, but from looking at it closer, you don’t know if this is a human bone.
25:41: GM: It looks close to a human bone, but probably not.
25:53: Someone: A mutation?
25:54: Someone else: Could be a mutation.
25:55: Someone else: I don’t know if it’s mutation.
25:56: Someone: Tallahassee?
25:57: Tallahassee: Yeah.
25:59: Someone: So, you’ve done a fair amount of travel.
26:01: Tallahassee: This is true.
26:02: Someone: You ever see anything like this in any of your books?
26:06: Tallahassee: Like seeing it in my books, or like with my eyes?
26:09: Someone: With your eyes.
26:10: Someone else: And then wrote it into books, because I’ve never read any of them.
26:13: Someone: Exactly like this.
26:15: Tallahassee: Yeah, exactly.
26:16: Tallahassee: Yeah, sometimes when I was traveling in the darkest forests of Africa—
26:24: Someone: I mean, the plains?
26:27: Tallahassee: Oh, I don’t know.
26:28: [Laughter]
26:30: Someone: Africa’s a big place.
26:31: Someone else: There are also forests.
26:32: [Laughter]
26:35: Someone: It’s got just one giant forest.
26:38: Tallahassee: Yeah, I do have a mysterious idol that I did collect from the darkest part of Africa.
26:44: Tallahassee: I did write about it in my book, A Mysterious Idol of Africa.
26:47: Someone: What’s the darkest part of it?
26:49: [Laughter]
26:50: GM: Okay, so—
27:05: Someone: Well, how about, since you’re so-called a psychologist, you just take a bone over to Mr. Corbitt’s face and say, “What is this?” and persuade him to tell me what it is.
27:10: Someone else: I’m gonna go there, and while he sounds like that, I’m gonna sneak in the chair—
27:17: Someone else: Okay, to the university. Thank you. That’s what I said we originally said.
27:23: Someone else: Thank you, Mr. Bakersfield, for finally having some sense in this game.
27:27: GM: Okay, so you guys are gonna go to the university.
27:30: Someone: We’re gonna pile in the city and come.
27:31: Billy: Do you want to go to the station with me?
27:34: Someone: Station? Oh my God.
27:36: Billy: What do you think, Dom?
27:37: [Laughter]
27:41: Someone: You’re totally brilliant.
27:44: Billy: All right.
27:45: Billy: Okay, so we’re gonna go to the station and—
27:47: Someone else: Also, these two are Billy and Dom.
27:49: Someone else: Neither of you guys have a car.
27:55: Bakersfield: Who’s got a car and a horse? You can go ahead and borrow my horse if you’d like to ride horseback together to the station.
28:01: Someone: You have a horse in a cul-de-sac?
28:03: Bakersfield: I keep it in my backyard.
28:04: Simeon: I’ll drive. Everyone get in my car.
28:06: GM: Yeah, you guys are going different places.
28:08: Someone: We just said that.
28:10: Someone else: Get in my— Simeon and Tallahassee, you come with me. Billy and Dom can start cars, guys can jog horseback.
28:18: Someone else: Ride in a car, Simeon.
28:24: Someone: Yeah, I have a car?
28:25: Someone else: Yeah, you have a car.
28:26: Someone: Yeah, I got a car.
28:27: Someone else: Let’s borrow your car.
28:28: GM: So, you three have cars. I’m too poor.
28:31: Someone else: I really haven’t come out.
28:32: Someone else: And you said you don’t have it.
28:33: GM: Okay.
28:34: GM: He says you got a car.
28:35: GM: Mr. Bakersfield.
28:36: GM: You think going back over to Corbitt’s house?
28:38: GM: Mr. Tallahassee?
28:39: Tallahassee: To ask him what the bone is.
28:41: Someone else: I was going to sneak in the back while he was distracted.
28:43: Someone else: Why would he tell us the truth?
28:44: Someone else: Why are you going into his backyard again?
28:46: Someone else: Why don’t we just go to the first—
28:50: Someone else: Maybe, yeah, in the middle of the day. He’s got a greenhouse while he’s watching us, and I have a Colt .45 and a bullwhip—
28:57: Someone else: So whip his face—
28:59: Someone else: Or you saw him in daylight.
29:02: Billy: Right. The game. I’m still a cop. You can’t do that.
29:11: Someone: The role—I’m just quoting my book.
29:15: GM: Okay. People want to go to the university, and I guess one wants to go to the police station.
29:20: GM: Okay, Mr. Baker—
29:22: GM: Guys, you three have cars. One of you needs to come with us.
29:26: GM: Tallahassee’s the contact for the new person. Tallahassee will go with them.
29:32: Someone: Hey, I changed my clothes back.
29:37: Bakersfield: Sounds great.
29:39: GM: Tallahassee, you’re going with these guys?
29:41: Tallahassee: Yeah, I guess so. I’m gonna keep an eye on them too, anyway.
29:47: GM: Okay. You two start heading— you three head across the street to Tallahassee’s house.
29:52: GM: You guys — Dr. Simeon and Major Bakersfield — go and climb into Dr. Simeon’s car.
30:00: GM: Uh, you, uh, let’s see—
30:07: Someone: Dom and the drunkard.
30:09: Someone else: I’m doing a lot of stuff.
30:10: Someone else: Why don’t you guys let them into my house and fill them in?
30:12: GM: And Dom and Tallahassee Turner, I want you to both roll me a Spot Hidden check.
30:20: Someone: That’s a 75.
30:22: Someone else: Oh no.
30:23: Someone else: 86.
30:24: [Laughter]
30:25: Someone else: Seven.
30:26: Someone else: 38.
30:27: [Laughter]
30:29: Someone: Success.
30:30: Someone else: Success.
30:32: Someone else: Hard success.
30:32: GM: As you guys are walking across the street and you’re kind of at the angle where you are about to step out of view, you happen to glance back over looking at Dr. Simeon’s house.
30:46: GM: And just as the angle gets right, you notice on the back roof—
30:53: Someone: My camera.
30:59: Someone else: My camera is not broken. It didn’t fall off with—
31:04: Someone else: Let’s go get the camera.
31:05: Someone else: That one’s dead.
31:07: Someone else: You should come in.
31:08: Someone else: I would not recommend that the Major go retrieve the camera.
31:13: Someone else: He might die.
31:14: Someone else: Uh oh.
31:15: Bakersfield: All right, I’m gonna climb up and get the camera.
31:18: Someone else: Don’t forget the ladder.
31:21: GM: Okay, well, grab the ladder.
31:23: GM: Thinking about that, you are able to climb up on the roof and get the camera.
31:27: GM: But it’s been — it’s just hung out of the roof, just teasing over the edge of the roof.
31:34: GM: I thought for sure it had fallen and broken.
31:36: GM: So you bring it down, and as you bring it down, you look at it.
31:39: GM: It does look like the lens is broken, but the film compartment is intact.
31:45: Someone: Don’t open it.
31:47: Someone else: Just saying, or you’ll expose the film.
31:49: Someone else: Bring it to my house in my—
31:52: Tallahassee: You have a darkroom.
31:54: Someone else: Oh, right.
31:56: Someone else: We’ll go to the darkroom.
31:58: Someone else: This is your kind of thing.
32:00: GM: You definitely have a darkroom.
32:02: GM: You kind of stay and do that, and let them borrow your car.
32:04: Tallahassee: Yeah, borrow my car.
32:06: Tallahassee: And I’m gonna go develop the film.
32:08: Someone: All right, let’s take those two-way radios from the future.
32:12: Someone else: They’d really have these places covered.
32:14: [Soft music]
32:26: GM: Tallahassee Turner, you’re in the darkroom.
32:30: GM: It’s lit only by a single red bulb that keeps your delicate film from being destroyed by the light.
32:36: GM: You get the plate in there, into the developing solution, and, you know, hoping and wishing that something’s gonna turn out from this.
32:48: GM: Maybe you’ve got something. Hopefully the film hasn’t been damaged. Hasn’t been too exposed.
32:53: Someone: I hope that stupid camera didn’t break.
32:58: Someone else: Or ruin the film.
32:59: Someone else: Just got a picture of him falling off the roof.
33:01: [Laughter]
33:03: GM: And as you’re standing over it looking, it doesn’t take too much time. The picture starts to fade in.
33:11: Someone: Here it comes.
33:12: Someone else: I can see it.
33:15: [Laughs]
33:17: Someone: Oh.
33:19: Someone else: You can get it.
33:21: Someone else: Whoa.
33:24: Someone else: Let me see.
33:25: Someone else: Guys again, guys again, I love this one.
33:27: Someone else: I’ll get back—
33:34: GM: Okay. We’re at the police station now.
33:37: Billy: We are.
33:38: Billy: Now, we need to go talk to the plate-runner guy, and if we see Kovach, we need to, you know—
33:50: Billy: I’m gonna need to maybe just turn and face the wall and kind of stay out of sight as best you can. Anyway, follow me.
33:59: GM: So you guys make your way back to records.
34:05: Billy: Records.
34:05: GM: Yeah.
34:05: GM: Go through lots of files, file cabinets.
34:09: GM: I guess, yeah, roll Library Use as you guys get into the different things.
34:13: Someone: 20%.
34:15: Someone else: Do you have anything higher?
34:16: Billy: 16.
34:17: Someone else: How’s it—
34:18: Someone else: Good for you.
34:19: Someone else: I rolled 21.
34:20: Someone else: 29.
34:21: Someone else: 26.
34:22: Someone else: 29.
34:23: Someone else: There we go.
34:24: Billy: 16.
34:25: Someone else: Yep, me 16.
34:26: GM: Okay.
34:27: Someone: Pretty hard, yeah.
34:29: Someone else: Hard success.
34:31: Someone else: Hard success.
34:32: GM: Yeah, so you guys, you take it through the files. This is gonna take a while, because there’s a lot of files, but I guess they’re organized fairly well, so it’s not too bad.
34:42: GM: And you guys know what you’re doing. You’ve done this before. You’re a rookie, but this is pretty good.
34:48: GM: You go back, you dig through it, you find the section that should match up the numbers, and dig through it.
34:55: GM: Oh wow. You do get a hit on the license plate.
35:09: GM: The name is Randolph Tomaszewski.
35:10: Someone: How do you say that?
35:12: Someone else: Zoo-ski? Thomas-shoe-ski?
35:14: Dom: Do you think maybe he’s got a record?
35:18: Someone else: Randolph Tomato-ski.
35:19: Dom: Do you think Mr. Ratface maybe has a record?
35:24: Billy: We could look up last known address.
35:29: Billy: Possibly. We can look around a little more and see if he maybe has a criminal record. We could look.
35:41: Dom: Yeah. Let’s do a little more research.
35:46: Someone: Do you think the record is calm?
35:51: GM: You do find this story.
35:55: GM: “Suspect questioned in animal slayings.”
36:01: GM: “Police today announced that a suspect has been arrested in connection with a recent rash of pet kidnappings in the southwest part of town.”
36:07: GM: “Although released later for lack of evidence, Randolph Tomaszewski was considered the prime suspect in recent disappearances of nearly a dozen dogs and cats from the homes and yards of the neighborhood surrounding Central Hospital.”
36:19: GM: “Tomaszewski is employed at the hospital as an orderly.”
36:27: GM: “It will be remembered that many of the missing pets have been discovered later in parks, usually mutilated or partially eaten.”
36:38: GM: “Public outcry over these atrocities has been strong, and police hope that they have uncovered a lead that will eventually allow them to close this case.”
36:51: GM: April 15th, 1925.
36:54: GM: And digging through it, you found the record to be arrested. Somebody actually slipped this inside the file.
37:01: GM: The paper report you got around — he wasn’t actually arrested. The file says he was just brought in for questioning.
37:08: GM: Yeah, the paper reported that he got arrested. They didn’t have enough evidence to really keep him.
37:17: GM: He’d just been reported as suspicious because of his character, and because he worked in the area. So they brought him in for information, but they did not have enough evidence to go on.
37:26: Someone: No, that’s not what Charlie would have done.
37:28: Someone else: That’s what—
37:29: GM: It just says he was the prime suspect. It doesn’t actually say he was arrested.
37:32: Someone: Right.
37:33: GM: And somebody had that newspaper clipping in the file with it.
37:39: Someone: Well, do you look up the police report?
37:42: Someone else: Perhaps if we go to — do we know where this Central Hospital is?
37:46: Billy: Central Hospital?
37:47: Someone else: Yeah, is Central Hospital—
37:49: Billy: It’s Central Hospital. It’s kind of the main place.
37:56: Dom: Should we go there now, or should we touch base with our friends?
38:01: Billy: I think maybe we should check with the others.
38:04: Dom: I think maybe we should check with the others.
38:05: Billy: We should.
38:06: Dom: Yeah.
38:07: Billy: Yeah. Before we head over and confront Mr. Tomaszewski.
38:12: Dom: All right.
38:13: Billy: We’re gonna head back to Tallahassee’s house.
38:15: GM: Okay.

38:16: Someone: All right.
38:17: GM: So, Dr. Simeon Cantstandya and Major Bakersfield, you guys pull up at Miskatonic.
38:25: Simeon: So what I think we should do is go talk to my colleague. He teaches biology and anatomy.
38:33: Someone: What’s his name?
38:36: Simeon: Dr. Shrimp Puerto Rico.
38:38: [Laughter]
38:49: GM: You get back to the lab. You find Dr. Puerto Rico.
38:51: [Laughter]
38:55: GM: He’s busy at work, doing some experiments that he’s always up to. Classic Dr. Puerto Rico.
39:07: GM: You walk in through the door. He sees you, Dr. Simeon.
39:10: Dr. Puerto Rico: Oh, hello!
39:12: Simeon: I gotta show you this, and I need you to keep it quiet, okay?
39:16: Simeon: Can you keep it quiet for us? Just as a colleague?
39:18: Dr. Puerto Rico: As a colleague, of course.
39:20: Simeon: And I’m gonna ask you not to ask any questions about it until the end.
39:29: Simeon: We got this bone.
39:33: Simeon: Bakersfield? Bakersfield, you awake?
39:36: Bakersfield: Yeah?
39:37: Simeon: Could you get the bone, please?
39:40: Bakersfield: Oh. Yeah, I got it in my satchel, Dr. Shrimp Puerto Rico. There you go.
39:44: GM: There it is.
39:45: GM: Major Bakersfield withdraws the bone from his sack with a flourish and displays it to Dr. Puerto Rico.
39:57: Someone: Dr. what?
39:58: Someone else: Dr. Puerto Rico.
39:58: Someone else: Dr. Shrimp Puerto Rico.
39:59: [Laughter]
40:06: GM: He looks at it and says, “Oh my. This is… this is… what is this? Where did you find this?”
40:14: Simeon: No questions, Mr. Porto— Dr. Puerto Rico.
40:17: Dr. Puerto Rico: Oh, I mean, you should tell me something so I can understand it.
40:22: Simeon: We’re actually hoping that the origins of this bone — we’re kind of hoping that you can tell us where it came from.
40:28: Someone: We’re looking to this guy.
40:29: Simeion: We looked in the anatomy book in my extensive library, and we thought it was a human arm bone. Are we close to that?
40:39: Someone: We think it’s a lot like a human—
40:41: Dr. Puerto Rico: Here’s the thing. It’s a large glance, but from looking at it closer, there are many things about it that do not make sense.
40:52: Dr. Puerto Rico: I will… I will look behind the strange. I will take it off. I will…
41:00: Simeon: Rough estimate — how long do you think it’ll take for you to kind of identify it and get us some more information about it?
41:03: Dr. Puerto Rico: A matter of your skills should take moments. It’s very mysterious. I… I will take a look at that. I’ll… I’ll give you a call.
41:12: Dr. Puerto Rico: I just— I hate this. I hate this. I hate this bone. I hate it.
41:18: Dr. Puerto Rico: At first glance, I would say this is a human bone. But there are strange growths. What kind of a human this is from — some somebody with severe birth defects?
41:31: Simeion: What kind of human bone would you say it resembles?
41:37: Dr. Puerto Rico: So it looks like a humerus — like a human arm bone. The bone that goes from your elbow to your shoulder.
41:43: Simeion: So are you saying that this bone has been tampered with, or does it look like it’s been tampered with?
41:58: Dr. Puerto Rico: Perhaps, but I don’t know any procedure that could do this.
42:05: GM: He says if someone was able to shape the bone itself and grow it this way, they were being very creative. It was something they did. It’s just not what I came from — a procedure I am not familiar with. Things that are far beyond my capacity.
42:27: Dr. Puerto Rico: This is no ordinary arm bone.
42:30: Simeion: But you know it’s an arm bone. How confident are you that it came from a human?
42:33: Dr. Puerto Rico: I would say 100 percent, if you discount all of these strange growths.
42:39: Someone: Can you describe the growths to us?
42:42: Dr. Puerto Rico: Like it’s a… look, if I’m not making guesses as a matter of science, but it looks as if other bones have been attached to it that were not supposed to be there — like almost like joints were manufactured to attach other bones onto it, as if there were more bones attached to it.
43:05: Bakersfield: Other arms.
43:07: Bakersfield: I say we go meet back up with the other guys. Let’s rendezvous back to your house and see what the other guys have turned up.
43:12: Bakersfield: And, uh, Dr. Shrimp—
43:14: [Laughter]
43:18: Bakersfield: Sorry, Dr. Puerto Rico, please be sure to call us as soon as you uncover anything else.
43:24: Dr. Puerto Rico: All right, all right.
43:25: GM: You guys exit stage right.
43:29: GM: Okay, we’re back to Tallahassee’s house.
43:31: GM: You guys were all closer than these guys were. The university’s farther away than the police station.
43:40: GM: So are you going to show these guys when they get there, or are you going to wait for everybody to get there?
43:45: Someone: Wait for everybody.
43:46: Someone else: No, we’re showing them right now.
43:47: Someone else: Hey guys, guys, get in here.
43:49: Someone else: Yeah, absolutely wait.
43:50: Someone else: What did reveal?
43:51: [Laughter]
43:52: Someone else: No, no, you are.
43:53: Someone else: That was true.
43:54: Someone else: It’s true.
43:56: GM: But I’m freaking out of my mind, and my sanity went down a couple bits because of this.
44:01: GM: So, okay, you guys come back into Tallahassee’s house — or not going to; Tallahassee’s at the door here. It’s open. You guys are coming in.
44:07: Tallahassee: Billy and Dom, get in here. Check this out. It was crazy.
44:13: Tallahassee: I’ll tell you — that major, he lucked out. As he was falling, I believe this picture was taken.
44:22: Tallahassee: Dom, you sure you don’t remember anything from when you were walking through that house last night?
44:27: Dom: But we’re opposed to— I don’t know that I even went into the house.
44:30: Tallahassee: Like, if you look really close, you guys see what I’m saying? That ghost?
44:35: GM: As you look up and see what you see in the window, all the memories from last night come flooding back in.
44:43: GM: Dominic actually grabs his head, and you get a massive headache for a second.
44:49: GM: He’ll actually stumble down to one knee as all the memories come flooding back in from the night before.
45:14: GM: You remember going in the house. You remember sneaking up the stairs.
45:16: GM: You remember the noise from the attic.
45:18: GM: You remember pulling open that attic door, turning on that light, and looking out into the attic to see that face — this same face.
45:29: Dom: I remember seeing this face last night in the attic.
45:33: Dom: I snuck up into Bernard’s house.
45:37: Dom: I opened the attic.
45:38: Dom: I saw that face, and then it all went black.
45:42: Someone: You remember hearing the chant?
45:44: Dom: Yes.
45:45: Dom: I swear to God, I’m gonna— step—
45:47: GM: You remember turning around to see Bernard Corbitt there.
45:51: Someone: This looks like a choice bit of—
45:53: GM: He’ll stop me saying this.
45:54: GM: Professor— sorry, Dr. Simeion and Major Bakersfield arrive.
46:01: Dom: Now that I remember Bernard chanting at me, can I roll Occult to kind of see if I know the origin of such a chant?
46:13: GM: First, yeah, you can roll Occult.
46:16: GM: But actually first, more memories come back.
46:20: GM: You remember hearing Bernard Corbitt’s chanting behind you.
46:23: GM: And you guys get that picture.
46:24: Someone: Yeah.
46:25: Someone else: It’s pretty awesome.
46:26: GM: Major Bakersfield, this is the photo that you got.
46:31: Someone: I think it’s a photo.
46:33: GM: Because it’s a weird angle. You took it as you picked it up — you were looking at it, and as you were taking the picture, you started to lose your footing.
46:45: GM: You managed to set the camera off to take the photo just before you stumbled off the roof.
46:53: GM: Looking at the photo, you see a blurry image of the side of Mr. Corbitt’s house.
47:00: GM: It’s an oblique angle, as you were dropping the camera as the time was taken.
47:05: GM: The windows are dark. The sky is dark.
47:09: GM: It is blurred to the side as the camera was tumbling towards the edge of the roof.
47:16: GM: But up in the upper window that leads up to what must be the attic, you see the blurred visage of what looks like a woman’s face.
47:25: GM: Maybe she’s screaming, or maybe she’s staring.
47:34: GM: But you can make it out.
47:38: GM: There’s absolutely somebody upstairs in that attic.
47:43: GM: So, Dom. You were saying you saw this woman when you opened the attic?
47:50: Dom: So what I did is, when I crept in the back — into the kitchen through the backyard — I heard Bernard on the phone with the police.
48:01: Dom: I snuck past him up the stairs.
48:04: Dom: And I remember, as I went in, I heard a noise from the attic, so I pulled open the attic door, and there was the face staring right back at me.
48:16: Dom: And I heard a noise behind me. I turned, and there was Bernard making some sort of chant in my direction, and I felt my whole body go cold.
48:30: GM: And you remember more stuff after that about it.
48:35: GM: After your body goes cold, it seizes up, and you’re standing there stiff.
48:45: GM: And at this point things get very blurry.
48:49: GM: It’s almost like you’re looking through your eyes, but from down a dark hallway, and you’re looking through a window at the end of the hallway.
48:59: GM: And this is the only way that you’re able to know what’s happening.
49:04: GM: You can’t move. You can’t speak.
49:08: GM: But as it happens, you can make out the vague form of Mr. Corbitt coming towards you, and he looks in your eyes for a moment.
49:17: GM: And then he whispers a command to you.
49:21: GM: And you turn around, and you think down the stairs from the attic.
49:25: GM: And then he whispers another command to you.
49:27: GM: And you walk up the stairs and enter the attic, as he closes the stairs behind you.
49:40: GM: Again, everything’s blurry at this point. It’s fading in and out.
49:47: GM: You remember vaguely huddling in a corner in the attic for hours,
49:50: GM: while you heard people walking around in the house.
49:53: GM: Because you heard the back door smash open,
49:56: GM: as your friends, Major Bakersfield and Dr. Simeion, burst into the back of the house trying to find you.
50:05: GM: You remember hearing the police wandering through the house, searching the bedrooms.
50:13: GM: Nobody ever opened the attic, though.
50:16: GM: Nobody ever pulled down that fold-down staircase and looked up in there like you did.
50:27: GM: And also, you vaguely recall, just around the edges of your vision, something moving up in the attic with you.
50:34: GM: It was dark.
50:36: GM: You can’t make it out exactly, but there was something in there.
51:08: GM: Thanks for listening to this episode of The Arkham Files.
51:13: GM: If you like what you hear, show us your support by checking us out on patreon.com/thearkhamfiles and leaving us a five-star review on iTunes.
51:15: [Music]
51:41: Stinger: No psychologists were injured in the recording of this episode.