406: Pain

Synopsis

The episode picks up where 405: Be Sensible left off. After two to two and a half hours of searching the police records, Billy, Dr. Simeon and Tallahassee finally pull a card whose fingerprint swirl matches the one from the dead man. The picture on it looks like the man the group found that morning, though the body was more decrepit, and the Keeper describes him as young with brownish blonde hair. The card names him as Harman Vance, and the table keeps joking that he is "Vance Refrigeration." The Keeper says that the arrest was three years earlier, in 1922. The address on the card, 611 Watley Street, is where the group found him, and the card lists known associates, namely the O'Malleys and Sheamus O'Malley of the O'Malley crime family. The Keeper adds that O'Malley's is also a pub downtown. Billy says they cannot take the card and writes down the pertinent information instead, then puts it back and says he has to pass some information to Detective Crane before they go so he does not get into any more trouble. His friends leave through the side door past the records clerk, Sarah, who is passed out at the desk with an empty bottle of ranch. Billy goes back to his desk, gathers what he has there, and flips off the closed door of Captain Renz before running out. The captain calls him a "loose cannon." The three head for Pizza Dragons to compare notes with the others.

Meanwhile, Dom Druncard and Major Bakersfield are in Raymond Goddard's house with an unconscious Devin Black when there is a knock at the door. The Major carries Devin into the hallway and lays him on the stairs, and Dom answers the door with his hand on the gun in his pocket. The caller is a friendly man in his 30s in shorts and a polo shirt, Bryce Gantt, a neighbor from across the street. He says that he has not seen Ray around and that he could have sworn he heard screaming from inside the house. Dom tells him that Mr. Goddard is back from his holiday and wants his new furnishings and that furniture fell on a tender part of the body. A Charm roll gets an extreme success, and Bryce asks if he can help, gives his name and says that he lives right across the street. Dom shuts the door on him, and the Keeper says Bryce is only looking at the door jamb wistfully because he wants to keep chatting. The table decides that there is no use in bringing Devin along, and he is left tied up in the house.

Before they leave, Dom slaps the Major in the face over how he treated Devin. The Major tries to block the slap, but Dom gets a bonus die for hitting him on the blind side and succeeds. Dom says "What in the hell is the matter with you?" The Major says that Dom's way was not working and that they got the answers they needed, and that he never meant to murder Devin, who works for Goodman Gray, just to press him. Dom says "That look in your eye fooled me" and that he will keep watching him, and that he hopes the Major will stop him if he ever does the same. The Major argues that they have done worse, and brings up what they had to do to Mary from the diner. Dom says he is sure neither of them wants to do that again, which is his whole point. Outside, the Keeper describes an ordinary, idyllic middle-class street, with Bryce nodding and waving from across the road, and the feeling that the group can never be one of those people again. They drive in silence to Pizza Dragons, where Denny nods them toward their usual corner table. When Billy, Dr. Simeon and Tallahassee arrive, the Keeper asks Simeon to roll a d10 for something he forgot earlier, and notes that the Major has a welt of four fingers across his bad eye. Billy tells them that the captain gave him flak over the group's shenanigans and pulled him off the Radio Man case for no reason, that something suspicious is going on there, and that they need to be more covert. Billy notes that the chief is the one the mayor appointed and could lean on the captain. The Major tells them about their visit and says that the mayor and Goodman Gray are definitely involved. Dom says that they will not tell the others about the torture or the tying up, only that they leaned on Devin Black and that he went pale when they mentioned Goodman Gray. Simeon rolls Psychology and the Keeper says that everything Dom says is the honest truth. The Major shows the octopus dog tag, which the group recognizes from Goodman Gray's crew in New Jerusalem. The table shares everything it knows, including the autopsy and the identity of the Radio Man. A player wonders whether the spiders from the other world stabbed him and offers to compare scars with the autopsy, and the Keeper reminds them that the coroner said the man was stabbed while still alive but died of exposure. They list their leads: Harman Vance's address on Watley Street, the O'Malleys, the hospital and Dr. Doyle, and the "ferryman" and "boaters" the hobos talk about. The Keeper asks whether there is any way to get to the mayor, and the table jokes about breaking down his door. The group splits up. Billy and Dr. Simeon go to the hospital, with Simeon saying that it is a safer bet for him, and Dom, the Major and Tallahassee go to O'Malley's. They plan to meet at Dr. Simeon's house in two hours.

At the hospital, in the evening with the autumn dark coming on, the front-desk nurse, Nurse Witherspoon, is one Billy and Dr. Simeon recognize from the first case in Mister Corbitt. Her name tag says Witherspoon, and Billy greets her as "nurse with a spoon." She says that she does not remember him, though Dr. Simeon introduces himself as Billy's psychologist, and then says that she does remember him. Billy jokes about jumping off a building, and she says that she cannot believe he would make such a joke after what happened with Dr. Doyle, who fell off the hospital roof. The Keeper reminds the two that the papers a few weeks earlier carried a story about a doctor who killed himself by jumping off the roof of Arkham Hospital. Billy apologizes, and the nurse says he was a dear friend and that Dr. Doyle would never take his own life. She says they worked together for 15 years and that he was the head administrator. She says that he started looking more tired and wrung out after she last spoke with Billy, around the events of the Miskatonic Mangler, that he seemed stressed and panicky a few weeks earlier, and that she thinks he may have gone up for fresh air and fallen. A Persuade roll gets her to say more: when she saw his body outside after the fall, it looked terrible and wasted away, as if he had aged between when she last saw him and then and was suddenly a hundred years old. Nobody new had come into his life that she knows of, and Mrs. Doyle said that everything was fine at home. Billy asks whether the mayor was one of his patients, and she says that Dr. Doyle did not take patients because he was an administrator. Billy asks to look at Dr. Doyle's office, but she says that they would need a warrant and that medical records are protected. After a hard Persuade from Dr. Simeon, she agrees to let them look as long as she can be there, and she unlocks the office but says they may not open any of the filing cabinets. As the group starts searching the office, one player rolls Spot Hidden and fails, and another gets a hard success. The episode ends there.

Funny Moments

Dom's story to Bryce Gantt is that furniture fell on a tender part of the body and that "It was a scream of pain." Bryce had suggested that someone dropped furniture "on your little tootsies."
After Dom shuts the door, the Keeper has Bryce's eyes trail along the door jam as if he wants to keep chatting. He calls out "Toodaloo," and Dom says it back.
A player describes giving the Major the side eye, and says he does not notice because it is on his eyepatch side. Dom slaps him on his blind side, the Keeper gives Dom an experience check for trying it, and a player says "Slap him right in his bad eye."
At Pizza Dragons the Keeper asks the Major why he has four fingers slapped across his bad eye, describing a welt across his face.
The records clerk, Sarah, is passed out at the desk with an empty ranch bottle, and a player says "She's in ranch land."
Billy flips off Captain Renz's door, and the Keeper shouts through it as the captain.
The table keeps calling the dead man "Vance Refrigeration," and the Keeper says "I knew you guys were going to say Vance refrigeration."
Players compare the autopsy with scars from the spiders in the other world and warn "seriously guys don't go to that place."
As the group splits up, the Keeper has everyone put their hands in the middle of the table. A player starts a cheer, another says "with our powers combined," and a third quacks, and one says "We create Optimus Prime." Denny says "guys, guys."
Billy greets the nurse as "nurse with a spoon," and says she should remember him from the police department.
Told that Dr. Doyle's death was "all over the papers," Billy asks whether he fell on some papers, and then whether he fell onto some papers.
Dr. Simeon says that he is Billy's psychologist, that Billy is seeing him every week for a couple of hours and that he has seen some things.
When a player asks the nurse whether she is single, she says she is Mrs. Witherspoon, and then asks "How married do you want me to be?"

Notable Quotes

"I could have sworn I heard some screaming coming from inside the house." —Bryce Gantt
"Furniture fell on a tender part of the body." —Dom Druncard
"You're a loose cannon." —Captain Renz
"What in the hell is the matter with you?" —Dom Druncard
"I'm just really good at acting." —Major Bakersfield
"You tortured a man for information." —Dom Druncard
"I think that's a safer bet for me." —Dr. Simeon
"Dr. Doyle would not kill himself." —Nurse Witherspoon
"I am the law." —Billy