Task Force S.I.R.E.N. has never been more prepared to face their shifting, unseen enemy. They just need one final piece of the puzzle: the pinion wings. But that will require a trip back into the nightmare realm of Benjamin's apiary. And it will prove to be an ultimate test to Jay's barely suppressed fears.One mistep could ruin everything. Do they have what it takes to strike into Benjamin's domain and come out alive?
Knights of the Night
KOTN Actual Play Podcast 41: Shit Luck Ep: 42 "Once More Into the Bees, My Friends"
[music] Hello, and welcome to Night of the Night Actual Play podcast. This world of darkness, storyline, shit-lock, was written in run Fire Storyteller Scott. And now, please enjoy Chapter 14, Scene 4, titled, "Once More Into The Beast". Two quick things before we begin the show. First, I'd like to suggest you visit cootnpodcast.com, where you'll find information on our GenCon 2011 giveaway. Second, please visit RPGpoles.com, where you can take the RPG podcast listener survey for 2011. This gives all the RPG podcasts an idea of who their listeners are. All the responses there are anonymous, and the raw data will be kept in this strict disconfidence. Thank you for your time, and now, before we continue with the adventure, we'll click promo. Hi, everyone. This is Neil from the Nerd Bound podcast, the world's sexiest RPG podcast. Nerd Bound is a weekly actual play podcast featuring sessions of Dungeons and Dragons 4th edition, New World and Dark Sun campaigns, Warhammer 40K RPGs including Rogue Traitor and Death Watch, Trails Cthulhu, Wild Towns, and more. But that's not all. The podcast is literally jam-packed with sultry banter, and innuendos. In your innuendos. So if you like double entendres, ridiculous conversations, and max-maxing your entertainment, download Nerd Bound via iTunes, or your favorite podcast aggregator, or share in the fun on our forums by visiting us at www.nerdbound.com. Thank you for your time, and now, on to the adventure. This is World of Darkness story shitlock. With us tonight, starting from my left, is Mike Play, Michael Play, Bob Play, Special Agent Chew Park, Tom Play, Jay Alton, and Jim Play, and Sister Katie O'Connor. It was carrying the coin, okay, it was carrying the B relish. Michael wants the coin. I'm not kidding. Well, I'm just saying it might be, you know, for research purposes only, I'm sure. Okay, so I'll form your pile into the white unmarked van. I played the blood price for this coin, I'll be carrying it, thank you very much. Now we don't need the van, we'll drive one of our cars. All right, we'll charge her to the best car. We move the van so far as where it's out of sight, so that it's not, you know. Well, yeah, to be fair, the rectory is kind of towards the back of, or to the western, which is the back of St. Patrick's Church, so it is quite a plot where it is. That's fine. That's fine. I just didn't want it to be something that, you know, all of the people going to work at vitamin B are driving fast. So you go ahead and drive to Benjamin's in the Charger? Sure. So what are you taking with you? Smokers, the B suits in the back of the car, and the trunk. Smoker nades, the bug vacs. How about the bug spray and stuff, too? Yeah, a whole bunch of bug spray. I think we want the smokers rather, we don't want to like leave dead bees all around. Just think that would be bad. That would be one like, that's like, but if one of us gets like compromised, it's warm time. Yeah, that's always handy to have. It's the last resort. Yeah. Who's carrying, you currently have, I'm going to say, four cans of ortho, large cans of ortho remaining. They have to be four of you, but is each one carrying a can? Is that why you're going to do it? What about weapons? I don't go anywhere without my Glock. Glock and Glock only. Right. I'll have regular bullets in the gun? Yes. Chew. Two glocks, sawed-off shotgun, a Kevlar, and a smoke grenade. Okay. Luckily, that is hidden for the most part underneath the vest. The problem is going to be with the sawed-off shotgun, because you're going to have to probably carry that. You're not going to be able to wear that underneath the suit comfortably. You're wearing your Kevlar? Michael, what are you wearing? I don't want to carry unless I was issued armor, body armor, and then I don't have body armor. I mean, unless you requested it, which these two gentlemen did when you started. No. Unless we have standard field equipment or gear or something like that. Okay. Then I don't have it. That'd be more of a special. Then I'll wear my tweed. Hey, don't want to make fun of the tweed. It's tough, man. Is you with the patch, Delbose? Of course it is. You guys look like you work for me. I'm the evil scientist, and you're the muscle. Yeah, that's what happens. That's what happens. You're my passe. This is for the chosen one, right? Right. I will have my knife. Good to see you. I have a knife for it. Your knife? Good knife. Is that a butter knife? Pairing knife, man? Subtle knife. It's a subtle knife. Very good. And Kate. What are you carrying? Even though we're facing Benjamin, can we still see the picture of Jade? She's much better than Benjamin. Sorry. I know Kate too. I'm packing my knife in my pistol, and of course, one of the skinchers, whatever. Pistol packing, then. All right. It's nearly dusk. You pull onto Oreo Court. All right. We drive down the street if there's a parking in front of this house. We do so. If not, we might drive. The parking's across the street, behind the opposite side of the street. There is an opening right in front of the house. Go ahead. Do we know the nature of the coin can it only be used by one person to pass through a barrier or...? We don't know. That would be a good test. I guess my point is that, you know, if I need to lend the B relic to whomever who's going to get the B's, or is one person going or all of us are going to go? I would just like to love to stay in the car and wait for you guys to come back with these B's. I'm assuming I'm going with you. Well, I figured you're not giving up the coin, so I'll give you the B idle and then you can go to the beehive and go open the beehive with all the thousands of B's. Yeah, yeah. I get it. Well, what are you going to be doing? Watching G. I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it. You don't position. Unless you want me to, call out the coin and then I'll be more happy to get to these myself. You know how the idle works. What? Yes, I do. So maybe you should give me the coin. Again. That's the idle. I will be holding the coin. We will be going into the back of the yard and we will be achieving the B's. Okay. I'm just exercising my advice. Is that thing buzzing at all? You're idle. I mean, it's supposed to. Nah, it's fine. No time. Did I leave your pocket? Did I leave your pocket? I don't know. Are you happy to see it? What's that buzzing noise? Never mind. Oh, man. Never mind. Oh, the idle's in the other pocket. Before John became werewolf, Kibble, he was able to lead me through the maze. I'm assuming that I will be able to lead you through the maze. I think the coin hopefully will allow us to pass him into the backyard, whether that's through the maze or through the maze, like it's walking through walls or whatever it entails. There is no place. There is no place. Or if the power of the idle, since that's where I got it from, maybe it will suppress the power of the maze. If you want to be in the quarry, the chosen one or the other, we want to have to. That's what I'm hoping. That's what I'm hoping. Yeah. So, what's the plan? Are you getting dressed in front and out front in your B-suits? No. Are there any lights on at the house? Benjamin's. No. Completely dark. Oh, we can't wear the B-suits underneath the regular clothes or whatever. No. No. Again, they're pretty bulky. Really baggy clothes. Yes. As I'm going to picture a few. I'm going to get a picture of you, but you're bulky too. No. I mean, you can wear really baggy clothes over it. I mean, it would look silly. Well, as I recall, we don't have that. I really don't think you could. You don't think we can pull off a moo moo? You know, a moo moo would be. You may be moo. I'm not moo moo in anything. As I recall, the grounds of this house were pretty overgrown, so once we got it. Right. We got the side of the building, and then there's a meet there, so we can go there and get dressed. That's true. All right. Makes sense. Yeah. Does everyone have a USB headset? They probably won't work as soon as we want to. Yeah. Yeah. Let's say a prayer for us, Kate. Just going? Constantly. However, I would not stand in front of the gate because I may be shooting out of it like a cannonball. Yes. The house looks dark and sinister, and the yummy wife of Vespers. Yeah. You can't really wear something outside. A really big hood sweatshirt. All right. You guys have duffel bags that you normally carry your equipment around in when you need to move something inconspicuously, unless you're carrying your sawed-off shotgun in your duffel bag. You're probably not wearing it underneath the... Yeah. It's in the duffel bag until you have the side of the house. Okay. That's fine. So, you know, I mean, it's a typical... It's a small street oil court. The Benjamin's house is darkened. You... I don't have a big fence next to it. Right. There's big fence. There's trees overgrown. You know, the lot is incredibly overgrown. Again, it's just been four days since you last were here, three or four days. And it just looks like it's the middle of summer, and even then some. But there are lights on in other houses around the neighborhood. There's people driving and coming home from work, so, you know, you just do the best you can. I'm assuming. It's stealthily to the side of the house, or you just moving like... I would say belong. Confident. Like... Yeah, it's like one of those things where you just look like you belong there. Or there you go. All right. Go. Or that you're an official business. Right. Well, people kind of know he's a beekeeper, right? Yes. Plus, I also have an idea of like a cover story for that. We're part of a zoning commission here to investigate some of the property lines. So, don't mind us. Well, we can be... Thank you, Citizen. Don't mind us. You can be a local beekeeping society. You can just come in and make sure you can see something. It's following all the regulations. Well, just, you know, we're just... We're from the city investigating a claim due to zoning rules, and we're here to just have a conversation. Just... Here's a typical government flunky that, you know, those harmonies. You move on to the side of the house, into the cover of the overgrown trees and shrubs. The gate looks exactly the same as before. With the crest of the plantards on the gate as before. The what? The plantard family crest. The St. Clair's. You mean the St. Clair, don't you? I'm just telling you. I want you to research to tell us you that's the plantard family crest. Yeah, I know. So, I'm just... Right. Just clarify. You're at the side of the house, you open your duffel bag, you start getting dressed in the beekeeper here, is that correct? From this distance, you can, you know, low version of hearing. The biz biz biz. Do so, I hate that noise. My ear has a little itch or something in there. Right. Oh. Just look at these guys and I'll get into it, you know, like, just some bees. Right. So, I wait until they're all dressed and ready so that I have access to my gun and I can trust them. All right. You don't seem to have drawn any frontward attention, I'm putting on your beekeeper since. Is there any reaction from the bee idol? No. Right. The gate is before you, it has... As I'm getting dressed, I'm sorry, I put the coin in my hand and then put the glove over that. I don't know if it needs to be a contact or a tooth. Right. Okay. By the way, I'm doing the same with the idol. The idol is in my hand, the knife is where I can reach it, but... Well, you can't have it in your hand with having your glove on at the same time. It either is in your glove hand or you're not wearing a glove. And I am not wearing a glove having seen Mike doing this, or whatever, I remind him that Crowley had the idol in his smoking jacket, he wasn't, he wasn't having his put on. According to your notes, anyways. Yeah, but I don't know how to physically touch it. How could I have a physical touch? Not according to Crowley's writings. Nothing in the clothing, just to feel how well, how much the fucking lady you feel. Well, how about this? What I want to do is have it in my hand, the glove pulled over it, but my hand will be effectively, I want people to be used by left hand, so to speak, you know what I mean? Right. The glove is big enough that you can slide it over without putting your fingers into it. So your hand, your right hand or your left hand? Your left hand. Your left hand is going to be essentially useless and maybe penalized if anything like jumping over a fence or over a gate or something like that, you will not suffer a minus. Well, okay. Let's get in a hurry. Okay. And if we're talking about that, then what I'll do is if the situation comes out where I need my hand, I'll pull off my glove, I'll risk the exposure to my left hand, do all the B-swarming, possibly. Right. If you apply that there's a primitive B-swarming shirt, but if it comes, if I have to make the choice to use my left hand, if I have to, you know, it will take time to remove the glove to be able to make your hand useful. It's going to take a second or two to pull that thing off and in that time, there's going to be a disadvantage I'm just preparing for it so that there's no tears. What Michael. All right. Isn't that warm? Okay. Just pull it out. All right, that's my point, and given that, then I'll wear my gloves normally and I will take off my glove to touch the idol if it turns out that needs to have the... So where is that? That'll be in my pocket. Okay. I've got to be clear about that. Can I comfortably hold and fire my weapon? Oh, well I'm sorry. Put it in my mouth. Cool, bigger than that. Can you use your gun with your gloves? That's a great question. I'm going to say, based on the suits I've saw, yeah, but there's going to be a minus and it may be significant, you know, it just doesn't, you try it and you're all... Did you look at the gloves? They're like really... Super thick. Big thick. Right. So yeah, you're in the same situation, you can try to use it, but you might just be better off. You know, I'm going to assume though they're, they're, they're secreted on your person in pockets. What's your name? All right. All right. Just for the sake of conversation, I have no idea if the keeper uniforms have pockets. It would seem to be counterintuitive because you wouldn't want them getting in there, but I think for the sake of this particular operation, we're actually going to be needing things and storing things. We're going to say the... Fanny Pack. Right. We're going to make him a little... Side floor, Fanny Pack. Right. He's got a... Well, you all have your duffel bags. That's right. Which I'm assuming you are or not, except for chew, leaving it the side of the house. Well, unless we need to... No, we have your device that captures what we need, right? The band. We have the vacuums. Yeah. Right? I have one. So you guys got guns and vacuums and, you know, packed into... Well, all right. Good point. And another point of order here, Benjamin shows up. Negotiate or attack to kill? Attack to kill is a very bad idea. No. All right. Negotiate it. All right. Negotiate it. I think you meant to say attack to die. No. Attack to run. I get that impression. He's very powerful. Well, how about attack to run away in return? All the more reason why I just went and cleared it up. No, that's a good point. I think it's important. You have... Yeah. No, no, I agree. When it shows up, we've run every band for himself. No, we negotiate. Negotiate. We try to explain why we're there. And then what happens? Well, that really depends on how the negotiation goes, doesn't it? All right. Okay. Then we run away. Well, I'm sorry. So to pull out a D&D term, what's your marching order? I assume I'm going through first and I would suggest maybe hand on the back of my shoulder a chain going backwards so that I can lead you through the base. All right. Maybe contact's necessary for the calling to pass through everybody. I'll tell you what is necessary. What? A role for you to face your fears. Yes, I know that. That was when I go through the gates. Well, the hand on your shoulder is pushing you along. She was giving you a love tap. From behind. Okay. Don't fail me now. I'm going to assume that you have your duffel bag with you carrying it in your gloved hand. And you might have missed the conversation because you stepped away from the table for a second. But firing your firearm with these gloves will definitely be at a minus. So fire. Yeah. Unless it's a bazooka. Push through the gate, five dice, and one success. All right. Was that risking willpower? No, because I have five dice or I minus one. So you walk up to the gates and it's a simple hinge gate. So you lift up the securing mechanism. As far as I know the gate doesn't shut right anyway, so I just first tried to just give it a shot. Right. Actually, it had a metal like clapping device that closes it. I thought there was a lock with the lock was just, it was that. And then there's a lock that can be attached to that, but he never locks it. Okay. So he hasn't locked it. Then I do lift it up and you move through the gates with chew behind you. Who's behind you? How dark is it? Right now it's heavily dusk, so it's pretty dark. Hopefully the bees will be sleeping. They're not. Good girl. No, you can hear that. What? Sleepy. Sleepy or? Me too, Michael, and, uh, just to get you with the gun in the back of Michael's head. Just in case you get possessed, you never know. You never know. All right. You walk through the gate. Oh, shoot. You're possessed. You're evil. As soon as you become, uh, a follower of Satan. I'm not a follower of Satan here. It's to control you. I'm always not the way that is. I'm always kind of saying this fond in it. Hey, I didn't kill your character. I didn't kill Tony. So, so killing. Okay. Bargaining. That's right. That's right. Logic. Let's go. I'm through like a triangle. You walk through the gate. You make an immediate right-hand turn because it's a hedge in front of you a large hedge, right? You then move to the left and go around the bend. And sure enough, there's another bend, um, to your right again as you walk forward another five feet or so. When you turn that, it's when the maze really started to get thick and confusing and started branching off in all different directions last time. But when you turn that final corner, it opens up into the backyard. It's a corner. I pull out my shelf. It feels hot in your hand. When you turn that corner, it's as if, um, doing something. Yeah. It's doing something. And you definitely feel like almost a point of uncomfortable, but, um, you feel obviously very happy that you're not stuck in the maze at that point. A lot of my phone, um, damn touch cranes. I can't, is it working? Sorry, you couldn't and it is not. Okay. Drop it back into the pocket. That's what I thought. That's what I thought. Well, there are touch cranes and you can't activate them unless it's flush, you know? Like pick it. It's a size of a touch. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. If you look, you've got the picture of the Victorian and you've got the backyard with the paths, um, leading up to the back porch and then leading deeper into the overgrown backyard. Um, there's a shed. There's a shed back here. I think those trees. There are four pallets, uh, with, um, be, yeah, uh, basically hives, hives there, which are called, um, they look like little chicken coops, there are wooden structures that have an rack. You pull out. Yes. It's called a length stroke high. That's the type of hive that it is kind of talked about, it's worth a box and it has pieces parts that you pull out. And at this point there are bees swarming all about the, I'm looking for a Benji, our friend. Um, right. That would be the first thing. Go ahead. Everyone make you all are standing at this intersection right here in the backyard, a path going towards the back porch and a path going towards the beehive hives, um, with low shrubbery and trees along the fence line just overgrown in a major way. So one can make a perception check. Straight up. Dark. No, it's dark. So it's going to be minus two die to two dice to your perception check. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. We got high vision darkness. We were in the apartment. It was only minus one. This is darker than that. This is dusk. We got beehive time. I'm sorry. I had to say that. Well, thanks. Good point. Yeah. Let's say I didn't, I wasn't being consistently perfectly honest, but, um, yeah, I think minus one goes to the darkness is fair, uh, with a little bit of a moonlight showing and then minus one for just the back there. Yeah. Yeah. You've got. That's a good point, Jim. Nothing. Wait, wait a camera, right? That's got high vision. Uh, dude. Nothing to work it back here. That's right. Oh my God. That's right. Shh. Go ahead and make the rolls. It's subtle knife is though. Yes. Mike, we have a little ticket. You rolled two dice and you get a success? I rolled three dice. That's amazing. I got two. Oh, nice. All right. Katie's got pink dice. Those are pretty, um, yeah, it's not that's big. Benjamin is not back here. There are, however, lots of bees, um, despite the, you know, the sound of the hive. I kind of think it's coming from the boxes themselves, the inside of the, um, the hides themselves. But there are some bees flying around. What's the structure here? That's like some kind of shed greenhouse type thing. Okay. Here's the thing about, well, you're going to say something? I was going to assume that each one of the boxes have their own queen in them. And we should. Yes. I understand it. That's where I was going to go. I don't know what this, but I just happen to see a special about this, but with these kind of, uh, hive boxes, what they are is that you take the lid off and there's like racks. Uh, I think four or five racks, one was like a server, right, is pull them up like racks and, you know, the honeycomb and there's going to be tripping with honey and bees. The way to find the queen is find the biggest one and she could be on any one of the racks. I say that's going to be the most difficult. Let's start with that. Sure. Okay. Well, wait a minute, maybe, maybe logic is the other way around. If that's what stirs them all up, maybe we want to get the other ones first. Well, as I do, well, now these may be super natural, maybe you smoke the crap out of it, then you open it up and start looking around and it's good for you. Yeah. Smoke. Smoke. You smoke them. To call them. And I have in my one hand, um, smoker and the other hand, I have a bug vac. He's a really good. All right. You're going to, all right, then the racks are yours. I would say you take the lid off, set it down and then pull up a rack and look for the big queen. Sure. Someone's going to have to hold the racks up. Yeah. And you're going to smoke too? Yeah. Smoke. I can probably hold the rack up. Whatever. Cover us with your sniper rifle or whatever it is. We don't need your running like a one out of the backyard. No, basket. Keep the smoke on. I've got it. I can control, I can do this till we open covers with the ortho in case things. It really is like looking into the heart of darkness for you and putting rain to the behind. It's scary. Yeah. You actually, you know, if you want to get closer than that, that you're going to make me grow up with more minuses as you get closer. All right. You're not a watch for Benjamin. All right. Of course I am. Someone's got to watch for Benjamin. I will, I'll do that. I will sacrifice myself and do that. Okay. Rather than do that. So where are you positioning yourself to watch for Benjamin? Where is that? The house is here. Yes. That's important. And the why here. Yeah. So is this an entrance to? That's a port. So I'm going to try to pull myself between these trees to wait a minute. There's hives there. Yeah. There's hives there. I'm thinking somewhere here. No, I'm going to stay in the backyard, but I probably like over here, which takes me farther away from the hives. Yes. But it gives me and there's the sight lines, the backyard and the gate. Okay. Got it. Okay. Is there any other, there's this building too. So if I'm here, I can watch that building in the backyard. It's a good place to be. So I'm going to be right there at that. Okay. I'm not going to make you make a roll since you're moving farther from the hives. It's actually parallel to the hives. Right. It's okay. I'm probably. Against the house. Right. Go ahead and roll. I want you to roll stealth plus dexterity, please, because it wouldn't tell me you're dying. I just want to clarify one thing. I would assume that you're trying to sneak from anyone viewing you in the house. Okay. Yeah. The coin has allowed us to pass through a protective barrier, but we don't have to all cluster around J now that we're through the barrier. Right. Don't know. I guess we'll find out as soon as we separate. She and I asked her this question, Sister Katie, never knew that her ward was touched. It wasn't broken anyways, but it wasn't touched either according to her. She never got any alarm bells. Right. So we're going to assume that Benjamin isn't coming, but we're going to watch for him nonetheless. And I move into position. I've gotten my dice. Okay. It's dark. You've got some bushes, but then you have a little bit of opening around the porch, but you can kind of stay low because the porch is raised with some steps down. So I'm going to give you, um, since you're so close to the house, it would be minus two dice, but because of the cover, I'm going to give you plus two dice. Wash. Okay. Yeah. Actually, I should roll this for you. What's your. Let me dice. Yeah. Five. Five. I'm rolling it because you don't know whether someone saw you in the house. Wait a minute. Now you can use my dice. You're right. I'll use my storyteller dice. Thanks. Look at that. Oh, you know that you were stealthy. I saw the ninja. So now you're behind that overgrown hedgerow to the right or to your left of the stairway. Yeah. Okay. The back stairs. So I'm going to get check and watch. I don't know what that building is. Right. It's a greenhouse and a shed. So it has, you know, it's open with, with glass panels and it has plants, but also some utility items in there as well. So you, the three of you see Jay go into a crouch, go into a military type maneuver and move across the backyard to a position and he waves to you once he's in position, which Katie, you might not have ever saw before, but certainly chew. And Michael have both seen this and worked with you in the field before in a military tech sense. So you get the, you know, I'm in position. Go ahead and move type action from. Okay. Are we taking the bees and doing something else or are we doing stuff here and leaving? We're just harvesting them. We have the bug vacuum. We're just going to suck them up and leave. No. I disagree. I think we should, uh, extract what we need from them here and leave the bees here. Because if we take the bees off this property, the bees will follow. Well, I think the following ultimately Benjamin will, Benjamin will be angry about that. Then if we just borrow a couple of wings, especially since the power of the island and the ritual that we've talked about, the magic or whatever seems to not hurt the bees and won't kill the bees. But for some reason I get the sense that this guy Benjamin knows the name of every single bee he's interacting with. So if we were to remove them from the premises, I would think you'd call down worse trouble for us. That's just a gut reaction. You know, not based on anything other than what we've, whatever. Well, that's not even something we talked about. How are we going to get the wings off and extract the blood out of here? Well, the wind is, we bee suits on. Pull them off with what? Put your hands on well so that we have to take off here. So you really want to do this here? I'm like, I'm not even going to get the blood out of the queen. You guys are really outstanding role players and, you know, strategists. You don't want to do this back up. My plan was to take the bees out. And now you're telling me you don't want to do that here? I thought the whole plan was just to get in and get the bees get out and we'll do our thing. Yeah. Who has the needle? It's going with the needle. How are you Lucius? Lucius. Lucius is, you know, back home, Brisbane, watching the videotape and, you know, handling his beak down from yesterday. God damn doctor, but, you know, there's someone else that has a needle, but he doesn't like bees. So what, so we can't even talk about this right now because he's over there or over here. Well, push. Oh, you can't push talk. No. No, it's a backyard. We can, you know, shot. Yeah. Yeah. That's not good. You could go like this and wave me towards you. All right. You know what? Yeah. I'm going to go like this. Let's, let's harvest the bees, take them over here or whatever away from all these other bees. Hide whatever the hell they're called. What's the official term for them? You're close to us. Okay. We're going to go over there and then we'll do it there and then let them go in the wild if you're so scared about your man. Just be clear. Are you talking about, let's take him outside of the barrier? No, just take him over here close to the barrier. Okay. So we're still within the barrier when we do this. I don't know. She was, what you're trying to say is that you're, you're not visible from the house. You're, you're like against the slip right at the corner of the house where it's tough to see you. Is that what you're trying to go for? I'm going closer to the exit farther away from the rest of the highs. Okay. Laying stroke. Hives to be specific. The whole move in the queen. They're going to be the height. It's warm bees. They'll follow the queen. You bring the queen to be over to anywhere in the rest of the bees. Hey, I might be able to stick a needle into the queen bee, but there's no way I'm going anywhere in those hives. Well, there's actually a couple of years old. Hopefully with the smoke we can. Well, you know, if we have. Well, no, because they can't actually turn them on. After the smoke, so. I'd say fair. You shouldn't talk right now. Because you're coming over. Well, I'm just saying if they're going like this and waving me on. Yeah. Right, I understand that and I'm just saying but you can't really because you can't really. I'm just saying if they're going like this and waving me on. I am. Right. I understand that. And I'm just saying, but you can't really. I'm going to get a button up like clear that I'm not going over. Right. Exactly. Let's go and choose plan of. Let's collect the bees. Collect what we think is the queen. Move over to the side where away from the hives. So Jake and. Here's what I. Perform the flabotomy. I would say. Is there nothing else? It's like just Japanese. It's okay. If you want to do the wing thing and let the live bees go all the way with the heat flater. Taking them out first. No. But getting the queen thing. If you're going to bring it over to him and say here, stick it in on the queen and take some blood out or whatever. That's got to be done. Ask your queen. Take the blood out. The queen back right away. Before everything starts moving around. From what we read. I think it mentioned taking. Drop. No. The wings. I mean, don't they have multiple sets of wings? They don't want you to pull all the wings off of one bee. We need 22 pairs of wings. From 11 vessels. From 11 vessels. But I think they have multiple sets of wings. No. No. We need two wings from each bee. Well, that's one point. Does that one be here? No, bees have two wings. Well, wasps and dragonflies and others have. Make an intelligence plus academics or animal kin role, please. I've found one. Yes. Intelligence plus that academic. Or academics if two don't have that. No, no, no. How many dice do you have? Oh boy. Three. There's something for it. Are you using academics or animal kin? I'm using academics. Minus two dice. What's that? Minus two. What's success? Oh. You don't have to subtract any dice because you're using animal kin. Okay. What's success? I have academics. Nothing. I'm not even trying. Okay. So both Kate and two agree that there are two sets. There's a set of wings that they fly with. And there are two smaller, very, very small sets of wings on the back of them, which are more for, like almost like a rudder on a ship. And those are a second set of wings that are on bees as well. They're very much smaller and not the major, quote unquote, you know, the things that you would see if you were watching a bee with your eye. You could still see the small ones, but not nearly as good. That's a good bar back because I would have lost that bet. All right. So I think the two larger ones is what we need to get from each one. Yes. Those are called opinions, right? Well, pinions are actually wings. Wings in feathered birds. They were speaking in a middle, you know, middle ages type tongue when they said the pinions and then Crowley copied off of that and used that same term. So yeah, you don't know. Okay. But I thought one of the definitions of opinion was the feathers of a bird that allow it to fly and that removing the pinions of the bird would then prevent them from flying, which contradicts exactly. And you know what? Right. Yeah. From my point of view, I've never stated that the bees would be able to fly once you're done yanking their wings off them. Is that something about that? The whole idea? That was it. They have a flower only. The whole idea of this band is to keep the queen from flying away. So if you rip the wings off the bees, you keep the bees from flying. Hence, keep the queen from flying. I think it's part of the band. And keep it rounded. It's ripping the wings off. Okay. All right. Nice. And? What do you do about how she says? The three of you walk up to the hive and there are bees swarming around. Right. Not a lot. Right. It's dusk. But there are still some flying around. You hear a nice humming noise inside the hive. Is there most of the bees seemingly are inside. There's certainly a last time you were here. Or those of you who were. And I think it was just you. You actually. Yeah. But you probably told the story. There were a lot more bees out and about the last time you were here. They were crawling all over. Yeah. Crazy stuff. So you walk up to there in your soups. And they certainly, you know, some of them are bouncing off of you and they're moving around in an agitated type manner. Who starts smoking? Yeah. We'll start. All right. The smokers are, there are four different hives. Which hives or hives are you smoking? The one closes to the gate. Okay. I think we smoke them all and then doubly smoke the one we're going to open. Just call them every way to suck and then go for one and open it up. You have three smokers. Katie suggests that. Anyone buying that? I don't see one of them. Yeah. I'm going to try to suck up some of the bees that are flying around with the bee back. Just. Yes. To get them right here. What's your dexterity plus athletics? It should be a little crack on the bottom of the hive. While he's doing that, the first part, what are you doing, Katie? I'm smoking the other hive. I'm smoking the hive that he's sucking and then going to the other hive. He's not sucking a hive. He's doing the air right now. But what are you doing? I'm smoking all the hives. Trying to call them all. All the hives. What are you doing? I'm smoking. The hives or this hive in particular? I'll smoke this for the first hive. Okay. We're going to be going for it. Okay. So he focuses on the first hive, smoking it really good. I'm assuming you're also smoking that hive as you're trying to suck some out of the air. And Katie, you move down to the second, third, and fourth, trying to give it smoking as well. Can you tell me if there's a square or, yeah, it's mostly a square like shade. Where are you smoking? All right. Probably two or a couple of pots in the crack where they come in and out of to get it into the hive. Okay. And then open up the top. There's like four corners that have small openings. Yeah. You could pull the smoke around the opening and go to the next one. Okay. So what's your dice pull for dexterity plus athletics? It's five. Five. All right. Because of the difficult nature of, you know, these aren't moving quickly at this point before they get smoked, it's minus three dice. And because of the suction power of the device meant more for stationary B than one flying and moving actively against its flow, I'm going to give another minus die. So it brings you down to one die, which is not a chance die. It's just a regular die. Stop. Zero dice is a chance die. Go ahead. If you said that these were kind of flying around us and we're on our outfits, why don't you just. No, I said they were bouncing. They don't actually land in your outfits. They're bouncing off your mask. Go ahead. No. Okay. So you give a couple of attempts and realize this isn't quite going to work. I'll just do it in the hive. Whether they're all clustered together. Okay. So Michael and yourself focus on the hive. How many pups? You know, how long are you taking to smoke? Good. Thirty seconds. Okay. I'm not sure how efficient these smokers are. So there's plenty of smoke. Their hand held is not huge, but there's a pretty good puff coming out. After thirty seconds, you're still hearing some buzzing and there's still a few bees flying about. So do you go longer than thirty seconds? The equipment that we have, would it have instructions on it like with recommended dosages or recommended times or whatever like that? There are. You're however, can I see them in the darkness? If you want to light something. Have you thought of that beforehand? Give it another thirty seconds. Please make a perception check. We're on to find some lightning. In spite of across the rain. Five dice and I rolled one success. Doesn't seem to be any movement in the house, still. Okay. And you thought for a second you saw some movement in the shed, but it actually was a little chipmunk moving through the undergrowth, which just startled you a bit. But so another thirty seconds go by. You continue to smoke with Michael, double smoking the first of the hives. And Katie, you continue on the other one to just try to calm them as best you can. Then what happens? I think we're good here. You want to lift it up? Right. With one hand smoking the other? I don't know how to do this. Hold on. I guess I can set the smoker down and then lift up the lid. As he's lifting it up, I'm also smoking the inside of this portion. Okay. You do that as you lift it up. A couple of bees come out, but you're noticing definitely a reduction of the speed that they're moving at and their aggressiveness. It seems as if the smoke is definitely paying off. And I'm going to suck up. Actually, you're looking at five sets of wooden slats, like wooden racks, two inches thick, two inches thick all the way across this particular area. You don't see any, there's no bees crawling on the outside of this wood. You want to lift up a... Yes, I will pick the first rack and pick up. Alright, he lifts up the first rack, and there are a group of bees in there, much more plastic now as you can tell. They're no longer pleasant. I suck them up, so I make sure I get at least 11, you know, more is better. Big one. Right. It should be about the size of the thumb. There's probably about maybe 12, 15, it's hard to guesstimate based off of that, so you go ahead and start sucking them up. You're also sucking in some honey and some of the comb. Sure. You're being rough and quick, I'm assuming, with it in the pale moonlight. So you go ahead and accomplish that, and the wind picks up a little bit. What do you do now? Until I mean by the wind picks up a little bit is the wind starts to blow your smoke a little bit off course as the wind picks up. Just like a breeze, it catches up a good breeze, and it kind of pushes it away. Well, I'm going to have the smoker in my other hand and apply more smoke. Right. You're pumping that baby a lot, so what happens at this point? I tell Mike to pick up the next panel. And Mike? I'm putting up the next panel. I'm all right. Too weird. That's why I didn't heal that smoke. I think I just swallowed a bee. Again, somewhere around 15, 20, 30, tough to tell in the darkness. This one's kind of definitely more movement and more activity. Still calm, but a lot of like writhing bodies moving on this one. And none of them in the moonlight that you have, you're working off the ambient light. None of them look like a queen. Okay. Next panel. I'm going to suck up a few more just to make sure I have at least 11. And that bee sucked up in the device. Prime from the third rack. You looked up the third rack and on this rack, it's just packed. I mean, it was actually hard, Michael, with one hand to lift it up. And you noticed that you do not feel any type of buzzing or any type of reaction from your idol at this point. But in the middle of just this writhing mass of bees is a very large, like a little bit larger than, you know, those typical bumblebees. A little bit larger than that, even. This massive sized, for me, to your eyes, bee. Something that isn't going to get sucked up by one of the little bug suckers? Sure. Do you want to suck it up or just jam it? I'm going to suck some blow. I started smoking the crap out of that massive writhing mass of bees. Alright, so you put the smoker in there and you start, you know, doing it over. Do you have something you want to say, Michael? Well, I could, you know what, I hand Mike the smoker I have and then pick the one up off the ground that he plays there, so we have two smokers. Okay. To just smoke the crap out of him. Okay. Yeah, we'll, we'll do that and try to make him docile. I'm just trying to think of, you know, is it just your cup it in your hand? You take your, your Leatherman tool and get the, you know, your gentle plier. I don't know how you do this without it. I don't know, let's just get this queen first. Okay, we're going to smoke the hell out of him. You smoke the hell out of him and they're still writhing about and you both can make a intelligence. Intelligence plus, again, let's go with, since you guys don't have animal, and all can go with academics. Okay. And subtract two dollars because of the esoteric nature of this thing. Mike, you guys are not. Yeah. Well, she was over making sure the other ones that we're going to react, right? Okay. I just want to make sure. So not quite. Yes, one. No, that's not my mojo. And they're probably talking in hush tones, I'm thinking, you know, like, they're not talking in this type of voice, like I'm giving you right now. It's much more hush. You believe that you now recall, um, to that when they get smoked, they actually start to eat the honey and the honeycomb because they think that they're going to be, they're going to lose their hives soon to a fight. Oh, and they're going to move the everything. Yeah, they're going to move. They might as well destroy it, eat it, get as much nutrients as they can before moving this comes back to you in a flat. You understand now why these bugs are, you know, moving about in seemingly not just docile and sitting there. They're actually feeding, trying to store and get that energy. They're going to have to, they think they're going to have to start a hive all over again. Can I see the queen bee at all? Oh, yeah. You can see her. Can I try to suck her up with the vacuum? You certainly can. Okay. So you put the vacuum to her and she, at first, it's like a little bit of resistance and then she comes into the, you know, the bee catcher. And at that point, all the lights in the house go on and they're going to stop the beer tonight. Damn. What? Thanks for listening to the nights of the night at actual play podcast. Visit KOTN Podcast.com for more information on this and other adventures where you'll find character stats, photos, storytelling, props, and even a form for comments and suggestions. Or you could email us directly at feedback@kotnpodcast.com. Or contact us via Twitter or leave a message on Facebook. All music for this podcast was created and performed by Zen Audio Smith. If you'd like custom professional music created for your podcasts or business, please visit ZenaudioSmith.com. And please join us next episode for more mystery and adventure. I'll cover you guys go. There's no fucking way I'm going to touch these bees. All right. I'll lift the lid. You smoke. You suck. I'll wait a minute. I'm sucking. I was lifting the lid. Yes. Yeah. Who's smoking and who's sucking? Bob. Wait. All you're going to do is lift the lid.