Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. With the price of just about everything going up during inflation, we thought we'd bring our prices down. So to help us, we brought in a reverse auctioneer, which is apparently a thing. Mint Mobile unlimited, premium wireless! Get 30-30, get 30, get 30, get 20, 20, get 20, get 20, get 20, get 20, get 15, 15, 15, just 15 bucks a month, so... Give it a try at mintmobile.com/switch. $45 up front for three months plus taxes and fees, promote rate for new customers for limited time, unlimited more than 40 gigabytes per month, slows, full turns at mintmobile.com. You are listening to the new mutual audio network. Welcome home. The following audio drama is rated PG for parental guidance. [Music] R to the north in a place of always snow. There is a village, and in that village. Despite what you might think, it's not the sonic society, the world's weekly showcase of modern audio drama. I'm Jack Ward, and with the jazzy fellow who is David Alt, whose instrument of his voice has entertained hundreds of thousands through the years, we have an unusual entry this week. Yes, well hello everyone, and good morning. The instrument in my voice, that just brings back another 9 o'clock news sketch of Rowan Atkinson saying, "I am a mime. My body is my tool." [Laughter] Oh brilliant, yes, but yeah, so Jack, you must be speaking of this week's feature, Winterfest, from Story Jazz, who contacted us through Reddit. Yes, I rarely get to go through Reddit. It was a pleasure to chat with Sam and Softy, guys, to get this show to you. It's more of an audio-fictional jazz piece, and it's great to see people engaging with Story whatever way you do it. Absolutely, and the feature begins right now and right here. On the sonic society. [Music] Far to the north, in a place of always snow, there is a little village, and in that village, the Winter festivities have just begun. Around the first bend, we see a little Clarice Thomas, and she's on her skates, and she's pushing fast. She's catching up to the little girl ahead of her, Brittany, Brittany, she's in the lead. She's been in the lead every year since the last few years, but the race is tight, the race is close. We have little Clarence. Clarence is Clarice's brother, of course, and he's catching up to her. They're neck and neck. They're neck and neck now, and as they fast, as they pass the second bend, they're pushing, they're pushing, they're getting close. They're getting close, and who's that behind? Who's that behind? That must be... Alright, give me a name. Uh...oh, God, Cookieface Miguel. Okay, and that's what we got to push up behind is a Cookieface Miguel. Cookieface, of course, is a baker's son. I'm sorry for that name. His name is not actually Cookieface, but everybody in the town calls him that. Nobody knows his real name, so he's pushing up from behind. He's coming up. He's fourth now. He's pushing fast. He's pushing fast, Clarice of Clarence. I think I messed up one of those names, but he's pushing up. He's coming up fast, and he's catching up to Brittany Britneyson. She's pushing ahead. He's looking back at him, but Cookieface Miguel is taking over. He's pushing ahead. He's coming up, and the final turn. The final turn. Who's going to make it? Who's going to make it? I can't see. I can't see. People are standing and cheering. I can't tell who's going to win. Who's going to win the race? Somebody down there on the line. Tell me who won. I guess we'll have to wait until the middle of the episode to find out who won the race. Welcome to Storyjazz, everybody. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to Storyjazz, to our Winter Holiday episode. Jingle-ing-ling. This is Chris, this Winter Holiday bells. Oh, God, you are almost left up already. We're 10 seconds in, and I almost already said the C word. As you can see, we're trying to tell a Winter Holiday celebratory story that is not inherently religious or hypercultural in nature to make this accessible for everyone. And it's sort of a challenge to ourselves to make this approachable, and maybe immortal and that. We should probably just bleep all, traditionally, Christmasy stuff. In a really aggressive way, so it sounds like we're talking about something completely different. Yes, yes, exactly. It's the bleep holiday. Yeah, I mean, I think this is a great idea. We get to totally open up our minds and create a new Winter Holiday scenario. And I got to say, I am as unprepared as I've ever been, to be honest, which is a good thing because actually we've asked our audience to help us prepare this time, which we're going to explain sort of what we did and what we received for our future listeners who maybe weren't able to participate because they weren't aware of the show. Also, future listeners, we love you. We love you. We had two opportunities for our listeners to interact. One was for them to vote on a crucial story element, and one was for them to submit pieces of a imaginary Winter Holiday. Rituals, decorations, snacks, possibly. Exactly. So we were looking for both an exciting, challenging, odd piece of crucial story element and some insight into what people value about the Winter Holidays. So for our crucial story element, the poll was between fried pickles and a VW-like hippie van, right? Yes. And of course, fried pickles won. Which I actually came up with both of them, but I think that I was more partial to the fried pickles anyway. I mean, I don't really know what that is because I do not live in the Southern United States or wherever fried pickles are a thing. Well, you also didn't know what Pozole was, and we made a whole story that was about it. We sure did. Oh my God, I should have researched fried pickles before this. No, no, no, no. I need you in your mind's eye to create fried pickles and use that as your source of inspiration. And it may be completely different from what actual fried pickles are, but that's okay. I still love you. So aside from our poll in which now we have to make sure fried pickles are a central crucial story element of our upcoming story. We also asked people to submit rituals, foods, just like Sam just described about Winter Holidays that make them feel special and important. And Sam, do you want to? I wrote them all up on my whiteboard back here. Which no one can see. Which no one can see because this is an audio medium. But in short, we've got some Eldritch gods up there. We got some edible snow that's like marshmallow snow. We got a reindeer piñata that you dance around and then snacks come out. Squirrels and cucumbers and winter witches. So we're going to see how we can work these ideas in. I also think that we might just, when we manage to work them in, sort of go, hey, and that idea was submitted by such and so. Maybe we do this in the ad break. I don't know. Let's just try to work with what we got. For all you new friends, just joining us for the first time. Hello, welcome. Thank you. This is a completely improvised show, which is why it's so janky and lovely and lovable. We're going to start with a scene and just improvise a story about winter holiday spirit from scratch. Welcome, everyone to Story Jazz. In a village deep in snow, a race has just taken place at an ice skating rink, right? Sitting on the edge of the racetrack is a middle-aged woman. She's got a cup of hot chocolate in her hand. She's poured a bit of a bit of schnapps into it when no one was looking out of a flask in her pocket. And she's watching the kids funnel onto the racetrack and cheer for cookie-faced McGill and Brittany Brynison. The actual winner of the race hasn't yet been determined, but everybody's excited nonetheless. A middle-aged man approaches pushing his way through the bleachers to sit down next to this woman, and hands her a little paper cup full of wintry snacks. Oh, thank you. I didn't know there were any left. Oh, one, he says. You won? Oh, no, who won? Oh, who won? I don't know. I'm honestly surprised that with his short, stubby legs, cookie-faced actually made it this far this year. Well, stubby legs are really very helpful when you are on the ice. You know, it can help to accelerate if you got the right technique. It's really hard to understand him through his massive beard. I'm actually pretty sure that you're entirely incorrect about that, but I'll accept your wisdom nonetheless. I used to skate a lot when I was a little boy. I know it don't look like it, but I did. Again, I'm almost certain you're lying to me. Was the line long the snack stand? No. And she looks over at the snack stand, and there are about two dozen people in line. You know, I think this is my least favorite holiday tradition. What little the concert lying? It's live's day, baby. The bearded man just chuckles deeply into his beard, or maybe he said something. It's hard to tell with him. Can you give us a description of the middle-aged woman? Yeah, she's maybe 5'11". She's quite a tall woman. She's got knee-high, thick wool socks and long boots that come probably mid-calf with heels, but thick heels that show it wouldn't get stuck in the snow or mud. She's got a pleated skirt with another pleated skirt over at the kind. A double layer that you would wear when it's cold out. And she's got her legs crossed and sort of a big, frilled wool coat on. And she's clutching her mug of spiked hot chocolate, which she has yet to drink. What's her name? Her name is Madeline Thompson. And she is Clarice and Clarence's mother. Nope, aunt. And she's not as invested in their winning because of it, but of course she will show up to support her niece and nephew. So, um, Madeline, would you catch Join Me for a walk now that the race is done? Oh, you aren't going for a walk, I take it? Well, I would still like you to join me. Wait, so are you doing this thing where you lie constantly or are you not? Yes, I am not. So you're saying you would like to go for a walk alone? I am asking you if you'd like to join me. One cannot. One can only lie through questions. Ah, okay. That took a while for me to grasp. Okay. This is still Madeline's voice. This is still Madeline's voice. Okay, I just got okay. I'm going to walk over there and like do a little walk through the park. And if you just so happy happening to be walking there too, then we can walk in close proximity to one another, huh? And she gets up clutching her hot chocolate and her cup of still undefined winter treats and walks off toward the park. I'll go this way, and he points away from her and then walks with her. Madeline and the bearded man walk away from the skating, ice skating rink. Is it a rink track leaving all the hustle and bustle and confusion behind? We still hear the reporter over the loudspeaker is going. I still can't see anything and we still don't know who is one. There seems to be a lot of commotion around me. That is all I can see. They really should have built my reporter's booth higher up. And as Madeline and this man, who is named Lehman Markovitz crunch up through waist high snow. Well, there's there's a path cut before them shuffled open, but around them, the snow is waist high. Like a maze, like a corn maze or something. Yes, there is a there is a snow maze, a waist high snow maze cut out that leads away from the ice skating circle. You can mark me a maze, wow. As soon as they feel like they've acquired some privacy, they hold each other's hands. I am very excited for your position in this year's celebration. What you don't want me to, you don't want me to participate? What's what's wrong? I want you to participate, but I, I, this is really hard to do, like on a spot. Yeah, you do be lying though, are we committing to this bit? I don't. I think we are. I think we have to. We are at this point. We might as well, right? It's different for out, baby. God. I'm excited, just not nervous. Okay, so you're not excited. You're nervous about my participating in the festival? He nods and says no. Suggestures you're allowed to not lie. Okay. Um. Gestures are speech. Right. Oh God. Oh, I'm sorry listeners, this is a really, really brain intensive episode, maybe we just get rid of lemons soon. No, no, I love him. How do you feel? Are you ready? Yeah, I think so. I think I'm just going to improv most of it. I do wonder though, what the whole decoration process is going to be like. What do you mean? As you know, I've been to every festival every year, so I know exactly what's going to happen. Yeah, yeah, I know. Well, there's this huge like decoration process that's a lie, right? So he's never used to any of them. He has no idea. Okay, cool. Yes. I got it. Right. I'll repeat everything and explain it as if you had never been to one of our festivals. I don't appreciate this. I don't. So here in wintering in, we have a very peculiar tradition for the winter holidays. So it involves lots of cake and that cake needs to be decorated. And over the past few decades, my, well, my sister used to do so. And I always felt sort of inept at all things aesthetic. So I never felt like I could participate in the decoration process. So going into this now, decorating these cakes, I'm assuming that it will go really awfully. So I feel like it's going to be really liberating to embrace failure and just pretend that I'm doing like abstract art and like, you know, sort of like a modern art thing where the cakes are more or less undecorated or partially smushed. They're really big. You know, you have to like use a ladder to climb on top. So I'm basically saying, I've given up on any hope of doing well. Well, you must remember that the physical beauty of the cake contributes greatly to its taste. Yeah. That's exactly. Oh, right. You're lying again. Okay. Thank you. So helpful. You know, the tongue is the the taster and the eyes are not involved in the tasting process. You know, even the ugliest cake could taste terrible. That's not even a lie. That's just right. Let me say that correctly. Yeah. Um, when you see the ugliest cake, you know, exactly how it's going to taste. Exactly. Right. That seems to make sense. Oh, hey, look, here's the exit. And somehow just casually on the side, they've made it through the little snow maze and are now approaching a little like wooded field and out of nervousness, they let go of each other's hands. Oh, it's possible that somebody is watching the trees around here are ever greens, right? It doesn't make sense for any other type of tree to be green right now. And they have little fruits dangling from them. I little pair sized strawberries that hang from the trees and seem to glow with multicolored lights. Is this allowed or is this too Christmassy? I just had the idea for like glowing Christmas. You said the forbidden word. You said the forbidden word. No, we're just going to bleep it out. Okay. Yes. Is it allowed? This is too bleepy. I don't really like bleeping anyway. I think that fruits like evergreen fruits, glowing evergreen fruits is lovely. Great. But neither Maddie nor Lehman have been to this particular house before. And the tales of the Christmas maze, the amazing Christmas maze. These tell of strange houses appearing where they never once were. Wait. There's a house? I thought you said there was a house. There's a wooded field is what I said. Okay. So in between the evergreens with their glowing fruit is a small house smoke curling up from the chimney. And the flickering lights in the window tell tale of a fire warm on the inside. And Madeline frowns and says, I didn't know there was a house here. Did we get out the right exit of the maze? I've seen this house before. You have? Oh, right. You're still doing your tradition. In that moment, the front door of the house opens and a small figure comes shuffling out with a covered tray in their hands. In the darkness and just the glow of the tree fruits, it is impossible to make out who this figure is, but they seem to be putting out a tray of sweets to cool in the wintery night air, small slivers of cucumber with little marzipan squirrels on top. Oh, hey, there you go. As the figure puts the tray down, they look up into the tree and wave at the tree. Madeline looks up and sees two little snow squirrels, fluffy white creatures that look quite like their little marzipan counterparts, look down at the cucumbers, and then scamper off. Excuse me, miss, miss, Lehman says, raising a hand. The figure looks over at the two of them and a startled upright runs inside the house and slams the door. I hate these, I don't want any. Madeline chuckles, but also walks forward and wants to examine the tray, but as she approaches the house, a low rumbling starts as if in the ground beneath her feet. The lights in the house start to flicker, and then the lights on the trees, the glowing fruits themselves, start to flicker as well. She reaches out instinctually and grabs Lehman by the hand. The house shakes and quakes and shakes off flakes. For a moment, it looks like it's made of some sort of edible material, some sort of bread of ginger, some sort of bread of ginger, and then all at once the house collapses and floppens and disappears into the ground as if it never was there, just a small clearing, amidst an orchard of glowing raspberry trees. I thought it was strawberries, glowing strawberry trees, nothing left but a small table and a tray of cucumbers with little marzipan squirrels on top. Madeline blinks. Did you see what I just saw? And she looks at Lehman. No. It's kind of a great ending for the scene. Yeah. I think we're going right back to Clarice and Clarence, because I think having Maddie as a central character, Maddie Thompson, as a connection between Clarice and Clarence and then Lehman, I think it can be fun. Lehman can be bringing the outside rituals from not this town and then this town can have its own mysteries. Right? What did I call the town Winteringen? Yeah, Winteringen. Does that make sense? It's kind of a kind of a German town name. Yeah, Winteringen. I like Winteringen. A young boy thumps onto the ice and skitters across the frozen surface. Ow! He says, "You can't just push me. Are you crazy?" And a little girl cackles and skates off in the other direction. I don't know how to cackle like a little girl does. That's kind of terrifying, actually. Get back here, Clarice! Catch me if you can! Clarence! Wow, it's kind of horrifying. Okay. Catch me if you can. Clarence scrambles to his feet, slips again. When he's nervous like this, he can't get his blades under control. Finally, a strong hand grabs him by the arm. Thanks, Brittany. Brittany, Brittany soon pulls him up. Yep. You put up a good race today. You and Clarice both. Usually, you guys are both second and third. Do you know how Cookieface got so fast? He almost beat me this year. Wow, there must be something in those cookies. What a strange joke for like a six-year-old to make, says Brittany. Brittany's like 14. No. They're six? Okay. No, they don't have to be six. I was just running with it. What's up, slowpoke? Says Clarice from across the rink. Hands in her ears, tongue out. Hands in her ears? Like all the way in. Tons of tears. Tons of tears. Okay, I got you. Clarice has the winner's medal draped around her neck. And the announcer is running down the bleachers, pushing between people to get to the ice, shouting into his microphone. Clarice, get back here. We have not determined the winner yet. You can't just take the medal and leave. And Clarice is running from the announcer as she's clearly taken the medal, even though she doesn't deserve it. We'll come to you soon with a new announcement as to who the actual winner is chasing her down. Right now as you speak. Excuse me, ma'am. Sorry, sir. Thank you. Excuse me. And he jumps onto the ice and wants to start running, but just goes flying and skitters across it wildly. I am now skittering across the ice. I do not have any blades on my feet, and I in fact never learned how to skate. I only learned the theory of skating. He slides into cookie-face McGill's shins and almost throws him down, just decks him and his parents, you know, the baker and the baker, both of his parents are bakers. The McGill family topples onto the ice as well. And there's just a big pile of people and cookies there. The McGill family pizza mouth and pastry toe McGill's. Okay. I'm writing that pizza mouth and pastry toe. Thank you very much for the holiday special on story jazz, guys. Hey, you named, I asked you for the name of a character and you came back at me with cookie-face McGill. This is all your fault. The announcer is crushed underneath three bakers and a pile of celebratory cookies. And a true baker's dozen and 13 precisely 13 cookies. He can feel the weight of each one and he mumbles into his microphone. There might be a punctured lung out here on the rink. Clarice is skating circles around the track now and as he passes clearance again, he reaches out and grabs her by the metal, yanking her to the ground by the neck. It's really kind of brutal, but she catches herself. She's acrobatic enough to like do a flip and free herself of the metal. That's cheating. Clarice grasps it between two hands. The gold medal is a cucumber slice. It looks like a cucumber slice, but we all know it's actually a cross-section or a slice of a winter berry. That's my new name for the berries that glow on the trees. Ah, yes, it winter berries. Also known as tree cucumbers or strawberries. Tree cucumbers. Tree cucumbers. There we go. Clarice gives Clarice a stern look. Look, Clarice, you can't disrespect our traditions like that. The winter berry medal is meant to go to the winter and you can't just steal it. This is important to all of us and look at the announcer over there trying to chase you. He got hurt. The bakers maybe are possibly hurt too and they almost spilled their cookies. And Clarice ignoring him jumps up to try and grab the metal. She's a little bit shorter, but he holds it just out of her reach. Stop it. Traditions. Oh my God. I'm just here to just to have fun. I don't need your predictions. And she skates off again. Sometimes I can't with that girl, he says. And Britney Britney's on lightly punches him in the shoulder. So you want to give me that medal now? She says, because I'm clearly the winner. Let's be real. The announcer frees himself from the pile of bakers and crawls over and grabs the medal from Clarence's hand and pulls it up into the air and says, the announcer has succeeded. He has now procured the medal and it shall be used properly in the upcoming festival. Silly kids, we're going to have our analysts look at our video evidence to make sure that we give this to the correct winner. That might take a while though because our hard drives are damaged from the cold. This year has been the coldest ever. And when I say our analysts, I mean me. I'm going to look at a video footage because I couldn't see anything from my booth. For some reason, the crowd starts cheering and he says, Oh, thank you. Thank you. Yes. Oh, I didn't actually win, folks. I just procured the medal from the metal thieves, one of whom might actually not be a thief because they actually won. But that leave is still to be determined. And people start throwing winter berries and marshmallows down from the bleachers, showering the announcer with sheer and he struggles as way off the brick, leaving Clarence and Britney sin allowed again, cookie face McGill. And his parents are now just sitting there having a grand old time eating cookies and eating winter berries and marshmallows off the ice. And just basically having a little family snack time there, cookie face, waves to Britney, Clarence and Clarice to come over and snack with them. Clarice puts her hands in her ears again and sticks out her tongue, thumbs, I guess, and sticks out her tongue and continues skating around the track, dodging weaving in and out of the various casual skaters and making everyone extremely nervous. There are casual skaters. Oh, yeah. The, the, the. The casual skaters have returned to the rink. Yeah. Yeah. The rink opens after the race and the casual skaters all skate around the giant idol in the center of the rink. It is a, it is a reindeer. It's a big animatronic reindeer that they install come winter time every year. People dance around it and it is a crucial part of the winter festival rituals in Windringham. Of course, come the central ritual later on in the season. It will get replaced by the massive cake, but for now, it's the center of all festivities. Will it get replaced by the cake or will it eat the cake? Nobody is quite sure. We will, we shall see, we shall determine this as we progress through the story. Somebody I'm sure will make a decision later on and we will both abide by it. What's, what's that on the roof? Ho, ho, ho. And a bottle of rum. It's me. What? Pirate Santa. Pirate Santa. Oh my gosh. Hey, I'm your biggest fan. I've brought you a present this year, something that you may not have listened to yet. Is it a stolen present? No. Because if it ain't, then you're not really living up to your pirate job. Yes. Yes, then it's stolen from two wonderful people, Sam and softy. This is their podcast just for you for Winter Festivity Day. Thank you, Pirate Santa. For a peep day. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't know if we might have to bleep out pirate Santa as well. It's just pirate bleep at which point it's just a pirate. Hello, I'm a festive pirate man. Anyway, I also come with cookies and cream and a message from them that says, check out their Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, follow them at storage and doing the full ad break in this character. Follow them at storage as cast or email them at storage as cast@gmail.com. You inspire me, festive pirate man with the, is that blood still stuck to your savor from the people you murdered to get all these presents? Or is that just like cranberry sauce? I travel through the intestines of slaughtered reindeer. I see, wow, and that's, and they reindeer shit presents, right? That's where you get them from. Quite. You're ruining this entire operation. Now everybody will know it. It's going to be like a new gold rush. People rushing to Norway to murder poor innocent present shitting reindeer. I think reindeer are also already kind of at risk, but yeah, story jazz does not condone animal cruelty. It's true. Both of us are pretty much vegetarian. One's just a bad vegan. And you're a bad vegetarian. It's true. Yeah. Hey, I wanted to thank everybody who interacted for this episode. It was a little chaotic because we did two interactions at once, but it turned out really well. And a lot of your ideas made it into the episode. The four main ones that we've managed to feature. I don't know if all of them have shown up in the first half yet. So spoilers possibly. The idea of eldritch gods came from not a bicycle. Thank you for that. The idea of dancing around a really big glow in reindeer is from anonymous 196. Thank you for Dr. Kate for the squirrels and cucumbers and Nadia for just general witchy things. You all are true friends and we love you. We love you. Eventually, Clarence manages to grab ahold of Clarice once again, drags her off the ice kicking and screaming and with some help from Britney, Britney, and cookie face McGill joins them too as they walk to the parking lot where their guardians are waiting to take them home. All right. So you guys later says cookie face, obviously, you can tell by the voice. I really hope that, you know, whoever skated best won the race, I couldn't tell from my position, but, but I'm sure one of you guys cookie face. You're a terrible skier. You must have cheated says, okay, and Clarice sort of like slaps her on the stomach. Yeah, I mean, I've been practicing a lot if you consider that cheating. I guess I would understand. So I got to go buy guys cheater cheater pumpkin or cheater cheater cucumber eater. Madeleine and Lehman are coming back from the woods. They seem to have made a bit of a detour because they're just coming like from out of the trees and are looking a little bit confused, but they approach the parking lot with a healthy sort of social distance between them. Just as friends and and before they get too close, Lehman waves to the two kids and to Maddie and says, I hope I don't see you later. And he waves and then he steps off and Maddie looks after him and waves again silently. Waves herself silently. She waves herself like she would wave a flag. She herself waves. All right, Sam, all good. Did they figure out who won? She says, Auntie Maddie, Auntie Maddie, Clarice is still on her skates light enough so that she can skate over the packed snow that has been packed down by people walking over it. And launches herself at Madeline's arms, Madeline catches her spinning around just barely staying on her legs. And Clarice sort of reaches out to help steadier as she holds Clarice. Clarice? Clarice? Shall we go home? See your mother? I'm sure she's been up all night baking. No, no, I don't want to go, I don't want to go. And just sort of carries her over to their vehicle, a sort of snowmobile type sled. Or maybe actually a sled with dogs on it? Sled dogs? Maybe? Possibly? Go for it. There are two huge wolf-like dogs like sort of dire wolves attached to a sled just chilling, just rolling around in the snow, enjoying the cold. And Madeline tosses Clarice onto the back seat and Clarice climbs up after her and they put on their seat belts. And Madeline sits down in the front seat and addresses the dogs who are still lying in the snow. Are we going to try to name the dogs right here? Sure. Are we just going to shore and name the dogs? I don't mind. Dogs' names are Opal and Garnet. Okay. Not to remember. It's not going to be too confusing with all these really other hard-hitting names like Cookie Face McGill. As Matty calls their names, Opal. Garnet? Opal and Garnet both raise their heads out of the snow powder. Yep, yep. And look at her tilting their heads like back and forth. Home then, dearies. Let's go home. And Opal and Garnet jump up and run into opposing directions and get confused when their chains stop. Opal, dear Garnet, the Thompson residents. The only home you two have ever known don't pretend. And Opal and Garnet sort of fall in line and tilt their heads one last time and then just sort of bolt. And the sled goes, lurches to life and it goes zooming off over the snow, up a sort of ramp onto like this. I'm imagining like a snow highway. So like, yeah, there's this tiny little wooden alpine snowed-in village of Windtringen. And all around it is like some sort of monorail-esque, tall highway made purely of ice and snow. And there are dog sleds zooming across that highway. And they put on their blinkers, merge onto the other stretch of passing sleds. And in 15 minutes, no more, no less their home, an old, creaky house at the end of an old creaky street with a sign above the door that says Thompson. We're home, we're home. The kids leap out of the sled and stomp with their skates through the snow, up to the front porch with a clack, clack, clack, clack, clack. They make it up the stairs and immediately we can hear a voice from the inside saying, "Don't you dare walk with those skates on the inside of the house, you take those off right now. I hear you." Clarence Clarice, don't you stake us, don't you take a step inside? You hear me? Just stop short of the house door and swallows and starts undoing his skates while Clarice launches herself, passes him into the house and falls right on her hands and knees and starts crawling through the house in order to not let the skates hit the ground. Clarice, I can hear you. Did you take off your skates? Clarice starts giggling uncontrollably. She hides behind a sofa in the glow of a crackling fireplace. You said fireplace so suspiciously. Yes, I don't know if we want fire. I want to do something about the fireplace. Ice place? Lightening. Wait, this is a snow-themed episode. It should be a snow place, but fireplace, fire truck, firing squad? Oh god, snowing squad possibly. Maddie follows the two kids up the stairs, stomps twice to get most of the snow off her boots. Slips the ankle high, heels down off of her leg and steps inside. She picks up Clarice from behind the couch, holds her out the door and shakes her once or twice to get the snow off with a little girl and then pulls her into her lap so she can wrangle the skates off of her feet as she tries to squirm away. The owner of that stern yet playful voice enters the living room. So, how was the race? Who won? Clarice and Clarice simultaneously say, "I did, no, yes, no, wait, yes, I did." Then Maddie answers and says, "Well, it's somewhat undecided, apparently. I feel like our announcer gets a little more senile every year." The woman who has just joined the room, I suppose this is the Thompson kid's mother, laughs and wipes her hands on her apron and says, "Well, as many times as he's run onto the ice and fallen and knocked his head, it wouldn't surprise me. Come kids, I've fried something up in the kitchen." Eileen, "There is something I'd like to discuss with you," says Maddie. Eileen, the mother, looks up and her facial expression shifts just slightly. She can hear a shift in the tone and Maddie's tone. She raises an eyebrow. Is this about your friend, Lehman? No. No. Southerner. No. It's not. Ooh, with his strange practices, such an interesting man. You never know whether he's lying or not. Eileen? Actually, he's always... It's not Lehman. Oh. That's disappointing. Well, what triviality have you brought me tonight? So I was with Lehman. And... So this is about Lehman. Okay. Give me more details. No, it's not about Lehman. I won't tell anybody about it and he certainly will lie about it, as you know. So we found the house. And at this, Eileen turns silent. The house. Yes. We found the house. The one night you and I aren't looking for it, Lehman and I just stumbled upon it. You were with Lehman. And he saw the house too? I assume he saw the house. It's sometimes difficult to tell what he does that doesn't see. I suppose that makes sense to you. But how did you react? Did you tell him? You didn't tell him. Did you? There wasn't time to tell or not tell anything. It lasted, but a few moments. The house was there as we suspected. The winterberry trees glowing around it. Yes. And in the next moment, it was gone. Did the squirrels say anything about this? Because they can be quite insightful on this thing. I don't trust them generally, but did they have anything to say about the house? The only thing I can confirm is that the squirrels were there too. And the squirrels did see it, so... Did they interact with it in any way? They didn't. But I suspect that might be because we were there. Or perhaps because Lehman was there. Hey, you know how squirrels are about outsiders. Right. But it just stood there? Empty was there. Before folding into nothingness. Was there light? Was there... Justice. A fire flickered inside, smoke billowed from the chimney, and a figure emerged. Justice, the stories say... A figure? Just as the stories say, you mention this now? After I poke and prod and question you, what did the figure look like? And as Maddie is about to answer, out of the kitchen comes the call, "Mom, where are these?" "Mom, I don't want to eat whatever this is." And Eileen rolls her eyes. And exhales, turns on her heels. Mumbles, "We'll talk about this later," to Madeleine, and enters the kitchen. Clarice and Clarice are bent over a tray of wintery treats that look very, very strange and not very wintery. They are folded pieces of bread, baked into a twisted knot, a small tower of twisted knots, sprinkled with sesame seeds and little bits of shaved pecans. Oh my God, this sounds really good. I was just going to put the pickles here. And they're neatly arranged on a baking sheet, covered in oil as if they had just been fried. Oh, yes. Right. I know. And a bite has been taken out of two of them, in the hands of young Clarice and Clarice. And on the inside of the twisted tower, we can see a thin green wedge. Um, yes. And I also know what this food looks like. It is... A pickle is usually cut in wedges, right? It's pickle wedges, right? And they have been deep fried in bread and- In the butter and the bread, yeah. Okay. Yes. We're making this up. This is not actually how big fried pickles usually are, we're reinventing it here. Right. The kids look up at Eileen with confused faces. What they are eating is not fresh and sweet, like the sugary cucumber slices that usually winterberry slices, but we've established that winterberries are basically strawberry slash cucumbers. I don't fucking know. Yes. Okay. They're strawberry cucumbers that grow on trees. Damn it. That's completely low. And glow in the night. Beautiful. So winterberries are delicious, delicious, uh, sweet and, um, amazing. These greenish, uh, these are like wah winter berries. Do you know what I'm saying? These are like the. Wario. Wario. Yes. These are like the Waluigi of winterberries. So they're one terberies. That's a quote. That's a tweetable quote right there. Yo. Um, and Clarence looks up at Eileen and says, um, these are interesting, ma, they're terrible bop. They're terrible. They're sour and gross and Clarice throws the fried pickle to the ground and Eileen, she sighs and she says, you two are old enough now. It's time I told you you are about to go from being just normal children to young witches. And the two kids whose eyes were previously focused on the, uh, fried pickles now look up at their mother with utter confusion, which on Clarence's face, slowly morphs into worry and on Clarice's face, slowly morphs into a devilish grin. Yes. And the first step to becoming good little witches is to eat your fried pickles. And Clarice's devilish grin turns to a sort of disappointed frown and Clarence's, Clarence's worried face turns to a deep horror object or object or. And on the couch in the living room, Maddie who has removed her thick, me high wool socks lounges back on the couch with a smile, remembering when she and Eileen was at age. And they their first fried pickles for winter fest. Um, great. Cool. I think this could be an episode. Do you think this is the ending? It's a good ending scene for them. Why don't we jump to Lehman? Uh, Lehman. Yes. Yes. Okay. I got something for Lehman. Go for it. This is actually, I think we actually, it's all come together. Yeah. In the center of town, Lehman Markovitz trundles along through the snow underneath the starry night sky. Oh, don't excuse me. Don't excuse me. He pushes through. That's so good. He pushes through the various people walking to their sleds to go back home or walking toward the warm core of wintering and it's a terrible night. It's a terrible night out, isn't it? He looks at the passing faces of the northerners who all look so storm-wethered and weathered by a thousand winter nights and many days lit only by the reflection off of the snow below. Wow. Um, so he looks at these people who used to be a foreign culture to him. And boom, he's starting to warm up to and then he looks up at the stars, the constellations that sit a little bit differently than they used to back in his home far, far to the south. He's just walking. Oftentimes, Lehman doesn't really have a place that he's trying to get to. He just takes everything in, which is perhaps how he ended up so far north to begin with. And now, Lehman's walk is taking him to the center of town, to the ice rink where stands an enormous idol of a reindeer, a creature he still isn't sure actually exists despite the insistence of everybody in wintering in that they've seen one before. He walks to the bleachers, to the bench where only a few hours earlier he sat besides Maddie, the singular and only reason he's stayed in wintering in or that's to say anywhere for more than a few months. It's been a long time since someone has tempted him enough to avoid letting his feet take him somewhere else. He breathes the cold air for a while. The cold is still novel to him. It's always here and this place is never not touched by snow, but he still relishes it. And right when he realizes that it's probably time to go back to his bed, the room at the McGill's place, the room over the bakery that smells so deliciously of bread every morning. He hears a voice, picture perfect, plummy pastries, wispy wet, waltzing waffles. And Lehman gets up and looks around and says "or gourbar". Lehman walks out onto the ice of the rink and looks for the source of the voice. There's someone here, delicious dancing dates on dishes, fantastic fresh false foods. Lehman frowns and walks around the big reindeer idol in the center of the rink, looking for the source of the voice, but as he passes around the idol it seems to be coming from behind him again, creamy, crunchy, cookies and cakes, lingering, leaping lemons, lozenges, are lozenges food though, wardenful leaping, lanky lemons, munchy, marinated mango meringue, just voluptuous, victorious, vengeful, vanilla. And with that last line of alliterative snack names, Lehman feels a warm breath on his neck, even through the long dark hair that he wears almost down to his waist and a thick beard that makes him nearly impossible to understand. He turns around and looks up toward the source of this breathy gust and looks straight into two piercing, ageless eyes and a grin that wraps so high around and meets again above them. "Hello," says this indescribable creature, "would you like to get inside my belly one more outside would suit the thigh." Lehman stares at this creature that he can't quite grasp, it's this shapeless thing, some sort of eldritch horror, wink, wink, and he clears his dry throat and says, "Yes please." This is so good, he has to lie and so he has to, he tells the Eldritch God that he wants to get in his belly, and the eldritch grin seems to double up and as the teeth split apart, a ring of nothingness opens around Lehman Markovitz. And the announcer has finally determined who the witter is as he's reviewed the tape for the past two hours, looking closely at the final lap, he's determined that the final line was crossed by none other than, and the announcer looks out of the door of his little booth at the edge of the ring, but there's no one to announce the winner too. He swore just a moment ago he saw someone, but there's no one there, all the benches are empty. And that's this week's show, please check the show notes for links for both shows this week at SonicSociety.org. Please join us next week as David and I are splitting this place for the Valley. Oh, I'll pack my audio earmuffs, how does that work? I don't know, but it involves audio hot toddies. But until then, I'm David Alt. And I'm Jack Ward and we are Splitsville. Yeah, bye for now. The Sonic Society is written and produced weekly by Jack Jay Ward and David Alt, with original music by Sharon B at SharonB.com. All features, interviews and audio drama shorts are owned completely by their originators and provided to the Sonic Society by Creative Commons Licensing. The society itself originates from Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Thanks for listening. [Music] This has been an electric vicoona production. [MUSIC PLAYING]
