198: Ulysses "Fart" Ulysses Was a President

## Summary

The party receive an airborne invitation to meet with Ricardo Ulysses in the Lichen Cave and Will conducts some detective work to find Gerald's address.

## Synopsis

The group have just exited Crumplemeyer's Home and Hardware store, having found all 4 puzzles, and solved 3 of them. Will and Dew have spotted Ricardo Ulysses atop the roof. Will, still in his guise as the outrageous mockery known as Ricardo "Fart" Ulysses, lets everyone know that Ricardo is watching. The real Ricardo reaches into his coat and pulls something out. He raises his hand over his head and throws something down. Will attempts to gallop towards Ricardo on Steed, and Batthwack telepathically tells Steed to play along, resulting in more of a gentle trot as the whatever-it-is floats towards the ground. Gwen casts *Detect Magic* and discovers the item is blazing with magical energy from all of the schools of magic. Dew's keen eyes are able to discern that it's a paper airplane floating down towards them and Will is desperately trying to get everyone to disperse, suspecting an attack. Raphina casts *Detect Traps* and finds nothing, so she snatches it out of the air with a twirl.

Raphina unfolds the paper airplane, which is apparently made from the magic paper they produce here in Morrow's Inlet and discovers a message written on it: *"Meet me in the Lichen Cave at high noon"*. Dew writes a message in reply on a totally DIFFERENT piece of paper: *"Where is the Lichen Cave? Signed, Everybody"* and throws it back, but it doesn't reach Ricardo. He goes for another attempt but Ricardo has already vanished. Gwen says she knows where the cave is. Will is nervous about meeting him in a place of his choosing on his terms, but Gwen is absolutely adamant that Ricardo shouldn't be allowed to get away with stealing their stuff. They have the idea to offer to meet Ricardo but only if he returns their stuff first. But how to get a message to him? Raphina writes on the back of the magic paper: *"First we need the Candy Lady's rent money back and all the things from our sacks from the blimp. Love, Raphina (at your service)."* She folds the magic paper back into an airplane and throws it, but it doesn't go very far. Batthwack suggests the message may have reached it's recipient, even if the paper airplane didn't.

Gwen shows them where the Lichen Cave is, pointing down the street to the south, past where they've been. She recommends they go and talk in Crumplemeyer's Tavern. They head there and find the Tavern is quite busy. Will (still in Ricardo "Fart" guise) requests a private room from the barman, but he doesn't take kindly to the presence of the master thief. In fact, during another demonstration of Will/Ricardo's "invisibility cloak", he tries to smash his hand with a club. Dew attempts to block the club and succeeds in hurting his hand.

Gwen suggests heading back to Crumplemeyer's Book Bin; after all Bella took a shine to Dew and would probably allow them some quiet space. However, when they get there the store is very busy with patrons queuing for puzzles.

Will wanders away on his own, saying he needs to change out of his Ricardo disguise, although unbeknownst to him, Batthwack sends Steed to keep an eye on him. Will in fact disguises himself again, this time as the postmaster he met earlier and goes over to Crumplemeyer's Post Station. There's another man working there, who recognises him and says *"Oh! Leonard! What are you doing here?"*. Will says he's come back for his lunch bag and goes into the back of the post office to "look" for it, while surreptitiously searching for information on Gerald, who was the post worker on duty when Vera's letter was hand delivered. In Gerald's cubby he manages to find a letter addressed to him at *"7 Crumplemeyer B Avenue, Morrow's Inlet"*. On the way out Will/Leonard tries to learn the name of the post worker and ends up thoroughly confusing him with a story about how he/Leonard was fired, had insomnia and forgot his lunch.

While the rest of the party wait for Will to return, they have a go at solving the final puzzle and decide to head off towards the Paper Mills (their reasoning being that the Paper Mills are labelled "A" and "B"). They pass the post office just as Will is emerging, still in disguise. Batthwack knows it's Will though as Steed has tipped him off.

## Quotes

* *"Get some rest, Leonard!"* -- the confused/worried post worker to Will (disguised as Leonard) as he leaves the post station having claimed he was fired, has insomnia and has lost his lunch bag.

## Trivia

* The episode title quotes Eric, who was making a clarification after Raphina slipped up and called Will's Ricardo disguise *"Ulysses Fart Ulysses"*.
* Greg fact: According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the longest ever paper airplane flight was 29.2 seconds, which makes Ricardo's attempt a new world record! A total of 4 minutes and 28 seconds elapse from the moment Eric says the item has left Ricardo's hand, to when Raphina snatches it out of the air (although not *all* of that may be actual in-game time - listener, you decide).
* This episode featured Denise's first Mad Libs recap! It was inspired by Dungeons & Dragons Mad Libs

## References

1. ↑ The solutions were "Monkey", "Burp" and "Bib"
2. ↑ Eric says so and **he's the DM**. Got it, listener??
3. ↑ See 197: He's a Lot Nicer To Us When He's Pretending He's a Terrible Person
4. ↑ Listener, the last unsolved puzzle was: *"Look high and low, but mostly high. Add A + B with your eye to the green and purple sky."*