Fall Foliage

Fall Foliage is the third of the Saint Mary Vincent Mysteries.

## CONCEPT

Every year for the Fall Foliage festival, the town businesses close their doors and set up tents on the sidewalks. The streets are blocked off to cars. Food stalls, entertainment and games are set up along with the night market. It is an event that begins at sundown and continues until the next sunset, a mix of cultures and beliefs and also Halloween costumes. Most importantly, it’s an event mainly for the residents. It’s not that visitors can’t attend, it’s just that hotels just happen to be booked up years in advance, events sold-out, attractions closed for scheduled maintenance, no automobiles are allowed and there are no shuttles provided.

It opens each year with the sacred ceremony of the Big Chonk Band to honor their saviors, the Moon-Eyes, and isn’t considered officially underway until the ceremonial fire is lit.

Many of the Indigenous legends concerning the time when their ancestors settled the area concern the two tribes that were living in this land when they arrived, The Wemategumis and the Moon-Eyes.

The Wemategumis were a rowdy and hot-blooded lot of small people with large heads and big eyes, who liked to play nasty tricks on the people of the other tribes. When the Wemategumis met the Humans, they demanded to be worshipped and paid reverence to. When the Humans refused, the Wemategumis stole from them, lamed their animals, stole their children and lured them into dangerous areas where they were sure to meet with injury, or even death. The Wemategumis were infuriated that the humans would not pay attention to them, and became increasingly more violent and less predictable.

The Moon-Eyes were a quiet people who lived in the mountain caves and were so sensitive to light that they were unable to venture out to hunt save on the darkest nights. The Moon-Eyes traded with the Humans, as they could acquire many things during the day that were out of reach to the Moon-Eyes. In return, the Moon-Eyes taught the humans how to lure the Wemategumis into the caves that led to the Thin Place, the river that divides the Near Shore (outer world) with the Far Shore (the underworld). When they did so the Moon-Eyes, who are the keepers of the Thin Place, trapped them on the Far Shore.

As thanks to the Moon-Eyes, every year at the time when the river is lowest and it would be easiest for the Far Shore creatures to escape, the Humans preform a ceremony to celebrate the brave deeds of the Moon-Eyes and to thank them for keeping their land safe. They then collect many gifts to give to the Moon-Eyes. Handmade clothing, cooking utensils, jewels and baubles, furs and wool blankets, and preserved foods are taken to the Trade Well, a narrow but deep sinkhole in the valley that the Indigenous say is the meeting location for the Moon-Eyed people. They light a large fire and spread all of the gifts out on a large stone slab, and must be gone from the area by the time the fire dies out, so that the Moon-Eyes may come in comfort to receive their tribute.

## HOOK

Nova Gunnarsson, an angry and unbalanced young man, has been convinced by a confidant that it is imperative he disrupt the ceremony of the Big Chonk Tribe. He believes that he has been chosen to do this because he is superior to all of the other townsfolk.

Nova despises the tribe’s “false lore” and insists that he alone understands the workings of the far shore, and that all others that pretend to should be punished. He steals the real gifts and replaces them with rancid food, bottles of urine, dead animals, dirty laundry and broken tools.

Much to Nova’s surprise, the Moon-Eyed people take great offense at this, and cease any efforts to reinforce the barriers at the Thin Place. The first to escape, thinking surely such an elaborate “prank” must indicate that the Humans are finally ready to pay them their due, is the Wemategumis. They light fires all across the mountain and immediately descend upon the festival, eager to collect their offerings from the person they believe must be the head shaman, Nova Gunnarsson.

### EVENTS DURING THE FALL FOLIAGE FESTIVAL

1. Food stands – All of the restaurants in town set up food stands

2. Games – Typical block party games

3. Beer Tent – Set up in the park

4. B-Horror Double Feature @ the Opera House: ThanksKilling & Pillow of Blood

5. Costume Parade: Children change into their costumes in the train and then parade up and down Broadway. There is a contest and prizes.

6. Musical Entertainment

7. Children’s Play

8. Sunrise Fall Foliage Train Ride

9. Farm-to-Table Breakfast Feast

## THREATS

### Monsters

* Wemategumi AKA Little Devil, Puckwudgie, Boggart, Imp

### Bystanders

* Buck Hazard
* Duke Hazard
* Chief Todd Bonk
* Erin Diskin
* Grayson Larson
* Hector Paxton
* Henry Elkwind
* Jarsten Kimblew
* Nana Hazard
* Nova Gunnarsson
* Scout Hazard
* Selena Hunt
* Mayor Victoria Noglet

## PRANKS

### **LEVEL ONE PRANKS**

**Ladies** getting groped and blaming **nearby men**.

**Some people** get pantsed.

Candy apples = Candy onions.

“Child” calling for help from bottom of inexplicably deep port-a-potty.

Sound system shenanigans

Collapsing bounce house

### **LEVEL TWO PRANKS**

Various rocks thrown

**A man** hit starts a fight with **Hector**, who ends up punching **the mayor**.

A hose from a mobile beer tap is run into a port-a-potty

Corn dogs = Corn snakes

**Child**’s arm stuck in wack-a-mole

Cocaine lifted from a **drug dealer** is put in cotton candy machine.

### **LEVEL THREE PRANKS**

**Police officer’s** gun switches places with a water gun.

Dunk tank rigged to not allow **person** out of water

Bobbing for apples in hot French fry oil

Flying harness breaks during children’s play

**A baby in a stroller** switches places with a turtle on the riverbank

Darts thrown