Episode 1: Welcome to Heavendale

## Official Synopsis

*In our first episode, we introduce our characters: Paul as Gerry, Shannon as Kim, and Shelby as Alex. A chance encounter found them fighting the same enemy, but what does this mean for the future of our heroes? Join us in the first episode of Critical Bits in our first mini-arc, 'Crime Orphans'!*

## Plot Summary

In the pre-episode backstory, we learn that local Heavendale teens Alex Finch and Gerry Gingham have just started fighting crime in their neighborhood. They’ve never busted anything bigger than jaywalkers and muggers, but recently they discovered information about a string of missing teens. All their information eventually leads them to one “Mr. Rafferty” (a.k.a.: Ratfink), who is known as the switchboard of the criminal underground.

Elsewhere in the pre-episode backstory, we learn of a crime orphan named Kim Bennett. She has been working in villainous circles since she was a child, and in recent years, she started working with a group of car-themed villains called The Mechanics. Very recently they granted Kim the opportunity to work her first solo mission: acting as a bodyguard for Ratfink.

On Friday, June 7th, Alex and Gerry try to sneak into Ratfink’s house. While trying to shut off power to the house, they accidentally shut off power for the whole block. Knowing that they have to act fast, Alex and Gerry rush inside the house.

Inside the two of them find Kim. They fight for a while, but when Alex and Gerry bring up teen kidnappings, Kim hesitates. She had already been having doubts about her villainous lifestyle before this, and Ratfink kidnapping teens is the final straw for her. She decides to team up with Alex and Gerry and take down Ratfink.

The three confront Ratfink and defeat him with ease (his strength being more in his connections than anything else). He manages to get away but leaves behind a laptop. The teens take the laptop and abscond back to Gerry’s house. Kim feels guilty about having just betrayed her team and needs a place to lay low for a while. Gerry offers to let her stay in the basement, knowing his dad won’t care.

The teens check Ratfink’s laptop. It contains mostly encrypted files, but one document was left open: a list of names and addresses. The list includes the names of several people Alex and Gerry know from school, including Luke Williams, Matt Glenn, and Nolan Marks. Gerry’s own name and address are on the list, but they are crossed out.

The story proper begins with Alex freaking out in Gerry’s basement about the list and what they’ve done. To cut some of the tension, the teens start introducing themselves to each other. Kim shows off her metal powers, and Gerry shows off his power neutralization. Alex does a handstand. Mr. Gingham calls downstairs to ask what the ruckus is about at one point, but Gerry pacifies him with his emotional manipulation powers.

Alex attempts to access more of the laptop, but it shuts down after a failed authorization attempt. After some debate about how to get it working again, the group settles on asking Alex’s brother Brantley to help them with his hacking skills.

The teens go to the Finch house and find Brantley screaming at cucks in *Fortnite* and bragging about his penis size. Gerry attempts to use his emotional manipulation powers to calm Brantley down but it backfires, sending Gerry into a *Fortnite* and Mountain Dew-filled fugue state. Alex has more luck with promising Brantley a batch of honey mustard corn dogs and Code Red in exchange for helping them.

After hacking into the laptop, Brantley shows the teens a more detailed document with daily schedules and notes on suspected superpowers for all the teens on the creepy list. This confirms Gerry’s name was crossed out because he is no longer suspected of having superpowers.

Of the other names on the list, the group is most interested in checking on Luke Williams, who is listed as having heat manipulation powers. They check his schedule and see that he usually posts up at Sonic on Friday nights. The group decides to head to Sonic and find him. On their way out, Alex takes Brantley’s *Minecraft* pickaxe.

The teens arrive at Sonic and, after a brief altercation with Austin Boyd, find Luke Williams hanging out with his friend group the Car Heads. Gerry has Kim use her mechanical knowledge to pass as a fellow Car Head and get information from Luke. They don’t get much from him other than dubious car talk, but Gerry does catch Luke drawing the heat out of an overheating engine with his powers at one point.

All of a sudden, officers from the teen policing organization D.A.Y.C.A.R.E. arrive on the scene. A man named Officer Jenkins confronts Alex about the laptop she’s holding, which he claims is D.A.Y.C.A.R.E. property. Gerry throws an empty Seagram's bottle at his dad's car to alert people to D.A.Y.C.A.R.E.'s presence.

Jenkins confronts Gerry and tries to get information on Luke out of him. Gerry in turn uses his mind powers to mollify the officer with false information. Jenkins feels surprisingly at ease around Gerry, partly due to the powers and partly due to Gerry reminding him of an old drug dealer friend of his. Jenkins soon feels comfortable enough to admit that he sees a lot of himself in Gerry (and also that he has a paralyzing fear of spiders). From this point onward, Jenkins considers Gerry a trustworthy teen friend.

Meanwhile, in the chaos of teens running away from D.A.Y.C.A.R.E., Alex loses the laptop. Kim attempts to get it back with her metal powers. She does so... but accidentally wipes the whole hard drive in the process. Not knowing what else to do, she wipes her prints off the laptop and dumps it in a trash can.

The teens get away without much to show for their trouble. However, they now know that Luke will be at the local drag race on Saturday morning, and that D.A.Y.C.A.R.E. is actively trying to capture him. They decide that going to the drag race would be the best thing to do next. Kim shreds the laptop with her powers for good measure and they head back to Gerry's house.

## Major Events and Firsts

* The beginning of this whole dumb podcast! Yay!
* Above the table introductions to players and their characters.
* Introduction of Heavendale (A City with Clouds™).
* Alex and Gerry meet and join forces with Kim for the first time. The basic backstory leading up to their meeting is also established.
* Introduction of Ratfink and The Mechanics via pre-episode backstory.
* Gerry and Kim demonstrate their powers to each other for the first time.
* Alex does a handstand.
* Alex, Gerry and Kim find their first piece of info linked to D.A.Y.C.A.R.E. (the list on Ratfink's laptop).
* Introduction of Mr. Gingham.
	+ Establishes that Gerry is used to keeping him out of his business with his emotional manipulation powers.
	+ Also establishes Mr. Gingham's catchphrase: "It's great to see ya, Alex!"
* First mentions of Luke Williams, Matt Glenn, and Nolan Marks.
* Introduction of Brantley Finch.
	+ Establishes his love of *Fortnite*, corn dogs, Mountain Dew, and his (supposedly) huge dick.
	+ Also establishes a character voice that Joel can do so eerily well that it will haunt him for the rest of his days.
* First mention of corn dogs in the podcast happens when Joel describes what someone named "Brantley" must be like.
	+ "I will say, though, that's definitely the fuckin' name of someone that just plays *Fortnite* all night. There's just like a pile of Mountain Dews and corn dogs sittin' next to him."
* First instance of Brantley's mind being too overwhelming for Gerry to handle.
* Brantley helps the teens with his hacking for the first time.
* Establishment of the "Narc side" and "non-Narc side" of town. Each side is marked by their own respective Sonic location (Narc Sonic and Non-Narc Sonic).
* First use of the team vehicle: Mr. Gingham's Mercury station wagon.
* Introduction of Austin Boyd.
	+ Establishes him as a high school quarterback and bully. If he's failing Math, you're not having fun.
* Introduction of Luke Williams and the Car Heads.
	+ Establishes the Car Heads' disdain for sleeves and dubious knowledge of actual car stuff.
* Kim first uses the name "Farrah" as a fake name when approaching the Car Heads. This is the starting point for her superhero name "Farrah Fender" later on.
* Alex and Kim share their first bonding moment when Kim comforts Alex in the car.
* Luke's power is revealed to be heat manipulation.
* Introduction of D.A.Y.C.A.R.E. as an organization dedicated to dealing with "at risk and dangerous youth". This includes the policing of teen crimes.
* Introduction of Officer Jenkins.
	+ Establishes his gullibility, comfort around teen drug dealers, and fear of spiders. Gerry gains Influence over him.
* The team loses the one major information lead they had. Woops. This prompts their need to attend the drag race in the next episode.

## Trivia

* Apparently Heavendale has one of the leading school systems in the country. Considering what we see of our heroes' school later in the podcast, either something is fishy with that claim or that says something about the quality of schools in the rest of the country. Possibly both.
* The players suggest an alternate title for this episode (and the arc as a whole) could be "Crime Orphans".
* In this episode, Paul accidentally gives Gerry's full name as "Gerald 'Gerry' Geraldo", which leads Shelby/Alex to call Gerry's dad "Mr. Geraldo" for a while. The players retcon this mistake in the next episode.
* The first roll of the entire game is Kim showing off her powers to her new friends. Unbelievably, the roll is a full 12.
	+ Rolling a perfect score on the very first roll of the game must have upset a witch somewhere in the world because all of the Fun Bunch's rolls from that point onward have been cursed.
* The first failed roll of the game is Alex trying to hack the laptop with Superior and accidentally shutting it down. She then failed enough rolls by the end of the episode to get the first level up of the game. (Hooray??)
* This episode establishes nobody (that we know of) knows how powers work or where they come from.
* This episode mentions Devon (a.k.a. The Shopkeeper) as a potential contact of Kim's. Despite seeming like a possible major character, he has yet to make an appearance in the story.
	+ Word of God confirms that he is unlikely to ever appear in the story at this point.
* It's mentioned in this episode that Gerry hops the fence and cuts through “the Jenkins’s yard” to get from Alex’s place to his.
	+ Word of God confirms that this Jenkins family is unrelated to Officer Jenkins, and that Officer Jenkins himself was probably named such because Joel unconsciously remembered Paul saying "Jenkins" earlier in the episode.
	+ Whoever this family is, they apparently have a dog.
* Above the table, Joel forgets the word for the top of an arm (fun fact: it's called a "shoulder"!). To this day, his players and fans have never let him live that down.

## NPC Appearances

* Ratfink (mentioned)
* The Mechanics (mentioned)
* Mr. Gingham
* Luke Williams
* Matt Glenn (mentioned)
* Nolan Marks (mentioned)
* Brantley Finch
* The Shopkeeper (mentioned)
* Austin Boyd
* The Car Heads
* Officer Jenkins