276: Hand-Back-Wrench

## Summary

Spurred on by Rosco's assertion that his dog is down there somewhere, the group descend into the abyss traversing rope bridges and walkways, and finding various groups of Sooty Gang members who are either gambling, sleeping or fighting. Batthwack manages to break up some of the fights, though all of the gang members they encounter seem to be in a kind of daze. They eventually find a smoke-filled room where some more gang members are drumming uncoordinatedly. Before long, Will and Rosco succumb to the fumes.

## Synopsis

They party stare down into the vast shaft from the balcony, the sound of the rhythmic thumping assaulting their senses. It's like they're at the site of a huge open dig. Most of the figures they can make out below are ibish, but not all. There are wooden ladders on either side of the platform they're on, leading to walkways that encircle the shaft below them. The size of this place suddenly gives Will the sense that they're in way over their heads. He sends Sheemie away with some money and Batthwack gives Sheemie his Bufflin whiskey. Rosco just continues to stare down into the abyss, utterly mesmerised, his tie fluttering in the fetid gales that waft past them. He puts his hand to his hat to hold it safely place.

Raphina sends down her *Arcane Eye*, attaching her two pairs of glasses to give them a boost. Will observes with disgust and wonder as she carefully lowers the eye, dangling it from its optic nerve a full 30 feet down. With an improved view she can now see that the walkways and rope bridges all head in a general, albeit chaotic, downward direction. People are moving in and out of holes and archways in the shaft wall. This new vantage point also allows Raphina to feel very certain that this chasm was carved out of the earth by a giant worm. She gasps and loudly whispers *"Melyugamar!"*

Rosco, who's next to Raphina at the railing, snaps out of his trance and says he thinks his dog is probably down there. Will coldly points out the likely truth of the matter: if Rosco's dog is down there, it's probably already dead. Raphina reminds him that the key they need is also probably down there. Batthwack begins to climb down one of the ladders and Will follows him. Rosco turns to Raphina and says *"Who the fuck's Melyugamar? Is that your Tanya?"* but Raphina dismisses it, saying she said the wrong thing. Rosco squints at her intently and says *"I can tell you got your secrets. I can tell. Part of you cares about this little group. And part of you has something else going on."* He descends the ladder and Raphina follows.

At the bottom of the ladder, the party step onto the narrow walkway that hugs the curved side of the chasm, slowly sloping downwards before terminating in a rope bridge. This leads across the gulf to an archway in the rock wall on the other side, from inside which voices can be heard. Will urges caution crossing this bridge all together, but Rosco marches over undeterred, a little old dirty man bravely entering the darkness on a mission to get back his dog. Will doesn't think Rosco going first is a great idea, so he follows and Batthwack dutifully stays close to Will.

Through the archway on the other side is a 30-foot circular room carved into the stone wall of the shaft, buzzing with activity and the noise of people talking and shouting animatedly. Raphina notes that this room definitely wasn't dug by a worm, but it slopes down to another archway leading back out to the main chasm. There's a lot of people huddled around something in the back corner, all with dark circles around their eyes, excitedly yelling numbers and exchanging handfuls of coins. Some are carrying torches in the dim light. As with other groups they've seen so far, they're mostly ibish, with some exceptions. They don't seem to take any notice of the party, being totally focussed on whatever they're doing. Rosco's experience with gambling suggests to him that they're betting on some kind of dice game, in fact they even seem to betting on the betting itself.

Suddenly a combined cheer of triumph and a groan of disappointment explodes from the group of gamblers and two of them begin fighting furiously. Remembering the events that Will had recounted of gang members fighting each other Batthwack doesn't wait before stepping in to easily break up their uncoordinated brawling. While he holds one of them in an armlock, Will notes how the other immediately goes back to the game, seemingly without paying any attention to the dragonborn. Rosco leans over to Will and says *"What the fuck? Is this what carin' about people looks like? Is this what havin' principles looks like? Goin' into fights that you don't even have any place being in?"* When Batthwack walks back over to them, he suddenly switches to a friendly demeanour before changing the subject and saying *"Let's just go. I'm lookin' for my dog."* Will is inspired to start practicing an impersonation of Rosco.

They head down the room and out of the lower archway, finding another walkway curving around the edge of the main shaft. This leads to another rope bridge, which they cross and pass through another archway in the side of the shaft into another recess. This one is much darker than the previous one, so Batthwack lights a torch and hands it to Will. The light reveals that they are surrounded by figures slumped on the ground, apparently asleep. Will can't resist pick-pocketing a few of them and does so with relative ease, finding a candle, the shell of an egg painted with scenes of human misery in disturbing detail, a cameo carved in the likeness of a hideous person, and a glass orb filled with moving smoke. The sight of this last item is a shock. It's a little smaller and the smoke isn't coloured, but Will is still convinced this could somehow be the same orb from before, so pockets it quietly and then goes back to the others. He shows Batthwack the cameo, who's visibly disappointed that Will hadn't found something more expensive, clearly still thinking about raising funds for his flying boots. Rosco squints at Batthwack, trying to reconcile this apparent sudden shift in character. *"What's your deal? You're honourable one moment and then obsessed over material possessions the next. Fascinating."*

In the back corner of this room, the top of a ladder pokes out of a hole in the ground. Batthwack strides over and begins to descend, despite Will's whispered protestations. Will hesitates, but Raphina and Rosco follow closely behind Batthwack, arriving at the bottom of the ladder with a soft plop just as a very foul odour assaults their noses: the smell of excrement. This must be the poop room that Rosco had in mind. A trodden path leads from the ladder to another archway where the orange glow of the chasm is visible. Determined to find any clue of his dog's whereabouts, Rosco takes a huge lungful of air, which is a mistake; he is only just able to mitigate the revulsion and the toxic air singes his lungs. Nevertheless, he becomes convinced that he has detected his own dog's poop in this room and this is all the confirmation he needs that he's heading in the right direction. Will desperately looks around for another way to go, but there isn't anything.

The group manage to rustle around amongst their things and find some of Gwen's marshmallow nose suppositories, but this does little to allay Will's concerns. *"It's not just about the smell. There is shit! You are standing in it, all of you!"* With no alternative, he comes down off the ladder and carefully picks his way along the path, *Prestidigitating* as he goes. Batthwack hands another torch to Rosco and Raphina offers everyone cups of tea, saying *"It helps with the aroma, by which I mean the poop improves the aroma of the tea."* As Will reaches the other side, and much to his chagrin, he realises he could have just used his *Cloak of the Bat* to fly over.

Back out in the main shaft everyone finds themselves on another curving walkway sloping down to another rope bridge. This leads across to another archway on the other side, where a lot of noise can be heard. Inside, they find a large room that reminds them of the gambling room they entered earlier, except that everyone in this room is engaged in a huge mosh pit of fighting and violence. One or two people are prone on the floor, unmoving. The group consists of around 20 fighters, mostly ibish, who are producing a cacophony of guttural yells, grunts, groans, screams and cries. Rosco goes to walk right on by, but Batthwack says he wants to stop the fighting, but can't think how he could. Rosco can't understand why he even cares, so Batthwack explains about the ibish they fought on the Grand Staircase who didn't seem to be in their right mind, as if they were possessed. Rosco finally seems to understand something of Batthwack's mindset, but says *"No one's in control of anything. Okay? You might have a perspective on what's right behaviour, what's wrong behaviour. What's a right mind, what's a wrong mind. But er, no one knows what the fuck they're doing. Okay? So live and let live. Pick your battles. Don't stress out so much. Help me find my fucking dog."* Batthwack replies *"I don't know what the fuck I'm doing,"* before waving his arms and casting *Zone of Truth* on the group of fighters, ignoring Will's warning cries.

About half the fighters are caught in the zone, who all look round directly at Batthwack, their dark-ringed eyes staring at him out of the gloom. Then they turn and look at each other and slowly start to disperse. It's apparent to Will and Raphina that something has changed in what these people were experiencing, as if the *Zone of Truth* has severed some sort of connection with whatever falsities they'd had in their minds. Their violent tendencies suppressed, they now don't seem to quite know what to do with themselves, not even really knowing how they came to be where they are. Batthwack grins and Rosco looks annoyed to have been proven wrong. Batthwack's grin fades as he realises that he won't be able to cast the same spell on everyone here and it will only serve to draw attention to them. Rosco marches on as the cured fighters seem to be wandering off to go to sleep. Will uses his cloak to conduct a quick stealthy circuit of the room, but finds no hidden exits, so they make their way out through the lower exit.

Back in the chasm once again, they make their way across yet another bridge towards another archway. This one has a gentle waft of smoky air floating out. Before they can reach the other side, Raphina begins to sneeze intermittently. Will attempts to *Prestidigitate* her nose, but it makes no difference. Through the archway they find a very smoky and hazy room, occupied by people undertaking a wide variety of nonsensical activities: some are stumbling around slowly, one is repeatedly smashing a glass platter, another is sat near the lower exit of this room furiously scribbling in a book. The room is a little less dark as they are closer to the light at the bottom of the shaft, so visible in the back of the room they are finally able to see the source of the thumping sound: a few sets of large timpani-style drums are being hit in various uncoordinated rhythms, some slow and steady, some fast and frenetic.

Raphina casts *Detect Poison and Disease*, which reveals that whatever smoke fills the room appears to be noxious. She fills her nostrils with more marshmallows and this seems to help the sneezing. Rosco urges them on, but Will coldly suggests that this poisonous air could have already killed his dog. *"I couldn't give two shits about the dog. It's really Rudy that I need,"* says Rosco. *"The rest of us don't give a shit about Rudy. Whatever the fuck Rudy is. We don't care. We just need to get a key,"* replies Will. There's a pause before Rosco speaks again with regret in his voice. He says *"I misspoke when I said I don't give a shit about Rosco,"* and Will suspects he's actually talking about himself. Will says the key is way more important than whatever "Rudy" is, *"like saving-the-world important. Not that I want to do that. But other people might."*

Raphina goes over to investigate the drums, to see if they're linked to the smoke in any way. She subtly tries to get closer by getting into the spirit of the irregular rhythms and performing a crazy jagged dance. She sees that in fact the smoke is emanating up out of small rudimentary holes in the floor all around the outside of this room. Rosco looks around for a bar and discovering nothing, begins smoking some rutabaga in his pipe, while Batthwack goes over to look at the person scribbling in their book. It's an ibish, hunched over and fully absorbed in their writing. Peering over their shoulder Batthwack can see they're just writing the word "Kek" over and over, swiftly filling up a page and then flipping it over to repeat the process again and again. Batthwack gently puts his hand over the page, but the ibish just continues to write over his hand, the sharp quill digging into his skin.

Raphina continues dancing and begins to hunch right down before eventually segueing into her trademark inchworm to get a better look at the holes in the floor, but this causes her sneezing to start up again, which only subsides when she moves away. All of a sudden, the smoke seems to get the better of Will and Rosco. Before anyone can realise what's happening, Will runs over to one of the drums, pushes someone out of the way, and begins to slap it with his hands as he feels some sort of rhythm move through his body. Oddly, one hand maintains a steady beat while the other part is completely erratic. Simultaneously, Rosco is suddenly overcome with intense anger at his dog for having gotten away from him, and begins to obsess over the terrible punishments he plans to exact on him.

## Trivia

* The episode title is a quote from Adam. Batthwack breaks up a gaggle of fighting Sooty Gang members with some deft manoeuvres, which Eric describes: *"You are able to slip in there you can predict where they're coming. You can read these punches a mile away. You parry one with your arm. You grab his arm and fling it around behind him and pull it up in a... it's not a Nelson, that's when you put your arms around their head but like an arm bar... nope, that's not right either. But you wrench their hand up behind their their back."* Abby: *"Half Nelson?"* Adam: *"It's a hand-back-wrench."* Eric: *"Oh a hand-back-ranch. Got it."* Alex: *"I feel like I have that on salad sometimes!"*
* Inspired by Will's fears of the poop room's poop plopping down out onto their heads, Eric tries to remember the term for the natural angle that any piled up material makes. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angle\_of\_repose!
* See Elaine's dance on YouTube!
* This week's episode description describes the Pork Fried Dice wiki as: virtuous.

## Recap Song

*Main article: The Music of Pork Fried Dice*
This episode featured KT and Eric doing a recap to the tune of *Must Be Santa*, a song covered by loads of artists (but KT's favourite is the Raffi version!):

*[Verse 1]*

Who's got a beard that's long and white?

Rosco's got a beard that's long and white

Who wants to get in an owl fight?

Rosco wants to get in an owl fight

Owl fight, beard that's white

*[Chorus]*

Must be Rosco

Must be Rosco

Must be Rosco, Rosco LaFleur

*[Verse 2]*

Who wears a hat and clothes of grey?

Rosco wears a hat and clothes of grey

Who smells like a lavender bouquet?

Rosco smells like a lavender bouquet

Lavender bouquet, clothes of grey

Owl fight, beard that's white

*[Chorus]*

Must be Rosco

Must be Rosco

Must be Rosco, Rosco LaFleur

*[Verse 3]*

Who's got a great big bulbous nose?

Rosco's got a great big bulbous nose

Who's got a dog he named Rosco?

Rosco's got a dog he named Rosco

Two Roscos, bulbous nose

Lavender bouquet, clothes of grey

Owl fight, beard that's white

*[Chorus]*

Must be Rosco

Must be Rosco

Must be Rosco, Rosco LaFleur

*[Verse 4]*

Who owes the Sooty Gang a pretty dime?

Rosco owes the Sooty Gang a pretty dime

Who laments the relentless march of time?

Rosco laments the relentless march of time

March of time, owes a dime

Two Roscos, bulbous nose

Lavender bouquet, clothes of grey

Owl fight, beard that's white

*[Chorus]*

Must be Rosco

Must be Rosco

Must be Rosco, Rosco LaFleur

## References

1. ↑ See episode 241: Raphina Phalange and the Pots
2. ↑ See episode 259: Fred Greenman
3. ↑ See episode 260: Batthwack Yells And Then Smashes... \*gasp\*
4. ↑ See episode 274: Treat Mo-Self
5. ↑ See episode 275: Am I Ever Gonna Make Any Friends?
6. ↑ See episode 195: Open Up and Eat the Rainbow!
7. ↑ Will's insight roll determines that he thinks both of Rosco's statements were true: *"I don't give a shit about this dog. But I misspoke when I said I don't give a shit about Rosco."*
8. ↑ Rosco's insight reveals this from KT: *"Will doesn't care about saving the world, he cares about saving something in particular. He definitely feels like getting the key is probably more important than a dog or Rudy"*
9. ↑ Speaking about Will's drumming style, KT said *"I don't want to give anything away, but part of Will is steady and the other part of Will is very stressed out."*