09:53 <Crion> Technically, the only schedule you're on now is Orr's very hazy one. You've still got a week at least until he starts bothering you about it, anyway. You've secured the oathsworn services of Peter Montgomery in return for certain considerations he himself is due on his way either home or to his grave, and now the main thing to do is plan your approach on The Mouse itself, or its Magic Kingdom, 09:53 <Crion> or both, given that in Arcadia, the ruler is the realm. 09:54 <Crion> The City of Orlando is, of course, peaceful 24 hours a day...at least until the United States military says otherwise. You can get back to the city center without running into any Mouseketeers pretty easily. 09:56 <dammitwho> Let's do this thing. We're not going to have to fight each Princess in turn before hitting the Rat, are we? 09:56 <VoxPVoxD> That piece of shit loves crossovers. No way it's one at a time. 09:59 <VoxPVoxD> Here's something Stewart is wondering, if Sarkosa or Clevenger knows or has theories: is the Mouse the architect of Disney, Inc., or is the title's presence/character a consequence of it? 10:01 <Crion> Clevinger doesn't know, and doesn't honestly seem all that interested. Sarkosa, on the other hand, asks Stewart if he's ever played Metal Gear Solid 2. 10:01 <VoxPVoxD> Of course. 10:02 <Crion> So you remember the bit at the end about how the Patriots were a rogue intelligence forged in the crucible of the White House, via overlapping processes and diseased occult ritual (intentional or not, that's what performing wealth in America is, really) year over year? 10:02 <Crion> Sarkosa thinks the Mouse is roughly the same thing, but on the Disney campus. 10:03 <Crion> And it's why the border marches between the "real" world and Arcadia are so thin here. 10:04 <VoxPVoxD> Nice. The way the Keeper works within the context of the company and the business is very interesting to him. He's wondering things like, should he short Disney before attacking the Magic Kingdom? It wouldn't make sense to hedge. 10:08 <Crion> Rory ?? has thoughts about that. He thinks any knock-on effects will take some time to show up in the market -- there might in fact be a "false spring" as fans rebel against the idea that Disney or its subsidiaries have lost the capitalist magic, a dead-mouse-bounce that pushes the stock higher, not lower, until a hinge point down the line when the loss of footing becomes overdetermined. 10:09 <Crion> Either way, it does occur to Stewart that while scouting around in the Mouse's territory is dangerous...there's no reason they can't just go to the top of a really tall building and survey the place. Florida, especially this part of Florida, is extremely flat. And while the castle itself has bloated beyond recognition, the general territory the Mouse holds to the southwest of the city is 10:09 <Crion> quite horizontal. 10:09 <VoxPVoxD> What's the tallest thing to look from? 10:10 <Crion> That would be SunTrust Center, one of like, hundreds of buildings around the country (some stadiums!) that bear a name like that. This one is a 441 foot tall skyscraper. 10:10 <Crion> Well, you know. Skyscraper for central Florida. 10:10 <VoxPVoxD> The sky hangs low here. 10:11 <VoxPVoxD> To the motley: "Anyone want to come look at the Magic Kingdom from the top of a tower?" 10:12 <VoxPVoxD> After a beat: "Fuck I should've bought a spyglass from Carth." 10:12 <banana> Melanie's curious about whether it's safe to go up a tall building with everyone under the happiness curse. "Are they doing... maintenance? Like, will the elevators work?" 10:12 <CBN> Tony: "Like in one of those Assassination Creed games? That's a good idea." 10:13 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Worst case we could take the stairs." Oh right, Melanie doesn't have joints. "But I don't think we're gonna have to worry about the elevators. Stuff seems to mostly just work, as far as I can tell." 10:13 <Crion> Lysander, who has been hanging about daydrinking: "I believe so. The building is part of the City's 'body,' right? So some level of maintenance should occur, just like healing over time. But even if not, surely an elevator won't fail after three weeks of light to no use." 10:14 <Crion> Rory ?? gives him a look over his paper. 10:14 <Crion> Rory, to the party: "Run the elevator once just to see what happens. I suspect it'll be fine." 10:14 <banana> Melanie: "Reducing people to cells sounds about right." 10:15 <trenchfoot> Nels: "I'd like to take in the view. And, um, the test run seems like a good idea." 10:16 <Crion> Peter is generally silent, with the one exception being when he informs you he's going across the street to stock up on bottled water. 10:17 <dammitwho> Maggie: "Elevators are good solid engineering. Worst thing that happens is that we get stuck and have to break open the hatch on the top there." 10:18 <trenchfoot> "Please don't talk about worst case scenarios. That's how we find out we were underestimating how bad things can get." 10:19 <CBN> Tony, helpfully: "It's nice we can still say 'the worst thing that happens' like we even know, though. That's called staying positive." 10:19 <banana> Well, let's not waste time. Melanie feels dumb now, questioning something that could have been routine... we've been here too long and everything has slowed down, exacerbating the motley's tendency to devolve into debates. Or her tendency. "Okay, let's go find out if there's something worse then." 10:21 <Crion> SunTrust Center overlooks the US 4/State 408 interchange in the city center about a dozen blocks south of the Neverending Queen. You could drive or walk. 10:23 <CBN> Tony: "Do you guys wanna walk? If we don't drive we can't get our van stolen by some dumb asshole again." 10:23 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart's not driving. If Maggie or Tony wants to pile us into the van, Stewart'll get in. Otherwise walking's fine. 10:23 <VoxPVoxD> "Fine by me." 10:23 <dammitwho> Maggie: "Might's well walk." 10:24 <Crion> Peter doesn't assume he has a vote. Stereo Vengeant hasn't been around since the duel...but there's a big, ominous pair of black-and-white noise-cancelling wireless headphones around his neck constantly now. 10:25 <banana> Melanie looks around at Tony as they proceed toward the tower, disinterested in whether Peter participates in this bit. "Why do I feel like we haven't seen the last of... I've forgotten his name." 10:25 <banana> "It was like Mouse, but- Mud?" 10:25 <VoxPVoxD> "Mutt?" 10:25 <VoxPVoxD> "The guy who got ejected from Spring here?" 10:26 <banana> "Right, the moment you said that I just felt a strong aura of 'fuck this guy', so Mutt." 10:26 <VoxPVoxD> "That did seem to be the vibe." 10:26 <Crion> Peter: "Because we haven't." 10:26 <Crion> "Mutt didn't just get ejected, he switched sides." 10:26 <Crion> "He works for the Mouse now." 10:27 <VoxPVoxD> "What a dipshit." 10:27 <banana> Melanie's silent for a moment. "That's even worse than his other choices." 10:28 <CBN> Tony: "And again, perfect reason to walk!" Tony stops himself from saying 'not like someone can steal our feet' because: Hedge. 10:28 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart stops himself from saying "not like someone can steal our shoes' because: Florida. 10:31 <dammitwho> Maggie: "I was right. That guy's a real dummy." 10:31 <Crion> Peter: "Either the Mouse keeps him around for narrative reasons or...I dunno. Sun Glasses Man is a mystery to me." 10:32 <Crion> "But that's who Mutt reports to, I think." 10:32 <banana> "He could be Aztec-themed." 10:33 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Not even the Wyrd is corny enough to give an Aztec loyalist an Iron and Wine cover for a Tip." 10:34 <CBN> While they walk, Tony just takes in the sights and, reluctantly, the smells. He can feel it in his bones that they aren't going to be stuck here forever, and once you can internalize that, it's easy to tolerate being just about anywhere. Even Florida. 10:35 <banana> Melanie: "But you know, obsidian mirrors..." 10:36 <Crion> Everyone really does just seem to be having a normal one. And like, a NORMAL normal one, not a Florida Man normal one. 10:38 <Crion> Tony, in his role as Baron and with his keen Hedge-senses, can even see the little guys starting to poke through here and there and...start hanging out with the people of Orlando? Sometimes they're feeding off the humans' Glamour but the City of Orlando makes it very clear the degree to which it will tolerate its own little guys and gals being fucked with, and so it is that like, hobs are 10:38 <Crion> starting to set up their own outdoor dining sections in some alleys next to restaurants that are moving along lazily. 10:40 <CBN> Tony nods and taps the brim of his hat at any hob that makes eye contact with him. Never hurts to let them know you're looking (out). 10:41 <Crion> They react, usually, with a grin and a bow, or whatever's biologically and morphologically equivalent -- slightly nervous and comical, because they're all kind of acting like they expect the hall monitor to show up at any time and reprimand them. 10:42 <CBN> Tony's probably the closest thing, and he's got bigger fish to fry. Vibe on lil guys. 10:43 <CBN> He does nudge the rest of the group and point out some of the cuter little outdoor dining sections, because it's nice to share nice things with friends. 10:44 <banana> Melanie: "Gah. Well... they're not doing anything wrong. Except serving seafood inland." 10:44 <Crion> Well, it won't be inland much longer, geologically speaking. 10:45 <CBN> Tony: "It's really too bad they can't do that kinda thing without this weird reality bleed thing going on. Maybe the Hedge will copy enough over when things go back to normal that they can keep it up." Real unremarked, load-bearing "when"s here. 10:47 <Crion> You can arrive at the SunTrust Center whenever you please, to find the front desk abandoned, the guy who was supposed to be manning it smoking with the cleaning lady, who is hitting on him, and in the back, an open door showing you the security guards goofing off and playing PlayStation on the huge bigscreen security monitor. 10:49 <trenchfoot> ...Nice? 10:49 <CBN> Tony smiles serenely, having been reminded of the stakes: This should not be something the hobs should see, or be encouraged by. 10:50 <Crion> None of them are paying attention to you and probably won't unless you do something like start shooting guns or setting things on fire. 10:50 <banana> How about pressing elevator buttons experimentally? 10:51 <Crion> Sure. Are you using the call panel outside or are you gonna step into one of these bad boys? One or two of them are sitting here with doors open to the lobby, as they're supposed to when not called. 10:53 <dammitwho> Oh, nice. 10:53 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Now before we go in, none of us are the devil, right?" 10:55 <dammitwho> Maggie: "Stewart, what in the sam hill are you talking about?" 10:56 <CBN> Tony: "I don't understand that reference but you said it like a joke so I'm thinking it is something like that." 10:57 <banana> Melanie: "I don't wear Prada anymore." Never did - her parents couldn't afford it - but there were knockoffs. A very long time ago. 10:57 <trenchfoot> Nels: "What?" 10:57 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'm sorry, I'm just tempting fate." 10:58 <Crion> Peter: "You guys are referring to like, multiple different movies." 10:58 <CBN> Tony, victoriously, but quietly: "I knew it." 10:59 <banana> Well, yeah. Has this guy never had friends who were born over a 100-year timespan? 11:00 <banana> Has he had friends? 11:01 <VoxPVoxD> That wasn't an I'm-not-the-devil... well it's probably fine. "Going up." 11:02 <Crion> These are big corporate elevators; you'll all fit comfortably. Annoyingly, it's a tiered elevator system; 35 floors to the place, and about every 10 it'll discharge into a second lobby, then a third lobby, for you to switch. 11:04 <CBN> Tony: "This is the fanciest building I've ever been in." He probably means tallest, or has-most-elevators. 11:04 <Crion> In these secondary lobbies, things are much the same as down at the first. Attendance does seem light -- possibly a pandemic holdover -- but the "workers" are mainly standing around and chatting, eating lunch, goofing off, and so on. 11:13 <VoxPVoxD> What a weird layout for a building. Feels like the kind of thing that, if we were in a video game, would turn into a setpiece encounter on the way out. But we're not. Haha. That would be insane, to think that. 11:15 <Crion> Well, you can't take the elevator to the roof. And, you realize, the top and second-to-top floors are schmoozy reserved executive suites for...whoever. You can tell because their buttons don't seem to work without a key. Won't have roof access there, either, probably. So it's best, Tony and Nels figure, to go to the highest floor you can and look for a way up. Melanie finds it pretty easily. 11:16 <banana> Melanie takes in the atmosphere, dull though it is, with a little interest. If she ever graduates, has some sort of 'normal life' and career, would it involve cubicles? Conventionally yes, but.. it doesn't feel likely. 11:17 <banana> "The stairs are in the corner here. Either it's just for maintenance, or roof access is a management perk..." 11:18 <Crion> Nope. Becomes very clear that like most modern American Big Buildings, there's a physical plant every ten floors and then another one on the roof, whose only executive amenity is an empty helipad. Otherwise it's a lot of HVAC and machine components. 11:18 <Crion> But, as you come out onto the weird artificial gravel-top and concrete, you are above everything else in the city. 11:19 <CBN> Tony sucks in a breath and lets it out slowly. Definitely the highest-up he's ever been. Really a ground-level kind of guy. Just gonna, try and hang out near the center, maybe by the stairs, here, it's fine. It's fine. 11:20 <Crion> There's a waist-high concrete barricade, maybe a bit lower than the waist on the taller guys, but this is not a place for people to be milling around, yeah. 11:21 <Crion> Off to the southwest -- you can tell by the sun, or just because you know where the Magic Kingdom is -- there's the great IP blight. 11:22 <banana> What content sprawls unmarketed across Orlando? 11:23 <Crion> To interpret that, first it must be asked: Have any of you been to Walt Disney World? 11:23 <CBN> Tony has not. 11:23 <trenchfoot> Nels keeps a wary eye on the barricades around the building as if expecting them to disappear, but after a bit (and standing comfortably far away from the edge), she'll look out over the city. And, no. 11:24 <dammitwho> Maggie will shade her eyes with her hand and squint, in order to see farther. 11:26 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart went a couple of times. It probably would've been a yearly thing if he hadn't been an only child. 11:27 <banana> Melanie had barely been outside Westminster before going off to college. She was learning a lot! 11:28 <dammitwho> Walt Disney World first opened in '71, so some of us never would have gotten the chance. 11:31 <Crion> You can tell at a glance that the Magic Kingdom is, clearly, its own thing, debauched and looming in the back of the resort. There are four smaller spires or castle-structures looming in the ruled desmense laid out before it, however. One of these is easy enough for any of you with pop culture knowledge to clock: there is a thin, silver tiara crowning Epcot. 11:31 <VoxPVoxD> Cute. 11:32 <Crion> Stewart can tell what the other three are, however. The great, animalistic Pride Rock-type ediface looming above the jungle off to your left, facing Disney World straight-on, is or used to be the Animal Kingdom -- the safari/adventure themepark module of the place. 11:33 <dammitwho> Uncertainly: "So it looks like there's an... orb kingdom, a rock kingdom...?" 11:34 <Crion> The glitzy, ritzy high-rise hotel surrounded by swinging spotlights shooting up against the hazy never-quite-night cloud cover in the center-front of the park? Hollywood Towers. Where they shove all their movie-related stuff that doesn't fit anywhere else. Star Wars, Toy Story, etcetera. 11:34 <Crion> And to your right, crowned by a great palatial waterside estate, Disney Springs. The resort. 11:35 <banana> Melanie, leaning unsafely on the railing, sighs. "I guess you cant fault the creature's sense of style." 11:37 <CBN> Tony, from a fair distance: "I still can!" 11:38 <banana> Melanie: "It does look like a fantasy though. I mean, it is." 11:38 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Tony's right." 11:38 <trenchfoot> She's a bit farther back than Tony is. 11:38 <banana> Is there an obvious route to the princess' castle? 11:38 <Crion> Peter: "I think you've already met the princess from Disney Springs. Or saw her, at least. Æreal." 11:39 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Animal World, Science World, Movie World, and... Resort World? Shopping World? Something like that. Hotels, transportation, it's got like an open air mall around it. They called it Pleasure Island when I was a kid. Part of it at least." 11:40 <CBN> Tony: "I thought the whole thing was Shopping World?" 11:40 <Crion> The four domains look connected by wide lanes. There's something moving along them, though. 11:41 <Crion> Indistinct, hard to make out from this distance. 11:41 <VoxPVoxD> "I guess, Aristotelianly, Animal Kingdom is earth, Epcot is fire, Hollywood Towers is air, and the Springs is water." 11:41 <Crion> A pulsing sort of mass. 11:41 <CBN> Tony: "Which one has the superhero movies? Spring said I would 'probably like those a lot.' " 11:42 <Crion> Peter nods. "Each is based on an actual Disney princess, but also their...remit. The Feather Princess got her wish. She lives in a palace out of the water. With the gulls and the crows, and no prince." 11:42 <banana> Spring is a douchebag. Not saying she's wrong. 11:42 <Crion> Peter: "Superhero movies are Marvel, and that's gonna be Hollywood Towers." 11:43 <banana> "These princesses... who are or were they? Do you know?" 11:44 <VoxPVoxD> "How much time have you spent inside?" 11:44 <Crion> Peter grimaces. "Nope. I've been trying to find out! My best guess is they're something like Avery is, but I don't know the mechanism. Goblin queens? Lost, like us, in a semi-durance? Hard to say from a distance." 11:45 <banana> Melanie: "So... you do think of yourself as Lost?" 11:45 <Crion> "I've tested Hollywood Towers. See all that...gunk...moving down the lanes? You can't get a great read on it from here. It's like...shadows of people." 11:47 <VoxPVoxD> "Is it actual people? Do you know if Disney had crowds in it when it went over?" 11:47 <Crion> To Melanie: "Of course I do. It's...what's it called. The science of classification. It's that. I got changed whether I like it or not." 11:47 <VoxPVoxD> "Taxonomy." 11:47 <Crion> Peter nods. 11:48 <banana> Melanie nods. "That's what we told Kingsley when he wasn't certain. They thought you'd been let go on purpose, that maybe it was a trick, et cetera." 11:49 <Crion> Peter sighs. "I liked Kingsley." He looks back towards the Kingdom. "I liked everyone, really. ...Maybe not some of the vampires." 11:51 <VoxPVoxD> "Becoming a vampire's basically an ironclad excuse to be an asshole forever. Some people seem to take it better than others." 11:52 <Crion> Peter: "This whole thing The City of Orlando is doing is weird -- up to and including the idea of a city 'doing' something on its own -- but it ran off the vampires right quick." 11:52 <Crion> "Can't be all bad." 11:52 <Crion> "No offense to Jesse or Lister." 11:53 <banana> Melanie: "Tony made the same point. The cells in the lobby seemed pretty happy... they're still not free though." 11:53 <VoxPVoxD> "Pure IP trickery. Universal just had their own legally distinct vampire they needed to push. Trying the Dark Universe thing." 11:53 <banana> Melanie cackles at that. That's exactly it. 11:53 <dammitwho> Maggie grunts. "Maybe. But any smart sailor gets uneasy when the rats start jumping overboard." 11:57 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'd take the vampires' fate over the willworkers'. Wizards all got et." 11:57 <Crion> Peter chuckles at Stewart's not-quite-joke. 11:57 <Crion> "Yeah, I've seen that...thing." 11:57 <Crion> "I've steered clear of it." 11:58 <VoxPVoxD> So how many ways into the park are there? 11:59 <Crion> A road you'll know is the Osceola Parkway if you check Google Maps is the main throughpass -- there are a bunch of ways in off of US 4. The woods seem very, very heavily...calcified? Thickened? Around the Kingdom itself. It clearly wants you to come in the normal way and experience the park. 12:04 <Crion> Here's something interesting, though: Stewart remembers the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex, and it's still there, in the very very foreground, actually right up against US 4. It doesn't seem to have the same sort of overriding Park Visitor tumor-mass that the rest of the place has. 12:05 <Crion> Nels notices that the same is true of the golf courses that seem to dot the liminal spaces between the princesses' desmenses. 12:05 <Crion> *demenses 12:06 <Crion> **demesnes. 12:06 <trenchfoot> She points this out to the rest of them. "That's weird, right?" 12:07 <Crion> Peter: "Yeah..." 12:07 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "The Wide World of Sports looks clear, too." 12:08 <banana> "Does the M-word.. not have power over athletics? Maybe it's not scripted enough?" 12:11 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Maybe it's just, there's no sports princess." 12:12 <VoxPVoxD> "Like a pitcher who was also a wizard...? No, that sounds like an anime." 12:12 <Crion> Peter: "Oh. Here's what I know about the other princesses: the one from the Animal Kingdom is basically just Princess Mononoke. That confused me until I remembered Disney had the distro rights for it. The Hollywood princess is a chameleon but usually looks like, an actual actress playing a Disney role." 12:12 <Crion> "I've got nothing on Epcot." 12:12 <VoxPVoxD> Come on, SHODAN... 12:13 <banana> Melanie: "Perhaps Epcot has Paris Hilton." 12:13 <banana> "Thanks for the information though." 12:15 <CBN> Tony: "That's silly, we aren't in France." 12:15 <Crion> Peter nods. "Yep. Oh, I brought water, if anyone needs to stay hydrated." 12:16 <Crion> He actually has been wearing like, a hiking insulated cooler thing this entire time. The water's moderately chilled. 12:16 <banana> To Tony: "She's the heir of a hotel-owning dynasty. Famous for being famous..." 12:17 <trenchfoot> Nels: "You can do that?" 12:18 <banana> "It makes sense, right? If you're really... what's the term they use on Wikipedia... notable. Then that itself is notable." 12:20 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "You don't even have to be that famous anymore. You can spin a modest 5-to-6 figure income out of being annoying on the internet, if you're lucky and willing enough to embarrass yourself." 12:21 <banana> Melanie: "How did you decide between annoying and gaming?" 12:21 <CBN> Tony: "Oh." About as much processing of the recently-outlined facts as one can do. 12:22 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I didn't." 12:22 <dammitwho> Maggie nods at Nels. "Sure. Even Mark Twain wrote about it." 12:23 <Crion> Peter will just quietly open a bottle for himself, then. 12:26 <dammitwho> Maggie makes a soft contemplative 'pff...' noise at the Magic Kingdom. "Oh, erh, I'll take some water if you're offering. Beer dehydrates." 12:26 <dammitwho> "Thanks, kiddo." 12:27 <banana> Melanie didn't really register the offer. She likes the sunlight. "Well, I'd rather go in through ESPN and try golf-hopping than follow the yellow brick road. They could both be just as trapped, but maybe not." 12:28 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart doesn't need any water; they left early enough that he didn't even start drinking yet. Luckily we also haven't had to do anything that requires focus or nerve. "So if we take the World of Sports in, we'll be crossing over in Hollywood. The golf courses give us more options... what theme are you guys in the mood for never wanting to see again when we get home?" 12:28 <Crion> Peter hands Maggie an unopened bottle. "Well, that's the thing, right. It could be empty for good reasons, or bad ones." 12:29 <Crion> He opens his mouth and shuts it again at Stewart's question. 12:30 <banana> Melanie: "Let's not ruin the Animal Kingdom." 12:30 <VoxPVoxD> Honestly, let him. "Go ahead." Getting firm opinions from the Wherehouse is like pulling teeth with a door and a string. 12:30 <VoxPVoxD> This is to Peter. 12:31 <Crion> Peter: "I was going to say manor houses." 12:31 <Crion> "Fuck Disney Springs." 12:32 <banana> Melanie: "That's fair." 12:32 <VoxPVoxD> "Aheh." Stewart looks out at the resort. Involuntarily he starts blocking out in his mind the way to make tipping and falling over the guardrail look most plausible like an accident. This'd be easier if he had started drinking. 12:32 <VoxPVoxD> Bad balance. 12:33 <VoxPVoxD> "Plenty of golf courses at that end of the park. 12:33 <VoxPVoxD> " 12:34 <Crion> Peter pulls out a sheet of printer paper. It's the promotional park map: https://www.orlandoescape.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/walt-disney-map-with-hotels.jpg 12:34 <Crion> "Yeah. So the two big ones are marked here, and you can see there's that third sort of right off the coast of the Magic Kingdom's...moat." 12:35 <Crion> "I honestly don't know how accurate this is." 12:35 <Crion> "It's from the internet." 12:35 <Crion> "But you can see it mostly lines up before, you know, the big changes." 12:36 <Crion> "The question to me is: who controls the water parks? Are they with their princesses, or with the sports...authority?" 12:36 <dammitwho> She clicks her tongue, pondering the map. "Bet our biggest problem is that moat, there. It probably wasn't to scale before, but I'll wager it is now." 12:38 <VoxPVoxD> Where's the monorail? 12:38 <Crion> Where it "should" be for the most part...meaning there's a direct line, via monorail, from Epcot to the Magic Kingdom, skipping the moat. You can even see trains moving along it. 12:39 <Crion> But you need to reach Epcot to board. 12:40 <banana> The worst case scenario, which Melanie will not voice, is that the golf courses are Arcadian parkland - a gateway further in. 12:41 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "If we get to Epcot, we can take the train across the moat... but then we're trusting faerie rails." 12:41 <banana> "A train line is like a promise..." 12:42 <VoxPVoxD> "Yeah, but a promise to whom?" 12:42 <dammitwho> Maggie nods. "I'd bet it's a surer ride, but we'll have to reckon on whether the Castle is bunkered down for a siege. If it is, the end of the line is where they'll have a lot of defenses up." 12:43 <trenchfoot> Nels: "There wouldn't happen to be like, boats or something as an alternative, would there?" 12:43 <dammitwho> "It's speed we want. The slower we go, the more time the Rat has to call up, freakin', playing cards with spears or what all." 12:45 <Crion> Peter: "I dunno if that's true." 12:45 <Crion> "This is the Mouse's domain, right?" 12:45 <Crion> "If it wants to Red Queen Executioner us, it can do it at the speed of thought." 12:45 <VoxPVoxD> "All the actual speedbumps are of indeterminate size and wearing tiaras anyway. We can't really predict the fastest way in by casing the joint." 12:46 <Crion> "Our vantage is that it operates by rules." 12:46 <Crion> "Stories." 12:46 <banana> ...ad- or dis-? 12:48 <dammitwho> She clicks her tongue. "What's your thought, Peter?" 12:49 <Crion> Peter: "Well, I don't have anything firm yet. I'm...not really good at this high-level theory stuff like Stewart and Melanie and, really, all of you are. But: Disney wants to acquire IP, right?" 12:49 <Crion> "Like, that's what it does." 12:49 <Crion> "The company." 12:50 <banana> "Yeah, they'd like to own the settings for every possible narrative." 12:50 <Crion> "It occured to me that maybe the best defense, walking in there, would be to be an archetype or a character that the Mouse didn't own already, and would have to buy, rather than steal from the public domain or worse, call up from its library." 12:51 <Crion> He sighs. "This is maybe less of a problem for all of you than the guy doing the whole, fucking, Prince Charming thing." 12:51 <Crion> "Because it does own that." 12:51 <dammitwho> "I don't know much about corporate intellectual property." 12:53 <banana> If Melanie was to be mean - which she will not - she might compare Maggie to Steamboat Willie. Which Disney also owns. 12:53 <Crion> To Maggie: "Well, if I had to summarize your vibe, you're like. Rosie the Riveter. And Disney can't buy her, she was created by the United States government, right." 12:54 <banana> "Stewart is doing a decent Zorro impression." 12:54 <VoxPVoxD> "Who owns Zorro?" 12:55 <banana> Melanie: "Sony!" 12:55 <banana> "Via Columbia, via Tristar..." 12:56 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'm not against it in principle, but I feel like I gotta say for the record that Polish Zorro sounds like a MADtv sketch." 12:57 <Crion> Peter: "It's not the first comp I'd have chosen, but it's better than being Orlando Bloom's guy from Pirates, which is where you're trending otherwise." 12:57 <Crion> "Disney does own him." 12:57 <dammitwho> Maggie: "Or one of those internet radio things you listen to." 12:57 <trenchfoot> Nels: "Weird question. Um. Who owns my stuff? I never thought to look it up." 12:57 <Crion> Peter blinks. "Oh. Oh shit. Right." 12:58 <Crion> "I think all your work is in the public domain and I don't think anyone's ever done a biopic of you...so you do. Or your estate." 12:58 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I think if it was anyone it'd be Sony via Columbia." 12:59 <Crion> "Yeah it depends where the rights to the masters are. Definitely not with Disney, though." 12:59 <banana> "Du-" Melanie shakes her head. Durance of the author + 70 years. 13:00 <banana> "Nels also has a great costume." 13:02 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart's mind wanders. Was that Salma Hayek in those Antonio Banderas Zorro movies? No, who was it... 13:03 <VoxPVoxD> Belatedly: "What do you think, Tony?" 13:04 <CBN> Tony: "Oh! It was the one from Entrapment. From the laser scene." 13:04 <CBN> With more certainty than you'll get from him about a lot of popular culture. But some things are important. 13:05 <CBN> Tony: "Not sure who I should disguise as if that's our plan though. Anybody got anything?" 13:05 <dammitwho> Maggie: "Any good beer company mascots? Spuds MacKenzie?" 13:07 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "If you wanna lean into the mien you could do Clayface. If you wanna lean into the hat and shotgun and beset by wily animals, then how's your Elmer Fudd?" 13:09 <CBN> Tony stares blankly at Stewart for a minute. It's perfect. "Buh buh. Buh." He reflects. "Oh! Sure." 13:11 <Crion> Peter, relieved: "So that's everyone but me. I'll need to figure something out." 13:11 <Crion> "Or maybe I won't." 13:11 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Can you shoot?" 13:11 <VoxPVoxD> "Like a pistol?" 13:12 <VoxPVoxD> "Like... a Walther?" 13:12 <Crion> "Yeah." 13:12 <Crion> "...Haha." 13:12 <banana> Melanie: "You don't have to be Prince Charming. And they'd really want to buy it." 13:12 <Crion> "Well, my dad taught me on rifles, but I've shot handguns. And I think I see where you're going with this." 13:13 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I think Mickey Mouse is a totally credible Bond villain." 13:13 <Crion> He leans against one of the giant air intake units. Not near the fan, of course. "I'll need to get fitted for a tux." 13:14 <VoxPVoxD> "There's bound to be tailors here." 13:17 <Crion> Peter: "So our plan is to hit up the ESPNZone, see if we can make a deal for safe passage through the courses, and if that either doesn't play or we get pushback from all..." He gestures towards the Magic Kingdom. "...that bullshit, we go full iconography and push through Epcot to the monorail?" 13:18 <CBN> Tony: "I mean, either way I'm loaded and good for it." He means the gun. He's sober as a judge (outside Florida). 13:19 <banana> Melanie: "Let's consider trying to sneak onto the courses.. they're not exactly fenced off. Ideally, we won't have to find who owns them. 13:19 <banana> " 13:20 <Crion> The courses aren't fenced off, but they do appear to be fully enclosed by the greater park. 13:20 <Crion> They're borderlands between the princesses' domains, rather than access points themselves. 13:23 <dammitwho> Maggie: "It sounds like the best shot." 13:23 <Crion> You can do it of course -- it just means risking the Animal Kingdom or Disney Springs, depending on which one you're targetijng. 13:23 <Crion> *targeting. 13:24 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, do we want to run afoul of the animal kingdom or the ligature mermaid?" 13:24 <VoxPVoxD> "Or risk running afoul of." 13:24 <dammitwho> "Bum-ba-dum-ba-dum~ All the day long whether rain or shine / She's working on the assembly line / She's making history / Working for victory / Rosie! The riveter!" 13:25 <dammitwho> She coughs, embarrassed, since the strategy talk is apparently ongoing. "Do we know anything about either one, really?" 13:25 <dammitwho> "I'm graspin' at straws, most of this stuff came up after my time." 13:25 <Crion> Peter: "I'm agonostic. Apparently the Jungle Princess eats people, but, like. That only matters after we're dead, and shouldn't factor." 13:25 <banana> "Peter, you said we saw Aereal at some point? You don't mean- the manatees?" 13:25 <Crion> "What?" 13:25 <Crion> "Manatees?" 13:26 <Crion> "She takes the form of crows." 13:26 <banana> "Er, forget it. Aha." 13:26 <VoxPVoxD> "Not tactically, I don't think, unless Peter does. It's just a vibe check, really. Like I said, do we want to get queasy looking at zoos or five star hotels for the rest of our lives?" 13:26 <Crion> "You saw manatees?" 13:26 <Crion> "Are they doing okay?" 13:26 <VoxPVoxD> "On the way in. They seemed to be." 13:26 <banana> Melanie: "They were right up the river, no need to fear anything. So cute." 13:26 <trenchfoot> Nels: "I think we'll be seeing more zoos than five star hotels in our lifetimes, if that helps." 13:26 <Crion> "That's good. Honestly..." He trails off, looking out over the City of Orlando. 13:27 <CBN> Tony: "They had little friends." 13:28 <banana> Melanie: "I think the suggestion to go in through, and say fuck off to, Disney Springs, was good." 13:30 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, I'm with Melanie." 13:30 <dammitwho> Maggie: "We wanna flip a coin or something, or is that gonna be messed up this close to the Magic Kingdom? Otherwise I'm fine with Disney Springs." 13:32 <Crion> Peter: "I don't actually want to meet the Feather Princess, necessarily...but she does hate it. The Mouse." 13:32 <Crion> "The Duke let that slip." 13:32 <Crion> "He said it in a way that implied they all do." 13:32 <banana> Melanie: "Do they have a backstage area where they all get together and gossip?" 13:32 <banana> "Not the princesses, the Keepers, I mean." 13:33 <banana> "Christ. Sorry, ignore that." 13:33 <dammitwho> "Let's never find out." 13:33 <Crion> Peter: "Æreal is the 'diplomat.'" 13:34 <Crion> "The Mouse sends her out to...talk. Seems to annoy the piss out of the Sun Glasses Man." 13:35 <Crion> "Anyway. The princesses probably have to be our enemies. But maybe..." 13:35 <Crion> He shrugs. "Maybe I've got motivated reasoning." 13:35 <dammitwho> Maggie: "Something to keep in our back pocket, there." 13:35 <banana> "If one of them catches us and wants to talk before commencing annihilation maneuvers, we shall." 13:36 <banana> Melanie: "It can't have been much fun, being caught between all these monsters and looking for a way out." 13:37 <CBN> Tony: "But if the bird lady doesn't like the mouse, we can do one of those, enemy-of-my-enemy-can-maybe-take-care-of-some-of-that-for-us, deals." 13:37 <Crion> Peter looks away. 13:38 <Crion> Once again he doesn't say something. 13:43 <dammitwho> Maggie shakes her head. "I don't think we'd like that deal, and Stewart can correct me but I don't think two of Them can ever permanmently kill each other. Let's just stick to her opening up the gates for us." 13:43 <dammitwho> "Unless that was what you meant." 13:44 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Are the princesses even Titles? What if they're just really fucked changelings?" 13:44 <VoxPVoxD> "Or hob royals?" 13:45 <dammitwho> "If they're hobs we can let Tony gladhand them." 13:45 <banana> We're going around in circles. It's kind of comfortable up here, but not safe.. safety is an illusion, even when we're back on the ground, as long as the Gates to the Kingdom remain open. 13:47 <Crion> Now he does decide to say something: "You came down here with a limited focus. I'm not going to ask that you expand it." 13:48 <Crion> "You know, it's weird." 13:49 <Crion> "You haven't asked me to present the skull?" 13:49 <banana> Melanie: "...Are we going to get a surprise if we do?" 13:49 <Crion> "Of the shithead rapist." 13:49 <Crion> "Not a bad one." 13:50 <banana> "Go ahead, then." 13:51 <Crion> He walks over to the maintenance door to one of the big HVAC units, and snaps his fingers in such a way to touch the door with his middle finger on the exchange. The door becomes a portal, into a Hollow. 13:51 <Crion> It's roughly the size of an extremely spacious coffin. 13:51 <Crion> On the other side of the portal is a door. 13:51 <Crion> In the middle of the blank, undifferentiated space, on the floor, is a skull. 13:53 <Crion> Peter picks it up, straddling the hollow. He holds it out. "Touch it, test it, whatever. I'm gonna put it back when I'm done." 13:54 <VoxPVoxD> Can you Tip a magic skull? 13:55 <Crion> Yes. 13:57 <Crion> Mere Jacoby -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbSXWsWDbm4 Ra ra Rasputin, lover of the Russian queen: They didn't quit, they wanted his head; Ra ra Rasputin, Russia's greatest love machine: And so they shot him 'til he was dead. 13:58 <VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Well, that's the real skull." 14:00 <banana> Melanie: "Yeah, he was a bad guy, and deserves to be a trophy at most.. but he's someone else's trophy." She sighs. "That's on hold. It's okay." 14:07 <Crion> Peter puts the skull back, steps out, and closes the door to his hollow. "You can probably guess why I don't just keep it on me." 14:07 <Crion> "But I can get it from anywhere." 14:17 <Crion> The six of you head for the stairs back down. Time to get to work.