Olivia laughs, perhaps a little too eagerly after the pall of the discussion around the Echavarria matter.
"You're the living end, Joseph!"
I have JUST enough tact to bring up neither the cult nor an autograph during the rest of our conversation. Ugh, that couch story was so unsettling. I can't imagine anything worse than hearing about it. Hopefully the Arab and others had a better go of things! They must have.
My business is concluded, but I do so enjoy being in the presence of an actress. This life must be so grand.
Likewise, Evelyn tries her best to steer the conversation away Echavarria and his cult, back toward more pleasant subjects.
"Do you still dabble in scriptwriting, Olivia? Boudica might not have fared well in cinema, but in theatre? People love a good tragedy..." and so on.
Amadeus, Anatoly and Freddy drive through the hills of Pasadena, finally looping back into Los Angeles once they're sure they aren't being followed. They stop at a lunch counter, despite a lack of appetite, to watch the streets and be sure they aren't tailed before heading back to the hotel.
Evelyn, Joseph and Ralph are whisked back to the studio lot once Olivia's lunch hour is over. She bids you all farewell before disappearing back into a mob of managers, acting coaches and makeup people. With no further direction in mind, the trio also return to the hotel.
Amadeus sighs deeply when the other band comes in, from where's propped up on the bed looking grumpy. "Welcome back, children. I saw an orgy involving an alien god's oversexual tongue and got shot; how was your day?"
I had a club sandwich that cost nearly a dollar wait what? Did you say alien god tongue? That's...what?
Then again, that's very much like Olivia described. Could she have seen what she thought she saw?
Was the tongue on a couch by any chance? Also...who shot you? Did the tongue shoot you?
What on earth is going on? None of this sounds even possible?
"I said to not get shot!" Evelyn proclaims exasperatedly as she hurries over to check Amadeus' wound, finding that someone has already done a patch job on it. For a scant few moments it seems like the rest of his odd summation of events has gone over her head, until finally, she looks to Anatoly and Freddy dubiously.
"What is he going on about? Olivia mentioned something like that, but I thought it was just a load of nonsense..."
Anatoly pays attention to nobody, and paces scratching at imaginary itches on his body, and mumbling to himself. If anyone calls his name he simply stares at them for a few seconds, before finally acknowledging them, but everyone finds it hard to carry on a conversation with him. He stands up, then sits down, then paces, seemingly in his own world. Once he even growls under his breath, and pulls a patch of hair from the top of his head, and simply carries it around for a bit.
Finally he stops in the middle of the room.
"Fire! We must burn it down! We must burn down that cursed place, and everyone, and...thing... it it. I'm going now. Gas, I need many cans of gas"!
Anatoly grabs his coat and heads towards the door, sweat soaking his pale complexion.
Distracted by her examination of Amadeus' gunshot wound, Evelyn almost doesn't catch Anatoly in time. She puts herself between the Russian and the door, and after taking a deep breath, does her best to appeal to Anatoly's sense of reason. That is, if it was still intact.
"Anatoly! Anatoly, please. What exactly do you think you saw?" she asks, not ready to believe what Amadeus already told her. The doctor slowly approaches him, trying to put her hands on his shoulders. "If it's anything like what he said, then it could not possibly have been real. It was just some sick prop made by those depraved perverts, nothing more."
Finally he stops in the middle of the room.
"Fire! We must burn it down! We must burn down that cursed place, and everyone, and...thing... it it. I'm going now. Gas, I need many cans of gas"!
Anatoly grabs his coat and heads towards the door, sweat soaking his pale complexion.
Anatoly had been quiet, but Freddy hadn't realized that the ordeal had hit him so hard.
"Anatoly, it's okay, sit down. We will come up with a plan. We can't just burn the place down."
Freddy looks to Evelyn. "As you can see, it got pretty ugly at the mansion. Our disguises didn't matter much when we stumbled on their ritual. The was apparently a mouth on the wall. Like that stone that Amadeus like to carry around." Freddy shakes his head. "I didn't see it. They chased us out of there and we got into a fire fight. Amadeus was hit and I tagged one of them. We drove around awhile afterward to make sure we weren't followed though, so we should be clear for now."
Anatoly gets agitated, and totally out of character for him roughly pushes the Dr. away from him. He then hear's Freddy's comments, and looks at him with wild eyes.
"Clear! Clear! we'll... nobody will ever be clear, until that abomination has been burnt from the face of the earth. Now out of my way, somebody's got to save the world".
Dr. Udko stands up, blocking the door.
"Anatoly. What do you need right now? Let's discuss what you saw and find a way forward. Come with me...."
Dr. Udko sits with Anatoly for a moment in the hotel bathroom where it's a little more quiet and attempts to bring him back to lucidity.
Amadeus sighs deeply. "The Mouth was NOT coming from a couch, it was coming from SOMEWHERE ELSE. It just...intruded on our world, like some damnable thrusting penetration, and its tongue was slobbering over the orgy participants and THEY LOVED IT. Its touch was ecstasy to them. IT WAS NOT NONSENSE, DAMMIT! IT WAS REAL!" Amadeus is shouting at the end, his eyes wide and insane and he hands shaking.
Distracted by Freddy's recounting of events, Evelyn is nearly bowled over. She looks back to Anatoly with genuine fear; he almost seemed like a different man. As Dr. Udko thankfully takes him aside, she takes a deep breath, seeming to regain her composure. She approaches Amadeus again, who, while also unhinged, was at least not trying to burn any buildings down. Yet.
With a sense of clinical detachment, Evelyn patiently does her best to console the man.
My eyes bug out a bit at all this commotion. It's not really possible that this really happened. Things don't...intrude into our world. Our world is all there is. Still, this orgy is something that should be investigated more completely.
After an hour or so of getting everyone collected again, you all sit down and start thinking about the situation at hand.
Doctor Udko speaks first. "I begin to have a better understanding of Walter Winston's state of mind in the time he was my patient- and of the source of Douglas Henslowe's continued troubles. The drawings in his journal were apparently not as metaphorical, not as much of a Goya-like fantasy as I had initially thought..."
"Winston and his friends tried stamping this Cult of the Thousand Mouths out with fire and guns back in 1924... and even with Ramon Echavarria gone, it seems it was only a temporary victory. If we are to succeed in Janet's task, we will need to be armed with more information than her father was. And the only person that would have a place to start is Samson Trammel- or his personal effects."
He pulls of his glasses.
"If it has mouths... it must have a stomach somewhere..."
Evelyn shudders at Dr. Udko's last remark. While still skeptical about these mouths that kept being talked about, she was utterly convinced of the cult's depravity.
"A journal or something of the sort would indeed prove most insightful, but how would we even go about retrieving it? Their departure from Trammel mansion did not exactly go smoothly." She looks to Amadeus and Anatoly, still concerned about their mental state. "Trying to go back in there would be... unwise. Unless there is somewhere else he might be keeping such materials."
I clean my glasses with my handkerchief. Think you can get invited to an orgy?
"Searching Trammel's mansion is likely the only way we'll get further information. But we'll have to, erm, "deal" with the occupants first. Perhaps we could collapse the house on the Mouth, give ourselves time to figure out how to get rid of it for good... do any of you have experience with dynamite?", Udko says. He's dabbing sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief.
"Dynamite? Did we not just now discuss why burning the place down would be a terrible idea?" Evelyn objects, referring to a discussion that was more implied than anything. Or perhaps she only hoped that Dr. Udko said as such to Anatoly. "Now you want to level the place?"
The doctor holds a hand up, indicating that she isn't quite done yet. "Besides that, how are we even going to get into the mansion to conduct our search? We should worry about that before doing anything... rash."
Anatoly calms down enough to sit in a chair and silently rock, shuddering a bit every now and then, as plans are discussed.
Dr. Udko stands up, blocking the door.
"Anatoly. What do you need right now? Let's discuss what you saw and find a way forward. Come with me...."Dr. Udko sits with Anatoly for a moment in the hotel bathroom where it's a little more quiet and attempts to bring him back to lucidity.
[dice=Psychoanalysis]1d6
"With that mouth around, there's no such thing as rash. Just... prudent in the extreme." Amadeus says, then laughs in a slightly mad tone.
Dr. Udko stands up, blocking the door.
"Anatoly. What do you need right now? Let's discuss what you saw and find a way forward. Come with me...."Dr. Udko sits with Anatoly for a moment in the hotel bathroom where it's a little more quiet and attempts to bring him back to lucidity.
[dice=Psychoanalysis]1d6
Freddy shakes his head. "There is no way that we just level that house. There could be innocent people involved. That place is huge, what if there are kids in there? Something I've been thinking about; the gardener from next store stuck a crucifix in one of the mouths and turned it into the little trinket that Amadeus carries around now, right? Maybe we break in again and try the same trick on the big one in the basement?"
I give an enthusiastic nod. Do you think we'll need a proportionally sized crucifix or do you believe any size will do? I believe I can get my hands on one big enough, though if reports on the mouth are accurate we'll need two people to carry it...
Evelyn rubs the bridge of her nose, trying to make sense of the whole thing. The thought that she might be in over her head resurfaces, but she quickly pushes it back down. If this mouth truly does exist, then there must be some scientific basis to it. Yes, that's it.
Nodding to herself, she looks to Freddy, addressing his idea.
"Assuming the gardener's story is true... what about the crucifix had such a profound effect on the mouth? Some kind of physical property, perhaps? It could have been some kind of chemical reaction, or... or..."
Evelyn rubs the bridge of her nose, trying to make sense of the whole thing. The thought that she might be in over her head resurfaces, but she quickly pushes it back down. If this mouth truly does exist, then there must be some scientific basis to it. Yes, that's it.
Nodding to herself, she looks to Freddy, addressing his idea.
"Assuming the gardener's story is true... what about the crucifix had such a profound effect on the mouth? Some kind of physical property, perhaps? It could have been some kind of chemical reaction, or... or..."
Amadeus looks incredulous. "I don't need a head shrinker to tell me I'm crazy, thank you. IT IS REAL!"
Increasingly unnerved by Amadeus' raving, Evelyn seems to just drop her previous thought.
"A-anyway, I would like to avoid the guns and dynamite if at all possible. We need a more permanent solution, and Trammel's materials might have just that. I do not think any more contact with this... mouth is wise. Unless you insist..." She looks to Amadeus and Anatoly again with a frown.
I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around this idea.
Suppose, for a moment that all this is true. The mouth is an...intrusion into our world. Is the statue there a second mouth, or is it just the leftovers of closing the last intrusion? Is there maybe a more permanent way of ending this problem or will more mouths just keep coming through? I have some research material back at my shop that might shed some more light into things?