Episode 22: Make Me

Narrator: Welcome to Ghost Wax, a Far and Tall Tales Production. The following story may contain graphic content. Listener discretion is advised. 

[Intro Music]

Episode 23. Make Me

*Recorder clicks on*

Angiers:  That is the weirdest looking vape I’ve ever seen.

Nash: It’s a recorder, like the one Voncid had?

Angiers: *Sarcastic AF* No, I missed it, mechanical box with the copper megaphone sticking out of it was really subtle.     

Nash: They are trying to get more of us to carry those around… apparently they can pick up stuff you can’t hear normally.

Angiers:  So it’s some kind of ghost phone?

Nash: I guess so.

Angiers:  And that's, what, a ghost mini?

Nash: Yeah.  I said there was no way I was going to be caught carrying around that obtrusive thing, so they got me this hands-free version.  

Agniers: *after a pause* I just can’t get used to this… 

Nash: To what?  

Angiers:  Well for one there's a black cat in the cat in the backseat.

Nash: He wanted to help.

Angiers: But why, why is he there in the first place?

Nash: Well… You can’t have him up front, the airbag could hurt him…

Angiers: *Sigh* Or how you people just talk about all this unreal shit so easily.

Nash: About what? GHOSTS and DEMONS and CURSED DOLLS.

Angiers: Not funny… I… *not wanting to say* I actually *beat* had an encounter with.

Nash: ***Interrupting*** had a run in with a cursed doll and that's where that huge scar on your neck you try to hide with the high collar clothes and scarves came from?

Angiers: *Unhappy sound*

Nash: Listen, you've got a file in the vault.  Everyone does.  Even if they don’t remember why.

*Awkward silence*

Nash: That's how they recruit.  Via trauma.  A lot of people brush up against this shit and are able to push it back down, ignore it, rationalize it away… but some people…  *Reciting a Latin phrase*  

CONSCRIBERE PER AGONIA.  

Recruit through agony.  Some of us get hit too hard to forget about it, or have our memories changed.  Not much they can do after that except recruit you.. or kill you, or make you an observer, or just let you go crazy.

Angiers: … so fucked up.

Nash: You are correct.

Angiers: *Beat* So what happened to you?

Nash: Hmm?

Angiers: How’d you get, you know, in?  What’s your AGON-NEEAH.

*Silence in response*

Oh, come on tough guy, that’s bullshit, you get to know mine and then I get left hanging?

Nash:  Look, we’re almost there, we don’t have time.

Angiers: Bullshit.

Nash: It’s really, really fucked up.

Angiers: I woke up in the middle of the night with a porcelain doll chewing at my jugular vein screaming “baby is so thirsty.”

Nash: Christ…

Angiers: Yeah.  I can handle it.

Nash: Ok.

*We hear the sounds of something squelching.  Nash has removed a row of false teeth and replacement gum/jaw on the left side of his face.*

Angiers: Shit… you umm… you can’t tell, those are really believable… I mean that is a very good prosthetic and… what uh… so what happened?

*We hear Nash putting the prosthetic back in*

Nash: *Talking strangely as the prosthetic fits back in*  I was six when I left the first one under my pillow…*speaking normally* I was six when I left the first one under my pillow. Apparently she really liked them.  Came back for the rest…

*Beat*

Angiers: … No shit?

*Nash nods*

Angiers: The Tooth Fairy?

Nash: I told you it was fucked up.

*There's a long pause but finally Nash chuckles under his breath.*

Angiers: Oh, FUCK you.

Nash: we’re here.

*The car pulls to a stop, we hear two doors open, one close, then a third open and close.*

Nash: Jinx.  Watch the back.  Keep an eye out if she tries to escape on a broomstick or something.

*Angiers closes her door*

Angiers: You really think she’s, like, a witch?

Nash: Yeah.

Angiers: How does that happen?

Nash: Witch, by Order definition, is someone who learned the practice of magic from a non-human entity.  So, you know, keep an eye out for any non-human entities lurking around.

Angiers: Do you take any of this shit seriously?

Nash:  Listen… I might have to, I might have to kill this woman.  Like… depending on how this interview goes, I might have to actually murder her tonight.  I’m a member of Blades Silver, I specialize in monsters, but there are no Blades Gold in the city tonight.  So it might be me and it might be soon and I fucking hate it.  I’ve… I’ve never actually done a person before.  So I’m just being a dick and I’m trying to get through it.

*We hear them approaching an apartment building*

Angiers: This shit is so fucked up.

Nash: You are correct.

Angiers:  Gallows humor.

Nash: Executioners humor.

Angiers:  Ok, I get it.  I was an EMT for a few years, I worked a beat… I get how it is.  I didn’t realize it applied to the spooky version of the shit too.

Nash: Sorry.

Angiers: I get it. We do what we need to.

*We hear an intercom buzz and after a few moments there’s a scratchy response.*

Isme: Hello?

Angiers: Isme Walsh?

Isme: Yeah, this is.

Angiers: My name is detective Margot Angiers, I’m here with my partner Francis Faraday, we have a few questions, if you have a minute to talk?

Isme: Could you hold your badges up to that camera?

Angiers: Yeah, we can. *Beat* Can you see them?

Isme: Uh huh.  Perfect.  Did you want to come up?

Angiers: If that’s ok with you.  You could come with us to the precinct if you were more comfortable with that.

Isme: Oh no, it’s fine, I'm not scared of you.  Come on up.

*We hear a buzz*

Nash: Interesting way to put that.

Angiers: Yeah…

Nash: Just double checking, your talisman is on?

Angiers: Yeah.

Nash: Alright, if you feel the urge to take it off, tell me or slap yourself or something.

Angiers: *Under her breath* So fucked up.

*The recorder cuts and returns.  Isme is listening to loud new agemusic*

Nash: Sorry, do you think you could turn the music down?  I’m going to record this conversation for our notes.

Isme:  Sure, one sec.  

*The volume of the music comes down*

Isme: That ok?

Nash: Yeah, that’s fine.

Isme: So what’s this about?  Did you say?

Nash: Not yet.

Angiers: We’re looking into an incident that occurred at the Yucks comedy club on 45th and 8th two weeks ago?

Isme: *Laughing*  Oh, ok, I thought you might be.

Nash: You found the incident funny?

Isme: Yeah, I mean, I’m not particularly in the business of heckling or like, getting into arguments with standup comedians.  They’re just trying to be funny right?

Nash: That's the idea.

Isme: Well, this was a little different.  This guy… he insulted me.  Not like, made fun of me, or hurt my feelings.  He… he sullied my honor.

Angiers: Kind of an old fashioned idea isn’t it?

Isme: Yeah, well among some circles… that kind of thing still really counts.

Nash: So you, what, argued with him?  Cursed at him?

Angiers: *Ahem* Could you just run us through the altercation how you remember it?  We want to add your version to the events?

Isme: Because something happened to him.

Angiers:  *Beat* It did.

Isme: And you think I had something to do with it?

Angiers: We are detectives.  We’re just investigating, gotta check off the boxes… so can you remember what happened?

Isme:  Yes, clearly.  I’d been having a pretty shitty week.  My uh, my partner had been in a really foul mood and it, and it *beat* turned out to be contagious.

Angiers:  Your partner?  Are they here?

Isme: No, we don’t live together… it's not a traditional relationship.  *pause* It’s complicated. 

Angiers: Sure.

Isme:  So since they were unhappy, I was unhappy… I’m a night owl, hell, that’s the whole reason I moved to the city… It doesn’t sleep either.  I was looking for something to do and Yucks is a short walk from my house.

Angiers:  You a big comedy lover?

Isme: Mmm, not particularly… I like… Well this will sound weird, but I like watching people who are really really trying at something.  I like to watch people have to work and struggle… that sounds creepy, that’s not what I mean.  Um, what I mean is I like watching people really care about things… does that make sense?

So… sushi.  The Japanese really really care about sushi.  People apprentice for years and years to get good at it, master it, but they don’t really believe in mastery, more a constant honing… anyways at sushi bars, you can usually see through the glass to watch them make it.  I’m not sure how that tradition started, *a faint echo begins behind Isme’s voice*  but I’m sure it endured because it’s interesting to watch.  Because they care, they really care about it.

*We hear the rattling of chains as the two detectives remove their protective talismans*

No one would be very interested in watching food be made in most restaurants, hell they’d probably be horrified.

I guess that’s a really long-winded way to say I like watching comedy, but mainly up-and-comers because they are hungry.

I haven’t been hungry basically ever.

*Isme’s voice alone*

Not since the shadow.

Angiers: Excuse me?

Isme: I’ve been working on subharmonic chanting… it's kind of like Mongolian throat singing.  I can weave commands into other speech without people noticing.  Crazy useful.  The Bracey coven did a workshop last year.

Angiers: Put your hands up.

*We hear Angiers draw her gun*

Isme: *Calmly*  Put your gun down.  Stay calm, I’m not going to hurt you. *With the deeper echo*  I’ll change your memories and send you on your way.  You won’t remember you were here.

*We hear the gun being set down on a table*

Angiers: *Struggling* our… talismans.

Isme: *Losing her temper a little at their resistance* Don’t look at him, look at me. 

*Pause, regains composure*

That’s what I was saying.  I made you take them off in the middle of my ramble about sushi.

Sit.

*We hear the detectives sit.*

So… you’re Order members?  Interesting.  I’ve only met one once.  I was young and stupid and still fighting the voice.  Thought I could take its gifts but not listen to it.

It seemed like a pretty sweet deal.  The power to bend others to your will?  What young woman, especially one treated like… well, how they treated me.

Nash: When did the shadow approach you?

Isme: When I turned sixteen.  It said that was the deal I’d made… I hadn’t ever contacted it so I don’t know if it meant past life or ancestors or what, but that’s what it said… to see a shadow speak… to watch part of it split open as a mouth, to see the inky purple black inside it, to realize that shadows could have insides… Nothing was ever the same.

Nash: I know what you mean.

Isme: Ah, the gifts it gave… they worked right away.  The next day at school I made everyone stand in the corner.  All I had to do was demand it… mean it… and they did.  I half thought the whole thing was a prank.

But Erin Manden… she spit at me… fought back… she hated me more than anyone else.  I don’t know why.

She spit at me and the hate in her eye… I mirrored it back.

I told her to drop dead.

Angiers: Shit.

Isme: Yeah.  Wish I could take that one back.  

*Beat* 

After that I just told everyone that I knew to forget I existed, packed up a bunch of things and left.

I meant what I said earlier, I really do like watching people have to try, because I never really have.

The Commanding just works so well, it’s this… cheat code to life.  I try not to use it.  I managed to go six months once.

I set myself up with a bunch of money, tried to just exist, have fun, make friends… 

But, remember I told you I’d met another member of your Order?  Well, I don’t know how, but they, like, smelled the power on me.  I was at a bar late at night, this was when I lived in Vegas.  I had a ton of money, I just asked a bank for it and they were, like, so nice to oblige, and I was just having fun blowing it all at big fun tables.

So, I wound up sitting at blackjack with this guy with dark glasses, but even though I couldn’t see his eyes I could tell he was watching me, in that way.

I could feel the Voice getting angry, it doesn’t like it when anyone pays too much attention, it gets jealous.  

But the guy wasn’t interested like that.

“Hello there,” he said it was so weird, like he was kinda sad to have to be talking to me?  I remember exactly what he said: “Who’s that following you?”

I jumped.  My stomach got cold.

That’s what my partner feels like.  Like something that is always following me, watching over my shoulder.  Looking into the world from just behind me.  I think that’s what it gets out of it.

A ride.  A ride through the world in flesh and bone.

“Nobody is following me.” I was insistent, tried to sell it, but I’d never had to get good at lying.

The man just shook his head… he had salt and pepper hair, a thick but really short black beard… um, his head was big and, I don’t know, brick shaped?

He shook his head and just pointed right between my eyes.

“I see him.  He’s right there.”

So that ended my six month streak of not using the Commanding on anyone.

I told him to forget he’d ever seen me, and I told the same to all the people in the casino.

I hightailed it.  Got all my shit from my penthouse and came back down, but when I was back in the lobby, that guy was there again waiting… he didn’t listen.  I tried Commanding him more, I tried telling him to leave me alone, like, normally, just asking, then warning him.  I told him that the thing following me was really mad, was going to do something we’d all regret.

He just shook his head again just like before.  “I’m afraid not.”

I realized he had put on black gloves.  I got really scared, but when I turned to ask one of the security guards for help I realized they were ignoring me.  I told them to forget I was here and it was working really well.

*Isme becomes more and more distressed reliving this memory over the course of this section, until at the end she is quite upset*

The man with the black gloves started moving his hands into weird shapes and I started to feel really sick… all the light in the lobby was… I don’t know how to describe this, but all the light was suddenly going sideways.  All the light that normally cast down onto the marble floor was twisting horizontally… the ground under my feet started to move, to shrink, every step I took disappeared, directions were changing, tightening… and I realized that this man’s hand was around my neck, even though he was all the way on the other side of the lobby. I couldn’t breathe.

I was so scared.

Which is why when the voice told me to whisper its name… its real name to the man, I did it right away without thinking about it.

It told me its real name the night I met it and I said I was never ever to say it unless it told me too…

And so I did.  The thing that gave me power over others, it had power over me.  What was I without it?

I whispered its name to the man, who was right next to me, strangling me and also on the other side of the lobby, and along the name my partner crept into him… and broke him all to pieces.

*Pause.  Isme takes a deep breath, collects herself, becoming calm again*

Have you ever seen every bone in a man’s body break at once?

It is insane.

I don’t know what he expected though, he was strangling me.  You can’t… you just have to expect that people will retaliate.

*Sigh*

After the encounter with that, what, mage?  Whatever he was, he had real magic, so I’ve been looking for places to improve myself.  How to get past protective talismans, the sub voice thing, I’m trying to get some power of my own, but the Voice doesn’t like that much.  

I don’t want to hurt people… that guy at the club… when he said that shit about me… being married to the devil it just… it just hit too close to home.  The Voice got really mad too, it was hissing in my ear and its anger, it became mine.

I whispered my partner-in-crime’s name to him, let it get inside and punish him.  I wish I could say I didn’t think it would be so brutal, but I knew what it was capable of.  I just thought he’d apologize.  I visited him every night and demanded it, but he just wouldn’t.

What’s with guys like that?  Someone else gets a little bit of power and they are willing to break themselves to pieces over it?  Whatever, he was a freak, he deserved it.  He shot me, you know.  Earlier tonight, but I have a charm, I actually worked the charm myself.  Regular metal isn’t so dangerous to me now…

I don’t know why I told you all this *Isme trails off*

Angiers: You’re lonely.  That thing won’t let anyone else close to you.  It owns you.

Isme: Look at the detective detecting things.

Angiers: It’s going to use you up.

Isme: Careful.  It’s back with me now and it doesn’t like you talking like that.

Angiers: Let us help you.

Isme: Cute.

Angiers: *Resolute* I mean it.

Isme: *Taken aback* You do… don’t you.

*Nash’s phone rings.  There is a startled pause moment while they all realize what the sound is.*

Nash: Can I answer my phone?  There will be more coming if I don’t.

Isme: Go ahead, don’t ask for help.

Nash: Yeah, hello?  Mmhmm, yeah, we’e with her now.  Yeah, since she was sixteen.  *waits*  Mhmm… Yeah. Cerulean.  Mmhmmm…

Isme: What? What did you say? Cerulean? Why did you say that?

Nash: Safe word.

Isme: What?

Nash: I’m putting them on speaker, they have something to say to you and your friend.

*Via speaker phone*

Voncid: *Whispering, echoing with power* Pathiters Made of Sticks.

*We hear a sharp intonation, a ring, the shadow groans in pain*

Isme: What did you do?  What was that name?  Wait wait, no STOP, don’t move, Put that down! 

PLEASE!

*Pleading* Please.

*We hear several loud gunshots ring out*

*Long beat*

Nash: *Dead inside*  Let’s go.

Angiers: I…

Nash: *Hollow* It’s done.  Can’t be undone.  Talking about it isn’t going to make it less.  This is the part where we go back to the car and we call the Eater to come clean it up… and we don’t think about that or what it means, ok?  This is the part where we do that and we don’t talk about it.

Angier: … Yeah… ok.

*We hear a long pause, footsteps, then car doors, then the engine.  Nash has forgotten about his recorder.

Once they are back in the car, we hear a cat purring.*

Angiers:  Good cat… *noticing* oh hey, still rolling.

*The audio cuts*

Narrator: Thank you for listening to Ghost Wax, a production of Far and Tall Tales. Find us at farandtalltales.squarespace.com. Ghost Wax is an independent podcast so if you liked this show, please rate and review, and consider joining us on Patreon at Patreon.com/farandtalltales

Also give a listen to our fantasy role play show Could've Been Heroes for something completely different. 

Ghost Wax is written and directed by Robert Knutson 

Production and editing by Aaron Schoenrock

Our theme song is by Beau Hoover.

This episode features Tony Patten as Nash, Emily Battles as Angiers, and Jan Pretzels as Isme Walsh.