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Kickstarter Roundup: Feb 9, 2020 | 20+ Ending Soon (including: Here to Slay) & 30+ New This Week (including: PARKS Expansion: Nightfall + PARKS Memories)
What this is:
This is a weekly, curated listing of Kickstarter board game projects that are either:
newly posted in the past 7 days, or
ending in the next 7 days (starting Feb 10) and have at least a fighting chance of being funded.
All board game projects meeting those criteria will automatically be included, no need to ask. (The occasional non-board game project may also sneak in!) Expect new lists each Sunday sometime between midnight and noon PST.
Ending Soon
Project Info
Players
Backers
Min / Avg Pledge
Ends
Comments
Shifting Realms: Darkness Revealed Shifting Realms: Darkness Revealed is an expansion to Soaring Rhino's flagship game Shifting Realms. // Has raised $3,880 of $2,000 so far. (~194%) ☑
Here to Slay A strategic role-playing fantasy card game from the creators of Unstable Unicorns. // Has raised $2,453,236 of $10,000 so far. (~24532%) ☑
Island Siege Anniversary Edition This is your chance to upgrade your APE Games classic with deluxe components and 4-player support. // Has raised $12,940 of $19,000 so far. (~68%)
Jurassic Parts Collect dinosaur fossils & assemble them into complete sets in this area control game for 2-4 players. // Has raised $23,549 of $10,000 so far. (~235%) ☑
Crimes in History: H. H. Holmes' Murder Castle A game of backstabbing and thrilling absurdities! Collect evidence and battle each other across a sprawling castle for 2-6 players! // Has raised $50,530 of $27,663 so far. (~182%) ☑
All Time Franchise Team Sets for the Pine Tar Baseball Game This project introduces the 30 all time franchise teams to the Pine Tar Baseball game. Each team will have 31 players, and an announcer // Has raised $915 of $400 so far. (~228%) ☑
Arcane Alley: Moonstruck Market Sell your goods in this wolfish expansion to the black magic market's tableau and set collection game. // Has raised $12,994 of $7,500 so far. (~173%) ☑
Tortuga 2199 Build a crew, hunt space monsters, become a pirate king. A deck-building and area-control game for 2-4 aspiring space pirates. // Has raised $114,754 of $35,000 so far. (~327%) ☑
Pineapple: A Visceral Truth or Lie Game Ask deep questions, reach the sweet core of your inner feelings, and find some liars. "Make100" gold metal fruit available! // Has raised $2,581 of $1,000 so far. (~258%) ☑
Harvest Fair Board Game A quick to play family game – grow your crops, then win trophies at the end-of-year Harvest Fair! // Has raised £531 of £250 so far. (~212%) ☑
Enchanters: East Quest Play an Enchanter and protect your village from monsters in this 1-4 player card-drafting game by forging infinite combos of Artifacts! // Has raised $175,461 of $30,000 so far. (~584%) ☑
Neko Neko Cafe - The Board Game Welcome to Neko Neko Cafe, a fast-paced resource management game where you compete with friends to serve delicious treats to customers. // Has raised $5,662 of $8,500 so far. (~66%)
Puns of Anarchy The game of rapid-fire pun-making! No bands, movies, or famous things are safe from becoming hilarious wordplay. // Has raised $117,147 of $10,000 so far. (~1171%) ☑
CHANCELLORSVILLE 1863 Playable in 1 hour. For 1 to 2 players. Innovative Civil War game with hidden movement, solitaire game engine, using military maps. // Has raised $17,710 of $2,500 so far. (~708%) ☑
Aeon's End: Outcasts A cooperative deck-building game of post-apocalyptic fantasy survival for 1-4 players. // Has raised $252,525 of $40,000 so far. (~631%) ☑
Bar Crawl A drinking game to play for a night of fun you won’t remember in the morning. // Has raised $272 of $10,000 so far. (~2%)
? - ?
5
$50 / $54
Mar 07
#lolwut
Catch the Letch Cats' Invasion "Catch the Letch Cats' Invasion" is a little expansion for the game "Catch the Letch" made for the kickstarter event "make 100" // Has raised €261 of €400 so far. (~65%)
Cyclone! Board Game A board game where players can rotate the board to steal the winning color! // Has raised $2,003 of $603,900 so far. (~0%)
? - ?
4
$NA / $501
Feb 09
#lolwut
Danger Park Danger Park is a light-weight map-building tabletop game about sabotage, fraud, and destruction for 2-4 players. // Has raised $12,520 of $19,000 so far. (~65%)
Dawn of Empire A war-game centered on the naval aspects of the Spanish-American War of 1898. // Has raised $3,267 of $2,000 so far. (~163%) ☑
2 - 2
46
$45 / $71
Mar 05
Deep State: New World Order A game of global conspiracies from the creators of Space Explorers. Seize the reins of power and become the secret ruler of the world! // Has raised $7,882 of $7,500 so far. (~105%) ☑
Dr Mike's Times Table Board Game A Board Game to help make times tables practice fun! // Has raised $548 AUD of $1,250 AUD so far. (~43%)
? - ?
9
$34 / $61 AUD
Mar 18
Enchanters: East Quest Play an Enchanter and protect your village from monsters in this 1-4 player card-drafting game by forging infinite combos of Artifacts! // Has raised $175,461 of $30,000 so far. (~584%) ☑
Forest Fighters Squirrels harvesting acorns for the winter and the resulting woodland mayhem that prospect causes! // Has raised $1,053 of $500 so far. (~210%) ☑
2 - 5
28
$30 / $38
Mar 20
#take2
Frutticola A small town in the US in the '50s, who will be able to produce and sell the best jams by the Christmas sale? // Has raised €18,622 of €10,000 so far. (~186%) ☑
Gray Eminence A 3 to 5 player board game about global intrigue, politics, bluffing and questionable morality. // Has raised $6,035 of $6,000 so far. (~100%) ☑
High Roller Horse Racing a genre-blazing game that merges Game Night with Casino Night and features 8 of America's greatest racehorses ever! // Has raised $1,993 of $12,000 so far. (~16%)
Kaiju Exchange A resource management game pitting 1-4 players + 1 Automaton against one other and getting rich by trading monster parts. // Has raised $8,269 of $12,888 so far. (~64%)
Kanban: EV The Deluxe Edition of Vital Lacerda's acclaimed efficiency eurogame with all new art from Ian O'Toole // Has raised $426,191 of $100,000 so far. (~426%) ☑
King Arthur's Vortex Chess Vortex Chess is a tactical Chess-like game, set in Arthurian Mythology. Merlin Ambrosius defending Camelot against Medraut ap Lot. // Has raised £992 of £999 so far. (~99%)
Meilenstein You make the first move. // Has raised €257 of €10,000 so far. (~2%)
2 - 4
7
$55 / €37
Apr 03
PARKS Expansion: Nightfall + PARKS Memories Celebrate the US National Parks with a new expansion for PARKS & a trio of Strategic Matching games featuring Fifty-Nine Parks art. // Has raised $322,378 of $43,600 so far. (~739%) ☑
Sererial Fantasy Tactics A table top war game style of board game, with options for quick play, or rpg elements for deeper longer play. // Has raised $2 of $28,000 so far. (~0%)
? - ?
2
$30 / $1
Apr 05
Spotting A card game aims at training attention, reaction and observation with the theme of Hong Kong's traditional food. // Has raised HK$20 of HK$40,000 so far. (~0%)
1 - 4
2
$20 / HK$10
Mar 06
Stampede It’s simple: pick an animal and attempt to survive the Stampede by outsmarting and outracing your friends. Plus cute artwork. // Has raised $3,954 of $10,000 so far. (~39%)
2 - 4
87
$40 / $45
Feb 18
Storm Dragons - Deluxified Edition with 6-player Expansion Trick-taking - only more. Card drafting, hand management and dragon abilities add strategy. Surprise your foes by changing game state. // Has raised $1,877 of $6,600 so far. (~28%)
take root- perennial edition a tabletop farming game featuring dungeon crawling, dating, and a chance to win the harvest festival // Has raised $618 of $400 so far. (~154%) ☑
Tanares Adventures + Arena: the Contest 1.5 A massive expansion for 100+ total hours of co-op content, a second print with reworked miniatures, and a legendary Dragon Collection. // Has raised $1,034,561 of $50,000 so far. (~2069%) ☑
The Lost Worlds of Josh Kirby A Space Opera board game featuring worlds created by the famed sci-fi illustrator Josh Kirby // Has raised $20,993 of $8,000 so far. (~262%) ☑
The Museum Tour Playset The Museum Tour Playset is a playset designed to bring the art museum experience right into your home! Great for ages 2-7! // Has raised $12,433 of $10,000 so far. (~124%) ☑
? - ?
154
$40 / $81
Mar 05
The Runelords Board Game A board game for 1-4 players based in the world of the best-selling fantasy series The Runelords by David Farland. // Has raised $13,364 of $70,000 so far. (~19%)
Tinderblox & Kittin Two different mint-tin dexterity games for every type of gamer! Includes a Kickstarter exclusive version for Tinderblox! // Has raised £20,190 of £5,500 so far. (~367%) ☑
? - ?
1119
$13 / £18
Feb 27
Tramways Adelaide Shanghai Tramways: Adelaide / Shanghai expansion: two exotic maps for avid gamers // Has raised $16,740 of $3,000 so far. (~558%) ☑
Vampire: The Masquerade – CHAPTERS A thrilling co-op adventure set in the World of Darkness. An unforgettable story-driven board game for 1-4 players. // Has raised $966,280 CAD of $250,000 CAD so far. (~386%) ☑
YOHEI An amazing skirmish game in an oriental fantasy setting. Lead legendary heroes into epic battles between asymmetric clans. // Has raised €15,421 of €5,000 so far. (~308%) ☑
Zombie Pile-Up The fastest player wins, go head to head against your friends in a frantic race to get the most zombie kills and get the highest score. // Has raised £768 of £1,000 so far. (~76%)
DMing my first campaign in a homebrew setting I came up with, and I'm really excited about how it's coming out!
So first there's going to be the lore dump, then a quick campaign summary, and then the most recent bit of worldbuilding.
Lore
In an alternate timeline, Earth is contacted by a race of extremely intelligent blue-colored aliens, known as the Iruki Their motives are mysterious, but they quickly establish relations with human leaders and set up Starfall Base on their initial landing site in Japan, which will eventually grow to the Iruki city of Starfall They bring with them the Konchu, a subjugated race of enormous bug-like creatures, whose strength, endurance, and chitinous plating over much of their bodies make them ideal muscle Several years pass, and humanity's technology is advancing by leaps and bounds, although this masks that unease is rising; humanity is growing mistrustful of the Iruki's outward generosity and increasingly confident in their own ability to handle this themselves, the Iruki brass are arguing amongst themselves what their mission entails, and the Konchu are beginning to suspect that the Iruki are up to nothing good behind the scenes The situation has turned into a powder keg ready to blow at any moment for any reason, but its catalyst will come in the form of another unexpected arrival from the sky Early one winter morning, an Iruki listening post picks up a familiar signature approaching New Zealand It belongs to a liveship of the Ekara, a race of semi-nomadic bird people with whom the Iruki had previously tangled (and against whom the Iruki may have committed war crimes, though the record is incomplete) A visual is acquired, and the vessel is seen to be limping heavily and sporting damage inconsistent with known weaponry Hours later, the vessel crashes in the ocean near Auckland, and a swarm of amphibious escape pods is observed escaping from the wreckage and making its way towards land An emergency meeting of top Iruki brass is called: all recognize that the detachment is far from ready to deal with the arrival of the possibly vengeful Ekara, let alone whatever caused that damage to their liveship, but Flight Commander Valon is firmly of the opinion that diplomatic relations must be established, while First Lieutenant Lania is convinced that both humanity and the Ekara must be subjugated in order to prepare the planet for assault from space by an unknown enemy A fight breaks out, and Lania shoots Valon with a space laser, thereby assuming command of the detachment by international law of go fuck yourself Lania immediately proceeds to the base's research labs to retrieve an incomplete viral bioweapon their scientists had been developing, flies to New Zealand, and releases it into a waterway near Wellington As it turns out, the Ekara are immune to the virus, but humanity is not: within a year, 90% of the human population has been wiped out, and the remaining 10% are clustered into the remains of once-mighty cities and entirely reliant on Iruki technology for survival, while being told that the virus was of Ekara origin However, the Konchu have finally had enough of serving a government of genocidal psychopaths and, along with a small number of sympathetic Iruki defectors, revolt, fight their way out of Starfall, and disperse across the world to attempt to help humanity rebuild and the Ekara to clear their name
It's against this background that our campaign story begins (well, sort of. Going into session one, I knew that most of humanity was dead, that the Iruki had subjugated the Konchu, that the Ekara were also there, and had written literally none of the rest of it).
Adelaide, Australia, many years after the Great Plague Mike The Mechanic, a thirtysomething human artificer more comfortable around vehicles than people, is working on a vehicle repair when Edie Unpronounceablename, an aboriginal halfling ranger, walks in She's walked all the way from Alice Springs and needs a drink, but would rather have one with someone else than by herself It takes some convincing, but Mike grudgingly agrees to leave his shop and walk her to the local saloon Inside, the two encounter Mushi Bushi, a Konchu monk with a very serious demeanor but who regularly makes Jojo's Bizarre Adventure references He's on the hunt for a bandit leader who's been causing trouble in the area around Adelaide He's heard that they have cool motorcycles Mike is instantly convinced to lend a hand
These three take down the bandit, then trace his funding source to an anarcho-capitalist warlord in a nearby town with connections to the Iruki, so after connecting up with Vollyte, an NPC Iruki defector wizard whose human wife and mixed son (who was going to become a fourth PC until the player ghosted me) were both killed in what he suspects was an assassination to send him a message (and no, I don't really want to think about, uh, "human-Iruki relations"), plus James, a gnome barbarian with a pet drop bear named Beary, and Captain Kangaroo, a highly trained attack kangaroo that decided Edie was its mother after Mushi probably gave it a severe concussion, this colorful band of misfits proceeds to take on and kill the warlord. However, Vollyte is very nearly killed in the fight, and elects to let his adventuring days conclude there, just as a young Ekara rogue NPC named Aerie who helped the gang get into the warlord's bunker decides this adventuring life is great, and she's going to tag along. Following this, the gang makes a terrible movie, steals two airplanes, gets trapped in a dimensional disturbance over the Pacific Ocean, lands in Mexico in a timeline where the movie was really good and celebrity versions of themselves also exist, light a bar on fire, almost get kicked out of a casino, learn that there is a plot afoot to steal the mythical Lifetime Disney Pass, a mysterious ticket to Disney World that predates the Plague and is apparently followed by weird, supernatural incidents, go to a lake, fight each other, fight a giant lake monster with Mickey Mouse ears, fight a kaiju Beary with Mickey Mouse ears after he eats the pass, which is also how the previous monster got like that, send James diving down Beary's throat to retrieve the Pass, then take a boat to Florida and fight a giant shark before arriving in Tampa Bay. Now, finally, we get to the worldbuilding I did this week that I thought was really cool.
Current Session
The party's boat is guided in to shore by an enthusiastic older man in a pirate hat, with a pirate accent, wearing an old Tampa Bay Buccaneers T-shirt He greets all happily until seeing Aerie, at which point his expression sours and he begins hurling invective The party extricate themselves from this encounter and head into The Navel Tavern, a dockside bar with what can only be described as a very sexy orange on the sign outside Inside, they're greeted by a human entertainer in an orange dress playing an out-of-tune piano, who introduces herself as "Florida's own Clementine O'Range" before launching into a truly mediocre piano ballad rendition of "State Of Florida" by Less Than Jake The bartender is a tired-looking Konchu serving a clientele of about half and half humans and Konchu Aerie and Mushi approach and Mushi remarks on how nice it is to be among his brethren The bartender introduces himself as Arukoru and explains that following the revolution and exodus, many Konchu made their way to sailing towns upon realizing that their size, strength, and toughness made them ideal sailors: as a result, Tampa is now about 60% Konchu He also apologizes to Aerie on behalf of "Bucky," the dock pirate, explaining that his family died in the plague when he was a child and he believes the Iruki that it was the Ekara's fault, and not to take it personally He finally notes that the bar is supposed to be called The Valencia, and The Navel was meant to be a strip club downtown, but the signs got mixed up in a shipping error just before the plague hit and, long story short, just ended up staying where they were, so now The Navel is an orange-themed bar by the docks and The Valencia is an orange-themed strip club downtown, because doesn't that just figure Asked about Disney World, his mandibles retract in such a way that a human's face might turn white, and he says he doesn't like to talk about that place, nobody who's returned from there has ever reported making it past "the guard dogs," and you'd be better off talking to Detective Tantei at the sheriff's office down the road So Mike marches down to the sheriff's office to meet with Detective Tantei He's a gruff, no-nonsense Konchu who runs a tight ship Asked about Disney World, Tantei seems pensive He explains that he's got his own reasons to be suspicious of Disney World, as he has seen a string of disappearances in recent weeks Human, Konchu, and even an Ekara, any age, any gender, the only pattern is that each and every one of them had come into possession of some item of vintage, pre-Plague Disney memorabilia shortly before going missing, and Disney World seems the only logical culprit Normally, he says, he would send some of his own men there to investigate, but it would be a suicide mission: he only feels comfortable asking Mike for help because "it's no chitin off my facial plating if a bunch of misfit strangers get themselves killed trying to get past the guard dogs." As this is happening, Aerie and James at The Navel have struck up a conversation with an Ekara named Megan, a paladin with an array of impressive biocybernetic augmentations that appear to be of Iruki origin (yes, this is a new PC) Upon being shown the pass, she confidently proclaims it to have been the pass of someone named Swoozie, a former Disney employee who did an expose on them and was subsequently disappeared She paints a bleak picture of Disney as an evil empire that will permanently silence its critics without even a second look, and the pass itself as an object of immense power that must not be allowed to fall into the wrong hands Aerie says "you sound like an authority on the subject: why don't you go there with us and help us get in?" and Megan replies "Make me an offer" So James challenges her I swear to god To a Yugioh duel I allow this because I reward audacious thinking, and long story short, James wins and Megan agrees to join
And now I have to figure out WTF "the guard dogs" are.
Hi guys - before we move forward with the weekly things to do post, we wanted to provide some clarity on why a new account is creating this post and provide the community with some information about who we are and how this came about. We’ll keep this intro brief for the sake of getting to what you actually came here for, finding cool things to do this week! We are 4 childhood friends (and are all Redditors as well), who grew up living and hanging out in Toronto. We realized every time we hung out we ended up at the same places because it was far too cumbersome to find anything else, and even though we wanted to explore new things, it just felt easier to go somewhere familiar. We decided we’d try our hand at creating something that makes discovering new things to do easy, and over the last few years and countless of hours later, we created the ExploreTO app. We really admired the daily things to do posts, and also aspired to contribute to the Reddit community in a way that is aligned with our passion project. Our focus on event research has been increasing over the last several months and when we saw that the mods have started doing the posts, we reached out to see if there was a way we can contribute. We are very delighted that the mods gave us the opportunity to create these weekly posts on a trial basis, and we hope you enjoy them! We also wanted to get ahead of some questions that you may be wondering about: How will this affect me as a user who frequently uses these posts? It won’t. We wanted to be transparent in this post because we know the passing of the torch may be confusing. We hope to maintain a great and consistent experience with these posts and improve it further over time based on feedback from the community. We don’t want these posts to turn into anything but what they have always been: a community generated post that captures the best things happening in Toronto. So what’s in it for you? To be frank, these posts take quite a bit of time a week to compile, especially if you aren’t already doing it for another purpose (we are, for our app). We thought it might be mutually beneficial to the community for us to generate these posts as we’re already doing a lot of event research. The community will get a weekly things to do thread that is continuously updated & improved, and we will get exposure for our app. We will never be impartial to events that “benefit us”, this will not only be true in the Reddit threads we post, but also in the app itself. We see our job as finding the best things to do based on the merit of the events themselves. We will never post affiliate or sponsored links on Reddit, however, if the community believes we’re doing a good job, we would be happily welcome anyone to check out our app. Closing thoughts Just like the app was created as a passion project, these posts will only be a continuation of said project. We have no clue how far the app will go and we’ve already spent thousands of hours working on it with nothing earned but the joy of a few positive reviews on the app store. We will however, ask you – the community, for one thing: if you enjoy these posts or derive some benefit from them, occasionally, please let us know. Between our day jobs and our evening passion project that is this app, we’re running on fumes and positive reinforcement. This is the first and last time we will add this intro on the post. We will link to it in the next few so that anyone who may have missed it can still access it. If you have any questions, please go ahead and ask. Hope you enjoy this week's post! Monday Jan 21 Burdock Piano Fest 2019 @ Burdock | 7PM | Free Do or Die Open Mic @ The Corner Comedy Club | 8PM | $5 DesignTO Talks: Tiffany Pratt @ Relative Space | 6PM | Free Tuesday Jan 22 Raptors vs. Sacramento Kings @ Scotiabank Arena | 7PM | $63+ DesignTO Talks: Uncovering Canadian Design @ EQ3 | 6:30PM | Free The Office Toronto Trivia! @ Dublin Calling | 8PM Free Coding Workshop @ HackerYou | 6:15PM | Free Art Battle Toronto @ Great Hall Toronto | 7:30PM | $10+ Tinder Tales: Drunk Dating @ Gladstone Hotel | 8PM | $12 Free Bollywood Dance Classes @ Sony Centre | 6-7PM | Free Wednesday Jan 23 Leafs vs. Washington Capitals | @ Scotiabank Arena | 7:30PM | Tickets Available Work/Life Exhibition @ Umbra Store | 6PM | Free Star Wars: A New Hope Concert @ Roy Thompson | 7:30 PM, Wed-Sat | $56+ Miso Making Workshop @ Skippa | 6PM | $50 Off The Rails @ Comedy Bar | 9:30PM | $7 Thursday Jan 24 Free Skate Rental Thursdays @ The Bentway Skate Trail | 5-9PM | Free Above & Beyond @ Rebel | 10PM | $76+ DesignTO Tours: Deloitte @ 22 Adelaide St W | 1:30PM | Free DesignTO: The Future of Work @ 180 John St | 4PM | $30 Arts & Minds: Sculpting Our Stories @ Aga Khan Museum | 6:30PM | Free Friday Jan 25 Winterlicious @ Various locations | Starts today - on until Feb 7 Friday Night Live: DinoNite @ ROM | 7PM | $19 Winter 2019 Opening Party @ Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery | 8PM | Free Kung Fu Fridays @ TIFF | Starts today! On until April 12th Airship Distillery District Bachata Party @ KizzMe | 8PM | $18 Saturday Jan 26 DJ Skate Nights @ Harbourfront | 8PM | Free Winter Craft Beer Festival @ Roundhouse Park | 11AM | $25 Après Skate Saturdays /w free Kahlua, Coffee, Hot Chocolate @ The Bentway Skate Trail | 5PM | Free Daft Punk Party @ Sneaky Dee's | 10PM | $5 Panic: 80's & 90's Video Dance Party @ Remix Lounge | 10PM | $10 Clams Casino @ Velvet Underground | 10PM | $26 Angela Zhang Live @ Sony Centre | 7PM | $156+ Pathways to Sustainability Conference @ MaRS | 8:30AM | $34 Sunday Jan 27 Mick Jenkins @ Mod Theatre | 8PM | $29 Winner Everywhere Tour [k-pop] @ Sony Centre | 8PM | $88+ Church Street Comedy @ Pegasus | 8PM | Free Vision Boarding + Intention Setting Workshop @ Lululemon Queen W | 1PM | $30 Ongoing Events Winterlicious @ Various locations | Starts Friday - on until Feb 7th Festival of Lights @ Distillery District | on until March 3rd DesignTO Festival @ Various locations | on until Jan 27th Winter Light Exhibition @ Ontario Place | on until Mar 17th Happy Place Toronto @ Harbourfront | on until Jan 27th Light Therapy @ MOCA | on until Feb 10th Black History Month @ Various locations | Starts Friday - on until Feb 28th Contemporary Art Exhibit, Pay what you can @ Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) | On Until Feb 13 ROM, free admission for post-secondary students @ The ROM | Every Tues Gardiner Museum, free admission for post-secondary students @ Gardiner Museum | Every Tues Aga Khan Museum, free admission @ Agha Khan Museum | Every Wed Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO), free admission @ Art Gallery of Ontario | Every Wed Bata Shoe Museum, pay what you can @ Bata Shoe Museum | Every Thurs Gardiner Museum, half price @ Gardiner Museum | Every Fri Winter Fun Ideas Skating | Map listing of all of Toronto's rinks Indoor Activities | A list of fun indoor things to do Winter Hiking | Top trails suited for winter hiking Spa Escape | 10 ideas for spa escapes We also post on Instgram, so if you'd like additional things to do ideas, you can check us out @exploreTOapp
What sort of things will ye find on the high seas!
"A pirate ship with all of it's crew are heavily asleep. Waking up any of the crew members causes them to suffer a heart attack!"
Further inspection of the ship reveals that someone brought aboard a cursed gem in the shape of a skull! Dispelling the magic from the gem will safely wake all of the crew.
"An island with a sail hung from palm tree's pulls up next to you! On it you see a man with tattered clothes and an age old beard. It's a traveling merchant! Right now it doesn't look like he has many goods, but he sure has a lot of money! All of his goods are laid out neatly on a very tattered, red and white checker blanket."
The trader will buy pretty much anything; don't try to steal from him though. His island and goods are protected by coconuts shrouded in blue flames, haunted by the souls who were lost at sea!
A group of sahuagin have found an underwater “temple” and awaken a shark god in it that has been imprisoned for millennia. They are now raiding coastal towns for live sacrifices to feed this newfound deity.
A castaway is floating on a poorly made life raft. If you try to offer him a ride he says he will only do it if you all are heading towards ...
A seagull lands on the bow with a message tied to it's leg.
A brass dragon can be seen flying along to the South.
As the crew tries to correct there course, they find the rudder is not responding.
a waterfall that falls from the clouds into the ocean. Your boat can travel up it. What could be up there?
a slow moving but non hostile leviathan that is just swimming along just below the surface. A giant turtle perhaps?
a whirlpool. If sucked in perhaps it's current propels you to the bottom of the ocean.
debris and destroyed ships from a concluded battle.
A literal parted ocean, in the ocean youre sailing on, that leads to an island that is submerged when the ocean is not parted, but above the surface when it is. What kind of strange physics leads to this?
a natural archway of seemingly natural stone that, if travelled through, leads to an ocean of blood within a demonic dimension.
a merchant ship filled with riches that looks to just be floating about on its own. It is completely abandoned. What kind of horrors/madness would cause the entirety of the crew to abandon such wealth? Why is there no trace of the crew at all, or any discernible struggle?
A massive Storm Giant that is just sitting atop a sand bar. He is fishing using a God Sized fishing rod. What is he fishing for you ask? Krakens hopefully. He wishes to make a nice Kraken dish for his girl for their anniversary. Unfortunately he seems to only be catching Colossal Squid thus far.
A dead whale that is just floating around and bloating from the trapped gasses within. Dont poke it. Oh dear, there are sharks poking it. Yup theyre taking chunks out of it. Its gonna explode if they keep biting it. Yeah- yup and there it goes. It exploded.
Trillions upon trillions of ants have, it seems, connected themselves together in a lattice and have formed a successful raft. By the grace of the gods, and the laws of physics they are floating to new lands. Take your hats off and salute these ants, friends, for their own unfathomable goals are loftier than our own and yet they are showing the world they can achieve anything. Respect.
18. Amidst the waves, there is a strange section of the ocean that all of a sudden features completely still and undisturbed water. Very suspicious.
a meteor from space, probably a solid 100 feet in radius, lights up the sky in a blaze and contacts the surface of the water sending a massive geyser back up into space and showering the surrounding mile and a rainy mist. It contacted the water nearly a mile away, will you investigate? Is it lost to the depths or did it land in a shallow enough spot to dive to?
3 lights can be seen a few miles away dancing above the ocean. Once the party's craft gets closer the lights suddenly rush towards them. They're pixies, and they're a little worse for wear. They plead for the party to save their island home from "the rock man".
Traveling brothel
Traveling casino
Naval ship
Naval fleet
Life raft with a man lost at sea
Life raft with a doppelgängeoni/some other shapeshifter posing as a man lost at sea
Weresharks
Pirate ship
Floating Supplies
Pirate ship with (enter monster here) as the captain
Kraken
Doldrums
Whirlpool
x
Pirate ship with (enter monster here) as the crew
36. Sea hags
Water elementals
Air elementals
Merfolk
Merrows
Ghost Ship
A friendly ship
A hostile ship
"From far off you see storm clouds, approaching fast. As the storm comes nearer, a water spout forms, stretching from the ocean to the sky. What are those large shapes swirling within the spout? Surely those aren't triangular dorsal fins?!"
"You've been stuck in the doldrums for a few days now, wishing for something, anything, to happen. As that thought crosses your mind for the thousandth time, a smell catches your nose. It smells like low tide in the docks. A desiccated hand, seaweed clinging to it like funeral wrappings, claws its way onto the rail. The arm attached to it, and yes truly the entire clawing corpse, is similarly encased in seaweed. Two more seaweed mummies quickly join it, effortlessly clawing their way onto the deck. A scream from elsewhere on the boat makes you realize that maybe you should have been careful what you wished for..."
"Off the stern you see men approaching the boat. Each is standing astride two harnessed sharks and it's hard to mistake the malice in their eyes."
*"Another gout of flame lights up the night sky. Truly this must be the terrible one-winged dragon pirate, Captain Blauvint with his magical cannon Belcher."
A boxy black ship that runs with no lights at night. It's a floating ninja fortress!
The players find a beautiful tiara or shell and gold in some lost temple, but soon after they aquire it Sahaugin (and other terrible things from the deep) attack whenever they stop.
An elven lich with eyes that have some other world's night sky in them, serves as the emissary of the mad goddess of the sea, burning those who do not pay her proper tithe.
The seven daggers of the Cortadormar, a crew of largely benevolent pirates famous for starting a feud with a local lord. Perhaps they seek help? Perhaps the local lord will pay well for information about them?
A small jungle island inhabited solely by dinosaurs, though crumbling structures hint at a previous civilization.
Vampirates. Nuff said.
A woman frozen in a solid block of ice, just bobbing there in the ocean. She looks mildly annoyed.
*a mile wide iceburg floats nearby, inhabited by a young white dragon and his cohort of kobold fishermen. There are several penguins that will raise the alarm should any Interlopers appear. The white dragon waits in a cave at the center of the burg and uses ice shape to ensure victory if anyone is foolish enough to face him within. He is visible through the ice. Sloped Icy staircase: DC-23.
At night, preferably, the sound of oars. Light reveals a black shape: a hooded man in an old boat; he asks for food and if given, he returns to a little isle somewhere close. If searched, the isle, the man and her wife, are infested with fungi. It's dreadful
The party comes across an unexplained abandoned ship floating on the high seas (a la the [Mary Celeste]((https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Celeste)). Exploring the craft is a disturbing experience - the PC's continually see things moving out of the corner of their eye.
If they look in the captain's cabin they will find what appears to be a large chest. Alas, it is a mimic. The party will then realize the things they saw moving in the corner of their eyes are more of the creatures: the ship is infested with mimics! What has happened here? Here are some possibilities:
1: The ship was transporting captured mimics, and they escaped and ate the crew.
2: Mimics are squid like creatures native to the depths of the sea. Every so often they come to the surface - perhaps to play, breed, or hunt.
3: The mimics are the spawn of a much larger mimic ... the ship itself.
A ship infested with rum gremlins -- they're contagious!
An uncharted island with a line mountain and lots of vegetation. It appears to move . . . And it opened an eye? The island is a giant turtle. And there's a druid grove/toweruins on its back.
A bottle in some flotsam. Cleaning the bottle reveals a model ship! But, a closer look reveals its no model. Another ship was cursed and trapped in the bottle. Can you free them? Will you be next?
Some small boats are gathered in a circle. Dressed in black robes, they chant in the deep speech.
A storm sorcerer in a manta cloak climbs aboard. The mage offers swift winds in exchange for safe passage, good company, and a black pearl.
"From out of the mist a ship appears. It's ghostly crew doesn't appear to notice anyone else. They appear to be fleeing in panic. Suddenly they stop and as one turn and stare to the South with mouths agape in horror. They throw up their arms as though to ward something off,then instantly pop out of existence. Off to the South a dim light can be briefly seen..."
Your Mage/scientist inspects a rainbow shimmer on the surface of the water surrounding your ship, it's liquid memory holding a message/warning.
A ship is sighted, called "Esoteric Order" from the city of Newburyport. The first seaman seen, Obed Marsh, seems normal, and responds to overtures. He tells them that...
"Right naow Cap'n is abaout changed. Can't shet his eyes no more, an' is all aout o' shape. He still wears clothes, but he'll take to the water soon."
Once closer, the PCs will see that the ship is crewed by silent, squat men with bulging eyes that never blink. When hailed, they simply stare at the PCs with unblinking eyes and gaping mouths. A rank stench of dead fish and rotting seaweed hangs over all. Swimming in the water beneath the "Esoteric Order" are humanoid shapes...
Underwater rock or reef
Floating carcass of giant sea creature
Giant Piranhas surround the ship.
There's a small, rocky island far away from any other land. On it is a very attractive woman in a makeshift shelter. You can hear her singing long before you can see her. She is NOT a siren; she is a bard whose performance is singing. She is here due to a miscalibration of a teleportation circle. She's also chaotic evil, greedy and very charming.
A gnomish submersible captained by a Rogue smuggler currently transporting drugs but also a member of the Gnomish Royal family in disguise on the run from their evil betrothed.
A stormcloud nursery: rain falls up from the ocean into slowly growing and darkening clouds.
A long makeshift canoe manned with goblins is anchored. The goblins are slapping the water with broad oars in unison, creating waves. When asked what they are doing, they say they are creating a tsunami to punish another beach-dwelling tribe who insulted their leader.
An awe-inspiring school of glittering flying fish burst from the ocean around you, chittering with delight like a beautiful birdsong.
A rowboat occupied by three famished and guilt-ridden seamen together with the well-gnawed bones of the deceased Cabin Boy, young Master Richard Parker, 17 y/o, destined not to grow any older.
A floating hulk whose crew are all dead. A throng of aquatic ghouls (Lacedons) are aboard and indulging in a feast.
A hot air balloon is floating along the breeze. The sole occupant of the balloons basket, a middle-aged male halfling, seems to frantically trying to land the balloon on the deck of your ship. Do you allow it ? or do you shoot him down ?
Murder mystery on the ship.
Attacked by an undersea vessel. Enchanted by elemental mage.
Bump into (literally) undersea vessel. Invented by dwarven/gnomish plumbers for use in underwater mining.
Slave ship coming back from war.
Druidic ship made entirely of animated plants.
Encounter trade ship set up for non-land based trade. Avoids taxes, trades exclusively with other vessels.
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Updated as of 08/16/2018 10:30pm EST. Will fix formatting once list is finished.
I don’t know if it’s regret that I’m feeling with working holidays in Australia
I am from Hong Kong. I don’t know if it’s regret that I’m feeling towards doing a working holiday here in Australia. I like traveling. I use Couchsurfing a lot in the past. From the year 2012 when I started a pre college degree and then 2013-2017 for my college degree, I’d been traveling every summer, so with the six times I traveled, one time is 2months in Europe, other 3times 2.5-3.5months in Europe, 1 time Australia+NZ(3months), 1 time US+Europe(3months). This March I turned 25. I worked at a commission based sales job in Hongkong that I really don’t like. I decided to apply for working holidays and I came to the East Coast first where I stayed with a homestay mom that I know from 3years back in Brisbane. I didn’t try hard to look for jobs in the first month(May). I proceeded to go to Airlie Beach, Townsville and eventually Cairns (July) where i got my first job as a hostel manager at the lowest rating hostel (you can easily look that up on booking,com) because my ex boss is Chinese and I am also Hong Kong Chinese hence I got the job. From then on, it was a month of craziness because he taught me all this stuff for four days and afterwards, he proceeded to leave the country to go on vacation with his wife and his kid. And I held the fort for the next ten days. All the while he was annoying and he loves barking orders at me and I held it in cuz at first I thought I knew how to handle him but when he came back all hell broke loose cuz I felt he was unappreciative and he nit picked everything that I did wrong and he also loved making unrealistic demands like after the backpackers cleaned the bathrooms he wanted me to take pictures of all the cleaned bathrooms on a daily basis. I don’t have the best emotional intelligence in the world and I became really nasty to him as he was like the same to me. I left without notice in early August after one month and left for Melbourne. I arrived here and I felt super lonely. It was really cold at that time and I couldn’t make the same relationships with people that I made back when I was in Cairns at the hostel with for example some girls from mainland China which is pretty ironical because if anyone of you knows, Hong Kong people generally dont really have the best affinity with mainland China as culturally we don’t experience the same things in terms of social dynamics, languages, currency, law, etc. But I met a bunch of really great friends in Cairns in contrast to a much more different vibe in Melbourne. And after three or four days of staying in Melbourne, I don’t know what drew me in but I went to the casino, this is when all things good started to decline. I basically lost all the money I made back in Cairns as well as the cash I held at the time. I am also a person with chronic illness with my neck since November 2011, I started using a Southeast Asian herb called kratom that has helped me deal with the my extreme and underdiagnosed calcifications around my neck since Jan 2018 and while I have had much better sleep and am able to function better during the day, I feel pretty reliant on it and I shouldn’t do that because it has addictive substance and maybe it’s because of the dehydration caused by kratom or other factors, I have become pretty antisocial but I gotta say, I also feel like being from Hong Kong and coming to Australia, I don’t know if I should say it’s a mismatch, I feel like I am not a particularly interesting person and I feel like there are big Asian communities out here already that in the eyes of many people, I am not interesting to talk to and I don’t stand out, as opposed to other times when I traveled around Europe, particularly I enjoyed visiting the poorer and less developed underdog Eastern European countries, I felt like from the standpoint of cultural exchange, I am in a happier place. Back to being in Melbourne, I have had two jobs here. One is event setup and packdown such as concerts and the other job I had was a cleaning technician project at a government building. The last work day is probably two weeks ago.. and last week I posted an ad on Gumtree and somebody contacted me about a farmwork opportunity at a dairy farm 7 hours away from Melbourne by public transport (as I don’t have drive and don’t have a car) near the Great Ocean Road. I jumped at the chance but immediately after four days of cow milking shifts (2 shifts a day) I had to go because it was not a good fit for me. My hands felt arthritic still from the job because I washed my hands a lot when the cows’ fecal matter touched my arms. I just couldn’t do it. I don’t regret trying that though and then I decided to come back to Melbourne on Xmas Eve and for the past few days I have felt a sense of loneliness I couldn’t shake out. I don’t like partying and going out for drinks after I have started using and needing kratom. I am feeling reflective about my gambling addiction that I stopped in late November as I banned myself from the casino (I lost everything - around 15000 AUD and this amount did not include any earnings I have received after I started working holidays in Australia it’s my previous savings, I feel lonely also because I don’t feel interested to talk much to a lot of people these days except maybe for talking to a few friends on Facebook messenger which I think is also caused by kratom.right now I just feel bored and empty. I saw tickets to go back home that are cheap relatively in early Jan. I am also thinking of going to Adelaide just to check the city out as a person that I met previously on a roadtrip thru couchsurfing road trip event is gonna drive to Adelaide on the 4th. I am thinking of going back to Brisbane to stay with my previous homestay and try to look for work there in hospitality. But right now I just don’t feel any motivation to look for work in Melbourne. I just feel contemplative and don’t know if I can regret coming here for working holidays. I don’t feel like I have changed much as a person. There are a few life lessons I have learnt with gambling but I don’t know what else I have achieved here. What can I do?
I. Richard was working in a bar. He had found the job from a friend who said that he was leaving it for greener pastures, and like hand me down clothing he had assumed the role. The job was nothing special. Working as a barback for a cocktail bar. It involved preparation for the cocktail drinks and during service, he would restock the condiments and glassware to ensure that all of the bartenders could fulfil their duties. Essentially, it was a labouring role that paid minimum wage. The bartenders would all bark orders at him and he received little commendation for the work involved. Currently the bar was not serving and they had the staff at the venue to do stocktake duties and a deep clean of the bar area. The back shelves of the bar were usually stocked with bottles of spirits. But seeing as they were giving everything a deep clean, the staff had taken down all of the bottles and Richard was given the task of wiping down the mirror glass surface that usually lay behind the bottles. It was difficult to understand why the mirrored glass needed such a deep clean. It wasn’t as if inspectors would look at the mirrored glass surface to determine the functionality of the bar. However, he was stuck with the job and because he was being paid, he did as he was ordered to. As he scrubbed and cleaned at the mirrored glass surface with a cloth and disinfectant, he could feel that the task was becoming more and more redundant. He felt that the bar manager was simply giving him orders so that he could establish some sort of superiority over him. After all, his bar manager had begun on the lowest rank in the hospitality industry just as he. So the bar manager presumed it was his right to give him obsolete tasks, just as another bar manager had once done to him when he was younger. It had its purpose, of course, everything has its purpose. The purpose of such orders was to instill an anal attitude to others in the cleanliness and upkeep of the bar. For the bar manager probably assumed that Richard, as he, would one day work through the ranks of the establishment. But Richard did not feel the same way as he scrubbed at the glass mirrored surface with the cloth. Repeatedly and with force to ensure that there was not a smudge upon the surface. And upon completion of the task with much endurance and effort he proclaimed to his manager, “I’ve finished.” The bar manager went up to inspect the surface of the mirrored glass, stating, “No, you haven’t.” The bar manager then went across inspecting the large mirror and pointing out points of fluff that had been left after Richard had applied the cloth to the surface. And so Richard repeated the task of cleaning the glass mirrored surface once again. With the same piece of cloth and producing the same results. Upon announcing the completion of his work, the bar manager once again inspected the surface and then in a fit of rage unleashed upon the unsuspecting Richard, “You stupid farkin’ idiot! You’ve done the same thing again. If you don’t do it properly, you won’t have a job tomorrow.” Richard stood there and thought about it. He looked at the piece of cloth in his hand that he was using. The disinfectant substance that had been brought to its minimum capacity within the spray bottle. The irrationality of the task at hand worked itself into the understandings of his present situation. The futility of it all. The idea that every day he had to work underneath this arsehole. Doing as he commanded, just so he could ensure that he could afford the rent that kept a roof above his head. It was a job and that’s presumably what all jobs do. Taking advantage of people’s desperation, forcing them to act in a mode of servility. As the anger seethed within Richard, little bubbles of sweat were released over his brow, as his face grew bright red. His blood had begun to boil. So he threw the near empty bottle of disinfectant at the bar manager’s head. The act didn’t exactly cause pain, but it gathered the bar manager’s attention who turned around surprised by the act. “Go fark yourself you arrogant cunt! You can shove the job up your arse!” You could see the bar manager’s face. The slight twitches in his eyebrows and mouth as he acknowledged what was happening. And then like the eruption of a volcano, came the seething ball of pus and putrid words that flowed from his inner core, “You piece of shit! I’ve done everything that I could for you! You’re lucky that you have this job with all of the shit that I have to put up with! GET OUT!!!” And so Richard cleaned out his locker and left the cocktail bar, not bothering to enquire about his final pay cheque. After that, Richard went home. His home was a room in a three bedroom apartment that he shared with two others in their twenties. Of them, only Fabian was home. He explained to Fabian what had happened and Fabian told him that he should call up the welfare services so he would be able to make next month’s rent. And so that’s what he did. Richard jumped through the holes and over the hurdles of the great and grand bureaucracy that is the welfare system. In order to justify his existence to a system that was corrupt and lost all senses of human decency long ago. Standing in line with many others who had lost faith in the system and mankind many years ago. The lines of anger and vile bitterness that seethed when one was left with no other option but to grovel before bureaucrats in an effort to feed themselves. For the rest of the time he looked up jobs on the internet, applying for them sparingly. He was in no rush to be spoon fed another pile of shit by people who had long ago formed themselves into groups of social cohesion. Oh, he was a necessary part of the group, no doubt. Without him, the group would not be able to function. Every group required that individual who they could shovel shit on and kick down at. Without that person who was being constantly replaced, well, without that person the group would cease to function and cease to be. And so Richard thought about it all. The predestination of being that person. The eternal newcomer. It would often result in a spiral of depression that eventuated into an act of suicide that held no ties to the group, so that the group would not be affected. That was the eventual path that that course of action led to. And there was always a new generation to step into the old shoes of the eternal newcomer. The great and grand design. The churning gears of the system that left a mountain of skulls in their wake. If people were happy with their jobs and that sort of behaviour didn’t exist, then never would there be a need to advertise for another job. Richard lay in bed, smoking a cigarette and stared up at the ceiling, listening to music. He found himself daydreaming about the futility of his situation. Trying to think up a way out of the constant state of entrapment that was destined to play itself out during different work roles throughout the course of his life. Was there such a thing as a way out of this predestined destiny of doom? A door? A window? A mouse hole? That was when Fabian knocked on the door of his bedroom, “Hey Richard. Richard? Are you in there?” “Yeah,” Richard replied, bringing himself to his feet and then opening the door to his bedroom to greet Fabian. “There’s a party tonight in Brunswick. I know you’ve been down lately, I’ll buy you a six pack if you come with me.” Without a moment’s hesitation, Richard replied that he would. He had a shower, the first time in days. What was the point otherwise? With no place to be. He used a new bar of soap to scrub at the crevice between his arse-crack. It resulted in a brown sewerage mixture and he watched the brown liquid diluted by water follow its pathway down the drain. Of course he had wiped his arse with toilet paper. But after a week’s build up of dirt, sweat and grime had gathered all over his body. It wasn’t that he was layered with dirt, it was simply the area where this sort of residue built up. After a shower and a clean set of clothes, he was ready to venture off and into the night. And so the two of them ventured off into the night, drinks in hand, to navigate the Melbourne metropolitan public transport system. Among their fellow passengers were other individuals, already intoxicated from pre-drinks taken at home. Most of them were teenagers or other twenty somethings. Most of them would still be living at home, not having to spend money on rent or bills, they had money to spend. People with family connections that were assured job security that lay in judgment of shitkickers like Richard and Fabian. Fabian was alright. He worked cleaning and janitorial jobs. His voiced opinion on the subject of work was, ‘It’s all shit when you have to wipe off shit stains from the toilets. But at least you get honest people when there’s no prestige involved in the work.’ The train carriage smelt like vomit and as people exited at the main stops, Richard and Fabian saw why. A group of the nightclubbers had left one of their friends passed out on the train, lying in his own vomit. A couple of ticket inspectors boarded the train and awoke him from a semi-comatose state. The man, the boy, mumbled something non-descript. The two ticket inspectors picked him off the ground and with one of them under each arm, took him outside at the next stop to do god only knows what. The two of them got off the train shortly after that. They followed different tram routes that were equally packed with night rabble and arrived at their destination. Fabian had made some attempt to explain to Richard that he couldn’t just sit on welfare and despite his apprehension of picking up another job, he would have to submit eventually. Richard batted off the line of questioning and they both decided to enjoy themselves for the night, putting all other obligations aside momentarily. They arrived at the house party and began to mingle. Richard took a seat in the backyard, rolling himself cigarettes and opening up the six pack of beers. Fabian preferred to venture indoors and danced with the young ladies who were all listening to music that was playing on a hi-fi system. The choice in music wasn’t that bad: a mix of electronic music; old school hip-hop; and pop tunes from the eighties. Richard kept on smoking cigarettes and drinking beer as other strays took their seats beside him, outside in the backyard to smoke cigarettes and get down to idle conversation. Among those that took their seats beside him were various artists, a lawyer that worked for some unmentioned government department, and some computer programmer working for a corporation. It was difficult to know what to say when surrounded by such a varied group. So they all focused in upon their addictions. Drugs, sex, cigarettes, alcohol… All of them had confronted some sort of substance abuse problem along the journey of life. And when they had finished with those types of conversations they focused in upon the different artists. Their dreams and ambitions. Among the booze, their work took precedence as it was all inconsequential to the larger picture. Despite what political or other motivations prompted them to create their work. There were so many problems in the world that it was difficult to ascertain the implications of taking strong political stances. And so everyone agreed, taking up the different artists political stances without consideration of real world consequences and knowing that tomorrow they would return to their lives without any real effort given to the various causes. After a while the conversation tired. Richard was four beers down and had started to rummage through the stockpile of different implements that lay in the backyard. Among such novelty items was a unicycle. Upon its discovery, Richard picked it out and made a great speech about the miscellaneous object, “A unicycle! For the love of God, who owns a unicycle?” “A performer of sorts, I guess.” One of the others replied. “Give it a try!” Another called out. And so that’s what Richard did. And with minimal effort and incredible balance, he took naturally to the thing. Riding around in circles as they all cheered him on and gave him minor applause. After a while he grew tired of the act and took a seat as the others set their attempts to ride the unicycle. None of the others had much success, to which they all commented upon Richard’s natural talent. The comments led Richard to form an idea. Or at least the beginnings of an idea. And when the night came to an end, he asked the owner of the house what they were planning to do with the unicycle. To which they replied, “I don’t know. I picked it up at a garage sale planning to learn to ride the thing, but never got around to it. I’m working full-time now, you can have it if you want it.” To which Richard accepted and both Richard and Fabian returned home, with the addition of a unicycle. II. The next day Richard, having no other obligations, went to the local park to practice on the unicycle. He first mastered his balance on the vehicle in the proper motion. Then he reversed that motion and learnt how to ride the thing backwards, in loops and controlling his distance and speed. He spent days on end riding the thing around in parking lots, learning how to jump around on the thing and maintain balance while remaining semi-stationary. He fulfilled his job seeker obligations. Making sure that he applied for his twenty jobs every month and attending his appointments with work placement agencies. Every time he went to one of those appointments a small piece of him died on the inside. The place seemed to be full of people with broken spirits and he supposed that he, himself, was one of them too. But all of the people there were disgusted with one another. The place maintained a semblance of order by the psychological trap of individuality. At one point or another all of these people held down a job. And so as each individual looked around, they did not bother to converse with one another, they all saw their own situation as unique. They all saw themselves as unique and they all maintained hope that they would find a job soon enough. But the truth was there was no counter counting down the time until they received their next opportunity. They could get a job any time between a day from now or they could be waiting twenty years. People preferred not to speak with one another in such venues, they were all disgusted with one another, everyone holding their own self-entitled pride. And Richard was no different. He looked around at the people waiting and presumed their sin of sloth. He sat down with the consultant and answered their questions. With each question the consultant would navigate through the systems on their computer and click the appropriate buttons to determine if he had met his obligations as a job seeker. And once that was completed Richard would return to the practice of riding his unicycle in various parking lots around the neighbourhood. One day Fabian joined him. Fabian came with a couple of longneck beers in hand to witness Richard’s improved skill. He sat on the parking lot curb, drinking his beers and commenting on Richard’s mastery of the unicycle, “Damn man! I can’t even ride one of those things, but you can do all sorts of shit on it, can’t ya’?” “Yeah, I was thinking,” Richard conversed as he rode backwards and forwards, “I was thinking that I could start putting on shows for the public.” “You mean busking?” “Yeah, busking. Think about it. I wouldn’t have any boss that I would have to report to. I wouldn’t have to deal with those bureaucrats at Centrelink. I’d treat it like a job, buskers can make good money if they offer something unique.” Richard remained semi-stationary and did a couple of jumps on the unicycle. “Yeah, but just riding a unicycle isn’t going to do it. You’d have to offer the crowd something special.” Richard got off the unicycle to join Fabian on the parking lot curb, “What do you mean?” “You’d have to do something with your hands. Like spinning a walking cane around or something, I dunno…” Richard and Fabian drank beers until the sun went down. Fabian had a lot of venting to do about his work and Richard listened peacefully. In their own ways they had both been working full days. Putting in the time and effort so that they could relax and rest easy, knowing that they had achieved something for the day. The next day Richard went shopping for clothes. Lacking any suitable funding to go out to the commercial shops, he browsed through opportunity shops and looked around for second hand clothing that was still suitable to wear. In amongst the different clothes and items of a miscellaneous nature, he found himself a bowler hat. Looking at the thing gave him an idea. It had a price tag attached to it that marked it on sale for ten dollars. It was of good quality and he did not complain, he bought the hat along with a few articles of clothing and then went back to his practice of the unicycle. This time he added the bowler hat into his routine. He started off by throwing the hat up in the air and catching it with the other hand while maintaining balance on the unicycle. It was difficult at first, but over time and practice the action became more fluid. After he had mastered simple actions, he began practicing more complex tasks. Like throwing the bowler hat a great distance up in the air and manoeuvring himself and the unicycle so that the hat would land on his head. He tried and failed that trick many times before he had any success. But over time he managed to achieve the results he desired. And shortly after that he was doing all sorts of complex and intricate things. After a couple of months of practice Fabian once again came to witness the skills that Richard had accumulated. He sat there with a longneck beer as he had done before. This time Richard was riding on the unicycle, throwing the hat up in the air, spinning the hat on his fingers, catching the hat in his teeth and jumping up and down on the unicycle in a reverse motion. Fabian was bewildered, “Holy shit man! Yeah, I’d pay to see that. You’re god damned diabolical on that thing!” “Diabolical, hey?” Richard said, while raising an eyebrow. “I like the sound of that. I think I’ll use that as my stage name.” Richard threw the hat up in the air and jumped on the unicycle in a three-hundred and sixty degree motion, “You may call me, ‘Diabolical’.” Fabian offered Richard a beer and they both sat and witnessed the sun set in the park. Toasting to Richard’s success and newfound vocation. The next Friday Richard travelled into the city to perform along Southbank, outside the casino in Melbourne. He carried with him a piece of chalk. He was dressed in a white shirt, black pants, with a black bow-tie, and stars drawn in black make-up around his eyes. With a series of onlookers, he drew out a circle on the pavement and announced to his audience, “Ladies and gentlemen, what you are about to witness can be described in no other way but ‘diabolical’.” After the brief introduction Richard mounted the unicycle and started riding around inside the perimeter of the chalk circle that he had drawn up on the pavement. After that, he started travelling backwards in the same motion with his bowler hat affixed to his head. He was just laying out the territory, ensuring that the audience gave him space. After the audience acknowledged this, he started jumping up and down on the unicycle in a backwards motion. Then he moved forwards again and threw the bowler hat up in the air and caught it with the other hand. Then he laid his arms out like a seesaw and began rolling the hat up and down the length of his arms as he maintained balance on the unicycle. He began to gather quite a crowd at this point and his hat tricks and motions on the unicycle increased in complexity. He continued to perform until his grand finale where he rode the unicycle backwards, threw the hat up in the air, jumped up in the air on the unicycle, perform a three hundred and sixty degree twist and catching the bowler hat on his head. He then dismounted from the unicycle to the sound of great applause from the audience who had gathered around him. He then walked around the circle that had been lined up in chalk and held the bowler hat out as his audience deposited their donations to his act. After this he took a half an hour break. He counted the money that he had earned. All up, he had received sixty dollars. Sixty dollars for a half hour routine wasn’t bad, Richard thought. He waited around for another half an hour. Buying himself a bottle of water, smoking some cigarettes and then returned to the circle laid out in chalk and repeated the half an hour act to a different audience of passers-by. He repeated the act until the stroke of midnight and then caught the last train home. All up, he had earned two hundred and eighty dollars. It wasn’t bad for a single night’s work. Hell, it was bloody fantastic! For the next week he went to the same area and repeated the routine. Some days were better than others, but each day was certainly worth the trip into town. Sometimes he would perform by daylight, other times he would perform at night. And he was slowly gathering a small fortune while doing so. Richard thought about the good fortune he had come across ever since leaving the bar job. The time and effort he had placed into creating and maintaining his act. It had all been worth it. But he began to notice something. The more he performed. The less takings he would receive. The crowd was growing weary of the act, despite how fantastic it was. Then came the day that would end his series of performances in Melbourne. It was during the day and he had gathered a crowd of small children who were looking at the man on the unicycle performing his routine. Then a child, a small girl with ribbons done in her hair in a pigtail fashion, went running into the circle drawn up in chalk. At that point Richard was balancing the hat in a see-saw motion up along the length of his arms. When he saw the child, he lost all control of the unicycle and veered off to the side, collapsing in a heap. Enraged by the incident, Richard lost his temper at the small child and began yelling at her, “You little shit! You fucked up my entire routine!” The reaction came as an automatic reaction that Richard had felt in the pain of his fall. The girl paused for a second in silence and then Richard could see the tears well up in her eyes. He held up his hands, trying to stop her from the tears. But the tears came, as did the screams, “Mummy! Mummmmmmy!!!” The audience that had gathered around Richard then began to call out in disgust at Richard’s behaviour. To which there was nothing Richard could do to take back the action. A large, muscular man approached Richard. Grabbing his arm and twisting it behind Richard’s back in what was a painful action, yelling at him, “Apologise to the young girl, ya’ bastard!” To which Richard squeaked out, “I’m sorry…” in the most pathetic way imaginable, with tears of pain running down his cheeks, making his make-up run. The little girl stopped crying and started laughing at Richard. The muscular man released Richard from his grip and then pushed him to the ground. The man took Richard’s takings for the day and gave it to the little girl and her mother. The crowd dispersed, leaving Richard there broken and bruised, realizing that he could never perform in Melbourne again. III. Richard returned home that day in hysterics. He kept on yelling and ranting about how he had had enough of this shithole city and that he was moving away to greener pastures. Try as Fabian might to calm him down, he could do nothing to settle his temper. Richard packed up some of his belongings in a suitcase. A few changes of clothes, some of his essential belongings and then went out to Fabian to ask him a favour. “Hey man,” they were both sitting down at the kitchen table, “if I pay you a month’s rent in advance, will you be able to clear up the rest of my shit. Sell my stuff. Do with it what you need to.” “Yeah, man, sure.” Fabian looked at Richard, “What happened? Anything serious? Are you okay?” “It was just farked man! Absolutely farked! I was basically humiliated in front of the whole city. I hate this farkin’ city! I farkin’ hate it!” “Calm down, just tell me what happened and we can sort it all out.” But Richard didn’t stick around to bother explaining everything to Fabian. He paid him the one month’s rent in advance. Grabbed his suitcase, the unicycle, everything else that he needed and took the next train into the city. On the train journey into the city, he plotted out his route via his phone. He planned to stop over in Geelong before heading west out towards Perth. He would stop along the road, stopping off at various points like Adelaide and all of the smaller rural towns inbetween. Performing his act and fueling his journey with any money he could. That was the plan. Hitting the open road, with no responsibilities. He’d pick up a car somewhere along the way, but for now he was appeased with taking the train. He booked a bed to stay in a backpackers in Geelong. A pub called Irish Murphys’ that existed just outside of the central business district of the city. He booked it for a series of three nights, believing that he could perform in the city centre for the next two days before continuing on his journey out west. The train from Melbourne to Geelong was only an hour’s journey and he soon found himself exiting the train. From there he caught a bus to the backpackers where he made camp for the night. He kept to himself and made sure that his belongings were locked up inside his room. There weren’t many other tourists in the place. There were a couple of middle aged Chinese women who were sharing a room. He ran into them in the kitchen while they were preparing themselves a meal. Some noodles mixed with fried chicken strips and some vegetables. They piled the soy sauce into the saucepan as they cooked the noodles, adding a teaspoon of fish sauce and other spices that were acquainted to their tastes. He attempted to make conversation with them, but they were largely lacking fluency in the English dialect. They looked at him in confusion as he attempted to make conversation. Feeling that his words would not be heard, he went downstairs and purchased a bottle of cheap red wine. He offered them each a glass, to which they refused. They retired to their rooms and he retired to his. He ended up drinking the full bottle of wine and falling asleep in a half-drunk state. He woke up in the morning at about a quarter past ten. He felt like he had eaten the cork of the wine bottle and the cork was being digested slowly in his stomach, floating in his stomach acids, producing this queasy feeling that was akin to seasickness. He went downstairs. The bar staff were busy preparing the venue for service later that day, so he went next door to the tuck shop and bought himself a sandwich. One of those greasy bacon and egg ones, with the paper wrapping around it that had become transparent because of all the grease dripping off of the bacon. He ate it and bought himself a bottle of lemon soda to wash it all down. It calmed his stomach and the queasy feeling soon disappeared. After a couple of hours sitting and watching cable television in the lounge room drinking glasses of water, he pulled himself together and prepared to make his grand debut on the city streets of Geelong. He dressed himself up in usual attire and applied the make-up to his eyes. White collared shirt, black bow-tie and black pants. Accompanied, of course, with the bowler hat. He caught the bus into the city. He couldn’t really find any performance space. There weren’t any other buskers and he spied that a group of homeless people had set up some form of encampment outside of the mall. He went into little Malop street where he decided there was enough space where he could perform his act. People walking past him looked at him oddly, not understanding what he intended to do. He drew up a circle with a piece of white chalk that he kept in his pocket and once more mounted his unicycle. Some people stopped and called out to him, “Hey, what the hell are you trying to do?” “Ladies and gentlemen,” he called out, raising his voice so that anybody within a fifty meter radius could hear him, “I am the great and glorious ‘Diabolical’ and what I am about to do here today is absolutely diabolical! If you all wish to witness the events with your own eyes, you will not be displeased!” A few people stopped and began watching Richard as he rode the unicycle around in circles. Then backwards in circles. There was not much of a crowd, but what he didn’t expect was for the encampment of homeless people to come and watch him. There was a small group of them, about five in all came to witness him as the others remained with their makeshift setup of sleeping bags and miscellaneous items. The leader of the group appeared to be a stout Mexican man. The Mexican man was roughly shaven and smoked a cigarette. He wore gloves with the fingers cut off and a dirty grey torn jacket, with cotton coming out of the tears in the material. He began speaking English with a rough accent, “This motherfucker says he’s ‘diabolical’, that’s my name! You ain’t taking my name now are ya’?” Richard ignored the homeless man as he continued on with his routine. Balancing his hat along his arms like a see-saw. “Now I know you wouldn’t be doing that? Taking my name ya’ faggot!” The berating comments began to get on Richard’s nerves. But he held his peace and continued on with the act. “Ya’ piece of shit! I’m ‘Diabolical’, that’s my name!” Other people began to leave the crowd that had gathered around Richard, scared off by the homeless man. And pretty soon the homeless man was yelling at him, “That’s my name! That’s my name! That’s my name!” Over and over again without pause. After all of the potential paying audience had dispersed, frightened by the constant heckling by the homeless man, Richard got off of the unicycle and ceased his act. He looked at the homeless man and his fellow cohorts, he wasn’t that tall and he was sure that he would be able to at least outrun them on the unicycle if they went to attack him. So Richard began yelling at him, “You worthless piece of shit! You just scared them all off! Fark you and fark this town!” The homeless Mexican man stood there and didn’t say anything. Instead he flicked the cigarette that he had been smoking towards Richard. The cigarette fell at Richard’s feet. The homeless man didn’t say anything after that, he just kept on staring at Richard. The other homeless people that had come with him lost interest and all walked back towards their encampment. But the Mexican homeless man, he just kept on standing there, staring at Richard without saying a word. After a while it began to creep Richard out, so Richard decided to walk back to the backpackers. Not looking back to see if he was being followed. When he reached the pub that doubled as a backpackers, he looked back behind him to see if he was being followed. He felt relieved when he found that the homeless man was nowhere in sight. So he entered the pub and ordered himself a drink. It started off with one pint. A pint of Carlton draught because it was the cheapest drink that he could afford. He would sit and listen to the music. They had live musicians who were performing classic and well-known rock songs. He would sit there alone and listen to songs, ordering pint after pint. Between intervals of the songs he would go outside and have a cigarette. Toking on cigarettes and talking to strangers. They’d offer him tidbits and information on a variety of different subjects. Nothing that mattered to him. He did take an interest in the story concerning how the homeless had all migrated from the larger capital city of Melbourne to Geelong. The police restrictions, they had explained, were less strict than they were in Melbourne. For some reason they seemed to get away with sleeping outside of the mall in the central business district. Richard listened attentively, nodding his head as he did so. Then went back into the bar and continued ordering pints of Carlton draught. Eventually he ran out of cigarettes and half cut, he asked the bartender where he could buy cigarettes. The bartender replied that there was a supermarket up down the road, about a kilometre. So he finished what remained of his current pint, placed his bowler hat on his head and went off to find the supermarket. He had been walking for about five minutes when it happened. An unknown assailant surprised him from behind and covered his face with a cloth covered in chloroform. He lost consciousness almost immediately. When he awoke, he was tied by the wrists and ankles, placed upon a wooden table in some unknown park. He struggled against the bonds, but they were affixed to his limbs tightly. He called out into the night, “Hello! What’s happening!? What’s happening!?!” From out of the shadows appeared the Mexican homeless man. The same one who had caused a disturbance in his performance earlier that day. “Y’know, I wasn’t lying.” Richard struggled more intensely against his bonds, but it was of no use, “What the fark are you doing you psycho!? Release me at once. I demand that you release me!” “That’s not going to help you homie. There ain’t no turning back from this shit now. It’s just me and you, alone here in the park. And nobody else around to hear ya’.” “Didn’t you hear me!? Let me go!” Richard called out, “Help! Heellp!” “I wasn’t lying when I said my name is ‘Diabolical’. Except the reason that I had that name was probably different from the reason why you had that name.” “Help! Heeelp!!!” Richard screamed out into the night without any reply. Diabolical produced a small knife. It was curved at the end of the blade. He then leaned forward and pressed it up against Richard’s neck. “I said shut the fuck up!” After that Diabolical wrapped a bandana around the mouth of Richard. Tying it around his mouth to act as a gag so that he couldn’t make any more noise. Any more noise that Richard attempted to make was inaudible. “As I was saying. I too am known by the name ‘Diabolical’. I received that name many years ago in my native country. I was a small child, perhaps eleven or twelve years old. I came from a very poor family and was being constantly bullied at school. So much so that for the large part I refused to attend. Instead, I would run around the neighbourhood, stealing food and different things in an effort to entertain myself. There was a group of us. I considered us all friends. Until one day, those friends turned against me and I was ousted from that group. In an act of revenge I kidnapped their dog. I tied that dog up much like I have you tied up here and now. And with that dog I skinned him alive. Back then, I wasn’t very good at it and made a mess of things. But I completed the job and displayed the pet before my old friends. No doubt, they were upset and probably would have killed me. If it weren’t for a man dressed in an all-white suit. He saw what I had done and then shot a pistol to scare off the other kids, my former friends. After that the man took me in and said that he could use someone like me. So he gave me other animals to skin. Feral cats from the neighbourhood, things like that. I got so good at it, that that man gave me the name ‘Diabolical’ in reference to my diabolical skill.” That was when Diabolical approached Richard, tied up to the table and unable to voice any sound of protest, with the knife. He began by cutting open his clothes. Leaving him naked in the cold night. Then after that made incisions up and down the length of his limbs. They were made lengthways, up the length of Richard’s arms and legs. He attempted to scream out in pain. But could not. “That man turned out to be a major drug lord in the city and used me. Allowing me to torture his captured enemies. Skinning them and presenting their carcasses to their family and loved ones. You could be sure that nobody crossed that man.” Diabolical made another incision, identical to the last, down the lengthways of the limbs. Running parallel to the other incision, perhaps three centimetres apart. “I was treated well. With luxury and everything else that I could ask for. This went on for years.” With the parallel incisions, he placed the knife underneath and began to peel the strip of skin off Richard’s body. Richard attempted to howl and struggle against the bonds, but there wasn’t anything he could do. “Until one day, that man asked me to skin someone who I didn’t want to skin. She was a lover. One of many, but a lover still the same.” After the strips of skin had been peeled, Diabolical had an opening to the rest of the skin that covered Richard’s body. From there he could go about the process like peeling an orange. Placing the knife under the skin and peeling off the rest of the layer. “I turned on the old man. The one who had taken me in and skinned him instead. But that man was powerful and once my betrayal was known, I had to leave the country. Somewhere where I couldn’t be found. So I thought, ‘Australia’, I mean, why not, right?” For the rest of the operation Diabolical remained focused on the process. Skinning the man alive and ensuring that everything was done to the utmost level of skill. After everything had been done and Richard’s whole body was skinned, Diabolical would tie him and string him up to a nearby gum tree. Singing to himself as he did so, “Give me a home amongst the gum trees. With lots of plum trees. A sheep or two, a kangaroo. A clothesline out the back. Verandah out the front.” All in a heavy Mexican accent. “And an old rockin’ chair.” Richard’s body would be discovered the next morning. By early morning joggers through the park, with his body strung up a gum tree, hung like a fisherman showing off his catch, by the legs. With his bowler hat strategically placed beneath him. As the blood dripped from his skinned carcass, dripping into the bowler hat in a little pool.
Listen, mate. Something is rotten in the State of Victoria, Australia. From the muddy banks of the Yarra, up and beyond Sydney Road, to the Dandenong mountain ranges….down to the borders of Port Phillip Bay where the fibreglass Luna Park clown, old Mr Moon, grins contemptuously over the brothels and slums of St Kilda. Fuck me sideways. Pernicious humidity followed by a spell of rain, and a sky perpetually overcast with moral decay. Something is wrong, and it rhymes with girder. Yeah, see....in St Kilda, in July of 2017 a dead body was found in the Triangle construction Site near the Bay, adjacent to where the Palais theatre once stood —before it burnt to cinders. Body had also been burnt, and was unidentifiable, charcoaled as it was. Funnily enough...Nobody seems to know who is to blame. As daily race riots and brawls break out on St Kilda streets, and the cops impose tougher alcohol restrictions, this gaping wound remains untended. J D Williams and the three Phillips brothers from Seattle had their part;— left their American legacy in Australia, no doubt about it— the Coney Island style theme park of vices, a carnival of underground crimes which led to that precise moment —a swamp of intertwined histories beyond my capabilities to research thoroughly or summarise accurately. Nevertheless, I swear to you old chum, like a moth to a flame, I was drawn into the tangled investigation of that mangled female corpse near Luna Park,... an investigation which would near drive me insane. My name is Pharlap Dronefire, a Private Investigator based in South Yarra. I’m not normally inclined to investigate murder cases, but this particular private client had a list of seemingly unrelated things he wanted me to research, the St Kilda murder being just one of them. As I didn’t have access myself to the police files, I resolved to meet up with my police contact, Andrew Barrington, and get the facts surrounding the case. Officer Barrington consented to meet at Luigi’s; a video game themed bar on Acland Street. It was a hot Saturday, and the St Kilda crowds were wild and varied; thousands of English, Irish and American tourists flocked to the beach, whilst teenagers vomited on the rickety roller-coasters of the seaside theme Park. The scenes were impressionistic, with Bosch-like crowds, bollards lined with palm trees. Myriad junkies asked for change and cigarettes of passers by— on the street, whilst bips and boops sang out from customers playing the vintage arcade machines behind me. I sat at the outside tables, drunks brushed by me on the cramped and cracked sidewalk, car pollution and smog slept thinly at knee level over the scene, as the green and orange blur of a passing tram flashed by. I saw officer Barrington approaching from a distance and waved as he crossed the road, shortly he sat down at the table and we ordered two Pale Ales. ‘Thanks for comin’ Bazza’ I said with genuine appreciation. Barrington scratched his face, and muttered a kind of ‘no wukkers ’ through his chin.....he seemed to have a lot on his mind. ‘So what have you got on this St Kilda killing?’ I asked directly, ‘There’s almost nothing online about it, barely made a dent in the press.’ ‘Jesus Pharlap.’ Barrington sighed, ‘Haven’t you got anything better to do than dig up old corpses?’ ‘You know me Baz—’ I said, ‘I’m determined to end up a chalk outline myself. But this corpse is still pretty fresh i’d say. Why are the cops choking on this chicken anyway? What’s the unseen bone?’ ‘Look…’ Officer Barrington sighed, as our beers arrived and I took a big swig of lager; ‘The murder made the papers when it happened, toured the news for a week or so...but because the body has never been identified there hasn’t been much for the press to chew on. There’s no suspects, no motive or cause. We’ve only been barely able to piece together what actually happened.’ Barrington took a sip of beer, as I jotted down some notes. The officer looked down at my ex—left-hand for a moment, noticing the bandaged stub from the accident that had happened to me recently. ‘What happened to your hand?’ He asked. ‘My own bones have been chewed…You and I...’ I replied, ‘....Work in a dangerous line of work.....sometimes the danger of your profession leaks over to mine in unexpected ways ....probably best leave it at that. So what exactly DO the police know about this barbecued girl?’. I noticed an extraordinary amount of discomfort in Barrington’s face as he discussed the girl. Being partially involved in the murder investigation, it seemed to have particularly disturbed him. He struggled uncomfortably in his seat, Barrington was a large muscular man with thick, black-rimmed glasses and layered, thin hair. His eyes seemed permanently tinged with paranoia. ‘Officially?’ Barrington replied nervously, ‘Nothing...... But unofficially....’ ‘You’ve got your own theories about who did this, don’t you?’ I asked making my own deductions. Bazza sighed and massaged the back of his neck; ‘Look’ he said, ‘Whatever I tell you here is completely off the record. You understand?’ I made an affirmative gesture. ‘You know well— I’ve been investigating various unsolved gangland killings for a long time.’ Said Officer Barrington, ‘We’ve discussed previously my unofficial research and interests.’ I nodded, motioning him to continue. ‘Well. Hexton Police Station is full of officer’s hunches. We’ve always known of these criminal families running things, and what not, but sometimes you don’t have the evidence to put the bastards away. This case goes back years....’ Another tram chimed past in the street as Bazza continued his story; ‘There was the Walsh Street Massacre in 1988; that set a wave of anxiety through the ranks. You’ve head of it?’ ‘Sounds familiar. That’s what ‘Animal Kingdom’ was about, right?’ I said. ‘Right. Before Howard took the guns away, you had the crime families, bank robbers, strings of crimes done with sawn-off shotguns in broader Hexton. Cops shot Greame Jensen, and Victor Pierce promised two cops would die in revenge attacks. After those two young coppers were murdered in Walsh Street, the cops fought back. Executed a bunch of the gang leaders. Then there were the trials of the Walsh Street killers, that bitch Wendy Pierce didn’t testify. Half the buggers never done time. I was trying to nail Peter McEvoy for a long time in the nineties. He moved up to NSW after he was freed.’ I furiously recorded notes as the officer spoke. ‘After the gangland killings of the nineties, and the Purana task force, it took years to catch up on who was doing what. Well that’s when I really went down a rabbit hole in my research. Started trailing these rich crime families who’d been running tricks over the NSW/Victorian border for over a century unchecked. I’m not talking about Gangitano, Gatto or the Manillas. Used to be all the crime was comin’ in from the docks, you know? The Painter and Dockers union, that’s where Victor Pierce worked, the Walsh Street murderer, the Moran family and the Carlton Crew, they were all running drugs through Port Melbourne. The Calabrian mafia, AKA the honoured society, the Ndrangheta—now they also got their claws into Australian society way back then too, they come down from Queensland, had their racketeering going through the fruit and vegetable markets. Everyone remembers the key events— Frank Benvenuto was killed in 2000, but even without their leader the ’Ndrangheta was obviously still operating —because in 2008 the cops seized 15 million ecstacy pills hidden in tomato cans from Calabria. Now, Frank Benvenuto rang Victor Peirce the day he died. You want my opinion— That’s because the thugs that organised Walsh Street, weren’t just acting on some petty revenge motive. The whole thing was planned from higher up, maybe Frank was fronting up to Peirce before he was shot, and maybe Peirce knew too much when he was blown away in 2002. You catch my drift?’ ‘’Im trying my best to follow—’ I replied, still anxiously scribbling notes. ‘Keep up mate… Anyway listen, after the terrorist attacks on September 11, people have been too hung up on Islamic extremism to pay attention to what’s really happening with the Mafia and these other organisations, these crime families. Now there was way more knowledge of this in the police force, the internal corruption was proven to go right to the top….in the end — we know the Wood Royal Commission only really exposed the affairs of the Kings Cross Police in Sydney, barely scratched the surface of mafia interception and corruption within the government. Yeah, they brought in some regulations, hell… even that snake Roger Rogerson got done eventually,…the Labour party dealing with Mokbel was partially revealed… but all the while, secret meetings of the same groups were happening; members of corporations, corrupt police, board members, Australian politicians. I was still trailing them, I had addresses of mansions where these figures lived and hung out. Just waiting to catch a lucky break. This wasn’t just a few career criminals. It was like an underground cult.’ I polished off my beer and motioned with my hand to the waitress to bring out another one. ‘So you think this St Kilda killing was perpetrated by these underground crime families?’ I asked intrigued. Bazza grew more paranoid still, almost sweating and glancing about him as if he was afraid of being watched. ‘There’s this urban legend among ...those interested in crime ....in this city. Have you ever heard of the the ‘Slaughter Theatre’ trilogy?’ ‘The what?’ I asked cluelessly. Barrington seemed peculiarly begrudging to keep telling me information about what he knew, nonetheless he obligingly indulged me; ‘Back in the days of Walsh Street there were rumours of these VHS tapes existing, you know?… It was rumoured that Peter McEvoy, Victor Pierce and other murderers involved in the police killings— used to film their crimes. Snuff videos —which would prove their identities in various murders —nail the Walsh Street killers, and hundreds of other crime figures….. these VHS were alleged to have been seen by multiple witnesses. The stickers on the old video tapes were supposed to be labelled ‘Slaughter Theatre’ in red permanent marker, creepy handwriting. That’s what all the legends say anyway. I know officers who claim to have seen some of this footage. I’m talking sadistic brutal shit. You remember Dennis Allen?’ ‘Sure’ I said. ‘Mr Death they used to call him, well— there’s apparently a snuff video of Allen cutting up one of his biker adversaries with a chainsaw, he’s covered in blood, films the whole thing as he approaches a bunch of slaughterhouse workers in their white gear. They’re all covered in blood and laughing their asses off, saying ‘What floor you working’ on then Dennis?’. Another guy I know claims he’s seen these tapes, proof of all kinds of things we just suspected… Mad Charlie being massacred at his home in Caulfield. Girls being raped and tortured and mutilated. One of the pieces of footage is allegedly of a group of about 30 members of the Comanchero Motorcycle club, and they’re standing around with a group of these government guys in suits, who pay them a bunch of money, then what follows is a sadistic orgy which ends in bloodshed and bizarre ritual.’ I sweated, my hand starting to cramp from the overload of information. I held my hand up for a moment, indicating Bazza to give me a second to catch up. Finally, after a deep breath, and massaging my wrist, I waved; ‘Go on’. Barrington continued; ‘In the nineties and noughties —more rumours popped up about these secret videos. Apparently rich perverts we’re paying criminals for these snuff films, this Slaughter Theatre….. some of them were even getting top notch production values with members of the Melbourne creative industry being involved. At least that’s how the rumours go. The legends are constantly embellished. In the 90’s it was burnt DVD’s which the files were allegedly being copied to. Press dubbed it ‘Slaughter Theatre part Two’. Then downloaded files, and well, you can imagine how the rumours escalated in the modern age of social media.’ I tried to absorb what Barrington was telling me, but had to admit it sounded suspiciously like an urban conspiracy theory. I tapped at my pad with the nib of my pen. ‘So how exactly does this relate to the burnt female corpse that was dumped here in St Kilda?’. ‘Listen,’ Barrington said adjusting his thick, black glasses nervously and preparing to stand; ‘I’m afraid there’s only so much I can tell you without compromising my job. That girl was burnt alive, with a can of gasoline. Autopsy confirms that much. If I tell you that urban legends suggesting that her murder was filmed— are prominent in police circles, would you even believe me? What if I told you I had proof that this murder was filmed as part of a third instalment in this snuff trilogy? Slaughter Theatre - Part Three. That these murders are having a resurgence ——that its all part of this conspiracy?’ ‘I’d say you were either crazy, or had something that would make the biggest news story in Australian history.’ I replied bluntly. Officer Barrington stood up and handed me a business card; ‘That’s all I can do, mate—to tip you off. Listen Pharlap… If you want to learn more I suggest you dig around about this snuff video, I think you’ll find more than you had imagined in your worst daydreams. The.... You’re going to want to speak to the guy —on this card’— (Barrington handed me a business card)— ‘…about a murder that happened at the Three Vertice construction site in Footscray in July 2016. Sorry I can’t be of more help...’ Officer Barrington then shook my hand firmly, and I thanked him before he disappeared into the St Kilda crowds. So that was how it started. How my innocence was tainted, and I was dragged into this most unnerving and unusual investigation. The business card Barrington gave me belonged to somebody called ‘Drendyl Pex. Three Vertice Construction Company. Owner. Manager.’ For a moment I sat back, and tried to get the tangled mess out of my brain, sipping at the last of my beer. Surely Barrington had gone a bit nuts— reeked of classic Police conspiracy stuff. The idea that the whole criminal underworld is linked through some kind of satanic cult— it was absurd. Satanic Panic. And as for this snuff film? Well… I just had trouble believing that something that could’ve appeared on a /4chan creepy pasta/ could exist in any tangible reality. Nonetheless, right now, it was my only lead. If Barrington believed that the murder of the girl at St Kilda… could somehow be linked to another murder in Footscray, i’d have to investigate it, any other solution would be neglectful. It was about a twenty five minute drive out to Footscray in my Valiant Charger. I had the air conditioning up to full blast, and my tinted windows down. The radio was blaring FURY FM, some poncy hipster DJ raving on about his succulent garden, and his batch of home-brewed beer. I was about to turn it off when a killer track came on, Head On by The Jesus and Mary Chain, so I cranked the volume and hit the gas. The DJ may have been an arsehole… but he did have decent taste in music, the next tracks were also great; King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, MGMT -Little Dark Age, ORB -Man in the Sand, Nap Eyes -Don’t be Right. The synthetic pulses of the Chromatics cover of Kate Bush’s ’Running up that Hill’ was playing as I pulled into the car park of the Three Vertice construction company. It was a busy location, with an adjacent yard; many workers in their flouro orange high vis neons and yellow hard hats coming and going. I stumbled over a poorly concreted patch of turf, up a flight of roughly hewn stairs, through a mesh steel fence, until I came into a sheltered office, and temporary reception desk. The lady at the desk gave me a funny look, and I realised I was still wearing my aviators and tennis visor, and I removed them for politeness. ‘Pharlap Dronefire. I’m here to speak to Drendyl Pex’, I said flatly. The blonde woman with dark wirey eyebrows still had an aggravated look on her face, she scowled and said, barely curteously; ‘I’m afraid Mr Pex is quite busy, do you have an appointment?’ I thought cunningly for a few split seconds; ‘No. But this is of a very private and urgent nature. Mr Pex will see it in his interest that we speak as soon as possible—’ ‘Im sorry sir, but Mr Pex….’— ‘—You can tell him it’s in relation to something that happened last year—at this site— he may want to keep confidential…’ The woman sighed, looking fearfully at her computer, ‘Ill try his office, if you just want to take a seat Mr….?’ ‘Dronefire’ I repeated, casually taking a seat on the old, tattered couch. It was about a seven minute wait —before a well dressed man, with shoulder length, greased-back hair, purple waist coat, cravat, dark velvet jacket and long boots walked into the room. The woman stood up to introduce us, but before she had a chance the man lunged forward and stood before me with his right hand held straight. The man commanded a strange authority, so that I found I quickly leapt to my feet in his presence, and before I knew it we were in the middle of a firm handshake. ‘Mr Dronefire I believe? Drendyl Pex.’ ‘It’s a pleasure, sir, Is there somewhere we can talk a little more privately?’ ‘Of course, please… Come to my onsite office.’ I followed Mr Pex outside of the temporary unit, and we walked up a hazardous mud slide mountain to a— 3 metre square— white cubicle or trailer. Pex opened a door, and we entered into the luxurious space, decked out with a bar and expensive furniture and entertainment system. ‘Can I fix you a rum, Mr Dronefire?’ Pex asked. ‘I’ve never said no to a rum before.’ I replied truthfully. Pex pulled down a bottle from his packed shelves, dropped ice machine cubes into two glasses and poured. ‘On the rocks suit?’ ‘Yeah…that…uh…that….suits perfectly’ I replied. Drendyl handed me a three quarter full glass of pale liquid; ‘Have you tried it?’ He asked ‘Australian brand, from Adelaide, Gunnery, white spiced. Best this country has to offer.’ I took a sip of the drink, and was surprised by the earthy taste, it was dirty but delicious. ‘Mr Pex’ I said, ‘May I be upfront?’ ‘You want to know about the death that occurred last year.’ Pex replied; ‘I’m guessing you’re a Private Investigator or amateur sleuth of some kind.’ ‘Your receptionist passed on the hint, I suppose?’ I asked. ’I must apologise for our quote-unquote reception. It’s a temporary head office, we’re building a new office space here. Miss Weabley is actually our occupational health and safety manager, just filling the desk whilst we get a new temp in—’ ‘I’m not here representing anyone in a legal capacity Mr Pex’… I said, sensing Pex’s defenses, ‘…you guessed it right, I am a P.I-——— my client is interested in a murder that occurred in St Kilda recently, however other trails of research have led me to a you. Did the death last year occur at this location?’ ‘Aha!’ said Pex, seeming to have figured me out, ‘You’re following the urban legend surrounding a certain snuff film.’ I tried not to act surprised. ‘I can provide you some information about that. But follow me, I want to show you something first.’ Pex swigged the rest of his drink, and placed down the empty glass, I followed his lead, and we exited the white building, trudging around a muddy path on the outer rim of the construction zone. My head was warm from liquor and smog, the sprawling horizon bore the haphazard scattering of Footscray industry. ‘Just up here…i’ll show you…. is where the death happened Mr Dronefire. Alice Goddard. Up over the hill there. I’ll show you the place alright…but….. Are you familiar with Footscray at all?’ ‘Not really…Not a bulldogs fan….I…uh…I barrack for Essendon.’ I joked. ‘Blasphemy’ Pex smiled with formulaic small talk, ‘This was Wurundjeri land, where we are standing. Some time ago it was an immense lagoon where the Koories went fishing. There was a factory here at the turn of the century when the industrial revolution hit. They bulldozed it in the seventies, and it’s been nothing much more than landfill up until 2007 when the Three Vertice construction company purchased it. It’s been a sort of base for some time, although our head office used to be in Fitzroy. We are an equal opportunity employer Mr Dronefire. In the last 20 years, over 50 thousand employees; South Vietnamese, Sudanese, Ethiopian, Somalian, Bangladeshi, Sri Lankan, Indonesian —they have all come through here.’ ‘I’m not quite sure why you are telling me this Mr Pex’ I confessed. ‘I know you’re not a fool Mr Dronefire. We’ve been through our trials and tribulations, pleaded our side in court cases. I don’t particularly enjoy going through the ordeal of recounting the horrific tragedy that happened here last year over and over again. But if I can be plain with you, off the record…’ I nodded. ‘There’s no doubt that girl Alice Goddard was murdered out here, and if you ask me, the likelihood that someone under the employ of the Three Vertice Construction company committing that murder— it’s more than just a likelihood. Of course, you can understand…. why, as leader of this company I would be cautious about publicity over this, i’m not a monster. My pity for the girl is endless. I’ve been very frank with the police about giving them all our employee files.’ I felt like I had just taken in a whiff of pure Drendyl heroine, and had to take a minute to contemplate it. ‘I’m not here to accuse you or your company of anything untoward Mr Pex. Just to seek out the truth. To be honest, I have absolutely nothing in my research which even suggests that the murder which occurred in St Kilda is in any way related to the death of Alice Goddard.’ ‘Well… if you’d done your research, you’d know that she—Alice— was burnt alive.’ Pex stated plainly, ‘Similar autopsy results as your St Kilda murder. I read the newspapers too Mr Dronefire. If I was a police man, i’d definitely be looking at the murders as a double homicide, or possibly two murders in a repeat serial killing. Mind you, this country’s never been well equipped to deal with the serial killer phenomenon, the AFP has a history of bungled investigations in that regard.’ ‘This snuff film?’ I asked increasingly intrigued, but distracted—’You said you were aware of——‘ ‘Everyone in Melbourne is aware of Slaughter Theatre, Mr Dronefire. It’s a legend that’s been spreading around parties in the Northern suburbs for as long as Venereal disease.’ I tried to hold back a chortle, given the morose aspect of the subject matter. Mr Pex began to walk again, and I followed him up over the last dirt pile which led to the alleged murder site. We were quite high up on the elevation now and had a good view of the Melbourne CBD. Pex stared outwards towards the skyscrapers looming over the Yarra on the horizon. ‘Do you know much about the Crown Casino?’ Pex asked, looking in the general direction of the deluxe crown towers on the horizon. ‘Only that it’s putting a lot of cash in Andrew Packer’s pocket’ I replied. ‘Pfa haha… Packer’s barely here, he’s too busy in Sydney building his 60 million dollar pad at Barangaroo, when he’s not brushing gently against his Scientologist buddies. Good mates with Tom Cruise our James, they’ve all stayed out here at Crown towers too; prominent Scientologists, the Kardashians, the Bush’s, the Rumsfields. Kerry Packer was much more interesting than his son, you know Dronefire. Back in the days of VHS, back when him and Rupert Murdoch were fighting their cold war over who was to be the king pin of the Australian media.’ I took a moment to absorb the serene, pale view of the spires of Hexton CBD, and the dark crown towers silhouetted by the glare of the sun. ‘I’m waiting for the day when the full history of Consolidated press broadcasting comes out,’ Pex continued, ‘…there’s a dark past there the public may never know about. But ol’ Kerry, he knew how to separate recorded history into public and private.’ ‘How do you mean exactly?’ I asked ‘I’m not going to spill all the dirt on Kerry—Mr Dronefire. My father and he had some shared acquaintances. We’d be here all year, and besides, what’s the point. The old cunts dead. You’re a younger bloke, aren’t you Dronefire? I’m guessing 34?’ Pex continued without waiting for an answer, ‘My generation will always remember the day— ha— when Nine Network over stepped Packer’s rule book….’ We reached the top of the hill and stared down into a junkyard of scrap material where the body of the girl had allegedly been dumped. ‘During the shortly lived ‘Australia’s Naughtiest Home Videos’ hosted by the Triple M yobbo Doug Mulray, do you remember? Grown men all over the country were loosening their belts with joy, but Kerry knew there was a time and a place for pornography, and Network television wasn’t it… Haha…. ‘Get that shit off the air!’ That’s what he told the Nine execs when he called them. You should have seen Doug Mulray’s face. Now young James, he’s much more interested in chasing girls, much more interested spending his time in Casino’s than policing the media-boundaries of public and private.’ ‘Forgive me Mr Pex’ I interrupted, ‘Maybe i’m misunderstanding all of this. But what exactly does this have to do with the snuff film? Slaughter Theatre?’ Pex seemed satisfied he had given me enough time to look at the scrapyard the body had allegedly been dumped, his body language suddenly changed, and suggested I had overstayed my welcome, and he authoritatively began to escort me back down the dirt hilltop. ‘I can tell you everything I know about the snuff film Mr Dronefire. I’ve heard plenty of rumours about these murders being connected. About them being filmed, and what not. The rumours are everywhere out West and up North in Victoria. They have been for the last 50 years— every time a body shows up, theres a new trail of gossip. Melbourne IS the murder capital of Australia, Mr Dronefire. But unfortunately, I can attest to the truth of those claims no more than I can—the millions of claims about the Loch Ness monster. For all intents and purposes, those of us who are sane rightly dismiss such conspiracies as absurd. Right wing nuts who can’t handle disorder in everything, want everything to be part of some master plan. Then you’ve got the left wing vultures, media types who love a scandal, any fad you can write an article about, or make an indy film inspired by. That’s all this is. Now I have to apologise Dronefire, but I am a busy man. Always happy to help out any investigation, and i’d just as soon see whoever is behind these horrendous crimes behind bars, as much as you, the police— and the girls parents. Now—‘ I could see Pex was wrapping up, but I wasn’t a hundred percent satisfied with the information I had been given, and needed a few more points; ‘Do you mind if stick around here for another ten minutes, just to get some quick interviews with the staff?’ Pex looked mildly disgruntled but not resistant; ‘I can give you ten minutes. Longer than that and you’d be interfering with our productivity i’m afraid. You can speak to our onsite supervisor, he works with most of the staff here.’ Drendyl whistled, and an ocker looking fellow with a mullet, safety vest and a hairy arms made his way over. ‘Fortyn Kildare, this is Private Investigator Dronefire. He’d like to ask you a few questions about the death of Alice Goddard.’ Pex excused himself and disappeared, as I shook Mr Kildare’s hand. ‘You’re a little late aren’t ya?’ asked the gruff man in a thick Aussie accent; ‘Press was all over this ten months ago. What are you hoping to dig up now—eh??’ Continued in Part Two: https://www.reddit.com/libraryofshadows/comments/7new6s/slaughter_theatre_part_two/
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