Archie at Swede’s
Michael
So, Swede's. It's the second-oldest bar in San Francisco, according to the Clampers anyway. These days it's owned by, yes, a former Merchant Marine nicknamed Swede who's kept a lot of the original features, including the rough-hewn if massive bar. Sitting in the Mission District, its clientele of tugboat captains and other habitués of the Bay waters gives it a very old-timey feel. And it's this bar that Ritchie and the other members of Yerba Buena ECV Lodge #1 have asked Archie to on this lovely June afternoon.
Now, most of the Lodge is coming from work so no, none of the members are wearing their red union suits. But each of them has some kind of red insignia on them: a tie, a red carnation in their lapel, an ECV ring or badge, etc. There are a dozen or so ECVs milling about at the bar, already a couple of drinks in, some of them. Ritchie extends his hand to Archie, "Arch! Welcome!"
Rob
I don't have a strong agenda in this scene as yet, other than wanting to make a good impression, and get a sense of whether any of these guys are actually clued in in any significant way.
Looking back over intermission-two-at-cliff-house, I see that after talking to Ritchie before, Archie was going to
a) see if there was anyone he could talk to about letting ECV put their Pisco Punch plaque up on or near the Transamerica Pyramid and
b) reassure himself as to whether he could see any memetic danger in doing so.
Can we say that Archie's moved on either of these things?
Michael
Oooh, yes. I'll take a look back at my notes on both of those and get back to you today. May be later, but those are essential to have in our back pocket for this scene.
Okay, so Sophie was set to prepare a full accounting of the history—memetic, History B-related, and otherwise—of the Montgomery Block. Which the following Research roll will reflect.
>>>> SUCCESS by 4
Success by 4. A decent enough success.
Actually, Rob, as far as die rolls for Archie go, you can go ahead and give me an Expert Skill (Memetics) roll at a +1 to your skill from Sophie's aiding you. I will present Sophie's information in two parts: the general Montgomery Block research and the specific stuff on the Bank Exchange & Billiard Saloon, Duncan Nicol, and the legend of pisco punch.
Rob
>>>> SUCCESS by 11
Michael
Okay. So to summarize first Sophie's general report on the Montgomery Block, which combines both publicly-available information, supposition triggered by our previous investigations, and SANDMAN records on why the Transamerica Pyramid was built:
yes, it was a magnet for dreamers, artists, poets, and madmen during San Francisco's boom years leading right up to the earthquake in '06 and had proportionally more of this type than you might expect, even for a "Little Bohemia" in a North American city at the time
yes, SANDMAN students of occult architecture firmly believe that Army engineer, land speculator, California founding father and Civil War general (!!!) Henry Wager Halleck, a.k.a. "Old Brains" built the building to be "futuristic," a fire- and earthquake-proof building that would be a prototype for keeping San Francisco safe from future calamities (and it worked!)
maybe Halleck was either directly or indirectly inspired by History B to build the Block to harness madness/artistic energy; either way the results were clear, with the resulting suicides/suspicious deaths we've talked about before (Jack London, Nora May French, George Sterling)
yes, with the movement of the financial center of SF to the area, the Block became a "free port" for both the fathers of San Francisco establishment and artists to mix and mingle; Sophie's NOT sure who this served: the forces of History B ("lunaticks, lovers, and poets") or the forces of History A (the almighty Grey Pyramid: finance, patriarchy, Western logic). One theory Sophie has is that Montgomery Block was meant to be a Casablanca where these two groups could rub shoulders freely. Out of this, of course, grew the infamous Bohemian Club/Bohemian Grove.
Now getting into Pisco Punch specifically:
the recipe, devised by Duncan Nicol, and served at the Bank Exchange and Billiard Saloon, which was a haven for just those bankers and financiers and real estate magnates on the corner of the otherwise Bohemian block, was lost for a good long time; however a historian for the CHS, William Bronson, is trying to resurrect it at the express request of the owners of the Transamerica Pyramid. It's a great marketing ploy: resurrect the long-lost cocktail that made San Francisco's cocktail scene famous worldwide!
Sophie thinks that the cocktail itself might have had … qualities. No less a personage than Rudyard Kipling said, "I have a theory it is compounded of the shavings of cherubs’ wings, the glory of a tropical dawn, the red clouds of sunset, and fragments of lost epics by dead masters." Cherubs? Lost epics? Those set off MAJOR History B alarm bells. It's clear from other first-person accounts that the drink made some people more aggressive than mere alcohol: while pisco, the Peruvian fortified wine that anchors the drink is quite potent, it's not going to give people visions or superhuman strength or any of the other things that the punch purported to do. Sophie thinks it may have had some kind of secret ingredient—the one Bronson thinks is mere gum arabic—that acted like a mild hallucinogen or other narcotic.
It is Archie's considered conclusion that the new-fangled recipe being resurrected by Bronson for the benefit of Transamerica's PR team is not dangerous, but the original one could be. In addition, bowdlerizing the original formula and promoting it at the Transamerica Pyramid bar might be a good way to memetically defuse its mythic power. As long as the new plaque doesn't mention any secret ingredients and as a result get the hoi polloi curious, the plaque could be used to SANDMAN's benefit, even if it indirectly evokes the Montgomery Block.
But, as always, there is more possibly to investigate here. This Montgomery Block business is downright fractal.
(This ended up working out better than I ever expected; again, real history seems to be made especially for Madness Dossier)
So honestly, I would love to weave in the Bronson article into our game narrative, Rob, because it so obviously vibes as a SANDMAN op. The secret ingredient is … gum arabic? Classic obfuscation. This would also allow Archie to come to the ECV meeting with the good news that the Transamerica people are willing to put the Pisco plaque back up once the recipe for the resurrected Punch is available in the Transamerica building's bar. Everyone's happy: corporations and quirky historians all. And if Archie wanted to give Bronson a little memetic source code oomph with his article for the CHS? Hey, who's to care.
Rob
Yes, the story is too good not to use, and the article is published in 1973 for crying out loud. So maybe Archie is the "mutual acquaintance" mentioned in the paragraph you pulled out above. Through Bronson, Archie gets the Transamerica people a safe version of the Pisco Punch recipe, and the Transamerica people put up a memetically safe version of the plaque. That line about "in fairness to Transamerica, the evil deed was done by some previous owner" might as well have Archie's signature under it.
Michael
I love it when a plan comes together.
Rob
Anyway, at Swede's, Archie comes in, armed with this good news, looks briefly out of place in the barroom as his eyes adjust to the light, then sees Ritchie, greets him warmly, turns on the charm.
Michael
So Swede's is an old bar. Archie can sense the history baked into the walls and into the obviously original (if scuffed and weathered) Victorian bar, a massive set of slabs of what looks like California hardwood. "Ah, Archie, welcome!" Ritchie says as Archie arrives punctually and acclimates to the mostly alien idea of being in a barroom. "Let me introduce you to the boys." As a rapid-fire set of glad-handing and business-carding happens, I'm sure Archie settles into a familiar, if a bit rusty, social and mental space. Savoir-Faire (Corporate America) at a +2 to Archie's skill because of Ritchie's influence.
>>>> SUCCESS by 5
First impressions are important, every ad man says, and Archie slips into moderately garrulous networking mode effortlessly. Ritchie takes Archie off to the side after this rapid-fire set of introductions, to the bar, where Ritchie does have himself a martini. "Archie, I got the letter from the Transamerica people, what a coup to have them both put the plaque back up and publicize a new version of the Pisco Punch. We're delighted." Swede, the massively-and-tattooed-forearmed former Merchant Marine who owns the bar (it's at this point that Archie finally sort of absorbs all the decor on the walls; the yellowed pictures of tugs in San Francisco Bay, the World War II Naval unit emblems and Pacific theater war booty?), slides Ritchie's martini, 2 olives to him and asks Archie, "What can I get for you?"
I think now I'd like to roll Archie's Corruption, Rob.
So Archie's going to roll Will at -2.
>>>> SUCCESS by 0
Rob
Archie orders a Fresca? (Unless the Corruption roll was to see if he takes a drink...)
Michael
Archie does indeed order a Fresca, but for the briefest of moments he had the strangest of thoughts flash through his head. "It couldn't be that harmful if I had maybe just one sip of one drink, just to fit in … or to make these … people believe I'm one of them. But it very quickly flees from Archie's mind, leaving him with a slightly unsettled feeling. "One Fresca, coming up," Swede says with a slight smirk of incredulity on his face.
Ritchie has a moment of maybe subconsciously-telegraphed guilt about being an LDS and drinking in front of another Mormon like this (ironically, since Archie's the one who's lost touch with the social aspects of his faith since moving to San Francisco), but it soon disappears in a wave of jollity and brotherhood. "Archie … we're happy to announce that today we'd like you to begin the process of becoming a Brother Clamper."
Rob
Yeah, I'm not sure there's a lot I need to do in this scene, but Archie plays along, is as friendly and charming as he can manage — it might be that not drinking is just as much a sign of Corruption as drinking would have been, as Archie feels a little smug, a little superior to these people, chats with Ritchie and meets the other fellows, all the while aware he is just playing a part here, he's not really one of these guys, he's clued in, he knows the real score.
(I can't remember: was Archie supposed to take a Corruption related quirk, or was that roll there the first test of that?)
Michael
That was the first test and yeah, Archie passed. I would have hashed out what exact Quirk would have resulted with you but mostly I want to leave the Corruption "cash-in" rolls for situations once a game week where Archie finds himself in stressful or esmologically- or memetic-influence-significant situations.
And yeah, as long as Archie is amenable to eventually being inducted into ECV, we can do the actual "ceremony" at some future point!
There's, like, a typical fraternal organization probationary period.