165: 1980/2024

SUMMARY

I may be gone, but not forever.

TRANSCRIPT

Original transcript edited by Theo and reviewed by Jenah

[BEGIN Episode 165.]

INTRO: Hey, guys, quick plugs. I’m still streaming on Twitch every Sunday over at twitch.tv/woebegonepod, where every Sunday I write that week’s episode soundtracks, and then we hang out and play a video game. Speed-running the Logical Journey of the Zoombinis is quite the experience, so if you’d like to see me fail at a children’s game and reset over and over again, that is twitch.tv/woebegonepod. And if you’d like to support the show, you can do so on Patreon over at patreon.com/woe_begone, where you can get early access to episodes, instrumentals, soundtrack albums, Q&As, director’s commentaries, Movies with Michael, postcards, and more. August is the two-year anniversary of the postcard tier, and I always do something very special with the August postcards. You aren’t going to want to miss that, so sign up by the end of the month to make sure that you get one. That is patreon.com/woe_begone. Special thanks to my ten newest patrons: [REDACTED] for supporting the show. Enjoy.

[Opening theme plays.]

[We hear the blink noise. There is light suburban ambience inside of a domestic house.]

HELEN [disoriented]: …Huh? Where… Lieutenant? Hello? Lieutenant, I swear to god, if this is another one of your stupid experiments, I’m not playing along this time. …Why’d you make it look exactly like my house? What do you want me to do!? If another iteration jumps out of a closet at me again, I’m going to kill her, and then you. …Hello. Lieutenant? Look, whatever it is, just… don’t… hurt me. Don’t send Eagle in. [Sighs.] Making me take the lord’s name in vain. He’ll probably forgive me for that. Now, what the hell is going on here?

[Helen rummages through papers on the kitchen table.]

HELEN: Okay, this is my house. All my bills, at least. …What happened right before this? Uh… Alright, Helen. Think. What was the last thing that you remember about O.I. …Lieutenant. Was he mid-sentence with me? That feels right? He must’ve been telling me something about a mission that he was putting together with… Eagle. And then I was here. …No mission brief, no explanation of an upcoming experiment. Just… blank. Wait. Did– Did I blink? Did– Did I blink back here? Does Lieutenant not know where I am, did he not send me here!?

[We hear Helen take a few steps.]

[Gasps.] Jerry! …He’s here. Oh, my god–! Sorry, again. [Sighs.] He’s here. Jerry’s here. …Lieutenant can fake that. Right? He wouldn’t. No. He wouldn’t iterate Jerry. That’s the real Hunter Jeremiah Hartley. And he’s really playing with his real dog, Rusty, with a real garden hose! Hey! Don’t drink out of–! that… [Sighs.] Shoot… I shouldn’t let him know that I’m here. What if I blink out again? What if Jerry sees me blink out? No. I can’t. Not until I’m sure that I can stay… Roger, on the other hand…

[Helen dials Roger’s phone number. The phone starts ringing.]

HELEN [muttering]: Come on, Roger, answer the phone. Come on, come on, come on…

[The phone stops ringing.]

HELEN: Dang it! Ugh. Hey, Roger? It’s Helen Hartley. Look, if you’re home and can hear this, you better pick up. I’m not gonna be here for very long. You’re gonna regret letting me go to the answering machine! [Huffs.] Whatever. Listen. I don’t know how long it’s been, or what day it is, or what’s going on back here in 1980, but I need you to pay attention. I. Have been. To the future. Ty Betteridge and I. We went there, and we ended up finding all of these different versions of Walters? And– And Ty has a big compound that he runs operations out of! …But none of that is important now.

There’s a version of Walters called Lieutenant, and he captured me, and has been holding me hostage inside of a facility called Operose International. That’s “Oscar-Papa-Echo-Romeo-Oscar-Sierra-Echo.” I need you to figure out anything that you can about them. I don’t even know if they existed in 1980, but I need you to find something. Anything. You have to figure out where they are located, and come find me. Tell O.V.E.R.! Tell them that a rival time travel group has one of their employees from 1980, and that they are using her to sabotage them. I’m back in 1980 right now, but I don’t know for how long. I can’t time travel. I was sent here without any way to go anywhere else. I don’t think that Lieutenant meant to send me here.

I need you to find someone that can get me out of Operose for good, and tell them what I’m telling you. I don’t know if Ty Betteridge is still in this time period, but tell him everything if you can. I suspect that he isn’t here, either. He’s part of this, too. I don’t know what’s going to happen if someone doesn’t get me out of Operose. It’s a dangerous place. They’re raising an army of Walters clones! They’re doing experiments, tearing people apart, and putting them back together again! And putting them in horrific scenarios, and then changing them with time travel! Lieutenant was telling me about a plan to lure Walters out, but I blinked out of that existence, and came back into this one while he was talking. Whatever he’s planning for Walters can’t be good for us.

I know that I just dumped more information on you than you can handle, but rewind the tape. Memorize all of it. I don’t think that I’m going to be here long enough to do anything about my situation. 

I blinked here, and when I unblink, I’m not even sure you’ll be able to remember any of this, but… I desperately need you to remember all of it and get to work. Can you do that for me? I guess we’ll find out. Thanks, Roger. You’re a good friend. If you find me, and rescue me you can have that $15 back that I owe you. I’ll see you soon. Hopefully… Goodbye, Roger. God bless you.

[Helen ends the voicemail. We hear her walk, gather a bundle of papers, and click a pen.]

HELEN: [Sighs.] Now, for Jerry… [Starts writing, then writes harder.] Shoot. This pen, it’s almost out of ink. [Pauses writing.] I wish I had Walters’ handy dandy computer thing.

[Helen readjusts the paper.]

HELEN: [Sighs.] Jerry,

I don’t know if this message will ever reach you. But… I hope that it does, and I hope that, one day, you’re able to understand what happened to me and why I might be gone. Mommy loves you so much, Jerry. More than you could ever know! One day, you’ll have children, and you’ll love them so much that your heart hurts, and you’ll understand that that is how I felt about you every single day. You can’t see me, but I’m watching you right now while I’m writing this. You’re out in the garden with Rusty, playing with the garden hose. You’re so sweet and innocent and carefree. Carefree in a way that only a child can be, unburdened by the responsibilities of adulthood. There’s nothing more in the world to do except play. [Sighs.] I want you to cherish it. Even though I know that a moment like this cannot be cherished within the moment itself. You’ll have to look back on it, and cherish it. The world is going to do so many things to you. But, for now, you’re in the yard, playing with the dog and the garden hose, and life has never been better.

I want to run out there; I want to scoop you up in a big hug, and hold you tight for the rest of time. Time, unfortunately, has a lot to do with why I can’t do that. It isn’t what you think it is. It’s not a straight line to the finish, it’s meandering. Warped. It speeds up, and slows down; it behaves strangely, even when it’s not being meddled with! And I’ve discovered that it is being meddled with. Constantly. By people with more power than you could ever imagine. They are why I can’t scoop you up into a big bear hug right now. I hope, one day, that you can forgive me for getting all tangled up in this. I hope that, one day, you’ll be able to read this letter, and stop yourself from getting tangled up in it, too. Though, I don’t know if anything I say or do can stop it. It seems inevitable.

You’re my Jerry. But… I know that, one day, you’ll be Hunter. You’ll work at Oldbrush Valley Energy and Resources, the same place that Mommy works. You’ll have a kind and loving soul, but there will be people who’ll intersect your path at sharp angles. Do your best to stay safe, and… show grace in those moments. I’ll always be proud of you, no matter what you do.

I don’t remember very much about when I was your age. I don’t remember the concrete things or specific events or people. The things that I remember the most are the feelings. Being swaddled up in a warm coat on a snowy day. Sitting in front of the television with the lights off between my parents, the glow of the TV set illuminating us. The smell of logs in the wooden stove. The texture of the carpet against my tiny feet. I’m scared that you won’t remember me. [Shaky inhale.] Try to remember me through how it felt when I was here. The smell of my hair. My home cooking, dog treats. The texture of sticky quarters for the Pac-Man machine at the pizza place. The sound of the birds through the windows in spring. The bird feeders that I put up beside the house so that you could see them up close. These will never leave your memory. If you’re having trouble remembering me, remember me through them.

I love you, Jerry. I love you more than anything. I may be gone, but not forever. …I love you. [Sighs.] 

Love,

Mom

[Helen sniffles as she leaves the paper somewhere it will be found.]

[The doorbell rings.]

HELEN: What!? Who the heck is that? Roger?

[Helen walks to the door, and opens it. We hear the outdoor ambience more clearly.]

NOBODY: Hi, Helen.

HELEN: Walters!

NOBODY: It’s good that you’re here. It means that work is being done.

HELEN: What the hell is going on? Do you know how I got here? I was inside of Operose, and then, all of a sudden, I was here.

NOBODY: Yes, I know how you got here. And you need to come with me now.

HELEN: Why would I ever go with you?

NOBODY: Because, if you don’t come with me, both of us are going to be trapped inside of Operose. You don’t want that, do you?

HELEN: No, I don’t. How can I trust you?

NOBODY: You need to give up on this idea of trusting people. Don’t trust me. Come on, we need to move quickly.

HELEN: Alright, alright! I’m coming.

NOBODY: And lose the cowboy hat. You look ridiculous.

HELEN: Oh. Right. I forgot that I was wearing it.

NOBODY: Yeah. That’s what they all say.

[Scene transition.]

[Restaurant ambience.]

NOBODY: Just pick something, Helen.

HELEN: I’m not hungry, Walters. …My stomach is still upside down from the time t– [Catching herself.] …from what happened this morning?

NOBODY: If you don’t want to be suspicious, you should really order something.

HELEN: I’ll have the eggs and bacon, please.

NOBODY: Biscuits and gravy for me, thank you.

HELEN: Why did you bring me here, Walters?

NOBODY: Because it’s safe. The diner produces a massive amount of electromagnetic signals. It renders any bug trying to transmit information out of here moot, because it essentially scrambles anything they’re trying to transmit.

HELEN: Who set that up? O.V.E.R.? The guy who runs the diner?

NOBODY: It’s impolite to ask. But, it makes the perfect location to swap information, and we need to swap information fast. Clock is ticking.

HELEN: You start. You’re the one that brought me here.

NOBODY: No, you start. You’re the one that might blink out of existence unexpectedly.

HELEN: So you do know about the blink. How long do I have? Is there any chance I could stay?

NOBODY: Probably not, but I am working on it. So, talk. Quickly. I’ve been looking for you. Where have you been, and what have they been doing to you?

HELEN: I’ve been inside of Operose International. They’re a time travel group that–

NOBODY: I know who Operose is.

HELEN: Right. So, all of that stuff happened at Ty’s Compound with the Greenhouse, and then, next thing I know, I’m transported inside of Operose. There’s a version of you there. Lieutenant… He’s in charge of overseeing me.

NOBODY: Lieutenant isn’t me. What is he having you do?

HELEN: Oh, you know, all sorts of stuff. For a while, there were these long interview sessions every day. He would ask me about what I was doing at O.V.E.R. during this time period. He would ask about specific days, minute-by-minute details of where I was, and what O.V.E.R. had instructed me to do. I don’t know why he wanted that, it’s not like I was a bigwig calling the shots, or anything. I was just telling the patrol drivers where to go.

NOBODY: Did he ask you about what I was doing in 1980?

HELEN: Not much. And not at first. He seemed more interested in what I was doing.

NOBODY: But I did come up.

HELEN: Eventually. We went day by day until we got to the day that you showed up. That’s when he started asking about you. He didn’t seem more or less interested in what you were doing than what I made for breakfast that morning. Not until recently. Today, actually. I’m sure that’s not a coincidence.

NOBODY: I’m sure it’s not, either. What happened today?

HELEN: I woke up and reported to my usual briefing room. Lieutenant came in and laid a big file down on the table. He told me that he and Eagle were working on a mission and that I would be heavily involved. It was a plan that involved finding and capturing you.

NOBODY: Did he tell you what I’ve been doing since the Greenhouse?

HELEN: He gave me the short version. The long version was in the file that I was supposed to read. He said that you’d been killing all of your other iterations and that it was building into something bigger. Something dangerous. Or, dangerous to Operose, at least. That you needed to be contained and that I was going to help him and Eagle contain you. They were going to use some other iterations to lure you in and capture you? Lieutenant said that he was in the process of recruiting those other iterations that he would need and that we would meet again to put everything together once that had been accomplished. He was kind of mid-sentence explaining this to me when I blinked and ended up back here.

NOBODY: I suppose that that explains where Mike and MW went. The propagation is worse than I thought. They know that you’re useful to me, which means that they probably have a good idea of what it is I’m trying to accomplish. Worst of all, they know that I’m alive. I could’ve gotten so much more done if they thought that I’d died in Texas. It bought me a lot less time than I thought it would. Skinner must’ve propagated the information back to them. Intentionally or unintentionally.

HELEN: Who? Skinner? Look, are you gonna tell me how you ended up back here in 1980?

NOBODY: That depends on whether or not you help me.

HELEN: Are you going to keep me here in 1980?

NOBODY: Yes, if everything goes according to plan, you’ll spend the rest of your days in peace and quiet in Oldbrush Valley with your family. Time travel will be a distant dream if it’s anything at all. So, yes, I’m going to help you.

HELEN: If I’m going to help you, I need to know more about what’s going on. So, spill the beans. How did you end up here?

NOBODY: I assume that you remember what happened at the Greenhouse and how the Ty I was working with betrayed me and threatened to connectivity strike me out of existence. Correct?

HELEN: I don’t know what a connectivity strike is, but I think I get it.

NOBODY: And, more importantly, you remember who Ty Betteridge is.

HELEN: Yes, I do. Why wouldn’t I?

NOBODY: After the Greenhouse incident, the Compound and Base decided that the best course of action was to send me to Texas, where they locked me up and threw away the key. I was able to escape from there, and had to start anew with my plans. I took out all of the Mike iterations that I could find. Though my failure at the Greenhouse made it apparent to me that if I wanted to accomplish my goals, I would have to set my sights higher than killing a few Mikes.

I can’t propagate the specifics, but I thought that I was making good progress until it came to my attention that there was a Michael iteration wandering around that no one knew about. Operose believed that they had killed him, and I had no reason to question their intel. Their intel was faulty, and that iteration was lying in wait until he was needed. I tried to intercept him, and ended up running into an agent that had discovered him and had been tasked with monitoring him to find out what he was trying to do. I encountered the agent, I recognized them, they recognized me, and they attempted to transport me, likely to some sort of holding facility. I managed to use my own Calculator in the middle of their R.S.C. scrub to do my own R.S.C. scrub, and made it to safety while keeping my location hidden to them. I came back to 1980, because if I am successful in the future, then I knew that you would be here.

HELEN: I’m not sure that I understand. If you’re successful in the future? You haven’t done whatever it is you’re going to do yet?

NOBODY: It sounds like you do understand. If I am successful in the future at affecting the past, the effects will already be present in the past. Hence, you are here. That can change if someone issues a correction, or if I change my mind in a way that causes me not to do it. That is what–

HELEN: That’s what blinking is. When something changes the future’s effect on the past.

NOBODY: That is essentially correct. Which means that a threat to me is a threat to you, Helen. If I don’t fulfill my mission, you will be launched right back into Operose in 2024, and there won’t be anything that I can do about it. They might dangle freedom in front of you to get you to comply, but they will keep you there as long as you’re useful and throw you in Storage when they’re done with you. They will not send you back here, where you might behave unpredictably or be difficult to find if they need you again. So, I’m all you’ve got, Helen.

HELEN: [Scoffs.] I don’t trust you. You must know that I don’t trust you. I think we’ve been over this before?

NOBODY: Stop talking about trust. You only have to trust me more than you trust Lieutenant and Eagle. And I assume they horrify you.

HELEN: Eagle was playing with a human ear the last time I saw him. A human ear. I thought about asking him where he got it from, but I was scared he was going to launch into a long story, and I had just eaten breakfast. It looked like Lieutenant’s ear.

NOBODY: That was definitely Lieutenant’s ear. And there will be blood and guts in my mission, but you won’t have to see any of it. You just need to cooperate with me and lead the other iterations to me. You said they were trying to lure me out, well, let them lure me out. I’ll be lying in wait and get the jump on them because I know about it. And once Operose is out of the way, what I’m trying to accomplish will be much easier.

HELEN: And if I don’t want to work with you?

NOBODY: You’ll blink back to 2024. I can’t say when—could be now, could be years from now. Blinking isn’t a very well-understood phenomenon.

HELEN: Okay, then. I’m in. If I have to be. What do I do now?

NOBODY: Take this. It’s a tracking device. Keep it in your pocket, and don’t let anybody know that you have it. Operose changes locations every day. Knowing where they are is the first step to getting ahead of them. Do not get caught with this. Do you understand?

HELEN: Okay. And all I have to do is play along with what they say.

NOBODY: Correct. I will do the rest of the work.

HELEN: And how do I get back to Operose? Are you going to use time travel to send me back there? The Calculator, or whatever? You just said that you don’t know where they are.

NOBODY: Oh, no, uh, I don’t have to use a Calculator. My intention got you here, so all I have to do is change it. So, you should blink back momentarily.

HELEN: Your “intention.” Wait. I’m not ready! I wanted to see my son again.

NOBODY: We don’t have time to waste. You’ll see Hunter again once I’ve gotten what I want. See you soon, Helen.

HELEN: Wait. This isn’t right! What about Ty–?

[We hear the blink noise.]

[Restaurant ambience fades out.]

[Scene transition.]

MICHAEL: …which is the thing about killin’ a horse, ya see. The average horse weighs about a thousand pounds, so ya gotta get outta the way. Eagle’s got a whole workshop on it.

MW: And, uh, all of this is from Lieutenant’s memory?

MICHAEL: Most of it, yessir.

MIKE: I don’t think that we want to hear anything else from Lieutenant’s memory, then. Thank you, Michael.

[We hear the blink noise.]

MICHAEL: Oh, good. You’re back. You were out for a hell of a long time, Helen.

HELEN: [Huffs.] …I guess you noticed that I blinked.

MIKE: Hey, Helen.

MW: Howdy, Helen.

HELEN: Lieutenant, what are these two doing here? Are these the iterations you were talking about?

MICHAEL: Keep this under your hat. Where’d your hat go, by the way? But, uh, I ain’t Lieutenant no more. It’s me. It’s Michael. I got the jump on him, and we got him consolidated into me. Now I’m actin’ as Lieutenant so that we can catch Nobody and put a stop to this whole mess.

MIKE: Yep, Helen, here’s what you missed on me. …Get it? Because we’re iterations? Simply put, Michael remembers everything that Lieutenant remembers, but now he’s on our side. And he says that Lieutenant was preparing to use you as a honeypot to lure in Nobody.

HELEN: Yeah. He was going over the mission with me when I blinked. Is that… still what we’re doing?

MICHAEL: Yes, ma’am. Nobody is makin’ one hell of a mess in the present. Do you remember Ty Betteridge?

HELEN: Of course, I remember Ty Betteridge.

MICHAEL: Well, these two chuckleheads don’t. That’s the problem. Shit’s fallin’ apart out here, and iterations are droppin’ like flies.

MIKE: We’re modifying Lieutenant’s plan in order to correct everything back to normal, but first we need to make sure that Nobody isn’t out there undoing everything that we do. And if O.I. thinks that we’re doing their work for them the whole time, all the better.

MW: So, whaddaya say, Helen? Wanna do us a solid and play along?

HELEN: Uh… [Puffs.] I– I guess so? You’re going to let me go back to 1980 if I play along, yeah?

MIKE: You have our word. And you won’t have to worry about blinks anymore. You’ll be back at home with Hunter. Happily ever after.

HELEN: Then I’ll play along.

MICHAEL: That’s what we wanted to hear, pard. Welcome to the team.

[Closing theme starts playing.]

CREDITS: This has been WOE.BEGONE. The voice of Helen Hartley was Tatiana Gefter. Check out her podcast Soul Operator. I’m in that. Or hear her in The Grotto. I’m in that. Thanks for playing.

[Closing theme plays out.]

AFTER-CREDITS (HELEN): No. How can I trust you?

AFTER-CREDITS (NOBODY): You can’t, Helen. You just have to trust me more than you trust Lieutenant. Come on. We’ve got to move.

AFTER-CREDITS (HELEN): Wait. Jerry. Nobody is watching Jerry. And not you. Nobody! He’s in the backyard unsupervised, we can’t just leave him there.

AFTER-CREDITS (NOBODY): Rusty is supervising him.

AFTER-CREDITS (HELEN): Rusty’s a dog!

AFTER-CREDITS (NOBODY): Rusty the Dog is the future mayor of Oldbush Valley. I think he can handle a kid. Now, come on, let’s go.

[END Episode 165.]