Graham, having not noticed it before now, will look up as Sam points out the marking on Dan's head. "Interesting, do you feel any different today Dan?  The groundhog was in my dream as well, it left pizza and this book for me.  The pizza was just pizza, but this book is something...spectacular..." He trails off as his attention once again gets lost in the book.

Dr. Dan looks at Sam and Graham with a blank stare. Then he slowly raises his hand to his forehead. Pulling his finger away, he notices the red pigment that has transferred from his head. Making a confused, scrunchy face, the doctor leaps to his feet and runs to the bathroom. After a few crashing noises--indicating that Dan has probably crashed into the stalls again--his loud, muffled voice carries from behind the door. Moments later the door cracks, and Dan can be overheard speaking with his producer: "I got a dang blood eye on my head Denny! It's an eye! No, warshed it off."

He makes his way back to the table. The red eye is gone, replaced by a half-wiped, red smear. Looking at Graham and Sam, he says, "Don't fee any differn't. Had a dang dream about Hippie Lowell," the man the group would know is Dan's friend (who is obviously manipulating Dan out of his money and possessions, though Dan seems oblivious to it), "He gave me a dang blood eye on my head! Best sleep I ever got though. I feel great! You guys got a couple a' books by the looks of it. What's in 'em, a story?"

"No, not stories...the best way to describe whats inside would be to say that they are instructions and diagrams.  A manual for something amazing, I just need more time to study it."

"Well, all I got was this donut.  He did mention to keep the big iron handy."  He pauses and glances at the book. investigation 10

"So no instruction in that book or the map he talked about?  Nothing about talking animals or moose?"

Dan, wondering now if the moose was also a dream, looks at the books and at the donut. "Something in the dang water in these parts, weird dreams, weird sleep, talkin' aminals. Makes me wonder what . . . what's goin' on round these parts." He pushes his glasses back up the bridge of his nose, squinting his eyes and staring behind the counter. He waits for the server to come back, with whom he's previously shared a friendly-if-nonsensical conversation. When he sees the server, he snorts a little laugh and revives a joke he told the person (a joke the server previously found completely NOT funny): "Knock knock. Who's there. Your friend. But I don't have any friends."

The doctor, speaking for both the knocker and the knockee in the joke, immediately bursts into a fit of foolish laughter, pointing at the server (I'm hoping he'll unintentionally cast tasha's hideous laughter on the server, DC 13 WIS). 

13

The server starts laughing uncontrollably, dropping a plate of scrambled eggs all over the floor

Dr. Dan stares at the server for a moment, shocked that someone is laughing so hard at his joke. Then he laughs so hard he falls off his chair.

Graham looks up confused from his book, stares at dan and the server, before turning to Sam to address his question "No, it does not have the map. And nothing about talking animals at all. I am hoping our moose friend will show up to enlighten us further."

Goose comes in, sits at the bar and had some cereal. He uses ketchup instead of milk, and grins happily to himself.

"so, about that map Goose?"

"Ahhhh yes." He pulls a map out of, you don't quite know where, it's not like he has pockets. It's an OS map of the area. Circled in red on it, some fifty miles north of the town is a spot just below a frozen lake. "Look for the cave, go inside and you're there!"

The Sheriff looks at the map.

ooc:

(how close is the nearest road to the destination?  How much driving versus how much walking?)

*There's a road with a lay-by about half an hour's walk from the lake.*

Graham, seeing the map being given to Sam, will hurriedly finish his breakfast and gather his things, including pouring his remaining coffee into a thermos. He then walks over to Sam "You think we will need any supplies at all?"

Dan picks himself up off the ground and looks at Goose. "That dang bear-hor--I mean mroose is back again!" He watches the creature hand the map over and stares at it for a moment, taking a long, loud sip of coffee. He doesn't take his eyes off the moose until he's done sipping. "Well, looks like we three hunks best be gettin' a move on. Gotta get this dang cold taken care of." 

He shivers, using a spoon on the bar to scoop up some of the eggs that landed on the bar top that the server spilled earlier. 

"Well, it's gonna take a couple hours drive on the back roads to get up there, even though it's only 50 miles out.  Then a half hour walks.  I'm gonna suggest we bring food for a day and then stock up on some spare grub in case we need to stay overnight.  I'm gonna stack up on ammunition for Big Iron."  He turns to the moose.  "So is there anything else we should be worrying about on our way up there.?"

"It's slippery, so mind you don't fall over. Other than that, should be a fine journey!"

Graham looks so Sam and Dan,t"Shall we regroup in an hour then after gathering supplies?"

insight check on the moose response:

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