Oso Sur

Block 1 — 23:00

Caller: Yes (rolled 5 — urgent/distressed) Caller card: Eight of Clubs — knowledge they cannot unlearn

Male voice, thirties. Fast, like he’d been rehearsing but had forgotten his place.

He’d found something on his work’s internal system that he hadn’t been looking for. A folder he’d opened by mistake, closed immediately. But not before he’d seen the names inside.

People he knew. Colleagues. A few friends.

He didn’t say what the list was. He didn’t need to. The shape of it was clear enough from how he talked around it.

Once you’ve seen something like that, he said, what are you supposed to do with it?

Oso said: document it if you can, somewhere safe and separate. Then put it down for tonight. You can’t carry that on the first night.

He didn’t sound convinced. He thanked Oso anyway.

He hung up before the block ended.

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Block 2 — 23:55

Caller: No (rolled 1)

No caller. The frost at the north glass corners held steady through the block — not spreading. The signal was clean and strong. One of those quiet stretches where the broadcast just goes out into the dark and you trust it’s reaching something.

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Block 3 — 00:55

Caller: Yes (rolled 6 — phenomenon) Caller card: Jack of Spades — trickster entity, playful horror

Female, age uncertain — mid-thirties, maybe older. Her tone was more puzzled than frightened. That was the telling detail.

She’d found a coin. Not unusual. But then she’d thrown it in a storm drain and found it again that afternoon, in the same jacket pocket. Same coin — she was certain because of a specific nick in the edge she’d noticed the first time. She threw it in a river. Found it again the next morning. She’d tried leaving it in a different state. It came back.

It’s not doing anything, she said. It just keeps coming back. Like it’s trying to tell me something, but it only knows one word.

Oso advised: don’t try to read it as a message. Put it somewhere visible — don’t hide it. See if the behaviour changes when it’s acknowledged. Keep notes.

She said she’d try that.

The coffee pot activated during this call. Third time. Oso noted it without comment on air.

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Block 4 — 01:55

Caller: Yes (rolled 4 — standard) Caller card: Seven of Hearts — something bittersweet

A quiet voice. Not sad — just at the end of something.

She said the year had been the longest she could remember. Not badly, just fully. More had happened than seemed possible to fit into twelve months. And tonight was the kind of night where you sit with all of it.

She asked if Oso ever felt like a broadcast was also a kind of goodbye.

Oso said: every time.

She said that was reassuring. Then she signed off.

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Oso Sur — Personal Notes

The coin caller: I believe her. The specific detail of the nick in the edge — that’s not a story someone invents. Something is trying to make contact through repetition. Not threatening. Just insistent, like she said. I want to hear from her again.

The man with the list: I did not say what I was thinking, which is that lists like the one he described tend to have consequences for the people who’ve seen them. He knows that. He didn’t need me to say it.

The coffee pot. Three times. I know what that means per protocol. I haven’t decided what to do about it yet. It’s not hostile. It’s just aware.

Dawn was clean. Grey-blue, no yellow at the horizon.

The frost resolved.

I’m leaving the coffee pot plugged in.