Transcript of this chapter:

rebecca: I ask you all to gather mushrooms, and you come back with... this thing!
barlow: Sorry, Rebecca. We got a little side-tracked.
rebecca: Well, how many mushrooms did you and Alex get?
barlow: Uh... none.
rebecca: Those mushrooms were important. We don't need a camper or whatever that is.
barlow: This isn't a camper, it's a gondola. Apparently there was once a transit system that took people over the woods to civilization.
rebecca: That sounds dangerous.
barlow: And it was, because this gondola crashed into the woods on its first journey...
barlow: This is far more important than your mushrooms.
rebecca: I don't know, I don't foresee much mushroom wine this year. This thing you brought out doesn't seem very useful.
barlow: Oh, I might find a use for it. It's an old form of transit...
barlow: I'm sure you got enough mushrooms from the others.
rebecca: That's what everyone else said. I'm really disappointed in you, Barlow. I was counting on you to pull through. You didn't go into the woods just to look for this camper, did you?
barlow: How many mushrooms DID get collected?
rebecca: Three! The sheriff didn't pick any. Eliza won't disturb her precious ecosystem. You and Alex came back empty-handed.
rebecca: I got three mushrooms from Crystal and Annabelle. They had something else in a bag, but they wouldn't tell me what it was. I can only guess.
rebecca: There aren't any mushrooms growing on this bus, are there?
barlow: This isn't a bus, it's a gondola...
barlow: And what's more, there's a corpse in it.
alex: Yes, the town histories state that nobody was hurt during the Great Gondola Disaster of 1958. It must've been someone who wasn't supposed to be there.
barlow: The sheriff already identified the body. It's a guy named Elkwood Sprawling.
alex: Elkwood?! You can't be serious!
alex: Elkwood was one of the great heroes of Spider Cliff... an adventurer who rose from humble beginnings to be one of the town's most powerful people. It was said that he had the respect of every man and the heart of every woman in town.
rebecca: This is all before my time. I've never heard about any of this.
alex: The fact that Elkwood was in that gondola confirms my fears... this disaster must've been the work of demons!
barlow: Before pointing fingers, we should find out what really caused it.
barlow: It looks like the cable snapped between the gondola and the town. On the other side, the cable goes off into the woods.
alex: This doesn't look like any kind of defect in the cable. Even with the cable being fifty years old, you can clearly see that the strands have been cut in a straight pattern directly across one spot.
barlow: Well... I have to admit you might be onto something here. But this was a long time ago, so there's little hope in solving the crime.
alex: Don't be too sure of that! The disaster is well-documented. There's a whole section of the archived dedicated to that era. Let me show you.
barlow: It probably wasn't a great idea in the first place. I don't know how it fell, but there are easier ways to get to Sprawling-Mossville.
rebecca: This is actually the first I've heard of this. I had no idea we had a route that went over the woods.
alex: I knew all about it. There's even a whole section in the archives dedicated to this era.
barlow: There are some things about this that I'm still curious about. Can you show me what we know about it?
barlow: You can't attribute EVERYTHING to demons.
alex: I can try.
barlow: Where's your proof?
alex: Well... this particular era of history is well documented, but nobody ever connected the disaster to demons.
alex: But I intend to go through the archives and find the link.
alex: Here are some of the artifacts from the gondola transit system. This poster was created to promote it.
alex: Someone also saved the newspaper account of the tragedy. It's probably the only account of it. The bridge was down at the time, so the local newspaper was probably the only paper to feature eye-witness accounts of it.
alex: The disaster is mentioned in a number of journals from various residents, but people soon lost interest in what happened and the whole thing was basically forgotten.
barlow: Who built this gondola thing?
alex: It was bankrolled by two of the most powerful families in Spider Cliff, the people who basically owned the town in those days.
barlow: Was my family involved?
alex: No, the gondola was built by the industrial barons in town. The primary leader, and designer of the whole system, was the last member of the Monocle family, whose factory was a leading manufacturer of monocles. His name was Hannibal Monoculous Bath.
alex: He designed and built the system, but his family's fortunes were in decline. The real money for the gondola came from the Sprawling family, which owned the local paper mill. In those days, paper from paper mammals was our biggest export.
barlow: How did they manage to build that station in the woods?
alex: Ah, that's quite a feat of engineering. It's well-documented, because it took over five years to get the thing built.
alex: Workers had to go into the woods during the yearly fog-tide, to build a platform that rose out of the woods. Amazingly, they managed to do that it without anyone dying or getting lost in the woods.
alex: The designer of the gondola system was also an accomplished dirigible pilot, and once the platform rose out of the woods he could ferry his workers to what would become the remote station.
alex: There were also stations built in Sprawling-Mossville and here in Spider Cliff, and two gondola cars were built... one to get from here to the remote station, and one to take people from there into the other town.
barlow: Who got stranded at the remote station?
alex: The first passengers were most of the people who financially backed the project. They were all members of the Sprawling family...
alex: Ignatius Sprawling was the town's richest and most powerful person. He and his wife Ellen rode in the gondola.
alex: Also in the gondola car were Elkwood Sprawling and his wife, Katherine Ivy Sprawling. Of course we know now that Elkwood didn't get off at the remote station, but tried to come back to town.
barlow: Who stood to gain from the disaster?
alex: Nobody! The disaster was seen as an economic tragedy by everyone in town.
alex: The only parties that would profit would be... the demonic forces.
barlow: Are we sure that those people survived? If Elkwood fell with the gondola...
alex: I know, I know. In the official story, they couldn't come back to Spider Cliff, but there was nothing to stop them from riding down to Sprawling-Mossville.
alex: It took several years before the bridge was rebuilt, and during that time Spider Cliff's fortunes declined. People started moving out of town when the bridge was back, so nobody really thought twice about the Sprawlings not coming back. At least, none of them ever came back... until today.
barlow: Why didn't that Bath guy go up with the others?
alex: If the newspaper reports are accurate, he stayed in the local station to operate the machinery. He had yet to train anyone to operate the gondola controls.
alex: Bath was devastated by the accident, both emotionally and financially. He closed up the local station soon afterwards and became a hermit of sorts. I think he died or left the town before we were born.
barlow: Did that Elkwood guy have any enemies?
alex: No, it was said that he was loved and respected by all.
barlow: Well, the same was said about Alistair Bigly Bean.
barlow: It's strange that my aunt Vedalia never mentioned anything about him or this incident.
alex: You know, I'm not sure that she was even there. There's a side article in this newspaper story saying that she killed a demon on the same day.
alex: It says here that she killed a demon trying to destroy the town at almost the exact same time as the disaster. The demon tried to sabotage the restraining bar that holds the town in place.
barlow: That sounds like big news.
alex: Nope, it was just a small article. Back in those days, that sort of thing was more common.
barlow: What happened in Spider Cliff after the disaster?
alex: Well, the town fell into an economic depression. The Monocle factory was already shut down, and without the leadership of Ignatius Sprawling the mammal mill closed down a few years after the disaster.
alex: it didn't help that the bridge was out. When the bridge did reopen, score of residents moved away to Sprawling-Mossville and other places. We probably lost over two-thirds of our population.
alex: It's sad, really. Gondola transit was supposed to revive this town. It was our most direct connection to Sprawling-Mossville.
barlow: Is that remote station still out there?
alex: It might be out there, but the fog from the woods would obscure it. It's been fifty years, so who knows what condition it might be in.
barlow: But our gondola car still has a cable leading into the woods. It might lead all the way up to the station.
alex: True. I suppose it might be possible to get the transit system working again. It would take a lot of work, though.
barlow: But.. it might be worth it.