Solo Tabletop RPG Review & Actual Play – Host: Until the Light Takes Us

Host: Until the Light Takes Us (Running from Skeletons)
Written by James Boychuk & Dylan Richardson
You can purchase this game here

Halloween means horror and there is no shortage of scary tabletop RPGs. This one is a very simple story generator centered around the end of the world & visions that predict its coming. I found this very similar to games like Alone Among the Stars where the mechanics simply provide a jumping off point for the player’s own imagination. This is not a game that takes you by the hand and guides your experience. Instead, it demands the player really dig deep and find an interesting story to tell from the inspiration given.

There’s not much more to say about it, so here’s my play through:

Josephine “Josie” Pace, 35

Expat in the Netherlands, working for a multinational corporation headquartered in The Hague

Raised vaguely Baptist in the American South, attended a private Christian college, moderately well-versed in the Christian Bible, by no means devout

Lina Castellano, 33 – On again/off again girlfriend/hookup 

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First Event – A HOLE OPENS IN THE SKY – October 2019

A great gaping hole appears in the sky above you. Through it, you see something you don’t recognize – shapes and colors you’ve never seen before.

Josie had never done psychedelics when she lived in the States. The constant fear surrounding drugs as one blanket terror overshadowed any benefit they might have. After a few months living in The Hague, she became curious. Her on-again/off-again Lina mentioned in passing she’d tripped on acid before which sparked Josie’s interest even further. A quick purchase online and two days later a box arrived at the apartment. Josie carefully opened the package which seemed to weigh nothing. The silver pouch of tabs was taped against the top, a way of hiding the drugs she supposed? Such things were technically legal here, in that the authorities turned a blind eye to it as long as you didn’t cause a nuisance. 

That Friday night, after a few glasses of wine, she & Lina dropped two tabs each. Around midnight, Josie stumbled from the bedroom, Lina was passed out in the darkness occasionally twitching from her trip. In the glaring fluorescent sterile white of the water closet, Josie looked at her face in the mirror. Behind her, the tiled room melted. Her eyes forced her to look up at a ceiling that caved way to a void expanse of stars & darkness. New horizons unfolded before Josie, geometry without sense or meaning, hues & tones, both sound & light, that spoke in an alien hum. 

Though she could not see it, there was an irrational sense that a pair of arms was extending across space, towards that hole, towards Josie. She would later claim she didn’t remember screaming when Lina told her about it. The police that knocked at the door, alerted by concerned neighbors, frowned with annoyance as they checked Josie’s pupils and muttered something in a tongue the young woman was still trying to learn. She knew they must think she was a silly American bitch, but she could still feel the reach of those arms, searching for her in the darkness.

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(One year later)

A MEMBER OF THE HOST – October 2020

You hear a voice behind you say, “Be not afraid.” You see an incomprehensible being that tells you secrets of the world.

The year that followed was nothing Josie could have ever predicted. By January the news was filled with stories of a horrible illness that was popping up across the planet. By March, masks were required and the government issued curfews. In a place that still felt like a strange land it was made even more alien by the sudden absence of life outside. Josie began to work from home which suited her fine. Theodoric, one of the men in her office, had an unsettling habit of lingering near her desk, awkward cloying attempts at small talk. Josie tried to dismiss him with as much politeness as she could but she could feel that deference she learned in the States making her come across as submissive. It was better now that she could simply work from her kitchen table.

This seeming peace & quiet was interrupted one afternoon, the sky darkening almost as soon as daylight had arrived, thick gray clouds heavy with rain consuming the world. Josie had stepped away to grab a sweater from her bedroom, skipping the light switch with confidence. A whisper touched her neck: “Be not afraid.”

Something like what she saw when the bathroom ceiling erupted open shimmered before her, a countenance beyond what her brain could process. It pulsed & glowed with a sunfire that somehow failed to illuminate anything beyond its own aura. In Josie’s mind she suddenly knew things: The thing at the center of the universe was sick, corrupted. She could see its leathery skin mottled with pus filled sores, erupting like volcanoes of ichor. The light before Josie told her that the sins of man were poisoning this god and that Josie was one who could heal it. The healing would be in ending her own sin. Josie reeled, feeling this thought ricochet in her mind, those feelings of fear about the girls she liked in high school & her parents’ righteous anger if they knew.

Three hours later she woke up in the still dark bedroom, no light from god speaking to her anymore. A streetlight from outside had snapped on and spread a honey glow across the window sill. Rising, groggy & disoriented, Josie made her way back to the kitchen table. Her phone was bright with a text from Lina, asking if Josie was doing well, if she wanted Lina to come over and they could order takeaway delivery.

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(Two weeks later)

TRUE BELIEVERS TURN TO SALT – November 2020

In a flash of light, every true believer of every faith in the world is turned into a pillar of salt.

The morning after Halloween. Josie’s head pounded with a reminder of too many drinks imbibed during her two-person party the night before with Lina. There was a faint memory somewhere in their of a news report, voices speaking with tremendous terror, but the alcohol smeared the details away. Josie reached over to wrap her arm around Lina. Her fingers found grit & grain which shook her a bit out of the stupor. Brushing her hand further only led to the sandy material in a pile spilling across the sheets where Lina passed out the night before.

Josie sat up and stared at the spot. Salt? She brought a hand to her mouth, the white crystals stuck to fingertips. Tasting. Yes. Salt. Pulling her robe off the bedroom door, Josie wrapped up and went to the kitchen calling out for Lina. No sign of her anywhere. She left in the middle of the night? 

The tv turns on with the press of a button and the apartment is filled with the sounds of chaos. News reports interrupt every channel. It’s in Dutch so she only gets bits & pieces. The images fill in the rest. Christians. Jews. Muslims. People of all faiths. They have gone missing and small piles of salt are spread across the globe. Some eyewitnesses claim they watched as their loved ones shriveled like raisins and dissolved into these piles but it’s clear authorities are not wanting to spread this story too widely. 

Josie curls up on the couch, telling herself to forget about her visions. She cannot believe that at the center of things is a monster like this. And she knows if she believes he is there, she will join the others with him.