episodes

145 – Another Boys’ Night

in which we hear about the Division of Cats, it is Boys Night once again, we discover what Kimmie has been up to, and Rai Fennekin “wins” the Ruin-A-Life Drawing.

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Ryan:  What you are about to hear is various communities junctions of the verb yeet.

Hello, and welcome to the Kakos Industries corporate shareholder announcements. At Kakos Industries, we help our clients to Do Evil Better. My name is Corin Deeth III, and I am CEO here at Kakos Industries. 

Last time, you may remember, shareholders, we had a few reasons to really ramp up our efforts to communicate with the Matmos, and we have had some success there. You might remember that the reason we have accelerated our experimentation with this is because Kimmie has disappeared, evidently to go join with the Matmos. Despite our closeness, it wasn’t my idea to ramp things up because of her. It seems that her existence is really important to a lot of people here at Kakos Industries. Whether they used to be part of the Cult of Ohh Ahh, or perhaps they just like her, Kimmie is important to many of our employees’ sense of self. Seeing her around makes them happy. Most of these people have never spoken with her, so it’s a little creepy, but all the same, people like her, and there has been a stir because of her disappearance. So, we’re moving things along, but I’ll get to that in more detail later.

We have discovered a method of communicating with the Matmos effectively, but the problem is that it does involve using a person under the influence of the Matmos. And by “using” them, I mean subjecting them to… uncomfortable electrical pulses. I am told that the experience is not exactly painful, but it is definitely unpleasant. At first, we attempted this with a person supposedly belonging to Buddy, because they seem to be the most out of it at any given moment. We strapped this person in, and began the broadcast. We can basically send an audio signal directly into the person’s brain, and with enough power applied to it, it allows us to talk with the Matmos directly. Or at least the pools of Matmos that are separate from the large interconnected pool that surrounds the building. We have not attempted this process with any of the people infected with the regular Matmos primarily because they’re either working hard for the company, or they are Clarissa and Hedera, my supposed liaisons to the Matmos, and if we tried to put electrodes on them, someone would end up dead. 

For the first time, though, we were able to speak directly with Buddy. It was about as enlightening as you would guess. Buddy is easily distracted, and understands very little of what you ask him. He was incredibly polite, and the researchers who were contacting him found that he was very interested in their lives and gave them a lot of encouragement where they needed it most. I can see what the appeal of Buddy is to the people carrying his brand of Matmos. 

We tried the people belonging to the Princess next. If you’ve forgotten, the people who belong to the Princess are the ones who bring me dead animals all the time. I hate that. Apparently, they were able to contact the princess, but once they had done so, the Princess asked who they were, why they were getting in touch, and when she decided that they had insufficient purpose for disturbing her rest, the person they were using as the conduit began to scream as loud as possible for minutes on end with only brief breaks to breathe. The person then ran out of oxygen from all the screaming and passed out, ending the experiment. I am told they are preparing to contact some of the others next. 

Clarissa and Hedera have been watching me from a distance recently, and when I catch them looking at me, they pantomime barfing. I know that this is related to Kimmie joining with the Matmos and the effect that has had on the rest of the people affected by the Matmos. I am told that they find me ever so slightly more attractive. I’m not sure why this specific attraction has increased. I am not the only person that Kimmie finds attractive. This was actually a frequent conversation topic for us for whatever reason. I have to wonder if this is even a real thing, or if it’s just an opportunity for Clarissa and Hedera to throw more tantrums. For what it’s worth, I’m not interested either. 

Today’s broadcast is coming to you from a cat shaped alarm clock that “seems to sarcastically ask if you ever even want to bother getting up again.” That’s directly on the spec sheet that they gave me. 

This alarm clock radio is called a Catdio. I know, it’s a real stretch. If that name isn’t taken already, then I assume the reason why is that everyone who thought of it had the sense not to go with that as their final idea. I am told that this comes from a collaboration between Experimental Electronic Anachronisms, a company that specializes in bringing old, unwanted technologies back, and our Division of Cats. 

I’m going to level with you shareholders: there is no division here at Kakos Industries that freaks me out more than the Division of Cats. There are Divisions that are responsible for making unspeakable horrors that don’t freak me out as much. The people in those divisions at least understand that what they’re doing is strange and unhealthy. The people in the Division of Cats have no sense whatsoever for how unreasonable they are. They have no sense for how unhealthy their habits are. And they have no sense for how difficult it is to breathe in their offices with all of the cat hair. There are, no joke, like seven hundred cats in their office. It’s a big office, but that’s a lot of fucking cats, okay? And half the people you tell about the Division of Cats are like, “sick, I want to work there.” It makes no sense to me. Monsters, that’s respectable. What are they even studying about cats? What is there to know about Cats that we don’t already? And it would be so easy for me to make the jokes that you’re already thinking of. Why, Corin, don’t you know that cats are inherently Evil masterminds? Don’t you know they probably run Kakos Industries behind the scenes with their little kitty diabolical minds. Except none of that is true. They aren’t running anything. There’s not even a single cat in the C-suite here at Kakos Industries. There is one dog, but admittedly, his workload is pretty light. It’s a lot of fucking cats. And one time they got out because someone left the door open. The Division of Endangered Birds was wiped out. And it took us weeks to catch them all. 

Anyway, the Division of Cats had something to do with this radio. I should mention that these announcements are strictly for Kakos Industries shareholders. If you aren’t a shareholder, then you should do something to become Evil immediately, otherwise, you might end up with like a ton of cats. 

We’ve had many of you using our kakosindustries.com/see link to report your sightings of these announcements. I have to repeat that anything you are seeing is inherently not true, or at least not the complete truth, unless your guesses, or those of your subconscious, happen to be very lucky. We are still investigating this matter. If you have any leads, please head to Kakos Industries dot com slash see. 

We are continuing the segment where we allow you to ask us questions about the business and just maybe we will bother answering them. The first question asks “why won’t you listen to the swans.” Look, I don’t know how you heard about this system for asking questions, but I’ll tell you what I’ve told you before. I do not answer to swans. They do not tell me what to do. You cannot live your life based on what swans want from you. They’re dumb birds. Okay? Are you satisfied now? 

The second question that we deemed appropriate to answer is “Do your employees live there, and what’s your drug policy?” That’s really two questions that have a little bit of overlap. The Kakos Industries building is technically multi-use with some outward facing retail and public access to our food courts, as well as some residences in the building. We’ve discussed how the building tends to shift around, and this is true of the office spaces and the living quarters, but not necessarily of the retail locations. They are on the ground floor for the most part, so it’s easier for them to stay put. As for the residences, I live in one. It makes it far easier for me to do my job, although it certainly gives you that feeling of never really getting out. I have to make sure I plan excursions so that I can feel that sense of freedom return. Some of our employees also live in these dwellings, though not always all the time. The apartment units do occasionally get shuffled around, so it’s not a strict delineation of a floor for offices and a floor for residences or anything like that. The residences, for better or worse, are interspersed. This can make things somewhat awkward if you live next to a Division that tends to work well through the night in a noisy fashion, or if you have a lot of occasional visitors that would prefer not to be seen leaving your quarters. For that reason, we tend to handle a lot of requests to move to different units on more peaceful floors, and the units on the noisier floors end up getting used for partying and trysts. The vast majority of our employees commute to work every day or work from home, only occasionally using one of our dwellings. As for the drug policy, we don’t test. Don’t come to work completely out of your mind, unless that’s part of your job. 

I also have a question here about sensory relief rooms, and yes we have a few throughout the building. We also have meditation spaces, as well as spaces for exercise classes and a host of other health related events. We have a couple of gyms. There’s the sexy gym for if you’re feeling sexy. There’s also the gym where looking at others while they exercise is strictly forbidden. There’s also the gym where everything is made from stone and you have to be completely naked to enter. I’m not actually sure what the purpose of that gym is, but it gets used and people seem to like it.

The Festival of Mud was interesting as always. There were some very interesting consistencies of mud for all of us to experience. The chunky mud may have been the worst. I am told that one of the muds was actually made without water, but instead used some sort of silicone lubricant. We need to do a different Festival. I will have to look into some sort of substitution. 

Coming up we have the Festival of Innovation. I am told that the theme this year is “robot prom.” I have a suspicion they will be forgoing the fighting for some dancing and then a bunch of the giant robot fucking we have come to expect from them. 

We also have Evil Con coming up. This is the opportunity every year for you shareholders, and shareholders in other companies I won’t name, to come together and really nerd out on all of the Evil that will be coming soon. I am told we have some big things in the works, but I am also told that I cannot tell you anything because it would spoil the surprise.

Last time I mentioned that the Tabithas are back, and they are once again inordinately concerned about my sex life. They seem to think that I need to unwind, and that this is the best way to do it. The Tabithas have been putting events on my calendar with titles like “sex with Tabitha L.” or “Corin’s chill out time with some pals”. They think I’m such a slave to my schedule that I’ll just show up and do whatever it says on my calendar. This is not the case. I can tell what they are doing and I am not a fan, so I’m not going to just show up. Realizing that, some of these events have been designed to trick me into attending, like one that was titled “getting business done”, which was just a conference room full of Tabithas in various states of undress waiting for me. 

I have missed a couple of real events on my calendar because I thought they were ruses placed there by the Tabithas. And I know that you are almost certainly asking the question, “why do they have access to his calendar?” and you know, I’ve been asking myself the same question. Some of them do work on my support staff. I have been unable to fire them for some reason. When I mentioned it to Grace, she told me that they are performing an important function, and I should let them do what they have to, and I really just hated every moment of that conversation. 

I mentioned that I would talk about Kimmie again and I suppose it’s time for that part of the broadcast. I swear that the amount of attention she gets you would think that she was the CEO of the company. I can think of a few board members who might prefer that, actually. Well–

JUNIOR: Corin. You have waited long enough. 

CORIN: I was going to tell the shareholders about Kimmie. 

JUNIOR: We will get there in due time. But first, most importantly…

CORIN: Right. It was boys night the other night.

JUNIOR: Yessssss.

CORIN: The stars had aligned.

JUNIOR: Yesssss!

CORIN: It was…

JUNIOR: Motherfucking Boys Night!

CORIN: We hadn’t done it in a little while so we got the boys together. The boys being myself, Soundman Steven, Brosephus, and Junior. I invited Dr. Dunkelwissen, but he was too busy. I invited Eddie, also, but she turned me down in no uncertain terms. You know, I was just making sure she was okay. Kimmie is her friend also, and why shouldn’t she be allowed to join in with Boys Night if she wants to. 

JUNIOR: Boys night is for boys of all genders. The only thing you’re not allowed to be is a downer. 

CORIN: Right.

JUNIOR: Unless you’re Corin. 

CORIN: Right.

JUNIOR: Well, anyway. It was Boys Night, and the boys were up to bad things again. But what the boys didn’t know was that they were in for a surprise.

CORIN: It was a festival.

JUNIOR: That’s exactly right. It was the [growl] festival, one of the most rockin’ festivals in all of Monster Kakos. 

CORIN: I’m not sure why we went back to Monster Kakos. There are bars with alcohol my body can actually process here on the surface.

JUNIOR: It was the [growl] Festival. And the boys needed to party hard. 

CORIN: We were nearly stomped on several times.

JUNIOR: Yes, that is one thing I did not realize would be an issue after my reduction. I was much more squishable. We were on the level of the smaller monsters, which is gross. Smaller monsters are weird and always up to unsavory things. 

CORIN: Junior made out with like three smaller monsters. 

JUNIOR: I was slumming it.

CORIN: You are not allowed to say that about people or monsters you make out with. 

JUNIOR: I can say whatever I like. 

CORIN: So, the [growl] Festival.

JUNIOR: Don’t embarrass yourself, Corin.

CORIN: I can’t seem to stop. It just keeps happening. 

JUNIOR: The [growl] Festival is the biggest celebration in all of Monster Kakos. It honors the founding of Monster Kakos by doing what the founders did: getting hammered and then getting hammered. 

CORIN: I can say with certainty that the only event on the surface that comes close in terms of outright debauchery is the Shareholders’ Ball. 

JUNIOR: You see, Corin, monsters are not raised to fear expressing themselves, whether that be through terrifying growls or the sensual arts. 

CORIN: Art is a strong word for what I saw.

JUNIOR: You were missing the point, Corin. The point is to let loose. There was music. There were beverages. There were beautiful monsters of all shapes and sizes. I think I even saw Corin getting close to a monster of particularly appealing shape and size. 

CORIN: She was very nice. 

JUNIOR: You were dancing together. Quite closely.

CORIN: It seemed rude to decline. 

JUNIOR: She was a small monster, Corin, she deserved nothing but your pity and disrespect. You know, in a fun way.

CORIN: I had fun dancing.

JUNIOR: But she wanted more!

CORIN: I couldn’t even correctly pronounce her name. 

JUNIOR: She thought your speech impediment was cute. She thought you were cute.

CORIN: Well, it wasn’t meant to be. 

JUNIOR: Corin passed out again. 

CORIN: I was severely intoxicated. 

JUNIOR: The lady was offended. 

CORIN: I am sorry. There was nothing I could do. 

JUNIOR: There were plenty of things you could do.

CORIN: Not after I lost consciousness. 

JUNIOR: We took a breather after that. Soundman and Brosephus were not getting as messed up as we were. In fact Brosephus seemed to just be keeping an eye on us. We didn’t drive, and we still got a DD. Anyway, we dragged Corin away and got some street tacos. 

CORIN: The tacos were delicious. But then that’s when the weird thing happened. 

JUNIOR: It wasn’t so weird, not if you understand Monster Kakos. 

CORIN: They had like an effigy of me that they burned. A few people actually thought I was a monster in a Corin Deeth costume dressed for the event somehow. 

JUNIOR: You see, the CEO of Kakos Industries takes on a somewhat mythical role in Monster Kakos. 

CORIN: As a villain.

JUNIOR: The relationship between Monster Kakos and Kakos Industries, at least historically, is a bit sensitive. The founding of Monster Kakos, depending on which version you read, alternately has the monsters being oppressed by Kakos Industries, or escaping from Kakos Industries into the cave system. 

CORIN: Most of the monsters don’t actually believe Kakos Industries exists, for some reason. They can take the same elevator we did. Some of them even work for both Kakos and Monster Kakos. 

JUNIOR: Sometimes Monster Kakos is too much and what you really want is boyfriend Kakos. 

CORIN: I think partly it’s that they don’t think the real Kakos up here on the surface measures up to the mythical Evil they learned about as children. All the same, there I was burning in effigy. 

JUNIOR: It wasn’t just that lass that thought you looked hot. 

CORIN: It was really sobering. I was ready to leave, and Brosephus agreed. Soundman, of course, couldn’t tear his eyes off of my burning effigy. 

JUNIOR: What’s that, Soundman? Oh, you shouldn’t be so embarrassed about enjoying the sight of Corin burning. It was hilarious after all. 

CORIN: So funny. 

JUNIOR: Anyway, I led them back to the elevator.

CORIN: And Kimmie was on the elevator. She told us that we looked rough.

JUNIOR: What she said was “why do you smell like monster pussy?”

CORIN: We were dancing very closely.

JUNIOR: You blamed it on me.

CORIN: Well, it was true.

JUNIOR: I did also smell like monster pussy. 

CORIN: I asked her where she had been.

JUNIOR: And this is where the story gets a lot less fun for me, so I’m going to skedaddle. 

CORIN: Right. Bye, Junior. 

JUNIOR: Adios.

So Kimmie was in the elevator. I was surprised and a bit drunk still. I asked her where she had been. She said something to the effect of “I thought you would know”. I told her I knew she went and joined the Matmos. She admitted to it. She seemed to think over her words carefully. She said that things were being dragged out for no reason, and that this whole situation with the Matmos needed to get resolved somehow and it seemed that no one had the courage. Then she paused. She said that she needed to know. It was too difficult not knowing. There was a part of the experience that was somehow exactly what she had always wanted, that feeling of belonging, that feeling of not being alone in your own head for once. I asked her if it had done what she had hoped for. She said that it was sort of a mixed bag, but that overall she really liked it. She apologized. She said that she knew we would have to stop being romantically involved. I told her that I forgave her. I understood the drive toward the unknown. She told me that she wanted to resolve this whole thing. She told me they expected me to down the whole bottle of Matmos within a week of being disconnected and they were honestly shocked at my ability to resist. She told me she was working toward some kind of resolution. And she told me she wouldn’t be far from me, at least not right away. Apparently, she was tasked with being a third liaison between me and the Matmos. I asked her if she would answer questions more easily. She then did her best impression of Clarissa and Hedera and told me to go fuck myself. We shared a laugh. All of us. Junior, Brosephus, Soundman. She said she would do her best to enlighten me. She was wearing one of the robes. She looked happy. I couldn’t really argue. When we got back to the surface, we went our separate ways. She told me she would see me soon. 

The Division of Erotic Experiences has some updates on the Satisficer, that sex toy they are working on that is supposed to be able to satisfy literally anyone’s needs. They have made some updates to what they are calling “submissive mode.” There are instructions to make sure you don’t pinch yourself as it transforms, and it also has some sensors to prevent accidents. And then, it supposedly allows you to be more dominant toward it. Jasmine told me you can “exercise your top energies.” Then she slapped the device, and it kind of bounced with a moan. This is going to get really uncomfortable. I can tell already.

The Division of Kaiju Battle Reenactment is working on Volcanodon vs. Cloudulatrix. This battle, as we all know, was a famous one, being recorded in drawings hundreds of years ago. I cannot wait to see what they do with it.

The Division of Figuring Out What All of These Keys Go to apparently found a spare key to my apartment. I took it away from them. 

It is now time for another Employee Spotlight. Today we are spotlighting Nicholson Bonaparte, who works in the Division of Robots Bossing Humans Around. We started that division just in case the robots ever rose up and we needed to show them that we did occasionally let them boss humans around, so maybe they should spare our lives. Nicholson is that human and he has somehow managed to hold down this position for over five years, much longer than any of his predecessors. He works in an office where he is given computer generated prompts and then he has to do the thing with the rest of his day. Sometimes that means he spends all day separating spice mixtures into the individual spices again. Sometimes he sorts lengths of string into their appropriate lengths from the tangle they are presented to him in. It’s different every day, but it is always pointless. All the same, Nicholson provides a valuable service to Kakos Industries. Thank you for what you do, Nicholson. 

We have decided that the glowing laborers in our Hell labor camp are probably not glowing from enlightenment. It may in fact be some kind of chemical contamination. We have found strange deposits of glowing ores. We are unsure if they are radioactive at this time, but it is possible that Meredith Gorgoro is working on another unauthorized side project. 

They say that Evil once turned one tile in every shower the wrong way just to slowly sap the life force of anyone living there. This is Things We’re Taking Credit for Now. Today, we are taking credit for fire, water, and your dependency on stimulants to make it through your day. Of course, we can’t know for certain that we did these things, but we do have a whole lot of cats to give away, so watch where you think those thoughts, Doubty McDoubtyPants.

Rai Fennekin has won today’s Ruin-A-Life Drawing. As a result, the life of Rai’s nemesis will be ruined. That nemesis is Tammy Huffman. We gave the wheel of misery a stiff spin and it landed on the space for “indiscreet”. From this day forward, Tammy Huffman will be fifty percent more indiscreet, which will have obvious and lasting effects on Tammy’s life. For Evil measure, Rai Fennekin will be 20% less indiscreet, which may make for some interesting results. Congratulations on the win, and best of luck. 

The Damnation and Ruination Squad, the team responsible for making the life-ruining declarations of the Wheel of Misery come true, are currently wearing lichen. That’s it. Just a combo of fungus and algae all over their bodies. It’s honestly the most “them” they have ever looked, in my opinion. 

This brings us to the end of our announcements, shareholders. It has been an eventful month here at Kakos Industries and also for me personally. Make sure that you destroy that radio however you see fit, or it will wake you up an hour early every day until you do. It isn’t worth it. The numbers are next.

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BRIAUNA: Kakos Industries is written and produced by Conrad Miszuk, who is also the voice of Corin Deeth, and the composer of the music. The introductions are read by Ryan Jenkins, and the credits are read by Briauna Kittle, peak physical performance even if you don’t want to admit it.

Please visit KakosIndustries.com for news, extras, and more episodes. There are also transcriptions on the website if you’d like to read along with the Kakos Industries announcements. That’s K-A-K-O-S-I-N-D-U-S-T-R-I-E-S dot com. Please visit store.KakosIndustries.com for merchandise and special offers and get wonderful benefits by becoming a subscription donor at kakosindustries.com/patreon. You can submit one time donations at paypal.me/kakosindustries. You can also purchase gear and other items for the production at kakosindustries.com/wishlist. Join our community at kakosindustries.com/discord. Questions, comments, or a strong desire to collaborate? Drop us a line at inquiries@kakosindustries.com. If you like Kakos Industries, be sure to rate and review us on your favorite podcasting service, and connect with us on YouTube (YouTube.com/KakosIndustries), Facebook (facebook.com/kakosindustries), Tumblr (kakosindustries.tumblr.com), Instagram (@kakosindustries), tik tok @Kakosindustries, and Twitter (@KakosIndustries). We encourage fan art and listener participation on all our social media platforms. 

Special thanks to our esteemed shareholders, Alfredo Ravioli, Jack Attack, and Diontrey. Also thanks to honored employees Calico, who laid the trap, Rocket who picked out the bait, and Anastasia K, who finally caught the enormous mouse. The Division of Beanies, Booties, and Construction Projects That Are Probably Too Large for Yarn, directed by Theo Cornet, has finished with the sports stadium as far as they are concerned, and have started to knit a garden. The Division of Obscure Vintage Technology, directed by Craig Czyz, has purchased a butter churn. They’re all Evil. The Division of Subtle Efficiency Increases, directed by Danniel R Smith, has started using AI to fill in the ends of workers’ sentences. Apparently correcting the AI errors is less time consuming than just doing their jobs by a small margin.  The Division of Saying It the Long Way, directed by Dino Schroeder, has been workshopping a novelette titled “well, just maybe, we’ll see”. The Division of Kakos Kafeteria Reviews, directed by Seth and Josh, has reviewed If You Can Skewer It. “Like the name suggests, if you can skewer it, they will cook it. 7.7/10”. The Division of Improbable Cookbooks, directed by Hayden Neff, has been working on “What If You Just Microwave Some Hotdogs?”. It presents extremely complicated recipes, followed by the option to make something much simpler instead.   The Division of More Monday Mondays, directed by Odie, has made Mondays that much more Monday by beginning a weekly training session first thing. The Division of Villainous Introspection, directed by Sarah, has been journaling extensively about the appeals of Evil and what makes it just so satisfying to do.  The Division of New Card Game Mechanics, led by Finn, has developed a card that smells really really nice. It’s definitely a part of the meta, but no one is sure why. The Division of Even Weirder bugs, directed by Franco El Terrible, has discovered a bug that thinks it’s giving you a high five when it is actually stinging you. The Division of Animal Stacking, directed by The One True Dave, has stacked thirteen goats. It’s helpful that they like standing on things. The Division of Unwanted Board Game Expansions directed by Kevin Rowland has created an expansion set that can only be completed twenty years from the date that it is begun. The Division of Prospective Exoplanet Tourism, directed by Victoria Wood, has started working on a pamphlet for the Fist Fight Nebula. “It’s actually quite peaceful here, though there are few planets as of yet”. The Division of In-Office Fan Fiction, directed by Kristina Kirkland, has started to write erotic fiction about two misshapen staples at the edge of one of their desks. Our esteemed shareholders, honored employees, division heads, and other Patreon patrons are the best. If you want a thank you in the credits, your own division, or other great rewards that help to keep this show running, please head to Kakosindustries.com/patreon. That’s Patreon: p-a-t-r-e-o-n.

Kakos industries can be dark, draw a picture about deep emotions within you.

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