New Guinea Football

In the mountains of New Guinea a number of violent tribes have been fighting a ritualistic war that has lasted for hundreds of years. The war consists mostly of skirmishes leading to injuries rather than fatalities (which are rare).

When anthropologists encountered the tribes they taught them European football to minimize the bloodshed. The skirmishes now only take place on the pitch, and each year the tribes gather for their football tournament.

Possibilities

1 The victims of the skirmishes were all ceremoniously thrown into a nearby lake that was home to a Dark Young. With the skirmishes replaced by a football tournament, the Dark Young is now hungry...

2 The ritualistic approach that the tribes took to the war meant that the fatalities that did occur were enough to keep a Servitor of the Outer Gods bound and imprisoned. With no more fatalities, the Servitor will soon be freed...

3 One of the anthropologists is using the tribes’ emotions, captured as part of the football tournament to summon the Outer God Nyarlathothep.

© Jochen Koltermann

The Party

A character receives, quite unexpectedly, an invitation to a soirée at the home of one of their old school-friends. The individual, one Humphrey Anderson-Boyd, is known as an international traveller and has something of a reputation as a dilettante and playboy. He is wealthy, handsome, elegant, and an eminently eligible bachelor. The society journals are quick to match him with any woman in whose company he is seen. His parties are said to be wild and debauched.

Humphrey lives in a large and airy house designed by a radical modern architect and located on the fringes of the fashionable city suburbs. The interior is exquisitely furnished and the grand windows overlook the extensive wooded and landscaped grounds. By day the dramatic skies and excellent views make it an idyllic spot, but at night it can feel very lonely and isolated. The house has been designed to be self-sufficient and has its own generator located in the cellars.

Jones, the cadaverous butler, is the only westerner in the domestic staff. The others are all dark skinned, slightly built Orientals who actively shun contact with the guests. They seem under the sway of the cook, an ancient and grossly fat woman who seems to do little except sit in a rocking chair and give orders. All of the Orientals carry slender knives and have a dragon tattoo on their necks. Jones is able to communicate in their tongue and appears to inspire either respect or fear.

Humphrey retains a number of gamekeepers and groundsmen, local men who maintain the gardens, keep down the wildlife, and patrol the grounds against poachers and trespassers. They consider Humphrey and his staff to be ‘queer folk’, but their wages are rather good, they receive a rather generous holiday allowance and Christmas bonus, and as such they are loyal and tight-lipped. The gamekeepers have well trained dogs and carry shotguns, and will see off anyone who tries anything funny. They and their dogs shun the woods, however.

Humphrey’s little bash, which includes among its guest-list writers, musicians, judges, a gangster, and at least one starlet of the silver screen, begins rather more formally than one might expect. The gramophone music is dull and repetitive and the conversation is terrible: this is hardly going to make the best shindig list of ‘Gentleman’ magazine. That is, until Jones fetches the “special” drink. The liquid is contained in a large bronze bowl worked with Chinese characters and intricate skull-and-claw designs, and appears to be luminous green in the dim light. The other guests have no qualms about drinking.

Possibilities

1 The characters have received an invite to the wrong party - the one they were supposed to attend isn’t until next week. The “special” drink is a powerful aphrodisiac made by the cook: it causes the drinker to lose all of their inhibitions - the affair becomes an orgiastic sex romp. If the characters have drunk the potion they will, in all probability, become willing participants in the carnal activities, though they probably won’t remember much of what went on. A number of prostitutes (both male and female) have been hired to ‘start things going’. Anyone with professional employment or a position of trust would be very badly affected if their participation in such activities became public knowledge.

2 The “special” drink is a potion that causes the drinker to fall into a waking trance. Humphrey is a newly created undead, Jones is his sire and mentor, and the Orientals are trusted henchmen. When everyone has succumbed to the effects of the potion Humphrey and Jones move among the guests and tap just a little blood from each, drinking enough during the course of the evening to satisfy their unholy needs. Both are immune to most forms of damage (although fire, electricity, and enchanted weapons work) and are exceedingly violent if they are interrupted: they are lethally fast and highly skilled creatures. Those who have drunk the potion remember little of the evening, but uniformly recall having had an excellent time.

3 Humphrey and Jones, both permanently insane, are the leaders of a small cult that worships Shub Niggurath. The “special” drink is a potion, made by the cook, with two main effects. First, it allows the cultists access to the guests’ psychic energy. Second, it induces a dream-like state that cushions their minds against the horrors they witness (they recall a wild party but can’t remember any details). Humphrey and Jones begin a ceremony that involves everyone performing complex chanting and dancing. At the penultimate moment a sacrifice is brought forth (a suitable victim has been secured and is being held in the cellars until required), and ultimately one or more Dark Young of Shub Niggurath are summoned. The horrifying entities consume the sacrifice (and anyone who hasn’t drunk the potion) then vanish into the wooded grounds.

© Adie Stewart

Period Pains

The investigator is used to occasional period pains, but never this bad. She is in absolute agony, feeling as though her insides are on fire. It started yesterday and the pain is just increasing and increasing. Intense bursts of pain alternate with incessant sharp, stabbing sensations. Unable to concentrate for any length of time and, at its worst, even unable to walk, she is finding it increasingly difficult to work. Sleep is possible (but only for short periods of time) but reading or anything that requires concentration is almost impossible. Her doctor has dismissed her complaints of higher levels of pain than usual as “Just a bit more severe than usual” and has prescribed painkillers that have no effect whatsoever.

Possibilities

1 The investigator is the victim of a devious cultist. Utilising ancient spells, she has created a non-physical manifestation of pain in the investigator which she is then tapping for her own means. She uses the psychic waves of agony to drive her attempts to summon Y’Golonac. The cessation of pain that precedes Y’Golonac’s arrival probably give the investigator great relief – until she realises what it portends.

2 The investigator has been impregnated by Shub Niggurath in its guise as the Ram of the Thousand Ewes. Nightmares soon begin, letting the investigator relive the moment of impregnation. If this doesn’t drive her to suicide, then she will soon give birth to a chitinous creature consisting of claws and fangs and little else. This creature burrows its way through the investigator’s abdomen, bursting out into the world in a spray of blood. After eviscerating the investigator, it flees to dank woodland where it grows to become a form of Dark Young.

3 During the few snatched moments of sleep the investigator’s dreams are filled with horrific images of blood and pain and unborn creatures mewling. Always waking in a cold sweat the feverous heat of her pain soon takes over. This constant swing of delirium takes its toll and the investigator finally collapses.

Rushed to hospital, she is diagnosed as suffering from a rare tropical disease extant only in certain jungles in South America. How on earth did she catch the disease?

Everything seems fine now that her malady is cured, but four weeks later the disease resurfaces and continues to do so every month. Her dreams are now tormented not only by the cries of unborns but also by a pox-marked figure dressed in a tattered robe and bearing a tattooed symbol on his forehead. Who is it and what further horror does it presage?

© Simon Taylor

Hunting Pink

A Rolls Royce Silver Lady is parked at the side of the road. An elderly chauffeur, uniform jacket removed, struggles to change a flat tyre. A little way along the road stands a well-dressed gentleman, hoping to secure assistance.

Simon Beaumains (Bart) of Clovenford is the epitome of English nobility; intelligent, educated, charming, handsome, his ancestors may be traced back to Norman times. He is a staunch Conservative and a defender of law, order, King and country.

Beaumains is very grateful to anyone who helps the elderly Grimes to change the tyre on his Rolls. Good samaritans (and their friends) receive an invitation to spend a weekend as guests of the Clovenfords. It is impossible to refuse without causing offence.

Astarte Hall is an impressive English manor set in immaculate gardens and rolling wooded English countryside. The nearest civilisation is the small village of Clovenford five miles from the Hall. Once settled at the Hall, the elderly and very infirm Baron Clovenford is ‘wheeled’ in to thank the good samaritans for assisting his son. He invites them to take part in a weekend of hunting and shooting activities, then retires.

Guests arriving for the weekend include a selection of famous socialites, wealthy businessmen, artistes and politicians. As the weather worsens the enormous fireplaces are banked with logs and brandy is served. The after-dinner party ends in the wee small hours with everyone in a fair state of inebriation.

Next morning there is commotion at (late) breakfast. The Baron has been found dead near the enormous outdoor maze. His body appears to have been torn apart by a wild animal and there appear to be cloven hoof footprints around the body. The Baron is laid in state in the cold of the family crypt.

The telephone lines are down due to the still-raging storm. The chauffeur returns with the news that the main road bridge at Clovenford has been swept away during the night. The area is cut off until the storm abates. There is no need to worry as there are supplies aplenty in the cellar and a backup generator in case the electricity lines are knocked out. “Honest, guvnor.”

Possibilities

1 The Clovenford Hunt (of which many of the guests are members) is an archetypal English tradition, hunting foxes on horseback accompanied by hounds. It provides a convenient cover for the cult activities of the Beaumains family who have been associated with The Black Goat of the Woods for hundreds of years.

Their favourite sport is hunting a human. The Beaumains horses are an unusually robust and temperamental breed as they are fed on human flesh in classical Greek tradition. The hounds are likewise barely domesticated wolves.

Last night the old Baron was forcibly removed as Master of the Hunt by his son. The new Baron immediately takes charge of the situation and organises a rather unseemly wake to commemorate his father’s passing. The wake becomes a drunken orgy and soon the Hunt members get into a sporting mood. Tonight is again the dark of the moon and the Master of the Hunt must organise a special feast to celebrate his ascension. This celebration will climax with the summoning of a Dark Young to assist the Hunt in pursuing their prey. Guess who is to be the prey?

2 The Beaumains’ bloodline has been contaminated ever since the British campaigns against Napoleon in Egypt; there is a ghoulish ancestor some way down the family tree. It is a matter of historical record that the Beaumains usually pass quietly with only an obituary in The Times, all the better to cover up their degeneration into ghoul. It is a family duty to take care of the Beaumains’ ghouls (the elders) who live in the extensive family crypts, obtaining a steady supply of recently buried corpses.

The new Baron has been properly schooled by his late father in his duties but the lessons did not take. His studies in Beaumains’ extensive occult library have prompted him to an alternative course of action. The new Baron intends to make use of this family curse by offering immortality to many of the influential guests (who are confidantes of his). The first step for them is to become cannibals, a well-documented method of greatly extending the human lifespan.

The elder Baron refused to accept this idea and so was lured outdoors and killed by his son. The guests in the know all participated in a sorcerous quickening ceremony and had a taste of the Baron. They were scared off by the elders, prowling out of the crypt, who become restless around the time of their regular feeding. Using their own magical means the elders will soon know of the new Baron’s plans and they will not approve.

One of the guests disappears later that day, kidnapped by the elders. The Baron realises what is happening and looks for suitable volunteers to descend into the crypt to deal with the family legacy. He makes a private faux confession of the family legacy in the hope of gaining sympathy and assistance. If the brave volunteers survive the ghouls then the cannibals may have fresh meat that night.

3 For untold years the area known as Clovenford has sheltered a large coven of witches. The witches were persecuted by the Beaumains in the years following the Norman conquest, and since then the coven has been very secretive. Many of the Beaumains males have died by violent means, attributed to a non-existent curse laid by the innocent coven.

The new Baron is in considerable debt due to poor play at the bridge table. Angered by his father’s recent refusal to cover his debts, Simon has taken violent action. The previous evening Simon killed his father using a rather blunt dagger from the Great Hall, spirited the body outside via the hidden stairway in the master bedroom, then faked the animal attack. The cloven hoofprints were made with a family heirloom; a plaster casting of ‘The Devils Footprint’ which sits beneath glass in the study, a curio dated 1867.

Simon plays upon the idea of the Curse of the Beaumains, telling many old family tales to back up his story. He even shows off the curio in the study. Unfortunately, he was seen returning last night by one of the guests, the actress Mary Bartlett, his fiancée. She confronts Simon later that morning within sight of one of our heroes, then an hour later accidentally falls to her death from the second-floor balcony. Simon again speaks of the Curse but this time he is watching carefully.

© Peter Devlin

Black Anna's Bower

This is not the first spate of disappearances in the area. A similar series is recorded in the Parish Records for 1760 when five children disappeared from forest dwellings in an area known as Black Annis Bower Close where the Lord Mayor's celebrations took place each Easter.

Black Annis Bower Close, where Leicester forest once bordered the old city along the Dane Hills, is now covered by the Dane Hill Estate but there are no records of this.

Black Annis is another name for the Celtic earth goddess Danu, wife of the sky god Ludd. She dwelt in a round cave about ten to twelve feet across and five feet high. Known as Black Anna’s Bower, she is said to have dug it out of the sandstone Dane Hills with her own fingernails.

There Black Anna waited in the branches of an old oak growing over the mouth of the cave waiting for children to come past. She would then scratch them to death and drink their blood, hanging their skins out to dry.

Possibilities

1 Black Anna’s Bower is an entrance to subterranean caverns inhabited by the descendants of the ancient Druids. They once used the cave for their sacrifices to Danu, and tended to the Children of Danu – Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath.

They normally sacrifice their own young while saving a breeding stock of their hardiest children but, occasionally, run short of sacrifices. They are then forced to risk their secrecy and raid the surface world through Black Anna’s Bower which is hidden in the Dane Hill Estate rubbish dump.

2 Black Anna’s Bower is located directly under 17 Shakespeare Drive, the home of Stephen Johnson. Since moving in he has been possessed by a malign dryad trapped in the Bower since the tree over the cave was cut down. It has grown weak and forces Johnson to sacrifice children so that it can leave the cave for a new oak in the field beyond the estate. If it is not stopped children will regularly go missing, and their skins found hanging in the branches of the oak.

3 The Bower is a gateway to the land of the faerie, renowned in legend for stealing human infants for their own. Only the innocent are allowed there, those that have not been corrupted by the adult world of humans. All three children were maltreated by their parents and have been granted sanctuary by the faeries. The Bower is guarded by Black Anna against the evils of the outside world.

© Garrie Hall

Tropical Death

Possibilities

1 One of the plants in the greenhouse is a form of nocturnal triffid and has just reached maturity. Until now it has been crawling around the greenhouse looking for prey before returning to its place.

2 One of the plants in the greenhouse is a four foot tall Very Young Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath. It has only just become mobile, and has been looking for prey. It was given to Kew after explorer Horatio Barnett returned from an expedition to darkest Africa. He died shortly afterwards and the strange plant was donated by a member of the family.

3 Smale died from contracting an exotic tropical disease. The source of the fast-acting disease is the pollen of a particularly beautiful orchid which has just come into bloom. The disease requires a large quantity of pollen to be inhaled before it can overcome the body’s defences. Smale had been breathing it for several hours before the swift acting disease took hold. Smale’s corpse is a wonderful supply of nutrients and soon it will sprout small green tendrils – new orchids.

© Steve Hatherley