The Cuban Connection

The local tobacconist has just got a new batch of very special cigars. Each of these hand-rolled Havana cigars is extremely expensive, but they are proving popular. Perhaps a little too popular.

Possibilities

1 The cigars are manufactured by clever but ruthless Cuban gangsters. They contain a number of highly addictive narcotics designed to hook not only the smoker, but those in the vicinity too.

2 The cigars are manufactured by Cuban cultists. They contain ceremonial incense that summons strange spirits when burned. The spirits induce a feeling of euphoria, but also feed on the life energy of those in close proximity. A portion of this energy is transferred to the cultists for use in their nefarious activities.

3 The cigars are manufactured by the Slaves of the Atchai. Each cigar contains one Atchai, a creature resembling a tiny trilobite. When the cigar is lit and put to the lips, the Atchai crawls into the smoker's mouth. Once inside the body, it attaches itself to the nervous system and begins to take control of the brain.

© Rob Illing

The Cardiss Tapes

Shortly after the invention of film reels, land developer Donald Cardiss shot a series of homemade pornographic reels featuring his friends and his own wife. The films were made in Cardiss’ home for distribution among a close-knit circle of ‘cinema enthusiasts’, in semi-open defiance of the authorities while he was awaiting trial on an obscenity charge.

The contents wouldn’t be considered particularly racy by today’s standards, being spliced together from scenes of unattractive naked people staring at the camera in drink or opium-befuddled complacency or having unenthusiastic sex in twos and threes. The most interesting moment is when one woman who’s sampled too much of Cardiss’ inducements over-balances and slides right off her partner, knocking herself unconscious on a coffee table.

However, anyone who watches the reels and doesn’t get distracted by the bumping and grinding in the foreground will notice that set up behind the participants and carefully framed in every shot are a series of canvas dropcloths crudely painted with erotic symbols and other, less recognisable (and faintly disturbing) marks.

The making of the tapes contributed to Cardiss’ conviction on the obscenity charge, and he was sentenced to three years in prison. During his time behind bars, there were a series of unexplained deaths among his friends who watched the tapes. Cardiss himself seems to have had a change of heart during his time in prison -- upon his release he made a frantic effort to re-acquire and destroy all copies of the reels. However, he died of a heart attack before completing the job, and the Cardiss tapes are still out there.

Possibilities

1 The Cardiss home was situated in an area where another reality is close to intersecting with our own. The frequent use of drink, opium, and other perception-altering chemicals made the household’s members receptive to outside influences. The weird symbols on the backdrops in the reels are concepts and ideas from outside our universe.

The senders are so alien to our way of life that there’s no knowing what their intentions were, but in our world their message, when completely assembled by watching all the tapes, takes on actual physical shape -- it hatches in the form of a worm in the viewer’s brain, which slowly eats the surrounding flesh, driving the victim mad and eventually killing them.

Cardiss felt the worm hatch in his own brain, and spent his time in prison in the horrified knowledge that a parasite was slowly destroying his faculties. The re-acquisition of the tapes was an attempt to find a cure for himself, and stop the malady from spreading, but in the end, there wasn’t enough time left to him. Anyone who watches the complete series of tapes is in danger of suffering the same fate.

2 The symbols in the backdrops are just a distraction. Anyone who studies the tapes carefully will notice that there are occasional frames spliced into the reels which have nothing to do with pornography -- they’re texts copied from a magical tome venerating Y’Golonac and laying out the materials and method of casting spells peculiar to Y’Golonac’s cult.

However, one of the viewers who was a quicker study than the others transcribed the tome and began using its spells to murder his fellow cultists and potential rivals. Cardiss was unable to do anything about this while behind bars, but when released, he tracked down and confronted the killer. Three years without practicing had made his skills rusty enough to lose the fight, though. The other cultist and the remaining tomes-on-tape are still at large.

3 There is nothing unusual about the tapes, the weird symbols are just Cardiss’ idea of good cinema.

When his corrosive influence was removed, his wife Dorothea (who fell pregnant during the shoot) set about reinventing herself. She moved away with her infant son, concocted a fictitious background to protect her reputation, and married well. The destruction of the tapes was a peace offering made by Cardiss in an attempt at reconciliation, and the deaths were just Cardiss’ friends falling victim to their other vices.

However, Dorothea’s family can still be hurt if her past comes out. Their money is in a complicated series of legal trusts set up by a conservative religious ancestor, and the bulk of it will revert to another branch of the family if the line is revealed to include an illegitimate birth. If evidence of the her activities on film is made public, the trust’s executors will strip them of their rights as beneficiaries.

© Chris Kerr

Slump-Fast

Let’s see, what’s in the mailbox:

Image by artflow.ai

Bill, notice, advertising, bill -oh, a package... pfft, another marketing trick with a free sample of a new diet drug called Slump-fast - 100% guaranteed weight loss, even after eating prime ribs for a whole week while only working the chew muscles... well, it’s free and you’ve gained a bit weight - how bad can it be?

Possibilities

1 It works! Unbelievably, it works! Slump-Fast got thousands of happy customers in the last few weeks, who enjoy eating anything they want, while still losing weight. No side effects, nothing - and all the while, people enjoy eating more... and more... and more... ... ‘Brains!’ ... !

2 Behind Slump-Fast is a group of cultists-cum-businessmen, who worship the old ones. The drug itself contains eggs of a microscopic form of extra-terrestrial larvae, which will spread inside the body, nourishing themselves from body fat. They won’t harm the carrier’s body or internal organs (at least in the first years...). However, they’ll start to take control over their victim's body, first only while sleeping or unconscious, later even in conscious state, making them obedient to the cultist’s telepathic orders.

3 A week later: Of course, no loss of weight. Another bluff package! In fact, analysis shows, that the drug only contains the usual ingredients allowed for a non-prescriptive drug: herbs, water, salt, plutonium... Plutonium?!

© Philipp Mählmann

I am not dead yet!

The investigators are approached by the police to identify a body. The officers are strangely reticent about who it is they are about to show in the morgue, and why the investigators specifically have been approached.

This small mystery is quickly resolved as the coroner throws back the white linen sheet from the body - it is one of the investigators. Fingerprints are near identical, as would be DNA if technology allows. The character knows nothing about having a twin.

Possibilities

1 The person is the character’s identical twin, separated at birth, who recently found out about his sibling. He (or she) was on his way to visit when he met his murderers - cultists, who thought they had caught one of their old enemies. They killed him (or her) in their traditional and easily recognizable way, and will be more than a little surprised to find that the person they thought dead is still walking.

2 Strange markings on the body, that are only be identified by consulting obscure books, reveal that the dead person was attempting a shape-changing spell. Presumably they intended to impersonate the investigator, when something went wrong. But why?

3 Upon closer inspection it becomes obvious that the dead person has marks and scars only recently acquired by the character. Upon even closer inspection, the characters realize that the still-living version, their friend and fellow investigator, does not have them. Obviously, the original investigator really is dead and lying in front of them - and whatever is standing with them is some kind of impersonation!

© Felix Girke

Hyde's New Face

A month ago Mr Hyde developed a growth on his thigh. Doctors assured him it was benign and scheduled an operation to remove the tumour. However, a week ago the pallid sac had grown a tiny grotesque face. Mr Hyde was even more disturbed by what the face said. It spoke of “hideous truths unknown to humanity.” Whenever Mr Hyde tried to show the growth to someone the face vanished; all anyone could see was a fleshy lump.

The “secrets of hell” that the face has told Mr Hyde have driven him near mad. The face has also convinced him that should it be removed then Mr Hyde will die. Can the investigators help before the operation?

Possibilities

1 Mr Hyde is carrying an evil parasitic life-form which, left untreated, will drive the host insane before taking over the whole body. Surgically removing the parasite will kill Mr Hyde. The only remedy is exorcism.

2 Mr Hyde has a rare disease that causes tumours and insanity. There is neither face nor danger of death. However, merely removing the lump is no cure. Another tumour will appear along with increasingly violent mental instability. The disease may be contagious.

3 The face belongs to a previously dormant underdeveloped conjoined twin that Mr Hyde’s body had absorbed whilst in the womb. The twin somehow survived and now jealously wants to have a body of its own. The twin can force Mr Hyde’s body to reabsorb its face when observed. Over time the twin will filter more and more nutrients to itself, eventually growing limbs while its brother becomes weaker. At the right time, the twin will extricate itself from its brother’s body. Surgery can save Mr Hyde, but only by murdering the conjoined twin.

© Chris Moreby

Barratt's Brain

Eric Barrett’s short life wasn’t a happy one. Confined to an asylum at four when he began to exhibit autistic behaviour, he spent three years scribbling weird, meaningless shapes on any scrap of paper he could reach, before finally dying of unknown causes.

Eager to study an unusual case further, the asylum’s doctors have convinced the grieving parents to allow them to perform an autopsy and craniotomy to identify the cause of death.

They cut into the boy’s skull and find...

Possibilities

1   ...a brass clockwork engine where his brain should be.

It’s still ticking over, tiny wires tugging at nerves and muscles that no longer respond. Interior convolutions of the skull suggest that the engine somehow GREW in its current position.

Eric’s uncle Phillip was an investigator into the unknown who looked too deeply into mysteries he should have avoided, and slowly went mad. In his insanity, he talked about the things he’d discovered. No-one listened, except his nephew, who didn’t understand what he was hearing. He understood one thing, though—the name ‘Hastur’. He made a game out of repeating it, and even invented a pretend playmate named Hastur.

The childish chanting, coupled with a boyish imagination that treated Hastur as real, was enough to evoke a partial manifestation of the Great Old One, with limited power. Eric and Hastur spent countless hours together, and Hastur told him things even his uncle didn’t know. The boy’s devastating transformation is the result.

His three years of drawings contain mythos secrets imparted by Hastur. Only a few, but they’re big ones, and each is repeated hundreds of times. Someone with the right knowledge could interpret them to reveal information with horrible implications for the whole human race. The Barrett’s have no idea what they have stuck on their fridge.

2.  ...a hollow, filled with nothing but bloody fluid.

Three years ago, parts of Eric’s brain were extracted by mi-go while the family vacationed at a mountain lake resort. They left enough to maintain basic functions, but took everything responsible for higher thought. The mi-go used those pieces of Eric in a mi-go mining machine, burrowing for minerals under the same lake he stayed at with his parents.

Worse, a week ago, Eric’s parents received a phone call in a buzzing, metallic voice claiming to BE Eric, begging them to rescue him. They thought it was a cruel joke, but if the boy is still alive in some form, something will have to be done.

The scribbled drawings are maps of mine shafts, somehow transmitted by the remainder of his brain.

3.  ...a bullet.

While she was pregnant, Eric’s mother was injured in a drive-by shooting. Because it was so close to her unborn baby, the doctors who attended her elected to leave the bullet in place and remove it after the boy was born. However, exploratory surgery failed to locate it after the birth.

The bullet penetrated Eric’s skull, and his brain formed around it. However, the lead slowly poisoned him, leading to the mental breakdown and eventual death.

The gangster responsible for the shooting was never convicted, and is now a wealthy and powerful man. A ballistic examination of the bullet could be the evidence which finally puts him behind bars.

The drawings are meaningless.

© Chris Kerr

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

The Fatted Calf

Hilary Eastfield notices that over a period of several weeks she is gaining weight. No matter how much exercise she does or how little she eats she keeps piling on the fat. There is no end to her ever-increasing girth and calculations reveal she is steadily gaining a pound a day. Doctors shed no light on the phenomenon and give the impression that they think she is hiding psychological problems that manifest themselves as a compulsive eating disorder.

Maybe they are right. However, if Hilary asks a close friend to keep watch on her at all times she discovers that the weight gain has nothing to do with excess eating and actually occurs at midnight every night.

Possibilities

1 Hilary has been selected as the next carrier of the Bloated Woman avatar. Upon reaching about 400 pounds she is visited by a tall, strongly-built man with jet-black skin who rapes her. As he does so, Hilary’s soul and consciousness are driven out of her body and the chaos of Nyarlathotep takes over.

2 Hoping to derive power from Ghatanathoa, a witch, cultist and sorceress has identified Hilary as a prime sacrifice. As sacrifices need fattening, she is using her powers to bring this about. If Hilary is unable to track down the witch, she will eventually be visited by a manifestation of Ghatanathoa who feasts upon her living flesh.

3 Craig Hampson is the grotesquely fat leader of a local cult. His voracious eating habits mean that he has had to find a way to rid himself of the excess weight. Whilst trawling through ancient Sumerian texts he found a spell that may help him.

He selected Hilary at random; his trial victim. His spell is a success and weight transfers from his frame to Hilary’s. Once she dies (from obesity) he chooses another victim.

© Simon Taylor

Fluke

James Simpson has been infected by a parasite, currently living in his gut. The parasite is meta-dimensional, winking in and out of this plane; as it feeds and grows stronger, it becomes more anchored in this plane. Simpson conversely becomes weaker as the parasite grows stronger.

Conventional medical procedures (purges, emetics, even surgery) have no effect, as the parasite flicks between dimensions until the danger to it passes. Ultimately, the parasite becomes strong enough to be permanently anchored in this plane. When this happens, Simpson is dying and the parasite (about two feet long and an inch in diameter) can be felt under his abdomen.

The parasite possesses one other unusual feature – It can compress its circumference until it is able to pass through the smallest of holes (although it is later able to tear its way through bone, plaster, and light brickwork). This means that it can exit Simpson at any time through his ears, tear ducts, nose, mouth, penis, or anus, should it be provoked.

Possibilities

1 Simpson, formerly an explorer and anthropologist, was captured and tortured by the Tcho-Tcho people in south-east Asia who tattooed on his belly summoning and binding rituals. Rapid research might reveal a dismissal spell but unless the investigators can remove the tattoos the worm will be summoned back into its host.

2 Simpson is the victim of a summoning spell cast by a hostile sorcerer. An Elder Sign pressed against his abdomen causes the parasite to erupt violently from Simpson, killing him. The worm is ‘anchored’ in front of the Elder Sign and can then be dealt with relatively easily.

3 The parasite is a servitor of Crom Cruach, the great worm god. It consumes Simpson entirely, before moving on. Once Simpson is consumed, the worm is larger and can enter and internally consume one more human-sized body, after which it reaches anaconda-sized proportions. Any further attempts to enter a human body results in the host’s immediate and messy destruction, unable to accommodate the creature’s increased size.

© Charles Ross

Buzzing

All day long images have been flashing into the investigators brain: electricity pylons, bee hives, neon lights, electric trains, and air conditioning vents. These images don’t have any bearing on what has been going on around her, but still the images are there.

That night, the investigator’s dreams are filled with the same images but this time a unifying theme is sensed: buzzing. All of the items are buzzing, a constant humming sound fills the dreams. Next morning the investigator wakes with an intense headache and still the buzzing fills her head. In fact, now she thinks about it, the sound has been there for the last couple of days, just too quiet for her to detect consciously.

Possibilities

1 The investigator is psychically sensitive but is ignorant of that fact. Some miles below her house a cthonian has laid an egg, an egg due to hatch in the next couple of days. The buzzing in her head is actually the telepathic communications between mother and young. As the hatching gets nearer the telepathic traffic gets heavier and heavier. When the egg hatches the telepathic blast might push her over the edge.

The parent and young then move on, possibly causing seismic disturbances in the process. The effect stops if the investigator leaves the area.

2 The investigator is carrying the eggs of a genetically engineered creature in her head. The creature has been created by the Mi-Go and planted in the investigator as an experiment. The next stage in the creature’s life cycle is a maggot type larva which stops buzzing but instead consumes the frontal lobe of the investigator’s brain causing her to lose all reasoning faculties in the process. Then it eats its way out of the investigator’s head via her ear. Finally, the creature pupates into a large fly-type creature which will search for more humans to deposit eggs into.

The investigator may feel grateful when the buzzing stops but if she realised what was going to happen next perhaps she wouldn’t feel so relieved.

3 Thinking back a few days, the investigator remembers a strange encounter in the street. A small man in a black suit approached her and asked for directions. He had a strongly oriental accent and appearance. After his brief, and dull, conversation with the investigator he touched her left hand very briefly whilst saying “Thank you.” The investigator had felt a slight itching sensation in her hand for the rest of the day but could not identify anything else wrong.

The oriental was in fact a cult assassin trained in the art of the Quivering Palm. The assassin has set up deadly vibrations in the body of the investigator, vibrations that in a few more days will cause the investigator’s head to messily explode.

© Simon Taylor

Book of Bones

Weeks or months after a brush with the Mythos, the modern-day investigator notices an irregular bruise spontaneously forming on one arm. Though painless, the bruise appears to resemble illegible writing. Over days, despite all efforts, the bruise spreads and grows legible. An X-ray or CAT scan shows that the investigator’s bones are engraved with small, precise letters in an alien script, which the growing bruise duplicates.

Possibilities

1 In the earlier Mythos encounter, Nyarlathotep noticed and cursed the investigator. The alien words, when fully formed in a week, transform the investigator into a Living Bruise, an invalid who lives in continual agony. Certain tattoos cure the curse (without conferring other protection), but the only qualified tattoo artist lives in Burma. Alternately, the victim can call Nyarlathotep, who grants a year’s relief from the curse in return for a service, such as destroying an Elder Sign in a distant ruin.

2 Decades ago the investigator’s grandfather, a secret worshipper of Yog-Sothoth, performed a ritual on his unconscious daughter that marked all her descendants. The investigator’s siblings are also forming bruises, which describe the spell Call Yog-Sothoth. Each victim experiences dreams that translate the alien script. The investigator’s attempts to inform his siblings may heal or create family breaches. The bruises fade normally, but will reappear in the next generation.

3 Despite the victim’s entreaties, the doctor who performed the CAT scan can’t resist sharing the peculiar case with fellow physicians. Word reaches a Brother of the Yellow Sign in a nearby hospital, who identifies the investigator as a sacrificial victim chosen by Hastur. A group of cultists posing as doctors capture the investigator and friends and read the bruises aloud. The resulting spell transports the investigators to the underground world of K’n-Yan, where Brothers wait to flense the flesh from the victim’s bones and inter them in a sacred library. If the victim escapes, the bruises fade.

© Allen Varney

Scarlet Fever

It is a rather peculiar disease, liquefying flesh into a thick red jelly, leaving only bones and skin untouched. Bodily functions continue unimpaired until the end. It is so rare that it does not yet have a name, let alone a cure.

Victims are often completely unaware that they carry the disease. Realisation sinks in only when cut: instead of blood, jelly wells out of the wound. Their skin does not heal, and if left unbandaged shrinks and wrinkles as the victim’s liquefied flesh oozes out.

Possibilities

1 The disease is caused by a body thief. The body thief possesses human victims in the course of its evil design. It is so successful at possession, that it has not had to materialise into its original, monstrous, form for many years now.

The unfortunate human is unaware of the possession, which lasts for a maximum of six months. After that the disease, a by-product of the process, causes the human body to fail irretrievably. The body thief then moves on.

2 A vampire is afoot, feeding on pre-digested human flesh. It has two forms; the first a tall and handsome human, the other a multi-legged maggot-thing with a stabbing proboscis.

The vampire-thing needs to inject its prey with digestive juices some months before feeding. It makes two visits, injecting juices at first and then returning once its victim is ripe.

3 Nyarlathotep occasionally chooses a bride. Or groom, it makes no difference. Nyarlathotep appears to the chosen individual in full regalia, and proposes. If the chosen individual accepts, they become its bride or groom and reside in the Daemon Sultan’s court for the rest of eternity.

Those that refuse are set free and cursed: everyone they encounter for more than a few hours will die, afflicted with a terrible liquefying disease. At midnight on the night of each full moon Nyarlathotep returns to ask, again, for their hand. If they accepts, the Outer God takes them to Azathoth’s court for the wedding and matrimonial bliss. If they decline, more are consigned to a grisly fate.

Eventually Nyarlathotep becomes bored with its bride/groom, and it is time to choose another.

© Steve Hatherley