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

Oblivion Circle

One peaceful night the investigator goes to sleep normally in her own bed. Hearing a noise in the night, the investigator wakes to find the world outside her bedroom totally changed. Odd, many-legged chairs and tables and weirdly organic trinkets now furnish her home. Other residents sleep soundly but if awakened, see nothing wrong. They seem well disposed toward the investigator, yet their speech sounds ominously strange; for instance, they swear by the names of unknown gods.

The night world outside the investigator’s house has also changed. She sees dreamily twisted houses, new bends in once-familiar roads, and inexplicable advertisements. (“Play Canton-Prefecture Super Lotto and win up to three years of life!”) Newspapers bear enigmatic headlines such as “Kaiser denies cranching out of control.” The victim detects no single obvious branch from her previous reality.

Fellow investigators, too, have changed and now pursue surreally distorted goals. Where the victim might remember a journalist ally as a zealous seeker of truth, the changed reporter now just as zealously casts horoscopes of target politicians, divining their future misdeeds. Though friendly toward the victim, changed investigators recognize nothing wrong with the world, instead believing the victim herself mad.

The victim may explore this nightmare world until dawn. Then she awakens in her bed, with the world outside back to normal. Yet she holds physical evidence that proves her “dream” actually happened, and an unbroken circle of white dust surrounds her bed.

Possibilities

1 An enemy sorcerer has magically transported the investigator into a carefully prepared section of the Dreamlands. Eavesdropping on the victim’s movements, the magician hopes to learn the whereabouts of incriminating evidence or a vital object the investigator owns. After the sorcerer learns the desired information, he dissolves the enchantment, returning the victim to the waking world.

2 In a previous adventure, the investigator offended a Cthulhoid cult. Cultists have projected her into a nightmare world of their communal imagining. They forge the physical evidence to make the illusion convincing. Though the spell cannot work in daylight, the cult intends to torment the investigator nightly until she goes mad.

3 The investigator has gone mad and created a submerged, split personality. This personality creates the nightly dream vision, a projection of the world she would prefer to live in. The mad investigator hallucinates the “physical evidence” and dust circle. Because some sane part of her still dwells on current investigations, the subconscious intuitions revealed in her nightmares may prompt genuine real-world leads.

© Allen Varney

Latin Course

This takes place after the investigators have found a book written in Latin - a language they don’t already master. Therefore they need to learn Latin before they can read the ancient book. As luck would have it, there’s a Latin course held at the local university. The course is taken by Professor Donald Brown, an elderly man with a strange accent.

Image by artflow.ai

Possibilities

1 Donald Brown is a sorcerer from Hungary. The locals discovered his Mythos activities and poisoned him. He survived but was partly paralyzed and managed to escaped to the USA. As a professor of Latin, it was easy for him to get a job at the university. The class also gives him opportunity to meet young people with healthy bodies. He now plans on finding someone with a weak mind and perform a mind transfer to get a new healthy young body.

2 One of the other students is Timothy Lyman, a young dilettante. He is taking the course to improve his Latin, as his present skill in the language was not sufficient to read a newly-bought book. The book, however, is written by Nyarlathotep and contains a spell that will summon Azathoth. Once someone has begun reading the book, they are compelled to complete it and cast the spell. If they does not do this then Nyarlathotep sends dreams to the reader, forcing him to finish the task. The dreams describe how anyone casting the spell will be greatly rewarded by the Deamon Sultan. Unknown to Lyman, however, summoning Azathoth resembles detonating a nuclear bomb.

3 The investigators feel unwelcome. It is as if the rest of the class (including the professor) is keeping a secret from them. The truth is that the whole class is a cult, and the lecturer is the high priest. Nobody actually learns Latin during the lectures (instead Latin cult phrases are repeated and learned by rote). The investigators have been placed in this class by mistake - will they discover the mistake before they are abducted and sacrificed at the next sabbath?

© Nicolai E Lassen

Hands

It’s late one night on a particularly isolated stretch of road. The temperature begins to drop, and the driver suddenly senses that “something else” is in the car.

Image by artflow.ai

Suddenly, a pair of hairy Hands reach over and grasp the wheel, wrenching it from the driver’s control. The vehicle spins to a halt, narrowly missing some trees. Immediately the Hands vanish, having been there for mere seconds. A careful examination of the car reveals no anomalies.

The disembodied Hands are extremely strong. Each Hand has three sinewy fingers and a thumb, each sporting a talon or claw. The Hands usually appear attached to powerful forearms that disappear at the elbow. They never attack directly, but may operate machines, prod and shove people/objects and even scratch or write messages.

The Hands usually appear out of nowhere, work their evil, and then vanish abruptly.

Possibilities

1 The “Hairy Hands” are a popular local myth. The stretch of road in question is notorious for fatal accidents, and many survivors of accidents claim to have seen the hideous Hands. Legend states that a murderer was lynched on that spot 150 years ago - and that the spirit of the murderer lives on.

2 The vehicle itself is haunted. When it was very new, it struck and killed a young man, Frederick Winterbottom. Winterbottom himself dabbled in dubious occult arts and his spirit now haunts the car.

3 The Hands were a part of a deliberate attack by the remnants of a previously vanquished cult. Remaining members, seeking revenge, have summoned a black and terrible spirit to do their bloody deed. Part of the summoning ritual involved each cultist cutting off a hand. The Hands will not cease until revenge is complete.

(Inspired by the “hairy hands of Dartmoor”.)

© Rob Illing

The Unborn

Not long ago the Amaranth Abortion Clinic was shut down for health violations, and it turned out that the doctors were practising without a license. Somehow they avoided prosecution, and are now running an underground clinic out of a run-down warehouse. They practice for free, taking only the fetuses of their clients as payment.

Image by Artflow.ai

Possibilities

1 The doctors are members of a cult who are using stem cells from the aborted fetuses to rejuvenate their dead god.

2 The doctors are being manipulated by an alien intelligence (or simply crazy), and are using the undifferentiated embryonic tissue that they collect to build a horrific pulsing, psychic mass in the basement of the clinic.

3 The doctors are harvesting the massive reserves of mental energies contained within the fetuses to power a spell of apocalyptic proportions.

© Ben Kohanski

The Missing Body

It’s been a big topic of conversation for three days now. Renowned anthropologist Marvin Reardon was found dead in his home with a knife in his chest. At the morgue, his body disappeared without a trace. However the investigators get involved, a few things come out. Reardon’s lover Cordelia Loomis was the last person to see him. Her story is she had an argument with him but left him alive. Loomis is a rich girl, and there are many rumors about her past and source of money, including criminal activities. She often vacations at seaside resorts.

The coroner Jackson Walters has been acting nervous since the body went missing. He took a week off and has rarely left his house. Friends are mystified at his odd behavior.

Possibilities

1 An alien worshipper of the Outer Gods is hiding in Jackson Walters’ attic. Walters has been feeding it dead animals, but it has demanding more so Walters stole a body from the morgue. As the thing tells him about the mythos Walters loses more of his sanity. It won’t be long before he steals another body or worse.

2 Cordelia Loomis is a deep one cultist. When Reardon was drunk she took him to a cult ceremony where he drank the blood of a deep one while the cultists chanted. The blood and the ritual turned him into a deep one hybrid. When Reardon found out he didn’t take it well and threatened to stop the cult forcing her to kill him. Later the body was stolen to keep the secret. Jackson Walters found evidence of Reardon’s transformation and was shaken up.

3 Loomis was mad at Reardon and summoned a star vampire to kill him. When it was done she stuck a knife in him to make it look less suspicious. Jackson Walters found him drained of blood and received a threatening note in the mail to get rid of the body or be killed. He did what it said and this is the reason for his nervousness.

© Randi Drysdale

The Face of God

A religious revival has struck a small town that lies far away from the rest of human civilization. Many people there claim to have seen the true face of God. Unfortunately, seeing the true face of God seems to be a traumatic experience; everyone who has undergone this ecstatic experience has emerged blind, some with their faces terribly scarred.

The investigators may be led to the town by any of a number of forces. Perhaps strange omens point them in that direction. Townspeople may beg for their assistance, or an investigator’s relative may be one of the blinded victims of this harsh god. For proactive investigators, a simple newspaper clipping may be sufficient. By whatever means, the investigators will arrive, and soon see that something is distinctively wrong.

That old time religion has caught on in a big way in the town, but some of the rites that the people practice seem distinctly odd. After they have been in the town for a night, investigators will very quickly realize that this revival is supernatural in nature. They begin to have strange dreams of the past, imparting ancient knowledge upon them that Man should not know.

Unless they are very careful, investigators will find themselves mindless minions of the town’s new god, themselves seeking new followers to bring into the fold.

Possibilities

1 The Great Old One, Nyogtha, has come to be trapped beneath this town. It was accidently contacted by innocent townsfolk, who soon found themselves practicing its dark rituals in order to preserve their lives. The reluctant cultists are blinded by Nyogtha so that they may better understand The Thing That Should Not Be. At least once a month, they also bring Nyogtha a sacrifice, to sate its dark hunger.

Although most of Nyogtha’s worshipers are reluctant, they are too fearful to make any move against the Great Old One. Some townsfolk, however, have grown to love the power that Nyogtha offers, and have thus joined into the Cult whole-heartedly. They know secret spells to control the living darkness, and will gleefully use them.

Investigators who enter Nyogtha’s town are likely to be inducted into the Cult by force, or offered up as a sacrifice.

2 A small band of cultists reside in the small town. They practice secret rites that allow them to look deep into the past, and have been using them for months to rediscover ancient sorcerous powers.

Sometimes, their dreams of the past cross into the consciousness of others. The cultists know when this happens, and they kidnap the unfortunate innocent, and force them to participate in a magical ritual. This ritual causes the victim to forget what they saw, leaving only vague impressions of a brush with divinity. The eyes of the victim must be put out during this ritual. When the investigators arrive in town, and begin dreaming of the past, they have accidently crossed paths with the cultist’s rituals, and are thus marked as the next victims.

These cultists have learned many spells from the past, and should be fearsome adverseries. They can manipulate time and space in many exotic fashions.

3 The people of the town have indeed seen the True Face of a God. It is Hypnos, an Elder God. Although certain legends say that the Elder Gods are benevolent, in truth, they do not care; men are less than fleas to them. Through cosmic accident, Hypnos’ true presence lies across this place on the earth. Those who see it have their eyes seared out, and are sometimes reduced to madness.

Still, due to the basic perversity of the human race, a great cult has sprung up around this god. If an investigator shows the least vestige of interest in the face of god, he will be preached to extensively. Many of Hypnos’ followers are great orators. Some have been changed by their nearness to their god, and have gained supernatural means to convince people of their rightness.

If the investigators do not fall prey to the beckoning of Hypnos, they must decide what to do with this situation. If they do not evacuate the town, and mark it forever uninhabitable, it is likely that a trip to the Dreamlands will be required, to somehow cause Hypnos to be moved from his current resting place.

© Shannon Appel

Pathogen

A microbiologist, a friend of the investigators, is found dead. Officials rule the death a suicide, but those who knew the scientist are baffled. He was respected in his field and had no family or financial troubles. Adding to the mystery and his loved ones’ grief, federal authorities are subjecting the scientist’s friends and family to intense interrogations, giving them stern warnings to keep their suspicions to themselves. Investigators find that at least a dozen other microbiologists across the globe have died, committed suicide, or disappeared under suspicious circumstances in the past month.

Possibilities

1 The microbiologists were part of a project focused on finding a vaccine for black pox, a form of hemorrhagic smallpox, 100% fatal if contracted. An ecological-based cult stole a weaponized-strain developed by the Soviets during the Cold War. Believing the human population needs to be reduced from billions to just a few thousand to save the planet, the cult plans on releasing the virus. Anyone who may prove a threat to this plan, such as the microbiologists, is targeted for assassination. The federal authorities are trying to track down the cult before the virus is released, and covering-up the plot to stave off a panic.

2 An alien race known as the Colony, an intelligent virus, is invading the planet. While it can survive outside of a host-body for centuries, the Colony requires warm-blooded animals to reproduce, finding humanity to be an inviting host. While humans are capable of fighting off the disease, children, elderly, and the sick are highly susceptible to infection. Those infected develop flu-like symptoms for a week while their body tries to fight off the disease; those losing the fight are controlled mind, body, and soul by the Colony. Terrified of being discovered and losing its favorite new hosts, the Colony is assassinating microbiologists.

3 A group within the federal government is behind the assassinations. A cult known as the Elite, made up of leaders from the worlds of politics, business, religion, and the military, hired the microbiologists to develop a doomsday virus as well as the cure. The Elite plan on releasing the virus, reducing the human population to a controllable level, while they themselves are immune from infection. Knowing the Elite are above the law due to their positions of influence, the group within the federal government is waging a secret war against the cult in a desperate attempt to foil the plot. The investigators discover their friend planned on introducing them to the Elite and inoculating them against the doomsday virus; now the investigators may be targets of both the cult and the government group.

© Bruce Priddy

Music from the Stars

A group of radio astronomers working in a secluded desert observatory have died. Investigation suggests that they all killed each other in a kind of frenzied bloodlust. Detailed investigation reveals that the astronomers were picking up a strange signal from a distant star - a strange kind of music with high-pitched wails and deep groaning moans.

Possibilities

1 The song is the Song of Shoggoth and is transmitted from a star in a far-distant galaxy. The song is a prayer that causes madness in weak-willed humans. Cults in certain areas of South America have duplicated the song in their own way over the years but none of them has ever brought the madness that the true Song of Shoggoth brings upon those who hear it.

2 The astronomers picked up a communication from another galaxy that is being sent by a highly advanced civilization as a message of peace. However, the message is too complex for human minds to comprehend, and those that try are stricken with madness.

3 The music is made by the mi-go as they travel across the vastness of space. It is filled with subliminal signals that are meant to convey an attitude of peace and solitude, but human minds cannot process the complexity of the music and they go insane from listening to it for too long.

© Paul Comeau

Mrs Whathernam

Mrs Wathernam is a nice old lady living down the street in a small but cozy home with a little garden. Mrs Whathernam adores children; many parents, who can’t afford a place in the kindergarden, send their children to her. There, they can play in her garden, Mrs Whaternam knows lots of games to play, never gets angry and bakes wonderful cakes.

Possibilities

1 Mrs Whathernam is really just a nice lady - with a tragic past: her husband returned from the war, but body and spirit broken. One night, he couldn’t stand it any longer, took a gun and turned on his family before killing himself. Mrs Whathernam survived, but her husband murdered their child.

By day, some of the children claim to have played with an unknown young boy; by night, people tell of a dark figure in a uniform staring out of the windows.

2 Mrs Whathernam has a dark secret: she is a murderer. Years ago, she and her husband were members of a dark cult and sacrificed people in their occult rituals. The cult was infiltrated by the authorities, and the cultists were arrested. Some were hanged, some committed suicide. Mrs Whathernam (not her real name) escaped...

3 Mrs Whathernam really, REALLY likes children - especially served with honey orange marinade and added spice...

© Philipp Mählmann

Gloomy Sunday

‘Gloomy Sunday’ is a mournful song about a young man deciding to follow the woman he loves into death, written and recorded in Hungary in 1933. A composer named Reszo Seress wrote it shortly after breaking up with a long-time girlfriend, and it quickly became popular, but also began to develop an odd reputation as the ‘Hungarian Suicide Song’. A number of deaths were linked to Gloomy Sunday, with suicides following a playing of the song, or lyrics from it appearing in suicide notes. Shortly after he approached her seeking a reconciliation, the composer’s girlfriend killed herself, leaving a note reading only “Szomorú Vasárnap” -- ‘Gloomy Sunday’.

An English language version was recorded, and Gloomy Sunday’s reputation as the suicide song spread across Europe and America, to a lesser degree than in Hungary, but still worrying authorities to the point of banning it from radio in several places.

(This is all true. There are websites that detail the song’s history or debunk the ‘suicide song’ legend, and various recordings available for download.)

Now, a dusty and rather scratchy original recording of the song being played by its composer has been restored and duplicated with a clarity never heard before, and the original Hungarian version of Gloomy Sunday is regaining popularity -- but this version of the song seems to have a power over its listeners that none of the previously mass-marketed recordings came close to matching. Listeners find themselves babbling snatches of Hungarian they don’t understand, experiencing terrible and sourceless fears, seeing strange visions they can’t explain, and killing themselves at a frightening rate.

Possibilities

1 Seress was a cultist, and quite mad. Along with the strange and troubling music he composed, there were rituals venerating forgotten gods. He forced his fiancee to join him, and at first she went along with it willingly, humouring a man she loved and believed could be brought back to sanity with patience and quiet surroundings. But soon the forbidden knowledge she was learning through their descent into the mythos began to horrify her. When she protested, Seress threatened to kill her if she backed out or if she told anyone of what they were doing.

His efforts were building towards a final rite he was reluctant to tell her about, but her own researches gave her an idea of what he was planning, and the sick fear of it became too much for her: she killed herself. Seress was furious at her betrayal, but continued his preparations for the rite as though he believed there would still be a second participant.

Now, the specially-prepared Gloomy Sunday recording acts as a kind of trap for the woman’s spirit, periodically forcing her to inhabit and possess a listener’s body against her will. It also calls to Seress, who immediately gives chase, armed with magical methods to force her to join him in the final ritual. The repeated suicides are the unfortunate ghost’s only way to free herself from the trap.

If nobody intervenes, the deaths continue until Seress finally captures his late fiancee and goes ahead with the ritual.

2 Seress wasn’t much of a composer, but he was a charming man with a wide range of acquaintances, and an accomplished plagiarist. One of his friends was a German-Hungarian scientist experimenting with brainwave transference using salvaged mi-go technology and money provided by Hitler’s Reichstag. He was exploring a promising method of transferring thoughts and memories from one mind to another encoded in repeating tones like the melody of a song. Seress liked the ‘music’ he heard in the scientist’s home one night, and left with the recording hidden under his coat, eventually publishing an adapted version of it with lyrics written by another acquaintance, as Gloomy Sunday.

Now listeners are experiencing some of the scientist’s recorded thoughts as they listen to his brainwave-duplicating sounds, including his growing doubt and guilt over accepting money from nazis, and increasingly paranoid fear of what can only be mi-go attempts at intimidation in order to reclaim their equipment.

If nobody intervenes, the Gloomy Sunday reputation continues to grow and the recording’s publisher quietly takes that version off the market. Isolated suicides continue, as private copies still exist.

3 Gloomy Sunday is simply a sad, regretful song with nothing supernatural about it. The wax the recording is pressed from is contaminated with toxic chemicals that fill the air with poisonous fumes when played. The hallucinations and deep depression listeners experience are symptoms of exposure.

In time, the recording company will switch to a safer material and try to hush up the deaths, leaving thousands of potentially deadly records in the hands of the public.

© Chris Kerr

Trouble on the Tracks

It is sometime in the 1920s when, during one of the worst winters in memory, an overnight sleeper train meets with a terrible accident. Amid a fierce gale, the express jumps the tracks and plunges into the icy waters beside the railroad. A dozen bodies have been recovered from the wreckage, but 20 people are still missing, including the engine-driver and stoker. Survivors and bodies have been taken by road to the nearest town. The police and railroad company engineers are looking into the causes of the accident.

Possibilities

1 Degenerate Serpent People from a decaying colony in caves near the railway have struck a blow against the hated humans who, with their noisy, polluting machines, have usurped the rightful position of the reptilians as masters of the Earth. The Serpent People have tunnelled beneath the rail-tracks to cause the accident. They are only interested in killing humans: the missing people are dead.

2 Deep Ones from an undersea colony off the coast are experiencing breeding problems. Fertility rates are dropping, and almost every child born to the colony for the last hundred years has been male, so the male/female ratio has become grossly unbalanced.

Desperate to find females to breed with, but aware that raiding another Deep One settlement or attacking a local community would cause more problems than they could deal with, the Deep Ones launched an assault on the overnight sleeper to steal human brides.

Of the people missing from the train, 16 are female. Of the bodies recovered, ten are male. Most of the missing females have been taken to the hybrid settlement.

3 One of the passengers on the train has interfered once too often in the affairs of a particular cult. Enraged by the investigator’s troublemaking, the cultists have summoned a hunting horror to wreak vengeance on the meddler. The Hunting Horror attacks while the investigator is travelling on the train, terrorising the engine crew and causing the driver to take a bend at an unsafe speed.

©  Tony Hickie

To the Future

Antiques are being stolen from houses throughout the area. Only items over a hundred years old are removed and any other valuables are left alone. The only clue left by the thieves is a slogan scrawled across a wall: “To the Future!”

Possibilities

1 There is a group, perhaps based around the artistic movements of Futurism and Vorticism, that is destroying old things as a matter of principle. They wish to rid the world of its past in order to hurry in a new, utopian society. The group could be worshippers of Yog-Sothoth and seek to open a gateway to the future.

2 The group is as above but they are really being manipulated by a group of art thieves. The furnace that the antiques are being sacrificed in is actually a complicated set of lights and mirrors concealing a conveyor belt that leads to a neighboring building. Here the antiques are evaluated and packaged before being distributed throughout the illegal art trade.

3 The thefts are all part of an elaborate insurance scam. The “victims” of the thefts are all close to bankruptcy or are in dire financial need. They have been approached by the thieves who are willing to remove and sell on the antiques for a large percentage of their value.

(Something like this could cause quite a stir among Nephilim as their stasis items would be ripe targets for the thieves.)

© Simon Hopper

Thrice-Blessed Mohammedan Steel

While shopping in an Arabic antiquities store, a curious item comes into view. It is a beautiful, but simple 8th-century dagger. The dagger, according to its supposed history was recovered from a tomb outside of Baghdad.

The owner of the store, Bazzeel Shimmir, drives a hard bargain and will not sell to investigators unless they show significant knowledge of Arabic history. “This is an important artefact, not a trinket or a letter opener,” he says. The investigators are allowed to examine the dagger, but without a detailed inspection, its true nature is not discernable. If the investigators want to find out the daggers true nature, they must buy it or steal it.

Possibilities

1 The dagger was owned by Abdul Al Hazred and was taken from his body after he was torn apart by an invisible monster in Damascus. The dagger was created from metal from a meteor, which fell from the sky. The extra-terrestrial nature of the metal makes it quite effective against mythos entities. The dagger has passed through the hands of many affluent Arabs before arriving here.

2 Al Hazred’s dagger was stolen from a Cthulhu-worshipping death cult from Iraq. They are hell-bent on retrieving it, and Mr Shimmir is not aware of this, nor is he involved in its theft. If the investigators procure the dagger, they can expect trouble from these fellows. Them and their shoggoth.

3 The dagger is a fake and Mr Shimmir has sold dozens like it. He specializes in forging supposedly ancient and rare esoteric artefacts and selling them to pseudo intellectuals and Middle Eastern aficionados. His reluctance to sell was a subterfuge to drive up the price. The Keeper should suggest the dagger glimmers with energy and power (which is actually the lighting and the high polish of the blade); Mr Shimmir steers the dagger’s supposed history to meet the investigators’ expectations.

© Kevin Kaier

WHEL

A local radio station has just changed its format from country and western to hard rock. They have been wildly successful. Shirts bearing the WHEL logo have spread across town and investigators can hear the station blaring from cars city-wide. During this same period, acts of random violence have increased dramatically during the hours from 1am to 4am.

Incidents of beatings, muggings and rape have taken an unbelievable upswing. The police force has been placed on city-wide alert and the media has been in an uproar.

Possibilities

1 The two phenomena are unrelated. The radio station is just a radio station, the acts of violence are being committed by a gang operating out of the seedier side of town.

2 The radio station is a front for a sinister experiment in mind control. A local psychologist and physicist got together to conduct a simple experiment in auditory stimulation and mood elevation. Their results were staggering and attracted government attention. Now under the control of a government organization involved with black operations, these two men are being forced to experiment on a larger scale, the populace of a city. From 11pm to midnight, the station sends out a low modulated tone underneath their regular broadcast. This tone increases the propensity for violent actions in individuals with violent tendencies. The government will continue this experiment for another two weeks before moving to a different station elsewhere to experiment with a different series of tones.

3 The station has been acquired by the leader of a cult of Nyarlathotep. This large cult is scattered across the town, throughout the social strata. They have been waiting for a sign for years to begin a concentrated assault against the city, believing that if they can cause riots and mass panic, then their god will appear. Due to certain worldwide events, the cult leader believes the time is now. He is using the station to send coded messages to his followers between 11pm and midnight. The cultists then go out and sow the seeds of discord. The number and level of the atrocities will increase over time, culminating in daylight bombings of several public buildings and civic leaders' assassinations on the same day.

© Matt Cowger

The Big Lie

You receive a letter from an old high school friend, Tor Hukli. He is now a rich owner of a line of banks and has heard about your investigation activities and was wondering if you would like to be a special guest speaker at one of his business parties. Naturally, you accept.

When you get to his house you realize how big it is - a huge 6 story mansion. You get there at 7:00, and he tells you he would like you to speak right after he gives his speech.

Possibilities

1 Tor introduces you to some of the more notable guests at his party. They are all high-class businessmen, and as you speak to the different people you realize that they don’t know why this party is being held. Most of the people at the party are tired, and in deep thought. Only by getting one of the guests drunk do you learn that everyone at the party is a member of some ‘religious church group’ and that they are meeting in the woods later that night for some sort of ceremony...

2 You explore the house to kill time. The upper four floors are entirely deserted. Most of the rooms are empty or used for storage. At the end of one of the halls is a locked door with intricate designs depicting numerous mythological scenes carved into it. Only by picking the lock or breaking the door can you access the room - and doing so reveals a small alter with a book on it. A mythos book...

3 When Tor gets up to give his speech, the room goes silent. He proceeds to give a long speech about his banking line, pledges, and about how it started and has evolved. Everything seems normal until about half way through the speech when the audience seems to get restless and intimidated. He notices this, and ends his speech and introduces you. As you start to give your speech, the crowd slowly becomes a raving mob and rush forward to sacrifice you to their god Hastur.

© Donswald Badfood

Who you gonna call?

Recently, apparently supernatural entities have been terrorizing the area. Fortunately, almost immediately after that started, a group called The Hadja showed up to deal with said supernatural problems. Their success rate is phenomenal, as are their rates. They like to be flashy when they take out gibbering monstrosities, and everyone knows about them now. They even have TV commercials.

There is also the distinct possibility that they aren’t what they say they are; at least three people investigating them have vanished. No one can get close to The Hadja, but then, they seem to be doing a very good job.

Possibilities

1 The Hadja are exactly what they say they are. They’re a group of hunters of the supernatural. They’re very good at what they do. The people who vanished were killed by the monsters they didn’t believe in before The Hadja could prevent it. The group might prove to be great allies of the investigators, if only for their experience in dealing with the supernatural. They have no Mythos experience, though.

2 The Hadja are merely an experienced group of con artists. All of the “supernatural enemies” were just created by sleight-of-hand, smoke and mirrors, and a lot of very expensive equipment. They just make up their own monsters to con the gullible out of their money. The people who vanished were either bribed or threatened into leaving The Hadja alone. If left alone, The Hadja will eventually bleed all they can out of the area and move on, taking their “monsters” with them.

3 Con men The Hadja may be, but they’re also a cult devoted to Nyarlothotep. They summon mythos entities as part of their ceremonies, then let them run amok and “destroy” them. The activities of The Hadja are two-fold: hide their own occult activities and make an ungodly amount of money. The people who vanished were caught snooping around their headquarters and were promptly sacrificed to Nyarlothotep.

(Inspired by Phantom Quest Corp.: Lover Come Back to Me)

© Megan McKnight

Isolated Town

The investigators come to a small town somewhere in southern USA. They might go there because they’re reporters writing an article about some local attraction, might be doing historical research or directly investigating the Mythos. For whatever reason, they need to go to the town library.

When they arrive at the village, the investigators notice the locals are kind of shunning the newcomers. Nothing surprising, the town has the reputation of being very religious and conservative. The investigators shouldn’t get any trouble besides getting weird looks. After a bit of research in the library, they find something really surprising: a copy of the Necronomicon.

Possibilities

1 The town is controlled by cultists who isolate the town for their nefarious purposes. They’re the ones turning the locals xenophobic and suspicious of outsiders, thus bringing the town’s reputation for conservatism. The copy of the Necronomicon has been hidden in the library but not well enough. Let’s hope the librarian doesn’t notice.

2 The locals though deeply religious and conservative are actually actively defending humanity against horrors from the Mythos. They are led by the local reverend. Though their social values clash with those of the investigators, they might become useful allies. They keep a number of Mythos books hidden in the town should forbidden knowledge be really needed.

3 The town is just an ordinary town despite being really religious and conservative. The locals don’t know the existence of the terrible book hidden in their library. Now how to get that book out of there without getting attention?

© Nicolas Dao Phan

Blood on the Tracks

The investigators find themselves sharing a compartment on the express train from Boston to Portland, stopping at Arkham amongst other places. Just as the train leaves North Station, a drunk man staggers into the compartment, slams the door shut with an effort and collapses in the corner seat. It soon becomes apparent that the man isn’t drunk but is suffering from a fatal stab wound to the lungs.

As the investigators tend to him, he gasps out his last words:

Looks like they’ve done for me, don’t it? ... They’re after it, see ... They want it more than anything ... only ... I took it from them ... Had to, see ... Someone had to ... Else Christ knows what they’d’ve done ... Can’t tell you what it is, though ... Too dangerous ... Can’t even tell you where it is ... ‘cause then you might tell them ... But I fooled them ... They might’ve stuck me through the lungs with a damn butcher knife ... but I shot the bastard dead who done for me and got away for long enough ... Long enough from them and those damn things of theirs ... Only maybe it’s the things that’re runnin’ the show ... Who knows ... Who kn- ...

Possibilities

1 The man, Adam Tubbs, has stolen a powerful cult artefact. He escaped from the cultists chasing him long enough to hide the artefact somewhere on the train. Unfortunately, one of the cultists caught up with him and stabbed him with a ritual dagger before Tubbs shot him dead and stuffed the body into a toilet. Several bad guys and two semi-human ‘things’ are on the train searching for Tubbs and the artefact.

2 Tubbs is a minor hoodlum who has crossed the gang he runs with by stealing a package of heroin from the latest consignment from Southeast Asia. He was trailed to the station by several gang members, where one of them ambushed and stabbed him before he was able to shoot the attacker and hide the body. Tubbs staggered onto the nearest train, stashed the kilo of heroin onboard and then stumbled into the investigators’ compartment. The ‘things’ he refers to are Vietnamese drug-traffickers that the gang is allied with. Three gangsters spotted Tubbs getting on the train and are now looking for Tubbs and the heroin.

3     Tubbs is a member of one of a pair of feuding cults that have an overwhelming hatred for each other. In a struggle for an artefact belonging to one of them, he has been stabbed and has slain one of his enemies. He has managed to hide the artefact on the train before staggering into the investigators’ compartment. Several cultists from each faction are also on board the train, searching for the artefact, Tubbs, and each other.

© Tony Hickie

Best-selling necktie

Philosophy major Andrew Cyrus Galbraith penned a runaway best-seller that made him internationally known. Too bad he’s not around to enjoy it.

An earlier collection of his essays had garnered critical acclaim for his striking new perspectives on old philosophical problems. However, Galbraith’s latest paper asked whether life had any meaning, and if not, then should you continue to live? His powerful thirty-page answer was no, life has no meaning outside of what we project on it, and no, we should not live through this absurdity. It was the most intelligent, convincing, solid argument ever written in favor of suicide. Simply titled You Should Do It, the paper also served as his own suicide note. Andrew tightened his necktie, secured the thick end of it to the cross-braces on his dorm window, and flung himself out.

His death was a minor news story the next day. It only drew world-wide attention two days later, after someone circulated the paper on the internet, and thousands of readers agreed with Galbraith’s tightly reasoned arguments, and began taking their own lives...

Possibilities

1 The paper is cursed. Galbraith undertook the Unspeakable Oath to accomplish this. Weak-willed people can be susceptible to suicide attempts if they read it. The curse can be cancelled, making all copies powerless, but only by seeking Galbraith’s ghost and allowing it to rest in peace by completing “unfinished business”. Whatever that may be.

2 The paper isn’t convincing. It’s actually a signal for members of a particular cult to sacrifice themselves en masse around the world, or killing many people in ways that look like suicide. The cult is using the sacrifices to summon something powerful - but what?

3 Galbraith’s paper really is that convincing. Shortly before the paper is published, a psychic has a vision of thousands of readers inspired to kill themselves if the paper becomes widely read. It can only be a matter of time before a priest of Nyarlathotep or other fiend publishes it on the internet.

© Rob Northrup