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A Call of Cthulhu Campaign run by Ben "The Kid"  Counter

This Campaign is now over......  We Saved the World!!!
** Updated 29.09.05 To see our current campaign click here Updated 29.09.05 **

The game is set in Baltimore, Maryland in the US.  Players are Delta Green agents or friendlies, probably from the US Intelligence or Law Enforcement communities (the DG rulebook has a list), and will all have had some brush with supernatural forces that brought them to Delta Green's attention.

Agencies from which Delta Green recruits include the FBI, CIA, NSA, IRS (more useful than it sounds), US Marshalls, SOCOM (not too many of these, please), US Postal Inspection Service, Park Rangers, ATF, DEA, and various US police forces and academic institutions.

Current Operatives in T Cell 

Samantha Moulder, Intelligence Analyst, Department of Energy (Intelligence Directorate). Delta Green Agent
Codename Theresa.
Samantha works on the Middle Eastern desk, analysing intelligence reports about the nuclear power capability of nations in that region (especially Iran). The Middle Eastern desk is run by Senior Analyst Becky Carver. Their boss is the Deputy Administrator of the Intelligence Directorate, Alan Radey.

Tom Silverstone, Deputy U.S. Marshal. Delta Green Agent.
Codename Thomas.
Tom works out of the Baltimore field office under US Marshal Martin Poklewski. Poklewski's team comprises Deputies Silverstone, Antoine Lioselle, and Theo Shaw. The serve warrants, protect Federal courts, escort prisoners, and pursue fugitives throughout the Maryland area.

Mehmet Al-Hajj, CIA Consultant.  Delta Green Agent.  (Previously of S Cell)
Codename Sebastian.
Normally going by the name of 'Mehmet Murray', Al-Hajj is an ex-'dog catcher' for Libyan intelligence now working as a consultant for the CIA. Mehmet is lying low in Baltimore and occasionally meets with CIA agents and handlers, normally anonymously, to give his opinion on intelligence reports relating to Libya and its intelligence services.

Dr Anette Darkcloud, CDC Researcher, Delta Green Friendly.  (Previously of S Cell)
Native American Dr Darkcloud previously worked at the CDC's facility on Corvin Island off the Maryland coast. After she became suspected of using her CDC credentials frivolously (in reality, she was helping a DG investigation at the time), Agent Samuel arranged for her to be given new employment at CGX Pharmaceuticals under fellow DG Friendly Professor DiGianni.

 + RIP + Pat Metcalfe, CIA 'Contract Employee'. Delta Green Agent  + RIP +
Codename Tarquin.
Metcalfe is 'on call' to the CIA, who use him for on-site observation in the Levant & Middle East. He is contacted by a handler he knows only as 'Gordon', who is presumably based at Langley. Metcalfe is not officially employed by the CIA - he works for a front company, AF Consulting International, that exists only on paper. 

To those who will be joining later - we have our three-man Delta Green cell so you chaps will probably be friendlies (those who help out Delta Green but aren't 'in the loop'), unless we can bring another cell into play.

Current Operatives in S Cell

Agent Samuel is not present. His identity is Delta Green classified and known only to other S-Cell members.

++ MIA ++ Raphayel Nott, FBI Special Agent, Delta Green Agent. ++ MIA ++
Codename Stefan.
Agent Nott works out of the FBI's Baltimore field office, normally working with the Baltimore PD on federal cases. His boss is Special Agent Herman Kurtz. Rafael's close colleagues at the field office include Special Agent Xavier Chilavert of the Hostage Rescue Team and behavioural science specialist Tyrell Collins.

Episode 1 - Trailer Trash

The newly-activated T-Cell has a nice, simple Night at the Opera to start their Delta Green careers. A professional loser named Hunter Brand has been murdered. DG are interested because Brand used to be a member of a now-defunct religious group, the Crimson Soul, which was on DG's 'to watch' list before it broke up. Is Brand's death cult-related? Has the Crimson Soul returned? Probably not, but someone's got to check it out.

T-Cell start by scooping out the murder scene - Brand's trailer. There's not much to see, but Agent Thomas talks with detective Reiser, the cop on the Brand case. Brand apparently answered the door to someone who shot him with a submachine gun. Not a common street weapon, but not unheard-of. Research into the Crimson Soul, meanwhile, turns up only the itinerary for one of their seminar courses - several lectures were dedicated to the subject of 'The Kindly Ones'.

Brand's girlfriend, Kelly Duquesne, gives them some better leads. Brand gave her a book - actually a large folder with several hundred printed out pages - given to him by 'someone he worked for'. Unfortunately it's in Russian, so DG friendly Professor Dario Ballack agrees to take it back to Georgetown University to get it translated. The title of the book is 'The Kindly Ones'. Professor Ballack recognises the reference - it could be from the ancient Greek legend of the Furies, spirits of vengeance referred to as 'the Kindly Ones' to avoid making them angry.

Kelly also lets them know Brand worked at St Bartholomew's Hospital, a large city general hospital where Brand was a porter. The agents chat with one of Brand's shift mates and discover that he left an item in his care, something the police don't know about yet - a palmtop computer. The computer's contents suggest that Brand had frequent meetings with someone referred to only as 'AK'. A letter drafted on the palmtop suggests that Brand was working for this person, doing something suspicious enough for Brand to threaten to go to 'the government' with it. Brand was apparently hiding something for 'AK' - what it is, and where it is, are the next questions T-Cell will have to answer.

Episode 2: Power Failure

or

Oh My God Get It Out Of My Mouth.

With T-Cell unavailable, S-Cell took over following up on leads about the death of Hunter Brand. FBI Special Agent Raphael Nott (Agent Stefan) and CIA 'Consultant' Mehmet Al-Hajj/Mehmet Murray (Agent Sebastian) were joined by Dr Annette Darkcloud of the CDC, who was brought in to cover the possibility that Brand was hiding some kind of biological agent for the mysterious 'AK'.

A return to St Bartholemew's Hospital revealed that Brand's work brough him into contact with a disused radiography suite. After talking their way into the hospital (during which process Dr Darkcloud's presence alarmed the hospital administrator, Alan Shipsides, into having a lawyer attend their conversation) the cell gained access to the radiography suite. There they discovered a large case containing several cubes of graphite which, when tested at a Delta Green-allied lab at CGX Pharmaceuticals just outside town (with the help of friendly, or possibly Agent, Professor DiGianni), proved to be highly radioactive. The case was stamped with the site code for Blackstone Valley Nuclear Power Station in Utah, and a flight to Salt Lake City soon followed.

Blackstone Valley, located in the barren near-desert of Utah, was abandoned in the 1980s and never fully decommissioned. S-Cell's search of the plant first turned up skeletal remains beneath the staff canteen, the skulls apparently eaten away as if by acid. After a terrifying hallucination during which Agent Sebastian witnessed the apparent deaths of plant workers in the pump house, it was clear that something was very wrong with Blackstone Valley.

S-Cell continued their search and entered the control building, where they encountered a man named Yevgeni. Yevgeni's responses to questioning were barely coherent - someone named 'Arkady' had 'shown them the way' at the reactor, presumably a long time before, and Yevgeni had been living at the abandoned plant since then. T-Cell was horrified to discover that Yevgeni was severely mutated, with thousands of writhing cilia covering his skin and long gasping gills running down his torso. Dr. Darkcloud at this point began to wonder just what the 'cross-agency taskforce' she had joined was really up to.

Agents Sebastian and Stefan restrained Yevgeni and continued on into the reactor core. A creature of uncertain species, that resided between the containment vessel and the sarcophagus, tried to grab the agents as they moved across the connecting bridge. Agent Stefan was grabbed and had something large, slimy and moving forced down his throat by the creature, with Agent Sebastian unable to assist him. In spite of Agent Stefan's attempts to shoot himself in the head the creature succeeded in implanting him and then, apparently satisfied, threw him aside.

A brief search of the reactor core turned up an observation platform rigged overlooking the core, in which were the remains of numerous incinerated documents. A partially intact exercise book was recovered by Agent Stefan. This turned out o be the only meaningful source of information recovered from Blackstone Valley since Agent Stefan, incensed at his apparent impregnation, shot Yevgeni dead shortly after leaving the reactor core.

With a definite supernatural threat having been detected, it is likely that Delta Green will put both T-Cell and S-Cell on the case. The significance of the information recovered at Blackstone Valley, and of Agent Stefan's possible infestation, have yet to be ascertained. 

Episode 3: Weapons of Mass Destruction 

S-Cell was left in an uncomfortable position with one corpse, one monster, and one possibly impregnated agent to deal with. Agent Rafael, who had been trailing the cell's movements in order to provide backup, arrived with two vans full of goons to take away Agent Stefan. Agent Sebastian and DG frindly Dr Annette Darkcloud were instructed to return to Baltimore on separate flights. Agent Rafael and his men entered the power station, presumably to clean up any incriminating evidence left there.

Agent Sebastian linked up with T-Cell in Baltimore. The partial documents recovered from Blackstone Valley appeared to be surveillance notes detailing the routine of retired Brigadier General Orry Maxwell at his estate in Vermont. Since Maxwell was the Deputy Administrator for Defence Programs at the National Nuclear Security Agency (responsible for nuclear decomissioning, stockpile management and storage amongst other things) this caused S/T-Cell some concern and it was decided that they should pay Orry Maxwell a visit.

Meanwhile, Dr Darkcloud, rather shaken up by her experiences, returned to work at the CDC facility off the Maryland coast. Her boss questioned her about her inquiries at St Bartholomew's Hospital and when she was unable to provide the documentation that showed she was making a legitimate search of the hospital, she was escorted from her office and placed on mandatory leave. She received a visit from Agent Samuel, who offered her a choice between becoming a regular DG friendly working for PGX Pharmaceuticals under Professor DiGianni, or of being treated as a 'potential information leak'. Dr Darkcloud decided the first option would be the wisest and she was put back in contact with S/T-Cell.

The combined cells reached rural Vermont and staked out Maxwell's estate. Though there were no lights on in the house and the blinds were all drawn, the garage door was open and there was possible movement inside. After a lengthy stakeout the cell entered the premises to be set upon by a pair of subhuman creatures - one was shot dead by Agent Sebastian and the other was killed by Agent Thomas, but not before the second creature killed Orry Maxwell in an upstairs bedroom. Maxwell's 4x4 drove off suddenly, to be pursued by Agent Tarquin out into the Vermont countryside.

Maxwell was in a horrible state, malodorous and covered in bedsores, and he had evidently been confined in the bedroom for some time. A check of the computer in the room showed that he had repeatedly accessed NNSA systems, in particular the security rotas for an NNSA facility at Mount Nuwisha, Oregon.

Meanwhile Agent Tarquin saw Maxwell's car stop by the side of the road and a woman get out to make a mobile phone call. Tarquin was instructed by the rest of the cell to bring her in alive - although she attempted to use some kind of spell or psychic power he quickly subdued and bound her, and threw her in the trunk of his car.

S/T-Cell were instructed by Agent Samuel to head for Mount Nuwisha immediately, since it was a weapons decomissioning facility where numerous nuclear weapons were stored. The captive woman was handed over to another DG agent, Agent Charles who evidently worked for the FBI, en route.

Agents Thomas and Theresa along with Dr Darkcloud entered the facility first, using Agent Theresa's Department of Energy credentials to get in. They saw that the weapons were kept in a huge natural cave sealed with massive blocks of concrete. The agents were then driven to the facility's staff building.

Agents Tarquin and Sebastian, waiting in a diner just up the road, saw a Talon riot control vehicle and a large van driving rapidly in the direction of the facility. They contacted the agents in the facility and followed the two vehicles in their car. The Talon suddenly swerved off the road and drove right through the main fence of the facility, followed by the van. Agent Tarquin, who was driving, opted to ram the van from behind. The van's rear doors opened and several men with Kalashnikov assault rifles opened fire. Both agents baled out - Agent Sebastian suffered minor injuries but Tarquin was hit by rifle fire and suffered further damage jumping from the car. He was in no position to defend himself when one of the attackers - evidently Russian mercenaries - dispatched him on the ground. With Agent Tarquin dead, Sebastian ran for the cover of the facility's motor pool.

In the staff building it was apparent that the noon security shift had not arrived (presumably due to Maxwell's changes to the facility's security procedures). Agent Thomas assisted the few security troopers in trying to engage the soldiers in the Talon (some kind of special forces unit equipped with submachine guns) who had driven through a second fence and were now assembled in front of the sealed-off cave. One of the troopers was hit by fire from the mercenaries and Dr Darkcloud gave first aid.

The troops in front of the cave enacted some form of ritual and one of the blocks dissolved as an amorphous flying creature manifested inside it. The creature grabbed and apparently absorbed one of the soldiers as if accepting an offering. Agent Thomas, upon witnessing this horrific and unnatural creature, suffered an episode of homicidal mania and ran out into the open to kill the creature (although rifle fire did not seem to trouble it). Fortunately for Agent Thomas his rifle jammed and the creature turned its attentions to a more immediate threat - the remaining security trooper at the doorway of the staff building.

Agent Sebastian, under fire in the motor pool and now bleeding badly, managed to contact Agent Samuel who reacted to proceedings with alarm. A few moments later Samuel informed the cell that, as per security procedures, two F-16s had been scrambled from the nearby Trelawney Air Force Base and that the Agents had better leave immediately. Agent Sebastian succeeded in starting up a military truck and drove to pick up the remaining Agents at the staff building. The flying creature killed the remaining security trooper in short order and immediately shot upwards, presumably to intercept the F-16s now streaking towards the facility. 

Agent Theresa and Dr Darkcloud, along with the wounded trooper, got into the truck and Agent Sebastian drove rapidly away. The troopers by the cave emerged with a large case carried between them - they got back into the Talon and drove quickly away, along with the mercenaries in the van. Agent Thomas, his mania subsiding, found a jeep and followed the other agents out of the base.

With one agent dead, one wounded and another having suffered a psychotic episode, things would be bad enough even if an unknown mythos-inspired force had not just acquired what might be a nuclear weapon.

Episode 4: Cold Comfort 

Once again, S/T-Cell called Agent Samuel for help. Since they were driving across the Rockies with a dying (quickly dead) soldier in a stolen military truck, and were fleeing the scene of the theft of a nuclear weapon, Agent Samuel arranged for them to lie low. They abandoned the truck and the unfortunately dead soldier (who even Dr Anette Darkcloud's medical expertise could not save), the agents made their way to an isolated ranch, following agent Samuel's directions.

The ranch was inhabited by a gun enthusiast named Herb, who apparently owed Agent Samuel a favour after an indecent where a strange shimmering thing came down from the sky over Herb's home. After a few beers and some nervous conversation (since Herb's gun never left his side), two cars drove up to the outskirts of the ranch,. One drove away and the agents were instructed to drive the remaining one to Salt Lake City airport. They found plane tickets to Tampa, Florida in the glove compartment, and bid goodbye to Herb.

Arriving at Tampa, they were met by a very well-muscled driver who took them to MacDill AFB, recognised by Agent Thomas as the headquarters of the US Special Operations Command (USSOCOM). Agent Samuel met them, introducing himself as Captain Cole Glaivan of the US Navy SEALS. He informed them that the cult sorceress captured by the cell in Vermont had been transported to the base and was currently in the 'Lynndie England Suite' awaiting 'processing'. Since she was S/T-Cell's collar, they were asked to begin her interrogation.

The prisoner, who had been bricked up in her cell after 'trying something' on one of Agent Samuel's men, was identified as Athena Seidl, a professor of folklore. Agent Sebastian and Agent Thomas interrogated Seidl thoroughly making maximum use of the cell's electrified floor. Dr Darkcloud's protestations about this inhumane activity were ignored and Seidl yielded several critical pieces of information. The 'Arkady' mentioned by Yevgeni before, and presumably identical with the 'AK' who was in contact with denton Bridger, was actually Akrady Khobotov. Khobotov, a nuclear scientist who defected from the Soviet Union in the 1980s, was working in the Intelligence Division of the Department of Energy, a fact which perturbed Agent Theresa since she worked for the same department. Research, however, suggested that Khobotov had not been heard of for some three years. The Court of the Kindly Ones was a theoretical 'master dimension' that determined the contents of all the other dimensions and was hence a source of immense cosmic power. Khobotov believed that he could open the way to this dimension, commune with the 'Kindly Ones' and their master, and help mankind (or at least himself) ascend to a higher plane of existence.

The location in Siberia alluded to by Yevgeni from the power station was also confirmed as Osip Gorge, a suspected centre of Soviet weapons research, now presumably abandoned, on the bleak Pacific coast of Siberia. Agent Samuel immediately began preparing a mission which the agents were to accompany. This was extremely disconcerting to Dr Darkcloud who, though a Delta Green friendly, was not entirely sure of what was going on. The agents were given a couple of days to prepare before being taken by Hercules transport plane to San Diego, and there being embarked upon a submarine. The submarine and troops were unmarked, and Agent Samuel was clear that the whole operation was deniable.

After a few days' travel (during which Dr Darkcloud became increasingly depressed) the submarine reached the Siberian coast and the agents and troops reached the shore by small inflatable. Under cover of darkness they approached the small airstrip, hangar and concrete building that comprised the Osip Gorge facility. The agents were instructed to wait in the hangar while the thirty or so troops under Agent Samuel secured the building and the airstrip.

The troops clearing the building reported that it was apparently abandoned and without obvious function. Shortly after this a small cargo plane appeared, landed on the airstrip, and taxied into the hangar. The agents found places to hide before the hangar doors closed. A rear door of the plane then opened and spilled several tons of slightly spoiled raw meat and gore onto the floor of the hangar. Sluices opened in the floor and began to drain the blood and gore away. The plane's pilot got out and began swearing loudly in Russian, apparently as surprised by the plane's cargo as the agents were.

The pilot opened a locked floor hatch and descended out of sight. The agents were prepared to wait in the hangar until the troops got the doors open, but the sounds of gunfire reached them from outside. Flaming wreckage crashed through the roof of the hangar and ignited aviation fuel. Out of contact with Samuel and in danger of being cooked along with a large heap of oozing meat, the agents went down after the pilot.

The 'real' Osip Gorge facility began with a decontamination room, with showers that sprayed freezing water over the already cold and dispirited agents. The agents also came across an infirmary (containing three naked corpses with livid lash marks) and a common room that had been reduced to a wreck (complete with deep gouge marks on the walls). The team explored a control room and a small adjoining room. This room contained two human corpses, the lower halves of their bodies stripped of skin and muscle, nailed to opposite walls and mumbling an incoherent stream of syllables even though they were clearly dead. Between the nailed-up corpses was a small table on which stood a golden bowl full of water.

This sight was too much for Dr Darkcloud, whose mind finally snapped. Her behaviour from then on was characterised by catatonia interspersed with bouts of explosive vomiting.

The agents then proceeded downstairs, into a half-flooded room. They witnessed the pilot in a heated argument with a mercenary guard of the same type the agents faced at Mount Nuwisha. As Agent Thomas sneaked across the darkened room the pilot was shot dead by one of the guards. Agent Thomas now had two choices - the large door the mercenaries were guarding, and a smaller vent or tunnel that smelled strongly of raw meat. He opted for the large door.

In the gunfight that followed one mercenary was killed and Agent Sebastian was again wounded while taking cover in the far doorway. The remaining mercenary ran through the doors, and agents Thomas and Sebastian pursued. They saw a large circular room half-filled with water, above which stood a platform on which Arkady Khobotov and several scientists were chanting around a central control console, Khobotov's hand over the master control. Behind him was an opening decorated with unreadable symbols. The agents surmised that they had found the site where the Court of the Kindly Ones was to be opened to the world.

In a shooting display of timely virtuosity, Agents Sebastian and Thomas shot Arkady Khobotov before he could activate the master control (the agents had made the connection between the big red button and the stolen nuclear weapon). The other scientists began screaming in bestial confusion while the remaining mercenary took cover behind the central console. The scientists began throwing themselves into the water, beneath the surface of which something was moving. The mercenary begged for mercy in broken English, claiming he didn't know about any of this religious stuff. As pasty white hands reached from the water to drag down the suicidal scientists, the agents retreated. The mercenary was caught by a sloughing-skinned living corpse hauling itself onto the platform, and the agents shut the door on the mercenary, ignoring his pleas as he beat on the door.

The agents were met on the first floor by Agent Samuel, whose troops had been fighting more mercenaries who had ambushed them. The fire in the hangar was under control and casualties were apparently acceptable. Samuel declared the mission at an end and the agents, along with a still-stupefied Dr Darkcloud, returned at a rapid pace to the inflatables, and then to the submarine.

With the Court of the Kindly Ones sealed for now, the agents can claim a form of success. However, their victory has cost the lives of one agent (possibly one more depending on the results of Agent Stefan's impregnation) and several of Samuel's men along with many innocents and non-combatants, not to mention serious mental damage to two agents and possible exposure of Delta Green's activities after Mount Nuwisha. But these are questions for the future - for now the agents must rest, recover, be debriefed by Delta Green, and reflect on what might have been had the Court of the Kindly Ones opened its gates to the world.

Episode 5: Gone Postal 

T-Cell, newly reorganised after operational losses, was contacted by Agent Samuel. One of the organisations on DG's watch list, a 'religious group' on the west coast, recently received a large amount of money from a book retailer, Interbook. Normally this would not concern T-Cell - except that at just after nine that morning one of the company's ex-employees walked into Interbook's main Baltimore office and began shooting his ex-colleagues. Several people were dead, including the shooter. T-Cell were to establish if there was any cult connection to the shootings, or if it was just another gun massacre.

Agent Thomas' US Marshall credentials gave the cell an 'in' - DG arranged for a the suspected shooter, Brian Szrback, to be placed retroactively on a list of witnesses under US Marshall protection, thus giving Agent Thomas a reason to investigate. The Cell went to the scene of the shooting, Interbook's offices, and found a scene of carnage with bodies everywhere being pored over by crime scene investigators. The homicide detective in charge, Detective Alan Carver, was not impressed by 'the Feds' being apparently unable to keep a close enough eye on their witness to stop him from going crazy and perpetrating a massacre. He was not happy about Agent Thomas running a parallel investigation but had little choice. As the unusually chipper Officer Graves led the agents around the offices the picture became clear. Szrback had entered, shot the receptionist, homed in on the man who had taken his job, and then shot at random before hiding in the upstairs ladies' bathroom and shooting himself dead.

Further investigation, however, suggested things were not that simple. Several emails recovered from Szrback's computer suggested that someone was deliberately feeding him information that made him increasingly paranoid about his co-workers. Similarly, a visit to Szrback's apartment confirmed that he was a paranoid obsessive who covered his furniture with Post-It notes and papered his bedroom with tin foil. The three survivors who knew Szrback best were Alice, his boss; Bart Strysik, Alice's deputy; and Washington Small, the closest Szrback had to a friend. T-Cell interviewed these three survivors in St Batholemew's hospital and ascertained that Szrback had become increasingly hostile, eventually accusing his bosses and colleagues of trying to kill him, after which he was fired.

After the interviews were conducted Agent Theresa was contacted by Washington Small who wanted to meet with her. Theresa met Small at a bar, carefully watched by Agent Sebastian and Friendly Dr Darkcloud. Small believed that someone had been actively encouraging Szrback's paranoia, but he didn't know who it was, or why. Agent Theresa left the bar but while driving back to her apartment she blacked out, and the other cell members lost contact with her.

While the meeting was taking place Agent Thomas had a message forwarded to him from his field office from Alice, who said that she believed her memory had been altered somehow - she remembered something called a 'stress cascade reaction' but not what it was or how it was involved in Szrback's insanity. Agent Thomas headed for St Bartholomew's, knowing that the Cell were getting close to whatever was behind the Interbook massacre.

Episode 6: Bullet In The Head 

Agent Thomas received another call from Alice. She could recall only that Bart Strysik was the one who addled her memory, to cover up the 'stress cascade' (although she still didn't know what the 'cascade' was). She ended the call by saying she had to burn herself. By the time Agents Thomas and Sebastian and Dr Darkcloud reached the hospital the ward in which Alice had been held was completely ablaze.

The Cell was unable to ascertain whether Alice was still alive. Furthermore, they could not contact Agent Theresa. Matters became even worse when Detective Alan Carver turned up and promptly arrested Agent Thomas for the murder of Brian Szrback. A rather mystified Agent Thomas was bundled into a police car. Agent Sebastian contacted a lawyer sometimes used by the CIA and sent him to the station to represent Agent Thomas.

In the interview room, as the enigmatic Officer Graves stood watch, Detective Carver claimed that the bullet pulled out of Brian Szrback's skull was not from Szrback's own weapon, but from Agent Thomas' standard issue gun. The lawyer, Mr Wiles, agreed that this was something that needed explaining, but Agent Thomas was unable to do so. With only a single piece of forensic evidence Detective Carver had to led Agent Thomas go after extensive questioning. Agent Thomas left none the wiser about how a bullet from his gun was used to cause Brian Szrback's obviously self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Meanwhile, Agent Theresa woke up in an alleyway on the other side of town, unsure of how she got there. Agent Sebastian and Dr Darkcloud picked her up and she told them that she had been knocked out or drugged, then woken up standing in a large container apparently full of amputated human body parts. After several hours of this horrible experience she passed out again and woke in the alley. She had no idea who did this to her, or why, or even if it was a real experience. The whole episode had left her very shaken and Sebastian and Dr Darkcloud took her to CGX Pharmeceuticals, which had a medical suite where Agent Theresa could be properly examined.

Agent Thomas arrived and relayed his tale of presumably wrongful arrest. The Cell's get-together was interrupted when Dr Darkcloud received a cell phone call from Bart Strysik. He wanted to meet up with the Cell - they needed information and he needed protection. The Cell needed to know what was going on and they cautiously agreed to meet the next day in Hollows Park, a well-frequented park in a safe part of the city.

Agent Sebastian kept watch while the other cell members approached Dr Strysik. Strysik explained that he worked for the Outlook Group, an organisation that provided psychological testing and research for a client which he suspected was the US Government. Whoever it was, that client wanted Delta Green destroyed. The Outlook Group was conducting an experiment to ascertain the results of a 'stress cascade reaction' on a cell-based group like Delta Green. A cascade was a phenomenon caused by small, carefully selected psychological stimuli causing a group of individuals to react in sudden, dramatic ways, from voting one way to violently turning on each other. To find out if a cascade would work on Delta Green, a cell was lured out into the open. The client arranged for a large transfer of money from Interbook to a likely-looking cult, while the Outlook Group used basic mind control to make Brian Szrback gun down several of his ex-colleagues and then shoot himself. This brought a Delta Green cell out of hiding to investigate. The horrible experience endured by Agent Thresa was the first of several planned 'stress simulations' designed to increase feelings of alienation and paranoia until the cell destroyed itself. If successful, these same techniques would be used against the whole of Delta Green in the hope it would self-destruct completely.

Unfortunately (for Strysik at least) something had gone wrong with the experiment. Alice recovered slightly too much of her memory, and the investigators were not supposed to find all the emails sent to Szrback. This breach of security led to Strysik being removed as the leader of the experiment. He claimed his client was about to order Outlook Group to interrogate and kill him - to avoid this he wanted protection from Delta Green in return for information about the Outlook Group. The experiment was to continue without Strysik, and only Strysik knew enough about the planned stress simulations to give the cell members any chance of surviving with their sanity intact.

The Cell decided they had little choice. They planned to get out of the city, find somewhere isolated and defensible, contact Agent Samuel and hope. Before departing with Strysik Agent Sebastian noticed Washington Small, evidently having escaped from the hospital in spite of obvious fresh burns, following him. Sebastian lost Small and picked up some communications gear at a shop selling surveillance equipment, but Small caught up with him as he left the shop. Small seemed to have some important information for Agent Sebastian but as soon as he got close, he tried to stab Sebastian with a hypodermic needle. Sebastian, not wanting to take any more risks, took out his sidearm - a .50 Desert Eagle - and blew an enormous hole in Small's abdomen at point blank range. Sebastian fled the scene, leaving the dying Small on the sidewalk, and met up with the cell in a newly-hired car.

As the cell, plus Strysik, left the city in an even greater hurry, Agent Theresa contacted Agent Samuel. She explained that the cell was caught up in an experiment run by the Outlook Group, that Agent Thomas was suspected of murder, and that the bodies were beginning to pile up. Agent Samuel replied that the cell was now compromised and there was to be no further contact - Samuel himself could be given the '9mm plan' just for talking to the agents. T-Cell was now on its own.

The cell found a small town, Thornside, in the country. It was a hunting town and since it was the off-season the town was small and quiet. The nearby Thorn Ridge Fishing Camp, a collection of well-appointed lakeshore fishing lodges closed for the off-season, was a good place for the cell to hold up. While settling down into one of the lodges, Strysik often taunted the agents. He claimed that Delta Green was not a government agency at all but an illegal terrorist organisation, along with giving dire warnings about the mental health of the agents. Agents Thomas and Sebastian took to gagging Strysik as a matter of course.

After two days, Agent Theresa heard a helicopter flying somewhere over the lake. That night, during Agent Sebastian's watch, several large all-terrain vehicles approached the camp and numerous armed men got out to surround it. One car drew closer and Marshal Poklewski, Agent Thomas' boss at the US Marshals Service, told Agent Thomas to give up and surrender. He knew that Agent Thomas (the man Poklewski knew as Deputy Tom Silverstone) had been accused of murder and was now effectively on the run, and expressed the wish to find out what happened from Agent Thomas himself before judicial proceedings took over. Men from the US Marshals Special Operations Group (SOG) were ready to storm the lodge if the cell did not give up.

The cell handed themselves over to Marshal Poklewski's custody on the condition that Strysik was kept gagged and travelled in a different car. Poklewski loaded the cell members into a car and one of the SOG members began driving them south towards the US Marshals HQ in Arlington, Virginia. Poklewski demanded answers from Agent Thomas who tried his best to come up with an explanation that did not involve Delta Green, the Outlook Group, or mind control.

About three hours away from Arlington, the SOG driver took a handgun from the central console. Agent Sebastian and Pokelwski both tried to wrest the gun away but the driver succeeded in blowing his own brains all over the driver's side window. The car, which was in the centre of a three-car convoy, slewed out of control and crashed. The agents and Poklewski escaped from the car as the rear car drew up beside them. Two SOG officers dragged Strysik out of the second car as Poklewski tried to radio for assistance, but was unable to get a signal.

One of the SOG agents manhandled the bound Strysik into the cover of the crashed car. The agents got Strysik's hood off just as the SOG officer's mouth opened to grotesque dimensions and he breathed out a cloud of noxious blue-grey gas. The agents and Strysik got clear but Poklewski breathed in a lungful and was rendered unconscious. The agents heard helicopter blades again and realised they were under attack - they battered the remaining SOG officer into unconsciousness and loaded the second car up with Pokleweski, the unconscious officer, Strysik and the agents and drove rapidly down the freeway to throw off any pursuers. Strysik expressed surprise that sub-projects 'Catalyst' and 'Bounce' were advanced enough to create such specific psychoses and physical alterations in a matter of hours. He explained that these two sub-projects were Outlook-facilitated research programs into the fields of mind control and physical augmentation respectively, and were under a master project known as 'Arc Dream' directed by the Gorp's mysterious client.

The cell stopped at a gas station to work out where they would go next. They noticed a neat bullet hole in the glass covering the attendant's booth, and the lack of an attendant. They quickly got back into the car and continued driving, but the agents noticed people - possibly soldiers - on either side of the freeway. Agent Theresa spotted a roadblock up ahead and opted to floor the car - the car ran over a tyre strip and skidded out of control. Agents Sebastian and Thomas tried to flee up the wooded embankment but were spotted and ordered back onto the road by armed men in urban camo fatigues and gas masks. They decided to do as they were told.

With all the agents surrounded by soldiers, the helicopter finally hovered into view and landed on the freeway. Several soldiers and a tall, old man in a suit got out. The man had greying hair, sallow skin and three gold teeth, and spoke with an Alabama drawl. He seemed to work for the Outlook Group's client, and ordered two of his soldiers to grab Strysik from the car and put him on the helicopter. The man gave the agents a choice - since an intact Delta Green cell was a very rare find, he would let them live if they came with him. Otherwise, they would be shot on the spot. Two muffled gunshots from the car suggested that Marshall Poklewski and the SOG officer did not have the same choice.

As Strysik was dragged past, he whispered that the agents should seek out Doctor John Baker, who could still by an ally of Strysik's. The agents elected to live, and soldiers administered hypodermic shots to the backs of their necks. The agents blacked out.

After an unknown period of time the agents woke up, suffering from severe headaches and freezing cold. They were in an old, crumbling, evidently stripped and abandoned concrete building. They had been cleaned up and were wearing simple white cotton clothing. The had no idea where they were or how they had got there. With the name 'John Baker' as their only clue, they began to explore.

Episode 7: There Is No Such Thing As Majestic-12 

Further exploration revealed that S-Cell had woken up in a small, abandoned outpost in a tiny and very cold island. They were totally alone. A series of tally marks on the wall of one room revealed the last occupant had been there for three and a half years.

The cell members found a pallet of boxes, each containing several trays of military-style rations, on a small concrete landing pad on the island. They took these inside and dismantled the pallet in the hope of fashioning a raft from the wooden slats and a sail from the tarpaulin that had covered the boxes. While they busies themselves with this task, they made sure to mention the name 'John Baker' several times in case they were being listened to, hoping that this mysterious ally would hear and come to rescue them. Several times they thought they glimpsed a ship on the far horizon, but they couldn't be sure.

Several days, then weeks passed. The raft was assembled, taken to the shore and lashed together. The sea was freezing cold and uninviting but it was more welcoming than an endless existence on the bleak island. The raft was launched and the cell members were carried on a stiff wind for about a hundred metres before the raft became snagged on what looked like submarine netting. Unable to free the raft, the cell members watched as a submarine conning tower emerged from the sea beside them. Two inflatables of troops in gas masks approached the raft - exhausted, wet and freezing, the cell members were unable to fend off the troops who tazered them and dragged them onto their inflatables in short order.

When the cell next awoke they were in a small, white tiled room. There were no doors or windows and the agents were naked. The room's only features were a small opening where tepid water flowed into a hole in the floor, a single unblinking light, and a small hatch in the ceiling that they could not open.

After some time, the hatch opened and a small cardboard tray was lowered down. On the tray were several blocks of tasteless but filling food. Agent Theresa's block contained a small piece of paper on which was written the world 'Medusa'. As soon as Agent Theresa said this word out loud one wall of the small room opened outwards to reveal a much larger room, evidently for monitoring the inmates of the small cell.

Although free, the agents were still naked and had no idea where they were. They began to explore, discovering they were apparently in the basement level of some large medical facility. The layout of the place defied logic and seemed designed to disorient escapees like themselves. While wandering the floor they came across another inmate in cell named Louis, a paunchy middle-aged man who claimed to be an insurance salesman captured and detained with no reason or explanation.

The agents left Louis alone and proceeded on to a small observation room. A large window in the room looked on to a small tiled cell not unlike the one they had woken up in. In this cell, strapped to a chair, was a man whose skin had evidently been removed and who was repeating the phrase 'there is no such thing as Majestic-12' over and over again. A sheet of medical1 notes on a clipboard in front of the window revealed the subject was Dr Bart Strysik. Dr Strysik's employers had apparently used Strysik as a subject in one of the Outlook Group's own experiments - or perhaps just wanted to teach him a gory and terminal lesson.

Leaving this rapidly behind, the agents entered an operating theatre with several operating tables and lots of medical gear. A patrolling soldier entered the room and the agents jumped him, succeeding in pinning him down and tying him to a table. Dr Darkcloud expressed the wish to cut off the soldier's testicles, but the other agents dissuaded her from doing so before the soldier's walkie-talkie informed them that he was late with his situation report and that reinforcements were being deployed.

The agents backtracked and released Louis, who promised he knew the layout of the building. The agents found a way to the next floor up but were pinned down by a group of soldiers with machine guns and riot shields. With only one gun between them and clad in only hospital gowns, the agents were in a precarious position They decided to push the hapless (and slightly annoying) Louis in front of the soldiers to draw their fire while the agents made a break for it. This seemed to work quite well, especially when Louis' bullet-ridden form mutated into a flabby headless giant with gaping, fanged mouths in its palms, and lumbered towards the horrified soldiers. Agent Sebastian, having witnessed sights of the supernatural and horrendous before, somehow knew that this creature was an avatar of Y'Golonac, a god of perversion and destructive lust.

The agents left 'Louis' and the soldiers to battle it out and headed up the stairs. By now alarms were blaring all over the building and the sounds of battle were intensifying downstairs. Eventually they reached a short corridor with a single office at the end. Agent Sebastian warily opened the door to find a single doctor sitting in front of a bank of monitor screens, some watching inmates in cells undergoing baffling experiments.

The doctor introduced himself as Dr John Baker. The agents were being listened to on the island and Dr Baker realised they knew something about Outlook itself, so he engineered their transfer to the facility and their escape from the basement levels.

Dr Strysik's failure with the Baltimore experiment left Dr Baker in a very uncomfortable position. Dr Baker had become curious about Outlook's client and had found out some information about them by covert interrogation of the subjects sent for psychological testing and alteration. With Strysik's failure so damaging to Outlook, Baker feared the client would start examining Dr Baker, too, and find out his illicit information-gathering. If they found this out then Baker was just as dead as Strysik. He offered to share what he knew about Outlook's client with Delta Green if S-Cell could get him to safety and Delta Green could guarantee his security. He would lead S-Cell out of the facility, then S-Cell would take Baker to Delta Green.

S-Cell guardedly agreed. They thought Baker was quite creepy and probably as much trouble as Strysik, but they had to escape.Baker led them through the top floor of the facility, a bewildering place where the client's soldiers were trained to accept surreal and violent situations without panicking. The agents witnessed an auditorium where subjects listened patiently to a lecture while soldiers shot random subjects. Baker eventually got them to a room where costumes and props for 'stress simulations' were stored, and had them dress in military fatigues. They were then led up to the ground floor, which was dressed to resemble the reception of a corporate headquarters.

The agents and Baker emerged into bright sunlight and heat. Baker got them past the guards on the door and commandeered them a jeep which they drove out of the Outlook compound and into what looked like a military base. Agent Thomas realised they must be in the US Marines base in Puerto Rico. The agents and Baker discussed how they should get out and onto the US mainland. One option was by air, and the other by boat. Since none of them could fly, they opted to take a patrol boat and make for the Florida coast. Agent Thomas talked his way past the Marines in charge of the patrol boats at anchor and the three agents, friendly Dr Darkcloud and Dr Baker drove the boat away from the base as fast as they could.

Dr Baker let the cell know a few facts about the Outlook Group's employers. They were a government agency known as Majestic-12. They were well-funded and extremely secret, and seemed to have access to the very highest levels of the US Government. Moreover, they had a need for heavily conditioned soldiers and operatives, psychological warfare scenarios (like Dr Strysik's 'stress cascade simulations'), and plenty of memory alterations and mind control. Majestic-12 funded Outlook's extravagant and morally questionable research in return for stress testing and conditioning of operatives.

Agent Sebastian attempted to contact CIA headquarters at Langley, hoping to get a message to his anonymous handler. He left a message with the emergency number he had been given, but could not tell if it would get through to the right person in time for the Company to help out the cell once they reached land.

As the boat approached Florida it was approached by a larger US Coastguard vessel, which made sense seeing as the agents were sailing through a major drug smuggling route. The vessel was boarded by the head coastguard who asked why a US Marine boat was sailing around so far away from established patrol routes. As Agent Thomas tried to think of a convincing answer gunfire rang out and Agent Theresa was wounded in the leg. Two of the crew of the coastguard boat were shooting at the agents from the upper deck of the vessel. The coastguard on the patrol boat demanded they cease fire but they didn't listen. Agents Sebastian and Thomas returned fire while Dr Darkcloud, continuing to exhibit an uncharacteristically high level of aggression, grabbed a gun and jumped onto the coastguard vessel.

After a short gunfight Agent Sebastian had killed one assailant and Dr Darkcloud, by virtue of running up to the nearest enemy and unloading her gun into him at point blank range, had killed the second. The rest of the crew were unconscious in the ship's cabin. The cell left the coastguard boat behind and, now with both the lead coastguard and Dr Baker in tow, continued towards the Florida Keys. The deeply shocked coastguard said the two dead men had only joined his crew just before the boat went out and he didn't know them - he wanted to get to shore and return to his base at the first opportunity. He suggested there was a particular island which wasn't used by smugglers and which was therefore easy to get to without having to go through too many patrols, but which was connected to the mainland via the Keys highway.

The cell took his advice and beached the boat on a secluded cove on the island in question. They prepared to leave the coastguard there, assuring him that he was free to go but understandably not telling him what they were doing or why. The coastguard was bidding them farewell when he said the words 'Dog Skin Kill'. These words, familiar from the emails and scrawled notes written by Brian Szrback back at Interbook, were in fact the trigger for a post-hypnotic suggestion implanted in Agent Thomas during his time in the police station. The suggestion compelled Agent Thomas, under the control of a secondary personality, to attack and kill the closest armed person. In this case, that was Agent Sebastian./p>

As Agent Thomas opened fire and Agent Sebastian dived into cover along with the wounded Agent Theresa. The coastguard took out his gun and started shooting, too. The increasingly irrational Dr Darkcloud tried to wrestle the gun off him. With Agent Sebsatian scrambling away into cover the closest armed target was now the coastgard, who Agent Thonmas promptly shot and wounded. With the words 'there is no such thing as Majestic-12' the coastguard put his gun to his head but Dr Darkcloud grabbed the gun off him. Agent Sebastian shot Agent Thomas in the knee and the shock was enough to bring him out of his post-hypnotic frenzy. The agents subdued the coastguard and tied him up.

The agents, now mostly wounded, battered, exhausted and fed up, made it through the undergrowth to the highway where they carjacked a very unfortunate soccermom driving an SUV. Throwing the coastgaurd in the trunk and piling into the vehicle they drove to a secluded layby where Agent Sebastian could try to contact the CIA again. This time his call was cut off by a voice claiming to be a Delta Green agent. Delta Green had been trying to contact the cell for some time, especially during the last couple of hours since DG observers on Puerto Rico had seen the mysterious facility in the US Marines base apparently being 'sanitized' by black-clad troops of unknown origin. Whatever S-Cell had done at Outlook, it had brought the wrath of the Group's client down on the organisation and it was currently being dismantled. S-Cell's new orders were to stay where they were and wait for Agent Raphael who was on his way to pick them up.

Dr Baker let a few more secrets slip. He had first become curious about the Group's client when he saw the kind of technology Outlook was being given to work with - memory-altering agents, gene-specific viruses, and other strange concoctions that could only be created with access to understanding of human genetics beyond the capacity of conventional science. From Majestic-12 operatives given to him for alteration and study he discovered the reason - the technology was alien in nature. Majestic-12 are an agency engaged in diplomatic relations with an alien species, apparently allowing them to carry out experiments on US soil in return for technology of staggering potential.

Agent Raphael arrived shortly afterwards with his customary two unmarked vans full of rough-looking goons. Agent Thomas, who had dealt with organised crime many times as a US Marshall, quickly realised that Raphael must be someone high up in the Mafia and his goons were 'family' henchmen. Raphael dragged Baker and the coastguard out of the car and told the soccermom to drive away and forget everything she had seen since he had seen her license plate and would soon know where she lived. The soccermom took the hint and soon the DG agents and their prisoners were alone by the freeway.

Agent Raphael wasted little time in executing the coastguard. He then moved on to Dr Baker. He told S-Cell that A-Cell's order were clear - they could not take the risk that this was just another stress simulation. Raphael promptly then Dr Baker dead, with little complaint from the agents. Raphael had his goons bundle the agents into one of the vans and loaded the bodies into the other. The agents then underwent a very, very long drive, occasionally stopping for toilet and food breaks in the middle of nowhere. After considerable time they were taken out into a city they recognised as Washington DC - in front of the Library of Congress, to be exact.

Although the agents were dirty, malodorous and often still bloodstained, Raphael had no trouble in getting them past security and into the Rare and Delicate Manuscripts section, where several large reading tables stood surrounded by glass-fronted cases full of huge old tomes. The only other person in the room was an extremely old man seated at a table, reading a book that consisted of several hundred sheets of paper in a large ringbinder.

The old man welcomed the agents, and introduced himself as Alphonse. He began by remarking that the cell was so thoroughly compromised that he really should give them the '9mm retirment plan'. However, he was getting mellow in his old age. In their short career the cell had brought Delta Green some very useful information, including the text he was leafing through which comprised a translation of Arkady Khobotov's treaty on 'The Kindly Ones'. Moreover, while Delta Green suspected the existence of Majestic-12, they had no idea of the Outlook Group or their connection to MJ-12. The cell's actions seemed to have caused Majestic-12 some consternation and probably halted many of their projects completely, thanks to the destruction of the Outlook Group that MJ-12 was evidently pursuing.

So, the cell did quite well. Instead of execution Alphonse offered them a new life each, somewhere quiet and comfortable. Their families would learn that they had died in accidents and no-one they knew would ever see them again. They would be given backstories so complete that the agents themselves would think they were true. The agents thought about this for a moment and accepted, Agent Sebastian commenting that Paris is supposed to be very nice this time of year.

With that, Alphonse instructed the agents to go with Agent Raphael who would take them to the first stage of their journeys.

'And agents,' said Alphonse as the security doors closed behind them, 'be seeing you.'

This Delta Green Campaign is now over......  We Saved the World!!!
** Updated 29.09.05 To see our current campaign click here Updated 29.09.05 **

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