Call of Cthul-Fu: Fury on the Orient Express!
Hello friends!
This has been an exciting evening for me. I ran the very first part of the new Call of Cthulhu adventure, Horror on the Orient Express! I’ve been working on a conversion for it into the system Feng Shui, because one of my three gaming groups is bombastic and too excitable for a slow, atmospheric horror romp. Instead, I’ve amped it up into a horror-themed pulp action romp!
Fury on the Orient Express
Book One: Through the Alps
Chapter One: Dancers in an Evening Fog, Part 1
Our story begins in London on New Year's Day. Three men and one woman visit the newest addition to the British Museum, the Maudslay Collection. It is a rare and exciting compilation of photos, recreations, and original pieces portraying religious and cult activity in ancient South America. Put together by the famed Professor Julius Arthur Smith. Friends of Professor Smith, war hero and aviator Tiberius Wallingsworth Sutherland and a fellow professor called Archibald Jameson, awaited their friend's arrival at his famed collection, while the third man, Harrison Kincaid, came in search of answers for some of the most horrifying things he's seen as a former detective with Scotland Yard. Meanwhile, Yakuza hitwoman, currently bodyguard, Kiyoko Yakahisa, stood at the ready with three fellow guards and the shateigashira, or second lieutenant, of her clan, Akio Kagane. They were set to protect Daichi Ken, shingiin, or law advisor, of her clan, who helped fund part of what went into the eventual completion of the Maudslay Collection.
Approaching Professor Smith's old friends, the Professor's handler, Beddows, gave each of the men an invitation to the upcoming scientific lecture symposium, the Challenger Lectures, a three day exhibition by some of the most brilliant minds in science, highly exclusive and invitation only. He promised the two men that they would be able to meet again with Professor Smith soon enough and went off. He then went to Daichi Ken and offered him an invitation. Daichi spoke through his translator and ally, Akio. He requested that he be allowed to take his bodyguards, as a matter of security, and Beddows confirmed that that was already taken care of.
Meanwhile, Professor Smith saw Harrison Kincaid looking curiously at a frightening image. Smith revealed to Kincaid that it was the only image he was not allowed to photograph nor bring back, and said that it was an image portraying an important segment of history for an ancient deity, El Desollado, or The Skinless One. He said they would tell him no more of El Desollado, and that he had to work in secret to draw the images. Kincaid told him of his troubles, that he came to perhaps gain some glimpse into the horrors of his past that drove him from his career as a Detective. Smith confirmed that Kincaid seemed like a type interested in the unknown and had an invitation to his lecture at the Summit sent to Kincaid's room in the Savoy, in the hopes that it would help to provide the answers he seeks.
The next day, Kiyoko was made to attend a meeting between her boss, Akio, and an academic rival of Professor Smith's named Professor Howard Hite. Professor Hite offered Akio a large sum of money to assassinate Professor Hite after the Challenger Lectures, to ensure that funding would go his way. Akio blew him off with a simple, "We'll think about it." Enraged that he'd be so rebuffed, he threatened to go straight to Daichi Ken, as he would agree immediately when he saw the sum offered. Akio laughed at him and left, Kioko and his thugs in tow.
The next day, the Challenger Lectures began! The party saw a horrible argument break out between Professor Smith and Professor Hite. Kiyoko attempted to break it up, but only succeeding in amusing Professor Hite and embarrassing Professor Smith. Professor Smith went off a bit disheartened, eventually reuniting with his former comrades, Professor Jameson and Tiberius Sutherland. He introduced them to the troubled investigator, Kincaid, and his investor, Daichi Ken.
Finally, it came time for him to prepare his lecture. The crowd was seated and the opening speech was given. Professor Smith took the stage and began his lecture; a speculative piece, with evidence, showing proof of bizarre spectral apparitions. He explained the science behind them and went on to postulate that they could well be proof of dimensions beyond human perspective, only glimpsed by humanity in fleeting and brief ways.
Professor Hite was to speak next, and he began his speech by mocking Professor Smith. He went on to describe how he had brought a rare and unique machine, repaired and improved upon, then brought to England from its original home in Arkham, Massachusetts. He then revealed the Hite Resonator, a device reclaimed from the Miskatonic University archives that would expand human perception through a wave resonance stimulation of the pineal gland.
Upon activating the device, the machine went critical and the entire auditorium was transported to a horrifying red plane. Giant, blood-red worm-like tendrils, thick as tree trunks, stretched over the sky in vast arcs, like criss-crossing rainbows of obscene flesh, while smaller versions of the same material covered the red, sandy earth like grotesque vegetation. A mountain in the distance devastated its surrounding landscape with an immense, invisible ray of heat that scorched the land in its constantly-firing wake. Far in the distance, a large collection of obscene things, like cockroaches with the heads of beautiful women, scooped up immense fistfuls of bodies and regurgitated upon them before eating the remains.
Daichi’s bodyguards had suddenly turned on him and were chewing on his limbs, light emitting from their eyes and mouths as they exchanged casual small-talk in a deeper, rumbling version of their original voices. Kiyoko, Tiberius, Kincaid, and Jameson killed all but one, and the survivor put out an immense cry to summon many more of its kind. A crowd of others answered him with songs of their own, men and women from all over academia suddenly glowing with an eery light from their eyes and mouths, and they began to attack the heroes with their horrible song. It nauseated Kiyoko, but with the help of her allies, she slew the soulless beasts. Upon death, they shriveled away, a blue light streaming out of them before leaving them empty.
Reuniting with Akio, the heroes compared notes. Akio had slain several of the same creatures, and even survived an encounter with a horrid, invisible beast, albeit with a broken leg. As they spoke, Daichi awoke and, when another invisible creature came, it knocked Akio unconscious and Daichi showed his true colors, bravely taking Akio and fleeing to safety. The heroes killed the creature, but at great cost to the sanity of Tiberius and Jameson as they witnessed the horror’s true form; a sort of tiger, scorpion, and fly creature, with a horrible segmented tail and scything, reaping claws.
Suddenly, one of the horrible roach women burst from the ground! It ignored the still-breathing heroes and immediately spewed on and consumed the dead body of the Blasphemy they’d killed before retreating back into the earth. The sight drove Jameson completely mad and the heroes had to drag him away, as the madness robbed him of the use of his legs until he could find time to recover.
After much traveling across the horrible plains, they found a sort of camp set up by the survivors. Men and women wept and panicked, the wounded were being tended to, it resembled dearly an impromptu camp set up during the Great War so short a time ago. Leading the camp was Beddows and Professor Smith, who had survived after mysteriously vanishing during the initial blast. Neither had seen Professor Hite since the blast, but Professor Smith postulated that, because he activated the machine, he would be at the center of it all.
Professor Smith then revealed that he had been reading a diary left behind by a traveller who had, most likely, passed away long ago. They were on Rhylkos, the Blood-Red Plane of Uvhash. It was located deep in another reality, and Uvhash was its god who slept in the center of Mars. In essence, they were in his dream, brought there by the horrible Resonator of Professor Hite. The only way to make the nightmare end for them was to find the resonator and destroy it yet again.
The heroes questioned aloud how they’d be able to destroy the machine if they couldn’t find it, and Professor Smith suggested they contact the roach creatures. The heroes were wary, fearing being consumed, until Smith pointed out that they seemed only to eat the dead. He assured them it would be a gamble, as he assumed they may be of help only by their human faces, but it was better than waiting for death by the Soulless or worse, such as the Blasphemies of Rhylkos.
The heroes set off to the fields that the roach-women occupied. They found themselves in a dark, grisly forest, with chalk-white trees whose black leaves vibrated and spasmed horribly, while they bore bloody hearts like fruit. In these woods, they were attacked by two of the Blasphemies, and Tiberius and Kincaid were almost killed in the fight.
They chose to camp after their fight, to heal their wounds and rest while staying ever on their guard ...
