Background
Some time ago, a group of Delta Green agents’ investigation culminated in a very messy confrontation, in which both the cultists and agents were wiped out. Unknown to Delta Green, Jake Hartwell had been able to escape death, search the carnage, and flee. Hartwell was able to find a key and a small scrap of paper with a storage facility address in Des Moines, Iowa, and a unit number for a Green Box. The agency only recently found him, after finding his fingerprints in the Green Box. Several items were missing, including a book about the “Mlath’ker.” The Mlath’ker closely resemble the “Erelim” of the previous cult. Hartwell has pieced this together, and currently has several cult members in “The Church of Recognition.” The Mlath’ker and Erelim are actually Greys.
At the start of the investigation, the investigators (the players) know nothing about Delta Green. They may have had a true experience with the unnatural, which is explained away by a “normal” conspiracy. The investigators frequent a forum called “Veritas Americae.” It hosts subsections for almost any modern conspiracy theory imaginable. The investigators can make posts after beginning the investigation, but the few responses they receive will be off-topic, unrelated, or otherwise unhelpful.
The investigators are contacted by a private message from a very recently created account. The message tells them to join a whatsapp group chat. Once all members are in the chat, the contact (secretly a Delta Green agent) sends some falsified (allegedly deleted) posts by Qanon. The posts include vague implications about the activities of a cult leader who is harvesting adrenochrome. The cult leader is paranoid, and cannot become suspicious that he is being investigated. The posts contain some forged documents about arrests, complete with mugshots. The mugshots are real, from Hartwell’s previous arrests, but the name has been changed to prevent the investigators from finding information on the previous cult. The posts also give the address of an apartment building, and a warehouse.
The town of Des Moines has had two disappearances (suspected to be murders) over the last two weeks. Both victims were last seen on the south end of the city. These victims were dismembered and used in a ritual to summon a Mlath’ker. Hartwell and the cult have been observing the Mlath’ker nightly, but are frustrated by it. He thinks that if he feeds it, it will do more than shuffle in the dirt and wheeze. 4 or 5 days after the investigation starts, he will murder another person and try to feed them to the Mlath’ker. After another 5 days, he will start abducting and murdering more people to make more Mlath’ker. 2 days after he starts, the agents directly intervene, having 4-5 murders with Hartwell as a likely suspect, in the neighbourhood of his house.
Throughout the mission, a group of agents keep tabs on the investigators. Once or twice through the scenario, the investigators might notice a white panel van showing up in the same places as them. The van has different plates each time, but always has a streak of orange paint on the front left bumper. The investigators are potential friendlies, so the agents aren’t trying to antagonize them.
Locations
All three locations are in southern Des Moines, within about a 30 minute walk of each other.
The apartment building
The apartment building where Hartwell lives. The apartment is shabby, run-down, and only barely maintained. The building is owned by a slum landlord who takes cash and doesn’t ask questions. Asking around, the investigators gain very little information about Hartwell. He leaves late at night, though he also seems to work somewhat normal hours, and he doesn’t speak much to anyone.
Hartwell’s apartment is decrepit and mostly bare. There are several scrawled notebooks and loose papers describing the “Erelim.” These notes are mostly abandoned, and Hartwell doesn’t think much of them, but he will notice if they go missing.
The warehouse
The warehouse is mostly empty, and the owner is a real estate agent trying to sell it. The main doors are chained and locked. Hartwell stores his notebook here while not observing the Mlath’ker, and enters by shimming an emergency exit door open. There is a sump pit with concrete walls on 3 of the 4 sides, with what looks like a hasty plastic patch job on the last wall. The plastic panel can be removed, exposing a duffel bag containing the following:
- A handwritten book titled “Secrets of the Mlath’ker.” The book has several annotations written in blue pen, drawing similarities between the “Mlath’ker” mentioned in the book, and the “Erelim.” The Mlath’ker are described as short, thin, grey-skinned humanoids with large heads, and small, fine-featured faces with big eyes. The book also describes a ritual to summon a Mlath’ker, requiring a vessel made of mutilated human corpses.
- A long, bloodstained knife made of bone. Made of a human femur.
- A second book of notes, detailing the actions of a Mlath’ker, observed over a period of several days, starting a few days after the second disappearance. The writing style progresses from a reverent description of the wisdom of the being, to frustration, eventually turning to speculation that the being is hungry.
- Other Green Box items as you see fit.
The scrapyard
The cult’s ritual space is found at the Garry scrapyard on the edge of town, hidden from plain sight. The scrapyard is owned by Sam Garry, and has all kinds of scrap metal from various sources. The outer fence is topped with razor wire, and has no obvious breaks in it.
The cult meeting space is an underground hollow, dug by the cult. The chamber is under a large pile of broken diesel generators and other large, low-demand scrap items up against the outside fence. The entrance is outside the scrapyard, through a small hole in the fence, obscured by some shrubs.
The chamber is a small, foul-smelling space, using panels from generators to reinforce the walls and ceiling. In a corner is what looks like a rotting, sewn together mass of body parts. Elsewhere in the room, there is a pile of recently disturbed dirt, which hides a shallow grave containing most of a human body, notably missing parts of the skull, and the left femur.
The mass of body parts, upon further inspection, is a humanoid made of various corpses. It has been mutilated: the limbs have been shortened, and the head has more skin and bone added to it, to make it resemble a Grey. This homunculus is a Mlath’ker. The body is connected to a Mi-go, who is observing the cult after the strange experience of having part of its attention drawn from one of its own Greys to this vessel. The “Mlath’ker” spends most of its time in a state of suspended animation, as the body is rapidly decomposing. The Mlath’ker will awaken when the investigators arrive, and the investigators may notice it breathing, and might see it move out of the corner of their eye. If attacked, the Mi-go will abandon the vessel immediately. The cult observes the Mlath’ker nightly for several hours.
If Hartwell suspects he has been discovered, he will go into hiding in the scrapyard. After Hartwell has stayed in the scrapyard for about a week, a strange set of flashing lights will appear above the scrapyard at night. After this, the cult chamber will be populated by 5 Greys (and the Mlath’ker), conducting experiments on what remains of Hartwell and the cultists. After another 3 days, all evidence in the chamber vanishes completely.
Jake Hartwell
34 year old male. Hartwell doesn’t own anything that would put him on the grid, and only works for cash. He is incredibly paranoid, and his only goals are to appease the Mlath’ker. Unwilling to abandon the position of power as the new cult leader, he sees it as his reward for all the hardship he has endured. He is unlikely to flee again, first preferring to hide, then fight.
The Agents
The agents are aware of the failures of the last group of agents: unsuccessfully raiding the cult compound, leaving direct evidence of Delta Green’s existence (the green box key and note), etc. They are here to clean up after the previous agents. In the event that the investigators’ mission goes south, they are prepared to step in and resolve the situation, but there is a strong preference for reducing exposure to the absolute bare minimum, as the situation has already exposed far, far too much of the agency. Under no circumstances will the agents meet with the investigators in person.
Ending the Scenario
After the investigators eradicate the cult, The group of agents find them and recover all material related to the cult, the unnatural, and Delta Green. Later, when the investigators look for any evidence of what happened, their homes have been turned over, all electronics are gone or completely wiped, and any other evidence is missing. Even the forum has disappeared.
Statblocks
Jake Hartwell
STR 11 CON 10 DEX 13 INT 12 POW 13 CHA 12
HP 12 WP 6
SKILLS: Occult 45%, Survival 35%, Alertness 65%, Firearms 60%, Heavy Machinery 40%, HUMINT 40%, Melee Weapons 55%, Stealth 40%, Athletics 60%, Dodge 40%, Navigate 30%, Search 40%, Unnatural 40%
ATTACKS: Knife: 55%, 1d4; M590 shotgun, 12 gauge shot: 60%, 2d10/2d6/1d6
Cultist
STR 12 CON 10 DEX 11 INT 10 POW 8 CHA 10
HP 10 WP 8
SKILLS: Occult 25%, Alertness 45%, Firearms 40%, Melee Weapons 35%, Athletics 40%, Unnatural 10%
ATTACKS: Knife: 55%, 1d4; Pistol: 40%, 1d10
Credits
Veritas Americae was written by Rhinowarlord for the 2023 Shotgun Scenario contest.
Source: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VX7qzUpJGFg5mWzRb_UIFpMaemkfI47thHZFTrcRKFM/edit