Impossible Landscapes Play Report, Part 3 - Like A Map Made Of Skin

This is part three of my Impossible Landscapes play report. You can find part one here and part two here.

The player characters are:

• Agent KATE, FBI agent. She has the lowest SAN, somewhere in the low 20s when this scenario starts. She has two disorders, paranoia and claustrophobia.
• Agent KIERAN, author and occult expert. He has read the play and has the highest Corruption among the Agents.
• Agent KRATOS, diplomat working at the UN. He is normally the most cautious of the Agents and has the lowest Corruption.
• Agent KONSTANTIN, former US Army physician with his own doctor's office in New York. His wife Molly and daughter Lily play an important role in this part of the campaign.

At the start of the scenario all Agents are low on Willpower and KRATOS is seriously hurt from his fight with Mr. Ed.

Like A Map Made Of Skin

The Agents are still in the empty house they woke up in after they successfully escaped the clown by drinking the Patzu. They discuss what to do next, when Agent KONSTANTIN suddenly receives a large amount of text messages and notifications about missed calls. The messages are from his wife Molly. She begs him to come home, she feels threatened by a woman that is following her and lurking around their house. She already called the police, but they didn't do anything.

Worried, KONSTANTIN tries to call Molly, but is unable to reach her. He calls the neighbours, but he only hears the sounds of a party and someone screaming "Unmask! Unmask!".

The other Agents try to contact bonds as well, with strange results. When KIERAN calls his girlfriend he hears unsettling wooden noises the whole time. It's the noise that a walking and talking marionette makes.

Agent KRATOS tries texting a bond, but his message does not go through. When he checks the message again it seems like it only consists of lines from the play.

The Agents are unsure what to do next. KONSTANTIN wants to go to New York and make sure that Molly is safe. The other Agents argue that it might be best for them and Molly to find Hotel Broadalbin as soon as possible. Finally, they decide to first go to Dorchester House during the day and do some surveillance.

When they get close to the psychiatric facility the notice that multiple police cars are parked there and that police officers are searching the area. They check the news and see that they are wanted as escaped patients. They retreat and go to the Boxer Hotel, in the hope that they are save there for a while.

Before they can enter the hotel, they are approached by a bicycle courier. The courier hands them a package and a letter. The letter is from Mister Wilde, instructing them to take the package to New York as part of their deal. They are supposed to deliver the package to someone in the Madison Square Park two days from now.

The Agents have already learned that Mister Wilde is a powerful individual, so they are willing to fulfill their end of the bargain. They steal a car and head for New York. They decide to check in on KONSTANTIN's wife on the way there.

When the Agents enter KONSTANTIN's home they hear a loud hammering sound coming from the basement. They also notice that short ropes are tied around all door handles. While they are investigating these ropes, KRATOS is attacked from behind by the knife-wielding Cherub. He manages to escape into the kitchen, where the other Agents are and lock the door behind him.

The Cherub tries to break through the door, but soon gives up on this plan. The Agents hear it retreating. A moment later they hear terrible screams from upstairs. KONSTANTIN recognizes the voice of his wife and storms upstairs, the other Agents follow.

KONSTANTIN and KATE run into the bedroom and find KONSTANTIN's wife Molly, badly injured by the Cherub's knife. His daughter Lily is also there, she seems unhurt but is unconscious. The Cherub seems to have disappeared again.

KIERAN and KRATOS are the last to reach the hallway upstairs. Behind them a door opens and the Cherub ambushes KRATOS again. It rams it's knife into KRATOS leg, who was already badly hurt before. KIERAN sees KRATOS fall, seemingly dead, and has a bout of temporary insanity.

KATE runs into the hallway and destroys the Cherub with two shots from her pistol. KONSTANTIN rushes to KRATOS side and applies First Aid. Thanks to the medical supplies he always carries with him, KONSTANTIN is able resuscitate KRATOS.

KONSTANTIN and KATE bring their fellow Agents, as well as Molly and Lily to their car outside, before they go back into the house to check out the noise in the basement. In the basement they find Ophelia Sitri, digging a hole to find the Whisper Labyrinth. KONSTANTIN kills her for what she has done to his family.

The Agents head to KONSTANTIN's medical practice, to rest and heal. Molly has a lot of questions for KONSTANTIN, but he is evasive and tells her that they first have to make sure that she and Lily are save.

In the practice, KONSTANTIN tends to the wounds of his comrades. Then he and KATE take Molly and Lily to relatives in New York. They leave KRATOS and KIERAN behind, so they can rest.

In the night, KRATOS dreams of the Whisper Labyrinth, the bottle of Jaycy Linz and a figure dressed in yellow rags, that is chasing him. When KIERAN wakes up he sees men with shotguns and gas masks patrolling the street.

When KATE and KONSTANTIN return to the practice the Agents discuss what to do next. They decide to open Wilde's package. Inside they find the Coquelicots mask and a Seere Inc. satellite phone, identical to the one they received from Barbas. It starts ringing.

KIERAN answers the phone. The caller is Bael. He tells them that there is something that they need to know and that he has send someone to help them. The next moment a car pulls up and a woman tells the Agents to hop in. The woman is Marie J. Malthuis, aka Malthus, one of the demons from the Ars Goetia. She takes the Agents to and abandoned house. On their way there, they see the STATIC killers once again.

Inside the house the Agents find a cache of weapons, ammunitions and drugs. But also a folder with Delta Green files. The files are reports on Operation Bristol and STATIC protocol.

Agent KIERAN decided to eat another gold bug, to find out what to do next. He has a vision of himself running towards the Hotel Broadalbin, while he is being shot at.

In the meantime, KATE and KRATOS take a closer look at the Coquelicots mask and they both put it on, with no immediate effect.

The Agents head for KATE's apartment in Brookly, to spend the night there. During the night KONSTANTIN notices that KATE and KRATOS are leaving the apartment. She wakes up KIERAN and they follow them. They witness how KATE and KRATOS attack a random passerby. They can intervene in time, before one of them kills the innocent man. KRATOS and KATE cannot explain what made them act that way, but they correctly suspect it is due to the mask.

The next morning the Agents make their way to the Eternal Light Flag Staff in the Madison Square Park, where they are supposed to deliver the package to someone. At precisely 6:16am they are approached by a friendly man with a French accent, who takes the package and leaves. The Agents follow him for a while, until the man disappears into a bookshop. The Agents debate if they should enter the bookshop as well, but decide against it. Agent KIERAN uses the satellite phone in the hope to talk to Bael.

Instead, another voice answers. It says: "The hunt is on. Duck!". KIERAN ducks in time and can avoid being shot by the STATIC killer that suddenly appeared. He immediately starts to run, followed by KRATOS and KONSTANTIN. KATE tries to stand her ground and manages to kill one of the STATIC killers. But more and more appear and she starts to run as well.

The Agents can successfully evade the killers for a while and retreat into a theater and run onto the stage. There, KRATOS notices that one of the actresses is his long-dead lover Isabella. Before he can say anything to her, her head is blown away by one of the STATIC killers.

The Agents escape the theater through a door and suddenly find themselves in Madison Square Park again, but all the people around them wear clothes from a different era. Suddenly, KONSTANTIN is shot in the back and falls unconscious. KIERAN and KRATOS steal a baby stroller from a screaming mother, throw KONSTANTIN's body on top of it and continue to run. KRATOS notices that the screaming mother looked like Michelle Vanfitz.

Agent KATE is the first to reach Hotel Broadalbin. In another paranoia attack she abandoned her team mates and left them to fend for themselves. KIERAN arrives second, with KONSTANTIN's body in tow. KRATOS is last, because he had to fight off an angry Michelle Vanfitz. Mere meters before he reaches Hotel Broadalbin, he is shot in the leg, but still manages to cross the threshold to the inside.

Thoughts about Like A Map Made Of Skin

I found that this part of the campaign requires the most work from the GM. There is no set thing to do for the Agents before they get attacked by the STATIC killers and can make their way to the Broadalbin. The book gives some options, like the different missions for Mister Wilde. But those are not fully fleshed out, so the GM has to do this themselves. I used this opportunity to use some of the content that the players had missed in the previous parts, like Ophelia Sitri or the bookshop. It also gave me a chance to have some of the bonds play a more central role. I think the whole session in KONSTANTIN's house worked quite well for this purpose.

I was a little bit disappointed by the STATIC chase. It felt much more boring than the clown chase in the Dorchester House. It only got exciting when KONSTANTIN got shot and the other Agents had to deal with that. And of the "revelations" that happened during the chase only the one on the theater stage really stuck out. If I were to run this again, I would probably modify the chase quite a bit.

You can find the next part of this series here.