WINTER PEPPER

1971. GRU-SV8 has assets everywhere in the Warsaw Pact. In East Berlin, friendlies gather tomes, documents and artifacts for transport to the SV8 archives in Moscow. The Stasi, East Germany’s secret police, spy on them. Assuming they are dissidents, the Stasi clandestinely copy one of these documents: the screenplay for an unfinished Fritz Lang film, Der König in Gelb. They target the cell for zersetzun: a campaign of harassment, gaslighting and psychological torment.

The assets contact SV8, assuming their troubles have unnatural origins. SV8 assumes they’re contaminated with the creeping madness of Hastur. Really, it’s the Stasi operatives gaslighting them who are infected. Soon, everyone else will be too.

## BRIEFING

The SV8 Agents receive the italicized text.

*Assets in GDR report symptoms consistent w/ supernatural contagion*

*Investigate assets:*

*\* Herbart Parkreiner*

*\* Lulu Desjardins*

*\* Dr. Edmund Godel*

*Determine source, respond accordingly*

## GIVE TO EACH PLAYER IN SECRET

*Covert supervisory role:*

*Monitor fellow agents*

*Serious contamination = LIQUIDATE*

(You can secretly enlist an Agent as an informant for the Stasi if you want to be nasty.)

## THE GDR CELL

The GDR Cell sends books and papers to the SV8 archive in Moscow. They have no combat or covert skills besides rudimentary tradecraft. They have each been victims of the Stasi’s psychological warfare.

***HERBART PARKREINER- Librarian***

**STR** 8, **CON** 9, **DEX** 8,

**INT** 15, **POW** 13, **CHA** 11

**HP** 9, **WP** 13, **SAN** 51

**Skills**: Anthropology 40%, Archaeology 40%, Bureaucracy 40%, Craft: Bibliography 40%, Criminology 60%, Forensics 40% Persuade 60%, HUMINT 50%, Occult 30%, Search 70%, Unnatural 6%

Herbart is a librarian who can find any book. He came to SV8’s attention due to his collecting occult texts. He’s old enough to remember the Weimar Republic, and not a fan of fascism or communism. He is fat and stress not been kind to him - his hair is falling out and his skin has a greasy texture.

Patrons ask Herbart for books he knows don’t exist. When he looks in the card catalog, he finds them. He feels an instinctive revulsion, combined with inexorable fascination. The books are never returned to the library, but are waiting in his apartment when he gets home.

***LULU DESJARDINS - Archivist***

**STR** 10, **CON** 9, **DEX** 12,

**INT** 12, **POW** 12, **CHA** 14

HP 10, WP 12, **SAN** 50

**Skills**: Accounting 50%, Bureaucracy 50%, Craft: Forgery 20%, Criminology 30%, Foreign Languages (English 60%, Russian 50%), History 40%, HUMINT 40%, Law 50%, Persuade 60%, Search 40%, Occult 20%

Lulu works at the National Archives, specializing in newspapers, photographs and periodicals. She came to SV8’s attention when she found records of SMERSH operations in Berlin during WW2. She’s a modern, liberated woman, dressing and acting accordingly. Anxiety has taken its toll, rendering her disheveled and haggard looking.

Lulu finds unusual documents in the archives. They chronicle the history of another world, strange and terrible. The documents disappear when she lets them out of her sight.

***DR EDMUND GOEDEL - Professor***

**STR** 11, **CON** 11, **DEX** 10,

**INT** 14, **POW** 11, **CHA** 13

**HP** 12, **WP** 11, **SAN** 43,

Persistent Anxiety Disorder

**Skills**: Anthropology 50%, Bureaucracy 40%, Criminology 40%, Foreign Language (Dutch 50%, Latin 40%), History 60%, HUMINT 50%, Search 60% Occult 40%, Persuade 40%

Edmund teaches the 30 Years War at Humboldt University Berlin. He came to SV8’s attention when wrote a paper on witch hysteria during the war. He wears glasses and sweatervests. Now he smokes nonstop and shakes like he’s coming down from an amphetamine binge.

Several of Dr Goedel’s students are Stasi informants. They bring things up in class they couldn’t possibly know. They point out errors in his textbooks he knows weren’t there before. Words that make no sense and things that never happened. Things he remembers when they tell him.

## BY SLOW DECAY

The GDR Cell is frightened, and begs the Agents for help. They aren’t sure what’s happening to them is real, and are desperate to confirm they aren’t going insane. As the infection worsens at the hands of the Stasi operation, they withdraw into their own world. Dr Goedel works on a paper about the mask. Lulu Desjardins clips her newspapers, imagining herself a consort to the head of the Imperial Dynasty. Herbart Parkreiner reads his books. They meet to discuss the play - despite never having read it.

The Stasi operatives encourage this, fanning the flames of their delusion. They insert themselves into their subjects’ lives, playing the other parts of Der Konig in Gelb. They tell themselves it’s method acting, a deep cover operation to destroy their targets. They can’t stop. They don’t want to stop.

## THE LANGUAGE

The Cell increasingly writes and speaks in a language totally incomprehensible to outside observers, interspersing normal conversations with aphasic gibberish. The written form appears only as foreign shapes, intelligible only to people also touched by the outside. The Stasi informants in their lives indulge this, pretending it makes complete sense to them. Until they themselves begin to understand.

If the Agents ask, any member of the Cell will teach them the language. It isn’t difficult to learn, if they put in the effort. Just sound out the syllables on the page along with them, and the rest will fall into place:

*HAVE - YOU - SEEN - THE - YELLOW - SIGN*

An Agent who learns the language will fall prey to the same delusions, accelerating their own downhill slide. It lets them understand Stasi operatives who use it as a secret language, convinced nobody will ever penetrate their argot.

## THE AUDIENCE BECOME THE ACTORS

By interacting with the GDR Cell, the Agents expose themselves to the entropic infohazards of Carcosa, and attract the attention of the Stasi. The operatives take a hands-off approach at first, to learn who they’re dealing with. They activate informants, monitor communications, compile biographical information, map relationships, and establish psychological profiles.

Then they begin the real work of destroying them.

*You turn the postcard over. It’s a photo of you. You’re five years old, standing on a beach of pure Baltic amber with your father. In the background, a palace rises above a misty lake. You remember the vacation like it was yesterday, despite never having seen this place.*

*The hotel lobby is blindingly lit in amber and gold with chandeliers and streaming banners. Enormous posters and photographs show you in places you’ve never been, with people you’ve never met. The crowd presses, spilling champagne and cake on you. They laugh and smile. They are so happy for you. Next morning there’s no evidence of the party.*

*You hear the sound of stealthy feet in the hall, a pick in your lock. You grab your weapon as quickly and quietly as you dare. The door swings open. A mannequin stands frozen, gun at the ready.*

*The music comes from the ceiling at night. The cafe speakers during the day. Kids hum it at the Intershop. Nobody knows what you’re talking about when you ask the name. You can’t get it out of your head.*

*The entrance to the U-Bahn is gone. In its place, with marble fates and fountains: a “Regierung tödliche Kammer”.*

The Agents can’t be sure whether this is the result of their connection with Carcosa, or an intelligence bureaucracy acting to drive them insane. Really, it’s a little of both. The manifestations get more overt as the Stasi operatives’ madness increases. Maybe they plant evidence that an Agent is deliberately worsening the infection.

***STASI AGENT***

**STR** 11, **CON** 11, **DEX** 11,

**INT** 11, **POW** 11, **CHA** 11

**HP** 11, **WP** 11, **SAN** 44,

Obsession (Carcosa)

**Skills**: Alertness 50%, Bureaucracy 40%, Criminology 50%, Disguise 50%, Drive 40%, Firearms 40%, Foreign Languages (English 50%, Russian 40%, Carcosan Glosolia 99%), HUMINT 60%, Persuade 60%, SIGINT 40%, Stealth 50%, Unarmed Combat 50%

**Attacks**: Makarov (40%, D8)

The way this stops is the Agents catch them in the act. They spot the masked man replacing a portrait. They realize the greengrocer has been switching their orders and figure out where he’s getting his instructions. They track things to their source.

***ADRIAN HUSS - Stasi Operative in charge of Zersetzung against the GDR Cell***

**STR** 11, **CON** 10, **DEX** 12,

**INT** 14, **POW** 11, **CHA** 12

**HP** 11, **WP** 11, **SAN** 33,

Paranoia, Obsession (Carcosa)

**Skills**: Alertness 50%, Art: Screenwriting 60%, Bureaucracy 40%, Criminology 60%, Disguise 50%, Drive 40%, Firearms 40%, Foreign Languages (English 50%, Russian 40%, Carcosan Glosolia 99%), HUMINT 60%, Persuade 60%, SIGINT 40%, Stealth 50%, Unarmed Combat 50%

**Attacks**: P38 (40%, D10)

**Rituals**: Yellow Sign

## RESOLUTION

If removed from the Stasi’s reach, Lulu, Herbart and Edmund might recover. Otherwise, they are doomed. Same for the Agents. Leaving the GDR is difficult while Huss is around. Visas will be denied and communications with the outside world interrupted or misdirected.

A visit to Huss’ office is an adventure. The Agents enter the building, maybe with weapons at the ready, It’s one room, the size of a closet. A receptionist - maybe Lulu with a new job - asks if they want coffee or tea while they wait. Points at the wall, says “he” will see them now.

Touching the wall knocks it over like a stage backdrop. Behind it are mountains of books, binders and paper. Clerks, intelligence analysts and operatives scuttle everywhere, pinning photos and dossiers up, scribbling connections between. The Agents find files on themselves, everyone they’ve ever met.

Huss rehearses for the role of the Phantom of Truth. He hands a copy of Der Konig in Gelb to the Agents, asking them to play the role of Cassilda or Gonzago. If threatened, he flees into the warren of intelligence - laughing all the way.

If pursued, light is visible at the end of the tunnel. It widens to open onto a shore of pure baltic amber. Across a misty lake is a beautiful palace, which rises against a backdrop of dandelion yellow moons and black stars. Agents who flee risk being buried under an avalanche of paper as they rush back toward reality. Agents who continue forward have come home.

## IF THE STASI GET THEIR WAY

Huss grows powerful within the *Staatssicherheitsdienst*. Ravenous paranoia and madness are the only allies he needs to climb to the top. As his influence grows, so does the decay of *Der Konig in Gelb*. Crimes become more nonsensical: *divisive sociocidal counterobeyance, ownership of a goldfish without a license*. The Stasi is paralyzed by the same fear and suspicion it sowed throughout society. The NPA is brought in to purge the ministry, exposing more innocent minds to the truth of Carcosa.

## Credits

WINTER PEPPER was written by mellonbread for the 2018  shotgun scenario contest.

Published by arrangement with the Delta Green Partnership. The intellectual property known as Delta Green is a trademark and copyright owned by the Delta Green Partnership, who has licensed its use here. The contents of this document are © mellonbread, excepting those elements that are components of the Delta Green intellectual property.

WINTER PEPPER is not available here under CC-BY-SA.