Bugs Bugs Bugs

## THE BRIEFING

Agent GARY, called me and told me he was being stalked by bug people. He asked me to send backup before they could get him. Meet him at the Green Box he set up at the mall.

## THE SECRET

Agent GARY hunted down and killed a witch from the Bug Coven, low level sorcerers who serve a giant assassin bug. The Coven stalked GARY and killed him in revenge. By investigating his disappearance, the Agents risk falling into the Coven’s trap, as the wily wizards trick them with bug illusions.

## AGENT GARY’S STASH

Telemarketer Dermot Humphrey, Delta Green Agent GARY, maintained a couple servers for the conspiracy and put in occasional work as muscle or an extra pair of hands. He had no government credentials and the Case Officer considered him unsuitable for regular field operations.

GARY’s “lair” is a defunct business at the local mall, shuttered and locked. There’s no sign of GARY. The mall is populated enough that Agents need a badge or good excuse to break the lock.

The Green Box has a server rack, tables of documents, and stuff pinned to the walls.

* The computers support Delta Green’s secure communications and file sharing. A computer scientist can break into them. The files inside are transmissions between Agents working other cases, obviously unrelated to whatever GARY was dealing with.  Agents can gain Unnatural points by studying them.
	+ Scanned pages from the March 1927 issue of National Sportsman magazine, describing a “horned bear” hunt in the Arctic.
	+ iPhone camera photos of a naked man seated against a wall. Half his body has been transmuted to rusty metal. A labyrinth-like pattern is visible on the wall.
	+ Text file, instructions for destruction of a “cube”. The process involves masonry saws, hammers and acid, but NOT FIRE UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES
* One table is a makeshift forensics workshop. On it is a postcard. One side is a photo of orca whales. The other side is blank, except for a bug drawn in the text field in sharpie. A beetle with an almond shaped abdomen and a pointy proboscis. There’s no return address.
	+ Biologists recognize the silhouette as an assassin bug, a type of insect that disguises itself using corpses in order to hunt prey.
	+ Historians and Occultists think it’s a black hand style warning, marking the recipient for death.
	+ The postcard has no fingerprints on it.
* On the wall is a map of the city. One location is crossed out. One has a pin in it.

There are no signs of forced entry, it doesn’t look like GARY made it back to his Green Box.

## A CRUEL TRICK

Once the Agents see the drawing on the postcard (the bug glyph), they become susceptible to a clever spell. Their perceptions will be spoofed at several junctures, making humans appear to be monstrous insects, and monstrous insects appear to be human. Only a single Agent needs to look at the glyph, and the whole group falls under its sway.
The scenario will tell the Handler when this happens.

## FAKEOUT 1: BUGS BUGS BUGS

As they leave the storage unit, a face in the crowd of mall shoppers turns toward the Agents. The disguise slips and it’s obvious what’s going on - a huge bug, wearing a corpse. It lurches toward them, proboscis flicking out of the host body’s drooling mouth.

This is the first trick.

If Agents respond with violence, the bug-person falls over, chittering and twitching before it curls up. Then the illusion is broken and it’s a normal person, who they just shot.

If the Agents keep their cool, the bug draws within licking range, then pushes past them. The illusion is broken and it’s just a normal lady in a hurry to find a bathroom.

If the Agents kill someone here, in a crowded mall, it’s up to them to find a way out.

## GARY’S PHONE

Computer scientists and Agents with NSA connections can geolocate the phone GARY used to call the case officer. This leads to the same pinned location as the map.

## CROSSED OUT LOCATION: THE EMPTY HOUSE

A suburban house. Signs of forced entry, car missing. The owner, Eva Engel, is nowhere to be found. Searching the house turns up a cardboard stencil of the bug shape found on the postcard in the Green Box.

## PINNED LOCATION: THE TERRARIUM

Another house. This one is owned by registered nurse Bernardine Cross. The window wells are filled with earth.
Inside, it looks like half a dozen people live here, or visit regularly and don’t clean up after themselves. There are empty beers and pizza boxes all over the place. Also scattered around the house:

* Surveillance photos of GARY.
* Bug stencils.
* Postcards with bugs drawn on them - same as the ones at the empty house.
* Gary’s phone, left casually on a table.
* An iron key.

The door down to the basement is barred, preventing whatever’s down there from getting out.

## FAKEOUT 2: THE SECOND APPARITION

This happens while the Agents are in the house at the pinned location, or outside doing surveillance. This time it’s a whole crowd of bugs, and they aren’t trying to hide. The human  heads peel back, the jaws fall off and the bug mouthparts emerge.
It’s a double fakeout. Behind the illusion are the five surviving members of the bug coven, armed with knives. If the Agents don’t defend themselves, the killers each deal an automatic D6 damage (after which combat is resolved normally via DEX order and rolls to hit).
The illusion breaks when either the Agents attack the cultists or the cultists hit the Agents.

## THE BUG COVEN

The bug coven are low level sorcerers who work for a gross giant insect disguised as a person, bringing it people to feed on. In exchange, the bug secretes chemicals that make them feel good. It taught them to draw the symbols that make people susceptible to bug illusions.
The coven has five members now. Cross the neurotic nurse, Greenback the jubilant banker, Jarvis the phlegmatic animal control officer, Katydid the combative marine biologist, and Bensalem the janitor. The coven is upset with GARY because he kidnapped and murdered the sixth bug witch, Eva Engel. Now they’re stalking the Agents.

## THE BASEMENT

The one room basement is lit red, like a night exhibit at the zoo. The room is divided by a big metal grate, secured with a sturdy padlock. On the side opposite the stairs, locked in the cage, is Agent GARY.

## FAKEOUT 3: GARY RESCUED

Gary is injured but alive. He is glad to see the Agents and asks them to let him out.

The key from upstairs opens the padlock. Gary stumbles out, thanking them profusely for saving him from the bug cult.
The giant assassin bug wearing Gary’s skin as a disguise waits to get an Agent alone before attacking them.

## PLAYTESTER SUGGESTIONS

*Occultists can study the bug glyph and learn how to recreate it. Drawing it is free. Casting the spell to make someone look like a bug only costs 1 WP on a failure and 1 SAN on a success. Any aggressive action done unto or by a disguised target breaks the illusion.*

*Biologists and Chemists can study the bug in order to duplicate its powers. By synthesizing its addictive secretions, they can mix up a potion with chemicals extracted from a person’s corpse. Drinking it costs 1 SAN, but disguises the user as that person so long as they’re carrying the corpse. It only fools those who’ve seen the bug glyph, and the potion is still slightly addictive. With further study, the process can work on non-human corpses too, or make it so only part of the corpse must be carried.*

*Bug photo by AndyMcLemore*

## THE COVEN

STR 10, CON 10, DEX 11, INT 11, POW 11, CHA 10

HP 10, WP 11, SAN 44, Addiction: Bug’s Kiss

**SKILLS**: Alertness 40%, Melee Weapons 50%, SIGINT 50%

**ATTACKS**: Knife (50%, 1D6 damage)

**BUG GLYPH**: Coven members can scribe a bug glyph, usually with a stencil.

**BUG ILLUSION**: Coven members can cause people who have seen the glyph to see normal humans as bugs in human skin.

**BUG TRACKING**: The bug drug in their system lets Coven members track anyone who has seen the bug glyph. This feels like a vague hotter/colder effect. They have to be careful how many people they show the glyph to, or they’ll get too many false positives and not find who they’re looking for.

## THE BUG

STR 15, CON 5, DEX 15, INT 3, POW 10

HP 10, WP 10

**SKILLS**: Pretend to Be Human While Disguised 50%, Hide 50%, Scuttle Around 50%

**ATTACKS**: Grapple and Feed (50%, or automatic if the target turns their back)

**GRAPPLE AND FEED**: On a successful roll, the Bug seizes the victim in its forelegs and injects them with venom using its proboscis. The venom has lethality of 10% and an onset of one hour, minus 10 minutes for each additional round the bug spends injecting the victim. The victim may escape the pin on their action by beating the bug in an opposed STR roll. A doctor can create an antidote to the poison from the bug's hemolymph.

**CORPSE DISGUISE**: When wearing a human corpse on its back, the bug can appear as that human to anyone who has seen the bug glyph. It can speak in their voice. It isn’t smart enough to fully imitate them but can act like it’s in shock or traumatized to compensate.

**CORPSE GETAWAY**: If it’s about to be killed, the bug can ditch the dead body on its back and run away. The corpse stays standing for one round, moving as though the bug were still beneath it fighting the Agents.

**BUG’S KISS**: When the bug feeds on a human being, it secretes an addictive chemical. This is how it communicates with the cult.

**SAN LOSS**: 1/1D8

## Credits

Bugs Bugs Bugs was written by mellonbread for the 2022  Shotgun Scenario contest. Source: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1U-WN4onD7X2nzPfV8e5PMlRd8IZDILtCMdPEijBBOxE/edit.

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.

Bugs Bugs Bugs is not available here under CC-BY-SA.

For preservation purposes, an exported PDF of the original submission can be found here.