Insane in the Membrane

## The Truth

The players were called to their usual meeting location by their case officer to investigate a strange file concerning an incident in Pocatello, Idaho at the **St. Duma’s Asylum** in 1896. The players and their case officer were exposed to the Case File and are all unconscious around a table, hallucinating the events in this scenario. Their case officer’s mind has been completely consumed and is the antagonist of this scenario.

## The Asylum

The asylum is a three story stone building furnished in the style of a 19th century sanitorium. The asylum’s floor and walls are covered in a red, fleshy membrane like stretched skin that is all across the interior of the building (0/1d4 Unnatural). It’s translucent, allowing red light to bathe the entirety of the asylum from the lights, most of which are on in the hallways but off in the rooms. Fleshy tumors are spaced in the halls and the rooms in various sizes, from a few feet in diameter to blocking an entrance. They are pulsating and react to touch (0/1 Unnatural). Furniture, etc. is replaced by fleshy counterparts. They too react when touched (0/1 Unnatural) but are harmless. The membrane can be torn rather easily but will repair itself in seconds (0/1 Unnatural), the furniture will not repair themselves.

The tumors are resilient but can be destroyed by hitting them many times, STR check. Pass means 10 minutes for a small tumor and 30 to create an opening in a blocked one. Failure means try again. They will melt if touched with flames. The tumors bleed when hit (0/1 Unnatural). While fleshy counterparts to mundane objects are common, real objects that can be found as well, especially weapons such as metal rods, saws, oil lamps, etc. can be found with a proper Search roll.

The Asylum’s 3 floors are from top to bottom: Padded Ward, Patient Rooms, Treatment/Entry Level.

## Padded Ward

   The players wake up in this level in individual unlit padded rooms, each secured to a gurney by a pair of Flesh-Shackles. They have no memory of how they got here, only remembering them falling asleep the night before and waking up here. If they yell, they can hear the other agents in adjacent rooms. After 3 minutes, if an agent yells or gets off their gurney, the **Flesh-Shackles** begin eating them. The **Flesh-Shackles** are attached to each of their limbs and resemble fleshy growths in the shape of limb restraints fused to the gurney, they are lined with sharp teeth on both ends of the restraint. When they begin eating, the agents feel an intense pain as the shackle comps down on each of their limbs with their teeth on both ends and begin to press inward, as if they are trying to eat the limb without a mouth (0/1d4 Violence). Players can take an opposed STR roll (**Flesh-shackle** STR is 7) at any time for each of their limbs to break free. Every turn the player isn’t free they take 1 DMG for each limb still restrained.

   All the rooms on this floor are the same as the player’s rooms. Listening into the padded walls or making a Search roll investigating them reveals the walls are pulsating softly like they are breathing (0/1 Unnatural). The exit is an emergency stairway blocked by a tumor. Throughout the rooms, voices can be heard faintly when every door is opened, only to reveal nothing. With an INT test players can discern that the voices are conversations with their case officer (0/1d4 Unnatural).

## Patient Rooms

   This floor’s hallways are identical to before, but the rooms are not padded and simply furnished with a bed, a bedside table, and a lamp. The halls also open up to a lounge area with couches, rocking chairs, and other homely things. Populating this level and in various rooms are 4-5 **Fleshwalkers**, humanoids resembling skinless people. They are found wandering the halls, laying in the beds, sitting in the lounge, and are hostile and will attack any agents on sight, but mainly rely on sound and can be avoided if the players quietly move around them. Investigating a Fleshwalker will point out bodily similarities to the players as well as several other unidentified people. (0/1d4).

In the center of the lounge area is a sinister looking Flesh Mouth (0/1d4) which resembles a large tumor lined with teeth, with a glass, smokey orb at the top of the tumor. Destroying the orb by any means causes all the **Fleshwalkers** to become inanimate. The exit to the level is an elevator in a hallway beyond the lounge which is blocked by a mass of quivering **Fleshwalkers** (0/1d4 Unnatural). These will not react to the players and will continue to undulate together until the orb is destroyed, after which they will fall inanimate and leave the elevator open.

## Treatment/Foyer

   The agents enter the floor looking down a circular fleshy tunnel about 10ft. in length. It's warm, damp and pulsating. At the end is an opening with a faint amount of light visible on the other end. The exit is a vertical opening in the tunnel that requires some effort to get open but not much. On the other side reveals a hallway much like the other floors, but wider and more well lit, with operating room doors rather than bedroom doors.

   After exiting the tunnel, Agents who pass an Alertness roll or if the agents walk 20 feet notice that a fleshy **tentacle** (See **Tentacle**) has attached itself to them as they exited from their stomach or back. Once noticed, the **tentacle** uses its lamprey-like mouth to attack the agents, trying to pull them to the entrance. Agents must make a CON test to resist the **tentacle**’s pull or be knocked over and pulled towards the opening again. To remove the **tentacle**, agents must either damage the **tentacle** or make a STR check. If it still has HP, it will continue to try and attack the agents.

   The hallway opens up to an entrance area, and has all the trappings of an entrance that a hospital would have with a reception area, lounge, and emergency area. The entrance is blocked by a large tumor that has a hardened shell made of keratin that resists flames and weapon strikes. Behind the keratin the bulk of the tumor seems to be this pulsating sac underneath it. Various flesh tubes branch out from this tumor and go into the floor and walls. These too cannot be harmed.

Various halls branch off of the lounge and in them are operating rooms, some of which just have beds and tables while others have surgical operating tables, however, each room has a flesh node where the flesh tube from the door comes out of the ground vertically and stands upright. The tube secretes a fleshy substance that is captured by a thin membrane until it fills up like a balloon on top of the node. Every five minutes, a Fleshwalker comes and retrieves the membrane-balloon and takes it with them, allowing the node to fill up again.

   On this level are 6~ **Fleshwalkers** that are dressed in orderly outfits, a History roll reveals them to be from the early 19th century. These **Fleshwalkers** do not attack the agents, but will attack if the agents attempt to compromise **their job**. They go to the flesh nodes in each of the operating rooms and take the secretions to the only room at the very end of a hallway. This room seems to be more up to date compared to the rest of the building, but still older than the current era.

## The Skin Person and Escaping

   Inside the room is a single bed and on top in a foetal position, head down is a figure sitting on the bed, however, the folds of its skin seep off the bed and onto the floor and onto the walls. This is **The Skin Person**, the source of the membrane across the whole facility (0/1d4). The **Fleshwalkers** are serving it by putting the meat-balloons underneath large folds of its skin, where it's absorbed and the membrane expands outward just a bit. Killing **The Skin Person** or stopping the **Fleshwalkers** from delivering its sustenance will kill **The Skin Person** and end the scenario. The **Fleshwalkers** are more plentiful in **The Skin Person**’s room and will be harder to fight if the players try to harm **The Skin Person**, however the nodes will be easier to take on individually but will have to be guarded to ensure that **The Skin Person** starves (about 5 minutes).

## Conclusion

After **The Skin Person** dies, the players wake up around the table and remember the memories from The Truth. Their case officer does not wake up, they are permanently dead due to tumors filling up their entire brain cavity and causing ruptures. Any players who die during the hallucination wake up but have undiagnosed brain cancer.

## Stat Blocks

### Fleshwalkers

Fleshy Servants

 13

HP: 10

WP: N/A

SAN: 0
**Skills:**
Alertness (50%) Track (40%) Unarmed Combat (40%) Melee weapons (40%)
**Attacks:**
Strike (60%) 1d4+1 DMG

Siphon (30%) See **Siphon**
**Track:** Using their sense of hearing, the Fleshwalkers can use their sense of sound to track a silent adversary based on their last known location of making noise. A success means the Fleshwalker knows where something that is an intruder is and can make an attack, a fail means the Fleshwalker thinks it knows where something is and slashes before returning to what it was doing.
**Siphon:** If a Fleshwalker has taken damage, it can attempt to Siphon HP from an enemy by connecting with a fleshy tube that extrudes from their body in order to siphon the opponent’s flesh for itself. The Siphon’s attack % turns to 70% if the enemy is being Grappled or is otherwise incapacitated. Siphon does 1d4 to an enemy and the Skinwalker gains that much HP back to a max of 10.

### Tentacle

Lampery-Like Horror

 11

HP: 4

WP: N/A

SAN: 0
**Skills:**
Unarmed Combat (40%)
**Attacks:**
Bite (70%) 1d4 DMG See **Bite**

Gnaw () 1d4+1 DMG See **Gnaw**

Pull (N/A) See **Pull**
**Bite:** After the player disconnects from the tentacle after the initial encounter, the tentacle can attempt to Bite the player. Next turn, the Tentacle can attempt **Gnaw** or **Pull** but not another **Bite** attack unless its disconnected. During the initial encounter the tentacle is considered having hit a **Bite** attack even though the player took no damage. A player may make a STR check (not an opposed check) to break a **Bite** in the turns after one has hit.

**Gnaw:** Deal 1d4 DMG to the enemy, but the enemy is not moved at all after this motion.

**Pull:** Pull the enemy off balance, they must make a CON check and if they fail they are knocked prone and dragged 5~ feet to the opening. They take 1 DMG from falling and dragging if they fail the CON check. They cannot take damage from **Pull** if they are already knocked prone, only pulled towards the opening.

### The Skin Person

Inner Mind of a Troubled Person

 N/A

HP: 10

WP: 16

SAN: 0
**Skills:**
Unnatural (50%)
**Attacks:**
Skin Subdue (60%) See **Skin Subdue**

Psychic Cry (30%) 1d4+1 DMG, Causes SAN check for Unnatural (1/1d4).
**Skin Subdue:** The Skin membrane around the enemy moulds and crawls up them, giving them a -20% on any movement-related actions or checks for 1 turn. To move, targets must make a STR or DEX roll or be stuck. **Skin Subdue** can also cause an enemy to trip, which requires and Athletics or DEX check and on fail the target is knocked prone. **Skin Subdue** can also be used if a target is adjacent to a wall. **Skin Subdue** can only affect one enemy at a time.

## Credits

Insane in the Membrane was written by Purrs for the 2021  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 © Purrs, excepting those elements that are components of the Delta Green intellectual property.

Insane in the Membrane is not available here under CC-BY-SA.
Source: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1MseWNL2Pw9dcrvidH2PEJbb-ATYTo-EM2WdPB-juEmY/edit