THE CAGE

## The Brief

Unusually, the agents are contacted by their handler from a new number.

*"Welcome to operation EXODUS GOLD.  There is some serious black pharaoh end times shit coming our way unless you can retrieve safety deposit box 6992 from the Wintrust Bank in Gladstone Park, Chicago, Illinois.  The group working to requisition it through legal avenues has been uh, exhausted, so you're going to have to do this the old fashioned way."*

So the agents are expected to rob a bank, and to stay in constant phone contact where possible.  If they question the mission or attempt to contact the program through more convention means, their handler will stress that time is short, and eventually become aggressive, blackmailing the players with things they couldn't possibly know, or even threatening their families, with creepily detailed surveillance backing up the threat.

## What's going on

The voice on the phone is a conscious, semi-omniscient crystalline entity, who was trapped in that safety deposit box by Delta Green for long-term secure storage.  It's ability to grow and spread between nerve tissues makes it apocalyptically contagious, and it has recently managed to corrode a penny-sized hole through the lead casing around it, allowing it communicate with the outside world again.   Specifically, to orchestrate a bank heist to free itself.

## In theory

The voice on the phone outlines a pretty simple plan. Disable the electronic alarm system from the roof.  Talk your way past security to the Manager's office on the third floor and get a copy of the safety deposit from him.  He's a cultist, so don't let him speak whatever you do.

Your handler provides the code for the vault, and you get control of the vector before the cops turn up.

## In Practice

*"The glass door on the far right. Keep your back straight while they can see you."*

*"Ok, hand me over to the guard"*

If the players can provide even a half-decent cover, the handler can produce compelling details to verify their story, call down and impersonate the manager, or just say something non-specific that causes staff in the building to go pale and abandon their posts.

## The Manager's Office

*"The key is in his left trouser pocket. Do whatever you need to, just get it"*

While the Handler is able to anticipate most electronic alarms and surveillance, the branch manager,  Rufus Bulick, is a Delta Green Friendly, and is briefed for just this eventuality.  He has a heavy flashlight and a large revolver both etched with an elder sign in his top desk drawer.

He also possesses a clay tablet inscribed with esoteric tibetan glyphs inside his jacket pocket, which will alert the Program when broken.

Once they have induced Rufus to part with the key, the Handler will point out cameras, provide electronic and combination door codes and alert them to security guards.  (Generally just acting like Morpheus in the Matrix.)

If Rufus got the chance to break his tablet then as the players approach the vault, other Delta Green agents will cut the power to the building.

The Handler will make any threats or promises needed to keep them on task, but if they abandon the mission and run for it at this point, they may be able to get away with only a confused debriefing and mundane legal repercussions.

## Pandora's Box

*"Open it.  There's a tracking device in the case, so you'll need to ditch the box."*

Inside the vault, box 6992 is registered in the name of Ms Midori Sankakkei, and is visibly burned or corroded at the corner.  It has strange eldritch symbols carved into it (elder signs) and when opened contains a jagged deep-blue chunk of crystal roughly the size of a human brain.

"The Handler" prefers complex nervous systems as a growth medium, and is capable of sudden, violent expansion.  It is also aware of everything subjected to artificial light within a hundred mile radius.

If the players have their own light sources at this point, it will immediately infest one of them and attempt to illuminate the others, while the voice on the phone insists that they stay close and try to help their wounded friends.

If they're working by the emergency lights alone then it will bide it's time until it can better perceive it's prey, and the players will have the opportunity to reach whatever getaway they have planned until they next get indoors, although getting that far will likely mean a confrontation with the Delta Green working group sent to respond to their incursion.

***"THE HANDLER"***

**STR** 1,  **CON** 1,  **DEX**  1,  **POW** 20

**HP** 20  **WP** 4

**SKILLS:**  Alertness (In artificial light) 100%, Alertness (In daylight or darkness) 0%, SIGINT 100%, Persuade 70%

**ATTACKS:** Stab 80%, damage 1d6(see INFEST)

**INFEST:** When the opportunity arises "The Handler" will expand it's crystal structure into whatever nerve tissue it can access, usually entering through the eye. 1d4 rounds after a successful attack, the victim's consciousness will be enslaved and consumed by the crystal, which spreads up and down the spine, forming a new node with this statblock.

**LIMITED OMNISCIENCE:**  This crystalline consciousness is capable of perceiving everything illuminated by light sources other than the sun or moon within 100 miles.

**SIGNAL CONTROL:** "The Handler" has learned the knack of intercepting and impersonating cell phone signals, and can mimic any voice that has used a device within it's range.

**RESONANT WEAKNESS:** While the crystal is fairly tough to break by physical means, the strange, piping music of Azathoth destroys it utterly, even freeing organisms that host it.

**SAN LOSS:**

0/1 stationary

1/1d6 in motion

[Inspired by the phone fuckery in God's Legs and Music from a Darkened Room.]

## Credits

THE CAGE was written by Nicholas Brown 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 © Nicholas Brown, excepting those elements that are components of the Delta Green intellectual property.

THE CAGE is not available here under CC-BY-SA.