A Silence of Three Parts

A shotgun campaign in three parts

## Part One: The Sound Before the Silence

We open on a van winding downs a quaint neighborhood, autumn leaves picturesque. **Dr. Sullivan** briefs the agents  (Program or Outlaw) dispatched to assist with a **KELLER Class Operation**. The car is packed with toys and suitcases full of whatever necessities and gear the agents could pack on short notice, but NO Delta Green contraband. One agent spies a “Slow—Deaf Child” sign. That’s where they turn into a long driveway up to a craftsman house.

Sullivan explains this is “asset Keller’s” safehouse. Keller is responsible for stopping multiple threats. Sullivan is warmly greeted by a **Father** with a cochlear implant, after pressing a soundless doorbell. They are ushered into a quiet house and served coffee by a **Mother** with a hearing aid. She talks about her kids, especially her son, **Theo**.

Two children come into the room. An older teenage **Sister**, giggling and signing to nine year old Theo. He wears an odd-looking pair of specialized noise cancelling headphones. The boy greets Dr. Sullivan in sign.

The family turn off their hearing devices and Sullivan finally explains. Theo is **KELLER**, and is very special. Dr. Sullivan serves as his interpreter. Delta Green sends them when “the **Sounds** get louder.” That is all he shares. Theo will be your guide.

Then they ride. After days of travel, pit-stops and hotel rooms, Theo pointing the way, they come to a decrepit Opera House. After making a full circle around the building he is sure of it. The **Sound** is coming from there.

Within they find scavenged computers, machinery, and blood. A dull hum or vibration can be felt on the floor. Following it leads to old wartime tunnels filled with humming pipes connecting the downtown. Bodies turn up, flayed open, brains, sensory organs and vocal cords removed. The hum becomes deep droning. It leads to a cathedral of horror. There stands a macabre mockery of a pipe organ jury-rigged together with brass, bone, monitors, speakers and wire connecting machine to flesh. It flickers to life, singing its **Discordant Song** of tortured, echoing voices, calling to the **Outer Dark**. They must destroy it before it drives them mad or cracks the world in two.

Addressed boxes and records lead to a local sound engineer contracted for renovations. This **Composer** must be put down, he will beg and squeal like a baby when they put a gun to his head.

When all is sorted, the boy relaxes, relieved. There is silence…for now.

### Home

Time passes. Agents recuperate or stay on the case. They are now part of **Taskforce KELLER**. This was just their first mission. There will be another.

Investigating Keller is treacherous. His secrets are well guarded. Sullivan will discourage inquiry. He remains silent on the matter. Keller may be more than an asset to him. They learn that there was a deaf community turned apocalyptic suicide cult roughly 8 years ago. A heavily redacted police report mentions a one-year old survivor, record sealed.

Staying on the case recovers a book from the Builder’s home: “ **'The Filthy Wailing Ones'**.” It is a highly heretical text, decrying the lie that is a loving god. It tells of **The Chorale** and **The Wailing Ones**, the mortal and immortal servants who call **The Outer Dark** to bring discord to creation.

## Part Two: The Silence that Followed

Out of the Silent earth a sound is heard. The case opens up on the agents in the van once again. Keller has led the team to a lonely farm.

Sullivan will insist he and the boy remain at a safe distance. An agent may always stay behind for protection.

The approach is at first quiet and desolate. The sound of wind chimes fills the air, but none can be seen. There are mutilated cattle in the pasture. Inside the farmhouse is a bloody massacre. Several bodies. On the upper floor a woman’s body lies in a bloody mess in the bathroom. Her bloated, distended belly popped like a pimple. A trail of blood lead out a window. The barn is filled with hanging corpses, their bones clacking as a north wind blows wind chimes. The blood pooling into a satanic symbols, geometric designs on the floor. If disturbed, the corpses scream, waking the **Wailing One**: a crawling, segmented horror stitched from man, woman, animal and bone.

The blood trail leads to the grain silo, where the **Wailing One** waits. Emptying the silo causes it to attack. It unfolds its body revealing thin sinewing organs…Vocal cords stretched like harp strings across its hemispheres. It plucks them, exciting the mind with strange desires and freakish tones. It will play the agents swan song if they aren’t careful.

When they return to the Motel, they witness KELLER struggling with a man with a wicked scar across his neck. He is forcing the boy into a car. Once dispatched, KELLER wordlessly urges the agents to the hotel room. They find the body of another assailant, and Dr. Sulllivan. His bloody hands still clutching his notebook.

### Home

They buried a lot of bodies back there. Now they must cope.

Sullivan’s bloodstained notebook contains notes and drawings of KELLER’s unique signs: “Dark Water - Tulu,” “Thousand Teeth - ?.” “Dark Wind - Black Wind? Nyarlathotep” Studying it will be invaluable to learning Keller’s unique lexicon. Most of Sullivan’s research has been ransacked by The Faction, but they can cobble together a few clues. It hypothesizes that KELLER’s voices are physical, not mental. He is not deaf. KELLER has only ever heard the sounds and voices of the **Great Old Ones** and **The Outer Dark**, so loud nothing can be heard over it. When these voices gets louder, an unnatural threat occurs.

Investigations also reveals a connection between the two assailants and the symbol in the barn. Both are linked to a cult called the **Quiescent**. According to one source, their cult cuts out their vocal cords or tongues in service to the **Dark Wind**, the only named god from the **Outer Dark** who shall silence the Cosmic Discord.

## Part Three: And The Silence Was With Him

There’s been a leak. The opposition knows about KELLER. They are coming for him. The agents must secure the KELLER and bring him to the Handler.

They arrive to find the opposition already there. The parents murdered. Keller and his sister are on the run. The agents can fight, but getting the boy out safely is more important. The opposition will give chase.

The Handler waits at the rendez-vous with armed men and a sniper. They are going to kill him. This isn’t right. He’s just a little boy. Not according to the Handler. “He’s something inhuman. That cult, the Quiescent summoned it from beyond. It’s a threat. I have my orders. I can’t let him fall into the wrong hands.” Negotiation will be difficult. They could always ghost the rendez-vous.

When tension is at its highest, KELLER keels over clutching his head. Through heaving breaths, he signs to anyone who can read them. “*Dark Song. The End*.” If asked where, he points…into the sky.

Keeping the boy alive burns them. They will be hunted by both factions at every turn. But they don’t know about his prophecy, nor are inclined to listen. Agents can track the threat by using the boy as a sextant, traveling until his arm is straight up. It brings them to the Allan Telescope Array.

The SETI scientists have found something, an object in the sky. Listening, has driven them quite insane. They can be seen modifying the array to transmit. They will interact excitedly, they’ve found intelligent life. They prepare to call it out of the Dark. If they suspect the agents are there to stop them they will use subterfuge to get the drop on them and lock them up while they get to work.

### Finales

As Delta Green factions move in, the array becomes a three-way battle. Agents can take advantage of the chaos to sabotage the cult’s transmitter. Failure sees a vast Dark descend, singing a beautiful, terrible song, driving everyone mad as darkness covers the Earth.

Perhaps, the agents can escape in the confusion with Theo, forever on the run. Perhaps they are cornered by the Handler.

Or perhaps Theo steps forward, signs “thank you” and… Speaks. Agents wake-up days later at home in the arms of loved ones. No one comes for them. When they recall Theo, they recall the sound of a Roaring Planet. Then a great silence. Then he is gone. And the silence was with him.

## Handler’s Note

This scenario works as a single night of play, simulating a grand campaign, or used as a Campaign Frame. Keller functions as a framing device for other published scenarios while the three parts serve as the major story beats.

## STATS

### Dr. Sullivan

**STR** 10 **CON** 12 **DEX** 10

**INT** 17 **POW** 11 **CHA** 12

**HP** 11 **WP** 11 **SAN** 44 **BP** 33

**Important Skills:** Anthropology 50, Archeology 40, History 60, Humant 50, Language ASL 50, Language Arabic 40, Language: Aklo 20, Navigate 50, Occult 60, Psychotherapy 20, Unnatural 10

**Disorder:** Totemic Compulsion (His notebook)

**Notes:** Can be made a pregenerated character. Use Anthropologist with the Counselor bonus package and “Things Man was Not Meant to Know” Damaged Veteran Trait.

### The Composer

**STR** 12 **CON** 12 **DEX** 15

**INT** 11 **POW** 4 **CHA** 8

**HP** 12 **WP** 14 **SAN** 0, Completely insane, hidden but detectable by a HUMINT score of 50

**Important Skills:** Alertness 40, Art: Sculpture 50, Art: Sound Design 60, Craft: Electronics 50, Stealth 40, Melee 50, Unnatural 50,

**Spells:** Exaltation of the Flesh, any two others

### Wailing One

**STR** 25 **CON** 20 **DEX** 10

**INT** 10 **POW** 15

**HP** 23 **WP** 15

**ARMOR:** See **MALFORMED**.

**SKILLS:** Alertness 80%, Athletics 50%, Grapple 55%,

**ATTACKS:** Flailing Limbs 50% 1D6+1, Grab 40% (Gnashing of Teeth),  Wailing Strings (see description)

**GNASHING OF TEETH:** After pinning the victim in its flailing limbs, the wailing one tears into its victim with gnashing teeth from many mouths, inflicting 2D6 damage. If the awfulness has taken damage, it heals 1 HP for each HP that the pinned victim loses, up to its maximum.

**MALFORMED:** Slippery and scrabbling, composed of flesh of dozens of men, women and animals, the Wailing One is difficult to destroy. It takes half the HP damage from any attack except for fire or hypergeometry.

**WAILING OF STRINGS:** The creature can “unfold” its body into a shape like a harp, revealing long connective sinews. It plucks them, intoning terrible songs that stun, confuse and cause further SAN loss. There is no roll to hit. Targets make a SAN roll EVERY round it plays. A success causes 1 SAN loss. A failure causes 1d4 SAN and a -20 to all skill rolls. A critical failure causes 4 SAN loss, -20 to skill rolls and are stunned for a round.

**SAN LOSS:** 1D4/1D10

### Tome: The Filthy Wailing Ones

**Language:** Arabic

**Study Time:** Weeks

**Unnatural:** 5

**Occult:** 8

**SAN Loss:** 1d8

Rituals: Call forth Those from outside, Reanimation Formula

### Tome: Dr. Sullivan’s Bloody Notebook

**Language:** English + ASL diagrams

**Study Time:** days

**Unnatural:** 3

**Occult:** 4

**Language:** ASL 5

**SAN Loss:** 1d4+1

**Rituals:** The Elder Sign

## Credits

A Silence of Three Parts was written by William Schar 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 © William Schar, excepting those elements that are components of the Delta Green intellectual property.

A Silence of Three Parts is not available here under CC-BY-SA.