Scenario Eight

The Unthawable Winter

“It’s still so cold,” whispered Mary.  She remembered the words of the serpent man.  His prophecy of doom.  A false prophecy, certainly.  But…  The Beasts kept coming.  Each was more savage than the last.  And a strange force seemed to drive them forth.  She felt as if a thousand invisible eyes were upon her.  Not like the omniscient sight of God, but something else, something of chill shadows and infinite malevolence.  Hecate’s malice.  It must be.  But…  It felt different somehow.  Something unimaginably horrid was hiding in the night sky’s darkness.  She felt it.  She knew it.

***

Joe thought of what he’d heard.  A ship is coming in the pier?  A ship?  A mountain of ice?  The cold comes from there as well…  And something.  Something skitters through the night.  The witch rats are gnawing, and breeding.  As the cold grows worse, their lust seems to thaw.  And beneath the earth great worms dig.  Terror makes the frost bite sharper in the bones.  Maybe he could find the missing children.  So many had gone missing when this new monstrosity came to town.  He’d heard of it too.  The piper.  If half of what he heard were true…  He shuddered and loaded his .45 automatic.  No matter how cold it became he would kill that creature in hot blood.  The things it did were unmentionable.  The inmates he had interviewed raving messes.  He hoped that Jenny’s sister had not been given over to those things.  Those hybrid monsters.  Poor Jenny…  Poor rich Jenny…

***

            The witch thing wanted.  The witch thing would get.  The witch thing thinks himself her pet!  Foolish little Goddess.  The Piper has his own debts.  Yes.  And the pets and children need feeding.  Yes.  He would do as she pleased.  As long as her pleasure was his.  His pleasure.  Sweet pleasure.  More children.  More family.  More pets.  The pleasure must come soon, soon, before the end of everything.  This town would be his until then.  Dear children make all things his.  Sweet children.  He shuddered in ecstasy at the scent of them.   All around him, deep underground, kept in cramped and rusty cages, children and adults screamed and wept.  They were all his children.  He heard the earth groan as the worms ripped through it.  He was not the only one who hungered.  Whatever the witch thing wanted, other Gods wanted this prey as well.  He could smell their hunger.

Custom components can be found here:

http://s622.photobucket.com/albums/tt307/avi_dreader/

 http://s622.photobucket.com/albums/tt307/avi_dreader/Additional%20Components%20for%20the%20Fan%20Creation%20League/

Ancient One: Rlim Shaikorth

Herald: The Pied Piper

Required Investigators: Jenny Barnes

Special Rules:

Start of Game: Any Rat-thing monster trophies are discarded.

Rat-things can not be collected as trophies or returned to the cup; if they are defeated, or would be otherwise returned to the cup, they return to The Unnamable instead. Rat-Things do not count against the monster limit.

Whenever a non-Cultist Rat-thing is drawn for an encounter or placed on the board, Jenny must draw two Corruptions (this includes the Rat-thing that begins at The Unnamable). 

Whenever a Cultist Rat-thing is drawn for an encounter or placed on the board, the first player must roll a die and draw two Corruptions on a success or the top red Corruption on a failure.

Clarification: Defeating a Rat-thing and moving it to The Unnamable does not count as placing it on the board.

Drawing a Cultist Rat-Thing will trigger Rlim Shaikorth's ability.

Cultist Rat-things are identical to Rat-Things in all other ways (and are considered Rat-things, not Cultists).