Eddie Lawson, under suspicion from his department, is sent to Istanbul. My latest playthrough of Scalphunter, a game of Solo Cold War Espionage. Scalphunter is available from Itch and DriveThruRPG, free or pay what you want.
After the (officially) unsolved murders of two senior Russian figures, D.Ops has decided that the best thing for the Department, and for Eddie Lawson, is to get Lawson out of the country and doing something uncontroversial for a while. He’s assigned a temporary cover and sent off to Istanbul to play at being a journalist while keeping an eye on the activities of an arms-dealer named Korkut. He’s assigned a local handler at the British Embassy in Istanbul, a wet-behind the ears newcomer named Ellington.
On arrival, Lawson has a discreet meeting with Ellington and receives his briefing. A simple enough task – surround Korkut with enough surveillance equipment that he can’t sneeze in an empty room without the SIS catching his cold. Simple enough except that Korkut is surrounded by a small army of ex-military minders, and there’s a very tight deadline. SIS want to pin Korkut’s activities down before he manages to arrange a deal with a terrorist cell based operating in Greece.
Mission: Conduct Unsanctioned Wiretap (Tradecraft)
Highly Complex (10) Critical (4)
Task 1
Lawson finds an opportunity the same day. While Korkut’s house is a near-fortress, he does have a chance to access Korkut’s limousine while his chauffeur is busy carrying on an illicit meeting with a woman in a club in the centre of town. Lawson manages to install a radio-tracker on the vehicle under the guise of tying his shoelace next to where it is parked, and gets away… but not without being spotted by another local parking his own car nearby.
Tamper With Vehicle (Tradecraft)
Roll 4
+Progress (1)
+Exposure (1)
Task 2
Lawson is supposed to be putting everything through Ellington at the Embassy but doesn’t want to waste time going through the red-tape that Ellington relies on. He places a secure call through to the reliable analyst Connie Yvon back in London and asks for her help in working out Korkut’s game plan. As always Connie comes up trumps. She seems to know Korkut’s MO from some previous surveillance and fills Lawson in on the way Korkut intimidates those around him to get them to comply and cover his tracks for him.
Cross-Reference Data (Analysis)
Ally (Connie) Roll 6 – Connie remains available
+Progress (2)
Task 3
After shadowing Korkut with the aid of the tracker on the car, Lawson identifies someone on the receiving end of Korkut’s bullying tactics. A dissolute British expatriate named Carlton who owns a failing club – The Silver Star – in town. Korkut has visited there despite the fact he would not be seen dead in such a dive.
Suspecting that Korkut is leaning on Carlton to provide a safe location for his illicit trade, Lawson spends an evening at the Silver Star, is unimpressed with the entertainment and the quality of the booze, and effects a private meeting with Carlton under the initial pretext of wanting to write about the Silver Star for his paper.
Contrive a Meeting (Interaction)
Roll 3
+Progress (3)
+Stress (1)
Task 4
Carlton listens anxiously as the friendly reporter turns out to be anything but that. Lawson tells Carlton that he knows Korkut is leaning on him and that he wants Carlton’s cooperation in helping Lawson bug the meeting place. Carlton flat out refuses… unless Lawson can get Carlton a ticket back to the UK and protection till it happens. He’s fed up with life in Istanbul… but not so fed up he wants to lose it at Korkut’s hands.
Lawson says he’ll see what he can do.
Once again eschewing Ellington’s uncertain assistance, Lawson contacts the Department back in London, trying to reach his friend and mentor Paddy White. When the call is routed to the Director of Intelligence instead, Lawson braces for a rebuke, but isn’t ready for what follows. White is dead, D.Int tells him, a sudden heart attack the previous day.
Secure Sanctuary (Standing)
Ally (Paddy) 1 – Discard Paddy permanently
+Urgency(1)
+Oversight(1)
On a failure, Enemy Action is triggered if the roll is equal to or less than current Exposure – so Lawson also has to face some obstacle. The enemy action rolled makes more sense to come from D.Int than enemy forces however
Not sparing Lawson’s feelings, D.Int tears into him for trying to avoid official channels by involving Paddy. “You’re hanging by a thread, Lawson!” Eddie doesn’t flinch or back down however.
Enemy Action: Intimidated (Interaction) 6 No ill effect
Task 5
Knowing the urgency of the case he’s working on, Lawson tries to reason with the Director of Intelligence. If he can’t provide a passage home for Carlton, can he at least authorise some security on the club-owner while he makes his own arrangements.
“Hanging by a bloody thread!” D.Int repeats, “The Department doesn’t have unlimited funds or unlimited personnel. Get the bloody Club Owner to do the right thing. Appeal to his better nature. “
Call additional support (Standing)
Roll 2
+Urgency (2)
+Oversight (2)
DOWNTIME
Hanging up the phone from D.Int, Lawson takes several deep breaths. Uncertain why his own immediate superior the Director of Operations hadn’t taken his call, Lawson makes some discreet enquiries at the Embassy. It appears that D.Ops is under a cloud himself due to covering up for Lawson’s recent activities, and D.Int has been given greater oversight over the Scalphunters’ department.
This isn’t good news. Deciding, for D.Ops’ sake to play things by the book at least for a while, Lawson files an official contact report for his meeting with Carlton and completes all the other paperwork he’d been avoiding so far.
+Urgency (3)
-Oversight (1)
Task 6
Lawson returns to the Silver Star to meet with Carlton again. The club manager is eager at first to hear what has been arranged and dismayed when Lawson plays hardball. Help us first, then we’ll see what we can do. He objects but Lawson has come prepared and shows Carlton photographic evidence of some of the disreputable activities that have been going on at the Silver Star with Carlton’s knowledge. He doesn’t openly threaten the man with jail, but that hangs unspoken in the air. Carlton crumbles. Lawson can set his trap in the club.
Psychological Coercion (Interaction)
Roll 6
+Progress (4)
Task 7
Lawson works through the next day in the Silver Star, installing recording equipment in the back-room where Carlton tells him Korkut will be having his meeting with the terrorist buyers that night. When Carlton arrives in the late afternoon he’s already drunk, belligerent and feeling sorry for himself. While Eddie is trying to calm him down (and then just get him to back off), Carlton raises his voice and starts threatening him with exposure, and polaroids be damned. Lawson knows the early-arriving staff are likely to overhear things and he pushes Lawson against a wall and lets him know exactly what will happen to Carlton if he follows through on his threats. Carlton crumbles yet further and collapses into a drunken and sobbing heap.
Public Confrontation (Interaction)
Roll 6
+Progress (5)
Task 8
Anxious about Carlton’s state of inebriated collapse, and knowing that if Korkut arrives and finds anything out of the ordinary the meeting is likely to be called off, Lawson takes matters into his own hands. He calls the Embassy and practically bullies Ellington into sending over a British doctor who can be discreet and unethical in equal measures. Carlton gets a cocktail of stimulants to bring him round and sober him up rapidly. Ellington has warned him that he’ll have to report this of course. “Damned unusual request”
Call additional support (Standing)
Roll 3
+Progress (6)
+Stress (2)
Task 9
It seems that Ellington was as good as his word. The doctor has barely departed, and Lawson is trying to marshall the now jittery, paranoid and twitching Carlton into a fit state to play host to Korkut later that night when the phone rings again. Ellington. In appropriately ambiguous language Ellington assures Lawson that Lawson has to return to the Embassy immediately, by which he means immediately. With a final warning to Carlton to stay calm (!) until Lawson returns, he drives rapidly back to the Embassy compound.
Ellington passes him on the way out. “I’ll take over the debacle at the Silver Star,” he says, “Look after your Carstairs fellow and make sure the meeting goes off smoothly. You wait in my office.”
“It’s Carlton,” says Lawson grimly.
He doesn’t have long to wait in Ellington’s office until the call from D.Int comes through. Ellington had passed on the details about the off-the-books medical intervention and D.Int asked Lawson in icy tones how he could possibly justify drugging a British citizen and involving the Embassy in such a blatant violation of protocol. Lawson, knowing D.Ops (and probably “C”) would have seen the need for this lays out the case as a matter of simple expedience. It doesn’t wash. “Next plane back to London,” says D.Int, “You’re finished.”
Justify Actions (Standing)
1
+Urgency (4) – Mission Failed
+Oversight (2)
On a roll of 1, still equal to his Exposure, Eddie triggers an Enemy Action. Although the mission is already failed at this point I rolled it to see if I could make sense of it – the one that came up was : Discredited (Standing). He rolled a 1 on his Standing check which unticked two Progress, bringing the total Progress down from 6 to 4. I’m taking that as a sign that Ellington’s handling of the Silver Star meeting didn’t go too well and Korkut smelled a rat.
Utter disaster
Personal Cost rolls:
Harm 0, Stress 2 = 2d6 – no increase to Burnout
Exposure 1, Oversight 1 = 2d6 +1 Blown (5)
Eddie does get 1 Experience Point as his only consolation
Otherworlds 