‘Dead Letter’ 1997 playtest logs: Briefing

We have tracked down the complete transcripts of the online playtest of “Dead Letter,” Adam Scott Glancy’s classic scenario from Delta Green: Countdown, played in AOL chatrooms in late 1997. Glancy ran “Dead Letter” for Pat Grindle (playing USARMIID Col. Frank Black), Shane Ivey (playing CIA operative Sam Dee), and Keith Potter (playing Assistant U.S. Attorney Brian Lundquist). He introduced the scenario by email.

Date: Sat, Sep 27, 1997 1:55 AM EST
From: SGlancy12
Subj: MISSION BRIEFING

PRELUDE, August 23, 1997:

Postal inspectors Johann Baldwin and James Rafferty charged into the chaos of the Berkley University-district post office fifteen minutes after they got the call. They lugged a portable X-ray unit and a duffel bag full of other gear past the police cordon out front and into the low, concrete building. The normal patrons were gone. Instead, the post office was full of police bomb squad and crime scene technicians. Chaos was everywhere.

In the main room, a sweating bomb squad sergeant was questioning the letter sorter who’d found the oozing, smelly package. “What do you mean it was cold?” the sergeant asked her. “Did you get any of the stuff that was leaking on your hands?”

The girl looked scared. “I don’t know… I mean, I don’t think so… Is it dangerous?”

“Shut up!” bellowed the bomb-squad sergeant, not at the letter sorter, but at the dog. A bomb-sniffing German Shepherd was barking insanely at both the letter sorter who’d found the package and the crime scene technician who’d swabbed the oily gunk off the girl’s fingers. The dog handler couldn’t get the big dog to alert on the suspicious package. Instead, the animal just about jerked its handler’s arm off trying to get out of the mail-sorting room.

The barking was aggravating Baldwin’s headache. “Jeezus,” he sighed, “Why doesn’t he put that mutt back in his truck?” No alert meant probably no explosives, hence no need for a bomb dog.

“Give me a hand here,” Rafferty said, setting the bulky X-ray machine on the sorting table.

Baldwin and Rafferty set the unit up quickly, careful not to touch the package in any way. The unit gave them a readable image less than sixty seconds later. The package contained no wires, no batteries, no blocks of C-4. Baldwin sighed in relief.

It was a head. A dog’s head.

Big, too. Might have come off one of the bomb dog’s sibling.

“Sick,” sighed Baldwin, though he felt himself relaxing. “Not as sick as a bomb, but sick.” Baldwin had seen the after affect of a letter bomb at the local IRS office. That finger with the wedding ring imbedded in the wall was an image Baldwin knew he’d never shake.

The relief in the building was palpable. The bomb squad guys packed it in and the rest of the Postal workers came back into office to get things back on track. Baldwin and Rafferty took the package into one of the storage rooms and set up a card table upon which to exhume the ghoulish contents. Snapping on latex gloves and donning surgical masks, they shooed the morbidly curious back to work while they opened the package.

As Baldwin folded the top of the package back, the stench hit his nose like an open bottle of formaldehyde. “Christ!” he muttered, wincing.

The first thing Baldwin saw was a set of surgical gloves taped to the inside of the lid. If the severed head was meant as a sick joke, why the hell would the prankster include gloves?

“I ain’t gonna like this,” Rafferty said, punctuating his disgust by tipping his mask up and spitting on the floor.

Inside was a layer of insulation constructed from what appeared to be a garbage bag wrapped around sweaty cold-packs filled with a neon sky-blue gel. Baldwin gingerly set the cold-packs aside.

Baldwin groaned involuntarily when he finally exposed the cold wet fur. He shot a look at his partner.

“Don’t even ask,” spit Rafferty. “I had to do that fetus they mailed to the abortion clinic, remember?” Baldwin knew it was his turn; no reprieve would be forthcoming. He reached in slowly, hesitantly…

And screamed like a gelding. Leaping back as if bitten, Baldwin clutched his hand to his chest.

“Jeezus!” roared Rafferty in shock. “What the hell’s the matter?”

Quaking between gasps for air, Baldwin could barely force out the words “F-f-f-fucking m-m-m-moved!”

“What?”

“Something moved in there!” Eyes bulging Baldwin croaked, “That thing fucking moved!”

For an adrenaline soaked second it seemed as if Rafferty might have believed him, but as the shock ebbed, his reason came back and Rafferty laughed out loud. “Jeezus! Are you trying to make me shit my pants on purpose or what?” Just then Hardwick, the Postmaster, threw open the door to the storeroom and charged in. Behind him a crowd of other postal workers jostled for a view.

“What’s going on in here?” Hardwick demanded.

“S’okay,” Rafferty replied pulling his mask down. “This thing’s just a bit gross is all. Just go back to work. We got it. Everything’s cool. Right Johann?”

The sweat-soaked, shivering Postal Inspector starring in horror at the package did nothing to assure Hardwick that everything was “cool.” Stepping forward Hardwick grimaced and peeked into the open top of the package. In a flash, Hardwick’s expression passed from revulsion, to confusion, and then to comprehension. Hardwick opened his mouth but only a strangled gag emerged. Turning wildly he charged back through the scattering postal workers as his morning breakfast rushed up his throat.

Rafferty stared in disbelief as Hardwick flew retching out of the room. Then turned back to the package. His mind reeled. This wasn’t right. It was just a dog head. Rafferty took a step forward, but drew up short at Baldwin’s hissed warning: “Don’t!” Swallowing hard, Rafferty stepped forward again. He could feel other postal workers filling the room behind him. Taking a breath, he picked the package up and turned its contents onto the card table.

There it was, the bloodless stump of the thawing German Shepherdís head, staring at everyone as it rocked slowly on the table. Rafferty could feel the tension building behind him as the other postal workers began to realize what was wrong. Stepping up Rafferty looked into the lifeless black eye staring up at him. Then Rafferty saw, truly saw, the lifeless eye staring back at him hungrily. Suddenly the dead jaws snapped shut in anticipation of slicing through Rafferty’s flesh. The stump began violently flopping atop the table, its jaws working convulsively as a chorus of screams erupted from the horrified postal workers. The severed head was barking. Silently, with no lungs or vocal cords. But it was barking.

And it kept on barking even after Rafferty sent it bouncing across the room with six rounds from his service revolver.

August 24, 1997:

“You are cordially invited to a night at the opera.”

Mission Briefing:

Contact Point: UC Berekly district Post Office

Time: 1 hour after close of business.

Mission Objectives:

1) Determine the source and the nature of the biological anomaly.

2) Determine level of involvement of the intended recipients of the biological anomaly.

3) Determine level of threat to National Security and Public Safety created by who ever or whatever is responsible for creating the biological anomaly.

4) Neutralize any immediate threats to National Security and Public Saftey with a minimum of exposure.

5) If violations of federal law have been commited, determine whether the charges can be prosecuted without exposure of the public to information about preternatural or paranormal phenomena. If those responsible can be brought to justice without exposing DG or the existance of preternatural or paranormal phenomena, then do so. If the threat of exposing DG or the existance of preternatural or paranormal phenomena is too great, “alternative methods” of resolving the situation are authorized.

Postal Inspector Johann Baldwin will present all physical evidence currently available.
Inspector Baldwin is a friendly. Not an Agent. Do not compromise compartmentalized security.

The only physical evidence currently available is the biological anomaly, the cardboard box it was mailed in, with the address it was going to (Fiona Lin Wei at the offices of a radical Ecology magazine called The Ecotopian) and the return address (Thomas Iron Shirt, at PO Box on the Blackfoot Indian Reservation in Montana), eight cold-packs, a garbage bag used to wrap the biological anomaly and packs together, two sets of surgical gloves taped to the inside lid of the box, and a note.

The note reads as follows:

“Dear Ms. Lin Wei

This abomination was the result of experiments conducted at the Amalgamated Bio-Carb, Inc. chemical production facility on the Blackfoot Indian reservation, just north of Browning Montana. From past experience I know you can be trusted to do everything in your power to expose this obscene perversion of science and nature. My position here is precarious, so I must move cautiously. I will contact you soon.”

— a Friend

Agent “John Drake” will provide all logistical support and coordinate your task force’s operation with other cells as needed. Agent Drake is the only DG contact authorized to receive information about this operation.

Be Seeing You . . .

Next: Session 1