Introduction: World War III
The political fallout from the (second) destruction of the US Space Docks and most of the fleet falls on Devon Gray, the Director of the C.I.A. Admiral James Morris, the deputy director shoulders the blame for the USS Cheney. President Whindham accepts their resignations. This year’s Presidential Elections are a joke. Only a tiny percentage of the electorate even bothers to vote. Whindham is pretty much the ‘only’ choice. Newly re-elected President Whindham appoints Nathan Forrest as the new Director of the C.I.A. An Army General Kwazzi Jefferson is appointed as Deputy Director.
Kyle Vaduva is shocked by the phone call asking him to come back to the Agency as Associate Deputy Director. Vaduva had resigned as CEO from the Bast Corporation after the destruction of the US fleet. Having a large security/mercenary operation under command of an American wasn’t very neutral and the Commonwealth was going to be just that. In fact, the Bast Corporation allowed any of its men to return to their home countries if they were at war and wanted to go home and fight. It caused a bit of a manpower drain but most of the personnel were from neutral Commonwealth countries.
One of the first things the Russo-Polish/American/Japanese & Korean alliance does is form a combined Special Forces formation to take advantage of each other’s strengths. Various allied intelligence services will contribute both personnel and command functions. This unit will be known as the 187th Special Operations Group. There are small units attached on all fronts. The PCs will mostly be members of this SOG. This campaign will follow one group, Team 42, as it is assigned missions on various fronts in this conflict.
This may well be our final Cyberpunk Campaign on this Meta-Arc we have been on since after our Fourth Corporate War Campaign. We have been discussing going back to our group’s past and doing what would be for us a Space Punk 3.0 Campaign (absolutely no relation to Cyberpunk 3.0). We are looking to call it Space Punk 2087 or some such non-sense. We will be starting a forum thread on this soon. But first, we hope to tie up a lot of story and plot threads. We have our shadowy old doomsday conspiracies pushing the world towards war. The United States and the Republic of Mars are holding on to the biggest secret in the solar system: Humans are now a multi-solar system species.
Team 42
Brandon Heath (aka Jean-Philippe de Gaulle): A solo who is an experimental Biomechanical (cyborg) with one of Doc Freeman’s ‘cyberbrains’. Grave was supposedly executed by the US government in 2026 for authorizing the murder of a young hacker and his family. Instead they put him in their Project Kill Switch Program (see Super Solo 2 Campaign for details). He was a long time employee of the Bast Corporation and holds a Martian passport. Brandon is made a Chief Warrant Officer – 4 in the Martian Marine Corps.
Katie von Kennen (aka Toeki Leeuwanhaak): Toeki (Katie) is a freelance C.I.A. asset from the Netherlands. She has been moving into the position of assistant director at the Human Resources Department at the Euro tech company RobotWerks for the past year. This one of a two pronged effort to disrupt EU advanced weapons systems development.
Nassim Faphi (aka Akil Badra): He is a cultivated C.I.A. asset from Tunisia. His strength is as a programmer and his resemblance to his alternate identity. He is very light in the cyberware department.
Noah Michaels (aka Mohammad Asyd): This 19 year old Thelas nomad is a veteran of the Bast Corporation’s Ghost Teams. He returned to the United States and was immediately recruited by the C.I.A. Noah and his siblings spent almost a decade of their youths being raised by their maternal half Vietnamese grandmother in Blackwater, FL. This young man also fought with the nomad militia at the Battle of Petersen Point. Noah returned to fight for his country and was immediately recruited by the C.I.A. and assigned to the 187th SOG.
Priest or S-0002134.7 (aka Shan Yu): He is a newly grown and trained fourth generation Nietzschean warrior and a stealth/assassin model. This is his second mission for the Collective. The Collective High Council has moved to let the Hives under Martian jurisdiction join the war on the side of Mars. Many warrior members of the New Zealand Hive transfer to a space hive and join the Martian Marine Corps. Priest is made a Chief Warrant Officer – 2 in the Martian Marine Corps.
Mission Prep
Team 42 gets off the train 85 kilometers behind the front lines at Warsaw. They had been on every kind of rail transport for almost a week from the sleek mag-lev running under the Bering Sea to a narrow gauge train across the open and fertile plains of the Ukraine. The 187th Special Operations Group’s HQ on the Polish front is a half a kilometer from a small train station. Two recycled Humvees are waiting for them there. The base is in an old Warsaw Pact command and control bunker.
Brandon, Nassim, Noah and Priest settle in and are then brought to see their mission control officer. Brandon remains placid as their new commander walks in the door. This man wears the uniform of a Major in the Free Czech Army. Wearing it is Korlea Sochor, terrorist, gangster and white slaver. One of Brandon’s few regrets was not killing him the last time they met about two years ago. (Mission to Prague part of Prelude to War 2050 to 2052)
Major Sochor begins his briefing. “In front of you are the dossiers with the identities you will be assuming in this operation. WO Brandon Heath, you will be Jean-Philippe de Gaulle, and yes, he is a very distant cousin of that one. Nassim Faphi, you will become Akil Badra, a real Tunisian whom you resemble to begin with. When my people are done with you, Akil’s own mother will think you’re her son. Now WO2 Priest and Agent Michaels, you are to be Shan Yu, a Chinese National and Mohammed Asyd? I would like to see you pull this off.”
“You do your job and we’ll do ours,” Priest tells him.
“Sir!” Sochor replies.
“What?” Priest asks.
“… and we’ll do ours, sir,” the Major corrects him, and then puts his hand to his ear.
Priest takes a second but responds, “Sir.”
Major Sochor continues, “You will have eight weeks to assimilate these new identities. You will also be given a backup identity and a phone for that person; learn that one too. There will be 10,000 euro in each of your go bags. Our operatives will arrange at least four openings at a Dutch research company by the beginning of the year. You will go to the City of Eindhoven in the Netherlands where we already have an operative in place. There you will be given a series of operations to be carried out.”
“We will secure three emergency safe houses. One will be the principle that you all will know about. If you get a bug out call, and one or more of you don’t show up within the hour, then half of you will know about a second safe house and only the other half will know about the third. There will also be a clean phone in each house,” Korlea concludes.
“What is the ex-fil protocol in that case?” asks Brandon.
“That will be arranged as we get closer to mission completion,” Korlea answers. “We’ll deal with any more questions tomorrow. Get some sleep, gentlemen.”
The meeting breaks up and as they all leave Korlea sidles up to Brandon and asks, “How is Natty doing?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Brandon answers coldly. “I haven’t seen her in over a year.” With that the biomechanical turns on his heels and walks away from the Czech officer.
As they return to their rooms, Noah asks Brandon, “Does he know Natty?”
“Yes,” Brandon replies. “He’s another stunning example of her horrible taste in men. I should have killed him when I had the chance.”
This is going to be fun, Noah thinks.
Timeline
2052
Wednesday, April 23rd: United States troops pour across the Bering Straits and reinforce the Russian Far East pocket that had been bypassed by Chinese troops.
Thursday, April 24th: The long quiescent Civil War in Ethiopia erupts as the EU-backed faction attempts to seize the capital Addis Ababa from the US backed faction. War comes to Africa.
Saturday, May 4th: Chinese troops invade Korea and land at Inchon where MacArthur did back in the first Korean War. The United States and Japan declare war in support of their ally. Indonesia attacks the Philippines, and the United States and Japan declare war on Indonesia but can send only meager resources.
Friday, May 10th: The EU blows up the two Martian battle satellites guarding the station at the L-3 point. The unarmed station surrenders. The EU announces that the cease fire that ‘ended’ Mars’ War of Independence is now over. They will seek to bring Mars under EU control. In the asteroid belt, a Mars armed transport escapes an EU trap off Ceres after delivering Charlie Bibbliodoc (now Adkis, again) at the secret asteroid station of the nomads who have moved to space. They have named themselves the ‘Star Runners’.
Saturday, June 1st: Martian Fleet under command of the hero of Martian Independence, Rear Admiral Salif Konchella, intercepts a large EU squadron off the Galileo Station now at the L-2 point (closest to the sun) in the Sol – Mars system. The Martian flagship the modern MSS Isidis leads the slaughter of the EU Fleet by destroying the EUS Napoleon Bonaparte, EUS Bismarck and the EUS Count di Cavour all by itself with its improved particle cannon and stealth technology. The EUS Marat is pounded into surrender by the MSS Deimos. The two transports also surrender to the Martian Fleet.
Sunday, June 2nd: The Japanese Carrier Zuikaku changes course and heads to Mars as does the USS Agamemnon.
Thursday, July 4th: United States submarine forces begin attacking South China Sea Oil production. Campaign for the Philippines starts but is mostly air and naval.
Monday, October 21st: The Chinese invade Indochina to secure the South China Sea oilfields as the US submarine offensive starts to bite. Vietnam and Cambodia resist. Laos is just overrun. Thailand isn’t attacked. The US sends some special operations troops.
Tuesday, November 5th: President Windham wins election for a sixth term, as he has no serious contenders to run against due to the wartime security restrictions. It is the least participated election in US history with only 9% of the electorate even bothering to vote.
Sunday, December 22nd thru Tuesday, December 24th: Indonesian navy and active invasion military is wiped out by American & Filipino allies. Indonesia falls out of the war soon after.
Friday, December 27th: It is Now.
Episode 1 – Eindhoven, a City of Fights … err … I mean Lights
Team 42 flies into Eindhoven in the Netherlands and meets their local contact Toeki Leeuwanhaak. Their first day at RobotWerks goes well. They make friends and get invited to see a local band at the pub down the street. Everything goes very smoothly until the Arab looking members of the Team are seen dancing with some local girls by members of the area’s skin head motorcycle gang. Most of the Team gets to spend their first night in Eindhoven in jail!
Everyone quickly gets settled in. Monday begins the workweek, which goes smoothly. However, that evening, a time sensitive mission comes up that will challenge the Team.
Background
With the entry of the United States of America and Japan into the conflict it is now truly World War III. The Bast Corporation (as they did before when the war first broke out) gives their employees from the newly warring nations an opportunity to return and fight for their country. The Russo-American Alliance creates an asymmetrical warfare unit made up of members contributed by their allied states. It is called the 187th Special Operations Group. The United States’ contribution is under the authority of the newly appointed Associate Deputy Director of the C.I.A., Kyle Vaduva.
The 187th SOG puts together a team for a special mission to a high tech robotics firm in Eindhoven, Holland. There they will be given a series of small jobs to do as they work as ‘code monkeys’ for the senior researchers of the Eindhoven RobotWerks. This is a high stakes attempt to breach a major enemy defense contractor during wartime. Meanwhile, the European Front remains bloody but static. The Chinese swarm over Korea and invade Indochina. The Americans immediately reinforce the Russian Bering Sea pocket. The only allied victory is over an invasion attempt of the southern Philippines by the aging fleet of Indonesia.
Dramatis Personae
Team 42
Brandon Heath (aka Jean-Philippe de Gaulle): A solo who is an experimental Biomechanical (cyborg) with one of Doc Freeman’s ‘cyberbrains’. Grave was supposedly executed by the US government in 2026 for authorizing the murder of a young hacker and his family. Instead they put him in their Project Kill Switch Program (see Super Solo 2 Campaign for details). He was a long time employee of the Bast Corporation and holds a Martian passport. Brandon is made a Chief Warrant Officer – 4 in the Martian Marine Corps.
Katie von Kennen (aka Toeki Leeuwanhaak): Toeki (Katie) is a freelance C.I.A. asset from the Netherlands. She has been moving into the position of assistant director at the Human Resources Department at the Euro tech company RobotWerks for the past year. This is one of a two pronged effort to disrupt EU advanced weapons systems development. She has lived for almost a year working at RobotWerks in Eindhoven, and shares company housing with three other female employees.
Nassim Faphi (aka Akil Badra): He is a cultivated C.I.A. asset from Tunisia. His strength is as a programmer and his resemblance to his alternate identity. He is very light in the cyberware department.
Noah Michaels (aka Mohammad Asyd): This 19 year old Thelas nomad is a veteran of the Bast Corporation’s Ghost Teams. He returned to the United States and was immediately recruited by the C.I.A. Noah and his siblings spent almost a decade of their youths being raised by their maternal half Vietnamese grandmother in Blackwater, FL. This young man also fought with the nomad militia at the Battle of Petersen Point. Noah returned to fight for his country and was immediately recruited by the C.I.A. and assigned to the 187th SOG.
Priest or S-0002134.7 (aka Shan Yu): He is a newly grown and trained fourth generation Nietzschean warrior and a stealth/assassin model. This is his second mission for the Collective. The Collective High Council has moved to let the Hives under Martian jurisdiction join the war on the side of Mars. Many warrior members of the New Zealand Hive transfer to a space hive and join the Martian Marine Corps. Priest is made a Chief Warrant Officer – 2 in the Martian Marine Corps.
The NPCs
Beatrice Visser is a cute twenty something secretary who lives at 1-B Kreeftstraat in a company owned housing block with Toeki.
Jan Smits is a Dutch guitarist with the band Vrede en Vrijheid (Peace and Freedom). He is dating Lara Janssen.
Klara Hoff is the Director of Human Resources at RobotWerks and Toeki’s immediate superior and friend. She also lives at 1-B Kreeftstraat.
Lara Janssen is another secretary from RobotWerks who lives at 1-B Kreeftstraat.
Wihelm de Boors is the security chief for RobotWerks in Eindhoven.
The Action
Friday, December 27, 2052:
Jean-Philippe de Gaulle (Brandon Heath), Akil Badra (Nassim Faphi), Mohammad Asyd (Noah Michaels) and Shan Yu (Priest) arrive at the Eindhoven airport on a flight from Paris. Waiting for them is a pleasant and attractive young woman holding up a sign: Eindhoven RobotWerks. They recognize their contact Toeki Leeuwanhaak as the person with the sign. Toeki has a vehicle there waiting to take them to the Eindhoven High Tech Campus where RobotWerks is located. There they are given a welcome orientation by the head of Human Resources, Klara Hoff. Their schedule will be 7 am to 3 pm. A small bus will come to their address and after two more stops will drop them at work. The process is reversed at the end of the day. If you work late the company provides transportation. They all fill out some final paperwork and have a physical. This includes blood tests. Three have full blood ID disguise options. The nurses hit the reservoirs and those three skate past. There is no record of Nassim’s DNA, only his false ID as Akil Badra, which does match.
Klara Hoff is very friendly and it is clear that she and Toeki are friends.
“Some of us are going to see a band tonight just down the street from where we live,” Klara tells them. “Toeki and I are going with our two housemates.”
“Lara is dating Jan, the guitarist in the band,” Toeki ads, “but Beatrice isn’t seeing anyone.”
All agree to meet there later in the evening. The small bus takes them to their new company issued apartments. These were actually a row of 4 connected two story homes at the address: 1 Kreeftstraat in the Rapelenburg neighborhood. The four men of Team 42 are lodged at 1-D while Toeki, Klara and their two housemates are at 1-B. Houses 1 – A & 1 – C have other employees of RobotWerks living there.
The four men go out to the bike shop down the street and get bikes to get around. It is winter, but mild so they are usable. Shan Yu (Priest) realizes he has never ridden a bicycle before. This is due to his deprived childhood … Oh wait, Nietzscheans born from the ‘iron womb’ don’t have childhoods. The Chinese American amuses the neighborhood kids as he takes his first (more than) a couple of falls trying to master his bike. Shan Yu’s patience and good humor earn him some admirers among the local neighborhood kids. The Nietzschean takes a walk around the neighborhood for a few blocks and scouts out some possible safe house locations and bolt holes. People get food and have dinner.
As the men get ready, Shan Yu comes out with killer Personal Grooming and Wardrobe and Style rolls. As the man has a lot of money, his clothes are expensive and look it. The man graciously offers one of the remaining three the ‘honor’ of being his ‘wing man’ and having a shot at his cast offs. Mohammad is a bit taken aback.
Finally around eight, the four men and four women head down to the end of the block to the club, Gelukkig Schoenmaker (Happy Shoemaker) to hear a folk rock trio, Vrede en Vrijheid (Peace and Freedom) play. This club has dark paneled walls and heavy furniture to give it an ambiance older than its actual age. There is a big table waiting for them up near the bandstand. The four women are regulars here. Shan Yu takes his time getting to the table as he preens. Mohammad sits and talks with Beatrice Visser. She is the one 10 between the girls. As Mohammad sees Shan Yu heading towards them (and Beautiful Beatrice) he says to her quietly about Shan Yu, “It’s hard to believe he’s still ‘in the closet’.”
When Shan Yu reaches the table he zeros in on Little Miss ‘10’ and kisses her hand with a flourish. Then the Chinese programmer turns to the others at the table. Beatrice turns to Mohammad and whispers, “I see what you mean.”
Mohammad asks Beatrice go up to dance as the band shifts into a higher gear. Toeki chats up Nassim and drags him out on the dance floor. Two young men arrive and notice the Party having a good time. Jean-Philippe notice that they sit down, pull out a phone and make a call. About fifteen minutes later the sounds of motorcycles is heard ouside pulling up to the Gelukkig Schoenmaker. Four more men come in wearing motorcycle gang cuts with a skull with a single SS lightning bolt on either side. The top rocker reads ‘Blanke Ras Regels’ (White Race Rules) and the bottom reads ‘Veldhoven’ (a town abutting to the west over the N2 Highway). They head over to the table with the two guys whom Jean-Philippe saw make a call.
Nassim is a little nervous about this and heads back to their table while Toeki remains on the dance floor. The now eight skinhead gangers get up. Three head towards Nassim and five towards Mohammed. Both Shan Yu and Jean-Philippe see trouble coming, but they are a bit away across a crowded room. All this time Mohammad, the self-declared ‘bad’ Muslim, is dancing away with Beatrice and now Toeki.
When the faux Algerian looks up and sees three men surrounding him he asks, “Hi guys, what’s up.”
Well, nothing is up because the beat down commences with a grapple and continues with much pummeling with the admonishment of, “Don’t dance with our women, you fuckin’ camel jockeys!”
Beatrice screams and Toeki shouts at the attackers, “You stupid, whimpy cowards.”
Suddenly Shan Yu darts across the room faster and with more agility than any human should be able to possess. This is noticed by a few people including Lara Janssen. The gang leader is soon face to face with Shan Yu.
Toeki continues her tirade, “Stupid, whimpy, 4 on 1 cowards!”
Jean-Philippe now enters the fray but is intercepted by the remaining two gangers. Without breaking stride he martial arts punches the smaller one for a stunning shot. The ganger crumples like a house of cards in the breeze.
Now Nassim sees his three tormentors coming and runs for it. The man is only 5’ 2” and uses the crowd and the tables to good advantage to stay ahead of his ‘beat down’.
The gang leader swings at Shan Yu who merely dodges and blocks the incoming blows while asking, “Is this all you’ve got?”
Mohammad is trying to protect himself the best he can. His skinweave and BTM protect him from all but a little bruise damage. Toeki moves to position herself for an attack. Brandon calls shot on a leg and shatters the limb of his opponent. Shan Yu continues to taunt the gang prez while just blocking and dodging. Nassim is starting to run out of space.
Four more gangers come charging in from the back door of the club. By now Jean-Philippe is using his thermographic vision to fight. He sees one of the fresh attackers has a cyber arm. The biomechanical does a running jumpkick and calls his shot on the cyber arm. The limb goes sailing across the room as the now one armed ganger falls to his knees in screams. This brings his three companions to a screeching halt giving Toeki her chance as she leaps on the back of one of these new bikers. Once securely on her perch, she starts ‘girly-punching’ the man while screaming in his ear, “Whimpy, cowardly bastards…”
Mohammad starts to bleed on the floor and gets in his ‘shot’ if only by proxy as one of his attackers slips and falls in the ‘Algerian’s’ blood. People are starting to shout that the Police are coming and indeed those with some cyberaudio hear the approaching sirens. The ganger leader shouts to his men and steps back from Shan Yu. The biker draws a 12mm semi-automatic but keeps it down at his side as he shouts for his people to pull out. Toeki slides off the back of her ‘victim’. The gangers grab their wounded and flee. A couple do get caught. The police flood the place and the EMT’s arrive. They take a report and detain Jean-Philippe, Mohammed Asyd and Shan Yu. Nassim doesn’t appear to have taken part in any fight so he isn’t held. Mohammad is treated at the scene, but he really isn’t injured, so off to the Eindhoven jail he goes.
Nassim, Toeki and the other women head home soon after. Klara says she will make a few calls and see if she can’t get them out of jail before Monday. For now–from those in the warmth of their own beds to those on a hard cold cot and the faint fragrance of vomit in the air–it is time for sleep.
***
Saturday, December 28, 2052:
Around noon an angry gentleman shows up at the Eindhoven central police station. He is Wihelm de Boors, the security chief for the Eindhoven High Tech Campus (and a Philips executive), who has come to fetch them. He seems to know the whole story and isn’t angry at the group. As de Boors is driving them home he “hopes they kicked that ganger scum’s asses”.
Thus Jean-Philippe has his first encounter with his senior boss. The biomechanical’s career here is off to a great start. Too bad he is a spy (and a terrorist). Once back at home Mohammad (Noah), Shan Yu (Priest) and Jean-Philippe (Brandon) clean up after their night as guests of the Eindhoven Police. Afterwards Shan Yu and Jean-Philippe head to the city’s library. The ‘Chinese’ operative looks up Buddhist monasteries and centers. He finds a meditation center in Eindhoven.
Mohammad gets some flowers and heads over to Toeki’s house a few doors down. He has come to apologize to the girls for the fighting last night. The flowers are for Beatrice, of course. This earns Mohammad lunch and his bandages changed by a houseful of grateful young women. When asked where the other two jailbirds are, Mohammad can’t help himself. “Shan Yu wanted to go out with Jean-Philippe, alone, together.”
Beatrice says everyone is invited to a party nearby at a friend from work’s place. The whole Team heads out with the girls from next door (except for Lara who is off with her musician boyfriend. Shan Yu and Jean-Philippe join them for the party. Everyone gets a chance to meet more of their co-workers. The company also forms a social circle that communicates quickly amongst itself. Try as he might to find a date, Shan Yu finds himself trapped in the ‘friend zone’.
***
Sunday, December 29, 2052:
It is a day of rest and the Team does so. Mohammad does lunch with Beatrice at the girl’s place. Only Shan Yu goes out: to the Buddhist Center he looked up yesterday.
***
Monday, December 30, 2052:
It is the Team’s first day of work. The bus comes out in front of their row of homes and they and the other employees get on. This private bus has two more stops and it is mostly full. They head down a main road south to the Eindhoven High Tech Campus where RobotWerks is located. This first day of work is mostly training in company procedures. They meet their ‘egghead’ supervisors, get their rest room keys and attend some sensitivity training.
After the Team returns home, a private letter courier drops off a small package to the house where the four men live. A coded message is hidden in the packing and shipping numbers. The package contains a small (Philips) transistor radio. Mohammad decodes the message which says to hide the radio between the tracks on the mail rail bridge to the east of the city between 2:45 am and 3:15 am tonight and turn it on. They discuss what to do, but fail to notify Toeki of the communication immediately.
Next: Episode 2 – Yup, We’re Blown!