January 18, 2017

Agenda: Carmilla Sanction 1948 #2: Entering Vienna

Folks, sans Vito, got to Vienna, bribing their way into the Soviet Zone of the country with a truckload of beer (via Karin) and using a contact to get into Vienna itself (via Joyce). Their mission: find Carmilla before the Russians yield to Allied pressure and open the city.

Discussing ways of getting into Vienna:

Joyce: Your typical Ivan -- and I have known a lot -- wants a hot meal, vodka, and not to get shot at.

Karin's brewer contact was Helmut Braun. The player put 4 points into him. Apparently, someone asked how useful he could be.

Hedy: Are you kidding? Brewers are always useful! I want a beer!

And I think the following was a joke from Joyce's player:

We are Russian Morale Officers! We have very talented Georgian girl, winner of the Hedy Lamarr Look-Alike Contest!

And, really, we all knew folks had to get to Vienna, and we all understood that the how was flavor, if amusing flavor.

QUICK BACKGROUND: As fans of The Third Man know, Vienna is divided into five zones: American, British, French, Russian, and International. It's the Russian's turn to patrol the International Zone, also known as the Inner City. The Russians tend to play fast and loose with the protocols involving cooperating with the authorities from other nations.

NB: Many thanks to the gamer who provided the map with all the places mentioned in the scenario flagged on it and all the zones marked! I had assumed all legations and HQs were in the zone of the country they belonged to. This is not, in fact, the case. Most, but not all, are in the Inner City / International Zone.

Folks were staying in a pension in the Soviet Zone.

Joyce's contact in the Kommandatura was Boris Ivanovik Kuranev. My notes don't seem sure whether he's Red Army or MGB (unless those overlap?), but he was the person who'd tipped Joyce off that she was going to be arrested for not being sufficiently revolutionary. Joyce's player put 7 points into him.

Naturally, Boris could not possibly allow her to look at the records, not even in return for such fine cigars. Nope, he was just going outside to smoke one of them, and she was absolutely not to use the keys he would leave behind with her for safe keeping while he took, oh, maybe 20, 40 minutes to smoke.

Joyce and Hedy wasted no time looking through the records, and found a few women who fit the description of Carmilla. Their photos were blurry, which could indicate she was feeding on them or had made them Renfields or both. Their names were all anagrams of hers. All looked fairly similar to each other and to Carmilla. And, Joyce saw another woman who looked like Carmilla, working in the Kommandatura.

Meanwhile, Karin and Isabella went to the address they were given for Edom's friendly in Vienna, Franz Herbert. He turned out to be a Nazi supporter, and rambled about conspiracies and how a different Carmilla look-alike was a female reincarnation of Die Fuhrer.

Karin wanted to kill the man, as she objects to Nazis and has a Drive of Revenge (Cultists), and this was a Hard Drive. So, she rigged his toilet with explosives (spending 2 points and getting a total of 4, and I think there was a 4 point Preparation roll in there as well). Isabella noticed this and set them off early, when all three were out of range, because she wanted him to set up a meeting with the Carmilla look-alike he knew. Isabella then used Reassurance to convince him that neither she nor Karin had set the explosives. All three left the less than safe safe house.

That evening, Isabella staked out Hotel Bristol where Millarca Karneburg worked and tailed her to her night job, tending bar in an off-limits club in a bombed out church near the Ottakring Cemetary, in the French Zone. Karin was with there as well, I think having tailed Franz.

Karin drifted into the bar, while Isabella watched from outside. One of them saw the glint of a sniper rifle. The sniper shot Franz, fatally.

Inside the bar, everyone ran for exists. Outside, Isabella was already moving. She moved fast enough to reach the roof where the sniper was.

They spoke briefly. He told her that she was welcome to kill as many Nazis as she wanted. She let him know it was Carmilla she was interested.

At this, he pointed a pistol at her, saying, "Your mother warns you to beware the assassin," which was a line from Carmilla, from the dreams of Laura, the girl Carmilla feeds on.

Isabella stayed still while he moved back into the shadows. She then tailed him without being seen, but decided, wisely, not to follow him into Palais Epstein.

Meanwhile, Joyce, in disguise as Joshua Lincoln, took Hedy, basically disguised to look like a woman who happened to resemble the famous Hedy Lamarr a little, to the Kit Kat Club, where they'd heard the action was. The club was a combination of burlesque, gambling den, drug parlor, and brothel. It was run by Mira Call and Irma Call, who claimed to be twins.

"Joshua" and Hedy flirted with the sisters and supplied social lubricant in the form of money and buying drinks and the like and, oh yes, flirting. The sisters admitted that they weren't twins, but customers liked to think they were. They praised Hedy's looks.

"Joshua" explained that they were from an American paper, doing articles on post-war Vienna and people with interesting stories.

Mira and Irma explained how they and ten other young women had been taken in and given shelter by a nice, rich lady. They'd stayed at her schloss, Schloss Karnstein, though the winter of 1945-1946. Then, with her help and the help of the best forger in town, Mr. Popescu, they started new lives in Vienna.

They listed the women, as best they remembered them. That is, they told no lies, and their information was accurate -- but sketchy.

Folks got back together to compare notes. There was some amusing conversation about Karin's attempt to kill Franz Herbert.

Joyce: Cultist?

Karin: A Nazi cultist.

Joyce: Nazi!?!

I think at this point, Isabella explained that she didn't want Franz dead until they knew everything he knew, and that was why she stopped Karin from killing him.

Joyce: I can't entirely blame her.

Hedy: Yes, you can. You can entirely blame her!

A couple of people were a little confused about Millarca being with the Wehrwolf resistance OOC, and possibly IC as well.

Joyce (whose player was not, I think, confused): So, you're telling me she's a werewolf vampire?

Isabella: That would be an abomination.

(Why yes, we are familiar with White Wolf's WoD. Why do you ask?)

They realized that Carmilla had killed one of the women she'd molded to look like her, right down to the anagram name, taking that woman's place. But which woman?

Joyce: You gotta give it to her -- she was very clever.

The information they had:

• Alma, last name unknown, actress
• Carmalli, last name unknown
• Carmilla, last name unknown
• Clar-Mila Vilsen, prostitute. Prostitution is legal in Vienna if one is licensed. Criminal record: called in for questioning as a material witness to a murder and for unlicensed prostitution
• Lara, last name unknown
• Llacrima Rocarne. Criminal record: called in for receiving illegal goods, suspected of a black market connection
• Marcilla, last name unknown
• Maricall, last name unknown
• Millarca Kareneberg, barmaid and chambermaid at Hotel Bristol (where the US Legation is), moonlights (illegally -- after curfew) as barmaid at a bar in the upper story of a burnt out church in the French Zone. Nazi agent, Werwolf Resistance. An Edom friendly (killed by a Russian sniper after being lucky enough to have Isabella save him from Karin's explosives) said that she is the female principle or reincarnation of Die Fuhrer -- unless that's one of Carmilla's other shadows. Some of the PCs believe or hope she's the one the actual Carmilla replaced.
• Mira and Irma Call, running the Kit-Kat Club, which is a burlesque, a brothel, and a place with connections to the black market
• Mircalla Kernstier, nurse. Criminal record: called in for questioning about missing morphine and penicillin. Isabella thinks she's a front runner for having been replaced by the actual Carmilla.

But, how to find out which one was Carmilla? Plans considered included:

• Isabella: Dangle Hedy as bait and see who bites -- literally. Then kill them.

Joyce: "Then kill them" is an important bit.

• Supplying all the women with mirrors and makeup from the black market and watching to see whether they all use the makeup and mirror at once, which one would expect, given this stuff is too expensive and likely folks need to use the black market to get it
• Find some other way involving photography, mirrors, and the vampire's need to feed.

Heat: After double checking with the book and asking Ken Hite a question, I've figured it out. The group's total Heat is 4.

• 1 point for being PCs.
• 2 points because of the small explosion in a semi-secluded area that did only property damage.
• 1 point added to those 2 points because when you gain Heat in Vienna in this scenario, you gain an extra point of it.
• 0 points for Isabella's encounter with the sniper on the roof, as she let him believe she was backing down.

Total = 4 points.