But the bugs appear to have broken the pact. The stockmen's flocks lie dead, decapitated and covered in bizarre burn marks. Strange lights buzz in the skies. Roadwardens investigated the attacks, but only one came back - sans half his skull. He rambled about stars trying to eat him. Then his brains fell out.
The shepherds ride Carnivorous Horses, maroon-coated palfreys with front-facing eyes and mouths of human teeth. The basin's grass is no good for regular mounts, they’d choke on the acidic soil and die gurgling up bloody vomit. The ranchers feed their steeds on the mutton of their sheep. The meat is tough, greasy and tastes of old pennies, but the grinning horses don’t seem to mind.
There's something in the soil here - maybe all the acid and heavy metals - that makes the ungulates produce precious metal in their wool. Nestled among the matted hair and cancerous lumps, they grow strands of gold, platinum, native aluminum... Stripping the fleece is a necessary but fiercely unpopular job; most jackaroos have hands swaddled in bandages where fingers have been degloved.
Jackaroos pick through the scorched remains, coughing as they sift for precious metals. Rifle-toting stockmen watch for necrophages, their horses happily grazing on the buffet of charred meat.
Mallos says the Mi-Go, a local tribe of flying bugmen, have begun killing his animals and stationhands. The change in behaviour is unusual - they normally leave his station alone (though he won't say why). Some volunteer roadwardens went to investigate, but they got party wiped. The headman is now offering 4,000 SP in golden fleece to anyone who exterminates the troublesome bugs.
If the party learns of his station's participation in the Mi-Go extortion racket, they can blackmail him into increasing their fee to 6,000 SP. Massacring tribals and executing outlaws might be beloved colonial pastimes, but human sacrifice and collaborating with monsters are still serious offences.
The cliffs are lousy with Horntoads, toothy lizard-frogs with a taste for human flesh thanks to the Mi-Go's careless corpse dumping. Anyone with wilderness expertise can spot their hidden burrows, else the team gets ambushed by 2d6 of the little monsters as they try to scale the plateau's narrow game trails.
At the summit, the exterior of the TOWER is visible from miles off. Rocks painted with white ochre litter the surrounds, warning signs left by autochthonous tribes and local monstermen. Most depict mounted gunmen tying victims to posts, then the crab-bugs carrying them off into the sky. More recent paintings show a starry night sky over a field of headless corpses.
Doors are fleshy portals, like giant sphincters covered in glowing pustules. They're coded only to open for Mi-Go, but smearing the butchered remains of a bug on it will work. They can be hacked down, if you don't mind a face full of acid (Save vs Breath or 2d6 damage). Someone with medical expertise could also "pick" one open, or even reprogram it entirely (this is what the Grey Hieros have done).
At any time, 1d6 Wretched Mi-Go are flying around the area. They ignore the party unless they've got visible light sources, then the headless bugs swarm them like confused moths - potentially clawing someone or carrying an unfortunate passenger into the air. During the night, the Constellation Mimic extrudes itself from a window in T8 and goes hunting for spirituous lymph to drink.
T1: The alien equivalent of a storage basement. Empty "barrels" made from chitin and lined with fuzzy purple fungus litter the ground. To Magic Users, they look like safe storage for hazardous magic items.
T2: A spongey staircase spirals 100' upwards. Halfway up, a Flying Head is tangled in some fleshy webbing, with another two brain jars trying to free it with their telekinesis.
They threaten to knock the characters off the stairs if they don't help. If freed, the jars argue over whether to help their friends upstairs or flee. Either way, they'll try to pressgang the party into helping.
T3: The tower suddenly terminates at a platform overlooking a beautiful night sky covered in shining stars. In reality, the Constellation Mimic is lairing on the landing. It will try to hypnotise someone into dropping whatever they're holding and approaching to be consumed. If the ploy fails, it retreats, only attacking if the party isn't carrying any sources of fire.
Assuming the slime flees, it leaves behind a half-digested Wretched Mi-Go. The creature buzzes feebly, partially-dissolved and missing its wings. Any brain jars present will want to shove it down the stairs. If attacked the bug freaks out, potentially dragging someone into a 150' fall down the central shaft.
If you heal the bug instead, it excretes an globule of grey ooze as a reward, before fleeing the dungeon. The slop is Serenity Slime, a psionic-painkiller that makes you immune to all mental effects and psychic attacks for an hour. The Mi-Go use it as a surgical anaesthetic.
T4: A dish of rippling black fungus, its surface a relatively accurate topographical map of the surrounding 6-miles. The cartographical fungi is heavy but doesn't spill out if the bowl is inverted, so stealing it is possible. A self-updating map is worth 3,000 SP to a cartographer or military commander.
In addition to the mold, two discarded brain jars lay on the floor - cracked open with immense force. The silvery metal is worth 113 SP. Loud slamming can be heard from above, along with a wet gurgling.
T5: The loud smashing noise comes from the eastern doorway - one of the bugs is ineffectually trying to open a sealed door. If the door is unlocked a Wretched Mi-Go starts flying around and smashing into things, dropping its Lightning Gun (as Wand of Lightning Bolts, 4 charges) in the process.
Drinking Eye sits at the end of the room, watching a display of headless Mi-Go flying around outside. That choking gurgle might be its laugh. It won't notice the party unless they make a lot of noise, whereupon it keeps them talking while it waits for an opportunity to flee and raise the alarm.
T6: Mi-Go hibernation quarters, repurposed as a darkroom for the Constellation Mimic. Flees here if confronted with fire-wielding creatures, the door reprogrammed to admit it. Interior is littered with excreted pseudo-pearls (the origin of its fake starlight) worth 800 SP, including a Pearl of Power.
T7: An operating theatre, occupied by White Teeth. The cacogen is glutting itself on brain jars, having thrown aside its facemask to expedite the mukbang. 208 SP worth of discarded brain jars litter the floor. A roadwarden lies dissected on the operating table, his head sawed open and brain missing. Two glistening syringes of Bio-Ointment (as Potion of Healing) and a +2 scalpel sit on a surgical tray.
Opening the door causes a panicked exodus of six Flying Heads and an angry shriek from the cacogen as its food escapes. It demands the party recapture the jars, else it'll devour their brains instead. If combat is joined, White Teeth can only attack once per round, thanks to its mouth tentacles being preoccupied.
T8: Shrine and Mi-Go nursery. Decorated with fungal wall murals to the Love Suicides: Horned Mother, Has-No-Thoughts, and Wax Mask. Breeding pools protrude from the floor, but the prepubescent bugs are nowhere to be found. They were eaten by the cacogens and their protoplasm.
T9: Instead of the outside world, this chitin window opens onto a narrow metal ramp. The Grey Hieros' flying machine is moored here, a slender vehicle of silvered metal hidden by a permanent casting of Invisibility 10'. The interior is filled with buzzing machines that only respond to their psionic powers.
Sam Weber
T10: Armoury. Filled with sticky racks for adhering weapons to. Most of them are empty, save for a single Mist Projector (as Scroll of Cloudkill) the cacogens haven't bothered to disable yet.
T11: Control room. Bloody Tongue meditates here, sifting through the fourth-dimensional databanks hidden in the tower's hyphae. If attacked, or alerted by the other cacogens, it extinguishes all fires inside the dungeon and dispatches the Constellation Mimic to devour any intruders.
A cavity built into the wall holds an ingot of Yuggothian Plutonium, a dense metal that glows an ominous pink - worth 5,000 SP to an alchemist or wizard. The container is lined with the same purple mycelium from the barrels in T1. Removing the isotope causes it to start going supercritical, exploding with deadly radiation in short order (Save vs Death) unless returned to the stabilising fungus. The ingot also powers the tower's biomechanics; remove it and the structure collapses in a few days.
Bioluminescent chameleonic gelatinous levitating vampire. Drains cranial and spinal fluids for sustenance. This generally entails melting a victim's head off and sucking their nervous system out. Mi-Go can survive this at the cost of becoming nearly brain dead. Terrestrial creatures aren't so lucky.
The protoplasm pretends to be patches of starry night sky, a tactic specifically designed to hunt Mi-Go. The bugs orientate themselves via astronavigation, so it mimics specific constellations to hypnotise them. For whatever reason, this works on other creatures too. Stats as Ooze (Monster Overhaul) with the ability to fly, enthrall victims who fail a Save vs Spells and a vulnerability to sunlight and fire.
The Grey Hieros avoid being attacked by wearing their special masks. If these were removed, they'd be at serious risk of getting eaten by their own monster.
If killed, 1,200 SP in pseudo-pearls can be harvested from the Constellation Mimic's remains.
FLYING HEADS
Spend long enough in a Mi-Go brain jar and you'll eventually develop psychic powers. It might be the entire point of the procedure. These flying heads are a mixture of dangerous criminals, autochthonous tribals, and local monstermen captured by the Steelwool stockmen. Stats as Poltergeist (Monster Overhaul), minus the invisibility and damage immunities, and with AC as plate.
The brain jars universally want to escape being devoured by the cacogens. They might also be torn between rescuing their friends or wreaking vengeance against the foreign colonisers that got them kidnapped and vivisected. Though the party isn't to blame, they might not care for the distinction.
Each brain case is worth 10d10 SP in rare metals and reagents if destroyed.
Nathan J. Anderson
GREY HIEROS
This trio of alien cacogens wiped out the Mi-Go solely to steal their stockpile of brains. Though they appear anthropomorphic thanks to their voluminous grey robes and ornate face masks, they're certainly not human, nor even the same species as one another. The hierodules are deserters from a spacefaring theocracy, abandoning their sacred duties in favour of nihilistic hedonism.
Stats as Mind Eater (Monster Overhaul). Their metallic facemasks are enchanted with minor Daylight spells, releasing 5' of dim solar radiation. This is an insurance policy against being eaten by their Constellation Mimic. The helmets are of limited use offensively, unless you want to headbutt a vampire.
Like any grouping of three people, one is tall, one is short, and one is fat.
The tall one is Bloody Tongue. It is cruel and clever, hoping to establish a steady stream of brains the same way the Mi-Go did. If told its pet protoplasm is eating up a potential meal ticket, it agrees to stop the attacks in exchange for Steelwool recommencing their tithe. Beneath the robes is a skinless torso with a twitching pseudopod instead of a head, pierced with 542 SP in titanium studs. Bloody Tongue carries a Silver Orb per the Monster Overhaul stats, letting it extinguish all nearby fires.
The short one is Drinking Eye. It is cowardly and voyeuristic, wanting to see the sights of the universe instead of babysitting the infantile scions of apostolic dynasties. Beneath the robes is a ratking of bloodshot eyestalks - like a beholder with no central eyeball. It wears 552 SP in golden tentacle rings.
The fat one is White Teeth. It is lazy and gluttonous, wanting only to feast upon the neural tissue of lesser creatures, sifting through the devoured memories for particularly titillating experiences. Beneath the robes is a mound of lamprey mouths lined with teeth, including 536 SP in silver dental filings.
If they fail a morale test, the cacogens try to gather as many brains and magic items as they can carry. Then they pile into the flying machine and make their getaway.
HORNTOADS
Somewhere between toad and lizard. Very patient, dig burrows in the ochre earth and wait in cryptobiosis for prey to approach. Common for more than can be fed to attack a given target. The carnivorous frogs sort it out between whoever’s left. Stats as Monstrous Vermin (Monster Overhaul).
WRETCHED MI-GO
Carcinised idiot savants decapitated by the Constellation Mimic. Fly around aimlessly, frequently killing themselves in crash landings. Attracted by bright lights. Stats as Harpy (Monster Overhaul), sans the innate charming ability until their mental faculties are restored.
Monsters are sourced from ShutteredRoom's Dry Red & Ochre Hills. I was pretty faithful with my adaptations, with the exception of the Grey Hags. I turned them into Mind Flayers because I thought the idea of them raiding a Mi-Go lab for the brain stockpile was funny. I flavoured them as rogue Hierodules from Book of the New Sun as an excuse to use that piece of art from Nathan Anderson.
Statblocks are from the Monster Overhaul. Some of the loot values are pulled from that book as well. The rest I eyeballed. Given Skerples probably used GLoG XP calculations for the treasure, a flat x10 multiplier to bring it into line with the normal 0e/1e/OSE numbers works fine as a bit of napkin math.
The map is DysonLogos' Alien Tower. It seemed only natural to use it for a Mi-Go outpost.
Many of the room descriptions and alien gadgets are taken from Sword&Stitchery's Eridian Ossuary.
The implied setting is from Mellonbread's BegoneFOE! fantasy heartbreaker. He's also the one who first showed me ShutteredRoom's d66 tables of monsters, so further kudos for that.
The scenario's title is a poem excerpt from a tumblr shitpost. You probably know the one. I think I first heard it from this burialgoods video. Original post is here.
"Most jackaroos have hands swaddled in bandages where fingers have been degloved." Horrid horrid horrid! Delightfully unpleasant throughout. A top-tier adventure from a deeply compelling setting.
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