Part two of the story; part one and the backstory are in the previous post, but so far:
In a world where the First World War was ended in 1916, air travel is by airship, and Edward the 8th did not abdicate the throne in 1937, the tiny mid Atlantic island of Ascension is a world transport hub, and suddenly the centre of attention for several powerful interests. Lord Mountbatten, head of a new and mysterious political police force known as the ‘Auxiliary Police’ has left some compromising paperwork on Ascension while travelling through, and has ordered the local detachment of the ‘Auxiliary Police’ to retrieve it.
On attempting to do so the Auxiliaries find they are not the only ones after this prize: the League of Nations has sent a detachment of mercenaries from the Hohenzollern Guard to collect the paperwork as evidence against Mountbatten for his nefarious deeds. After some light skirmishing Lieutenant von Muldenheim has reached the Control Tower office where the paperwork has been left. Unknown to him, however, the Auxiliaries are not far behind, and Colonel Oliver, their leader, is about to enter the building…
Suddenly everyone was converging on the control tower. von Mildenheim’s colleagues ran to support him, with his Captain, Von Witzleben, leaping onto the bonnet of a truck and taking a shot at Colonel Oliver. He missed but the shot alerted the Lieutenant inside to the danger. Pvt. Hoepner, veteran of many a close combat, ran to the control tower.
Ever the coward, Oliver tried to play the ‘disarmed’ card to avoid getting hurt, but Elder Son had been prepared and countered this with a ‘Free Pass’. Lieutenant von Muldenheim was able to deliver a haymaker of a blow to Lawrence, knocking him out of the door and down the steps, after which Oliver decided that promotion or no promotion he would make a tactical retreat and left the scene.
Now that he had the journal, Lieutenant Mulnheim was ordered to get out of the area, while Private Hoepner jumped into the control tower to cover his defeat, and Sgt. Lühring came to support him on the opposite side.
The Lieutenant hesitated, clearly wanting to support his comrades, but Sg. Lühring shouted something through the widow in German and he legged it; no-one is sure what the sergeant said but he looked more scared of her than anything the auxiliaries could manage.
With their object achieved the mopping up began. One Auxiliary ran into the control tower expecting to meet a young Lieutenant and instead was confronted by pvt. Hoepner, as nasty a surprise as could be imagined.
Meanwhile Lieutenant Gunning found himself between Sgt. Lühring and Capt. Von Witzleben.
At this point anyone sensible would have retreated but Gunning decided this was the time to settle old scores and took a wild swing at Lühring, who blocked it and landed a few blows in return.
Meanwhile Pvt. Hoepner, never one for the subtle approach, punched Warrant Officer Whitehead so hard the latter flew off the balcony and onto the ground.
Lühring and von Witzleben expected Gunning to retreat, but enraged he kept fighting back. Unable to disengage they had to keep going and hope to knock him down.
In the end, just as Whitehead returned to the fray, Lühring and von Witzleben managed to subdue Lt. Gunning, and retreated with Hoepner, leaving Whitehead to remove his Lieutenant from the area.
The end result was that Mountbatten’s Journal was captured and the secrets contained therein will hopefully be transported to the Hague for analysis of the contents, while Colonel Oliver worked on a highly imaginative report to blame his subordinates for the failure of his mission…
Elder Son hand I had a great time: he told me later he’d been a bit concerned that he wouldn’t enjoy the game but had found himself getting more and more into it until the end. We missed a lot of things, and forgot to use some fortune cards and skills on the character cards, but now I’m all motivated to finish preparing other characters, so another game will probably appear soon.
Railway Misadventures 