Call of Cthulhu Compatible: Fear's Sharp Little Needles
Customers are advised that contents of this book include themes of disease, infection, and contamination that may upset the reader (and players).
Fear's Sharp Little Needles is an ENnie award winning anthology of 26 one-night modern day scenarios for the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game published by Chaosium, Inc, edited by Jeff Moeller and written by Christopher Smith Adair, Glynn Owen Barrass, Simon Brake, Stuart Boon, Chad Bowser, Brian Courtemanche, Scott Dorward, Adam Gauntlett, Allan Goodall, Helen Gould, Tyler Hudak, Jo Kreil, Jeff Moeller, Andi Newton, Oscar Rios, Brian M. Sammons, Matthew Sanderson, Jennifer Thrasher, Joe Trier, Jason Williams, Matt Wiseman, and Simon Yee, with art by Dean Engelhardt, Reuben Dodd, Badger McInnes,
Taking its inspirational cues from Delta Green, X-Files, The Ritual, Mandy, and True Detective, the book takes a mature look at the horror of human nature and its ability to be just as disturbing as anything from the Mythos with blood and its inhuman uses as its theme.
The Scenarios
- Separation Anxiety, by Jeff Moeller. Disappearances of distinctive looking people stretching back decades leads to an “agritourism” self-pick farm in rural Ohio
- Undertow, by Simon Brake. A reclusive, depressed author lives alone with his black dog on the Californian coast, but is tracked down by curious investigators when his new book displays knowledge of the Cthulhu Mythos
- Sins of My Youth, by Oscar Rios. The investigators are stalked and attacked by a lunatic who seems to inexplicably know everything about them.
- Walter’s Final Wish, by Matt Wiseman & Jennifer Thrasher. Cultist in an oldfolks home uses mythos techniques to brainwash the staff for evil ends.
- Whose Fuel is Men and Stones, by Jason Williams. Solo adventure where investigator is a potential sacrificial target of middle-eastern cultists who wish to summon Cthugha in London.
- Pulvis Et Umbra Sumus, by Matthew Sanderson. Out of the blue, the investigators are invited to the reading of the will of a wealthy recluse in Maine. However, none of them have ever heard of this person, but they definitely need the money.
- The Great and Terrible Awto, by Jo Kreil. Several individuals who are working on a new concept car are killed in strange and suspicious accidents.
- Spilsbury #9485, by Adam Gauntlett. A butchered murder victim stuffed in a steamer trunk and left on a train in 1932 keeps turning up again and again throughout the decades, and whenever it appears disaster follows as time bends, breaks, and opens up to alternate dimensions allowing the things From Beyond through.
- Lights Out, by Joe Trier. Investigations into a teenage girl's murder reveal she had been using a ouija board to contact her dead boyfriend in the weeks before her untimely death; but who had she really been talking to?
- Bone Deep, by Allan Goodall. A killer who makes off with his victim’s body parts leads the investigators to The Bone Collectors, a cult of Mordiggian collecting lost knowledge etched into the bones of living humans.
- Do Not Call Up That Which You Cannot Put Down, by Brian Courtemanche. Investigators discover the Monster of Martin’s Beach, as first described by H.P. Lovecraft and Sonia Greene in their story “The Invisible Monster” (Weird Tales, November 1923 issue).
- Hit and Run, by Tyler Hudak. The PCs get drawn into the aftermath of the hit and run death of a child; a grieving family member has turned to the Mythos for revenge.
- Remaking the Hatteras Reef, by Andi Newton. When marine biologists scuttle an old ship in an attempt to revitalize a coral reef, an evil artifact is released to horrifying results.
- The Sores, by Helen Gould. A strange and fatal disease is rearing its head in a rural town, with no apparent cause, cure, or obvious link between the victims.
- Up Jumped the Reaper, by Chad Bowser. A missing person case in the North Carolina mountains is not all it seems.
- Resurrection, by Stuart Boon. A long-dead college friend returns from the grave prompting questions and leading to a gruesome and terrifying revelation.
- Waiting To Be Born, by Christopher Smith Adair. A fertility clinic works the will of Yidhra, spreading, and then horribly reincorporating, genetic material in her hunger for diversification.
- Unland, by Scott Dorward. The investigators are drawn to an abandoned amusement park, now a holy site where lies are stripped away.
- The Focus Group, by Simon Yee. A focus group is asked backed to try out a new phone app game to give their opinion of the experience in a controlled environment; they’ll wish that they hadn’t.
- Dissociation, by Matthew Sanderson. Alone, isolated, confused, and with limited ensory input, the investigators must somehow deal with an unseen puppeteer that seems to want to understand what scares them, and why.
- Poetry Night, by Oscar Rios. A poetry slam at a local coffeehouse takes a walk off the map. Literally.
- The Tormiss CRD, Model Z-17, by Andi Newton. When preparations for cremation reveal strange, worm-like growths in a dead man’s pacemaker, investigators must track down and stop cultists at a medical device company.
- Ghosts of Ravenscar, by Glynn Owen Barrass. group of rescuers, stranded by weather, must somehow survive being stalked by an ancient abomination, with only their wits and what they can scrounge.
- The Special Menu, by Adam Gauntlett, with Brian M. Sammons. A fast-food franchise. Mythos corrupton. Enough said. Winner of the First Annual Stygian Fox Squick Contest.
- The Winoka Point Research Center, by Oscar Rios. An abandoned, but not uninhabited, island-based government research facility. Probably should have been on the West coast.
- Phlebotomy, by Jeffrey Moeller and the Crew. A full-length scenario. Horror unexpectedly erupts at a phlebotomist’s office and the players must survive the aftermath. And what does all of this have to do with notorious “celebutante,” London Sinclair?