Death Date With Dracula!

Dracula has just thrown the Red Line Corporate Solutions car into a ditch. He's not happy, probably because they've killed two of his three Brides. He promises to find and kill them in four days.

Natasha Avram, former Russian government assassin. Wears a lot of leather. Driven by money. Possible sociopath.

Sten Brodrington, ace driver who is a bit vague about which specific branch of British intelligence he worked for. He's looking for direction and purpose in life, or at least that's what he says.

Max Fischer, German investigator with a mysterious past. A little twitchy. He's hoping for some sort of redemption.

Carmel Shaked, Israeli break-and-enter specialist with a bit of a nationalistic streak. Carmel has had enough of secrets and lies.

Sten is injured and Natasha is bleeding out on the tarmac, so the first order of business is to get them some medical attention; Dracula can wait.

Natasha cannot. She wants to get out of Europe and back home, where she can call on some back up. The others get her stable enough to travel and off they go, to Mother Russia.

The former assassin calls in some favours and the team acquires an abandoned and remote water mill in which to make its last stand; it is hoped that the water around the building will prove a barrier to Dracula and any vampiric minions he decides to send.

The team moves in and, lacking the time for a natural recovery, it turns to the dark arts in order to bring Natasha and Sten to fighting fitness. Goats are purchased and sacrificed, and rituals are enacted. The rituals are designed to take a week of preparation and rushing has unpredictable results; both Natasha and Sten wake up afterwards healed, but also covered in a layer of hircine fur.

Max calls on his contact at the Vatican, Archbishop Rodrigo Ortega, and explains the dire situation. He arranges for Ortega to visit the water mill and bless and sanctify the ground; Ortega consents -- he and Max are close -- but does not agree to be blindfolded on the journey to the site. Ortega should arrive the day before Dracula's arrival.

Natasha contacts her Uncle Ivan and requests weapons and other gear; this arrives over the next couple of days, but a requested light machine gun takes longer and is accompanied by four burly and taciturn Russians. They do not leave after making the delivery; Natasha doesn't get much out of them but is content that they are there to help.

It turns out the four are also vampires but the team gambles that they are not Dracula's vampires; the fact that the Russians seem to have undead agents does cause some disquiet but there's not enough time to worry, or look a vampiric gift horse in the, er, fangs.

Sten arranges the arrival of ten Russian swimwear models; he says that they are to provide a distraction, as Dracula has an eye for the ladies, but the others are not convinced by his reasoning. The models are given food, drink, and music and are told to have fun and ignore any loud explosions.

The team waits.

As night falls on the fourth of September, they hear the howling of wolves. Max and Sten inject themselves with some of the orange serum the team recovered from EDOM's base, hoping that the liquid's abilities will give them an advantage in the battle to come.

The team spots figures approaching from all directions; there are at least twenty. The shooting begins, as the Red Line team and its Russian allies use rifles to pick off the approaching figures; in response missiles twist out of the darkness. The mill is hit and begins to collapse, while the nearby outbuilding -- to which the team planned to fall back if necessary -- is almost flattened by another blast.

(Carmel's player rolls a d10 to see how many of the partying models inside the building are killed. He rolls a 10. Many jokes are made about how he never rolls high when he needs to.)

Four figures dressed head to toe in black combat gear drop out of the sky, landing without harm in the midst of the team's defences, and then it all goes to heck.

The team's plans and precautions seem to have little effect on the new arrivals. Throwing holy wafers and water at them does nothing, and ultraviolet spotlights do nothing, so the team resorts to brute force. And grenades. Lots of grenades.

One of the black-clad warriors reveals himself to be faster and stronger than the others, beheading one of the Russians with his bare hands; the team decides that this must be Dracula himself. They concentrate their attacks on him and leave the others to the Russians; he manages to hold off the entire team for a while before Carmel pierces his chest with a crossbow bolt and he crumbles to dust.

Dracula is dead!

The other vampires are still causing trouble so the team aids its Russian allies in cornering and eliminating them; as they are doing so a thick mist descends.

Dracula isn't dead.

The lord of the vampires proves to be more than a match for the team. He mesmerises Natasha and turns her against her colleagues; the assassin cannot resist the vampire's command and she shoots Sten. While that's happening, Dracula grabs Carmel and throws her through a wall, puncturing her lung; he then pursues Max and Sten, who have retreated downriver.

The vampire punches Max so hard that the German's nose is sheared right off, landing with a quiet splash in the river, to be carried away by the current; Max dives in after it and disappears from sight. Dracula turns on Sten, immobilises him with a choke hold, then starts munching away at his neck; the Red Line team is dismayed to see the vampire's wounds healing as he feeds.

A bloodied Max resurfaces a short distance away, out of Dracula's line of sight, and takes aim with his crossbow. Whether it's because the vampire is distracted, or because Max's accuracy is boosted by the EDOM serum, the bolt flies true; this time there is no skullduggery and the bolt pierces Dracula's heart.

A look of disbelief and surprise crosses the monster's face before he collapses to his knees, then to the ground. Max moves fast, beheading Dracula and then using white phosphorus grenades to incinerate both the body and the head. The ashes are then scattered at two different points of the river, just to be sure.

Dracula is dead.

Natasha calls Uncle Ivan and arranges for an evacuation; soon an unmarked helicopter arrives and the team is taken away to a Russian military base where, under a suspicious level of security, its members receive medical attention.

They are welcomed as "guests" of the Russian vampire programme, but it's clear that they will never be allowed to leave; even Natasha is a little affronted by her government's lack of gratitude but doesn't make a fuss. Sten decides to collaborate, while Carmel and Max plot escape, but that's all a story for another day.

Next: nothing! We're done! Dracula is defeated and the investigators get a sort of happy ending. Well, they are all alive, at least. I doubt we will return to see if Carmel and Max manage to get away from the Russians, and what Natasha and Sten do; once you've beaten Dracula, anything else is going to be a bit of an anticlimax.

That said, there will be at least one more Dracula Dossier post as I have some thoughts on the campaign from the GM's perspective, so look out for that in the next couple of days.