HOMECOMING
Hooks:
1 You were special forces, or something similar. At some point, you met Cat (lanky, older, gray eyes), who presumably worked for the CIA. Now, you're out of the game, and miserable, and Cat has a job. Today Tyson Lockshee stole biological weapons from his employer, Trinity Labs, and now represents a “grave and urgent threat to our national security.” The job is $25k to retrieve Tyson and the equipment he stole. He’s at 2621 Hatteras Court, Murfreesboro, TN 37129, visiting his girlfriend’s family; if any of them are infected, terminate with extreme prejudice but make it look like an accident. No pay if anything about the job ever gets written down. Cat provides floorplans to the house and access to body armor, firearms, suppressors, and NVGs if desired. Soonest you can arrive is 12am on October 23rd, 2026.
2 You work in law enforcement, but moonlight for the Cali cartel on the weekends. They call you at midnight as October 23rd becomes October 24th to say one of their money launderers has gone too far. His name is Robert Wayne, and a team was sent to kidnap him, his wife and his two kids from their home at 2621 Hatteras Court, Murfreesboro, Tennessee 37129. Now that team isn't responding, and you're the backup crew being sent in to fix it. Pay is $15k for Robert alive, plus $30k if you also bag all three members of the family. No pay if any mention of this is ever found in the news or on a police blotter. You've got floorplans for the house, but you're on your own for weapons and supplies.
use 2721 Hatteras Court as satellite imagery reference if desired.
Timeline:
2016: Robert Wayne, an accountant, begins laundering money for the Cali cartel.
2025: Robert’s daughter, Ashlyn, leaves for college at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville.
May 17th, 2026. Tyson Lockshee, a 32 year old PhD student at UTk in biomedical engineering who already has his MD, gets hired at Trinity Labs, which specializes in using CRISPR to modify human genome.
June 27th, 2026- Tyson listens to a podcast about secret codes hidden in the Bible. He begins researching for himself.
July 4th, 2026 - Everyone agrees Tyson has out-kicked his coverage by getting a date with sophomore Ashlyn Wayne.
Oct 22nd, 2026, 4pm. Tyson Lockshee and Ashlyn arrive at the Wayne home on fall break to meet her family.
6pm: Tyson spikes the family chili bowl with barbiturates, and when they pass out, ties up the family and puts Ashlyn in a cage upstairs.
7pm: Tyson begins his treatment on Ashlyn while she is still unconscious.
11pm: Just as the treatment is wrapping up, a Lee Company van pulls up outside. A tac team led by Diego Gonzalez picks the lock on the front door and lets themselves in. They arrive upstairs in 2.5 Bedroom just as the treatment finishes. Ashlyn wakes up, erupts in a web of fleshy tendrils, killing everyone in the attack team except for Diego, and paralyzing Tyson from the waist down. Diego runs from the room and hides under the ping pong table in 2.2 Bonus Room, and Tyson crawls down the stairs to 1.1 Front Entryway.
On the left, Justin Kim, 16-year-old. The name on the deed is Seo-Joon Kim, Justin's father. They moved Justin here to attend a prestigious American High School, but the rest of the family still lives in South Korea. Justin stays up till 2:00 in the morning playing fortnite or pranking the neighbors most nights.
On the right, Ken Curtis. Elderly retiree, lives by himself. His only hobby is keeping up with what's going on in the neighborhood. Extremely light sleeper, who will wake at almost any noise, and is not afraid to knock on someone's door at 2:00 in the morning and ask them to quiet things down.
Encounter Table
Every time the party moves to a new room, spends time doing something, or makes a loud noise, roll d6. On a one or two, roll on the encounter table. If there's ever unsuppressed gunfire or something of equivalent noise, automatically roll an encounter.
Encounter d20
1-15: Mark this encounter. After this encounter is marked three times, tac team arrives.
16-17: Justin ding-dong ditches the house. Whether the door is answered or not, he waits 5 minutes, and then does it again. Gives up after a total of 2d4 times.
18-19: Ken Curtis wakes up. A light goes on in the front room of the house next door. If it's night time, any noise will have him walking over to knock on the door and ask those inside to keep it quiet. If he was awoken by loud noise, he’s already on his way, rehearsing what he’ll say as he goes.
20: d4-2 of the tac team killed by Ashlyn return to life as beasts. They will not attack her, or anyone else who is infected.
Tac Team: a non-descript Suburban pulls up to the house. Inside is a tac team of five led by James Grimal (bearded, roided up, diplomatic), who are taking on the job described in the hook that is not being used for this machine (so if the players are working for the cartel, then James is working for a man named Cat). Regardless of job, they're former military, blooded in violence, in black BDUs, Kevlar vests, with suppressed Sig Sauer MPX’s and Glocks. James knows: negotiation and clever manipulation is a great way to get the drop on people. A good backstory is that he works for a secret wing of the government called Delta Green concerned with investigating the paranormal (James played a lot of RPGs in the 90s). He has fake FBI ID’s for the whole tac team. Also knows that when manipulation fails, speed and violence of action takes the day every time.
o: open
L: locked
All exterior doors use the same key; locked interior doors can be popped open from the outside.
The Wayne House: New, nice siding, two story, big garage.
0.1 Front Lawn: “vote Obi-Wan Kenobi 2028” yard sign. Parked in the driveway, a Ford Ranger (Tyson’s) and a Mercedes four door sedan (Ashlyn’s). Parked at the street, a van from a well known HVAC and plumbing company. All vehicles are locked. Back door to the garage has a key under the mat. Looking carefully at the front door, it was picked recently.
0.2 Back Yard: patio, fire pit, string lights, Blackstone grill. Lot of use in the late spring and early fall.
0.3 Garage: brand new G-wagon & new model Ford F150 with all the options. Against one wall, the nice rolling tool racks, most of them empty and all the tools clearly unused.
1.1 Front Den / Entryway
Tyson Lockshee (strong jawline, jacked, terrified), passed out in the middle of crawling towards the front door. He was paralyzed from the waist down during the altercation upstairs. A wound on his head is bleeding pretty bad; a blood trail leads up the stairs. He knows that he was attempting to turn his girlfriend Ashlyn into an angel using CRISPR gene modification technology and a code he discovered in The Book of Revelation. He knows that mentioning any of that is going to look really bad. That some other guys broke into the Wayne house, and certainly looked like they wanted to kill everyone inside. That if he plays his cards right, there's a chance he gets off scot free. In Tyson’s back pocket, the key to Ashlyn’s cage upstairs in 2.5 Gym.
In the front den, couches surround a low table with a bowl. Inside, keys for both vehicles in the garage and the two parked out front. On the tables, family photos show Rob, Lisa, Ashlyn and Sean together with their two dogs (big golden retrievers).
1.2 Bathroom
Standard bathroom; sink, toilet, poo-pourri on the back of the toilet.
A bottle of barbiturates rests on the counter, empty. It's extra concentrated, so even a small amount would put an adult to sleep pretty quickly.
1.3 Laundry Room
Two dog crates, with food and water bowls. No dogs. The darks are dry, and the light load needs to be rotated to the dryer. Sitting on top of the dryer, a burner phone. It's unlocked, and contains text messages that are very obviously about laundering drug money. Belongs to Robert.
1.4 Dining / Living / Kitchen
TV is showing a rerun of The Thing, surrounded by couches covered in throw pillows. Smell of burning, from the microwave. Inside, four cell phones, microwaved to a crisp. On the stove, a pot of chili, spiked with barbiturates. Anyone eating a bowl will be passed out in 20 minutes.
1.5 Master Bed
Pretty typical master bed: a king bed framed by two bedside tables, one filled with creams and ointments, the other filled with mass print paperbacks by Tom Clancy, and hidden under them, a stash of porn. Stashed along the side of the bed next to the latter bedside table, a Kimber 1911, cocked and locked.
1.6 Master Bath
Three members of the family tied up. Rob (finance bro all grown up), Lisa (trophy wife become stay at home mom), Sean (hard at work on his 5th year in a 2 year associates degree at the local community college). Lisa had an adverse reaction to the barbiturates, had a seizure and is unconscious on the floor in a puddle of her own vomit; she’ll be dead in an hour or two. The two others in the room watched helplessly as this happened. On Rob's wrist, a watch. On the inside of the watch, a symbol associated with the Cali cartel, that any member of law enforcement would recognize.
Rob. Knows: that he's being punished for enriching himself when he could have been helping others. That that son of a bitch Tyson is probably raping his daughter right now. Wants: return his life to honoring Jesus Christ. To kill Tyson. And no, he does not see any contradiction between those two things.
2.1 Office
Typical suburban bedroom made into an office; two monitors, big desk, office chair with lots of back support, family photos on the wall taken by a professional photographer at that one beach vacation where everyone was actually happy with each other.
Two dogs, manic. Big goldens. Won't attack but will bark SO loud. Dog tags “Bruce” and “Damien”.
Desk: Inside, documents indicating that Rob’s real work as an accountant is laundering money for the cartels. In a secret compartment below that, proof that he’s also stealing something like 5% off the top from them.
2.2 Bonus Room
Ping pong table, couch, TV with multiple gaming systems, dartboard on one wall. Crouching and shaking under the ping pong table is…
Diego Gonzalez, currently homicide detective with the local police department, moonlights for the cartels. Wearing black fatigues, military grade ballistic armor, three magazines for an AR-15 in a chest rig, and has a Glock 17 on his hip with three spare mags. Knows that he's a coward for freezing when everything went to crap in the other room. That the daughter they were supposed to kidnap along with Rob Wayne turned into a monster. Wants: to redeem himself by shooting something (namely the first person or thing to walk through the door of this room), like he should have hours ago. Fears: that he is too much of a coward to ever leave this room.
2.3 Upstairs Bathroom
Spotless. Regularly cleaned by Lisa.
Book: A book, containing diagrams that explain Tyson’s process. Tyson discovered that the Book of Revelation, if converted to numeric code, contains something that looks suspiciously like a code for genome. He's using a CRISPR machine to input that genome into the blood of his girlfriend Ashlyn. He believes it contains the formula for humans to become Angels, and gain the gift of flight, eternal life, and superhuman strength, and thinks he is giving her a great gift.
2.4 Teenage Bedroom
Quintessential teenage boy room. Fortnite posters, a football helmet, clothes all over the floor, an unmade bed.
2.5 Gym
Pink walls, and a mural on one wall showing Ashlyn as a girl wearing a crown at the center of the family. However, the furniture is that of a gym, which was put in when she started her sophomore year.
Bodies: four of them in black BDUs, ballistic plate, carrying AR’s and Glocks with three mags for each. One more AR than there are bodies, which was dropped by Diego.
Machinery: it's so wrecked that it takes a turn to work out what it is, but after some inspection, it's a portable CRISPR machine combined with a dialysis machine. It allows the machine to draw blood out of a person, to rewrite the DNA contained within the blood, and then to recirculate it back into the person's body. Currently programmed with a formula that looks nothing like human DNA.
Cage: inside a dog-sized cage reinforced to hold a human, locked with a padlock (key in Tyson's pocket), the youngest child of this family, home from college, wearing a bright orange tri-Delta sweatshirt. Her name is Ashlyn (blonde, aspiring influencer, blood-covered), and she is terrified. She knows that her boyfriend drugged her and her whole family, that men with guns broke into the house, that something killed those men, and that something is wrong with her. She has IV tubing hanging out of her arm. It was previously hooked up to the CRISPR machine, but that came loose. Wants to get out of here, and to see her boyfriend Tyson die.
Ashlyn (The Beast)
However, inside Ashlyn is the beast. Every turn Ashlyn is outside of her cage, roll 1d6. 1: The beast takes over. 2-3: a sign of the beast, successive rolls are -1. 4-6 nothing.
If Ashlyn feels threatened, sees her family threatened, or encounters Tyson again, roll 1d4 on the same table. If anyone attempts to do Ashlyn harm or attempts to hurt her family, the beast emerges.
Sign of the Beast d8
1 Something moves under Ashlyn’s sweatshirt. From a part of her body where nothing should be moving.
2 Ashlyn stares off into space, not moving for a good 30 seconds.
3 Ashlyn grabs a character’s hand. They are viscerally taken back to the most traumatic thing they’ve experienced in life, re-experiencing it but with Ashlyn off to the side, watching.
4 Something falls to the ground; Ashlyn catches it with super human speed.
5 Ashlyn’s eyes turn black. Then turn back to normal if anyone notices.
6 Something dark moves under the skin of Ashlyn’s exposed hand.
7 The whole party sees the same vision; Ashlyn, crowned as empress of a worldwide empire, the presidents and leaders of nations bowing down at her feet.
8 The beast is released.
The beast wants to kill. Anyone killed by the beast is raised as a beast themselves. Anyone wounded by a beast changes into one in d20 hours, unless they remove the part of themselves that received the wound. As the original beast, Ashlyn can retract the tentacles and extra heads to appear human. Other beasts lack this ability.
The Beast
A mess of fleshy, ropey tentacles, with teeth and cutting edges protruding from the ends. 10 horns, 7 heads, and 666 written on each of the heads. Speed of a leopard, fleshy paws for feet resembling bear paws, and a gaping maw for a mouth like a lion. (See Revelation 13)
Evasion: +3 (no sense of self preservation).
Shooting: 16 (tentacles up to 30 ft, On a hit -5 to the wound check, but target is dragged towards the beast)
Melee: 2d10
Harm:
Xd6 Result
1-10. The beast seems unstoppable, rising despite grievous wounds. When rolling on this table again, add an additional 1d6.
11-15. One of the tendrils emanating from the beast is destroyed. -1 to all rolls it makes going forward; this stacks. When rolling on this table again, add an additional 1d6.
16-20. The beast is struck in the head and is stunned for d6 rounds. When rolling on this table again, add an additional 2d6.
21+. The beast is destroyed.
