Operation Window Maker - The Attack

The team reached their jump off point as planned at 08:00 and split into the three attack groups.

I assumed it would take 1 hour plus 1D6 in 10 minute increments to reach their attack location. Breakfast rolled 1 so would arrive in 1 hour 10 minutes. Both the Explosive Specialist – Royal Marine Street and Assault Team Rainbow rolled 3 so arriving in 1 hour 30 minutes.

The game started at 08:00, the attack was due to commence at 10:00.

I checked and the helicopter was on the landing pad atop the building.

At 08:30 Helicopter Pilot Erika Klaus stepped out of the bar with Lola and Chardonnay they headed for the helicopter. Breakfast are still 40 minutes away and the other two teams are 90 minutes away.

09:00 after boarding and going through the routine flight checks they take off.

09:10 Breakfast arrive just off the South gate of the complex and Snap immediately hears something moving through the jungle. It’s almost certainly the tracked robotic vehicle (TRV) that had been previously identified trundling around the compound. Crackle steps of a twig and it goes Snap, the team freezes and the TRV halts.

9:15 The TRV doesn’t record any other movement and continues on its way. Crackle hears it move off and there is general relief amongst the team.

As there was an uncertain arrival time the micro plan was that each team would arrive at the compound, identify their attack point and then back off into the jungle to avoid detection. Moving back up to the wire/wall just before 10:00 hours and kicking everything off on time.

What do they say about no plan survives contact with the enemy!

Still 09:15 Zaira emerges from the bar area with two Foot Robotic bodyguards (FRB) and proceeds to wander around the compound in an erratic manner.

He’s obviously taking his morning constitutional but Breakfast are engaged with the TRV and don’t see him. The other two teams are still making their way to the compound so also don’t see him.

09:20 Pop Pop moves forward stealthily, on her own and if she had been taller, about 5’ taller she would have seen Zaira in the distance but the brown container obscured her line of sight. Such are the vagaries of a mission at Vagabond Manor that the game could have been over before the official start time of 10:00 if she had been able to take that shot.

09:25 She had to hit the dirt as she heard a 2nd TRV trundling from the west or her left, it then moved into view but didn’t spot her.

09:30 The Explosive Specialist, Marine Street reached the compound, she could see a FRB on patrol but it didn’t see her. You might have trouble spotting her as well, but her base is more visible than she is.

09:30 Team Rainbow also arrive at the compound wall but this doesn’t go so well. Magenta makes a noise as she approaches and an FRB detects the sound and turns in her direction. She realizes that the FRB has seen her because it raises its gun but she is faster.

Fast and accurate is a good combination, her reflexes take over and she fires without conscious thought and hits its centre of mass, right in the chest or at least the bundle of cables and steel tubing that would be its chest if it had a chest. It falls to the ground fizzing and popping as this happens and fuelled by the adrenaline rush, Miss Magenta is quickly over the wall and making her way to the bar which is assumed to be the HQ.

On reflection I can’t remember why I made that assumption but there must have been a good reason.

The sound of gunfire attracts another TRV, it turn’s from its preordained circuit and make its way to the East side of the compound.

The picture is largely irrelevant, it’s only included because I quite like it. Sorry.

Zaira is spooked by the sound of gunfire, as well he might be because it’s pretty close to where he had perambulated to. He immediately turns, and protected by his FRB’s he sets off back to the safety of the bar, the building on the left of the picture. This is a cautious retreat; they don’t want to run into trouble unaware and also don’t know Magenta is just the other side of the storage unit. You can see where Magenta has reached fuelled by her adrenaline rush, she also doesn’t know Zaira is loose in the compound and the other side of the building.

The rest of Rainbow team are still on the far side of the compound wall.

The gunfire kicks off the start of the action 30 minutes before planned.

Marine Explosive Expert Danielle Steel can see a FRB through the wire and decides her best course of action is to shoot it.

This turns out to be a bad decision because she misses, it turns…and she gets off a 2nd salvo of SMG fire in its direction but misses again, the FRB then returns the fire it’s armed with some sort of auto cannon and doesn’t miss. Street hits the dirt, hard and reflects she needs more range time. Blowing things up is fun but shooting straight is going to save your life.

Then she reflects that it would be nice to get out of here to be able to get more range time.

She’s out of the fight, OOF, badly injured but not dead…..yet.

Pop Pop and the rest of Breakfast are held up by the TRV, it’s moving around the perimeter towards the sound of firing but having a little trouble with tree roots etc and only moving slowly. Breakfast are a Sniper Team and don’t fancy mixing it with this well armed machine.

All the remaining FRB’s react to the shooting and call for orders. They need new orders to override their pre-programmed instructions. Control is apparently sleeping and doesn’t respond but Mrs White…you remember Agent White, she’s in the same building as Control and hearing the shots assumes, rightly, that the attack has started. She picks up a kitchen knife and moves warily towards Control. 

It’s going to take 2 moves to get there. He needs to remain inactive next move or she will be discovered….he has a gun! It’s a bit of a tense time in the Bar.

This FRB turns and sees the rest of Rainbow who have followed Magenta over the wall.

You remember the TRV, the one I liked the picture of? Well it moved back toward the shooting and into line of sight of Rainbow, they are now over the outer wall. A gunfight ensues, the majority of Rainbow take cover behind this low wall but Purple and Magenta return fire and both score a hit. They are using some form of explosive charge weapons and firing through a wire fence. Unfortunately one of these hit’s was a hit on the fence and explodes on contact but the other slipped through the mesh and took out the TRV.

Zaira and bodyguards are getting close to the Bar, he’ll soon be safe inside. They hear a scream from the building. Agent White has reached the Control and stuck the kitchen knife in him. Control is Johnny Mo and he’s now the ex Johnny Mo. She needs to reach the bar door to lock and bolt it before Zaira enters. Will she make it in time.

Meanwhile the FRB by the North Gate has been having a bit of a torrid time and Miss Magenta has shot it through the head, it is now defunct.

Zaira’s lead FRB sees Miss Purple as she moves forward, there’s an exchange of fire and Purple doesn’t survive it, Rainbows first casualty is dead before hitting the ground.

To be fair the FRB is rather cheating because it has some form of armour piercing cannon and a huge drum of ammunition, but I don’t suppose it thinks of cheating or anything else really.

Zaira makes a run for the bar door and reaches it before Agent White, be bursts through and in spite of his short stature he’s a very powerful man and puts her OOF. Well that didn’t go as I’d have liked.

Miss Green and Miss Blue move forward to attack the FRB with the big cannon, as you can see Green didn’t survive the encounter but neither did the FRB, she’s bleeding on the ground and he’s leaking hydraulic oil or whatever robots leak when they’ve had various pipes and cables severed.

It’s not clear in the picture but there’s another FRB behind the black SUV, it can’t see Miss Blue and she can’t see it.

Well not until it moves closer towards the bar door. There’s a huge fire fight. Miss Blue goes down first, then Miss Magenta is shot. Just in case you’re not counting that’s 4 out of the 5 members of team Rainbow down and only Miss Scarlet the Team Leader still standing.

You don’t get to lead a team like Rainbow without being a bit bold, brave and handy with a weapon and in the final exchange of fire it’s the FRB that falls and Miss Scarlet who is victorious.

Then there’s a sharp rifle crack as Pop Pop, tired of watching the TRV make it’s slow way around the compound, has decided to shoot it in the back. The Geneva Conventions are OK with this and the shot takes it out of the fight.

This action draws another FRB into the fight. It’s directive was to guard the south gate but seeing the TRV blown up, right in front of the south gate, a move of a couple of yards to see where the firing came from seems quite reasonable. Even so it was mentally preparing its defence in case it had to answer to the RAT’s (Robotic and Tracks) court of enquiry. This was a mistake because splitting its computing power between a court defence and a firing solution meant that it missed both Pop Pop and Snap, they ducked down into the undergrowth.

Just in case you’re wondering what the score is, let me remind you. Rainbow is fragmented, two dead and two badly wounded. There’s only Scarlet still operational, she can’t carry 2 wounded and decides to leave them both and head for the south of the compound and join up with Breakfast. She decides she must maintain radio silence and reasons that there’s not been much gunfire from Breakfasts area and so they are probably still operational.

Marine street is wounded and incapable of moving but no one knows that, so she’s on her own.

Four FRB’s and 1 RTV are down, deactivated by Scarlet’s team, and there’s 1 RTV deactivated by Pop Pop.

Breakfast are the only team still in the game, they are pinned down and decide they must maintain radio silence too, they know that there’s 1 FRB shooting at them from the South Gate area and surmise that as the last sound of gunfire in the west was an Auto canon that there’s at least 1 FRB or RTV in that area and certainly 1 RTV went round to the east and hasn’t been seen since. They believe they are on their own and react accordingly.

I almost forgot, Zaira is in the bar but Breakfast don’t know this, Scarlet does know this but as she’s maintaining radio silence she doesn’t pass on the information. Zaira has called for his helicopter to come and pick him up but it’s over 1 hour flying time away and probably doesn’t have enough fuel to make the return trip. He’s on his own, so locks and bars the steel door to the bar and it’s going to take explosives to get in. As Marine Street is the only one who can use explosives it’s looking a bit bleak for the mission.

Breakfast are professionals and they have a pride in getting the job done, so they decide to give it one more shot. Pop Pop checks to see if the FRB is still there, she Pop’s up, it sees her and fires, missing as she ducks back down again.

The FRB continues to fire at Pop Pop and there’s an ominous click as it runs out of ammunition. This is a golden opportunity for Breakfast.

Crackle runs down to the fence and starts to cut through it as Pop Pop and Snap rise and fire at the out of ammo Robot. Yes I know it’s a bit unfair but it’s the only way they are going to get the job done.

Snap’s submachine gun stutters and also runs out of ammunition but not before she’s unloaded most of the clip into the FRB and it collapses as it’s electrical circuits short out and it fries.

Having gone through the wire Crackle sees this FRB coming towards her. She fires first and misses, its return fire misses also but she gets it with her next burst and it’s down.

An eerie silence descends on the compound as Breakfast start to advance, taking up covering positions and then leapfrogging forward in the approved fashion. There is no sign of movement from the bar but Scarlet comes round the corner of a building and sees them. She shouts and lets them know that Zaira is still in the bar, they have him trapped.

Of course he’s trapped behind an impregnable door.

Pop Pop takes a good firing position behind the container and draws a bead on one of the windows but can see that they are bared and have what looks like steel shutters behind the bars.

I was wondering how I could resolve this, they can’t get in, but he can’t get out, but they can’t stay there for ever, but he can. It’s a bit of a conundrum.

As Snap and Crackle got close to the bar a solution presented itself. Snap blazed away at the windows and door to ensure no one came out and Crackle picked up the auto cannon and once she had figured out which was the safety and which was the trigger, she blew the door off its hinges.

Crackle was first through, she saw Zaira and fired, but missed and run out of ammo, Snap and Zaira fired simultaneously, and both hit each other and take out their opponent. Thinking about all the paperwork if they take Zaira alive, Crackle draws her machete and finishes the job.

Nothing moves in the compound. It’s very quiet, all except for a small motor as the last TRV tries to get into the compound but it can’t get through the gap in the wire. Eventually Crackle finds the deactivation switch in the bar and pulls the lever, there is now total silence.

The Chinook arrived, it was too big to land but all the wounded including Agent White were winched up and they also recovered the bodies of Miss Purple and Miss Blue. Zaira is dead and they left no real evidence as to who had carried out the hit, a pretty perfect result…..unless your name was Purple or Blue.

V’s report to Z was a little more succinct than my account here but essentially confirmed  the same information.

As you probably gathered there was a table of possible incidents to throw a spanner in  the works. 

Well - Thanks for reading, if indeed you did do and I'd appreciate any thoughts you might have.

Cheers

V

Operation Window Maker - The Attack Plan

The Attack Plan

First of all I’d like to thank everyone who offered suggestions as to the best way to carry out the attack, I took parts of everyone’s ideas apart from Nuking them, although that would have achieved the prime objective but not the secondary one of getting Agent White out of the compound. Well apart from as a shrivelled corpse that is.

Information I didn’t provide in the initial briefing was that there were three Tracked Robots, TR’s patrolling the perimeter outside the compound and six, Foot Robots, FR’s inside. Two of these were at the north and south gates respectively and would remain in place. Two were on a random patrol inside the perimeter controlled by a random direction and distance dice. The final 2 were allocated for close protection of Zaira and moved with him. Johnny Mo was the Robot Controller and his control centre was inside the bar.

I created an event table for the defenders, which worked well, although these things don’t always do so. I was going to have surveillance cameras in place but in the end I forgot about them until the game was well underway and it seemed wrong to introduce them then. Finally I’d intended to have an underground bunker system below the bar but I couldn’t be bothered to draw the plans for it. Yes I know that’s pretty slack.

This is the plan of attack that V submitted to Z and obtained his approval. The plan was submitted in writing but the approval was not. Could it be that Z didn’t want his name appended to such a risky plan…..unless it succeeded?

Operation Window Cleaner.

All elements of the attack team are to move to the jump off point 1Km south of the compound.

From there, Sniper Team Breakfast are to take up a position slightly west of the south gate. They should have line of sight to the door of the bar. Popolopopski the sniper should be able to put a bullet into Zaira’s eye from that range, right or left – it doesn’t matter.

Attack team Rainbow are to move to the east side of the compound and storm the compound once the first shot is fired. Alternatively this will happen if Snap the leader of the Sniper Team gives them the go ahead. They are lightly armed but I’ve allocated them an experimental machine pistol the MB 350, with explosive shells. These are strictly against the Geneva Conventions but what the Swiss didn’t know they won’t complain about. Especially as two of the largest Swiss Banks are big shareholders in the technology.

I’ve assumed that with the lack of heat signature the Chinese have developed some form of Artificial Intelligence Robotics and it will need something a little more powerful than a 7.62mm bullet to put it out of action, hence the MB 350.

I’ve recruited a specialist into the attack team. Danielle Street, from the Royal Marines. She’s an expert with explosives and armed with a LAW to take out the tracked robot we’ve seen. Her roll is to lay a diversionary explosive device to the west of the compound, by the red burnt out car, either in or outside the fence, and then another one to the north of the compound about 100m north. These will both be remotely detonated and after placing the charges she will move south and rendezvous with Breakfast so that her diversionary explosions will time with Pop Pop’s first strike.

The attack elements will be at the jump off point by 08.00 hours on the 14th. I’m allowing a minimum of 1 hour to reach their respective attack points, but they should all be in place by 10.00 hours. At that point Pop Pop will target the bar door for 1 hour only, if Zaira hasn’t appeared by 11.00 Marine Street will set off the first diversionary charge followed 3 minutes later by the 2nd one and at 11.05 Rainbow will start their assault.

If all goes well they will regroup at the original jump off point but I have a Chinook Helicopter on standby to extract the team if that is necessary.

V

Operation Code Name – Window Maker

Objective - The Assassination of Fecino Zaira and Extraction of Agent White.

Sorry to call you out at this late hour but we have a problem, I just nodded. 02:35 on a Wednesday morning usually means there’s a problem and it usually comes across my desk if it’s a Latin American problem.

“You briefed Mrs White” Z continued, I nodded again, thinking of the nice polite old lady I’d briefed about 3 weeks ago. Edna May White, she was posing as a cook and housekeeper, we’d managed to infiltrate her into Fecino Zaira’s compound.

It’s a long story but then again they usually are.

Zaira was one of the more unusual of the Cartel Bosses. He lived as a semi-recluse behind walls and wire in the jungle, 20 miles from the nearest road. The only way into the Compound was a 2 to 3 day hard trek through the jungle or by helicopter. There wasn’t a landing pad as such, the copter landed on the roof of one of the buildings in the Compound, stayed for a few minutes and then left.

I’d only noticed the Compound by accident. It had been there for years but the satellite images had been scanned by computers, the thermal imaging specification was looking for concentrated activity, not 2 people and a child and so it had discounted the place, believing it was abandoned at best or had a couple of squatters at worse.

This is the latest satellite image of the compound.

Zaira went missing eighteen months ago, there had been some blood letting with the other Cartels and we thought he’d been eliminated. The only strange thing was that Johnny Mo his prime bodyguard had disappeared at the same time, but what really set off alarm bells was that Monsignor Blanc had disappeared also. Blanc was Zaira’s Chef and it was unusual for a Chef to be eliminated, especially one as talented as Blanc. He would have been worth 10kg of H to any of the leading families because they all liked fine food.

“Are you paying attention” Z barked. “Of course sir” I responded immediately but wondered what he’d been saying the past few minutes.

“I arranged to drop a small drone from one of the American spy planes that operate over Columbia and have just received the pictures”. He held in his hand six 8 x 10 pictures of the compound, “that’s all we’re going to get, the drone pilot flew the damn thing into a tree and it crashed”. He proceeded to pass them over 1 at a time, he does like a little drama.

“That is a low altitude picture”, he said, I noted the sarcasm in his voice but saw the helicopter again. That’s what had tipped me off in the first place, everything else in the compound looked old and disused but on one of the original satellite images a red helicopter was shown in the same place as it stood now.

“The drone got some good clean shots before it crashed” he continued. I let out a low whistle, partly because I recognised Erika Klaus the pilot but also in admiration at the willowy frames of the two young women with her.

I knew that Zaira had a propensity for tall slim women. This was as good as intel would get I thought, until I examined the next picture.

Fecino Zaira the king pin himself, along with bodyguard Johnny Mo and to my great relief, Agent White. The very Edna May White I’d managed to insert into Zaira’s household once I’d found out he needed a new Chef.

Monsignor Blanc had contracted some tropical disease and had surfaced in a private hospital in Bogotá, that piece of information had enabled me to push forward with my plan. I thought it was a cute idea to name my Agent White and so did Marcello, third in line to Zaira himself.

Marcello wanted to be head of the Norte del Valle Cartel himself and with Zaira gone he was one step closer to that goal. I’d been cultivating him for quiet a long time and it was starting to pay off.

“There’s a couple of snags” Z continued as he passed the next photo over.

I could see what he meant. “Do we have any info on this machine” I asked hopefully. “Not a bean” was his reply. “There are rumours from China South West Station that the Chinese are well advanced in their mechanical and robotic experimental weapons program’s. This might be another attempt at increasing their influence in South America through the drugs trade. That’s not all though”.

Looking closely I was sure I recognised the small size of Zaira but what was behind him, and why hadn’t they shown up on the thermal imaging scans. They looked like a pair of armed guards in some sort of tactical armour. Z shrugged, “We’ll have nothing from the satellite for 3 days and can’t confirm the thermal record”.

“This last one was taken shortly before the drone crashed. It looks as if it caught the attention of whoever that is but we don’t know for sure”.

“I’ve already scrambled Sniper team ‘Breakfast’ and they’re taking off in a couple of minutes, they’ll be under your direct command.”

Finally he was giving me some good news; Breakfast was the best team we had. On a very good day Pop Pop could hit a man sized target at around 2,200m, at 1,500m she was 98%.

Then I thought of the jungle, she’d be lucky to get a line of sight of 100m and it would probably be much less. Getting into that position would require all the training and skill of the three woman team, getting out again from that close in would be even more difficult if not impossible. That’s where the other 2 members of the team would earn their corn.

“Do I still have Assault team Rainbow” I asked. “Of course” was his laconic reply, “they’re already in country and ready to go”. “There’s one final thing though”. My heart sank. “We received a radio message from our black-site listening station in the Azores. They picked up the following coded message which we are fairly sure is from the compound. Our super-computer has so far, failed to crack the cipher”.

The red swallow flies upside down over Moscow. As a consequence, Execute operation widow-maker. The truss of my second cousin is in the hand-bag of my grandmother’s chamber-maid.

“I believe this might be an old WWll code, they used to put the message in the 2nd sentence, the rest is just gobblegook, the reference to "Execute operation Widow Maker" may well be to confirm we should hit Zaira now (one of his many nicknames is Widow Maker”). “I’ve sent Miss Twopence Moneypenny down to the basement to check in the old code books, if Agent White was under pressure this might have been the best she could do.”

At that moment E=mc2 came into the room. “I think we might be on the wrong track with the code. According to my information (still kept on a Rolodex and none the worse for that), Zaira’s nickname is Window Maker because of his uncanny ability to see through any plan to capture him. Did we get the code in morse or oral transmission” he asked. “Morse” responded Z “but what difference does one dash and dot make”? E=mc2 looked at him in disbelief. “There’s a world of difference, one is a kill instruction from our Agent and the other is a trap, he’s seen through our plan and is laughing at us”.

Z looked slightly put out by this latest information and issued his instructions sourly. “We have photographic evidence that he’s there, V you’re head of South American operations, I want your assessment and a plan of attack on my desk before Breakfast arrive in Columbia as 09:00 hours tomorrow”.

“Yes Sir”

Ok that’s my opening brief and I’m going to play the game solo. I’ve set up the table as the original photo and distributed any impediments in and around the compound. What I’d really appreciate is a plan of attack from anyone who feels they can contribute.

There is very little known about the compound, there will probably be booby traps, security camera’s, bunkers under the living accommodation, clandestine escape routes, you name it.

The living accommodation might be the Bar, the rest of the buildings look like they are storage facilities but may not be. The bar by the way is the building with the Red Lions outside.

There’s obviously some form of guards/sentries but don’t forget, nothing significant showed up on thermal imaging when checking against human signatures, so this might just be a red herring. You don’t know how many guards etc there are, nor how effective they may be. Final point is that the helicopter hasn’t stayed long when it’s landed in the past and so you would expect this to have gone when you arrive.

The objective of the mission is to kill Zaira, this is the prime objective. The secondary objective is to extract Agent White, you have no communication channel open to her.

How would you go about it.

Any thoughts and comments will be gratefully considered and the respondent's name will go into the prize draw. Unfortunately there is no prize but your name will be recorded in shining lights on the Blog.

If I can work out how to do that!

Cheers

En Guarde you Villain's

En Guarde you Villain’s

It was a fine Spring day in one of the Piddling villages, the sun was high in the sky and the pheasants were making the sort of soft clucking sound as they thought of the mating season to come, followed by the long lazy days of summer, then of course there was the 12th of August but the pheasants didn’t allow the future to impinge on the present too much.

Unlike Squire Samuel Benbow Snapcase, a lesser known scion of the famous Snapcase family, The Lords Snapcase were held in some high regard among the Piddling’s; Lesser Piddling, Greater Piddling and Much Piddling in the Marsh.

Squire Samuel was waiting impatiently for the Revenue Men. Yes - I know you might be thinking that they were the last people he would want to see, what with the honey distillery he was running in one of the Outhouses close to the Big House, but of course you’d be wrong.

He had a long standing, understanding, is I think the correct term and the understanding was with Captain ‘Old’ Bill Avery of His Majesties Revenue Service. Cptn Avery liked to confiscate contraband in the name of the King, as much and as often as he could. His only issue with this situation was that he didn’t believe the King needed to receive all of the confiscated goods. There was some leeway for an enterprising man to spread the bounty around to local deserving causes before the balance of the contraband was secured in His Majesties Government’s bonded warehouses.

Squire Samuel and Cptn Avery both regarded themselves as deserving local causes and so to that end a motley crew of Revenue men were protecting a small shipment of high value contraband as they trudged slowly along the green lane to the Squires house.

Captain Avery liked to lead his men from the front and he was ably assisted by Mad John Leadstone, they chatted amicably as they made their along the track, their pace was slowed by the pack ponies but even more so by the two men in front of the ponies. Scudder and Fishbait had served in the Royal Navy for many years but had both been severely wounded and each lost a leg in the service of their country. They wryly joked that between them they had the best pair of legs in the Piddlings and they could spread them further than anyone else.

Well - except of course for the Widow Hackett but she had extenuating circumstances that we don’t need to go into here.

Avery and Leadstone had opened a gap between themselves and the rest of the crew and this was to be their undoing. A swarthy gnome of a woman rose quietly from behind the hedge and aimed her musket at the back of Cptn Avery’s noble head and with a grunt in Spanish she pulled the trigger.

Our gallant Captain might have mistaken the ill looking woman for one of the beasts in the field but that was his last mistake, as her bullet went through the back of his skull and out the front. Leadstone looked down in horror as his commanding officer fell to the ground. Although it probably went through his mind that there would be no open casket for Avery he responded to the attack immediately.

“Ambush” he roared in a voice that could have been heard in the Main Tops when he was a young Lieutenant in the Royal Navy and even now his men responded as a well trained team will……..They dithered a little, dallied even more and then ran around like headless chickens.

Scudder pushed through the hedge and screaming like a banshee, he advanced on the ill looking Spanish woman.

Seconds later another woman rose from the near side of the hedge, she was dressed in a tight fitting green uniform and armed with a Baker Rifle. Quick as lightening she aimed and fired on Mad John Leadstone, blood trickled from the wound but he remained on his feet. Swaying a little from the pain he bellowed to Fishbait “Get her” In spite of his wooden crutch Fishbait lunged through the hedge bordering the track and drawing his cutlass he closed with the cowardly assassin who recoiled in horror as the brave man advanced.

The unarmed mule skinner was heard to mutter “The Saints preserve us” as another of the ill looking bunch poked her wicked head over the wall next to him. This was the leader of the dastardly band, a low outcast from society, Mary Shelly with an itchy belly. She was known in the drinking dens of the marches as a poet and writer of sorts, an underserved reputation, unlike the one she had for treachery and low cunning which was well deserved.

She might have been one of the most unsavoury characters to wave a red and white plume on a shako but she was a crack shot and the innocent mule skinner died instantly.

It would be no comfort to him to know that Comfort Weeks strolled calmly to the wall and realising that the rules seemed to favour shooting more than was expected put a bullet between the squinty eyes of Shelly with the itchy belly and the leader of the cowardly desperadoes died as quickly as her previous innocent victim.

Comfort Weeks also took no comfort from the fact that like a demented Jack in a box, another of the villainous crew popped up and shot her without warning. There was some mutinous muttering that the villain had a book in one hand and a sword in the other, how then was she able to shoot, this was quickly quashed by the chap who was reading the rules.

As you see here Tempest Abercrombie exacted swift revenge for the unlawful killing of poor Comfort by putting a bullet into the scurrilous hound and you can see her blood staining the ground. (The red cube means she’s wounded, but you probably guessed that.) Unfortunately she didn’t die like the dog she was. (Note the tense).

Brave and noble Edouard d’Orsay drew his cutlass and advanced on the evil wretch. Brandishing his weapon he invited her to take a turn or two around the dead body of her leader, she blanched and stuttered a reply that was lost in the wind.

(Note the book and sword - clearly no pistol).

Another of the evil crew steps out from hiding and plugs the already wounded John Leadstone. No mercy is obviously their battle cry. Muffled a little from behind their hiding places.

Edouard attacked his wicked enemy and struck a mighty blow, she parried in vain because her cheap nine penny sword was smashed asunder and his blade made of the finest Sheffield steel clove her to the bone. She died a whimpering death.

Things are looking quite sticky for our intrepid hero’s, but they’re a plucky bunch and will fight on in spite of the loss of their courageous leader and valiant second in command.

Typically the enemy resort to underhand tactics, two against one. Fishbait is a fine old gentleman with one leg and he had an exhausting night the previous night, battling monsters in an underground cavern system, a tale that may never be told now, but these wicked scoundrels have no honour and show no mercy, they attack him viciously.

They butcher the poor old, one legged gentleman without remorse, as Modesty Higginbottom looks on in horror at the unspeakable events happening in front of her. She points her pistol and fires, there is the satisfaction of seeing one of the ignoble fiends’s hit and blood spurts from the wound. Of course you can’t get blood from a stone and so this dries up quickly.

The other old veteran, Scudder is slain by the callous Spanish witch and he dies a painful death, his passing is not an easy one as she leans over him, muttering in Spanish. She asks where he keeps his valuables but the scent of her garlic laden breath takes him aback and he can not respond.

That and the fact that he can’t speak Spanish so doesn’t have a clue what she is asking.

Well they might be a plucky bunch but events are unfolding in favour of the mean, cowardly, back shooting ambushers and the brave and plucky Revenue men decide they would be better off by making a strategic withdrawal. They have given their best but the odds were always against them, I think it was eight to eight but two of them only have 1 leg each so in a leg count the odds were against them.

Tempest Abercrombie, Edouard d’Orsay and Modesty Higginbottom looking pale and wan, make a fighting withdrawal (at speed) back down the green lane leaving behind many brave men and women of the Revenue Service.

There is an adjunct, maybe an addenda or addendum depending on your level of education, mine leads me to think of it as an extra bit but I’m sure someone will correct me soon enough.

After a few stiffening libations down at the Dog and Sprocket the surviving members of the Revenue men decided that they should return to the scene of their defeat and see if any of their brothers in arms survived the vicious and unprovoked ambush. Quietly moving up the green lane they can see lights on in Squire Samuel Benbow Snapcase’s house. Edging closer they see candles flickering and hear loud, raucous voices, shouting and singing as if in celebration.

They creep up to the house and hear some talk that indicates the rather manish figure in the tight fitting green uniform is none other than the infamous The Honourable Verity (Peaches) Snapcase, is she related in some strange way to Squire Snapcase? 

 Almost certainly.

Then Edouard remembers the recent rumour that the current Lord Snapcase has recruited a unit of ruffians and nerdowells called the Silver Bayonet, can this be the very same brigands that set upon the Revenue men.

As I hope, you will have realized my opponent for this game was the well known Mad Lord Snapcase, Lady Snapcase was visiting family and friends in the area and he was able to slip away for a short while. As always after his infrequent visits I was left saddened by the fact that he and the other member of our Triumvirate Sir Douglas live so far away. However on counting the number of empty bottles of wine and the depleted state of my larder it’s maybe just as well.

Anyway I hope you enjoyed reading my true and impartial account of our game.

Cheers