Item seed: The Copenhagen Archive.

The Copenhagen Archive

This semi-legendary tome is a rumor among the occult community; it purports to be an accurate recounting of the Secret History of civilization since the end of World War I.  Most dabblers in the supernatural know ‘a friend of a friend’ who has perused it, but people who have actually gone through it are thin on the ground.  Which makes sense, because it’s actually a subtle and powerful trap.

The Copenhagen Archive manifests as a box stuffed full of hanging files which are themselves stuffed with documents, maps, photos, and a tape reel or two.  If a regular person – which is to say; somebody without magical, psychic, occult, or generally supernatural abilities – reads it, nothing happens.  The story the Archive tells is self-evident nonsense; it’s certainly put together well, but there are obvious flaws and untruths in it.  Regular people generally assume that it’s a bizarre kind of research for a work of fiction; and, indeed, if they hold onto it for long enough somebody calls up looking for ‘some lost book notes,’ and thus retrieving the Archives.  There’s even usually a small reward involved.

That’s if a regular person finds the Archives.  What happens if somebody with supernatural abilities gets their hands on it?  Depends on the general tone of the campaign:

  • Dark.  The Copenhagen Archive insinuates itself in the victim’s brain, first appearing as an interest, then as an obsession, then as a compulsion, and then eventually shutting down all higher brain functions and putting the victim in a coma.  This makes it easy for the Conspiracy to acquire the victim later: it’s a free body with occult potential and no pesky free will to worry about. Perfect for possession or brainwashing, in other words.
  • Grey.  Reading the Copenhagen Archive degrades the victim’s ability to use his supernatural abilities; the process takes about a month or so, but at the end of it the victim will be as about as occultly significant as a rock, and probably starting to think that he was kidding himself about having esoteric powers in the first place.  In this version, the Conspiracy uses the Archive as a precision weapon; it’s an excellent way of shutting down future magical sociopaths before they can even really get going.

 

  • Light.  In this version, the victim reads the Copenhagen Archive, has an extremely good laugh at the farrago of nonsense that it represents, and wonders when the movie is coming out.  Unbeknownst to said victim, he is also now LOUDLY broadcasting his presence on an extremely narrow occult ‘bandwidth.’  Anybody working for the Conspiracy who gets within ten miles of the victim will be able to hear it; two or more Men in Black will be able to easily triangulate the source.  And from there it’s just a matter of the Shadow Government sending over the usual team of social workers and job placement specialists. I mean, seriously: moving things with your mind is very much a marketable skill, and everybody’s got student loans to pay off, right?

All of this is resistible, of course: the exact mechanics depend on the game system, but it should be possible for PCs (with a decent amount of effort) and almost impossible for NPCs.  Successfully resisting the Copenhagen Archive allows for permanent protection against its effects.  And, of course, agents of the Conspiracy are themselves immune to the Archive’s effect. It’d be too insanely dangerous to keep around, otherwise.