It’s been far too long since I actually played a game with all the models I’ve been making, so this week I cleared the kitchen table, in the process finding all kinds of interesting items I thought I’d lost, and set up a new version of “Ascension Island”.
It’s 1937; Ascension is a mid-Atlantic meeting point of spies, traders, crooks and diplomats. Unfortunately, one diplomat seems to have vanished while transferring from her South American airship to a British service to carry her to London. Captain Bryant and his team must find the diplomat, hopefully safe and well, and get her off the Island; preferably before her home country declares war.
They’ve finally tracked the Diplomat down to the “Montaro trading” warehouse at the Aerodrome (top right in the picture above). The plan is to get her out of there and bundle her into the waiting aircraft.
Bryant decided to make sure the plane is ready and that the route from the warehouse is safe. He and two of his team exit their police car before Sgt. Coulson drives onward to the warehouse.
Bryant and team make contact with the “Foreign Pilot”, (Dictated, as usual, by a die roll and a table of options) but suddenly they are interrupted by Matron Fox of the Auxiliary Police, who claims that the Auxiliaries are dealing with the situation and orders them to stand down. When this fails, she tries her now standard ruse of “What’s that over there?”…
…and then tries to stop the pilot flying the plane. (This is decided by a die roll; if the Fox wins she is considered to have ‘persuaded’ the pilot to refuse to fly, or incapacitated her). Fortunately, she fails.
However Lt Gunning has taken position on some suspicious looking boxes, and soon bullets are zinging around Bryant’s ears.
Meanwhile, the rest of the Auxiliaries are moving fast. Their ‘leader’, Col. Lawrence, has ordered another of the squad, “Commandant Allen”, to drive a truck to the Montaro Warehouse to find the Diplomat…
At the same time, he’s dispatched Seaman Dundas to switch off the electricity supply in the hope of stopping the aircraft from taking off.
And what of the dashing and brave Col. Lawrence himself, you may ask? He’s in the control tower, where no-one can shoot at him, trying to steal a radio… He pulls at the plug (dice roll) and gets an electric shock
Back outside, Bryant and the pilot run for the plane and jump on board with bullets flying around them. The pilot throttles the plane up
Meanwhile, Sgt. Coulson, already annoyed at being sent to babysit a diplomat instead of join in any fighting, hears gunshots and diverts along an alleyway into the aerodrome.
As Bryant tries to close the door on the plane, Seaman Dundas, having successfully turned off the power switch, runs across and grabs the door frame before it is completely shut. This is unfortunately impossible to show on the model using little figures, so here’s a “behind the scenes” view showing who is on the plane.
It’s also showing that the dice gave Seaman Dundas a particularly hard day, as Bryant shows two successes in the ensuing fight, probably bashing the door against Dundas’s fingers.
It seems the Police will be able to rescue the diplomat, but they reckoned without Lt. Gunning, who is still on those boxes…
As the plane taxis by, Gunning empties his magazine at it, hoping to hit something critical enough to stop it… He hits four times, but will it damage something important?
(
Turn story card)
Kaboom. A stray bullet punctures a fuel line… and smoke starts pouring from the engine. The pilot tries to stop the plane, but it is out of control…
Will the police be able to get to the Diplomat first, or will the Auxiliaries capture her?
Why are the auxiliaries trying to catch the diplomat in the first place?
Can colonel Lawrence steal the radio without further injury?
Found out in next week’s exciting episode of “The Diplomatic Rescue”
