The Swamps of Moonshine
A Short Story and Play Report of #Moonstein
The shuttle dropped Zane Valstrom two kilometers from the township, if the clustering of shacks, solar rigs, and sinking concrete pads could even be called that. A knight once, a colonel later, he stepped onto Moonshine’s spongy soil with a noble title and no plan, chasing a fief with no battalions, no credits, and no roof.
The air stank of methane and boiled moss. Somewhere in the reeds, a generator coughed itself awake. A skiff passed on the brownwater canal, its pilot not even glancing his way.
"My Lord Count," a voice called. Baron Columbue stood beside a rusty two-seater parked under a dead solar tree. He wore a faded military jacket trimmed to suggest nobility, three misfitted rings, and a self-satisfied grin.
Zane had read just enough to know Columbue was broadly despised. But his name sat on every regional ledger: permits, levies, contracts. His incompetence was a mask for real influence.
They climbed into the buggy. It rattled through the swamp.
"Your papers are quite in order," Columbue said, fanning himself with a limp, stained printout. "Unfortunately, Moonshine regards credentials with about as much reverence as mold. What you need isn’t documentation, my dear Count. What you need is action."
Zane grunted. He’d dealt with political rats before, but Columbue was something worse: smug, slippery, and pretending to be helpful.
Columbue sniffed. "Luva’s your problem. She's holed up in that estate like it’s a palace, loved by the locals and drunk on her own influence. But she's a blockade to progress."
Zane frowned. "She owns the Roadhouse?"
"No," Columbue waved the notion away. "That’s mine. But she runs everything else like she owns it. Burn her out, and the swamp opens up."
Zane didn’t trust Columbue. The man had ambitions and offered too much, too easily. Zane could tell he was being used, and that Luva likely wasn’t a rival. But Columbue still had reach, and Zane had nothing.
Zane watched the water roll past, dull and stagnant. He could dismiss Columbue. He could press ahead alone. But that would mean starting from nothing. He could reach out to Luva himself, but she hadn’t responded to his initial messages; only Columbue had. Maybe the foppish swamp snake had interfered with the transmissions somehow, or maybe Luva was making a statement with her silence. He hated this kind of thing. No battlefield, no chain of command, no clarity. Just smiles and favors and words that meant too many things.
But action? That he understood. If he couldn’t trust Columbue, he could at least use him. Even if it meant getting his hands dirty.
***
Zane approached Roarke Garnett in the square, beneath the ruined shadow of an old comms tower. The man leaned against a beat-up Rover, coat hanging loose like it had never known a tailor. A pane of flexglass had been bolted where the rear window used to be.
"Good afternoon," Zane said, keeping his voice formal. "I apologize for being brash, but I would rather not beat around the bush. I am Count Zane, now of Moonshine. I was told that you were a man of impressive skills and the kind of courage needed to address a particular type of problem."
Roarke didn’t look up. "You want to head into the jungle? I can keep your guys alive. I don’t care if they’re ecos or narcos. There are wild plants out there with glands worth the trouble."
Zane folded his arms.
Roarke glanced sideways. "Of course, maybe you need something done in town? Something outside the bounds."
"Ever since I landed on Moonshine," Roarke said, almost conversationally, "it's been problem-solving all the way. What problems can I solve for you?"
Zane considered. This wasn’t the kind of man he’d choose to work with. But he didn’t get to choose much anymore.
Roarke added, "I'm putting a crew together. I need to test them first. If they're competent, we might be able to pull off what you need. But we’ll need supplies. Are you a man of means?"
"I have means and I intend to grow them. My claim here is real, and so is my ambition. I’m the count of this swamp, and I plan to bring the barons to heel." Zane said.
The count took a step closer, his voice quiet, almost drowned out by the sound of the water pumps.
"If you're the kind of man who can help, then I’ll help you too. Supplies won't be a problem. I need Countess Luva of Rustwood Reach removed. Quietly. And if possible, I want the deed to trace back to Columbue. What will it take to get your boys moving?"
Roarke scratched his chin. "I got a feller needs a set of Reflecc. You want us to solve your problem at the Soirée? We may need some explosives and a Grav belt or two..."
Zane nodded once. "Basic armor and explosives I'll provide. Reflecc and Grav belts? They're not cheap. Prove you're worth the cost, and we can revisit it."
He let the pause stretch, weighing Roarke's reaction.
"I can give you 6000 CR now and another 10,000 when the job is complete."
Roarke straightened. "Your Excellency, these terms are acceptable. Please have the items and the upfront fee dropped off at my Land Rover in the town square today."
"The side compartment will be open," he added. "Have your man place the parcel inside and close it. It will self-lock."
Zane responded with a curt nod.
***
The Roadhouse was packed wall to wall with shouting, swaying bodies. Sweat glistened under stuttering strobe lights. The band onstage poured noise over the crowd. All distortion, synth, and fury a hymn to frustration and chemical haze.
Zane stood near the edge of the stage beside Columbue, watching the press of flesh and fist. The crowd pressed forward, drunk on whiskey and noise, fists in the air and feet stomping to the rhythm. Someone threw a bottle. Another climbed a rail for a better view of the stage. Zane scanned their faces; open-mouthed, shining-eyed, ravenous.
An emcee shouted over the speakers: Duel to the Death. Zane tensed. That wasn’t how this had been billed. Columbue laughed, exaggerated, called back: "Friendly duel! No death!" but the crowd booed.
No time to correct the record. Zane stepped forward and drew steel.
They circled. Zane moved in fast, tight, and efficient. Columbue had size but no training. A pulled strike to the forearm brought blood. The crowd roared.
The music swelled.
Zane dropped his blade low and stepped in close. "Swear fealty to me," he said, quiet and cold. "Or die where you stand."
The ambient mic picked it up. The crowd fell silent. Columbue swayed and dropped to one knee.
"I swear!" he gasped. "To Count Zane of Moonshine!"
The cheer started to rise, then shattered! A blast tore through the front of the Roadhouse. Heat and flame snapped the crowd into chaos.
Zane grabbed Columbue by the collar and dragged him off the stage.
Through the bar, into the kitchen. Smoke clawed at the ceiling.
"I really should have brought a gun," Zane said.
A camera crew stumbled past them. Staff crouched behind prep tables.
Zane pushed onward. "Keep your sword ready and your eyes open. You come from a family that won title by conquest. Act like it."
They burst into the alley. More shouting. Gunfire somewhere across the square. News drones blinked in the dark.
Zane braced Columbue against a wall.
He’d taken the Baron’s oath. Staged the duel. The broadcast had been perfect. Despite that, they were still sinking into the swamps of Moonshine.
***
Columbue's manor house was a sprawl of faux-opulence—peeling brass fixtures, mismatched velvet curtains, and chandeliers that rattled when anyone walked too hard on the floors. It smelled faintly of perfume, old bourbon, and swamp mold. A peacock feather fan drooped from one corner. Zane sat in a sunken armchair that swallowed half his weight.
Columbue paced before a holoterminal flickering with news footage. His arm was bound and his jacket hung from one shoulder, singed and stained. But he looked pleased with himself.
"The paperwork's in," he said. "As of this morning, I'm the recognized interim executor of her estate. Her people are holding the manor, but I’ve got bureaucrats saying they want stability. Give it a day, two at most, and we can walk in with legitimacy."
Zane leaned back. "And the credits?"
"Accounts are locked pending inquest. But I've got proxies. Holding firms. Dummy accounts. We can start moving assets. Quietly. Proper use of documents, my dear Count, can accomplish more than any regiment. And I dare say I wield the pen with some flair."
Zane didn’t smile. "That isn’t one of my talents."
"No," Columbue said, smug. "But I swore fealty, remember?"
Zane rose. The window’s stained shutters rattled against the wind.
"Then we act. Quietly for now. Roarke’s crew may still be useful. Luva’s estate has armed holdouts. I want to draw up a plan."
Columbue lifted his drink. "The record office is intact. Dusty, neglected, but serviceable. You’ll find maps, property deeds, census files."
Zane nodded. "Good. What about the clerk?"
"I have an appointment. A few more documents to sign, some transfers to finalize. Nothing dramatic, but they keep the wheels turning."
The estate could be taken, but not rushed. Legitimacy first, pressure second.
***
The sun beat down like a curse as Zane and Columbue exited the record office. The air shimmered with heat. Concrete panels radiated warmth through the soles of his boots. A dull afternoon hum of generator thrum, cicadas, and voices from the square.
Then a crack split the air.
Glass shattered behind them. Zane grabbed Columbue by the back of his garish jacket and yanked him down. Another shot spat sparks from a metal post.
Zane swore and hauled the Baron up and over his shoulder. The man groaned as blood slicked his sleeve.
"Sniper," Zane said.
He sprinted toward the nearest cover—a concrete column at the edge of the lot—and dropped Columbue behind it. Another shot chipped stone beside his head.
Then, impossibly, a woman appeared.
"Get down!" she shouted.
She ran low, crouched, camera slung across her chest. Ivy Rae Tiller. Zane recognized her immediately. An independent reporter with just a mic, a lens, and a reckless streak.
She slid beside them and shoved the mic toward his face.
"This is Ivy Rae Tiller, live with Count Zane Valstrom! Count, is it true you’re in league with the Lord High Crab of Madriguera?"
Another shot cracked. Zane flinched.
He pulled her close. "Seriously?! This is when you want to do the interview?"
She pulled the camera tighter. "What about the rumors of Garmonbozia whiskey being spiked with adrenechrome? That your vassal Columbue owns Bob’s Bottle Shoppe? Will you commit to investigating him?"
Zane stared at her, dumbfounded. But the camera was on, blinking red.
"Yes," he growled. "It concerns me greatly. Spiking whiskey with that kind of pharmaceutical is criminal. Reckless. I will look into it."
Ivy gave a quick nod. "You heard it here first, folks!"
The gunfire didn’t stop. Zane glanced at Columbue, the baron was bleeding and barely alert.
"I’ll get us out," he muttered.
Bullets hissed past. Then a pause.
Zane shifted his weight. Ivy turned her camera to her own face as Zane ran.
"Live from the Book Depository. Count Zane of Moonshine. Baron Columbue. Under fire but standing firm. Back to you."
She clicked off.
***
Columbue's manor was dim, damp, and still smelled of smoke. Zane stood near the shuttered window, arms folded. Columbue slouched on a velvet divan beneath a chintzy chandelier, one arm bandaged, the other nursing a drink.
"You lied to me," Zane said flatly.
Columbue rolled his eyes. "I never lied. I just didn’t volunteer. There’s a difference."
"You own the Bottle Shoppe."
"Among other things," Columbue said. "You want legitimacy, I provide means. Credits don’t grow on cypress roots."
Zane didn’t move. His voice dropped. "You put a pharmaceutical in whiskey. To make it addictive."
Columbue sipped. "And Ivy Tiller shouted it on a livestream, I know. But she’s just an independent journalist with a microphone and a flair for drama. People forget."
"Not this time," Zane said. "You underestimate her."
Columbue shrugged. "So what if she’s loud? This world forgets fast. And the public wants its drink more than it wants clean hands."
Zane’s jaw tensed. "I don’t like what you’re selling. And I don’t like that you dragged me into it."
Columbue leaned forward, voice lower. "You work with Roarke. The man has a trail of bodies behind him and probably doesn't know the meaning of mercy. And you’re drawing a moral line here?"
Zane looked away. He hated every truth in that sentence.
"Then find someone else to share the burden," Columbue continued. "There’s a poker game over at a new place in town: Roach’s. Discreet company. Loose chips. And I hear the cheesecake’s not bad. You might win something useful."
Zane nodded, the weight still coiled in his jaw.
He wasn’t done with Columbue.
But for now, he'd play the next hand.
***
Roach’s was loud, smoky, and full of lies. Zane sat at the back table, half-shadowed by a cracked neon sign and a ceiling fan that never stopped clacking. Columbue lounged beside him, still bandaged, drink in hand, grinning like the cards were already his. The other barons drank and laughed, moonshine fogging their breath, their eyes.
Zane barely heard the questions Ivy tossed his way as she slipped into the room, filming again. He gave her a nod, a grin, a puff of cigar smoke. Played the Count. Played calm.
Then she stepped too close.
Zane arched a brow. "We're not ducking sniper fire anymore. You can take a step back."
She didn't. She leaned in. Her hair brushed his neck.
The movement wasn’t right.
Zane stiffened. There was something wrong with Ivy’s smile.
Behind him, someone shouted. A figure moved outside the window. A woman, bag over her head, a knife to her throat. Roarke's hand held her.
The once-Ivy thing beside Zane leaned in. Snake-black tendrils lashed.
Zane got his blade free, stabbed, grazing the thing's ribs. It shrieked and recoiled, but not far enough. Tendrils wrapped his throat.
He tried to shout. The breath never came. Cold seized his spine. Darkness bloomed at the edges.
Someone screamed.
Chaos hit the table.
***
A slow, dragging heaviness, like being pulled deeper into the swamp. Every breath came thick. Wet.
Zane floated somewhere between pain and memory. Noise blurred around him. A beep. A voice. A hiss of oxygen.
He saw flashes: the duel, the Roadhouse, Ivy's camera blinking red, Columbue bleeding, Roarke's knife.
Then the thing wearing Ivy's face.
He'd stabbed it. He was sure of that. Steel had hit something.
A monitor beeped faintly. Distant. Irrelevant.
The Game Behind the Story
This story emerged from a Method 2 Braunstein, as described in Brozer. The method draws inspiration from En Garde! and Gangbusters, where players write out their actions in advance, and the game unfolds around those written intentions:
“Taking a page from En Garde and Gangbusters, players turn in written orders that detail their intentions for the turn. The referee surveys these orders, determines what things need to be played out and then calls together players that are in conflict with each other in order to determine the outcomes of any schemes or battles. This method may feel fairer to more players, but this may come at the cost of requiring more referee time and effort to keep things moving. The big downside to this method is that if even one key player disappears for a weekend or else consistently drags their feet on getting their instructions in, everything else in the campaign can be held up for who knows how long.”
And yes, it played out just like that.
Each of us submitted orders via email. The GM resolved them and adjudicated conflicts based on intent. He used the Traveller ruleset to accomplish this, but it was a black box to the players. As a player, I found it refreshing. It echoed the way old-school games were often described, less about "builds" and more about plans. There was no optimization for initiative order or rule exploits. It was all positioning, decision-making, and trust in the ref to interpret your intent fairly.
This kind of Braunstein approach works especially well when players lack deep system mastery. You don’t need to understand every chart; you just need to know what your character wants. I suspect it would pair beautifully with complex systems like ACKS II, especially for domain-level play. Hirelings, expeditions, and political agents can all be handed off to the rules behind the screen. Your focus stays on the broader game: diplomacy, empire-building, spying, and sabotage.
I’d even be curious to see how far this format could be pushed in convention play.
Lessons from the Mud
Not everything ran smoothly. And that’s part of the charm.
In the first turn, nearly every player submitted some version of “gather information” as their order. That was a signal. We were all feeling out the setting, trying to find footing before committing to action. And while that’s understandable, it slows the pace and flattens early drama.
Looking back, I think this could be improved with a stronger scaffold at the start:
Give players a clearer frame of reference.
Faction handouts like the ones in Brozer can go a long way. Establish who the characters are, who they owe, who they hate, and what’s at stake.Hold a post-game debrief.
After the game, we never fully circled back. I wish we had. A post-mortem session, where the GM walks through outcomes, reveals hidden plots, and explains how decisions collided, would’ve been hugely valuable. It turns the story from “what happened to me” into “what happened to all of us.”
From Report to Story
Telling the story of a Braunstein campaign is tricky.
There’s no single plot. Only entangled threads. Characters enter and exit scenes that most players never see. The events are real, but the telling is subjective. That’s why I wrote The Swamps of Moonshine the way I did.
Where possible, I used actual phrasing from player posts and chat logs. I tried to preserve the voice of the game while shaping it into something readable. And I deliberately kept other characters in the background, so their players could tell their own stories in their own ways.
If you played in the game, I hope this adds some perspective.
If you didn’t, I hope it still worked as a pulpy story.
Final Verdict
Would I do it again? Absolutely.
This format rewards bold moves and sharp writing. It respects the intelligence of the players. And it creates moments that are worth remembering.
I’ll be writing up more of these in the weeks ahead.
In the meantime, I’d love to hear your thoughts, especially if you’ve run or played in Braunsteins like this.
Let’s drag more stories out of the swamp.