Penny

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

Camilla sank wearily into one of the evacuated chairs and seized a crust of bread left behind. She stuffed it into her mouth and chewed enthusiastically tearing and ripping with her teeth. Always slender she simply didn’t have the spare body fat to endure long periods of hunger. The innkeeper looked at her in concern.

“We ‘d need a room,” Camilla said around her mouthful of bread. The innkeeper tapped her lips thoughtfully, cocking a hip out in a pose that must have been instinctive.

“I can make space for you in the hayloft of the stables,” she countered, “I have a couple of spare sleeping pallets I can drag out there.” Cydric and Camilla exchanged a look.

“Deal,” Cydric declared, “We can work for food drink and board.” The innkeeper, who must have been worried as a lone woman running such an establishment, broke into a broad smile.

“Very well, I am Rosalie De Courenne,” the innkeeper declared, “and I will bring you food and ale before you fall down.” They all sat down and hot bread and boiling stew appeared as if by magic. A moment later Rosalie appeared with flagons of ale, setting the foaming mugs down before returning to the bar to collect the promised bucket of potato vodka. Rosalie sat down with them and they introduced themselves. Rosalie explained how she had once been the wife of a wealthy Nuln merchant who had traded weapons for the fine furs and amber that the Kislivite trappers gathered in the northern tundras. During one of their trips to Praag, Rosalie had caught her husband in bed with a local whore. In a particularly creative act of vengeance she had sold his cargo of steel to the Prince for half the price her husband had demanded. Once that was done she had sold the horses, the wagons, the pots and pans, the tents, everything down to the last tacking nail. That accomplished she had skipped town with some of the local boyars until poverty had forced her husband to return to Nuln with nothing but his shoes. For lack of a better plan she had bought the Drunken Mare and had been operating it ever since.

To Camilla’s considerable delight the Inn also had a rarely used wash house, and in exchange for a few extra coins, their new employer set the chambermaids to heating the large wooden drums that would allow the weary travellers to bathe.
@POOHEAD189

The Enemy Within: Warhammer 40K RP

Silvana felt a growing unease as the moved about the lower hive. The impressions she gleaned were stained by the viewpoints of the inhabitants. The alley and habs were dark and forbidding, places of predation and danger. Whirls of emotion, anger, fear and dispair blighted her vision. Without even the pretense of disguise, a lot of those emotions were focused on the pair of them.

“We should see if we can find where Leopold purchased his pigments,” she said quietly. There were two many eyes upon them for her to encourage disinterest, not without lighting a psychic beacon which would blaze like a flame to any psykers in the enemy employ. Given the events in the Sarkonad house, she wasn’t willing to bet that there weren’t such individuals.

They moved quickly down the dark alleys, passing piles of refuse and shivering obscura addicts This close to the lifts there were few gangers, but they were there. Heavily tattooed men, and a few women, draped in colored leather and improbable piercings. They carried concealed weapons and their psychic impressions were stained with violence and death. Silvana carried the plasma gun in a duffle bag, its olive drab canvas a clash with her fine clothing. Her hand slipped beneath her jacket to the grip of her transvassuer pistol, the black rubber a comfort to her.
Infront of them a large square opened, crowded with stalls and shouting vendors. Hawkers cried the benefits of everything from stolen tanks of prometheum to cartons of black market Lho sticks. People scuttled between hundreds of vendors buying food and selling whatever they could. Silvana saw copper wire, ancient machine parts, even various hallucinogenic fungi. To a psychic eye it was a shifting colored mass but she detected no spoor of chaos.

“We need to go deeper,” she reluctantly advised.
@POOHEAD189

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

The Drunken Mare wasn’t the worst tavern in Praag although that wasn’t as great a compliment as it might have been. The building was three stories with a steep pitched roof in a half timbered Imperial style, but any grandeur it had ever possessed was long since passed. The sign that hung above the door was old and fading but appeared to depict an improbablely voluptuous woman attempting to attract the interest of a very clearly male horse.

The interior smelled of pipe smoke and old ale. There was a large common room with a massive stone fireplace over which a large cauldron of stew bubled. Dark wood framed doors lead back into further smoky back rooms which Camilla imagined were store rooms and kitchens. Two elaborately carved staircases led up to a balcony where tired looking whores chatted with each other, occasionally making the effort to stretch out a leg or shake their bosoms at likely candidates. It was early for their trade but no doubt business would pick up.

For once Camilla was able to enjoy entering a tavern without attracting gasps. She was a long way from her glamorous best. Her face and body were filthy and her hair a tangled mess. Weeks of poor nutrition and exposure to the cold had left her looking almost skeletally thin and malnourished. With her ragged cloak she could probably pass for a young boy. Despite the fact that it wasn’t quite lunch time the tavern was packed. Kislivites and Imperials filled almost every seat. Many of them seemed to be merchants or tradesmen, locals or traders trapped here by the winter snows. There were a fair number of soldiers too. A group of hussars sat at a large corner table, throwing dice and roaring a Kislivite song that Camilla couldn’t follow. They slapped the table at intervals and threw back belts of vodka from a large leather cup that seemed to circle the table according to rules known only to the players.

“Ale?” a handsome woman in late middle age demanded with a harried peremptory air. She wore a stained apron and carried a tray piled dangerously high with empty flagons. She had eyes that were pale blue and Camilla intuited that she must have been very beautiful when she was young. Years of hard work had ground her down. The innkeepers eyes measured them apprehensively, noting the filth, their wounds, and their obvious weaponry.

“Or food, we have beef and barley stew and fresh bread,” she expanded. There was a slight hint of an accent, Brettonian Camilla thought, though long attenuated by living among the Kislivites. Idly she wondered what the woman’s story was. Camilla’s stomach growled audibley at the mention of food. They had found nothing to eat on the day long march besides a few handfuls of bitter berries which Ivan dubiously recommended as ‘sometimes a treat for horses’. Even that faint praise hadn’t been enough to disturb the party from eating all they could find.

“Both,” Camilla said immediately, her voice causing the innkeeper to arch an eyebrow and give her a second glance.

“And rooms,” she added eagerly dong her best to keep her eyes away from the stew. The innkeeper shook her head decisively.

“No rooms honey, we are all full up with people in from the countryside, I doubt you could find a room anywhere in Praag.” Camilla frowned in disappointment, trying to force her hunger fogged brain to function.

“I can clear you a table,” the innkeeper offered, “if you have the coin for it?” It wasn’t quite an accusation but it had the sharp edge of a question that would be answered before the conversation proceeded. Camilla reached into her pouch and fished around digging through the handful of black iron coins for something acceptable. Yantz reached into his tunic and pulled out a purse jingling it significantly. The innkeepers face softened into a warm professional smile at the sound. Camilla felt a surge of relief, they had never been paid for their service in Nordland and funds had been getting pretty tight before that. They would need to find work and soon. The innkeeper turned to one of the corner tables at which a group of sallow looking youths, sons of minor nobles or rich merchants by their dress.

“You lot, settle up your tab and clear out!” she snapped. The popinjays sat up drunkenly and glared at the woman.

“We are done when we say we are done Bretonnian whore!” one of them, a pimpled youth with dirty blonde hair snapped drunkenly. His companions growled in surly agreement, sneering contemptuously. The innkeeper’s back stiffened her posture that of someone about to embark on a confrontation but with no wish to do so. Camilla felt an irrational surge of rage. She was hungry tired and filthy. She had been abducted, terrified, shot at and nearly killed more times than she cared to count and now, when they finally reached safely, these drunken louts were standing between her and a hot meal. Without a word she stalked across the floor towards the group. The leaders eyes widened either recognising her as a woman or merely surprised that someone would approach her. She seized a clay mug from the table and swung it in a broad arc that ended at the blonde mans temple, shattering in a spray of broken pottery. The fellows eyes glazed and he slumped back in his seat, soaked in spilled ale. His companions prepped for a fight by the earlier harsh words, surged out of their chairs and rushed towards the slight Tilean.

@POOHEAD189

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

Camilla’s blade raised a shower of spark as it ground across the black steel armor. The shock of the misaimed stroke jarred her shoulder painfully as the hell forged plate turned the elven blade. She fell back with a cry nearling losing her grip on the weapon. The dwarf drew back its hooked axe to gut her and for a moment she thought she heard an evil chuckle. Konrad’s greatsword sheered down in a might blow, amputating the things arm at the shoulder, slicing it from neck to breast in a spray of blood. Too tired to offer thanks Camilla fell back into her place in the loose diamond the party had formed around Dietricha. The wizard was crouched over the strange bull like altar chanting weird words that seemed to slide from her ears.

“Your guess is as good as mine!” Yantz shouted in response to a question she hadn’t heard. The sandy haired Imperial slashed uselessly at a trio of Chaos Dwarfs, his heavy sword striking like blacksmiths hammer down upon their shields. The orcs ranks were thinning rapidly. The greenskins were unmatched in their rage, but as Imperial armies well knew, discipline was more than a match for brute strength. The Chaos Dwarves were forming into larger ranks and beginning to push on the altar. Only the high ground and the distraction of the remaining orcs kept them from being instantly over run.

“This isn’t going to work!” Camilla yelled over the din, pausing to thrust the point of her weapon through the eyeslit of a dwarf attempting to gain the platform. Another six or seven Dawi-Zarr climbed onto the platform. They instantly locked shield, forming a bulwark which would be impossible for the exhausted group to overcome.

“We can’t…”

The cavern rocked with the war shriek of the monster as it smashed down into the rear of the phalanx, claws slashing like sabres. Whether by natural ferocity or dark sorcery, the creature’s claws tore armor like paper. It snapped and tore with its teeth, rending fresh and snapping bone in a nightmarish orgy of destruction. It’s tail snapped like a cannon, the scorpion like stinger struck Yantz’ sword and shattered it like a mortar ball, pitching the Imperial off his feet with a shout of pain. The beast roared and turned its head to look at Camilla, eyes burning with hateful intelligence. She was out of tricks and clever tactics, she hardly had the energy to dodge, all she could do was grip her sword and await the inevitable. The great beast reared back, muscles bunching like vast steel cables, black wings spreading like a funerial shroud. It screeched like a deamon, great jaws displaying hundreds of dagger like teeth, and launched itself at her like a thunderbolt from heaven. Camilla raised her blade and closed her eyes. She felt the wind of the things approach, smelled the stench of its maw and then…

The world exploded into a billion points of azure light.

_________________________________________________________________

Chapter 7 - Praag

When surveying the many geographic oddities that characterise the land of Kislev one would be remiss not to discuss the unique Karkov Crater of the Black Ice mountains. Located just over a hundred miles from Volksgrad the crater is a perfectly hemispherical gulf that appears to be scooped from the peak of one of the smaller mountains. Approximately two hundred feet in diameter, the crater is unusually smooth and shows no sign of the volcanism which characterises similar craters in the archipelagos south of Araby and the Gulf of Ijan.

As is so often the case, the local Kislivites ascribe all manor of strange superstitions to the crater. Some tales speak of an ancient stronghold of evil dwarves allegedly located beneath the mountain. Others speak of a beautiful woman descending from the heavens. Even more fanciful tales speak of the God Ulric rending the earth and rising from the crater to the great howling of wolves. Needless to say all of these peasant superstitions are ridiculous. The most likely explanation for the Karkov Crater is gradual erosion from a secondary aquifer…

From: Geographical Oddities of the Northern Reaches, Vol IV, Altdorf Press

“Answer me wizardling, lest I cleave your head from your shoulders” Ulkjar the Skull Cleaver demanded. The hulking champions brazen armor steamed in the frigid air of northern Kislev. The camp was located on an a rocky hillock. Though the snows covered the land with a thin film of white the ground for a mile in every direction was clear like a boil thrusting up through clear skin and spreading the red heat of infection. The Kislivites were proud of their harsh winter, long a bar for invaders, but for this army, for this commander, there would be no winter. Already his scouts had reached the outskirts of Praag, driving thousands from their pitiful villages to freeze in the snow. Once the city was taken, they would make fine provisions for the march south.

Around the hillock fires burned. Black armored chaos warriors moved among burly Norscans clustered around the days captives. Men and women screamed in a continual wail of agony as the vile warriors took their varied amusement with them. The weaker ones were already boiling in Norscan cook pots. Thousands of beastmen circled like skavengers, snapping at the bloodied leavings of their betters. Horns blew and weapons clashed in occasional displays of wanton blood lust. That was as it should be in the army of the Skull Cleaver. The weak, friend or foe, had no place here.

The adept of Tzeentch continued his chant, fell magics gathered about him, dancing off his crystalline armor in motes of leprous yellow light. Sarhasis the Neverborne was a powerful wizard and strange even by the standards of his own kind. Strange enough to seek out allies among Khorne’s chosen, a natural enemy of his mercurial master. The alliance the two had made was undeniably effective, they had cut their way across the waste together, gathering men and influence as they went, but neither of them like or trusted the other. Sarhasis spat a serpentine word of power and cast his knuckle bones. The bone, each taken from the index finger of an apostate priest, hung in the air a moment longer than gravity would have dictated and then fell to the earth in what looked like a random jumble.

“Nothing…” the sorcerer rasped, his voice like snake skins coiling and sliding over one and other.

“How can there be nothing?” Ulkjar snapped, his hand gripping and ungripping on the hilt of his axe. In the sunken caves of Uglish, the pair had uncovered an obscure prophecy carved into the living rock of those unhallowed catacombs. It spoke of an army that would march in the heat of the summer, though around them be ice. It also spoke of a twin bane. The Summer Maiden and the Wolf of Winter. Only if the pair stood against them were the omens of victory uncertain. If they did not take the city of Daemons, they did then they would have to seek their daemonhood at Haigh Tarna. Even Sarhashis, who had studied the library of the blind Eater Lygax and walked the scroll forest of Pentafore could find no record of where or what Haigh Tarna might be. Though they had found clues as to whom the Summer Maiden and the Wolf of Winter might be.

Ulkjar had sent his norscan allies to deal with them, though they cursed him for forcing them to sail in such an unprofitable season. Blood oaths and terror had forced the reavers to go, though it seemed they had failed to kill either of the prophesied pair. That such doom should be attached to mere mortal mercenaries was not uncommon. Those who walked the many fold paths knew that fate more often turned on the actions of paupers than princes. Every nine days for the past two months they had cast the bones. Seeking signs and portents of the Banes. The readings had returned captivity, freedom, travel and the Daemon Smiths. It seemed now that the pair must have fallen for what else could explain their absence from the bones. Though it hadn’t been as smooth as Ulkjar had hoped, it seemed that the reavers had done their work. That the death blows came at the hands of Daemon Smiths was of no concern.

“They are dead,” Ulkjar rumbled, his enthusiasim giving his words the buzz of an impending landslide.

“It must be so, if they were upon the face of the earth, the bones would spy them out,” Sarhashis agreed reluctantly. Ulkjar began to laugh and turned from the profane circle to face his assembled chieftans. All four of the Dark Gods were represented as always they were when a great captain arose. He shook his axe in the air.

“We wait no longer!” Ulkjar roared, his shadow, cast by a hundred fires, briefly flickered into that of a vast dog with immense teeth.

“Victory awaits us in the City of Daemons!”

The answering roar shook the very hilltop

Star Crossed: The Duke's Rebellion

Rene’s heart thundered in his chest like a distant orchestra. A surge of physical weakness ran through him as Solae’s eyes fluttered open. Some part of him, a distant cold part, had been preparing some sort of response for what he would do if she had died. He wasn’t entirely sure what that would have been, other than violent and short lived. It’s sudden absence felt like a stone slipping from between gears that allowed time to move forward as it should. He held Solae close to him, her slender frame was cooler than it should have been, but he felt her pulse warm and vital within.

The universe abruptly flip flopped. It took a moment for his mind to replay her words and relay their meaning to his adrenaline addled mind. Marriage. It seemed like a dizzy daydream, something he had steadfastly not allowed himself to think of in the few free moments they had had since their sudden and violent meeting nearly a week before. A week did not seem like a long time to know someone but Rene knew that this last week had been longer than a lifetime for most people.

Part of him wanted to argue the point. To remind her that no matter what his previous rank, he was a penniless soldier, a murderer as far as the Imperial authorities were concerned, for all that he had cheated the headsman by taking the Star and enlisting in a service that was a haven for the dregs of society. The social cost of such a marriage would be ruinous to Solae, it would certainly spell the end of her glittering career in Imperial service. She would be an outcast among her own kind. But of course she already knew that. Solae Falia knew every bit as well as he did what such an arrangement meant and, as she had so clearly pointed out back at Lord Armon’s estate, a subjective lifetime ago, he didn’t have any business trying to make her decisions for her.

That pretty firmly put the question in his court. How did he feel about it? She already considered the risks and had made her decision. He didn’t care about her property or her wealth or even her station, he had once enjoyed all those things and not found his life unbearable for their absence. It wouldn’t matter a spacer’s damn in any case until they reached loyalist territory and could register the vow. That goal, though far closer for their possession of the Bonaventure, still seemed impossibly far away, hardly worth worrying about.

Rene glanced around the cabin. Trash eddied in the uncertain flows of the air recyclers and the chamber smelt of unwashed bodies. The star field was pure enough that there was no sensation of motion, although the readings on the navigation field scrolled with digital exactness, tracing their outbound course through the heavens. It was about as far from the formal setting he had once imagined as could be imagined. Still cradling Solae he reached an arm around and collected the sword that had been propped against the spare jumpseat. The weapon was slick with sugarcane juice and slightly tacky to the touch. He really should have been in ceremonial armor with a proper favor from his intended. The only favor either of them had were bruises and burns from the past several hours. At least in space he could argue that it was moonrise, the traditional time for such overtures.

He was on his knees holding Solae in one arm, her aurite hair cascading to the deck, frizzled, burned, and tangled with tiny pieces of cane husk. Rene didn’t want to know what he looked or smelled like, spattered and slicked with gore and sweat. It didn’t matter. With archaic dignity he lifted the blade to his lips, and kissed it just above the pommel, a surprisingly formal gesture in such squalid surroundings.The act was supposed to represent a formal offer of protection by the suitors house for their intended. He didn’t suppose that house Quentain would feel bound by the symbolic act of a disinherited son, but it felt like the right thing to do. There wasn’t much in the universe that Rene was certain of right now but the fact that he loved the golden haired marquessa was a truth as solid as bedrock. He could find political reasons why this was a bad idea but nothing that changed the way he felt.

“Solae Falia,” he said over the whine of the impulse engines. The rest of the formula archaic and courtly fled his mind. It seemed to pretentious a thing to say out loud.

“Will you marry me?”

Renaissance Monster Hunting

I have the germ of an idea that I would like develop with the aid of a partner.

The elevator pitch is monster hunting (vampires, werewolves) ect in Renaissance Europe, particularly Italy, France and Central Europe.

The characters will be normal people who have decided to dedicate their lives to eradicating monsters. They probably have occult knowledge and skills but at the end of the day they are vanilla mortals. They will be grounded in the world view and and political social systems of the time. This means prospective partners require at least a big picture knowledge of the period. You don't need to be a historian, but it will probably help if you know a Hapsburg from a Medici.

This will be an advanced RP with significant plot contribution and character development expected.

If you still aren't turned off, by all means drop me a PM.

I should also point out that this will be 18+

Penny.

The Enemy Within: Warhammer 40K RP

Gun oils and graphium lubricant were familiar smells. Silvana was not herself a combatant but she had been around enough gunmen in her inquisitional career for the minutiae of arms. She ignored Heironymus' lecture about weapons, all of which was old information to her. The young interrogator probably didn't mean to be insulting. The powersword he wore swept though the air with a soft his. Unusual weapons for Arbites, Ortega clearly believed in equiping his people well. That or the Governor was supplementing his budget. That wasn't in and of itself a problem, nor technically improper, unless of course she were trying to buy the Arbite's silence with generous contributions in order to cover up her own incompetence. Silvana pictured Ortega's thorny aura. She could not imagine the Arbite reacting well to even an oblique attempt to bribe him.

" I don't need to point out to you the dangers of giving a blind woman an automatic weapon," she commented dryly. Reaching into one of the packing crates the lifted a plasmagun from its packing crate and hefted it experimentally. She could not imagine needing such firepower, even in the hive. There were a trio of plasma cells nestled among the packing straw. Smiling she slipped the cells into her pouch, they made the leather bag bulge awkwardly. She took the third cell back out of the bag and slotted it home in magazine well built into the stock. For a moment nothing happened, she couldn't see the lights but she didn't hear the distinctive hum of charge flowing into the weapon. She murmered a mechanics mantra and slapped the mechanism with the flat of her hand, it hummed gratifyingly.

"I suppose the worst thing that can happen is it misfires and kills us all," she said dryly.

"Are you always this upbeat?" Heironymus asked as he completed his own preparations.

"You pear too much into the future, tends to dampen ones disposition," she replied. It was partially intended as a joke, though there was a kernel of truth in the statement.

"So what do you intend to do? Drive around the slums and hope to spot something before we are gunned down?" the words contained no emotional loading whatsoever.

Star Crossed: The Duke's Rebellion

Seconds dragged by with the weight of decades. Rene’s attention darted between Solae and the unfamiliar controls. He hastily punched keys at the console. Holographic screens fluttered to life on either side of him, filling the cockpit with a pale blue glow. The screens stuttered and flickered unsteadily, given the slovenly state of the Bonaventure Rene wouldn’t have bet that the projectors had been serviced since their installation. Another few keystrokes brought up the external cameras. Six out of eight returned nothing but static, the optical pickups either damaged or missing all together. By luck or providence one of the two live screens showed Kalrio and his people retreating towards the rubber trees that screened the ancient railroad.

Rene glanced at Solae, she was obviously in a bad way, smoke inhalation or the early stages of shock perhaps. The incoming contacts were coming across the attack board at considerable speed, vector line elongating as the rangefinder figures clicked down in a blur. The freighters sensors were too rudimentary to provide any identification but they had to be rapid response jumpers. Armed aircraft that could carry a squad or two depending on who friendly the soldiers were willing to be. Sweat began to trickle down his neck, there was so much going on that his body wanted to shut down, but that was death for him and maybe worse for Solae.

Rene wasn’t a pilot. The corp employed specialist flight officers and all the training he had ever had was a few hours moving dropships around a firebase. Nothing like this. For a moments delay he checked the video to make sure Kalrio and his people were out of the way of any potential backblast, then he reached over and lit the plasma thrusters. The great engines roared to life filling the ship with an assymetrical rhythmic thrum that rattled his teeth. The deck beneath him quivered like a living thing as the thrusters fired. At present the outlets were flared widely enough that they gave almost no lift. Rene waited three precious seconds and then irised the thruster casings to focus the thrust. The Bonaventure pitched sideway as the port side lifted a meter into the air and ground them sideways across the pad in a shower of sparks that would have put any fireworks display he had ever seen to shame. Intertia slammed Rene into the side of his seat as the ship slid sideways gouging a thirty centimeter trench through the dirt, he felt them hit the side of the cane field and keep going, the slap of the stalks like a gauntlet. Solae screamed and Rene couldn’t be sure he wasn’t joining her.

“I suggest you rebalance your thrust,” Mia crooned, her tone so inappropriate to the situation that it shook Rene from his panic. He cut thrust to port and increased to starboard and the ship pogoed into the air the deck pressing hard against his feet. A shower of flaming dirt, ignited by the star hot kiss of the plasma thrusters, tumbled to the ground to add to the gathering blaze. They were ascending rapidly and Rene made a few quick adjustments. The Bonaventure’s thrusters were badly misaligned, a fact which its veteran pilot was no doubt used to compensating for, and Rene, as a novice, had missed it completely. Given the power involved he was lucky he hadn’t flipped the ship on its back and wrecked the freighter within the first few seconds.

“Mia can you help balance port and starboard thrust!’ he yelled, struggling to make himself heard over the roar of the ship. The flight smoothed considerably and the vibration decreased from bone rattling to merely brain scrambling. Rene had just enough time to sigh with relief when a proximity alert shrieked. Rene glanced down at the attack board in horror, one of the jumpers was within 1500 meters. There was a noise like an anvil falling into a steel works and the ship whipsawed wildly. The sound of bullets ricocheting inside the hull was so loud it was a physical pain to endure.

“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” Rene yelled, ducking low in his seat in what was an understandable but totally useless response. The air was filled with the thick greasy scent of burning metal and he could see the pale blue sparks of shorting electronics flickering in the corner of his eyes. Something on the control board went dark but he didn’t even have time to worry about what it might be.

“Frieghter Bonaventure you will land at once at desig…” The comm unit squaked.

Rene chopped the throttle and the ground fell away from under him as the Bonaventure plummeted a thousand feet in a few seconds, dropping him out of the line of fire of the jumper. The ship screamed like a whistle and he slapped the emergency containment sealing the cockpit off from the hull of the ship. Then he focused the jets as tightly as they could go. The deck smashed up through his spine as the ship lifted at maximum rate. He felt his vision begin to gray as the blood was forced to his feet. He cast a desperate glance at Solae, aware that he was pushing her beyond her physical limits but unable to do anything else that would protect her life and freedom.

“Stay with me,” he prayed, though the words came out as an unintelligible slur. The altimeter spun like a roulette wheel climbing to fifty thousand feet, then a hundred. His hands felt weak and his vision was going dark.

“Master Quentain I suggest you…” Mia buzzed at the edge of his consciousness. Through his fading vision he saw the atmosphere slip away, his reckless rate of climb far outpacing that of the pursuing jumpers. They were atmosphere capable vehicles and couldn’t pursue into vacuum. The viewport darkened to the full black of open space, the stars losing their twinkle and sharpening as the air molecules that diffracted the light slipped away beneath them. Rene chopped the throttles back to one gravity and nearly passed out as his blood thundered back to his brain. He gasped several mouthfuls of air and then vomited over the arm of his seat.

“Miiiiaaa,” he croaked.

“Plot a one g burn to the closest jump point and execute,” he managed wiping his mouth with his sleeve and disengaging his restraint. He tumbled to his knees and crawled across to Solae. Without a pause he pulled an infuser from his belt, a basic unit loaded with adrenaline and powerful anti-inflammatories. He pressed the needle to her wrist and pulled the trigger with a hiss of compressed air. The rattle of the plasma jets slowed and ceased and he felt the gentle kick of impulse engines engaging, driving them out and away from New Concordia.

“Stay with me,” he begged cradling Solae in his arms.

The Enemy Within: Warhammer 40K RP

Ortega seemed far less concerned to meet agents of the Inquisition than most. The two organisations had similar goals, in theory, but in practice the Inquisition’s presence usually spelt trouble for Adeptus Arbities. Silvana hoped that they would be able to cooperate here, it was always better to operate with the locals assent, if not their active participation.

Ortega drew up his visor to reveal hard dark eyes and features which might have been handsome if he weren’t so grim. At some point in the past he had caught a piece of shrapnel which drew a pale white line over his otherwise tanned skin. He regarded the symbol intently for several long moments.

“Come with me,” he directed.

Ortga led them down into the bowels of the building. At every turn they met arbites cluthing las rifles and riot guns and bedecked in body armor. These men had to be locals and many of them seemed a little uneasy with the level of hardware they were now handling.

“Your men are well armed Adept Ortega,” Silvana asked as they passed through a door flanked by two grim looking patrolmen. The stiffened as though about to go to attention but then thought the better of it. Ortega grunted what might have been a laugh.

“Why are my men so well armed you mean. What did you say your name was again Mistress...?” he responded bluntly.

“Silvana Euphrati,” she supplied. Ortega pressed an button and summoned a lift cage made of woven wire. It looked flimsy to Silvana but the arbite stepped in without hesitation and so the Inquisitorial party followed. Without direction the elevator began to decend.

“It is a war mistress Euphrati,” Ortega went on, responding to the original question. They rattled down several stories until the lift stopped at the opening to a short hallway. Medical doors, designed to prevent the spread of biohazards faced them. Ortega led the way, pushing through the doors without any kind of decontamination, proof that the facility wasn’t being used for its original intention. The temperature inside dropped by twenty degrees and Silvana’s breath steamed. A large room infront of them was separated into dozens of cubicles by hanging plastic sheeting. Each cubicle held a dead human body. Medicae technicians in white robes and wearing rubberized gloves moved around drawing phials of blood or dissecting the corpses in the familiar autopsy procedure. Picters on steel posts captured the grizzly work as organs were removed and weighed and wounds examined. The whole place reeked of formalin and the mostly obliterated traces of human waste and blood. Most of the bodies bore gun shots or las burns, though some had been killed by grenade blasts judging by the blow and bloodshot eyes.

“The lower levels are completely out of control, regardless of what the Governor and her pack of fools chooses to believe,” Ortega said, the thin sneer evident in his voice. He led them through the room to a side chamber in which a dozen corpses stood on examination benches. The Y shaped stitches that closed their chest cavities a clear sign that the autopsies had already been completed. All of the bodies were tattooed with a bewildering array of what Silvana assumed were ganger marks but each one of these bodies bore the unmistakable sigil. In some cases it was inked but in other cases it had clearly been burned, flesh puckered and distended at the edge of the marks distorting older tattoos.

“We took it for some sort of gang mark,” Ortega explained, as he picked up a pritned file from the end of one of the stretchers and leafed through it.

“Each one of these was bagged at a site of serious resistance, fight like frakkers I’m told, can't find any real connection between them, but it's been five generations since records down in the lower habs were worth a heretics damn.” He set the file down and looked up at the new comers.

“I’m sure you don’t hear this alot, but I’m damn happy the Ordos is taking an interest in this rat frak.”
@POOHEAD189