Penny

Tales of Tamriel

As Vorn drew his dagger Kris felt an uncharacteristic red mist settle over her mind. After months of tracking the former Imperial officer, after her failed attempt on the road, this was her chance to eliminate him once and for all.

“For the Empire!” she roared and leaped towards Vorn, slashing backhandedly at one of the Dunmer soldiers, more to clear him out of her path than out of any conscious desire to attack the mer. The blade bit into the elfs arm, parting his mail and cleaving him to the bone. Blood spattered across the wall as she twisted the blade free and leaped towards Vorn. A door flew open and smashed into her face sending her staggering back with a flash of white pain. The Thaelmor she had seen on the rode strode from the door raising his hand to point at Drax, arcane energy billowed around his fist as he gathered a bolt of lightning to strike the argonian dead.

Kris scrambled to her feet, gripped her sword with both hands and swung it in a downward arc with all her strength. The blade chopped through the Mer’s wrist with a sound like a butchers cleaver. The gloved hand tumbled to the floor with a spurt of bright blood. The elf screamed and staggered backwards. Kris drove her boot into the door smashing it back into the wailing Thaelmor and sending him tumbling out of sight. Vorn struck with his dagger before she could recover, the blade slicing across her forearm with a blaze of pain. She screamed and fell back a step, cuting a clumsy arc through the air that forced Vorn to jump back to avoid being gutted. Hoping that Drax could keep the remaining two soldiers at bay she lunged after her former commander. Vorn parried the thrust with his dagger and then turned and bolted past Drax and the soldiers heading for the door.

“No!” Kris yelled, in pain and frustration. Blood ran freely from her nose where the door had hit her and from the dagger cut. She charged after Vorn hitting him from behind in a flying tackle that smashed him against the ballustrating. The impact drove the breath from Vorn’s lung and sent Kris sword clattering to the floor below. With a twist of her wrist she tore the dagger from his hand as her other hand grabbed his hair and yanked his head back.

“Wait!” Vorn screamed, “I serve the Empire!”

“So did I,” Kris grated and then sliced the dagger across his throat, spraying blood out over the railing as she felt the blade grate across his spine. She held on for a second longer, listening to the gurgling of Vorn’s breath for a moment until his body began to relax. With a yell of triumph she shoved his body over the railing, watching it turn a half rotation in the air before hitting the marble floor with a meaty thump. It was over.

Star Crossed: The Duke's Rebellion

Rene pulled himself to his feet, the pain in his chest told him that armor or no armor he would have bruises tomorrow, but that was both cheap at the price and presumed he would still be alive tomorrow. The room they were in appeared to have been a conference room of some kind, though the blast that had shattered the window had also tossed the central table up against the wall. Stationary of various sorts smouldered amidst the wailing firearms and though it was unlikely the fires would spread the smell of burning carpeting itched at Rene’s sinuses.

“Decimal, is there a path to the PEA that is clear of hostiles?” he asked, unslinging his weapon and checking to make sure it was in working order. The building shook with another massive blast as one of the APCs fired its plasma cannon. Ghostly ionic lightning clug to the wiring concealed beneath the plaster walls for a moment and then winked out as the aftershock dissipated. Rene had never been in a true battle before, and most of his fighting had been against poorly trained GIDs, he didn’t relish going up against the Dukes trained forces if it could possibly be avoided.

“There are no hostiles in the building,” the AI responded in its flat emotionless voice. Rene frowned for a moment and then remembered that to Decimal all of the combatants currently shooting each other to pieces had a perfect right to be here. Mia would not have made such a mistake but then the AI was probably more expensive than Decimal and certainly more sensitive to social currents.

“Consider everyone other than Solae and myself a hostile and answer the question,” he restated, moving to the door and inching it open. Beyond the door stretched a long corridor with red and grey carpeting in a standard Imperial pattern. Doorways stood every few meters, all closed as per the automated fire protocol to reduce airflow. Red light blinked intermittently above to provide emergency lighting.

“There are no such pathways sir,” the AI responded unhelpfully. Rene ground his teeth, wishing they had the time and ability to upload Mia into the system.

“The way with fewest then,” he snapped.

“Ascending via stairway delta three will take you past five members of General Bhast’s security detail,” Decimal responded. Rene had never heard of a General Bhast but the Imperial Marines were deliberately kept segregated from the GIDs and sector defense forces, afterall they were supposed to exist to exercise the Empress’s will when local forces proved inadequate or disloyal.

“That is the fewest?” Rene asked in puzzlement.

“They are in front of the door to the PEA control center,” Decimal expanded, “all routes that lead to the PEA pass through that access point.” That made sense to Rene, though it was a tribute to the discipline of these men that they hadn’t abandoned the post when the shooting started.

“Ok,” Rene said gesturing Solae to follow him.

“Guide us and open all doors between here and there,” he instructed as they headed out into the corridor. Rene took the lead sweeping the barrel of his carbine left and right as they moved down the hallways. Decimal might not believe there were any enemies in their path, but it would have been foolish to take the AI at its word, particularly given it hadn’t recognised people shooting at each other might be hostiles without Rene’s prompting.

The AI guided their way by way of turning the red alarm lights blue and it only took a minute to reach the central stairwell. Rene opened the door and recoiled, slamming it shut, as a blast of blue fire leaped up the shaft as a plasma cannon strike shook the building. He heard the click-whir of an anti armor rocket deploying and then a secondary explosion as something was lit up by the breaching charge such weapons carried. Rene suspected one the APCs had been hit. That was good, as it meant that Bhast’s troops weren’t having it all their own way. Rene’s major concern had been that the professionals would mop up the mercenaries too fast to allow them entry, but it seemed Ralch’s men were giving a good accounting for themselves.

“All troops loyal to Superintendent Ralch, lay down your weapons and you will be spared,” an icy female voice boomed from the public address system built into the wall.

“Decimal disable access to all systems for anyone except Solae and myself,” Rene snapped, embarrassed not to have thought of it before. The PA system fell silent instantly as the speaker, General Bhast he presumed was cut off. Rene opened the door again, the stair shaft was smokey and reeked of the actinic discharge of a heavy bore plasma weapon.

“Ok we need to run,” he told Solae and then suited action to words by darting up the spiralling stair way, the muzzle of his weapon scanning the upper coils of the spiral for any enemies. If she had been trained, Solae would have covered the lower approaches, but the plasma blast had probably collapsed any possible access and there was no time to worry about it. They reached the top floor door indicated by Decimals blue dot and Rene pushed it open. Twenty yards down the hallway stood five men in grey battle armor hunkered down behind overturned tables and office machinery that had been toppled to provide improvised barricades.

“Friendlies hold your fire!” Rene shouted, pulling Solae out of the stairway before firing a long burst down into the shaft. The bullets smashed harmlessly into the walls, spraying the interior of the shaft with shattered plastocrete.

“Get ready they are coming!” he screamed and dashed towards the enemy, pulling Solae with him.

“Get down!” one of the soldiers yelled and Rene and Solae threw themselves onto the carpet, a mere handful of meters before the fireteam. A pair of grenades flew over their heads into the shaft and detonated with a hollow crump, the back blast coating them in shattered plaster. Hands seized the pair of them and dragged them over the makeshift barricade depositing them on their rumps within the enemy defensive perimeter.

“How many…” a grizzled looking squad leader, began to ask before his eyes widened, taking in the minute differences between the erzatz armor Ten had provided and his own. He opened his mouth to scream a warning but Rene thrust the barrel of his carbine into the man's stomach and pulled the trigger. The carbine snapping discharge pitched the man over with a spray of ceramic shards as the armor gave way, blood gouted from his lips as he clutched at his chest for a moment before going limp. Rene jumped to his feet and put three rounds into the next closest soldier, catching him in the neck and head with a flash of red. A hatchet faced woman with a heavy automatic weapon swung her weapon to bear, but before she could manage it the sharp whap whap whap of Solae’s pistol made her stagger and fall in a puddle of spreading blood. Rene tried to get a shot off at the next closest opponent but they fellow dove at him driving him to the ground and smashing him back against one of the heavy tables with enough force to make him see stars. The man drove a vicious headbutt towards Rene’s face but the marine dropped his chin so the blow fell on the peak of his helmet rather than against his forehead. Something hot stung his right side but Rene had no time to worry about it. Dropping his carbine he pulled the cutting bar from his belt and thrust it up underneath the bottom flange of the mans ceramic breastplate. The bar whirred as Rene triggered it, alternating diamond cutting chains slicing deep into the mans intestines. Shrieking the soldier grabbed at his stomach, his breastplate preventing him from reaching the wound, not that it would have done him any good. The body shuddered as the final surviving soldier opened fire, shattered ceramic glanced off Rene’s armor along with a spray of blood and vicera but the body was enough of a shield to save his life. With strength borne of adrenaline he pitched the now limp corpse at the gunman and his smoking carbine. The man tried to dodge but the improvised barricades occluded his movements and he was forced to fend off the grizzly missile with his hand. The gesture gave Rene enough time to close the distance, catching him around the waist and driving him to the ground. White hot pain seared up Rene side but he ignored it, shoving the carbine skyward the panicking soldier fired a long burst into the ceiling raining plaster down in a shower that turned the muzzle blasts into bottle shaped domes of light about the barrel until the magazine clicked empty. Rene shoved the weapon aside and aimed a punch at his opponents neck, aiming to shatter the cartilage but the soldier got his arm up in time and deflected the strike while at the same time driving his fist into Rene side. The marine screamed in pain but kept his grip of his opponent his hand found the hilt of his knife and he drove it downward at the soldier beneath him. With speed borne of desperation the trooper caught his wrist and held the knife away from his throat, but even so the bloody diamond tipped blade slipped lower and closer to him with each passing second. There was a flat bang and the blade plunged home, burying itself to the hilt in the mass of veins and arteries just above the man's heart, the ceramic armor no match for the cutting bar, but the man was already dead, a neat hole punched in the side of his head. Solae stood uncertainly with her smoking pistol in her hand and Rene let out a sigh of relief that stabbed pain through his body.

“Rene?” Solae asked, concern in her eyes. He pulled himself to his feet, as best he could, blood soaked the front of his uniform, though the coating of plaster made it appear like he had been iced with sugar, gingerly he touched the lower right section of his breastplate and his hand came away wet with blood where one of the rounds had punched into his body. Now that the adrenaline of combat was passing it began to throb painfully, the armor had done its job, deflecting the shot out and away from his vitals but no armor a man could wear could stop a electro-motive weapon at close range. He could only hope it hadn’t hit anything vital.

“I’m all right,” he told her, ignoring the pain and hoping that it was more or less true. He drew a spray canister from his webbing and popped the plastic seal then sprayed himself by depressing the release with his thumb. The foam felt prickly and cold as it coated the wound, stemming the bleeding and combining antiseptic with localized analgesic. It wouldn’t make the wound any better, but it contained a localized coagulant which would stem the bleeding.

The door behind the barricade was large and armored. It had been finished with an expensive looking wood veneer but the effect had been ruined by gunfire that left long crazed spiderwebs through the synthetic material. As if on cue the door slid open, mangled panels vanishing into the recesses in the wall. Beyond Rene could see the glow of holographic monitors and in the center of the room the crystalline form of the PEA itself. It seemed incredible that it was finally within reach.

The Sunday Group - Paranormal Detectives

Looking forward to a post @Naril!

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

They raced off into the rocky hills, the camel scrabbling up the shallow slopes at the best speed the beast could manage. A few arrows sped in their direction but the range was too long and they fell short. While the other camel riders might have ridden them down, burdened only by one rider, few of the bandits seemed inclined to miss out on their share of loot in the caravan in order to chase after the fleeing fugitives. Emmaline herself might have fetched a fine price at the slave market but few of the bandits had gotten a look at her and the certainty of wealth now was worth more than the possibility of wealth later, particularly if this meant haring off into the desert.

The sounds of the dying caravan faded as they exited the valley and raced across the rocky desert towards the east. Bitterly Emmaline realised that her alchemical supplies and her books, both purchased and considerable expense had been left behind in the confusion.

“May Ranald rot their cocks,” she muttered through gritted teeth. Amal glanced at her with an arched eyebrow. Given the fact that curse words were among the first most people learned he likely understood the last part of the sentence.

“Ranald is the God of Thieves,” she explained tersely. Amal nodded his understanding and allowed the camel, already huffing with exhaustion to slow. The eastern sky was already beginning to lighten with the coming of dawn and the brutal heat of the day. Under ordinary circumstances people would seek cover from the sun, but at least for the moment they needed to open the distance between themselves and the bandits. They pushed on for another hour or so into the blistering sunrise before they came to another shallow canyon. The camel, not the healthiest beast, was already blowing hard and quivering with the strain. In the distance lay the shadow of a shallow canyon.

“We are still days from Coppher,” Emmaline observed, “With no water and no food. We should take shelter.”

Amal glanced back over his shoulder, looking for signs of pursuit from the bandits, but there was nothing in sight. They could at least hope that their enemies were not following.

“If we don’t let the camel rest we will be walking before too long,” she observed.

“By Allah, alright!” Amal agreed and guided the camel into the ravine. The temperature dropped almost immediately as the canyon walls blocked the blistering sun.

“What is that?” Emmaline asked pointing towards what appeared to be an ancient stone doorway carved into one of the canyons small branches.

The Sunday Group - Paranormal Detectives

@POOHEAD189

Pitch a character and you are in, although that must be like rp #50 we are doing together :P

The Sunday Group - Paranormal Detectives

Im going to give this till Monday then move forward/replace inactive players.

Grim Galaxy: Shots and Chances

Sayeeda slept uneasily. After the success of their hijacked RIP jump the exhaustion of days of constant work and stress had kicked in. She had barely made it to her bunk before sleep had claimed her. Curious nightmares plagued her. Taya balancing her fathers sever head in a scale. A vision of herself with her arm on fire, flicking it irritably in an attempt to put it out. Saxon making love to her as Terran science officer critiqued her body's performance and Prince Aiden watched with disapproval . Her old troopers lounging among plasma burned corpses while they smoked cigarettes. Briefly she was back in her light attack vehicle as the surf surged over the sides, dragging at the safety release of her harness, only this time it refused to come free even as the water closed over her head.

She awoke with a start, shaking and sweating despite the relative cool of the climate control system. Irritably, she tossed aside her sheet and sat up grabbing for the bottle of brandy she kept on her bedside table. Finding it empty she hurled it across the room in disgust where it clattered off a bulkhead and landed in one of her boots.

“For fucks sake,” she muttered to herself and climbed out of bed. Pulling on a pair of exercise shorts and a tan tank top she slipped out of her room and made her way down to the corner of the hold they had designated as the gym. Even with the guns they had stolen from Canek and his mean the space was cavernously empty. Fortunately no one seemed to be around. She wrapped her hands and began to work on the punching bag, circling constantly and delivering powerful jabs and one two combinations in quick succession. The sharp rhythmic slaps of her hands against the bag made a counterpoint to her grunts of effort. As the sweat began to flow she began adding kicks and knee jabs to the routine, pounding the battered old bag hard enough that puffs of dust emerged from the seam at the top. She didn’t seem to tire. Though she hadn’t had much time to think about it, since her encounter with the Terrans it seemed that she was capable of greater and greater feats of endurance. The medical computer didn’t detect any measurable differences in her blood work or in her body scans but she could see and feel the difference. It didn’t seem to be a bad thing, but she couldn’t help but feel violated by the Terrans and she couldn’t help but wonder what it might cost her in the future.

“What did the poor bag ever do to you? Stars don’t you ever give it a rest?” A sleepy Taya asked her, emerging from the crew section wearing a robe and with a towel around her hair and a cup of coffee in her hand. Coffee had been one of the few things they had bought on board on Hahn, other than Indra and the guns of course.

“Never,” she replied, blowing a wisp of hair from infront of her eyes before delivering a lightning fast series of blows that culminated in a spinning kick that shook the mounting bracket.

“You should consider a hobby or something,” Taya observed, taking a seat on a convenient crate. Junebug returned to a balanced fighting stance for a moment before letting her arms fall to her sides.

“There is always some younger out there, someone faster, someone with more talent… and they are probably training,” Junebug told her repeating the aphorisim her instructors had drilled into her.

“I suppose I should take it up then,” Taya said with a grin.

“Only if you want to live,” Junebug replied, the nonchalance in her voice making the younger woman flinch.

“Stars, that's a little bleak” Taya mumbled. Feeling embarrassed Junebug held up her hands and crossed to take a seat on a crate beside Taya.

“Sorry, I get a little dramatic I guess,” she apologised. That didn’t change her opinion, but neither did she want to fight with or scare Taya.

“You want some coffee?” the aristocrat asked, “I made a pot.”

Junebug shook her head, pulled a bottle of water from a crate and tore the seal from it with her teeth before guzzling half of it to quench the thirst her exercise and days of Hahns dry dusty atmosphere had raised. Taya watched her for a moment before continuing.

“Junebug… do you remember your first… you know?” Taya mumbled.

“My first…” Junebug asked in confusion, thinking for a moment that they were straying into areas of sexual remincants that she wasn’t sure she wanted to enter. Then she understood, Taya had just been in her first major gun battle afterall.

“My first kill you mean?” she asked, resisting the urge to scowl. It wasn’t good manners to ask a veteran such questions, but Taya wasn’t a mercenary, at least not by training, and she probably didn’t know that.

“Probably not,” she admitted, “my first couple of actions I was so scared everything is kind of grey. I remember shooting but I’m cursed if I could tell you at what. The first one I remember though…”

She paused to take another drink of water, swished it around her mouth and spat it back out onto the deck. Taya frowned at the unladylike behavior but made no further comment.

“We launched a surprise attack and overan an indig fire base,” she explained, mind far away in the purplish green forests of a distant world.

“Our Tankers torched their bunkers and we rushed them, came over the berm at full power and landed on the other side fishtailing all to hell. A guy ran out of one of the barracks, no pants on, just a jacket and an assault rifle, silhouetted perfectly by the door frame…”

She raised her hands and squeezed her fingers together in a pantomime of firing a heavy stabilized plasma weapon, though Taya probably didn’t recognize it as such.

“First round blew off his knee cap and he fell into the second, right in the chest, pop pop pop,” she explained, lowering her hands.

“Did it bother you?” Taya asked.

“At the time, I was too scared to think about anything other than staying alive,” she explained.

“Afterwards? I don’t know, I guess I’ve done alot worse shit than killing a half naked conscript in the wrong place at the wrong time.” She fell silent and then shook her self alert.

“I keep seeing the man I shot the other day, one second he was alive, the next second blood everywhere,” the girl confided. Junebug lay a hand awkwardly on her knee.

“Hey no sweat,” she told her, “Besides no one is in this line of work that isn’t half a bastard anyway, no doubt he deserved it.” Taya smiled wanly at that.

“Your in this line of work, do you deserve it?” she asked with a slight smile. Junebug grinned wolfishly.

“And how little girl, and how.”

Taya nodded solemly and looked up at her captain.

"Will I be able to stop seeing his face?" Taya asked somewhat timidly. Junebug's face sobered. You didn't lie to your troops, there was no point.

"Only if you want to live."

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

They traveled steadily west under the cool evening sky. The heat of the Araybian sun was such that no one traveled by day if they could manage it. As the days passed and Lashiek sank behind them Emmaline gradually felt the tension lift from her. If Emir Omar’s heirs were looking for her, she had clearly slipped the city before they were able to organise a search. Perhaps a caravan had simply been too unorthodox a choice to bear watching, or perhaps the heirs were more interested in fighting over their father's inheritance than in tracking down the slave girl who had slain him.

She attracted more than her fair shair of looks from the caravans various denizens. Her pale skin and eyes would have been obvious even if her blond hair did not give her away as a foreigner. At least Amal’s assertion that she was his wife kept anyone from getting too curious. The thief had the look of a bad man to cross, especially if you planned on sleeping at any point. She kept her books and equipment in her pack, though she was eager read them, she didn’t want to raise any more suspicion than she had too. Wizards were more tolerated in Araby than was the case in the Empire but it wasn't a cultural difference she was keen to explore.

Amal had been vague about his sudden decision to leave Lashiek but his frequent glances over his shoulder told her that he was even more concerned about pursuit than she was. Whatever had happened in the bath house had clearly left him spooked, but she hadn’t chosen to press him on the topic. They had talked surprisingly little, pretending to be husband and wife meant that they both, in theory already knew each other and both of their minds were occupied with the possibility of pursuit.

“It is a still night,” Emmaline observed, pulling her shawl closely about her as they made their way through a shallow defile. The landscape around them grew craggy as they moved westward, while they were not far from the coast the inland mountains ran down to the sea and to a treacherous series of reefs and shoals beyond. The camels seemed more restive than usual as they picked their way across the broken ground. A sudden scream split the night and a caravan guard toppled to the ground clawing at an arrow in his belly. Another thwacked into the wooden bench on which Emmaline was sitting. A half dozen more arced through the air, one striking a camel which screamed and bolted. The caravan drivers tried to stir their beasts to a sprint but already horseman could be seen riding across the skyline at the far end of the defile.

“AaiiiiIe!” came a great shout and a dozen shabbily dressed bandits leaped from the low scrub and rushed forward,the archers too, having lossed their missiles, burst into view as they rushed down the shallow walls of the defile. Steel rang against steel and sparks flew where scimitars clashed as the caravan guards tried to give battle. Emmaline looked around wildly only to spot more bandits coming down from behind them. One of the bandits leaped onto the wagon. Emmaline managed to shrieked and dodged as his scimitar bit into the timber she had just vacated. She punched at his head but he caught her wrist and grinned at her with hideous blackened teeth as he drew back his blade. The panicked Imperial shrieked a word in the arcane tongue and the bandit shrieked and dropped his sword, his hand was blackened and smoking and his filthy sleeve was on fire. Emmaline snatched up the sword that her spell had momentarily imbued with the heat of its forging, now cool to her hand, and hacked inexpertly at the screaming bandit. The heavy blade bit into the flesh between neck and collarbone with a sound like a cleaver severing a joint of beef. Bright arterial blood sparkled in the moonlight as the bandit tumbled out of the wagon. The blade hung and the unexpected jolt yanked Emmaline off balance. She made a desperate grab for the edge of the wagon but toppled out after the bandit landing on her rear with a thump in the rocky sand.

Star Crossed: The Duke's Rebellion

Rene allowed himself to smile, taking his mind from the grim reality of what he would do if Solae were hit. He could appreciate her sentiment but the reality was that his death or capture didn’t matter much in the scheme of the things. It was Solae’s DNA that would activate the PEA and if were taken alive the very best she could look forward to was a life of slavery to the Duke and his creatures.

“An after party sounds good,” he replied with a grin that grew more wicked as the moments passed.

“There are a few of those dresses I wouldn’t mind seeing you in… or out of more to the point,” he expanded grinning as he brought the jeep live and lifted them from the warehouse floor. Solae was right, it was considerably better for morale to have something to look forward to.

Night had fallen by the time they reached the compound. The consulate compound was an Imperial installation even if its control on Zatis was somewhat unorthodox. That meant that it was exempt from the crowding that pushed all of the other buildings in the dome together. A broad boulevard surrounded its nine foot wall, leaving clear lanes of fire in case the building needed to be defended. Fortunately the spirit of Zatis could not be completely curbed and their were several tall buildings that offered lines of sight down into the embassy compound. Rene set the jeep down behind one of them, the offices of a communications firm that made its money using the PEA during more stable times. Ten had not been clear as to whether he owned the place, or he was merely able to pressure the owners, but it amounted to the same thing, the doors were unlocked and the alarms were disarmed. The feed from the small overhead drone remained largely unchanged, though Rene noticed that the Dukes troops had taken up more defensible positions, close to their armored personnel carriers. Ralch’s mercenaries appeared to be inside the building and neither side was actively patrolling. Rene grinned and showed the vid screen to Solae, she arched an eyebrow in interrogation.

“They don’t trust each other enough to move around in small groups,” he explained, “our ruse looks to be working.”

“But they aren’t shooting at each other?” she asked. Rene nodded, his smile wolfish and broad.

“Not yet.”

As Ten had promised the building was completely empty and they had no trouble working their way to the fifth floor where a large boardroom with industrial grey carpet provided a view over the wall that surrounded the spire like consulate building. The APC’s squatted amongst the ruins of ornamental gardens, oddly foreshortened for being viewed from above. Rene laid his duffel bag on the conference room table and unzipped it. Inside was an old fashioned slug thrower, similar to the kind most of Ralch’s mercenaries carried and a stubby tube with a dark green band around it and a boxy trigger assembly.

“Ok,” Rene said, delaying the inevitable for one more moment.

“I love you,” he told Solae, gently squeezing her hand before standing and moving to the open window. He laid the rifle down against the sill and flipped open its holographic sights. He laid the glowing ring across the neck of one of the Duke’s grey clad soldiers and then squeezed the trigger. The slug thrower cracked and the soldier pitched forward with a spray of red mist. Rene instantly elevated his angle and put two rounds through one of the windows in which Ralch’s mercenaries were sheltering. Chaos erupted at once as both sides, already jumpy opened fire upon one and other. Plasma bolts blew the windows of the building into chunks of flaming glass and slug throwers tore up the grass. One of the APCs fired its plasma cannon and the scorching cyan blast blew out every widow in on the front side of the building as it filled one of the lower floor rooms with blue fire, kicking up a donut of dust as the vehicle recoiled against the heavy discharge. The shouts and screams of panicked and wounded men echoed weirdly in the void between the wall and the building and fire alarms began to shriek. Rene dropped the rifle and picked up the tube and fitted it to his shoulder, aiming through the primitive iron sights at a spot part way between the second and third floors. The tube let out a dull chunk of pressurized air followed by the whir of cable as the carrier charge sailed across the street, over the wall and into the shattered window. It hit somewhere inside the building and a green light on the tube light up as the fibre optic cable return a solid connection.

“Here we go,” he told Solae, hooking the carrier to his combat armor at the attachment point.

“This isn’t how I prefer you to get into my lap but…” he held out his arms and Solae moved in front of him. He put his arms around her, took a deep breath and jumped from the window. The carrier whired down the zip line with all the speed of Rene’s leap. They raced towards the storm of gunfire, desperately hoping no one took this moment to look up, fortunately the plasma cannon had raised enough dust and debris that the air was already fairly opaque. Spot fires started by small arms added to the concealment and they swept over the outer wall, over the smoky divide lit by flashes of blue and orange fire and into the window. Rene did his best to coil his body around Solae’s but they hit hard, the line parting when the carrier reached the end, powerful motors whipped the line back across the road and out of sight as the two nobles tumbled into a sprawl on the floor of the room, their armor saving them from being cut to pieces on the shattered glass.

“Well,” Rene observed with a gasp as he lay on the floor beside his lover. There was no obvious sign they had been heard, though it would be difficult to tell over the snap of gunfire and the sharp crump of grenades going off.

“So far, so good…”

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

Emmaline felt clean for the first time since she had been dragged into Emir Omar’s bed chamber a year ago. Some dirt didn’t come off no matter how many rose scented baths you took. Idly she wondered if the Emir’s blood had been what made her feel clean again, realising such thoughts might verge on heretical she closed her eyes and allowed the hot water to relax her muscles and her mind. She was the only woman in the bath house and she had two servants to herself. The conservatively garbed women washed her hair and scrubbed her body with practiced care, whispering softly to each other in Arabic that she pretended not to understand. As her lecherous old master had told her, allowing people to underestimate you never failed to pay off. The conversation largely revolved around her golden hair and the petty jealousy the bath maids held for those who could afford to use their services so she tuned them out. She was so relaxed she might have fallen asleep when Amal suddenly stuck his head through the tarp that partitioned the bath, catching a full view of her naked body in the calm hot water. She had just enough time to gasp and attempt to cover herself with her hands before he told her to meet him outside and then vanished, followed by heavy footfalls and angry shouts.

“The rogue!” one of the dancing girls exclaimed, seeming outraged.

“A handsome rogue though,” the other responded with a titter. Emmaline rose from the bath, allowing the hot water to stream over her generous form for a moment before sticking her head out between the two pieces of tarp, careful to keep herself concealed. She caught the familiar whiff of blood on the air. Retracting her head she snatched up a towel and quickly began to dry herself off. The two attendants stepped to her and took over the job.

“Shall we brush your hair mistress?” the first one asked in halting Riekspiel in an abominable accent. Emmaline could only presume she had picked it up from passing sailors and Imperial merchants. She was about to refuse, when she realised that Amal obviously didn’t intend her to rush after him. Worse yet doing so might make her an accomplice in whatever mayhem he had just committed.

“Ja,” she ordered the serving girl, shaking her sodden hair away from her back and taking a seat on a carven three legged stool provided for the purpose. The girls began to brush her hair with a comb made of some kind of ivory and within a quarter hour it was shining with the full lustore of spun gold. The practice also gave her body time to dry in the hot desert air and by the time she had dressed in her sari she had almost forgotten about Amal’s sudden disappearance.

It was almost another half hour later when Amal returned to deliver his surprising offer. She had been on the verge of simply abandoning the thief, especially as a number of armed barefoot Arabyians had come in and out of the bath house, sailors judging by their calloused palms and rolling gates, and appeared to be growing increasingly agitated by something they found inside.

“I wish to travel to Copher,” she told him as they hurried away through a side alley. While she had intended to take a ship, it might well be a better choice to take the land route, though that meant weeks of travel across

“If you wish to come with me, I won't object, you are the only person I know in this Sigmar blighted country.”

“What is in Copher?” Amal asked. Emmaline gave him a side long look. Copher was the closest major city, but it was also a seat of learning and sorcerous knowledge. She wanted to consult the scholars there about the strange map she had taken from the Emir.

“When I…” she glanced around as they hurried down a narrow street, there were too many people for her to speak openly so she changed her words.

“When I did what I did, I also stole an ancient map that was on display,” she explained, opting for the truth as the simplest and most expidient choices.

“I want to ask a historian in Copher about it.”

“A map to what?” Amal asked, his eyes narrowing speculatively.

“Well if I knew, I wouldn’t need to consult anyone would I,” she replied tartly.

“I need to pick up a few things before we leave town,” she told him. Amal looked nervously over his shoulder.

“So long as its quick…”

The Street of Wonder was located on the southern side of the city, only a few blocks from where the ancient city walls sectioned of the desert with is limestone ramparts. In mid afternoon it was a busy place filled with sound and confusion. Students of various philosophers stood at opposing street corners, shouting insults and arguments back and forth at each other. Brightly dressed merchants cried the virtues of wares from a dozen kingdoms, promised miracles, offered immortality and various other such persuasions. There were even peddlers selling relics of lost Khemri, or so they claimed, as far as Emmaline could tell there was nothing on display that might not have as easily been a fake produced this very week.

There were more substantial shops also, some claiming to be the domains of wizards and seers. Emmaline could detect a spark of genuine magic in but a few and she angled quickly towards one located in a large white washed building. A sign hung out front depicting a stylized eye within a pyramid. The interior of the shop was dark and cool and smelled strongly of incense. Books lay piled in more or less random, many in languages Emmaline didn’t recognise. There were Khemrian papyri and even Cathayan writings all piled up without any rhyme nor reason she could detect. On the other side of the store stood a variety of oddly assorted items. Paws of some creature she didn't recognise, bundles of incense, and flasks and alchemical equipment. An exceedingly tall man hunched behind a counter in front of a wall filled with jars and bottles of unknown content. Amal glanced around suspiciously, Emmaline dearly hoped he was too smart to attempt to steal anything.

“Hexe,” the tall man said in an oddly serpentine voice, bowing from the waist to her.

“What can I do for you?” he asked in flawless Reikspiel. She reached into her pocket and drew out a handful of gold coins. The fellow smile grew broader.

A little while later Emmaline and Amal emerged from the store. In a leather backpack she now carried a large case filled with the basic tools of her trade. Alchemical equipment, ungents and ingredients, a small rod of magnetic gold, and a variety of ingredients that one rarely found in the wild. She had also purchased a tome on Charmon, as well as a lexicon for translating Khemri and the other ancient languages of the desert. It had cost most of her coin, but she hoped it would prove a worthy investment.

“Shall we be on our way?” she asked.