Penny

The Pavonis Campaign - Warhammer 40000

Katiya swept up her peaked cap as it blew against her feet, she snatched it up and shoved it down on her head, dumping a handful of dust over her face as she did so. All was chaos and confusion. She could only assume that Captain Raloc had summoned the vehicles to retrieve him, shortly before the rebel bomb had killed him and leveled the Arbities Sanctum. Another rebel appeared out of the smoke and Katiya shot him in the head, her bolt pistol clicking dry.

"Armored units, this is Commissar Petrovska, cease fire we have friendlies in the AO. You are to withdraw half a klom to the south," she called over the vox. There was a moments hesitation before a pair of 'yes ma'ams' sounded in the vox bead in her ear. There was clear dissapointment in the troopers voices but if the blundered around in the smoke and dust the rebels would have them for sure.

"Once you reach there hold for my command," she continued, methodically reloading her pistol. There was still firing going on in the smoke, though Katiya didn't imagine there could be any Arbites survivors. She could hear rounds whining of the chimera and the hell hound but both vehicles were already backing at full speed, tracks throwing up torn pavement and keeping their thick frontal armor pointed at the enemy. There wasn't any practical way to cross to the vehicles without being cut down so Katiya turned instead to the cinder block wall which had sectioned off what had been a vehicle park. She shrugged off her great coat and passed it to Connors.

"Shield me," she directed. The corporal clearly didn't understand but he held the greatcoat up as she directed. Katiya drew the powersword from its scabbard, lit the blade and then plunged it into the wall in a downward slash. The powere blade hissed as it parted rockrete, teh bluish glow hopefully hidden from the half blind rebels by the coat. She made two more cuts and a triangular section of the wall tumbled free. Extinguishing the sword she climbed through to the other side. Connors followed handing her the coat as he clambered through. A few shots struck the wall on the far side but that was probably more random chance.

"Open fire," she directed the tanks which had by now pulled back out of the concealing smoke. Autocannons and multilasers howled immediately, ripping through the smoke. The whine of ricochets was loud and nauseating as the heavy weapons chopped through the plaza sweeping down the rebels who hadn't yet gone to ground.

"What are we shooting at ma'am?" one of the armored commanders asked. Katiya was gratified that he had opened fire before wasting time asking such a question.

"Area target, anyone alive in that smoke is to be presumed a rebel," she responded.

"Are you in communications with base?" she asked, knowing that the chimera would have much better vox equipment than the short range bead she was using.

"Yes ma'am, they say they have demonstrators in the streets, no fighting yet though," the unknown sergeant replied. Katiya looked at Connors, there was no way they were going to be able to rejoin the vehicles, not without bringing them back into missile range, and they just didn't have enough armor to take the risk.

"Tell Lieutenant... Owens, that he is in command and he is to hold his position, dig in as best he can. He is not to open fire without provocation, but respond if fired upon. Under no circumstances is he to take troops into the streets. Also we have seen the rebels use one vehicle bomb already, tell him to frag anything that gets too close."

There was a long pause, doubtless the vehicle commander would have preferred the Commissar deliver the orders herself, but that wasn't going to be practical. After a moment he called a confirmation.

"Cease fire and return to base," she directed, "if you find your way blocked or unsafe, rally to the palace until I can get through to you," she added.

"Yes ma'am? What about you?" came the reply a heartbeat before the roar of autocannons ceased. Katiya could hear the cries of wounded rebels from the plaza but there was no point in keeping the tanks there to be outflanked. The commissar looked up at the sky, the sun was hazy and blood red as it sank through the smoke towards the horizon.

"We will have to make our own way back," she replied and turned to her companion.

"Well Corporal, I suggest we get moving, I suspect the streets are going to be full of these 'demonstrators' tonight," her tone was cold. Whatever was happening on Pavonis, it was no simple civil unrest. Protesting workers didn't usually go for suicide bombings. And it seemed awfully convenient that it had managed to knock out both the senior Arbities Adept, and the senior Guard officer in one blow.

The Sinful Stars

The house Duke Placedo, the summer house, as Annika was later to learn, was an impressive place. It reared up before them atop a hill, surrounded on all sides by groves of orange trees and carefully tended grape vines. Peasants toiled both in the orchards and tending herds or large creatures with thick wooly pelts with which Annika was not familiar. There was no central village as these were serfs of the estate rather than town folk, though there was a wine press and a water mill as well as several other communal outbuildings mostly clustered along a small stream that wound its way down to the bay the house overlooked. The house itself was surrounded by a wall of worked stone, though the wall was somewhat lower on the hill than the house so as not to obstruct its view of the scenic bay beyond, the structure itself was of warm stone with many wings, each ending in a large rounded turret and roofed with tile of a glazed terracotta. Annika didn't doubt that the house was defensible, being located on a hill that formed a slight promontory overlooking the bay and approachable only via a long winding track paved with stone. Generations of horses had worn a slight declivity in the track that made it feel narrower than it was, though attacking enemies trying to run up hill towards the walls would have found the place narrow enough in truth.

Cleo his guard somewhat lowered, appeared to be talking enthusiastically about hawking with Orion, a topic in which Orion was either interested or at least knowledgeable enough to fake interest for the Hazat's benefit. None of Cleo's companions appeared to be taking much of an interest in their strange guests, other than to occasionally glare at Ragnar who kept a look of haughty contempt on his brutish features. Only one of them appeared to be of Cleo's rank, a younger cousin from what Annika had overheard and he appeared to be keeping his distance from the new comers. The others were probably minor nobility, the kind of hangers own who inevitably attached themselves to their betters.

"Why don't you want them to know who you are?" Annika asked Filenia as they approached the gates of the wall. The gates were made of iron wood and sported a massive symbol of House Hazat. The stone towers flanking it were low and ancient in construction, though the stubby barrels of automatic machine guns projecting from the loopholes suggested that they had their uses in modern times also.

"None of your business priest," Filenia hissed in arrogant disgust at having been addressed by a lowly member of the clergy.

"Ah but it is my business, as Sir Pentecost's confessor it is my business to shield his soul from unwholesome influences, which might include you," she responded calmly. Filenia's face darkened with rage but she obviously didn't want to risk a scene here an now.

"I will speak to Sir Orion about it and not his lap dog," she snapped, walking away from the priestess before Annika could press her with further questions.

The Pavonis Campaign - Warhammer 40000

Katiya considered it for a long moment. Her teachers at the scholam would have said that she had an admission of guilt and she ought to make a judgment on the spot. Of course that was easy for the Drill Abotts to say as they would probably never find themselves on a hostile world surrounded by troopers who were both scared and heavily armed.

"Well I suppose, if it were reported, I would have to have you flogged," she said, a slight smile tugging at her lips.

"Of course I would also have to have the sergeant shot for impeding an order of the Commissariat, so it is probably better if the incident is never reported to me," she concluded. Gripping the dashboard of the ground car as a heavy delivery truck roared passed them in a cloud of promethium fumes. Katiya scowled at the vehicle as it pulled away, where were the praetors when you needed them. Ahead of them the Adeptus Arbities Sanctum rose into view, it was a five story tapered spire, faced with the traditional black granite to demonstrate the implacability of Imperial Judgment. Positions in the Arbities were sought after in the scholams, safer than the Commissariat or the Stormtroopers but still promising action and glory in His name. Katiya hadn't been tempted, having viewed even the Commissariat as a consolation for not being assigned to the Navy. The Emperor of Mankind had his reasons she was sure, and she would serve Him in whatever capacity.

Low buildings, administrative complexes and habs, surrounded the citadel like the roots of a great plant. Stalls and kiosks lined the road, hawking cheap goods and food of various quality. A preacher stood atop one of them, screaming about the end times and the emperors coming, unfavorable judgment. Ahead of them the delivery truck swerved suddenly disappearing down a ramp below the spire. There was a sudden crash and spatter of gunfire before the scream of rending metal. A moment later there was tremendous flash and a concussion that hit the ground car and flipped it like a tiddly wink. Katiya's word was a callidiscope of confused images and colors as she was whipped against her restraints and a vast cloud of dust rushed out to obscure the sky. With a crash that was barely audible after the roar of the explosion the roof of the ground car hit the pavement, the blast of the explosion diving them several more meters in a shower of sparks before they came to a stop.

Katiya could taste blood in her mouth as she blinked the dust from her eyes, suspended by her seat belt upside down. The peaked hat had fallen to the floor and her long blond hair, gathered into a tight braid hung downwards. Dust chocked her mouth and eyes and she struggled to breath as her weight pressed down against the belts. It was probably only the flak armor she wore beneath her great coat that had prevented her from breaking her ribs. Outside in the swirling dust came the familiar crack, crack of stubber fire and she tried to order her thoughts. Someone had set off a bomb in the basement of the Arbities citadel. Instinctively she thumbed her palm in the Valhallan gesture of a half-aquilla. A moment later there was a screaming sound of disintegrating masonry as the tower itself, cloaked in the dust, collapsed into the void created by the blast below it. Shouts of victory and stubber fire increased, close enough now that Katiya could see the orange star of the muzzle flash. A figure in miners coveralls resolved out of the fog, holding a stubber in one hand and shouting in triumph.

"Death to the Oppressors!" he howled, oblivious to overturned car and its passengers. Katiya pulled her bolt pistol from its holster and fired. The round detonated in the joint between leg and pelvis and the bursting bolt flung the rebel aside in a gout of blood. He howeled in pain for a few seconts before the massive bloodloss quieted him. Another figure emerged beside the first and triggered a burst of stubber fire at the car, it raked the top section in a spray of sparks before Katiya's bolt struck him in the throat, decapitating him neatly. More figures began to converge on the firing, clearly the rebels had been in position to sweep up any surviving Arbities. Katiya's pulse thundered in her head as she dropped another of the rebels. This wasn't going to end well.

The Sinful Stars

Annika exchanged a look with Orion though Filenia ignored the confessor as she might any minor servant. The last vestiges of her dark twin flashed with irritation before her training took over and she picked up one of the plastic paddle and began to help Ragnar and Logan drive the raft towards the beach. The thief and the priestess together were barely able to keep the stroke with the Vuldrok but fortunately the slight curve wasn't a large detriment to reaching the shore. Annika considered for a moment how strange it was that they had lost virtually nothing in the crash. As an Estakonic cleric she was expected to carry everything she owned and beg for her supper, Ragnar didn't own anything she was aware of other than weapons and armor, Logan's possession were few, illegal and mostly hidden within folds of his clothing. Only Orion had any real luggage and the majority of that had been the sacred banner he was charged to deliver. She hoped that the strange fact was a good omen of some kind, perhaps a moral from the Omega Gospel, but for the moment she couldn't think of it.

"We certainly picked a nice spot to crash," Logan observed as they reached the shallows and Ragnar dropped his oar and jumped into the thigh deep water. Annika waited a moment longer then hiked up her skirts and followed suit, feeling the warm sand between her toes beneath the cool clear water. Filenia extended her arms to Orion imperiously. The knight looked from the woman to the case, repleate with its seals and gold filigree.

"I got it," Logan said, a little too eagerly and snatched up the case, leaving Orion to lift Filenia in his arms and step into the water, carrying the woman to the shore. By the time they reached the fringe of beach where sear looking grass swept down out of groves of tended fruit trees the had already been noticed. From the northern spur of the bay a dozen horsemen were racing towards them, colorful pennons snapping from laser lances chased with heraldic designs. Ragnar growled and reached for his heavy pistol, thumbing back the hammer with one of his massive hands. Annika touched his hand to prevent any precipitous action.

"These are not our enemies," she said in Vuldrok, happy to see a slight flash of worry from Filenia at her use of the barbaric tongue. Of course a Hazat would be amazed at such a thing, they were a provincial house compared to the learned and cosmopolitan al'Malik Annika thought accidly.

"Says you," Ragnar rumbled, but he relented and tucked the weapon away. The horsemen were only a dozen meters away now, their horses slowing to a trot. None of them were leveling their lances, though their faces were closed even if not exactly hostile.

"It might be better if you didn't tell them who I am," Filenia whispered urgently. Ragnar shot Annika an 'I told you so' look a moment before the leader of the group, a handsome young man, wearing armor and carrying a sword and pistol on a tooled leather weapons belt, swung from his saddle. The nobleman's spurs clinked as he stepped away from his horse, keeping his weapons hand clear. He glanced from Ragnar to Orion, taking in Annika's ecclesiastical garb. He seemed wary, thought not quite overtly hostile.

"Ho, strangers," he called in a thick Arogonese accent, "what brings you to my fathers duchy?"

The Knight's Song

Julliette hissed in alarm as the newly acquired arming sword nearly dragged her to the ground, the weight of the thing throwing her. The knight shouted something but his words were lost in the vast hall, that seemed to drink even his full throated bellow. The guesture to the horse was understandable but the eerie dancers between her and the beast made it less than useful. One of the dancers whirled towards her grabbing for her with a long hand taloned with painted nails that gleamed like metal hooks. She swung the arming sword, in a clumsy arc that nearly pulled her off her feet again. The very crudity of the strike saved her life as her opponent assumed it a feint until the moment it bisected the things waist, there was no more resistance than a sharp knife meets against butter and she sprawled to the floor amidst the nauesiating yellow robes the thing wore and the painted nails. Scrambling to her feet she heaved the sword at the group around the knight with both hands, the flat of it crashing across the back of one of the dancers and sending him tumbling into another who instnctivly struck out, ripping a chunk of bloody rotting flesh from the first.

Knives sprang into Julliette's hands and flew like darts to other dancers as she cleared a path for herself, exhausting her meagre store of preciously balanced daggers in a few heartbeats before scrambling up onto the back of the warhorse. For it's own part the beast lived up to its name, kicking and biting at the strange assailants with an almost human enthusiasm. She grabbed at the reigns but the horse showed no signs of recognizing her authority other than to flick its ears irritably as she sawed at its bridle.

"Work with me here," she snapped at the horse and it lurched forward, driving its weight into the close packed attackers surrounding the knight, with a shatter of bones and unearthly screams.

Dogs of War: Old World Mercenaries

Emmaline giggled brainlessly. She had been doing so frequently for the past hour or so of travel, conscious that it annoyed both the Sheriff and his hung over guardsmen. They had been walking for perhaps three quarters of an hour and the forest around them was growing taller and wilder. The tidy farmsteads had vanished also, giving way at first to charcoal burners huts, then isolated hunters cottages, before signs of human habitation ceased all together. There was some traffic on the road though, a merchant and a wagon of goods, a trio of trappers bringing furs to market, all of whom nodded personably at the party of soldiers and their strange guests. They were mounted on horses from the city watch stables, Emmaline, having stolen a few in her time managed to keep a saddle, though the effort made her legs ache and her bottom hurt. Riding wasn't a skill you could afford to get too out of practice in she supposed.

"We must be approaching the sight of your... alleged attack yes?" Vandershute asked as the hunter vanished out of view behind a small hill.

"You couldn't have run very far to escape beastmen afterall?" he pressed, his tone as always faultless and yet somehow mocking.

"Not much further I think, perhaps the reputation of you and your men scared them too much to continue the chase," Emmaline replied, unable to avoid needling the sheriff just a little. She didn't know what game he was playing, but whatever it was he was clearly getting ready to make a move. Emmaline didn't much like their chances, nine versus two wasn't great odds, especially if they didn't have surprise on their side, and both Vandershute and his men were clearly watching them carefully.

"There," Emmaline said, pointing to some ripped bark on a large oaktree by the side of the road.

"Claw marks from the beasts," she asserted, it was as likely a regular bear as anything else, but she had been on the look out for anything that might give credence to her made up story and this was the first likely candidate.

"Ah, then let us dismount and see if we can find tracks in the woods," Vandershute declared. Emmaline hoped he might dismount first, giving them a moment to allow their horses to bolt, but the sheriff merely waited for the two strangers to slip from their saddles to the leaf covered roadway.

The Sinful Stars

Annika had not ridden in an escape pod before, and she found little to recommend the experience. No sooner had they been violently thrust from the dying transport, the impact slamming all of them against the walls of the pod, than the deck bucked upwards under the power of the breaking thrusters. Annika was somewhat fortunate in that her fall was cushioned by Orion's body, though the knights muscled chest was scarcely less yielding than steel might have been. A slender hand grabbed her and hoisted her upwards with surprising strength, the pilots concubine had somehow managed to strap herself in and Annika took her help gladly getting the crash harness around her own shoulders. Logan Christopher, better and anticipating disaster than the rest of them had also managed to, more or less, keep his feet and was strapped in, though he seemed to be praying rather than offering aid. Annika supposed that as a member of the clergy she ought to have applauded that, but as someone in need of help she found her piety somewhat strained. Her instructors had liked to say that the Pancreator helped those who helped themselves, Annika preferred the way the al'Malik guardsmen back on Istkar put it. Praise the Pancreator and pass the ammuntion.

Alarms began to sound as the sickening sense of falling increased. Ragnar and Orion had managed to get to their feet now and though they looped the crash webbing around them, neither buckled themselves in completely. Annika did pray now, invoking the Pancreator to guide them to a safe landing and asking forgiveness for the use of her other, less holy arts. The crash webbing smashed downward into her shoulders as the final stages of the breaking thrusters fired, and then, with a shattering crash of rending steel, they hit. For a few seconds Annika's mind went blank, shocked out of coherent experience by her brain bouncing of the inside of her skull, then she was lucid again. There was hiss of invading steam and then a gush of water as the outside environment infiltrated the escape pod. Annika pulled free of her crash webbing without difficulty, it having been set for a larger person than her slight form and stepped across to the exit panel, slapping the manual release. There was a dull crump as the explosive charges in the lining of the door, designed to free a warped hatch, went off and the door flew from its hinges, water rushed in, almost but not quite knocking the priestess from her feet. Bright sunlight flooded the compartment, refracted into rainbow brilliance from the billowing steam hissing of the surface of the friction heated pod.

Annika stepped out onto the lip of the hatch and surveyed her surroundings. The pod had come down a hundred meters or so from an idyllic looking shore. Gentle surf lapped at the pod, hissing as it found high points on the hull that had not yet been quenched. Colorful coral spread out between the pod and the beach where strange twin headed trees rustled in the breeze like palms. The pod was only about a quater submerged having landed on the reef, smashing the coral beneath without quite punching through it. Around them were numerous dead fish with twin tails and flat leaf like profiles. Their skin had been blanched a pale pink by the heat of the pods decent. She turned and looked back into the pod, iris flaring to adjust to the interior lit mostly by emergency chemical lights. To her immense relief Orion was up and moving, helping the strange servant to get free of her own tangled restraints. Ragnar frustrated by Logan's lack of progress, grabbed the scraver by the neck and pitched him bodily out of the hatch to splash into the hip deep water. The pod shifted and began to tip backwards towards the deeper water on the far side of the reef.

"Go!" Orion shouted and handed the slave woman up to Annika who grabbed her by the wrist and tossed her into the water with as little ceremony as Ragnar had shown Logan. The Vuldruk ripped a survival pod away from the wall and clambered up through the hatch a heartbeat ahead of Orion. The Priestess the Knight and the Reaver stepped off onto the coral shelf a moment before the pod toppled backwards into the deep water beyond the fringe of the reef, hissing and spitting as it filled with water and began to sink out of sight. Overhead large birds began to circle and caw, attracted by the dead fish.

"Well," Annika said, taking the emergency pod from Ragnar and withdrawing the auto-inflalting raft.

"At least wherever we are has nice beaches..."

Penny's Pencils

The Sinful Stars

Chapter II

"Are we really going to die for a stupid flag?" Ragnar roared over the increasingly violent screams of the dying transport as it battered its way though the upper reaches of the atmosphere. Metal screamed as bulkheads buckled and superstructure tore away. Unsecured luggage clattered around as the ship continued to try to shake itself to pieces. Annika gripped one of the stantions and avoided being thrown of her feet by a sudden violent jolt that banged her against the steel hull paneling. Paneling she noted, that was growing alarmingly hot. The several thousand tons of steel that made up the Encomienda's hull was a considerable heat sink, but compared to millions of tons of onrushing atmosphere, not considerable enough.

"You are welcome to run for the escape pod," Annika commented sourly, trying not to clutch too desperately at her Jumpgate medallion.

"Oh sure, considering only our noble master can trigger the launch," Logan Christopher replied. The thief was crouched in an agony of indecision, clearly torn between the desire to run for the sole remaining escape pod and wanting to stay close to Orion, the only practical agent of salvation.

"Can you use you arts to save us witch?" Ragnar asked. Annika smiled tightly.

"I can pray for your soul," she offered tersely.

"Pray?! That is the best you can do?" Ragnar snapped, carefully suppressed fear adding an acid edge to his voice.

"Well yoga lessons would be a little impractical at the moment," she returned. There was a resounding crash and a sudden rush of air as something ripped apart forward. The vibration, grew significantly worse and air roared through the compartment, thick with the stink of burning metal and cooking insulation.

"Yoga?" Orion shouted as he stumbled out of the cargo bay, clutching the ceramsteel case that contained the ancient banner the Duke had given to the knight back on Gwyenneth tucked under his arm. Sir Pentecost's surcoat appeared to be smouldering the rushing air igniting and snuffing the flames like a guttering flame. Snarling the knight ripped away the burning fabric tossing it away before the rushing air ripped it from his hand.

"Let's say we get out of here before the Kurgan come back and kill us all, or we smash into the planet?" Logan whined.