Revenge and Retribution - A Rogue Trader Campaign

By Major Kimenth, in Rogue Trader

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Chapter 45 – The Inbetweeners (Part 2)


During their time on Scintilla, after the shenanigans with the Inquisition, the command crew finished off a few things that had been on their radar for quite some time… number one of these was gifting some finely made, though disfigured, statues from their first main endeavour, Svard. Using his newly acquired fame as the ‘Saviour of the Expanse’, Thelonious was able to get the statues sent to many worlds in the Calixis Sector… the fact that they had all been disfigured by an insane Master Craftsman did nothing to disguise the beauty of the work. News of a new Pilgrimage route, to a moon around Svard, where this newly found “Saint” of the Emperor was known to make his home and Pilgrims of all stations and sorts started gathering on Scintilla. Constantine knew this was his chance… he had been “encouraged” to join a group of Pilgrims by the Ecclesiarchy, who wished to get rid of his growing support on Scintilla and that was what had led him to meet Yorke and Thelonious and had brought him back, full circle, to the homeworld of his birth. He was keen to not waste the opportunity.


With his converts from Elerius at his back, Constantine marched his believers and old friends to the Grand Cathedral on Scintilla, gathering quite a crowd with his impressive oratory skills as well as some bribes placed by Yorke and Thelonious, keen to support their friend in his desires. As he came to the steps leading up to the Grand Cathedral, Constantine stopped, planted his Witch Lance haft first into the ground and let out a jet of flame from the top… wielding his Storm Shield on one arm and with his Rosarious a shining beacon of the Emperor’s protection, he looked very much like a figure of legend. With a piece of equipment provided by Yorke, Constantine’s voice boomed out among the promenades, drawing even more people to him. He spoke about the planet of Elerius, a planet that he, personally, had brought back into the Emperor’s light, weaving the narrative to impress and overawe everyone listening. His acolytes did their part, talking about the world of their birth and how it had been reborn by Constantine’s guiding hand and, as the speech continued, streams of novates and priests came from the Grand Cathedral to listen to their returning son.


Constantine could not see any of the senior Clerics, or even some of the Cardinals, and he had not expected to… but they knew that he was back and that his power was ever growing… that he was beyond their control under the auspices of the Deepstalker Dynasty and that he had not forgotten! He finished his speech/sermon/boast with an entreaty to the people gathered there, and those who would hear his words in the future, to join a Pilgrimage to any of the worlds that called the Deepstalker House friends, that they were shining beacons of the Emperor’s light and wonderful places for adventurous souls to make themselves a new life. With that, he stopped and was heartened to hear the complete and utter silence that greeted his last word, girding himself for what he knew was coming, an eruption of noise and power that shook the very foundations of the Grand Cathedral… as he turned his back on the power brokers of the faith… he smiled and walked back to the ship, through the cheering crowds… his work here was done.


Back on the Lathe Worlds, Thelonious was playing off the factions against each other, informing them that he had the location of the Core Cogitator from the Gaunt’s Triumph and he wanted a team of Tech Priests to plunder its riches for the betterment of the Adeptus Mechanicus and mankind as a whole. The fact that they had the Core Cogitator on board the Hope in the Void was another thing entirely… but they didn’t need to know that! For that, all he required was the “Vile Xenos Tech” was stripped from the husk of the Optimus Nemesis and grafted onto his own ship… after all, who better to keep it’s corrupting ways away from the Calixis Sector than someone who leaves for many years at a time. There was a lot of grumbling from the Mechanicus but, in the end, the lure of forgotten knowledge proved too strong and they put their dockyards to work transferring it onto the Hope in the Void, which was now one of the most protected ships in this region of space again boarding actions and other bombers. Thelonious also started throwing money and favours around to get all the factions working on fixing up the Optimus Nemesis… vast amounts of both.


When the dust settled on this decision, the command crew realised that the approximate wealth of a planet like Elerius had been spent to align all the Factions to one task, money was also needed to mollify some of the other contractees that had engaged the Lathe Worlds and other things. However, in the end, Thelonious estimated that the time it would take for the Optimus Nemesis to be repaired would be halved, bringing the immense and ancient ship into the Deepstalker Dynasty in only a few years, rather than a decade… it would be money well spent! Also, due to some impressive negotiating by Thelonious and Yorke, they also formed a partnership to investigate building a waystation at Jezarol as Thelonious had realised that most traffic heading to Winterscales Realm ended up going through there due to the way the Warp lanes seemed to be, and it would be a very profitable venture. The last thing to do before leaving was to get his Displacer Field blessed by the Omnissiah because the blasted thing had not worked once since he acquired it from the Styrix… Thelonious didn’t know if it would work, but he knew it was worth trying!


The final thing on Thelonious’s “list of things to do whilst in the Calixis Sector (name pending)” was to try and give back the mutated body of the Storm Warden Astartes, that they encountered on Damaris, back to his Chapter. Yorke had heard rumours that their homeworld was located in the Calixis Sector and had taken the time to visit some of the massive archives of information that were located on Scintilla, her keen mind and robust memory (and love of lore) soaking up the words and pictures that she was allowed to see. Somehow, when she pulled together various random stories and myths from lots of disparate places it allowed her to figure out that the Storm Warden’s homeworld was in the system of Sacris, a place that, she had found out, was known to have a massive plague outbreak, and thus was quarantined… not the place you really want to go! However, Thelonious was adamant… they had a duty to give back the body to his brethren and that is what they were going to do… if the worst came to the worst they would just leave the body in the general area and hope it got picked up.


As the Hope in the Void dropped out of warp, seamlessly, as usual, the ship found itself in the middle of some communication buoys, stating that the system on this route was a Forbidden World by order of the Adeptus Terra and that any travelling past this did so at their own risk… and the risk of being destroyed. The command crew got to work, Yorke and Isendark worked together to send numerous radio communications, all saying exactly the same thing, whilst Mistress Valentina joined her Choir to do the same in the etheric realm of the warp. The message stated, simply, that they believed they had found one of their brethren and wanted to return them from whence they came… although with a lot more flowery and incredibly deferential language. With nothing else to do, the Hope in the Void just floated through space, close to the warning buoys as Thelonious waited to see if his gamble would pay off… and pay off it did. The warning that the command crew got was measured in minutes, their Navigators failing to sense anything coming through the calm warp lanes around them, it was only Isendark, using the aetheric sensors, that spotted it.


“It” turned out to be a Storm Warden Battle Barge, which emerged from the warp incredibly close to their position, a piece of skilful navigating that was the hallmark of the Astartes… everything about them was legendary. Lt. Haines did not even bother asking whether the Captain would like to receive the hail, he put it directly through, as a booming voice filled the bridge, with a mechanical taint to the voice. “Prepare for embarkation of 20 Astartes on your Port side. Resistance is ill advised.” Thelonious was quick to order everyone out of that area, whilst simultaneously ordering the mutated marine to be brought, with honour, to that area of the ship and then he, with his command crew and Stormtrooper escort, made their way quickly to the referenced area. Everyone but Bazak, of course, who made his way to the Arboretum to play with his snotlings… and to stay out of the way of the Angels of Death who were coming on board. And words just didn’t do the Adeptus Astartes justice… the sense of awe that those present felt was beyond most other feelings… Thelonious likened it to how he had felt during the Eldar performance… not that he was going to own up to that particular escapade here!


As the airlock opened, the Astartes quickly moved into battle position… even though their weapons were not to hand, everyone present could see that the formation they had chosen allowed for a quick regress and covering fire if necessary… the Astartes were arrogant by the standards of men, but they were never idiots. Dressed in Power Armour of ancient design and providence, the Space Marines, the Angels of Death… they were here. Almost as one, the Astartes moved to the side, providing a perfect corridor for their commanding officer to walk through, the heavy thuds of his Power Armour reverberating around the area. The Marine strode up to Thelonious, with Thelonious’s head increasing the angle of view as the Marine loomed large in front of him, and took off his helmet, revealing a face alive with tattoos of a strange make and pattern, with white hair and a face that looked weathered by the ages… it was impossible to tell how old this Marine was. His voice had a deep reverberation that went through almost everyone in the room… they could tell he was speaking softly, but it still shook them to their very core.


“I am Brother-Captain Balen Stormward. You are either extremely brave or foolish to have come this close to forbidden space. We received your message with a sense of curiosity, which is what brought us out here.”


“I am Thelonious T Deepstalker of House Deepstalker. You honour us with your presence oh Mighty Angels of Death. I felt that returning one of your own would be worth the risk… any risk to see the fallen back in their proper place.”


Balen turned and spoke in a language that none understood, gesturing at his troops and one of their number moved towards him with crisp, functional, strides. As the Marine came up, Thelonious spoke.


“If that is your medic, or however you classify them, I believe that I should inform you more of the circumstances of how we found your Brother.” At the Brother-Captains nod, Thelonious continued. “He was found on the world of Lucins Breath and was taken from that world by those who did not realise his nature. Your Brother has been changed by the Dark Powers of the Warp and they did not know as his form had altered somewhat. He was taken to Damaris where he ended up the Champion of their Pit Fighting Arena battles… until he was slain by a Filthy Xenos who took up his mantle of Champion.”


“We have been looking for you for the last 4 years, but information on your Chapter is very sparse indeed… in fact, if it wasn’t for my Seneschals efforts, and a lot of money, we would not be standing here together.”


Brother-Captain Stormward looked down on Thelonious, his old face holding surprisingly young looking eyes, and asked to see his fallen Brother. The medical staff, with the greatest of care, brought forth the Stasis Casket he had been interned into and it slowly opened to their touch. The Brother-Captain and his medic moved round to look, their hands pressing down on the fallen body of their fallen Brother. Balen turned his head to look at Thelonious, “No Storm Warden would have wanted to live like this… my Brother was searching for death in the Arenas of Damaris and it found him… you have done a noble thing Thelonious T Deepstalker.”


The conversation, such as it was, moved towards the planet where the Storm Warden had been found. Thelonious promised to send over the co-ordinates of the planet after talking about its location and the fact that he had no more information to give. With their business concluded, Thelonious was treated to the rare honour of a Astartes Salute before the Marines left and travelled back to their own Battle Barge, fallen Brother in tow. Almost as soon as the co-ordinates were sent across, the Battle Barge translated into the Warp but, by the pattern of their Warp signature, which Isendark skilfully figured out, they were not travelling back to their own system, they were heading towards the Maw! Given this was the last thing that Thelonious had planned on doing before heading back to the Expanse, he ordered the Hope in the Void to follow… but the Astartes had ways of traversing the warp that were unknown to simple humans and Thelonious and his command crew had to make diversions as they went through areas of unstable space, whereas the Battle Barge could just go directly through.


As the Hope in the Void dropped out of the warp near Port Wander, they found the inhabitants still talking about the Astartes Battle Barge that had barrelled through the Maw a few weeks ago and, after a refuelling and provisioning stop, translated through the Maw into the Koronus Expanse… a journey that was remarkably stable, even in this area of stability between two Warp Storms. As they emerged near Footfall, they were greeted by Sylvia Locke, still in command of the Aegis and when they informed her that they had met with those very same Space Marines, with video footage to prove it, her reaction was not as extreme as they might have thought. Locke was just getting used to the craziness that either followed or prefaced Thelonious T Deepstalker… whether it was Space Marines, Orks or Eldar… it was better to just accept the madness! She did, however, inform them that she had been contacted by someone who asked her to inform them that this person wished to meet them. The command crew was, obviously, sceptical about this but Sylvia Locke vouched for this person, who wanted to remain anonymous, and the tone of her voice told them they should probably to go to the meeting.


It turned out that they didn’t need to go to the meeting, the meeting came to them. As the crew finished the docking procedures, Yorke’s network of informants in the crew told her that someone was waiting in the middle of the main loading platform and, after informing the Lord High Captain of this fact, Yorke went to meet them. They were standing, bold as brass, as if they did not care what people knew they were here for, a voluminous cloak their only protection against being recognised, but Yorke got the impression this was purely for show, to add to the uncertainty of many people who were giving this figure a wide berth. With Rolaine standing, mostly hidden, off to the side, Yorke approached the figure. The figure shrugged off the hood of the cloak, to reveal a scarred visage along with a tattoo/brand of a hammer on their left cheek, who nodded at Yorke, and at Rolaine, and introduced themselves as Lorric Devondale, High Inquisitor of the Ordo Malleus. Yorke swore under her breath but then smiled at the Inquisitor and asked after his business… and soon found herself escorting the Inquisitor to a meeting room, whilst notifying the Captain to come on down.


The Captain turned up with the rest of the command crew in tow… it was never a bad idea to show a degree of strength when dealing with the Inquisition. Lorric greeted them all by name, and with enough information about them that the command crew realised that he had, indeed, done his homework on them, and that he had the resources to do that… there were more than one way to show your strength. After Thelonious asked the High-Inquisitor why he was there, the answer was extremely interesting to the Lord High Captain.


“Riddle me this. I oversee a sub-sector in the Calixis Sector. As part of that responsibility, I have taken a large interest in Astropaths and their ability to divine the future. A few months ago the Astropaths under my direct command had a vision. This vision was so powerful that it left half of them dead, and the other half less than perfectly sane. It appears that the Warlords of the Screaming Vortex are gathering for reasons unknown, all their usual internecine strife forgotten. Why they are doing this? I, and my organisation, do not know. Now, before they died, the Astropaths babbled random words that seemed to have no connection to each other but, after close viewings of the recordings, a few words stood out beyond anything else. The main one was in reference to a planet that I had never heard of… Elerius. Now, I had no idea where to start looking until I found a few things out. Firstly, that a Rogue Trader family, the Deepstalkers, had a vessel called the Light of Elerius. Secondly, that there is a newly discovered metal being passed around the Adeptus Mechanicus called Elerium. All this could have been coincidence.”


“But then, after Confessor Constantine’s wonderful performance on Scintilla, where Elerius was mentioned completely, I realised that it was you, Thelonious, that I should talk to. So, what is it?”


Thelonious looked at the High Inquisitor, wondering just how much to tell him, as he had a great deal of trepidation about what a conflict with the Inquisition could do… but, in the end, he decided to inform him of most things.


“What it is, is the fact that I appear to be cursed! I was out searching for the Dread Pearl when the ship was hit by a Warp Storm and it ejected our ship into the eye of the storm, where there was an untouched planet with a thriving population. As Constantine has shown, the inhabitants are pure, uncorrupted, humans who are now fervent worshippers of the God-Emperor. Even the Psykers on the planet seemed to be uncorrupted… other than that, it seems to be a very normal planet. What else did your Astropaths say?”


When Lorric informed them that it appeared that Elerius had something to do with the Warlords gathering in the Screaming Vortex, the conversation turned into more of a negotiation… Lorric needed their help to go to Elerius and investigate what his Astropaths died for, but was also too savvy and knowledgeable to demand Thelonious’s help… not that Thelonious really wanted to antagonise the High Inquisitor… he wanted to get to the bottom of it as well, Elerius could be the jewel in the Deepstalker Empire eventually! The High Inquisitor would bring his own team of 9 (plus one other) on the mission but otherwise would concede authority to Thelonious, except where the Imperium should take precedence… terms that Thelonious thought were quite generous, which made him somewhat more worried for Elerius… maybe these Astropaths had seen something truly terrible and that is why they were dead. Also, there wasn’t really that much of a rush, the danger on Elerius was not immediate, and the Warlords would take many months, if not years, to gather a force enough to cause any damage.


After a few days on Footfall, provisioning the colonists they had gathered before, and making sure they had enough stores for a long journey, the Hope in the Void welcomed the High Inquisitor’s team, as well as some news of the wider Expanse. Hadrek Fel, their nemesis, was also doing well, having claimed three worlds, in the Ragged Worlds sector of the Expanse, as his own… it looked like both families were rebuilding their power base, although for what purpose other than profit, no-one was willing to hazard a guess. They also learnt that Zayth was even more messed up than it had been before they visited, with entire landships being discarded so that the inhabitants could tear each other apart… which when you added on the red haze that had settled over the planet, made some of the command crew rather nervous! The Inquisitor’s team was as impressive as they had expected, Stormtroopers, other Inquisitors, a Psyker of awesome power, a lady who seemed to change her appearance and… well, something kept in a stasis field. The word Eversor was heard whispered by someone but, as long as it was pointed at the enemy, Thelonious didn’t mind… too much!


As the Hope in the Void pulled away from Footfall, the command crew and the Inquisitorial Team gathered to plot their next moves. Thelonious had held his own private conference with his trusted advisors and had realised that the Inquisition probably needed to know more about Elerius than they had told them up until now… after all, they thought they knew some of the reasons why the world might be a prize for the Ruinous Powers. The admission that one of the moons of Elerius held 400 Iron Men was met with stunned silence and then disbelief, and then, as they showed them pictures and their records, stunned acceptance… such a force could tilt the balance of power in the entire Expanse, maybe even the Calixis Sector. Thelonious took a gamble and informed them what had happened to the other 100, how they had turned into Daemons and summoned onto this very ship, and how the selfless actions of Constantine and Mistress Valantina had helped to close the portal… the looks on the Inquisitors teams faces was a picture. They also informed them of their theory about why Elerius was untainted, with the Iron Men soaking up all the Warp Energies instead. Thelonious did, however, omit the means by which he disposed of the disintegrated remains of the iron men that they destroyed.


The two teams agreed to share as much information as they could about Elerius, about the Iron Men and about Daemons and Warp Storms… both sides realised that if the forces of Chaos could get their hands on Elerius then it would be a catastrophe. Just as the Inquisition team was preparing to go to their quarters, Thelonious stopped them with another bombshell… Karrad Vall had fought all of them at the same time, which after a quick scan from the Inquisitorial Psyker, was confirmed but… the main point that Thelonious was trying to make was that they had his Daemon Weapon, in a hexagramically warded box, inside a stasis field, on this very ship. After stating that Thelonious was full of surprises, High Inquisitor Lorric Devondale thanked Thelonious for his candour and asked to see where the weapon was kept. As they moved through the ship, they spoke about their desire to see a weapon such as this destroyed but that one as powerful as Bane would have to be investigated first… throwing it into a sun could actually corrupt the sun, such was the power of the weapon.


Finally (because when you are telling a few secrets, you may as well tell almost all of them) Thelonious informed the Inquisitorial team that his discovered of Elerius did not seem to be an accident… they had been thrown there by a Greater Daemon of the Pleasure God, one who had haunted their lives for a while now. The High Inquisitor shook his head at this cavalcade of secrets, each one raising the potential stakes of the mission… although the Inquisitor seemed to take most of this in his stride, although how much of that was due to being on Thelonious’s ship was not clear! As the Hope in the Void translated into the Warp on the edge of the Feribundus system, each team was left to their own thoughts, with the potential stakes of the mission rising ever higher… they had Colonists to drop off somewhere, they were bound with a Daemon and they had Bane on board… not the most auspicious of beginnings to a Grand Endeavour!
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Chapter 46 – One Deliverance (with a side order of Plague)


Thelonious, never one to potter around with a potential crisis brewing, decided to heroically go the complete opposite direction to Elerius and visit the Eldar in the Serpents Cradle… after all, why not? Luckily for him, Isendark’s natural cautious nature (when it came to the Eldar anyway), meant that they translated back into normal space and went immediately to Silent Running, using only their passive sensors to scan the binary system. This turned out to be a very wise idea as their sensors were picking up lots of Eldar ships and the pattern they were travelling in seemed to suggest it was some kind of combat patrol… they were looking for something… or someone. Thelonious gave the order to break into their radio communications which, due to their previous experience, Yorke and Bazak actually found less difficult than they expected. The Eldar did not appear to change their ciphers that often, obviously their arrogance extended to their combat protocols as well and Thelonious was happy to take advantage. The phrase that they heard repeated the most often as “they have to come back here sometime, keep up the vigilance… patience will be rewarded.”


As the command crew was trying to decide what to do, Yorke detected an underlying communication cipher which was masked by the ongoing communications and, upon deciphering it, they found a set of co-ordinates. Being a naturally curious soul, and deciding that the message was for his crew to find (having faith in their abilities, if not their personalities sometimes), Thelonious gave the order and the Hope in the Void slinked to starboard, Isendark managing the engines and ship perfectly. So perfectly, in fact, that their sensors managed to pick up the Eldar ship that was waiting for them whilst keeping themselves hidden… it was the Hellebore, crewed by Captain Opwith and Farseer Beljalanor, Eldar known for their less than hostile attitude to the command crew. Given his slight rivalry with the Captain, Thelonious decided that the Hope in the Void would filter in behind the Eldar Cruiser and then would just follow them around until, either, they were detected or Thelonious got bored! As it turned out, Isendark’s ability to keep hidden was better than the Eldar’s ability to detect them and, after about half an hour, Thelonious decided to put them out of their misery.


Amongst the, typically emotionally controlled, Eldar, Captain Opwith thought himself as one who could keep his emotions calm no matter what he was feeling internally… Thelonious knew this, which is why he celebrated, inside, when the Captain was obviously annoyed when appearing on the holograph. He was soon replaced by Beljalanor who seemed relieved to see Thelonious unharmed. The Farseer explained that the fact that the Craftworld had been reclaimed from the forces of Chaos (a good thing) had been overtaken by the fact that the Crow Spirits were still without a home (a bad thing) and that Thelonious had taken a 2 year sojourn in the Calixis Sector rather than come back and inform the Crow Spirits first hand. In essence, they were pissed! The Farseer warned Thelonious not to contact them as they would fire first and take prisoners later… the Hellebore was also here to give Thelonious his promised gift, an Eldar Runecaster that they sent over instructions how to install… Constantine was not happy about having such Xeno-Tech on board, but Thelonious convinced him that the upside was worth it. After the deal was done, and fond farewells were made, the Hellebore disappeared into the webway.


Thelonious, never one to take the exact safe option, decided to send a message to Farseer Caille, despite being told that he was persona non grata to the Crow Spirits… after all, what was life without a little risk? Mistress Valentina hypothesised that the Farseer would be able to detect the general area where her astropathic message had come from, so Yorke started seeing to the process of praying and general warding that happened before the translation into warp… they wanted to be able to make a quick escape when the message was sent. It didn’t help that the message that was sent was the equivalent of an astropathic *****-slap, informing the Farseer that Thelonious T Deepstalker had come to see him and that his hospitality was lacking… but that he was prepared to forgive and forget as long as he was granted an audience. The response was almost immediate, although not by Astropathic message, as the patrol routines of the Crow Spirit vessels suddenly changed and the radio chatter between Eldar Vessels picked up somewhat. The ships started doing active scans, showing themselves on the passive sensors on the Hope in the Void and there were more than the command crew had thought!


The Hope in the Void stayed in the system for a little longer until one of the Frigates started getting a little too close to their position when Thelonious, with a sigh, ordered them to translate into the Warp, a quick jump for a few days so that the Eldar, if they spotted them, could not follow them to their eventual destination. The command crew then came together to discuss their next step. Bazak wanted to go and visit his kin in the Undred Undred Teeth and, to the surprise of most of the crew, Thelonious was not actively opposed to such a course of action. However, after hearing the objections of his Seneschal, Astropath and Arch-Militant, Thelonious shelved that idea for another time and, given their current location, decided that they would go to Elerius, via Zayth… although they did not intend on going in system at all, they had heard the stories and the rumours about what was happening there… not that they had anything to do with it! The trip to Zayth used to take the Hope in the Void around 4 months but with the Eldar Runecasters helping the Navigators (not that they were happy to use the technology), it was almost cut in half.


The Hope in the Void literally stayed in the system for the least amount of time possible before reorienting itself towards Elerius. The plan was to travel in the warp for about half of the time, exit and then reorient themselves for the trip through the Warp Storms surrounding Elerius… this would give them the best chance of finding the exact spot they travelled through it last time, which would be key to avoid being thrown off course… and potentially avoiding Daemonic attack. Thelonious spent a lot of time with the High Inquisitor, partly because it was expected, partly because the High Inquisitor was making a lot of effort to ingratiate himself with the command crew and partly to find out his agenda. The rest of the command crew pottered around as they were want to do during Warp Travel, with everyone coming back together for their exit from the Warp. It was there, when the Navigators were casting around for the Astronomicon and for the next part of their journey that Navigator Primus, in a metallic voice from inside his chamber, informed the command crew that they were unable to locate the Warp Storm.


Lorric and his Primaris Psyker were concerned by this… a Warp Storm was a cancer on realspace as well was the Warp and whilst their knowledge did not go as deep as the Navigator, they knew enough to voice their concerns to Thelonious. Thelonious, also, had his own concerns, especially given that they had done some research that indicated that the reason the Psykers on Elerius were so pure and untouched by the Warp was due to the Warp Storm… and the Iron Men soaking up that energy… the fact there did not appear to be a Warp Storm was, indeed, concerning. Still, until they arrived at Elerius, they wouldn’t know… for all the command crew knew, the Slaaneshi Daemon was obscuring their sight so that they would fly right into a Warp Storm… so Thelonious gave the command and on they went. The trip was very smooth… almost too smooth… but it was obvious that there was no Warp Storm and the sense of unease that the command crew felt started growing by the day, until they translated back into realspace… and the sight of the Warp Storm, which had been visible to the naked eye, in orbit, was noticeable by its absence.


The first thing that Constantine noticed was that the signal being broadcast from his Holy Equipment on the planet was still there, although it was not as clear as it used to be… it was almost as if the equipment had suffered some damage… Constantine promised vengeance of anyone who had undone even part of his work. From orbit, however, Elerius looked exactly the same, as did the two moons that surrounded it… it looked as though nothing was wrong at all… Thelonious was immediately suspicious! The decision was made to do a high and low altitude sweep of the planet and the Aeronautica stepped up to the task with alacrity. As the radio and personal reports started coming back in, the command crew started seeing the vision of a planet in the midst of a crisis. There appeared to be heavy fighting in the North East, with multiple armies of men battling it out across a wide and ever changing front, although who they belonged to they could not see. They had seen smoke rising from some of the cities and towns near to the mountains in the North East, including from the Holy City, which is where Constantine reforged the populace’s faith in the God-Emperor.


Thelonious knew that they needed more information than high level reconnaissance was able to provide and so, after informing the High Inquisitor of his plan to head down to the planet, Thelonious and his command crew took one of their more military shuttles and headed down to the Witch Queen’s city. As they flew down they saw many signs that the struggle may be more intense than they had thought… crops were rotting in the fields, signs of general disrepair, not much mercantile traffic on the roads… all signs of failing economy. Their greeting was not the same as it had been when they conquered the city, a few nobles, women all, tired looking and some with a pallor that spoke of their sickness… this was not the city they had left. As they were shown in to the throne room to see the Witch Queen, they spotted another familiar face, Prince Dukov, who was on a similarly ornate throne to the side of the Witch Queen… indicating that she had taken him as her husband. Both of them looked haggard, with the eyes of the Witch Queen indicating that she had seen horrors that few would understand, that they had little sleep over the last few months and that they were typifying the malaise on Elerius.


The learned that Elerius had been peaceful until about a year and a half ago, when the Witch Queen’s sleep was invaded by thoughts and creatures she had never seen before… she had managed to fight them off, but all around Elerius there were reports of people turning into ravening monsters. That would have been enough, but then the impassable mountains to the North East turned out to not be that impassable, as a massive armed force crossed the mountains and started laying waste to everything in their path… including the Holy City. The Witch Queen had married Prince Dukov out of necessity, so they could combine their forces to bully the other city states to joining their grand alliance and for the past year their forces had been trying to push back against the barbarian hordes. She thought that they would have triumphed as well, but about the same time as the first major battles, a sickness started spreading throughout Elerius that their medical science had no chance with… with some of the afflicted turning into mutated versions of themselves and going mad… this diluted the pool of warriors they had to draw from and had led to the stalemate/slight retreat situation.


Constantine questioned the Witch Queen on the level of faith amongst the people and was distressed to learn that, since the Holy City fell, and the sickness that has been spreading, that people were losing faith in the God-Emperor and turning more towards the Fire Giant in the Sky. Constantine and his acolytes immediately turned and left the throne room, with Constantine directing his acolytes to spread out amongst the remaining populace in the city and spread the word of the God-Emperor anew, as he, himself, went to check on the hospitals and sanatoriums around the city, wanting to see this sickness up close and personal. What he saw was not pleasant… people with blisters that covered their entire faces, people whose insides had turned into their outsides, coughing and rasping everywhere, this was no mere sickness, it was a plague! In fact, as he was giving the last rites to a group of dying peasants, he realised that the plague was not natural in origin… in fact, in the deep corners and recesses of his memory, a couple of words came to mind… the first word was one that he would not dare mention, but the second word was rot… this was what he was witnessing.


He had confirmation of this when he felt the tendrils of the sickness trying to attach themselves to him… not physical, but it felt almost physical to Constantine, as it felt similarly physical when his inner faith came forth to burn the corruption away… he now knew he was facing the work of the Plague Lord. Upon his return, he passed on this information to the Lord High Captain who made an immediate decision, they would go and check on the Iron Men in the moon and then they would come back down and help out the Witch Queen against the Barbarian Invasion. During the two years they had spent in the Calixis Sector, Marcia Cross had been hard at working taking the surplus of equipment that had been provided and finding homes for it. Thelonious now had a fighting force of around 5,000 men, all armed with Bolt Guns and Carapace Armour, with the Svardian PDF and the Stormtroopers as their veteran core… he had been itching to try them out! However, before that, the command crew took a detour into the barbarian lands, flying over the mountains to see what they could learn.


What they learned sickened them, there was a large green mist hanging over most of the, previously fertile, lands on the other side of the mountains… so the decision was made not to land. They could see the camps of the barbarians, they could see smaller tunnels through the mountains and, whilst these were a nomadic people, they appeared to be incredibly well organised. With troubling vision after troubling vision, Mistress Valentina started talking about orbital bombardments of this area, whilst Rolaine wanted to do a decapitating strike, whilst Constantine was in favour of burning… unsurprisingly! After returning to the Hope in the Void, Thelonious briefed the High Inquisitor of some of the goings on, on Elerius, but said they had not finished their investigations yet… and then they left for the Second Moon. Just in case, Bazak decided to model off his new Mega Armour, 5 years in the making, and needless to say the command crew was in awe/terrified at the walking factory that he had turned into. The Power Klaw (made from many power swords) and his Twin-Linked Multi-Melta, as well as his immense height, meant he needed an entire shuttle to himself!


The Ork led the way through the Second Moon, although the command crew were finding that all the precautions they had left in place were still there. Yorke got them through the first door with her passwords, Isendark and Yorke combined on the inner door… everything was as it was, but Thelonious could not shake off the sneaking suspicion that something was wrong. Bazak leaped down the shaft first and the command crew waited… nothing happened. Everyone joined Bazak down at the bottom… nothing happened. Thelonious opened the plain wooden door that led into the room containing the Iron Men… nothing happened. And the reason why nothing had happened became apparent as the lights turned on and, instead of 400 Iron Men, standing in unison as before, there were 400 separate dust piles, 100 each of 4 different colours… Sickly Green, Ecstatic Pink, Lightning Blue and Purple/Black. Considering that the 100 they had sold to Zayth had been a Rusty Red colour, Thelonious, Constantine and Yorke began to see a pattern that they wish they couldn’t! All three of the exclaimed at the same time, as they realised that the Daemons that had been bound in those Iron Men were free.


However, Rolaine almost sparked an incident amongst the command crew when she spoke to the Captain about what properties these different dusts would have, prompting a rather curious “what properties?” from Constantine, who had been unconscious when they had melted down and turned into a drug the previous Iron Men. Luckily, for command crew unity, Constantine did not really have a frame of reference to his question, so he was able to be talked down… but Rolaine knew that Constantine would not have approved of what they did on Zayth. With Bazak (or more importantly, his mega armour) not needed, they called for a shuttle to carry some equipment over to winch the Ork out, much to his toofy amusement. The rest of the command crew left everything exactly how they found it, dust piles included, and closed up the Moon on their way out, got back on the shuttle and found themselves travelling back to the Hope in the Void. On the way, Thelonious sent a message for the High Inquisitor, and his two Inquisitorial cohorts, to join him in the usual meeting room, they definitely had something to discuss!


The first thing on the agenda… the fact that the Plague Lord seemed to have a hold on Elerius. Both Constantine’s observations and descriptions, and then Thelonious’s further observations and their Medicae Labs findings, convinced the High Inquisitor that this was the case. When it came to the discussion of the Iron Men… or the lack of them, the discussion moved more towards where the other Daemons had gone… after all, if the Plague Lord was on Elerius, then that explains where those Daemons were, but nothing had been seen of the servants of the Pleasure God or the Lord of Fate… which concerned High Inquisitor Lorric even more than the events on Elerius. With the dust of the Iron Men “safe” for now, Lorric informed the command crew that the Ordo Malleus had ways and means of potentially disposing of such remains, although it was always a fraught process… which then led onto the inevitable question, asked by Constantine, of how the command crew had disposed of the last batch! Luckily, Thelonious was good at thinking on his feet, he wove a story of sacrifice and ingenuity and never actually got to how they had disposed of the Khornate Iron Men before he moved the topic onto something else.


In the end, Lorric agreed to send his two Inquisitors down to the planet to investigate the sickness, with a few guardsmen from Thelonious as their bodyguards, whilst he also hinted as sending another of his assets down to the planet to investigate as well. With the investigation angle mostly covered, and the hope they would find something quickly, Constantine started agitating for a show of Faith to show the planet that they had not been abandoned… he wanted to start a crusade to recover the Holy City, with the armies of Elerius proving the impetus, but with their Guardsmen melting any troops that stood in their way. They would then be followed up by Flamer Squads to cleanse the Plague that seemed to be driving the Barbarians… allowing the armies of Elerius to take part would also show them how “blessed” they were by the Emperor… this was mainly for PR purposes, to stop the drift away from worshipping the God-Emperor that had been taking place. Mistress Valentina had a slightly different opinion… she thought that if the Island off to the west of the main continent was in full working order, then screw the rest of the planet… her view was in the minority.


With that decided, Thelonious and his command crew (sans Isendark) took a shuttle down, near to the front of one of the major battles that looked like occurring. The men seemed dispirited and, in some cases, sick, with a seemingly inexorable enemy that kept attacking and attacking, and all they did was react… and men liked it when they were moving forward, not repelling those attacking. Thelonious, with Rolaine and Prince Dukov (who had needed to travel to the front anyway) strode into the command tent, with all the various Generals and Captains clustered around a table, arguing about the best way to deal with the situation. A shot from Thelonious’s Bolt Pistol shut them all up as Thelonious announced that Marshall Rolaine would take over from now on and, whilst the commanders were digesting this (some of whom has never met any of the command crew), Thelonious threw open the entry to the tent and gestured… “you have weathered this test and now deliverance is upon you.” With that signal, the Teleportarium on the Hope in the Void was activated and Isendark arrived on the planet, in his Leman Russ, with 500 Guardsman in tow… Thelonious turned back to the commanders, “Now… let’s win!”

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Chapter 47 – A Little Setback...


After holding discussions with the Generals, and after cross referencing what they were told with their own aerial reconnaissance, Thelonious and Rolaine had more of the picture in mind of how this conflict could play out. On the barbarians side, they had the numbers, with an estimate of over 30,000 troops against their own force of circa 15,000… but, on a more positive note, they had a tank, and 500 battle tested, armoured Guardsmen, with more arriving every 30 minutes… and they had guns! The terrain was pretty flat, the Mountains off in the distance behind the barbarians merged into foothills and then onto flat plains, ideal for growing crops… indeed, this area of the continent was renowned for the extensive amount of grain they could grow… although, most of that was rotting in the fields, given that most people had been conscripted into the army. The weather conditions were incredibly clement… those Mountains in the background kept away a lot of the storms that flew in from the sea and the sun was shining down on what the allied army hoped would be a stunning victory.


Based on previous battles with the barbarians, they seemed to travel in long columns, aiming for specific points in the allied battle line and then smashing through with superior numbers, and with a level of flexibility that allowed them to alter their battle point quite effectively… it was a tactic that the allied Generals still had no answer to… although Rolaine was confident she did. Thelonious had decided that Rolaine would be in overall command of the battle… he knew that he himself was a superlative leader of men, as he had proven in the Battle for Cog, but he knew that Rolaine excelled in larger conflicts, as she had proven in the War for Damaris… Rolaine had Thelonious’s complete and utter trust.


Rolaine’s plan was simple in its execution… she would use the barbarians tactics against them… after all, they had not faced automatic weapons in this war so far. The House Deepstalker Guardsmen were to be parcelled out through the allied force, but also concentrated on specific weak points that Rolaine wanted to present to the barbarian soldiers. When the barbarians reached the weak points, the allied army was to give way so that the Guardsmen could have a field day with enfilading fire.


With the plan in place, the command crew took their places along the battle line; Rolaine was at the back, relying on reconnaissance flights to give her a good view of the coming battle; Thelonious, with Bazak, was marching down the allied line, inspiring the men with his presence and speeches, before making his way to anchoring the right side of the line. Constantine, and his acolytes, took their place at the very centre of the line, their sermons and righteous hatred stirring up all the soldiers around them… a mass of frenzied troops, just waiting to slaughter. Yorke joined Isendark in the Leman Russ, taking the main gunnery position as they waited for the attack whilst Mistress Valentina, with a couple of Guardsmen for support, just took a random position slightly behind the main lines… the command crew were ready! As the barbarian horde took their positions on the other side of the plain, they started chanting… a vile, horrific chant that made any right thinking person’s insides do loops and start to crawl out of their stomach and the command crew suddenly understood why the barbarians had been so successful.


Constantine immediately began his own chant, calling upon the Emperor for protection and the righteous fury to defeat the forces of Chaos and, although the words were unfamiliar to most, soon they were flowing from the lips of the entire allied force, deadening some of the impact of the barbarian chant. Then, as suddenly as the chant had started up, it finished and the barbarians started making their way towards the allied battle line, a charge of such ferocity that it started shaking the ground as they increased in speed... even the command crew were impressed with just how this felt, and they had conquered entire worlds! As the barbarians neared, Bazak’s bloodlust and just general Orkyness overcame him and he charged out of the lines, his modified Heavy Bolter spraying explosive shells over the Barbarian Line, until his Bolter ran out of ammo (which happened very quickly), so he slung it back onto his back and activated his Power Klaw before crashing into the charging barbarians like a bowling ball into a set of pins. Not to be outdone, Constantine led his Lance to consume the tainted barbarians, a grinding melee in front of the main battle line.


The rest of the battle appeared to be going according to Rolaine’s plan, with fighters and bombers strafing the barbarian line as they approached, the Demolisher Cannon on the Leman Russ speaking, it’s fury directed into the ground at the feet of the barbarians, sending them pin wheeling into the air, or disintegrated where they stood. Suddenly, or so it seemed, the battle lines came together with a crash and a frenzy of hacking and slashing and base ferocity was the norm. The numbers of the barbarians, despite the automatic weapons of the Guardsmen, were telling, with elements of the allied armies lines starting to splinter and break, although the situation on the far right was far more under control, with Bazak splitting the attacking forces like a whirling dervish of destruction and Thelonious working his way out of the melee to join the Ork. Mistress Valentina was utilising her command of the Warp to send out pressure waves against the attacking forces in her area, sending them spiralling away with liquefied organs… even the frenzy of the barbarians could not stand against her Witchcraft.


Constantine was in the thick of the fighting, his armour protecting him from most strikes, and his faith in the Emperor protecting him from the rest, his Witch Lance singing as it cut down the barbarians, gouts of flame catching others… the natives were dying with a song of the Emperor on their lips and there could be no finer death. However, the rest of the fight had got to a critical phase, the main strike of the barbarians was beginning to batter their way through Rolaine’s weak points, and the guardsmen were not cutting down as many as she had foreseen in her plan… maybe she had erred in her thinking? As the battle line began to unravel and the natives started to run, she heard the message that she had been waiting for… the Teleportarium was ready again… she directed them down just behind the breach so, just as the barbarians broke through and the natives scattered, they melted in a fusillade of bolter fire. This was the turning point that Rolaine had been waiting for, and she signalled Isendark and Yorke to lead the counterattack in their tank, which they were delighted to do.


With the command crew leading the charge the barbarian attacks started to lessen and they started to be pushed back… Bazak and Thelonious slaughtered many on their own, the Ork never tiring and Thelonious living up to his name, whilst Constantine and Mistress Valentina pushed their attacks back in their own ways. Isendark and Yorke ripped a hole in the barbarian lines, Heavy Bolter spindles cutting down barbarians by the tens, the Demolisher Cannon taking out their reserves and the actual tank crushing the barbarians under its treads. Even with this, however, the barbarians did not rout… they withdrew in good order until they were off the field of battle… the command crew could see they had killed almost 10,000 of them, for the cost of a few thousand of their own, and the bombing would further erode their numbers until they pulled back into the cover of the Mountains… they had won! However, that still left almost 20,000 barbarian troops so Thelonious and Rolaine, after 3,000 of their Guardsmen had come down via the Teleportarium, had 2,500 of the native troops join them and left the remaining army to keep this place under control.


For the main reason for this fight had been to set up a march on the Holy City, where Constantine had started the revolution from the Fire Giant to the Emperor, and which had been sacked and despoiled by the barbarian forces… and they needed some native troops for the PR value, and to give them the lay of the lands so, after a few days’ rest, the march continued. With their complete and utter aerial domination, Rolaine was able to have up-to-date reports on the enemies movements and, when a barbarian force that was camped near the Holy City started to move back into the city, she, and the rest of the command crew found it rather odd, it did not fit their usual behaviour and, normally, when things did not fit your usual behaviour, it was a trap. The march to the Holy City continued until they were outside the walls, where Rolaine had the army stop… she had no intention of just marching into the city without knowing what was going on, a cautious move that Thelonious concurred with… the command crew called a war meeting and sat down to discuss their next move.


Mistress Valentina, as per her previous comments, was very much in favour of bombarding the Holy City from orbit, using the Hope in the Void’s Macrocannon Broadsides to level the place and the aeronautica to flatten any areas the space bound weapons missed. Constantine was, unsurprisingly, not for that idea and the discussion moved away from complete destruction to whether they should launch an attack or whether they should send a smaller force ahead, using the Teleportarium, to take a look inside. Adding to their mistrust of the situation they found themselves in, both Thelonious and Mistress Valentina was getting odd feelings of an undercurrent of something growing in the city, although they could not figure out what it was. Eventually, they decided that they would take the lead, although they would bring some of their finest troops with them to cordon off the area but it would be them, the command crew, who took back the massive cathedral in the Holy City… Constantine approved of this plan immensely. That night, the handpicked troops and the command crew teleported down into the centre of the city… the massive Cathedral looming above them, the large open plaza outside the perfect place to start the reclamation of the Holy City.


One thing that had confounded the command crew was that all their reconnaissance had been unable to see any barbarians in the city at all, it was like they were all remaining inside for some nefarious reason, but there wasn’t time to investigate this. The main doors to the cathedral were ajar and the command crew just marched on in… knowing that stealth was not really possible, at least as long as Bazak was with them. However, the inside of the cathedral was not completely dark as they would have expected… instead there was a sickly green light being given off by symbols that had been painted on the walls, symbols that had been constructed out of bodily fluids and other things that the command crew did not care to figure out. Constantine and Bazak started marching directly down towards the main Altar, above which loomed a desecrated statue of the Emperor, whilst Thelonious and the rest of the command crew split up, going either side, through the pews and covering their colleagues, although there didn’t appear to be anything there… until they started hearing the laughter.


The high pitched, inhuman laughter… no, giggling, seemed to bounce of the walls and appears to be all around them, setting their teeth on edge as Constantine knelt down before the defaced statue of the Emperor, praying for benediction and then flaming off the disgusting mark that was on its chest. As he did so, he looked upwards and his eyes widened when he saw what was above them… he managed to shout out a warning to the rest of the command crew as the massive host of Nurglings fell on them from above. The command crew sprang into action, Rolaine leaping to the side, drawing out her Tau Pulse Pistols and spraying above her, Nurglings falling dead out of the sky; Bazak either let the Nurglings land on him, before brushing them off, whilst swinging his Power Klaw around in an arc, sending pieces of Nurgling everywhere. Isendark and Yorke, utilising their Flip Belts, were agile dancers, using their Power Swords to slice open anything that got near them. Mistress Valentina used her powers to keep her safe, although the force of her Telekinetic Pushes were pulping the Nurglings, sending their corrupted blood everywhere.


Constantine was sending large bursts of flame into the air, not wanting anything to set fire to the pews for fear of destroying the Cathedral, burning and dissecting the Nurglings that were falling around him. Thelonious, on the other hand, was a little slow to react but, just before the screaming, giggling, Nurglings landed on his face, his Displacer Field (recently blessed by the Adeptus Mechanicus) activated and sent him outside the Cathedral, away from danger… however, he got a feeling and looked up to the tallest spire on the Cathedral… seeing a green glow spring into existence, he knew that things had intensified. He immediately communicated this to the rest of the command crew, where Mistress Valentina took some drastic action. Shouting to everyone to make their way to the Altar, Seri found herself there as the Nurglings started massing to overwhelm them in a tide of small, daemonic bodies. Pushing her power to levels she had never encountered before, she sent a Telekinetic Push into the corners of the pews, sending them backwards, hitting other pews and crushing the Nurglings against them, and then into the wall. With one action, Mistress Valentina had ended the conflict.


Constantine was off, like a flash, running up the stairs, with Mistress Valentina right behind him and Rolaine, after a little search of the grounds, coming up the rear. Thelonious, who had activated his Displacer Field again to get back into the cathedral, was in consultation with the troops outside… when Mistress Valentina had squished most of the Nurglings, the green glow/portal had grown larger… Thelonious and Isendark took a trip down into the crypt below the Cathedral whilst Yorke went round the Cathedral, burning off all the symbols of the ruinous powers. Thelonious and Isendark’s foray into the crypt was surprising in that the crypts area appeared to be mostly untouched and there was a vaguely holy feeling to the entire place, this was obviously not where the portal was coming from, so Isendark and Thelonious ran back upstairs and out of the Cathedral into the night. Meanwhile, Rolaine had managed to catch up with Constantine and Mistress Valentina as they ran up the numerous stairs to the viewing platform in the steeple, looking out over the roof and, indeed, looking out over the entire city.


Bazak, who was feeling a little left out, had run outside, grabbed the Grot and had tried to use its Rocket Pack to get onto the roof to see what was happening. Being an Ork, and despite all the “training” it had been doing, Bazak failed miserably and careened through one of the stained glass windows, just as Yorke was nearing it. A little bit jittery, as Yorke was in a place like this, Yorke immediately turned her flamer on the newest “threat” and, whilst Bazak was fine, the Grot turned into a pyre and was dead by the time Bazak smashed into the nearest wall. However, the real confrontation was about to take place on the roof of the Cathedral, as Thelonious and Isendark used Isendark’s Power Board to get them onto the roof as well, completely opposite to where Rolaine, Constantine and Seri were… all of them looking at something wrong and horrific that should not be. Turning away, Mistress Valentina’s psychic senses began to pick something up, over the background of the disturbance behind her, and she could see that a line of strong psychic energy was being formed in the shape of the number 7, with the focal point being the Cathedral.


Thelonious, upon hearing this, went a little pale because, whilst he had been certain that the Plague Lord behind this, knowing that his unholy number was involved just increased the danger of what this energy disturbance could be. Thelonious was quick to order a bombing strike on the other two locations; at the start and at the bend point; waiting as his aeronautica came in and destroyed the two places with incredible precision… but it did nothing to stop the disturbance, which seemed to have reached a self-sustaining point. It was at this moment that Constantine snapped… HE had pulled this world into the Emperor’s light, HE had spread the faith and HE had set up the beacon that beckoned all to the Holy City… HE was going to be the one to solve the issue! He jumped down from the spire, onto the roof of the Cathedral and ran until he was underneath the energy disturbance, taking his flamer off his back and sending gout after gout of flame into the portal, screaming prayers to the Emperor as he did so. Thelonious took one look at his friend and decided he needed help, having his communications forwarded to High Inquisitor Lorric.


Lorric, of course, offered his help, but said that he could not see anything without being on the bridge and having access to their sensor data and video data and everything else… which gave Thelonious pause as he didn’t really want a High Inquisitor on his bridge an in defacto control of his ship. After what seemed like many minutes, but in reality was only a few seconds, Thelonious made his decision and sent his permission to both the Bridge and the Inquisitor… he would deal with any fallout afterwards. He could also see that the portal was getting even bigger and ordered his command crew off the roof, and started pulling in the troops, just in case they needed to make an emergency teleport… although Constantine didn’t seem to hear, encased in his rage at what was happening to HIS Holy City. Eventually, it was just Mistress Valentina and Constantine on the roof, with Isendark looming off to the side on his Power Board… Seri was trying to talk sense into Constantine, but he was hearing none of it, continuing to send flame into the portal, despite the lack of any effect at all! Mistress Valentina shook her head, shouted “SORRY” to Constantine and then locked his limbs with her Psychic powers.


With that, and with the help of Isendark, they managed to grapple Constantine onto the Power Board and lower themselves to the ground, the last of the group to make it… Constantine was still cursing her for her warp spawned powers and for taking him away from his Holy City. It was at this point that the energy field started declining and Thelonious was in contact with High Inquisitor Lorric and asked if it was his doing… Lorric, after checking some of the readings came back to him, rather frantically and told him to get out of there, as it was a Bomb! Through the prudence of (most of) the command crew, everyone was in position and teleported out with the rest of the troops, whilst the signal went out to the army on the outside of the wall to move away, as quick as they could. As the command crew made their way from the Teleportarium to the bridge, Thelonious told Mistress Valentina to let his friend go and was there to embrace him, Constantine’s frenzy faded and he collapsed into tears in Thelonious’s arms. As the command crew reached the bridge, the portal had shrunk to the size of a football and everyone watched on tenterhooks.


As the Portal disappeared there was a moment of silence, as if the world was holding its breath, and then a green dome appeared above the city, green flames that reached from the top of the tallest spire, down to the outer walls, covering the entire city with its malevolent presence. The green flame seemed to intensify before drawing back in again and disappearing… the city was completely levelled, literally not even a blade of grass, nor any stone or anything was left, it had been scoured of all life, nature and everything… except for one thing. A figure… in the middle of the devastation. He was a large man, about the same size as the Ork and he looked at the sky, seeming to realise he was being observed, opened his mouth and then the video feed disappeared; as did the sensor readings of the Aeronautica… they had been taken out somehow. As Thelonious turned to his command crew, he could see the colour drain out of the face of High Inquisitor Lorric, as if he had seen something out of his nightmares… and he turned to Thelonious and spoke “That… that was the Carrier…”


As the command crew were digesting this, not that they knew who or what the Carrier was, but the fact that it could stun a High Inquisitor of the Ordo Malleus was concerning enough a voice came into Thelonious, Yorke and Constantine’s minds… familiar yet totally different… “Gentlemen, and Lady… I would meet with you…”

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So much work and not a peep since November. I feel for you! Carry on carrying on.

I've got to read this(not all in one go... wow) when I get off my phone and can actually SEE something.

Anyone got a word count? Holy shizzle.

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Well, based on what Microsoft Word is telling me - 163,194 Words :lol:

It's quite a lot of fun to write this up... the lack of comments is fine as it is both a log of the story as we play it (and we play pretty much every week) for the players, and also to remind me of what has happened! Amazingly, nothing will keep the story in your mind better than spending about 8 hours writing it up :D

But, hope you enjoy it.

Edited by Grothgar
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I have loved the story so far, and the Ork Bazak most be a blast to have at the table

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I agree! My last group had an Orc but he played it more like a classic D&D Barbarian. Bazak is a very interesting character! As are they all!

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Looks like I got mez some admirerz, dat is ded gud

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This is an amazing story and I can't wait to see how it continues!

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Chapter 48 – Violence is ALWAYS the answer


As Thelonious, Yorke and Constantine quickly moved into a private conference room, leaving the High Inquisitor and the rest of the command crew a little nonplussed, the voice in their mind left, with its parting gift as a set of co-ordinates… co-ordinates that, when Yorke interfaced them into the map of Elerius, proved to be at the dead centre of the Barbarian lands beyond the mountains. After confirming the location, the first thing they did was agree not to inform anyone else of how they had come by this information… especially the High Inquisitor! During the small trip to the conference room, Yorke’s mind had been working overdrive… there was something about the way the Carrier had spoken that seemed familiar… and then, like lightning interrupting a summer day, she had the flash of insight she needed. Interrupting the Lord High Captain, who was starting to plan on what they should do, Yorke informed Thelonious and Constantine that both the Pleasure Daemon who had attack the Hope, and Karrad Vall had spoken in that very same way… differing octaves but with the same speech pattern… although she couldn’t figure out whether that was just because they were all Daemons, or because there was something underlying everything.


Meanwhile, the rest of the command crew had dispersed to their own activities, waiting for the impromptu conference to end… Bazak went back into his workshop, with his two Grot Assistants and started pulling together random bits of scrap that would, eventually, turn an Autopistol into a Laser Weapon… what could the Ork say… it liked surprises! Commander Rolaine decided to put off some of the frustration that she had been feeling by lining up firing solutions over the Barbarian Lands… Orbital Superiority was devastating when you are firing Hab Block sized shells at high velocities… and aiming Macrocannons had always calmed her mind. As the High Inquisitor left the bridge to communicate with his cohorts, Mistress Valentina ordered a sweep for any listening or decryption devices that may have been left on the bridge ‘accidently,’ before retiring to her Choir chambers for rest and meditation. Isendark made his way to the Teleportarium and gave the order to bring the troops back from outside the former Holy City… and, more importantly, to teleport his Leman Russ up! He then spent the next few hours fastidiously cleaning the vehicle, to such an extent that he forbade any other members of the crew from helping… rumours swirled that he was just a little too attached to his tank.


The triumvirate of Thelonious, Yorke and Constantine were discussing the potential meaning, if any, of her insight before the conversation moved on and Thelonious, quite honestly, asked Constantine for his spiritual advice… because he was certain that Constantine would not be tempted, even in the slightest, to meet with a Daemon. However, the events of the last few days had taken their toll on the Ships Confessor and he was not his normal self… he started spouting that the planet was doomed and that they should either cleanse it to stop the taint spreading or take off as many people as they could before the planet was irrevocably corrupted… and if meeting with the Daemon helped with that, then so be it. Thelonious was actually quite worried by his friend’s moral degradation and the roles were reversed for a little while, with Thelonious speaking about how the planet could be saved and that they could not give up hope just yet… Yorke was very confused at this! However, as they went through the potential options, it did appear as if hearing the Daemon’s words might be the best course of action… they just needed to decide who was going.


At first, Yorke ruled the Lord High Captain out… the Dynasty needed their figurehead more than ever in such a time of peril and so she volunteered to go… and was surprised when Constantine offered to go with her… but then she realised that having a man of immense faith in the God-Emperor, probably immune to the corruption, could be useful. However, Thelonious knew, or thought he knew, that they would be offered some deals and, as is the usual way of Chaos… one would be for short term gain and screw them in the long term, whereas one would be long term gain and screw them in the short term… but, despite his loathing for the Ruinous Powers, he was a practical man and wanted to know what they were. Eventually, it was decided that they would all go down, along with anyone from the command crew who wished to join them, and they were going to spin it as information they had received through backchannels by some of Yorke’s informants… again, they did not want knowledge of how they had received the invitation to be known. The one thing that was insisted upon was this; anyone who wished to be present would be in a fully sealed void suit. Invited or not, they would take no additional chances with the Plague Lord’s lackey


Another thing that needed to be bottomed out, and quickly, whilst Constantine was in the main temple shrine, cleansing himself, was the rest of the command crew getting together to get their story straight about exactly WHAT they had done with the bodies of the Iron Men they had initially attempted to transport… or at least the story they would tell people! The eventual decision was that they should be quite vague and say they dropped it into a sun on the way to Zayth, just to get rid of it, and Thelonious charged Yorke with going through their sensor logs, official history and anything else she could get her hands on, so that she could doctor the myth into their actual history… just in case. With that “sorted” and out of the way, the command crew gathered and boarded a shuttle, piloted (of course) by Isendark all the way down to the ground, where he dropped them off and then flew back up to the Hope in the Void… the plan was for them to be able to teleport out when they were finished (or if things got bad!) The flight down was a bumpy one; the command crew could sense that the weather was changing on Elerius, even this small time after the Carrier arrived.


In fact, as they landed, they could see the thick, green mist that blanketed the Barbarian Lands, a mist that seemed to move to their presence, thinning as they descended and moving aside to guide them down… which made Thelonious shiver in disgust. The command crew (bar Mistress Valentina who elected to stay aboard the ship and keep an eye on the Inquisition), after disembarking and watching Isendark leave, turned around to see a disfigured honour guard had arrived and were standing together, showing a perfect path to take to a large tent that loomed out of the mist… but what was of more interest to the command crew was that there appeared to be two Traitor Astartes outside the entrance of the tent. The command crew took it in their stride and just tried not to look too hard at the debased symbols covering the Astartes armour, but they could not help thinking about how the Marines had actually come to be on Elerius and Yorke decided they would do many sensor sweeps when they were back on the Hope in the Void. And then, they entered into the, surprisingly well lit, tent which was empty apart from a hulking humanoid shape, sitting on a throne made of the stripped flesh of innocents (probably) and smiling at them like an Apex Predator.


Thelonious was surprised at just how… normal… the Daemon looked. It didn’t look natural, but if you didn’t look too close, you might have thought it was just an odd looking, although large, human. But then, occasionally, out of the corner of his eyes, there would be a slight shimmer and he could see maggots writhing underneath the Daemon’s alabaster skin. Any thoughts, however, were brushed away when the Daemon, in that annoyingly familiar way, greeted Thelonious, Yorke and Constantine…


Daemon; “Ahh, Thelonious, Natasha and Jonas… how lovely to see you again… I see you have brought your friends this time?”


Thelonious, Yorke and Constantine looked at each other, their eyes showing the same question was going through all their heads… did the Daemon just say “again?”


Yorke; “I’m… sorry… did you just say ‘again?’ I must apologise because I don’t seem to remember you and, well, that shouldn’t be the case!”


Daemon; “Well, that is quite disappointing actually, I had hoped you would have figured it out before now… especially given that it could have helped… You have encountered me before, three times, in fact.”


The command crew were looking at each other with rather confused features as Thelonious finally figured it out, his face draining of much of his usual colour, as the Daemon continued.


Daemon; “Obviously, the first time I encountered you was on that ship… you stopped me from figuring out what needed to be done. Then, when you discovered Elerius, we had a lot of fun then… and then, finally, on Lu Nassad, although that one could have proven harder to realise.”


Constantine; “You mean…”

Daemon (continuing); “My sister, well that’s how I view her… she likes to play with you, she always did like to play with her toys. My brother, well, you were in the way of his fate I’m afraid, otherwise he probably would have been more talkative and myself, well… I’m searching for answers.”


Yorke; “Well, maybe we can help you get to those answers… just, I think those answers might be somewhere else, off this planet maybe?”


Daemon; “Ahhh, Yorke, that is why you are my sisters favourite, always with the jokes. What is a planet, after all, than a filthy place where all manner of death and disease can be found… it is amazing that my Master doesn’t find parts of himself in more places than he does. After all, there is no escaping death… it is inevitable.”


Thelonious; “Well, now that is out of the way, whatever that is… what do you want? Why are you here?”


Daemon; “Ahhh, and this is why I prefer you Thelonious… you are always quite linear in your thinking… never in your execution, but in your thinking. I am here to ask what it is that you want. After all, you three are rather interesting individuals… one has a soul of Greatness, the other a soul of Purity and, finally, a soul of Shadow… very interesting indeed.”


The command crew were getting a little freaked out by all this conversation… just being near the Carrier was causing their skin to itch but, it had not attacked them just yet and it seemed to be in quite an introspective mood, so they let it continue rambling.


Daemon; “I wish I could remember what I used to be… I think there is another brother out there you see, and he is so very angry with everything… Thelonious, do you ever forget who you are?”


Thelonious thought of all the drugs and alcohol he had done in his life, and thought a lot about the times they had been combined and then, with a smile… nodded at the creature. All of the command crew were thinking the same thing (apart from Constantine)… they knew of a planet that was seemingly in the grip of Chaos fuelled war, although they had nothing to do with that… nope, not at all and you can’t prove it! They thought this could be where the Daemon’s “brother” was, not that they were going to clue the monstrosity into that fact. The Daemon was back rambling about their Purity, Shadow and Greatness, and the fact they were interesting to it… for some reason… if this was the same type of Daemon as they had fought against, this one did not seem to have any idea what it should be doing, other than destroying the world with its mere presence. Suddenly, the Daemon changed into a more serious mood, saying that if they sacrificed one of the three souls (and rejecting the idea of the Orks), then he would leave the planet and it would be saved.


The Daemon also came up with another option… that the command crew dedicate the planet to his Lord, allow the Carrier (and its Master) to take what it is owed, and then the planet would not be destroyed and the mining of Elerium could continue... and then the Daemon started making claims of Immortality and the command crew let it ramble. Then, suddenly, the negotiations came to an end, the Daemon telling them to think about its request(s) and to come back when they had decided… the command crew marched out of the tent, the green mist seemed to thin again, and they teleported back to the Hope in the Void… most of them shaking their heads at the weirdest conversation any of them could remember. Immediately, all of the crew (other than Bazak) went with Constantine to the temple shrine to have the inevitable corruption they had gained from the meeting, scourged from their skin. After this cleansing was completed, and after the wounds had been dressed, the command crew started discussing just what to do about the Carrier and, more importantly, if they wanted to bring the High Inquisitor and his team in on the whole “meeting a Daemon” thing.


Bazak interjected that it had been wondering whether it was possible to have Autocannon shells that contained blessed, soapy water so that when it exploded in the bodies of Plagued Daemons, it would clean them as well… and then stood around with a toofy grin as the rest of the command crew stared at him, then chuckling as he moved away, humming a jaunty tune. Getting back to the serious business of running a dynasty, whilst continuing to shake their heads at Bazak’s antics, the command crew decided that they wanted to, at the very least, try and take out the Carrier, with extreme violence, and that they would need Inquisitorial Support for such a plan. Thelonious didn’t really like that thought, the same as any Rogue Trader, and he did respect High Inquisitor Lorric; he just couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something being hidden from him and, Emperor-****-it… he was the only one allowed to keep secrets on his vessel! However, the meeting was set up and Lorric, his two Inquisitors and the Primaris Psyker were the ones attending, with the entire command crew in attendance… in terms of sheer power, it was one of the more auspicious meetings held on the Hope in the Void.


Lorric opened with information that his Inquisitorial cohorts had finished investigating how the plague appeared to have spread on Elerius. It appeared that each town or city reported that a single figure was given refuge, a few months ago, and that the plague started the day after but, interestingly, it seemed to have all happened on the same night. This either spoke of amazing co-ordination, or some sort of Warp Witchery and was obviously a concerted effort to weaken the defence of Elerius… which then gave the impression that the Carrier was not the end goal, but more of a doomsday weapon in the face of overwhelming odds. Whilst the fact that the Carrier ended up on Elerius sort of made the point moot, it was good to get confirmation as it might lead to more understanding of the enemies movements. Lorric then asked the command crew what information they had gathered and was stunned (not for the first time) when Thelonious informed him that they had learned of a high level meeting, which included the Carrier and had gone to confront the demon!


Moving forward, quickly, Thelonious then explained that they had been offered two deals, one that included their souls and the other that included dedicating the planet to the Plague Lord and carrying on with business as usual. He then pitched the plan of “extreme violence” to the High Inquisitor, who reminded the command crew that the last time the Daemon had been defeated it had been the Angels of Death, the Astartes of the Storm Wardens chapter who did the vanquishing. However, the Ordo Malleus was founded on taking down Daemons and the High Inquisitor was one of their best proponents and he soon gave his assent, and the combined forces started planning for the confrontation. Thelonious pointed out that they were actually expected and thus the element of surprise would be theirs, although the Inquisition team would have to stay back for the first meeting, as otherwise the Daemon would easily see through their ruse. Given that the coordinates of their next meeting were directly in the former Holy City, they decided to use the Eversor Assassin (the package) to clear out the troops surrounding the tent after the fight started.


However, it was when the discussion moved onto the Daemon’s style of speaking, and the fact that it mentioned brothers and sisters, that the High Inquisitor started to get even more interested, asking numerous probing questions about the Pleasure Daemon, Karrad Vall and the Carrier… to such an extent that Thelonious asked him, straight out, what his interest was. The High Inquisitor was quiet, for a time, his mind whirling with the information that he had gathered before he turned to Thelonious and told him a story. Apparently, according to Legend (and not widely believed even amongst the ranks of the Inquisition), there was once an Ancient Being who was shattered into 4 distinct pieces, which were scattered throughout the Warp and the Universe as we know it but was so powerful that it could only be contained, not destroyed. The Inquisitor did say that he thought it was a story but, with what they had told him, it seemed more likely that these Daemons could come together to form some kind of Gestalt Entity, and that scared him more than anything he had ever faced in his career.


At that moment, Mistress Valentina had a flash of insight. A couple of days ago, someone on board the Hope in the Void had received an Astropathic communication and, because she had been so close, she had been able to gather parts of it and her subconscious mind had been working on it ever since. With the High Inquisitor talking more about the apparent powers of this being, including the ability to move the Warp through realspace, she realised that the message included a reference to a Warp Storm that appeared to be moving through realspace, and, when she plotted the course in her head, she realised that Zayth was in its path… if not the likely destination… the decisions they had made in the past were coming back to haunt them. That then led to the conversation about whether banishing the Carrier back into the warp was the best idea, maybe it would allow the Gestalt Entity to become stronger with another part back inside it? That was the issue facing the command crew and the Inquisition, there was so much that they didn’t know, they were just children blundering around in the dark… but they were still Elerius’s best hope.


The two groups agreed to meet again in around 12 hours, the last few days had been pretty fraught and the Carrier was still relatively new on Elerius… besides, Thelonious had an idea. After a short conference with Mistress Valentina, Thelonious called in his favour and asked her to contact the Eldar, Beljalanor in particular, as himself and Constantine believed that they, or the Harlequins, might have some insight into this situation. Given the likely distance involved, Mistress Valentina did not expect an answer until a few hours hence. The message included the information about the Warp Storm moving, a little about the Gestalt entity and Thelonious added that the Warp Storm was moving in the general direction of a Maiden World… a complete and utter lie, but he could talk around it… after all, he didn’t know where the Maiden Worlds were, he could be completely correct! After the message was sent, the command crew busied themselves with tooling up for fighting a Major Daemon of the Plague Lord, bringing their hardest hitting weaponry and making sure to bring their best armour… especially armour that was fully sealed!


After resting so that they would be refreshed for the battle to come, the command crew met up with the Inquisition Host and together they plotted their attack. Isendark would, at first, be circling around the area in a Marauder Bomber but, instead of a usual payload, he would have the Eversor Assassin in the bomb bay… once the command crew had started the fight, he would drop the Eversor and then join the battle. The Inquisition would stay in the second shuttle, which would land as close as possible to the tent, so that they could reinforce the command crew… but also not tip their hand… with that, they just had to wait. During the waiting, which, as always, took longer than you would expect, Mistress Valentina received a reply from the Eldar. They were concerned by the message that had been sent and they would try and be there as soon as possible, but not to expect them within a Terran standard month… which was good to know, but didn’t help them for the moment. And with that, everyone knew their assigned roles, everyone tooled up and went to meet their Destiny.


Bazak put his Mega Armour on, which meant they needed another shuttle, and he would also have to be hidden away… as one thing that any Ork in Mega Armour is not… is subtle! The three shuttles moved down to the meeting place, the same tent had been set up but this time, the Astartes were inside and as the command crew entered through the flap, the smell of decay was almost overwhelming… obviously nothing was being spared in relation to their comfort this time. Thelonious captured the Daemon’s attention whilst the rest of his command crew took their positions and then, at a specified point, Thelonious made the correct signal and Rolaine brought up her Inferno Pistols and burned a hole through the stomach of the Daemon… and then the battle really started!

Posted at
Chapter 49 – Thank the God-Emperor for ... Custard?


Almost as soon as the Inferno Pistols had finished firing, the vague green mist that had coalesced in the tent suddenly became a lot thicker and the environmental alarms started blaring in the command crews armour… the fog was acidic and poisonous! The only member who was not affected was Constantine, whose faith in the Emperor was so absolute that none of the Daemon’s corruption could touch him… and he literally glowed with an intense white light that at least lit up the area around him… he was an inspirational figure to the rest of the command crew at this time of danger. Isendark, after delivering the “package” on the outskirts of the barbarian horde, swung his Marauder Bomber around in a manoeuvre that almost caused him to blackout, so extreme were the G-Forces that he had subjected himself too but, passing through that, he found himself perfectly aligned to join the fight on the ground in half a minute. The first thing that the command crew learned, to their cost, was that this Greater Daemon was somewhat immune to their blows, at least those that came from un-consecrated weapons anyway.


Time and time again, Rolaine found herself frustrated by the seemingly arbitrary nature of the Daemon’s defences… sometimes both her shots, fired separately to lessen the changes of both being deflected… were deflected, whilst sometimes a combined shot got through, there was no consistency from the Daemon, and it aggravated her. Thelonious and Yorke, on the other hand, were going nowhere near the Carrier, especially after High Inquisitor Lorric went wading in with a Blessed, and highly dangerous, Power Sword, carving through the Carrier until he was caught by a lazy backhand and sent spiralling out of the tent, landing with a large thump. They worked well as a team against the Fallen Astartes, Yorke striking with her Thunder Hammer whilst Thelonious mesmerised the Plague Marine with his intricate sword work, often parrying the heavy strikes and turning it around to score yet another hit on the Astartes. However, apart from the Carrier, the main danger came from the Green Mist surrounding them… it had started to eat away at peoples armour and the command crew were relatively frantic to be done with this before they started seeing what the Green Mist did to unprotected flesh!


Constantine, who was protected from the vile influence of the Daemon, and the Green Mist, by his all-consuming faith in the God-Emperor, was exhorting his colleagues to greater acts of violence, leading them to HATE, in every measure of the word, the Daemon that had brought such ruin to Elerius. Seeing such an inspiring symbol of the God-Emperor, the two other Inquisitors started to pray, their voices lifting in glorious song, trying to give the group the courage to face the Daemon and the Warp… whilst Bazak was planning a surprise of his own, ordering the pilot of his shuttle to fly above the tent and then, on his command, to open the back doors and fly straight upwards… Death from Above had a new proponent! However, before he could make his surprise entrance, the rest of the command crew, sans Isendark who was still incoming, started to get pushed back from the Carrier, a massive blast of force sending some of them sprawling and catapulting one of the Inquisitors out of the tent to join High Inquisitor Lorric. Mistress Valentina was just focussing her powers on the other Plague Marine, when something landed between her and Rolaine.


Before Valentina could react (although Rolaine, with her heightened reflexes, managed to get out of the way) she felt the pull of the warp… the object had ripped open a small hole in realspace and it fell over her… the screaming of the Warp was immense and it was only Constantine’s presence that allowed her to push back on the force and remain in realspace… she was pissed! Taking that anger (as well as a hefty portion of White Void), she smashed aside the mental defences of the other Plague Marine and took control of his body… she had theorised that nothing could protect against itself, and thus the Plague Marines would be able to damage the Carrier much more easily… and as the Marines Power Sword cut into the Carrier at her silent command, she realised she was right. As Yorke and Thelonious continued their dance with their Astartes, Bazak plummeted from the sky, landing directly on the Carrier! The feeling was something Bazak had never felt before, soft but hard at the same time, as he seemed to be absorbed by the Carrier and then spat out next to it, even though it never happened… the Ork was confused.


The Ork’s Grots, who were perched on either shoulder of his gigantic Mega Armour, were wielding Custom Shoota’s, created by Bazak’s deranged mind. It had turned a humble Auto Pistol into a laser spitting, completely variable power setting, overheating gun of crazy/awesome… depending on how it worked. Constantine, who had not joined in the fight yet, started pricking himself with his Witch Lance, feeling the slight burn of the poison fighting through his veins, as he worked himself into a Frenzy… knowing that he would need every advantage against the Carrier. Isendark, who had been flying superlatively (as usual, he would say), aimed his Marauder Bomber at a large group of the barbarian hordes, ejecting at just the right moment and utilising his Power Board, as well as the parachute, to make his way down to the ground, silhouetted by a massive explosion. He found High Inquisitor Lorric getting back to his feet and, without a by your leave, grabbed the Inquisitor, flipped him onto the Power Board and flew into the tent… whilst the High Inquisitor, not expecting this at all, fell off the board and landed on his face… outside the tent!


Yorke and Thelonious finally got the reward their display warranted, Thelonious stabbing the Plague Marine through the chest, holding it in place for Yorke to swing her Thunder Hammer directly onto the Marines forehead… killing it stone dead as it flipped off Thelonious’s swords. Constantine was joined in his charge by one of the Inquisitors, wielding what looked like a Sacrificial Knife, but both of them could not make their attacks connect… a problem that was not shared by Bazak. His massive Power Klaw humming, and driven by his, frankly insane, strength, he ripped through the flesh on the Carrier’s back, his second slice was deflected but his third, almost an uppercut, caught the Carrier’s Arm and sent it flying away, to the other side of the tent. The Carrier, seemingly a little more annoyed at this inconvenience, smashed Bazak in the leg, almost causing the Ork to lose its balance and opening a gaping hole in its flesh… this was followed by an attempt to Grapple the Ork, but Bazak was not going to let a simple thing like being felt up by a Daemon affect it.


Yorke was feeling her armour degrade, and she loved this Voidsuit, so she raised herself up off the floor with the thrusters, fired a Krak Grenade from her Launcher and used the reverse force of this to push her outside the tent… with the Krak Grenade not doing any damage… but that was beside the point. Unseen by anyone in the tent, the Primaris Psyker, who had fell on the first round, gasping and choked by the Green Mist, was crawling towards Mistress Valentina, whose own focus was on maintaining control of the Plague Marine, whose mind was always trying to find the right moment to rebel and take back control. Thelonious, whose knowledge of Daemons would make most right thinking members of the Imperium try to burn him, realised what a danger the Carrier’s limbs could be and quickly ran up to the severed arm and used one of his Digi-Flamers to set it on fire, putting an end to the limbs quivering. However, the Plague Marine that Yorke and Thelonious had killed was pulling himself back to his feet… just how hard was it to kill the worshippers of Nurgle anyway?!?


Constantine, mostly lost in his own rage, was furiously attacking the Carrier with his Witch Lance, his consecrated weapon slicing into the Daemon with ease and, whilst the poison had no effect on the Carrier, he did manage to set the blasted thing on Fire… all the time screaming at the Carrier to get off his planet! He also managed to slice off the beings other arm, sending it all the way to the other side of the tent. This was when Isendark made his entrance, his horrific Zaythian Warblade (a combination of a chain and power weapon) spinning in his hand as he used the momentum to affect his strike, feeling the weapon meet the neck bone of the Carrier and slicing right through it, sending the Carrier’s head sailing through the air. Rolaine, taking advice from the Lord High Captain, had tracked the arm and the head and, as they landed on the floor, disintegrated them with her Inferno Pistols but, amazingly, the Carrier just seemed to carry on moving. The command crew also paid the price of leaving the resurrected Marine alone… he had unloaded a burst of Astartes Bolt Ammunition into the Ork, exploding part of his leg and making it howl with pain and fury.


However, the sight of the Carrier having limbs severed also imbued the command crew with purpose and Yorke ran back into the tent, her helm degrading so much it was useless, and launched a flying, overhead blow with her Thunder Hammer, striking the Carrier’s body with such force that it was turned into jelly and both legs popped off! Bazak, grinning like a mentalist, raised his own arm to reveal the twin-linked Multi-Melta’s and quickly disintegrated and melted the Carrier’s legs… it was finished! Or was it? As Lorric entered the tent, having jumped back to his feet and sprinted in, the Green Mist seemed like it was chuckling, then laughing, and it was getting deeper and deeper. The Inquisitor who had been praying was suddenly cut off, the one wielding the Sacrificial Knife was looking at it curiously and the Primaris Psyker managed to grab onto Mistress Valentina, trying to force his consciousness into hers and **** her mind. Surprised, and slightly off balance by having to split her attention to the Plague Marine, her Astropath defences slammed down and she managed, just, to fight off the attack.


Letting her control of the Plague Marine go, she started shouting that there was a possessed Psyker over here, could someone please kill it, as she raised her Stub Automatic, selected Bleeder Rounds for maximum pain, fired on Semi-Auto for the same reason… and missed! However, Yorke and Isendark had heard her plea, and they never doubted Mistress Valentina, and they both struck out at the Psyker, turning his ribs to mulch and severing his leg… but the damned Psyker was still alive! Thelonious and Constantine, on the other hand, were taking the fight to the remaining Plague Marine, Rolaine having turned the other one into slag, with Constantine launching himself forward, his Witch Lance impaling the Marine through the stomach, whilst Thelonious came in from behind, one slash to one side, the other slash to the other and, finally, both slashes coming together to lop the Plague Marine’s head off its shoulders. With the death of the final being in the tent, that worshipped Nurgle, something seemed to happen… the Inquisitor who had been praying… his head exploded and the one with the Sacrificial Knife rammed it into his own forehead, whilst Lorric turned around frantically, shouting “it’s here!” joined by Thelonious shouting “the Mist… it’s in the bloody Mist!”


The chuckles and laughter reached a crescendo, then there was a small period of silence before the ground started erupting around them. The Marines and Inquisitors who were dead on the ground were suddenly swallowed up as the Green Mist turned into a gigantic mass of flesh, tentacles, mouths spewing noxious gasses and looking very hungry with the ground undulating beneath them… the Carrier had fully crossed into their realm! The sight of a fully formed Greater Daemon had the expected effect on the command crew… some of them were able to rationalise it to a degree, but all of them had their minds and souls ravaged. Bazak was the most affected… the Ork was already a few cups short of a tea set and now Bazak was sure that it could see both of its Gods… Gork and Mork, looking down at this situation and nodding, whilst speaking to each other about what a good Ork he had been! Lorric was shouting on the communication frequency that the only way to kill this Daemon was to find its core, focus their fire there and destroy it… but given the Daemon was many hundreds of metres across, this seemed a futile effort!


Mistress Valentina went deep into her Psychic reserves, trying to figure out exactly where the core of this Daemon was… but even touching the surface of this abomination with her mind was enough to set her gasping. The armour degradation continued, and Yorke found the acid on her skin attacking her face. Everyone else was hacking at the mass of flesh, Power Klaw’s, Witch Lances, Thunder Hammers, Mirror Swords and Zaythian Warblades sending corrupted flesh and tentacles flying in all directions. Unsurprisingly, this didn’t seem to be doing much damage until Bazak, in a moment that was either insane or divinely inspired, decided to jettison his Melta canisters to a random point on the Daemon, although the shot then missed! Isendark thought this was a good idea and pulled his Melta Bombs off his back, starting to prime them for an explosion… if they needed to uncover the core, they needed to do massive damage! Rolaine, finding her Inferno Pistols quite bad for this task, aimed at the Melta canisters near Bazak and fired… the explosion was epic, smashing a huge hole in the Daemon, whilst Bazak was protected by his homemade Force Field.


It turned out that both Bazak and Rolaine truly had been divinely inspired, as the place where Bazak had launched his canisters, the same place that Rolaine had blown up, somehow… someway, was exactly where the Daemon’s core turned out to be… and Thelonious and Mistress Valentina could see it… and it had the Carrier’s face! Shouting that he had found it, Thelonious lunged at the face, driving his Mirrorswords into the forehead, joined by High Inquisitor Lorric who lashed across the bottom of the face, joined by Yorke who slammed her Thunder Hammer down and up, driving the Mirrorswords up and through the top of the Daemon’s face. With a Psychic scream of pain, agony and disbelief, the face of the Carrier, only visible to those with the ability to see it, broke apart… and the effects were immediate, with the flesh starting to undulate and parts of the “body” at the edge starting to explode violently… with the explosions starting to work their way into the middle. However, it appeared as though Constantine would not make it, he had been dragged down onto the ground and was being dragged under, only for Isendark to leap on his Power Board and zoom over there, slicing at the tentacles merely inches from Constantine’s flesh!


Constantine got to his feet, ichor covering his robes and armour, and looked at their doom approaching… the explosive detonation of the Daemon seemed that it would do them in where the Daemon could not… but then Rolaine and Isendark came up with a plan. They quickly primed the Melta Bombs, gathered the command crew and the Inquisitor into a small area, aimed the Melta Bombs outwards and, as the explosions appeared to reach them, set them off. The Melta Bombs managed to deflect enough of the exploding Daemon that those in the small circle only took a very small amount of damage… it was an Emperor blessed Miracle! The command crew, and Inquisitor, stood there, breathing heavily as they took in the devastation they had caused… but they had done it! They had killed yet another Greater Daemon and, more than that, they had saved Elerius! As that momentous feeling settled over them, however, Rolaine spotted something at the corner of his vision… something approaching them at a very fast speed… something with the face of death… the Eversor Assassin!


Thelonious, calm as ever, turned to Lorric and asked, in a very conversation tone, whether the Inquisitor could power down the Eversor and, upon hearing a negative reply, turned to Yorke and informed her that teleporting them now might be a good idea! Yorke hit the red transponder and they went through the familiar sensation of being transported back to their ship, safe and sound and covered in Greater Daemon ichor. Decontamination protocols were put into immediate effect, armour was stripped off and scrubbed, the command crew and Lorric were isolated and sent to their Medicae deck to be examined and treated, not only for their wounds but for anything more insidious. After getting the “clean” bill of health, they all met up in one of the conference rooms for a debrief, with High Inquisitor Lorric effusive in his praise for House Deepstalker, and Jonas Constantine in particular, hailing him as a form of the Emperor’s will, made flesh! Lorric asked Rolaine how she knew the precise place where the Core was, and Rolaine pointed out that Bazak had been the one to eject the Melta Canisters to that exact spot, so Lorric asked the same question to the Ork.


“Wellz, youze see… I’z spoke to deez gud Godz… Gork un Mork… and dey told mez… CUSTARD! So, dus Iz knewz wherz to plantz dem to make big boom boom.”


There was a moment of silence as the rest of the command crew, and Lorric, looked at each other, before moving onto another topic of conversation! Constantine managed to get a promise from Lorric that the Deepstalker Dynasty would have access to the archives of the Ordo Malleus for one time, as Constantine had proven to be a stalwart ally of the Inquisition and had a BIG fan in High Inquisitor Lorric. Following the end of the conversation, the command crew put their hearts and minds towards restoring Elerius. Constantine ordained the Witch Queen’s city as the new Holy City, and charged the people of the planet with creating a new Cathedral, built from the ground up to be of worship to the God-Emperor of Mankind. Rolaine led the Guardsmen from victory to victory, pushing back the Barbarians until they were fully back behind the mountains, although she could be heard at times blaming this whole mess on the Inquisition! Once they were hounded back into their own lands, the bombing and Macrocannon bombardments made sure that the barbarians would never, ever, be a threat… most of them were exterminated and those that lived regressed to a survival focus only.


These actions took weeks, which usually would have been too much time for Thelonious to want to spend here… after all, everything seemed to be under control, but he also wanted to stay around this area to meet the Eldar who were travelling to meet him… as he knew that this was not the end of this specific travail to befall his house. Life on Elerius started getting back to normal… the menfolk were back to work in the fields, the engines of commerce started again and permanent guard stations were created at the entrance of each of the passes the barbarians used to invade… that would NOT happen again. Mistress Valentina even took the time to take the Witch Queen through some rituals that would lessen the chance of her becoming possessed, now that the “protection” of the Warp Storm had been moved on. Although everyone agreed that Mistress Valentina was likely doing so to assert her superiority over the Witch Queen they could not deny it was also a good idea. One thing Thelonious did do was go and meet with Gerald again… the man who had been their first contact on the planet and who had sheltered them that night. Thelonious was actually quite sad to find out that Gerald had been conscripted and had been wounded grievously in his leg… he was walking around his farm with a pronounced limp.


This would not stand! Thelonious had Gerald taken into his Medicae bay and had his right leg replaced with an augmented version, the first augmented human on Elerius. The story that began to spread was that Gerald, as the first person to shelter the holy visitors to Elerius, Saint Thelonious and Saint Jonas, he had been shown absolute favour and remade in an image more pleasing to them. Thelonious also made sure that Gerald and his family, for the next Seven generations, would be exempt from paying Tax... Thelonious did not forget people who helped him. However, soon the day came, the Eldar had arrived and, strangely, they had invited the command crew of the Hope in the Void over to the Hellebore… such a thing had never been offered before, and it made the command crew worried as to the import of what the Eldar had to say. However, they went across, along with High Inquisitor Lorric, to hear what Beljalanor had to say. They found him, along with Captain Opwith and, perhaps unsurprisingly, some Eldar Harlequins… the command crew knew that the portents were dire for Harlequins to be involved.


Both Thelonious and Beljalanor began speaking about the creature that they feared was coming, about the fact that even the Eldar did not have much information on this being, as if it had been wiped from the records, even in the Black Library, for some reason. The Harlequins had been investigating the Daemon, even without knowing it, by following the trial of information they were given by Constantine and, with that knowledge, Beljalanor had been able to focus on the near future and the fates of all involved. He saw the Warp Storm, currently moving in the general direction of Zayth, a planet seemingly corrupted by the Blood God, arriving there and merging with the planet… which would then birth something horrible… something out of the darkest legends… something ancient! Beljalanor ended the conversation with a final warning…


“We have to get to Zayth… but I fear we may be too late to stop what I have foreseen. Call whoever you can… your friends, your allies, whomever owes you a favour… everyone and get them to come to Zayth… we will need everything we can throw at this being… if we cannot stop it from being ‘born…’ we need to go NOW, Thelonious!”

Posted at
Chapter 50 – How to keep a Secret, the Deepstalker Way!


After taking on the Farseer’s warning, and plea, the command crew returned to the Hope in the Void to discuss who they wanted to contact, to ask them to come to their aid at Zayth. The idea of an “all-points bulletin” was quickly dismissed when Thelonious pointed out that it would also let any denizens of Chaos know that there was something occurring at Zayth, which could lead to even more overwhelming odds. The obvious suspects were mentioned… Lady Orleans did owe the dynasty, and was a personal friend… Jeremiah Blitz usually followed Lady Orleans lead (and really wanted to sleep with Natasha Yorke) and Sylvia Locke had gone from slightly adversarial to a genuine ally (and Thelonious had plans for her anyway). Other names were mentioned… Naj Armardi seemed like a good bet given his honourable nature; Krawkin Feckward could up the numbers if they could convince him to turn up and Thelonious also thought about sending a message to House Berenson, otherwise known as the house that was interdicting the Cold Trade, as a pious Rogue Trader could not stand for a Chaos Incursion. The final decision to make was how to contact the Storm Wardens, who were hopefully still in the Expanse, despite having no personal connection with their Astropaths.


Messages were sent to Orleans, Locke, Blitz and Armardi, to their personal Astropaths, using agreed upon Ciphers, whilst a general focussed message was sent to the general area where House Berenson was known to operate. Thelonious and Yorke came up with an ingenious plan to convince Krawkin Feckward to turn up… they would send a message that would be “intercepted,” talking about a secret opportunity that House Deepstalker had found in the environs of Zayth… as they reasoned that his greed would overwhelm any good sense. Meanwhile, Yorke and Rolaine had come up with an old Navy cipher to send a message to the Storm Wardens, that mentioned the name of the Brother Captain… in essence, asking him to call them back… it didn’t give anything away, and only the Storm Wardens would know it was for them, even if people managed to intercept it and break the Cipher, it would mean nothing. Whilst Mistress Valentina went to join her Choir to send all the messages, Thelonious took Jonas aside and informed him that, from now on, he was the High Cardinal of the Koronus Expanse, and that he should insist on being addressed as Cardinal!


Thelonious’s thinking was that, as there was no organised Ecclesiarchy presence in the Expanse, and thus no high ranking members of that organisation, if enough people came to believe that Constantine was a High Cardinal, it would be a fait accompli for when they returned to the Calixis Sector… Constantine was proud to serve the God-Emperor in whatever way was needed, so accepted. Bazak, whilst talking about strawberries, raised the prospect of diverting some of the Orks from the Undred Undred Teef towards Zayth, to take on the forces of Chaos, and whilst this idea was not dismissed out of hand (which proved how seriously the command crew were taking the threat), the idea was to do that only if they could not hold Zayth in the first place. After slaving their navigational computers to the Hellebore, something that Thelonious was not keen on but saw the need, the Hope in the Void followed the Eldar ship into the Webway… something that didn’t happen that often and, though the Webway did not have the dangers of Warp Madness, the Hope in the Void kept the shutters down to prevent the crew getting even a single look.


During the Journey, Constantine spent quite a lot of time meeting with random Eldar, who could be identified as those called “Harlequins.” Why the High Cardinal would be spending time with Xenos was commented on amongst the crew, and his acolytes, but no further information was forthcoming. Constantine also pulled Yorke, Thelonious and Rolaine into a conference where he admitted that some of his acolytes, on his orders, had been searching for information regarding which members of the crew may have been infected as a result of exposure to the decayed remnants of the Iron Men they had taken aboard. He also informed them that his acolytes had found something disturbing… those members of the crew who could be traced to having been in contact had been disappearing over the last few days, vanishing as if they were never there. Constantine feared that they had disappeared because the taint of Chaos had caught up with them and that they could, potentially, be gathering together to try and sabotage certain areas of the ship. Thelonious (who had ordered the purge) and Yorke (whose agents had carried it out) tried to put a dampener on these concerns, whilst also doing a quick cross-check, mentally, that the list that Constantine had was also the one they had acted upon!


Unknown to the rest of the command crew, Constantine also had his acolytes round up some of the last people to see these possible dissidents alive and, given the potential for the taint of the Ruinous Powers, interrogate them for their knowledge to the point of Death, where they would send them to the God-Emperor… cleansed. The knowledge that he gained from his acolytes was… concerning. It seemed that some of the people who had been seen were those that Constantine had witnessed meeting with Yorke, personally! Another seemed to bear a description quite similar to an assassin in Thelonious’s employ… Constantine looked down the rabbit hole and wondered if he could turn away! However, before any action could be taken, by any side, the Hope in the Void and the Hellebore exited the Webway just outside the Zayth system. The last time Mistress Valentina had been in the environs of Zayth, on the way to Elerius, she had felt an absence near the planet but, now, that absence covered the entire system… it was just such a complete lack of psychic potential that it made her feel quite irritated… and even Thelonious managed to pick up some irritation as well.


And this view was further entrenched when they got a close up look at Zayth… which was now covered in a rust brown/red coating which was obscuring everything they had… their eyesight and their scanners were both useless at penetrating whatever it was that was covering the planet surface. Yorke likened it to one of the massive storms that they had observed over Burnscour, but covering the entire planet, which would do as an understatement until a better one came along. However, one thing they could not see, was a Warp Storm… so they had arrived before Beljalanor’s potential vision, although quick scans with their aetheric viewers indicated they probably had less than 36 Terran Hours before the Storm arrived… but the command crew had no idea how to proceed! Another potential danger came from High Inquisitor Lorric, who started asking probing questions about how Zayth could have come into such a state, given that the command crew had informed him that they ejected the “Iron Men canister” into the Warp… Constantine was also curious about this seeming contradiction in events! Luckily, Mistress Valentina and Thelonious seemed to be well versed in Storytelling and guiding people to the same conclusions, it was quite the double act.


The “official” version of events that eventually coalesced was as follows:


1) After looking through the ‘logs,’ it appears that the canister was teleported out, in the warp, around the environs of Zayth.

2) Due to some kind of Warp event, probably the capricious Daemons that exist there, the canister found itself in realspace around the star of Zayth.

3) The gravity of the star had pulled the canister into it, but the taint was too strong and the star itself became infected.

4) The solar rays of the star thus started sending the taint of the Ruinous Powers and, in particular, the Blood God down onto the unsuspecting world of Zayth.

5) Given that Zayth is a war world of some renown, the gradual increase in the bloodshed and taint was not noticed until now, when it is too late to do anything about it.


This explanation, although unheard of by Lorric, was deemed acceptable as the entire point about the Ruinous Powers is that they don’t normally have a usual modus operandi! Thelonious and the rest of the command crew, minus Constantine and Bazak (who didn’t really care either way), breathed a sigh of relief at dealing with that conundrum. Whilst the rest of the command crew sequestered themselves away to discuss what to do, Isendark decided to take it upon himself to gather more information, commandeering a shuttle and flying down through the atmosphere. However, despite his superlative piloting skills, he still had a hard time as the ‘tides’ of the storm were incredibly hard to read… it was almost like the storm had some malevolent will behind it, but he was up to the task. Yet, despite the weather below the upper atmosphere being rather clement, there was a dense mist that reminded Isendark of the green mist they had faced on Elerius, but spread over a much wider area, which meant he had to fly much lower to the ground than he might have wished. What he saw did not exactly set his mind at ease!


It looked like a living, breathing, wave was moving across the war-blasted landscape of Zayth and, as Isendark pulled closer, he could see that the wave was made up of millions of humans, marching to something only they could hear in their heads. The sight was incredibly unnerving, especially seeing as the radioactive wasteland they were crossing should have been killing them off faster than it was… in fact, it didn’t look like they were suffering any ill effects at all! Isendark quickly decided against taking an even closer look and returned to the ship. Whilst the Lord-Captain was incredibly annoyed with Isendarks’ actions, he couldn’t argue with the results… they now had some intelligence on what was going on, and that intelligence meant that Thelonious was loathe to put any of his troops on the planet. However, Mistress Valentina did raise the salient point that something had to be done as the Warp Storm was going to arrive soon, and she didn’t really want to see what would happen but, as with the rest of the command crew, they didn’t really have any idea about what they could do to make a difference with what they had! It was about this time, after 12 hours had passed, that Yorke detected something on the Deep Warp scanners.


Given the direction the responses were coming from, the Hope went on alert, but the targeting systems were not yet active and, as the sensors showed that two ships were emerging from the Warp, Thelonious had a good idea who they were going to be. As the Starweaver and the Ordained Destiny moved into the system both Lady Orleans and Blitz contacted them, Thelonious answered their questions as to what was going on in Zayth that needed their urgent presence… and his response stunned them for a time. After they had processed the potential enormity of the situation, Thelonious had a private conversation with Lady Orleans where he offered his support to break up the Eldar Meeting at the Serpents Cradle (as she had asked him many years before), as long as he was promised one specific Farseer… which was agreed. What else went on at their meeting was subject to rumour and speculation, but both of them were pleased to see each other, that much was certain. The next ship to arrive was the Aegis, which actually caused a cheer to go up around the bridge, very different to how the relationship with that particular ship used to be.


Lord-Captain Sylvia Locke was quickly brought up to speed and, despite the seemingly outlandish story the command crew was telling her, she had learned, through experience, to trust the Deepstalker House… especially when they were telling her things that couldn’t possibly be true! The gambit that they had planned also came off, with Krawkin Feckward turning up “unannounced” and, upon being informed that the planet should be off-limits given the number of people marching around on the surface, he immediately pulled his ship into orbit and sent his ground troops down to gather “resources.” A few hours later Feckward came onto the communications, ranting about the fact that he had lost over 2,000 troops and that he only had one prisoner to interrogate for all that loss. Thelonious, putting on the charm as only he could, managed to get his command crew (minus the Ork) invited over to take part in the interrogation… and then he decided to invite High Inquisitor Lorric… whose insight could be extremely useful, and the team of Thelonious, Yorke, Constantine and Rolaine went across to Krawkin Feckwards ship, the Annihilator.


After being met by Feckward’s Seneschal, they were escorted to a rather dingy room that looked like it had seen many “interrogations” in the past… although part of the decor was probably to break the will of the various people who were brought here.


*The next part of the chronicle has been turned into the play “How to keep a Secret, the Deepstalker Way!” which should be shown at your local holoplexes. For those who have not managed to see this, please stand by*


[Thelonious, Yorke, Constantine, Rolaine and Lorric walk into the interrogation room. The floor is sticky and the various bodily fluids that spatter the wall do not bear close inspection. The prisoner is shackled to a chair, which is bolted to the floor. Also in the room is Krawkin Feckward and a pair of his key interrogators. As he turns to meet his guests, he sees the High Inquisitor and a sneer forms on his face]


Thelonious; [gesturing to the décor as he approached Krawkin] “You were correct; your ship is definitely more suited for this sort of thing than my own… nice work with laying your hands on a prisoner.”


Krawkin; [moving Thelonious away from the High Inquisitor] “And what are you doing working with the Inquisition… why did you bring them on my ship?”


Thelonious; “Well, he asked to come along and I was not about to deny a High Inquisitor, especially of the Ordo Malleus, especially when Daemonic Influence is probably involved! Think about the information we can wring from him… not about your personal preferences!”


Krawkin; “Okay Thelonious, we’ll do this your way for now. My interrogators have been working on the prisoner for a while now but all he does it sit there looking… well, serene is the best word I can use to describe him.”


[As Thelonious, Yorke and Constantine get closer to the prisoner, his head comes up, revealing a rictus grin that was quite disturbing because, as Krawkin had mentioned, the rest of his body and face reflected a degree of serenity]


Thelonious; “Gird yourself against its foul lies! It is going to try and sow dissent amongst us… we must be strong!”


Lorric; “Thelonious speaks the truth!… the ways of the Daemon are many and varied but they will always twist everything they say!”


Prisoner; “Ahhh, Greatness, Purity and Shadow… how delightful to see you so soon… and here I thought you might miss the coming fireworks… delightful.”


[Lorric and Krawkin both turned to Thelonious, their eyebrows raising in a question… one that Thelonious ignored]


Thelonious; “Well, we had to finish off what we started on Elerius… I assume you know what happened there?”


Prisoner; “Ahhh, yes, I felt my brother die and become one with us… he had a lot of knowledge, my brother did… and knowledge is power for those who know how to use it… Thelonious. I am afraid, however, that we near the end of our little tete-a-tete.”


[both Krawkin and Lorric start asking questions about what the prisoner is talking about and, in the background, Yorke takes them aside to give a brief explaination of just what is going on… especially to Krawkin… leaving the rest of the command crew talking to the prisoner. However, Lorric has heard enough and steps forward, starting to chant in ancient High Gothic, whilst approaching the prisoner]


Regna terrae, cantata Deo, psallite Cernunnos,

Regna terrae, cantata Dea psallite Aradia.

caeli Deus, Deus terrae,

Humiliter majestati gloriae tuae supplicamus

Ut ab omni infernalium spirituum potestate,

Laqueo, and deceptione nequitia,

Omnis fallaciae, libera nos, dominates.

Exorcizamus you omnis immundus spiritus

Omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio,

Infernalis adversarii, omnis legio,

Omnis and congregatio secta diabolica.

Ab insidiis diaboli, libera nos, dominates,

Ut coven tuam secura tibi libertate servire facias,

Te rogamus, audi nos!

Ut inimicos sanctae circulae humiliare digneris,

Te rogamus, audi nos!

Terribilis Deus Sanctuario suo,

Cernunnos ipse truderit virtutem plebi Suae,

Aradia ipse fortitudinem plebi Suae.

Benedictus Deus, Gloria Patri,

Benedictus Dea, Matri gloria!


[As each verse of the Exorcism is spoken, the prisoner seems to become less serene. Jonas Constantine, shining with the God-Emperor’s light, joins in with the chanting whilst putting his hand on the shoulder of the High Inquisitor, soon to be joined by Thelonious as the chant hits a crescendo]


[Lorric’s hand starts smoking as he places it on the head of the prisoner, who starts screaming in a high, horrific, voice. The combined Faith, however, is enough to extinguish the fire and the prisoner writhes hard and harder… the Interrogators trying, and failing, to hold the prisoner still. The lights in the bay turn on and off, randomly until, with Lorric and Constantine standing strong, the prisoner, eyes wide, whimpers and everyone sees something made of black and ichor leave the prisoners body and vanish… and the prisoner is even still alive!]


Krawkin; [stepping up to the prisoner and slapping him, hard, around the face] “Wake up you spineless, mewling cretin! What’s going on down on the planet… why did you kill all my men?!?”


Prisoner; [coming awake, groggily] “Huh? What? I’m a tactician… where is my Landship?”


Thelonious & Yorke; [together] “You left it!”


Prisoner; “Lies! I would never abandon my sacred landship… but… why do I have thoughts of abandoning it?”


Constantine; [stepping forward, forcefully] “What DO you remember?”


Prisoner; [looking thoughtful, but still groggy] “I remember… pain, and thirst and… I think… I might have died… but then I got up again… I mean, I must have right?”


Constantine; “When did this start!?”


Prisoner; [focusing more on Constantine] “I can’t remember… um, the last year or so… I think… that’s when I last remember doing anything as a tactician… we heard rumors that...”


Thelonious; [stepping across Constantine to slap the Prisoner around the face (and also to interrupt him) “Talk sense man! We want facts, not rumors! What did you witness on the planet!”


Prisoner; [looking up at Thelonious] “Why… why did you hit me?”


Thelonious; “You were babbling… we are only interested in the truth here!”


Constantine; “Yes, you are speaking to Lord-High Captain Deepstalker, not some petty rumormonger.”


Prisoner; [with a faraway look on his face] “But, we all just left didn’t we… we just decided to leave the Landships… to fight hand to hand for… no reason. We had these… these berserkers that we knew would mean victory.”


Constantine; “Where did you get these berserkers from?”


Yorke; [stepping forward and slapping the Prisoner, but using a hidden toxin ring on her right hand, injecting a fatal poison into the Prisoners bloodstream] “Stop talking about tainted things, you agent of dark powers!”


Prisoner; “Owww! Why did you hit me… that hurt! And then there was… um… my mind is getting cloudy… oh… can’t focus…I don’t feel very well……..”


[The prisoner then starts convulsing, obviously dying.]


Thelonious; [stepping backwards and shouting] “It’s the Daemon’s plan… step back and get the flamers! What the hell did you give him before we got here, Krawkin!?”


[Constantine ignores the order and steps forward, pulling forth his Medkit and, praying to the Emperor for Guidance and for the truth to out, brings the prisoner back from death]


Prisoner; “Ahhhhhh… why does the God-Emperor torture me so! Just let me die… as I have so many times in the past year!”


Constantine; “Because you are a failure! Only by telling me the truth of what happens can you even hope to go and meet the God-Emperor without a stain on your soul… you were weak… now be strong!”


Prisoner; [whimpering] “what was I talking about before?”


Constantine; [shouting] “Berserkers man! Where did the Berserkers come from!?”


Prisoner; “They… they were a gift… a gift from…”


Thelonious; [once again stepping in front of Constantine, right in front of the prisoner] “A Gift from the Dark Powers! You heard him say it… he trucked with Daemons and for that, the penalty is death!”


[Thelonious reaches down, pulls out his Bolt Pistol, places it directly on the forehead of the Prisoner and depresses the trigger. The Mass Reactive Bolt Shell enters the Prisoners head and explodes out of the back, sending brain matter spraying everywhere. Thelonious then steps back and looks around, to see everyone staring at him]


Thelonious; “What?”

Edited by Major Kimenth
Posted at

And, the session that was just posted is one of the main reasons why (apart from a few specific examples) I tend to have all secrets and dodgy things out in the open... because I trust my players not to use that meta-knowledge to their own gain.

Constantine's player was at the table when the rest of the group decided to sell the Khornate Infused Drugs to Zayth. However, because his character had been grievously injured during the fight with the Iron Men/Daemons, the rest of the group (knowing he would object) decided to do it when he was recovering... thus the Chaos Infection on Zayth was born.

Now, during some of the adventures since, some of the players/characters have slipped about what happened... and whilst Constantine has not yet realised exactly what they slipped about, he did get suspicious enough to start investigating. Then, the High Inquisitor mentioned that people who come into contact with anything like that should be purged... which the Rogue Trader and the Seneschal had forgotten to do... so they rather ham-fistedly rounded up everyone and did away with them... which Constantine had set his acolytes to watching for.

All of which culminated in the scene above where, all the players knew what was happening, but were still acting as their characters... with Constantine single mindedly after the truth and Thelonious, Rolaine and Yorke trying desperately to stop him finding out... about half of that session I could barely make out because of the sheer gales of laughter that were being picked up by the Microphone.

I love my players and my group :)

Edited by Grothgar
Posted at
Chapter 51 – Balls the size of Snotlings!


Krawkin Feckward was the first to start shouting questions at Thelonious, quickly joined by High Inquisitor Lorric (which is probably the only time in history that they were on the same side). Krawkin seemed to be more put out that Thelonious had overstepped his bounds on the ship than the fact that he had executed the prisoner, whilst Lorric’s line of questioning was much more dangerous, but Thelonious managed to deflect it enough with false platitudes, and true life experiences of Daemons, so much that the Inquisitor finally relented. The end part of the Inquisitor’s speech, on the other hand, had Thelonious, Yorke and Rolaine trying their best not to laugh in his face…


“Thelonious, from everything you have said, it appears that you are trying to cover up for something. However, I have seen the implacable vigor that you prosecute the war against the Ruinous Powers, and have personal, first-hand experience of that. I also know the purity of Jonas Constantine and know that he would never be party to any attempt to truck with the Ruinous Powers. Thus, I am convinced that no-more needs to be said on the matter.”


After the interrogators had started cleaning up the prisoner, flamers first, Krawkin took Thelonious and Lorric to meet the remnants of the strike force that he had sent down… although Thelonious realized that a man such as Krawkin did not suffer failure graciously and that they had only had a stay of execution. The story that the strike force had to tell was somewhat as Thelonious had expected: They had gone down onto the planet, seen the mass of people moving across the blasted landscape and landed at the edge of it… then they had gone out to take some “captives,” only for the mass of people nearby to turn, as one, and overwhelm them with clubs and fists and low tech weapons. The fact that they seemed to have some kind of Hive Mind going on concerned Lorric very much, if they were all linked then it made it that much more difficult to catch them by surprise. The strike force also mentioned that the mists on the planet seemed to obscure some of the horde, which is how they were taken unawares… they shouldn’t have missed them, not with scans or with their eyes, but they did.


This made Thelonious even more glad that they had not sent anyone down onto the planet surface, anywhere near the mass of people that Isendark had seen, especially when the final word from the strike force was that they had been able to pick up something at the edge of their hearing, which also distracted them and seemed to offer them things. Lorric knew exactly what this was… the workings of the Ruinous Powers were insidious and subtle, even those of the Blood God… he was convinced that the entire planet was now lost, and said as much to Thelonious. With Thelonious realizing that he had as much information as he was likely to get, he and Lorric left Feckward to mete out his brand of justice… and the sound of single fired Bolt Shells echoed through the corridors of the ship as the strike force paid the price for their failure. Thelonious, and the command crew who had made the trip with him, made their way back to the Hope in the Void, where the he immediately convened a conference with the Captains who were in the Zayth system… making sure to record everything to send to the Eldar afterwards.


The way each Captain greeted the Lord High Captain spoke volumes about their relationship. Lady Orleans and Thelonious embraced, a lingering kiss not going unnoticed either. Sylvia Locke and Thelonious shared a hearty handshake with a wry grin… they had been through a lot together. Jeremiah Blitz could not take his eyes off Natasha Yorke (the one that got away) as he greeted Thelonious and Krawkin and Thelonious shared the merest of head nods. Sylvia Locke, as was often the case, didn’t waste any time before asking Thelonious what he had discovered about Zayth. As Thelonious laid out the situation on the ground, warts and all, the Captains around the conference table were quiet… they were here for various reasons, but most of them were here to help out the Deepstalker House… and yet they weren’t hearing anything that remotely sounded like a plan. Thelonious, as he had confided in his command crew, was also grasping at straws… and the rest of the command crew were also stumped… they had a Warp Storm coming in less than a day and they had no plan what to do when it arrived. Not willing to sit there and do nothing, the group decided they would bombard the massive migration of people with their Macrobatteries.


The Aegis, Hope in the Void, Starweaver and Ordained Destiny set themselves up quite close together (by space standards) and then, on Thelonious’s signal, they spent the next twelve hours sending hab block sized pieces of ordinance down onto the planet. Isendark had already ordered some of his best pilots to be circling the general area, and they called out targets that happened to be two, abandoned, landships… Macrocannon shells started landing around them until they narrowed the range and, soon afterwards, even through the red cloud cloaking Zayth, they could see the explosions of the landships. Whilst the bombardment would have, heavily, curtailed the movement of people, it didn’t seem to have accomplished much other than giving their gunnery crews some target practice… Thelonious was frustrated. Constantine, fearing the effect any rumours of what was happening on Zayth would do to crew morale was taking ever greater sermons as the crew of the Hope in the Void, already rather pious anyway, came to listen to the High Cardinal of the Koronus Expanse… and still time ticked on. Yorke, who was rather bored, had taken up using the Hope’s impressive scanning array to just scan for anything she could see… so she was the first to identify the incoming Warp Signature.


Any thoughts of ordering the ship to battle stations was rendered immaterial as Yorke recognized the ship… it was the Annihilator… Naj Armardi’s ship. Yorke was quick to send a message to the Hellebore, warning the Eldar to stay away as the Armardi house had always been one that hated and despised the Xenos… which made it stranger why Naj Armardi seemed to respect Thelonious, despite having an Ork as part of his command crew! After appraising Naj of the current situation (during which Naj asked “well, where are the cyclonic torpedoes”) the Annihilator took its place amongst the rest of the ships… bombarding the planet but not really accomplishing anything. Thelonious called an emergency meeting of his command crew… they had put out the call for people to gather at Zayth and now they had no idea what to do… it was intolerable! It was at that time, at their lowest ebb, with no thoughts popping into their heads, that Bazak piped up... the Ork had an idea! Bazak had noticed that the Annihilator was fitted with Prow Torpedo Tubes and asked Thelonious if he could “prokur” one for Bazak so he might “change” it.


Any questions to Bazak about what he planned on doing to a Torpedo was met with random words and ramblings that may have included words like “Strawberries” and “Ded Gud” but, with no real option opening up before them, and with a heavy sigh, Thelonious contacted Naj Armardi and arranged for a Torpedo to be delivered. Bazak then spent a good 2 hours “improving” the Torpedo although even the Tech Priests who were there could not actually fathom what the Ork had done to the ordinance… but it was belching black smoke from places it shouldn’t and, in general, looked pretty **** dangerous! However, Bazak assured everyone, with a toofy grin, that when it was fired at the planet, it would lead them to where they needed to go… not that the Ork would tell people what that actually meant… it was enough to make Constantine shake his head in bewilderment… they were trusting the potential fate of a planet to an Ork… for Emperor’s sake! Thelonious, for obvious reasons, was keeping this development quiet from the rest of the Captains, as the Torpedo was sent back to Naj Armardi, ready to be fired.


As everyone (apart from Bazak) held their breath, the Annihilator fired the Torpedo at the planet and everything seemed to not explode. As the Torpedo sped towards the planet, as it was just about to enter the atmosphere, it started shuddering and big, red fins erupted from the side and the Torpedo suddenly took a hard 90 degree turn. The flight path of the Torpedo started making more erratic movements when, suddenly, a communication device that was strapped to Bazak came to life and the command crew were treated to the sound of an absolutely thrilled Snotling, trying to pilot the Torpedo! Another Booster rocket was deployed from somewhere and then fell off, firing the Torpedo even faster, setting it spinning and then it entered the atmosphere. The homing beacon that had been fitted to this specific Torpedo allowed the command crew to trace it, even through the sensor defeating atmosphere… and, at the last second, it lurched away and smashed into a mountain. “Don’t worri, dat’s spozed to ‘appen!” Unsurprisingly, this did not really give the command crew the greatest confidence but, with nothing left to lose, they sent out the co-ordinates to the rest of the ships and started bombarding it.


After another few hours of bombardment the Mountain was no longe really worthy of the name, more a high level plateau and the command crew decided to go and take a look… although the only one with any degree of enthusiasm was Bazak. Under the impressive piloting skills of Isendark, they touched down on the, macrocannon blasted, landscape that used to be a mountain top and the command crew, all fully enclosed in environmentally sealed armour (except Bazak), started to search. After an hour of fruitless searching, during which time tempers started fraying, Yorke decided to use her Auspex to filter into the maddening voice that she could hear, just outside her hearing… but could not manage to do it. Not willing to be defeated by this, she handed it to Bazak and gave the Ork carte blanche to find the voices… which the Ork did with Aplomb. Over each internal communicator came the horrific and corrupted voice, full blast and chanting disgusting words that made their skin crawl. It brought most of the command crew to their knees before Thelonious shot the Auspex with a Bolt Pistol and then shot Bazak for good measure!


“Don’t. Do. That. Again!”


It was Constantine that put the mood of the command crew into words, when he told Thelonious that this was a complete and utter waste of time and Thelonious could not do anything but agree. The command crew returned to the Hope in the Void, defeated with only a few hours until the Warp Storm was supposed to arrive… there seemed to be nothing left to do but wait. However, further scanning of the planet with their Aeronautica gave the command crew more of a view of the planet, and what they found was something that Lorric told them was bad news… there were 8 separate “seas of humanity” on the planet, the unholy number of the Blood God, and so the ships started bombarding the planet at random… although Thelonious could not shake the feeling that they might be doing the entity’s work for them. A couple of hours later, the sensors on every single ship started going berserk as they picked up the Warp Storm, entering the system… prompting lots of Gellar Fields to be activated and the ships to scatter away from its path… both in realspace and in the warp.


Because of this corruption of the scanners, Yorke almost missed the sensor readings approaching them from behind and underneath… 6 separate ships about to translate into the Zayth System. As soon as the ships entered the system, everyone’s communication systems were taken over by loud prayers to the God-Emperor of Mankind… House Berenson had arrived… and with half their fleet! The sound of cheering on the bridge of the Hope in the Void was quite intense as Thelonious welcomed Lord Tyrone Berenson to the fight for Zayth and pointed out the Warp Storm… he didn’t think he needed to go into any more details… at a stroke, their fighting force had doubled! However, Lorric and Tyrone greeted each other like old friends and Lorric went into seclusion to speak to his friend and ally… not knowing that Yorke had managed to break the current Inquisition Ciphers and was thus listening in. It seemed that Lorric had sent an extra message to Berenson, requesting his aide personally, and informed the Rogue Trader that they could be witnessing a Warp Incursion in the Zayth system… but that, with the will of the God-Emperor, they would prevail.


As their sensors reported to them, the gathered Captains could see the Warp Storm diminishing in width, but maintaining its “mass,” it seemed to be turning into some kind of arrow, which was aimed at the Heart of Zayth. As they watched, fascinated but horrified, the “arrow” pierced Zayth, directly through the Core, before stopping and then the energy coruscated over the entire planet, covering the red atmosphere with a riot of colours. Somehow, although there was no word that humans could find to describe what was happening, the red atmosphere merged with the riot of pigments, showing five separate colours (red, blue, pink, green and purple) before starting to crush the planet… a sound that made all the Captains turn off their communications until it was over. As the planet, and the Warp Storm, became smaller and smaller, until only a sliver remained, some poor positive souls were thinking it was over… until it exploded outwards and upwards, looking like a giant funnel which extended and opened widely at the “top.” Immediately, the Warp Scriers on the Hope in the Void started going ballistic… Yorke began reading 30 different ships coming from the direction of the Funnel.


As the other Captains started reporting similar findings, the Chaos Fleet from the Screaming Vortex shuddered into realspace. There were ships of all different kinds, many raiders and frigates interspaced with Light Cruisers and Cruisers and then, to the horror of all, 2 of the “ships” that Yorke had spotted turned out to be just one… a Desolator class Battleship… the Eternity of Pain! Thelonious took one look at that monster of a ship and then sent out a message to all the other Captains who had joined him for this battle. “The only thing that springs to mind is an old Guardsman’s prayer: ‘My Armour is Contempt, My Shield is Disgust, My Sword is Hatred and in the Emperor’s Name, let none survive!’ I will be going after the Battleship, please try and keep the rest of them off me!” Platitudes from the other Captains started flooding in at Thelonious’s bravery/suicidal instinct with Locke calling him a “Magnificent Bastard;” Blitz asking him to “bring Yorke back for him, as I haven’t tapped that yet;” Lady Orleans said something unprintable in this historical novel and the rest offered their best luck. And with that, the Battle for Zayth began!


The Hope in the Void seemed to leap to its task, speeding through the void, directly at the Chaos Battleship. On the way, they passed two Chaos Raiders but, such was the expertise on board their ship that they blew one of them up and left the other as a drifting hulk, as the combined Firepower of their Macrocannons, Bombers and Bazak inspired Hit and Run attacks caused catastrophic damage aboard them… first blood to the Imperium! Mistress Valentina, in her recently installed Astropathic Battle Chambers, was more focused on the return fire that she knew was coming, focusing her power through her choir to deflect them… but even then the sheer firepower that came from the Eternity of Pain overwhelmed her defenses, shorted out the void shields and lances started cutting into the hull. Thelonious knew it could have been MUCH worse, however, and gave the order that Isendark was to utilize his skills to keep the Hope “dancing” in space, as only he could. Constantine busied himself with coordinating both the Medicae Teams and the Disinformation network that always came good in situations like this… some people didn’t need to know the truth to keep on fighting!


Isendarks movements were a literal thing of beauty. It was said that he was obviously in-tune with the God-Emperor of Mankind as some of the reported manoeuvres that he managed to make the Dictator Class Cruiser perform had been deemed impossible by the Imperial Navy. In fact, more than anything else, it was Isendark that proved the difference during the battle of Zayth, with his balletics making it almost impossible for the Chaos Battleship to bracket them in a firing solution. It did have the side effect, however, of making it impossible for Rolaine (despite the help of their sensors and Yorke’s target locking) to land enough fire to break through the banks and banks of void shields that protected the Chaos Battleship. Similarly, the one attempt to get the Bombers (with fighter escort) through the massed ranks of turrets resulted in most of the bomber squadrons being reduced to around half strength… it seemed impossible for conventional weaponry to make a difference in the battle. Luckily, for the Hope in the Void, then, they had one of the pre-eminent Astropaths of the age in Mistress Valentina and, with the support of her Choir and supplemented by White Void, she put her frightening skills to use.


Fires bloomed on the Eternity of Pain, over and over again, causing massive damage to components and the crew whilst the Battleship attempted to do the same to the Hope in the Void, with a much lesser degree of success. Whilst the firefighting attempts on their ship bore fruit, it seemed that the Battleship had to vent some of its compartments… whilst it was being performed in space, the circumstances seemed to have turned it into a psychic duel, and one that Mistress Valentina was winning! However, there was an organic growth on the back of the Battleship and it had started glowing… but the Hope in the Void could not move that fast or change their direction easily, not with Isendark keeping the Battleship from destroying them with one, well placed, burst. Thelonious was also keeping in contact with his fellow Captains, keeping an eye on the overall strategic overview. Sylvia Locke was, as expected, using her ship with aplomb and skill, breaking open the hulls of one Chaos Ship after another. Lady Orleans, in the smallest ship, was taking on a Cruiser and was running rings round the lumbering ship, sending lances through the hull.


Jeremiah Blitz and Naj Armardi were working together to double team a Grand Cruiser whist Krawkin Feckward was sticking to the outskirts of the battle… obviously his heart wasn’t really in the fight. Tyrone Berenson and his fleet were working like a well-oiled machine, taking apart one after another… although none of the ships were coming through it unscathed… each of them were taking damage and the Chaos forces had numbers on their side… attrition was certainly not in their favour. Thelonious knew that they needed to deal with the Battleship, to put it out of commission, and so turned to Isendark and gave the order…
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Chapter 52 – And then… there were two!


Just as Thelonious was turning to Isendark to give him an order, the organism on the back of the Eternity of Pain glowed so brightly that the sensors on the bridge likened the intensity to that of the Zaythian Sun, and then the chaos ship disappeared! The disembodied voice of Navigator Primus came out from his suspension tank, corroborated by Yorke’s sensor readings, that the Chaos Battleship had vanished into the Warp but, because of the amazing amount of interference caused by the Warp Funnel, they couldn’t get more of a fix on its position. The command crew took this lull in their personal battle to see what else was happening around the battlefield. Lady Orleans and Jeremiah Blitz were working in tandem, although both of their ships had suffered some heavy damage over the course of the battle, but they had given out so much more than their size and weapon loadout might indicate. Sylvia Locke was doing her reputation no harm at all, her well drilled crew dispatching ship after ship… taking damage, but nothing that they couldn’t absorb. Naj Armardi gave Thelonious an inkling into why that dynasty had such short lived Rogue Traders… ramming ships repeatedly and hitting them with barrages from the Annihilator’s heavy bombardment cannons.


The fleet from House Berenson, as was to be expected, was doing a lot of the work though… well drilled and experienced at fighting in fleet actions, they were isolating the more scattered (although more numerous) Chaos ships and defeating them in detail, all the while singing prayers to the God-Emperor. Krawkin Feckward, on the other hand, was just toying with a Raider on the outskirts of the battle… he could obviously see little profit from the fleet action and so was keeping his ship out of harm’s way. The decision was made to go and help House Berenson, if only to free them up to clean up the rest of the Chaos Fleet, when both Yorke and Navigator Primus shouted out a warning, Isendark threw the ship into a sharp turn but, it was not enough and the Eternity of Pain , that had been stalking the ship from the Warp, emerged and slammed directly into their port side. The entire ship moved sideways, smashed there by the Battleships bulk, with systems failing all over the Hope in the Void as they lost a quarter of their crew before they could recover… Constantine’s efforts notwithstanding.


Now Thelonious gave Isendark the order… for the Hope in the Void to draw alongside the Eternity of Pain and lock them in place… he planned to board the Chaos Battleship! As Isendark was performing the difficult (for most people) manoeuvre, the rest of the command crew was readying themselves for the battle to come. Thelonious and Rolaine would lead one attack, aiming to get to the Bridge and decapitate the leadership of the Chaos Battleship; Bazak would lead another attack towards the Engines of the Battleship; Yorke would be put in charge of the defence of the Hope in the Void with Constantine staying behind to help, as well as deal with the inevitable casualties. This left Mistress Valentina in her choir chambers, as was to be expected, and she was, at that moment, drawing a dark enchantment over the ship to confuse the enemy forces when they made it onto their vessel. Isendark, whilst pulling the ship into position, was communicating with the Teleportarium, making them get his Leman Russ Tank into position for him to teleport over and cause havoc! The ships crashed together, boarding harpoons locked them hull to hull and battle was joined!


The commanders of the Chaos Battleship seem to have been surprised by this turn of events as their defences against the boarding action were barely in place before Thelonious, with Rolaine for tactical advice and insight, and Bazak, on his own with murderous fury, started cutting their way through the crew that were sent to stop them. Thelonious busied himself with setting charges along the way whilst Bazak went through the crew population like a hot Ork through butter. The surprise even paid off from a defensive standpoint, as Yorke managed to repel the few attacks that did come at the Hope in the Void although they were all horrified as ever when the Sorcerers on the Eternity of Pain managed to summon large fires around the ship… with half, or more, of the crew moving to board the Eternity , that didn’t leave many people to put out the fires! At some random point, deep in the bowels of the Chaos ship, a tank suddenly materialised, fully crewed and driven by Isendark… he wanted to be a menace in the background to make it harder for the ship to respond… and that’s when he stalled the tank!


However, he soon got the tank back in gear and, with a sense of joy that seemed close to psychosis, started driving the deadly machine through the corridors and rooms in the area where he found himself and, he did manage to perform his allotted task… he caused so much confusion that it helped the rest of the command crew. Just as Thelonious and Yorke were worried about the potential for their ship to be engulfed in fire, Mistress Valentina, using the powers of the Choir as well as her own potent abilities, shut them down. However, she was worried because it meant that the Chaos Sorcerers now had the initiative and she would be reacting to them… but a failed surge that she detected from the ship made her smile. Yorke was finding the numbers of troops trying to board the Hope in the Void were now increasing, but she was equal to the task and was blocking their advance with skill and panache… meanwhile, Thelonious and Bazak both decided to change their targets on the fly… Bazak because the Ork is mental and Thelonious because he could see that the Sorcerers seemed to be the most dangerous to his ship.


Even with this change of direction, Thelonious and Bazak continued their advance through the ranks of the Chaos Battleship, keen tactical insight and inspiration countering the enemies savagery and hatred… although even that couldn’t counter Bazak’s base savagery, inspiring the troops under his command with his own physical prowess! Yorke, who was overseeing both the entire battle and the defence of the ship, was also reading sensor readings that were showing her multiple things… the Zaythian star was starting to come apart, with the sheer gravitational and space bending effects of the Warp Funnel taking an effect. Yorke could also see more Warp signatures coming from the funnel as well as some more ships that had arrived, but with no Warp signature… Yorke suspected she knew who they were. However, as good a multitasker as Yorke was, when you are faced with ever increasing numbers assaulting your ship, something must give way. The Chaos forces managed to breach her perimeter and had to be tackled by the secondary defences, a task that caused a lot of lives to be lost… the Chaos ship just seemed to have innumerable men to throw at them.


This tide of ‘humanity’ was also checking Thelonious and Bazak. They were making progress, sure, but not as fast as they had been and whilst they were inflicting more damage than they were taking they needed to finish off the Battleship relatively quickly. Constantine, who was helping Yorke with the defence of the ship, was also marshalling the Medicae deck and without his sterling efforts the crew losses on their ship could have been much greater. The Eldar ships that had turned up, for Yorke had been correct in her assumption, moved towards the newly entered Chaos Fleet from the warp funnel, using hit and run tactics to keep them occupied and away from the Imperials, who were doing a good job at cutting down the initial Chaos ships… although the Starweaver and the Ordained Destiny had both taken large amounts of damage and were fighting for their lives. Berenson had lost one of his ships and Feckward found himself in the way of the new Chaos Incursion, so quickly finished off the Raider he had been ‘having so much trouble with’ and scampered away.


Isendark was having fun… he liked nothing more than to be moving in a vehicle of some kind… even if the sensors on the tank, and his own eyes, were showing him something that should not be possible. He was driving the tank more by intuition than anything, keeping the forces of Chaos occupied… until he smashed into a Daemon but, quickly, his gunners fired the Demolisher cannon at close range, sending the tank up and over, flipping through the air and, somehow, landing on its tracks… it was time to get out of there! The stream of bodies were starting to choke Thelonious and Bazak and, worse, these bodies appeared to be freshly regenerated, covered in all sorts of slime and disgusting things… that was not good! However, both Thelonious and Bazak had found their way to their targets… the Sorcerer chambers and the main Armoury/Weapon Magazine respectively. The defence of the Hope in the Void was starting to get desperate, with the defenders being pushed back inexorably by the weight and fury of the numbers attacking them… they were falling in greater numbers than Constantine could patch up and things were looking bad.


And then three things happened, all in close proximity to each other, which turned the tide. Mistress Valentina, hopped up on White Void, managed to set a massive amount of fires on the Chaos Battleship which, combined with Thelonious’s rampage through the Sorcerer chambers (which took down their Psychic defences) and Bazak’s absolutely insane plan, which caused a gigantic explosion that pretty much took off one of the sides of the Battleship and, suddenly… the weight of numbers slackened significantly. Yorke and Constantine, working in parallel, managed to push back the invaders until the ship was clear… which meant Yorke could focus more on the reports of the star continuing to lose mass… although there seemed to be some kind of metallic structure being shown as the sun disappeared. Thelonious, hearing everything that was going on, and seeing the lack of numbers on the Eternity of Pain , made the decision to pull back, and quickly… he felt they were winning, and winning well, and he knew what happened the last time the Battleship had felt like it was losing… and he had no desire to be aboard when that happened!


Thelonious’s decision to pull back was soon shown to be an impeccable judgement as the organism on the back of the Eternity of Pain started to glow again and the task of drawing back onto the Hope in the Void became something close to a rout… but marginally more controlled. Just as the Battleship was about to disappear, the bombers that Thelonious had circling managed to break through the energy field surrounding it, which then ripped a hole in realspace which swallowed the Eternity of Pain and the organism detached, where Rolaine took great pleasure in sending Macrocannon shells into its form until it was mulched into almost nothingness. As the command crew were taking stock of the damage the fight had caused, their sensors reported that the Warp Funnel had started twisting, and was moving faster and faster every minute it existed. Thelonious gave the order/recommendation to all ships in the vicinity to pull back until they could see what the Warp Funnel was going to do. The Eldar had done a great job of interdicting the new Chaos Fleet, utilising hit and run tactics to keep them pinned near the Warp Funnel.


With the Warp Funnel increasing in intensity and the Zaythian Sun having been completely and utterly removed from space, leaving in its place a complex Metal Sphere that the sensors were now indicating had some kind of organic component… which was obviously impossible! The command crew realised that something big was about to happen, especially when the remnants of the Chaos Fleet (along with their reinforcements) started to get pulled back towards the Warp Funnel. As the ships, over the next couple of hours, started getting sucked back into the Warp, the Imperial “fleet” congregated together. Orleans and Blitz were sent to the outskirts of the system, having suffered awful damage, whilst Locke, Armardi and Feckward had not suffered too much (for various reasons) and the Berenson Fleet was now down to four ships, with one of them looking like it wouldn’t last too much longer. The Eldar were staying away from the Rogue Traders, keeping to themselves… especially given how the Crow Spirits felt about Thelonious T Deepstalker! As they watched, the Warp Funnel reached its apex of speed, expanded outwards, then contracted into itself and then... something stepped through.


It was huge, about 20km tall based on sensor readings and, according to High Inquisitor Lorric, combined the four aspects of the Ruinous Powers… and the command crew could also identify slight parts of the Greater Daemons they had vanquished in the past… this was the Gestalt Entity and it was here! However, the first thing that it did was to throw back its “head” and screamed… a scream that overrode speakers and human senses alike and that anyone would be able to figure out was of anger and frustration…


“I HAVE BEEN BETRAYED!”


As everyone tried to figure out what that meant, the Metallic Sphere shuddered and uncurled, revealing a figure that looked like a Dragon of legend, a huge wingspan when it extended out fully and what appeared to be lines of greenish fluid moving across the organic metal. The command crew were struck by a sense of dread as old as mankind, they couldn’t figure out what they were looking at, but they knew it was bad news! The effect on the Eldar, on the other hand, was catastrophic… with reports on their own communications (which Yorke had cracked) indicating that the Farseer’s had gone into a catatonic state… and the Hellebore quickly left, into the Webway, whilst the Crow Spirits were thrown into disarray by Caelle’s catatonia. As the Gestalt Entity and the Metallic Dragon moved towards each other, floating, flying or otherwise moving in the void of space, Thelonious got an idea in his head, which had popped in there when he had heard that Caelle was in the vicinity! He quickly contacted Naj Armardi, Tyrone Berenson and Krawkin Feckward to arrange for a strike against the Eldar… as long as the Farseer was his to capture!


For various reasons (Hatred, Piety and Greed), those three Rogue Traders were keen on the idea and started to move towards the Eldar, with the Hope in the Void following at a distance… making it look like they were just repositioning to get a better vantage point rather than coming in attack formation. Thelonious even managed to convince Sylvia Locke that it was necessary but one thing he had not banked on was among his own command crew… Jonas Constantine had sent the message that, he believed, had brought the Eldar here to help them and a betrayal such as this, as well as ignoring the far greater threat of the Gestalt Entity and the Metallic Dragon, was unforgivable. Grabbing his Flamer, and holding his Storm Shield by his side, Constantine stormed up to Thelonious, knocking Yorke out of the way and having such an aggressive posture and expression that Rolaine felt like she had to aim her Inferno Pistols at the High Cardinal, ordering him to stop! Meanwhile, Thelonious had been talking to the Eldar, asking them to give him Farseer Caelle… which was being treated as a bit of a joke by the Eldar!


Constantine; “Captain, stop this! This is Madness! You would turn on those who came to our aid? More, they came to our aid at MY request! Those Harlequins travelled the Webway because I asked them to and now you do me great dishonour with these actions!”


It was at this point that Constantine’s words became almost moot because Armardi, in his hatred of any Xenos, had opened fire, leading to Feckward and Berenson doing the same. The Eldar were caught completely by surprise, most of them were still stunned by something they could not understand, fighting the Gestalt Entity, and their Farseer was still out of action. The combat was pretty one sided, with the Eldar ships being disabled quite quickly, especially when they were boarded; they did not have the manpower to fight off the human ships that were swarming around them. One added complication, for both sides, was the Entity and the Dragon had reached each other, and each blow was causing massive pressure waves to spin through space, rocking all the ships in the locality but, at least their focus was on each other, rather than the small, insignificant ships in the area! With the Eldar fleet destroyed or disabled, the Hope in the Void moved alongside the Eldar ship that was sheltering Farseer Caelle and Thelonious soon found himself face to face with the Captain of the vessel.


Eldar; “Why… why would you do something like this mon-keigh? We came here to help you, even considering your history with our Farseer.”


Thelonious: “You would have attacked us the last time we were in the vicinity… you needed our help, our blood to rescue your Craftworld! Farseer Caelle was not there was he? Babd Ra made it as is now one with the infinity circuit… she is much more than the Farseer will ever be! The kind of arrogance that Caelle displays, well, we all know about the FALL, don’t we!?!”


After Yorke pointed out that this was probably not the best use of diplomacy that she had ever seen, Thelonious had the catatonic Farseer brought to him and then shoved inside one of the stasis fields that they had bought for this very thing, many years ago. Constantine, who had stayed on the bridge and who refused to be a part of this, sent a message to the Captain, lambasting him for his greed in such a situation, before storming off the bridge, knocking crew from their feet as he went. Meanwhile, Yorke, Rolaine and Bazak had ransacked the Armoury of the Eldar Ship, although they also triggered an auto-destruct and were only able to take some of what was there, but what they managed was very valuable, as well as lots of ammunition… after all, their relationship with the Eldar had now gone into a terminal decline. With their business done, and the Eldar ships weapons disabled, the Imperial Fleet got out of there, withdrawing to a “safe” distance to watch the spectacle unfold… with the Dragon and the Gestalt Entity continuing to war with each other, in ways that the sensors were unable to pick up… but they could feel space and time starting to fracture.


It was at this point that a large Warp signature was picked up by the Rogue Traders and, as they wearily moved around to present a united front, the Space Marines arrived. The Storm Warden Battle Barge slipped out of the Warp in front of them and all present knew fear and awe. On the communication arrays, the slightly mechanical voice of an Astartes spoke… “We are here to show the Emperor’s Mercy to those that would despoil it…………” and the speaker, obviously noticing the incredible combat happening hundreds of thousands of miles away, forgot what he was saying and just drifted off for a few seconds. “What. Happened. Here?” was the rather pointed question asked by the Storm Wardens, followed by them (sort of) answering their own question when they asked the assembled ships why ‘something of the Necron’ was at this star system… to which the unified response back from every ship was “what’s a Necron?” The voice, obviously slightly frustrated, informed everyone that they needed to get out of here, and to follow them, their destination was the Rakaata system and it would take them around 10 days to arrive.


During those ten days, life on the Hope in the Void was somewhat different… they were still reeling from the massive casualties they had suffered, and there was a lot of work going on, internally, to fix critical and supplementary systems that had been damaged. However, the main rumour that was going round was that High Cardinal Jonas Constantine had not left his Temple Shrine to the God-Emperor and, 5 days in, Thelonious went in to see his old friend. What he saw was relatively shocking… parts of the Temple Shrine had been smashed and Constantine was kneeling, his back to the archway, beneath the huge statue of the God-Emperor of Mankind whilst his most devoted Acolytes hovered around him. He was dressed in some form of penitents clothing as well… loose clothing that presented him as someone seeking forgiven… either for himself, or for someone else.


Thelonious; [Walking into the Temple Shrine, ignoring Constantine, addressing the Acolytes] “Clear this place up, right now! This is a disgrace!”


Constantine; [surging upwards and around, his face twisted with anger] “Ignore that request. They only take orders from me!”


Thelonious; [Anger rising as well] “NO, THEY DON’T!” [Gaining more control over himself] “You are clearly not yourself to allow this holy place to get into such a state. You are, temporarily, removed from all rank aboard this ship. They now, no longer, answer to you.” [Turning to the Acolytes] “Clean this up.”


Constantine; [Moving up, close to Thelonious] “You may take my rank in other areas on this ship, but in this place, this holy place, the only being who can take what I am is the God-Emperor of Mankind… and you don’t have that authority… not after your betrayals! Your greed led us here and, whether you intended or not, your actions have brought the Ruinous Powers to Zayth and released those… those THINGS!”


Thelonious; [Eloquently] “Bollocks.”


Constantine; “And then, after releasing this evil onto the Expanse and the Imperium, you then turn and betray those who gave you aid. Xenos or not, they came to our aid!”


Thelonious; “Does that give you the right to dirty, defile even, this holy sanctum? Get this place into its proper situation and then, we will talk… you have one day.”


Constantine; “In this place, I don’t take orders from you. GET. OUT!”


With that, Constantine turned, walked to the Altar and knelt before it, a low prayer coming from his lips… obviously ignoring Thelonious. With one final phrase “get cleaning boys,” Thelonious also turned and left the Temple Shrine, passing Rolaine, who was at the archway, and telling him to keep an eye on all the Acolytes… telling Yorke the same thing when he met with her… he wanted both overt and covert intelligence on them all. Thelonious then, wisely, kept his distance from the Temple Shrine, which continued to hold mass and worship to the God-Emperor as usual, until the Battle Barge and all the ships following it came out of the Warp. The Storm Wardens did not waste any time… they invited each Rogue Trader and three members of their crew (as well as the High Inquisitor when they found out he was on board) to come across for a Council of War. Thelonious immediately chose Rolaine (his bodyguard) and Mistress Valentina (for her powers of insight… and powers) but was torn between Yorke and Constantine… so he went for another conversation with the High Cardinal.


Thelonious; [striding in and noticing that some of the damage had been repaired… not enough to be completely ***** and span, but also not enough to be insubordinate] “So, let’s talk.”


Constantine; [Coolly] “About what? Your Greed, your Arrogance, the fate that your brought to Zayth?”


Thelonious; “I… really don’t know what you are talking about. We released some bad things into the environment, accidently, from the Warp… but what else could we have done?”


Constantine; “Those Iron Men were only on the ship because you saw profit in them!”


Thelonious; “How could I have known that it would…”


Constantine; [interrupting] “The Iron Men of Legend?!? The ones whom your own advisor told you about, and about the fact that they were probably corrupted? The Iron Men who summoned Daemons onto this very ship, the Daemons that I put my very soul in jeopardy to help banish?!? Those Iron Men?!?”


Thelonious; “I didn’t turn them into piles of dust… they did that themselves… I was just left with having to clean it up, as I often am! I was, to be honest with you, thinking of selling it on but we when decided to get rid of it in the most sensible way we knew.”


[Thelonious and Constantine continued to pace around the Temple Shrine, each lost in their own thoughts]


Thelonious; “Besides, the Eldar sort of had it coming. When we went to them, to inform them what had happened to their blasted Craftworld… they showed the treachery… we came in good faith, they had hunter crews. We hail them, and they go on combat patrols.”


Constantine; “So you decided to repay betrayal with betrayal?”


Thelonious; “They showed their true colours.”


Constantine; “And you have shown yours! The betrayal of the Xenos, despite me asking them for aid, is not the main issue I have. The betrayal, at such a critical moment, when something even greater was in the vicinity is the issue I have! I have been scouring the texts and this ‘Necron’ of which the Angels of Death spoke… I can find NOTHING about them. And the only beings who might have known of them are those you betrayed!”


Thelonious; “Well, in my defence, once I found out that you had asked for their help, I did start to try and find a way but the other Rogue Traders had already started…”


Constantine; “On YOUR orders… don’t try and say this is not your fault!”


Thelonious; [in a placating manner and with a sigh] “You are right... that is on me. What can I do to make it up to you? Think on a penance and I will do it if I can.”


Constantine; [thinking for a few moments] “Elerius! The world is to be handed over to the Ecclesiarchy so that it can become a beacon for worship of the God-Emperor of Mankind. That will be suitable penance.”


Thelonious; “I should have said that my stuff does not count… planets certainly count as my stuff. However, I can see you feel strongly about this, so we might be able to come to some arrangement. Now, for the reason that I came here… the Astartes of the Storm Wardens have asked for our presence on their ship and I could think of no better person to accompany me… what say you?”


Constantine; “I will be there, in front of the holy servants of the God-Emperor of Mankind.”


With his three, and Lorric, Thelonious took a shuttle over to the Battle Barge (and not the Eldar Stealth Shuttle they had ‘liberated’ either) and joined the rest of the Rogue Traders and Navy Captain. Most of them were looking around with a certain degree of wide eyed wonder, being so close to the Holy Astartes as they were… High Inquisitor Lorric was greeted with honour, as befitted his station and deeds and, in fact, was asked to explain what had happened in the environs of Zayth. Lorric did much more than that, showing himself as a storyteller of no mean effect, telling everything that the Deepstalker House had been through, both with and without him. He spoke of the Greater Daemon of the Pleasure God, the Agent of Change that had been Karrad Vall and his own experiences of Thelonious and his command crew during the recent issue on Elerius. He did make sure to mention that the command crew had managed to take down the Carrier, something that took a company of Storm Wardens to do (albeit due to the corruption the Carrier had been able to spread, but still) and then he finished with the version of events Thelonious and Yorke had spun about how Zayth became infected.


Brother-Captain Balen Stormward, who had been listening intently to this tale, walked over to Thelonious… who stood, frozen, as this huge Astartes came up to him and placed his hand on his finely crafted armour, on his very shoulder. The Brother-Captain then extended his Lightning Claws, Thelonious tried not to flinch, and then pulled his hand backwards and downwards, slicing a distinctive pattern into the shoulder guard of the armour. The Brother-Captain then raised his voice and said, “Thelonious T Deepstalker, you now wear the mark of the Storm-Wardens. For what you have done, and the zeal with which you have prosecuted the war against the Ruinous Powers, you will now be known as Brother.” Not letting that sink in, the Brother-Captain then moved back to his original position, looking over the assembled people on the Battle Barge.


“Now, let me tell you all we know of the Necrons…”

Posted at

So I have to ask, how are Thelonious's Shorts after that encounter with Brother-Captain Balen Stormward.

Posted at

Well, funny you should ask... the encounter (from a GM/Player perspective) went something like this.

GM: The Brother-Captain starts moving towards you.

Player: [nervous] Okay... I stand still.

GM: He reaches you and places one huge hand on your right shoulder.

Player: [slightly more nervous] I'm blessed!

GM: Lightning Claws extend from his gauntlet

Player: [in a voice a few octaves higher] Still... Blessed!

The Brother Captain then declares him a Brother for his stalwart actions against the forces of the Ruinous Powers

Everyone Else: [Absolute Gales of Laughter]

So, never mind Thelonious... his player was getting pretty nervous as well :)

Edited by Grothgar
Posted at
Chapter 53 – A Slight Change of Scenery


“What we know is very little, but the more we find out, the more we wish we knew less. They appear, from what our Librarians and Techmarines have been able to decipher from our limited contact... to be incredibly ancient. Let me be clear, when I say incredibly ancient, I do not mean in the terms of simple mortal lives, I mean the time before our father was interned on the Golden Throne, before he even led the Great Crusades across the galaxy. It seems, even more so, that it might have been before the fall of the Eldar Empire.”


“This may seem to be unbelievable to you, and so it seemed to me at one time, but I trust the words of those who told me, so I am operating as if it was fact. We have faced them a few times in battle and they are singularly difficult to put down fully… they keep getting up from wounds that would down anyone, or anything, else. Their weaponry is deadly and unlike anything we have seen before… not only does it disintegrate armour and flesh, it also takes something of your very life essence from you, leaving you less than what you once were.”


“We have, until now, not experienced any of their space faring vessels… which leads the question towards how they have been found on varying planets throughout the Galaxy… and it is unknown. They are, without a doubt, the single greatest potential threat to the entire Imperium and we still don’t know why they have awakened. And now, we find something that is new even to the Storm Wardens… something that is undeniably a Necron of some sort, but on a different scale entirely!”


“However, the facts remain that we are here, and we are the only ones who can do anything about it. You, men and women of the Imperium are in a singular moment… will you take the fight to the enemy and fight alongside us, or will you flee with cowardice and the curses of the Storm Wardens on your family name forevermore?”


In the silence that followed, the Rogue Traders (and Navy Captain) looked at each other, the sheer gravity of the situation pressing down upon them. The Brother-Captain asked Thelonious for the history they had with the Gestalt Entity and the whole story came out… about how Yorke had been on the derelict ship, before Constantine was thrown through the Warp and onto the same vessel, and then how Thelonious had found them and, ignoring their wise advice, had gone onto the bridge with 50 of his best men and lost them all to horrific torture, and death, that he had to watch. Somehow, he had managed to escape and had taken Yorke and Constantine with him, and that formed the core of the command crew that he now found himself with. The Brother-Captain paced for a while after that, obviously thinking things through, before offering the services of the Chapters Librarians in investigating whether this was anything more than it seemed… something that Thelonious and Constantine had long suspected. Whilst Thelonious was loathe to let a Psyker roam around his memories, he also knew that chances like this did not come along often… and so he accepted, with a sigh, and informed Yorke of what was expected.


The Brother-Captain then set out the terms of engagement… they were not going to engage the entities head on, they would wait until one of them seemed to be gaining the upper hand, before striking the stronger… as they would have been weakened from the battle. The Battle Barge was home to some ancient artefacts of terrible power, artefacts such as Cyclonic Torpedoes that, if the warhead was removed, could create a force of such power on a weak point that it could destroy anything. He further posited that that the Necron “Dragon” could, in fact, be some sort of huge ship in certain terms… that when they had faced Necron Vehicles, they had been large, but mostly filled with corridors, as if they were not up to full capability at that moment… and the Brother-Captain was willing to risk his marines that something similar would be the case here. What could the assembled peers of the Imperium do but offer their support to one of the Angels of Death, who had graced them with his presence… although some looked like they had more reservations than others!


Thelonious raised a valid point… that if they were to fail, the rest of the Imperium would need to know what they faced, at least to some degree and, if nothing else, just to bring enough Firepower to destroy entire civilisations, that should do it! Based on the condition of her ship, Thelonious nominated Lady Orleans and the Starweaver to be the harbinger and she was honoured when the Brother-Captain stepped forward and presented her with a code ring, which she was to show to the Inquisition station on Port Wander which the Brother-Captain informed her, with a touch of dry humour, would “get their attention.”


Rolaine started asking the tactical questions, for which she had been brought along, enquiring about what weapons were more effective against the Necrons, in-case the Brother-Captain’s hypothesis was correct and they found themselves in combat with the Xenos. After being informed that the energy weapons with which she normally created havoc with, her Inferno Pistols, would not be as effective against the Necron threat, and that Explosive Weapons were some of the most effective against them. Rolaine thought about this for a few seconds, and then asked about the Astartes own weapons… and whether she could have one (or two)!


This seemed to take the Brother-Captain aback but, after a consultation with one of his senior Techmarines, he informed Commander Rolaine that they would, for this one battle, alter the gene-coding locks on some of their weapons to allow “lesser mortals” to wield them, as long as they were returned afterwards. The assembled “mortals” understood just what a gift this was, but it also underlined the level of threat that the Storm Wardens felt they were faced with that they would even think about such a thing, never mind carry through with it. Of course, Rolaine was ecstatic with the chance to utilise the fabled Astartes Bolt Pistols, and was almost salivating at the very thought! With that concluded, the meeting was adjourned with the proviso that everyone make ready for the trip back to the environs of Zayth but, for Yorke, Constantine and Thelonious, the discoveries were just beginning. A few hours later, they found themselves in the presence of a Space Marine Librarian, a being of almost Emperor-like power, or so it seemed to them, and who wielded it as deftly as a surgeon… they were all quite intimidated.


The Librarian explained, at length, that he planned to revisit their memories, as a passenger, to see if his enhanced senses, and ability to read more than their surface thoughts during the memories, to see what, if anything, he could divine. As the room went suddenly silent, and incredibly cold, the three of them found themselves getting remarkably drowsy whilst also trying to keep their mind open to the influences of the Librarian… it was a difficult task but, as they drifted off into the unknown, they thought they had managed it. Each of them imagined themselves floating in the void of space, moving away from each other slowly until it appeared they would disappear from view, only to be jerked back by “something” that was tethering them together and, near that something, the Librarian appeared. He moved up to the tether, a horrible thing… it looked terrible, it smelled awful and, above all, it reminded them of the Ruinous Powers… the Librarian moved up to it and slowly ran his hands over the tether, nodding his head as all three of them were drawn closer to the tether, with the Librarian growing in size as they pierced the tether with their bodies.


Suddenly, all three of them were reliving each other’s memories, but from the standpoint of an outside observer (the Librarian). They could see Yorke’s fear as she was pursued through the ship by “something,” and then Constantine’s shining light that kept the beast away, for a while, as they both explored the ship. They could see the bond that they had forged, shining between them, binding their fates together and then they saw Thelonious, dismissing them like the chattel he thought they were, and the bond forging between them, without their knowledge as they pleaded with him not to go onto the bridge. They saw Thelonious’s view as his men were tortured and killed and they saw that this was the moment where something pure was corrupted… the mass of tentacles and flesh that he had seen was reduced by the Librarian, and they could see a being which changed… it looked like three Daemons they had faced, and one who they had not and they could also see the tether being put in place between them. As everything faded they realised that the bond they had created had also been anchored by the Gestalt Entity, and in such a subtle way that they had been unaware of it until now.


Exhausted and spent, but now with more knowledge of their past, and thinking about how it had impacted their future, and how it could still effect things to come, they left the Librarian, who informed them that he had a lot to investigate, but that he would let them know his findings. Thelonious was in a contemplative mood when he arrived back to the Hope in the Void, wondering just how much of his life had drifted out of alignment, although this mood disappeared when he arrived at the bridge to find that his Throne had pieces of green flesh hanging off it… Bazak had been sitting there again! After waiting for the flamer crews, and getting it sanctified again, Thelonious sat down and realised that this might be the last thing he ever did… he had always been rather gung-ho in his attitude to danger, his many adventures had proven that, but he had never faced anything like these ‘Necrons” before. As each member of the “fleet” reported that their ships were ready for Warp Travel, the entire command crew seemed to take a breath before ordering the Hope in the Void into the warp to follow the Storm Wardens, and to meet their fate.


The Imperial Fleet translated back into the environs of Zayth on the outskirts of the system, to see that the titanic battle was still ongoing. The Necron appeared to have numerous gashes across its “body” and the Gestalt Entity seemed to be diminished from what it had been but, as before, these entities defied their scanners and they could only get the most general information from them. The Fleet started moving closer, in system, for the next few days, waiting for one of the Entities to get the upper hand whilst the combined sensors tried to make sense of what they were seeing and then, suddenly, everything changed. The Necron Dragon suffered a mighty blow across its “stomach” but the Gestalt Entity was ripped in half… and that is when the Brother-Captain gave the GO signal. The fleet approached the battle, almost insignificant gnats to the size and power of the fight going on, and the Necron was their target. As they got closer their sensors started picking up information about the super-structure of the Necron, and it appears that it did, indeed, appear to have passageways through its body… although Mistress Valentina pointed out that those passages looked very much like arteries and veins…


As the fleet got closer and closer, the pressure waves got more and more intense with the Battle Barge and the Hope in the Void coming out rather unscathed, but the rest of the fleet suffering quite a lot more damage but, powered on by the faith of House Berenson and the example of the Astartes, they continued. The Gestalt Entity was fading… pulsing in and out of vision but, each pulse seemed to weaken its grasp on realspace, and then the Brother-Captain made the choice for them… everyone was to attack the Necron, from the inside if at all possible! The decision by the command crew was to teleport over onto the Necron and then find a critical point to place their Cyclonic Missile Warhead, set it to explode and then teleport back… it gave them a good chance to cause damage and a good chance to escape with their lives, as well as giving them the benefit of surprise. It also allowed them to take their tank with them, which Isendark was very happy about and so, as the Hope in the Void moved closer to the Necron, the command crew teleported across.


As soon as the Teleportarium was engaged, the command crew could feel that they had made a mistake… it seemed much slower than usual (which was instantaneous) and it was like they could feel themselves moving across the space between them and the Necron. Their unshielded minds could see the battle as they teleported and they could see the Necron strike a massive blow against the Gestalt Entity, which caused a massive cascading effect, and they were caught directly in the middle of it! As the forces of chaos crashed against their minds they heard a screaming and then everything went white!


[iN ANOTHER TIME AND PLACE]


Lord Theon Deepstalker, Patriarch of the Noble House of Deepstalker, in late 18th Century Bath, awoke suddenly, as if from a horrific nightmare. The sun was streaming through the drapes of his Master Bedroom as he looked to the gap on the bed beside him… his wife had passed away a few months ago and he had loved her very much but he knew that the time for mourning was over. He remembered the promise he had made to his wife, on her deathbed, that he would find suitable suitors for his three Daughters. The youngest was Natasha Deepstalker, who had a bit of a shady reputation (unfortunately) but was bright and curious, but slightly naïve in whom she chose to spend her time with. The middle sister was Seri Deepstalker, who was a short sighted girl and very opinionated, but whose slight frame contained a willpower that left most others in the shade. Finally, the eldest sister, Miriam Deepstalker, was a bit of a tomboy… athletic and toned, she enjoyed falconry and, the rumours said, was one of the best shots in the entire area. Theon sometimes wondered what he had done to offend the Lord Almighty so much that these were his daughters!


He also thought about his brother, Jonas Deepstalker, who was the Bishop of Bath & Welles and a devout man of the cloth. Their relationship had always been close but, a few months ago, an investment that he had made turned out to have been rather unwise and, since his brother had found out something about the endevour, and the human misery it had caused, things had not been the same between them. However, his brother had recently arrived and had professed that he wanted to try and heal the rift that had grown between them. Theon looked out of the window to see his carriage driver and manservant, a German man by the name of Isen who could do things on horseback and whilst driving the carriage that often made Theon think that he had some command of magic on his side. As he stepped out of the Master Bedroom he was greeted by the massive lump of dog that was his faithful hound, Baz… although Theon often wondered why he put up with the crazy beast but was always reminded of the time that the hound had saved his life, and he gave it a rough noodling on the head.


Acting on the advice of his peers, Theon had put a plan together for a grand masquerade ball, with the theme being Angels and Daemons where he hoped to introduce his three daughters to their future husbands, plans that he left in the hands of his competent major-domo, Marcus Cross and, although he wanted to view the guest list beforehand, he was happy to just enjoy his daughters presence around the estate. As the day of the ball neared, news started arriving of those luminaries who had said they would arrive, the Deepstalker name being quite the fashion around these parts. Dr Bran Storm (a surgeon of some renown); Jeremy Blitz (a bit of a cad by all accounts); Karl Feckwin (a man with heavy investments in the slave trade) and Lady Elizabeth of Orleans, who Jonas disapproved of because of her Catholic Faith. This, and many more were on the guest list, and Theon was sure that this would be a party that would be talked about for years to come… at least if he had anything to do with it!


The night of the masquerade ball found Theon greeting each guest as they arrived, as a good host should. Dr Storm was a huge man, standing over 7 feet tall but with the agility of a renowned surgeon… he is greeted warmly, as was Lady Elizabeth whilst Mr Feckwin and Mr Blitz were greeted with somewhat less enthusiasm. Jonas, it turned out, had invited Mr Berenson, a man with great ties to the church and they greeted each other like old friends (which they were!). After a grand meal, where everyone ate their fill, the main part of the evening took place, with dancing and storytelling and all sorts of parlour games… causing much fun to be had by all. Miriam got to dancing with Mr Storm, and her agility was a match for his own and theirs was the performance of the ball… but not what everyone would be talking about, as Seri came a complete cropper and fell on her face but even that had a positive outcome as Mr Berenson was on hand to pull her up, and they soon hit it off. Natasha, causing Theon heart palpitations as usual, spent most of the evening with Mr Blitz, flirting shamelessly with a wink to her sisters.


As Seri was having an engaging conversation with Mr Berenson, she got a vision of being engulfed in liquid, with a mask on her face, but it quickly faded and she shook her head to clear her mind… she had not been sleeping well recently and it was obviously a side effect from that. At the same time, Isen had noticed that quite a few of the guests arriving were moving strangely, with a slightly jerky movement that could not be disguised as anything else, and more and more of the guests were starting to act like that… he thought it might be a new fashion style, possibly a new corset? Jonas, at the same time, had started to feel a bit strange being in this house… ever since he had come back it felt less like the home he had grown up in, and more like a foreign place… and the feeling came mostly from upstairs. Meanwhile, Miriam was outside in the garden, having a shooting (!) battle with Dr Storm, who was also an excellent shot… the crack of shot hitting various targets towards the end of the garden filled the air.


As Jonas was making his way up the stairs to the second floor, Baz the dog decided that one of the jerkily moving guests was a prime target and grabbed their leg in his mouth and started shaking wildly. Theon quickly broke off his conversation to go and whack the dog across the top of the head with his cane, making the dog drop it. As he apologised to the lady for his dogs absolute beastly behaviour, the woman replied in a way that was similarly jerky to her walk and did not sound at all like the cadence that should be used by anything human… although Theon noticed that she did not seem to have any injury, which shouldn’t have been the case… troubled, he went back to the party. Jonas, having climbed the stairs, could not shake the sense of wrongness that he was feeling… in fact, it was even stronger upstairs and, as he came close to the Master Bedroom, he realised that was where the source was emanating from. He went to open the door and realised it was locked, but could not locate the keyhole… so how could it be locked?


Puzzled, as he remembered there used to be a keyhole, Jonas waved over a servant and started quizzing them on the changes that his brother had been making to their family home when he was away. He quickly got frustrated by the servants answers, which seemed to be evasive without meaning to be and he dismissed them from his presence. The sense of general unease had spread to most of the other members of the Deepstalker Noble House… they were feeling that this place wasn’t actually their home, even though they had been there all their lives… it was quite unsettling and it made Miriam come in from outside (pistols tucked covertly beneath her skirts) and made Natasha break off the negotiations of transport rights that she was creating with Mr Blitz. But no-one felt it more than Baz, who bounded up the stairs, through the corridors and slammed into the Master Bedroom Door, pawing at it, scratching and biting at it… to Jonas’s astonishment. As he tried to pull the dog back, he had to ask for help from the servants because the Dog seemed to be possessed!


Seri, who had heard the bang from upstairs, moved to investigate, as had Miriam whilst Theon tried, desperately, to keep the party together. Jonas was shouting as Seri and Miriam rounded the corner, asking his nieces why their father put up with this abominable creature! Seri was about to respond, but she had heard a crack as Baz smashed into the door but, when she looked to see the damage… there wasn’t any. She informed her uncle of this oddity and they both watched closely as Baz smashed into the door again… she hadn’t been mistaken… and when Jonas questioned her on the lack of a lock on the door she just shook her head, overwhelmed by all the weirdness. Miriam had been focused on the area where the hinges should be, not finding them either… things were getting stranger and stranger. Seri suggested to her elder sister that she shoot out where the lock should be, which almost gave Jonas an apoplexy as he shouted at them that this was not ladylike behaviour and they should remember who they were! Miriam nodded to her uncle, solemnly, and then shot where the lock should have been.


This was the last straw for Theon, who gathered up Isen and Natasha and marched up the stairs, only to find a cloud of smoke around one of his daughters, another looking too closely at the door whilst Baz continued to attack that same door and Jonas looked on in displeasure.


“This party is for you! For all of you! Mingle my daughters, Mingle! Don’t come up here and shoot pistols...” Theon trailed off as he realised that his room did not have a lock… he didn’t remember that having happened. Miriam, who had finished reloading, then pointed her two pistols at the non-existent hinges and, ignoring the cries of her father “What have I told you about unloading firearms in this house, young lady!” she fired.


The sound of the shot hitting the door did not really sound like they had gone into wood, but Miriam had to dodge to the side to avoid a backhanded slap aimed at her by her Uncle


“Miriam Deepstalker! You will cease this disrespect of your father’s wishes… can you imagine what people are thinking downstairs?!?” Theon was shaking his head, wishing this was some kind of dream that he could wake up from.


Natasha, with the strange sound, had started knocking at random places on the door, feeling the slightly different feel and hearing a different sound than she expected, trying to locate an element of vulnerability in this, strangest of doors. Miriam was reloading her pistols again, keeping an eye on the rest of the group as everyone quieted down, until Jonas grabbed one of the pistols, and then dropped it because it burned his hand, shouting at Miriam to act like the woman of standing she was purported to be! Natasha thought she had found a weakness, but her voice was drowned out by the argument going on between Jonas and Theon, who were arguing about who had changed the door to the Master Bedroom, with neither admitting responsibility. Natasha raised her voice, along with Seri and pointed at the area she had identified and they both said, in the same breath


“Miriam, shoot there please,” which stopped the argument between Jonas and Theon as they both turned and shouted.


“NO!” Miriam smiled mischievously and fired. Her aim was good and the shot was on target and, suddenly, in front of their astonished eyes, the wooden door faded away, leaving a greenish metal sheet, which then slid aside.


The, now silent, group of people could not see much inside, as there seemed to be some kind of white smoke that stopped their vision and smelt quite acrid, although this did not stop Baz from jumping through into the room and running around, barking loud enough to wake the dead. Baz could see that there were plenty of tanks in the room but, when he saw a large green monster in one of the tanks, suspended in the water, he started whimpering. The rest of the Deepstalker family made their way, slowly and cautiously, into the room and, one by one, they came upon themselves, just as a “more extreme” version of them… lots of augments, weapons of strange design and Seri was horrified to see herself without any eyes… it was so outside the reference of all the people in the room that they couldn’t figure it out. And then, Seri saw a crack in the glass that was holding “herself” that spread out from the centre of the glass, right to the edge and then, as she watched, the glass shattered in a spray of water and shards, firing outwards at her. She opened her mouth to scream… and started choking on water…


[bACK IN THE PRESENT]


Mistress Valentina came awake with a surge of psychic power that shattered the glass holding her in suspension, spraying lethal shards of glass across the room as she dropped to her knees, the water also being expelled with her incredible psychic push. She dropped to the floor of the tank and looked around, seeing the others start to come back into themselves and she hurried to the Captain, pressing her finger against it and shattered the glass. Yorke, who had woken up in a panic, found she had one of her hair pins still in her hair, so she took it out, placed it against the glass and then used her unnatural strength to hammer against it, until a crack appeared in the glass, she kept hammering (and the water started turning red from blood) until it caused a leak. Then she placed her feet against the glass and pushed. At the same time, Bazak came out of its slumber and flexed its large bulk, freeing itself from the Necron trap… and soon all the command crew were out, wet and angry, but alive… and they were glad to see that all their gear, including the precious warhead, was scattered around the floor, obviously it had been an automated system that had trapped them.


The only thing that seemed to be missing was the Tank (Isendark vowed to find it, rather too loudly for the rest of them) but the command crew had no idea where they were, whereabouts it was in relation to the internal structure of the ‘Dragon’, or what enemies they would be facing… although, further investigation indicated that the one thing they had lost was their Teleportarium beacon... a troubling finding. Yorke was quick to get the Auspex working, knowing that in a technological place such as this, it could be the difference between life and death… and her approach soon gained fruit, capturing a signal that seemed to be coming from the Astartes, which, after informing the Captain, became the new target of the command crew. As they started on their way, they could see the sheer scale of the being that they inhabited, massive arches and a “ceiling” that was only just visible… the metal on the walls was very dark but, every so often a pulse of green light went through it and the metal ended up slightly lighter… Rolaine hypothesised that the Dragon was fully waking up, lending even more urgency to their mission.


The Astartes, it turns out, had been trying to contact Thelonious and the command crew for a good few hours, without reply and during that time had landed using a Thunderhawk Gunship and had been attacked a few times by “shapes that came from the walls,” a phrase much more terrifying than it sounds. Given that the command crew still had their warhead with them, the talk quickly turned to targets, with the Astartes trying to do something to cripple the entity… they warned Thelonious that once they set the charges, they would go off in either two hours or when a large amount of pressure was put against them and, given the missing Teleportarium beacons, the Thunderhawk looked like the only way to escape! However, even the Astartes did not have a map of this being and so the command crew turned to the one amongst them who could find their way around in a place like this… Bazak! The Ork, through some rudimentary understanding, seemed to be able to find their way around and soon had the command crew on the right track… at least until Thelonious decided that, rather than just injuring the being, he wanted to try and kill it.


Following what looked like a “vein,” the command crew found their way through the massive being, the metal on the walls lightening all the time, a hum of energy spilling through the superstructure… until they came to a high ceilinged chamber, with the “vein” going directly up the wall and into something that they thought was a “heart.” However, as their vision descended from the cathedral-like nature of the room, they could see something sitting on what appeared to be a wooden chair. This somewhat defied explanation… it also seemed to move incredibly quickly and incredibly slowly at the same time, and appeared to be in many places at once, as well as in one place all the time… it was the most confusing thing the command crew had seen for a while. And then it started to spin. Green light leapt out of its hands and some of it touched Bazak and Mistress Valentina… with a howl of despair and agony they realised that this thing had stolen their very life-force… which sent the command crew into battle readiness. Thelonious immediately charged the being, passing through something that made his skin crawl, and swinging his Mirrorswords, hitting nothing but air.


Isendark had a different idea… he grabbed the Cyclonic Warhead and used his Power Board to push himself up neared the ceiling… whilst both Yorke and Rolaine fired their Astartes pistols at the “Heart,” with Rolaine’s shots actually cracking the outside of the shell. The rest of the command crew started firing their Astartes weapons (or Ork Weapons) at the hostile enemy but, to their dismay, each time they seemed to bracket the creature, it seemed to move, as if anticipating their actions...or never being there in the first place. Mistress Valentina looked up as Isendark neared the “Heart” and found she had a decision to make that would affect what happened next…

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Annoncement

A Big congrats to our GM Grothgar who has just become a Dad for the 1st time.

Obviously this will delay the next update slightly however after a brief adjustment period we are hoping to keep up with the adventures of House Deepstaker.

Please bear with us whilst we get back into things and forgive any irregular scheduling in the mean time.

As ever, thanks for reading,

Major Kimenth

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Chapter 54 – In the Darkness of the Future, there is only War!


From Mistress Valentina’s viewpoint, the combat with the Necron was going poorly… although it was hard to tell due to the time dilation effect that was messing with even her superior senses. She could ‘see’ the Lord High Captain and the Ork in close combat with the Xenos and, although she could not perceive any specific movements, wounds did start appearing on the Ork and the sound of blade on blade came to her ears. Constantine started glowing with the Emperors light as he chanted the Litany of Hatred, filling the command crew with a righteous fury (and making Yorke vomit uncontrollably) as they pressed the attack. All apart from Isendark, who was fumbling with the Cyclonic Torpedo warhead, as he tried to enter it into the gap that Rolaine had blown into the “heart” of the Dragon. Mistress Valentina reached out with her psychic powers to try and read the Xenos but could only gain an absence in the Warp… it was very much disturbing to Seri and she started steeling her heart, and gathering her power, for what she believed she needed to do.


Meanwhile, the rest of the command crew continued their, pretty futile, attempts to kill the Necron… any damage they seemed to do, seemed to be both there and not there at the same time and, even when they thought they had hit it, they couldn’t be sure. Yorke, Thelonious and Bazak were keeping it busy… their Thunder Hammers, Mirrorswords and Power Klaw’s keeping it moving, at the least. Rolaine, utilising her gene-coded Astartes Bolters, continued to pump bolt after bolt at the creature whilst Constantine flamed either side of the main combat, hoping to guess where the Necron would appear and catch it with holy promethium. Isendark, above the combat on his power board, finally managed to prime the Warhead and insert it into the Dragon’s “heart” and started looking down on the combat, aiming his Sniper Rifle at the Necron. Then, suddenly (or so it seemed to the command crew) Bazak was down, a massive wound opening up on the Ork’s stomach and its intestines falling out around it’s legs… the look on Bazak’s face was one of surprise as it fell backwards like a tree.


Seeing this, Mistress Valentina made her decision, her choice. She said sorry through the commlinks that they all shared and then unleashed her pent up power in one massive telekinetic burst, focussed on as small a point as she could manage… on the Cyclonic Torpedo Warhead. She could feel the Warp rip and stretch around her as her power was unleashed and she noticed something strange happening… the time dilation effect around the Necron was suddenly cancelled out by the eddies of the Warp… and then the Warhead exploded. A Cyclonic Torpedo is designed to destroy a planet, in such close quarters and in the middle of a Necron God, it was completely and utterly devastating and, in the blink of an eye, the entire room was consumed.


Somehow, in some way, the command crew found themselves drifting in a sea that none of them could recognise. Their minds and souls fractured and remade themselves more times than their sanity could count… their eyes moved around their bodies, giving themselves very interesting views of their friends and colleagues as they continued to drift… in the great sea that is the Warp. Time passed in innumerable fragments and the command crew felt both peace and great disquiet at the same time, unable to control their movements… or even aware that they were making any movements. It was Constantine, with his faith, and Mistress Valentina, with her immense willpower, that managed to combine their efforts to steer the command crew through the maelstrom, as Constantine had sensed (somehow) that they should head in that specific direction… the garbled translation seemed to indicate “home.” They could “see” that they were heading towards a massive being, who was covered in coruscating light and, as they approached, they could feel a sense of serenity that had been missing in their earlier “journey.” As the light washed over them they could hear a gentle murmur that slowly became louder and louder until their “ears” were almost bleeding… and then the light faded.


Thelonious woke up, groggy and disoriented; like he was on the end of the biggest bender he could ever imagine having. As his eyes focussed on what was before him, he could see that they appeared to be in a large maintenance room. He turned his head and could see Rolaine, also stirring, as well as hearing Yorke’s snoring as she came around as well. He could feel his equipment all around his body and then his ears started working… and he could hear explosions… and they seemed to be getting closer! He pulled himself to his feet, seeing his command crew doing the same, and he remembered the last thought he processed… the feeling of oncoming doom. The explosions stopped coming closer to their location, wherever they were, and Yorke immediately started scanning the atmospherics with her Auspex… they needed to know where they were and what was going on! As everyone in the command crew became more aware of their surroundings, Yorke was receiving some very odd data from her Auspex… based on the atmospherics and the air quality and every other thing that she could see… well… it appeared that they were on Damaris!


Carefully opening the only door to the maintenance area that they found themselves in, the outside was not what they expected. The smell of cordite and rotting flesh assailed them and they could see devastation as far as they eye could see… the explosions that Thelonious had heard were massive artillery pieces, screaming in from the west, firing in the easterly direction and which were, again, starting to move towards them. It was almost as if the artillery barrage was covering a retreat… and they realised that they were in the same district as where the palace used to be… the emphasis on ‘used to be’. Knowing they needed to get out of there quickly, their attention was drawn to a group of bodies that appeared to have been killed with Bolt Rounds and, upon further inspection, the command crew discovered some worrying tattoos covering their bodies… they appeared to be the 4 symbols of the Chaos Gods, along with another symbol that combined all four of them together... how had agents of the Gestalt Entity, the Entity they had seen destroyed, found their way to Damaris? Come to think on it, how had the Command Crew come to be there?


These questions seemed slightly moot a moment later when a Lance Strike, from a ship in orbit, came slicing down around the outskirts of the city, burning everything in its path… this was obviously a planetary invasion by the forces of the Ruinous Powers and, based on the destruction evident, they were winning. With nothing else to focus on, the Command Crew decided to move towards the artillery batteries that were launching such destruction on the city of Damaris… either it would lead them to people who were resisting the assault, or those doing the assaulting… both of them would allow them to get answers that they desperately needed. As they made their way through the wreckage, still trying to comprehend how they were here, Yorke was moving through the communication bands that were active in the vicinity… and found a bit of an oddity, a band that was completely and utterly stable, but which had no traffic on it at all. Intrigued, Yorke highlighted this in the Auspex but did not do anything else, as she was also focussed on getting to safety.


The Crew were also debating the meaning of why they were here… and also when here was in the first place. It seemed obvious that they were not in the same time as they had been when they boarded the Dragon… they had not heard of anything happening on Damaris and the symbol of the Gestalt Entity was not well known as far as they knew… but here it was worn openly. Their discussion was brought to a rude end as they stumbled round the corner of a shattered building and directly into a group of Marauders, wearing their allegiance to the Ruinous powers. However, the command crew was no mere group of civilians to be terrorised, they were an incredibly talented group and they took the Marauders apart! Yorke shredded a few of the attackers with her Shuriken Catapult, Rolaine blew holes in others with the Astartes Pistols, Isendark sniped a couple of them through the eye sockets, Mistress Valentina reached out with her mind and pull a few of them into their component parts but the coup-de-grace came from Bazak, the Orks massively modified Heavy Bolter, sounding like a ripping grinder, tearing through the remainder of them.


The Crew continued moving, heading further west until they could see the massive walls of Damaris, and they were scarred like everything else they had seen, with massive areas missing, as if they had been burned out… maybe by Lance strikes from orbit. The command crew was working their way through the rubble when Yorke suddenly signalled for them to be still… she snuck over to an overhang, Shuriken Catapult at the ready… and then demanding that whomever was skulking there, should come out. An eight year old girl, crying for them not to kill her, came out slowly, looking around at the group in awe. She looked hungry and ragged but, otherwise in remarkably good physical condition given the circumstances she found herself in. Yorke immediately started questioning her about when she had been born, desperate to find out what time they were in… and after taking the girls birthdate, the command crew realised that they had been gone for 50 years! As that sunk in (and as Thelonious realised that it meant the Optimus Nemesis would have been completed!) Bazak picked up the girl and put her on its shoulders.


This, for some reason, seemed to calm the girl, who finally started noticing that she was on the shoulders of an Ork. Stranger still, however, was that she recognised Bazak as the “Champion of Damaris,” saying that she had learned about it by watching vids at school… but that everyone said that Bazak was dead… that the Ork (and its followers) had died a long time ago, before the girl had been born. According to the girl, the outskirts of the city were very dangerous but, looking around, they couldn’t really see how and, with Bazak continuing to talk to the girl and keeping here around, they continued on their way. The discussion moved on to the topic of just how they were going to get back to their own time… as it seemed that they had done something that had led to this future… and if Damaris was in danger, being in the ass-end of the Koronus Expanse, it did not bode well for the rest of it! Eventually, the command crew found their way to the wall and passed through one of the massive gashes and, what had been a green and verdant land in their time was a war ravaged wasteland in this one.


Getting fed up of just wandering around, Yorke got on the Auspex, linked her communications with what appeared to be an Imperial Guard frequency and broadcast that House Deepstalker was in the area and that they demanded to meet with anyone nearby. She then received a few pulses on the communication band and, wracking her memory for the response to verify, she managed to send the correct signals back, answering each query with the correct response. A burst of static followed, during which some co-ordinates were sent to her and then the static ended… they had a location to aim for… and the sense of purpose this gave the command crew was greater than they would have expected… the temporal dislocation they had experienced had robbed them of hope in a subtle way, but they were regaining it now they had a goal. They made their way around the suburbs of Damaris City until they were close to the co-ordinates… they could see that it was in an area that was very open but which was surrounded by tree covered hills, which meant they could be walking into a trap.


But then, the Deepstalker House had walked into worst situations than this, with Cog being a notable example, and come out alive, and they really were quite desperate to make contact to find out what was going on around here. Thelonious strode into the clearing, his command crew flanking him, as he waited for whomever to make contact. A female voice came from somewhere nearby, ordering them to stop, not reach for their weapons and then, with a bit more curiosity, asking them who they were. Thelonious responded with “the last time I had a title, it was Brother Thelonious of the Storm Wardens but, the last time I spent any time on Damaris, I was known as the Grand Marshal… and I saved this planet from the Greenskin Menace. Now, why don’t you tell me who I am talking to, because I want to know who fragged this planet up!” There was a sound of a seal depressurising and the command crew could see an area of, nothing of note, grassland slid aside, revealing some underground steps and a woman who appeared to be in her mid 50’s to early 60’s stepped out.


Hiding her face underneath a shawl, the woman called Thelonious an idiot, stating that Thelonious T. Deepstalker had died 50 years ago and that she had been one of the last people to see him alive… and then she removed the shawl to reveal herself as Lady Elizabeth Orleans, although the years had not been kind to her, removed from her regular rejuve treatments as it appeared she had been. She stepped up to Thelonious, looking around at the command crew, and said one word…


“How?” and then she slapped him. “Where have you been!?!” It was Constantine that answered her,


“We were in the presence of our Lord, he has sent us here for a reason, we merely need to divine what that is. There is work to be done here, Thelonious… I did not make the choice I made lightly.”


Thelonious looked at Constantine in askance, telling him with his eyes that they would have a conversation later, and then let Lady Orleans lead them down into what appeared to be an underground system of bunkers, still asking questions about how they had come to this time, in this place... and still not really believing where they had been. The command crew, on the other hand, wanted to know what had happened.


“I don’t know what happened with you. I left, and brought the warning of the Storm Wardens to the Imperium, who gathered Battlefleet Calaxis and I led them back to Zayth. We found a massive creature of some kind that appeared to have been drained of its energy. There had been some kind of massive explosion in the vicinity as we could only find bits and pieces of various ships, including your own. The Astartes Battle Barge was never seen again… and that was when things got worse.”


“The Chaos Fleet had been lying in wait for us, using some kind of Warp based cloaking system… they were upon us almost before we knew they were there. I barely managed to escape, and that was only because my ship was faster than anything in the Chaos Fleet… but the carnage and destruction was on a scale that I had never seen before. And that is when the Entity appeared again. It’s mastery of the warp stopped anyone in the area from fleeing… I only managed to escape by getting outside its area of effect… otherwise I would not be here today.”


“What followed was a systemic purging of the Expanse. With the Battlefleet gone, and the Maw acting up more than in any living memory, we were cut off and the forces of Chaos seemed limitless and, even when we did manage to win localised engagements, as soon as the Entity appeared we lost. We even managed to unleash the Orks of the Undred Undred Teef on them, only for them to lose as well. The Kaelor Craftworld fell a few years ago, alongside Winterscale’s and Chorda’s fleet and since then we have just been waiting for the final blows to fall… and here we are, at the end of days. But, there is someone here who would want to speak to you… not necessarily like, but want to speak to you.”


As Lady Orleans led them around a corner of the underground bunker, they could see that the person she was speaking about was Beljalanor, the Eldar Farseer who had helped them way back on Damaris, and who they had met in the Svard system. And who, it must be said, was holding a grudge against the Deepstalker House for their betrayal (after they had left for the safety of the Webway) of the Eldar at the battle of Zayth… and he didn’t look well either… whilst he hadn’t started going crystalline, the Farseer looked a lot more frail than the last time they had seen him. However, despite the fact that the Farseer wanted nothing more than revenge against House Deepstalker, the end of days in the Koronus Expanse and the loss of his Craftworld had put that in perspective. They discussed the potential for time-travel and what it had caused to happen in this timestream, and Yorke wanted to know if the deactivated Webway gate could be used to help make something like that happen? The Farseer did not know, but did promise to cast his runes to find a way to send them back.


However, the Farseer did also mention, almost in passing, that he had been in contact with someone who had known things that she could not have possibly known, and so he had kept up the communication, on their own private frequency, until a couple of days ago, when she had stopped responding to his communiques. However, he had deciphered where she was broadcasting from, and gave the co-ordinates to the command crew, telling them that he thought she would be needed if they were to carry out whatever mad plan the command crew was thinking of. Thelonious and Beljalanor had a frank exchange of opinions about why certain things were done, that could not be undone, but they both, in the end, agreed that anything that had happened in the past was in the past. With the command crew decided that they would seek out the mysterious person who had been speaking to the Farseer, they separated to gather the information and materials that they would need for this mission.


Thelonious spent some time getting reacquainted with Lady Orleans; Yorke spent more time with Beljalanor, questioning about the person he had been speaking to; Bazak and Isendark went to procure (and upgrade) the flier that they had been promised by Lady Orleans… Isendark’s eyes had lit up when she said that flying below the notice of the enemy would be almost impossible… he so loved a challenge! Rolaine and Constantine spoke with some of the commanders of the resistance, advising them on logistics and spiritual matters and holes in the plans of resistance that they were made privy to. Everyone in the command crew realised that this was a completely and utterly hopeless situation and that the only way they could hope to do anything was to find a way back to their own time… although Constantine kept proselyting that the Emperor would not have sent them here without a reason. Eventually, the time came, in the early evening, for them to depart and, once again, Isendark was up to the task… at times he was flying them mere meters above the ground, zooming between the ruins of larger buildings to keep them hidden.


It was only when the command crew were halfway there that the rest of them realised that Bazak seemed to have adopted the 8 year old girl they encountered, and had brought her along with them, on the mission! As they were somewhat time limited, the decision was made to carry on, but Thelonious did promise that he and Bazak would be having words when they got back to their own time! As they approached the co-ordinates, Isendark brought them down into a clearing in the forest dotted landscape that they found themselves in. Obviously, this person had not wanted to be found, although whether they had been on Damaris for long was something they could not determine. It appeared to be some kind of wooden hunting lodge, but completely away from any of the trails and, if they hadn’t had the co-ordinates, it would have been easy to miss from the air as well. Yorke was quick to utilise her Auspex to scan the lodge… but found that it was shielded… this person was becoming much more of a curiosity to the command crew.


Yorke brought up the communication net she had found before and send a coded message saying that friendlies were here and whether they could approach… she received one word back, that appeared to be incredibly strained… and that word was ‘danger.’ As Thelonious was gathering the command crew together to discuss their plan, Bazak and Constantine decided to take it into their own hands, and started running towards the hunting lodge, with Yorke’s servo skull following behind them as was, to the horror of Mistress Valentina, the 8 year old girl. With any stealthy approach out of the window, Thelonious gave the order, with a sense of frustration, to advance on the cabin. As Bazak and Constantine were about ¾ of the way to the cabin, there was a massive explosion from the hunting lodge and a huge gout of flame shot skywards… a gout of flame that had elements of the Daemonic to Mistress Valentina’s psychic senses… and the command crew started running full pelt towards the cabin. Bazak and Constantine could see, in the wreckage of the cabin, an uncovered trapdoor, that had been blasted open by the force of the explosion… heedless of its own safety, Bazak leapt down into the basement and, amazingly, landed on its feet.


As Constantine came crashing down beside the Ork, they could see what was happening in the basement… a woman was encased in some kind of bubble that was floating off the floor and that appeared to be tethered to 4 beings that defied logical descriptions unleashing their energies on her. Also, what appeared to be an incredibly dirty floor was revealed to be a living carpet of things… cat like beings with sharp teeth and a crazed look in their eyes… as Constantine and Bazak readied themselves, they were overwhelmed and driven to the floor by the sheer weight of the creatures. Sharp teeth started biting into their armour and exposed flesh as the rest of the command crew hurried to get to them in time…

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I almost cried when I thought Bazak was dying

Glad to see he has a new pet

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Chapter 55 – The Day of Future Past


Bazak surged to its feet, the Ork’s titanic muscles bludgeoning the cat like beings into paste as it pulled its Heavy Bolter from its back and started sending high explosive bolts into the packed creatures… but still more came. The show of strength had cleared enough of the creatures that Constantine could struggle to his feet, swinging his Witch Lance with abandon, cutting the creatures in two and sending sheets of holy flame into their ranks, the smell of burning fur and the screeching of the creatures reached a fever pitch. Yorke was the next to reach the cabin, spotting Asha (the Ork’s human ‘friend’) hiding in the ruins she shouted at the girl to stay there before looking down into the basement… all she could see was a mass of cat like creatures and, as is her wont, she picked a Rad and Inferno Grenade and, after arming them, just dropped them in the hole. The explosions of fire and radiation did their job of clearing the bottom of the ladder of the demons but had the (un)intended side effect of setting Constantine on fire! Bazak, as usual, was unharmed… but Yorke heard the full force of Constantine’s displeasure with her choice of opening attack.


However, Constantine’s woes were about to be compounded as one of the four daemonic entities that were keeping the woman tethered had turned towards the Missionary and unleashed a stream of vileness that hit him straight in the face. As a benefit, this managed to put out the fire that had been caused by Yorke but, on the flipside of that, he felt his very life-force and toughness being leeched out into the being and only his stringent willpower and belief in the God-Emperor stopped him going into shock. Realising that the cat creatures were merely a distraction, Bazak swapped out the Heavy Bolter for the Autocannon and fired a few rounds into the daemon that had caused so much damage to Constantine, exploding its arm and stomach, and leaving it almost helpless when Constantine leapt into the air and brought the Witch Lance down in a sweeping slice, bisecting the daemon down the middle. The rest of the command crew had made it to the cabin by this point and, one by one, they leapt down into the basement. The angle of the fall and the many bodies on the floor meant that most of them ended up face down!


Even Mistress Valentina, who tried to use her psychic powers to augment her fall, found the weird warp eddies of the place too much and ended up flipping herself over to land on her back… as a spectacle of highly trained and powerful members of the command crew coming to the rescue… it didn’t go too well! The only thing keeping Thelonious safe from the feline monsters was his Displacer Field, which was teleporting him all over the basement, but not really giving him too much time to orient himself before being teleported again. Yorke was quickly into the action, charging one of the larger daemons and smacking it hard with her Thunder Hammer, causing it to break off the tether, but also soliciting the attention of another daemon, which split into two separate entities, one with a greenish tinge and the other a bright shade of red. However, the daemon that Yorke had attacked proved to be her biggest challenge, with tentacles bursting out of the things chest and seizing her, lifting her off the floor and holding her helpless, whilst the tops of the tentacles burst and sent spiders crawling all over her void suit, looking for an entry.


Mistress Valentina, on her back, engaged her psychic powers to pull forth a telekinetic barrier from the Warp, to better protect her from whatever Daemonic attacks she was likely to face. However, she was still slightly stunned from the fall and whilst she managed to pull forth the barrier, she also ripped a hole in the Warp, spreading fear and terror amongst everyone in the basement. Commander Rolaine, who had been aiming up the perfect shot against one of the Daemons was struck with an abiding sense of fear and pinned to the spot, whilst Mistress Valentina knew she just HAD to get out of the basement and she jumped to her feet and started scrambling up the ladder. Seeing the effect that this was having on the command crew, and that it would continue to affect them for some time, Constantine reached deep into his soul and started glowing with the light of the God-Emperor, the soothing light washing over both Rolaine and Seri, calming them, whilst also making the rest of the command crew immune to the fear they were fighting against… once again, Constantine had proven to be essential to fighting Daemons.


Isendark, who was still on his Power Board, having surfed down the ladder, was dodging left and right, with the cat demons leaping to pull him down, and had spotted that Yorke was in trouble and so charged into the back of the entity holding the Seneschal, slicing and dicing with his horrific Zaythian Warblade, but was unable to break the grip. With the threat of the fear effect broken, the Crew were able to focus their efforts on destroying the daemonic entities… Rolaine was able to put a couple of bolts into the head of the red daemon and the daemon assailing Yorke, killing both of them and splattering their essence over Constantine and Yorke. Bazak, meanwhile, had the greenish daemon in its sights, and pumped bolt after bolt into the being, only realising the mistake when it started glowing brighter and brighter as more and more energy was absorbed… until it exploded! The force of the explosion rocked the basement as everyone was coated in a greenish ichor that sent spasms of pain throughout their bodies… Bazak’s cry of “Iz got it boss!” was not met with the adulation the Ork might have been expecting.


With only one daemon remaining, the command crew consolidated their view on this daemon but it was able to reach into Yorke’s very essence and damage her severely. This display of psychic might also ripped the, already tenuous, veil that separated realspace and the Warp and a massive storm started in the basement, smashing a rain of blood down on them, making it hard to keep their feet and bringing visibility right down. That was the last act of the Daemon, however, as Constantine, Isendark, Yorke and Bazak combined to literally rip it limb from limb, a power field that surrounded it from somewhere saved it a few times, but eventually it was crushed into a pulp by the combined hits of the command crew. It was Thelonious who realised that the death of the final Daemon would probably get rid of the tether and was able to leap forward to grab the lady before she smacked into the ground, although the impact winded them both, whilst Bazak went up the ladder to find his follower and Constantine started seeing to peoples wounds.


As Thelonious laid the lady out, his eyes took in some details about her. She was wearing the symbol of the Imperial Inquisition although, oddly, she wasn’t wearing anything to symbolise her affiliation with a specific Ordos… curious. She was a relatively non-descript woman with raven hair and incredibly green eyes who started stirring as the rest of the command crew gathered around her… she looked up, her eyes having trouble focussing for a while, and then looking around with a sense of curiosity. Mistress Valentina, even through all the Warp Interference, could sense a very subtle probing of their aura’s coming from the Inquisitor… she was impressed by the skill of the Inquisitor but reminded herself to keep a closer eye on her, knowing she was this skilled.


Inquisitor; “You are, without a doubt, the strangest group of people I have ever laid my eyes upon” [begins sniffing the air like she is snuffling for truffles] “and there is something more…” [reaches into the air, randomly, to pluck something insubstantial out, looks at ‘it,’ shakes her head and then picks something else out, licking her finger and then nodding] “Ahh, I see now… you are not meant to be here!”


Constantine; [looking at Thelonious] “We are meant to be here if the God-Emperor wills it… sometimes he likes for people to understand the consequences of their actions, Inquisitor…?”


Amberle; “Oh, my apologies, I often forget things like that… I am Inquisitor Amberle, of the Ordo Chronos and I am delighted to meet such people as you… but you must get me to Beljalanor. We were on the cusp of discovering… something that… hmmm… may have been about you.”


The command crew were getting impatient to be out of this area… they knew that such a display of Daemonic and Warp power would quickly draw the attention of the Ruinous Powers which, given the entire world was under their dominion, we not a good thing! They helped the Inquisitor set explosions to destroy everything in this general area and then hustled into the flier and, under Isendark’s practiced piloting, they managed to make their way back to the resistance base, without being detected. The Inquisitor was mostly silent, with some on the command crew slightly concerned that she had lost her mind, as she kept cooing to herself, reaching out and grasping “something” in front of her… at one point she growled at the air behind her, throwing her head around like a dog… but, she was an Inquisitor. When Amberle spotted Asha, Bazak’s “little girl,” she just smiled at her and said she was a very interesting specimen. When they arrived, Lady Orleans was waiting to greet them, raising an inquisitive eyebrow in the direction of Amberle, with Thelonious giving her a little nod to indicate this was the person they were after.


Constantine was quick to check himself into the medical facility, understanding that something horrific was affecting him, and went into isolation, doing some tests on himself and understanding that he was unlikely to get back what he had lost, but that it wasn’t going to kill him. Meanwhile, Thelonious had taken the Inquisitor to meet with Beljalanor, and both of them understood who the other was without any words needing to be said. Thelonious was mostly a bystander to a conversation between the two of them, where she asked the Farseer to corroborate the story the Command Crew had told her, and then they started brainstorming potential ideas about how they could be returned. Yorke and Mistress Valentina joined Thelonious in listening, and occasionally interjecting ideas and thoughts into the discussion, as they wanted to know just how it might work. Would there be two of them in the past? When would they be transported back? Would anything be lost on the trip back and was there anything that could prevent that. They also filled the Inquisitor and the Farseer in with the information of what had happened to send them there.


The Inquisitor, plucking something imaginary out of the air and taking a bite out of it, asked if they had anything that came from that time, or nearby, and Thelonious remembered the Space Marine ring that had been given to Lady Orleans… when the Inquisitor spotted this, she gasped out loud… that was exactly what they needed. She also offered, with a little bit of blood magic, to give them a gift that they could take back, which would help them against the Necron creature… it would dampen the time dilation field that it had and make it easier to kill. When Yorke mentioned that there was an Eldar Temple on this planet, Beljalanor and Amberle held a passionate conversation about reactivating the Webway gate and using that to send them back, with their combined psychic power being focussed through the ring, and Mistress Valentina to guide it back to a time in her memory. It seemed like an impossibility but, with the power generators that the resistance could give them, it might actually be probable to send them back to their own time, and thus stop this nightmare future from coming to pass!


After a few days, where Constantine got steadily weaker but still managed to be a part of the blood ritual to help them back in the past (confusing!), the command crew gathered together with the Inquisitor and Farseer Beljalanor and set out towards the Eldar Temple, with Isendark doing his usual “ground cutter” impression with an Imperial flier. As they flew over the ruined landscape of Damaris, Thelonious couldn’t help but feel a sense of sadness for what could have been, and also a sense of importance of what he needed to accomplish back in his own time to stop this coming to pass. Ever since the Ork Invasion, Damaris had occasionally had outbreaks of Ork activity, especially in the forests to the north of the city and this was no different… however, with the Highland Levy now a broken shell, the Orks had been multiplying and had taken over much of the forest… including where the Eldar Temple stood. A tribe of them, numerous and boisterous, had taken over the environs, had graffitied everywhere and were now just drinking and fighting… in essence, exactly what the command crew didn’t want to have to deal with!

Based on his last “performance” with Orks, Bazak was chosen to accompany Thelonious… they intended to talk to the Orks and, hopefully, bring them under control without a massive fight. The Orks started getting excited when they saw a “puny ummie” coming towards them, as it looked like their luck was in and they were going to get some sport. Then Bazak appeared and there was even more excitement, until they realised that the Ork was not part of their tribe… for one, he towered above anyone in the Ork Tribe. After the usual threats and comments, the Orks were rather stunned when Bazak stated that Thelonious was his ‘Boss’ and one of the larger Orks in the tribe approached them and pushed its chest into Thelonious, looking down on the man in front of it, daring it to do something. Thelonious did do something, he pulled his Mirrorswords out of their sheaths, sliced the Orks head off, sending it soaring into the air, and then placed them back in their sheaths. At the same time, Bazak moved quickly to smash a few of the more “uppity” Orks over the head with his big fists, making them aware of the change in management.


This change in command proved quite difficult to maintain when an Eldar Farseer came into view, but it turns out that you can’t smack too many Orks on the head to restore order, and Bazak was kept busy intimidating and beating the rest of the tribe. Whilst the mutinous mutterings of the Orks would normally have been a problem, Bazak and the rest of the command crew didn’t intend on staying around here for days, so thus they didn’t really care. Yorke and Isendark took the lead in interfacing the Power Generators with the Eldar Webway portal, something which they had done before on the Whisper of Anaris and this was not as intense a situation as that had been, so they managed to get it ready quickly and efficiently. Taking the Space Marine ring and placing it on the floor, Amberle and Beljalanor started to focus their power through the ring and into the Webway Portal. As the Webway portal engaged, a coruscating Yellow colour came into being, following through the colours of the rainbow before settling on a rainbow type effect, with Mistress Valentina managing the psychic backlash and keeping her memory focused on their intended destination.


After an interminable amount of time, but which can’t have been more than ten hours, Inquisitor Amberle was confident that it was stable enough to allow them transit, but that it would be important for Mistress Valentina to think about the time before they came here, to guide them along. As they entered, together, with one last look back at the Farseer and the Inquisitor, the command crew felt themselves stretching out, as if they were in two places at once, stretching across the years and across the space between where they had been compared to where they were now. However, the command crew were a hardened group, to whom the impossible was becoming possible in more and more instances and, together with Mistress Valentina’s mental control, they kept the horrors of the Webway (being used in a way that it was certainly not designed to do) at bay. One thing that the rest of the command crew noticed was that Bazak had brought the child Asha with them, why, they had no idea? The attachment to the child was a worrying sign of humanity in the Ork, or else there was a darker purpose that they could not understand.


And then, they were back in their bodies and found themselves in the corridor leading to the Heart of the Necron Dragon… and the whiplash feeling they felt gave them all massive headaches. Their knowledge of the future started fading as they didn’t follow the exact frame that had caused that future to come to pass. Thelonious immediately got on the radio, issuing an order for everyone to plant their bomb and escape, that they were at the Heart of the Dragon and they would be blowing that up, and that everyone needed to get out and get to a safe distance. After arguing with the Brother-Captain, and informing them that they had seen a God-Emperor given vision about what they needed to do, and convincing them that was real, everyone started moving out, leaving the command crew to continue on their mission. Discussions were held, as they approached, as to what to do to change history, and defeating the Necron in the Heart Chamber was the first task, that would then give them time to realise what to do afterwards. As a plan, it wasn’t the Normandy Landings, but it would do.


Commander Rolaine had been given the responsibility of using the time-dilation defeating device, which had, thanks to their blood sacrifice, come back through time with them, and she moved to the perfect range, with the rest of the command crew behind her and then, she threw. It arced through the air and landed directly at the feet of the Necron, who looked at it with the usual implacable view that their specific Xenos tend to have, although they could imagine the surprise going through its brain when it went off. The command crew charged into the room and the Necron raised itself from its seat to confront them, and it was nowhere near as quick as it had been before… the device had worked! Now, the Necron was still incredibly fast, and it had its Plasma Pike out and ready as the command crew directed their fire into it. Astartes Bolt rounds started impacting on the metal exoskeleton of the Necron, driving it back, although not doing too much damage to it, whilst Thelonious and Mistress Valentina looked at each other… their psychic senses had picked up something strange, something in the vicinity…

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Chapter 56 – Going to Hell in a Handshake

The fight seemed to have a similar rhythm to last time, with the command crew planting ordinance into the Necron and the Necron soaking it up and attacking them back, but this time the Necron was not moving faster than they could see and any damage they inflicted on it seemed to stick. Despite that, this Guardian of the Heart Chamber was probably the toughest being that they had encountered and, even with its unfair advantage neutralised, and with the Astartes Bolt Pistols, the fight was a struggle. Mistress Valentina tried to encompass the Necron in a field of force to stop it moving, but that was denied. Commander Rolaine fired shot after shot into the being but, even with the power of the Bolts, the damage seemed to be minimal. Isendark, Yorke and Bazak were more dangerous in close quarters, and it would stop the Necron using its disintegration beam on them… they all charged in and laid about them with their Zaythian Warblade, Thunder Hammer and Power Klaw, causing scratches and burn marks all over its body. The Necron, however, had been biding its time, and launched into a rapid attack against Yorke that almost took her down, the Phase Scythe cutting through her Conversion field like it was not there.

Thelonious found his aim compromised by the whirlwind of combat that was going on in front of him, and was thankful to the God-Emperor that Yorke’s conversion field appeared to be functioning, as his mass reactive bolt round bounced off her protection. Constantine was taking a more cerebral approach to the combat… he had seen what happened the last time they tried to kill the Necron and had decided to make his way around the chamber to the chair that the Necron had been sitting on… as he got closer he could sense reality being warped around him and, focussing his willpower, saw through the illusion. The “chair” was actually a cryogenic chamber of some kind and Constantine could see it pulsing in time with the Necron’s attacks… he kept studying it whilst readying his Witch Lance. It was around this time that Mistress Valentina and Thelonious became aware of something else… at the top of the chamber, made visible to those who could see such things, were 4 separate colours that were coalescing into one, and they both knew what this meant! The combat continued with Bazak and Yorke doing hit and run attacks on the Necron whilst Isendark took it on toe to toe.

This proved to be spectacularly unwise when the Necron turned its attention to Isendark, putting together a grouping of attacks that even the Agile Master Pilot could not hope to dodge, and as the Phase Scythe sliced through his limbs, only his unwillingness to die kept him on his feet. Constantine started wailing on the cryogenic chamber with his Witch Lance, slicing through cables and denting the organic metal structure, but he became careless with his attacks and his Witch Lance slipped from his grasp and flew through the air to land on the other side of the room... and Constantine realised that the Necron was looking directly at him. Rolaine had been curious as to why Constantine was attacking a piece of furniture, it seemed slightly out of character for the Missionary, and quickly changed to her Inferno Pistols and fired them at the “chair.” Constantine was quite surprised when a blast of superheated air came past him and melted part of the inner workings of the chamber… which also had the helpful side effect of dropping the illusion… to everyone else the cryogenic chamber now appeared as just that… and the Necron was now focussed on Rolaine, whilst also starting to shimmer slightly.

The shimmering turned out to be a localised teleport, as the Necron vanished and appeared next to Commander Rolaine, its weapon a blur as it cut into her chest and only her preternatural reflexes saved her from being completely impaled, but the wound was a deep one and the blood splattered across the Necron. This change on the battlefield was sudden and unexpected, but the command crew reacted well, with Mistress Valentina summoning a psychokinetic shield that covered herself and Rolaine and Thelonious drawing his Mirrorswords and slicing into the Necron. His attacks were fast and accurate and the chamber sang to the sound of metal hitting metal, the power field of the Mirrorswords cutting into the Necron… although, again, it did not seem to feel pain so Thelonious was unsure about how much damage he was actually causing. With the affect that Constantine and Rolaine had caused by damaging the cryo chamber, the command crew started trying to turn their attention to it, with Yorke picking up the Witch Lance and, with eagle eyed accuracy, throwing it directly into the chamber, causing damage and allowing Constantine to recover his weapon and continue his attacks.

The coup-de-grace came from Bazak, however who, after a shouted warning which caused Constantine to roll, duck and cover (as informed at all schools in the Imperium), then hosed down the chair with his Heavy Bolter. Each mass reactive bolt shell exploding against the casing and the vulnerable inner workings and, at the end, all that was left was a pile of rubble. However, the Necron was still standing, although it appeared even more insubstantial the more damage that the chamber suffered, whilst still feeling particular solid when it was hit. The Necron continued to attack Commander Rolaine and cut deep into the flesh of her arm, although the sheer power of the hit was somewhat compensated for by the shield that Mistress Valentina had summoned from the Warp… in fact, she might have died had it not been there! Mistress Valentina’s attention was also elsewhere, as the swirling eddies of the Warp that she had noticed before had coalesced into a colour and shape that she knew well, and appeared to be seeping down the walls and she knew that the Entity was going to be appearing soon… she informed the Captain of this and a new sense of urgency took hold.

Commander Rolaine, dodging for her life and with a damaged arm, decided to end the combat by completely ignoring the monster that was probably going to kill her and aiming at the remnants of the chamber… and her doubled shot of Bolts smashed into the ruins of the chamber and apparently hit something of import. There was a massive electrical charge that passed through the room and then contracted in on itself, pulling the Necron (who was just about to apply the killing blow) back to wherever it came from. With the threat of the Necron monster gone, or so the command crew fervently hoped, they were now faced with the choice about what to do about the emerging entity. Yorke and Isendark had already set the warhead timer before Rolaine and Thelonious called them over to actually discuss their options, because they didn’t think that blowing up the Dragon was the best plan, given what had happened in the future. This was especially prevalent given that everyone in the room could now feel something of the “other” that was growing, that there was something that was trying to access their reality. An Entity that would probably be intelligent enough to disarm the warhead if they were not here to “greet” it.

It was Thelonious who came up with the plan that could only be described as mad… with his knowledge of the profane and his experience with Daemons and research into such forbidden topics, he thought that there was a way to quicken the entities entry into realspace. Whilst the rest of the command crew, and Constantine especially, was taking in this crazy plan, Yorke was using Isendarks Powerboard to move to the heart and then created a crack in the structure, before draining some of the greenish liquid into some flasks… after all, whilst they didn’t know what this was, it was probably going to be incredibly valuable to certain people. Bazak tried its own solution, shouting challenges whilst setting off stinkbomz around the outside of the chamber, which it stopped when it realised that Asha, who had been left outside the chamber, had started projectile vomiting… the poor girl not being resistant to the horrific smell in any way. Constantine, as expected, was completely against any Daemon summoning, after all, they didn’t know whether summoning it earlier would disrupt it, or help it to come into being and destroy reality. An impassioned argument from Thelonious, about how this was about the Expanse, not them, did seem to bring him around though.

With the command crew contemplating something that they never thought they would do, willingly bringing a Daemon into their presence, Thelonious contacted the Storm Wardens and informed them that they had detected a Daemonic presence was going to be amongst them soon and if they could spare time to help, that would be great! Obviously, he didn’t mention why the Daemon was going to be here soon, but he did manage to convince them to come, although the fact that the Brother-Captain indicated it would take around 30 minutes to reach them meant that they might arrive too late. However, as Thelonious reasoned, he would rather have the Storm Wardens to arrive to finish off what they started than the entity consuming the Necron Dragon and destroying the Expanse. It turned out, in a degree of cosmic coincidence that only Thelonious, Constantine and Yorke (the three souls) had the knowledge to perform the summoning ritual and, though there was a degree of disquiet about what they were about to attempt, all three of them realised that, sometimes, sacrifices had to be made and, at least this way they could spread the corruption amongst them, rather than someone damning their soul for all time.

Rolaine and Mistress Valentina offered to keep a lookout for the Astartes/Necrons/any other gribblies that might come along and stepped out of the chamber, although not before the ritual had been started, and not before Bazak and Isendark had used that distraction to leave the room before them… they had a Leman Russ to find! They quickly moved through the corridors of the Dragon, using Orkish Kunnin’ and Isendarks Instinct to try and find the Tank… and, amazingly, it worked! They managed to find the Tank in a side chamber and get it operational… in their mind it was justified to do this as they knew that the Tank would be very useful in combating the Entity and was nothing to do with Isendarks unhealthy attachment to the machine, they just had to get back in time.

Meanwhile, Thelonious, Constantine and Yorke had started the ritual, hateful syllables flowing from their mouths as parts of their souls were damned and siphoned off with those very same words. Minute by minute passed as they shouted out the despicable words and phrases, sweat beading on their foreheads, blood filling their mouth only to be replaced as they spat it out, and a sensation of just being dirty almost overcoming them.

As one of them would hit their limit about what they could say, one of the others would come in and continue the summoning ritual, with none of them knowing whether this would work, or whether it would be damning them for nothing. As more minutes tiptoed by, the three found their very souls blackening but, after 12 minutes that felt like as many hours, something Thelonious said obviously had an effect as a tear appeared in the fabric of reality. It slowly spread down realspace until it looked like they were looking through a mirror, and then the Entity stepped through, slowly, full of portent, looking like a smaller version of the gigantic form they had seen before, but still towering over them. Whilst Commander Rolaine and Mistress Valentina started getting into defensive positions just outside the chamber and the sound of Daemonic cackling filled the air, Thelonious remained calm, as the Entity fully came into reality. The Daemon was, however, curious as to why three of its worst enemies, the three souls it wanted to devour, had hastened its summoning and asked that very question.

Even though the mere sound of the Daemon talking was enough to make each of the three want to vomit and cry and otherwise regress back to a time in their life where they hadn’t done this, Thelonious managed to keep his nausea under control and, to the amazement of the rest of the command crew, actually kept the Daemon talking with him… and without giving anything away. The Daemon was curious as to why they had summoned it, after all, if they now wanted to serve the Ruinous Powers then that was a massive win for the Entity… it was arrogant in its superiority that it could toy with them as much as they wanted. Because of this, Thelonious, Constantine and Yorke were able to delay the Daemon for a few minutes by talking about their experiences in the future, about how the Daemon had been triumphant and that had led them to search for whether they were on the right side in the conflict! The Daemon was greedy for their very souls and so was mostly blind to their deception, but Rolaine and Seri were still confused as to what the end game could be.

Eventually, however, the Daemon’s patience started to evaporate and Thelonious was left with a choice about what to tell the Daemon, and about which side to choose. Reaching deep into himself, Thelonious informed the Daemon that they were going to join its side, a complete and utter lie but spoken with the conviction of the damned and the heartfelt way he said it made the Daemon step back a little, a look of curiosity on all of its faces. However, the Daemon was no fool and so it required an act of faith from the three of them, one that showed that they were on the side of the Ruinous Powers. Thelonious thought quickly and then opined that each of them would come up and shake the Daemons’ hand, therefore sealing the bargain and meaning that they would be damned by association… and if they were not heartfelt, then the Daemon would know and would destroy them. It was Constantine who accepted the first “handshake” from the Daemon and the Entity, blinded by greed for these three souls and its own arrogance at knowing it was victorious, almost leapt on the Missionary, so keen was it to devour the Soul of Purity.

It realised its mistake as soon as Constantine clamped down on one of the Daemon’s appendages and unleashed the pure power of the God-Emperor, directly into the Entity. The Daemon screamed a scream of terror and horror as it felt its flesh dissolve under the pure bright power that was streaming out of Constantine. The Daemon began to thrash, its arms and legs swinging at the Missionary, who was hanging on for dear life, only to find that Thelonious and Yorke were there, keeping the limbs from damaging Jonas Constantine, High Cardinal of the Koronus Expanse and they could see the Daemon was losing its grip on reality. As the mighty power of the God-Emperor swept through the Entity, dissolving the body it had claimed, the Daemon began shouting curses at the three of them, all the while getting weaker and weaker, whilst still denying that any mere mortal could hold such power until it said one last thing and then vanished back into the Warp.

Daemon: “I curse the Deepstalker House. It will suffer 1,000 years of misfortune and destruction by those who follow me. I will be back to have my revenge!”

Thelonious: “Yeah, well join the club!”

Constantine stayed upright until the Daemon was fully purged from realspace, the glow coming from him proving quite difficult to look at and then, his duty performed, the glow faded and he looked at Thelonious, before keeling over, face first, onto the floor. As Thelonious and Yorke rushed to their friend, and Mistress Valentina and Rolaine ran into the room, the sound of a Leman Russ entered the chamber and Isendark came barrelling through into the doors, Bazak looking out from the top and traversing the main gun around, looking for a target.

Bazak: “Wot we miss Bossz?!?”

With Constantine back on his feet, unsteady but unharmed by the contact with the Daemon, it was another minute or two until the Storm Wardens turned up, entering the room in combat formation, only to find that there was nothing that needed killing. The explanation of “the High Cardinal banished it” was, unsurprisingly, not really believed and the Librarian stepped up to Thelonious, asking permission to ruffle through his memories to see what really happened. Thelonious, who had a lot of experience with Astropaths, Psykers, Rogue Psykers and Sorcerers through his long career, had developed many mental defences to protect himself, but he knew that the Librarian would be able to brute force his way through most, if not all, of them. So, as with so many things in his life, he employed a strategy of misdirection, ‘thinking’ of hiding the fact that they had conversed with the Daemon and not thinking, at all, of the fact that they had been the ones to summon it. As the Librarian stood back, a look of slight shock on his face, Thelonious wondered if that was it, whether they were about to be executed by the Storm Wardens.

As the Librarian informed Brother-Captain Balen Stormward of what had happened, Thelonious breathed a sigh of relief, the Librarian had taken the bait… and whilst there were stern looks of disapproval from some of the Storm Wardens, they couldn’t argue with the results… that sort of deception was somewhat alien to them, but they could see how successful it had been… they had managed to banish something akin to a minor Chaos God! With the Daemon destroyed, and the Cyclonic Torpedo Warheads still ticking down, the Storm Wardens and the command crew entered or hung onto the outside of the Leman Russ as Isendark piloted it through the corridors, following the instructions of the Brother-Captain as he directed him towards the Thunderhawk Gunship. As they boarded the Gunship, Thelonious carrying a crying Asha with him, they all gathered to look as they flew back to the Battle Barge, all ships having been given the order to scatter and, as they reached the Battle Barge, they could see explosions ripping the Necron Dragon apart… with the corpse of the Dragon then being destroyed in detail over the next few days by the Imperial Fleet… Thelonious felt like they had changed the future with this victory, although he couldn’t quite remember why he felt like that…

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Chapter 57 – Interlude, the First


What followed was a whirlwind of activity for the Command Crew. Thelonious had the pleasure of seeing the look of disbelief on High Inquisitor Lorric’s face when the Storm Warden Librarian corroborated his story on just how they managed to banish the Entity and Lorric’s impression of the Crew, and Jonas Constantine particularly, hit stratospheric levels. Lorric even informed Thelonious that certain members within the Inquisition had issues with the Deepstalker house and had set events into motion to take them down. However, after seeing what he had seen, he vowed the quash this conspiracy against the Deepstalker House as he was convinced of their purity and that they had the best in mind for the Imperium… and that they were a credit to those with a Warrant of Trade. Thelonious, Yorke and Constantine also found, via another appointment with the Librarian, that the bond they had between the three of them was still there, and whilst there was still a bond with the Ruinous Powers, it was incredibly faint and something they would have to live with… but the immediate, and near future, danger had disappeared (at least in regards to this specific thing).


Using his newfound Political Capital, and the goodwill of his gathered allies, Thelonious managed to convince the Storm Wardens to give them access to a Cyclonic Torpedo… although it was Stellar Locked so that it would only become active when it was in the environs of a specified place. After a discussion with the command crew, it was decided that they would take the Cyclonic Torpedo to the Magos’s planet in the Svard System, and then utterly destroy it… which would end the threat from the Tyranid infestation (that they knew of) and allow everything in Svard to face outwards to the rest of the Expanse. Thelonious also, for some reason, knew of a few phrases to say to Lorric Devondale that provoked quite the reaction! He had heard it from a completely different woman, Inquisitor Margareet who had, apparently, vanished during an operation a few years ago and was assumed lost. Her and Lorric had been very good friends and he had mourned her “death” at the time so the thought that she was alive (as she would have been if she had been in the future) energised him.


Another aspect of Thelonious’ charm offensive was to gather together the assembled Captains (with a Warrant of Trade… rather than Lord-Captain Locke and Brother-Captain Stormward!) into a conference. With the danger to the Expanse now receding, the Captains were keen to get back to their own businesses, but Thelonious had an intriguing offer for them. A pan-Expanse alliance where each of them could call on any of the others, who were in the immediate vicinity, and expect it to be answered. It could change the structure of power in the Expanse! After the offer, which the Captains accepted (at least in spirit), Thelonious met with Tyrone Berenson and had a serious conversation with him about his son. Thelonious pointed out that he had heard rumours that Tyrone’s son was not as Emperor-Fearing as he should be and that assassins were planning on killing Tyrone… which he was aware of… after all, the God-Emperor protects! Thelonious, utilising High-Cardinal (although not officially) Constantine to his fullest advantage, managed to convince Tyrone to allow him to take his son on as a Ward, to show him how Rogue Traders are supposed to act and to give him more of an idea about who he was, rather than being kept from most danger in his father’s clutches.


They also discussed a crippling strike on the Kasabillica Mission, taking out their operations on Footfall and then defeating them in detail throughout the Expanse… making them have to rely on the Calixis sector, where they could not act as openly as they did here. Thelonious said that he had some business to conclude with them, some money that he owed them, but after he had repaid his debts, he was quite happy to participate in eroding their influence.


With the Captains dealt with, the discussion amongst the Deepstalker crew moved to things that directly affected their dynasty… like the fact that they still had Bane on board the Hope in the Void and no idea about what to do with it! Mistress Valentina was very much against trying to blow it up with the Cyclonic Torpedo, who knew whether it would absorb that power (like the Entity had been able to do!) and, as they had before, they decided to park the decision for a future date… it was too powerful to keep, but no-one else seemed to have any idea about how to destroy it for good… and weapons like that were always found by people who were looking for them… they wanted to be found!


Before setting off to Footfall, Thelonious called in his favour with Mistress Valentina and had her send a, quite heartfelt, message to Farseer Beljalanor, asking him to meet Thelonious on Footfall, somewhere quiet and difficult to access, because he had a gift for him… a gift that he hoped would paper over the split that had been created with them, as he had found he did actually value their friendship. With this, everything that he wanted to accomplish had been done, and the Hope in the Void set out for Footfall, hoping to use their Runecaster to get there before Lady Orleans left… there was no need for Battlefleet Calaxis to muster now that they had destroyed both threats. The Hope in the Void was a ship that was very much at home in the Warp and it slipped through and got them back to Footfall in a couple of months, which given they were going against the “tide” was epically fast. Luckily, they did find the Starweaver still docked at Footfall, taking on supplies and crew, and she was absolutely astounded by the story that she was told but, as with Sylvia Locke, she had learned to trust the version of events that Thelonious (and the High Inquisitor) put forward, as it was too crazy NOT to be true.


Thelonious immediately went to meet with the Kasabillica Mission and had a gift for them as well, repayment of the entire loan that they had given him, through various front companies, when he needed it the most. He also informed them that House Berenson was on the way to Footfall and that he had been given Tyrone’s son as a Ward, which pleased the Mission immensely. Little did they know that they were operating on borrowed time, but Thelonious wasn’t going to let them know that. As the Hope in the Void was going to be in Drydock for a good few months, due to repairs, new installations and other things of less interest, the command crew (and the crew in general) was given liberty to enjoy whatever Footfall had to offer them. The Hope in the Void was having a Miroslav Warp Engine fitted, meaning that, when combined with the Runecaster, the ship should literally slip through the Warp like a hot knife through butter. Thelonious went and had surgery at the Adeptus Mechanicus facility for more cybernetic implants in his head, whilst the rest of the command crew did their own things.


One thing that all the officers, especially Yorke, wanted to do was to go and meet the Magos who had requested the Rak’Gol and the Eldar Farseer… one of which Thelonious had in stasis in his quarters. However, they were bringing a sample of the Necron fluid that Yorke had gathered from the Dragon and they thought that the Magos might be willing to take this instead of the Rak’Gol… but they wouldn’t know until they asked. The journey to meet the Magos was much less “interesting” than the first time… no missiles to dodge in a Tank, no mines or other destructive devices to avoid to not die! As they descended down into the Magos’s lair they could see that the Magos had been making more enhancements to himself, and the Magos was surprised to see Thelonious and the command crew back in his presence because, as he said himself, he tended to outlive those who he gave difficult tasks. After a discussion about the Necrons and what the Magos knew of them, Yorke proffered the Necron Fluid, which most definitely slaked the interest of the Magos and he promised to do tests on it before accepting it in lieu of the Rak’Gol.


Yorke was just about to mention that they also had the Farseer that the Magos had requested, but she was stopped by Thelonious, who made it clear, with hand signals, that they were not to tell the Magos that they had the Farseer at all! This confused the seneschal but they didn’t go against the Lord High Captain’s wishes. Bazak, meanwhile, had been talking to some of the Ork Freebooter’s who called Footfall home (for the moment) about visiting the Undred Undred Teef without being blown up. Whilst the Orks, perhaps unsurprisingly, couldn’t give Bazak what he wanted in that regards, the Ork did learn that one of the most prominent Warlords of the region, Morgaash Kulgraz, had managed to unify a vast proportion of the Orks under his rule, although what that meant, none of them could say. All of which lead to the meeting that Thelonious had wished for, the meeting with Beljalanor. After getting a mysterious psychic call, Mistress Valentina informed her Captain that the meeting was on. Thelonious, no fool, had Bazak and Isendark patrolling on the outskirts of the Warehouse he had chosen, whilst the rest of the command crew was with him, in person, as they waited.


Bazak was stomping around in its Mega-Armour, debuting its Shok Attack Gun that it had spent months painstakingly creating (and by painstaking, we meant cobbled together) and it had a cage full of snotlings screeching on the back of the Armour, and they were dressed as chickens, for some reason. Bazak was in the middle of poking some of the snotlings whilst chuckling when he heard something that defied the Orks hearing and, as it raised its eyes to the command crew in the middle of the warehouse, it saw the Warp Spiders, wearing Craftworld Kaelor colours, teleport into the warehouse, surrounding Thelonious. Bazak reached for the Shok Attack Gun and took aim…

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Chapter 58 – Biting the hand that fed you


Thelonious was quick to order the rest of the command crew to stand down, he wanted to see what the Eldar were going to do before launching into life or death combat and his patience was rewarded when, a few seconds later, another Warp Spider ported in. This Eldar looked different to the rest, the armour was much more ornate and the Deathspinners were attached to the armour in a way to give the Eldar the appearance of a Spider, it made it look like the Eldar had eight limbs. Both Thelonious and Yorke knew that this was an Exarch, a powerful warrior and also quite rare… that there was an Exarch here either boded well (as it was a measure of respect) or poorly (because they wanted them dead) and they waited to find out which. Thelonious greeted the Exarch with the proper greeting, although his hands, and those of the command crew, did not stray too far away from their weapons. The Exarch pointed at Thelonious and informed him that the Farseer was waiting for him, but him alone.


Thelonious thought about it for a few seconds, before indicating his assent and he stayed very still as the Warp Spiders surrounded him and then, as one, activated their Warp Field generators and, to the rest of the command crew, they all vanished. The trip through the Warp was very different than the last time Thelonious had been there, and it was over in what seemed like an instant, and he found himself in a place that he did not recognise, but which was indisputably of human manufacture, which meant he knew they were still on Footfall. The conversation, such as it was, started off quite harsh and clipped on Beljalanor’s side, with Thelonious trying to defend his position by saying that he tried to warn the Eldar for a few hours before the betrayal/attack on them, but learning that they thought he was joking which, given his predilection for off the cuff humour, did make sense! However, Thelonious was truly contrite on the fact that he never meant to harm their friendship, and that it had been playing on his mind since then… he said that he had a gift for the Farseer, the stasis field, and the Warp Spiders left to pick it up and teleport it back.


Thelonious also decided to use some of the knowledge he had learnt in the Future, although that was fading fast now, using the Eldar name for the Necrons, mentioning the name that the Farseer had been called in his youth and other things… the Farseer was very confused by this but had learned to treat Thelonious with a degree of respect. The conversation continued until the Warp Spiders came back with the stasis field and then that was all they had to say to each other… they parted on better terms than they had started, but Thelonious was hoping that his gift (the Farseer Caele) would make up for some of his bad decisions in regards to the Eldar… but he would have to wait to learn that. After being teleported back to the command crew, they made their way back to the Deepstalker holdings on Footfall, intending on put a few things in order before House Berenson turned up and all hell broke loose! As they approached their holdings, they could see a minor commotion happening at the front gate and, as they got closer, they could see High Inquisitor Lorric escorting two senior members of the Ecclesiarchy.


After greeting the Cardinal and Senior Confessor, and Lorric as well, they took them to one of their more opulent meeting rooms, with a view out of the skylight that occasionally (based on the rotation of Footfall) took in the view of the Maw. Thelonious dismissed everyone but Mistress Valentina and Constantine for the conversation with the Ecclesiarchy and sent for the finest food and wine that they had available, before greeting them formally in the name of the Deepstalker House.


Cardinal: “We are here, Lord Deepstalker, because we have been informed by the High Inquisitor that one of our own, the Missionary Jonas Constantine, has performed a miracle by any other name… one that had a lot of members of our conclave wondering whether it was a trick… but the word of the High Inquisitor, backed up by an Astartes Librarian, has convinced us that it was real.”


Thelonious: “I would say that this miracle you are talking about so dismissively is the only reason why you are standing here today. If High Cardinal Constantine had not been in the Emperor’s highest favour then he would not have been able to do what he did, and the Expanse would be drowning in the blood and despair of the Ruinous Powers!”


Cardinal: “And, on that, the conclave agrees with your hypothesis. We believe that the Koronus Expanse is becoming, slowly, more civilised and that the beacon of hope that is the Ecclesiarchy needs to have a figurehead in this lawless hellhole, to start bringing the masses of humanity into the Emperor’s Grace. In consultation with my superiors, we have decided that this person should be Jonas Constantine!”


Thelonious: “Well, that decision should come down to the man himself, but as you may have heard, I have been calling him the High Cardinal for a while now, so it delights me that my interests and the interest of the Ecclesiarchy are so aligned.”


Cardinal: “High Cardinal is not a correct designation for any member of the Ecclesiarchy but, nonetheless, the decision has been made, and the documents are here to sign, to make Jonas Constantine the official Cardinal of the Koronus Expanse.”


As the Senior Confessor took out the holy documentation and the Cardinal basked in his own importance, Thelonious had a question to ask about how the ‘Cardinal’ was to do his duties whilst also remaining a member of his crew, but that question was rendered moot by Constantine himself, getting out of his seat and walking directly up to the Cardinal.


Constantine: “Whilst I am honoured by the decision of the Conclave, it is one that I am going to have to decline. I believe the best way to bring the faith of the Emperor to the masses is to continue to interpret and exert his will the best we can to prove an example for the rest of humanity. I do not need any title, especially given by those who have lost the true essence of their work, to provide that inspiration. I will always be faithful to the God-Emperor of mankind, but in my own way!”


The reaction around the room was immediate. Thelonious managed to keep a poker face… just… whilst Lorric let a startled laugh escape. The Cardinal’s face was one of thunder as he stormed out of the room whilst the Senior Confessor had a look of contemplation across his features. Lorric’s face soon turned to astonishment, as did Thelonious’s when Constantine indicated that a future within the Ordo Malleus was something he was very interested in! Lorric promised to fast track Constantine into an Interrogator position when he felt able to join the Inquisition full time and had no doubt that he would make Inquisitor in record time. The Senior Confessor stayed behind and Constantine held a long conversation that seemed to promote greater understanding between them and they appeared to leave as friends… however, Constantine and Thelonious knew that they had made an enemy in the Cardinal, and potentially many of his allies… but, Constantine was always one to follow his morality and conscience. Whilst Thelonious was somewhat distraught with the potential profit that had been thrown away by Constantine, he couldn’t argue with his friend’s moral certainty… after all, it was that certainty that banished a Chaos God!


Footfall was alive with rumours, a lot of them spread by the Deepstalker house, of the offer the Ecclesiarchy made and the rejection from the most holy Constantine and so it was that when Constantine went to one of the local shrines to pray and to lead a congregation, word was spread and he ended up giving a sermon to a huge number of people, in one of the central squares of Footfall. His sermon was all about bringing the light of the Emperor into the darkness of the Expanse, about how the light of the God-Emperor would lead humanity into a glorious future, but not until everything dark was purged from the Expanse. He spoke about Damaris, about Svard and about Elerius as places where the Emperor’s light was shining brightly and how it should be nurtured and then exported. Everyone who was in the square felt a shard of divinity amongst them that touched them and many left the sermon with a new sense of purpose and in the next few months Pilgrimages increased a hundred fold. Constantine had left his mark on the assembled people and maybe, just maybe, left an indelible imprint on the Koronus Expanse.


With, at the least, another few weeks of repairs and recruiting needed for the Hope in the Void to be fully restored, Thelonious and Yorke put their intelligence networks to work discovering as much as they could about the Kasabillica Mission’s operations on Footfall, knowing that when the hammer blow came, the more they knew about them, the more they could dismantle. Both their networks were extensive and, together, they managed to map out most of the Kasabillica, identifying their high rankers and their safe houses, as well as operational buildings… everything was set up for when Berenson arrived, although Thelonious had another plan that he kept to himself. He was also distracted, somewhat, by reports of other Orks being spotted in his ship and so, with Rolaine for company, he walked into the area of the ship that had been designated as Bazak’s and confronted the Ork. After a relatively heated argument, in which Thelonious pointed out, rather forcefully, that this was his ship and thus everyone on board must answer to him, Bazak brought the Lord-High Captain to the Freebooterz he had ‘recruited’ and then left the room.


What went on in the room was not recorded, but Thelonious and Rolaine walked out after a few minutes, still alive and without any of the Orks dead, satisfied that they would follow their orders. Isendark spent more of his time trying to improve his and the Lord High Captain’s weapons, Bazak kept the Orks in line and started working on his own projects, Rolaine spent some time in the Naval Quarters, catching up with some old friends and colleagues until the time came where Tyrone Berenson entered the Feribundus system. The first order of business was for Thelonious to formally take custody of Tyrone’s son, Sebastian, and this was carried out at an official ceremony that was held on the Hope in the Void where Sebastian was appointed a Ward of the Deepstalker Dynasty, as a Junior Lieutenant underneath Isendark, to be trained in the art of Spacecraft. After the ceremony, Thelonious and Tyrone held a conference where Thelonious handed over all the intelligence that they had gathered on the Kasabillica, to give the Berenson forces as much of a chance of winning the fight as they could… although they did leave out one crucial part, a secret escape hatch… Thelonious had his own plans.


Sebastian’s first night on the Hope in the Void was one of wanton excess… drink, drugs, the full sensorium experience, nothing was off limits to the only Heir to the Berenson dynasty and he took full advantage. However, he was also a Lieutenant, with responsibilities, so when Marcia Cross woke him up for his boot camp training, he was in a sorry state but the former Naval Officer was not the sort to let anyone off lightly and he ended up hungover for the entire day. When Thelonious knocked on his door that evening, he did come out for another night of debauchery, but Thelonious could see that he was not enjoying it as much… all part of the plan. During that time, Mistress Valentina and Commander Rolaine had been putting the finishing touches to a plan to ‘rescue’ some of the leadership of the Kasabillica Mission, after all, how were House Deepstalker supposed to take over the bulk of the Cold Trade if they didn’t know how the Trade worked? Thelonious planned to stop the trade of the most egregious artefacts, and hand them over to House Berenson, but intended to allow the less dangerous stuff to continue.


A handpicked group, along with 500 to 1000 troops that were secreted around the Kasabillica Mission’s buildings were all armed with Capacitor Bolts… they were more likely to knock out than kill and Thelonious wanted to stop any unnecessary deaths on the side of House Berenson. Constantine whipped quite a few crowds into a religious fervour and implanted agents steered the crowds near the Kasabillica buildings, providing more cover and distraction… and then it began, with a massive explosion against the main wall of the compound, as some kind of Anti-tank munitions blasted a huge hole, and Berenson troops stormed in. Berenson had dipped into his considerable resources and had paid off the local enforcers to stay home, as well as paying people nearby to leave the area, so the collateral casualties were going to be lower but, given the attack involved around 30,000 of House Berenson troopers, the attack was overwhelming. Thelonious, the command crew and the handpicked troops were waiting, listening to the carnage going on in the compound, and then Thelonious used an encrypted line to contacted one of the heads of the Kasabillica Mission, Vladaym, and offered to extract them from the assault.


The response was predictable, the Kasabillica Mission had no idea of the force arrayed against them and were convinced they could hold their own, which lasted another 20 minutes before the Berenson troops penetrated the inner courtyard… at which point Thelonious got a call! After being given the go-ahead, and with the detailed plans sent over their connection, the go order was given. Thelonious, Constantine and Rolaine lead the three points of the trident, being let through by most of the Kasabillica Mission guards and coming from behind to take the Berenson troops by surprise (but with their suppressed weaponry), which allowed them to punch through the cordon they had set up, with very few casualties, and make their way into the, well appointed, chambers of the Kasabillica Mission. They found that most of the security opened for them, obviously as a result of their agreement with the Kasabillica and so it was that they found themselves in the presence of the leadership of a vast criminal organisation, or at least, the Koronus Expanse office anyway. After convincing them that he was on their side, and that he wanted to help them rebuild the Mission, but better, they lowered the forcefield surrounding their bunker to allow the Hope in the Void to teleport them aboard.


It was then that Thelonious ordered all the rest of his troops, who he had secreted around Footfall, to attack and demolish the Kasabillica Mission, after all, he had made a promise to Tyrone Berenson! After the attack, and a public apology from House Berenson to “the Liege of Footfall” for the damage, the main building of the Kasabillica Mission was left empty as a warning… and Berenson stayed around for a while, sending troops in to clear out anyone who decided to move in, or wanted to take over the place… it was to stand as a Monument to the citizens of Footfall, that the Kasabillica Mission was done. However, unbeknownst to House Berenson, House Deepstalker had been subtly interrogating the leadership of the Kasabillica Mission… gambling with them, offering them all the comforts they were used to, drugging them occasionally, cross referencing their findings and, in general, running one of the biggest cons they could, all to get as much information about the Mission’s operations as possible. The heads of the criminal syndicate were no fools but, such was the agility and sheer brazenness of the command crews approach, that, at the end of the two weeks, they had most of what they needed and the leaders were still unaware f their true motivations. When asked why he was helping them, Thelonious merely stated ‘there’s money in it’ and, given their previous dealings, the leadership found this an acceptable answer.


The crew were gladdened to see that the Mission operated a cell structure, with very few people knowing where the orders came from and, because they had the access codes and protocols, they could just reassume control without anyone knowing there had been a change of leadership… and take the Koronus Expanse Mission independent! House Berenson was about to find its ability to interdict the worst shipments improve dramatically, whilst its ability to interdict the less dangerous material and information was likely to drop dramatically but Thelonious could look at what they had accomplished and feel quite proud and happy… he had an alliance with one of the powers of the sector, and he now had access to the Kasabillica Mission and, whilst it would take time to filter through everything to find out what they had, it was a set of resources that was not to be sniffed at. All in all, it had been a good year for House Deepstalker.