Hrrm...

This is a rather lengthy (sorry) wall-of-text-recap of my mix of the two scenarios; A Stony Sleep and Shadows of Madness, part one.

Player Characters: Kill Team Prascus (in my version Watch Captain Prascus is younger and alive and their Kill Team Captain): 1. Scipio, Ultramarine Tac Marine. 2. Elyas, Dark Angel Tech Marine. 3. Sepheran, Blood Angel Apothecarion, 4. Yngvar, Space Wolf Devastator (played as NPC), and 5. Warik Azuri, Raven Guard Librarian (played as NPC). One player character named Aurel (A Mortifactor Assault Marine) is dropped in the first half of this scenario, as the player isn't in the group anymore).

SPOILER WARNING!

In this mix of these two adventures, Baraban is the place for both the madness AND the missing inquisitor Vincent. In my story, Vincent went to this planet for the reason of the mysterious madness spreading among the forces, friendly and hostile, on Baraban. So the main objectives both include finding/rescuing Vincent (if possible) and finishing his investigation into what causes the madness, among other things. Second and tertiary objectives include rescuing a kidnapped General Caroses and taking out the Tau command team. I totally left out the Necron ending, and substituted it with an ancient chamber that is now being excavated by the Samech/Alpha Legion team. They are about to steal away an age-old and revered chaotic sepulchre that are also a small ship, belonging to a Pre-Age of Shadow Chaos Sorcerer. They replace the sepulchre with a chaos cogitator to keep the remaining Trellises functioning.

So the Kill Team first arrives back at Erioch from Aurum (part 1 of The Emperor Protects), mission complete. They now know that Diaz Lan has been infected by genestealers, so the Apothecarion of the group (a former Sanguinary Priest) closely monitors him as he is interred aboard his ship The Horizon's Pride on the ride back to Watch Fortress Erioch. On board are also Brigadeer Heth as he wants to accompany the KT back. Father Marius is also among the returning ones. A calm enough journey begins and the ride to Erioch goes more or less according to plan.

When the KT arrives at Erioch they are informed it is custom to leave either a written report (the most common) or a verbal report (this is done only if the mission was a failure or some other incident did happen) on return from the mission. So the team leader, Brother Scipio of the Ultramarines, a Tactical Marine visits "the door" and leaves his report. The door is what they (in my version) call the front gate into the second level of the Tower of Brass, where the Inquisitors have their main offices. This is also the place where the KT's get their missions.

Diaz Lan is taken into care by Chief Apothecarion Alegander Septimus the Elder and his team in the Apothecarium department of Erioch. They immediately begin to sedate Diaz Lan to be able to operate on his body, so as to try to remove the Genestealer taint. These series of operations (eight in all) takes 13 days of gruelling medical work to complete. But, apparently Septimus reports his work is a success. Diaz Lan's body is now reportedly without Tyranid taint. A very weak Lan is transferred to the infirmary for further observation. Apothecarion Sepheran from the KT is allowed to watch these operations on Diaz Lan, but not to participate. Diaz Lan slowly recovers.

During the first days, a detachment of Sisters of Battle arrives, to take back the body of their dead sister, found on Aurum and also hear something of what
transpired from Father Marius and the KT.

Meanwhile, after a couple of installment days and general routines beginning and after the report is written/left at The Door, the (whole) team is summoned by Forge Master Greyweaver to the Foundry for more detailed reports of how they found the schematic and what they think its purpose is.
The Tech-Marine start to work together with the Brother-Artisans, examining the schematic and after a few rolls more of the characters get a chance to investigate about what it could be. First day in the Foundry: really nothing gets discovered. Second day, Greyweaver suggests they take the blueprint into the
Foundry's special lab complex called "The Technosanctum" (Is this a silly name? I invented it) where they get more into it's detail and starts magnifying more parts of it. This makes some parts of it go "blurry" and eight parts of it turns into unusual colours. Suddenly, something "flashing" strikes out from the blueprint just as the Tech-Marine magnifies a more detailed part. (After a few bad rolls) this strikes him in the eye and shakes him off his feet to the floor. He lies there, and the others see he's in great pain as the "influence" from the schematic starts 'tainting' the area around his eye and side of his skull.

Greyweaver immediately orders that the Tactical Marine hurry to the Librarium aboard Erioch to find a Librarian that can help in this matter, as Harl suspects (rightly) that it has something to do with foul Warp-influences. Scipio gets hold of a first rank Librarian by the name of Warik Azuri, Raven Guard Librarian now on Deathwatch duty under Akineton's department. They make a fast return to the Technosanctum and the Librarian kneels by the Tech-Marine, trying to counter the Warp taint effects. After two rounds of high voiced chanting and general appliance of sacred texts from the Imperial Faith and a holy symbol held to the Tech-Marines head, the Librarian manages to stop the dangerous influence.

After this, the Tech-Marine is in a bad shape, but recovers from his strange wound after only a few days of chastising prayers and careful monitoring by Warik Azuri, who also lends a hand in the reading. They return to the Technosanctum and once again participate in the blueprint investigation, now in the shielded red-zone part of of the lab. Warik Azuri is now requested to stay with the team during the investigation, by Greyweaver himself.

The days go on, routine schedual and investigational hours meandering together.After only a week, Diaz Lan, very pale-looking and weak show up late one evening at the marines cells and informs the characters that he already are planning for the return to Aurum, as the Inquisition demands it in the critical Imperium-integrating phase on the planet. Everyone is surprised, but wishes the envoy the best health and safe return to Aurum. He's going to start his journey back in another fortnight, apparently accompanied by three other Deathwatch-marines (not of the players KT)as Aurum's people has such reverence for Deathwatch marines and also the Sisters of Battle and Father Marius.

A week and a half later, when the KT and Greyweavers personnel is nearing a solution to the schematic enigma, the Apothecarion Sepheran of the KT visits one of the smaller chapels to pray, where he discovers the lone Chief Apothecarion Alegander Septimus in a dark corner, praying feverishly and muttering something about "Forgive me father of my father, great emperor, I am only one servant and the deeds never ending... Forgive me mine faults". The Chief Apothecarion doesn't notice Sepheran, who quietly exits and think not so much of it.

The Technosanctums inner lab is now under quarantine and finally the team starts to understand something of what the schematic describes. It is apparently a blueprint for making a blasphemous heretek component called a Thaumagramm Diode.Greyweaver starts talking about the only place he suspect this can come from: the Samech Apostate Mechanicus.

A few days later, Diaz Lan leaves for Aurum aboard Horizon's Pride accompanied by the entourage of earlier mentioned personnel.

The day after, in the evening time, 3 great explosions go off inside Watch Fortress Erioch; one in the ammo department of the Flight Deck, one in the ammo and weapons testing rooms of the Foundry and finally the biggest of the three explodes within the ammunitions and weapons sections of the Armoury level.

The KT are practicing battle training in The Hunting Grounds, and first thinks the explosion as being part of the combat. But all of the training halls power
down and they begin hearing loud sirens howling. The race outside meeting lots of other marines and support personnel milling about, wondering.

More and more information starts to come out to all the resident marines and personnel on Erioch, on what happened in the three explosions.
Two of Erioch's inquisitors, Vils Andarion and Ezu Ghraile as well as 56 servitors and 113 other human personnel die immediately. High Chaplain Titus
Strome, Harl Greyweaver, Master of the Armoury Sekendi Kundus (silly name?) and Watch Captain Ramiel all die within 10 to 13 hours of their injuries. And, to add to the great tragedy, one great setback is that now, the current ammo supplies on Erioch is nearly depleted. This means all teams reported as going on missions is to be prioritized. In spite of this, the result is that only one magazine can be supplied to each KT marine, and that means ONE mag: the one carried attached to the weapon (including heavy weapons).

Confusion, disbelief and disorder reigns for hours, but are cut short as Lord Inquisitor Carmelius summons all able marines and high officials to a meeting in the Great Hall. There the meeting is first begun with a short and high strung speech by Mordigael, and then he hands it over to Carmelius who among other
things says he doesn't know who or what made this atrocity possible within the walls of the Fortress. But none will slow their work until the culprit or
culprits are found, extracted of ALL information and then executed. Also, the ordinary work of The Deathwatch marines and their assignments must continue. This is then followed by prayer and loud supplications to the Emperor and the Deathwatch. Then the meeting is over.

Two days later, the KT are summoned to the Surveillance Theatre by Carmelius and other personnel who informs them their next assignment: they must go to the planet Baraban and locate a lost inquisitor, Zaer Vincent. Baraban are also the only other known planet that have decavane crystals as a mineable resource, and the Inquisition thinks it is important to see if there's a link between the happenings on Aurum and Baraban. Carmelius show them more footage of the strange phenomena on Baraban and also a short vid of what transpired around Outpost 420, and probably the best starting point for information. The characters read up on Baraban and some older reports on unexplicable events on the planet. They also read some reports sent from Vincent to Carmelius about what he (Vincent) calls "Delirium Trellises" he has found traces of in strange quiet places around Baraban. Then, the KT get the great honor of using (and being wardens of) something called an Archeotech Luminator, an artefact from the Omega Vault. The eyes of the Tech-Marine will not stop glimmering for what seems like hours...

Anyway, after a rushed preparation the KT are sent with the cruiser Spear of Fury, where a group of gruff Black Templars welcome the group but turn sour at the sight of Warik Azuri, now a full member of the KT. In spite of this the younger BT warms up to the group when they touch the target subject: Baraban.

After two rather uneventful weeks aboard the cruiser they enter the orbit of the planet and plan their descent by Thunderhawk. The requisitioned landspeeder are loaded into the T-Hawk and they're away.

After just minutes the pilot informs them the drop point are under attack by Kroot, and the KT decides to intervene on behalf of the hard pressed Guardsmen.
The T-Hawk manage to make a near-ground sweeping that drops the KT plus Brigadeer Heth and the ejected landspeeder (shielded in a shock-resistant material) behind the Imperial Guard trenches (I had painted and flocked 28-mm sized trenches with Guardsmen figs in them and Kroot figs coming howling over the field, seems the players liked it).

After the short but sweet rescue of the Guardsmen, they get to speak to the whisky-and-smoking-voiced bad-a** Sargeant Acernon Hatch (I replaced the lieutenant with this guy, thought it more appropriate). It was him that could be seen on the vid of the strange battle around Outpost 420 and they get more detailed info on what really happened. The KT start to sort out what could only be hallucinations, but on a very big scale. They get to visit the exact place of
the vid-recorded battle between Tau and the Guardsmen. After many hours, searching around in the "spooky woods" they happen to come upon some parts that are unnaturally quiet.
They remember the artefact they carry and take out the Archeotech Luminator, which suddenly shows a sort of strange smoky darkness in which can be seen something otherwordly, a construct of sorts (I changed the Trellis into a smaller more intricately designed apparatus, with barely visible chaos-signs on it. The few remaining Trellises are also linked to a central power node/chaos cogitator that can be found underneath the Kard'Dane islands.)

As they walk nearer to the apparatus, all members of the KT hear a strange "powering up"-sound and suddenly are assaulted by the full force of the Trellis.
Two of the KT marines start hallucinating. The Ultramarine suddenly see himself as one of a team back on MacCragge, battling the Tyranid invasion, and start to "scout for synapse leader-animals", suddenly sneaking away among the shrub. The Dark Angel assaults a tree, thinking it is one of the Fallen, come to wreak havoc. This continues for a while, as the other (unafflicted) team members try to wrestle down their stricken brothers. Brother Yngvar arrives at the scene (from the landspeeder, where Brigadeer Heth waits) and totally obliterates the Trellis with a well placed Krak grenade.

Warik Azuri ponders about what this apparatus could be, how old it can be and as the others, suspects it to be of chaos origin (doh!). Anyway, he could feel the sinister machine on a level that must mean it somehow hides partly within the Warp. This info is taken in by the group and they decide to go see if something can be dug up in the missing inquisitor's quarters.

At the Epsilon Garrison HQ's they meet General Castus Iacton, who bids them welcome to the garrison and asks the KT what he can do for them. He tells them about Vincent and that the inquisitor's been missing for a month now. Before he left, he regularly left some small undescriptive reports on his work or posted letters through the garrison to his superiors. Only one report was left with Iacton, a survey of sorts describing strange tales among the Guardsmen about the western fronts on the main continent of Baraban, and also concerning the western coasts of those lands (near the Kard'Dane islands).

And, an ornate box has been left, by the "other marines" that inquired about Vincent. (I replaced the Black Templars with Subjugators, as I thought it'd be strangely stupid of the Alpha Legioneers to masquerade as a chapter NOT participating in the Crusade). Brigadeer Heth suddenly accepts the box. But not before some of the marines seem to smell a strange odour around it. They hurriedly tell Heth to put it down, but the man has already picked up the key attached to it, and starts to feel dizzy. They manage to hinder the Brigadeer's death through the Apothecarion's timely actions, but Heth is now out of action, and stays weakened at the HQ's.

After this, the KT boards the landspeeder from a balcony, and leaves to recon some of the other parts of the fronts. They want to find more "quiet places" and neutralize more Trellises. They see lots of chaotic front sections with Guardsmen fighting each other, and they travel beyond these lines and into Tau territory. There they suddenly meet and battle it out with a Hammerhead tank among the woods, losing a fate point to the otherwise vapourized landspeeder. They manage to ground the Tau tank and breach its interiors, capturing the Tau driver. The driver is taken back to HQ's for interrogation. There they manage to get the general coordinates for the Tau HQ's on the southern continent after some fruitful "good marine-bad marine" interrogation work (nice roleplaying!).

And, instead of searching for more Trellises, the players totally surprises the GM (me!) with going after the HQ right there and then...!

They manage to get past some of the more busy front sections on the main continent and then enter the southern one from the sea. There they come to the
foothold "Fort Dorn" and meet with the Trellises-touched general and his crazy but barely holding out troops. The general is happy that the Emperor's angels of death have come to help them, only to see them suddenly leave again for the interior of the southern continent, hidden under the darkness of night.

They travel fast but are detected by Tau Sensor towers and some drone patrols start firing at the lanspeeder. It gets grounded and then suddenly the KT are
under serious fire by a XV 15 Stealth team. They battle it out (not knowing where to fire among the many (Space Hulk) blips showing up on their sensors) and finally drive the stealth team away.

This is where we stopped playing for now. The next planned sessions are far away in November this year. Phew! I get some more preparation time atleast.

(Are you still reading this? Fantastic stamina!)