Deep in the heart of a wrecked warmachine on the ruined planet Zayth, Jak Frost is questioning the last priestess of Mykybe, Zaythi Goddess of Love & Good Fortune, about the mysterious Veil, source of the X-1 archeotech that has since vanished from under the nose of Acting-Captain Marzu. The priestess's mutant offspring move to assist her prognostications, unbolting a pneumatic tube from the wall, draping it around her python-like, and letting her breath deeply of the fumes that have accumulated over the centuries. Her vision is suitably oracular and ambiguous.

Priestess : You have seen the veil, held before the Goddess that she not drive Man mad with her beauty... I see you tread the path of the thief and the avatar, see you follow in their footsteps to the place of light... but I see only darkness! There is a place, like this, writ large, where they lay offerings before the God of Flesh, and pray for the return of the Gods of Iron, and they know nothing of the world beyond! *long string of babbled Navigator's Cant* I see you seeking a pearl of great price, but you are not the only ones who seek it... seven after seven after seven... you will be damned by your greed... I see war in your future... Damaris! Oceans of blood! Beware the beastman! Beware the creatures beyond the Veil! ..... Make haste! The demons are coming!

All annoyingly vague, and worrisome, and generic. Are these Gods of Iron heretical robots? Khornate Chaos Marines? And Seven is the number of the Ruinous Power Nurgle... Although those co-ordinates may actually mean something concrete, and are relayed to Benetek.

Jak Frost : Well, that was all very obvious. Beware the mutants! Beware the Orks! Beware the Tyranids, they're quite nasty... Beware the Stinky Cheese! I wonder who that refers to?
Acting-Captain Casu Marzu : I can't imagine.

Jak now has to decide what to do next - the Priestess begged him to show kindness to her people, but they ARE all mutants and witches, so he would be entirely within his rights to hose them all down with gunfire and have the site nuked from orbit. Instead, he decides to make it Somebody Else's Problem, and persuades the landship Ironclad that detouring to ransack the war machine for salvage is worth it, especially if they get a priestess and oracle as well. The Rose Tattoo's Tech-Priests want to spend the weeks until the Ironclad can crawl there studying the machine in depth, of course, learning everything they can of its technological arcana. This Jak hesitantly approves, on the condition they don't punch holes in the still intact sections, and take precautions against being blown away by the next superstorm.

Up on the Rose Tattoo, we learn more of what has been keeping Marzu too busy to meet with the Zaythi. He's ordered a complete breakdown on all data-security logs and power usage for the ship, searching for any evidence that the X-1 is still on board and trying to infiltrate the data-vaults. It doesn't appear the Inquisitor and his retinue had it in their possession, despite his scans of their quarters.

GM : You really want to scan the rooms? It's generally a very bad idea to take an interest in the activities of the Inquisition, lest they reciprocate.

And Inquisitor Lammergeier's interest in Lord-Captain's van Baroque's illness has him worried as well. Leaving the Lord-Captain in suspended animation, citing the risks of trying to repair his brain without the very best chirugeons to hand, has been convenient for Marzu's megalomania, but if the Inquisition are so intrigued by the case, than perhaps he should try and repair the damage himself, even if organic brain tissue is such a poor substitute for the purity of silicon.

GM : So Marzu spends a few days bent over a microscope, operating on the Lord-Captain's brain. *looks innocent*

GM : Anything you want to inscribe on the Lord-Captain's new steel plate, before you sew him up?
Jak Frost : A *****.
Acting-Captain Casu Marzu : Hey, that's not fair. I wouldn't do anything like that.
GM : No. You'd nano-etch it in figures a few molecules high.
Acting-Captain Casu Marzu : Not true. I like the Lord-Captain. If it wasn't for him I wouldn't be out here giving orders and doing whatever the hell I like. BWAHAHAHA.

Tech-Priest Casu Marzu : Good news, crew! The operation was a success! Our valiant Lord-Captain will soon be fit to resume his command!
GM : 'Just ignore this remote control I'm holding.'

The Lord-Captain is cautiously pleased to see that his ship is still intact and most of the crew still alive, despite Marzu being in command. However, the confession that the X-1 Unit is missing nearly puts him back into a coma.

Jak Frost : How could you loose a box???
Tech-Priest Casu Marzu : It..... good question!

Jak Frost : Were any the Inquisitor's acolytes carrying a box big enough to hold it?
Tech-Priest Casu Marzu : Cylinder. Round ends. It was an X-box 360

Lord-Captain van Baroque decides to punish Marzu and Frost - by promoting them both. Jak will now be responsible for the ship's financial endeavours, and Marzu will handle the details. ALL the details.

GM : Clever. You can sit back and relax, while Jak strangles under the responsibility, and Marzu drowns in the paperwork.

But first, the results of Marzu's electronic security checks are coming in. There's no evidence of the X-1 being active in the last few weeks, but there are some peculiar oddities over the last few months. Tech-Priest and Lay-Technician cognomens being used to log into the ship's systems at points far removed from where those crew members should be. Cross-referencing them to the Rose Tattoo's camera records, patchy as they are, reveals something alarming - they have a Tech-Priest aboard that Marzu doesn't recognise, and this individual has being going from section to section of the ship, avoiding the Enginarium and Command Spire, familiarising himself with the layout and systems, unchallenged by the crew. A Tech-Priest IS a good disguise - the robes conceal much, and mere crew dare not question what he is doing lest it intrude upon the sacred mysteries of technology. Jak immediately passes on a description to the various joy-girls and scum he found places for on the ship. Van Baroque does the same with his own spy network among the crew. Marzu determines that the intruder has an unhealthy interest in the Rose Tattoo's Munitorium, and its life support systems, and Malakai determines that the now unused Alienage, cleared as it is of missionaries, and powered down to divert extra power to the ship's sensor arrays, would be a good place for a spy to hide. He leads a thorough search, and indeed they find something interesting - one of the Alienage's comm-lines has been hacked, with a socket for a burst receiver/transmitter. Jak rigs a concealed camera to watch the area, in case the spy comes back.

Jak learns that the fake Tech-Priest has been seen in the ship's sewerage works, where, for reasons of Tradition, rickety walkways hang over the bubbling vats, and talks to the sergeant at arms responsible for that section.

GM : It's not one of the most prestigious postings on the ship.
Jak : That's an understatement. Have you seen this Tech-Priest doing anything unusual down here?
Sergeant-at-Arms : Well, sir, no. He said it was a surprise inspection.
Jak OOC : Clearly we need to consult the Evil Overlord list. There are no such things as surprise inspections. Anything else?
Sergeant-at-Arms : Well, we had that outbreak of ****-flies last month, but we got it under control.
Jak : Oh? Did you use flamers?
Sergeant-at-Arms : Oh, NO, sir! No naked flames down here!

Marzu, Jak and the rest inspect the Munitorium, directly over the sewerage works.

Tech-Priest Casu Marzu : Have any of you seen any Tech-Priests in here? Raise your hands.
Munitorium Servitors : .....* all raise hands, power-lifters, etc.*
Jak : Tech-Priests other than Marzu.
Munitorium Servitors : *all lower hands*

They place extra guards on the Munitorium, pending the capture of the spy. They don't want him dead just yet, in case he's an Inquisitorial agent. A suspicious hotspot on one of the Munitorium walls turns out to be an illicit still in one of the gun-decks. The gun crew clan in question is relieved that Marzu isn't angry about this - he's understanding about their needs ( providing the design is one of the approved Illicit Still Configurations )

GM : After all, it saves on industrial solvent too.

Unfortunately all this running around searching for the spy has left the rest of the ship in the hands of the ordinary crew. And even with the extra sensor arrays online, they completely fail to notice the four Ork raiders coming in to attack, until it's too late.

GM : The Oracle told you that the demons were coming...
Jak : That could have meant anything!

Lord-Captain van Baroque : Orks? Excellent!
GM : Yes, more heads for your trophy room.

Happily, the Orks prove spectacularly incompetent at everything, from shooting to boarding to even maintaining morale. After the lead vessel Big Loota gets blasted out of the sky, Marzu even manages to intimidate the second into leaving to find an easier target elsewhere.

GM : Possibly your threat was a bit wordy for Orks.
Lord-Captain : 'You grotz ain't fit to sniff da dags of Ghazgull Thraka!'
GM : Better. 'You like all dat dakka? Well dere's plenny more where dat came from!'

GM : I can only assume that first wave of Ork boarders attempted to board via the Rose Tattoo's engines. While they were running.

Eventually, the Rose Tattoo having run rings around the other four ships, noses up behind the last, which is so damaged it can only go in straight lines, and has no rear-facing weapons.

Tech-Priest Casu Marzu : See that Ork on the stern? Waving the white flag? Target the main guns on him first.

Jak Frost : I can imagine the conditions on their ship. 'Hey, Boss, is dat dere air dukt supposed ta be spitting fire like dat?'

But Malakai realised something in the middle of battle - even with the firefight raging, he really should have kept the Munitorium locked. Because within minutes of the Orks defeat, and the crew drooling over the thought of the loot they can capture from the hulks, a massive explosion rips through the armoury and the adjacent laser batteries. In retrospect, the middle of the battle was the best time for the spy to make his move.

Malakai : All he needed to do was be on one the gun decks, 'blessing' each shell, and have one sent back to the Munitorium as defective.
GM : *nods* Just as well you dealt with the Orks so quickly - imagine how bad it would have been if the Munitorium and Sunsear batteries had gone up during the battle? Could have been worse - the explosion could have blown out through the crew barracks, or down through the sewerage works. That would have been a short sharp shower for the planet below. Of course, given the conditions on Zayth, they probably wouldn't have noticed.

The explorers order a total lockdown of the ship - they're going to find this agent if it's the last thing they do....and it very well might be.

A few quotes, whose context I have forgotten

Jak Frost : Pardon me, my pants are shaking

Lord-Captain van Baroque : Necrons dancing the Robot.
Jak Frost : Tech-Priest/Necron Dance-off!

Relics & Revelations - Perusing Black Crusade, and the rules on Minions.

Jak's player : I want a minion with Quadrapedal, Winged, and Unnatural Agility!
Me : ....why?...oh god.... you want Rainbow Dash as a minion, don't you. **
Jak's player :

Needless to say, I will not be running such a campaign - given what they do to normal campaigns, the thought of what they would do when they're actually on the side of Chaos terrified me.

Jak's player : *to a prospective GM* I'm not sure I can recommend sitting in on one of our games ... If you ever want to see a campaign go...
Me : **** up? Spectacularly pear-shaped? Some sort of Chaos pear, with tentacles?

Because of the trouble the X-1 unit caused, it's suggested Marzu do some additional neurosurgery on the Lord-Captain, so that whenever he thinks of the device, he says 'my *****' instead.

Lord-Captain van Baroque : Does anybody know where my ***** is? The Tech-priest had it last and he's lost it, damnitall.
Navigator Benetek : I know how you feel - I haven't seen mine in years.

Navigator Benetek : I know that as a Navigator I won't be the centre of attention of every encounter. I'll just evolve into being the centre of my own planetary system XD

Navigator Benetek OOC : Another thing: Looking at the map of the Koronus Expanse I noticed Damaris (which the oracle mentions in her prophecy) is a planet more toward the Maw. Would it be fair to assume Netzach knows this too? If so I want to sent them a warning via our Astropath next session, considering her mentions of war in our future and seas of blood et al. Whatever the outcome I assume that even if I'm allowed to send a warning they'll just ignore it, it being a message through a minor Astropath from an unknown Navigator babbling about some chicks prophecy coming from a war-world... but at least I tried then, and afterward can tell them "I told you so" if the **** happens to hit the fan
GM : Depends how you phrase it - "reliable precog foretells oceans of blood on Damaris - have you had similar predictions there?" for example
Navigator Benetek : I sure wasn't gonna broadcast "ancient tart we found in the middle of the desert babbles about war, take care."

The Explorers supposedly in charge of the starship Rose Tattoo have narrowly avoided disaster, but only because the ship's armoury exploded after their battle with four Ork raiders, and not during. Of course, the 2000-odd crew working and living in the sections around the armoury were not so lucky, but either way the Life-Captain and his subordinates would very much like to get their hands on the saboteur. Tech-Priest Marzu, indeed, suggests an interesting experiment should they capture him alive - drag him behind the ship on a long chain when they re-enter the Warp. The ship's various psykers go slightly pale at the suggestion - true, most likely he would be promptly devoured by the eternally ravenous denizens of that realm, but the other possibility is that he comes back demonically possessed.

Jak : If he's still on board, he may have changed his disguise. Hell, I can change my face pretty easily.
Tech-Priest Marzu : I can change faces pretty easily too *smacks powerfist against palm*

Navigator Benetek uses his abilities to survey nearby space, in case that last Ork ship has changed his mind and came back - instead, he feels the launch of one of the Rose Tattoo's salvation pods, making a bee-line for the storm-wracked surface of Zayth below. It's probably a decoy, but Jak and Xanthis fly down in pursuit to be sure. Either way, Marzu thinks that now would be a good time to conduct the ritual marking his own ascension to Magos, since it includes a certain amount of mechanical upgrades that may prove useful, even if his underlings deplore the speed he demands.

Malakai OOC : Will you please stop referring to your psychic abilities as 'spells'? Magic only comes from one source in the 40K universe.
GM : Magical ponies?

Finding a safe place to land proves next to impossible, and Jak elects to simply drop the passenger compartment while he tries to hover the Aquila lander over a slightly less precipitous patch of mountainside.

Jak : Dumping cargo.... now.
GM : The tech-priests are going to love you.

The pursuit is complicated by the demands of the nearest Zaythi landship, the 'Unbreakable' that they depart post-haste, but Marzu claims they are pursuit of Orks to exterminate, and to that noble end the Unbreakable even agrees to shell the mountainside flat, after Jak and Xanthis find no sign of the saboteur at the pod but don't want to take any chances.

But, as they had feared, the assassin was still on board the Rose Tattoo - he had simply exited the ship and strolled around the hull to the life support compartments, slaughtering everybody he met on the way. He was no doubt hoping to lure the ship's officers and armament into a trap, but he hadn't reckoned on Marzu's willingness to use ancient wonders of technology at effectively point-blank range - teleporting the assassin and a fair chunk of the surrounding life-support machinery into the Teleportarium, and into a ring of armsmen, Astropath Adrik Starsson, and Marzu himself, resplendent in his new robes of office - i.e. power armour and chaingun.

The assassin actually manages to dodge the hail of lasgun fire and armour-piercing bullets, and responds with something the size of a marble that shatters Marzu's armour and even manages to seriously damage his 'true flesh' and merely organic components beneath.

Up on the bridge, Malakai Tubreau elects not to send any more troops down there ( assuming, rightly, that anything that can actually hurt the Tech-priest would make short work of anybody still merely human ) and instead attempts a trick he saw Marzu do once - re-routing huge amounts of power to the Teleportarium, in the hope of frying the assassin as the machinery overloads.

GM : You realise the tech-priests will want your skin as an oil-rag, don't you? You are endangering the sacred mysteries of technology - after all, humans are easily replaced, but ancient machinery is impossible to recreate.

It works though - the Tesla coils and giant van de Graff generators arc spectacularly, immolating and in some cases exploding the unfortunate armsmen, and not doing Adrik or Marzu much good either, but slowing down the assassin enough for Adrik to telepathically blind him - which is when Jak arrives to finish the job with a few clips of autopistol rounds.

Jak : You okay?
Magos Marzu : Give me a minute *looks down at chest, where his grey nanite-infused blood-substitute is knitting his True Flesh back together* OK, good to go.

The assassin manages to survive this, but at least he's unconscious. Marzu and Adrik can take their time dismantling his body and mind. Among their discoveries are a number of contacts he had, all over the Koronus Expanse, and the fact it was him that stole the X-1 unit from Marzu's lab before Inquisitor Lammergeier's acolytes had a chance to find it. Marzu quietly replaces it in his personal vault, without informing the Lord-Captain. After all, he has enough issues to worry about. For one thing he had to endure the Rose Tattoo's Chief Archivist reporting on all the damage and current population, in excruciating detail, counting every pipe-marshal, indentured rating, lux-man and wax-collector.

Chief Archivist :... I'm pleased to report that the ship's complement of scribes, led-mechanics, and archivists survived the attack completely unscathed...
Magos Marzu : Imagine our joy.
Chief Archivist : ...3 sanctioned psykers of the Adeptus Astra Telepathica...etc etc. Etc. Oh, and one Lord-Captain. *tick*
Magos Marzu : Will somebody shoot this man? Please?
Jak : Wouldn't it have been easier to just tell us who died?
Chief Archivist : Certainly! *starts again from the top* Death by immolation of Guildmaster Grover of the Portside Locomotive Clan ...etc etc etc... and the accidental death of one Bow-legged Betti, listed as 'Crew Entertainment Specialist' *eyes list suspiciously*

Plus they want to ensure that the situation with the assassin never arises again - every deck sergeant, section-master and clan head will be expected to send in weekly reports, and immediately report any odd goings-on such as surprise inspections.

GM : They'll need some things before they can do that - such as the ability to read and write. Illiteracy is the norm in the Imperium.
Jak: What? But every Imperial Gaurdsman has a copy of the Gaurdsman's Uplifting Primer!
Malakai : Yup. And most of them have to ask their Commissar to read it to them.

Lord-Captain van Baroque : I want you to start literacy classes among the crew.
Chief Archivist : All of them?? Which has risen in number by two, I have just been informed.
Lord-Captain van Baroque : Risen? How?
Chief Archivist : Twins, Lord-Captain. Mother and children doing well.
Lord-Captain van Baroque : Ah. Give my congratulations to the parents, and increase their rum ration.
Chief Archivist : Yes, Lord-Captain. The father is given as 'Probably Henri No-nose Vancattum'.

But even the meeting survived without anybody having to gnaw their own leg off, they're still going to be swamped with work. For one thing, there's all that Ork pirate loot to snaffle. Indeed, the quantity is sufficient to make a measurable improvement in the van Baroque fortunes, with more than enough to wave at the Zaythi landships Unbreakable & Ironclad, in return for their assistance in rebuilding the armoury. Having three wrecked ships to de-orbit and and salvage for millions of tonnes of metal helps with negotiations, and even if a number of the Zaythi landship do object to having hulks dropped on their planet, pointedly reminding them how they got hulked does reduce this to mere grumbling.

GM : You have very good relations with the landship Ironclad - some relations even better than others *glances at Jak, who had been bedding one of the Ironclad's Navigator-Captains.*

GM : You're very good at those charm rolls.
Jak : I should be, I'm a popular person.
GM : But not as popular as the late Bow-legged Betti.

Benetek has an announcement too, that he makes over a small soiree he's arranged in the observation dome.

Navigator Benetek : Just a small meal, mind you - four courses. Barely a brunch.

He's figured out what the Navigator's Cant in that prophecy meant - Mykybe's Veil is the Zaythi name for a Warp Storm that dominates the local starscape, and whilst not a particularly violent area of Warp-Real Space interaction, the destination given in the prophecy appears to be right on the very edge, if not inside. Not very encouraging, given that Rogue Trader Ingeneri went there after more items like the X-1, and he never came back. At least negotiations with the various landships are going well - most of them were impressed by the Rose Tattoo's brutal dispatch of the 'green-skinned demons' but at least one landship remains intransigent. Despite assurances that the Rose Tattoo is merely at Zayth to trade, this landship sneers "Like the thief Ingeneri?" The mention of this name, connected as it is to the X-1 unit, naturally gets their attention, and after protracted negotiations and the express delivery of a million-tonne pile of salvage, the Rose Tattoo's officers get permission to come down for in-person discussion at the Landship Indefatigable, focus of all that religious and military attention centuries ago, and in sad decline ever since their living god was murdered.

The Indefatigable is in sad shape for a Zaythi city-machine - half-crippled, nearly immobile, but still richly inscribed with images of their god - a Space Marine in Crusade Era power armour. Some suspicions about the nature of this once-Living God of War are aroused.

To say that Marzu makes an impression is an understatement - the officers and priests react with a mixture of shock and awe and frothing rage at the 'insult to their religion' that is his wearing of power armour. The high priest is particularly put out, and Marzu is forced to put down a small mutiny by the more devout followers (all with X-1 branded on their foreheads, incidentally). Apparently Ingeneri, 50 years or so ago, had wormed his way into their confidence and made off with one of the sacred relics of their religion - the X-1 Unit, which their 'god' claimed could only be returned to his people in the sky once the Zaythi landships were reunited - one way or the other. The theft was last straw for the Indefatigable, with regular mutinies, and raids and attacks by other landships happy to finish the job, ever since.

Marzu follows this up by demanding the 17-year-old Navigator-Captain gather his crew together, makes a small speech about how he too, has come from the stars and will like nothing better than to see the Zaythi (and, of course, their technology) reunited as a pious people... and has the X-1 Unit teleported down into his hands.

To say that pandemonium reigns is an understatement. Mass religious hysteria becomes the order of the day, and with the teen-aged Navigator-Captain alive with slightly premature visions of their renewed conquest of every other fortress-machine on the planet, the party are lead to the most Holy of Holies, where the remains of their god are interred in a gilded sepulcher - currently also occupied by the aforementioned high priest, who has barricaded himself in snarling that it's all some kind of trick. Needless to say Jak & Marzu make short work of these feeble defences, and the High Priest is removed to have a nice quiet lie down somewhere, while Marzu & the others inspect the inner sanctum - the massive skeleton of a Space Marine, and parts of his armour, bones, armour and walls all decorated with intricately gilded shell-casings, bones, jewels, fragments of radioactive glass, and everything else the faithful could offer. He also appears to be of the Iron Hands chapter - interesting, because those marines have very close ties to the Adeptus Mechanicus. No-one in the group can guess how one ended up here, though ( and Jak is understandably reluctant to mention his adventures under another name, somewhere far across the Galaxy)

The power armour's machine spirits are, sadly, quite insane after centuries without maintenance, and it doesn't help that the helmet and arm are missing - seized long ago during raids by other landships. Marzu sets out to recover the missing relics, and as usual, almost single-handedly reduces the first target landship's crew to gibbering wrecks - after all, none of their light weapons can hurt him, and after he assures them that he'll go away if they just hand over the relics, they do so eagerly. The other landship proves more intractable - understandably alarmed by the threatened resurgence of the Indefatigable, their first move is to open fire as the Rose Tattoo clears the horizon - and since Zaythi landships are effectively cruisers, if planet-bound, this should be a tough fight.

With the unlucky Landship Immovable swiftly traumatised by the arrival of Magos Marzu, the crew of the Rose Tattoo may well have hoped that the subsequent attack on the Irresistible would go equally as well. Unfortunately, the latter Landship has had enough warning to raise all its void shields, and it appears it would rather fight to the bitter end than submit to the Rogue Trader and his crew. Certainly, Marzu can’t really on any of his usual tactics – he can’t teleport in through the fields, and blowing the Landship off the face of the planet is out of the question. Not only would that risk destroying or simply loosing the Iron Hands Space Marine relic they’re after, but trying to target anything on the ground, when the ship is being tugged about by tidal effects, and suffering perceptible drag even from the traces of atmosphere that high up, makes for some very difficult manoeuvring.

The Irresistible has no such problem – true, the storm-wracked skies of Zayth mean they can’t actually see what they’re firing at, but radar arrays (and long practise) mean at least a third of the house-sized shells they fire will hit the Rose Tattoo. Or would do, if Jak’s mastery of the controls hadn’t had the kilometres-long starship pirouetting like a ballerina around the incoming shells.

Navigator Netzach Benetek OoC: I've checked, and I'm actually 29.
Lord-Captain van Baroque OoC: Years or Tonnes?

Instead, Marzu suggests loading one of the drop pods they acquired with himself, a few of his more combat-ready tech-priests, and a half-dozen armsmen, and going down to shake some sense into the Zaythi. The Lord-Captain notices one of the other advantages of this scheme as well.

GM : 'Ok, turn the ship around, we're going home. We're leaving Marzu here.'

A happy thought, at least until he remembers he needs a Tech-Priest of Marzu's undeniable talents to keep the starship's relic systems in working order. Either way, Jak will have to stay at the Rose Tattoo's helm, however. Because as long as the Irresistible is firing at them, they are less likely to notice the drop pod coming the other way. Needless to say, descending into an oncoming artillery barrage just adds to the excitement of the descent.

Magos Casu Marzu: First one to grab the chest bars is a *****

Here narrated to the Apocalypse theme from BSG : The Plan - A piece of incidental music I've been intending to use since the start of the campaign, in just such a scene.

Cavil : *rants about wanting to see X-rays and smell dark matter*
Magos Casu Marzu: *looks innocent* What?
GM: Indeed - you've probably already got a dark matter detector wired up to your olfactory bulb.

GM: The clouds lit from below by red lightning, and lit brighter by the macrocannon barrage, each shell trailing fire and ribbons of smoke, rising thousands of kilometres towards the starship. Even in near vacuum, the shock of their passage makes the drop-pod tremble, and by the time the potholes are ablaze with the heat of re-entry, the pod is thrown violently about by the sky-tearing violence of the passing shells, any one of which could obliterate you in an instant. The external cameras show the clouds rushing up towards you, until the pod is struck by lightning that crawls for seconds across the red-hot metal, and then there's just the blasted surface of Zayth and the great blue bubble of the landship's void shields filling the world and the sudden crashing weight as the retros fire and you all black out.

After the drop pod finishes rolling across the roof of the landship, and jams itself into a crease in the hull, it’s only a matter of time until Marzu and his troops blast their way into the Irresistible’s bridge, and take the Elder-Tacticians hostage.

But they refuse to surrender - for some reason they seem horrified by what will happen to them if they do.

Irresistible's Elder-Tactician: *laughing bitterly* You have no idea, do you? You have raised the Indefatigable back to prominence, and you have no idea what you have unreleased.

Even splashing their commander across the bridge does little to dissuade them from further resistance, at least until Marzu shouts at them some more and the new commander can accept this as an excuse to 'negotiate a ceasefire'.

Marzu insists they complete these negotiations aboard the Rose Tattoo, but does offer to have the wounded treated aboard the ship - but again, this suggestion appals the Landship's crew. Eventually, the explorers determine why the Zaythi were so afraid of the Rose Tattoo's alliance with the Indefatigable - because the 'Silver God's attempt to re-unify the Zaythi usually involved the extermination of anybody that wouldn't agree, and the culling of one-sixth of the population of any Landships that were "weak enough to resist, but fail in that resistance". And the Indefatigable's crew have held fast to that belief ever since - one reason the other Landships were delighted to see them humiliated, and alarmed when the Rose Tattoo gave them encouragement.

Jak Frost OoC: The Irresistible got off lightly - if Marzu hadn't worked we would have just dropped Benetek on them. BOOOOOOOOM.
Magos Marzu OoC: I can see the collision in slow motion... hits... deforms... wobble wobble wobble.
GM: Hypnotic, isn't it?
Jak Frost OOC: One day he's going to be too big to fit on the ship, and we'll have to shove him outside anyway.
Lord-Captain van Baroque: And one day another ship will say 'Agh! We're being attacked by a giant space amoeba!' And then the ship's counsellor will say 'Captain, wait! I can feel its thoughts... it wants to be our... Navigator?'

With all that resolved, the Lord-Captain can finally put that trophy room of his to some diplomatic use, and intends to persuade representatives from the Landships Ironclad, Unbreakable, Indefatigable, and others, aboard, in an attempt to hammer out some mutually agreeable treaty whereby the Landships call a ceasefire in their millennia-old war, and the van Baroques make great big piles of money. Or become hereditary Governors of Zayth. Either is acceptable.

The Irresistible’s people – the first Zaythi that have actually been up to the Rose Tattoo - are suitably impressed by the trophy room, especially the large number of pickled and stuffed Ork heads, but the situation is nonetheless tense – but then, finding a common cause for a dozen different factions who have been attempting to exterminate each other for the last twelve thousand years is not the sort of thing that be achieved over tea and biscuits. The presence of the Indefatigable contingent will no doubt have a number of the other Landships distinctly concerned – possibly it has something to do with the air of homicidal religious mania hovering about them. Those missionaries the Rose Tattoo brought along will prove useful, as well – just the sort of people you need when you’re exploiting religious revivals for diplomatic reasons. The young preacher, Titus Garvel, who had proved so useful in the weeks previous with his knack for diplomacy and natural compassion, will be a particularly good choice.

Although they do need to shift the cagebirds elsewhere for the time being - having a delegate grabbed and eaten by something with six-inch claws would look bad.

Magos Marzu: What are we feeding these things, anyway?
Jak Frost: Orphans.

Lord-Captain van Baroque: One of these days I'm going to get this ship refitted. And show up that smug bastard dePlague. I mean, dePledge.
GM: dePlague?
Lord-Captain van Baroque: A pox on him.

Actually, upgrading the ship would be nice, assuming they can afford it. Especially after they start comparing their own ship to some that might be available

Navigator Netzach Benetek OoC: OK our ship is officially too small: size-wise we could even land it here in Kings Park...
Magos Marzu OoC : It's not the size that matters, it's the content of weapons and equipment - like 2 nova cannons and the ability to fit the Rose Tattoo in its cargo bay as an escape craft. ... Not to forget the ability to have Imperator gating cannon on each side for pesky planets that get in the way ... yeh that's the stuff"
Navigator Netzach Benetek OoC:*clicks Buy Now on getyourcheapmassconveyernow.com.au* That should take care of that Logician issue... but might give Drhoz a headache...

Magos Marzu: Benetek has more chins than a Chinese phonebook.

Magos Marzu : You know, we should place bets on Benetek versus that thing with all the eyes and claws.
Jak Frost: We'd let it out of the cage first, right?

Some sort of orbital facility, to act as neutral ground for the Zaythi, might be a good idea too. Perhaps they can leave Marzu behind to keep the peace while the rest of them pop over to the Breaking Yards and purchase a suitable hulk to refit?

Magos Marzu : True we do need a space station - but the Orks are right next door in the 'Undred 'Undred Teef. So it would have to be a big F*** OFF station. And secondly if you think I'm going to stay back and wait, while you go to the Breaking Yards, you have been eating the wrong herbs with your baby back ribs.
Navigator Netzach Benetek : I'd never eat baby back ribs! Babies are way too small.... although baby elephants might do, lightly roasted , with a little garlic-mint sauce... *drools*
Magos Marzu : You'd eat baby back ribs, and the rest, if it went anywhere near your mouth. Why do you think I pass the salt with the power fist?

But all that aside, the Irresistible’s people do agree to hand over the late Space Marine’s helmet, in return for the promise of protection, and certain trade concessions. This, once in the hands of the explorers, gives them the clue they need to prove the cause of death – a curious slash neatly aligned along the weakest point of the back of the neck seal. This has Marzu examining the cervical vertebrae of the remains, and working free from between them the thing that brought him down so suddenly - a fragment of an Eldar shuriken.

The Lord-Captain remains on Zayth to continue negotiations, while his ship is ordered to scout ahead to the co-ordinates given in the Mykybean Prophecy. This never actually happens, since the crew get slightly distracted by a Free Gretchin Republic, and the Navigator getting possessed.

Swinging past the gas giant Ahemait on their way out of the system, on the off-chance some relic of the Zaythi's time as a space-faring people still remains. Delightfully, they find the wreckage of a space station among its uttermost moons, ideal for salvage and use as neutral ground for the Zaythi negotiations. Less delightfully, somebody fires a mass driver at them from a nearby retrograde moon, which the Zaythi's ancestors had apparently been mining for the metal content. Easily dodging the chunks of nickel-iron, the Rose Tattoo sends Marzu, Jak, Astropath Adrik and a dozen heavily-armed Styrxis Vat-Brutes over to give those responsible a piece of their minds. Benetek tags along in his void-mumu because this expedition should prove amusing.

GM: The Vat-Brutes are still exactly where Marzu left them, dully sitting against the walls and exuding an aura of hopeless despair.
Jak: I'll put some My Little Ponies videos on for them, that'll cheer them right up.
GM: MLP:FiM, I hope, not Gens 1 to 3?
Jak: Of course, I want them to cheer up, not kill themselves.

The moonlet in question, it turns out, has been infested by Orkoids, but the fight is much easier than it might otherwise have been, since all the Orkoids are the smaller, runt-like Gretchin subspecies. Indeed, the resulting turkey shoot is almost entirely one way, what with the Explorers having better weapons, void suits that aren't full of holes, and the foresight not to run around so fast they go into orbit. Even the gretchin's banner - a ragged red flag - avails them little, as the humans and their purchased Vat-Brutes work their way down into the complex, blowing up or ripping apart each bulkhead as they go.

Navigator Netzach Benetek: For a moment the airflow stops... I'm stuck in the hole.

Magos Marzu: I'm going to get coloured jumpsuits for all the crew - no more people sneaking around from section to section.
GM: Are you going to colour-code the corridors too, so people in red jumpsuits can't go in Orange corridors?
Magos Marzu: No, this isn't Paranoia
GM: First Precept of the Adeptus Mechanicus - 'The Computer is NOT your friend'

Navigator Netzach Benetek: I grab one of the Gretchin as they're blown past and take a bite.
GM: How are you doing that through a space suit?
Navigator Netzach Benetek: It's wearing a space suit?
GM: No, you are.
Navigator Netzach Benetek : Oh, yes, I forgot.
GM: You could always take a few back to the ship and give them to your personal chef.
Navigator Netzach Benetek: That's true
GM: And Ork flesh IS edible - one Rogue Trader discovered they make a passable vodka, if you boil them long enough
Magos Marzu: And they'll be conveniently freeze-dried too.
GM: Chilled Gretchin brains
Navigator Netzach Benetek: Gretchin Finger Salad *drool*

Eventually they corner the Gobbo leader in the last chamber, when he waves the red banner and with a shout of "Free Gretchin Republic Forever!!!" he yanks on a detonation lever.

Astropath Adrik: I lock the lever in place with Telekinesis.
GM : The Gretchin frantically tugs on the lever, with increasing desperation, and by the time the rest of you move into the room he's jumping up and down on it.
Magos Marzu: Ok, you two brutes grab that Gretchin and make a wish
Vat-Brutes: ???
Magos Marzu: *sighs* Just tear him in half, OK?

After that, they go inspect their other prize. Marzu is so delighted with the station that his spends some time running up and down the corridors, mechadendrites flailing, at the sight if all this lovely, lovely technology to dissect, before he settles down long enough to see if he can actually get it running again. But then, as a tech-priest, he's mostly immune to one other aspect of the wreck - the ruined space station is deeply creepy, and it's not just the atmospheric gases frozen to the walls. Both the psykers, and soon enough Jak, his co-pilot R.D. and even Marzu can feel the presence of something in the room with them. Something long dead, a ghost so old it's even forgotten it ever had a name, reduced to a desperate longing to return home to Zayth. Returning inside one of the explorers will do nicely.

Netzach is promptly possessed, but his odd behaviour makes the others suspicious enough to scan his brain.

GM: Yup, there's two minds in there alright...
Astropath Adrik: Funny, I didn't know Navigators reproduced by fission. Although I suppose he's big enough...

Netzach and his puppet-master panic, and he turns his Third Eye on them all. Jak is forced to shoot him, and Marzu orders the Vat-Brutes to subdue Netzach long enough to drug him.

GM: Marzu comes back with Netzach bobbing along behind at the end of a mechadendrite, like some ghastly balloon.

Their Navigator comes around eventually, despite the double dose they had to hit him with.

GM : You wake up in the dark, with the strange smell of bacon in the air. It's dark because they've tied a towel around your space helmet, and the smell of bacon probably comes from the hole Jak blasted in your belly with those pulse pistols of his.

He's not the only one they had to drug either, because the entity slipped off into somebody else afterwards. R.D's repeated requests that they all return to the ship might mean she's possessed, but more likely are because the station is deeply unnerving, and there's two psykers on boards with her, AND she's just been told about the ghost. Of course, the Rose Tattoo's seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin isn't going to let any of them back on board if there's a chance the spirit will go around possessing people, so Marzu et al settle in to try and get the station into better shape by themselves. At least their ship can send over some supplies and tools. And who knows what archeotech they might find around the station?

Magos Marzu: I'm going to need some WD-40
GM: And some duck tape

Jak Frost : What do I find on the Commander's body?
GM : .... Three gold coins and a potion of Spider Climb.

Eventually, it occurs to them they might be able to get the ghost to move out of whoever it's possessing, if they offer a better candidate - i.e. one they can happily send off to Zayth and not care if he comes back dead. And they have just the candidate - Bob the Logician Assassin. Called Bob because that's what happens when you cut the legs and arms off somebody and throw him into a life-support tank. This appears to work, and now, at least, the station is in fit shape to be towed into high Zayth orbit. And from there it's only a short shuttle hop down to the planet, where the ghost eagerly slips free of the assassin's body, and out onto the surface... the blasted, lifeless surface of the planet it loved in life, before the Big War. Marzu returns to the Rose Tattoo leaving the spirit to, no doubt, wander howling its grief across the wasteland for the rest of eternity.

Some interesting memos get circulated among the officers over the coming weeks, too.

Dear fellow crew,

I regret to inform you that Gretchin snacks appear not to agree with me. They seem to have added a few extra centimetres to my waist and elongated my fingernails into convenient skewers for late-night snacks. I guess this might be why they haven't caught on in the Imperium at large yet.

I'm looking forward to hoverboard lessons from Jak so I'll be able to move about the ship once again...

Yours, Netzach Benetek

He botched his mutation checks, and if now so obese as to be incapable of movement under his own power, but has at least developed some impressive talons, so he wont have to mash the dial when trying to use the phone.

Salute !

Attention to Orders - the following are effective immediate;

1) Orks are our dire enemies. Of the Xenos we are likely to encounter, they rank below Tyranids, Necrons, and for extermination. Ennoulians, Hrud, the Hazeroth and so-called Dark Eldar have a slightly higher priority too.

2) The enemy of our enemies are our "Friends”. This is a Rogue Trader vessel. Aliens are resources to be traded with. To that end Free Gretchin Republics, Empire-orientated Blood Axe Mercs, Deff Skullz-Freebooterz who act as privateers, Wealth-driven Bad Moonz are all potential markets and cobelligerents. Human life is sacred, Orkoids aren’t. If we need to for instance to invade the worlds of our foes I have no compunction about spending millions of Green skin lives to do so. Especially since in having done so they will keep coming back and plague our enemies for centuries. Especially since Orks cannot be corrupted by chaos, also remember it is believed that Tyranids and Orkoids are natural enemies.

3) Hybrids. One of the darkest secrets is the so called 'Half-Orks' . Tainted Humans hybridized in the womb with Ork DNA usually by Blood Axe Doks. Everything creating such must be exterminated. The Hybrids themselves are still abhumans and useful agents given that they have all the advantages of Orks and Humans. They must be co-opted and cared for.

4) The Alienage will host meetings as needed with Orkoids. Only Hybrids may live there however.

5) All Goffs must die.

Leman Van Baroque, Lord Commodore, Rose Tattoo

This would appear to be one of the command decisions the seneschal will have to mitigate - when the entire crew hates Orks with an overriding passion, the presence of any on board is unlikely to go down well. Marzu's plan to equip everybody with new overalls, etc, is unlikely to find favour either, as it will undo centuries of tradition on the ancient ship.

GM : What about the sumptuary laws? Such as the one "No crewmember below C Deck is allowed to wear a hat"?
Magos Marzu : I don't care about hats, I just want them to wear welding masks when they're working, and so on
GM: Do they count as hats?
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Current ruling is they're masks, providing they cover no more than half of the scalp.

Jak: *regarding Netzach's newly mutated talons* It's the only way he can scratch himself now

One of the bionics you can get is Concealed Cavity - hiding something inside your arm, under a skin flap, say.

Jak: Netzach doesn't need the operation - he's already got enough flaps.
Magos Marzu: I still waiting for the ratling snipers he has concealed in his armpits

The Lord-Captain has ordered them to proceed with scouting towards Mykybe's Veil - they creatively interpret this as implying a need for a well-equipped Base Camp and expedition first, and head off in the opposite direction, to the Breaking Yards at SR-651 in order to buy upgrades for the Rose Tattoo, and vital components for the derelict Void Station they salvaged.

GM: The Babylon .05 - because you have to be drunk to the point of mental impairment to work there.

GM : Over half this drink is just foam.
Jak's Player: You'll never be a barman.
Netzach's player: Another life-long ambition lost.
All players: *LOL*
Netzach's Player: I'll start making a replacement character now, shall I?
Marzu's Player: Netzach is going to vanish into fat air.

GM: Original Rogue Trader notwithstanding, I don't think it's very likely you'll ever have Space Marines on your crew.
Magos Marzu: Darn, no special cuddles with the Space Marines for us.

Jak's Player: I insist we play Space Marines named Larcus, Crispin, and Malleus.
Marzu's Player: Woopwoopwoopwoop! Why I oughta...
Jaranthine's Player: Two fingers of his power fist permanently locked for eye-poking

Netzach checks whether his contract with the van Baroque lineage allows for such independent action - it does, but mostly because he and the Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerine are old friends, and Jaranthine's loyalty is always more to the ship rather than any potentially flawed Lord-Captain.

Jak: It's okay, we've all got the dead albatross of responsibility around our necks

Jak: I surprised you picture the Warp as an ocean, Netzach, and not a cloudscape filled with the tempting aromas of delicious meals to hunt down.
Netzach: Or a ballpit, filled with chicken cutlets instead of balls
Jak: Mummy, what's that in the ballpit? *Netzach surfaces, eating as he goes* GWARRRRR...OMNOMNOMNOM

But whatever way he visualises the Empyrean, Netzach once again makes the trip in a fraction of the predicted time.

Magos Marzu: What? We're here already?? I only said 'Make It So' a minute ago!
Jak: You know, I can picture people, some time in the future, looking at our travel times and saying "..... bull! Where did they REALLY go?"

The Breaking Yards are a nasty, nasty place, heavily fortified against Orks, and the void-workers enslaved to a consortium of highly suspicious business interests. After the Yards sends out a Pilot to guide them in through the mess of minefields, asteroids, and fractured planets, they can start negotiations for the Generatoria, Life Support Systems, and assorted other materiel the Rose Tattoo needs for the new Void Station, and itself. Naturally, if they bribe the right people, they can be bumped up the queue. The Yards are always in need of replacement void-workers - does the Rose Tattoo have a few hundred crew they're willing to trade?

Jak: I'm not going to sell any of our crew into slavery! I don't care how far it moves us up the queue!
GM: The negotiator raises another eyebrow
Jak: How many eyebrows does this guy have?
GM: Four, he's a mutant

GM: He conceals it well, but the negotiator is *fascinated* by your implied admission that the Rose Tattoo is damaged, and under-crewed, and lacking a Lord-Captain
Jaranthine : Uh-oh.

Seneschal Hamerin offers the services of the psyker Xanthis Raytheon instead - after all, if it was a clerical error that got him out into the Expanse in the first place, he can't complain if 'getting lost in the paperwork' leaves him at the Yards. The negotiator says he'll have to discuss the deal with his superiors, and Jak volunteers to follow him to find out who he's actually going to see, and whether he has the pirate contacts they now suspect. Jak, at least, is ordinary enough in appearance to get away with this, and certain other skills he doesn't like to advertise.

Jak: Where's Malakai, anyway?
GM: Snorkelling in Bilge Sump Four.

Jaranthine: I'm going through the crew lists for any criminals, troublemakers and malcontents that deserve to be sold into horrible slavery - apart from Marzu and Jak, of course.

Jak flies off to the Breaking Yards station with his co-pilot R.D. to guard the Aquila lander when they get there, and hurries off to follow the suspect negotiator. Marzu and Benetek trawl through the markets for any small items that might be useful, and acquire a set of illegal Elseways Charts that Benetek wisely won't be telling Lord-Captain van Baroque about. It also gives Benetek a chance to practice on hid new grav-board, since he can't get around under his own power anymore.

Netzach: I've fallen off.
GM: BOOOM
Magos Marzu: The ship's hit something!

GM: Some of the Guildsmen are being carried around on palanquins, by slaves.
Magos Marzu: I don't think that's going to work with Benetek.
GM: No, but perhaps if you replace the slaves with Warhound Titans?

Seneschal Hamerin continues trading with the various salvage brokers and contractors for everything else on Marzu's shopping list, such as better crew, and the advanced tool shop they'll need to build new parts for Void Station Babylon.

Jaranthine: I'll see if I can replace the late Bow-legged Betti, too.
GM : Why? Jak signed all those 'crew entertainment specialists' aboard back at Port Wander. Why do you want more?
Jaranthine : They're good, but they're no Bow-legged Betti. I wonder if there's any way I can improve the quality of the ones I have?
GM: By an odd co-incidence, one of the ships they were salvaging was carrying a cargo of nipple-tassels.

Elsewhere, Jak's careful stalking of the negotiator provides evidence of collusion between the various commercial interests at the Yards, which isn't surprising, and a tiny spacecraft of strange design concealed between the secure hab-zone and the outer skin of the station, which is. Getting past the airlock and into this mystery ship isn't that tricky for Jak either, but he does have those sound supressers, silencers, lift belt and Tau spy training, after all.

GM: And there's a cardboard box you can hide under, too.

GM: You disguise skill is handy, too "I am here to clean ze pool"

Flashback to his Tau training

Tau : And this security flaw is common to most Gue'la airlocks, because of their tragic unwillingness to embrace things that are new. We can only hope that once they recognise the wisdom of the Tau way and embrace the Greater Good, that the humans will recognise the shortcomings of this design. But I must warn you, that this security flaw could also be used to vent a ship to vacuum, and terribly end the lives of innocents who have yet to embrace the Greater Good. I am sure you would do no such thing, Gue'vesa Jak, as you are a good man, yes?

And indeed, he doesn't vent the ship, after confirming that the suspects have pirate contacts and may well be intending to use Xanthis as a component in a psychic-jamming torture machine. Instead, he sneaks down to the hidden ship's Enginarium, murders the tech-priest, and rigs the engines to explode. And then sneaks back out again, under the very noses of security.

Jak's player : 01
GM: 01?!? I can only assume the security staff, despite being bent over their consoles peering intently at the screens, somehow fail to notice when you lean in over their shoulders to look as well.

He then strolls back down to the landing bay, and grins smugly at R.D.

Jak: Guess what I just did.
GM: Back in the secure section, the spaceship's containment fields collapse, and the ensuing explosion vaporises the ship, most of the Commercia section, and hundreds of Administratum agents, guildsmen and slaves. The expanding fireball splits open the outer shell, and vibrations racing through the structure snap off the loosely attached slave barracks, spilling air and people into the void.
Jak:
GM: Netzach, Marzu and Jaranthine, the fireball is perfectly visible through the ports of your lighter, and as your eyes recover from the flash you can see the spreading cloud of debris. Netzach, with your awareness of the void you can feel that a lot of that debris is flailing its arms and legs.

Jak: I guess I should have paid attention to the way Drhoz kept stressing 'out of range of the explosion'

R.D. is of course appalled, but Jak persuades her to keep quiet, for the good of the van Baroque lineage. But she does want to stay away from him for a while.

GM: Happily, R.D. does have a partner aboard the Rose Tattoo - one of the catering staff, I believe...
Jaranthine's Player: Wait... catering staff?!? Don't tell me you're a Pinkie Pie/Rainbow Dash shipper?!?
GM:
Jaranthine's Player: Pinkie/Dash... what is wrong with you? Everypony knows Apple/Dash is the only true 'ship....

The rest of the week is spent trying to repair the damage, compensate for the loss of personell, and cover up their involvement. The surviving administrators have, at least, jumped to the conclusion that it was an Ork raid, and once he recieved Jak's admission of guilt, Jaranthine hurriedly had that Ork Buzzsaw Fighta they had dumped overboard, to reinforce that false belief. Despite the fact the rest of the Ork Fleet never shows up, the Rose Tattoo doesn't get the blame for the disaster - for one thing, it destroyed stuff they had already agreed to purchase, killed most of the people they'd been in negotiations with, and nobody that saw Jak anywhere near Ground Zero survived. Jaranthine even suggests ways the Yards can exploit the disaster as tax reductions.

GM: It's near the end of the financial year, so it's the best possible time to kill thousands of slaves.
Jaranthine: If you file the losses under Section 811.c to e, you might even reduce your taxes for the next.... half-decade?
Surviving Yards Administratum: That's wonderful! We should do this every year!
Jaranthine: No, better hold off for another ... 30. Law of Diminishing Returns.

And they happily purchase several hundred voidworker slaves, now surplus to requirements at the Yards, at least until the businesses can rebuild. No point feeding them here, in that case. Them, and all the other purchases such as expert voidsmen and specialists newly indentured to the Rose Tattoo, and thousands of work uniforms salvaged from wrecked starships and simply piling up at the Yards (who cares what slaves wear?), etc, will all go nicely towards getting Babylon Station up and running, and the Rose Tattoo measurable improved. Even if the total expense is going to give Lord-Captain van Baroque another attack of apoplexy when he finds out.

They even get to keep Xanthis! At least until they can find someone else to palm him off on.

Jak's player: I've been in games where we've messed up badly before, but how is it that in any game where [Marzu's player] is involved, we can mess up THIS badly and still come out ahead?
Jaranthine's Player : It's not him, it's just that we're very good at profiteering from disaster

Jak: Well, I think I've figured out why I don't feel guilty about this - All these slaves are going to have much better lives under our care...
GM: And all it cost you was thousands of innocent lives...
Jaranthine: ...and a certain amount of tarnish on our souls.
Magos Marzu: Don't worry, I can buff that out.

They return to Zayth to offload the void-workers, tools, vital components, and various special personnel at their void-station. This includes choosing what tech-priests to leave behind to supervise the rebuilding. There is some competition for the post, when they realise it could lead to a permanent position of authority, and extended access to Zaythi technology.

GM: If tech-priests ever smiled, they'd be smiling.

R.D. is promoted to Wing Commander for the new station.

Jak : It's a bit hard, leaving Dash behind like this...
GM: It's only temporary - you can pick her up again when you get back from the Veil.
Jak: But who am I going to have as a co-pilot until then?
GM: well....
Jaranthine : Not her! She's a terrible pilot! She's afraid of heights!
GM: The only other possibility is Derpy...
Jaranthine and Jak :
GM: And besides, your first choice is much to busy looking after the alien birds - she's the only one that can get close enough to feed them and not get eaten
Jaranthine: All I can say is they have some strange naming traditions on that planet.
Jak: The second I find out one of the Astropaths is named Twilight Sparkle...
Jaranthine's Player: I think we've found our limit - corrupt enough to accidentally kill thousands of people and not feel guilty, not corrupt enough to introduce Fluttershy as a 40K NPC.
Netzach's player: I'm going to have to watch some MLP:FiM now, I only followed half of that.
Jaranthine's player: Welcome to the herd.
Jaranthine, Jak, GM : One of us, one of us, one of us...

They finally head off towards the warp-storm known as Mykybe's Veil.

GM: You might want to avoid Valcetti's Triangle, a suspiciously high number of ships have vanished without trace there over the years...

Magos Marzu: Let's go there!
GM: Were you even listening to what I just said? Why would you want to risk it?
Magos Marzu: Because all those ships have gone missing!
GM: Yes, and if you follow them it's entirely likely you'll find out how they disappeared!

Their first stop should have been in empty space, but within seconds of their early arrival the entire ship is thrumming to a vibration bordering on infrasonic.

Magos Marzu: Kraken!
GM: Now how the hell did you know that?
Magos Marzu: You mean it IS Void Kraken?!?

They're only babies, merely twice the size of the Rose Tattoo, but even so Jak puts the ship into Silent Running and attempts the fastest U-turn ever made in this region of space. Luckily, their ship is fast enough and manoeuvrable enough to manage this, unlike all the other wrecks Magos Marzu now notes floating derelict in the distance.

Magos Marzu: Let's go salvage them!
Jaranthine: An excellent suggestion, Father, but for the unfortunate problem that this vessel is not equipped for salvage
GM: That, and you've got Four Ravenous Void Kraken trying to eat your ship
Netzach: Does my chef have any recipes for Kraken?

They get away, only to be damned by Benetek's over-confidence.

GM: There's a strong warp current that will take you straight towards Mykybe's Veil in under a week. Of course, you could play it safe and take the long route...
Netzach: Let's live dangerously for once.
Jaranthine: Wait, what?!?

GM: The warp current becomes increasingly furious as the hours draw on, and develops a dangerous cross-current that keeps swinging the ship about despite your best efforts to keep her in trim. In your personal analogy of the Warp, the ocean is becoming very rough, and ahead the horizon is jagged with mountainous waves.
Jaranthine : I think Jak and I are going to have lunch in the Observation Dome today, I'm sure the view is going to be amazing...
GM: From the Navigator's cupola, through your Third Eye, the forward horizon is black with rain, broken with jagged lightning, and the Rose Tattoo is dropping into the troughs between the waves with a violence they can feel in their souls...
Netzach: I use my precognitive ability to look ahead
GM: Through the illusion of your warp analogy, and the double illusion of time, you can see something moving in the storm towards you, black and gigantic through the stalls, a truly gigantic wave, looming up, the crest miles high, already curling to break down over the tiny Rose Tattoo below...
Netzach: Get us out of the Warp! Get us out NOW!!!!!

The Rose Tattoo breaks back into real space with purple fire clutching hungrily at its stern, an undertow determined to drag them back to destruction. But at least they're back in 'reality', even if they badly overshot their destination, and the the Milky Way is invisible, and the only stars are smeared out like slowly flickering candle-flames against a sky the colour of a bloody bruise...

Nice read, all of it! MOAR NOW!!!!!! :-D

eBarbarossa said:

Thanks, but the games is fortnightly. We do have a webpage though

http://www.olafvantol.nl/rogue-trader/index.php

For the people wanting more, we played chapter 18 last sunday, Drhoz did an excellent write-up which I put on the mentioned website. I also created a little "sneak peek" for the next session: our top-gun pilot will have to fly down to the demon-infested planet to extract the half of the away team that got stuck on its surface. Using our teleportarium is out of the question as the last time we used it in the warp storm a daemonette manifested, who knows what will show up next...

www.olafvantol.nl/blog/roguetrader-story/roguetrader-news/chapter-19-sneak-peek/

enjoy!

One of the customised Space Marine chapters for the proposed Deathwatch game is a chapter of astoundingly ill luck, and faulty genetic engineering.

GM : They really were scraped from the bottom of the geneseed fridge, weren't they?

van Baroque's player: The Lamentors chapter psychic ability was good - they spread waves of despair, just like I've been accused of doing

van Baroque's player: The Space Wolf Dreadnought Bjorn the Fell-handed is so old he actually met the Emperor.
Jak's player: "Back in my day, Orks were twice as big. And three times as ugly!"
GM: "Get off my lawn!... I wore an Ork head on my belt, it was the fashion of the time...

Another randomly generated chapter for the mini-campaign - the Dark Hunters.

Jak's player : Really? Here's some advice - never say that when you're drunk.

Jaranthine's Player: Do you remember when gamer's didn't reproduce? I miss those days
Jak's Player: Didn't stop 'em trying
Jaranthine's Player: Yes, they just didn't succeed.
Jak's Player: It's not like we could have used the zombie-bite method
van Baroque's player: No, we just used the Space Marine mehod - take their best and brightest, and make them into gamers

But back to Rogue Trader, where the Rose Tattoo has been seeking the secret behind Mykybe's Veil, and have found themselves up a certain creek whose reaches are notoriously treacherous, especially when you're lacking paddles.

GM: I find it fascinating that the Mykybean Prophecy said you'd be doomed by your greed...
Jaranthine's Player: ... and it was Netzach that got us here.
GM: The living embodiment of gluttony
Netzach Benetek: I'm not gluttonous!
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Dude... when we met you, you could still see your own feet. And you can't even reach your own mouth any more!
Netzach Benetek: That's what the talons are for!

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: I dread to think what he's going to look like if he ever loses all that weight.
GM : All those skinflaps?
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: *shudders*
GM: He could hold them with his fingers and toes and flap around the ship like a bat
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Argh! Brain Bleach! Brain Bleach!

GM : I can picture Netzach floating in some kind of big tank, flabby little arms sticking out to the sides, and occasionally bouncing off the glass like that manatee

GM: The auspex officers immediately undertake the Marzu Protocols
Netzach Benetek: The Marzu Protocols?
GM: 'Scan everything before the Tech-Priest threatens to kill you'

There are no planets or stars nearby, and, at least at first, no signs of anything hostile. They're deep within the Warp Storm known to the Zaythi as Mykybe's Veil, but at least their aren't any demons knocking on the windows.

GM: The radio frequencies are swarming with signals, however - some in Gothic, some in guttural human tongues, others of clearly xenos origin. Most of them fragmentary, or corrupted by echoes and the currents of the storm. "'This is Free Trader Beowulf"
Lord-Captain van Baroque's player: Really?
GM: ... "ph'nglui mglw'nafh wgah'nagl fhtagn".... "Phssthpok the Pak"... "Come to Delirius and Die of Pleasure!" ... babbled prayers to something called the Young God ...
Jaranthine's Player: Clearly this is the 'See how many pop culture references the GM can squeeze in scene'
GM : and Jak's voice "I know you can hear this - Don't attack the sorcerer - what ever you do, don't..."
Jak Frost:

Not only that, but one of the officers spots the silhouette of a ship against the bruise-coloured sky.

Magos Marzu: Go to Red Alert! You! Change the lightbulb!
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: No need, that was one of the purchases I made - we actually have switches now.
Magos Marzu: He flips switches now? That's too complicated!

Lord-Captain van Baroque: I'm preparing my weapons and laser-sights before I lead the boarding party
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: How do you put a laser pointer on a powersword?

Jak Frost:The Omnissiah invented duck tape to bind together all of Man's creation

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: What worries me is that whenever there are hull repairs to do, Marzu starts whistling "The Candyman"

The other ship appears to be an Imperial freighter, well under a kilometre long, and drastically ill-prepared to be out here on its own. The engines seem to be ticking over, but it's just drifting. Naturally, this is all highly suspicious, and the Rose Tattoo is careful to approach from behind, out of any line of fire. They even risk getting close enough to sweep the silent ship with their own Gellar Field, which they hope will drive any disincarnate demons from the vessel. Incarnate demons are another thing entirely, and the boarding party blast their way in far from any of the airlocks. What they find is the entire ship turned into a temple of exquisite torture - every flat surface painted or inscribed with eye-twisting runes, and the crew riveted, or sewn with steel wire, to floors and benches and chairs. Everybody, even the servitors, has been intricately and painstakingly tortured to death, over a period of weeks, and the bodies stuffed with some kind of colourful powder to preserve the remains. The captain apparently tortured himself to death. Worst of all, every corpse - even the children in the Captain's quarters - bear hideously ecstatic grins. Naturally, this all all horribly disturbing, and the Lord-Captain orders most of the boarding party replaced with tech-priests, servitors, and Vat-Brutes, who for the most part have been too heavily lobotomised to be upset by anything.

The powder turns out to be the cargo - megatonnes of some preservative food spice, being hauled between two planets none of the explorers have ever heard of.

Jak Frost:They were hauling the eleven secret herbs and spices.

How the ship ended up here and how long it's been drifting is a mystery, but the burnt-out Geller Field is probably a clue. Jaranthine orders a full mass aboard the Rose Tattoo, and the prayers and catechisms broadcast to the explorers on the tainted vessel.

GM : Those popular old hymns "Soldier, Kick The Balls of Demons" and the "Deviatus" ... 'Be Pure! Be Vigilant! Behave!'

On using NPCs as Meat Shields, in the event there IS still something lurking

Jak Frost OOC: Puppy Armour - +10 versus Paladins

Magos Marzu: It's not unusual...
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin OOC: It's the spirit of Tom Jones, it must be annihilated before it can sing 'What's New Pussycat"!
Magos Marzu OOC: Too late! *launches into song*

Eventually they decide to salvage the spice bales, and scuttle the ship as irrevocably tainted - the way something keeps licking their earlobes inside their space suits, or caressing them in very private places, is somewhat disturbing. At least they recover the Charter of Trade

GM : Jak takes one look around the room, goes 'A-Ha!' tugs on a light fitting, and a concealed safe drops from the ceiling. A few seconds after that he's got past the rest of the security, too.
Jak Frost: All yours, Lord-Captain
Lord-Captain van Baroque: Hmmm
GM : You're really going to have to look more deeply into Jak's origins, one of these days, aren't you :

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Now we must pray to the memories of those who were lost to the Warp...
Jak Frost: One, Two, Four, Three, Glad It Was Them And Wasn't Me.
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin:

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Have you even looked at Netzach lately? That kind of weight gain is NOT NORMAL - the Inquisition are going to interrogate him as a mutant!
Jak Frost: So the Inquisition is also Jenny Craig now?

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Stop putting words in Netzach's mouth
Lord-Captain van Baroque: It's safer than putting food in
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: True, you might lose an arm

Netzach Benetek: I'm already on half-rations, only 6 meals a day!

But even as the violated transport is being destroyed, another signal comes to the explorers' notice - heavily encrypted, and fragmentary, but apparently a Space Marine request for extraction. It's repeated over and over, and seems to be coming from a star a little over a light-year away, but it is roughly in the direction they want to go - even though some misgivings are noted about the possible nature of a threat that makes Space Marines want to retreat.

After a difficult Warp Jump, where time and quasi-time are being devoured by convergences in the warp-currents off each side of the ship, and transit time stretching into weeks, they learn where the signal originated. It's coming from a damp and cloudy world, orbited by three very curious objects.

Auspex Officer: That's not a moon!
Jak Frost: If you say 'it's a space station' I'm going to punch you in the face
Auspex Officer: Funnily enough...

The three stations are apparently constructed, or at least gilded, with gold, platinum, cut glass and gemstones, and even wood, and built along no sane guidelines of symmetry or geometry. Nor has any care been taken in ensuring their orbits complement each other. As soon as they detect the incoming Rose Tattoo, all three launch into cacophonous broadcast on all frequencies, uncaring if they interfere with each other, in a dozen different languages and pict-protocols. The most comprehensible repeats "Welcome to Cinnabar! Bring your tribute, Indulge yourselves in Cinnabar!" Since Marzu can detect nothing resembling a weapon on any of these giant 'communication satellites', the Lord-Captain orders a crew down to investigate the source of the Space Marine signal. The only sign of civilisation on the surface are primitive radio interference, as if from electrical generators, in a small region surrounding the distress call. They take the telepor homer, since it seems likely they'll want to leave again in a hurry.

GM : The drop-pod comes down hard in among rocky hills, overlooking the basin below
Jak Frost: On top of a baboon holding up a lion cub and somebody singing 'Circle of Life' Well, Netzach told us to pick up some of the locale delicacies... we've got lion cub pâté and half a baboon's arse
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: You know what is most disturbing? Netzach is actually drooling.
GM : Fine, so be it - After the drop pod lands, and the automatic storm bolters mow down the semi-circle of animals at the bottom of the cliff, the hatches pop open, you all climb out, and throw the lion cub pâté and other assorted body parts back into the vehicle for later. Happy now?

Jak, Jaranthine, Adrik and the nameless crewmen slog down the mountainside and across the swamp, discovering primitive quarrywork; tentacled swamp monsters; the dangers of teleporting anything when demons can pop along for a ride; the locals' habit of crucifying people up-side-down and placing bets on how long it takes for scavengers to show up and eat their eyes; and a causeway crowded with people and carts hauling huge loads of wood, ore, furs, and the like to the gates of Cinnabar, a stone and wood city with two gates Jak can see from his hiding place under one of the carts. The others wait out in the swamp.

At one gate, the goods are being taxed - sometimes barely at all, and sometimes at one-hundred percent, before the bearers are allowed into the city. At the other, supplicants try their luck on the chocolate wheel. As the barker says...

Barker/Gatekeeper : Witness, all ye, this supplicant who places his fate in the hands of the Young God! Will he be fêted by the City? Sworn to service? Or some other fate seen fit for him? Place ye wagers, ladies and gentlefolk!

Instead of any of these possibilities, a flash of light emerges from the opened Other Gate, and the supplicant explodes, to the vast amusement of most of the crowd of humans, mutants, beastmen and xenos. Jak decides to climb over the city wall instead - it seems safer than either of the gates. But one of his first ports of call as he climbs from rooftop to rooftop is the Other Gate, where a luckier supplicant has just emerged, grinning hugely, as bags of coin, garlands, and extremely intimate kisses, are piled upon him. Clinging over the other gate is a ghastly fusion of precious metal, weaponry, and twitching flesh, apparently dedicated to the random annihilation or mercy for anybody reckless enough to try that entrance.

Magos Marzu: *Studying the picts Jak broadcasts up to the starship* Tech Heresy! Of the most VILE sort!
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Worse! That's Obliterator Cult technology!

Guests head off to spend their hand-earned cash in Cinnabar's brothels, gambling dens, fleshpots and arenas. One pair are having a tug of war, wrists bound together, under a clockwork guillotine. Elsewhere, two hyena-headed beastmen are indulging in a knife fight that turns out to be foreplay. Jak also discovers where all that tribute is going, as slaves dressed in oddly segmented leather horse-collars dump it all into deep steaming pits in the ground. Elsewhere, dozens are dragging a huge amniotic sac out of a tunnel, and cutting the contents free - a golden, bejeweled, multilegged tank.

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Defiler!!!!!

Naturally, they intend to wipe the entire city off the map before they leave, and Jak leaves a marker beacon to help target the orbital bombardment later, and presses on towards the source of the signal. Which, alarmingly, appears to be a Thousand Sons Chaos Marine standing in the middle of some kind of arena, looking down into a heavily barred pit, where something is frothing and snarling with rage. Worse, he's soon aware of Jak's presence on the nearby rooftop - but instead of melting Jak and the building down into a screaming puddle of mutated plasma, merely gestures for Jak to come down and join him. Jaranthine moves in a hurry to join them, leaving his power armour behind so he can more silently. Just standing this close to a psyker of such strength is causing claws of terror to run up and down Jak's spine.

Thousand Sons Sorcerer: I knew you would be here,'Jak'. I foresaw your presence, written in the skeins of fate. Look there *points into the pit, where a long-haired space marine with fangs, in remnants of grey armour, is frothing and foaming at the mouth and trying to climb up the sides of the pit to get at the Sorcerer* To think, once we strode among Mankind like gods, and look at them now - less than animal. If only his Primarch could see him now. Such is the fate of traitors... *turns back to Jak* I foresee you will use this *summons a rolled parchment burning with eldritch fire out of thin air* and that you will survive this day. But I advise you to leave now, and at speed, lest you discover how broad a definition 'survive' can be. They know you are here. I, they tolerate - our intentions currently coincide. You, they tolerate only as long as you are amusing.

Jak nervously accepts the parchment, and yells over the intercom that they are leaving NOW. But Jaranthine has now arrived, and reaches down into the pit.

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Brother Astartes! We are here to rescue you!
GM : OK... the Space Wolf leaps, and seizes your wrist. Strength test...
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: No problem.... oh wait... I left my power armour back with Adrik, didn't I Jak! Little help here!

Happily, they managed to call in an emergency teleport, although the Space Wolf immediately seizes Jaranthine by the throat as a Meat Shield, until he can figure out where he is. Even more fortunately, Lord-Captain Leman van Baroque is named after Space Wolf Primarch Leman Russ, which really helps calm down the space marine long enough for him to stop strangling Jaranthine.

GM : He probably thought he was being rescued by a Sister of Battle XD
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin: Hey, I'm not that bishie!

Netzach Benetek: A space puppy, can we keep him?
GM : 'He followed me home'

But the space stations, or whatever they are, are turning to face the starship. And back down on the surface, Adrik and the Proctors are fleeing through the swamp, being hunted by the Space Wolf's horribly altered pack-brothers...

One of the Space Marines from the upcoming Deathwatch game has, at Weldun's suggestion, been named Gilroy MacIan, because that's Anglo-Gaelic for Leroy Jenkins. When he's not charging Orks mobs, ripping off their arms, and beating them to death with the soggy end, he has other things to occupy his time.

Rondale/Jak/Frontbottom's Player : Gilroy's hobbies are either baking muffins or knitting. Both encourage temperance and dexterity - and I'll do both in power armour
GM: So what does he do with the stuff he knits?
Player: Strangles his enemies. 'This scarf is just your colour!' 'BLAARGHHH! *choking noises*'

Brother Gilroy : GIIIIILROY MacIAAAAAN!!!!!!!!! *charges*
Brother Telemachus: I foresee myself recquisitioning the Astartes Grapnel Launcher a lot. *SHUUNT - reels Gilroy back in*
GM: I foresee myself spending most of the session transcribing quotes.

GM: I've realised that I've been playing R.D. as completely loyal, without even realising I was doing it. It's a shame that this is 40K, and the kind of people she's giving her loyalty to... therein lies the tragedy.

Also, introduced this session, a new character. Cargo Sarvus, void-master and best pilot on the Rose Tattoo. As to why he's only shown up now, I handwaved that it's taken this long to replace and decontaminate everything damaged or destroyed during the events at 105 Anurahda, all those months ago. Sarvus enjoys a Mind Interface Unit plugged into the back of his skull, through which he can jack into his ship and perform feats if piloting that out-do even Jak's memorable efforts.

GM: He's got a fibre-optic mullet

The action as we open this episode is split across three arenas - in space, where the junior helmsman is trying to live up to his superior's example as they duel with three fully functional space stations; in the sky of Cinnabar as Jak and Carno fly down to rescue their crewmates (and the inexplicably popular NPC Proctor Smythe); and down in the swamp where Adrik and the surviving Proctors flee for their lives.

Jak Frost : R.D. is back at Zayth, who am I going to have as a co-pilot? Ah, of course... Roid Rage.
Roid Rage : HRUH!
Jak Frost : So, Roid, how's you and the wife? Any kids yet?
Roid Rage : ....Mutter....
Jak Frost : Dude, we keep telling you, you don't have to look like that! Stop taking those pills!

As it happens, the Rose Tattoo deals with the three space stations in a matter of hours; Jak and Carno in their respective aerospace vehicles avoid being shot to pieces by a half-dozen Chaos fighters, before returning the favour with interest; and Adrik manages to blow the altered Space Wolf apart with a lucky hit from his heavy stubber - an entire magazine-full of lucky hits.

GM:The thing's golden cybernetics continue to twitch and jerk about and stare at you even after you've reduced the rest of it to bloody tatters.
Astropath Adrik : I stomp on the bits and try to crush them with the butt of the stubber.

GM: Proctor Nemo fled off into the swamp in blind panic, and a little while later you hear him screaming over the vox, that subsides into horrible gurgling, followed by mechanical noises as if his helmet is being removed, and hideous giggling, followed by renewed shrieks.
Astropath Adrik : And that's why you don't run off alone into an alien swamp.

GM:The incoming shells descend like meteors, lighting up the sky and reducing square kilometres of the surface to molten rock and live steam, the thunderous shockwaves enough to knock the four of you off your feet even here, as the mushroom cloud rises livid above the banks of yellow mist. I bet you're glad you stayed out in the swamp now, aren't you?

GM: So as the fragments de-orbit, the surface will be showered with molten gold and platinum.
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : And Slaneesh will still be happy. Wonderful.

Of course, the late Astartes isn't the only horror at large in the swamp, as they learn while Jak is recovering the Drop Pod, and Carno gives the fugitives air support. Something huge is smashing its way through the swamp, and that something huge is armed with battlecannon, autocannons, and missile launchers, on top of the giant claws it's using to tear up the countryside. It misses putting an artillery shell through Carno's cockpit by no more than a hair's bredth, but it's not until Jak manages to arrive and opens fire on the thing from behind that they manage to take it down.

GM: You could even try and use the drop pod as a wrecking ball.
Carno Sarvus : You could teabag the Defiler

Magos Casu Marzu : I can't believe you endangered two of our machines, just to rescue the Astropath and some proctors. I'm going to ream you a new one when you get back. So, how many crew did you lose?
Jak Frost : Three of the five.
Magos Casu Marzu : But you rescued Proctor Smythe?
Jak Frost : Yes, we got him.
Magos Casu Marzu : All is forgiven.

Jak Frost : I've got a drop pod on my ass.
GM: It's hanging there like a giant metal haemorrhoid.

After they return to the Rose Tattoo and all resistance has been squashed, they decide on their next move. Dropping one of the burnt-out space stations on a convenient fault line, thus triggering volcanic, tectonic, and climatic devastation, would seem an appropriate reaction.

Astropath Adrik : We should inscribe some kind of message on the front, before we drop it on the planet.
GM: 'Hi there!'
Jak Frost : 'A present from the Rose Tattoo'
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : 'The Emperor Orders You To Die'

Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : Hey guys! It's 1940, you're London, and you left your lights on....

Magos Casu Marzu : We're officially renaming this planet from Cinnabar to Cinder.

Astropath Adrik : We should send a message about this Space Wolf we rescued - 'Lost Puppy'
Navigator Netzach Benetek : 'Still has all his own teeth'

The planet duly remodelled, the Rose Tattoo continues its efforts to leave the Mykybe's Veil warpstorm. The voyage is complicated by the discovery that, despite explicit orders not to, at least 50 of the voidsmen detailed to rig the Slaneeshi space stations for de-orbiting have smuggled chunks of gold, platinum, and gems aboard. Jaranthine orders them flogged, and in the case of five randomly selected, executed by their fellows. This doesn't do shipboard morale much good, as the crew aren't happy that megatonnes of precious metal was left unclaimed, even if it was consecrated to Slaneesh.

Even the explorers admit it would have been amusing to sell the metal to rival Rogue Trader Maximilian dePledge, but the resultant Inquisitorial s***storm wouldn't be worth it.

Speaking of Inquisitorial s***storms, they examine the scroll Jak was given by the Thousand Sons sorcerer, but despite confirmation that there's something bound into it, reads it anyway.

Jak Frost : I want somebody to tie me down before I read this.
Navigator Netzach Benetek : I could sit on you...

It's simple instructions that, within nine hours of leaving the warpstorm, Jak broadcast a warning to himself on nine listed frequencies - at least some of which is the very warning they picked up in radio traffic weeks before. Worryingly strange, but the entity bound into the parchment remains quiescent even after they jettison the scroll.

GM: So... to reward those crew who didn't pocketing chunks of gold consecrated to the god of pleasure... you're handing out vouchers for the ship's complement of doxies?
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : ... yes.
GM : Nothing like a sanctioned blowjob
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : There will be no unsanctioned fellatio on MY ship!
Astropath Adrik : Will we have the priests standing by to supervise?
Jak Frost : The Emperor Protects...Brand Condoms.

GM: The Warp Sea around the ship continues to be mountainous, with strange crosscurrents and eddies, and you soon see why - emerging from the foam are black islands, sheer and rocky, congealed from the despair and sorrow of some long-dead civilisation, a maze of deadly shoals, encrusted with these bleached bones of wrecked ships ... the Great Barrier Grief.
All : *groan*
Marzu's Player : Can somebody pass me a bottle to throw at him?

Jak Frost : I'm going to tell the crew that the noise is just us scraping off the warp-taint before we leave the storm.
GM: Scraping off the sex-barnacles?
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : Argh!
GM: Actually, that would be perfect for Slaneesh, given that barnacles are hermaphrodites with penises sixteen times as long as their body.
Jak Frost : Wait...in Halflife, when I'm being attacked by roof barnacles... they're attacking me with their d***s?
GM: Yup!

GM: Mention hermaphrodites with penises sixteen times as long as their body, and the Lord-Captain wakes up

Beyond the Griefs, the conditions in the Warp become bizarre.

GM: There is an ancient proverb you once heard a House Benetek diplomat use, and had explained to you 'to pour oil on troubled waters'. Fisherman on primitive planets use a few drops of oil to smooth out the surface of the water, and that's very much like what you perceive here - ahead of the Rose Tattoo the Warp has flattened out to an eerie calm, lightyears across, at least.

The paranoid explorers spend a gratifying amount of time pouring over the exact wording of the Mykybean Prophecy, and conducting Imperial Tarot readings. The cards of the Tower, upside-down, the Harlequin, the Rogue Trader, the Hoard and the Five of Xenos, are all suitably alarming, especially in connection with the player's knowledge of a similar warp phenomena, the Cadian Gate, of Necron manufacture.

Lord-Captain van Baroque : How do our psykers feel?
Navigator Netzach Benetek : A bit peckish.

But they press on anyway, out of the storm and into the becalmed area, towards the dense star cluster at its heart. Jak nearly forgets to broadcast the warning they picked up weeks ago, but does so in the nick of time. No telling what would have happened if he hadn't.

The system they emerge in, which at their best guess is closest to the co-ordinates given in the prophecy, is swarming with spacecraft, and radio traffic, but with no evidence of warp capability.

GM: The Rose Tattoo jumps back into realspace about 200 AU from the central star.
Jak Frost : AU???
Navigator Netzach Benetek : Yes, Astronomical Units.
Jak Frost : Oh, I thought you meant Air Units.
GM: 20,000 meters would be a bit close

GM: PukmukKLAK*HOOT*PkaukaukauKLIK*rising whistling*pukpakPAKkauKLUK
All :
GM: It's like no human or language you've even heard of.
Jak Frost : No kidding.

Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : Well, we've found a new alien species. Imperial First Contact protocol at this point is "Invade".

But judging by the change in radio traffic, they certainly noticed the Rose Tattoo's arrival, even if they can't find it as it traverses the system on silent running. Video broadcasts reveal the locals to have a bizarre pentaradial symmetry, and a love of rounded architecture. But it's something they have in geosynchronous orbit of their homeworld that draws the keenest attention - a human-built starship of considerable size...

One of the Space Marines from the upcoming Deathwatch game has, at Weldun's suggestion, been named Gilroy MacIan, because that's Anglo-Gaelic for Leroy Jenkins. When he's not charging Orks mobs, ripping off their arms, and beating them to death with the soggy end, he has other things to occupy his time.

Rondale/Jak/Frontbottom's Player : Gilroy's hobbies are either baking muffins or knitting. Both encourage temperance and dexterity - and I'll do both in power armour
GM: So what does he do with the stuff he knits?
Player: Strangles his enemies. 'This scarf is just your colour!' 'BLAARGHHH! *choking noises*'

Brother Gilroy : GIIIIILROY MacIAAAAAN!!!!!!!!! *charges*
Brother Telemachus: I foresee myself recquisitioning the Astartes Grapnel Launcher a lot. *SHUUNT - reels Gilroy back in*
GM: I foresee myself spending most of the session transcribing quotes.

GM: I've realised that I've been playing R.D. as completely loyal, without even realising I was doing it. It's a shame that this is 40K, and the kind of people she's giving her loyalty to... therein lies the tragedy.

Also, introduced this session, a new character. Cargo Sarvus, void-master and best pilot on the Rose Tattoo. As to why he's only shown up now, I handwaved that it's taken this long to replace and decontaminate everything damaged or destroyed during the events at 105 Anurahda, all those months ago. Sarvus enjoys a Mind Interface Unit plugged into the back of his skull, through which he can jack into his ship and perform feats if piloting that out-do even Jak's memorable efforts.

GM: He's got a fibre-optic mullet

The action as we open this episode is split across three arenas - in space, where the junior helmsman is trying to live up to his superior's example as they duel with three fully functional space stations; in the sky of Cinnabar as Jak and Carno fly down to rescue their crewmates (and the inexplicably popular NPC Proctor Smythe); and down in the swamp where Adrik and the surviving Proctors flee for their lives.

Jak Frost : R.D. is back at Zayth, who am I going to have as a co-pilot? Ah, of course... Roid Rage.
Roid Rage : HRUH!
Jak Frost : So, Roid, how's you and the wife? Any kids yet?
Roid Rage : ....Mutter....
Jak Frost : Dude, we keep telling you, you don't have to look like that! Stop taking those pills!

As it happens, the Rose Tattoo deals with the three space stations in a matter of hours; Jak and Carno in their respective aerospace vehicles avoid being shot to pieces by a half-dozen Chaos fighters, before returning the favour with interest; and Adrik manages to blow the altered Space Wolf apart with a lucky hit from his heavy stubber - an entire magazine-full of lucky hits.

GM:The thing's golden cybernetics continue to twitch and jerk about and stare at you even after you've reduced the rest of it to bloody tatters.
Astropath Adrik : I stomp on the bits and try to crush them with the butt of the stubber.

GM: Proctor Nemo fled off into the swamp in blind panic, and a little while later you hear him screaming over the vox, that subsides into horrible gurgling, followed by mechanical noises as if his helmet is being removed, and hideous giggling, followed by renewed shrieks.
Astropath Adrik : And that's why you don't run off alone into an alien swamp.

GM:The incoming shells descend like meteors, lighting up the sky and reducing square kilometres of the surface to molten rock and live steam, the thunderous shockwaves enough to knock the four of you off your feet even here, as the mushroom cloud rises livid above the banks of yellow mist. I bet you're glad you stayed out in the swamp now, aren't you?

GM: So as the fragments de-orbit, the surface will be showered with molten gold and platinum.
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : And Slaneesh will still be happy. Wonderful.

Of course, the late Astartes isn't the only horror at large in the swamp, as they learn while Jak is recovering the Drop Pod, and Carno gives the fugitives air support. Something huge is smashing its way through the swamp, and that something huge is armed with battlecannon, autocannons, and missile launchers, on top of the giant claws it's using to tear up the countryside. It misses putting an artillery shell through Carno's cockpit by no more than a hair's bredth, but it's not until Jak manages to arrive and opens fire on the thing from behind that they manage to take it down.

GM: You could even try and use the drop pod as a wrecking ball.
Carno Sarvus : You could teabag the Defiler

Magos Casu Marzu : I can't believe you endangered two of our machines, just to rescue the Astropath and some proctors. I'm going to ream you a new one when you get back. So, how many crew did you lose?
Jak Frost : Three of the five.
Magos Casu Marzu : But you rescued Proctor Smythe?
Jak Frost : Yes, we got him.
Magos Casu Marzu : All is forgiven.

Jak Frost : I've got a drop pod on my ass.
GM: It's hanging there like a giant metal haemorrhoid.

After they return to the Rose Tattoo and all resistance has been squashed, they decide on their next move. Dropping one of the burnt-out space stations on a convenient fault line, thus triggering volcanic, tectonic, and climatic devastation, would seem an appropriate reaction.

Astropath Adrik : We should inscribe some kind of message on the front, before we drop it on the planet.
GM: 'Hi there!'
Jak Frost : 'A present from the Rose Tattoo'
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : 'The Emperor Orders You To Die'

Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : Hey guys! It's 1940, you're London, and you left your lights on....

Magos Casu Marzu : We're officially renaming this planet from Cinnabar to Cinder.

Astropath Adrik : We should send a message about this Space Wolf we rescued - 'Lost Puppy'
Navigator Netzach Benetek : 'Still has all his own teeth'

The planet duly remodelled, the Rose Tattoo continues its efforts to leave the Mykybe's Veil warpstorm. The voyage is complicated by the discovery that, despite explicit orders not to, at least 50 of the voidsmen detailed to rig the Slaneeshi space stations for de-orbiting have smuggled chunks of gold, platinum, and gems aboard. Jaranthine orders them flogged, and in the case of five randomly selected, executed by their fellows. This doesn't do shipboard morale much good, as the crew aren't happy that megatonnes of precious metal was left unclaimed, even if it was consecrated to Slaneesh.

Even the explorers admit it would have been amusing to sell the metal to rival Rogue Trader Maximilian dePledge, but the resultant Inquisitorial s***storm wouldn't be worth it.

Speaking of Inquisitorial s***storms, they examine the scroll Jak was given by the Thousand Sons sorcerer, but despite confirmation that there's something bound into it, reads it anyway.

Jak Frost : I want somebody to tie me down before I read this.
Navigator Netzach Benetek : I could sit on you...

It's simple instructions that, within nine hours of leaving the warpstorm, Jak broadcast a warning to himself on nine listed frequencies - at least some of which is the very warning they picked up in radio traffic weeks before. Worryingly strange, but the entity bound into the parchment remains quiescent even after they jettison the scroll.

GM: So... to reward those crew who didn't pocketing chunks of gold consecrated to the god of pleasure... you're handing out vouchers for the ship's complement of doxies?
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : ... yes.
GM : Nothing like a sanctioned blowjob
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : There will be no unsanctioned fellatio on MY ship!
Astropath Adrik : Will we have the priests standing by to supervise?
Jak Frost : The Emperor Protects...Brand Condoms.

GM: The Warp Sea around the ship continues to be mountainous, with strange crosscurrents and eddies, and you soon see why - emerging from the foam are black islands, sheer and rocky, congealed from the despair and sorrow of some long-dead civilisation, a maze of deadly shoals, encrusted with these bleached bones of wrecked ships ... the Great Barrier Grief.
All : *groan*
Marzu's Player : Can somebody pass me a bottle to throw at him?

Jak Frost : I'm going to tell the crew that the noise is just us scraping off the warp-taint before we leave the storm.
GM: Scraping off the sex-barnacles?
Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : Argh!
GM: Actually, that would be perfect for Slaneesh, given that barnacles are hermaphrodites with penises sixteen times as long as their body.
Jak Frost : Wait...in Halflife, when I'm being attacked by roof barnacles... they're attacking me with their d***s?
GM: Yup!

GM: Mention hermaphrodites with penises sixteen times as long as their body, and the Lord-Captain wakes up

Beyond the Griefs, the conditions in the Warp become bizarre.

GM: There is an ancient proverb you once heard a House Benetek diplomat use, and had explained to you 'to pour oil on troubled waters'. Fisherman on primitive planets use a few drops of oil to smooth out the surface of the water, and that's very much like what you perceive here - ahead of the Rose Tattoo the Warp has flattened out to an eerie calm, lightyears across, at least.

The paranoid explorers spend a gratifying amount of time pouring over the exact wording of the Mykybean Prophecy, and conducting Imperial Tarot readings. The cards of the Tower, upside-down, the Harlequin, the Rogue Trader, the Hoard and the Five of Xenos, are all suitably alarming, especially in connection with the player's knowledge of a similar warp phenomena, the Cadian Gate, of Necron manufacture.

Lord-Captain van Baroque : How do our psykers feel?
Navigator Netzach Benetek : A bit peckish.

But they press on anyway, out of the storm and into the becalmed area, towards the dense star cluster at its heart. Jak nearly forgets to broadcast the warning they picked up weeks ago, but does so in the nick of time. No telling what would have happened if he hadn't.

The system they emerge in, which at their best guess is closest to the co-ordinates given in the prophecy, is swarming with spacecraft, and radio traffic, but with no evidence of warp capability.

GM: The Rose Tattoo jumps back into realspace about 200 AU from the central star.
Jak Frost : AU???
Navigator Netzach Benetek : Yes, Astronomical Units.
Jak Frost : Oh, I thought you meant Air Units.
GM: 20,000 meters would be a bit close

GM: PukmukKLAK*HOOT*PkaukaukauKLIK*rising whistling*pukpakPAKkauKLUK
All :
GM: It's like no human or language you've even heard of.
Jak Frost : No kidding.

Senschal Jaranthine Hamerin : Well, we've found a new alien species. Imperial First Contact protocol at this point is "Invade".

But judging by the change in radio traffic, they certainly noticed the Rose Tattoo's arrival, even if they can't find it as it traverses the system on silent running. Video broadcasts reveal the locals to have a bizarre pentaradial symmetry, and a love of rounded architecture. But it's something they have in geosynchronous orbit of their homeworld that draws the keenest attention - a human-built starship of considerable size...

For the past 24 hours I haven't been able to get the image out of my head of a space marine strangling a tyranid warrior to death with a rainbow coloured scarf he just finished knitting while yelling "It's just your colour!"

WhiteLycan said:

XD

A quote I forgot to include

Magos Marzu : We have to fly closer to the planet - I want to hit it with my sword.
GM : You know, with Carno at the helm... you could actually do that.

Yeah when I read the original "Fly closer I wanna hit it with my sword" quote I literally laughed out loud and my wife asked me what I was laughing at. I proceeded to attempt to explain what I was laughing at and what followed was just a whole lot of confusion and pity-laughs.

I find this thread as enjoyable as Into the Maw; or, How I Became Incredibly Wealthy

Ever read that one?

WhiteLycan said:

*nods* And regard it highly

Space Marine Gilroy MacIan : What, nobody wants to charge the enemy with me? Ah well, I'll just do it myself. GILROY MacIAAAAAAANNNNNN!!!!
Space Marine Apothecary : Don't worry, I'll come with you.... I'll harvest your gene-seed one of these days...

Space Marine Gilroy MacIan : *sings* I like to fillet big monsters, I cannot lie; you battle-brothers can't deny...

Magos Casu Marzu : By the time we're done stripping the resources of this planet it'll look like Easter Island. Mostly bare, with big stone heads of ourselves looking out to sea.
GM: I believe the Moai look inland.
Magos Casu Marzu : Who cares, we still want our faces on stuff.
GM : Wanted - Dead or Alive posters seems likely.

On the Ork who traveled back in time, and killed himself so he could get another copy of his favourite gun.

Ork: Wait... *goes cross-eyed* If I do it again.... I'd 'ave THREE guns.... I could do dis ad infinitinitumium.
GM : If he did do it an infinite number of times he might actually have Enuff Dakka.
Ork : I could cover me ship in me favourite gun! an fire 'em all at once!
van Baroque's player : Reminds me of the old vehicle combat rules, where you could equip a Rhino with an infinite number of storm bolters.

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : Wait - Proctor Smythe only cost me 1000 points as a minion, why is Rainbow Dash more expensive?
GM : Because she's 20% cooler.

Anyway - as the Rose Tattoo continues its stealthy approach to the Pentapod's system, a lot of the extraneous radio traffic shuts down - they're apparently taking the search for whatever just flared into existence out in their Oort Cloud very seriously. Radio and television broadcasts from the inhabited worlds continue - apparently a lot of talking heads discussing the phenomena, and referring with graphics and archive photos to the arrival of the other human spaceship long before. By the looks of things, something badly damaged the other ship - almost certainly Lord-Captain Bel Ingeneri's Sycorax - before it come into the system on a ballistic trajectory, and was braked into orbit by Pukusian rescue ships.

van Baroque and Magos Marzu argue at some length about the best way to exploit these unknown xenos, and seize the Sycorax for themselves.

Jak Frost : The rest of the crew have snuggled up to Netzach 'Mummy and Daddy are fighting again '

Lord-Commodore Leman van Baroque : Send them a message telling them we seek to parley
GM : Ah, Lord-Commodore sir? Was that parley or puree?

Magos Casu Marzu : Maybe I should scare the bejeezus out of them by walking out to meet them, with mechadendrites flailing and going BLARGLEBLARGLEBLARGLE

Lord-Commodore Leman van Baroque : The only thing Benetek has to worry about is us meeting a peg-legged captain asking if we've seen the White Whale.

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : The problem with finding Ratlings for Netzach to conceal about his person is that they carry packets of spice, and once Netzach works up a sweat he might mistake them for food. 'Hey, raw Ratling.... this isn't bad, actually'
GM : Ratling curry
Navigator Netzach Benetek : Don't worry, I won't eat them if they're good cooks

The explorers and various crew specialists pour over the broadcasts for more clues about the culture of these aliens e.g. Searching the minor channels for subtitled programs, indicating a variety of cultures and languages.

GM : Looking for the equivalent of SBS television? Of course, SBS is famous for certain other aspects of its line-up...
Magos Casu Marzu : *turns head to side* What's it doing with that tentacle?

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : So it appears they don't have conflict? They prefer to resolve everything with negotiation?
Magos Casu Marzu : Excellent, we can crush them. BWAHAHAHA

The Pentapod equivalent of the United Nations has a flag featuring a stylised sun, equal in size to the stylised Planet 4 next to it.

Magos Casu Marzu : We should send them our flag - their world crushed in an iron fist.
Voidsmaster Carno Sarvus : An iron fist clutching two balls?
GM : Well, their flag DOES have two circles on it...

GM : Apparently they display status or position by the elaborateness of their hats.
Jak Frost : We should sell them Team Fortress 2 - Hats for everybody!

Popular Pentapod pastimes - team football and synchronised stomping. Both demonstrate considerable talent for working in groups, and synchronised tactics. The latter sounds like massed Taiko drumming.

Lord-Commodore Leman van Baroque : Well, we can safely assume that their world is not like Arrakis.
Voidsmaster Carno Sarvus : Tap-dancers of Dune - the shortest-lived sports league in the Galaxy.

Communications opened - the locals apparently know a smattering of High Gothic, to the explorer's surprise.

Pentapod : Welcome! Welcome to our nest! Have you come for tradeness?

The xenos also send a simplified graphic encyclopaedia of their planet, biology, language and history, prior to sending out an interceptor with their First Contact Team. Marzu can barely conceal his glee that none of the xenos ships have weapons batteries, void shields, or anything resembling even basic armour. If the Rose Tattoo does decide to invade, it's going to be a short war.

Magos Casu Marzu : Hey, Jak - what's that holovid you're always watching?
Jak Frost : What, the one with the ponies? Here you go. If you lose the disc, I will break your legs.
Magos Casu Marzu : Send them that - there you go, there's our history
GM : I predict they're going to be slightly confused when they come aboard expecting brightly coloured ponies
Magos Casu Marzu : BWAHAHAHAHA. Wait, I sent the right disc, didn't I? Harmless ponies? Not the footage of what we did to Cinnabar?

Jak Frost : I'll tell all the Adepts that were using the Alienage area for parties to clear off, so we can get it ready.
Jak Frost : Racing stripes in the Alienage
Magos Casu Marzu : Skidmarks
All : Arghhhhhh!
Navigator Netzach Benetek : Not my skidmarks, too small.
All : Arghhhhhh Brain Bleach! Brain Bleach!
Voidsmaster Carno Sarvus : Stop making it worse!

Navigator Netzach Benetek : Can I be there at the meeting?
Lord-Commodore Leman van Baroque : No.
GM : We wouldn't want you mistaking one of the Ambassadors for a Swedish Meatball and eating them.

Lord-Commodore Leman van Baroque : Let's start a Black Crusade campaign, we're clearly corrupt.
Navigator Netzach Benetek : You mean thus isn't BC already?

Magos Casu Marzu : Right, once the diplomats are in the Alienage, I'll have my tech-priests take their shuttle apart to study the technology.
GM : They'll come back to find all the wheels missing.
Magos Casu Marzu : It doesn't have wheels.
Jak Frost : Well, we installed some, then we took 'em off.
Magos Casu Marzu : Now it's on bricks

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : If you don't translate faithfully...
GM : ... we'll cut your ears off.

Pentapod diplomatic assistant : I hope there's a little Pentapod's room
Pentapod Diplomat : I told you to go before we left!

GM : The Alienage doors are big enough that you could transport whales, assuming you had some transparent aluminium

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : We wish to teach these Xenos their proper place in the Universe.
Navigator Netzach Benetek : As bean bags.
Magos Casu Marzu : Or Space Hoppers.
GM : Yes, I can all too easily picture you bastards seizing them by the eyestalks and leaping about the room on their backs.

Negotiations proceed quite well, although the five xenos are clearly rather perturbed that the explorers are more concerned about the Sycorax, than about the whereabouts or fate of the Sycorax's crew ( I just wish I had some props to hand, to better emulate the way their five eyestalks kept swinging about. Perhaps I should make a hat, for next session ).

Pukusian Diplomat : Welcome to you, Imperium-of-Man ! Welcome to our nest! I MukkKLIKklikPLUCK of Xenos, representative of Admirable F'Kau-Kau-Kau, we welcome Imperium-of-Man in great friending.

Pukusian Diplomat : Yes, Honoured-Seneschal-Jaranthine-Hamerin-of-Rose-Tattoo-and-House-van-Baroque, the otherward Nest-Star-Machine had Imperium-of-Mans, manyness of Imperium-of-Mans, but they all ceased, was a much sadness.

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : We will help each other and we will grow strong... it's not my fault the second 'we' is less inclusive...

But despite the friendly and colourful nature of the Pukusians, something about them makes the humans' skin crawl, even more so usual, given the mere fact that they're aliens and the Imperium are a bunch of fanatical xenophobes. The Lord-Captain orders Adrik to telepathically probe them, in case they're attempting some kind of psychic trick themselves.

Astropath Adrik : Which of the pair shall I probe first, Lord-Captain?
Lord-Commodore Leman van Baroque : Either one.
Magos Casu Marzu : Wait, what? Pair? There's five of them.
Astropath Adrik : I... I can only only feel... two... souls *goes into seizure and starts bleeding from the eye-sockets*
Pukusian Diplomat : Honoured-Seneschal-Jaranthine-Hamerin-of-Rose-Tattoo-and-House-van-Baroque, is your nestmate unwell?
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : You! Why are there only two of you?
Pukusian Diplomat : *blink-blink-blink-blink-blinking nervously* Honoured-Seneschal-Jaranthine-Hamerin-of-Rose-Tattoo-and-House-van-Baroque, this Xenos imply there is being a misunderstandment? One-Two-Three-Four-Fives, fives Xenos, fives is being auspicious symbol.

As Adrik is carted off to have his brain flushed, the other explorers huddle to discuss their suspicions. It seems certain that three of the Pukusian diplomats and camera-beings are Psychic Nulls - incredibly rare in the Imperium, and bane to psychic effects and demonic entities. A large population of such might well explain the odd behavior of the Rose Tattoo's Geller Field, and the eerie stillness of the Warp in this region. If true, the Pukusians may be an incredibly valuable resource in and of themselves, providing the humans can tolerate being around them long enough.

Jak Frost : Arcoflagellant Blanks! Fit the Pentapod brains with control circuits, and power flails, and send against the enemies of Mankind!
Voidsmaster Carno Sarvus : Or just cut out their living brains and put them in life support boxes - portable null shields.
GM : I foresee horrible, horrible things happening to innocent Pukusians over the coming years....

Eventually, the negotiation team agrees to further talks down on the planet, towards the end of handing over the Sycorax and any artefacts, and opening a trading mission on Planet 3 - also habitable, but with a smaller population than Planet 4. The extra privacy there should make it easier to kidnap random Pukusians for dissection, too. The Pukusians are clearly disappointed that the humans are refusing to teach them about Grav-plate technology, or explain what Void Shields or Warp Engines are, but relieved that the 'Imperium of Man' is not demanding further reparations for all the extra damage they've done to the Sycorax-Nest-Star-Machine as they're methodically explored and taken it apart over the preceeding decades. They're also profoundly shocked by Jaranthine's claim that the Imperium occupies most of the galaxy (carefully not mentioning that the Imperium consists of thousands of isolated, beleaguered sectors, surrounded by hostile species on every side).

Jak Frost : Poor bastards - they think they're in the Star Trek universe but they're really in 40K - they're f***ed.

The explorers insist on an inspection of the Sycorax before they head down to Planet Four ( Pukus itself, and homeworld of the species, apparently ) for endless negotiations, state dinners, tours of important Pukusian cultural sites, and TV interviews. They helpfully send across one of their Atlases of the human ship, detailing at length every corridor, compartment, and artefact they've found so far ( but oddly making no mention of the biological components i.e. crew ). It swiftly becomes apparent, on close study of these maps, that the late Lord-Captain Bel Ingeneri was a sneaky bastard - the corridors are designed to confuse boarders and lead them into killing zones, and there's at least three sections the Pukusians and presumably Imperial Customs Officials never found their way into. The damage to the ship ( and discovery of assorted leftover teeth ) also implies that it was a Void Kraken that wrecked the Sycorax, and so terrified the crew that they risked a suicidal jump into the Warp even though their Geller Field Generators had been destroyed. But whatever had been peeling the ship open like a banana, en route to the heart of the Bridge Tower, it had gone through the projector compartments first, leaving the crew defenceless from Warp entities even as they fled the monster.

One hidden chamber the Pukusians did discover and duly catalogue was Ingeneri's hidden trophy room. And alarmingly, it's dedicated to the arts of War, bizarre and ancient weapons on every wall, and pride of place given to two sets of admittedly damaged Crusade-Era Space Marine power armour - one Iron Hands, the other the traitorous Thousand Sons. Where in the Galaxy could he have got these from, and why hadn't the Iron Hands or Imperial Authorities ever strung him up like a dog for doing so?

Navigator Netzach Benetek : Space Marines are pretty careless with their stuff, aren't they? Leaving all this gear lying around...
Magos Casu Marzu : They're like teenagers that way

Lord-Commodore Leman van Baroque : That's a good question - what has that Space Wolf we rescued been up to?
GM : Not much - staring at the walls in the Temple, mostly.
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : And brewing something that will actually get a Space Marine drunk. And kill anybody else.
Navigator Netzach Benetek : You wanted the Space Puppy, you look after him!
Jak Frost : Oh wonderful, now he's scraping his butt on the carpet.
Navigator Netzach Benetek : See, I told you it wasn't me who made those skidmarks.
All : Arghhhhhh! Brain Bleach! Brain Bleach!

They head across to see what treasures Ingeneri had stuffed in his smuggling bays, dissuading the locals from accompanying them by promising to film everything themselves, and bringing along a specialised portable generator servitor for any power supplies they might need.

GM : Rightio, pass me the jumper leads and hook up his nipples.

Magos Casu Marzu : Where's my lumin-skull?
Jak Frost : I think the adepts were using it at their dance party
GM : DOOF DOOF DOOF DOOF DOOF

GM : The Pukusians are clearly dismayed by the servitor, what with its plenitude of cybernetic implants and unnatural nature.
Magos Casu Marzu : Eh? What about me, then?
GM : You, they can assume is wearing some kind of elaborate void-suit. The servitor is the one who had his lips and nose sewn shut and an oxygen tank plugged into his throat. And, of course, the AC/DC nipples.

Marzu, Jak, Carno and Netzach are hardly fazed by the body that ages 50 years in seconds after they find it, rotting to slime crawling with foot-long maggots, because they're all unfeeling bastards who have seen or inflicted worse. Marzu is more interested in the odd misbehaviour of their void-suits chronometers, but he and Jak are actively alarmed when they discover, among the hundreds of other illegal relics of war in the secret cargo bay, the thankfully inert remains of a Necrontyr warrior, its utterly lethal Gauss Flayer weapon, and a very large grooved and segmented box made of the same alloy. The latter has been securely bolted into some kind of suppression cage, but everything here is completely out of power. Marzu immediately sets about recharging the suppression charge. Jak, on the other hand, immediately climbs into the Leman Russ battletank parked nearby. It might be out of juice, but at least inside the tank the Necrontyr devices might not notice him, if Marzu accidentally wakes them up...

You should make the Benetek fellow cost 1 space and 1 power to account for his incredible size and the power needed to keep the kitchens in overdrive 24/7 to feed his 27 daily meals.

WhiteLycan said:

heehee - they've already had to make special transport arrangements. And every time he goes up a rank he fails the mutation test and gets bigger!

Well actually I already do, but luckily I'm best-craftmanship so those requirements are both reduced by 1

Rank 5 atm though, 3 more ranks to go, so who knows what's needed in the future.... (at my suggestion, for flavor, we tweaked the mutation a bit: every time I fail the toughness test and gain a mutation, I also expand a bit... It's happened three times now, leaving me hulking and with no movement left. luckily I have a hoverboard now which floats me around)

Could always get the Eldar hover platform thing from hostile acquisitions. Can move 6m as a half action. Could mount yourself on it lol

Jak's Player : I won't be here for the next few sessions.
GM : That's okay, I'll just make sure you're horribly injured this week, and out of commission til you get back.
Jak's Player : For a few weeks?
GM : Sure - it might take Jaranthine that long to find you a new head.

Marzu, Jak, Carno, and Netzach, in the company of the battery-pack servitor, are nervously poking at the apparently inert stasis cage around the Necrontyr artefact they've discovered. Before they let Marzu do more than merely inspect it from a distance, the others insist of searching the smuggler's hold for anything that might given them a chance of survival, in the event the Necron device wakes up. A pristine Leman Russ battletank is a start.

Jak Frost : We'll have to jumpstart the tank first - hey, Nipple Man, over here!

Magos Casu Marzu : Yes, I'd like to do the whole John Woo thing too, and drive a tank around shooting the place up.

Netzach Benetek continues to suffer the results of his increasingly inhuman obesity.

GM : Your hoverboard is so overloaded it barely clears shag carpet

GM : Sure, you can get up there - just flex your buttocks, that should work the hoverboard controls.
Magos Casu Marzu : Bags never cleaning that hoverboard.
Jak Frost : S***, beat me to it.

Navigator Netzach Benetek : But if anything happens and they run off, I'll be helpless!
Magos Casu Marzu : And that would be hilarious
GM : Don't worry, you can still get around a bit - admittedly by emulating an elephant seal wallowing up a beach.
Jak Frost : I'm not leaving you behind!
Magos Casu Marzu : I might.

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : I need to get the Shocking upgrade to my Rod of Persuasion
Jak's Player : That's funny, Jak's Rod of Persuasion uses Charm

Magos Casu Marzu : But I'll stop now, or the GM will kill me.
GM : Rocks Fall, Everybody Dies.
Jak Frost : Or Netzach falls on you from the 9th floor. What an ignoble way to die.
Magos Casu Marzu : And imagine the slow motion footage!
Jak Frost : And in the distance you see a small mushroom cloud… it smells of bacon.

Jak Frost : Hmm, this reminds me of my old tank commander… Throne, how I hated that bastard.

Jak Frost : Brother Marzu? The tank is ready for the Activation Blessing.
Magos Casu Marzu : Hmm? Oh, alright. *waves mechadendrites vaguely in direction* Operation Checklist blah blah blah.
Jak Frost :
GM : What a pious man you are.

Jak Frost : Is there a tank commander's hat I can wear?
GM : No, but there's some paper, you can fold your own.
Jak Frost : Hang about, I want to write something on it first … C O M M I S A R

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : Well, are asses are covered, anyway.
Magos Casu Marzu : *looks at Netzach* That's a whole lot of covering

While Marzu's efforts to ensure the stasis cage is recharged appear to have gone without a hitch, a certain amount of excitement intervenes, with the Sycorax reliving its last moments as a living ship. Else, Proctor Symthe and other crew sent across to find out why Marzu et al haven't checked in, are picking up the screams and panicked orders from 50 years ago, as the Void Kraken or whatever it was chewed the ship apart.

GM : The entire ship shakes
Magos Casu Marzu : I check whether Netzach fell off the ninth floor.

Magos Casu Marzu : I do it for the same reason I'd want to drive a tank around inside a space ship - BECAUSE IT'S COOL.

GM : Shame the tank doesn't have magnetic treads, or you could just drive it up the side of the ship.
All : …
Magos Casu Marzu : Just a minute, I want to make a mental note here… mag… netic… treads.
Jak Frost : Boarding actions in tanks!
Magos Casu Marzu : Fit them with some kind of gas jet and fly across!
Jak Frost : "Captain! The humans are boarding us!" "Well, shoot them." "But sir, they're in tanks! " "…. what? " and " How the F*** did they fit a Baneblade into a boarding torpedo!?"

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : What kind of Leman Russ battletank is it? Prime pattern or one of the variants?
Jak's Player : … Optimus pattern…
Magos Casu Marzu : If that tank suddenly transforms into a robot we're really in trouble.
Jak's Player : "Dakka is the right of all sentient lifeforms"

It seems that these echoes of the past are suppressed by the presence of the Pukusian psychic blanks - certainly, they haven't noticed any problems with 50-year-old events replaying themselves in their presence. For one thing, it would have interfered with their efforts of stripping the ship bare for study by their scientists.

But there is still plenty of stuff the Pukusians haven't found yet, that the explorers proceed to loot. Searching the Command Spire for the late Lord-Captain Ingeneri's Warrant of Trade is a priority, but they can still have some fun while they were doing it.

Voidsman Carno Sarvus : I want to try the Captain's command throne for size.
Jak Frost : Hey, get out of there!
Voidsman Carno Sarvus : My paper hat says CAPTAIN, I outrank you!

Unfortunately, Ingeneri wasn't completely stupid, despite apparently ordering his ship into the Warp without Geller Fields. For one thing, one of the likely hiding places turns out to contain an acid bomb. Jak realises his error in time, but it's too late for everybody else that was standing behind him.

GM : Evidently, the moment you realised it was a bomb you threw it away. At Carno.

Voidsman Carno Sarvus : I'm screaming in 3 languages.
GM : And Pukusian?
Voidsman Carno Sarvus : 4 languages.

The acid makes pretty short work of Carno and Netzach's void-suits, and large amounts of flesh underneath, although Marzu merely develops an annoyed look at the damage to his paintwork. The Pukusian escort, who's space suit wasn't nearly as durable as those worn by the humans, isn't so lucky.

Magos Casu Marzu : Tell them to send another blancmange, this one's broken.

But even this proves little more than a minor distraction from the ongoing effort to strip the Sycorax of everything that isn't nailed down. Including that Battletank, the platoon's worth of Imperial Guard supplies hidden in the smuggler's hold, and all the gold leaf, statuary, tapestries and objets de art that Ingeneri used to make guests and crew insane with envy.

GM : Lord-Commodore van Baroque approves, of course - he's tired of living in a ship where all the walls are painted Mental Asylum Green.

GM : Marzu snorts derisively at Ingeneri's encoded log - it's only a 137-digit prime encryption. He could do it in his head - and does
Jak's Player : "Met a Xenos named Eldrad - nice enough for alien scum, but seemed a bit gullible" Fifty years later - Void Kraken!

Leaving the details of how Ingeneri robbed the Zaythi of their holy artefacts, and what he actually found at the place he met his doom, for later, Jaranthine and the others return to the question of how much stuff they can brow-beat the Pukusians into handing over. Convincing them to make the components and armour they'll need to get the Sycorax spaceworthy seems a good idea.

GM : 'Make us five of these - ignore the bit where it says 'Orbital Bombardment Cannon''

The Pukusians get the first look at the Rose Tattoo's navigator.

Pukusian diplomat : ….Is the honoured manling pregnant?
Magos Casu Marzu : Only if it's a baby whale.
Navigator Netzach Benetek : In two weeks I burst open…

Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : There's standing orders - if it ever looks like your Navigator is about to captured by Kroot, you kill him and burn him to ash, so they can't eat him and learn Warp navigation.
GM : *nods* the Qorl species recently became Warp-capable - they captured human Navigators and implanted control insects in their brains.
Magos Casu Marzu : I can sabotage their entire race! Give them our last Navigator…

GM : What?! Your latest mutation didn't make you any bigger?
Navigator Netzach Benetek : I know, I'm disappointed as well.
GM : I was hoping your movements penalties would take you into negatives - so fat your gravitational field stops other people getting away.

Magos Casu Marzu : I'll have to drop by the mechanics, to get treated for underbelly rust. It costs a lot, I know, but hey, you've got to look after yourself.

Magos Casu Marzu : *sings* We're tech-priests and we know it. Wiggle Wiggle Wiggle Wiggle Wiggle UH.

Marzu eventually agrees to teach the Pukusians enough about the production of Adamantium and Ceramite armour, and starship components, and plascrete and plasteel, to ensure the repairs to the Sycorax and the building of the Rose Tattoo's embassy on Planet 3 can proceed without delay. For one thing, Pukusian vegetables are uniformly lethal to humans, so they'll need lots of arable land to supply the embassy staff.

GM : It's pretty clear that any human that tried a bite of this fruit would be on the ground foaming at both ends, in seconds.
Magos Casu Marzu : Can we get some of of this and make a chemical weapon? To feed into an enemy ship's life support systems?
GM : … *sigh* sure
Jak Frost : Pukusian pepper spray

Pukusian architects and engineers jump at the chance to explore the combination of aesthetics and materials.

Benetek's Player : So how about something halfway there, sketched by drhoz? A crossover between Imperial skulls and Pukusian igloo style? (let's put the gm to work! )
Voidsman Carno Sarvus : While I do see a number of Pukusian buildings being of similar architecture, its a relatively inefficient design (for humans at least) and would take a supreme effort to build and design while also fitting our needs. While it does exist today design such as this may not exist in the 41st millennium, you have to remember that the Imperium likes conformity, even the more radical designers and architects still have imperial backgrounds. This is because anything strange and not conforming to such design could be seen as heretical. I do understand that the party is not strictly pious but habits die hard.
Seneschal Jaranthine Hamerin : The party, no. But certain party members are, even if they're more, uh… protestant than orthodox.
Jak's Player : So what Olaf is asking for is basically an Eskimo S&M club. Club those seals, baby!
Benetek's Player : Oops, was it that obvious…? Now to ruin your appetite: imagine Netzach in some leather
GM : godammit, I was just about to eat.

Of course, they also have to explain why they need such durable materials. This they attempt to do by convincing the Pukusians that the Galaxy is completely full of psychotic bastards, but you can trust us. Honest.

GM : *dryly* How fortunate, in a universe consisting entirely of psychopaths, that it was the Imperium of Man that found the Pukusians first.

Voidsman Carno Sarvus : I dream of a day when the Galaxy is at peace, all the races living together as one.
Jak's Player : The Sisters of Battle retired to use their chainswords as hedge trimmers…
GM : The Reasonable Marines must have made an alliance with the Equestrians.
Jak's Player : Love and Tolerate, Xenos scum.
GM : Nothing can resist the Orbital Friendship Cannon.
Jak's Player : All the races apart from the Tyranids. F*** those guys.
GM : Eh, just let Pinkie Pie lead them off somewhere harmless.

Magos Casu Marzu : Colourful Blancmanges
GM : They're not that soft - except perhaps militarily.

This, of course, necessitates efforts by Jak to teach the Pukusians how to defend themselves. The Pukusians agree that it's important to protect your nest, and I'm sure they'll learn a lot from Jak's demonstrations of human military tactics and technology.

GM : I'm amused by the mental image of Jak banging his head against a tree, while the Pukusians make their comically inept attempts at military exercise in the background.

After the latest terrifyingly inept efforts at artillery practise by Pukusian volunteers, Jak orders more human weapons brought down from the Sycorax. They get back to him with a query -

Proctor Smythe : Ah, sir? Did you order anybody to move anything else in here?
Jak Frost : … whhhhhhy?
Proctor Smythe : Because that big metal box you told us not to go anywhere near isn't there anymore.
Jak Frost : Oh crap. What about the people I left on guard? Can you see them anywhere?
Proctor Smythe : I'll check…. no, no sign of them either sir.
Jak Frost : Oh double crap.

The Necrontyr are loose - and the Explorers can only pray they get everybody off the Sycorax before any more humans get reduced to a thin layer of greasy soot…

I don't know what you plan on using for Necron stats (if you even ever plan on having them fight your PCs) but the Deathwatch adventure The Emperor Protects has the stats for a Guardian of the Tomb, Spectral Harbinger, and… I could have SWORN there were stats for a regular necron troop, but I guess not. But at least the book gives official tabletop stats for the Particle Emitter, Flayer Rifle, and Wraithblade.

there's stats in Black Crusade

Right you are!!

NECRONS!!! Can't wait