I'm DMing a new DH game for four players who've never before done DH. I've never DMed DH befroe, but I've been in a few games and I've played and DMed under various systems since Tunnels And Trolls (bless its name, holy God-Emperor!) in the 80's.

My four players are:

Sean - been RPGing about 6 months, Hive Enforcer (he hasn't picked his home-world yet, and he'll get to be a full-on Arbitrator later)

David - been RPing with Sean for about the same amount of time. Fenrisian Guardsman (I allowed a Fenrisian thinking there must at least be some PDF forces)

Pete - Never RPed, but pat of Sean and Davids group so he knows what's going on, Volg Scum (he saw the Piratical piccy in the DH book and he's stuck to that idea)

Jamie - thinks RPGs should either be Japanese or fire rockets, Metallican Gunslinger Assassin (he saw Metallican and thought he'd be from Metallica)

My four merry intrepid Acolytes traipsed off of the ship bringing them to Calderis, one of the moons of Tallides, a gas giant in the Xraxis system (they don't actually know this, because they didn't ask. I'd put the rolling eyes smiley here, but I'd never stop using it, as you will read) >_< .

As they stepped off, into the heavily populated space-port of Hive Zero (they knew that's where they were, as I'd told them). Nobody really noticed them, but four guys were giving them the evil eye. Without asking details about them, David, our Feral Guardsman wandered up to them and gave them the eyeball back, growling like one of the wolves of his homeworld Fenris. He promptly rolled 97 for his Intimidation check (a critical failure to you and me) and ended up writhing on the floor as his target nut-kicked him (1 fatigue).

Jamie decided that killing was on the menu and quick-drew his Hand Cannon, slotting one of the nutters in the head, and wounding one of his friends. With brains oozing down the sides of their faces, the three remaining (strangely-well-armed) blokeys blazed back with their semi-autos, hitting Jamie for no damage, but missing the prostrate David. Sean hauled out his Enforcer ID and demands the nutters to cease and desist, but is answered with derision and bullets, so he shoots back, but doesn't hit (he later claims this to be a warning shot). Pete fires his semi-auto but misses and skirts around the edge of the fight. New turn, David staggered to his feet, drawing his shotgun. Jamie wounds another. The three nutters, now annoyed, fire. A lot. David gets missed, but Jamie takes 2 shots to his unprotected chest, thankfully surviving unharmed (double 1 for damage). Sean blasts one of the wounded with his shotgun, but doesn't kill him. Scum miss, more skirting mk2.

Another turn. David snacks one of the nutters with his mono-sword, is critical dodged and counter-punched, knocking him out (d3 Fatigue, I rolled a 9 on d10, total of 4). Jamie then goes Judge Dredd, killing the two wounded blokeys with one volley. Blokey number 4, realising he's pretty screwed, shoots Jamie in the chest again, doing 6 wounds. Sean swaps to his revolver, but misses. Pete hits with a grapple, but fails to wound. David uses a Fate point to wake up and staggers to his feet (again) and stabs the bad guy in the back with his mono-sword, bisecting his liver.

At this point, several Enforcers show up. Sean tries to "I'm an Enforcer too!" his way out of it, which fails and everyone is carted off to the cells (this is because he's only an Enforcer and won't join the Arbites proper until he's level 4, in this scenario a full Arbites would have far too much authority). Sean makes enough of an impression that he gets a private cell. Everyone else is covered in blood, so they aren't bothered by the other inmates. Once everything is sorted, all their gear is returned to them, minus their ammunition. Guns are legal, and their papers appear okay, but better safe than sorry, right? (Never mess with the DM) Asking the various coppers where they can find decent accomodation, Sean passes an Inquiry check with the sargeant on duty and everyone decamps to the local hospital, where Jamie is bunged on a catheter and treated for his chest wounds (2 days and 65tg is what I end up rolling for his stay). The other three leave him to languish alone and unloved whilst they check into the motel nearby. Sean and David buy a room, Pete goes with them, everyone dumps their packs and head to a local illegal gunstore in the back rooms of a bar that Sean charmed out of the motel owner, along with a password. At the door, they remember that they're covered in blood and have to drag David away from the boozer to get changed. Once suitably attired, they return to the bar. Peter saunters up to the bar and immediately upsets the barman by asking for the "strongest stuff you've got". The barman plonks a green, bubbling liquid in front of Peter. Refusing to pay, he nearly gets his head blown off. Deciding not to drink, he passes off the liquid to David who fails his Intelligence test and downs the lot in one go. Remembering he has Iron Stomach, he passed his Carouse test, so wasn't horizontal when he was dragged into a drinking game with the locals. He was horizontal almost immediately thereafter as he failed another Intelligence test and downed another glass of the green stuff in one go, and collapsed backwards. His head hit the floor, but it just rebounded him back upright and over onto the table, losing him 20tg in bets.

Sean and his pet thief give the password to the barman and are rewarded with a key and a visit to the toilet. Once inside, Sean notices nothing, but Thiefy Pete the Thieving Thiefboy notices one of the stalls has a keyhole in the lock. Putting the key in the lock reveals a button above the door. Pressing the button activates a trap, which snares Thiefy Pete's hand. Abandoning him to his fate, Sean wanders into the storre, but can't pierce the gloom on the shelves. He eventually purchases some extremely reasonably-priced laspacks and a few hundred rounds of ammo, selling a couple of guns to afford it. Peter decides to sell his snub pistol and throws it to Sean. Fumbling his rolls, he actually throws it "at" Sean, numbing his calf (I rollled 10 for damage, so his entire leg for numbed down to the bone!). Sean charms the gun-seller into admitting he might have a "Harlequin" Assassination palm-pistol, but can't afford it. After freeing his pet Scum, Sean and Pete go scrape David off the table and wander to the motel. Peter tries to sneak past the desk clerk so he can get a free nights kip, but fails miserably and has to camp in the alley behind the motel.

Alone and cold in the alleyway, Peter makes a successful Perception check, and is ready when he's jumped by three guys. He manages to fight them off very well, killing one with his snub auto (with bullets provided by Sean) and stabbing another, The third pegs it into the distance. David wakens from his drunken stupor, hearing the gunshots, but Sean can't hear anything. The Fenrisian drags his hiver pal around the back anyway. Having looted the corpses of his attackers (and pocketing all of said loot for himself, including a wad of cash, a funny knife and a couple of snub autos), Peter hands the ID he'd found over to the Enforcer, who declares it OK. Looking at it himself, Peter declares it fake. Enforcer's cheeks glow like a beacon. Drunken IGgy staggers back to the motel, the others follow and Pete buys a room of his own rather than spending another night in the open. Once morning comes, with David sporting a nastier headache than he expected ("But it's not as strong as Fenrisian mead! That gives a hangover like two continents colliding!"), the band reforms with Jamie (I critical succeeded my doctors Medicae test, so he got out early), who reloads his guns (as a Metallican, he was curled into a ball whimpering while he had no real gun for protection). On their way back to the motel, they fail their perception checks and get jumped again. This devolves into a bit of a farce as not only the Acolytes but all three assailants miss with all of their shots. The assailants are joined by two more from an alley. One of them has an Eviscerator. He charges, trips falls over and embeds the chainsword in the rock-crete. David stabs at him, missing so badly his sword ends up stuck in the ground too. Jamie shoots at the prone loony, missing too. Sean shoots at the other new guy, hitting him square between the eyes with his snub auto. The bullet stops an inch from the man's head and falls to the ground. The first three assailants fire wildly, injuring Jamie ("Aw, not a-******-gain, man...") for one wound. Pete skirts the fight, trying to get closer to the Psyker, who fails his first two Psychic Checks. David pulls the sword out of the ground and happily stabs the still-prone chainsword-wielder, who's finished off by Jamie, who then Jams his Hand Cannon. Pete charges in, trying to stab the nasty Psyker with the shiney new knife he'd half-inched the night before, but it squirms out of his grip and slices open his arm (1 fatigue from blood loss, no damage). Sean semi-autos again and hits the psyker twice. The bullets spang straight back toward him, hitting him in the mesh vest once. The three crazies fire like hell, hitting David for no damage due to his natty flak armour. Jamie unjams his gun. David draws his lasgun and charges towards the Psyker, firing wildly and hitting. The bolt is deflected away. The Scum (or is that the dumb?) stabs the psyker again, but the knife obviously prefers Petes blood, as it slices him open again, knocking him out from blood loss. The psyker finally passes a Psychic Test and stomps on the ground, causing an earth tremor that knocks all the Acolytes on their ass.

Cole, since he's on the ground, stays there to Brace his lasgun and snaps a shot off at the Psyker. His shield holds but the bolt is visibly closer to hitting. Jamie wounds a loony, but Sean goes all Matrix and unleashes Righteous Fury on the poor nutters, killing all three in one volley of semi-auto fire. Pete stays asleep. The Psyker obviously dislikes sleeping on the job and passes his Lightning psychic check and fries Pete where he lies. The resulting charge doesn't do any damage and snaps Pete awake, but not for long and he tries to stab the Psyker with the strange blade again and ends up stabbed back into unconsciousness for his troubles. Everyone else unleashes several shades of hell on the Psyker, who shrugs it all off, laughing. Just as all hope seems lost, Inquisitor Damian Thullust stabs the bugger through the back with a Witch Lance, immolating him where he stands. He kicks Pete awake. Pete, not playing the sharpest fang in the maw, cheeks the Witch Hunter and ends up having an Inferno Pistol applied to his ear, creating a 6m deep, 3" wide pothole in the rock-crete. He does gets some of his ear back. The rest meakly follow after that.

Thats where the story ends for the first advanture. Asking for an Inq Seal befor they left? Nope. Checking out their surroundings? Nope. Examining their foes? Nope. Thoroughly searching the corpses? Nope. On the whole, a B+ I'd say, because they did survive and attempted reasonably fluffy reactions, so I gave them 200xp for this mission before bonuses. Sean ended up with 100 bonus xp, for a total of 300 for supreme fluffiness (and offing three guys with one salvo, luck comes into it in my games). Jamie got 30 bonus xp (I quietly rolled for him going doo-lally without his beloved guns, and he critical succeeded, and he killed everyone he pointed his pistols at). Cole got 30xp bonus too for his drinking game and general fluffiness. Pete got -50xp stupidity "bonus" for stabbing himself not once, not twice, but three times.

Tune in for the next episode, same bat-time, same bat-channel!

Next up: Why Jamie should have been put in the sack

Starting exactly where we left off, with a loony in Witchhunter garb cleaning his Witch Lance and staring meaningfully at his watch, the intrepid band decides to search the corpses. There are 4, with a smoking pile of robes where the 5th should be. There they find many things. They find that Pete shouldn't be trusted with IDs (he dropped one down a drain) and that neither should Sean (who set his on fire). From the stuff they did glean (3 keys which no-one can read, several sets of ID, fake and otherwise, lots of cash and several weapons) they made the decision to... well, go to the pub actually. The =][=, being on a seperate errand, sent them back to town to recuperate. Pete got what was left of his ear sewn back on, then got given some seriously powerful painkillers that knocked him silly (and 5 extra pills). Once outside and pubward-bound, Sean gets bumped by someone. He gets Pete and David to grab the poor unfortunate and drag him into an alleyway, and they dose up the poor bugger with Pete's newly aquired Rohypno... umm, painkillers. They manage to get no useful info out of him (he's too drugged to reply) before they decide to take him into Enforcer custody. This backfires as several heavily armed men (one of whom has an Eviscerator) dragging another unconcious man tends to get the Enforcers notice. Everyone ends up in the cells again, but their story checks out and they only stay 6 hours, but now the Enforcers know exactly how heavily armed they are *facepalm*.

The merry band of alcoholics then went to the pub, ostensibly to get more ammo, but actually so David could challenge those drunkards to a drinking re-match (he loses, but someone else loses first, so they get robbed instead). Jamie is forcibly restrained from shooting up the bar. Once they kicked David awake, they sauntered nonchalantly into the toilet together, not noticing the funny looks four guys who entered together get when they all go to the toilet together too. Once inside (Pete, due his drugged-up state, is left with his hand in the button-trap again), Jamie notices a shiny pistol and is instantly entranced, drooling. David wanders around drunkenly and the one (semi)sane Acolyte remaining barters for armour, some guns, and the Harlequin Assassin pistol they heard about before. Jamie bought a new helmet with built-in vox and David a micro-bead, but Jamie really wants the new pistol however, so they buy the new pistol too. Once you hear the stats you might wonder as to why no-one thought this gun might be questionable, but Jamie gots gun, Jamie happy (Ripper Pistol :: 18m range, -/10/30, 1d10+3 R, Pen 0, Clip Infinite, Reload Never, Primitive - WTF?!?!?). They merrily sauntered back to the motel to stash their gear, David collapsing into bed and snoring loudly enough to... more on that later. Jamie collapsed into a drunken stupor, as did Pete as the painkillers started mixing with the alcohol in his blood, leaving them both collapsed in the doorway of their room. Sean didn't notice the thump of their skulls on the carpet, but that wasn't the problem; Davids snoring was so loud that he couldn't sleep! Worse, it was so loud that no-one who wasn't drunk or drugged up to the eyeballs could either! The Motel Superintendant came in to get David to shut up. When shaking, kicking and dousing with water didn't work (Toughness tests at +0, +10 and +20), he attempted to awaken/kill David by smothering him. Sean let this go on until David seemed in danger of death, then intervened. David still didn't wake up, but the noise was so great, Sean decided to check on the others. He poured Jamie into bed along with Pete and closed their door (reducing the snoring volume by around 57%), but Jamie woke up just enough to call the =][= over the vox and call him Irene and say he's really sorry. Much swearing ensues until the vox is wrestled from the drunken sot by Sean, who'd heard over Davids new micro-bead. Sean wanders into Pete/Jamies room next morning to make sure everything is okay, Pete pops another pill and goes to happy-land and once Sean re-opens the door he finds the =][= has left a warning nailed to the door by a knife. Another warning (this time nailed with an axe) is left on Davids room door, so David returns the favour, keeping the axe, but nailing a note to the Supers' door with a knife (he was talked out of using the Eviscerator :shock: ). Outside, the four are bundled into a hovercar by an irate =][=. David and Pete end up thrown out outside a known gladiatorial arena. Sean and Jamie go to check out the domiciles of the previous days attackers. Once dropped off by Mr =][=, S/J wander over to the domiciles, but a screaming attacker (about 3'6" tall, covered by robes) leaps at them from above. Jamie calmly blasts it in the face with his Hand Cannon, so it keeps going, over the railing and into the depths of the Hive. Another figure is in view, so Jamie wants to start attacking that too. Sean councils patience and attempts to calm the situation, but it ends up a fight again. Unfortunately, the new guy's gun explodes ihis hand, bloiwing it off, so he swaps to a snub auto and gets kicked in the stump by Sean for his troubles. When he refuses to talk, Jamie executes the poor bugger. They then start getting shot at from outside the range of their weapons (pistols and shotguns) so they sprint into the cover of the apartments they have come to investigate (1152). Once inside...

Meanwhile, D/P get into the arema with very good Tech-use checks on the fake IDs the =][= gave them, making them untracable ( dammit!). They get into the Arena as "Platinum Members", and are lead into a lavishly-appointed suite. Pete is restrained from nicking the fittings. They there view two poor buggers who'd "tried to betray our cause" get eaten by a "big, chitinous snakelike thing". Once that was done, everyone but the Platinum Members got thrown out. Pete and David, being the newest members were given the option of fighting or betting. Having spent all of the cash I'd thrown at them, they were forced to fight ( My evil plan succeeds!). Out in the Arena, three Attack Squigs (David's an Imperial Guard who's fought Orks before so he recognized them with a decent Int test) bounded across the Arena at them. David killed one before they got close enough, but one managed to take some bites out of Pete. They managed to kill them all (Pete kept stabbing one long after it was dead), but were left bloodied, or at least Pete was. They were then tranq-ed and dumped outside, with 200tg in winnings in each of their jackets. They get bundled into a hovercar and driven off.

Back at the apartment, Jamie (since there's nothing to kill) guards the door whilst Sean searches the apartment. He finds a bathful of fungus, some seriously high-calibre weaponry (strangely poorly designed) and a lot of cash. At this point, the door is kicked in by an enormous figure, so Jamie shoots whatever it is in the head. This pisses off the figure who then charges Jamie. Sean looks out, sees the Ogryn and nearly cacks himself, but tries to calm the situation. Having been shot in the head, the Ogryn is uncalmable, and punches Jamie into the apartment wall. The apartment wall 30ft away. Jamie fires back, but he's hook gaffed back into the hall (YOINK!). A full-blown ZOMG-fight ensues, with another, even bigger figure trying to get into the apartment, but unable to fit through the doorway. Realising his Hand Cannon ain't cutting it, Jamie tries out his new pistol, shredding the poor Ogryn nearly to death in two semi-auto bursts. Then the bigger figure outside rips the door completely out of the wall, and with a bellowed WAAAGH!!!, the Ork stampeded into the room. Deciding that discretion is the better part of valour, our "brave" heroes scream for help over Jamies vox and jump out the window onto the fire escape. Once outside, Jamie finishes off the Ogryn with another burst from his new best friend. Then they go up the ladder, followed swiftly by the Ork. Unfortunately for the Ork, Sean is smarter than it, and he decides to shoot out the bolts holding the fire escapes lower level to the upper ones. He manages to shoot off both of the ones he aims at, but Jamie epic-fails, merely damaging one, even with his Hand Cannon's Manstopper rounds. The ork takes this opportunity to clamber partially up the ladder and fire wildy at Jamie, but his armour holds. Jamie shoots back, and the Ork dodges... by letting go of the ladder, landing on the now-partially-unsecured fire-escape. Sean finished off the bolts and the ork falls 50 feet onto its head. Over the vox, the =][= tells them to check the corpse, but with no way back down and the apartments possibly filled with ork-lovers, they decide to get to the roof and try to find another way down. Once there they get shot at. A lot. Then David and Pete arrive from an access door and they get shot at too (David later remarked he should have held the Eviscerator in one hand and saif "Groovy..." for his entrance). Over the lip of the roof someone cooly kills all three heavy-stubber-wielders without even looking.

Who is this mysterious benefactor? What is actually occuring in Hive Zero? Wher is the high-tech (and low-tech) gear coming form? Can Jamie stop shooting everything he sees? Will the Scum actually kill something? Will the Fenrisian ever bathe? Find out the answers to these questions and more next time!!!

Okays. Next episode. And Sean will regret saying "gotta think about everything or else he will pull you up for it later" to me... Pete didn't show for this (we waited over an hour for him, so we started late), so I decided that in the furore, David had "accidentally" backhanded him with a blunt bit of his Eviscerator, so he was out cold, and would remain so.

After they dusted themselves off from the near gunning, they tried to get whoever it was to come out. Unforunately, their savious was already behind them. Lady Nerrissa Kaedes, Inquisitor Lord of the Ordo Hereticus, had had to bail them out. She was not amused and sent them all back to check on what they'd missed. Total swag: 2x Heavy Stubbers (with 119 and 199 bullets each) 1 Heavy Stubber (151 Manstopper bullets), a large amount of cash, one bag of 15 teeth (14 human, 1 ork), a note detailing EXACTLY where and when to ambush the group and a severe bollocking from the boss. She then does a BAtman and disappears off the roof. The lunatics-in-chief sauntered down to the room next door to the one with the Ogryn corpse in it. Sean was about to open it when David noticed it was wired. They decided not to mess with it and went to the last door they had a key for, 1154 Omicron. This time, the doot was guarded with a bit of tape and a hair. Once they wandered inside, they found that, like the last set of rooms they'd "searched" (shot up), it was relatively high-class, with two bedrooms, a main room and a private 'fresher off the hall (cooking is centralised in the Hive Zero low- and mid-range hab-blocks, so no kitchen). They plonked the unconcious Pete behind the sofa, with David bracing one of the newly-aquired Stubbers on the sofa in case of doorway intrusion. He was under orders, however, to hide rather than blast the crap out of whatever came in (which was why David had the Heavy Stubber and Jamie didn't). Sean and Jamie searched the 'fresher room first. It was very classy, with a bath AND a shower. In the base was some more fungus. In the toilet was some ****, and in the cistern was a blue plastic package. Sean opened it and it went "phooph!" and whatever had been inside evaporated. No clues there, my friends :evil:. After careful examination of the shower, they found that the shower head showed signs of repeated removal. They examined for booby-traps this time and found none (whether there were any is something only I know ). Sean managed to get teh shower head off, but only with Jamies help (*cough*wuss*cough*). They could see a roll of paper inside the hose (please note once I said this, they didn't bother checking the shower head. Was this relevant? Yes! Am I a bastard for this? Oh HELL yes!) Extracting it, they founf it to be tightly rolled cash. Extremely high-denomination bills. 5K and 10K to be specific. Jamie started muttering that he knew what was happening, "some ****** ponce wi' money" was behind it all apparently. They could only get one roll out, so the decided to see how far down the shower tube the money went. After checking for more booby traps (are they getting paranoid yet? Not enough methinks) thy unclipped the hose from the base of the wall and found the money went all the way down the 3m tube. That's a hell of a lot of cash, isn't it, Jamie? ("Aw ****, man..."). Checking around, they found a bog-brush. This unscrewed to make a pokey-stick with which you could push a copious amount down a tube! They used it to half-inch the lot. The group are now very rich, and likely to have made the ex-owner of said dosh rather upset. They leave the bathroom as they'd found it (only without cash, blue plastic thingy or the medical supplies in the medicine cabinet they'd "borrowed" too). Back in the main room ("Guard BORED! Need to kill!") they search about and find a gun (compact revolver) down the sofa, a list of names and adresses behind the Screen (some of which have been crossed out and all of which have a number in thrones beside them), a Worship Table with hymnal and a good view onto the squashed Ork outside. After checking everything around the door to tehright, they sneak into the darkened room (the drapes are heavy and shut), but the main light doesn't work (David plays the Admiral Ackbar line we all know and love on his laptop, 5xp for sheer nerdiness). Jamie and Sean sneak into the room and switch on the bedside lamp, but thankfully no-one's in the bed. They search the wardrobe and find 4 blue standard hab-coveralls (general workers garb) and one orange hab-coverall (which the Enforcer knows denotes a criminal! DUN DUN DUNNNN!! ) with a name on it. In teh bedside cabinet they find a nice gun tehy've never seen before, a Hymnal in Hugh Gothic, a torch and some blank paper. Shining the torch on the paper (well done guys!) they find script they've never seen before and keep the paper. And the torch. And the gun. Under the pillow they find a nasty-looking knife and beneath teh bed a recessed panel in the floor that they decide to... leave alone (start eerie/ominous music here).

In the other room (same checking around as if OHGOD-EMPERORTHERESSOMETHINGHEREISNTTHERE!!! Cole playing "It's a twap!" every time they failed a check didn't help), in the wardrobe they find three more blue hab-coveralls and a red hazordous-area hab-coverall. There was also a suit they believe a Noble would wear (big-ass hat with a feather, wonderful blue cloth, silver and gold accents, waistcoat, overcoat, pantaloons, under-pantaloons and a pair of gorgeous boots). Jamie said "Ah ****** knew it, man!!" I said nothing. In the pocket of what became known as The Noble Suit was a hankerchief witht the initials M.J.-S. on the corner. Which was also written on the prisoner gear. Strange, huh? In the bsdie cabinet was another Hymnal, written in High Gothic. Sean shone (Hey, same word!) the torch on it and another line of text was revealed (xp bonus for smarts there m'boy!). But non-one recognised the text. In the bottom drawer was a beatiful dueling laspistol with acoutrements and beneath the pillow was a stub auto. They then searched the room for secret passages, as it was right next to the room of the Psyker from the the first missive. And if there weren;t any secret passages, Davids new Elite Advance (Melee Weapons [Chain] for 300xp) would soon ensure there was an entrance whether I liked it or not. They found the old "pull the light fittings" wheeze worked. They tied several blue hab-coveralls together and decanted all three of tehmselves into the room to pull on the fitting from a distance in case it blew up. Note: they didn't actually check for booby-traps this time. I think they were so happy to find a way into the Psykers rooms they forgot. Bad mistake :evil: . A door appeares in the wall, opening into a very dark unknown area. At this point, Cole hears something in the other room and the group goes on combat alertness. Jamie hears something happening in the room the group's in and jumps over the bolas fired from beneath the bed. David and Sean swind up on the floor. David immediatley cuts himself loose (mono-blade FTW!), but Sean fails. Whilst they're on the floor, two heavily-armoured types (one with a Suppressioon Shield on his back) burst into the main room from the other bedroom and shout at them not to move (now where did they come from, I wonder?). They appear to be Arbites, but Sean notices that they don't operate like Arbites (why burst in with the Shield on his back? Why not in front with the shotgun locked? Why only two?), and covertly signals Jamie not to shoot (Jamie wants to kill and he's got his Ripper Pistol out but not pointed anywhere but the floor). Seans "covert signs" are along the lines of semaphore (they really should get a Cant and some signs, or at least buy Jamie a muzzle) and one tells him to stay schtum (quiet). The other (the one with the shield), turns away and begins talking into his helmet-comm. Sensing this not to be going well, Sean asks if he can free himself, but the Arbites-alike points his shotgun at Sean and threatens him. Not wanting to be caught, they Unleash The Jamie and all hell breaks loose. The first arbites-alike notices Sean trying to get free and blasts away at him, but his armour and toughness hold him in good stead. The other spins round, notices the **** hitting the fan and gets his shotty ready. Jamies unleashes his Ripper Pistol, but the Primitive flechettes can't penetrate the highly-rated Carapace armour. David (who's already in the sprinters starting position from cutting himself loose) Charges in with his new toy. The Eviscerator cleaves the surprised shooters hand clean off, spraying blood. He screams and drops his shotgun just before it gets chopped in half too. Sean manages to free himself and dive behind the bed in the bedroom. The first (handless) shooter makes a really good Toughness save (3), leaps away and scoops up his shotgun (Ag test), blasting David in the chest at point blank range. Davids Flak armour saves him from major injury, but he still gets wounded. The shield blokey blasts away at Jamie, tipping Jamie into the Seriously Injured category. Jamie replies with his Ripper Pistol, but again the thick armour saves the nutter. David proceeds to decapitate the handless blokey, and his head bounces off of his mate, who passes a Fear check despite Seans insistance they could talk about things. Sean sets up the Heavy Stubber in the door instead of taking a prisoner like he wanted. The shielded guy blasts David with two point-blank shots, but his armour absorbs all but 1 wound (I should've semi-auto'd!! Scatter + Semi-auto is brutal at point blank, but guess who forgot? *facepalm* ) Jamie swaps guns to his Hand Cannon and misses. David All-Out Assaults the poor bugger remaining and saws most of his face off. Acoryte Squad Victoly! After checking the living one for injuries (y'know, other than the whole face-removal thing) and treating his (and their own) wounds, they half-inch the remaining armour (checking size-wise, they're lucky. The one with out a head-piece fits Jamie reasonably well, and the one with out an arm fits Sean. The helmet wasn't destroyed when David chopped off the head). Now all they have to do is... ****! I hear sirens!
All three make Ag tests to sprint the **** out of the hab (forgetting to grab their heavy stubber and... some other things). Only Jamie fails (and him by 1). After a decent set of successful Ag tests, they manage to shake their pursuers in an alley and traipse merrily back to their motel.

Them: A job well done!
Me:
Them: Wait. What's wrong?
Me:
Them: Nah, nothings wrong
Me:
Them: What could be wrong?!
Me:
Them: What's wrong?!?!
Me:
Them: Oh, crap, we forgot Pete!
Me: My plan succeeds!!!

They go into their motel and tip the supervisor enough that he forgives them and find Lady Kaedes waiting for them. They hand over thier findings, Jamies Ripper Pistol (a foul abomination, fusing blessed Human tech with unclean Eldar technologies! *ka-confiscate*), the duelling pistol (they get that back, it seems harmless in terms of abomination but not in terms of shooty), the heavy Autopistol (a design from the Damocles Gulf, they get that back too) and the money and Hymnal they couldn't understand. The Lady looks through the rolls of cash and finds copies of various Writs of Charter in all of them. She seems distracted, because she hands the cash back to Sean but keeps the Writs. She tells them they may need that cash to spring their buddy. When she reads the Hymnal under the light of the torch, she actually pales. She gives them a name and address and gives them a direct order to go see this man immediately after they clean up their wounds. Then she leaves. The merry band check their motel for messages, getting various packages. These contain seals, writs, IDs and sundry other things (Sean got a proper Arbites badge, David got some raw meat, Jamie got nothing, they didn't check Pete's). They wander down to the local hosprital again and get Outpatients treatment this time. They have to come back all week to get their wounds healed (except for David and Pete, the first is barely wounded and the other has other problems).

Where is our favourite pirate? Why was he abandoned alone and blood-spattered in a room with a decapitated corpse, a faceless man (both of who had been stripped) and a heavy weapon? Will we ever see him again?! Find out this and more, next time on Fox(fax)!!