Penny

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

We circled east. There was enough gaps in the mangroves this close to the deeper water of the lake that, even without Garm, it wasn't a challenge. I pulled my hood up. My hunting clothes weren't a particularly close match to the fatigues the enemy were wearing, but they were sufficiently different from the furs and leather of the locals to make it clear I was an off worlder. My hair was in a severe braid, which I concealed beneath the foul weather hood. Clara and Selenica took similar precautions. It wasn't certain that the presence of so many women would arouse suspicion, but it was a risk we were all keen to avoid. I brought the Helix-2 though there was no chance I would be able to get the massive thing unlimbered in time to bring it into action, so I gripped my thousander under my weather cloak and hoped for the best.

The dock was a metal platform on pontoons bolted to the side of the ferocrete levy. The lake wasn't big enough to have appreciable tides but this was off the shelf tech meant for somewhere that did. A small crane had been attached to the central section to facilitate the transfer of heavy loads from the water side to the mud side, its yellow and black lifting arm surprisingly bright and cheerful amidst the drab natural colors. Two men in flak armor stood smoking low sticks, both in the small patch of shade provided by the crane. The moment they saw us they tossed the lho sticks they had been smoking into the water and unshipped las rifles. These weren't the gilded show pieces we had seen in the hands of the natives. They were dark compact weapons, with underslung lumens and other personalized upgrades. Professional mercenaries almost certainly. I wondered how Nagrip had accomplished this impressive, if crude, piece of engineering. Clearly he was more than the minor warp dabbler Hadrian had imagined when we set out. He had funding and support, maybe even Mechanicus support to get all this done. Hadrian clambered to his feet and cupped his hands around his mouth.

"Get us an enginseer, barge crapped out about two clicks out!" he bellowed, sounding extremely irritated. The guards were gripping their rifles but not pointing them. I wondered if I dared give them a nudge with my mind, but decided against it. Something was wrong with this place. I had no knowledge of the planets hydrography but it seemed impossible that a city could by laying under the mud like this without being many thousands of years old, probably pre-imperial and xenos to boot. They were a sour an unpleasant taste in the back of my mind and I wasn't eager to swim in such murky waters.

"Who the frak are you!?" one of the guards called, lifting his las gun to point at us. The skiff continued towards them no faster than a swift walk.

"Who the frak do you think I am?!" Hadrian thundered, "Now get us a damn enginseer before the locals decided to come back and sink our damn barge while we can't move it! Do you know what the boss will do to us if we lose that shipment?"

It was a masterful performance, edged with enough irritation and interest to hold their attention as we approached. We were perhaps ten feet away when Clara reached down and took out a length of locally made rope. As she drew her arm back one of the guards must have realised something was amiss, he began to swing his weapon down and open his mouth to shout. Clara threw the rope, casting it wide so both men ducked involuntarily to avoid it, her other hand came around and hurled something small and metallic. The frag grenade struck the closest thug in to top of the head with an audible crack, having ducked into its trajectory, he dropped his gun and staggered backwards, bright blood leaking from his crown. The grenade bounced back, striking the concrete and plopping into the filthy water, the pin having never been pulled. The second guard reared back but Hadrian whipped out his sword and threw it overhand with a spin like a trala spike. It hit the second mercenary in the throat punching through his neck and glancing off his spine, dropping him to the ground with blood gouting from his severed blood vessels. Clara leaped the remaining four feet and scrambled up onto the dock, but the man she had brained with the grenade was recovering, staggering drunkenly towards Clara and clawing for his pistol. Even stunned he was good, catching her wrist before she could jab the short knife into him. She twisted him around, towards the edge of the dock but it could only be a moment before he screamed or managed to engage his vox. I brought the paddle down on the back of his head as hard as I could. I felt vertebrae and skull crack under the force of the blow, and he dropped like a polaxed grox. Clara's grip was all that kept him from tumbling into the water, guiding him down so we didn't soak a uniform we would momentarily need.

I dropped the paddle as Clara tied up the skiff, climbing out awkwardly, nearly falling into the drink as my weight pushed the gunnel down towards the water. Selenica looked pale but followed behind, the pair of us keeping watch while Clara and Hadrian pulled on the uniforms of the dead enforcers. I crept to the edge and looked down towards the unsettling city. A broad moat had been dug for the purpose of drainage and I saw big promethum powered pumps off to the west, spraying water out over the levees in three giant muddy geysers. Beyond the moat the ground rose slightly to the city. The buildings on this side had been cleared. The undertaking seemed immense until I saw how it was being done, through my hunters magnocular I could see filthy looking men, off world laborers judging by their garb, spraying muddy water from a great hose, effectively sluicing the mud which encrusted the buildings down into the moat. Only after they had done all they could did the slaves move in with brooms and buckets. On the western side of the city I could see barracks made out of plastec sheeting. The space between the wall and the moat was grooved by what looked like a giant sledge, hooked to the wall at one end and pilings at the other by cables that allowed it to be drawn back and forth across the mud. Presumably equipment and supplies were craned down onto it and then it was slid across the intervening space to the mostly cleared streets. I could see slaves acting as stevedores, hauling crates of supplies out of sight and into the city. The more I saw, the less I liked.

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

I felt bile rising in my throat at Garm's words. The Ordos of the Holy Inquisition had nebulous but vast responsibilites, but at its core the Ordo Malleus, with which I had become associated, was concerned with the Daemon. I had almost died at the hands of Bahometus and his abominations, and the wrongness of what he had summoned lingered in my mind. All psykers lived with the knowledge of what lived just beyond the prosaic veil of reality. It was a private fear that lurked at the back of the mind. To see it made manifest, to see the doom of all life, was difficult to bear.

"The Emperor Protects," I intoned without any real conviction. Hadrian reached back and squeezed my hand and we slicked on across the dark water.

We began to pass villages, identical in every respect to Garm's home, save they were all abandoned. Some had red dye smeared on the walls of their rude huts, others were smouldering ruins, torched by their neighbours, or by their own hands in a vain attempt to stamp out the contagion. We saw only one living soul. An old man sitting against a clump of trees. His eyes were rolled back and his breathing laboured, great red sores covered his body, weeping clear sera which had attracted thousands of tiny black insects. If they bothered the old man he was too far gone to do anything about it.

"The Sickness," was all Garm would say, stroking harder to steer us further away from the dying man.

We continued on for another hour before, abruptly the mangrove ended. Just ended. Prefabricated ferrocrete blocks had been set up in a vast wall. It curved away to both sides too irregular for me to estimate the area beyond. My breath caught as the boat grounded against the concrete. The area beyond wasn't cleared. It was drained. Millions of gallons of water had been pumped, revealing a landscape of dried mud beyond. Patches of it were blackened where organic matter had been piled and burned. Great trenches had been dug and they still flowed with brackish sea water. The skeletons of marine life encursted the recovered earth like mould, imparting their iodine stink to the vista.

"What in the name of the Throne," Selenica breathed. It wasn't just mud and ash. In the center stood a city. It rose in a series of structures carved of some greenish basalt. Obelisks rose at oddly irregular intervals like quills on a porcupine. At the edge of the ruins I could see men with las guns, standing watch over other men, passing buckets of mud out and tossing them into the trenches. Slaves put to excavating the city, captured tribesmen or subjugated members of Nagrip's allies.

"What the fuck is this..." I breathed.

Tricksters and Theives: A Warhammer RP

Neil lead the way with confidence, though given all the twists and turns they took Emmaline was hopelessly turned around. In places bridges had been constructed across the river of effluent, sometimes stone, sometimes simple planks, and they were obliged to cross to avoid sudden ends in the walk way or partial collapses of ancient slumping brickwork. The signs of patrol by the sewer jacks, old campfires, discarded wine bottles and impressively vulgar graffiti, grew sparser and sparser, which she supposed was proof positive that they were moving in a definite direction. Neil's lips moved wordlessly, as though recalling a past conversation or memorized directions, though given how long he had been doing it the directions were either hopelessly complex or he was repeating it over and over.

The rats were a constant, skittering away into the darkness as the halo of the torches reached them. The crawled out of the sewer, slick and drowned looking to scuttle off into cracks in the walls. The smell of them crinkled Emmaline's nose, the sharp scent of ammonia underlaid with an earthy animal musk. Slowly the sense they were under Nuln began to disconnect from her mind, and the tunnels became a place in their own right, endless and labyrinthine. Oddly, this increased her confidence, moving her further and further from the chaos and terror of the siege.

"Up ahead," Neil said, starling Emmaline after a period of silence. They came through a vaulted arch into a large circular chamber a few steps above the level of the sewer flow. Dark but clean water flowed down in three directions in shallow cascades. Water fell from a trio of lead pipes into a large central pool that fed the falls.

"What is this place?" Emmaline asked, staring around at the bizarre construction. Neil lifted his torch to give her a better view of the room.

"It is a flush," Neil said, "water falls from some of the feeder creeks and carries the sewage down to the Reik. Between the inflow and the suction of the river it keeps everything from just piling up."

"How do you know that?" Emmaline asked in puzzlement.

"I'm an Engineer remember," Neil snickered. Truth be told Emmaline had forgotten that, but she nodded her agreement.

"Is it much further?" Emmaline asked. There was a sudden an intense smell of rat. Something exploded beside Emmaline's head spraying fragments of broken bricks. Something squat with glowing eyes and chisel like teeth stood in one of the side passages, whirling a filthy sling of brownish cloth. A half dozen more charged out of the passages, hissing and brandishing rusted weapons.

"DIE MANTHINGS!" one of them hisses in a horrific mockery of Reikspiel.

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

Once it became clear that we weren't to be killed on the spot, the atmosphere warmed considerably. While the boats were being prepared the women and children returned from wherever it was they had vanished to. Some of them hid, other approached us, more than a few tried to touch my hair, the gold being an unusual shade among what were a darkskinned and dark haired people. One of the warriors even attempted to grab me, but Clara produced a knife in a heartbeat and persuaded him to mind his manners.

The chief's son, Garm by name, was sent with us to be our guide, though he didn't seem altogether pleased with the idea. These people had been fighting their kinfolk since Nagrip had established his domination. This is how the lasguns had come into their possession. They were horrified that their own people had abandoned their rituals to follow Nagrip's dark gospel. I was horrified also, thinking about how easy it would be to subvert simple folk all over the Imperium with nothing more sophisticated than a few crates of weapons and medicine.

"We could spend the night," I suggested to Hadrian, glancing at the sun. He shook his head firmly.

"This is the last night before the lunar tide, we cant afford to wait."

"Do we even have a plan?" I objected.

"Find Nagrip, send him to the Emperor's Judgement," he replied.

"That is more like a mission statement,' I suggested.

"Kavasa, Kavasa," he replied, alternating pronunciations. Then he grew more serious. "We cant plan till we get more information, and to do that we need to get closer."

"The Emperor Protects," I said, without much enthusiasm.

Tricksters and Theives: A Warhammer RP

Emmaline had grown up on Altdorf, in the dock district, where the stink of emptied chamberpots mixed with the reek of fish too long out of water. She had even prowled the tannery district as a child and suffered the horrible odor of the leather makers trade. None of these things held a candle to Nuln's sewers. A great river of filth flowed down a central canal, flanked on both side by narrow paved shoulders upon which a sewer jack or maintenance worker could proceed. She gagged slightly at the sight and was suddenly strangely glad that the baying of monsters above her was there to impel her to go on.

"Can you..." Neil began but Emmaline was already waving her hands. Abruptly the air they breathed became clear, if somewhat dry and sterile. An old alchemists trick to protect oneself from inhaling unwholesome gases.

"You know," she mused, "I've done more magic in the past couple of days than I have in the last month." Neil snickered and gave her a lascivious grin.

"I'll say," he agreed lustily. Emmaline snickered in spite of the situation.

"Well now, as then, I am in your hands," she teased. Neil bowed and set off down the brick walkway. Emmaline followed. She knew the sewers opened up at various points along the river, but figured they were within the city walls. If Neil really did know a way out, it was a dangerous weakness to the city. Still, if the could just get beyond the walls, there was a good chance they would get away clean, the beastmen far to focused on the battle above to trouble with a sewer. The only thing down here was shit and stink.

__________

Scritscrit watched the interlopers as they moved through the tunnels. At first he had thought it was the hated sewer jacks, a perennial threat with their crossbows and axes, but he saw that was not the case. A tall looking manling and one of their breeders. She was meatier than some of her kind, though nothing like a true skaven female. He snuffled the air softly, catching a hint of something coming off thee pair. Could it be? He had smelled such things before in the doom forges of the Skyre and on the Grey Seerers. It smelled like... warpstone. If these interlopers had warp stone... it might be enough for Scriscrit to rise far. He padded after them on silent feet. Watching. Waiting.

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

I strongly suspected that we were going to need to insitute some kind of communal classes before our next mission, though I could appreciate it wasn't time to bring it up. The boatmen jabbered in their cant. Though agitated, they weren't immediately going for weapons, which I took to be a good sign. The language was derived from a form of proto gothic that tugged at the edge of my conciousness.

"Arg ye stande vay thak provfae?" one of them called, fingering his weapon.

"Do we stand with the prophet," Hadrian translated. Judging by the way the locals shifted when they said it, alot hung on our answer. I ran the angles quickly in my mind. There have been many times in my inglorious career in His service my back ground as a con artist has come in handy. These people had no tradition of prophets, which meant the concept was off world. Stand with suggested the drawing of lines and picking of sides. That meant they balance of probabilities meant they weren't with the off worlder.

"No," I suggested, hoping that Hadrian had been translating literally.

"Onae!" Hadrian called. The phenoms began to coalecse in my mind as I got more of a sample size. The boatmen exchanged glances, clearly afraid, though of exactly what I wasn't sure.

"Climb... we take you safe," one of the boatmen called.

"There is no way we are getting Lucius on one of those boats," I sighed.

The village was located down one of the many murky streams. Great walls of almost impenetrable mangrove rose on both sides. At times the canopy reached completely across the water, blocking out the sun like a tunnel. After an hour or so the channel opened to reveal a small island, ramparted by carefully manicured mangroves. A handful of boats were pulled up against a muddy bank. Long strings of eel like fish hung from ropes above a smoking trench. Unwashed children threw handfuls of what looked like seaweed into the trench, feeding smouldering fires within. Beyond the shore stood a cluster of huts of woven seaweed, bedecked with shells and dried flowers. Grim faced men squatted in the dirt before the huts, some had las guns, others had spears of metal or bone. Thye all stood as the boats came into view, eyes widdening as Lucius stomped through the water behing the boat, up to his neck in the brackish water but unworried. By the time we reached the village all the children were out of sight and all the men were waiting for us, weapons brandished. A grisled looking man with ritual scars on his face led them, clearly the chief.

"I hope you are ready to negotiate," I whispered to Hadrian.

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

Conspiramid

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

The valley fell slowly, slumping as though exhausted. Even so, the water it gathered was little more than a trickle, so thick with mineral salt that it glistened like spilled promethium as it glugged its way towards the southern swamps. The burials grew thicker as we approached the southern terminus, studding the rocky swale like stubble. They seemed to me almost impossibly thick, given what little I knew about the population density of the area. Perhaps the introduction of las guns had resulted in a sharp uptick in death, or perhaps the coffins were simply sturdier than they appeared. I wondered if the depth one was interned into the valley correlated somehow with status, those of low status being buried close to where they had died, with those of higher status being carried further into the blighted expanse. Perhaps the locals believed the spirits of the dead had to traverse the length of the valley to reach the next world and their chiefs got a head start.

The valley exited between gray stone peaks, greenish vegetation beginning with shocking abruptness once we cleared the rainshadow. The land fell off quickly beyond, and we were treated to a view of a hundred miles or so, though it was hazy with humidity coming up off the swamps. The Swamps was a bit of a misnomer I realized. It was closer to a system of mangroves, low muddy earth shot through with deeper channels that ran out towards the great inland sea that collected the rain water and snow melt of half a continent. I could smell it, the reek of decaying organic matter, stagnant salty water, and sulfur. It didn’t promise to be a pleasant jaunt.

We descended along a dirt track worn in the side of the mountain by generations of funeral processions. In places stones had been piled to provide crude steps, but such conveniences were few. The lower we got, the thicker the air became and the worse the smell got. By the time we reached the first gnarled mangrove trees with their thick swollen leaves, the air was a miasmic fume, thick and damp upon the skin. My calves ached terribly from the long descent. I tried to keep in shape, more to keep the amasec off my hips than for the Emperor’s glory it was true, but I wasn’t exactly used to long hikes over rough terrain. Hadrian and Lazarus showed no signs of discomfort and Clara looked like she was positively enjoying it. Selenica alone looked pained, and I took some comfort in the companionship of misery. I was about to ask what we should do next when Clara, who had been taking point with her auto gun, made a quick sharp gesture. I didn’t know what it meant, but Hadrian grabbed me and dragged me off what remained of the path, Lucius and the others following suit. We sheltered behind a vast thicket of thorny vines, its twisted knots shot through with brilliant purple flowers. For a long minute I heard nothing, then a rhythmic thumping. As we crouched I reached out and touched Lucius’ mind, calming the murderous impulses which were building there. The thumping grew louder and a dozen men and women passed us by. They were dressed in sturdy leathers, their eyes downcast. At the front of the group a young man carried one of the log coffins before him like a standard. Two other men flanked him, striking the earth with heavy staves of gnarled wood to keep the timing of their march. They all wore hoods that had been smeared red with what must have been some equivalent of ochre, not a dye, but a smeared muddy pigment caked and uneven. Feathers and bits of pearlescent material I judged to be some kind of shell festooned their clothing, clacking softly as they walked. Several of them had slung las guns, jarringly out of place with the primitive barbarity of their garb. They looked neither left nor right, simply trudging on up the path we had just descended, completely intent on their task. After ten minutes or so Clara gave a terse: “Clear.” and we emerged onto the path.

“Funeral procession,” Selenica observed. “Think there is any chance they will run across those dead mutants?” Hadrian shook his head.

“As desolate as the valley is, those mutants are probably in the cook pots of their fellows by now. If they bother cooking them at all. I assume they normally subsist on the marrow of interred bones,” he opined. My stomach turned at the idea of something eating the rotten marrow inside months old bones.

“What was with the red hoods?” Clara asked. She was in the process of taping an auspex unit to the side of her rifle, the better to find targets when the sight lines were so short.

“It is a marker,” I explained. There was an expectant silence broken by Clara who had finally finished with her tape.

“A marker of what Emm?” she prompted.

“Plague,” I told them quietly, the forest of coffins at the end of the valley suddenly making considerably more sense.

“Red hoods mean plague.”

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

The echoes of the shoot lasted a disconcertingly long time, rippling down the valley in decreasing amplitude. I whispered a silent prayer of thanks to the machine spirit of the Helix 2. That much I felt I could still do without feeling like too much of a fraud. I was impressed by my luck with the weapon so far, esspecially considering at the end of a long afternoon practicing with rifles, Clara's response had been to sigh and remind me I could always club someone with it. The big gun hissed on its suspensor field which I took for an acknowledgement. The mutant I had shot looked more or less human, if you didn't count the extra eyes on his arms neck and legs. I didn't doubt there had been additional eyes on his chest, but those had been burned to jelly by the discharge of my weapon.

"Ve mast move," I declared in my aristocratic accent, but instead of action there was a general murmer of discontent from the local guide. I turned and snapped my fingers.

"Ve are vasting daylight," I glowered, but the locals were crossing arms over chests, a few even fingering weapons. Clara had picked up on the tension and had rather nonchalantly turned so that her carbine covered our hirelings. Well Hadrian's hirelings I suppose, given that their contract was with an ersatz big game hunter who was in inquisitional custody.

"We did..." one of the porters blurted, then paused and knuckled his forehead when he saw the blaze of anger in my eyes.

"That is, yer ladyship, we signed on to hunt Carnadons, not trespass on some feral burial ground, not to fight mutants, nor tangle with no ferals what had las guns," he continued, his voice gaining conviction as he ran on and he received murmurs of approval and agreement from he fellows.

"How dare you," I snapped continuing to simulate area, "are the men of Havenos so bereft of testicles zat they are afraid of primitives and subhumans?" I made a broad sweeping gesture to encompass the valley.

"Old zuperstitions?" I scoffed. It was a masterful performance, exactly what an aristocratic huntress would do and maybe if they hadn't seen the bloody hands it might even have worked. That wasn't my purpose however. I had to make a decision because they thought I was the leader, but it was up to Hadrian as to how we played it.

Let them go. His thought came softly but clearly. We had practiced speaking mentally during out time at his estate. He was getting much better, though initially I had used much to complicated mental metaphors that left him scratching his head or laughing out loud.

"Very vell, if you are not men, you may stay and guard ze ve-hicles," I sneered, "those of us with spines will explore for a few days, zen we shall return."

I turned my back on them and Clara, Selenica and Lazarus began unloading gear from the half tracks. That would have had to be done anyway, unless we wanted to knock the wall down in order to bring the vehicles through. It would have been faster, but it would certainly mean fighting every mutant in the valley. I toed the one I had shot, his mouth lolling open to reveal black teeth filed to points. The must have been outcasts, cursed by custom or greatest need to live in this horrid place. I walked a little ways a way and made a show of scanning with a pocket auspex glass I kept in a pocket.

"Do you think they will actually stay with the vehicles?" I asked as he came close. He inclined his head and I followed his gaze. I noticed Lazarus seemed to be spending a little more time near the engine manifolds than necessary.

"He is convincing the machine spirits to run for a few minutes and then deactivate. I'll wager this lot will try to bolt the second we are out of sight," he said.

"Do you think our enemy might have an agent among them?" I asked, voicing a thought I had been mulling over for a while. We were well out of vox range of the settlement, but it was possible one or more of our local allies was a spy, either for our enemy or just freelance. There would certainly be spies back in the settlement who would be happy to get a story of what the big game hunters were up to for the price of a free drink, possibly warning the enemy that we were coming.

"They wouldn't be much of an enemy if they didn't," Hadrian said sounding very sexy and inquisitorial to my ear.

"Two days to the end of the valley, maybe one more to the dark of the moon," I mused, "we will be cutting this kind of fine."

Dark Streets - Urban Shadows

@rush99999

How can he put January in his debt?