Penny

At The Edge of The World

The chain that suspended the gem was a long one, and the diamond disappeared between my breasts as we hurried back to the camp. The moon must have been peaking through the clouds overhead affording us better light. The sentries, a pair of the surviving Prostates, lifted their crossbows, then lowered them as they saw who it was. They shared knowing looks and set their weapons down, returning to their vigil.

The next day dawned bright and clear, the sun beating down to lift steam from the rain sodden jungle in long streamers. The haunted aspect it had possessed since the rain stared appeared to have lifted also and the improvement in morale became marked when we hit a large trail, almost a road, that Beren assured us lead to Darkwater Crossing. Surprisingly the road wasn't a muddy lake, being drained by a large ditch that ran along side it and laid with timber that occasionally protruded from the reddish volcanic dirt packed atop it. To the south the ground fell away to the black river, a dark ribbon of water several hundred yards wide. It was swollen with the recent rains, up over its banks as evidenced by partially submerged trees. Dozens of craft made their way along it, most no larger than the barge Beren had commanded when I first met him, though a few were respectable vessels with one or two masts.

The city of Darkwater Crossing was a smudge of chimney smoke on the horizon, though it seemed we would be there before too much long. I looked down at the reddish mud already caking my boots.

"I do hope you are right about the baths," I complained.

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

"Any chance they are still around?" Jocasta asked, sticking her head into the tunnel that marred the wall. She pulled a lens of ground green crystal down from her sun hat and peered into the darkness. It curved away out of sight into the distance. There were odd discolourations on the wall which she took to be gundarog script. She wasn't entirely sure what the writings might signify, perhaps no more than crude grafitti.

"Every chance," Otar growled, his voice simmering with ancient racial anger. The other dwarves were simillarly exercised, knuckles white on weapons, shoulders set.

"No chance we can get back up?" Jocasta asked, swinging her lens covered eye up to the hole above them and the broken dragon at the bottom like a busted kite.

"Aye, we can probably climb..." The world lurched violently sideways. There was a rumbling crack and dust exploded from the walls of the cavern. Rocks tumbled down in an ever increasing torrent. Boulders the size of wagons crashed down, pulping the body of the dragon like great cannonballs from the sky. The dwarves moved with the same mechanical motion they had displayed in the crypt, pressing themselves into the walls. Dust billowed in great waves, washing over Jocasta a moment before Beren grabbed her around the waist and hurled her back into the dwarven tunnels. A moment before she was yanked away she got a brief glance of a familiar demonic figure in the billowing dust, a braod smile on its face.

Word association Game!

Arctic

Bodacious Bounties: Bounty Hunter AU

Jocasta set a shotglass on the edge of the table, one at each pocket. She filled them indiscriminatley with liquor from bottles, barely glancing at the labels. She shot the cuffs of her jacket and racked the balls with quick efficient motions. Small electromechanical charges in the balls adjusted their positions slightly so that they were perfectly positioned. She dropped back and took one of the ques, telescoping it out with a flick of her wrist before snagging a slice of pizza.

"I suppose we will need to bolt it to the deck if we keep it," she mused, running a hand across the edge of the table.

"Might make getting vehicles in here harder," she pondered, looking regretfully at the space where the speeder had sat. The vehicle had been sold to fund the mech purchase. The mech itself was suspended from working rig in the far corner of the hanger back, looking decidedly worse for wear after its outing. Cygi appeared against the holo projector dressed as a news anchor in a button down red blazer. A moment later the holo lit up with some clips of Neil's fight. Two men with overdeveloped physiques and ear pieces were enthusiatically breaking down the action. Cygi looked dissaproving and then vanished, reappearing a moment later to pick up a holographic copy of one of the liquor bottles and taking an imaginary pull.

"Hey," Jocasta called to Neil, snapping his fingers to draw his attention.

"We watching, or we playing?" she asked.

At The Edge of The World

I stood frozen between the two treasures, mezmerised by each for their own aspects. It was something like a trace because I couldn't pull my eyes away. I was dimly aware of a squirming sensation from the snake tattoo I had aquired back in the temple but it seemed distant and unimportant at the present moment. That I have a weakness for jewels I will not deny and to find two in such an odd arangment in the middle of a jungle was positively thrilling.

I reached out my hand, hearing the jungle go quiet all around me as though holding its breath. I leaned forward and lifted the glowing diamond from the statue. It was heavier than I thought and the sound of the silver chain on the stone idol was as loud as a violin bow in the dark. There was a sudden hissing sound as the second idol began to disolve, folding in on itself and sinking down into the forest floor. I stood amazed as it faded away, like a stain being rinsed from fine linen. The last thing to go was the red and black stone glaring malevolently at me like an eye benath the ground before finally vanishing beneath the leaf mould.

"Emmaline?" Beren called behind me and I turned suddenly to face him, the glittering jewel hanging from the chain in my fist.

"Uhhh..." I replied uncertainly.

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

“Did you just have this laying around?” I asked Hadrian as Lazarus fiddled with the seals of the Sororitas power armor. It was very impressive, grayed ceramite with gold and red highlights and intricate traceries in gold and silver. I flexed my arm, listening to the slight whir of servos as I opened and closed my fist. My hair had been treated with a platinum/white dye and then pulled back into a severe braid that coiled around the back of my skull to keep it out of the way. Clara was artfully applying a black fleur-de-lis tattoo to my right cheek to better disguise my face while my left eye was covered with a combat view finder with a red glass lens. I had to admit I looked nothing like the mopy noblewoman I had been portraying till this point.

“I try to plan for a number of contingencies,” Hadrian replied blandly. We were sitting in one of the shuttles which connected us to the Caledonia. The sturdy vehicle would supply me the privacy to change as well as a short hop across the city, hopefully bypassing any unpleasantness that might have attended a direct route.

“Sure, I bet he has one of those leather death cult outfits for you in case the ‘contingency’ arises,” Clara snickered, making bunyip ears with her fingers at the word contingency. Hadrian shot her a look that quieted her laughter, even if it didn’t quite banish it from her eyes.

“I hope at least it has been deconsecrated,” Lazarus said, slapping a hand against my chestplate as he spoke the ritual of percussive maintenance. The view finder lit up with unintelligible runes and I felt the faint rush of environmental cooling systems against the plastec body glove I was wearing underneath it.

“There is nothing more holy than the work of the Inquisition,” Hadrian countered, avoiding a direct answer. A blat of binaric from Lazarus suggested the point had not passed him over either. Lazarus withdrew a slender parchment and placed it against my left breast. He let out another string of binaric and then produced a slender gun which spurted red wax over the top of the paper. He fumbled in his robes and withdrew a chain on which a number of brass seals hung like hab keys. Finding the appropriate symbol he pressed it into the wax to create a neat seal.

“Stand,” Lazarus instructed and I complied feeling the power of the servo assist as I did so. Clara passed behind me and fastened a short cape around my shoulders before lifting an ornate bolt gun from the engraved case which had held the armor. She wafted the incense over the gun, using both hands to bear its considerable weight.
“For Terra’s sake Em, don’t try to actually fire this thing,” she cautioned as she slung the weapon over my shoulder. I lifted the weapons experimentally, finding that with the power assist it had almost no weight at all.

“Your confidence in me is touching,” I told her, earning a quirked smile.

“I’m more worried about the holes you might put in me with it if you do,” Clara retorted. I slid the strap of the weapon around to keep it in place beside my thigh.

“If I’m a Sister of Battle shouldn’t I get a flamer or something?” I asked. There was a collective wince.
“Em, we love you, but I’m giving you a bolter only under protest,” Clara said gently. Lazarus nodded vigorously and made the cogwheel sign of the Omnissiah with his hands. I rolled my eyes and tried to make a rude gesture, the extra foot of height I picked up from the armored boots banged my fist against the low ceiling of the shuttle to the considerable amusement of the party.

___

Pentecostal Rememberence proved to be several square miles in size. It was ringed by a high parapeted wall, complete with baroque gatehouses encrusted with gargoyles. In more settled times the gates were opened at certain hours to allow pilgrims access to the gardens within, assuming of course they made an appropriate donation. Now the great wooden gates were closed and armed militia men walked the walls, pikes and las guns on obvious display. I strode forward at the head of our little party. We had left a score of our escort to secure the shuttle in the alms park a few blocks away, retaining a dozen of the blue smocked Caledonian’s for show. Clara, Elektra and Hadrian formed the other three points of a diamond with me, Lazarus having been left behind to command the men at the shuttle. Partially, this was because he was a seasoned soldier and attuned to the shuttle, partially it was to ease any potential theological difficulties between the two Imperial cults.

“Approach no further!” a voice called from the wall, “This precinct is closed while the Primate is in meditation.”

“Authority is not given to you to defy the will of the Most Holy Emperor of Mankind!” I called back, touching my words slightly with my psychic gift so that they echoed off the wall despite my lack of amplification equipment.

“Open your gates or He will see them opened,” I commanded. There was a long silence and then, just as I thought they were going to call my bluff, the gateway swung open. Fraternus militia stood on the other side in a wall to block passage. They were dressed in white robes which were more than a little grubby with dirt and gun oil. Most had las guns across their chest at something like porte arms. I strode forward with absolute confidence.
“I am Sister-Palatine Eudoxia of the Order of the Eternal Rose, I have come to deliver Lord Deckard, the duly appointed Ecclesiarcical Envoy to his Holiness,” I announced, glossing over the exact source of Deckard’s appointment. The leader of the militia stared at me for a moment before his eyes hardened.

“I am afraid I cannot allow…” I struck him full across the face with my armored gauntlet. I had meant it as a chastening slap, but the servo assisted armor struck him with the force of a scumball bat. His jaw snapped shut and he was hurled into the masonry of the gatehouse with a bruising crunch before dropping to the ground in a boneless heap.

“Frak,” I heard Clara say but I raise both my hands as though appealing to the heavens, not slowing my stride.

“Alas, your brother has sinned by impeding our progress. To impede the Holy Emperor’s work, even in error is a grave sin, for does not all heresy draw its strength first from error? Pray brothers and sisters, pray that such sin does not enter your own hearts, for should you sin again, having thus seen the Emperor’s Will made clear, you will stray from the shame of error into the abyss of heresy. Fall to your knees and pray that such heresy, and such need for chastisement, should never be needed in this holy place!” I patted my bolter for emphasis on ‘chastisement’ before continuing in a resonant voice: “For to be thrice mistaken is to be thrice damned, and condemned to the fires of perdition!” I pronounced, my face upturned as though in conversation with the Emperor as I strode past. One by one the Militia fell to their knees dropping their weapons and clasping their hands in prayer. We strode past them into the gardens, my face shining with a light which wasn’t exactly holy.

“Throne above Emmaline,” Hadrian hissed through clenched, “ease up on the whammy.” I let the psychic force I had been projecting fade to a background hum, the feeling of sanctity dissipating in my companions. All of them were trembling in the aftermath of my display, despite in Hadrian and Clara’s cases, being hardened by training against it.

“For fraks sake, your face was glowing, and for a second it looked like you had wings of light,” Clara muttered, making the sign of the Aquilla in the direction of the cathedral. Elektra was staring at me wide eyed in a disturbingly reverential fashion.

“Sorry, I got a little carried away,” I explained. It was easy to do in a place like this awash with the psychic background of Faith. Clara muttered something uncomplimentary as we continued on along a winding path that lead through the gardens. Gardens was perhaps a bit of a misnomer, it was more like an ornamental forest, complete with carefully tended groves, ponds and streams. It was laid out in an elaborate spiral that pilgrims were expected to walk before approaching the baroque cathedral that rose like a needle from its heart. Now and then agricultural servitors, gilding in the forms of praying saints, trundled past intent on their tasks. We ignored the circuitous root and marched across country as it were, arriving at the gates of the cathedral in time to be greeted by a trio of robed clerics.

“Envoy Deckard, Sister-Palatine,” the leader greeted us in a colourless voice, “His Holiness is expecting you.” We were lead through a series of halls and back passages to, of all things, a bed chamber. It was dominated by a vast four poster bed in which a frail man reclined in an absurd combination of bed clothes and a primates jeweled miter. His face was lined with great age and a pair of half moon spectacles had been surgically attached to the bridge of his nose. His face had an unhealthy pallor from the several pict screens around the room, some of which showed data that was meaningless to me and some of which showed video feeds of various sermons and reports.

“Ah, the Lord Deckard of which we have heard so much so recently,” he declared in a peevish voice. I performed a genuflection, my knee thumping a little harder than desired into the plush carpeting.

“And Sister-Palatine Eudoxia, yes welcome child,” he cooed.

“I am Primate Fulstes, which of course you know, and if you are here regarding my vote…” before Fulstes could continue one of the vid feeds enlarged with the flashing emblem of the Ministorum and then faded to show an aquiline man in his late middle years.
“My children,” the man, whom I recognised from picts as Primate Hildebrand, began.
“It is with great regret that I come before you today, so soon after the Ascension of Blessed Ratsini to his eternal reward.” He had a practiced oratorical voice, honed on years of sermonizing and theological debate.

“I would not violate the period of morning so appropriate for my departed brother without the gravest of justifications and I fear, these are graver than any we have heard in many years.”

“Heresy must never be far from the mind of the faithful and we must be ever vigilant for its stench, but to watch for heresy, and to discover it in our own institutions are too very different things. Therefore it is with a heavy heart that I must tell you of treachery so base that it is difficult even for me to believe.”

“Oh frak,” Clara muttered in the background.

“I have been shown incontrovertible evidence, that the murder of Blessed Ratsini was conducted by none other than agents of the false Primate Osten Von Mandelbrot! I call on all true sons of the Emperor to subdue this false prince so he may be questioned and punished.”

“I know this truth will be difficult to accept for we held this viper to our breasts as our very brother, but should any doubt the veracity of these claims…” The pict pivoted slightly to a silk covered cushion, with a theatrical whisk the Primate pulled the silk free to reveal a familiar object, the black and silver skull of the Inquisitorial Rosette.

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

Jocasta took a live and let live attitude towards the God's. She had made her annual tithe to Aulor in exchange for residence in the university and made the occasional offering to Zjarina under the dark moon when she was trying something particularly risky or unwise. Zealots and priests of all kinds made her a little uncomfortable. No one could doubt the existance of the gods, but only a fool would attract their attention.

The dwarves gathered around the rune door, kneeling in the dust around Otar who was busily scratching runes into the dirt. Beren joined them apparently familiar with dwarven rites. Jocasta stood awkwardly, arms slick to the elbow with dragon blood. She considered wether their might be time to cut out one of the beasts venom sacks, but she gave it up as a bad bargin. It might disrespectful if she spilled a hundred pounds of dragon entrails onto the cavern floor while they were praying.

Otar stood and began to chant, calling out to his god or gods. Jocasta felt her hackles raise as something began to happen. It wasn't magic as she understood it and it was subliminally irksome that she couldn't sense what was happening. The runes began to glow as the priest prayed, his hand raised in supplication. Jocasta felt a sharp sting in the shape of the mark the demon had left on her. She gritted her teeth and stepped a little further back. Otar's voice swelled, becoming deeper and more resonanant until it seemed less like a voice and more like the grinding of stones, or the fall of water from a great height. With a booming command and a sharp guesture the dwarf sent red gold light surging up into the door, lighting the runes like lava through shallow channels. For a moment nothing happened, then there was a concussive boom that started a shower of rocks and grit down from above. A series of smaller booms began to echo and reverberate as the great door began to sink into the floor on some ancient counterweight system concealed in the wall. A sepulcral blast of dusty air errupted out into the cavern, glowing like a muzzle flash with the light of the runes.

"Behold!" Otar boomed, a touch of the gravitas of moments before lingering in his voice.

Pirates - Ye Be Warned

Jessica's finger twitched at the mention of the Map of Algorab. The hammer snapped fowrward and ignited the pan, she flicked her wrist aside in the heartbeat before the main charge went off. The musket cracked in a cloud of smoke. Galt flinched back as specks of burning power sprayed across his face. Splinters flew from the bulkhead as the musket ball buried itself in the timber with a crack. Jess took another pull of rum as one of her sailors stuck his head into the cabin to make sure she was ok. Jess arched her eyebrow at the sailor who beat a hasty retreat. Jess tossed the spent musket onto her hammock.

"The Map of Algorab?" she asked. The legend of the map was well known among the thieves and pirates of the Metramaic Sea and beyond. It's exact nature was malleable, used in stories and tall tales to add spice and adventure.

"I suppose this means that you don't actually have the map?" Jess asked, "which conviently keeps me from just taking it and throwing you over the side."

The Enemy Beyond: Warhammer 40,000 Inquisitor RP

"Surely Lord Deckard, more comfortable accommodations can be found for your wife while you undertake this scared duty?" Salavere objected. Hadrian made a brushing gesture with his hand, body language current on Gudrun but not widely spread beyond.

"You will forgive me Cleric Salavere, if given what I have seen of your security, I prefer to undertake my wife's protection myself," he spoke coldly. Salavere flushed and Osten grimaced at the rebuke implicit in the words but neither contradicted them.

"If your Excellencies will excuse us we will see about rounding up your stray Primates."

_____

"I don't like this," I told Hadrian as we headed out into the street once more. Urien's troops were deployed in rough columns to either side of us with Clara and Lazarus forming the advance party. Between weapon's master and the skitarii there seemed little chance of us blundering into anything unprotected.

"Which aspect?" Hadrian asked, "the politics, the fraternus militia, the bombing?" I shrugged my shoulders and pulled the grey cloak Clara had given me to conceal myself around me.

"All of it, none of it, I don't know," I temporized, trying to find the words to describe what I was feeling.

"Who cares who wears which pretty hat, we came here to find heretics and now we are collecting votes?" I asked. Hadrian's lips pursed slightly at my words, he knew that the time I had spent with Lucius Raj had eroded my faith in the Emperor to a degree that was best not openly voiced but for him the God Emperor and His Church remained as fixed and immovable as the stars.

"We know that the heretics had something to do with the assassination, so we pull at this thread until we learn more," Hadrian replied. He hesitated as though considering what to say next, and then went on.

"My old Master taught me that Inquisitors act like the anti-bodies of the Imperium, seeking out wrongs and corruptions of all kinds, and that in that pursuit we will inevitably find the enemies of Man at work. We will find something, trust me."

Fortune & Glory: Grimdark Pulp RP

"Where are?" Jocasta asked, climbing reluctantly out of Beren's lap and checking her own limbs to make sure nothing was broken. She peered around a vast cavern, lit only by the body of the wyrm. There was a tunnel that lead upwards, though it was much too steep for man or dwarf to climb. They had rode the avalance of debris down the tunnel that the dragon had used to reach the surface, it was a miracle that none of them had been killed in the fall and there was no likelyhood they could climb back up. Jocasta stood and walked over to the crumpled form of Martinus Morelocke lay burned and broken upon the ground. His right arm was burned to a withered stump and a smile was on his lips. Jocasta quirked a smile to realise the old man had died a dragon slayer. She walked across to the dragon and rummaged in her satchel, tossing away pieces of debris that had accumulated from the fall.

"What are you doing?" Beren asked as Jocasta produced a short knife and plunged it into the dragons body.

"Stop that!" Varin hissed, but Jocasta ignored him.

"Waste not," she replied, tongue peaking from the corner of her mouth. "Want not," she concluded as she pulled free a dragon scale and stuffed it into her pouch. She took a phial from her pouch and felt along the palid flesh below, then made another quick stroke of her knife. Brackish blood began to flow and she began collecting it in the flask.

"This would be worth a fortune back at the university," she explained, plucking away several more scales in a similar fashion.

"Look here!" Radsvir shouted, lifting a dwarven cave lantern to one of the cavern walls. It was no wall at all, but masonry fashioned in the strange fashion of the dwarves. A vast door of some dull metal was sat into it, carved with runes that reflected the lantern light.

"It's a hold door," Otar breathed in amazment, "The beast was trapped between a dwarven door and a humans curse."

"What does it say?" Jocasta called over her shoulder, still engaged in her grizzly salvage. Otar moved to the door and peered up at the runes in reverence.

"Speak friend and enter," Otar reported.

"What does that mean?" Beren asked.

"It's a riddle," Buri declared. "We just say the dwarvish word for friend and the door will open."

"Yalshi," Otar called out in a commanding voice. Nothing happened.

"Well that was a stuipd idea," Jocasta observed tartly.