Penny

Death and Desire: A Warhammer Fantasy RP

“We can hope the Sultan’s men are a messy white smear somewhere,” Calliope said grimly. Their escape from Copher had not been unnoticed, despite the fact that they had struck out to the east, rather than running west towards Lashiek and the bay of corsairs. They had seen the dust on the horizon for an hour or so before the Roc struck and had planned to slip away during the chill of the desert night. That, at least, was no longer a problem.

“What is this place?” Calliope mused, striking a light to a torch from the handful of possessions they had been able to steal before they fled the city.

“I am no scholar,” Bahadir replied.

“And here I was thinking you were a Doktor of Historaia,” Calliope snarked, though Bahadir merely looked blank at the unfamiliar Reikspeil terms.

“I have heard legends that when the Great Kings ruled across the Sands these lands were their distant satrapys,” Bahadir said and it was Calliope’s turn to run into the language barrier. Satrapy? He continued and she didn’t have to reveal her ignorance.

“When their governors displeased them, it was said they were forbidden to return to their homeland in death as well as in life, and that they were entombed in the sands of Araby forever,”” Bahadir explained. Calliope grunted noncommittally as she edged into the tunnel. She reached her hand out into the column of falling sand and felt it run over her fingers for a few moments. Edging around it they found that the tunnel had been paved with large blocks of sandstones. Columns studded the walls supporting ancient almost illegible frescos. Dust from the sand fall billowed around their feet like fog and Calliope pulled her scarf around her face to stop it from tickling her nose. They pushed down the hallway into a large room. Idols of strange and forgotten gods sat on pedestals. Some were simple wood carvings, others were laced with gold or had eyes of semiprecious stones. Calliope leaned close to one that appeared to be a woman wrapped in a large snake. This idol looked newer and was considerably curvier than the other female deities present. The figures features looked almost Imperial, and its hair was highlighted with pale yellow chalk. Calliope looked upwards and saw that the roof was covered with faux constellations picked out in verdegied bronze.

“What is it that makes you southerners so eager to die? Too many dates? Lack of decent ale?” Calliope wondered.

The Namespace of the Rose

This is genius

De Trop Disgrace: Warhammer Fantasy RP

“Eleanor. Eleanor open the door!” Emmaline struggled out of the bath she had been luxuriating in, splashing water all over the floor. She stepped out and immediately slipped on the dark wooden floor, comically pin wheeling her arms before landing on her rump in a crash.

“Lady Eleanor?! Are you ok?! Julian’s shrill voice came through the door, “are you ok.”

“Vhat are you goeng to do break down le doair?” she called back acidly as she scrambled to her feet and towleed herself off.

“What?” Jullian called back, unable to penetrate the accent through the thick timber door.

“Ould on a momon,” she called, pulling on a gown and stumbling into the main room. She turned they key and pulled the door open. Julian nearly fell into the room, all but scratching at the door. His earnest face was pale and his lips were visibly trembling. His eyes bulged at her state of relative undress and his pale face suffused with a blush so deep Emmaline worried he was about to pass out.

“Well? Why aré you breakeng down mon doair and intairrupteng mon bath?” she demanded. Julian opened and closed his mouth like a fish. Emmaline snapped her fingers repeatedly under the boy’s nose.

“Oh ahhh… men just arrived, men from my father,” he whined, all but wringing his hand. Emmaline manuvered him onto a couch and thrust a glass of schnapps into his hand. He swallowed it in a convulsive gulp then gasped as the liquor’s burn hit. Emmaline plucked the glass from his hand before he could drop it.

“Zo mén arrived from yur fathair…” Eleanor prompted, struggling to reign in her mounting frustration. Julian blinked and then seemed to return to himself.

“They are closeted with Colditz now,” he explained, “I think there is a priest with them.”

“A priest?” Eleanor asked then her eyes widened.

“Eez 'e haire to marry uz do you think?” she asked. Julian looked momentarily confused.

“I… I think he might have found out about… no, I wont let it happen!” he cried then leaped to his feet and rushed out of the room.

“Julian!” Emmaline yelled after him confused and starting to grow a little afraid. She looked down at the schnapps bottle in her hand and took a long drink, then quickly started dressing.

The screams came a half hour later once Emmaline was dressed and heading out in search of Julian. They seemed to come from the valley and what they portend Emmaline had no idea. She slipped from the room and to her surprise Colditz and his guards were no where to be found. Emmaline wasted only a few minutes to grab a few valuable items then headed for the stables, willing to take advantage of whatever breaks came her way. More screams came from the house as whe was pulling a saddle onto an expensive looking horse. There was something fell on the air and she could feel a knot of ice in her stomach. The need to get away from this place was a desperate throbbing thing. The buckles were just about in place when a hand fell on her shoulder. Emmaline screamed and tried to twist away but the fingers gripped like iron. She was whirled around and found herself face to face with Colditz. Or what was left of his face. Great bloody rents had been torn in it with what looked like claws and his palor was cold and dead. Witchfires burned in his eyes and though he had not yet the grey color of the grave the stink of dark sorcery poured off the cadaver. Other horrors, older fleshless skeletons stained with graveyard earth and moss joineed Colditz, hemming her in. Screaming she was dragged infront of the manor.

“It is ok Eleanor, it will be ok!” Julian was shouting, his eyes wide and wide with shock. Emmaline could pick out burst blood vessels in his face and dark magic coiled around him.

“I learned this at university, I know it looks bad but I promise I’ll keep you safe… I’ll let you….” he trailed off shooting her an agonized look as he realised that if he let her, or anyone else go the truth of what he was would get out. He was a necromancer. A wizard who tampered with the forces of life and death and was forever damned by the poison of dark magic.

“Look I’ll think of something,” he promised. One of the chambermaids stumbled from the manor and was struck down by a skeleton with a scythe. Julian whimpered then muttered something, the maid rose jerkily to join a growing perimeter around the house.

"Julian! Julian! You have to let me go!" Emmaline shrieked, momentarily forgetting her accent.

“I’ll think of something,” Julian promised as the zombie of Colditz dragged Emmaline screaming into the house.

Heroes of The Guard: A Warhammer 40K RP

“Why are you not training with the rest of your platoon Corporal?” Commissar Sobek seemed to appear from nowhere as Sel rounded a corner. She had her first pocket full of credits from the blackmarket deal and managed to avoid jumping out of her skin only by dint of the fact that this was the third such ambush in the two weeks since the fight. She still flinched but no guardsmen was so pure that the sudden appearance of a Commissar wouldn’t unsettle them.

“Sir!” Sel replied, stiffening to something like attention but not attempting a salute. The distant thump of boots on deck plates told her that the platoon was running the assault course in a nearby hold. Distant strains of cadence song echoed through the cavernous steel haulways.

“You ask my why I’m a guardsman,
Ask me why I sleep in a ditch,
It isn’t so much that I’m stupid,
It is just I don’t want to be rich.”

Sel brought her heart rate under control and straightened up, trying to ignore the roll of credit notes in her pocket which suddenly weighed about a thousand pounds. Sobek glared at her, eyebrow arched, awaiting explanation.

“It isn’t my unit Sir,” she explained, “I’m temporarily attached…”

“As a driver, yes I know,” Sobek interrupted. “So I can expect to see you training with your… sentinel pilots?” The words sounded like a curse. Sel ran her hand through her hair and affected an air of confusion.

“You’d have to ask Lieutenant Caradwalden sir, I’m supposed to be at his disposal,” Sel replied. Sobek glowered at her, his lip curling in contempt at the mention of Kayden’s name.

“Perhaps I should speak with him regarding finding you some duties?” Sobek suggested.

“Sir,” Sel responded, neither agreeing or disagreeing, while politely suggesting he get the frak on with. Sobek glared at her for a moment longer, balked by the lack of engagement, then stepped out of her way.

“Continue with… whatever it is you are doing Corporal Seldon,” Sobek ordered. Sel considered it a very bad sign that a member of the Commisariat knew her name but she merely clicked her ankles together and headed off down the oily smelling corridor. She turned a corner towards Kayden’s office and paused. Her eyes caught a flicker of movement in the shadows ahead. It might be rats, but her hive instincts found it easier to believe that a couple of Langeroth troopers with pipe wrenches or entrenching tools. Had Sobek been deliberately holding her in place while they got in position. It seemed far fetched but Sel hadn’t survived these past five years by taking an unnecessarily rosy view of the situation. There had been several fights already, jostling in mess lines, collisions in the showers, that kind of thing. Sel felt a sudden conviction that she should look in on her unit. She turned left and jogged down the hall. This was going to come to killing before the voyage was out or she was a Catachan.

Wealth and Warpstorms

Camilla led the way up the side of the depression, pulling down dust goggles and wrapping her face with a sand scarf before they reached the scouring winds at the top of the ravine. The desert stretched out before them, painted in a beautiful variety of earth tones which were kept eternally sharp by the low intensity storm of airborne grit. The sun was going down but there brillian moons were coming up to replace it, the illumination becoming both more diffuse and brighter as a result, seeming to cool the color tones.

"Yvrine already swept up here with auspex," Camilla half shouted as Alcander joined her, pulling the collar of his duster high in imperfect protection. His own personal unit was out and scanning but his keen eyes were sweeping the area as aggresively as the electronics.

"Maybe shae missed soomthin," he called, pointing to a beeping reading on his own handheld unit.

Tricksters and Theives: A Warhammer RP

One of the things that Emmaline had always loved about Altdorf is that it never slept. Even as the hour moved towards midnight the streets of the upper city still bustled with rowdy celebrants staggering from tavern to tavern. Students still gathered in the platz and shouted at each other in drunken debates. Pie sellers and street vendors still hawked their wares at the street corners with well practiced cries. Whores called out promises of exstacy from balconies and knockingshop doors. The fog gave all this a very strange aura, refracting voices and seeming to materialize people a few feet ahead and vanish them a few feet behind. Emmaline was sure that Altdorf's legion pickpockets was making full use of the unusual conditions as they approached the Tower of Blackhaven.

"They call that an iron works?" Neil whispered derisievly. The street droped closer to the Reik here, houses and shops giving way to a network of armorers, blacksmiths, swordsmiths, coopers, farriers, gunsmiths and bell founders which lay along this portion of the Reik. By ordanance of the city, these had to stop work after sundown so that the clamor of their anvils would not keep half the city awake. Smoke still drifted from the brick chimneys of many, as most artisans chose to keep the fires low rather than let them go out entirely. The paving here was new and fitted together so tightly a knife blade could not be passed between any two stones. This was a result of the numerous dwarves who lived in this quater. They had grown so frustrated with the work of 'manlings' and the constant delays caused by wagon breakdowns that they had clubbed together to create what the locals jokingly called 'Backfire Pass' owing to the fact that the good road led to twice as many wagons thronging it and actually making the conjestion worse.

"How will we get the boys back to the farms once they have seen Nuln," Emmaline joked as she lead the way through the back alleys towards the distant shape of Blackhaven. The tower had once been a turent in one of the earlier citywalls that had long since been swallowed by Altdorf's growth. It had partially collapsed as a result of people scavenging for stones but had been saved by a wizard who had moved in and constructed a private Tower. The job had been done with more enthusiasm than skill, so that a rickety series of half timbered floors had been piled ontop of the original tower until it nearly trebled in height. A great iron chimeny ran from the top of the old stonework to the peak of the tower carrying the smoke from several floors up beyond the conical tile roof.

"Looks like it might come down at any minute," Neil opined as he gazed at it skeptically across the empty courtyard that surrounded it. A wrought iron fence sectioned off some wild looking gardens that were overgrown and forboding in the fog.

"That is a cheery thought," Emmaline agreed, still slightly bugged from the Bugmans. She crossed quickly to the fence but laid a restraining hand on Neil's shoulder when he made to vault it. Emmaline muttered several syllables and then pulled two of the bars appart as though parting branches.

"Neat trick," Neil observed as he followed her through. It was always better to pass through barriers rather than break them when it came to magic. Much less chance of setting off countermeasures.

"You aren't the only thing that is putty in my hands," she assured him as they reached the base of the Tower. Neil laid a hand on the heavy fieldstone and mortar construction.

"Do you have a way through this?" he asked. Emmaline pointed towards a window several stories above.

"I'll stay here and keep watch, you can lower a rope to me when it is safe," she said sweetly.

Death and Desire: A Warhammer Fantasy RP

Long they strove with axe and sword
with might blows and corteous word
Comrades through blood and danger passed
To battle now til one breathed their last
Of such feats the bards do sing
such beauty in the axes swing
and poetry of knife and sword
that would the very god's have awed.

The sand which drank the oceans tears
shook with lusty blood mad cheers.
And though the lusty mamba led the dance
the Namir not from his purpose glanced
and ruse or trick could from fury take
the brutal blows that axe did rake
Until with tears of anguish in his eyes
Tiger smote the snake no more to rise

~Araybian Folk Song

The guards carried Calliope from the field, her limp body hanging between them. Blood soaked the front of her tunic in such volume that there could be no doubt she was dead, even if several thousand people hadn't watched Bahadir's axe hit her cleanly between the breasts. The crowd was roaring, some of them chanting Bahadir's name, others bemoaning the fortunes they had lost by wagering on the pirate. The guards themselves were muttering about this very thing as they hurled her body off a stone dock into the back of the corpse cart which waited, already loaded with bodies, to be driven out into the desert to dump the carrior for jackals and buzzards to dispose of.

_______________________

"This is the man," the vizier declared pointing at Bahadir through the bars of his cell. There was dissapointment in his eyes for he would have much prefered to butcher the pirate, but so long as she was dead it made little difference to him. Bahadir backed up in his cell as two mamlukes with pikes stepped forward, meaning to skewer him where he stood. Unfortunately the cell was large enough that if the slave kept himself pressed against the back wall, they couldn't quite reach him.

"Don't be tedious," the vizier sneered, "try to die with some dignity slave."

"Maybe an example would help?" someone whispered in his ear. THe vizier half turned an arm locked around his head and he felt naked steel at his throat. From the corner of his eye he caught sight of Calliope and trembeled, momentarily beliving her to be a vengeful ghost.

"By Allah how..."

Calliope could have told him. She could have explained how she had kept the wineskin from the previous night, how she had patiently kept her wound flowing so that she could collect blood and mix it with the wine. She could have told him how she had placed the blood filled flask between her breasts before the fight, perhaps even explained how Bahadir had deliberately struck her just so, so that the wineskin would burst and she would appear to be slain. She might even have told him how she hid under the pile of corpses until dark, then stole a dagger. Why she had come back at all was harder for her to explain, though perhaps a promise to a ship mate, even the piss poor ships they made here, was worth something. She explained none of this, instead before he could speak another word she raked the blade across his throat so hard she felt it grind on bone. The vizier made a noiseless bubbling scream, his wind pipe no longer reaching his vocal cords. Calliope shoved him into the one of the guards, who staggered aside cursing. The other tried to withdraw his pike from the bars, only to have Bahadir snatch the weapon free, then drive the butt end into the soliders stomach. Calliope cut both their throats before they could recover themselves enough to scream. Blood was already pooling on the floor. Calliope took the key from the nearest guard and opened the cell.

"There is a cart filled with deadmen waiting to take us out of the city, and I think I've seen enough of its delights for the time being."

Heroes of The Guard: A Warhammer 40K RP

Sel caught up with Kolcek as he paused to try to decipher a crudely marked plackard which directed the troops around the mazelike internal compartments of the ship. They were all still new enough to the ship that unfamiliar areas, like officers country, could throw them. Kolcek glanced at her a little warily.

"Let's have a chat," she suggested, propeling the trooper into a side compartment by force of presence. Kolcek wasn't scared exactly but he wore the instinctive blank face that private soldiers had learned to turn on NCO's since before humans ever left Terra.

"The gun, where did you get it," she demanded, glancing down the hallway to make sure there was no chance of being overheard. Koleck looked around evasively, his eyes falling on arcane pipes and fuse boxes covered in Mechanicus prayer slips.

"Just... you know battlefield salvage," Kolcek answered, not at all convincingly. He had every appearance of a man whose lover is about to find him in bed with her sister.

"Kolcek, this is clearly an officer sidearm and it is brand new, do you know how I know?" Sel asked mildly.

"H..how?" Kolcek asked.

"Because I am not a frakking idiot!" Sel snapped tapping Kolcek three times on the head with the barrel of the unloaded gun.

"They'll kill me, Emperor's teeth Corporal I ..."

"They?" Sel interjected, "That is a promising start."

_____

E Company's billet was several decks down, close to the small Adeptus Mechanicus shrine which the regiments few actual Tech priests had claimed, or been granted some arcane visitors rights too. Many among the engineers were partiall to the cog boys and their strange rituals, a few even wore the hollow cog medallions of lay members. They were billted on a vehicle deck which dwarfed the present need, stretching so far away that the far walls were lost in the gloom, the luminators beyond the immediate are having been turned off to conserve power. A small island of human activity remained, centered around the scores of vehicles that the 2nd and perhaps some other regiments had embarked but the gloom beyond gave Sel an uncomfortable feeling that something hostile lurked just beyond reach. Old hive world instincts prickled and made her more queasy even then the smell of hot welding torches or the screaming whine of cutting tools at work on metal. Seargent Greer proved easy to find. He was sitting with a few of his men beside a flaming barrel filled with gravel and prometheum. There was a bottle being passed around but it vanished as Sel approached.

"You lost corporal?" he called in a nasal voice which put Sel in mind of a more than usually mean sump rat. Sel shook her head, coming to the edge of the firelight. Greer's face reinforced her impression, pinched and hungry looking it had been burned in the past by a flamer so that his right side had the look of a candle which had been held briefly to a hot griddle. The eye on that side was a crude augmetic which blazed in the firelight. He and his crew were some mean looking bastards no mistake.

"No, come to see a man about a gun," she told him. An icy chill went through her guts as the laughter and conversation ceased. Greer himself lifted a partially finished lho stick and tossed it into the barrel.

"Reckon that if your not lost coporal, you should get lost," he said with dangerous calm. There was a sound of wood scraping on the deck plates as several men stood up, clearly willing to enforce the order if she didn't obey.

"Trooper Kolcek told me that if I wanted a gun, you were the man to see," she tried with bright innocence.

"Trooper Kolcek better watch his step the next time he is walking alone, and you... well you are already alone aren't you?" Greer grinned. A man burst from the shadows, a pry bar cocked to strike. Sel whipped the pistol from her pocket and shove it into the man's eye, almost blacking out with pain from the sudden movement as it agravated her wound. The whole scene froze comically, Sel's stolen pistol a foot from the chest of her would be attacker, Greer and his mean stopped in their tracks.

"He better," Sel replied, struggling to keep her voice level through fear and pain.

"Because if he falls down a shaft one dark night, that note I put in his file will go to Commissar Sobek and who knows what might happen? Come to think of it I better watch out too, no telling who might hear what if I were to turn out to be terminally unlucky?" There was a diffuse growl of anger and Greer's features twisted with fury for a moment before resolving into cruel amusement.

"What is this, just wanted to take a look before you turn us over to your commissariat buddies?" Greer demanded. Sel felt a rush of relief that made her giddy as she realised they werent just going to kill her and take her chances.

"You know, that is the second time this week someone has accused me of being a Commisariat agent," she replied, lowering the pistol and thrusting it into her belt.

"I might almost feel offended, but as it happens, I want in."

____

"So how does it work, must be pretty slick to avoid all the Munitorum bean counters?" Sel asked as she took a mouthful of the joyliq that had been offered to her. Greer puffed on a fresh lho stick, blowing the acrid smoke out through his nose like a dragon of legend. Both the liquor and the smokes were of higher quality than was usually found in the regiment, which confirmed Sel's impression that there was money to be made on the black market.

"Well..." he began, his desire to keep secrets warring with his desire to show how very clever he was. It was a one sided battle, the Emperor save her from idiot men.

"We got a way of forging requisitions see, so we just ask for what we want, few extra crates arrive and they are delivered to my boys, once we get it, we take the stuff, pack them expendibles, smoke cyclinders, expended las packs, stuff like that, then send them back claiming there was delivery mistake. No one gets wise because we swap out orders with other legitimate cargos, maybe some administratum drone is looking, but if we do it just before we ship out some place, theyd have to chase us through time and space to actually check up on it, and once they get here..." Greer trailed of in a snicker, placing two hand across his chest in the sign of the Aquilla.

"We sent it back as soon as we saw the problem y'honor," he mocked, playing the part of a piebald innocent protesting in confusion and dismay. Sel had to admit that as fiddles went it was pretty smart. Nothing came out of regimental stores, because it wasn't supposed to be there in the first place. How he was forging requistions was a more interesting question, blackmail likely, or another conspirator. It also meant that Greer wasn't really harming the regiment, it wasn't as though he were stealing food or ammunition that anyone would likely need, and she knew for a fact that guardsmen would pay for extras. Food, weapons, gear, any little extra that might make the difference between life and death, or might be traded to an enterprising local girl who would make life a little more worth living.

"Alright, so deal me in," Sel demanded, "ten percent cut." Greer sucked at his teeth, glancing at her sideways and considering how much cheaper it might be just to have her killed.

"A ten percent fee for you silence? he demanded. Sel laughed and took some more liquor.

"No ten percent fee on top of the ten percent for silence," she demanded. Greer's eyes widened in horror at this naked greed.

"What that other ten percent buys you is access to F companies requisitions," she hurriedly explained. Greer gave her a long look.

"Your B company arent you?" he demanded. Sel turned her collar inside out to show her scout insignia. The scouts were part of F company and so was she even if she was on secondment.

"F company is logistics, so they can get anything and no one bats and eye, it is going to look suspicious if a bunch of Engineers start ordering say pharma, or tech, but no one is going to bat an eye at the confusing mix of shit F has to order. You got so many specalties jammed together there, medical, scouts, training, everything."

Greer's eyes widened as understanding went through him then settled into a greedy smile as he calculated how much more he could get for such exotic items. The answer obviously pleased him and he clapped her on the back.

"It is a deal, but don't be having no real accidents before we get to the sharp end," he warned her.

"Glad to hear it," Sel gritted, the blow to her back making her wound throb in a way she hoped wasn't an omen of disaster to come.

Penny's Pencils

Heroes of The Guard: A Warhammer 40K RP

"Throne of Terra Kolcek were you born an idiot or did you do a rotation after basic!" Sel exploded once she was sure the commissar was out of earshot. Her back and ribs throbbed mightily and though she was aware that she was lucky to be breathing at all, that knowledge did little to cool her temper. Kolcek grimaced and gave her a rather sheepish look. Bad enough to get caught with a weapon that should have been in lockup, but he could have easily said he dropped the damn thing and it went off. Sobek had been temporarily molifed perhaps, by the Lieutenant's heroics and so he might get off with stoppage of liquor and extra watches, but he might just as easily have been shot for admitting to shooting her.

"Uhhh... thank you sir," Sel said turning to nod her thanks to Kayden. It wasn't that he ever stopped acting like an Aristo, it was just that it seemed to flip between useful and dangerous with alarming regularity. Never the less, with her record and without the protection of a scout company commander a sentinel pilot could expect to be on the shit list from the Commissariat plenty without actually getting involved in brawls. She rubbed her eye and grimaced, she was developing a spectacular shiner where that Langeroth fraker had clocked her while she was still waking up.

"How did the fighting start Kolcek," Kayden asked after giving Sel a quick nod. Kolcek shrugged still smiling the same idot smile that Boffin was wearing.

"Those Langercocks came in and started throwing their weight around, saying that seeing we spent our last tour polishing our balls while they were really fighting. Said we didn't deserve such good quaters if we weren't actually going to fight. Some of the boy started talking about taking out those roks ourselves and how it was better than beating up on a few rebels...."

"... and it escalated from there," Sel finished. Simple resentments like this could escalate quickly, esspecially if they were emboldened by a Commissar like Sobek who might be looking for an excuse to unite his own men at the expense of other.