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The Valkyrie bucked hard in the crosswinds, warning runes screaming across the cockpit bulkhead. MASON heard the pilots arguing over the vox—too much flak, too much turbulence, too much everything. “Ghost Lead, negative drop. Repeat, negative drop,” the pilot barked. “You jump now, you die before the chute arms.” MASON keyed his helm mic. “Open the ramp.” “Absolutely not—” He didn’t wait. Manual override hissed beneath his hand. The ramp locks clanked. Red light still burning overhead. SPECTRE looked at him once. Just once. “Go,” he said. She walked past the panic-stricken crew chief, the green light still stubbornly dark, and dove into the storm. The pilot shrieked over the vox, “What the—?! We are not cleared for—” MASON cut the channel. “Vultures,” he said, “follow your Lead.” They did. The sky swallowed them whole. Wind shredded their descent patterns; flak lit the clouds below with ugly veins of orange. Grav-chutes bucked and snarled. This was a bad drop—one of the worst. Perfect. Their quarry wouldn’t expect anyone insane enough to follow him through this. MASON hit last, knees slamming into broken concrete, breath ripping from his lungs. He rose fast, scanning— A body lay on the street. A rag-wrapped, skeletal hive vagrant, the kind who slept wherever the ash didn’t choke him. Throat severed in a clean line. SPECTRE hadn’t waited. She’d cleared the witness the moment she hit dirt. MASON didn’t waste breath mourning the bastard. Wrong corner, wrong hour. The hive ate people like him every night. “Red Hours,” he murmured to the squad, and they fanned out, shadows seeking deeper shadow.

THE 164TH: Team Dossier AQUILON TEMPESTOR MASON Role: Squad Lead Weapons: Hotshot Lascarbine and a Tempestus Dagger MASON never traded up for the traditional officer’s pistol and sabre. He sticks with the same lascarbine he’s carried since his first drop, and the squad trusts him for that. He keeps a sealed relic-vial of Armageddon ash under his chestplate—grainy grey dirt Yarrick himself once trod on. MASON’s leadership style is brutally simple: “land hard, move fast, die later.” He handpicked every member of the 164th Ash Vultures after a disastrous, op that killed 80% of his previous squad at Hive Secundus. Since then, he’s shown an almost religious intolerance for incompetence and an equally religious patience for trauma. AQUILON TROOPER VESPER Role: Rifleman Weapons: Hotshot Lascarbine and a Tempestus Dagger VESPER refuses every promotion thrown at him, convinced dying starts the moment you get noticed. He blends into any formation like smoke—quiet, unobtrusive, impossible to remember until everything’s already gone to hell. Among the Ash Vultures, VESPER is the steady center. Nobody knows how old he is, but his instincts in a firefight are flawless. He and MASON share a long, unspoken history from the early Harakoni days, something involving a failed drop and a crashed Valkyrie whose crew didn’t make it. AQUILON TROOPER ECHO Role: Rifleman Weapons: Hotshot Lascarbine and a Tempestus Dagger ECHO claims her memories were wiped, that she once fought alongside silver-armoured warriors carrying halberds. The others laugh it off—mostly to hide that they believe she might be right. She’s brilliant at pattern analysis and movement prediction, often calling threats seconds before they appear. Off-mission she watches the sky like something’s going to come back for her. AQUILON TROOPER THORN Role: Rifleman Weapons: Hotshot Lascarbine and a Tempestus Dagger The sole non-Harakoni in the team, THORN survived an Ork overrunning of his Steel Legion company by sheer stubborn refusal to die. MASON dragged him into the Ash Vultures not out of pity but respect: THORN kept firing long after his gas mask cracked and his squad was gone. The others treat him like a younger cousin—respectful but merciless in hazing. THORN takes it in stride, absorbing Harakoni doctrine with frightening speed. AQUILON GRENADIER KILN Role: Demolitions Weapons: Hotshot Laspistol, Melta Bombs and a Tempestus Dagger KILN is a walking arsenal. He carries more grenade varieties than most supply officers have manifest slips for. His favorites are a pair of Krak Grenades, sizes for an Astartes. They came from a trade with a Black Templar neophyte; the reliquary he gave away in return almost certainly wasn’t authentic, but no one questions it. KILN treats explosives like fine wines—classified by vintage, flavour, and ideal occasion. AQUILON GUNFIGHTER SABLE Role: Dual-Pistol Specialist Weapons: 2× Hotshot Laspistols and a Tempestus Dagger SABLE solves problems with gunfire and is annoyed when other solutions work. Her reputation for dead spouses follows her around; the squad jokes she marries for fun and “widows” for stress relief. She and VESPER have an odd sibling rivalry: he avoids notice, she demands it. On missions, their paired advance is devastating. AQUILON GUNNER HEMLOCK Role: Melta Support Weapons: Melta Carbine and a Tempestus Dagger HEMLOCK hides his intelligence behind a slackjaw façade. In truth he’s a meticulous thinker, designing a wargame about grot submarines and Ork naval tactics. He’s terrified the others will find out—not because they’ll laugh, but because they’ll ask to play. In battle, HEMLOCK’s melta work is clinical. Anything that needs to stop existing, he deletes. AQUILON GUNNER PRAXIS Role: Plasma Support Weapons: Plasma Carbine and a Tempestus Dagger PRAXIS was raised to be a dentist, then discovered he hated teeth and loved falling out of aircraft. He took to plasma like an addict to his vice: he knows it’s killing him a little at a time, but Throne does it feel righteous. He and HEMLOCK often run paired deep-strike insertions—one melts armour, one melts everything inside it. AQUILON MARKSMAN TANGENT Role: Sniper Weapons: Hotshot Long-Las and a Tempestus Dagger TANGENT’s auditory implant plays constant choirs whenever it detects blasphemy. Given the Imperium’s general level of profanity, she’s lived in a private cathedral for four straight years. Her silence unnerves new recruits, but the Vultures consider it comforting. If TANGENT is listening to what you have to say, it means you’re not damned… yet. AQUILON PRECURSOR SPECTRE Role: Pathfinder/Forward Drop Weapons: Hotshot Laspistol and a Tempestus Dagger Youngest in the squad, SPECTRE hates aircraft with a religious intensity and prefers to free-fall whenever regulations allow. First down, first gone, he marks drop zones with burning white phosphorus—his way of telling the enemy the sky belongs to the Ash Vultures. He hero-worships MASON and distrusts ECHO, claiming ECHO “falls like she’s being watched.” SERVO-SENTRY ARGONAUT Role: Automated Support Weapons: Hotshot Volley Gun and a Tempestus Dagger The regimental Enginseer insists ARGONAUT is a standard-pattern servo-sentry. The 164th insists he’s the reassembled skull of Trooper Argus Naught, whose grav-chute failed and who crushed an Ork Big Mek on impact. The team issued the Servo-Sentry with a Tempestus Dagger, and while no one has ever seen the servitor draw the weapon (or wonder how such a miracle could occur), they find its mere presence comforting.

Ordo Maledictum: 164th Detachment "Ash Vultures" Affiliation: Ordo Maledictum Role: Rapid Retrieval and Purification Unit Doctrine: Grav-chute insertions into rift-proximate warzones to recover warp-tainted artifacts, terminate psy-reactive entities, or destroy evidence of corruption. Motto: “By any means necessary.” Symbol: A black shoulder pad or knee guard bearing a red Inquisitorial “I” pierced by a downward silver sword — the blade representing “containment from above.” Uniform: • Fatigues: Smoke-grey and dust-tan mix, worn and scorched. • Carapace Armor: faded olive. • Markings: Red wiring, faded purity seals, patches of melted paint. Lore: Once part of the Harakoni Warhawks, the 164th were deployed for 11 years on the planet Armageddon. 16 months after the fall of Cadia, the 164th were transferred to the Vigilus Sector. Officially “lost during transit,” they were instead redirected for special duties: retrieval of warp-tainted relics, purging of psychic outbreaks, and sterilization of contaminated outposts, by the Ordo Maledictum. The Ordo Maledictum emerged after the birth of the Great Rift, and were given a near impossible task: Close the Great Rift. The 164th operate without backup, without oversight, and without limits. Each Grav Chute descent is a death sentence delayed by discipline. They’ve fought daemons, foul xenos, cultists, rogue Guardsmen, and even loyalist Astartes who impede the Ordos mission to save the Imperium of Mankind. The 164th's orders are simple: Save Humanity from Chaos... by any means necessary.