[DH1e] The Damocles Contingency (RPG IC)

[Lysimachus]

Reynard:

 

Reynard gave Falk a tired, grateful smile, but refused the lho-stick. He had a pack in his pocket, but they were there purely to ease business transactions with those who did smoke. Over the years, he'd occasionally had to earn a few Thrones pushing narcotics of one kind or another, but he'd quickly realised they were all a mug's game.

 

He looked around at the group. Moving over to Nicios, while trying not to look, he offered his long coat to cover the smaller man's nakedness.

 

"Well fought, Nicios. I don't know if that medikit survived, but perhaps when you have had a breather, you could take a look at our zealous comrade? He endures it with typical stoicism, but I fear the Warden did him some serious damage."

 

With that, Reynard found an empty spot on the floor and sat down. He pulled out his bolt pistols to check them over after their first firing in anger, and to swap out the partially expended clips for the full ones from his belt. Always better to reload when you had a quiet moment, rather than risk running dry at a noisy one.

 

Of course, he hoped that this would be a needless precaution.

 

 

[Mazer Rackham]

The Cleansed Control Room:

 

DAMOCLES CONTINGENCY IN: 100 MINS

 

The wait is interminable, the heat making it worse. Minutes grind on until more than half an hour passes. Temperature gauges steadily decline, as the roiling heat vents through the ducts. Surfaces come to an acceptable level on which to walk without boots melting or flash welding to the deck. When the air pumps kick in, a torrent of gas-chilled air billows into the room, bringing a fresh tingling sensation to exposed skin, the argentium-particulate a mild irritation to the eyes, but a ritual banishment to lingering clades of impurity or rust-rot.

 

The bunker doors open, leaving the way clear to begin the ascent to whence you came in the inspection lift.

 

For whatever reason, the emergency lines are cut - likely a result of the Golem's tampering with mechanisms and relays to draw power and retain control.

 

You are in limbo - not knowing if your message got out, still under the threat of an orbital bombardment, buried under a mountain of rockrete and adamantium.

 

There is one certainty, though. Everything stinks of burnt metal.

 

GM: Lads, you can just narrate your way to the lift now, and even getting in, and beginning your ascent. I'll give it until tonight/tomorrow morning, then take over and move us on.

 

EDIT: GM: I'll add a bit of direction here. Anyone can operate the lift, and you can even override the speed to make it go faster - however, this will increase the risk of the ascent motors burning out unless you drop some weight. The more weight you drop, the less the motors are taxed. The travel time is one hour. I will shave 1 minute per Kilo of weight you drop to a maximum of 20 minutes/20 Kilos.

 

Edited August 2, 2023 by Mazer Rackham
Lift instructions.

[Necronaut]

Scourge:

 

Once the howling, aetherial gale had subsided, and his vision had returned, Scourge dragged himself to his feet, surprised to find himself largely intact, if only slightly worse for wear. Whilst the others worked at the command terminal, he moved to retrieve his dented helm and boltgun and prepared to depart to reunite with their master. But this was not to be: Hive Primus's nucleonic stack was in danger of reducing the entire structure to slag and ash unless extreme measures were taken. He ran back over to the terminal where the others were huddled and he knelt beside them, head bowed in prayer beseeching the God-Emperor for protection as the energy shields flickered to life.

Edited August 2, 2023 by Necronaut

[Lysimachus]

Reynard:

 

Spoiler

Reynard will drop:
Carapace Chest Plate 7kg (oof, that was expensive and it didn't get used once!!! )
Frag Grenade 0.5kg
Cartograph 0.5kg
1 (Empty) Bolt Clip 0.35
1 (Empty) Las Clip 0.175

for a total of approx 8.5kg = 8.5 minutes increased speed.

 

Reynard pulled off the heavy breastplate and dumped it on the deck. He placed his last frag grenade - jammed by the Golem's witchery - more carefully beside it, along with a few other items including the cartograph of Hive Primus. If they got out in time, he was already planning to leave Damocles and never come back!

 

As the lift started to move upwards, Reynard wondered if they were safe yet. Had Falk's message of their success gotten through? Had the old man's 'Contingency' been stopped? He certainly hoped so.

 

Even if the message had not been sent, surely the authorities in the Hive and in orbit must have noted the sudden spike in reactor power, followed by the sudden release of excess energy? Reynard could only imagine that the vast plume of white-hot plasma escaping the vent shaft must have been visible on bloody Terra itself! If nothing else, surely that would have given Locke reason enough to pause his countdown?

 

Besides, if a non-psyker like Reynard could feel the difference in the air now that the Golem was gone - somehow lighter, cleaner, less oppressive… even here in darkness and filth and under billions of tons of plascrete - then wouldn't Lady Gwynne and all her kind also know in their bones that Damocles had been freed? Perhaps they had even felt it the moment Scourge's hammer ended the vile daemonic cube?

 

Ended it.

 

The thought stuck in Reynard's mind, and he found himself pondering, staring out into the blackness that deepened beneath the lift car.

 

 

Edited August 2, 2023 by Lysimachus

[A.T.]

Falk

 

The field fell, the golem and its minions gone without trace save for a shimering golen tracery where Aldario had died - the casing holocameo forever fused to this place by the fury of the plasma vents.

 

His shield, left outside of the protective bubble, was warped beyond use. A quick weapons check revealed that the illicit handcannon he had carried had not survived the earlier witchcraft but his vox-legi proved more stubbornly resistant to such things.

 

The recaf had somewhat eased his mind though, while they could not know if they returned to the surface to gaze upon the life or death of this world the spread had been contained. There would be no prize here for the enemies of mankind.

 

 

Dropping for starters - shield(5kg), modified handcannon(4kg), two grenades(1kg)

[Lord_Ikka]

Nicios

As Nicios had no weight to drop, he simply stood in the lift. He did use his powers to heal some of his comrades' wounds. 

Spoiler

Manifest Psychic Power (Healer)

Threshold - 7

Rolls (Nicios automatically passes with a 1, just need to roll for phenomena) - 8, 4, 6, 7, 2

Results = Heal the following ampunt of Wounds: 

Scourge - 5

Restal - 3

Bardas - 5

Reynard - 2

Falk - 2

 

[Necronaut]

Scourge:

 

He stayed on his knees praying to the Master of Mankind all throughout the interminable period of waiting through the blast furnace conditions. Sweat ran down his brow and into his beard in rivulets and he squeezed his eyes shut against the perspiration, daring not to break his concentration, while his right hand grasped Hywelesbane's haft. Eventually the brutal heat subsided, and normalcy began to return to the tabernacle, but the interior was a heat-blasted wreck. No matter, they were soon to be quit of the den of evil, and the careful ministrations of Bardas had cleansed the chamber in the holy fires of the Omnissiah, cauterising the horrific wound inflicted by the Golem.

 

+++

 

Time was running short, and they hurried back to the decrepit lift to start their ascent, their return journey to the hive proper, unable to know when or if the Exterminatus fleet in orbit over Damocles were to deliver the gift of annihilation. His compatriots were stripping off their excess equipment in hope of shaving off precious seconds or minutes from their transit time and Scourge wordlessly joined them, unclasping his heavy leather belt where his old and worn laspistol and dagger had resided for decades, letting them fall to the floor at his feet with an unceremonious clunk. He looked about his person for other trinkets he might drop and found himself coming up short: the suit of power armour, boltgun and daemon-hammer were without price, each ordained by the various powers which claimed fealty to the Church and Golden Throne, each a holy relic which could not be left to rot in the darkness of the underworld. He could no more abandon them than he could hack off one of his limbs. Somewhat embarrassed he stepped into the lift alongside his allies and waited for it to begin its journey upward. 

 

As the elevator shuddered to life his eyes widened in realisation and he removed his battered casque which had been given to him by his father as a young man preparing to join the God-Emperor's armies in the night sky. He looked thoughtfully at the steel helm, where it had been scarred and dented by the various wars he had fought in, where it had recently been spot-welded and patched after Cutter's aircraft had been sabotaged and destroyed. He traced his fingers over the network of dings and gouges in the metal, over the pattern of slits and circular openings in the visor that had been his eyes for so long, one last time and let it drop into the darkness below, clanging loudly where it landed on the floor at the base of Hive Primus, never to be seen again in his life or the lives of any that would follow for many centuries. 

 

He left Scourge, the faceless knight-penitent to lie in peace, to claim his well-earned rest in the deep, hidden tomb at the site of his triumph over the forces of Ruin, far beneath the feet of the populace of the hive. A fitting end for the grim crusader after a lifetime of war and suffering.

 

Petrus Kovac, knight-errant of the God-Emperor, smiled for the first time in years, glad to be alive. 

Edited August 2, 2023 by Necronaut

[Trokair]

Bardas

 

As the others boarded the lift, ready to ascend to the hive and bring word of their triumph before it was too late, Bardas took a step back, he would remain down here, for now whether that be to his death or just Duties end.

 

Seeing the questioning look on Reynards face Bardas threw over his voice, the little spherical speaker easily caught by the Foxkin. Just as the Lift sprung into life.

 

+My Friends, if we fail to get the message out, and Swords rain from the sky, then it matters not if our tomb is in the Hive or amongst the rocks of the earth below it.+

 

+However if you succeed in your ascent, and this world is spared the Deadman’s sanction, then the shrine down here needs to be guarded until such time as sanctified personal from beyond the Golems reach can take custodianship.+

 

+If Hive Primus survives this day, then there is still much to be cleansed and cured. It would be a poor showing if others had to gather here in many a years time to repeat our efforts because we let even one disciple of the false mechanicus seek refuge in an unguarded shrine. Duty calls to not leave them such a vital heart unguarded. +

 

+This shrine will be mine to care for until Duties end, be it death or a changing of the watch.+

 

Watching the lift recede on its journey to the surface Bardas waited until it was no longer discernible, then gathered up all that the others had left behind and returned to the shrine, he had a Thermal Stack to keep an eye on, to keep in balance and beating with life.  

Edited August 2, 2023 by Trokair

[Machine God]

Kerr Restal:

 

So it was to the lift he went, not before picking up some discarded trash. 

 

The Weasel had dropped a used las mag and a bolt pistol mag. Waste not, want not. It should fetch a profit. 

 

He made for the lift. 

 

 

 

 

[Lord_Ikka]

Nicios

 

As the door closed and the lift began to rise, Nicios cracked a small, grim smile. He may have nearly died and lost everything he carried, but he was content.

 

Whether death, reward, or something else awaited them above he cared not. He had wanted excitement, to serve the God-Emperor in a worthy way. After the banishment of the foul, rogue pysker AI, he had accomplished his goals- this time spent in the service of the Inquisition had brought color to his grey world. 

 

He would face whatever came next with calm and pride, ready to do his duty to the Imperium. 

[A.T.]

Falk

 

As the air rushed around them and the ascent began Falk noted that the others seemed to stand a little calmer and taller than he had seen them. Save perhaps for the recently disrobed psyker standing with a grim smile as they hurtled upwards.

 

Falk offered the man his flak-coat, and met his smile, "who knows, they might build statues to remember this day".

[Mazer Rackham]

The Vestibule of Excision:

 

The inspection lift car is still a warm cage, the bare plasteel fairly shimmering in the thicker parts where it has absorbed most of the heat. With the anchors off, the counterweight and motors rattle with almost alarming judder as the crate shoots skywards, closing quickly with the lower bell chamber of the hive vent you left some short time ago.

 

Silence of words in the car as the buzz and hum of power shunts and safety control rods is now more reassuring than alarming, despite the desperately arid air here. You witness your handiwork: the gentle slide and ebb of power through the brilliance of the cyan spill of light from the millennia old nucleonic stacks. A testament to the Mechanicum, now cared for a single Cog in the Grand Machine. A great heresy to lose it - of course after the precious commodity of life.

 

At least to your human equation.

 

As the cart rumbles ever closer, the hatch to admit it into the chamber cracks open, and the pinpoint of light from the vent pile above, shimmering as a moon in darkness, is suddenly washed out by powerful stablights and las-pointers, sweeping the car. The light is blinding, but behind the shocking beams are carapace armoured stormtroopers in bulky plate, and behind them, the reassuring presence of the Voivode.

 

The doors to the tunnel with the Arbites squads is sealed. Even as you watch, the doors, unpowered are heaved open, not taking an hour, but in a fraction of that time - mere long heartbeats - as a giant steps into the chamber. Apart from his quicksilver shod left arm, his raiment is otherwise black. Heraldry obscured with a blank, black shield on his right pauldron, he strides into the space, accompanied by the Judges he saved by heaving the doors shut at Falk's warning. Upon each hip is a well-oiled holster with deadly pistols, and the rasp of his green robes is as well known to you as your own voices.

 

"Stand aside!" Locke calls from behind the stormtroops. He rushes to the group as fast as he is able, his eyes hooded, but face alight with hope. "Magistrate Falk - your message?"

 

His hands gently escort you from the cage, palms resting on your shoulders as though to reassure himself you're all real.

 

"We have little time - Caleb, is it done, my son?"

 

Edited August 2, 2023 by Mazer Rackham
Clear up, remove cringe.

[A.T.]

Falk

 

A curious certainty given the lack of evidence of the act, but it was the absence itself that was proof. A weight lifted from this world that could not be explained nor denied.

 

"It is done"

[Mazer Rackham]

The Chamber:

 

DAMOCLES CONTINGENCY IN: 40 MINS

 

The simplicity of it is perfect.

 

"You have fulfilled a bargain with the daemon then...you have delivered Locke," he half smiles, humour creasing the worry out of his eyes.

 

The old man stands taller, and the weight of years, of all the failures he blamed himself for seem to shift - not ease. Relief and certainty fills his countenance, and once more, he is the Lord Inquisitor.

 

"We must away. Cutter!"

 

The Voivode growls to life as the engines flare and Locke ushers everyone aboard. The guncutter lifts off, packed full of all the souls it can, Cephas remains behind. The ship cleaves into the air, ramming itself against gravity as it hauls up the vent at full throttle, leaving only a fraction of the heat, the plasma spume left before. It is long minutes before the ship even gains halfway.

 

"Faster, Cutter!"

 

+Bleep, bloop-aweeb-ploo!+

 

"I heard him the first time!" the pilot replies through gritted teeth.

 

"The plasma venting knocked out a lot of our ground to orbit communications, and I must deliver the clearance code in person," Locke explains, as gravity pulls at you all. "We are already broadcasting IFF. Let us hope they do not shoot us down!"

 

++++++++++++

 

The Vent:

 

DAMOCLES CONTINGENCY IN: 15 MINS

 

The broad landing deck of the Apocalypse Class Battleship witnesses the guncutter as it broaches the screens of Valkyries and Thunderbolts - indeed those very aircraft escort the Guncutter into the bay. As you alight, you can hear the ship groaning in anger as the many powerful lance batteries begin to charge up, ready to annihilate the hive below.

 

Locke rushes out onto the deck, two Frateris supporting him. All is haste.

"Convey me to the Captain! Now!"

 

The Seal he presents stifles all opposition as the whole troupe of you rush headlong.

 

+++++++++++

 

The Wardroom:

 

DAMOCLES CONTINGENCY IN: 5 MINS

 

The Inquisitor bursts into the Captain's room where he is holding last minute conference with his officers.

 

"I am Lord Inquisitor Garrad Locke! My Will is Law, my Word is Law! Cancel the attack!"

 

The Captain is stunned, but only for a heartbeat. He jams the commbead down on his desk and takes a breath.

 

++++++++++

 

DAMOCLES CONTINGENCY: NOW.

 

Hector's Revenge Fires.

 

Unable to contain the energies of the massive batteries, the word to cease fire is too late to reach the gun batteries.

 

Streams of power lash the atmosphere, torturing it, slewing across the desert sands, and chewing rock, grit and anything foolish enough to be standing outside in the polluted, irradiated air.

 

A skilful shift of the thrusters pitches the firing solution on target, a target that shouts up at the heavens for attention.

 

A homing beacon inside the Black Ship that brought the Golem to Damocles. A sword falls upon the Gladius, those who live by it, dying by it, and every residual trace of the Golem, or any poison it left behind is eradicated upon this earth as it was in the aetheric heavens. Pummelled by the near miss, the hive recoils, shifts and wavers, but it stands intact.

 

Damocles is saved.

 

By a handful of mere mortals whose names the billions of souls within may never know.

 

=][=

 

+++++++++++

 

"It is in the worst of times, that the true qualities of men shine through. Their light is the Emperor's Will, their strength the Emperor's Hand. Yet what kind of men can suffer in such darkness, what qualities will work in the shade, where the dagger in the dark is worth a thousand swords at dawn?"

-Inquisitor Garrad Locke

 

+++++++++++

 

=][=

[Mazer Rackham]

++ THE DAMOCLES CONTINGENCY ++

 

+ EPILOGUE +

 

Night Cycle, 10 days after the Cataclysm:

 

One:

 

At a dive bar deep in the hive, Young Lecroix sits thumbing a drink. The room suddenly hushes as the most stunning, athletic blonde woman in a long blue evening robe enters. She politely declines the invites of the scoundrels and ne'er-do-wells, to make a beeline for him. She sits on the barstool next to him, her sapphire eyes drinking him in, an insolent smile creasing her lips. She extends a hand and a drink comes almost without her asking.

 

She sips from it, a sparkling golden wine, watching the young man trying not to look at her bare knee, her trim, muscular calf.

 

"I heard you're a whiz with ciphers," she says, conspiritorially.

 

Seb blushes. "Uh, no, not really."

 

"I think you are. Mr Reynard says you can help me."

 

They go to her room, where she tells him to freshen up, before jabbing her thigh with the drug polymorphine, and changing into something more appropriate. She subdues him with a single blow to the back of the head.

 

+Vendetta. Subject secured, returning to Vault.+

 

Two:

 

A table outside a swanky restaurant. A pretty lady with sharp wits and long black hair takes a bouquet of flowers from her suitor.

 

"Grace," she tells him.

 

They sit to dine. A Microscope falls out of his pocket and she laughs.

 

They don't notice the crystal roll free from the magnfier and roll gently uphill until it stops. A street cleaner picks it up, assuming it is a jewel, and both hurry away.

 

Three:

 

An officer of the Arbites is laid to rest with full honours. The title of Proctor is bestowed upon a courageous Magistrate who took the law into the depths of a hive and triumphed over the darkness.

 

He keeps his Vox Legi next to the bed in his new quarters.

 

Four:

 

A secret clade of the Mechanicum arrives. A Specialist team trusted by both the Cog and the Inquisition, they set about purging all the systems of any taint of scrapcode. They are assisted in this by an old Magos who remained loyal and buried in a radioactive pit, and a young, newly minted Magos Errantor (reportedly who died several times in the battle against the Animus Silica) with another adept called Xerxia, works hard to restore the functions and integrity of the works of the Opus.

 

Five:

 

Given thanks for his psychic fortitude, a grey man, an agent of the Adminstratum Invigilus is commended and promoted to Senior Special Investigator. His new office comes with a stipend for clothing, in which he invests heavily. He is visited often by the Adepts of the Astrotelepathica, who press him to teach the gifted orphans how to hold back the dark.

 

Six:

 

Killer spills blood,

Pockets full of coin,

He melts to black.

 

Seven:

 

A squire attends his knight for the last time, where the secrets of their true names are exchanged as both reward and tokens of trust. The mighty Space Marine entrusts the mortal with the safekeeping of the relics, and then joins his brothers in nameless cohort, pledging himself to the Deathwatch.

 

+++++++++++

 

Night Cycle, 14 Days after the Cataclysm, Damocles:

 

Viceroy stepped down from the guncutter onto the landing platform, the vista of the interior of the hive a city backdrop alight with algae. Her weapons stowed at her back and hips, her armoured bodyglove a matte, jet black. Auburn hair tied back loosely, her pale complexion marred by purple bags under emerald eyes red-rimmed form sleep loss.

 

Locke stood waiting her, at his shoulder a handful of acolytes.

 

"Hello daughter."

 

"My Lord," she replies, smiling but bowing to observe protocol. Her long cloak folds as she does. She stops moving forward, keeping a distance of ten feet from her adoptive father.

 

"Is Verdict around?"

 

"Somewhere, father. He does he duty."

 

"As do we all," he replies, but his eyes are moist, his voice breaking a little from the strain.

 

"I cannot tell you how much you mean to us all," Viceroy said, her words a little rushed. "Are you certain?"

 

"I am. My shame and the fate of this hive, and all our friends and loyal servants must be assured. By my last act, do I name you successor. Lady Victoria Locke." So saying, he took out his seal, and stepped forward to place it into her hands. "Verdict, I am ready. I forgive you, and all of them."

 

A zip-snap presages Garrad Locke's head snapping backwards with a round right between the eyes. There is no-one within a mile, and Verdict isn't either. A small blink of light indicates his position as he signals. The Lord Inquisitor falls, and Viceroy catches him, closing his eyes as she bears him to the ground.

 

"All your secrets are safe now, old man. I'll seal the files. You died a long time ago, a long-range kill, very messy."

 

Heart heavy with grief, she let the acolytes carry him a way.

 

A necessary evil to save so many from an uncaring universe.

 

++++++++++

 

=][=

 

THE DAMOCLES CONTINGENCY

 

=][=

 

 

[Mazer Rackham]

+ YOU HAVE BEEN WATCHING +

 

AN RPG NOOK WARHAMMER 40,000 PRODUCTION

 

IN ASSOCIATION WITH THE MAZER RACKHAM PRESS AND THE CABAL OF DEAD INK

 

A.T as Caleb Augustus Falke

 

Lysimachus as Reynard, of the 'De Carabas' Family.

 

Trokair as Tech-Sentinel Bardas

 

Lord_Ikka as Jericus Nicios

 

Beren as Garvek 'Stimms' Halsome

 

Machine God as Kerr Restal

 

Necronaut as The Penitent/Scourge/Petrus Kovac

 

Kelborn as Nico Hivmund

 

Ancient Sobek as Matthias 'Cutter' Beckett

 

Marshal Valkenhayn as SGT Solomon 1071 Kytele-V

 

And

 

Mazer Rackham as Tom Cruise (in a Submarine)

 

THANK YOU TO ALL OUR PLAYERS AND READERS, WITHOUT YOU THERE IS NO STORY!

 

=][=  THE DAMOCLES CONTINGENCY =][=

 

 

No servo skulls were harmed in the making of this game, Merch is available on request, except the backlog is about 40,000 years.

Limited transcript editions of this game signed by Dan Abnett are not official, but neither is this production, so who cares?

 

Yes, this is the end. You can applaud and leave now. We love you really.

 

 

Edited August 2, 2023 by Mazer Rackham
Formatting, Credits.