[DH1e] The Damocles Contingency (RPG IC)

[Mazer Rackham]

The Attilan Kush:

 

Bardas:

 

The mountains rise from the shimmering golden sands, the reflections not just heat from the sun and hot-house infusion from the fug miles above, but from punishing radiation. Your radmeter beeps savagely, but even as it does so, the Tauros has shot through the patch before the malign spirits of the Rad can take root in your meat and trueflesh. A Sentinel is all too aware how his implants can soak up the lethal, invisible poison, and whilst they grant resistance to it overall, they can carry it for decades without proper scrubbing.

 

And scrubbing is tedious. The Earth of Fuller gets everywhere. Irritating.

 

Above you, thrust up from the plains, the majestic peaks of the Kush. The filters in your suit detect cleaner, fresher air, the radcount dropping swiftly to manageable, background levels, where the deep minerals soak away the deathly spectres. Plateaus and plains erupt in short bursts and the foothills slope upwards, the engines of the cavalcade around you beginning to labour as the air begins to thin, and the grit displaces under weight. One vehicle slides sideways down a bank, but there are good natured jeers at and from the crew, who fall to the back of the herd.

 

As you crest the next rise, roughly 300 metres from your position, you look down on a small mountain tarn, by which a tiny hamlet dwells.

 

Or did.

 

Bodies lie at the tarn edge, legs submerged, or scattered, shot down where they ran. Adult bodies in their desert garb huddle smaller bundles for protection, but no life stirs. The special filtration pump the settlers affixed to the tarn has likewise been plundered, many of it's mechanisms thieved.

 

Bike tracks and monocycle prints run all over the place in helter-skelter chaos, unlike the vehicles of the Khamsin, who, whilst crossing great tracts of waste kept in each others' tracks as much as possible.

 

+The D'reg,+ Aydam Khosh states, a deeper loathing in his voice than the throaty growl of his Venator engine. +Scouts out!+

 

The Brotherhood on bikes and quads dismount, creeping forward slowly, carefully searching the ground in front of them, whilst the rest of the men manning the heavy vehicle weapons give cover. The man assigned to Shenzi makes the grenade launcher ready, a grim set to his chin.

 

Valkyrie 212:

 

GM: If any of you examine the Seal, you will notice it is markedly different to your own, and you may/may not recognise it. If you have Forbidden Lore, (Inquisition, Arbites, Xenos), you may make a Challenging (+0) Forbidden Lore Test, otherwise, the composition, symbology and fabrication will obviously different, but otherwise unknown to you. A Manifestation of Sense Presence with 2 DoS on the Test will provide more information without having the Forbidden Lore specified. Queries in the OOC as per.

 

 

Edited April 26, 2023 by Mazer Rackham

[Lysimachus]

Reynard:

 

Reynard looked down at the injured killer and sighed. He wanted the password to the slate, but if the man was a real Inquisitorial agent he wouldn't quickly give it up.

 

Not to mention that he might also be no different to them, a loyal Imperial thrust into a situation by his superiors with the bare minimum of information that would help him complete his task, but not enough to understand it. If so, yet again the masters played games in the shadows and 'lesser' men ended up with a bloody nose. That made the thought of torture somewhat… distasteful?

 

On the other hand, he might just be a thief. And a traitor.

 

He sighed again, sat down on a bench not far from where the man lay shackled, and pointed at the sigil Falk held.

 

"Is that actually yours? If it is then perhaps we can talk?"

 

 

[Mazer Rackham]

Valkyrie 212:

 

Reynard:

 

The prisoner looks up at you, looks across to Scourge. His eyes then linger on Falk. He's breathing hard against the pain, now the natural shock is wearing off.

 

"Go choke on a doughnut."

[A.T.]

Falk

 

After removing the mans comms and ensuring they were not transmitting Falk closed his eyes and marshalled as much calm as he could manage under the circumstances, "given our destination it seems that secrecy is no longer required."

 

Gazing once more upon the prisoner he held up his hand as the symbol of the Inquisition illuminated the interior of the transport, "thief or acolyte it matters not. My word is law, my seal is law, and you will answer."

 

Interrogate?

Roll 28 vs interrogation 41

[Necronaut]

Scourge:

 

"Listen to me as hard as thou canst, cur…"

 

Scourge fished the golden Inquisitorial ingot from another belt pouch for the first time since his induction into the secret society, and held in the bound man's field of view as the airship bucked under them. His every word dripped hatred and malevolence. 

 

"Thou art entering a world of pain. The Ordo Hereticus doth not forgive, doth not forget. Thy master's ignorance or malice or both may have damned this hive and every soul herein. Now, speak!"

 

 

Intimidate Test: 37 + 20 (Power Armour) = 57

Intimidate: 1d100 46: success, 1 DoS

 

OOC: I'm unsure if Scourge needs to do a supporting intimidate test for Falk's interrogation or just provide general assistance to the test. In either event, this ought to narratively support Falk, and/or stack with the previous intimidate test.

Edited April 26, 2023 by Necronaut

[Lysimachus]

Reynard:

 

Reynard smiled. He agreed with Falk and Scourge. If the man was a murderer who had killed a loyal Agent, he already knew about the Inquisition being on Damocles. If he was an Agent himself, he knew it even more so. So there was little - nothing, in fact - to be gained by hiding.

 

But if he was the rightful bearer, maybe they could convince him they were - very loosely - on the same side? He took his own icon out of one of his deeper pockets and showed it for a moment before putting it away again.

 

"Heavier than they look, right? Are you sure we can't find a way to help each other? Call it professional courtesy? From the picts it looks like you've been watching these Aldario people for quite some time. We were told to keep this one alive, but if you can convince me of the reasons why I should, I might just stamp on her neck myself."

 

He wasn't planning to, of course, but maybe they could get the fool talking.

 

 

Edited April 26, 2023 by Lysimachus

[Mazer Rackham]

Valkyrie 212:

 

The prisoner looks at you like you're all mad, then looks at Falk, the only one so far who hasn't beaten, crushed, kicked, or tried to blow his head off.

 

"I thought...you were mercs, House troops, or...bandits," his breath is short, word slurred by stupefaction from the beating he's taken, and the blood still flowing from his face. The small movements of him breathing leverage discomfort, and he has to stop to control himself. "His seal...is law. His word...is law. If you...are like me. Then you know I can't talk."

 

He lies back, spitting out bloody phlegm, clearing his throat.

 

"I'm dead...already. Nothing to...threaten me with." He grins up at Scourge.

 

GM: Opposed Scrutiny, boys.

Edited April 26, 2023 by Mazer Rackham

[Lysimachus]

Reynard:

 

 

Scrutiny: Per28/2 = 14 +10(HS:Sight) = 24, Roll: 73, Fail!

Edited April 26, 2023 by Lysimachus

[Lord_Ikka]

Nicios

Spoiler

Scrutiny Test

Target - 15

Roll - 48

Result = Fail, 3 DoF

 

Nicios sees nothing...

 

[A.T.]

Falk

 

"Threaten?" asked Falk, "No. I have seen the face of the golem, it's nature. It is a thing of the warp and this world will burn before it is allowed to escape. And so I do not threaten, I command by this seal and by the Emperors name".

 

Scrutiny 47, Roll 47 - flat pass, plus any bonuses from assists, the target being fatigued, etc)

[Mazer Rackham]

Valkyrie 212:

 

Falk:

 

The prisoner shifts a little. It's at that point you realise he's cupping one of his hands, not just holding it.

 

"She'll...find a way. In the Emperor's...name, too. Make...you think...it's your...choice."

 

You realise that in the tumult of Cutter's wild manoeuvres, one of the filaments Nicios took from Gwynne's arm is missing.

 

"Look...at you, us," he says peering up at you. "Look at...what...they make you...give."

 

He winces, grunts.

 

 

Edited April 26, 2023 by Mazer Rackham

[A.T.]

Falk

 

Falk nods towards Scourge to check the hand, but keeps the man engaged, "my hand has lain no innocent bodies across by path, my hand has taken no acts against the Emperors name or law. I am investigator, inquisitor, even your life I had spared that the truth might out."

 

Fixing the prisoner in his glare, "give me names, acts, where to find the innocent and the guilty that I may bring the Emperors Justice to them before it is too late for this world". Guessing at what the man may have done, "and too late for what absolution you might find in this life."

[Mazer Rackham]

Valkyrie 212:

 

Falk:

 

"I don't feel...guilty. Ugh." He really starts labouring. "When she...comes...ask her for your...names, places, acts. What is justice? You win, who...do you...save? A hive? Unnh. You lose...I save the Imperium. What is...your law, compared...to that? Your hands are as stained...as mine. You just can't...see-unnh! See...the dirt."

 

His stare becomes glassy.

 

"Exitus...Acta..."

 

He slumps into a heap. His hands relax, and the green-black filament glints, embedded in his hand, the palm black enough to show it has been in there some time, the rapid bruising from the pummelling dealt has just hidden the spreading blotches.

Edited April 27, 2023 by Mazer Rackham

[Trokair]

Bardas

 

Taking the opportunity Bardas climbed out of the Tauros and both stretched and shake some of the dust and sand out of his cloths. There were enough Brotherhood members scouring the immediate area that he doubt he could contribute to the search, and the scouts where already fanning out to cover the wider area.

 

Instead he took out the Auspex and adjusted the setting for greatest reach; he could always dial in on any area of interest on subsequent sweeps.

 

Spoiler

Auspex Use

Awareness test

Per: 34 + 20 form Auspex = 54

D100: 11, Pass, 4 DoS

Tech-Use to refine detection

Int 39 + 10 (Tech Use +10) = 49

D100: 41, Pass 0 DoS

 

[Lysimachus]

Reynard:

 

Well, that was that.

 

Reynard stashed the data-slate into his pocket in disgust. Maybe Locke or Bardas or Haldane's techs could crack the password? Nothing else to be done until they reached the Halls of Judgement.

 

"Cutter, what's our eta? Nicios, how's she doing?"

 

[Mazer Rackham]

The Attilan Kush:

 

GM: You detect a petrochemical trail consistent with small-scale engines corresponding to the tyre prints and treadmarks left by the D'Reg vehicles. It is heading east, in the direction of the Primary Hive.

 

Valkyrie 212:

 

Cutter leans back, for a second - it's all he can spare.

 

"Too long. LIDAR is painting a shortcut. Do you want me to take it? Just so you know, it does mean blasting a hole in the wall!"

Edited April 27, 2023 by Mazer Rackham
Typo's, blowing the hive wall

[A.T.]

Falk

 

"Do it, and request the ship close orbit if possible.". Yesterday 'she' covered many possibilities but with this seal a single culprit moved to the fore, and if they were so intent on the death of the Aldario they must believe they are in some way a threat to the golem.

 

Locke had suggested it was to be sent as a weapon against the xenos but from everything he had witnessed such an act would not lead to an empire of corpses but one of slaves to a far darker will. A plague that would spread back to the Imperium a thousand fold.

[Trokair]

Bardas

 

Looking up and around Bardas orientated himself, in a landscape like this important features could be seen for way afar, but seeing just one was not enough, two or three landmarks was much safer.

 

Tapping the screen of the Auspex he turned to the two still in the Tauros, trusting that they would pass the message on to Aydam Khosh.

 

+They headed east, or at least a good number of them have. Perhaps they seek to join those parts of the evil that has taken root in the hive.+

[Mazer Rackham]

Valkyrie 212:

 

"Understood. Solomon, bring our Hellstreaks online, and fire on co-ordinates 23458.X, 56432.Y, 1453.Z."

 

GM: Solomon will now be required to make four (4) Challenging (+0) BS skill Tests using a vehicle mounted weapon, thereby discounting any talents or abilities that do not function for a weapon of this type. Note that you can't miss the wall - it's five miles high, after all! The Tests will resolve against the thinnest part of the wall Cutter can find (the co-ordinates he has given as your target). Deviation from the target by DoF (also known as Degrees of Failure) will have consequences on the airframe, and collateral damage to the hive wall.

 

GM Instruction: This will cause localised hive structure decompression. The Valkyrie is sealed, but many of the compartments within the layering of the wall (there are habs and domiciles in the mid-shell) are not. Comments in the OOC.

[Marshal Valkenhayn]

Solomon:

Despite him being nearly 200 Imperial Pounds of grizzled spacer shoved into an armored void shell, Solomon is surprisingly easy to overlook when he's settled into a role. So it is that the grim co-pilot has lapsed into attentive silence as the drama plays out behind him, managing subsystems for Cutter and generally keeping his opinions to himself.

Gripping a small crank fashioned to look like the spiked halo of an Imperial Angel, Solomon twists it from 'Deliberation' to 'Judgment,' a shutter vibrating through the hull as the machine spirit growls its subsonic approval. 

"Hellstreaks armed." 

Right hand guiding the targeting reticule toward the indicated coordinates, he carefully pans his magnified view across the wall, grunting softly as the layers upon layers of patch repairs and modifications fill his sights. Were the hive freshly built, such a maneuver would still hold some risk. But with potential weak spots lurking throughout the super structure, the amount of damage they might do could be catastrophic.

Thumb pressing down on the primary weapon safety, he unlocks his firing stud, and depresses it.

As The Emperor Wills.

    HELLSTREAK TEST 1/4
BS: 37 + Challenging 0 = 37
Roll: 45 (0 Degrees Failure)

    HELLSTREAK TEST 2/4
BS: 37 + Challenging 0 = 37
Roll: 95 (5 Degrees Failure)
Fate: 0/2 Remaining
Reroll: 14 (2 Degrees Success)

    HELLSTREAK TEST 3/4
BS: 37 + Challenging 0 = 37
Roll: 55 (1 Degrees Failure)

    HELLSTREAK TEST 4/4
BS: 37 + Challenging 0 = 37
Roll: 37 (0 Degrees Success)

As the storm of missiles blasts toward the wall, Solomon 1071 finds himself thinking of his squad, deployed to the surface as support for the struggling enforcers. The thought of them caught up in these explosions, or worse, brings a slight frown to his hidden features. And if the chatter from the compartment is correct, much worse may be about to happen.

"Who is SHE?" he asks, breaking into the conversation even as he blasts away layer upon layer of the hive wall.

[Mazer Rackham]

Valkyrie 212:

 

The buckled repair plates and plascast bonding rods covering the aging, creaking shell plates part as the air-to-ground missiles pulverise, and rend them open in a shower of molten rain, the glowing golden globules dropping to cool into red-hot bullets, each greater in size than a man's head. Solomon's aim is good, mastering the machine spirits so that Cutter can chop the Valkyrie through the ruined slit in the side of the hive.

 

Decompression blows out more plating, unravelling it like a zip, and you can glimpse the bodies of hivers falling, flailing into the vast gulf within and without.

 

They'll be dead before they hit the ground.

 

Chattels and icons, nuts and bolts, follow your exit, with only the starboard vector thruster smashing into sparking ruin. Trailing smoke, the Valkyrie plummets as it hit the negative air pressure, then is immediately vaulted up, yanked by an invisible chain as the thermal restores order and Cutter, now without traffic and myriad pipes and hab-blocks to dodge, pulls up into a tight circling turn.

 

Black vultures soar above, then, turning so the sunlight glimmers off their canopies, begin a stoop, carrion birds looking to feed.

 

"Thunderbolts. Fabulous," Cutter says. Your earpieces crackle. +All Navy callsigns, all Navy callsigns, this is Retrieval Team Gamma-zero-seven, urgent mission, do not fire, do not fire!+

 

+Upload your authorisation,+ a cold Navy pilot replies. +Or you will be fired upon.+

 

Cutter snags the stick, snarls. "Someone do that? My hands are full."

 

East of the Atillan Kush:

 

The dust trail rises into the sky, but is almost lost in the muggy mess.

 

Almost.

 

From the foothills, the Khamsin Brotherhood spot a small hauler, with a tarp tied tightly over the flat-bed cargo platform. Around this lumbering turtle, swim faster terrapins, the bikes and light quads of the quarry - ragged streamers of red cotton and cloth flags flutter out behind the tailgates, from the robed bodies of the D'reg. The powerful motors of the well-maintained Tauros vehicles eat up the distance, the miles closing as the leopard of the desert pounces on.

 

"Better get your weapon ready," the driver tells you. "We'll be hip deep in Mukaali  in about ten seconds."

[Trokair]

Bardas

 

As the Brotherhoods closed on the D'reg hauler and its escort the driver leans over to inform Bardas to ready his weapon, yelling over the noise yet barley heard. Bardas acknowledged with a nod, then glanced up to Shenzi and its handler. The grenade launcher, assuming it had the right ammunition, was the only weapon on board that could be a danger to the big hauler, so it would pay to know what it had in its sight.

 

With Saxa the best Bardas expected to be able to do is maybe go after bike riding escort, but unlike hunting game back home in the wilderness near his shrine he was now in motion, and the Tauros would affect his aim, no matter how good the driver handled her.

 

Swapping out the sleeker teeth magazine for one of the man-stopper filled magazines he had acquired in the wreck he readied his weapon. Seeking likely targets amongst the D'reg ahead.

 

(I assume Bardas is about to enter some form of structure time, can I declare a pre structure time Aim (at a likly target) in addition to having Saxa readied?)    

[A.T.]

Falk

 

More wasted life, but even now Falk could feel the shadow darkening above to end it all should they fail here. 'Exitus Acta...', no, this was not justice it was a gamble, a desperate bid to stop events in motion not the vagueness of what might be.

 

The distinction brought him no comfort as he moved past the body to the comms terminal, entering the mission ident code, "Ident two-one-one-gamma-zero-seven, clearance level Vermillion".

 

He looks back and Gwynne as he speaks to the pilot, "how much time?"

[Lord_Ikka]

Nicios

 

As the others dealt with what was apparently some sort of air-battle, Nicios kept working on Lady Gwynne. The pirate Aeldari poison was still in her veins, still trying to kill her. Another shot of stimm? Would that put her into deeper shock...?

Spoiler

Medicae Test (going for continuing care- don't know if there is something specific I need to do)

Target - 63 (43 + 20 medikit)

Roll - 05

Result = Pass, 5 DoS

 

"Scourge, hand me the weapon's clip and the Inquisitorial emblem. I'll look into the emblem later when we are...safer."

[Mazer Rackham]

Valkyrie 212:

 

Falk:

 

"Not long - five minutes!" Cutter calls back.

 

Nicios:

GM: No mate, nothing special required.

 

Gwynne's breathing becomes almost normal, even though she's almost blue-black all over, her veins standing out thickly as they pulse the sludge and blood through her body. Her fluttering eyes find you, but do not see you. You understand it is only by the uncommon gifts that she detects you at all.

 

"Jericus. I'm...scared. Please..." she weakly holds out her hand.

 

 

The Eastern Marches:

 

The Brotherhood are on the tails of the D'reg, and throttling onward, come hell or high water. Since this is the desert, the former is more likely.

 

GM: No, no structured time required, just go ahead and post. If you take a shot, just roll BS Tests as normal. The vehicle is bumping about, but your crash harness will compensate (the Khamsin know their onions). To hit a Rider you will need a Called Shot, otherwise I will 50/50 the result. The enemy is now at 75m.