Extra super duper full house tonight. Everyone is here. Raltus Metallus, the Guardsmen. Govelius Pwnus the Clergymen. Appelius Gracchus the Noble Arbite. Diode the Tech Priest. Raptorman the Feral Assassin. Venus the Voidborn Sanctioned Psyker. And another player from the Black Crusade game who just watched this session but is rolling up a Hive Scum.
When we last left the Acolytes, they'd just greased the Glowing King and shut down his whole colony of rebelling mutants, and adjourned to Delta Barracks to rest and rearm. At the end of last session, the Feral Assassin (now a complete drug fiend) had talked one of the PDF troopers into acquiring some Frenzon for him, and sent him down into the (wartorn) Underhive to acquire some. The trooper managed to get him one injection. Not satisfied, the Assassin marched into the Infirmary and declared that he was commandeering it in the name of the Inquisition and the Emperor. The Medic, at a loss for what to say, left, and the Assassin promptly looted all the stimm in the joint. Meanwhile the Sanctioned Psyker decided they wanted to screw with some of the Assassin's drugs, in an effort subvert his addiction and maybe help him quit. Unfortunately, due to some miscommunication between them and I, it didn't turn out how the Pskyer wanted. (They wanted to perform a ritual to cast a Self-Only Fear power on some of the Assassin's drugs, so it'd activate when he tried to use them. There's like, a dozen problems with that, not the least of which is heresy. Non-Imperial rituals = Sorcery = Heresy. He said he communicated all this to me in a note he passed at the end of session several weeks ago...but it's not how I remember the content of the note. I screwed up in that I said I would talk to him about out of game, but I forgot to.)
So what happened instead is he snuck into the Assassin's room while they were sleeping and replaced half of his drugs with placebos.
I think the Assassin player is gunning for some kind of Eversor Assassin theme, as characters who max out in DH are considered to have been promoted to the highest ranks of their career path. I suggested last game he look into an injector harness and he kind of rejected it, but this week he is all about the idea. Those pesky half actions to inject drugs. Pah.
The next day the PCs and Captain Mkeric of the Vaxanguard 8th Regulars discussed the situation. To summarize a lot of what's happened, hese are the things they've already learned or are told by Mkeric:
1. They knew the interruption in the food shipments to the Underhive originated in the Vaxanide Hall of Trade and Commerce, by way of the Office of Sub-comptroller Cacio Menicus.
2. They knew weapons were ending up in the hands of the mutants. They'd proven the weapons found in the mutant's possession came from within the hive. They were informed by Captain Mkeric that there's a thriving smuggling operation in the Hive, and a group of bandits who raid PDF and planetary supply lines all the time. The PDF haven't been able to apprehend them, due to the hostile terrain of the planet, the skill of the bandits at living off the land...and most likely some incompetence.
3. They know the person to talk to about weapons moving through the hive is Quartermaster General Adom Ivorose, located in Ultimo Barracks, i.e. High Command.
4. Captain Mkeric informs them that, prior to all these events in the hive, High Command had embarked on a massive "Force Reorganization." Citing the slowness and inefficiency of the current regime, Major General Marcone and his senior staff began rearranging command structures, moving troops into different regiments and transferring resources between different barracks in the hive. In the opinion of Captain Mkeric and some other line officers, it's been a debacle and has led to confusion and waste. Lord General Lucan Albus, the senior officer of the PDF, is popular with the men and the people, but he is aging poorly and is distant from the day to day operations of the PDF. Marcone is slated to be his successor and most senior command decisions already fall to him.
5. Captain Mkeric tells the PCs his units sustained heavy casualties during the pacification of the Underhive, far in excess of what was expected fighting poorly armed rioters. Friendly fire and indirect fire incidents accounted for the vast majority of losses. What I didn't underscore to the PCs, and I probably should have, is the commanders who were responsible for it.
The PCs debate for a bit and strategize about how they want to proceed. The Tech-Priest accesses a cogitator in the barracks and links up with the main hive cogitator, using Cpt. Mkeric's codes. They start locating the places they need to go. They dig into Sub-comptroller Menicus' personnel file and find he's a minor noble in House Vaxanide. Administrator comments on his file indicate he's a pet appointee, the product of nepotism and a total slouch. The PCs also investigate some of the documents relating to the transfer of food to establish a timeline of when Menicus' office stopped allowing shipments into the Underhive.
They ask Cpt. Mkeric (nicely, I might add) for some man power to back them up. Mkeric asks his under-strength and war-weary regiment for volunteers, and 4 step up. 2 are pretty gung ho, while one of them is kind of reticent. When asked why, he says it's because the Inquisition is scary, and when asked what's scary about them, he very plainly states "something about destroying whole worlds in the name of the Emperor."
Now, that's pretty much all the rope an NPC needs to hang themselves when it comes to my PCs. The Arbite is the first to draw his gun and fire. He hits (this is the same player who plays the Khornate Champion in Black Crusade) but the whelp dodges perfectly (he really does.) The Eccliesiarch Priest, who made a point to everyone about trying to be diplomatic right now, Emperor bless him, talks the Arbite down from killing the guy and they have him fall in. The Arbite takes a personal interest in duties of Private Dobbs from here on.
The PCs load up into the PDF-run lift into the Upper Hive, with assurances from Mkeric that he can help them out if they need someone official to vouch for them. The Upper Hive is a gorgeous, soaring interior space, like a cone standing on its tip, where the many businesses, manses, palaces and governmental buildings line the walls of the hive in tiers, and the streets run in spirals along its sides, the road paved in a tile mosaic depicting a never-ending wave. False yellow sunlight is projected down on the Upper Hive by lamps hidden behind opaque glass panels in the ceiling, to give the rich the illusion of living somewhere with more than 30 days of sunlight a year.
The PCs decide to leave the bulk of their larger caliber weapons behind in a further effort to remain low key. I make it a point to say they stand out a quite a bit from the crowd. They balk at that idea when they see nobles walking around with armed bodyguards, but I point out the body guards are wearing houses colors and look military. The PCs look like an ecletic bunch of off-worlders toting assault rifles, flamers and heavy stubbers. I give them the option to change their minds despite that, but they agree "rolling with just pistols is way more hardcore" and that settles it. They assign a pair of their guardsmen, one of them Pvt. Dobbs, to guard their equipment and the Delta Barracks lift. The Arbite gives his Autogun to Pvt. Dobbs and tells him to guard it with his life.
The PCs roll out to the Hall of Trade and Commerce and into the office of Sub-comptroller Cacio Menicus. They find him to be a fat blob of a man in a powdered wig, in a blue coat trimmed with gold that is far too small for his sizable gut. He's clearly upset by their visit, and punctuates most of his sentences by shouting "Igner! Igner, where are you!" either into the adjoining anteroom or into the vox connected to his desk. The PCs encountered no one entering his offices.
They immediately put the screws to him, while fanning out to cover any possible escape should he try to run. (The only exits being the door to the office and a large window that opens up to a 5-story fall to the street level.) They also begin carefully scanning the room for recording devices or anything of that nature.
Menicus effusively denies any involvement in stopping food shipments to the Underhive, and apologetically admits that he doesn't deal with a lot of the routine paperwork that comes through his office everyday, he delegates those responsibilities to his secretary, Igner Cotes. The PCs poke and prod him from a few more angles but it becomes clear that Menicus is largely a waste of space, the Emperor and the Imperium's time, and mostly importantly, the PC's time. The Ecclisiearch Priest calmly explains to Menicus that he's responsible, indirectly and directly, for the deaths and injuries of thousands and thousands of people, and that gross dereliction of duty is as bad as heresy. The party begin heatedly debating how they're going to execute Menicus, and who is going to do it. It dawns on Menicus what is about to happen and he pleads for his life, which no one is listening to. This goes on for a bit, the players kind of working themselves up into a frenzy of Imperial Justice, until the Arbite leans over and says "I take out my knife and stab him in the neck."
That's good enough for me. I'm sure someone else probably had something pithy to say before they killed him, but we needed to move on. The PCs access Menicus' cogitator and pull up information on Igner Cotes, his address and a picture of him. He's a thin, awkward-looking man with big ears, uneven teeth and a somewhat vacant expression. They also note he was supposed to work today and never came in. The Techpriest checks the digital signature of the machine spirit on the many food shipment documents on file, and sees that the vast majority of them were processed not by Menicus' cogitator, but by Cotes'. To their credit, the PCs were very thorough. They didn't automatically assume Cotes was the one that denied these routine food shipment orders. Someone could have been using his cogitator to do so. They access the Hall of Trade and Commerce's security pict recordings to verify no one else has come in or out of the office besides Cotes or Menicus.
Next they search Menicus' body. They find like 50 thrones, a Good-quality Compact Las Pistol, his personal ID card that accesses the Ascension Lifts and his home, a meerschaum pipe and.....a baggie of white powder.
Now, because my crew loves 40k memes, they immediately all shouted
WARP DUST (NSFW). The Pskyer does some Psyniscience to detect the presence of the Warp (which they've been doing pretty consistently against everything the party runs across) and finds nothing. While the party are puzzling over this dust, the Assassin fails a Willpower test and snatches the bag for himself. Knowing what's coming next, the party turns to planning their next move while the Assassin, being a feral worlder and having never seen or tried Obscura....decides to snort it. (It's usually smoked.) Although his nose feels like someone stuck a flamer in it and pulled the trigger, the rest of him feels amazing, simply amazing. To the party, he seems glassy-eyed and distant, with a silly smile on his face. The Pskyer, who believes drug use is an affront to the Emperor, seems to be on a crusade to cure the Assassin of his addiction. Unfortunately he failed his roll to notice the Assassin stealthily snooting up.
The PCs vox Cpt. Mkeric and tell him to have Igner Cotes arrested on sight, to notify the authorities at the Star Port to be on the lookout for him, and to post guards at every possible lift in the Hive to be on the lookout for him. Mkeric acquiesces although he notes that's a lot of ground to cover and he's spread pretty thin already. They order Pvt. Dobbs and the other PDF trooper to down to the Star Port (I think) to personally search for him and prevent him from leaving the planet. The party then decides to head for Igner Cotes' house, in Hab 264 in the Lower Hive's nicer residential district. They return to the Delta Barracks lift, reclaim their gear and their two gung-ho PDF troopers, and head downhive.
Upon entering the hab's lobby, they notice a man leaning against the wall. The Guardsmen, a combat veteran, takes a good look at him and recognizes a seasoned fighter. The man is hard-bitten, scarred and weathered like he's lived a tough life. He's also paying them no mind. The PCs post their two PDF troopers in the lobby to keep an eye on things, and they roll up stairs. The door to Cotes' hab unit is metal and operated by a card reader, and has a vox speaker. The Arbite presses the button and very politely asks anyone inside to come to the door. He does this several times but gets no answer. The Tech Priest tries hacking the panel, which I wasn't too sure whether to make it a security check or a tech-use tech, but in the end went with security and he failed. He considers using Lumen Blast to simply fry the unit, but we point out that technology is sacred to the Tech Priests of Mars and purposefully destroying it is sacrilege. Even the humble card reader is an aspect of the Omnissiah's glory and has a machine spirit. In the end the PCs simply unload their weapons on the door until they shoot out the locking mechanism.
Inside the hab unit, they find a rather normal looking abode. But there are several clues around. Because at least one of my players has read this thread, I'll go into detail that they may not have fully gotten (why will become evident soon):
1. They find some data slates with maps of the hive interior, as well as geographical maps of the area around the hive. They find some reference material to the noble families of Vaxanide and their histories. In the same dataslate, they also find photos of Cotes, obviously taken by a 2nd party discretely.
2. In another data slate, they find a message from one Major Simon Valteer of the 2nd Vaxanide Battlegroup to Cotes, that simply says "Kingfish."
3. They find several discarded injector vials. The Feral World Assassin is angry at not discovering any drugs.
4. In a closet they find heavy rain gear, and weighters covered in mud.
5. A rough-drawn map that seems to describe a way into the Underhive from the Lower Hive, via Warehouse 1765e in the Lower Hive.
6. Several used fuel voucher slips from the civilian docks of the hive, and more fresh ones ready to use.
The PCs dig through some of this stuff for a moment, when they hear gunfire from down below. Everyone but the Tech Priest (who cynically voiced what everyone was thinking, that the NPCs were dead when they were ordered to wait below), opts to remain in the hab unit to look around some more and use his Auspex (the 40k equivalent of Star Trek's Tricorder.)
The rest of the PCs rush to the stairwell and are met by at least 3 men, all looking much the same as the man they left in the lobby, very mercenary. They duck in behind the last turn of the stairwell as the they meet the PCs coming down the stairs.
The Pskyer, still unseen by the foe, activates their Camouflage power and becomes hazy and hard to see, and even harder to hit, and edges forward. The Eccliesiarch Priest, who is angling for avoiding combat as part of his roleplay, stays at the top of the stairs out of the line of fire. The Guardsmen opens up with his Heavy Stubber and tears the skull of the first merc apart instantly. The Arbite moves forward and fires his shotgun but it goes wide. The Feral World Assassin charges down the stairs and injects himself with a dose of Frenzon. Unfortunately, there's a 50% chance it's one of the fake ones, and he is denied the hot rush chemicals pumping through his veins. At some point he's also taken some stimm, so he's on two substances even though the Obscura isn't quite as fresh. As I put it "Hey man, I gotta go up to come down!"
More mercs come around the corner, bringing their number to 4, and open fire with las carbines, managing to tag the Imperial Guardsmen. But it bounces off his armor. Another merc chucks a frag grenade at the small cluster of people at the top of the stairs, but it misses and bounces back down the stairs, the explosion only hitting the Guardsmen. Luckily his flak armor, which is extra effective against fragmentation, absorbed most of the wounds.
The Pskyer continues down the stairwell, now in open view of the mercs. But being camo-y and running to boot, she's impossible to hit. The Eccliesiarch Priest continues to stay out of combat at the rear. The Imperial Guardsmen opens fire again with the Heavy Stubber but misses. The Arbite moves down the stairs and closes the gap. The Feral World Assassin charges into melee with one of the mercs but misses his first attack, and in turning the corner of the stairwell reveals 2 more, bringing their numbers to 6.
On the merc's turn, one charges into the Assassin and they double team him, but neither manage to hit him, nor are any other hits dealt out in ranged. One merc remains somewhat near the bottom of the stairs.
On the player's turn, the Psyker activates Unnatural Aim (and sets off another phenomenon where the walls start to bleed. This time the Assassin's eyes started to bleed a little too) and plants a grenade directly in the middle of the mercs...and the Assassin. He takes some wounds from the grenade but his flak armor keeps him safe from the majority of it. The mercs...not so much. One manages to dodge out of the blast, but another is killed instantly while more two are seriously wounded.
The Guardsmen misses, again, with his Heavy Stubber and decides its time to ditch it. The Ecclisiearch Priest, due to me heckling him a little bit, moves closer to the fight. The Assassin cuts down one of the injured mercs with his mono-edged cleaver, and as he does so, he notes the man displays almost no emotional or pain reaction to his death blow, his face just as still and stoney in death as it was in life.
The Arbite is seriously conflicted. He wants to throw a grenade, badly. The Assassin says bring it and so he does. The grenade bounces off the wall in front of the Assassin and his foe and lands directly on them. Two wounded mercs are shredded by the blast, but the Assassin still comes out of it alive, although he's pretty torn up at this point.
The mercs are now effectively beaten. The one at the bottom of the stairs begins running for the lobby doors, while the remaining merc left in the stairwell turns and unloads on the Assassin's legs, bringing him near critical damage levels.
The Psyker moves down the stairs and uses a healing power to recoup a few of the Assassin's wounds. The Eccliesiarch Priest, realizing the escaping merc is their only chance at getting information, runs down the stairs in pursuit. The Guardsmen tosses down his Heavy Stubber in disgust and draws his autopistol and sword. The Arbite draws his combat knife and charges into the last merc alive in the stairwell, and rams into his side, just as the Assassin unleashes a devastating attack to the merc's neck with his cleaver.
By now the fleeing merc has made already it out of the lobby doors and on to the street. The Eccliesiarch Priest busts out after him but can't locate the merc amidst the crowds. Angrily, he returns to the group.
The two PDF troopers they left to guard the lobby are dead, shot through with las rounds. Upstairs, the Tech Priest completes his search of Cotes' hab unit, learning that the door was wired with a silent alarm trigger, and joins the group in the lobby. They thoroughly loot the mercs' bodies, pulling up more than 50 thrones, some genuine hive ID badges that identify the mercs as off-world traders, and curious wooden icons of a cheerfully smiling face with a wide toothy grin, hand-carved, about the size of a small tea saucers. The Psyker tries to sense the presence of the Warp on them but finds nothing.
On closer inspection of the actual corpses, they notice a series of red pin pricks in the skin of the mercs, mostly around the head, skull and back of the neck. The Tech Priest, who has a working knowledge of medicine, recognizes what look like the tiny wounds left from mind-probes, which can be used for everything from interrogation to hypno-conditioning. He activates the chain scapel on his Mechadendrite arm and slices a merc's skull cap off, to examine his brain. Although he can clearly see marks in the soft tissue relating to the probes, the brain otherwise looks healthy and normal to him. The Pskyer uses Pysniscience again and this time picks up the very faint signature of the Warp on each of the dead mercs.
A few residents start coming out into the halls to investigate, but a quick flash of the party's Inquisitorial Warrants quickly send them scurrying back to their hab units. The party turns its back on the bloody mess in the stairwell of Hab 246 and makes for Ultimo Barracks, to have a word with Quartermaster General Adom Ivorose about PDF weapons ending up in the hands of the mutants.
Ultimo Barracks is by far the largest, best-defended and stocked barracks in the hive. The PCs find Ivorose at his desk, pouring over data slates and documents. He's a heavier, older man, with a trimmed white beard and mustache and a crisp uniform. When questioned about the weapons he freely admits he doesn't know how they're going missing. He receives orders to have them moved to one of the barracks or storehouses in the hive, they're received and signed for, then a day later they're gone. The Arbite asks how his weapons ended up in the hands of mutants and the old war dog pales at the implication and says he doesn't know. Coolly the Arbite asks him if he's intellectually capable counting how many weapons are out there and Ivorose estimates more than 1,000 weapons, and charge packs to boot. He angrily denies he's part of anything, and said all his efforts to try and get to the bottom of the missing supplies have been stymied, by the riots, the pacification and most of all the Force Reorganization. He's scornful of Major General Marcone and the whole business. It's snarled his logistics, resulted in lost equipment and as far as he could tell, wasn't necessary. He asks the PCs to let him know who is responsible for stealing the weapons and giving them to the mutants, so he can personally shoot them himself. Satisfied for the time being, the PCs leave.
They decide their next move is to investigate the warehouse shown on the map they found in Cotes' hab unit, and hope he gets caught in their dragnet.
Next time, the acolytes will go to Warhouse 1765e, and descend into the secret maintenance tunnels and air ducts that connect the Lower and Underhive, retracing the steps of Igner Cotes' heretical path.
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Topic: Dark Heresy (And other Warhammer 40,000 RPGs) (Read 18655 times)