Written by Jason (jymmijamz)
Game – Rogue Trader
GM – Chris
Altius (Astropath Transcendent) – Jason
Victris (Navigator) – Will
Admiral Winter (Lord Captain) – Tanya
Chapter 2
The heavyset man in power armour at the head of the room addresses his guests, inviting them to enjoy the party. Looking around the hall the group can make out representatives from all walks of life in space.
Approaching Panderious is a man who, identified by the bandana covering his third eye, must be Lusious the Navigator. The two men turn away deep in quiet conversation, a ship’s serf passes by and Panderious snatches a bottle of Amnsec from the tray as it sweeps past. At the other end of the room is the tech priest Aviner decked out in the red robes of the Adeptus Mechanicus, conversing with noble born Victrix, her ornate force rod slung across her shoulders. Victrix quaffs delicately from a glass of Amnsec before nodding thoughtfully at something Aviner has just said.
Admiral Winter introduces herself to the Lord Captain Zanatov. “Welcome aboard, what do you make of the Vengeance of St Drusus?” he asks sweeping his arm in a wide arc taking in the whole room. Admiral Winter smiles, as she looks around. “It is most impressive.” As they continue to talk Winter notices one of the void born serf’s seems to be paying them a lot of attention.
Meanwhile Victris settles into the role of noble, lording over the ship’s serfs. Turning to one serf in particular he is quite surprised by his attitude and demeanour, deciding to keep an eye on the man he also notices that he is paying too much attention to the two captains. Suddenly a dark shadow falls across him, turning to the crew member sitting beside him and asks. “Is there someone behind me?” the crewman looks back over his shoulder, turning pale he quickly faces front and nods silently. Looking around, Victris find himself staring into the bionic eyes of Aviner, their optics whirr and shutters contract as they focus on him. “Navigator Victris I believe?” Aviner says. His voice hissing with static as it emanates from his vox-unit. “Yes lord Aviner, nice to meet you.” With another hiss of static Aviner addresses Victris, congratulating him on his dedication to the machine god, before adding. “I understand you have some concerns regarding the ship machine spirit. “No, no, no. I meant nothing by it.” Victris says, holding his hand up palms out. In response Aviner tilts his head slightly. “The spirit is vengeful; it will be difficult to withdraw from combat. But all will be fine, if you lead it not into temptation.” He hisses before turning and making his way across the room. Servo’s whining and pistons hissing as he moves away.
Admiral Winter makes her way around the room on the arm on the arm of Lord Captain Zanatov, being introduced to people of interest. Whilst Winter is in conversation with Panderious and Victrix, Victris notices Panderious catch the eye of the loitering serf, who gives him an evil look and he backs down. His interest piqued Victris takes a closer look at the overly attentive serf and notices an antiquated inferno pistol hanging at his waist. Approaching Panderious, Victris stops in front of the serf.
Altius takes a small glass of Amnsec and finds a quiet corner only to have Panderious, board of polite conversation, force his presence on him. Lighting a hloe stick and proffering a bottle off Amnsec, which fizzed and bubbled as if something had been added? “Want some?”He asks. Altius looks over, shakes his head and turns away, shifting his body mass, not quite turning his back on Panderious. Seeing this Panderious gets up and storms off, muttering under his breath. “….. Bloody witches….. Try to be nice…” As Altius stares at his receding back, he is suddenly over come with the feeling that there is something very wrong. As a hoary frost forms on his glass Altius drops it and clutches at his stomach nausea sweeping over him in agonizing waves. Forcing himself to focus, Altius opens his mind and looks around the room. As he does so he becomes aware of a warp storm about to break over the ship, already he can see the faintest shadowy outlines of figures mingling with the partying crowd. “CAPTAIN, I need to inform you that a warp storm is about to burst over this craft!” He shouts, jumping to his feet. But Admiral Winter is too far away, and cannot hear him over the sounds of revelry.
“Will you look at that?” Zanatov says, indicating a viewing screen. As the group turn, they can see slipping from behind a small moon is a sword class frigate. At 1.5 km long, plough fronted and bristling with weapons and antenna, it cuts an impressive sight against the backdrop of twinkling stars. Zanatov clicks his fingers and the small moon, now behind the ship, explodes, silhouetting the ship in all its glory. “Ladies and gents I give you the Boadicea’s Wrath!” the room explodes in a chorus of wild cheers.
Seeing companions are not paying him any attention Altius focus his mind on Admiral Winter.
+Captain, you need to inform Zanatov that a warp storm is about to sweep over this ship. He needs to do something immediately+. Winter suddenly stops what she is doing, her face going pale and slack with shock. With the voice of her astropath stilling ringing in her head, Winter grabs Zanatov by the collar. “WARP STORM, NOW!” she shouts in his face. The Lord Captain turns to the shadowing ship serf. “Wha, Wha, What.” He stammers. In response the serf pulls his inferno pistol. “Aviner, Geller shield. NOW!” He bellows. Aviner’s vox-grill hisses “The machine spirit is temperamental; I will need to get someone to see to it directly.” As Aviner turns towards the doors, Panderious appears his face ashen. “All hands, prepare to repel borders.” He calls, drawing his own weapons. Suddenly it all goes to hell; images of the warp descend around them. The walls run with blood and flames, tortured souls try to pull themselves from the floors. Moans, screams and hysterical laughter fill the air. Suddenly over one hundred humans in tattered leathers, with filed teeth and long nails sharpened to vicious points are standing amongst the party goers. The psychic shock is much for Altius to bear and keels over like a felled tree, his head bouncing off the steel floor plates. Out cold Altius misses the start of the battle.
Looking around her Admiral Winter spots the man in power armour, who she thought was Lord Captain Zanatov, is on his knees foaming at the mouth and jabbering. Meanwhile the serf is clubbing one of the chaos minions over the head with the butt of his pistol. “Lord Captain Zanatov I presume?” Admiral Winter says offering her hand to the man dressed as a serf. Zanatov looks at the offered hand but does not take it. “It’s nice to meet you, at last. Now kill something.” he says firing from the hip to make his point. Drawing her power sword Winter salutes and lays into the closest target, her initial attack misses as her opponent seems to step into the etherium and back.
Pulling his hellfire pistol, Victris starts firing at targets around him as they percent themselves. Moments later he spots three chaos cultists closing on Altius’ prone body intent on murdering him, taking aim he lets loose a couple impressively accurate hellfire rounds. The first shot punches through two of the chaotic minions, setting them both ablaze. The second round passes through the heat haze and smoke of the two ruined bodies finding it mark in the back of the third, killing him instantly and sending his body sprawling to the floor.
As the battle rages Altius staggers back to his feet, shaking his head to clear it, he spots several smoking corpses lying in untidy heaps around him and shrugs. “Have I missed something?” he thinks. Taking a moment to assess the situation, Altius draws his stub-auto and joints the fray.
Looking around for his next target Victris spots two of the enemy aim strange weapons at Aviner. A cone of energy envelopes Aviner and the floor beneath him starts to buckle. Before Victris can react, the floor collapses and Aviner disappears through the resulting hole. Seeing this, Victris runs over firing from the hip, killing the enemy with nonchalant ease. Looking down through the ruptured floor plates he can just make out Aviner a couple of floors below. “Are you okay down there?” he calls. “Yes I am fine. But something is blocking my communications. I am educating your key unit with what is needed to activate the Geller field.” Victris suddenly feels the device at his belt warming, as its machine spirit takes on the necessary data. Turning away from the hole Victris grabs the arm of a panicked crewmen as he rushes past. “Take me to the place I can activate the Geller field.” The man’s already shocked expression turns even more ashen and his eyes widen. “The. Tha.. That is in Aviner’s realm, we can go there, and the auto defences will kill us.” The man stammers. “If we can’t get the field up we are all dead anyway!” He hisses in the man’s face. “Okay, okay, follow me.” The crewman says, with morbid resignation, and turns to leave. “Hold up a second.” Victris says grabbing the man’s arm again. Looking around he spots Panderious close by. “Panderious, Can you help us? I have the means to start the Geller Field.” He shouts. Panderious turns in his direction still firing his strange pistols, razor sharp discs flying from their barrels. “Sorry, I think I am needed here.” He replies, firing over Victris’ head. The whine of the shuriken ends in a wet thud, and a sharp scream emanates just meters behind him. “But maybe you should take your crew mates with you, the more the merrier.” He says with a wild grin, before turning back to the fight looking for his next target.
Tapping his micro-bead Victris gets in contact with Admiral Winter and Altius. “Captain, Victris here. Aviner is having some difficulty get through to the Geller field. He has given me the means to instruct the Geller Field to start up, but I need some help to get into his domain.” There is a short hiss in his ear, before Winter’s response comes through. “Roger that, will come to you. Altius did you get all of that?” “Yes captain. I’m already on my way, Altius out.” And the connection goes dead. As the group converge on Victris and make their way out of the hall, the fighting escalates. With the sounds of heavy fire and Zanatov’s rallying calls chasing them through the carnage that litters the corridors. With as much speed as caution will allow the group make their way through the Vengeance of St Drusus heading for the mech priest’s workshops.
GAMING TALES 