Storythread

Storythread: it's been an interesting last two weeks edition. Hopefully you've all recovered from the shock (or elation) and are ready to get back to serious business now, i.e. writing stories.

If you have Veeky Forums related works of fiction to post, post them here, and hopefully some kind user will give you feedback (or at least acknowledge that someone did actually read it, which let's face it is what writefags really want).

If you don't have a story ready then I and other anons will be posting pictures throughout the thread for you to test your writing skills on. This is, more or less, a world-building and character-building exercise: two vital skills for playing roleplaying games. If you don't have any pics to post, you could try posting an idea for a setting or a character, and maybe someone will be willing to write a story using it. It's also an exercise in writing though, where writefags can try out their material and gain inspiration, so if you just want to talk about world-building save it for the world-building threads.

Remember that writefags love to have feedback on their work. Writing takes a long time, especially stories that go over several posts, and it can be really depressing when no one even seems to read it (and the writer won't know you read it unless you leave a comment).

And since writing takes a long time remember to keep the thread bumped. Pics are good, feedback is better.

Last week's thread can still be found in the archive here
And finally, don't forget to check out past stories on our wiki page:
1d4chan.org/wiki/Storythread

Other urls found in this thread:

docs.google.com/document/d/1SRphZm7Xt3xfQpDIR0wggfw9DtJcC0ST0sDEUwnwzgA/edit?usp=sharing
twitter.com/NSFWRedditImage

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Cont. For the user who said he was looking forward to more.

It took him a moment to process. He heard the words, and he knew their meaning, but he didn't understand at first. And then it hit him. The commisar didn't know! The infraction and the punishment were both off the books after all, he couldn't know! He wasnt gonna get shot! Faulin felt like dancing a jigging and bursting out into song, but he kept a lid on it. Gotta appear right stoic and proper in front of officers after all, specially commisars. He hadn't lasted this long by being stupid, nor by having a bad poker face. So he kept his expression under control and quietly demured. "Just doing my duty sir".

As he spoke a thought occurred to him. The commisar thought he was doing this all voluntary like after all, maybe if he played it up he could turn this to his advantage? Now no man who knew him would accuse private Faulin of being the most devote servant of the emperor, but he was quite good at faking it. Had to be, lack of proper piety got you shot after all. So he slipped into his best impression of the priest from the Parish he went to as a boy and continued speaking, slowly gaining volume and confidence as his voice filled with 'religious fervor'. "After all we must needs maintain these vessels of the Emperor's holy wrath, which he has seen fit ro bless us with, lest we be found ungrateful for his gift and he withdraw his blessings!" The private said emphatically.

When he finished speaking the commisar said nothing. He just stared for a moment, and Faulin worried he might have laid it on a little thick. Had he been seen through? Shit, shit, he shoulda just been happy to get out alive, what'd he go and risk it for? He continued to grow ever more nervous, until when the commisar turned ro face him and suddenly clapped a hand on his shoulder he nearly jumped out of his skin.

"You" the commisar began solemnly "are truly a model of what an imperial guardsmen should be. A true servant of the emperor. Would that we had more with your faith, none could stand against us." He said.

He was facing Faulin full on now. Were those tears in his eyes? 'Surely not', Faulin thought,' I must be imagining things, commisars don't cry.'


"When I was assigned to this regiment I was worried" the commisar conspiritorially said leaning a bit closer. "I had heard the men were insubordinate and faithless . I feared I would find no true servant of the emperor among this gaggle. Fears i though corroberated when i saw they had all run off whoring, and then i saw you. Quietly and unassumingly doing your duty. I had prayed to Him on Terra to grant me at least one man I could trust, and he has answered. Private Faulin, I wish to have you assigned as my aid. Will you help me to bring this regiment back to the emperor's light?"

Outwardly Faulin put on his best impression of humility, but inside he was screaming and crying. There was no way out of it! "I wold be honored sir."

"Good good, then I'll speak with the colonel and draw up the transfer orders"

And that is the beginning of the story of Private James Faulin. Unwilling aid to Commisar Daniel Brocke, attached to the Missisary 44rth armored division

>all the spelling errors.

This is why I should really not post on my phone, and should really give things a once over before posting. Sorry lads.

spelling errors aside, you did good work user (I'm btw)

thank you.

Has anyone heard back from The Bard yet? I was told today was the day but have heard nothing.

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I've got a game for you guys: can you guess which stories on the wiki are mine?

I ask because I want to know if I have an identifiable style. I generally post the stories I write anonymously, but lately I've been wondering if there are some common denominators to my writing, and if it would help me to know what they are. No need to go to too much effort. If you can't pick out my stories easily, then obviously I don't have a consistent style and the question is moot. But if you can take glance at the wiki and go 'aha - he's /that/ guy', then it would probably help me to know how you do it.

I want to know because I've recently started work on a novel, and hence I've been taking a long hard look at my past writing and seeing if I can find any way to improve it. (This is also why I won't be contributing material to the thread much for the immediate future - sorry. Although don't worry, I will still be capping stories and updating the wiki.)

To start you off, I'll give you the most recent sample of my work
and a hint: I tend to upload my stories in groups. There's also plenty of my stuff on there, so this shouldn't be a needle-in-a-haystack hunt.

Of course, this all presupposes that there are people out there who have actually read what's on the wiki

picture unrelated, hopefully.

"So you got the explosives set?"
"Yep."
"The gobbos know nothing about what we did?"
"Not a clue."
"And you even managed to save my family?"
"Every single one."

This was it, the moment of payoff. After months of subjugation to the goblin tribes, one little fairy named Sandi finally escaped her slavers and came across Velm, a gruff knight who revered the fairies as protectors of nature.
Together, that fairy and Velm began their campaign of liberation, striking at the goblin hideouts wherever they hid. With Sandi's knowledge of goblin society and Velm's strength of arms, the goblins had no chance of repelling them.
Now there was only one goblin stronghold left and they had several dozen pounds of explosives to deal with it. Sandi knew everything there was to know about this one: it was the one she fled from and returning in order to bring it crashing down made her giddy.

And so it led to this. The explosives were all in place, the fairies were freed, and now the goblins were blissfully unaware of how close they were to having their place blow up.
"You got the thing?" Sandi asked.
"Right here." In Velm's hand was a small rune. Breaking it would trigger all the explosives in the fortress with a magical shockwave.
"Do it." Velm crushed the rune easily enough. "On three, we do it." Sandi held her fist out. "One...two..."

On three, as their fists connected, the base blew up sky-high behind them. Neither knight nor fairy paid any heed to the explosion. This was their payoff. This was their win and nothing could take that away from them.

"Hey, Velm," Sandi asked as they walked away, "do you mind if I stayed with you a little longer?"
Velm grew a small smile, "I can always do with a fairy partner. You're always welcome."
"Partners..." the word rolled off perfectly for Sandi. It was everything she could have wanted at this moment. "Yeah, I'd love that."
"Then c'mon," Velm said. "Let's go eat, partner."
"Awesome."

And this was how the greatest team was formed.

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Hmmmm the bit I wanted feedback on is long enough I'm thinking it will scare everyone off. Maybe I'd best just post another shortish bit and hold off on more until somebody says they've read through it.

Not sure though if I should post starting at the beginning of the entire section or post the bit immediately prior to the last bit I posted

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Oh man, that was good enough I kind of hate you. The story I'm working on atm has an almost identical need-to-sound-like-super-zealous-guardsman-guy scene and you rocked it way harder than me.

Normally I'd be concerned to find someone else writing a scene so similar but the 40k setting being what it is its actually kind of awesome/hilarious.

In the first line you aught to remove the he said at the end. its unnecessary.

1. BWAHAHAHAHA!
2. Awesome 40k fluff
3. While a given regiment might have any number of non-standard rank titles in general in the IG he would be called Trooper Faulin. If this regiment calls them privates instead that's fine just make it clear their regiment is a hipster who thinks trooper is too mainstream. I feel like its important we 40k writefags try to make sure we're using the same nomenclature. Its a big part of what makes writing within a specific world so comfy and fun.
4. Similarly I'm pretty sure regiment is the largest permanent formation used by the IG so I'd change it to the 44rth regiment (unless its composed of multiple regiments) in which case I'd go with Legion (not to be confused with a steel legion which is an armored or mechanized regiment from Armageddon).
5. Sorry to be nomenclature nazi but is Missionary a planet? If not a missionary division (regiment) would violate the Decree Passive.
6. what you've posted in this thread is good enough Ima look at the beggining in the previous thread (I can almost never force myself to read other peoples stuff and give feedback like I hope people will do for me so thats kind of like my highest form of praise.)

>pic related: just for your man Faulin

"Relax an' Enjoy"


"You don't want to go over there and indulge? " The apprentice, some young kid run away from the Ecclesiarchy, looked incredulous as he sat behind the pillar and whispered.

"Nah, I can wait." The old master glanced at a mirror on a stick, and reached for a lever. Patches of purple scaling slid and flexed as he adjusted the tripod mounted pict recorder expertly, lining it up with the mirror to take in the scene beyond.

"They're both in the heat of it now. Can't we just go over and have our way with 'em? Not like they'd mind." Beyond the pillar, other whispers echoed just inaudibly, speaking undertones of passion and lust.

"Nah. if she sees me, she'll realize something's up and break out." To illustrate the point, he pointed to the purple scaling on his arm, which flexed suggestively as the apprentice looked on. "It's not straight up mind control, see. Just pressing the right buttons." Beyond the pillar, things clanked to the floor, one at a time.

"Really?" The apprentice furled eyebrows and leaned in.

"Sure. The Sororitas over there, naughty one she is, got a thing for exotic woman though it's really, really repressed. The Eldar's into bestiality, also really repressed."

"How do you know all this? Some other spell?" The rumpling of cloth joined the armor. Someone moaned lightly.

"Psychological profiling. I look, I listen."

The apprentice snorted a laugh. "Sounds almost Tzeentchian, master. Are you so sure you're not one of 'em again?"

"Nothin' wrong with a little thinking to get your jollies." More moans began to cascaded through the air, feminine and alluring. "Sounds like the show's starting. Relax an' enjoy."

Screw it I want to hear what people think and if people think "10 posts is too long to read" so be it. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!

>[First some clarification: Primarch is a Leman Russ, Warshop is a chimera, and Amelia Cibo is a mechanicum clerk who’s magos lord boss replaced her body with a customized Leman Russ (she wishes he'd asked first)]


“I guess we’d better start trying to get a hold of someone with either the authority, or the influence to send some flyboys and convince them to do it. Miana you’re the master here but Warshop and Primarch have enough vox-range that us amateurs might get through to someone. Mi is there anything the rest of the unit could do to assist?”

“Recaff, gallons and gallons of recaff.”

Two hours later Hest, all-but knowing what the answer would be, tapped Miana’s shoulder, “Any luck?”

“I was only able to find the vox-frequencies of three officers or officials with maybe the authority to send fighters or even ground based anti-air anywhere and whose VO would put me through.”

“They didn’t sound like they were going to do anything?”


“Oh here are the recordings, you can decide for yourself. This first one’s from the Captain of a Cadian mechanized air-defense company.”

The recording played from Cibo’s internal hailer “The fuck you want us to do about it?! We’re getting hit everywhere! Don’t bother me with this shit again!”

Hest was surprised and a little disgusted by the officer’s total lack of composure. The man clearly either didn’t know the effect having a commander yell something like that into a vox would have on every one of his mean who heard it, or hadn’t the self discipline to maintain at least a façade of confidence.

Miana cued up the next recording, this voice lacked the hysterical edge of the Cadian captain, but was so obviously unconcerned with their warning it was almost more disheartening, “We’ll investigate as soon as we can free up the manpower.”

Hest looked down at Miana inquiringly.

“That was Overseer Kalpatril the guy the Administratum put in overall command of the spaceport itself. He seemed to have about as much intellectual firepower as Mightyman Bob.” Mightyman Bob was the unit’s nickname for one of Magos Volkin’s servitors.

The vox-wizard started to cue up the final recording, “After that moron I had to get creative but I was finally able to convince that air-traffic vox guy you and Briand play cards with to relay a vox transmission into orbit where I eventually got a hold of a vox officer aboard Sol Invictus herself, High Admiral Milvian’s very own flagship. The VO actually seemed like a decent sort but made it clear getting a message to the admiral herself was not even a possibility. This is the most important swabby we can ever hope to reach so far as the Navy’s concerned.”

Hest knew from the contempt in Miana’s voice he wouldn’t like what this maybe-important void-jockey had to say; he didn’t.

The woman whose voice played over the cabin’s hailer couldn’t have sounded any more hostile. “Who is this?! You’re not authorized to be on this net! You’re in a world of shit whoever you are. You’ll go to the penal legions for this!”

Hest was immediately alarmed but, before he could ask, Miana anticipated his next question. “That cunt’s going to have a serious case of the ass when she tries to find out who she was just talking to.”

“Are you absolutely sure about that? You’ve always been able to do stuff like that.”

Self-satisfaction momentarily relieved Miana’s stressed expression, “Vox transmissions can be traced to their point of origin, but they’ll trace that transmission to the spaceport because it relayed our signal. I can’t imagine how many vox transmissions were coming in and out of Belkin at the time but I know it’s a shit-load and any one of them could be the transmission that was getting bounced to them. Your orbital-traffic controller buddy might well be in a world of shit depending on what kind of logs the spaceport keeps, but I lied about what unit I was from as no one gives a fuck what some Leman Russ crew thinks and he definitely didn’t recognize my voice so he’s as far as that Navy cunt’s quest will ever go.”

Hest sighed, even having suspected things would turn out this, it was disheartening. “There’s no one else you can contact?”

“With most of our upper-echelon command wiped out in the Ork’s rokfall and vox-nets overloaded with panicked reports from damn near every fucking unit and installation in or near the plateau its almost impossible to get a hold of anyone who knows even as little as we do about the strategic situation or what the chain of command is now. If you want I can keep trying to get someone who can do something, but I really doubt it will accomplish much anything.”

Hest’s face turned to a bitter grimace and he didn’t respond immediately, his brow furrowed with thought. Finally his grimace disappeared and he nodded to himself looking a man who’d just resolved himself to a course of action he had hoped to avoid.

“Fuck it. Don’t bother. We’re gonna have to do something about it ourselves or we’re gonna get crumped.”

Hest crawled back into his TC station plopped his headset on and fiddled with his vox settings as he opened the hatch above the commander’s station and stood up to look out. Miana was somewhat curious to see why he was broadcasting on a channel that would go to every crewmember in every tank in the squadron as well as Magos Volkin.

“Everybody kit up and get ready to roll out; full combat posture. The Emperor needs some xenos dealt with and the 3rd Steel Legion’s gonna oblige him.” He’d forgotten they weren’t a Legion regiment anymore again but the squadron was so used to it by now they probably didn’t even notice.

The squadron might not have any remaining officers or paid any attention to rank among themselves but there was still no doubt about who the leaders were; as everyone else stowed gear and began running through rituals of activation Rosk, Duffers, and Phillipe, the ratling tank commander of the unit’s chimera Warshop, got out or off of their vehicles and converged on Cibo as Hest climbed on top of her to meet them. It only took Miana, who had no idea what Hest was doing, to climb out after him.

As the three tankers from the other vehicles arrived for their little conference Rosk cut straight to the chase, “You finally got through to someone with their head out of their ass? What’re our orders?”

Miana, staring at Hest like he’d lost his mind, seconded the question. Her tone was intensely pointed. “Yes Trooper Hest, what are our orders?”

“It should be apparent to anyone who’s watched Miana at her vox-caster for the last hour that what little is left of the Guard’s chain of command on Heerin is totally fucked, we can’t rely on the Brass to accomplish shit. If Miana’s right about orks secretly airlifting forces in from the West they have to be dealt with right now or we, and by we I mean the Imperium of man on Heerin, are about to be wiped out.

There are good reasons orders, even bad ones, must be obeyed, but even more important than orders is our mission: the defense of the Holy Imperium of Man. Right now the Emperor needs somebody to keep ork airlifts from collapsing the imperial defensive lines around Belkin. We are going to do it for him. Nothing, not laws or regs, not orders, not the chain of command, and sure as fuck no commissar can be allowed to stand in the way of that. Are you with me?”

Hest was unaware of it but Amelia piped this little speech over the squadron’s vox-net so that it was heard by every single man and woman in the unit. To Hest’s intense surprise cheering, shouts of variations on “Shit yes!”, and cries of “Vive l’Empereur” (this last from the ratlings of course) erupted from all three tanks before any of the three squadron-members Hest was actually consulting with could say anything one way or the other. Nonetheless Phillipe and Duffers didn’t hesitate to join in the unit’s displays of bravado.

Rosk did not join in cheering and, after a moment, he told Hest pointedly, “I would be more inspired by your courageous words if we actually possessed anti-aircraft weaponry with which we might hope to actually harm these theoretical ork fliers.”

Hest smiled, he’d expected Rosk to raise the issue if Miana hadn’t first, “Its true we don’t have any AAA, but we’re gonna make a pit-stop on our way west and take care of that.”

Rosk stared at Hest contemplatively for perhaps twenty or thirty seconds then finally nodded and strode back to board Primarch.

Only Miana and Hest remained atop Cibo’s hull. Hest turned to see how Miana had reacted to his unilateral decision for the unit and his heart sank as he saw she looked more weary, more strained, than he’d ever seen her before.

“You don’t like what’s going on?”

Instead of Miana it was Cibo who answered though Miana’s expression made it clear the tank-clerk spoke for both of them, “Hest… do you really know what you’re doing?”

Hest seemed to deflate for a moment; he looked away and ran a hand through his hair, “Fuck no, but…” Hest hesitated for a moment as though reluctant then looked back over at Miana and continued, his tone frank if resigned, “This whole situation, everything about it, screams of a disaster in the making. You know it Miana, and based on your having broadcast me to the entire unit I can guess you know it as well Cibo, probably better than either of us. The orks have a plan and our forces stand no chance in hell of defeating it because we’re all either flailing blindly at orkish misdirection or waiting uselessly for someone to tell us what to do. If we don’t go and at least try to stop what we see happening here we, and every other human within a thousand miles, is gonna die. I know we don’t really have any fucking idea what’s happening, and even if our guesswork and speculation is spot-on three lone tanks with no infantry support or hope of backup probably aren’t going to live long if we get in the way of a coordinated ork warband; the thing is I’ll sure as fuck take those shit odds over the alternative.”

Miana seemed unconvinced. “So that’s it? You’re taking command?”

“I’m sure as fuck not saying such a thing out loud, that would be Impersonating an Officer.”

Cibo ended the debate when she pronounced without a hint of uncertainty, “It’s what Yarrick would do.” The clerk/tank would know, she’d fought with him at Hades Hive, and the Steel Legioners respect for her centuries of experience was absolute. If Senior Clerk First Class Amelia Cibo, veteran of not just one, not just two, but all three wars for Armageddon, said something was so, it was so. Thusly encouraged Miana climbed back into the Leman Russ and returned to her vox-station.

Hest remained standing there on top of the tank, alone. He should have been relieved his people were behind his unilateral decision, instead suddenly he felt very alone; like some beast cast without warning far away from the comfort of its heard where it could just blend in and become safely indistinguishable from anyone else. Eventually the guardsman sighed and clambered down through the TC hatch, he’d already resolved himself to go through with this if he could; no sense in fighting that battle with himself again.

After briefly consulting a composite high-resolution overhead pict of the Plateau he’d obtained from a Navy midshipman in exchange for passing on letters from a local girl the swabby had met on shore leave, Hest confirmed everyone in the squadron was squared away, and ordered them to roll out.

As Cibo lurched into motion and Hest was surrounded by her armored hull and the reassuring rumble of her engine his sudden flash of terror began to subside, he even grinned as he magnified portions of the overhead pict. Kiela, Primarch’s turret gunner and the youngest person in the squadron, had taken to writing the midshipman’s letters “from Renia” like an ork took to violence; the most recent one had been really popular within the squadron. It took real talent to write such moving verse about a man’s noble features and “eyes whose gaze is like warm blankets on a cold night” when you had no idea what he looked like or what color the eyes were. Whoever Renia was the Boonhurst First and Only “Regiment” owed her a drink.

>section break
>[Man, deciding how best to break something into 2k character posts is like an art-form unto itself]


Hest directed the squadron to the nearest of the air defense positions in the spaceport’s outermost defensive ring. On the way he hailed Primarch over the vox, “Rosk I need you to turn Primarch over to Amelie or Kiela while you, Duffer, and Hannah kit out in full infantry gear and transfer yourselves over on top of Cibo; I mean full carapace armor, grenades, special weapons, the whole nine yards, you need to look like really short Titans.”

As Rosk acknowledged the order Miana turned to look at Hest like he’d just suggested chaos worship, “Turn Primarch over to Kiela? You are fucking crazy.” The two ratlings, Remi and Jean-Claude, chortled in their bizarre accent from the tank’s sponson stations.

“You’d rather have her driving a Leman Russ while we’re on foot nearby?”

“Shit yes, she’s only a homicidal psychopath when she has the opportunity to use a battlecannon on someone. Let her set targets herself and there’d be nothing left of the spaceport for the orks to capture.”

Hest attempted to deflect the course of the conversation, “I think its healthy to enjoy what you do.”

Miana glanced at the tank’s loader, formerly of the Krieg Death Korps, in mock apology, “I’m sorry you had to hear that Sigs. I know how your people feel about experiencing joy or pleasure. Try not to think too much less of him.”

To the shock of the entire crew the former Krieger croaked out a response, “A trooper of the Korps. must embrace what punishments the Emperor sees fit to bless them with. To do less would be treason.”

Hest laughed, “And those Tempestus pussies think they’re such hard dudes.”

Remi looked at the driver and made a show of being surprised, “Mon diu! Zat vas very nearly a joke my skull-festooned friend. Zey vill be making you return your gas mask for zis I am thinking.”

>section break

Three tanks rumbled down the road towards a heavily sandbagged and concertina-wired air-defense firebase. Rather than an actual armored defense complex like most of the other batteries in the Belkin spaceport’s outermost defensive line this position was comprised of three static hydra flak turrets and a pair of hydra tanks surrounded by breastworks. The PDF troopers responsible for manning the firebase quickly gathered along the side of the road, eager for some news of what was happening from the approaching armored column. One Leman Russ rumbled to a halt a good forty yards from the edge of the firebase as did the lone Chimera but the remaining stormtrooper-laden Russ rolled right up to the edge of the concertina-wire and the four heavily armed and armored men riding on top wasted no time in hopping over the wire into the firebase proper.

Before any of the PDF had time to ask any questions though one of the soldiers raised his heavy flamer to point directly into their midst and ignited its pilot flame as the other three raised a standard flamer, a grenade launcher, and a hot-shot volley gun. The firebase troopers abruptly realized just how enormous the guns on the three tanks were and that they were all pointed at the firebase; in fact they had every inch of it perfectly covered.

The man with the heavy flamer spoke, projecting his voice loud enough to be heard by every man and woman present. “Every one of you is going to do exactly what I tell you and absolutely nothing else. We have important things to do and absolutely no time to fuck around with any of you. Understood?”

They stared back in mute shock and he nodded as though their stunned silence were the desired response. At a gesture two of the other carapace-armored soldiers, Flamer and Volley Gun, pushed their way through the gathered PDF, none of whom risked turning around to see what they were doing.

“Who are the gunners for those two tank hydras?”

One man raised his hand immediately; the other did so only reluctantly after those nearby turned to stare at him. Heavy Flamer gestured the two gunners foreword and Grenade Launcher jabbed each with a styrette of something that immediately dropped them into unconscious heaps.

“Alright, here’s what’s going on. We’re taking those two tank hydras and their gunners because the Emperor needs them somewhere else. You’re all going to remain frozen where you are while we mount up, make sure their ammo and fuel are topped off and drive away. Until every one of our tanks is so far away you can’t even see us anymore you’re all going to remain frozen so we don’t have to worry about anyone making vox transmissions; we don’t have time to deal with your CO’s fussing about our taking his tanks. Are you all confident you know what we need from you?”

When he was again met by silence Heavy Flamer and Grenade Launcher each picked up one of the hydra gunners, slung them over a shoulder, and started towards the flak tanks.
No one said a word until, just before Hest reached the closer hydra, a voice from the crowd of PDF called out, “Only one of those tanks is operational!”

“Which?”

When they all pointed at the same vehicle Hest looked over at Rosk, already in the indicated hydra’s drivers seat, and the man began fiddling with the gun platform’s controls and speaking the relevant activation incantation. After a few moments Rosk looked over at Hesk and shook his head confirming the vehicle was totally dead: no sign of the engine waking, not a spark of battery or capacitor power, nothing; no motive force remained within the Hydra, its machine spirit was dead.

Now that Hest truly looked at the warmachine what he saw disgusted him. Rust and corrosion seemed to cover more of the tank’s surface than did the remnants of its paintjob which gave it an appearance grotesquely reminiscent of a plaguebearer. The machine must have been parked there for decades and had settled down into the mud so far it was buried halfway to the top of its drive wheels. Hest rubbed accumulated dirt away from where the vehicle’s name should have been painted so that at least the name of this lost comrade might be known. He had to struggle to make it out: this hydra had been Glory to the Heavens.

The machine spirit of Ostrichizer, the surviving flak tank, did rouse to its activation ritual, but instead of singing with the powerful invigorating rumble Hest had come to expect from the noble tanks of his Imperial Guard its engine seemed to moan; its voice was a sputtering shrieking tragedy that sounded like illness felt. Hest gritted his teeth and forced himself to climb aboard Ostrichizer instead of exploding at the PDF in outrage over their revolting neglect of such noble machines. Through their negligence and disrespect these PDF wretches had murdered Glory to the Heavens as effectively as any Tau hammerhead; the Hydra’s machine spirit hadn’t even the comfort of knowing as it passed that it had died gloriously in battle striking down foes of the Emperor right to the last. Hest found the irony mocking, for a tank so named to have sunk into the ground away from the heavens bringing not glory but shame. Were it not for rage the Steel Legionary might have wept.

As Ostrichizer lurched into motion at Rosk’s direction and they rolled west Hest laid a hand on the hydra’s hull and silently swore to its machine spirit, on his honor and by his faith in the Holy God-Emperor of Mankind, that it would never again suffer such indignity and callus neglect. That done, Hest patted the warmachine affectionately and turned his thoughts to the work ahead, “Rejoice Ostrichizer, you’re finally going to war. Before this day is done xenos will feel the caress of your shells and hear the roar of your guns as they die; we must render all the service that your brother could not.”


>That's the entire section leading up to the bit I first posted last thread

Delay until monday

The rich Tiefling business woman; Zanatas "Zanta" Falren, was throwing a party, celebration for her latest business venture. She was successful in suing a rival company for plagiarism and slander, but mostly slander to herself and her family name. Because miss Zanta Falren was the type of rich person one could consider among the powerful type, it was assumed that not only she hired the best lawyers and or attorneys money can buy. And she probably even help rigged the trial by tossing a couple of bills and money here and there to make sure she won the trial and that she gets to own the rival company and all of its shares, profits and other properties.

But; "None of that matters anymore, I'm here to celebrate and invite as much people as I can think off and know to my mansion party!" -she said when interviewed by the press.

And in a weekend night about a hundred-plus people have been invited and are currently enjoying a night of delicious-buffet-served food, bottomless drinks, good music being played and basically uppity-rich people being uppity-rich people. A lot of the people in the party who're invited are the employees of Ms. Zanta Falren's company.

Yet almost not every one of her employee's have entered the celebration in her mansion as one employee; a young man was rushing very fast to the mansion of Zanta Falren as he feared he may have been to late, worrying he would not be able to personally meet Ms. Falren believing she's be busying herself with alot of people attending her party.

Though fortunately for him he was not late for anything, the young man who rushed for the party now just had to wait in line to be accepted into the mansion.

"Oh boy, there're sure alot of people as of now... I just hope Ms. Falren would have some time with me... I just hope." The young man thought to himself as the line of people atleast advanced to a slow yet steady pace as he could see he'd be nearing the end of the line soon.

...

The young man in question was Marcus Weatherbee. He is a young human male who is exactly twenty years old and works as a lowly intern, or more specifically; as Ms. Falren's little assistant. He was actually lucky he got such a close position to Ms. Falren as his job as an assistant ranged from typical secretary work to him doing some house chores of hers, basically he almost worked as her maid sometimes. And because his not-so-typical type of job involves him being that close to Ms. Falren, he also gets a slightly higher salary and pay grade than most lower-class corporate employees.

Although Ms. Falren still maintains levels of professionalism, he actually has developed feelings for his boss. Sure she's likely a hundred or so years old compared to a human such as himself who's just a mere twenty, he's essentially a little child compared to Ms. Falren's age. So he did the next thing any human who has a crush and general feelings for a pretty and attractive humanoid being such as Zanatas Falren the rich business Tiefling woman, who's also single; confess his feelings and crush on her.

The reasons for Marcus having feelings for her is because despite her using him as a part time Maid for tasks and job that amount to house chores, she treats him well. Despite the level of professionalism she maintains between herself and Marcus Weatherbee she does occasionally acts all friendly and down-to-earth towards him. And at other times she'd even offer him lunch and or dinner outside, and she'd even be kind and compassionate enough to give him a cup of coffee sometimes when starting a day of work. Which is why he thought it'd be right to confess his developing feelings to her, and to top it all off he even brought a compact Boombox that he has currently strapped along his back along with a tape containing a song he made just for her.

Now the only thing he has to do is state his name and business so that he could be let in to Ms. Falren's mansion.

>to be continued

...

I have to say, dude, I like the way it's coming together. However, I don't think the rank and file troopers would be so zealous as to perform every rite and litany.

As always I could nitpick (things like verb-subject continuity, run-on sentences, etc) but I don't think that's what this story needs. I have to say that it needs a consistency of narrative voice.

I also have to admit that I'm not current in the fluff

1. Hey you actually read it *weeps*
2. Its not that they're super zealous its that they honest believe that their tanks have actual machine spirits that require the activation rights to be preformed or the vehicle won't turn on. (they don't actually think of them as "turning on" only inanimate objects can be turned on or off. their tanks have to be woken up.) Also I thought I had pretty well illustrated that Hest at least really believed in these machine spirits and was pretty hardcore about treating them right. How did you interpret those scenes with the hydras?
3. Please elaborate on
>needs a consistency of narrative voice.
4. Any other thoughts? (not to look a gift feedback in the mouth)

>Hydra scenes.
I found them...interesting, to say the least. Self-appointed command knocks out the drivers as opposed to press them into service, then try to steal the hydras only to find one of them works, and somehow there are enough crewmen to make 4 tanks fully operational without taking extra guardsmen. From a logistics standpoint you should be at least at 2 full operational, 2 half operational.

I must have missed the introduction of their beliefs when it comes to the machine spirits.

By narrative voice, I mean you switching between 3rd person omniscient and stream of consciousness. Either one is fine independent of the other, but both combined tend to create confusion.

Other thoughts....well, just nitpicking.
Break up most of your long sentences into concise thoughts.
>"As Ostrichizer lurched into motion, Hest laid a hand on the hydra's hull. He silently swore, on his honor..."
It reads a bit easier (in my opinion, anyway) and allows you to be more expressive.

Sorry about the long wait. I'm kind of at work.

they only need a driver in the Hydra to get it away from the firebase. their plan was to have their techpriest act as the driver/vox operator and his servitor as loader for one of the vehicles and then have a sponson heavy bolter or two just go unmanned if nescesary (Cibo can operate her own weaponry she's just kind of a shit gunner/has trouble driving, operating hull HB and operating another weapon at same time

They are going to press the driver into service. Theres an antidote for the seditive they just didn't want to have to deal with a prisoner who might make a run for it or samat else. Its there belief that if he wakes up in an unfamiliar place with no one he knows in sight he'll be more likely to cooperate

a million thanks user. You're being the person Mr. Rogers always knew you could be.

>its there belief
You really need to work on your homonyms, too.

Wait...did you just change your name?

I'm posting in a different thread under an RP name I forget to check my name all the time

requesting Warhammer 40k - Red Dwarf parody

"Well he sure is set on making a record. Full twenty minutes and counting. Me thinks Larry might be winning."

A group of young adults, all of them in their mid 20's, are standing outside a small stone hovel. Outside the hovel is an old gas lamppost that smelled of rust and decay even though neither were visible present. The hovel itself gave off an eerie green glow from all it's pores, creating an alien scene to the nearby woods. These men have been standing at the doorsteps of the hovel for some time now, making bets on who of them could last the longest. So far nobody has lasted longer than the current person, Larry. All those who have been inside have come out in various degrees of terror. None of them would specify why.

"Ah, here he comes. And paler than the lot of you combined. He's a good candidate for the few hundred you lot have already sunk into this pot."

Larry indeed was pale. And exhausted. His breathing heavy, eyes darting, fingers shaking and mouth agape. His movements were sluggish and unsure.

"Christ all mighty, you look awful. And judging from the smell you poor bastard pissed yourself."

No answer was given. Larry continued on without joining the others, completely ignoring the combination of mockery and consolation that came from those who had not yet entered the hovel. Those who had remained decidedly silent.

"Now then, who's next?"

Those remaining seemed reluctant. They were kicking up dust, rubbing the backs of their necks and avoiding eye contact. Despite their bravado and mockery of those who had been inside, they themselves had lost the will to enter.

Except for Henry, the one who had been taking the time. He was still full of vigor and ready to pocket the pool, something he was set on doing from the very start. After all, he was the one who had made the bet in the first place.

"Fine then, if you ladies apparently have pantyhose too tight to walk, I will do it myself. See you in a few hours."

...

...

...

"I AM ANTARTHUS THE MAGNIFICENT"
A heavy servo assisted claw smashed through into the wall and inch from her head. Julia flinched.
"I know you are Mr Antarthus. You said that before." She came up to just below the nipples on his nuclear powered steam suit. "I also said that I need your help. Please?"

"NO ONE ASKS ANTARTHUS OF HELP. I AM THE VILEST OF VILLAINS I AM..."

"Alan Burgess. Your name is Alan Burgess." Julia's voice quavered. "I know everything about you. Everything about how Antarthus came to be. All about the experiments they made you carry out. All about how you came to be in that suit. The accident."

The only visibly human parts of Antarthus were his eyes. They blinked. The rest of his bright green armour merely hulked.

"Then why did you look for me? I've killed many for less."

Julia adjusted her glasses. "Mr Burgess you've only killed seventeen people that I know of. I'd say fifteen you had a reasonably good excuse or self defence. Two just happened to be holding a child hostage. I know how you feel about children Mr Burgess. I know who they made you carry out the experiments on. I know what's left of you inside that suit thinks about that."

The eyes glowed, watered. "So many tiny coffins..."

"There is a sick child. A very sick child. In room 2555 of St Mary's Hospital. Her name is Sally. She will never walk again. She is also unlikely to live out the week. At the fulfill a dream foundation where I work. We asked her what she wanted. She wanted to meet the only person who was more crippled than her and yet could outsmart and out fight all of the Honour League. She wanted to meet you Mr Burgess. She wants to meet Antarthus. Will you help?"

He scraped concrete dust from the spiked knuckles of his suit. "I'll... I'll think about it."

Three days later, Sally died. By her bed was a signed photo of the cities most wanted man. In her arms a bright green teddy bear.

Unsure if to leave the story as is or develop. There's a whole world I've had in mind.

>Helsia Damos

The fuck?
Is someone using Jaina Proudmoore as character art or something?

... someone...

Hey, I am continuing the whfb story I was doing on the last 2 pages.

Finally Marcus got his turn to reach the entrance of the mansion. It was just as big as he'd imagine, then again it was the typical run-of-the-mill rich person's mansion. And just as he entered the path sorrounded by the large lawn in front of the mansion, he was greeted by an elven house servant.

"Good evening sir. Do you have your invitation?"

"Oh no..." Marcus thought to himself as he realized he had no such thing, plus he never even knew an actual invitation was needed.

"Uhm, actually I'm someone Ms. Falren knows. I'm Marcus Weatherbee, I work as part time secretary and as her personal. *ahem* ...Errand boy."

"Well its nice to meet you sir. But may I please have your invitation?"

"I never knew an invitation was needed. I wasn't even told an invitation was required!"

The elven house servant polite demeanor then changed to a slightly smug one, though Marcus never noticed it.

"Hmpf. Seriously? Ms. Falren said she'd INVITE people in a recent interview of her's. There's a reason why there is this system of letting people with invitations in. We don't just let anyone in, and how am I suppose to know you really are a close associate of Ms. Zanatas Falren?"

"Just ask her, I swear! I work for her personally. She'll let me in, I-"

"Sorry sir but rules are rules. And clearly even if you ARE a close associate. You still need an invitation. Now begone with you! There are other guests waiting in line."

Marcus looked back to see a growing line of people, one of which was a hulking Orc man who was starting to get impatient and one irritated looking Halfling.

Marcus gave up on his insistence and walk out of the queue of people. He was starting to get distressed as to how is he going to get in now? He thought of one way he could get in; through the back door.

Once the front door greeters did not notice him, nor anyone was watching him. He slipped out of sight, sneaked through the lawn and moved through bushes to stay hidden from anyone who'd notice.

...

Bump for the bump god

Yes, sorry for the delay. We were just about to pull the trigger on who we were accepting when it turned out one of the stories was legit plagiarized from some poor guy's livejournal. We've had to put things back a couple of days while we confirmed that the livejournal owner wasn't the same person who submitted the story, and while we worked out which of the 'nearly-made-its' was getting promoted to 'made-it'. It has been a real hassle to be quite honest family. Why someone would try and slip us a mickie for $15.80 I'll never know. Hopefully everything will be copacetic again by Monday, and we'll be able to send out feedback shortly after. Sorry for the delay!
also did you guys know people still used livejournal?

Marcus moved and sneaked around by the bushes and shrubs dotted along at what was the huge lawn of Ms. Falren's mansion. Finally he got to the back of the mansion without anyone noticing and there he saw the back door which was being used by some waiting staff in the party to bring in food and drinks.

Marcus waited for the right time where all the waiting staff for the event would all go in so that he may sneak in or walk in without raising too much suspicions or atleast where not that much people would look at him. And just like that he saw the moment where all the staff outside have now walked in with the back door open and this was it, he walked out of a bush he was hiding in and to the open back door. But suddenly an armed guard appeared in between the door frame just as Marcus almost reached it by a few steps.

"Whoa there! Who are you??? You don't look like one of the waiting staff." The guard answered in a gruff manner. It seemed Ms. Falren hired mercenaries, or private military contractors to guard her estate as of recently or for this party.

"Oh. I'm, uh, Marcus Weatherbee. I'm Ms. Zanatas Falren's secretary and part time errand boy... May I come in? She can vouch for me I swear, I just have to see her."

"You're an errand boy? Bullshit! If you were one of her house servants or the waiting staff, then why the fuck are you not wearing uniform? Plus what's with that boombox you got in your back?"

"Hey that's not a nice thing to say to a guest-"

"You're no guest! If you're a guest, you should've been in the front entrance showing your invitation and not attempting to sneak through here. SO GO AWAY!"

"Please I swear, she knows me. Just contact her and she'll tell you-"

Then the hired merc-guard aimed his gun at Marcus and threatened. "IF YOU DON'T LEAVE THE PREMISES NOW I'M GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU."

"WHAT THE!? YOU CAN'T DO THAT!" Marcus raised his arms in fear for his life as a weapon was now faced directly at him.

>will continue

...

"I'M GIVING YOU TILL THE COUNT OF TEN TO GET OUT OF HERE OR ELSE!"

Marcus stared at the barrel of the guard's assault rifle noticing he had a suppressor attachment on. Meaning while the gun would still be noisy it would make less noisy if fired so that it wouldn't cause a ruckus that'd be heard by the rest of the guests in the party.

"ONE. TWO. THREE-" The guard was already counting down and Marcus had to think quickly; get out of here to not get killed by a trigger happy mercenary looking for an excuse to kill something and live another day. Or do something "drastic."

What Marcus did instead of getting out of there was bold yet shocking; through a fit of adrenaline suddenly coursing through his veins and the rest of his body he actually tackled the mercenary. Marcus tackled the merc before he could even fire his weapon or even react and once the merc was stunned and lost a hold of his weapon, Marcus was now sitting on top of the dazed mercenary.

And without a second thought Marcus rolled both his hands into fists and punched dazed contractor in the head twice with both hands as the dazed merc was now knocked out unconscious.

"...Holy shit!" Was the only thing Marcus was able to say as to realizing what he has done and gotten himself into. He has KO'd an armed soldier of fortune and was not immediately gunned down. He looked around to see no one was around to witness what happened. Marcus dragged the unconscious body and hid it in a bush along with the guy's weapon. Then Marcus also realized something, he can now get in since no one was around to see him, meaning he finally could get in and meet Ms. Falren. And to also confess something special.

Marcus made haste and jogged through the back entrance. He navigated to some hallways that he believed led to the main dining area and ball room where Ms. Falren's guests are all gathered and surprisingly when he had to pass by a number of waiting staff and other house servants batted an eye on him.

But just as he was about to make it to the dining area and ball room he was stopped by one of the house keeping staff as he was called.

"Hey you! Stop, I got something to tell you."

"Oh no, am I caught?" Marcus thought to himself as he turned around to see another Tiefling; a guy looked like a butler, approached Marcus.

"Are you busy right now? Looking for Ms. Falren? Well can you do me a solid deliver this bottle of expensive high-end branded Whiskey to her? I'm a bit bogged with having to tend some of these rich snobs who ain't Ms. Falren. You new 'round here? Haven't seen you before. But anyways, deliver this bottle to her. Should be easy to carry since the person who sent this had it kept in this here bottle carrier sling. Oh and Ms. Falren's in her private chambers at the top floor, stairs are right over there. Just keep heading up till you reach the top and that's the floor where her quarters are. Now go, she's actually just preparing to look good. And dinner hasn't started yet."

"...Uhmm Thanks friend, I'll be going now!" Thanks that housekeeping staff that was unaware of whom Marcus really was. He now knows where exactly Zanta Falren is as he also slung the bottle of expensive whiskey around him to also have it delivered to her as well.

Marcus reached the stairs and immediately made haste in climbing them. So far so good as no one seemed to know that he wasn’t exactly “authorized personnel.” Plus despite his previous encounter with that guard earlier, he seemed a bit relaxed and at ease that there doesn’t seem to be any other guards he’s seen so far. Maybe they were all downstairs guarding the premises?

Unfortunately once he reached the top floor he saw another private guard, a mercenary just like the one he encountered earlier.

“HEY, WHO ARE YOU!? You don’t look like the housekeeping staff, how’d you get in here!?”

>will continue

Well thank you for the feed back. If I could I would go back and correct the redundancy, and the spelong errors, but I just kinda tossed thst out as quick as I could, because I was on my phone at the time and I wanted to get it posted before my battery died.

I'll keep the nomenclature in mind for future pieces. Any other terms you think would be good to know?

Missisary was the name of the planet yes. It's not a spelling error of missionary, it's a bastardization of Mississippi based on the way I heard it pronounced by this really drunk Hill Billy once.

...

...

So how do you exactly feel about rough drafts being posted in these threads?

...

Cont from Part 2 of Chapter 2 is here. Sorry if it drags a little, not much action here, its more of an opportunity to build on the central characters somewhat.

=][=

The low hum of the warp drives was a constant aboard the Lady Sovereign. While normally it proved a nuisance when trying to concentrate, in light of the absolute silence of Prosper it was a comfort just to hear something man-made again.
I sat at my desk, watching the cursor blink as I decided best how to round off my report of the chase of the rogue Magos. It had been a long pursuit, spanning two years and several sub-sectors. Now it was finally at an end, and I could look forward to some well-deserved seclusion. Banners displaying Imperial heraldry hung from the walls alongside paintings depicting figures I greatly respected from Imperial history. Primarch Vulkan, who served to remind that we work to protect the denizens of the Imperium, Saint Sabbat, who showed the necessity of sacrifice, and adorning the wall directly across from my desk, Eisenhorn, who’s wisdom I had long-revered.

Though dead, his words lived through his published work, and I was proud to have a copy of The Spheres of Longing within my collection. It sat in a display case amongst the bookcases that lined one wall of the room.
I had always been taught a warrior’s instruments of war should speak for him, both on and off the battlefield. To that end, I had elected to place my armour and various armaments on stands and racks in a small alcove of to the left. Easily accessible, and serving as a reminder to any guests I might have that I was a warrior first, and an Inquisitor second.
My thoughts returned once again to Lysa. I was certain she’d run on ahead in an effort to impress with her abilities as an Interrogator.

(cont.)

It had been a mercy on my part that had spared her, sometimes I wondered if that was a mistake. Lysa was a remarkably potent psyker and trained with both close quarters and ranged weaponry, but what she lacked was experience in the field, even after twelve years in my service. Those missions I had allowed her on had been minor investigations with easy access to resources and little real danger.
I had, for my part, sheltered her far too much, viewing her as more of a daughter than an Inquisitor in training. Perhaps this was her way of breaking those bonds. I was shaken from my thoughts by a knock at the door. I sat up and switched the monitor off.
“Come.”

Leah entered, clad in a matt-black bodyglove that did nothing to hide her muscular physique, and her Arbiter trenchcoat. The sweat on her brow suggested she was fresh from the training room, and in her hands she carried two mugs of steaming recaff.
“Thought this might ease the worry a little,” she smiled, setting a mug down before me.
“Worry?” I asked indifferently. I could read from her surface thoughts that she didn’t believe me. She knew me far too well.
“Well, it’s there if you want it.”
I sighed, lifting a hand to tug at the bandaging on my shoulder as I studied my blank monitor thoughtfully.
“Feels as though we can’t catch a break. Klyte is dead, and we’re already jumping into the next job.”

(cont.)

“It could be much worse,” she offered, “Remember the Subhive Nightmare?”
She was referring to when we were both Arbiters, during far simpler times. I had always been a fighter, and the one engagement from my former life that stood out was the Subhive incident. The entire hive had become destabilized from beneath, and eventually we had been deployed under the guiding hand of an Inquisitor to look into the problem.
Of course, said problem was a Daemon, and after ninety percent losses on our part, the survivors of our unit had been offered employment by the Inquisition. Now only I and Leah were left, time robs more than any cutpurse could.

“How long will the warp jump take?” I asked after a moment.
“The Cat reckons two days, you worry too much.” She lifted her recaff to her mouth, blowing on it and taking a sip. I did the same but found it scalding, quite how Leah tolerated it I couldn’t say.
“Do you think I shelter her too much?”
“I think you forget she isn’t ten years old anymore,” she chided me in a way none of my other henchmen, even Tannhauser, would, “She’s more than capable, she’s passed all the theory, the psychic evaluation, everything the scholam threw at her, but you won’t trust her on her own.”
I became irritable despite knowing she was right. I held Lysa too close, and in time that might be used against me, perhaps it was best that she’d jumped into the deep end herself.

(cont.)

“If there’s nothing else…” I said sternly, not wishing for a lecture on hindsight.
“Actually, there is. We’ve had correspondence. Lieutenant Rickard Kiasan, Jurdani twelfth. He’s arranged for a landing zone, said he’d had contact with Lysa and that they’d found something.”
My interest was piqued now. If Lysa has seized the initiative and established contact with the Imperial Guard, it would give us an armed response in case things went badly. Moreover, it meant that Lysa had someone watching her back.
“What are you thinking?” Leah asked, snapping me back to reality.
“Be subtle,” I said, “Prep the unmarked Valkyrie.”

=][=

We watched the unmarked Valkyrie descending towards the diminutive space port through the wide, stained glass window.
Port Fortune was the largest of Crestworld’s settlements, a township thoroughly overshadowed by the forest that bordered it on all sides. Kiasan, Rickard, I ought to call him, had described it as being akin to a clearing that simply happened to have a city in it, and I had been incredulous until I had seen it for myself, with trees as large as three hundred feet towering around it.

Unsurprisingly, buildings here were either cut from the trees or shaped from slate rock. Of all the Imperial worlds I had visited, this was perhaps the most peculiar. I had never heard of a chapel being repurposed into a café, yet here we were, sat at a table on the old chapel’s upper walkway while the faithful ambled around in the considerably larger cathedral across the bustling market square we currently overlooked.

(cont.)

And we were quite the sight, me in my matt-black bodyglove, over which sat a deep red corset inlaid with flak panelling, and a matching strip of red cloth wound around my waist, from which hung my equipment, chief among which was my laspistol, a battered old thing that I had kept by me since I had been old enough to handle firearms under the Inquisitor’s guidance.
Rickard on the other hand was clad in the drab brown, silver and red of the Jurdani twelfth, his lasgun hanging from a leather strap over the back of his chair like one might hang a coat. Between us sat two mugs of steaming recaff and a plate of untouched cakes complimentary of the café’s owners.

I doubt they had seen an Interrogator before, but they knew the rosette. The occasional nervous glance from the counter told me such.
“Your master,” Kiasan started. I looked back at him with a curious gaze, keen to hear what he had to say.
“Your master, is he the merciful sort?”
“Where it applies…” I replied.
“Meaning?”
“Meaning he’s not a caricature like the vid picts would have you believe. Inquisitors don’t swing between killing planetary governors and giving out Exterminatus orders from day to day.”
“Ah,” he turned to glance out of the window as his face turned a shade pinker, “You going to tell him I asked?”
“Mission reports are a thing,” I smirked as he shifted uncomfortably in his seat, “Who knows? I might…”

=][=

Any criticisms people have, do let me know!

Error! The painting of the Inquisitor that Inquisitor Bronn admires is meant to be Ravenor, not Eisenhorn.
Sorry about that, folks.

...

Just curious, is it a good idea to namefag in these threads? I've noticed that it seems to help actually getting your stuff read.

>I've noticed that it seems to help actually getting your stuff read.
you may be onto something there. Either way, no one's going to judge you if you want to namefag in this thread.

Indeed, I've found it helps, just keep it mostly to this type of thread. People take to it less kindly in other threads.

In that case...

Fairly regular contributor but only little bit for this thread.

Don't suppose I could nudge you to take a look at my stuff? Always looking to improve.

...

Archives are fine. We're only really concerned with writing blogs/personal websites like tumblr.

How recently did you read the Ravenor books?

Sorry user I should elucidate on that. What I mean is it reads very very similarly to Dan Abnett. Enough that were it not for some slight alterations in sentence structure I'd assume it was. This is not at all a bad thing.

"Religion does some very strange things to people. That's what I've always said." He returned to staring into his glass. It winked back. The man holding the glass wasn't drunk yet but he was on his way.

"See now some religious ideas I get. They're crazy but they make sense in a weird way. Say for example Hanat whisky. Imbued with the psychic tranquility and peace of the hive-monks who make it, some small element of their psyche travelling out into the universe with each bottle."

The man lit a cigarette. There was some initial scrabbling in the semi darkness before he found plasma torch to use as a lighter. This being despite common sense and an enormous number of safety regulations. The light of the torch caused the photo reactive filters on the old marine helmet next to him to thunk into place. He kept talking to the glass. "I think it's nice. You get drunk and you've got your very own suicide hotline in a bottle." The glass swirled a little of its own volition. "I mean there's not much I can tell you before this ship crashes into the sun but a man like me doesn't have a great many living friends and I've got a confession to make. A whole lot of them. You see, I'm the man who killed a galaxy."

And on that note, I just discovered that there was a released omnibus on the pupil confronting the disgraced master.

Time to acquire a new volume to stick next to each of their independent lexicons.

For nomenclature and other setting-specific knowledge the Imperial Guardsman's Uplifting Primer seems to me like required reading. The very last page of the third edition IG codex was just a glossary of IG slang.

The brain is a funny thing after I read your etymology for the planet name I can see that its Missisary but before I read it as Missionary every time. Its pretty cool that you have like a backstory for the name.

Some, like me, work on longer bits that we end up posting over 2 or more threads and being a namefag makes it a lot easier for people to be like "Oh hey this is more of that one story" than just linking to the earlier posts will do. Also I wouldn't be surprised if it makes people more likely to read/give feedback.

The glass did a little dance. Its psychoreactive contents knew just fine who was drinking from it.

"My father was a preacher. Not many folks'll know that." Grey Stubble crackled as the man rubbed his chin. "I got a little of the bug myself. I guess that's where this whole thing starts..."

> that work as intros go?

>www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlXnAnSkQtI

"Wait, I can explain!" Was what Marcus yelled out to the guard. Although the mercenary he is being confronted by is just like the other one he confronted and knocked earlier, this one was not armed with a gun but just a baton, thankfully atleast.

"I'm just here to personally deliver this bottle to-"

"YOU'RE NOT GOING ANYWHERE NEAR OUR CLIENT INTRUDER! I BET THAT SHIT YOU GOT IN THERE AIN'T WHISKEY, BUT POISON! MS. FALREN'S RIGHT TO BE WORRIED ABOUT RIVALS TAKING REVENGE."

The mercenary's baton then sparked up with electricity, it was a stun stick. He pointed it at Marcus. "YOU'RE GOING DOWN BOY!"

The merc charged and swung his stun-baton but missed as he was able to dodge the swings. Marcus managed to time a leg sweep, hitting the merc's back leg perfectly as he fell on the ground on his ass. Marcus immediately obtained the stun-baton that went loose from the knocked down mercenary's grip and used its electrical charge to stun the merc. The merc yelled in pain for about five seconds till Marcus stopped as the merc was now twitching from the electrical shock but was then knocked out.

"HEY! WHAT'S GOING ON IN THERE!? PRIVATE VANDAELE, WHAT'S GOING ON!?" A yell was heard from one of the rooms. "SHIT!" Marcus exclaimed to himself as it turns out there are other mercenaries around the floor. One mercenary rushed out and saw Marcus and the knocked out merc, then two more mercenaries appeared. All of them bearing melee weapons, one with a baton aswell, one with a baseball bat and the other had a tomahawk.

"Stir clear boys, you two already beat up one vandal who tried teepeeing the client's mansion. This one's mine." The mercenary with the combat axe pointed it at me. "I'm gonna chop you to pieces motherfucker!"

Its been about a year/ year and a half since I last read any Abnett? I loved the way he structured his material though. I do it in a lot of my work, not just the 40k stuff.

You may be waiting a while for books 2 and 3 of the Bequin trilogy.

You know i meant this to be a one off, but now i feel like adding a few more. Feedback is appreciated.

Faulin raised the lho-stick to his lips to take a drag as he considered his cards, a few odds and ends and a pair of Primarchs. Not a great hand by any means, but it wasn't bad either. He let out a puff of smoke. He'd been playing safe all night, focusing on the long game slowly and accumulating chips rather than gambling on a big payoff. Of the six players they'd had at the start of the night, two had been bled dry of chips. Of the remaining three players besides himself, one was down to his last stacks, and one was reckless. He'd gotten here by luck really, if he didn't stop now while he was ahead he was leaving poorer than when he came in. Faulin didn't even really think about the two of them, he had them figured, the last man was the one he was playing against at this point. Scarred son of a witch had a wicked poker face, probably on account of half his face being un-moving scar tissue. Still, reaction hiding scar tissue or not, Faulin had to respect a man who could bluff him.

Even before he'd been picked up by the Commissar as an aid it'd been getting hard to find troopers willing to play cards with him. Ever since he was reassigned to Blocke as his aide it was impossible. No one wanted to risk playing cards with the Commissar's aide. Fortunately these new boys didn't know him just yet. They'd been rolled into the Regiment from what was left of the 77th to replace casualties sustained on the last campaign. It had been hard to sniff out a game. Harder still to get himself included, but not impossible, no not for James Faulin. These were his kind of people, and he knew how to speak their language.

He took one more drag before pushing forward his stakes “all in” He said, staring straight at scar face looking for any perceptible reaction in the other Guardsman as the other players made their bets. The reckless one pushed in his pile, and the other folded, but Faulin didn't care about them. He only had eyes for Scar face. Finally the bet had gone around the table and it was his opponents turn to wager. The trooper looked down once at his cards, then back up at Faulin, and the corner of his mouth twitched up. It was a small thing, but it spoke volumes. Man might as well have been laughing at him, but Faulin didn't let any reaction slip through. He hadn't bet yet, maybe he was trying to fake him out.
The trooper reached down and pushed his chips into the middle of the table, and just as he was opening his mouth to declare his bet, the door swung open.

Ah warp take him. Standing there, silhouetted in the doorway, was Commissar Brocke. Faulin dropped his cards and came to his feet. Now, while gambling and cards were not against regulations per se, they were frowned upon, especially by the Commissar. The copious amounts of Amasec and Rotgut that had been shared about, now that was against regs. For warp's sake, he'd made it a year and a half as Brocke's aid without getting found out and shot. Made it a whole campaign without getting shot following after him on his fool antics, and now he was gonna get shot over a game of cards. He just knew it. Emporer above if he was gonna get shot why'd it have to be cards? Why couldn't it have been whores?

“And what, is going on here?” Commissar Brocke asked in a quiet voice that was somehow made terrifying by how calm he sounded, his right hand resting lightly on his bolt pistol. Faulin opened his mouth to respond, his brain desperately trying to find some way out of this, but before he could speak the scarred man beat him to it.

“We was just tryin to get closser to the rest of the unit sir” He said, nodding his head towards Faulin “what with being new and all we figgured we should get to know the troopers we'd be serving with.It was all for unit...unity. Sir.” Faulin had to admit that was some pretty decent deflection. Shame the Amasec caught up with him there at the end. Still, he doubted the Commissar would buy it.

“Right, unit integration” The commissar snorted “Unless i'm mistaken, with the exception of Trooper Faulin your all from the 77th.” He paused for a moment before continuing “ You are all on latrine duty, now vacate the premises.” It was at this point Faulin recalled that there were in fact other punishments besides execution, and that maybe he should really stop jumping to the worst case scenario, he was gonna give himself an ulcer if he kept doing that. He made to leave, but the commissar stopped him “Not you Trooper, I want to speak with you.” Emperor's balls, maybe he'd relaxed too soon.

The commissar was staring at him intently. Unconsciously he found himself orienting to face the Black clad figure.

“Faulin” He said slowly, and in the momentary pause before he continued Faulin imagined the worse. He'd been found out, betrayed Brocke's trust. The other men had gotten latrine duty, he'd get assigned to some front line unit on it's way to the meat grinder, or maybe he really would get shot. He braced himself for the worse as the Commissar opened his mouth to speak again “You know how much I appreciate your dedication, but you really should speak with me before going undercover to root out weakness in the new troops, you can't act unilaterally like this. If anyone but me had found you here they might have misunderstood.”

His mind stopped, it's gears ground to a halt, before kicking into overdrive. Upon finding his loyal, devout, and dedicated aide in a den of sin, rather than seeing Faulin for the scum he was, he'd rationalized an explanation for why he was there! The Commissar had handed him an excuse on a silver platter, now he just had to play along and it was smooth sailing!

“Didn't want to bother you with it sir” He mumbled as if chagrined looking down slightly“ You have so many responsibilities as it was, I thought I'd take care of it myself.”

Brocke clapped him on the shoulder and smiled “And I appreciate it, I couldn't wish for a more devout aide, but we can't have this happening again alright?” He said, and then his brow wrinkled as he sniffed the air. “Faulin have you been smoking?”

Now seeing as Faulin's life depended on Brocke thinking he was a choir boy, he'd been very careful not to have any Lho-sticks around him, and to get rid of the signs before reporting to duty when he did indulge. This was a bit of a prickly conundrum, but fortunately he had the perfect excuse.

“well sir, I had to blend in, disguise myself. I was reluctant at first, but then I remembered the story of how the Emperor met Lord Russ. He hid his divinity and went in disguise so that he could take the measure of his Son. If the Emperor could lower himself for the sake of learning the truth, I thought that as his servant I could do no less, though I may find it distasteful” He declared as piously as he could.

The commissar looked at him funny after that, and Faulin wondered, for what seemed the millionth time, if this was were he went just a little to far and lost credibility. If this latest deception would be seen through.

But then the Commissar chuckled and said "Ah, Faulin, I've said it before, but i wish we had more men like you, the Imperium would certainly be better for it." He turned and walked out the doorway calling over his shoulder " Come on then, let's get out of here"

Faulin sighed when the Commissars back was turned, letting himself slump in relief. He'd made it, another disaster averted. James Faulin lived to lie another day. As he turned to leave his eyes fell on the table. The other guardsmen had left their cards when they left. Suddenly overcome with curiosity he went and flipped over the cards to see what the result would have been. He struggled not to laugh when he saw them. The scarred son of a witch had had three Emperors!

...

>song from still plays

The mercenary charged at Marcus about swing his tomahawk at him but Marcus was able to time his defense as he quickly prodded the mercenary, resulting in the merc being momentarily shocked and yelped in pain and stumbled back a bit.

"AARRGH! YOU LITTLE SHIT!!!" The merc rose back up and charged again to Marcus. But this time the mercenary was being quicker than before as Marcus had to dodge his attacks. "COME ON BOY! LETS SEE YOU HIT ME!"

Marcus looked around his surroundings; he saw the two other mercs who're still gripping their weapons, the merc he's currently fighting. Then he saw a mirror that so happen to be hanged in the wall between him and the attacking merc. The merc charged again at Marcus, and with quick reflexes; Marcus was able to pull the mirror from its hanging place and made it fall and shatter on the merc's head.

"OOWWW!!!" The merc simply yelled in pain as his part of head was now cut and bleeding. Marcus then prodded the merc for four seconds, shocking and stunning him as he fell twitching.

"CORPORAL HOLVOET IS DOWN!" One of the standing by mercs yelled as both of them now ran to Marcus. But he then saw a decorative vase on a nightstand just next to him, grabbed it and chucked it to one of the charging mercs. His throw landed perfectly on one of the mercenaries’ head as he was KO’d from having such an object thrown hard and break at his head.

Marcus dealt with the remaining mercenary who had baseball bat, the merc swung away at Marcus but he just tried dodging every swing till he’d find an error the merc would make that he could use to his advantage. Finally the merc tried to make a wide swing against Marcus, only for him to use the opening to prod the merc for a second; shocking him as the merc was now on his knee. And Marcus then KO’d him with a solid hit from his stun-baton on the merc's head.

>to be continued

docs.google.com/document/d/1SRphZm7Xt3xfQpDIR0wggfw9DtJcC0ST0sDEUwnwzgA/edit?usp=sharing

feedback pless

image is of the character in the latter half, courtesy of a drawfriend named Boxume from many months ago