Chapter 2.1: Fallen Reaper (IC - Kanna and Arlene)

Screaming. A woman's voice. She screamed and screamed, the volume of her piercing voice threatening to burst Arlene's ear drums. The weightlessness in her limbs seemed to accentuate the tortured holler, as though not being able to push back against anything forced her to take the brunt of it. It twisted and turned in her head like a knife. Then it took shape. She recognized the voice. No. She recognized the flickering, cracking of flames behind it.

It was her sister.

She had found her. Arlene had left her to burn to save her Tau comrades - for the Greater Good. Her sister, ever loyal servant of the Imperium, had stood between Arlene and her mission. And Arlene did not hesitate. The face fluttered before her. It was as decimated as she remembered. A pulse round at that distance was not kind to human flesh.

How could you? How could you choose them over your own flesh and blood, Arlene? The Warp hungers for you now. So close. So close. Come home. I will be waiting when you get here. Come home. We have so much left to talk about...

Her eyes fluttered open. Her body refused to move. Her voice didn't work. But she could see. And if she could see, she was alive. After agonizing minutes on the ground, she was finally able to wiggle her big toe...


The psyker laughed as he tore through the ranks of Fire Warriors. Eldritch lightning burned from his eyes. Where he pointed, Tau exploded. Where he looked, Tau melted into one another. Where he spit, Tau fizzed and burned into piles on the ground.

He strode through them, a behemoth. Kanna could only react. Magazine after magazine he pumped into the beast, but to no effect. Some horrible force protected it. It was like it had its own shield generator, but much more corrupt. Kanna reached for another magazine, but found his belt empty. His pulse rifle had started to sag at the barrel - melting under his constant barrage. He had never seen such a thing before. Never thought it possible. Surely only gue'la tech would melt doing the one thing it was designed to do. Tau technology would never be so inferior.

He couldn't think on it. He could only drop the weapon, turn and run. His hooves pounded into the ground. No matter how hard he pushed himself, however, he could gain no ground. He watched in horror as he actually progressed backward. He glanced back. The behemoth psyker had locked eyes onto him and with each massive intake of air into its mouth, Kanna was sucked backward.

He screamed as his body left the ground. Weightlessness enveloped him. His body twisted and convulsed so that it turned to regard its doom. The face, twenty times as large as his own body, burned red hot with ancient, horrid, corrupt power. One last breath and he would be consumed. One last inhale...

He awoke with a gasp of air. He couldn't move his body. But he could breathe, and that meant he was alive. After more than fifteen minutes, he was able to make a fist.


+++Congrats on Burning Fate to survive. It is always a pleasure as a GM when things have gone this way. I am glad you both decided to burn fate and not to let your PCs die. I think you are both outstanding and they are integral to the game. So, hopefully you cherish them even more now. As such, you awake with 0 HPs, upwards of an hour after your fall. Talking is pain. Movement is agony. Life fucking sucks. Fuck this ship. Happy RPing+++

I gave you a choice. You wanted this... You asked... Arlene cried out to her sister Look where you are now! Look at the "Emperor's Embrace!" You think this is home? As she spoke, she felt the warp's grip on her loosen. "You've lost sight of home. You lost sight when you left. But I stayed. I protected it. I left you something to come home to. You killed friend and family for this. I tried to save you. I tried to save you...

Arlene's eyes fluttered open. She tried to breathe, but only shallow gasps came. She tried to move, but pain shot through her arms. She tried to see, but tears warped her vision. Arlene cried for a good while, softly, for her sister. Maybe someday she would be able to apologize.

She struggled to speak. Coughs sputtered blood against the inside of her helmet. Slowly, she inhaled the oxygen, touched by the metallic rust of her blood. Very slowly, and very carefully, she moved her head around, trying to take in what she could of her surroundings. The figure of another Tau lay in front of her. She remembered that Kanna had fallen with her. She tries to speak out to him.

"k-... han-... hannah... s-... still... alive?" She tasted the blood as she spoke, and her dry throat burned with each try. She could only barely mutter the words, hoping the comm system would amplify what little she could squeak to him. She rested while she waited for an answer. Alone, it would have to be a miracle for her to get back to the squad. But if Kanna were alive, even with just one other body, their chances of success were far greater. She stared at the Tau, praying for some motion, some sign of life. But could did she pray to, after all she has done?

KAnna woke with a start.

Even in his sleep, his adrenal pumps kicked out horrific amounts of stimulants.

'Fight or flight' it was casually termed. He makes it to all fours, unaware of where he was but not seeming to care. He screams with primal fear, drawing Arlene's waning attention. He scrabbles his arms and legs, flailing them to keep the monstrosity from devouring him whole.

To Arlene, it must've looked like he was coated in bugs and trying to rid himself by panicking.

He kicks his way to the bulkhead, calming ever so slightly before removing his helmet and throwing it against the opposite wall.

He was breathing hard, near hyper ventilation and his face was coated with a sheen of sweat.

Terror was in his eyes.

He regains his senses over the next minute, but he could not stop his heart from pounding, nor could he slow his breath.....

Instead of speaking, he sinks his head in his hands and starts the calming ritual.
He had not had to relive those memories in many cycles. Even after so long, the mental scar could still be ripped away to exposed raw flesh beneath.

"He's alive..." Arlene said, nodding slowly. She lifted one arm in a lazy wave at the Tau, her body twinging at the pain of the motion. She spoke slowly, stopping often to swallow dryly. "Hey Kanna... did you pee yourself? If you're fine, patch me up... My outsides look pretty, but I think my insides are bloody." Overwhelmed by the gravity of everything that had just happened, Arlene receded into her most comfortable environment, trying to lighten the mood and pretend everything was going well.

Arlene looked around slowly. Even up on the walkway, she had no idea where the team was, and after falling this distance, and being unconscious for this long, she hadn't the slightest idea where they were, or how to get back to the bridge. Still, if they wanted any chance of survival, they had to forge on and hope they could make it back before the Reaper Four calls the mission. Laying on her side, she dragged and pushed herself over to the nearest piece of unknown machinery, slowly regaining her ability to move. In time, she felt her breath returning, and she learned how to move without causing so much pain.

The walkway above looked so much smaller given its distance. How they had survived the fall, neither of the Reapers knew. Faith in a deity was not the orthodox understanding of the galaxy from the Tau perspective, but the Greater Good did not offer any visceral explanations for what had transpired. From the secular perspective, science explained it: probability. While it was improbable to survive a fall as they both had just done, it was not impossible. And in that gray area between reason and faith, they existed.

They existed in excruciating pain. Their gear was battered and, in some cases, broken. They were in enemy territory, cut off from their supply lines, and hostiles could be around any corner. If their weapons were functional, they could fight and win... but not forever. The scrapyard they found themselves in seemed to conceal horrors in every crevice of twisted metal and junk. Looming movers, huge things with no logical purpose in a ship like this, towered at awkward intervals. From the ground, they could see at least three, but knew there were more. They were simply hidden from sight given the height of the junk piles. This was a maze. A horrendous maze.

Their armor weighed them down, but it was protection. Keeping it on would offer protection if they got into a scrap, but ditching it here and now would make them faster and, more importantly, quieter. From now on out, each and every decision could mean life or death. Nothing was a simple choice now.

And then they needed to decide how to carry on. Would they attempt to return to the bridge, or push on in an effort to find Reaper 1 and link up with the team?

First thing was first, Kanna stands and makes his way to Arlene.
He had read the required teachings on gue'la anatomy, in order to better understand them; first, he had to inquire the reason for the bleeding.

"Is this internal bleeding, or the reproductive cyclic bleeding that occurs every 28 days in your species' females?"

As he asks the dumb question (not quite understanding that it was a taboo subject among the gue'la) he checks her over in an attemot to render medical aid. after her he would look at his own injuries.

"We need to link up with any other reaper teams we can find. Have you attempted contact?"

At the question, Arlene's face immediately turns red. "The former, Kanna. Organ Damage." She moves to remove some of her armor and winces in pain.

"The latter is a very personal subject, not one you ask without expecting to get slapped. At least in our culture. I'll let it slide this time." She says with a slight smile, still breathing heavily.

Looking up at the catwalk, Arlene wonders how they had survived the fall. Any Imperial would proclaim the Emperor's graces, but clearly that was no longer the case. Tau technology and luck were all she had on her side now. She checks her wrist-comm at Kanna's second question, shaking her head, "That was step three. I'm wary of broadcasting our location if we can't defend ourselves... I'll give it a try now."

Arlene punches a few buttons on her comm and repeats a message through all Korst'la channels, "This is Korst'la Dor Gue'vesa'ui Arlene Cunningham. Me and another member of Reaper Four have fallen into what appears to be a junkyard in the bowels of the ship. We are alive and injured, requesting immediate support. Over." Each message is a little different through sharp pauses for breath, teeth clenching in pain, or sudden wincing.

Arlene is met with only silence. There isn't even the static reply of a failed sent message. As her senses come to, she realizes that all systems inside her armor have stopped working. Her blacksunfilter, life support readings of the team and herself, and communications signals are completely dead.

"That seems to do us no good here. I wonder if the suits have sustained too much damage or if this area of the ship has an EM effect? kanna says as he begins to tend to his own wounds.

"We must find a way out of this madness. Were you required to take any navigational survival classes from your pre tau'va days?"

Arlene slapped her wrist comm a few times, watching as the screen flickered. She tapped the side of her helmet. Nothing. Carefully, she took it off. "I hate to accept it, but you're right. Dead in the water, so to speak. No navigation or communication tools whatsoever." She took her broken helmet and set it down on the machine. Then she tested the care Kanna had given her, carefully putting weight on each of her legs, lifting herself slowly and carefully off the bulky machinery she'd propped up against.

"Yeah of course. Honestly the PDF was just Youth of the Emperor for big kids, but we played with guns too. That being said, our training was on survival and navigation on the desert planet T'ros. We weren't supposed to leave. I'm sure a lot transfers, but my knowledge is worn a little thin on a warp infested void ship. It would be wise to lighten the load as much as possible. I don't know how long we'll be moving for, but the less energy we spend in hauling gear, the better. Besides, we can't handle another fight, if we get caught, we'll probably die."

As she speaks, she starts carefully stripping off armor until she was only wearing her body glove. She gives a nod to Kanna, as if to tell him to do the same. "Come on, no time to lose. This could almost be fun if we weren't on the verge of death. I always tried too hard in those survival drills." Memories of her time in the PDF flashed through her mind, her squad, her friends, and family. It all ended with the crippling memory of her squad's death, and the toll she took on Joyce. He used her longshot like a cane, supporting herself while she moved. She looked back at Kanna, remembering the two still had a chance at life.

He shakes his head.
"We are taught to trust in our gear. It may be dead now, but I do not doubt it is an effect of this place. Once we get to a different location, I know the subsystems will reactivate."

He had a thought that the carbine would not work too well in this area. Twice it had jammed, this place might be affecting it and he had another weapon available. He slings the carbine and draws his plasma cutter in a firm, two handed grip.

Arlene looked at Kanna with annoyance on her face. "I can tell you've had loads of survival training. So, your plan is to face another squad of cannibals head on, while wounded, wielding a welding torch? Pray to the Ethereals that we don't find another one of those Daemons. Even with all seven of us at the ready it took H.T. almost effortlessly. We were barely able to run fast enough to keep it from finishing him off. Armor would be great when we stand a fighting chance, but at this point, getting caught would get us killed. Take what you'd like, but I'm not slowing down because you've worn yourself out."

Arlene reaches into the pile of gear and pulls out her vambrace, sliding it back on. She slapped the screen a few times, trying in vain to bring some life back to the machine. Kanna may be right, she hoped after some movement, the comm/navigation device would reactive. Until then, they would hobble through the ship and pray they found their way.

Kanna smiles grimly, He'd take the bait.

"Cannibals are redundant creatures. They had high tech weaponry at thier disposal and they tried to club us to death."

The smile fades, Demons? Warp? They sound like guael'a bedtime stories. Are they connected to something called a 'psi-ker?'"

Arlene gave a shrug "Suit yourself. If you're prepared then, let's head out." Arlene motions for him to follow as she begins to trek through the junkyard.

"Yeah, you could say that I think. I'm not well versed on chaos in general, but from my understanding, it all comes from the same place. Psykers get their power from where daemons come from. It's why everyone is so wary of them, and why they can be so terrifying."

He shudders.

If what Arelene said was true, then this ship was connected to psykers in some esoteric way.

"We should make haste. There is no way to tell how much time has passed since we fell. Speaking of, how do you think we survived the fall? I saw nothing that could have slowed our descent."
He neglected to mention that he felt the effects of impacts with such objects....

While Arlene focuses on Kanna's question, she is able to discern a pattern to the random avenues of junk in there way. The bad news was that there was no straight path back to any ladder that would lead back to the walkway from where they fell. The good news was that there were clearly multiple ways to exit this seemingly humongous junkyard.

On either side of them, scrap was piled three meters high at least. In some places much higher. But the scout-sniper quickly realized that this was more or less a maze. And she knew a surefire way to get out of a maze. All one had to do was touch the wall nearest to them - left or right, it didn't matter - and keep contact with that wall while they walked. Sooner or later, they would find an exit. It was simple logic; it would take some time, but it would work.

Leaving her jet black gear that marked her as one of the Tau Empire's absolute best, she shuffled forward on cautious feet, weapon at the ready.

+++

They wagered at least 25 raik'or had passed since they started. But Arlene's plan had worked. Ahead of them, some 40 meters away was a clear exit. Two large hangar-sized blast doors stood wide open. The darkness beyond them some sort of salvation.

All the two had to do was run to their exit, but nothing was ever that easy. There were two groups of them. Kanna and Arlene had heard them long before they spotted them, and smelled them long before they had heard them.

The junk walls had been cleared out on both the right and left, some ten meters in front of the hangar doors. It had been converted into some sort of makeshift living space. There was a cook fire burning and evidently meat was cooking. Some figured moved to and fro, mostly keeping their eyes on the fire or sleeping and lazing around. None of them traveled the main path unless it was to urinate or walk from one camp to the other.

Evidently, the veteran and the sniper had found a cannibal nest. Getting through it to the hangar doors would be another matter entirely.

Kanna puts the plasma cutter back in his side holster and rearms his pulse carbine.

He whispers as lowly as possible to Arelene, "We can draw them into a kill corridor, I still have photon grenades. It wont be hard to shoot them down while they are disoriented."

Arlene gave a few nods, silent for a moment while she thought of a plan. "Hold on, do you think you can put that plasma cutter to use? I say we make proper Kauyon. Can you cut free a trash avalanche safely? We may be able to bury an entire camp, then you lure them back into a firing lane. Be careful with those flashes though." She punctuated the last point by pointing at their unprotected eyes.

"We're open too. And either way, this is risky. How do you want to play it?"

Kanna examines the layout of the area, and slowly shakes his head.

"I admire the plan, but I see no areas that could be coerced into a collapse of debris. Nor do I see anything to be gained by doing this."
He awaited to see if Arlene could point out anything directly that she had to the contrary. It was possible that he had missed something.

Arlene shook her head as well, scanning the junk piles. "I was hoping you could identify a weak spot. I doubt we can finish them all safely without something to whittle down their numbers. Should we try to push through? I vote to sneak through as much as possible, but keep our flashes close. We can make some noise throwing the junk about, that'll give us a small window to sneak through undetected. If all else fails, we flash the whole lot of them and run. Unless you feel confident in us taking the camps head on."

He shakes his head.
"No. You plan is sound. Try and distract them with noise elsewhere. When they leave to investigate we will sneak though. Do you have anything we could trigger from far away?"

Arlene gives a nod, showing Kanna the small collection of photon grenades on her belt. "A few photons or a longshot clip is all I can offer. Though if we pop them, we shouldn't look, they'll blind us now too." She held on to one for a moment before looking behind her.

"Let's take them through the maze. It'll be simple, we'll flash, maybe take a few shots as they're disoriented, then we lose them in the trash. We circle back around and clean up whatever's left at the camps. Easy pickings."