You are ensign Tristan Aphesius Scathach of the 38th Enforcer Squadron. Not eight hours ago, you killed an Ork Wierdboy and destroyed his Kroozer. Now you find yourself toasting your victory along with a host of other junior officers of the Imperial Navy destroyer CT-381. The party has thinned out somewhat, the younger midshipmen and less iron-stomached ensigns retiring to their quarters. But a small group of ensigns and sub-lieutenants, including you and your friends, have stuck around to empty the last few bottles of drink and trade war stories. Well, stories about the one major battle your crew has fought so far. Sitting next to you is sub-lieutenant Henrietta Arys, the second-in-command of a squadron of Fury interceptors from the battlecruiser Dominus Nova. As a double ace, you’d think she’d be out in the Trident warzone, but you know from personal experience that Etta lacks the confidence and presence an effective officer needs, despite her flying skills.
>>19596831As the others ask her for some stories of her own heroism, you realize you understand very little about void craft maneuvering and attack craft in general, aside from the basics they taught you at the naval academy. However, Etta’s brilliance shines through her shyness and humility. You would never have thought to turn the Orks’ propensity for dakka and infighting against them by luring one squadron of fighta’s into another. And you doubt you’d be able to fly through the fierce plasma streams of a voidship’s engines, especially not with a squadron of Chaos fighters on your tail. At last, attention turns towards ensign Jowells and his telling of the First Battle of Poseidon, which he’d heard from his father, and you find yourself nursing a mug of lukewarm water next to Etta. She looks much more comfortable with the party now than she did when she arrived, as she demonstrates a complex voidcraft maneuver of some sort to you using the many emptied bottles on the table. Your best friend Elim is leading a small crowd of drunken sailors in some traditional navy shanties, while Marius, ever noble and honorable, is helping someone brew some recaf in the mess kitchen. Euphesius is nowhere to be seen.What do you want to do?>[ ] Leave the party with Etta, so you can finally get some time alone before she leaves.>[ ] Try to pay attention to the voidcraft lesson through the fog of alcohol.>[ ] Listen to Jowells’ story about the Imperial victory at Poseidon. >Something else?
Glad to see that this is still going. I'm just going to sleep now, so I hope to see the rest in the archives tomorrow.>[ ] Leave the party with Etta, so you can finally get some time alone before she leaves.
>[ ] Try to pay attention to the voidcraft lesson through the fog of alcohol. I'm guessing we can learn something useful from this?
>>19597036Seconding.
>>19597036Second this. So glad this is still running.
>Previous Threads: http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive.html?tags=Battlefleet%20Quest>Sorry, it is still continuing. Hopefully it'll go through the summer, maybe into winter depending on how fast we go. >>19597036>[ ] Leave the party with Etta, so you can finally get some time alone before she leaves.You tap Henrietta on her shoulder, interrupting her recreation of some complex dog-fighting maneuver that you’d asked her to show you some time ago. Unfortunately, you found yourself a little too buzzed to understand any of talk about relative velocities and vector-thrust maneuvers. “Sorry, but it looks like things are winding down here. Wanna…go and find a quieter place to talk?” you ask quietly as the shanty-singers start on the next verse of “Bottles on the Wall.” “Ah, um, sure.” She looks a little surprised by your invitation, but smiles softly and nods her head. You take her up by her hand, eliciting a small gasp from her. Her hand is cool and small, thin fingers that interlace with yours as she pulls herself closer to you. The light blush on her face goes well with her delicate face and blonde hair, and you find yourself staring at her a little longer than you’d like. You quickly turn your head towards the mess door and pray that she didn’t notice.You hope Elim’s too focused on his drunken antics to notice as you walk out with Henrietta, arm in arm. He’ll probably ask some questions as it is, but at least he won’t be leering at you the whole time. Now, where can you go?>[ ] Port Observation lounge, with a view of the stars and the dock>[ ] Your macrocannon turret; there shouldn’t be anyone there while you’re docked.>[ ] Your quarters>[ ] CT-381’s small chapel
>>19597270The chapel, maybe, or the observation lounge. Somewhere new.
>>19597270[X] Port Observation lounge, with a view of the stars and the dockThe stars ought to be pretty.
>>19597270The observation lounge sounds good.
>[ ] Port Observation lounge, with a view of the stars and the dockThe port observation lounge was just an empty space between two slabs of adamantium armor, sealed up with armaglass. It’s a tall vertical space, like an oversized nave, criss-crossed with steel ribs to hold up decks of dark hardwood floors and soft grav-couches. Cage elevators run up and down the adamantium walls, providing access to the lounge’s many levels.You and Henrietta head for the top, where the armaglass curves back to form a ceiling stained with stars and nebulae and the crescent of a tiny asteroidal moon. The lounge has a few couples scattered around, but the uppermost level is empty. The two of you take seats on a small red couch positioned on the level’s edge, where you can see stars in front of and above you.Is there anything in particular you want to talk about?>[ ] War stories>[ ] Personal questions>[ ] Flirt>Something else? It’s your decision.
>>19597502[X] War storiesStart with some war stories, it is easy common ground. After some war stories we'll go into light flirting and depending on how that is received heavy flirting.
>>19597531Seconding, I guess. Maybe just stick to light flirting, we don't want to come on too strongly.
>>19597502Flirt for the flirt god!
>War stories and flirting, okay.The two of you are silent as you look up at the stars, a nervous tension filling the air. To break the ice, you decide to continue the topic from the mess and tell her some war stories. Well, you have few war stories to tell, but you supplement them with tales of the duels you fought in your school days against other students and the pranks you and Elim pulled on a few of your proctors. She giggles as you tell her about the time you and he slipped wild Lamian eel’s into the soup of the day at mess after a particularly annoying noble bemoaned the lack of fresh food and showed off the skills of his personal chef.“And what about you? I’m sure your pretty little head has hatched a few pranks in its day.” “Oh, of course! Fighter pilots aren’t stuffy like you officers. I remember, one time, our entire flight class teamed up…”The two of you while away the hours trading stories, and you start to flirt a little. It goes back and forth, though Etta seems to hold back from anything too forward. By the chime of the Fourth Watch bell, though, your hand is on her shoulder as she leans against your chest, telling you about the rings of Durandum, the hive world she was born on. The flight helmet on your head makes it a little harder to hear her than you might expect, but the warmth and weight of her body against yours keeps you occupied enough.The chimes bring you both back to the ground, and Etta gets back up, somewhat reluctantly. She lifts the flight helmet from your head and clips it onto her belt.“Well, I guess I’d better get going. I’ll need some sleep before I go on patrol again.”“I’ll walk you to your fighter,” you say half-jokingly, but she intertwines her arm with yours and the two of you head for the distant landing bay.
>>19597876The shift change is less busy than usual, you notice as you walk through the decks of the Cobra. Most of the duties of a shift are changed when a vessel enters port, and the efforts of the crew are focused more on damage repair than day-to-day operations. The landing bays are much busier than usual, however, and it takes some time for you and Etta to navigate the tides of servitors off-loading supplies and shoals of parked lighters and landers. The parked Fury interceptor is already in pre-flight mode, and you can see the shapes of her flight crew through the armaglass viewports along its hull. Etta kisses you on the cheek before running up the ramp, fitting her flight helmet on as she gets into the interceptor’s main hatch. With a final wave as you see her take her place in the cockpit, you walk back towards the main decks of the destroyer.“Ensign Scathach!” A voice calls out your name, and you turn around. Standing next to a pallet of fuel rods is third lieutenant Baisan, the officer in charge of the CT-381’s torpedo bays. You raise your hand in a crisp salute, or as crisp as you can make it, as he walks towards you, a stern expression on his face.“Congratulations, ensign! On your first kill credit!” The lieutenant has to shout to be heard over the launching interceptor, but he’d probably have to shout to get anything through your fuzzy skull right now. >Cont.
>>19598103“Thanks, thank you, Sir. I wasn’t expecting to hear that, sir.” You stammer out. Third lieutenant Baisan is notorious for his cronyism and snobbishness, particularly towards any officer in charge of non-ordinance weapons. A student of the Gareox school, he believes in the superiority of ordinance, torpedoes in particular, and he isn’t afraid to tell others that. Plus, anyone trying to move up in the ranks or get into the torpedo bays has to curry favor with him, which can be an expensive proposition. You and your roommates decided a long time ago that you didn’t want anything to do with him, but it seems he wants something to do with you.“Why not? I’ve been hearing a lot about you lately, Scathach, from all sorts of men. Seems you’ve started to draw some attention to yourself. Gunning for some promotion? For some fame and glory, hm?” The lieutenant smiles, or maybe sneers. You’ve seen him do both before and they look nearly the same on his face. “Well, why don’t you join my boys over in the torpedo bays? There’ll be some openings there pretty soon, and you could fill a spot if you do me a little favor.”>Well?
>>19598120But... i like my big cannon
>>19598120I'm very sorry sir, I just could never get a hang of torpedo firing arcs, I much prefer cannons. Personal preference, you understand right?If we join him this fuckhole might get some amount of the credit for our accomplishments, if we just keep on doing what we've been doing with those macrocannons, not to mention our valor against orks and working with the Astropaths, we'll get noticed by someone without having to go through this guy.
>>19598195>>19598198“Um…” No. “Sorry, sir, I don’t think I could do that just yet. I have a responsibility to my guncrew, and to be honest I’m not all that great with ordinance. It would be like giving a deaf man a trumpet and asking him to play, sir.” You really don’t think this would be a good idea, and you’ve got a good deal of upward momentum already, with your battle performance and your astropath duties. The third lieutenant’s face doesn’t change, as if he was expecting your answer. “Ah, I see. Well, I’m sure you’d pick it up quickly if you transferred over. But just keep me in mind, hm? If you hear something strange or odd with Sakai, I’ve always got my door open.” With that, Baisan walks back to the pile of fuel rods. You wonder what that was all about as he head back to your quarters for a long, deep sleep. =][=
>>19598390Well, we've got first shift on Macrocannon duty, so we should sleep up and get to that. Hopefully nothing will happen today, though I think by this point our men there love us to bits, which is really good.Sleep, get up, shower, eat food, head to the Macrocannon.
>>19598390This is interesting, what could that torpedo douche want from us, and what is his buisness with Subleutenant Sakai? I wonder if we should inform Sakai about his questions...Otherwise seconding >>19598566
>Sorry, still writing.With the ship at dock and laid up for repairs, you have a free day of leave to yourself. You spend the first ten hours of it sleeping off the party and battle fatigue, but the mess has a few familiar faces when you walk in. Sub-lieutenant Sakai is seated with ensign Bernard Jowells, half-empty trays of food before them. Marius is still standing at the mess line, trying to pick between grayish pease or soggy biscuits as you sit down on the bench next to the sub-lieutenant. “So you didn’t hear the news, then?” the sub-lieutenant asks when you tell him about your weird encounter with Baisan. “What news?”“Lieutenant Crade’s been promoted. Lieutenant commander, in command of CT-382 now that Commander Oogles is dead. A bunch of our junior officers got transferred over with him, and Baisan’s trying to maneuver his man into their positions.”“So it was just politics, then?” Bernard asks.“Of a sort, I guess. If Baisan’s men don’t get the promotions, then Commissar Hirst will try to get his boys in, or Lieutenant Aren will.”The politics of the 38th Enforcer Squadron would make any serious Battlefleet officer giggle; jockeying for position in a dead-end patrol? What a waste of time and effort. But thanks to Marius, who keeps his ear to the ground and pays attention to these sorts of things, you have some understanding of the power groups in play. >cont.
>>19598639Of course, there’s the Ordinance group, under Baisan. Made up of torpedo men and crews, as well as a few of the hangar personnel, it’s a bunch of mean-eyed croneys who follow Baisan’s orders and do whatever he asks. They get a lot of glory, thanks to their control of the torpedo bays, but they aren’t really effective leaders of men. Plus, there are always rumors that the third lieutenant purposely goes for the most dimwitted officers in the squadron. Then there’s Fleet Commissar Hirst, AKA Jellybelly, who commands the commissarial cadets and armsmen. The Commissar isn’t well-respected or liked by anyone, but he’s a commissar, and his word is inviolable. He tends to delegate to his cadets and spend all his time on the bridge or in his office, doing Emperor knows what. Theresa sometimes gets involved in his messes, generally mopping up minor crewmen who smuggle in an obscura shipment or run the illegal gambling rings.This pits him against Lieutenant Aren, one of the squadron quartermasters. The lieutenant is rumored to run the Enforcer’s small black market with an iron fist, and you’ve heard of crewbosses and minor crewmen disappearing or running into suspicious “accidents” whenever they try to bypass him. Tall and muscular, with a reputation made of equal parts respect and fear, he commands a coterie of voidmen and trusted crew, augmented with some minor midshipmen. His powerbase is in the lower decks, but he’s known to supply many luxuries to more senior officers. >cont
>>19598746You’ve heard rumors that fleet confessor Barrin is also forming his own faction in the squadron, made up mostly of the omnipresent Ecclesiarchy priests and more faithful officers, but if he is then it’s being done very quietly. The Mechanicus is a far more obvious faction, but they keep their hands out of the day-to-day politics and only weigh in when they feel the need to. Your friend Ephesius, born on a shrineworld but mechanically inclined, would probably know more about them than you.“What about us, sub-lieutenant? There are more officers in the macrobatteries than there are in the torpedoes; why don’t you lead a faction?” Marius asks as he bites into one of the soggy, gravy-drenched biscuits on his plate. The sub-lieutenant glares at him, the most intense expression you’ve ever seen him make. “I’m well out of it boy. And if you’re smart you’ll stay out of it too. There’s no good in getting involved in inter-ship politics. Just do the duty the Emperor gives you and you’ll move up in your own time, with none of the backstabbing and lying.” It’s the most emotion you’ve ever heard out of the aged sub-lieutenant, and you wonder just what he did before he became 381’s chief gunner. The rest of the meal is filled with back and forth discussions on just what the power groups are going to do about the vacant officer slots, and who’s going to be promoted and who’s not. Elim, when he finally wakes up and joins you in the mess, says that it’ll probably all come down to whoever has enough hot air to rise to the top of the heap, which would mean becoming the Officer of the Watch.
>>19598889You have a whole day of leave ahead of you, and now you need ot decide what to do with it. The Ork staff that you picked up, and stroked before you took a shower, was something you were going to ask the astropath’s about. Then the question of factions and promotions came up, and it might be something you want to check out. And of course, you could always go off-ship to the Yonnus Orbital, the small space station orbiting Vyan VIII that you’re currently docked to. >[ ] Go and ask the psykers about psyker magic>[ ] Find out more about the factions>[ ] Go offship and see if the Orbital has anything more interesting than politics and sorcery>[ ] Hang out with your friends
>>19598942[X] Go and ask the psykers about psyker magicAsk them now, if they advise that we throw it out of an airlock than we put it in a container and throw it out an airlock.
>>19598942Psykers, always psykers.
>>19598942>[ ] Factions, etc.
>>19598975Secondan, even if it could bite us in the ass. Bring the staff too, i guess.
>>19598975>>19598960>[ ] Go and ask the psykers about psyker magic“The only way to deal with a psyker is another psyker,” your dad would always say. Well, you decided to go and grab the psyker’s staff (or did you?) and now you’re going to need another psyker to sort it out. The astropath quarters aboard the CT-381 are isolated from the rest of the ship, accessible through a single lift. Guarded by two bonded armsmen in black, portcullis helmets and racked shotguns, you can’t imagine many people drop by for a social call. “Um, ensign Scathach, to see the astropath seniorus?” you say questioningly, now unsure if this was really a good idea. The bonded armsmen simply run a scanner wand over you and open the hatch. ‘No going back now,’ you think, and you step through into a shadowy room.The first thing you notice is the smell. It’s a strange, floral spicy aroma that just seems to hang on the edge of your nose, too strong to ignore but not strong enough for you to identify. As your eyes adjust to the gloom, you see that it comes from the strands of braided rope or hanging mobiles or curtains and swathes of fabric that surround you and cast shadows from the dim lamps mounted in the ceiling. You see shards of dark rock hanging from a wire; streaming purity seals covered in thick, wax letters; a maroon curtain decorated with a complex gold weave that sticks out of the cloth like bumps on a road. For a blind astropath, touch is probably the most important sense they have left. >cont
>>19599274“Well, come on in then.” The cantankerous old voice calls you from somewhere in this cave of surfaces, and you push past a hanging curtain of beads into another room. This one is less gloomy than the last, all the walls covered with a dull gold cloth stitched with images of the Emperor and His Saints, reflecting the light from the single lamp in the ceiling. Other curtains, made of metal and glass rods, swing and tinkle in front of other doorways.In this room, astropath seniorus Diao is sitting in front of a small circular table, the Emperor’s tarot being slowly laid out by curled, liver-spotted hands. A pot of tea, the source of the spicy scent, sits next to him, with two steaming cups perched on etched bronze plates.“Take a seat; I’m just finishing this up.” He motions towards the chair in front of him, somewhat vaguely. As you sit down, he waves in the direction of one of the cups. “Help yourself. It’s a nice little thing from the girls at Castor. Don’t ask me to name it; the wife got it.”“Well, then, ensign, why would the transcriber of astropaths need to come to his subject’s quarters, hm? And make sure you speak loudly; my ears aren’t as good as they used to be.”
>>19599388First take a sip of the tea.Then inform him of how we killed the psychic ork, and after the battle we felt a bit compelled to take the staff as a souvenir. We consider this to be and oddity and wanted an expert's advice on this matter.On second thought we should probably phrase everything in hypotheticals and "a friend of mine", just to maintain deniability and so that Diao isn't compelled to take action against us.
>>19599448We should try and bring the staff here sometime, see what he thinks of it.
>>19599388Time to contribute now=?Take a sip of the tea, if its good comment on it."Well, i am in a bit of a bind here... I am sure you heard that the ship got boarded by orks in the last engagement? Well, the macrocannon turret were i serve my second shift got hit too. We managed to repell them, not at least because i managed to kill their leader. A psyker."Take another sip. "After the engagement it's usually time to take trophies. Well, i thought it would be better not to take anything from the ork psyker because, well, he was a psyker, and you never know with all that crazy warp stuff...""Anyways, i stand before the xeno corpses and suddenly i notice this staff the ork carried. Before i knew it i had already taken it halfway back to my quarters. This is NOT something i usually do. I suspect that the staff has influenced my actions..."Take Staff out."And i came here because, as my father said, you need a psyker to deal with psychic stuff, and you are the only one i know on this ship."Honesty works best. Hes a psyker, he could see through our lies.
>>19599543You can contribute whenever you want.>>19599448You take a sip of the tea. It’s good; a strong bitterness complimented by a mild spicy-sweet flavor. Your throat isn’t so dry anymore. The old man flips down another card, the magus of Adeptio, ascendant.“Um, I don’t know how much you’ve heard, but a few days ago we were boarded by some Orks. An-”“Yes, I know. I’m not a blind old man-well, I am, but that’s besides the point. Young Adora wasn’t up in the tower during the battle and heard about it. So? What’s that got to do with me?” Flip. Harlequin of Discordia, descendant. “And I killed some sort of ork psyker.” You take another sip of the tea. Should you really tell the truth?“Oh? Good job, good luck. Hope he didn’t curse you. He didn’t curse you, did he?” Flip. The Emperor, ascendant. “No, I don’t think he ever got the chance. Blew out his brains through his eye after he did some weird psyker thing. Anyway, a friend of mine took his staff as a trophy. I don’t know if he planned to do it or not, though, and I’m a little worried about him.” At the very least, you want to keep some deniability.“Hm. Mind repeating that last bit? And more truthfully this time?”
>>19599604Damn psykers, i knew they could see lies. Tell him everything.
>>19599604Very well, I decided that the staff would be a bad thing to take and the next thing I knew I was halfway back to my quarters with it in my hand.
>>19599604You sit with your mouth agape, cup in one hand, saucer in the other. Diao gives a wheezy sigh and shakes his white-haired head. He opens his eyes and glares at you with pits that look like the void itself.“Didn’t need the Tarot to tell you were lying your black pants off. I can smell it on you clear enough, oh yes.” Flip. The Great Hoste, descendant. “It stinks like an ork does, oh yes.”“Then, can you help me? Tell me what’s going on? I don’t even know why I picked it up; I was halfway to my quarters when I realized I had the damn thing!” Your voice wavers a little bit as you recall that moment. It didn’t seem odd then, but now, in the presence of the tarot, surrounded by images of the Emperor, you feel afraid. Afraid of what the Ork psyker might have done. Afraid of the empty eyes staring at you.“Hmph. There, not so hard.” Diao closes his eyes and tilts his head down toward the tarot again. The Assassin of Execitaria, ascendant. “And of course I can help you, boy. I’m not astropath seniorus for nothing, you know. Give me your hand.” You raise your hand and put it in his, and he looks up to the cloth-covered ceiling. Your right hand is in his left, the Emperor card between them.“Oh shining Emperor, who lights the path, grant me the strength to see past the veil.” Diao’s nose wrinkles as he sniffs in great big gulps of air. You can feel the air growing hotter, more humid. Sweat drips down your forehead into your eyes, and you try to blink it away.“Oh! Oh, how interesting.” “What?”“Oho, the Emperor is on you boy! Kakakaka!”
>>19599718As much as I enjoy the cryptic psyker business I am somewhat freaked out by this staff business so could you please tell me what you mean by that, and give me advice for what to do with the staff?
>>19599604>>19599718There is so much win in those two posts. The tarot cards alone...I really missed this quest, your writing style is glorious OP.
>>19599718He puts his other hand over yours, and looks at you with closed eyes, grinning a nearly toothless grin. You answer with a nervous smile, anxious to find out.“What an interesting little psyker spell you’ve got on you. The weirdboy knew what it was doin’. I’ll need to see the staff to be sure, but you’re a damn sight luckier than you look. The psyker put his mark on the staff, so that the first man, or ork, to lay eyes on it would pick it up. With a strong will, about a 15 out of 20, you can resist it. But if you don’t, POOF! It explodes with all of the warpstuff inside of it. And we’d all be fodder for demons in a warp rift.” The smile fades away from your face.“Course, that’s if you’re unlucky. It’s an Ork thing, and unreliable at that. When you took hold of that staff, it recognized you as its master, and gave you its benefits. It makes Orks fear you, respect you. If you were tossed onto a space hulk holding that thing, I’d wager you could control a fair number of the smaller ones, and a couple of the reg’lar sized ones, without any trouble t’all. If you give’m an order, they’ll follow it rather than make the Big Bad Boy angry.”“Um, so it’s a good thing?” Another nervous smile, and a shrug, as you imagine commanding a Waaagh! of your own, rampaging through the stars on a giant space hulk. A tricorn painted with a white ork skull on your head, a cutlass in one hand and megabolter-claw instead of the other as you bellow out orders to nobs and warbosses…>cont.
>>19599898“What? No!” He frowns at you, his lower lip thrown out petulantly. “It’s xenos, of course it’s not a good thing! But it’s not outright gonna kill you either. You could probably melt it down or toss it into space and be okay, now that it’s settled down. If anyone kills you and picks it up, they might trigger it, but then it won’t be your problem, will it? Kakakaka!” The astropath seniorus cackles again, before looking at you with a serious look on his face.“By all rights, you should have never picked it up. If the fleet commissar ever found out, he’d have you skinned alive with that whip of his. If the confessor ever found out, you’d be burned at the stake, never mind we’re on a spaceship. Me, I’m just gonna give you some advice. Melt it down into something normal, like a…chainsword or something. It won’t be attracting the attention a full-height Ork staff would, and it’ll remember what’s been kept in it.” He lets go of your hand and places the Emperor on the table. “And that’s all I can help you with. I know you’ll be keepin’ your mouth shut for fear of yourself, so I’m not going to curse you or wipe your brain or anything like that, though I could. The wife frowns on that sort of thing though. But I’ll be keeping you in mind, young Tristan, oh yes.”
>>19599898>Ten years later, WAAAGGHH! Humie (your name was hard to pronounce) laid a trail of devastation throughout the Segmentum Tempestus, and your name was reviled throughout the Imperium as the greatest traitor since Horus. Orks throughout the galaxy flocked to your banner, knowing you would be the one to lead them to Da Big Fight At Da End A' Everyfin.
