[W40KRP, DH Ascension] Fire and Rain

Chrysis

A slender mechadendrite coiled at Attilas' shoulder unwinds and snakes it's way towards the front windscreen of the skimmer. There are a series of quiet clicks and whirring noises as lenses adjust for a better view of the activity ahead.

Using the Optical Mechadendrite as a Telescopic Sight to get a look at the scene ahead. Any Perception based tests required are at +10 from the Mechadendrite.

SanderJK

"I'll take a look from up high, see if I can get a get a general view of the area, see both the layout and if there's any unusual activity." Enoch mutters a mantra under his breath, then instantly his eyes glaze over.

Far Sight, 5km away, 100m high towards the centre of the hub. (Would be just like looking from that height normally).Farsight (Fettered versus 6(17-7WP-2Power Well-2Discipline Focus)). (3d10=14): Success

Payot

"Lord Inquisitor, what approach pattern shall we take ?"

I gather I'm piloting since it's one my ways to be useful.

susan

The two Acolytes gazing into the scene ahead using Psychic powers and mechanical tools see much the same sight; Arbites, abandoned buildings, smoke, and bodies. The town itself, now that you're taking a close look at it, appears to have recently suffered some kind of blasts or explosions; there are sets of scorch marks in radiating patterns on the ground and some of the buildings, though the blasts seem to have been fairly contained to a dozen meters or so. The inner radii of the blasts show signs of some seriously high temperatures (warped metal, some running glass), but outside the scorch marks there is little if any damage, no signs of shrapnel or shockwaves [You can roll some knowledge checks to try and guess what caused these].

There are bodies everywhere around the scene. The Arbites have been at work for a while now, so most have been wrapped in bags and moved into rows near the bulk landers, but there's still enough scattered around the town to give you a grizzly picture. People lying in streets, out of doorways. A few near the blasts that look half melted. Men, women, children... The bodies seem spread out all over the place, but aside from the corpses near the blasts you don't see any immediate signs of why the people died, no obvious wounds or unusual corpse degradation patterns. You doubt there are many survivors to give an accurate account of what happened here.

You do also notice that, of the several dozen Arbites on the scene, all the ones on the ground handling the bodies are wearing full contamination suits with rebreathers and oxygen tanks. The closest Arbites not wearing HazMat gear are a few kilometers outside of town, maintaining a perimeter.

SanderJK

Enoch says outloud what he sees. "It looks pretty serious. A lot of bodies, and a lot of Arbites. Strange explosions seem to have taken place. Let me search my memory if I've heard about such a thing."
Forbidden Lore (Psykers): 4 DoS
Forbidden Lore (The Warp): 4 DoS
Scholastic Lore (Occult): 5 DoF

Spoiler:

Forbidden Lore(Psykers), v 53 Forbidden Lore(The Warp), v 53 Scholastic Lore(Occult), v 53 (1d100=11, 1d100=8, 1d100=99) Note: All rolled with a "Knack" +10 bonus, which is a minor power I cannot fail even at fettered

Chrysis

"Addendum: Explosions highly localised. Most bodies have no apparent wounds. Arbites have deployed bio-weapon countermeasures. Recommend likewise if entering Arbites perimeter."

Spoiler:

FL Admech: 2 DoS
FL Archaeotech: 3 DoS
FL Inquisition: 5 DoS
SL Chymistry: 2 DoS

The rolls

And a roll for Total Recall, just in case, comes up as 90 so I don't remember well if I've seen this kind of thing before.

Matev

Sorry guys, thought I'd have wi-fi when I got dragged out in vacation, no such luck. Kicking this from my phone to let you know I'll be back Saturday evening.

susan

As to your rolls:

Enoch - You've seen this type of thing before when confronting Warp beasts ans Psykers, and that could certainly account for the activity and destruction you see. The blast marks could be psychic energy manifestations, the corpses could have been killed a hundred ways with psychic powers to leave them in their current state. You would very much like to dissect and observe them personally, of course. You are somewhat interested by the scale of the thing; if it was a single massively powerful psyker, you would frankly expect more destruction, leveled buildings and the like. Perhaps multiple, lesser psykers? And if this village was killed for some kind of blood ritual, you can't identify it. A summoning of a Daemon would be noticed during and after, and you don't detect the residue of any other mass-scale slaying ritual. Corpses are also significantly less useful for rituals than living specimens. You wonder if there's anyone not just dead here, but missing...

Attilas - This doesn't strike you as some chemical or mechanical accident. While the blast marks could technically come from explosives or gas lines (though they still seem too localized for that), and while a gas or chemical leak could have killed these people, you're missing some evidence that that would have occurred. Any chemical agent deadly and widespread enough to cause this would still be active on the site, and no Arbites captain who knew what was happening would risk this much exposure to his men, HazMat suit or no. You don't see clouds of gas, or signs on buildings of acidic corrosion, and these people look like they just died too quickly for any of that. Perhaps you could be looking at a Biological agent, but the same risks would apply, and that of course would not be an accident. If you got on-scene, you could rule it out completely, but you don't think this event has much to do with Tech or Chemicals.

SanderJK

Enoch ponders the situation. "Hmmm, it's definitely carnage out there, and it has some hallmarks of a Psyker activity, but I'm afraid I don't recognize it as anything I've seen before, or heard about. It doesn't look like a single large possession, more like a few dozen localized attacks. I don't see any remains of the attackers either. They could've fled, moved on, been imprisoned, who knows."

Chrysis

"The current situation is inconsistent with explosives or chemical attack. Potential Biological contaminant, but that cannot be confirmed without closer examination."

Do we know the names of the Commissioner and Officer involved in the conversation we overheard? Specifically the Commissioner. Alternatively do we know the name of the company that owns this place? Could be handy for trying to talk our way in.

susan

Yes on all counts; the Field Commander of the Arbites here is Captain Cainus Jordans, the local Commissioner is Arbites Commissioner Finneus Steward, and this whole operation is under the ownership of the Magnuson Household, one of the larger local Houses with a wide area of interests and that has been helping to run this world for almost half a century at this point.

Matev

"No specific method as to the deaths, locations...?" Drake muttered, half to himself, "We're going to need to take a closer look I believe to get anything useful out of this scene...."

susan

What's yoru plan of approach? Open/sneaky/combo?

Matev

Likely a little of both. Sneaking around could lead to shooting we don't want to deal with, but we can't reveal ourselves as an Inquisitor and retinue yet...

Chrysis

I would suggest walking straight up to them claiming to be an investigation team from the mining household and basically browbeat our way in. It looks like the Arbites cleanup crew are already here, so we can't pretend to be them. The mining households probably have a bit more flexibility on team makeup as well, which can explain our interesting team.

Matev

Is there mining on this world? I thought it was pretty much Agri and Agri accessories. A minor modification should suffice.

"Get me the name of one of the noble families." Drake asked the Tech-Priest, "We're going to go in there as a private investigation team for the nobility. We have a couple minutes to work out a quick background before we go down there."

Chrysis

Attilas begins to refer to his dataslate.

"Current data indicates this town is a holding of the Magnuson Household, one of the more powerful local houses."

He then begins to rattle off all the information currently known. A screed of information on important household figures, other local holdings, and what financial information is known.

susan

Yep, there's mining. It's a very small percentage when compared with the Agriculture business, but still pretty substantial and a business that very well augments the local industry. Most raw minerals are sent back to the two or three major cities to be smelted and processed.

Go ahead and introduce yourselves to the Arbites. Any characters playing this stealthy can start to roll checks.

Dread__Cthulhu

Matev wrote: »

Is there mining on this world? I thought it was pretty much Agri and Agri accessories. A minor modification should suffice.

"Get me the name of one of the noble families." Drake asked the Tech-Priest, "We're going to go in there as a private investigation team for the nobility. We have a couple minutes to work out a quick background before we go down there."

Eldrit listens intently as the play is laid down, straightening his cloak so as to ensure to conceal his decidedly non-standard equipment.

Matev

"Very well. Let's get going." Drake said, "Locate the command center so we may get proper access to the site."

susan

You looking for anything specific, or are you going to just approach the closest Arbites on the perimeter? You will almost certainly be stopped by a perimeter guard before you get inside the area, sneakiness notwithstanding.

Chrysis

I'm just going to follow the inquisitors lead. Not like Attilas would be able to sneak in anyway, he's a little conspicuous.

Matev

Looking for something like a mobile command center, or something to that regard. Barring that, we'll likely just find the first Arbites we can and blow through that way.

susan

There is a group of Arbites a bit further away from the next; a few larger speeders, lots of people standing around and chatting.

Chrysis

I'm going to suggest we rock up to the nearest group of Arbites and try and brow beat them into either letting us talk to the guy in charge or start poking around.

susan

Sounds like a plan . Start talkin'/rollin' and we'll get things moving.

SanderJK

"We're going to bluff our way through then? I'll let others do the talking.... and take some precautions just in case." Enoch tenses up for a second, and a shimmer comes over him.

OOC Fettered Cast: Flesh Like Iron: Success! Adding 5 (!) to my Toughness, and lose 1 AB

Spoiler:

Activating Flesh Like Iron (v18/23/28/33) (3d10+11=33)

I'll need to retest every 10 rounds (~1 minute) or lose the bonus.

Chrysis

"A bluff seems most prudent. We are poorly equipped for stealth and the termination of Arbite officers will make further investigation difficult."

Matev

"A fair idea." Drake intones, "Take us in casually. We belong here." He takes a deep breath, readying himself for yet another performance. At least the arbites would be easy to talk around.

susan

(Forums seem back.... kind of. We lose any posts?)

Payot

((I don't know. But blue-dotting is gone, and so are the options for posts ? Or are they just manual now ?))

Matev

((Ugh, painful to lose the easy way to do colors....))

SanderJK

Apparently the makeup forms are work in progress, they didn't want to wait on it to launch due to the issues on the old one. Anyway, I'm back after I managed to lock myself out by changing my email adress setting

For blue dotting, click on the flag on the topright corner. But turn of email notifications in your settings! or you'll be spammed to hell and beyond.

Chrysis

((I think grey is no longer the best choice for OOC stuff either. Luckily it doesn't look like we've lost any posts, so we should be good to continue.))

susan

Sorry, I've been sick for a couple days and haven't posted much.

So! To keep things moving, I'll post this update which I think is what y'all were intending. Anyone who wished to do something else is still free to post actions:

After you take a moment to assess the situation and drop off any members of your party that wish to sneak closer, your speeder lifts off once more to cut in towards the scene of the savagery. Almost as soon as you break the treeline the Arbites spot you, and their professional lounging immediately morphs into quick action. The two nearest Arbites craft take off and speed directly toward you, their warning lights blazing in the sky and a loud speaker commanding you to land; they don't seem in the mood for much small talk.

On the ground once more at the edge of the clearing, an Arbites craft lands right next to you and a half dozen armored troopers pour out, their weapons clearly primed to fire but, for the moment, pointing at the ground. Their Seargant approaches, ordering you to open your side door with a wave of her hand. As soon as it opens, she shouts inside, "You are bound by Law to turn back around immediately and leave this place! There has been a serious accident, and we cannot allow you to continue! If you try to come in, we will shoot you down, do you understand!"