What Hides In Darkness (40K)

[Pcm979]

Rause knelt down in front of the corpses, twitching his right hand in tiny, controlled movements. A tiny mechadendrite extended from his Narcathium and carefully sliced off small fragments of flesh from strategic areas, depositing them in a sealed and purified container on his waist.

"Engage auto-medicae." He barked into his suit's vox. A moment later the battle diagnosis system overlaid his regular vision, little streams of Gothic text leading off from the more egregious wounds. "Record, all ranges. Highest quality."
"Working." The suit's tinny voice reported.

[Dark Silver]

Demian was the last out of the shuttle/gunship, heavy bolter at his side, holding his chain halbred like he already expected trouble. various gernades were strapped to his waist in a bandolier.

As the others fanned out, he kept a eye upon the horizon, his power armor's sensors scanning for signs of foe.

[Cynical Cat]

There were two nearby entrances to the building complex. An ordinary sized door not too far from the destroyed Valkyrie and a larger, cargo door further away. The control tower was on the roof of and adjacent stack. A ladder along the side of the stack allowed access to its roof.

[GeneralTacticus]

"Oh, the usual. Found what appears to be the missing Arbites transport and platoon, minus well... the platoon. Thirteen bodies counting crew which leaves approximately three squads of Arbites unaccounted for. The transport is more or less totaled, destroyed by heavy weapons fire, possible lascannon or similar. The crew and arbites were done in by lasgun or something similar, Tau pulse weapons perhaps. Traces of synth-blood. Some sort of comm jam thats disrupting any attempt to contact the ship. Pretty much the usual.

"Based on the situation it appears that the arbites went down fighting. What confuses me is that if they went down fighting why isn't there more bodies and why aren't there the bodies of the enemy? My thought on that one is that it's possible the arbites were the ones responsible. Possessed or turned traitor somehow, corrupted. Explains the lack of a discernable enemy.

"I've got my guardsmen scouring the area for entrances and exits. Hopefully we can find a way to get past the interference and get a good communication line back to the Burden of Judgement. Boosting the signal apparently does nothing.

"That's what appears to be the long and the short of it. My suggestion is we secure the area and await for the Deathwatch to land and then work on securing a means of communication. After that we can start looking at taking the rest of the complex."

Halima nodded. "I believe the jamming to be psychic in nature; I sensed it as we came in. The Burden of Judgement and our reinforcements along the perimeter are aware of its existence, and I have instructed our tech-priests to try to circumvent the jamming with a landline. Emperor willing, our communications will be restored soon.â€

[SirNitram]

Mal was following the Captain's orders, searching for an access terminal. He was clambering up the control tower, indicating that his Deathwatch 'keeper' remain on the ground. He wasn't sure it'd support his weight; adding in the weight of Astartes armour was asking for trouble.

[Cynical Cat]

The ladder was steel and solidly bolted onto the side of the building. It would support even an armoured Astartes, perhaps even one in Terminator tactical dreadnought armour. Malkamar reached the top of the building. The door to the control tower had had its hinges blasted out with some kind of heat weaponry. Inside the stairs led up to a control room filled with blasted equipment and three corpses. To the discerning eye the damage had been done with high powered las weapons or perhaps a low powered pulse weapons.

[SirNitram]

Mal tapped his vox. "Control tower's a no-go. We're looking at energy weapons.. A las all the way up, or maybe a Tau pulse design. How far are we from the Tau sphere? And worlds known to have their elite traffick in Tau battlesuit technology?" The Astartes asked.

[Charon]

Vibius watched Mal go up the ladder, following him a short time after as the ladder could easily hold him and he wasn't about to let an underarmed soldier get out from under his eyes. Vibius looked around the top of the building and then out over the positions he could see, spotting good defendable positions, most of them were where bodies of the Arbites now lay. As Mal came back out of the control tower and made his report Vibius took a glance in.

"Scrap heap now. What about a secondary? A place like this should have redundancy."

[B4UTRUST]

Gravin nodded towards Inquisitor Toran.
"Agreed. I did a brief scan of the area when my forces moved to secure this section of the landing site. I could discern no minds other then those of my crew.

"The prescense of two hellguns does imply that they were carrying other weapons then their standard shotguns, however so I don't want to immediatly invalidate the line of thought that the Arbites themselves are responsible. But for the moment I'm more then willing to consider all options. We honestly don't have enough data to make any accurate judgements at this juncture."

Gravin's comm flared to life as the Space Marine Mal gave his report of his findings inside of the control tower. A second later Vibius's question came through.
"Could be on another building somewhere. I don't see one off hand, however.

"Lt. Calad, if you would be so kind, take your men and secure the building entrance near the wreckage. I want to know whats on the other side of it."
"Yes sir, right away."

The four guardsmen confered amongst themselves for a moment then made a tactical advance upon the door. Two of them took up positions by the wall on either side while the sergeant moved to open the door. Lt. Calad hung back, gun trained on the door. Sgt. Corcer pulled open the door and moved back with it out of the line of fire. They waited before advancing in to see if anything inside tried to attack.

Gravin watched his men for a moment before turning back to Inquisitor Toran and Captain Crassiros.
"Captain Crassiros, Inquisitor Toran, your thoughts on the cargo doors? We can divide up and take both doors seperately or stay together and take one of them. "

[SirNitram]

"Redundancy is a given. However, our opposition no doubt thought the same. If I had my old gear and a few days, I'd try to make repairs here. As it stands, that's not even slightly feasible." The heretic sucked on his teeth, a habit of his when thinking. "Any other control systems will likely be inside, on the assumption that it would provide protection. Which means gaining control will mean hitting the most fortified sections."

[Cynical Cat]

The door opened to a stairway leading to vast room full of conveyors and pipes. Dials and consols monitored the flow of the apparently inactive machinery. Signs of battle were everywhere.

Spent shells, bullet holes, and blast marks were everywhere. At the foot of the door was sprawled the blasted body of an Arbites Enforcer armed with a drum fed grenade launcher. Two more Enforcers were dead at the foot of the stairs, combat shotguns still clenched in their dead hands. Each one had been riddled with energy weapons fire that had cracked and then shattered their armour before destroying the flesh underneath. Four more Arbitors could found further in the room.

Several more pools of coagulated gore were also found. In one of them was a yellowish, carapaced four fingered hand and forearm. As the Guardsmen made their discovery, the auspexes carried by the hunter skull registered a large number of signals advancing through the facility towards their position.

[GeneralTacticus]

Halima was just opening her mouth to reply when Federov hurried over, small lights flashing all over his sensor rig.

“Inquisitor Toran,â€

[B4UTRUST]

Gravin glanced towards the door as his men went in. When the auspexes went off he glanced down and then towards the door again.
"Well, ask and thou shalt recieve apparently."
Gravin raised his storm bolter in one hand and started moving towards the door.

"Lt. Calad, talk to me. What's going on."
"Bodies, sir. Arbites and... shit. We've got xenos. Four fingers, yellow, carapace. Tyranid?"
"Damn. Alright, we're coming. You've got possible hostiles moving in your direction so find cover and take up firing positions."
"Permission to augment our firepower with available means?"
"Go for it..."

In the background of the comm Gravin could hear the heavy metal chunk of a gernade being loaded into a chamber followed by the sounds of shotguns being cocked.

"If possible, lets try to cut this down to a single firelane. A single hallway or something where they have to come in a limited number. Damien, take up position with the guard and provide cover. Ezekial, Angelus; standby."

[Cynical Cat]

They were swift, not inhumanely so, but quick. They entered from three different points at the far end of the large room and took cover. The soldiers were bipedal humanoids and covered in a dark yellow carapace-like armour. They gripped carbine-like weapons made of rounded shapes.

The first to reach cover fired bursts of pulse weapon fire at the Guardsmen while the next group leap frogged to closer positions. Then they switched roles. Their fire was accurate, but not exceptionally so. Their weapons were not quite as powerful as their Tau equivalents, but a few shots would wreck carapace armour and prolonged vollies would breach even Astartes armour. They fought and died in absolute silence.

[GeneralTacticus]

Halima's retinue took cover and returned fire. Theda, Mertok and the Vessorine clan warriors pumped hellgun fire into the advancing enemy with unerring accuracy. The squad marksman, scanned the enemy squads for any officers or equivalents they might have, finger poised on his long-las’ trigger, while the Janissary with the flamer hunkered down and prepared to hose the enemy when they came within range. Behind them, the second team of Janissaries slipped through the door one at a time, adding their fire to that of their fellows. One hefted a missile launcher loaded with frag missiles.

Sebastian’s shotgun spat bolt rounds and Executioner shells that would dismember any enemies they struck. Federov’s grenade launcher lofted frag grenades over all obstacles and into the group providing cover fire. His lascannon-armed servitors hung back for now, waiting to see if more appropriate targets would present themselves.

Halima herself crouched behind cover with the Janissaries, bolt pistol spitting near-silent death at the enemy. She reached out with subtle tendrils of warp energy, probing at the enemy’s minds and seeking to discern their true nature.

[Cynical Cat]

The soldier-things advanced into the storm of fire. Their tough carapaces protected them from frag grenade fire and against targets this tough there were few one shot kills. Their own weapons were fearsome and they were not unskilled in their use. Streams of pulse fire turned the area around the door into a kill zone and at any concentration of troopers. Guardsmen and Janissaries alike fell to the alien warriors. And yet more came.

The kept their discipline of several groups advancing while several others provided cover fire. They bled thick red blood when their carapaces were breached, but continued fighting until they died and they died hard. Of the original group a dozen were dead on the floor, but a score more reinforcements had entered the room.

Halima touched the minds of the alien warriors and found no hate, no fury, no love, or any heat at all. Just cold obediance and a feeble flicker of intelligence. It was like touching the mind of a servitor.

Auspexes continued to read more blips heading their way. The more sensitive ones also detected blips heading towards the cargo doors. Some of the readings indicated beings much larger than the advancing drone soldiers.

[GeneralTacticus]

Halima ground her teeth in frustration. Whatever these things were, they were tougher than they had any right to be, and Emperor knew how many more of them there were. Too many, for sure.

So much for subtlety. Abandoning any attempt to hide from psychic detection, Halima reached out with her will and filled herself with the power of the Warp. Behind her helmet’s visor, her eyes blazed with psychic energy, and her vox-command of “brace yourselvesâ€

[Cynical Cat]

The drone soldiers fell. Several of them twitched and thrashed on the floor, more lay still, a few stood back up. Most of those were picked off by Imperial weapons fire. The other drones continued to fire and advance. Two Guardsmen and a Jannissary fell, armour blasted open and flesh blown apart by pulse blasts. More continued to enter the room and reinforce the fighters.

[Pcm979]

With a painful screech, four white-hot claws burst through the wall a good four metres above the fray. Portions of it tumbled in, revealing the figure of Rause Siaides. He knelt down in the hole he'd just created and carefully took aim, then fired- To watch the bolt do nothing but knock his target over. He quickly switched to Kraken and skored a lucky shot to one's head-analouge, but losing the brain didn't seem to even slow it down. Typical Xenos.
He switched once again, this time to conventional rounds, with far more success- One shot to the chest, one to the head-analouge, one for luck. Unfortunately there were just too many of them to make a difference from up there, so he hopped down through the hole and landed with a thud, tumbling into cover like an enormous metal boulder. Then he was up again, one arm holding the Bolter carefully, the other ready to slash with the sizzling claws.

[GeneralTacticus]

Halima breathed a small sigh of relief as Rause entered the fray. That should even things up a bit. Unable to unleash another telepathic blast without hitting the Marine as well – which probably wouldn’t do any significant damage, but would be inconvenient – she switched tactics, focusing on a single drone soldier and boring into its mind. If these things were essentially biological automatons made to obey orders, then perhaps she could subvert that and turn them against each other. Worth a try, at least.

[Cynical Cat]

The drone soldiers continued to pour out fire, moving up, firing, and reloading with mechanical precision. Several more dropped, but they advanced undaunted. Halima psychicly reached into the mind of one of the closer drone soldiers. It resisted for a moment and then the inquisitor had full control. For a brief instant. Then its brain fried. The brain dead creature continued to advance clumsily, its dying body directed by its cybernetics and control network. Data feeds from other units allowed it to direct fire, albeit with greatly reduced accuracy but still with great volume. The drone soldier wouldn't live long, all of its organic systems were failing. But until it fell it could still fight.

[Pcm979]

Rause helpfully filled Halima's stubbornly un-dead Xeno with bolts, then assessed the situation over the vox: "Drones. Strong, numerous, fearless. This is untenable."

[GeneralTacticus]

“I must agree.â€

[The Necrontyr Messenger]

Salvor came up behind Hamila’s team, bolter coughing out a metal storm shell with a ‘raark’ that carried it over Rause’s shoulder pads into the throng beyond, where it exploded, creating a small but intense cone of shrapnel which would, even though these creatures were tough, give them something to think about, and hopefully have a suppressive effect – even astartes tended to operate less effectively with shrapnel bouncing off their armour, even if it wasn’t wounding them. Several more bolts followed in quick succession, and he crouched as he did so, sending the bolts in carefully timed arcs, pressed against a stanchion supporting the ceiling of the cavern. His lightning clawed hand reached down to his grenade dispenser, taking the small disk of an astartes pattern frag grenade and thumbing its timer to two seconds.

“Inquisitor Toran, withdraw your men to my position, then head up the stairs. Brother Siaides, we’ll hold them here for a few moments…â€

[GeneralTacticus]

“Acknowledged.â€