[40K] Solomon's Hunt
Feb 18, 2017 22:32:03 GMT -6
Post by Deleted on Feb 18, 2017 22:32:03 GMT -6
I've been toying with a Warhammer 40k character outside of all the factions to flesh out some of the cooler aspects. It's short and still in the works, but I think you'll like this badass.
Pech was a planet too humid and inhospitable to any sane faction within the galaxy, and as a result had never been graced by the Imperium of Man nor the massive infrastructure or bureaucracy that inevitably trailed behind them. Only the Kroot species could maintain lives in such a primordial habitat. Far from the reaches or desires of any conquest, Pech was ideal for rogues and exiles; Pech was accepting of all who were willing to die on her soil.
Deep within the planet, nestled between thorned palms and razor-sharp bushes with poisoned fruit, ran the wildest beasts in a perpetual battle of hunger. There were no plains for gentle herbivores to neither graze nor gentle pools of crystal clear water for their thirst. Just jagged rocks and muddied swamp and canopies that engulfed the jungles with shadow. If it rained, it poured for days and flooded any nest below the treeline. To hunt here on Pech would require an apex predator beyond any measure and no one considered himself highest on the food chain than the infamous Rex Solomon.
Beneath his wide-brim hat, Solomon dragged on a fat cigar tucked beneath a mustache that stretched to his sideburns. Thunderclouds had filled the orange sky and sapped all color out of the exotic forest, leaving Rex’s camp to bask in darkness. Solomon continued to stare into the horizon, beyond the black clouds and tree tops, tracking an unknown danger with his bionic eyepiece.
“Is it going to pour, Mr. Solomon?”
“First time on Pech, isn’t it son? Why do you think I had the team set up here on this plateau? For the view?”
Rex chuckled to his own joke and then extinguished his cigar on the butt of his pegleg. He turned about on his good leg to face the young man and the impatient scags he had tricked into joining him for this hunt. It was a motley band of misfits pulled for different reasons, each with their own skills or equipment. There were Catachan fighters who sought the danger and penal legion scum who were fleeing it. There were explorers and traders, medics and engineers, fighters and fools; Solomon was not too keen on denying the help he needed. A violent hobby such as his meant a high-turnover for the inexperienced in the worst way possible.
“Walk with me, boy. If you plan on leaving this rock in anything but a jar then you’ll have to wise up quick. Tell me – you hunt before?”
Despite his prosthetic leg, Solomon outpaced the young adventurer as the two weaved in and about the encampment’s working. Men mingled by the campfire, sharing flasks of amnesac and exaggerated stories of yore. The soft crackle of the fire was no match for the frightening caws and sinister bellows of horrid creatures, either mating or killing or even possibly both. The youth stumbled over a massive tire of a Tauros attack buggy much to the chagrin of a group of Ogryn gnawing on slabs of meat.
“Uh, I’m afraid not Mr. Solomon. Aside from my civic duty to my planetary defense force, this is my first foray into, uh, big game hunting. Oh, I’m Kip by the way.”
They walked between a confiscated armory of assorted weapons and traps; an assortment of autoguns, heavy stubbers, overstuffed krak bombs and crude stake-like weapons stained with foreign bloods. Much of it had been accumulated it from the bountiful stockpiles of planetary governors eager to see their xeno creature problems eradicated. Some of it was donated or recovered and a few killer relics misappropriated from their owners. Combined with the miscreants huddled about the camp and rogue traders up above, Rex Solomon had built himself an expeditionary force away from the grip of anyone’s control.
“Kip, you said? Sounds like an animal call. Kip. Do you have a last name, Kip?”
“Not really, Mr. Solomon.”
“So tell me Kip – what will the remembrancers write of you? You think they can write a song about a lad name Kip? “
“To be frank, sir, I’m not a fan of poetry written by men who hold quills instead of lasguns. Let them keep their cantations.”
Solomon let out another hearty guffaw and stopped in his preparations.
“Aye, you’re damn right Kip,” Rex agreed, patting the back of Kip’s flak vest, “The dead have no use for sing-a-longs. Save them for the blowhards. You’re not on patrol or guard duty. I’d never put a greenhorn on perimeter.”
Kip continued to nod, oblivious to the subtle ribbing of the legendary tracker. He had been so fascinated with the figure that he failed to notice they had made an entire round about the encampment.
“Come along Kip – every man and woman fresh to the hunt should see what they’re up against.”
Solomon led the march to his command tent, a massive frame of canvas propped up near the campfire circle. Unlike the dim barracks outside, Solomon’s tent was a well-lit jamboree of luxury. Despite being filled with knickknacks, it was primitive in all forms. No hololithic projectors or advanced machinery; just old maps and bones. A Servoskull hummed about with scrolls in its grasp, but the auspex had been mounted in something beyond the perfect human skull. At the back of the room, a man and a woman took turns using a Vox-caster and quill to chart migratory patterns on a tremendous Pech map scroll. The hunter placed his iconic hat down on the main table and addressed his de-facto squire, touring the grisly collection in near silence. There were colossal bones and ribcages and skulls from a campaign that stretched across planets. Rex plunged his hand into the sockets of a fierce looking head with a massive overbite and cracks running through the crown. Despite Rex’s height, the skull dwarfed their heads in size and stature.
“The Emperor save you if you’re ever up against a Greenskin. Dumb as rocks but eager to fight. Nearly lost my arm setting a trap for Giant Squiggoths when these bastards found my crew first. I’m sure they’d have had us if they hadn’t chased us into the minefield.”
Solomon traced his fingers along the Ork’s teeth, dabbing the tips to test their sharpness, then placed it in Kip’s grasp. He rotated it with awe, but soon the feeling subsided and he was left with an overwhelming sense of disgust.
“Xeno scum. Inquisitor Loffengar used to say that even confronting the xeno was as damning as being one,” Kip returned the decapitated fossil back to its place.
“He’s not wrong, Kip, but that’s the wrong mentality. We’re all damned, no doubt about it. We hunt not for the sport or the thrill, as lively as it is, but rather because it’s the only thing we can do. You must understand that mankind is the apex predator. Look at these wretched beasts; they must mutate and consume and contort because they lack what makes us infallible. This is why you’re asked to fear these abominations. So you may hate them with enough fury that you seek out and exterminate them.”
Rex had crossed the room and snatched the map from his Vox scouts with enough force to leave them surprised. He unfurled the scroll, spreading it wide for Kip. His remaining eye was lit with the same zeal and fury of an iterator addressing a conquered world.
“It’s not about fangs or venom, Kip! We can only grow so far, but our minds are infinite in room. There’s a thousand ways to skin a Tyrant and you can be damn sure I’m going to try every one of them.”
By now, Solomon’s Voxcasters had departed from their positions in total silence leaving Kip to Rex’s control. The bionic eyepiece moved about on its own accord, milling about the stained map and all its markings. There were hand-drawn skulls on certain landmarks and dotted arrows weaving about the inked lines in an untraceable mess.
“Here, do you see this?” Solomon stabbed at an oblong bird-like silhouette at the peak of mountain, “King of all the Razorwings, sitting on her fat throne, coming down faster than Elysian troops with broken gravchutes. Perched so high up that we couldn’t move any of our equipment up the crags. You ever had seen a Razorwing the size of a Leman Russ?” Kip shook his head in disbelief. “Outclassed any avian sibling, louder than any Valkyrie. This harlot could lift Ogryn by the handful and shrug off any poison we hit her with.”
Solomon stormed across his trophy room to a framed set of plucked feathers glazed in some foul chemical to forever preserve their sheen. Each crest was black like obsidian tapering into bits of iridescence, seemingly sparkling under the lanterns of the tent. The hunter thrust the prize into Kip’s wanton grasp.
“I killed her, Kip. No one dared to stand between her nest and me, boy. I took Sheila here, scaled to the peak in the dead of night and harpooned the bitch through her gizzard. When she tried to flee, I reeled her back and finished her off with a meltagun to the heart. No chain unbreakable, be it the shackles of man or beast’s hunger.”
Surely Solomon had told this story before, and no doubt in some instances he had received the applause he deserved, but Kip remained fascinated with the plumage before him. Rex’s building bravado faded back to the cries of the night jungle, engulfed in memories of a hunt too thrilling for anyone but himself. The boy returned the feathers to their original display before turning heel and following in the footsteps of the scouts.
“I should get some rest, Mr. Solomon. The hunt starts at daybreak, yes?”
“Aye, good call Kip. I hope this old bloke hasn’t bored you with his exploits. You’ll do us all good with a few hours of rest. Go on, get to bed, boy.” Rex slipped his hat back on top of his weathered hair, pulling the brim down across his eyes. “I’m going to prepare everything we’ll need for the hunt.”
Outside much of the festivity had faded away and the few characters awake were either stoically patrolling or preparing assorted armaments. None regarded Kip’s presence, allowing him to indulge in his curiosity rampantly fueled by Solomon’s lecturing. There were Mark IX sniper rifles and Longlas rifles haphazardly bundled together in excess. There were crates of every type of pistol, including the overwhelming plasma and inferno varieties, once reserved for elite soldiers in the Imperium, now up for grabs like spoiled fruits. There were Ripper guns and missile launchers in unnecessary volumes with enough munitions to outnumber even the insects of Pech. There were even exotic weapons that Kip had never seen before seemingly inoperable by normal men, like that of bone-like rifles or boxy, brightly-colored railguns. It was obvious why Solomon was so difficult to apprehend; he was armed with more firepower than certain regiments and hoarding enough xeno weaponry to be condemned at the stake.
Most of the hammocks and tents had been filled with soldiers of similar cliques or backgrounds and as a result Kip was forced to wander between quarters to find a place to rest. There was spare ‘bedding’ for Ogryn in their own extended shelter – the giants comfortably snoring on their piles of ripped canvas, palm fronds and destroyed webbing. Kip wedged himself in the space between them and leaned his head backwards on the makeshift pillow that was a knapsack stuffed with fauna. There was nothing he could do when one of them rolled over and clung to him like a child’s plaything except close his eyes and wait for dawn.
Heavy eyes gave way to somber dreams and Kip found himself eyeing fantasies of blackened woods and towering trees. He was alone in the winding paths alit by rays of the Emperor’s light cascading through the gaps above. It was not his home, nor was it Pech, or any place he had ever seen before. The evergreens were silent and devoid of birdcalls or insect hums but overwhelmingly peaceful. His legs moved on their own accord, gliding across the terrain faster than Chimera treads, pushing Kip to an unknown ending. When he tried to pivot his body and turn away, the light from above would blind him and turn him back on course, until he felt an insatiable hunger enveloping him. Kip’s legs gave way and forced him to crawl and pull at the ground with his own hands until the earth beneath him could no longer withstand his grip. The world would seize and shake but Kip remained adamant in his pursuit of the unknown. The undergrowth was consumed by the same blinding light from above until he was blinded on all four, screaming out in agony, only to find his mouth stuffed with dirt to choke upon.
Kip shot up from his nightmare, throwing his weight against the Ogryn’s arm, disrupting the cranky giant. Outside came the clamor of men’s boots and curses, no doubt signaling the inception of the hunt. The Ogryn brute stood up on his massive frame, wiped the drool from his jaw and gifted Kip a smile with rotting teeth and a stank breath that could pierce a Death Korp’s breathing apparatus.
“You is nice and warm like blankie. Mikey like you. You sleep in Ogryn tent with Mikey.”
Psychopathic manchild or not, Kip couldn’t help but feel grateful to finally have some sort of ally within Solomon’s hunting retinue. The Ogryn stood up, too tall for the tent they fashioned, and practically punched his head through the ceiling. Mikey stepped around (or more aptly, through) Kip to awake his brothers with less civility: he kicked at their ribs and shouted at them with a vigor that only Ogryn can muster. They roused violently and almost broke into a skirmish in their tiny tent, their elephantine bodies pushing at the wooden frames, refusing to listen to one another. Kip vanished behind their frames as they jostled each other in morning grumpiness.
“Shuddup! We wake up, bonehead! Time to kill!”
“I kill Mikey for waking me up with boot.”
“Mikey will eat you if you try! Now Mikey say shuddup. Time for Salmon.”
With their issues immediately resolved with the simplest diplomacy, the herd of brutes pushed out of their tent into the growing regiment outside in the circle. Mikey, the self-appointed leader just inches taller than his brothers, placed his massive hands on Kip and shoved him outwards with the rest of his team. The masses outside were already packed and armed and huddled together in mini-factions. Kip’s miniscule presence besides the Ogryn team made him the subject of snickers from the outcast warriors within the encampment. It was best they laugh at a distance, as Bone’ead Mikey would have surely killed any man who mocked his toy.
To the ignorant, no one would have been able to tell a small village had ever set up; every tent had been repurposed or collapsed and every weapon loaded onto some form of mobile platform, be it strapped to Land Crawlers or the backs of mindless Servitors. Solomon himself was nowhere to be found and soon enough each clique fell to mocking or ridiculing each other to the point of aggravation. By the time Mikey was about to wrap his mitts about a Catachan’s throat, Solomon’s iconic frame emerged from the underbrush beyond them, backed by a large group of aliens armed with rifles. Had Rex not been chuckling about some unheard anecdote, he would have easily been mistaken for a xeno’s prisoner. Many of the expeditionaries grimaced at the sight, refusing to even acknowledge the xenos before them. Though difficult to tell by their almost avian-like features, Kip could tell the aliens were not happy to be in the presence of humanity either.
“Good morning, lads! Another fabulous night on Pech with no casualties worth mentioning!”
Kip’s stomach churned as he studied the monsters in further detail; he had never seen such animalistic creatures and every ounce of him was eager to rush to a weapon and kill them in their place. Hate muddled with intrigue, as he couldn’t take his eyes off Solomon’s xeno allies, however. Incapable of whispering to Mikey, the young man addressed another scarred human in fatigues to his side.
“What in the Emperor’s name are those?”
“New to Pech? They’re Kroot. Whore themselves out to the Blue-Skins especially. Solomon has been dealing with them for years now. Just listen to him and don’t pay them attention.”
“What, hired like mercenaries? What for?”
Rex conversed with a Kroot slightly taller than the other aliens, already a half meter taller than anyone but the Ogryns in the camp. Though its Low Gothic was garbled and borderline blasphemous, it was still intelligible enough for Solomon to nod his head to.
“Everyone here knows there’s few trackers better than me,” Rex boasted to his men before him, “But you’d be a fool to throw a Kroot’s skills away because you’re afraid of being eaten. Torvald, get off your ass and bring them what we spoke about.”
One of the more finely-dressed adventurers snapped his fingers and two Servitors with hefty crates attached to their bodies proceeded to slog over to the aliens.
“Just as we agreed, Shaper,” Rex kicked at the lid of a crate, ignorant of the Servitor’s poor balance, spilling a wide variety of confiscated weapons unto the ground. The spry warriors behind the Shaper and Solomon leapt forward with frightening speed and began collecting the loose firearms with excitement. They clicked and chirped at each other, which seemed only to upset the hunting retinue. The Shaper nodded his head, shaking massive spiked quills about in the humidity, and an even larger monstrosity stepped out from behind them. It was a Krootox, a lumbering beast that walked on its knuckles, jockeyed by a small Kroot carnivore atop its back. Alongside it were bundled, rattling cages wrapped in woven cloths, hiding the beasts beneath. Solomon approached the Krootox, unwavering to what was essentially a tattooed war machine with a cannon mounted on its spine, and unbuckled the cages from their restraints. As if some form of performer unveiling parlor tricks, Solomon ripped the blankets off to reveal Kroot-looking monsters, quadrupeds that snarled and bit at their cage like wolves. A few proper greenhorns, including Kip, couldn’t help but gasp at such a ghastly deal. None protested however.
“I love these little buggers,” Rex laughed, kicking at the cage with his prosthetic, agitating the already upset hounds, “You’ve never really hunted until you’ve used Kroot Hounds. Nastier than any dog!”
The Kroot, with their Shaper and their Krootox, had regrouped at the outskirts, eager to return to their far-off homes with their new prizes.
“Rex: will you require our services to lead them properly?” gargled the Shaper, ignoring Solomon’s instigation. To hear a xeno address the galaxy’s most notorious hunter by his given name drove Kip’s blood to a boil.
“Hardly. You’ve done enough. We’ll let you know when the hunt is finished so you can come pick the bones clean, Shaper. Sound fair?”
“We honor your hunt.”
It was no litany but it worked for Solomon who tipped his hat and sent the Kroot on their way. They vanished into the woodlands within seconds, at home within the endless embrace of the jungle. When he was sure they were out of sight, Solomon approached the circle of men and women gathered by the doused campfire.
“I can tell by the look in some of your faces that you’re not happy with my negotiations. I’ll be the first to tell you I’m not a businessman – I leave the trickery to men in robes. Those of you who have hunted with me before know what you are up against. I advise the rest of you to learn quickly, because Pech is quite unforgiving in her lessons.”
Solomon’s scouts, the couple from the night before, retrieved the Kroot Hound crates and began restraining them to the Servitors with the same appeal as scrubbing latrines.
“Now I know that many of you come from worlds free of heresy, lacking in mutants and monsters. If word got out about these dealings, I’m sure we’d all be put to the stockades for execution; probably the only thing the Church can get done quickly.”
There were select laughs from hardened criminals on the far side of the circle.
“Still, I have an open door policy and anyone who feels uncomfortable with it has the right to tell me now. Not later, when the hunt begins. Now and only now. Go on, no need to be afraid. Speak up.”
Eyes darted back and forth as everyone within the retinue scanned each other, eager to see who would speak up against allying themselves with xenos for such a battle. One of the men who had gasped at the sight of the Kroot Hounds braved himself with the sign of the Aquila and stepped forward in the ring to speak.
“What’s stopping those…things from turning on us and chewing us apart?”
“Absolutely nothing. They have no learned respect – only instinct. An instinct to hunt and kill and eat and nothing else.”
Solomon’s explanation did little to change the man’s opinion.
“I do not wish to put my life in the hands of a xeno who isn’t enslaved to our command.”
Solomon mulled the thought for a bit then turned on his good leg and directed his arm to the forest behind him.
“Open door policy, lad. You can go unhindered by the Kroot if you want it so.”
“Walk away?! There’s nothing out there!”
“There’s plenty out there. In fact, I think it’ll keep you quite busy. Pech is perfect for remembrancers like you. You’ll get that story you’ve always wanted.”
“This is heresy! I served the Imperium of Man and I demand respect!”
“I thought I told you the door was open. Start walking.”
The young poet desperately turned about the circle, looking for anyone to support his claim but he was only met with the scowls of the men and women he assumed would die to protect his books. One Catachan man dropped the man’s bundlepack at his feet, letting the scrolls and inks spill out into the dirt. He fell to his knees, desperate to recollect everything, cursing all those around him. When he refused to leave, the barrels of guns and tips of bayonets were leveled against him.
“May your faith protect you,” Solomon bowed, removing his hat to salute him goodbye.
“The Emperor shall protect me! D-damn y-you heretics! F-f-fools!” the remembrancer cluched to his broken poems and ran off into the thicket of the forests, disappearing just as the Kroot had moments ago. His cursing soon faded to the squawks of birds and all was reset to Pech’s natural state. There was no more objection from anyone within the retinue.
“Alright lads! Mount up and move out! Stay frosty, keep your wits about you! Do what you can for every man but be prepared for the worst!”
The cavalcade organized themselves into a sloppy line and began marching outwards, through the opposite side of the meadow’s edges. The Ogryn and the Catachan and the Penitent, all united under one cause: hunt down one of Pech’s most legendary and dangerous creatures ever, the Greater Knarloc. Rex joined the march, standing tall besides his caged hounds and a worrisome Kip still staring off into the Remembrancer’s exit.
“I said wits about you, Kip! We march the other way!”
“Mr. Solomon, aren’t you worried that that man will reach the spaceport and warn the Ordo Xeno of this hunt?”
“No, not really.”
“If I might ask, why is that, sir?”
“Because the spaceport is 100 mile in the other direction.”
Pech was a planet too humid and inhospitable to any sane faction within the galaxy, and as a result had never been graced by the Imperium of Man nor the massive infrastructure or bureaucracy that inevitably trailed behind them. Only the Kroot species could maintain lives in such a primordial habitat. Far from the reaches or desires of any conquest, Pech was ideal for rogues and exiles; Pech was accepting of all who were willing to die on her soil.
Deep within the planet, nestled between thorned palms and razor-sharp bushes with poisoned fruit, ran the wildest beasts in a perpetual battle of hunger. There were no plains for gentle herbivores to neither graze nor gentle pools of crystal clear water for their thirst. Just jagged rocks and muddied swamp and canopies that engulfed the jungles with shadow. If it rained, it poured for days and flooded any nest below the treeline. To hunt here on Pech would require an apex predator beyond any measure and no one considered himself highest on the food chain than the infamous Rex Solomon.
Beneath his wide-brim hat, Solomon dragged on a fat cigar tucked beneath a mustache that stretched to his sideburns. Thunderclouds had filled the orange sky and sapped all color out of the exotic forest, leaving Rex’s camp to bask in darkness. Solomon continued to stare into the horizon, beyond the black clouds and tree tops, tracking an unknown danger with his bionic eyepiece.
“Is it going to pour, Mr. Solomon?”
“First time on Pech, isn’t it son? Why do you think I had the team set up here on this plateau? For the view?”
Rex chuckled to his own joke and then extinguished his cigar on the butt of his pegleg. He turned about on his good leg to face the young man and the impatient scags he had tricked into joining him for this hunt. It was a motley band of misfits pulled for different reasons, each with their own skills or equipment. There were Catachan fighters who sought the danger and penal legion scum who were fleeing it. There were explorers and traders, medics and engineers, fighters and fools; Solomon was not too keen on denying the help he needed. A violent hobby such as his meant a high-turnover for the inexperienced in the worst way possible.
“Walk with me, boy. If you plan on leaving this rock in anything but a jar then you’ll have to wise up quick. Tell me – you hunt before?”
Despite his prosthetic leg, Solomon outpaced the young adventurer as the two weaved in and about the encampment’s working. Men mingled by the campfire, sharing flasks of amnesac and exaggerated stories of yore. The soft crackle of the fire was no match for the frightening caws and sinister bellows of horrid creatures, either mating or killing or even possibly both. The youth stumbled over a massive tire of a Tauros attack buggy much to the chagrin of a group of Ogryn gnawing on slabs of meat.
“Uh, I’m afraid not Mr. Solomon. Aside from my civic duty to my planetary defense force, this is my first foray into, uh, big game hunting. Oh, I’m Kip by the way.”
They walked between a confiscated armory of assorted weapons and traps; an assortment of autoguns, heavy stubbers, overstuffed krak bombs and crude stake-like weapons stained with foreign bloods. Much of it had been accumulated it from the bountiful stockpiles of planetary governors eager to see their xeno creature problems eradicated. Some of it was donated or recovered and a few killer relics misappropriated from their owners. Combined with the miscreants huddled about the camp and rogue traders up above, Rex Solomon had built himself an expeditionary force away from the grip of anyone’s control.
“Kip, you said? Sounds like an animal call. Kip. Do you have a last name, Kip?”
“Not really, Mr. Solomon.”
“So tell me Kip – what will the remembrancers write of you? You think they can write a song about a lad name Kip? “
“To be frank, sir, I’m not a fan of poetry written by men who hold quills instead of lasguns. Let them keep their cantations.”
Solomon let out another hearty guffaw and stopped in his preparations.
“Aye, you’re damn right Kip,” Rex agreed, patting the back of Kip’s flak vest, “The dead have no use for sing-a-longs. Save them for the blowhards. You’re not on patrol or guard duty. I’d never put a greenhorn on perimeter.”
Kip continued to nod, oblivious to the subtle ribbing of the legendary tracker. He had been so fascinated with the figure that he failed to notice they had made an entire round about the encampment.
“Come along Kip – every man and woman fresh to the hunt should see what they’re up against.”
Solomon led the march to his command tent, a massive frame of canvas propped up near the campfire circle. Unlike the dim barracks outside, Solomon’s tent was a well-lit jamboree of luxury. Despite being filled with knickknacks, it was primitive in all forms. No hololithic projectors or advanced machinery; just old maps and bones. A Servoskull hummed about with scrolls in its grasp, but the auspex had been mounted in something beyond the perfect human skull. At the back of the room, a man and a woman took turns using a Vox-caster and quill to chart migratory patterns on a tremendous Pech map scroll. The hunter placed his iconic hat down on the main table and addressed his de-facto squire, touring the grisly collection in near silence. There were colossal bones and ribcages and skulls from a campaign that stretched across planets. Rex plunged his hand into the sockets of a fierce looking head with a massive overbite and cracks running through the crown. Despite Rex’s height, the skull dwarfed their heads in size and stature.
“The Emperor save you if you’re ever up against a Greenskin. Dumb as rocks but eager to fight. Nearly lost my arm setting a trap for Giant Squiggoths when these bastards found my crew first. I’m sure they’d have had us if they hadn’t chased us into the minefield.”
Solomon traced his fingers along the Ork’s teeth, dabbing the tips to test their sharpness, then placed it in Kip’s grasp. He rotated it with awe, but soon the feeling subsided and he was left with an overwhelming sense of disgust.
“Xeno scum. Inquisitor Loffengar used to say that even confronting the xeno was as damning as being one,” Kip returned the decapitated fossil back to its place.
“He’s not wrong, Kip, but that’s the wrong mentality. We’re all damned, no doubt about it. We hunt not for the sport or the thrill, as lively as it is, but rather because it’s the only thing we can do. You must understand that mankind is the apex predator. Look at these wretched beasts; they must mutate and consume and contort because they lack what makes us infallible. This is why you’re asked to fear these abominations. So you may hate them with enough fury that you seek out and exterminate them.”
Rex had crossed the room and snatched the map from his Vox scouts with enough force to leave them surprised. He unfurled the scroll, spreading it wide for Kip. His remaining eye was lit with the same zeal and fury of an iterator addressing a conquered world.
“It’s not about fangs or venom, Kip! We can only grow so far, but our minds are infinite in room. There’s a thousand ways to skin a Tyrant and you can be damn sure I’m going to try every one of them.”
By now, Solomon’s Voxcasters had departed from their positions in total silence leaving Kip to Rex’s control. The bionic eyepiece moved about on its own accord, milling about the stained map and all its markings. There were hand-drawn skulls on certain landmarks and dotted arrows weaving about the inked lines in an untraceable mess.
“Here, do you see this?” Solomon stabbed at an oblong bird-like silhouette at the peak of mountain, “King of all the Razorwings, sitting on her fat throne, coming down faster than Elysian troops with broken gravchutes. Perched so high up that we couldn’t move any of our equipment up the crags. You ever had seen a Razorwing the size of a Leman Russ?” Kip shook his head in disbelief. “Outclassed any avian sibling, louder than any Valkyrie. This harlot could lift Ogryn by the handful and shrug off any poison we hit her with.”
Solomon stormed across his trophy room to a framed set of plucked feathers glazed in some foul chemical to forever preserve their sheen. Each crest was black like obsidian tapering into bits of iridescence, seemingly sparkling under the lanterns of the tent. The hunter thrust the prize into Kip’s wanton grasp.
“I killed her, Kip. No one dared to stand between her nest and me, boy. I took Sheila here, scaled to the peak in the dead of night and harpooned the bitch through her gizzard. When she tried to flee, I reeled her back and finished her off with a meltagun to the heart. No chain unbreakable, be it the shackles of man or beast’s hunger.”
Surely Solomon had told this story before, and no doubt in some instances he had received the applause he deserved, but Kip remained fascinated with the plumage before him. Rex’s building bravado faded back to the cries of the night jungle, engulfed in memories of a hunt too thrilling for anyone but himself. The boy returned the feathers to their original display before turning heel and following in the footsteps of the scouts.
“I should get some rest, Mr. Solomon. The hunt starts at daybreak, yes?”
“Aye, good call Kip. I hope this old bloke hasn’t bored you with his exploits. You’ll do us all good with a few hours of rest. Go on, get to bed, boy.” Rex slipped his hat back on top of his weathered hair, pulling the brim down across his eyes. “I’m going to prepare everything we’ll need for the hunt.”
Outside much of the festivity had faded away and the few characters awake were either stoically patrolling or preparing assorted armaments. None regarded Kip’s presence, allowing him to indulge in his curiosity rampantly fueled by Solomon’s lecturing. There were Mark IX sniper rifles and Longlas rifles haphazardly bundled together in excess. There were crates of every type of pistol, including the overwhelming plasma and inferno varieties, once reserved for elite soldiers in the Imperium, now up for grabs like spoiled fruits. There were Ripper guns and missile launchers in unnecessary volumes with enough munitions to outnumber even the insects of Pech. There were even exotic weapons that Kip had never seen before seemingly inoperable by normal men, like that of bone-like rifles or boxy, brightly-colored railguns. It was obvious why Solomon was so difficult to apprehend; he was armed with more firepower than certain regiments and hoarding enough xeno weaponry to be condemned at the stake.
Most of the hammocks and tents had been filled with soldiers of similar cliques or backgrounds and as a result Kip was forced to wander between quarters to find a place to rest. There was spare ‘bedding’ for Ogryn in their own extended shelter – the giants comfortably snoring on their piles of ripped canvas, palm fronds and destroyed webbing. Kip wedged himself in the space between them and leaned his head backwards on the makeshift pillow that was a knapsack stuffed with fauna. There was nothing he could do when one of them rolled over and clung to him like a child’s plaything except close his eyes and wait for dawn.
Heavy eyes gave way to somber dreams and Kip found himself eyeing fantasies of blackened woods and towering trees. He was alone in the winding paths alit by rays of the Emperor’s light cascading through the gaps above. It was not his home, nor was it Pech, or any place he had ever seen before. The evergreens were silent and devoid of birdcalls or insect hums but overwhelmingly peaceful. His legs moved on their own accord, gliding across the terrain faster than Chimera treads, pushing Kip to an unknown ending. When he tried to pivot his body and turn away, the light from above would blind him and turn him back on course, until he felt an insatiable hunger enveloping him. Kip’s legs gave way and forced him to crawl and pull at the ground with his own hands until the earth beneath him could no longer withstand his grip. The world would seize and shake but Kip remained adamant in his pursuit of the unknown. The undergrowth was consumed by the same blinding light from above until he was blinded on all four, screaming out in agony, only to find his mouth stuffed with dirt to choke upon.
Kip shot up from his nightmare, throwing his weight against the Ogryn’s arm, disrupting the cranky giant. Outside came the clamor of men’s boots and curses, no doubt signaling the inception of the hunt. The Ogryn brute stood up on his massive frame, wiped the drool from his jaw and gifted Kip a smile with rotting teeth and a stank breath that could pierce a Death Korp’s breathing apparatus.
“You is nice and warm like blankie. Mikey like you. You sleep in Ogryn tent with Mikey.”
Psychopathic manchild or not, Kip couldn’t help but feel grateful to finally have some sort of ally within Solomon’s hunting retinue. The Ogryn stood up, too tall for the tent they fashioned, and practically punched his head through the ceiling. Mikey stepped around (or more aptly, through) Kip to awake his brothers with less civility: he kicked at their ribs and shouted at them with a vigor that only Ogryn can muster. They roused violently and almost broke into a skirmish in their tiny tent, their elephantine bodies pushing at the wooden frames, refusing to listen to one another. Kip vanished behind their frames as they jostled each other in morning grumpiness.
“Shuddup! We wake up, bonehead! Time to kill!”
“I kill Mikey for waking me up with boot.”
“Mikey will eat you if you try! Now Mikey say shuddup. Time for Salmon.”
With their issues immediately resolved with the simplest diplomacy, the herd of brutes pushed out of their tent into the growing regiment outside in the circle. Mikey, the self-appointed leader just inches taller than his brothers, placed his massive hands on Kip and shoved him outwards with the rest of his team. The masses outside were already packed and armed and huddled together in mini-factions. Kip’s miniscule presence besides the Ogryn team made him the subject of snickers from the outcast warriors within the encampment. It was best they laugh at a distance, as Bone’ead Mikey would have surely killed any man who mocked his toy.
To the ignorant, no one would have been able to tell a small village had ever set up; every tent had been repurposed or collapsed and every weapon loaded onto some form of mobile platform, be it strapped to Land Crawlers or the backs of mindless Servitors. Solomon himself was nowhere to be found and soon enough each clique fell to mocking or ridiculing each other to the point of aggravation. By the time Mikey was about to wrap his mitts about a Catachan’s throat, Solomon’s iconic frame emerged from the underbrush beyond them, backed by a large group of aliens armed with rifles. Had Rex not been chuckling about some unheard anecdote, he would have easily been mistaken for a xeno’s prisoner. Many of the expeditionaries grimaced at the sight, refusing to even acknowledge the xenos before them. Though difficult to tell by their almost avian-like features, Kip could tell the aliens were not happy to be in the presence of humanity either.
“Good morning, lads! Another fabulous night on Pech with no casualties worth mentioning!”
Kip’s stomach churned as he studied the monsters in further detail; he had never seen such animalistic creatures and every ounce of him was eager to rush to a weapon and kill them in their place. Hate muddled with intrigue, as he couldn’t take his eyes off Solomon’s xeno allies, however. Incapable of whispering to Mikey, the young man addressed another scarred human in fatigues to his side.
“What in the Emperor’s name are those?”
“New to Pech? They’re Kroot. Whore themselves out to the Blue-Skins especially. Solomon has been dealing with them for years now. Just listen to him and don’t pay them attention.”
“What, hired like mercenaries? What for?”
Rex conversed with a Kroot slightly taller than the other aliens, already a half meter taller than anyone but the Ogryns in the camp. Though its Low Gothic was garbled and borderline blasphemous, it was still intelligible enough for Solomon to nod his head to.
“Everyone here knows there’s few trackers better than me,” Rex boasted to his men before him, “But you’d be a fool to throw a Kroot’s skills away because you’re afraid of being eaten. Torvald, get off your ass and bring them what we spoke about.”
One of the more finely-dressed adventurers snapped his fingers and two Servitors with hefty crates attached to their bodies proceeded to slog over to the aliens.
“Just as we agreed, Shaper,” Rex kicked at the lid of a crate, ignorant of the Servitor’s poor balance, spilling a wide variety of confiscated weapons unto the ground. The spry warriors behind the Shaper and Solomon leapt forward with frightening speed and began collecting the loose firearms with excitement. They clicked and chirped at each other, which seemed only to upset the hunting retinue. The Shaper nodded his head, shaking massive spiked quills about in the humidity, and an even larger monstrosity stepped out from behind them. It was a Krootox, a lumbering beast that walked on its knuckles, jockeyed by a small Kroot carnivore atop its back. Alongside it were bundled, rattling cages wrapped in woven cloths, hiding the beasts beneath. Solomon approached the Krootox, unwavering to what was essentially a tattooed war machine with a cannon mounted on its spine, and unbuckled the cages from their restraints. As if some form of performer unveiling parlor tricks, Solomon ripped the blankets off to reveal Kroot-looking monsters, quadrupeds that snarled and bit at their cage like wolves. A few proper greenhorns, including Kip, couldn’t help but gasp at such a ghastly deal. None protested however.
“I love these little buggers,” Rex laughed, kicking at the cage with his prosthetic, agitating the already upset hounds, “You’ve never really hunted until you’ve used Kroot Hounds. Nastier than any dog!”
The Kroot, with their Shaper and their Krootox, had regrouped at the outskirts, eager to return to their far-off homes with their new prizes.
“Rex: will you require our services to lead them properly?” gargled the Shaper, ignoring Solomon’s instigation. To hear a xeno address the galaxy’s most notorious hunter by his given name drove Kip’s blood to a boil.
“Hardly. You’ve done enough. We’ll let you know when the hunt is finished so you can come pick the bones clean, Shaper. Sound fair?”
“We honor your hunt.”
It was no litany but it worked for Solomon who tipped his hat and sent the Kroot on their way. They vanished into the woodlands within seconds, at home within the endless embrace of the jungle. When he was sure they were out of sight, Solomon approached the circle of men and women gathered by the doused campfire.
“I can tell by the look in some of your faces that you’re not happy with my negotiations. I’ll be the first to tell you I’m not a businessman – I leave the trickery to men in robes. Those of you who have hunted with me before know what you are up against. I advise the rest of you to learn quickly, because Pech is quite unforgiving in her lessons.”
Solomon’s scouts, the couple from the night before, retrieved the Kroot Hound crates and began restraining them to the Servitors with the same appeal as scrubbing latrines.
“Now I know that many of you come from worlds free of heresy, lacking in mutants and monsters. If word got out about these dealings, I’m sure we’d all be put to the stockades for execution; probably the only thing the Church can get done quickly.”
There were select laughs from hardened criminals on the far side of the circle.
“Still, I have an open door policy and anyone who feels uncomfortable with it has the right to tell me now. Not later, when the hunt begins. Now and only now. Go on, no need to be afraid. Speak up.”
Eyes darted back and forth as everyone within the retinue scanned each other, eager to see who would speak up against allying themselves with xenos for such a battle. One of the men who had gasped at the sight of the Kroot Hounds braved himself with the sign of the Aquila and stepped forward in the ring to speak.
“What’s stopping those…things from turning on us and chewing us apart?”
“Absolutely nothing. They have no learned respect – only instinct. An instinct to hunt and kill and eat and nothing else.”
Solomon’s explanation did little to change the man’s opinion.
“I do not wish to put my life in the hands of a xeno who isn’t enslaved to our command.”
Solomon mulled the thought for a bit then turned on his good leg and directed his arm to the forest behind him.
“Open door policy, lad. You can go unhindered by the Kroot if you want it so.”
“Walk away?! There’s nothing out there!”
“There’s plenty out there. In fact, I think it’ll keep you quite busy. Pech is perfect for remembrancers like you. You’ll get that story you’ve always wanted.”
“This is heresy! I served the Imperium of Man and I demand respect!”
“I thought I told you the door was open. Start walking.”
The young poet desperately turned about the circle, looking for anyone to support his claim but he was only met with the scowls of the men and women he assumed would die to protect his books. One Catachan man dropped the man’s bundlepack at his feet, letting the scrolls and inks spill out into the dirt. He fell to his knees, desperate to recollect everything, cursing all those around him. When he refused to leave, the barrels of guns and tips of bayonets were leveled against him.
“May your faith protect you,” Solomon bowed, removing his hat to salute him goodbye.
“The Emperor shall protect me! D-damn y-you heretics! F-f-fools!” the remembrancer cluched to his broken poems and ran off into the thicket of the forests, disappearing just as the Kroot had moments ago. His cursing soon faded to the squawks of birds and all was reset to Pech’s natural state. There was no more objection from anyone within the retinue.
“Alright lads! Mount up and move out! Stay frosty, keep your wits about you! Do what you can for every man but be prepared for the worst!”
The cavalcade organized themselves into a sloppy line and began marching outwards, through the opposite side of the meadow’s edges. The Ogryn and the Catachan and the Penitent, all united under one cause: hunt down one of Pech’s most legendary and dangerous creatures ever, the Greater Knarloc. Rex joined the march, standing tall besides his caged hounds and a worrisome Kip still staring off into the Remembrancer’s exit.
“I said wits about you, Kip! We march the other way!”
“Mr. Solomon, aren’t you worried that that man will reach the spaceport and warn the Ordo Xeno of this hunt?”
“No, not really.”
“If I might ask, why is that, sir?”
“Because the spaceport is 100 mile in the other direction.”
