Session XXIII: Forward, not backward - Report
General Summary
Returning to the "Eternal Perdition" the Crew found themselves in the grips of indecision once again. Bjorn was stewing about wanted to find some backwater so he could settle it take it over and fill it citizens loyal to the imperium but mostly himself. The method of populating said planet was still up for speculation. The rest of the crew was actually talking about what would be most advantageous to go to next instead of focusing on pipe dreams. The general consensus was that Rasp's mission seemed the most pressing and that his desire to better protect the ship with precursor armor seemed like the right choice stacked against Stig's statements of misremembrance and unknowns.
Bjorn wasn't keen on the idea initially as he was still harboring some acute mistrust for the Omnisiahen priest. Rasp's usual demeanor of 'whatever, fuck it' found it's way to the surface and most of the crew took that as a sign that the tech-savant was in fact telling at least a partial truth that the crew should consider moving to Magoros to fulfill the assignment. After a bit of convincing from the others and a quick word from Ani, Bjorn caved and Captain Fellrider finally gave the order to translate to warp space.
Isaac had holed himself up in the navigator's seclusium aboard the vessel so he could further investigate the polyhedron retrieved from Illisk. It's hard to say what the three eyed Psyker had or was hoping to discover but the interruption from his studies must have put him off his game. Everything was going smoothly as the Perdition was translating, the stable warp route was found again, Isaac knew where he was going well since they had been past the planet in question already and the instruments all read green so it was a bit surprising when everything seemed to be going their way that when they entered the slipstream that the warp managed the infiltrate past their hull and corrupt almost all of the food on board.
The perdition was spat out in the Magoros system as planned but the crew was already concerned about only a couple weeks of food remaining on board. What happened next was bad on a number of levels.
The system of Magoros is a desolate one with mostly or completely dead planets surrounded by a viscous looking asteroid field and an unstable pulsar releasing intermittent gravity pulses that burn the nearest planet to it, Magoros Minor, to ash at least a couple times a day. Without void shields and a sturdy hull any void ship would be just as likely destroyed by any single gravity release as the unfortunate planet in it's orbit.
The system's Mandeville point allowed the Crew to arrive on the outer most reaches of the system outside the shard halo asteroid belt. Not wanting to deal with any more damage Bjorn decided to perform what should have been an easy maneuver to leave the galactic plane and essentially hop over the asteroid field, coming safely back into the galactic plane on the other side. Unfortunately, luck or perhaps skill wasn't with the Captain this day as when he moved the Perdition out of the galactic plane the instruments when crazy and Bjorn and the rest of the thousands of souls on board the ship went spinning off into the darkness of the void.
Day after day went by as Murk, Stig, Rasp and Bjorn all tried to right the ship but the Perdition was showing no signs of being brought back in line. Bjorn blindly guessed day after day at where the galactic plane was and likely flew through it multiple times only to go through too far and remain lost in space again. After the 5th day the ship shuddered under the grip of an exterior source. The spinning of the vessel was slowed and a crewmate on the bridge informed the Captain that they had caught a ping off of a large vessel momentarily. They weren't alone in the emptiness. Battle stations were readied but no attack came. Unless you could what happened next.
A garbled radio transmission came through the vox as the phantom vessel that had presumably slowed the Perdition's mad decent into the void reached out to communicate. The results were not harmless. Ani suddenly held her head in pain as blood gushed from her nose and ran out of her tear ducts. The strain was too much for the young by Aeldari standards, woman collapsed and blacked out.
Bjorn didn't even have to order Rasp to help her as the tech priest quickly made efforts to bring her back around. It was a never before seen act of duty as Rasp had never volunteered his help so readily to a xenos before. Perhaps the prospects of starvation and an unknown foe superseded his need to act in his usual way. Ani was back on her feet in no time.
After many attempt by Stig to further communicate through the vox the big man eventually got a coherent thought. Once that happened, Bjorn took over on the radio. Eve made her opinion known about what she thought they were dealing with and came to the conclusion that the ship belonged to the Fra'al. A rare species that dwelled in this Segmentum and were known for being nomads, raiding undefended planets and making deals whenever possible for their inscrutable means. The offer the aliens gave Bjorn was not a happy one. In return for the Fra'al supplying the perdition with food so that they could survive longer they requested that a large number of crew be transferred over to their ship, which through the observation windows Bjorn and crew could see was a massive battlecruiser. It easily outclassed the Perdition but Bjorn wasn't willing to send his crew to their likely deaths or worse at the hands of an unknown species.
Stig and Murk could see the merit of the offer and thought they should take the deal but Bjorn wasn't having it. Rasp and Ani kept their opinions to themselves, likely for opposite reasons. but in the end Bjorn turned the ship around pointed it back at the now distant Magoros system and punch the engine into gear. The Fra'al spoke again that they would see the crew again with a new offer, which sounded vaguely threatening but it was hard to tell with their incredibly distorted raspy voices.
On the good side though Bjorn was finally able to steer the "Eternal Perdition" back into the system arriving on the inside of the asteroid belt a week after they should of the first time. Demoralized but thankful they hadn't been traded for food the crew got back to work trying to think about anything but the dwindling stock of food aboard. Murk started eying smaller workers as a large carnivorous animal might look at a potential meal. Thankfully Rasp was able to locate the derelict which they had come in search of in the first place and took everyone's mind off of food for the moment. "The Righteous Path" floated in synchronous orbit in close proximity to the pulsar. Initially Ani hypothesized that the ship's armor must of protected it from the gravity blasted but further investigation revealed an anomaly on the face of the pulsar creating a 'dead' area that did not release a gravity wave, essentially creating a hole in the blast waves that the ancient ship fit neatly through every time the pulsar released another wave of devastation on the system.
The Perdition had to hide behind Magoros minor to avoid one such wave before moving into position with "The Righteous Path". What had caused the ship to be abandoned in such a way was unknown but the ancient vessel was a relic in it's own right from the great expansion of mankind before the dark age of technology descended on the galaxy. The secrets it could potentially hold were immeasurable.
Docking with the ancient cruiser the command Crew and two full companies of Imperial guardsmen were deployed onto the perdition, donning their void suits and performing the sometimes perilous boarding action of one by one floating down the ambilocal new locked into place between the two ships. "The righteous path" was sealed tight however and the Crew had to cut their way in. After the exit was resealed behind the companies of Imperial Guard (IG) the team started to look around, particularly for food as well as whatever Rasp had put them on to. So far the questions sent his way had been light and infrequent but the group moved forward anyway.
Bjorn told one of the two IG companies to remain at the entrance to establish a beachhead aboard this unknown ship while the command crew and the other company of IG moved into the ship towards the cargo holds to try and retrieve some rations. The Crew moved downward through the decks of the ship on a lift headed straight for the bottom. As they cut across a landing bay on one of the lower decks, headed for one of the aft ward lifts their microbeads sprang to life with garbled screaming and gunfire. The IG company left behind was in need of rescue as they were being assaulted by some unknown assailant. Bjorn didn't waste and time ordering his group back to the lift to return to the upper deck where they had breached and order the murder servitors aboard the perdition deployed.
The rumble of the servitor's capsules slamming into the hull of "the righteous path" could be felt through out the vessel as the lift skyrocketed upward only to suddenly and noisily come to a grinding halt. Rasp set to work to find the problem. He discovered it when he was able to remove what could only be described as a huge scaly tusk from the gear house. The group pondered this item as the lift resumed it's ascent. Bjorn and Ani both couldn't determine what this piece of xeno belonged to but clever Rasp was quick to tell them that this had to come from a very large specimen of the Tyranid species.
His insights were confirmed however when the crew was able to return to the breach point. Alpha Company of the IG they had taken aboard were all dead, along with the murder servitors. The unbelievable amount of gore and viscera that coated the large chamber where they had entered from was staggering. In the end to stem any further losses Bjorn ordered the corpses be collected by Bravo company and returned to the Perdition so that they could be turned into corpse starch and fed to the remaining crew aboard.
Bjorn would not be kept from his prize though as he eyed the ancient ship, knowing it would not be left to the dark any longer. His legacy started today...
Rewards Granted
- +3 xp
- 91 total xp
- Ani +12xp (previous logs)
- Bjorn +12xp (previous logs)
- Isaac +6xp (previous logs and hidden plot found)
- Murk +8xp (previous logs)
- Rasp +1xp (previous haikus)
- Stig +12xp (previous logs)
Missions/Quests Completed
COMPLETED MISSIONS
- The Milk Run (Completed)
- Murk - A tail of two Waaagh! (Completed)
- Ani - Getting past the visions of the future (Complete)
ACTIVE MISSIONS
- Grasping hands from every corner of the Void - Part 1 & Part 2 complete Part 3 (In process)
- Bjorn - Darktide (begun - Part 1, optional objective 1 failed, Part 2 Complete, Part 3 - In process)
- Isaac - The god-machine (Part 1 & 2 complete, Part 3 - In process)
- Rasp - Children of the Machine (begun - detoured - Objective 1 Complete, Objective 2 failed, Objective 3, - In Process.)
- Stig - The Jungles of Ash (begun - detoured - Objective 1 failed, Part 2 - In process)
Character(s) interacted with
Fra'al
Created Content
- Fra'al
- STC (Standard Template Construct)
Related Reports
Session XXII
Stig
Stig
Species
Career
Militant
B
4
A
3
I
2
C
2
W
2
P
2
Wounds
21/21
Strain
13/13
Soak
8
Defence
M1/R1
Murc Boilah-Krusha
Murc
Species
Career
Ork
Ork
B
5
A
3
I
1
C
2
W
3
P
2
Wounds
0/26
Strain
4/13
Soak
9
Defence
M1/R1
Rasputin
Rasp
Species
Career
Forge World
Chiurgeon
B
3
A
3
I
4
C
2
W
3
P
1
Wounds
/13
Strain
/13
Soak
4
Defence
M1/R1
Vanirach
Vanirach (Ani)
Species
Career
Eldar
First-Mate/Interpreter
B
2
A
3
I
3
C
2
W
2
P
2
Wounds
1/12
Strain
0/12
Soak
6
Defence
M1/R1
Report Date
27 Feb 2021
Primary Location
Comments