Masks - A short story

Hope this isn't too cliche, but here's a short story about my 40k army. Let me know what you think.



Scene One
A comet streaked across the sky of the imperial world of Dova, a soggy verdant planet where the rain never stopped. As the comet sailed through the atmosphere an imperial soldier watched it with halfhearted interest, the rain mostly obscuring his view. His com crackled, “… Debris breaking up in atmo.. might be an old satellite or piece of space junk. Get a bird out there and take a look.” Ajantis touched the mic of his com, “On it.” He sighed and grabbed his flight jacket, “thought it was going to be a quiet night.”

Within a few minutes his Valkyrie gunship was skimming low over the treetops. Luckily his onboard sensors had picked up the object as it struck the planet. Within a minute or two he would be on site, but as he checked the readings he hurriedly clicked on his com. Ajantis exclaimed, “Outpost seven this is Valkyrie two, the object leveled out…repeat the object leveled out before landing.” No response on his com, he repeated his transmission. He quickly reset his coms, but nothing appeared wrong. Through the rain a dark shape materialized ahead, a ship hovering in the sky, smaller than his Valkyrie but wicked looking with a mast, a red glow pulsed from the deck. There was a single flash of crackling dark light in the night sky before the beam struck the Valkyrie splitting it down the center creating a fireball that streaked to the forest floor below.

Standing on the bow of the dark eldar raider, the archon tossed the heavy dark lance to a warrior on the deck. “Return to the duke, follow his signal, by now he’s found the downed Falcon,” he ordered. Archon Dresslock Kel’Markav stood on the bow staring at the burning wreckage, a look of disgust on his face, while his warriors followed their instructions. Quietly he said to himself, “everything changes.”

Scene Two
“It is whispered on the streets of Commorragh that the bones of a farseer grants foresight to the bearer, I have always wondered if that were true,” Duke Kherush said smiled jeeringly as he looked over the survivors of the crash. The eldar falcon had plummeted steeply, but regained a semblance of control before crashing; it was wrecked and obscured partially in a cluster of broken trees. There were three broken survivors of the smashed ship and ensuing fire fight, two disarmed eldar guardians, one who was gravely injured the poison even now driving him to unconsciousness, and a farseer. Standing over them, nearly a dozen dark eldar warriors held their poisoned rifles at the ready, waiting for the command to fire. Duke Kherush approached his captives in polished black armor, drew his pistol, and placed it to the temple of the injured guardian.

“You couldn’t predict this would happen?’ he fired instantly incinerating him. “Your foresight has been somewhat exaggerated wouldn’t you say, you thought you could hide from me on a human world?” He leveled his pistol on the other guardian and fired whimsically a short cry of pain before leaving only a pile of ash.

The farseer stood silent and defiant, armor singed and surrounded by the enemy. The duke’s second, an archon in ghost plate approached quickly, his blade slick with blood and venom. “The humans will not be long, their scout ship is destroyed, and they will send more to investigate. We must go quickly.”

Duke Kherush grabbed the farseer by the throat and with his other hand ripped off the rune covered elongated helmet revealing a black eyed woman with a rush of long dark hair. She smiled and laughed even as he strangled her. “Why do you find your death so amusing, I have won?!?” he snarled angry that his victory was being spoiled, for she had no fear for him to devour.
“It’s not my death I find amusing,” she coughed out as a spray of the duke’s warm blood splashed across her face. Half his head had been sliced cleanly off revealing the brain within by the archon who quietly whispered, “die for the Laughing God” as he slaughtered the remaining warriors with practiced arcs of his blade.

“And so it begins,” the farseer spoke softly in almost a whisper as they fled to the archon’s nearby raider. As it ascended into the dark sky, a small, but powerful explosion enveloped the crash site, obliterating the downed falcon and forest for a quarter kilometer. “Duke Kherush is dead, I’m in charge now,” barked duke Dresslock.

“Valkyrie two, this is Outpost seven… come in.”

Very nice, I hope you have more stuff like this coming, I will post this story link on a few other pages

I love dark eldar... The only reason I don't have an army of them is because their models are fragile and I don't have battlefoam.

Wow, that was really good I did not know you were a writer. It makes me want to start buying models for my dark eldar army right now! You have inspired me to read the fluff section of my Dark Eldar codex, keep it coming. Something tells me that the upcoming battle between Dark Eldar and IG is inspired by your games against Hinkel.

On a side note: I am an inspiring writer who lack your skills will you please read my thread called The End and give me some tips. Cunnin you should start back writing to, we should all write, read, and critique each others work its the only way to get better from what they say.

Me and Brandon said we will write maybe even some battles, I will have some IG stories to add and he will do the DE, so this should be nice, but ya all the guys in the goula group are all about the fluff... Well except on guy names Jon, but Brandon is the first to take this on, hope to see even more people doing this it really makes you look at your armies better and more then just being battle figures. Brandon as much as he loves his dark elder wants to write the next codex if mike ward or what ever his name don't lol

Hinkel wrote:Me and Brandon said we will write maybe even some battles, I will have some IG stories to add and he will do the DE, so this should be nice, but ya all the guys in the goula group are all about the fluff... Well except on guy names Jon, but Brandon is the first to take this on, hope to see even more people doing this it really makes you look at your armies better and more then just being battle figures. Brandon as much as he loves his dark elder wants to write the next codex if mike ward or what ever his name don't lol

That's good and congrats to ya'll. I've been working on something myself.... Not quite done yet with mine, but I believe it will give me the motivation for keeping up with only one army. I've wrote in the past and like writing... I just don't have the funds to really crank out an army as of yet.

Guys, this is pure gold we have 4 writers on the forum this section should stay packed. We know writing can be a long process but with 4 writers we can have atleast 1-3 sections to read a week. Also we can encourage each other as it is flat out grueling at times but like Hinkel said it makes you look at your army completely different, you have more pride in it.

I play Grey Knights because I want to win tournaments, however I have thought of a story for them and it makes me look at them completely different. I will be making a story for my Grey Knights, Space Marines, and Dark Eldar and eventually they will all combine into one great ending where all 3 of my armys are used. I am so excited about writing and its because I have you guys doing the same so lets start writing!

The ig side of Brandon's story wil be out this weekend, enjoy

Going to try to have some extra fluff sometime today, gotta write out a full plot

Got a plot fleshed out.

In the Beginning
The raucous markets of Tesslear had all of the signs of a major trading hub within the webway; filth, refuse, shouting, transient aliens, and the sickly sweet scents of the pleasure houses permeated its twisting valleys and tunnels. The coral like structures of the metallic torus made an apt harbor for those who did not want to be found, a hundred mercantile and mercenary ships of dissimilar make and design moored to its wayward spires. At the center of the torus a muted and bluish glow cast from a trapped dying star intermingled with the dim white and crimson flashes of the surrounding warp vacuole cascading the realm in a myriad of strange and shifting colors.

The vast majority of Tesslear’s denizens were the piratical dark eldar, though other menacing aliens took to port here or lurked in the alleys and caverns preying on the unwary or the weak. The teeming crowds of the marketplace were more burdensome of late with the escalating wars of the Imperium in nearby sectors, refugees and bandits flocked like vultures on a corpse. Three among the many a trio of lightly armored dark eldar warriors strode through the rough crowds, rifles held casually aloft, nearly having to push themselves through at points, goading the slow with the serrated bayonets. They bore the thorny crest of the Anguished Rose across their black lacquered armor the central cabal of the asteroid city, unarguably the final authority in this place.

“Move!” shouted one of the warriors, his armor new, but adorned with the trophies of his first raid, the ears of an imperial soldier. With each command his voice echoed with a hint of malice using his splinter rifle to prod on a straggler drawing a trickle of blood.

“There’s too much activity out there. It’s the fear; I can taste it on all of them. They can feel death coming,” said the second soldier, his helm adorned with several jagged teeth taken from a hormagaunt.
It was clear from ahead that a haemonculus was being ushered through the crowd by a pack of vicious looking wracks. The creatures were twisted and deformed much like their master. The crowd fled before them for they would waste no time with such warnings for they spoke no words, all sense of being long since tortured out of them they understood only one thing, the will of their master and the pleasure of killing.

“Come, warriors of the Anguished Rose, I seek the one with the teeth of the ‘gaunt.” called the haunting and grotesque haemonculus. His face gnarled like twisted roots and oozing a black paste, he repeated, “Warriors come,” more forcefully. Claw like fingers motioned from a pair of additional limbs, the creature had four arms and its skin was stretched taught over its skeletal frame. The warriors cautiously approached knowing it was a great danger to disrespect an alchemist, while one removed his helmet after shouldering his rifle. The warrior was confident and young, though his hair was completely shaven off, he warily watched the hulking creatures as he met the gaze of their master. The toothy mawed wracks, their clothing held in place by fleshooks, half slid their barbed cleaver swords and snorted a warning beast’s warning.

“You are one of the archon’s bastards are you not?” hissed the haemonculus.

“So I am, and you are the alchemist Rancor of the cabal of the Darkened Sky are you not, you came here upon the ship Sorrow’s Edge.” he said plainly.

Toothily the haemonculus smiled, “Good, very astute of you, the young often lack an eye for detail. I understand you have an interest in real space, particularly the ancient lore of our craftworld kin.”

For a moment, surprise hinted in the face of the warrior and even as he reflexively began to flip his rifle to the ready the wracks lurched forward and grabbed him with chemically enhanced strength. The remaining warriors leveled their rifles and fired off a short burst of poisoned shards into the muscled wracks. With a bestial howl the muscled horrors unhooked their cleavers and hacked the warriors down into chunks of gore. The crowd seemed not to notice, but gave a wide berth to the group.

“How…” the surprised warrior exclaimed.

“No, Dresslock, what I’m more interested in is what your father learned at the Black Library. Now rest… we have the entirety of your cabal to slay.” A spidery boney limb shot forward its tip covered in a long barbed syringe jabbing itself into Dresslock’s chest plate. Dresslock grasped for the syringe, his strength fading from him. He struggled and gasped a few breaths more before his eyes rolled back and he fell limp.

Rancor snarled into a com, “Prey secure, release the toxins and begin the assault.” And with the command, a dozen ships moored released clouds of deadly neurotoxin gas that swept down the crowded streets and into the porous caves and caverns, aliens and dark eldar alike scrambled to escape it, but there was no refuge, only the alchemist and his minions stood unaffected, while the denizens of Tesslear died by the thousands. This day the city’s streets stood almost quiet, but for the choking gasps of a dying city, while the armies of the cabal of Sorrow’s Edge massed and marched on the palace of the Anguished Rose, the battle was just beginning.

Really good work man.... Awesome job. You know I like dark eldar too.

@AlmightyDM and CKO: Maybe you can join us at http://www.thedarkcity.net/

Yours truly has been on this for some time. It's a really good place to discuss dark eldar tactics for bringing down Monkeigh and other of the lesser races out there. Plus CKO they have a cabal name generator that Sky Serpent the mod of the forum just put up so maybe you can find a name you like for your cabal or covent.

I just lurk on their forums, lots of good stuff there. I'm going to try and aquire a copy of Path of the Renegade sometime soon. People say its a very fluffy novel for the DE.

AllmightyDM wrote:I just lurk on their forums, lots of good stuff there. I'm going to try and aquire a copy of Path of the Renegade sometime soon. People say its a very fluffy novel for the DE.

The path of the warrior was very good too. I'm in the middle of path of the Seer from the novels of Eldar. I want to read path of the renegade and the outcast too.

Hush

The air crackled and thundered as the ravager gunship passed overhead, the nonstop and rapid reverberations of the disintegrator cannons felt unending to Cerro. He had watched as crowd of traders had rushed towards the palace after the necrotoxin gas attack, but had been burned to ashes as the ship passed. He had been fortunate and ducked into a nearby ally when the attack had started the two others, his commanding sybarite and another warrior had not been so lucky, perishing to the gas and the passing blades of a reaver jetbike. The multitude of deaths in the markets had overflowed his dark psychic bloodlust, he could feel the intoxicating power as he drank up all the psychic energy. All fear had left him as peaked out of the ally seeing no enemy soldiers nearby he darted out, grabbed his commander’s venom blade, and began his stealthy track back to the palace. Dark colored raider transports were touching down by the dozens on nearby streets and rooftops delivering warriors from an enemy cabal. Among them deadly wyches, twisted wracks, darklight snipers the merest glance would cleave a ship in half, let alone a warrior in simple armor.

Ahead three kabalite warriors had setup a splinter cannon in the street, they had piled up some debris in a makeshift barricade. Cerro un-shouldered his splinter rifle and crept up, the warriors of the enemy cabal were too busy firing away at someone on the other side. With the bloodlust pounding in his head he rushed forward for what felt like a huge distance and up onto the debris, he slung his rifle into a crude aim point blank on the warriors head and fired splattering gore through the faceplate of the unaware warrior. He quickly turned to the cannon operator, who had only enough time to turn and receive a volley of needle like shards to the face and throat. The third had time to turn an unsteady aim and fired clipping Cerro in the shoulderplate from which the cruel poisoned shards now protruded. The force of the hit caused Cerro to drop his rifle, but he could not feel the pain of it, he rushed forward drawing the venom blade and slashed down cleaving his enemies arm and burying the blade in his face.

Cerro smirked knowing that if he survived this assault that he would certainly be promoted to the position of his dead Sybarite. He identified the enemy cabal easily enough, Sorrow’s Edge was one of the larger cabals and the slain men at his feet were trueborn, which meant that this raid meant an all-out war if his cabal survived this attack. He hefted the cannon, and although it was heavy it would be far more useful in a firefight. He spat on the dead trueborn and recovered his sword from his enemies skull. Noticing the poisoned shards in his shoulder he disdainfully grabbed them and threw them down, a rivulet of blood flowing down his black armor. From the looks of it, the enemy was setting up a beach head in this corridor, nearby streets were filled with enemy soldiers who had been through in leaving no survivors, dead littered the streets like dried leaves.

Bolts of darklight were raining onto and from the palace; its elegant and ancient minarets were now cracked and crumbling under the weight of the siege by the cabal of Sorrow’s Edge. The skies over the palace had nearly three dozen ships only a small group of Anguished Rose raiders had even lifted off before being blown out of the air by overwhelming firepower in a futile attempt to slow the oncoming horde. Ravager gunships sailed the skies unleashing volley after volley of darklight as a nearby raider exploded mid-sky, its unfortunate crew falling with the wreckage hundreds of feet into the forming battle lines below.

“The flickerfields will fall soon and the traitor will be mine,” smiled Duke Kherush as one of a dozen minarets crumbled over into dust. His own ravager surrounded by a howling horde of scourges, their bat-like wings furiously beating to keep up with the duke’s ship. As he spoke one of the palace turrets swept his gunship disintegrating half a dozen scourges and exploding the starboard turret and gunner in a wave of black crackling energy.

“Down you fools, take us to the streets,” as the duke steadied himself on the thin rails of the ship. His personal guard an incubi Klaivex glared menacingly at the ravager’s pilot and they descended with at a sickening angle the ship convulsing with a tremor from damage to the steerage. Seeing the duke’s ship descent a nearby raiders broke off from the assault to join them.

On the ground, Cerro could see that there was no chance he would be able to navigate to the palace. His first thoughts were of escaping to the port and stealing a small ship, though the likelihood of his escape was negligible with the apparent loss of sky superiority. He looked up for a moment and saw a smoking ravager descending almost on top of him, he stared wide eyed it was maked as the duke’s own chariot. He looked to the nearby splinter cannon and cackled, at least he could kill the bastard responsible for this. He unlocked the cannon free of its emplacement and took cover next to an overturned cart. The ravager gunship damaged as it was, adroitly maneuvered into the narrow streets and with a shuddering lurch, scraped a nearby building, only fitting due to its loss of its turret, the pilot was either remarkable or desperate. The duke’s sleek ship scarred from the explosion hovered over the rubble strewn street. Cerro watched as first an armored incubi leapt the rails with its cruel demi-klaives drawn, next a dozen scourges fluttered onto the ground, scanning the area with their shard carbines and blaster rifles, and finally the duke himself. The duke stood at average height his long black hair loose and straight. He wore dark ghost plate armor and an eldritch huskblade on his back. Fearlessly Cerro slammed the splinter cannon into position and fired a stream of splinters mowing down the scourges their bodies convulsing as the poison wracked them with pain and death. Reflexively the klaivex jumped in front of the duke, shielding himself with his wide bladed demiklaive, splinters bouncing harmlessly off its hooked blade, although at its edges his hands and armor quickly disentegrated under the constant fire and he fell dead in a bloody heap as the cannon spun down.

Wordlessly the duke unhooked his bone blade, it smoked with dark runes, he held the long blade in one hand and dashed forwards drawing his blast pistol with his other. Cerro expertly grabbed up another ammunition cell and cocked it into place as the duke leveled his own pistol while he ran at a full sprint. A flash of darklight blasted and the cannon shattered into a thousand screaming shards. Cerro was knocked away landing hard against the stone ground, he rolled to his side and drew his the dead man’s blade defensive as the duke noiselessly bounded over the barrier. His hand flew away cut away clean still clutching the venomed blade clattering on the nearby ground. He looked at the duke in disbelief at his quickness and skill. He howled in rage and grabbed for a rifle and with one hand shakily aimed at the duke, who only stood there intently watching with his pure black eyes.

“Dead men don’t scream,” said the duke assuredly as Cerro’s flesh instantly tightened, his eyes shriveled, his body turned to dust and fell away, leaving only bones to fill his armor only a final short gasp echoed his passing.

Hinkel wrote:The ig side of Brandon's story wil be out this weekend, enjoy

Hey Shakespeare where's your stuff? lol

Sorry, but I have been busy of late I like the new additions. However like others have stated its hard to write
aboout non-human characters. I was lost some times because I forgot I was reading about Dark Eldar that is a good thing but it can be bad also. Overall I like what I am reading.

Work dude, been hell the past couple weeks