Of Scales and Sigmarite Another dark scaled Saurus was torn apart by the hail of gunfire, its form dissolving into starlight that scattered like dying embers. The mad cackle of the Skaven Engineer piloting the lumbering walking machine could be heard even over the screaming of its warpengines. The mission most certainly was not going to plan, Morrig thought with a sigh. The Knight-Azyros of the Astral Templars vaulted over a fallen pillar that made up the Skryre rat’s outer lair. The order had come from Sigmar himself that a small force of Astral Templars backed up by mortal auxiliaries were to take the head of the Skryre Engineer known as the Screwfang before he became too powerful. Sadly despite the surprise aid of a group of hardened Seraphon, the Warlock Engineer’s inventions were far more advanced than they had predicted. Even as the last of his automatons and half metal servants had perished, the Engineer had emerged in a walking machine bristling with weapons and armour that turned aside even Sigmarite starblades. Whilst the mortal forces held back the bulk of Screwfang’s forces above, the task force to remove his head was close to annihilation. “I suppose your masters never realised just how deadly Screwfang had become either?” Morrig muttered to the sole surviving Seraphon. She turned her raven haired head to study the scarred Saurus using the rocky cover beside her. Tox of the Darkened Scale growled low before he managed to form the word, “No.” “Well, it looks like it is down to us two then. Have you got a plan?” Morrig whispered as the clanking footfalls grew closer. Tox gave a fang filled smile, “Yes.” ------------------------------------------- Warlock Engineer Ibriz Screwfang cackled again as he directed his Doomwalker to crush the already mangled body of a Stormcast. Sure, their Sigmarite plate would have been difficult to crack with conventional weapons, but with enough weight and enough Warpstone, even the mightiest of armour could be sundered. Besides, the flesh of the Stormcast was still mortal flesh, enough blunt force would slay them easily enough. The Skaven salivated for a moment as he pictured the bloody mess within the armour of the once human. Now here, he reflected, was a weapon of the future. How his foes within Clan Skryre had laughed at him, thought him their inferior. Now he had the last laugh, with his Doomwalker not even the champions of the man-thing God or the lizard-things could even touch him. He stopped as a series of alarms began to sound in his cockpit. He bit back a curse and thanked the Horned One that he had spent all those long months stealing the blueprints for Engin-Seer Skreee’s proximity alarms. He turned the Doomwalker to focus on this new foe and screamed as everything in his vision erupted into bright and blinding light. ---------------------------------------- The light of Azyr shone from Morrig’s outstretched lantern and she sent up a prayer to Sigmar that the Skaven hadn’t inured his vision optics against such a tactic. She smiled as she saw that was not the case, the walking machine flailed about blindly. Its huge ratling gun spat untargeted bullets in a wide but harmless arc and its claw arms swung clumsily. Tox was already in motion as the celestial beacon erupted into purifying light, as the Skaven machine recoiled from the light he bounded around to the side, legs poised to make a leap as soon as an opening presented itself. He was of the Darkened Scale, a spawning from the world that was, they were shadow and they were death. Perhaps the Old Ones had seen a use in their Plan for what other races would term assassins. Since their rebirth in starlight, the Darkened Scale had continued their duty, though inwardly Tox knew he and his brothers were naught but memories and watched closely for any deviance to the Plan. Tox put such thoughts aside and concentrated at the task in hand. I am shadow...I am death... The Skaven walking machine suddenly stopped its convulsions and in that brief moment, Tox leapt forwards. ----------------------------------------- Agonized and blinded, Screwfang slammed a talon down on the button he thought would shut off the screen and let loose a screech of rage as instead it caused the ratling cannon to unload most of its ammo store in a wide and un-aimed volley. He panicked, desperately trying to swat the Stormcast with a claw but to no avail. This was inconceivable! How could such lesser beings make such a mockery of Screwfang?! It had to be some kind of betrayal. The adepts who had manned his workshop must have betrayed him, sabotaging his most genius of weapons and selling him out to these foes. He ground his fangs in fury, if he hadn’t already killed all his adepts earlier for another perceived betrayal he would have done so again. No matter, even with this sabotage, these foes could not harm him. He sunk his fangs into his tail and whilst wincing quickly counted to thirteen to focus himself. The walker suddenly lurched as something heavy landed upon it and moments later the screen went black. Above the whine of the warpengine, Screwfang could make out the scrabbling of heavy claws and the tearing of metal plates. His eyes widened as one by one warning lights flickered all about the control panels, several shorting out as poorly soldered connections broke. “No-no-no-no...the fool-thing!” Screwfang screeched as he realized what his foes were doing. Like a rat seized by the black hunger, one of the Seraphon was tearing away at cables and power nodes with frenzied abandon. Except, doing so would destabilize the warpengine, the resulting blast would kill them all and destroy everything Screwfang had amassed and built over his genius life. The warpengine began to wail louder, the temperature within the cockpit began to grow more and more unbearable as Screwfang leapt from his chair and desperately tried to reroute power and prevent the engine from detonating. All the while the Seraphon outside tore away more wires and cables. Screwfang’s talons began to smoulder as he desperately prised off the main control box, the scent of burning fur and flesh was all about him as he seized the red hot cable and pulled. ------------------------------------------------ Tox hissed and scrambled to another part of the walker device, the surface of the Skaven machine was becoming hot, enough that even his clawed feet were beginning to burn from the touch. The winged human was yelling something about getting away from it but he ignored her, the kill was all that mattered. There suddenly came a low whine from the walking machine and it toppled forwards. Tox rolled away from it as steam issued from vents and the gaps in its armour he had created. A hatch opened and a smouldering form leapt free, charging off deeper into the tunnels. The Seraphon and Stormcast briefly glanced at each other before chasing after it. ------------------------------------------------- Screwfang ran. His flesh and what was still left of his fur still felt that they were aflame, but he did not stop. In his laboratory was the working of a skitterleap device, it was not finished but likely was the one chance to escape these foes, his one chance to preserve his genius. He skidded into his lab and scrambled for the device even as he imagined the footfalls of his enemies approach. He threw several inventions aside and scattered assorted blueprints of his great works, he paused for a brief moment caught by the thought that perhaps he should try and rescue some of his designs before these fools blundered in and destroyed everything. Even as he quashed that thought he heard an intake and echoed exhalation of air moments before something bit him in the neck. He reached up and pulled out a protruding dart laced with a dark substance. The world began to fall away as he turned, swaying, and he saw a dark scaled Saurus lower a wooden pipe from its scaly lips. He tried to say something, perhaps one final curse at the Horned Rat for abandoning him. The armoured form of a Stormcast followed behind the Saurus and watched him impassively. He felt his legs buckle and found himself staring up at ceiling of his burrow. The darkness seemed to spread around his vision; it swept cold comforting arms around him and extinguished the light within his eyes. ------------------------------------------------- Morrig gazed across the laboratory even as the Skaven gasped his last. Though she did not understand how most of these inventions worked or what these drawings meant for a moment she felt gripped by purpose. If the realms of man could take this knowledge and repurpose it into something safe, perhaps they would have a better chance in throwing back the forces of Chaos? Tox stomped forwards and withdrew a small reddish stone from a pouch, he whispered a sacred word of the Old Ones and the stone was enveloped in flame. He glanced at Morrig, what might have been a look of sympathy and understanding crossed his gaze as the works of Screwfang began to burn. Morrig stared at the flames for a long moment, trying to not think of the folly her moment of weakness might have brought. She turned about and left the growing fire. But Tox lingered, a shadow amongst the flame.
Given that i'm not an action or battle narrative writer, i'm going to take that as high praise. Thank you greatly good sir! :3 Screwfang was a bit of a curious one as he only had one line of dialogue in the whole piece, the rest was all thoughts and inner reflection. Which raises the question if a Skaven would think in broken sentences and double-speak let alone an accent? To be fair, I probably should have conveyed more of the double-speak into his mind to at least tie it together that these were indeed the Skaven's thoughts. Likewise, whilst there were some clear differences between Morrig and Tox (mostly at the end) I could have made more of the alien nature between them apparent. So, I actually was surprised myself that I wrote the AoS piece, given that until recently i've been very iffy or meh with that world and especially the Sigmarines. One of my DMs/PCs (we rotate rpgs) started a AoS Soulbound game and dared me to play as a Stormcast. After making the character, properly reading the lore, and from the first session, I found myself really liking not only the setting but the idea of the Stormcast themselves. Of course, that character in question was Morrig Crowcaller, whom I enjoyed voicing enough that she wormed her way into my entry paired alongside my assassin saurus (because why not?) Oh and she is a reference to the Morrigan, though maybe not so much in character. Didn't you have a rat-tank that failed even more than Screwfang's? You also rarely have any contingency plans, just a stubborness and refusual to actually die. Aww thankies. It was a hard piece to write throughout, with the rough plotline of Morrig and Tox wrecking a killa kan being the only thing I could come to mind with. As this was my first piece over 350 words for about a year, i'm glad it went down as well as it seemed to have done.
I'll take that as a high compliment as I don't quite know why either There is something I guess that is entertaining about the crazed minds of the Skaven as everything fail around them. They're almost like your Mr Fawlty-ies, Richie and Eddie, Arnold Rimmers, or Blackadders...just more chaotically evil and explosive. In a strange way you can almost root for them...Neek neek...
Well, I like all the aforementioned comedy acts (especially Red Dwarf and Blackadder) so if this is your sense of humour then no wonder I liked it the most.