Archived from groups: rec.games.miniatures.warhammer (More info?)
Well, I'd threatened to do this before, and this weekend I was bored enough
for half an hour to sling something together. This is my first stab at any
significant 40k fluff. I've tried to get the feeling of that fevered purple
prose that 40k seems to generate without straying into parody. I've also
tried to capture some of the feel of the quiet and peacful agri-world that
is being invaded, as well as giving some thematic justification for some of
my other armies to fight on this world. This might become the basis for an
informal campaign on this world, since my buddy who plays Warhammer is
willing to play 40k but only using my armies. Observant readers will also
notice I'm stealing some names from Gene Wolfe; this is intentional, since
this happens throughout 40k, and particularly with the Death Guard (Terminus
Est, Typhon).
Criticism will be gratefully accepted, since I may well have written
something that contradicts canonical material - the only fluff sources I
have are some of the current codices and a small handful of the books.
Particularly, I may have messed up some organizational details with the
Traitor PDF and the Sisters of Battle. Anyway, here we go...
---
_Et in Arcadia ego_
The long summer has finally ended, and the Fall has come to Saltus. The
grain hangs heavy on its stalks and the herd-beasts have grown fat out on
the prairies. Harvesting will begin soon, and not long after it will be cold
enough to begin the slaughtering. But this year there is a faint scent on
the night breeze, a stench unfamiliar to this planet. Unknown to the farmers
and ranchers who populate this quiet agri-world, a single spore of contagion
has drifted down from space, from the Warp. His rusted armor and swollen
joints pain him; his bones ache in his torn and feverish flesh. This pleases
him, because this spore is Vodalus of the Death Guard, and he is Plague.
This year, the cicadas' droning buzz at night is louder than it ever has
been. The grain is heavy, but it is heavy with a corruption that drives men
mad before it kills. The kine are fat, because their flesh is gravid with
disease. And on the far side of the endless prairies, well away from the
lone spaceport where meat and grain have been sent out into the Imperium for
ten thousand years, something horrible has begun. One tiny town, a backwater
even on this backwater world, has been visited by a pestilence that kills
some, deranges others, and twists the remainder into inhuman monsters.
Vodalus has come bearing this pestilence in the name of Father Nurgle, and
his victims rally around him. Sick, mad, and dead, they lurch towards the
next village, blighting the countryside simply by walking through it.
As people in the surrounding towns begin to realize that something is going
wrong, madmen and prophets arise from the citizenry. Some call for cleansing
fires, pleading for the righteous wrath of the Emperor of Mankind to
cauterize this running wound. Others, especially those who have eaten the
poisoned grain and tainted meat, shout and sing that since all must come to
death, better to do so joyfully. Local PDF units splinter into factions and
turn against each other, with the majority renouncing their oaths of service
to pledge themselves to Nurgle. First among these turncoats are the traitors
of the 113th Home Guard. They have slain their commissars and butchered
their priests at the behest of Agitators and demagogues; now they march
under the Plague Banner as the Recusant 113th.
For the past few hundred years, the Ecclesiarchy has maintained a small
scriptorium on this world. Before the first harvest moon arrives, the tiny
convent discovers what is happening as refugees begin streaming in. The
Abbess rapidly sends out Missions of the Order Militant to contain the
rampaging Plague. The Sisters of Battle burn the poisoned fields to try and
check its growth; eventually they burn the poisoned villages, and villagers,
as well. Raging brushfires a thousand miles wide race across the world,
barely faster than the infestation itself.
At the capital, an astropath screams the Imperial governor's plea for help
out into the void, so desperate for deliverance that she is heedless of who
might hear it. A passing Space Marine battlegroup, which might fight to
save Saltus or scorch it clean from orbit. The far-wandering and
inscrutable Eldar, who might aid one side, or both, or neither. Or even the
first probing tentacles of a Tyranid hive fleet which will devour pure and
tainted alike without pausing to tell the difference.
On Saltus, it is the Year of the Plague.
--
Ken Coble
Will you still have a song to sing
When the razor boy comes
And takes your fancy things away?
Will you still be singing it
On that cold and windy day?
--Steely Dan, "Razor Boy"
Well, I'd threatened to do this before, and this weekend I was bored enough
for half an hour to sling something together. This is my first stab at any
significant 40k fluff. I've tried to get the feeling of that fevered purple
prose that 40k seems to generate without straying into parody. I've also
tried to capture some of the feel of the quiet and peacful agri-world that
is being invaded, as well as giving some thematic justification for some of
my other armies to fight on this world. This might become the basis for an
informal campaign on this world, since my buddy who plays Warhammer is
willing to play 40k but only using my armies. Observant readers will also
notice I'm stealing some names from Gene Wolfe; this is intentional, since
this happens throughout 40k, and particularly with the Death Guard (Terminus
Est, Typhon).
Criticism will be gratefully accepted, since I may well have written
something that contradicts canonical material - the only fluff sources I
have are some of the current codices and a small handful of the books.
Particularly, I may have messed up some organizational details with the
Traitor PDF and the Sisters of Battle. Anyway, here we go...
---
_Et in Arcadia ego_
The long summer has finally ended, and the Fall has come to Saltus. The
grain hangs heavy on its stalks and the herd-beasts have grown fat out on
the prairies. Harvesting will begin soon, and not long after it will be cold
enough to begin the slaughtering. But this year there is a faint scent on
the night breeze, a stench unfamiliar to this planet. Unknown to the farmers
and ranchers who populate this quiet agri-world, a single spore of contagion
has drifted down from space, from the Warp. His rusted armor and swollen
joints pain him; his bones ache in his torn and feverish flesh. This pleases
him, because this spore is Vodalus of the Death Guard, and he is Plague.
This year, the cicadas' droning buzz at night is louder than it ever has
been. The grain is heavy, but it is heavy with a corruption that drives men
mad before it kills. The kine are fat, because their flesh is gravid with
disease. And on the far side of the endless prairies, well away from the
lone spaceport where meat and grain have been sent out into the Imperium for
ten thousand years, something horrible has begun. One tiny town, a backwater
even on this backwater world, has been visited by a pestilence that kills
some, deranges others, and twists the remainder into inhuman monsters.
Vodalus has come bearing this pestilence in the name of Father Nurgle, and
his victims rally around him. Sick, mad, and dead, they lurch towards the
next village, blighting the countryside simply by walking through it.
As people in the surrounding towns begin to realize that something is going
wrong, madmen and prophets arise from the citizenry. Some call for cleansing
fires, pleading for the righteous wrath of the Emperor of Mankind to
cauterize this running wound. Others, especially those who have eaten the
poisoned grain and tainted meat, shout and sing that since all must come to
death, better to do so joyfully. Local PDF units splinter into factions and
turn against each other, with the majority renouncing their oaths of service
to pledge themselves to Nurgle. First among these turncoats are the traitors
of the 113th Home Guard. They have slain their commissars and butchered
their priests at the behest of Agitators and demagogues; now they march
under the Plague Banner as the Recusant 113th.
For the past few hundred years, the Ecclesiarchy has maintained a small
scriptorium on this world. Before the first harvest moon arrives, the tiny
convent discovers what is happening as refugees begin streaming in. The
Abbess rapidly sends out Missions of the Order Militant to contain the
rampaging Plague. The Sisters of Battle burn the poisoned fields to try and
check its growth; eventually they burn the poisoned villages, and villagers,
as well. Raging brushfires a thousand miles wide race across the world,
barely faster than the infestation itself.
At the capital, an astropath screams the Imperial governor's plea for help
out into the void, so desperate for deliverance that she is heedless of who
might hear it. A passing Space Marine battlegroup, which might fight to
save Saltus or scorch it clean from orbit. The far-wandering and
inscrutable Eldar, who might aid one side, or both, or neither. Or even the
first probing tentacles of a Tyranid hive fleet which will devour pure and
tainted alike without pausing to tell the difference.
On Saltus, it is the Year of the Plague.
--
Ken Coble
Will you still have a song to sing
When the razor boy comes
And takes your fancy things away?
Will you still be singing it
On that cold and windy day?
--Steely Dan, "Razor Boy"
z0Od.65002$K72.7976979@twister.southeast.rr.com...
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