Papa Steve didn’t feel well. For hours, the floor beneath him had been hissing and roaring.
Just two feet under the lurking Delaque Gang, hundreds and hundreds of rats and other even more pestilencious vermin streamed and squeaked through the belly of the underhive. Their cacophonous chorus of squeals and screams made quite a decent song for the ghosts that surrounded them, the old Gang Leader felt. Although not a really pious man, Steve was no fool not to know that the spirits of the underhive were much more than real. At least, real enough to be a threat to everyone not careful enough…
Blam!
The Scout strolling before him was knocked to his knees. Blood spilled out his chest and pelvis. Several sounds of varying guns echoed from the ceiling. They were trapped! Steve yelled a command to his Gang to cover, but it was too late. Way too late. The only thing he was able to see were several lightnings from other guns pointing at them. He saw Yuri and Anatol going down. And suddenly, a shadow lept from his cover and rushed towards him. He wasn’t even fast enough to pull the trigger of his beloved Bolter gun…
As Papa Steve woke up, he felt an itching pain in his left chest. Under the bloody, soaked tissues presumably Xerxes had wrapped around him, he assumed at least two ribs to be broken from the assaulting mutant. He mumbled a grim curse against all muties and tried to get up. No further use in resting, he thought.
After a while, he was abe to attempt some steps and walk along his tattered mates. As he could perceive, they looked pretty bad – even worse than their usual appearance. The muties had hit them really hard and they had known where it would hurt the most.
“They’ve taken our Scout, that dude from Dead End Pass… or was it Glory Hole?…” Sokrates snarled. “Only the Emperor, who protects the righteous ones, or the tunnel rats know what they’ll do to that poor fella. Damn sorry for that, he had a nice plasma pist. They could’ve kept the rest of him“. Steve chuckled. He had always envied the old grim Heavy for his sense of creeping humour, though he held him for a bit too open for that Redemptionist babbling about the Emperor sitting in his throne and protecting mankind and all that stuff. The mere thought of mankind being top-notch of the foodchain, which the frock guys always proclaimed, made Steve sick. Anyone thinking himself to be on top just because he was some form of human had no idea what lurked at the bottom of the hive swamps… Nevertheless, they would need a good portion of old Sokrates’ humour if they had to regroup and fall back to their base.
“The other lads also got their share. Oblomov was hit in the chest, yet will be able…“. Steve shut his mind and ears and thought. Sokrates would continue babbling on for quite a while, he knew better than trying to stop his friend. He had to think. Why were they hit so hard by a bunch of underhive muties? How was it possible that one of them attacked four armed Delaque and was still breathing, even sliced his chest? Somehow, they were too many. And too well equipped. Perhaps they raided a Guilder? Nah, that would have been made public by an open mutie hunt. Something else? He had to…
Suddenly, his eyes opened wide, he put his wrist around Socrates’ collar and pulled it to his face. “The entrance!” he yelled in the stupid face of poor Socrates and leaped sideways. Hurling and cursing in all of the underhive dialects he spoke (and Steve thought himself to be a linguist for that matter), he pressed and jumped and raced several storeys deeper into the tunnel systems. Nearly slipping on the last mile, he went to a very specific spot. A spot only he and the two Heavies knew. Or should know. The hidden archeotech camp was a jewel. A place of wonders and treasures. If only…
“No, no, no, no, no, Noooooo!” the Ganger yelled as he saw what had happened. Someone had broken the hidden seal that led to the cavern where they had found their beautiful and costly archeotech stuff. Steve sank to his knees. His head did hurt even more than his stomach. No use in crawling inside. He knew that the muties had sacked every valuable inch of that damned hole. They were beaten by their own ancient weapons, he realized. His wrists turned blue by the pressure, as he swore to himself that he would get them. And made them choke on the sweet, sweet archeotech they had stolen today…
austrohammer 