The Barbarian

Out in the Ursha Wastes, the wind howls upon the rolling steppe. This is a cruel land. Fires fumble between the tops of distant trees; struggling to keep their footing in the blowing gale. The corpse of the Megalith also rustles, long sheets of bloody leather flapping against its crumbling bones.

Civilised folk, with their books and their rotten teeth from farming, would be unable to stand the overwhelming stench coming from the carcass. Even a second of exposure would send most vomiting until they brought forth blood: their eyes streaming and their mouths agape in wrenching horror. This is beyond what the human body can stand.

The civilised human anyway.

The savage makes its way towards the corpse. Its Axe glistens with blood, human and beastial, and its eyes glimmer with cold hunger.

The Axe blade bites deep into the bone and a rich vien of marrow comes gushing out.

The clan will eat well this night.

Horses trotting through obscene depths. Led by torchlight. Fed on straw. Foul ichor leaks from the stone walls. The ground is awash with aeons of grime. Things fester in the muck from before mankind’s earliest ancestors.

These are forbidden paths to walk.

Bloody ichor squelched into the very stone.

There is a screw above the ceiling to push it down.

The Wonk

The Crossbow is buried into the wall, pressing the pressure plate will set off.

Gods, when is it my turn to be happy?

Rebel

Roaming the dense dark thicket of stoney passages, Gun barrels glinting in the torchlight. Sometimes things skitter from the darkness and are gunned down. Behind them is a trail of splinters and pieces of ten-foot-poles split and smashed by dozens of traps. Big poison-tipped spikes stick out of some, arcane fire scorches mark others.

These are the adventures of the merchant class. These are the dark ventures of the bourgeoisie.

Neadfage

-Cappuccino for ***** The Baristas voice is earnest as a bell.

-I guess I’m just trying to understand. He’s looking at me. He’s not sad. He’s not even really angry. He just looks kind. The grey in his eyes really brings out the sparkle in the blue. Outside, the airships chug through a smog choked sky. Soot-stained birds swoop between gutters and eaves. I’m struggling.

-W-Well I suppose it all just… slipped away from me really…

There isn’t really a good way to explain why you broke someone’s heart. Why, after they got home from work early, they found you not only sleeping with two other men, but men who they knew and trusted. I suppose, if their was a good way, it would become a way of justifying a terrible betrayal, and therefore be bad.

Perhaps the best explanation of all for something so awful, is just to stay silent.

The room shuddered. The colour of the world dampened. The airships were gone. The sky was clear. Strange raptors stalked in the place of the birds. Life went on. The man across from me was gone.

It all went fine.

Maybe it’ll all go fine.

Rogue Trader

The ship glides against the howling void, metal and plastic the only defence against an infinite nothingness. Its a sterile place for the most part, but where there’s filth it runs deep, planets of infinite tumourous scales and teeth, nightmare vistas of unspeakable violation. Its enough to drive a man mad.

But there’s great wealth to be found, great glory to be sought. Adventure and riches await beyond the howling wastes of the void.

That or an anonymous death on a backwater planet, feasted on by beasts unfathomable.

Smicaeda

Shadows flit around the base of the brass behemoth, belching fire and smoke. A great roar shoots across the Russian marches as the leviathan raises its enormous foot. The shadows flitting back and forth start to materialise and become solid. The War-Witches of the Red Harpy Coven are moving alongside their gargantuan companion.

Soldiers watch from the battlements as the huge beast draws near. Cannons are brought forth. Machine guns are set up. Rifles are fixed. An officer places his hand on the hilt of his sword. Nearby the Pale Vizier watches on with indifference. Soon the shadow of death will be upon all of them.

Abeir-Toril

Legends say, that in the ringed city, the streets are paved with gold. That, behind the vast fortifications, there are many wonders beyond the imagining of Man. It is a place of Ehmretah, the Immortal Ones, who pioneer technology, science and art and drive the great onward march of the species towards perfection.

Others say that Death is there, for Death their may as well be. That the wall around the city is not a defence but a prison, to keep the Great Dragon of Death enclosed forever. They say the streets are not streets at all but rivers. Dense rivers of crimson gore flowing from the Great Defiler Himself.

I am unconvinced by either. In the first case, why did these enlightened beings, eternal bastions of perfection, allow my son to go untreated for the Pox six winters ago?

In the second, why was the Great Dragon of Death able to step beyond those marble walls, and cast the light of my world underneath its soft wings?