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The first volley of attacks destroys a dozen of the arms - but more overrun the shattered remains of there comrades without hesitation. It is clear that they intend to swamp you in numbers and pull you apart.
Down the corridor, you were moving along originally is a bulkhead door designed to seal the ship in the event of a breach. If you can reach it the armour metal should, at the very least, buy you some time.
"By the Emperor's magnificent golden codpiece... pull back." Lothar starts moving back and firing at the swarm of limbs. His lasgun blazes as he goes.
Lothar's retreat is orderly at least landing several hits with his lasgun as he moves backwards.
Vasyl briefly considers slowly withdrawing, lobbing another grenade or firing his Armageddon as he does so.
But he realises the sheer impossibility of defeating this mass of animated cyberlimbs with the firepower they have on hand...
"TO THE BULKHEAD DOOR! NOW!", he shouts, as he turns and runs towards the bulkhead door.
I wasn't including the base successes. If those are included, this becomes 16 DoS.
Rerolls
Here so as not to disrupt existing rolled dice
Vasyl in full retreat is a marvel in how such a large man can duck, dodge, and dive past threat after threat, making good speed towards safety, however temporary.
Erkan falls back with his companions, using his lucius pattern shotlas to lay down a destructive hail of fire at the advancing horde of daemonic limbs. Amidst the hail of gun fire, his companions can boldly hearing him professing a chant of faith. "The Emperor is my strength, while I walk in His grace I shall fear no evil. Neither the daemons of the warp nor the corrupted hearts of fallen men will keep me from my duty to Mankind. The Emperor is the radiant light shining across the infinite galaxies, a beacon of hope in the darkest of times. We honored few who serve Him are blessed, for by our actions His will is done."
Movement (3): 3 fallback actions
success total: 13
Heuronymous's nerve breaks in the face of the flailing limbs and he pulls his way away from the possessed augmentics.
He is not nearly as successful as his companions, and the arrogant Techpriest fallsto the mass of metal and claws.
Movement 4
Praetus considers his blade for a moment remembering how little effect it had on the last "thing" and then he turns and flees without a word. he leaps slashes and dodges barely seen foes in his flight. at one point he is about to strike out but at the last moment sees it is Vasyl.
Vasyl seeks a means to begin closing the bulkhead door, his composure starting to return.
I can wait. A little. They had better not go for glory.
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As the majority of the acolytes make it beyond the door, they turn to see Aenarius diving towards the door - and get grabbed. One, two, three, four...the hands keep grabbing him, there weight dragging the Arbitrator to his knees. The wall of limbs wells up behind him, a solid mass of bronze.
Gritting his teeth, Aernarius lunges forward one last time - and strike the controls by the blast door with a firm hand. The door slams shut it microseconds, mere moments before the wall hits the otherside of the door...and a dull thud strikes moments later.
"Father Erkan will you commend his soul to the Emperor before we move on. The God Emperor and the Imperium demand sacrifice for the safety of his flock spread amongst the stars. A warrior who dies fighting the enemies of the God Emperor of Mankind has died a hero. We will make his name known to the Emperor in our prayers." Lothar puts a hand on the door. "Aenarius Laedram you will not be forgotten."
Vasyl stares at the door for a moment.
Damn. I liked him.
Quietly, the hiver says:
"Good luck, Aenarius."
He turns to the others.
"We can't stay long here. Those arms are keen to get the rest of us, and I wouldn't put it past them to breach that door - or find a way around it. Let's move asap."
Having helped drag the techpriest back and continued his heavy fire as the arms surged forward, Erkan had not seen Aenarius begin to be overwhelmed until it was too late. Just as Erkan begins to press back toward the hallway, the arbite dove forward and hit the controls, slamming the blast doors shut. As the dull thump resounded on the other side, Erkan rests ahand against the door. After a few long seconds, he speaks resolutely. "Blessed is he who sacrifices himself for the good of Mankind, for the life of Men is greater than any one soul. Let his blessed soul be called to Your side before the Golden Throne. Aenarius, may you serve eternal. Farewell, brother."
Lifting his head, he nods to Vasyl, "I agree, let us move."
With no time and doubtful safety the acolytes continue down the corridor towards the Engineerium. Several times corridors split off but there was nothing obvious along them beyond crew quarters or storage bays.
As the group approached another such divergence, this one marked 'Auxillary Gellar Generator', a sudden vox message crackled over the airwaves from Volga. "The main chapel has been desecrated, repeat, desecrated! Something is trapped within it! Attempting to rendevois with ship defenders holed up in the rear-" The transmission cuts off there.
Good luck, Volga. But better you than me. I'd better forestall anyone running off like a fool.
"Let's press on. We have a job to do."
They're too far for us to get in time one way or the other. Lothar points at the Auxiliary Gellar Field Sign. "Techpriest Bahrenfahrer that sounds important, should we stay the course or check this components status."
Heironymous grinds his teeth, his wounds pulling at his mind.
"Let us see our purpose done, then return here if need be."
With the Techpriest's choice made the acolytes continued along the bare metal. It takes nearly 20 minutes to journey along the kilometres long hallway until finally, a problem occurred - a massive blast door sealed off the corridor, the same as the one that had sealed off the corridor ahead. As you approach you a smear of blood by the door, a shotgun and the panel to open the door has been blasted. The blood trail leads to one of the ship vents. It is far too small for an adult human to make it through - at least, not a whole one.
The route to the enginerium you'll either need to get through this door or find a new route. The enginerium itself is maybe 10 more minutes past this door. Alternatively, it appears that detouring through a secondary cargo bay likely containing vast numbers of spare parts and raw material for the engines. Of course, you can also backtrack and go to another location.
"I think we should head through the cargo bay and go around."
Heironymous retrieves his servo-skull from an unknown compartment within his robes.
"Let me scout this out."
He drops it into the air and it whirs away towards the detour cargo bay with instructions to scout and report back to Heironymous.
"Waiting on the skull's report then cargo bay sounds like a plan."
As they continue toward the enginarium, Erkan tries to reconnect with Volga on the vox. "Volga, confirm, something trapped within the main chapel. Any details - xenos, chaos? Any luck connecting with defenders?"
Keeping his eyes toward the opposite direction, Erkan waits on guard for any pursuing critters, his mind offering prayers for those they have lost.
With the near miss of the arms, Praetus takes a step back from the Skull as it moves by.
He looks as though he is about to say something, but instead pulls out a knife and tests it's edge.
There is no response from Volga, and only faint traffic from the bridge team - everything seems normal there for now, but it's clear that even the voxpack is strugging to punch through the sheer mass of metal that makes up the ship at this distance.
After 15 minutes of waiting for the servo skull it returns intact and functional. Downloading the reports shows that there are two figures in the cargobay - their limbs have been replaced by the bronze augmetics that seem to be the course of so many of the ship's problems. If the two women are still alive themselves they show no sign of it, there heads lolling around listlessly as the augmetics clank around the cargo bay.
"Two you say, they are tough but enough but we can put them down. We open up with concentrated fire take down one target first before moving onto the next. Unless Praetus wants to stealth into position ahead of us I think I should take point let them focus their attacks on me and my shield."
"I would be pleased by the opportunity to redeem myself in the eyes of the God-Emperor for my failings earlier. By you leave I will move into position"
The Assassin looks to Brother Vaughn for permission
"How many krak grenades do we have left?"
"I have two."
"I have two as well"
With grenades prepared the acolytes head for the cargo bay and it's alternative route. The entrance to the cargo bar is open, and much is obscured by the piles of materials within - you cannot initially see the creatures the servo skull spotted.
Erkan enters cautiously alongside his comrades, a Krak grenade in his right hand, his longlas at the ready in his left. "Anyone seeing anything?"
Lothar moves in cautiously and delibrately keeping his shield and rifle in hand his eyes sleeping over the area. He is in front of the group knowing Praetus lies unseen in the shadows to come to their aid.
Heironymous follows, keeping his distance with his las-carbine ready. He has no desire to tangle with another augmentic-beast at close quarters.
Praetus will attempt to creep forward, activating his Stummer as he goes.
As Praetus moved on quiet feet through the cavernous space he heard, and then spotted, the pair of former Hospitalier near a small office. The shuffle of metal on metal just covered the heavy breathing of one and the gentle sobbing of the other.
Two exits led from the room. The enemy was closer to the one you needed, but could perhaps be gotten past without fighting with luck and skill...if that was what was desired. Ambushing them or simply attacking might also work.
"I only had the one, and that went against the first of these things we faced. A spare would be nice, otherwise I'll open up with the Armageddon."
***************
Quietly...
"Ambush sounds good to me. Focus on one, bring it down, repeat. Oh and don't get killed."
At Vasyl's words, Erkan had quietly handed him his other krak grenade. "I have two, and can't throw them at the same time... take this."
---------
Speaking very quietly, "Or do we hit them both with grenades to start then focus on one? It will be far more challenging to use the grenades once they close on us. Lothar and the Hieronymous could target the left one while Vasyl and I hit the right. Then Praetus would enter from somewhere as well..."
"Good point Erkan and cheers." says Vasyl as he palms the grenade.
"Yeah, two on each first. Then we focus on one if we're not pinned down."
The assassin moves away and whispers into his microbead.
"These two seem more human, they may not be targets"
Vasyl manoeuvres using cover to approach the foe.
Quietly does it...
Erkan keys his microbead and quietly whispers back, "Sadly, corruption such as this can rarely be cleansed, except through flame. Please trust me. May the Emperor recover their souls. Now, engage."
Having lined up the throw carefully, Erkan throws his grenade at the right abomination.
Huh. We'll be doing them a favour by killing them. Suits me.
Vasyl lobs his Krak grenade at the same target as Erkan.
Lothar moves forward and throws the grenade watching as it goes wide as he misjudges the distance. Still if they were to charge it seemed like they would attack the most obvious target.
Heironymous unloads into either the grenaded creature if it's still standing, or the other one if not.
The two grenades blasted one, heavily wounding it. It staggers to the side, gasping for breath. The other lurched towards Erkan with a series of clicks.
The bronze, clawed fist smashed through the steel crate behind the Cleric and was stuck for a moment, the Emperor showing his blessings on Erkan once more.
Praetus moves forward and slashes with Oblivion.
The blade slashes across the the Sisters back.
Damage 12 Pen 2
The woman trapped within whimpered and shuddered under the blow, but was still covered in the armoured robes of her order. It absorbed at least some of the damage, and Praetus felt something metallic beneath.
The woman attempted to free herself.
But remained trapped, for now, and could only swipe at Praetus with one hand.
The claws came terrifyingly close but didn't strike the assassin.