H-M
Contains...
Harsh Lessons - A Deadzone Story, The Helfather, HEW Guntracks, Holo-Sight, The Judwan, Jump Packs, Kish - Plague Named Character, The Kraww, The Lu-Fin Exiles, Marauders, Marauder Commandos, Marauder Hulk, Marauder Mawbeast Bombers, Marauder Ripper Suits, Marauder Ripper Suits with close combat weaponry, Marauder Ripper Suits with long ranged weaponry, Marauder Sniper, Marauder Stuntbot, Mission Log.
A-Z can be found here.
D-G can be found here.
N-Z can be found here.
Harsh Lessons - A Deadzone Story.
What was taking them so long?
Fillon peered through her scope yet again, playing it around the moonlit plaza. The area was still clear. Reports had come through on long-range comms that they might not be the only ones moving for the med-station, and the longer Zek and Uro took retrieving the package the more chance they had of enemy contact. If a secure line was even remotely possible she would have pinged her team by now, but on Nexus Psi that was a laughable notion. Comms were grakked planetwide.
She sighed and shifted her weight, rolling her shoulders. Yes, she’d seen some awful missions in her time, from the massacre at Uraxia City to the Cerno uprising, but this one was a new low. No backup, no heavy support, and no comms. It was a sweep-and-keep, cutting in under the Corp’s noses and picking their well-stocked facilities clean under cover of a global panic, and it should have been easy. Okay, there was the Plague to contend with, but they’d found what had looked like an isolated continent far away from the action. They just hadn’t realised how fast it could spread.
And it wasn’t like the Infected were their only problem. Sure, the Enforcers generally had bigger game to chase, but they still took a dim view of looters, especially ones on the payroll of the Rebellion. They were terrifying to stand up against. Fast, deadly, almost impossible to kill. And jet packs! Belwin’s standard topic of conversation when he’d been drinking had always been easy life would be with one of those suits; now he’d dealt with Enforcers face to face, she doubted he’d have the stomach to bring it up again.
OTR-9 had already fallen foul of the Orx once since coming planetside. They’d walked into an ambush that had turned into a fighting retreat against overwhelming odds. She’d lost five of her squad that day; Rhodd and Brel had been the first, cut down in the crossfire that sprang the trap, and Radna and Nolan had died in the furious close-quarters battle at the end of the engagement. Gonak had died like a true hero, fighting a trio of battlesuits. She fought with the cunning of a seasoned brawler, spinning to let blows clatter off her armoured shell before turning back to smash armour open with wide swings of her ceremonial blades. Fillon suspected the Teraton had known it was a losing battle, but had held on long enough for the remaining members of the squad to break away.
They’d learned a lot that day. The Orx were neither savage not stupid, and they’d paid the price for thinking they were. That’s why they were taking no chances. If someone else was making a run on the Mazon Labs station, it was likely to be a Marauder team. If it had been another Rebs unit they would have known about it, and it was unlikely the Enforcers or Plague would be interested in black-market medical supplies. That’s why she was watching from up here, with H’ryk waiting on a nearby rooftop to get the drop on any would-be attackers, and Ryla was waiting just inside the med-station door. The Sorak was a vicious blade fighter, deadly in confined spaces, and he was ready to jump on anything that got inside. Belwin was watching the Zees as they searched crates for their objective.
Fillon raised her scope and made another sweep of the plaza. Her heart jumped as she caught a flash of movement in the shadows. It took her a moment to focus, but then she saw the running figure and her heart leapt. She felt a mixture of tension and vindication as she recognised the long arms, loping stride and crocodilian jaw. If it hadn’t been for the twin rifles, he would have looked for all the world like a DreadBall player making a sprint for the endzone. Still, the creature was stealthy; if she hadn’t looked at that precise moment she would have missed him. Once again she found herself questioning what she thought she knew about these alien raiders.
The running Orx came to the watchtower behind the med-station and slung his rifles, swinging up onto the ladder with a grace that looked out of place on such a muscular creature. She nodded absently; when they’d arrived here, that was the first place she’d checked, too. It was an obvious location for a sniper, which is why she’d left it clear and plumped for the first-storey window instead. The warrior made it to the top of the tower, looking almost disappointed at the lack of enemies. Fillon watched as he took a small device from a pouch at his belt and lifted it. It flashed three times; a signalling device. He wasn’t alone.
She swung the rifle back in the direction he’d come from, searching for targets. It took her two passes before she spotted them: three Orx and one of their malformed hunting dogs, crouched in the cover of a burnt-out Habtainer. There could have been more of them waiting in cover. Radio silence suddenly became less important than warning her troops, and she opened a broad-burst channel.
“Fillon here. We’ve got incoming. One in the watchtower, four to the south, maybe more. Things are gonna get messy.”
The first acknowledgement to snap back was H’ryk. The Kraaw had probably already seen them, just hadn’t thought to let the others know. Typical lone wolf. Before she could give an order, she heard his ear-splitting screech and knew that the element of surprise was gone.
She lifted her rifle, feeling the cool of the stock against her cheek as she slowed her breathing, and picked a target…
Helfather, The.
Many of the mercenary warriors who ply their trade on the fringes of Corporation space have blood-curdling nicknames and impressive ranks. Few are as well-deserved as that of Shadrek Mal-Raz.
The assumption is that he is a Forge Father by race as his armour and weaponry are all made by that most secretive and closed culture. However, it is clearly a customised or at least extremely rare form of equipment as no other examples have been reported on other battlefields.
In combat, the roar of his double-barrelled heat cannon is as distinctive as the clank of his massively armoured exo-suit. He is to be found at the forefront of the attack, destroying everything within reach. Vehicles are reduced to semi-molten smouldering heaps of slag, habtainers are shattered and their contents set ablaze, even the concrete foundations are cracked and blackened by the searing heat.
The survivors of this assault emerge into an inferno of destruction and it is these tragic few who have dubbed him Helfather.
HEW Guntracks.
HEW Guntracks were once popular among Corporation armed forces, but when Accutek started pushing the HSW-04 – and its hefty exclusive-use agreement – they were forgotten almost overnight. Most have now found homes among Marauder fleets, where goblin crews treasure them for their sturdy construction and excessive firepower.
Holo-Sight.
The view of the world through a holo-sight is enhanced by computer to include the likely impact point of the weapon’s shots. This allows the user to fine tune their aim before giving away their position, and makes the first shot far more deadly.
The Judwan are a calm, peaceful race, each one following the ancient Mu’shen’wan path to spiritual enlightenment. A staggeringly large number of them are healers, using a mixture of dazzling technology and ancient medicine to care for those with whom they share the galaxy, but never asking for reward or recompense
Jump Packs.
It is important to understand that jump packs are not full flight suits. After many studies, most militaries decided that the huge weight of fuel required for sustained flight would be better allocated to more ammunition and bigger guns. Jump packs enhance the user’s range of movement, but do not allow them to fly
Kish, Plague Named Character.
The exotic and sensual Sphyr have graced the pleasure planets and entertainment centres of Corporation worlds for generations. Nexus Psi was no different.
Kish was only unusual in that she had dreams of a better time, a distant and long-lost time, when her people had been their own masters and their rituals and traditions were still intact. She had avoided the most degrading of duties and merely stood in her traditional garb as an exotic curiosity to greet visitors to the convention hall and casinos of Lower Tiberia. Still, she had her ancestral shu-lith-nu and she had her pride – a pride that got her into a great deal of trouble, though never as much trouble as the Plague.
The fight against the mutant hordes had been fierce, but there were too many of them to resist for long. At first she assumed that she had died, then it seemed more as if she had been transported to some other realm. Perhaps she had been chosen – yes, that was it. Her faith in the old ways was to be tested. She was to face a trial by combat that would risk not only her life, but also her immortal soul itself. She could not fail.
At least, that’s what the unfortunate Plague victim Kish thinks is happening. The damaged and mutant remains of her once-proud mind muddle her proud dreams and her bleak reality into a strange mix of fantasy and fact. Her battles against the ancient foes of her race play out once more in her crazed mind as she slaughters the few surviving citizens of the shattered planet and fights with unbridled fury against anyone who crosses her path in an effort to cleanse her spirit and be at one with her gods.
Kraww, The.
The Kraaw are unparalleled guerrilla fighters, and enemies of the Rebellion have come to fear their swift, unexpected attacks from high vantage points – so much so that the winged aliens have had to adapt their tactics to maintain the element of surprise. Kraaw Warriors have recently set aside their traditional Stingcasters in favour of a wrist-mounted grav-blaster, retuned and overcharged to produce dissonant grav-pulses.
While this renders the weapon completely non-lethal, the Kraaw have still found a deadly use for it. They will unleash a fusillade of blaster fire from on high, sending their enemies sprawling or pulling them out of cover, before swooping in to claim their kills at close range with their Talon Blades.
Lu-Fin Exiles, The.
Under the earth of New Czechia, in specially developed laboratories the scientists of the Lu-Fin Conglomerate are doomed to spend the rest of their lives analysing the materials collected from suspected Plague outbreaks. Locked down under miles of elaborate safeguards to ensure no outbreak can result from their investigations, these exiles are locked in to a programme of experiments on the recovered corpses and any alien hardware thought connected. Their research has afforded the Corporation a better understanding of how to best combat the Plague on the battlefield with a few biological tricks of their own.
Beyond the dissection of the “hows”, the Surgeon Generals are concerned with the “whys” – why the Plague were designed, breed or evolved. It has been theorised that the creation of the various mutated hosts is the intended effect. These savage, ultraviolent killers have no compassion, no fear, and yet retain most of their problem solving capabilities. The Stage 3s are for the most part infertile, and so after a while a race infected by the Plague will die out. Many are killed outright by the disease, others are killed by the infected members of their own society. Those infected have no way of reproducing other than by infection. As long as a Primary Infection Source – one of the “Plague Devices” remains active, the Plague will not stop.
At first, the Lu-Fin exiles thought the primary purpose of the Stage 3s seems to be to spread the disease beyond the principal infection site, as they retain the ability to utilise technology and indeed, appear to be driven to spread away from their infection site. But the infection’s characteristics are inherently self-limiting. Could this be to protect the creators of the Plague? The leading, current theory is that extinction of intelligent races through sheer havoc rather than direct pathogen mortality is the ultimate aim of the Plague.
Marauders.
The Orx were not always mercenaries and brigands. For a good time their considerable martial skill was put to good use by the Corporation; they were equipped and trained to act as shock troops and guards by decree of the Council itself. Once the Orx realised that they could use their new skills to their own benefit, they rebelled on a scale that demonstrated their cunning. The Marauders, as they became known after the Mandrake Rebellion, are now a terror of the shipping lanes, known for attacking cargo haulers and pillaging spaceports. They see a Deadzone as an opportunity too great to pass up, even if they have to fight their way through a fleet blockade to reach one.
Originally, the Orx were one of the many races inducted into the Corporation military and they fought well for their human masters. Over centuries they became increasingly militarised and eventually began to question why they were carving out empires for the humans when they could keep them for themselves. More than a few wars started that way.
These days, the Marauders are famed mercenaries and are some of the most professional soldiers known to the Corporation. They are regularly hired both by and against Human forces and take a great deal of professional pride in being apolitical. Most Marauder units will be uniformed and uniformly equipped with state-of-the-art weaponry and support equipment. They are drilled in modern tactical doctrine and can be relied upon to undertake any mission with practised skill.
Of course, when they aren’t working for someone else’s money they work for themselves. Having been made privy to the secrets of the Containment Protocol many years ago when the Corporation was learning to deal with such problems, the modern Marauders know that there are rich pickings to be had within them. Few would think twice at the idea of stocking up on new technology and supplies when all that protects the bulk of them is a few poorly trained militia.
The Marauder forces themselves are a mixture of different, but related races. These range from the smaller Goblins to the enormous Hulks, with the Orx forming a standard near-Human scale that allows them to use most captured equipment with ease.
As they are professional mercenaries, you can find Marauders in almost every combat zone across the Corporation and far beyond. They are unable to discuss the strange sights they have seen outside the Sphere for reasons of professional discretion, but few doubt that they have come into contact with stranger aliens than are currently defined by the Corporation’s public data banks.
Within the confines of the Deadzone the Marauders have yet one more ace up their sleeves – they are naturally immune to the Plague.
The Orx were not always mercenaries and brigands. For a good time their considerable martial skill was put to good use by the Corporation; they were equipped and trained to act as shock troops by decree of the Council itself. Within the regime the Corporation secretly introduced the Green Watch Enhancement Programme, training the biggest of the Orx as elite Commandos. This need breed of soldier was faster, stronger and more intelligent than regular Grunts, trained in the art of subterfuge and sabotage.
Even after the rebellion the brutal elitist regime still exists within Marauder Society, the Dreadnaught-Class starship Supremacy, stolen in a legendary raid by General Gruik’s “Lucky Fives,” housing the Green Watch Training Academy. It is here where the Commandos learn their trade.
The Commandos are bigger, elite troops rather than regular Grunts and have been sculpted with the design of the Marauder Warlord and DreadBall Marauder Guard in mind.
Marauder Hulk.
It’s often mooted that the Lu-Fan Corporation’s decision to bring Hulks into the Orx training programmes was one of the key factors leading to the Mandrake Rebellion. While their destructive potential and stubborn refusal to die made them a terrifying prospect for the Corporation’s enemies, it didn’t take long for the Orx to realise that their dim-witted kin had been turned into deadly warriors. Hulks are now often found leading the charge during Marauder raids, delighting in the explosive destruction they sow with their Slam Cannons.
Marauder Mawbeast Bombers.
Mawbeasts are a common sight in Marauder camps. Bred to be intimidating and obedient and enhanced with mechanical “upgrades”, they are used primary as guard-dogs, but occasionally they find a place on the battlefield. In fact, it’s a surprisingly common occurrence for an enterprising Goblin to strap a Mawbeast with explosives and drive it towards the enemy. If the teeth don’t get ‘em, they say, the big bang will.
Marauder Ripper Suits.
The Gorsch Corporation shot to fame when its Heavy Load Exo-Suit was adapted for combat use by Marauder units. With the addition of dense armour plating and support-level weaponry, the Exo-Suits became a common sight on battlefields across the galaxy. Although the Marauders no longer work for the Corporation, there are rumours that Gorsch still provides them with suit upgrades – for a price, of course.
Marauder Ripper Suits with close combat weaponry.
Orx believe that the most prestigious kills are the ones made at close range, so it’s no surprise that it’s become common practice to refit Exo-Suits for this purpose. Countless Orx have replaced their suits’ ranged weapons with heavy-duty combat weaponry, usually repurposed from industrial machinery. It might seem crude, but no one who’s been on the receiving end of a HammerJack can doubt its efficiency.
Marauder Ripper Suits with long ranged weaponry.
The Gorsch Corporation shot to fame when its Heavy Load Exo-Suit was adapted for combat use by Orc units. With the addition of dense armour plating and support-level weaponry, the Exo-Suits became a common sight on battlefields across the galaxy. Although the Orx no longer work for the Corporation, there are rumours that Gorsch still provides them with suit upgrades – for a price, of course.
Marauder Sniper.
Although Goblins are as much a part of Marauder fleets as any of the other greenskins are, their lack of obvious battlefield potential often goes against then. However, their keen eyes and penchant for stealth leads many of them to become marksmen, carrying long-ranged rifles that let them stay out of harm’s way while sowing chaos in the enemy’s ranks.
Marauder Stuntbot.
An older generation Strider combat suit, the Stuntbot is piloted by a single dexterous Goblin who, with a fully enclosed set of armour and a big gun, suddenly isn't’t that frightened of getting into a scrap.
Mission Log.
Mission log 332\19\a Log begins. Our objective is a piece of experimental technology, function classified. Prior to the outbreak it was being held in the Lu-Fan warehouse district – outpost D-9 – but audio logs indicate that a group of researchers tried to move it to a safer location. Intel concludes that their transport was brought down when they tried to pass through D-12.
While we don’t know what hit the research team, we do know that the area was recently chosen by a group of Marauders as the site for a base camp. Considering the facts, it is unlikely that they are aware of the existence of the experimental tech; however, we can expect resistance on our approach.
I have already assembled a strike team. I have chosen 03\Baraka, 07\Yuri and 08\Ryler as the vanguard of the group, following sweep drill 021, with 02\Toval giving heavy fire support in case of armoured units. 12\Aral is the obvious choice to recover the device, but he will be accompanied by 09\Hyris – whom he has briefed – as a backup. Assuming all goes well, Hyris will also provide short-ranged defensive support while Aral completes his task.
Review to follow after extraction (crossref 332\19\b). Log ends.
Acknowledgements.
Gmorts Chaotica would like to thank James M Hewitt of the Quirkworthy Blog and Titan Games for their invaluable assistance in the compiling of this encyclopaedia.