The Hacked Knee Dominion Part 19: Blood and Smoke

The zombie incursion had brought the boot of Helmawr's Enforcers grinding down hard on Sector H8. Suppression squads were patrolling the district in force, and there were even rumours of Inquisitorial intervention - the zombie tides had been shepherded by worshippers of the wrong gods, after all. All this had led to a cooling off in the ongoing turf war, which was probably why, upon signing up to escort a guilder caravan of promethium and tech gear across contested territory, the Hi-Viz Jackers and the Wasted had seen fit to get loaded on some ace-grade chems they'd scored down the Shackled Well.

Of course, the job turned spiky: Hacked Knee's resident Goliaths, the Reprobates, came gunning for trouble and loot, springing an ambush as the convoy crossed an abandoned domespace. This was when the stimm-bender proved a mixed blessing - sure, the Orlock allies were steeled by chem-born confidence, but their metabolisms were run ragged, leaving them vulnerable to injury.

Vints had brought Akilles, Zam, Darik and Dwice along, matched by equal numbers from the Wasted. As smoke bombs popped in the path ahead, and frag grenades and bolterfire rained down from the buildings that lined the route, Vints led his lighter-armed boys off to the left of the avenue, where the bulk of the Reprobates appeared to be lurking. Some of the Wasted peeled off to the right to find superior firing positions, while the Orlocks' bigger guns remained on the caravan.

The Goliaths moved fast, getting a foothold on the convoy and taking out one of the Wasted. Akilles poured stubber heat into two of the raiders, but was no match in close combat, and was soon out of action. The Wasted's resident ratling exchanged sniper fire with a Reprobate in a distant watchtower, and Zammel prised one of the raiders off the caravan by setting him ablaze, before getting blasted unconscious himself.

Over and up on the walkways, Vints made to charge a lurking Goliath, but stumbled short and got a face full of lead that made him bleed but didn't put him down. Young Dwice stepped up to show the boss how it's done, letting rip with his autopistol and blasting the Goliath  off the walkway and out of the fight.

The Reprobates were making good use of smoke bomb cover to get at the caravan - even their pet sumpkrok getting involved and snapping up loot in his jagged jaws - but smart shooting from the Wasted was whittling their numbers down. Jacker Darik got a solid hit on the Goliath leader with his hand flamer, setting the bull boss ablaze.

As the convoy neared the dome exit, the Reprobates braved a storm of fire from the Orlocks to grab more loot. Vints and Dwice were blasting away at anything they could see from the walkway, the juve again showing up his boss by actually hitting his targets.

Having steeled out the flames until they were extinguished, the Reprobate chief judged his boys had nabbed enough, and ordered a retreat. As the last of the smoke cleared, the convoy rolled out of the dome, its Orlock defenders twitching as the stimms finally wore off.

The raid had been lightning fast, but the Jackers and the Wasted had done enough to secure their fee - and their good standing - with the guilders. As for the Reprobates, they'd snagged a tidy enough amount of loot.

It's surely a rare day in the underhive when everyone gets what they want from a gang scrap, but this was one of those days. The worst casualty was likely Vints Courraine's pride - he really could've done without the shooting lesson from Dwice.

The Hacked Knee Dominion Part 18: The Last Laugh

There was discord afoot in Sector H8, with reports circulating of rioting mobs of helots and techworkers roaming the domes and tunnels, and the Hi-Viz Jackers had caught an open vox feed from some bigwig Electro-Guilder who found himself lost and alone in the middle of it all. Vints Courraine rightly couldn't ignore a cry for help from such a person of importance, and gathered a small crew - Griv, Tzig, Ivan and young Lorn - to run a rescue mission while the rest of the boys guarded Shallow Alley, Clam Breath and Nu Bedlam.

Tzig Oresson reckoned he'd found his chance. The gauntlet they were about to run would be hazard high - who'd notice, or maybe even care, if a stray bullet or krak grenade went Vints's way? It'd be a sweet thing to vox the news to Overboss Degister uphive, reporting the long-deserved demise of vexacious Vints.

The Jacker crew weren't the only ones to heed the Guilder's call. When they found the voltbroker in an old, ruined dome, he was already attended by a handful of Eschers from the Ash Roses, and a few of the Wasted, who were living up to their names - Rusty and the juves reeked of wildsnake.

Trigger fingers twitched when the Jackers clocked mutie boss Abraham Krass and a few of his Skymother's Chosen - the attempted takeover of Shallow Alley was still fresh in their minds  - but Vints and Griv subtly reined the Jackers in. A Guilder's favour was worth more than cheap revenge, this shift anyway.

That this job would be trickier than a simple search  and rescue had been evident when they'd hit the dome - one side was dominated by a looming skull effigy, all ablaze and surrounded by seven ripe heads on pikes. The Jackers had had enough run-ins with the Hellhounds to know when the dark play of the Wrong Gods was in effect.

And so it came to be - the guilder's fawning welcome to his rescuers was cut short by a ragged chorus of moans from all corners of the dome. The rioters had arrived, and as the rescue posse caught gimpse of them in the shadows, they saw dozens of hunched, shambling forms, limbs hanging loose and askew. Then the stench hit them.

It was Wasted Rusty who gave voice to what they were all thinking. 'Sumpdamn plague zombies!'
No nonsense from Ash Rose leader Amaranth. 'Okay, gals and gimps, let's move. Away from that freaky totem.'

She was pointing towards a cluster of exit points at the dome edge. To get there, they'd have to pass by a low watchtower and then head round the side of a tall rusted tower.

'Sound plan, human - er, woman,' muttered Krass sibilantly.  'I see some of those dead things might move to block our path - we shall deal with them.'

He led his mutie crew towards the near side of the tower. Vints, meanwhile, was shmoozing the guilder, much to Tzig's disdain.

'Alright, sir,if you wouldn't mind heading thataways -' Vints pointed to the exits spotted by Amaranth. '- we'll have you out of here in a click or two, no glitches. My name's Vints, by the way, Vints Courraine, Hi-Viz Jackers. Perhaps you've heard of me?'

Pathetic, lickspittle stuff, thought Tzig as the crew posse moved away from the dome centre. But without warning, a grenade dropped from above, detonating in their midst. The frag blast pinned several gangers including Tzig, who found himself unhurt but sprawling on the domefloor.

Then, a flurry of lasbolts from the high levels, left and right.

'Frag it!' called Griv. 'It's not just the plague zees! There's a sumpdamn cult out there!'

As if that wasn't figurable from the blazing effigy, thought Tzig, hauling himself up. As he got to his feet, he glimpsed a rangy figure beyond the nearest mob of zombies. The figure looked to be floating a few feet of the ground, and a strange dark light licked its brow as it gestured violently in the direction of the posse.

At the gesture, one of the Chosen muties flew sideways, victim of a sudden, unseen impact. Tzig watched the mutie hit a nearby walkway head first and fall to the ground, limp.

'Wych!' he cried, scrambling back towards the watchtower. 'The've got a wych with 'em!'
Ivan was a few paces away. 'Man, what have we got into here?'

Tzig grimaced and shrugged as more lasbolts flashed down from above. One was deadeye hit on the guilder, but there was an implosive boom as the merchant's displacer field kicked in and teleported him - several paces back, right where the gangs had found him.

The voltmerchant staggered, disoriented - he clearly didn't have to rely on his exotic security tech that often. One of the Wasted boys darted forward and grabbed him by the arm, spinning him round and directing him towards the cover of the watchtower's support column.

With a rippling moan, the zombies shuffled closer still.

Amaranth was yelling at everyone to haul boots past the tall tower. Tzig clocked Vints barking agreement - about right that Courraine would take orders from some toxpeddling Escher fragger, thought Tzig. He turned to Ivan, unable to resist sharing sharing this acid barb, but Ivan suddenly wasn't there.

That fragging wych again. Propelled by dark forces, Ivan was hurtling back around the watchtower support, slamming into Vints and flooring them both.

This brought a smirk to Tzig's face. Still, the Escher boss was right - they needed to get moving, and fast. He clambered over the watchtower anchor struts and scoped the route beyond the tall tower. A fair few zombies shuffling towards them, but not in the numbers they were back the other way. He readied a frag grenade and launched it at the nearest two - they fell, but weren't out. The dead don't die easy in the Underhive.

Tzig heard the roar of a flamer, behind him to his left. Turning he, saw it was Krass, who'd just blasted the vanguard of the stumbling column of zombies creeping round the other side of the tall tower.

Griv, stood between Tzig and Krass, was calling. 'Oresson! Show that three-armed freak how Jackers blitz zees!'

With that, Griv let rip into the same bunch of zombies with a shreddershot, felling a handful who didn't get back up. Tzig brought his grenade launcher to bear and fired the same way, taking out more of the mob. They'd thinned out the zombies in that quarter - time to push ahead. Krass and his lackeys were already scuttling back to the main posse.

Ivan was back on his feet and taking careful aim up the tall tower, way above their heads. His autogun barked and was met with a brief roar from the towertop. Then, a shaggy, horned form tumbled down to the domefloor, where it impacted with a wet thud, releasing the grenade launcher it was holding. One cultist sniper down.

But there was no time to celebrate. The oncoming horde of zombies had now practically reached the watchtower. Tzig could smell them, could see their rotten lips splitting as they gnashed their jaws in mindless anticipation. And beyond, the ragged shadows of cultists, driving the dead onwards, hellbent on making sacrifice to the Wrong Gods.

Tzig took up a  position shoulder to shoulder with Griv at the base of the tall tower. There was a scream from the edge of the spore patch - the zombies had burst through and were swarming the two Wasted there.

Rusty had gone down, fetid claws and teeth digging into his flesh. Within seconds, he'd turned, lurching around to join the attack on his former comrades. The other Wasted battled bravely to deflect the grasping undead.

His back to the tall tower, Tzig took in the posse's attempt at a defensive line. To the left, Krass was seeing off oncoming zombies with almost laughable ease, decapitating one after another with his chainglaive. To the right, Lorn was out on his own, suddenly in close combat with the lead zombie of another tendril of the swarm. The juve was slashing frantically with his combat knife, lopping fingers off the zombie - but to his credit, he bought himself half a chance to duck and roll away, scrambling behind the watchtower base.

'We gotta get this done, fast,' said Griv, showering the nearest clutch of zombies with shreddershot.

'Where's the guilder?'

Tzig was craning his neck to catch sight when he felt his guts twist. Some unseen force grabbed him and slammed him sideways into Griv. Both men dropped, dazed.

Tzig's head swam as he hauled himself to his feet again. Time stretched. The first things he clocked were things further away, slow motion: Vints and the Ash Roses blasting and hacking holes in zombies; two lethally augmented cultists, wreathed in electrical halos, arriving at the dome edge and being met with aggression by Amaranth and her phyrr cat; the guilder and a bodyguard of Eschers and Chosen muties hustling ever closer to an exit tunnel.

Nearer things resolved: Krass's chainglaive tearing into yet more zombies even as the mutant boss inched backwards; the agonised screams of the second Wasted to be brought down and turned by the swarm; the stench of dead flesh, closer than ever.

The swarm was practically within grasp, spilling around the sides of the watchtower support. Tzig came snapping back to the moment.

Griv was a split-second ahead of him. 'Drop back, man, we're almost done, almost good to go!'

'We got an escape route?'

'Bet your boots. The Roses took out those techy freaks, looks like we're good.'

The zombies were so close now, Tzig could pick out their individual moans and see right into their dead eyes. With Griv, he scrambled back over the tower supports to join Ivan and Lorn under a sloping walkway.

At the dome edge, the guilder and his escort had reached one of the tunnels. A lasbolt danced down from the towertop - they'd neglected the second gunner up there - but again the merchant's displacer field kicked in. Tzig could just about make out the recorporation flash up one of the tunnels. With the escort right behind him, the guilder was safe.

'Let's go, boys!' yelled Tzig.

'What about the boss?' said Lorn.

Vints was only a few metres away, hacking away at the nearest of the oncoming swarm. Krass was just beyond, still wreaking havoc with his chainglaive  - the mutie boss was clearly enjoying himself, but with the rest of the Chosen gone, he looked ready to depart.

'Frag the boss,' said Tzig. 'The guilder's safe, we done what we came here to do.'

'No way, man!' yelped Lorn, and darted out of cover toward the embattled leader. Another lasbolt rained down from on high and dropped the juve.

'Ah frag!' snapped Griv. 'Ivan, grab the kid and get gone! We'll cover you!'

Agile Ivan was already leaping forward and dragging Lorn's limp frame out of the path of the zombies before Tzig could voice an objection. He had no choice but to join Griv in blasting away, barely keeping the zombies at bay.

Seconds later, Ivan was heading for the exit, the juve slung over his shoulder. Over the way, Krass had retreated to behind a billboard, stopping to decapitate a couple more undead before fleeing the dome.

As for Vints, he'd taken down the zombies attacking him and had somehow ducked back behind his gangmates. The zombies were mere footsteps away now. The stench was overpowering.

Tzig glanced back. Vints was already at one of the tunnel exits.

Tzig caught his boss's eye. Vints grinned and winked. 'Sorry, boys!'

And then he was gone.

A wall of zombies pressed in from left and right, too close and too many to hold back with gunfire. Tzig and Griv swung their weapons deperately, fending off the undead as best they could.
'Frag this!' growled Griv, disengaging. Somehow, he slipped through the zombies' grasp and was away to the exit.

Tzig made to do likewise, but he stumbled, and a dead hand grabbed his hi-viz jacket. And then another. And another. And then rancid arms were wrapping around his limbs and ragged fingernails were digging into his flesh.

'Vintsen Courraine, you bastard!' he cried. 'In the name of the Iron House, I swear I will haunt you, I swear I will-'

His voice was drowned out by the roars of the zombie horde as they piled onto him and began to feast.

The dead don't die easy in the Underhive - but the living sure do.

The Hacked Knee Dominion Part 17: Alley Snakes

After the fight, Vints Courraine would tell himself that he'd made a difference when the Skymother's Chosen came gunning for Shallow Alley.

As it happened, Vints had sent Fat Davvo, the Jackers' resident slopper, to the needleway hub a few shifts earlier - his latest batch of slop hadn't helped Vints or Ivan get over the wounds they'd sustained in the scrap with the Hellhounds at Catch 22, but Davvo was convinced that he could stew up something better if he bagged one of the ultra-mutie rats that had been lurking around Shallow Alley since Norvegicus's attempted takeover. For safety, Vints sent Akilles, Griv and green juve Ferdi along too - just as well, as word came not long after that a posse of Skymother muties were headed that way.

Vints ordered the rest of the gang to haul boots and back up the boys, but was in no fit state to join them himself. He was stuck in Nu Bedlam with Ivan, wincing at the pain from his stitches and waiting for the crew to get back.

A shift ticked by, then another, and half another.

Finally, the Jackers returned, with wounded in tow.

The way juve Lorn Skarsky told it, it was a hell of a scrap. When they clocked that the Chosen were approaching, Akilles, Griv and Ferdi had ducked into the nearer needleways, leaving Davvo playing decoy. Davvo was surprisingly calm about this after the event - probably he was just glad he'd not blown himself up with the melta trap he'd clumsily set.

Davvo was no scrapper, said Lorn. No kidding, said Vints.

Motormouth Lorn carried on with his tale: the three Jackers had waited til the muties had entered the hub, then they emerged from the needles behind a heavy blast door, intending to get the drop on the muties' heavy guns and biggest brutes. Thing went sideways pretty fast, though - Ferdi bopped forward and opened the door and Akilles and Griv got some shots in, but the muties struck back fast, blasting Ferdi's guts out and setting the heavy boys on fire. They were trapped at the end of a tight corridor. Things looked bad.

Almost already, though, the rest of the Jackers were arriving at the Alley. Ijax and Dwice were first, getting stuck into a point-blank gunfight with a mean-looking mutie. But they shot worse than a blindsnake-blind juve, and the mean bastard rushed them and took them out, bloody though he was from Griv's gunfire.

The mutie boss mustered his boys to rush Akilles and Griv, but Tzig, Zam and Onzo arrived behind them, making for a major distraction. Onzo led the charge and got taken out, poor bastard, but Zammy charged forward, shreddershot blazing, laying the mutie boss and some fo his flunkies low. Sure, the mutie boss didn't bleed, but good old Zam brought major pain to the freak with the mining laser. Tzig hung back and fired frag grenades from a doorway - just maybe things were starting to look spirewards…

Vints interrupted Lorn here, pointing out how bloodied the returning crew had been.

Lorn grinned and shrugged. Sure, the muties charged Zammy and cut him up real bad, and sure Tzig went down not long after, but over the way things weren't looking so grievous. Griv wasn't on fire no more, and was bringing the shotgun pain to one of the big brute muties, who bled out not long after. And Darik and Lorn himself had been hot on the heels of Ijax and Dwice - hot was the word alright, as Darik flamed the bloody mutie who'd caused so much trouble. No more trouble from him.

Lorn puffed up his chest as he told Vints how he'd snuck up on another of the Chosen's big hitters and knifed him out of the fight. Griv was coming to back  him up, and even Akilles was back in the fight, having put of the flames and reloaded his big stubber. By now, the muties weren't looking so clever - some of them were legging it out of the alley. Before long, even their leader was out of there, and the last dregs of the gang fled not long after.

The Hi Viz Jackers had held Shallow Alley again. What's more, Fat Davvo had caught a brace of juicy, bloated rats. There'd be good slop served in Nu Bedlam this shift.

Vints should have been happy about all this, but it was bugging him that he'd heard it all from this gobby juve Lorn. Not from Griv, not from Darik, not even from wounded Dwice. Sumpdammit, and Akilles had gone over Vints's head and made the call about the doc's fees - Zam was getting patched up, but Ferdi was a goner.

He could hear them now, yukking it up outside the habhole, cocksure in their victory. Griv and Darik and that snake Tzig ragging Akilles about getting burnt up again, which even got a laugh from the dour heavy-stubber man.

Vints seethed. He was losing his grip on the gang. Losing his grip all round, spiked by a ratmutie chainglaive and blasted by Hellhound plasma. Well, to the Wrong Gods with them. They wouldn't have beaten the Chosen if he hadn't sent them to bodyguard Davvo.

He'd show them all, one way or another. He'd give them a reason to respect the name of Vintsen Courraine if was the last thing he did.

The Hacked Knee Dominion Part 16: Gunn's Law

Sector H8 scuttlebutt had it that the Hellhounds worshipped the Wrong Gods and that they were doing unspeakable things to captive hivers in their flesh-labs. This alone was enough to garner the interest of grizzled gunsel Jonn Gunn - the Corpse Guild putting a hefty bounty on the deviant gang for skimming cadaver farm profits was an added incentive.

Gunn had heard that the Hellhounds were making a play for the Catch 22 gambling den, as were the Hi-Viz Jackers, and he decided to throw in his lot with the latter crew. He met them at the Haggler's Town toll crossing and had their measure almost straight away. In his career as a merc, Gunn had crossed paths with countless gang bosses like Vints Courraine - not a bad fighter, but as proud and vain as a spire noble. Such types were, Gunn found, usually backed up by a crew of less showy but more competent men, and so it was here - Akilles, Tzig and the rest all had the weary look of those used to indulging their leader's overambition. They rolled their eyes even as Vints struggled on, revived by slopper fayre but still not fully recovered from the chest wound he'd copped off a Cawdor chainglaive.

Within a shift, the crew had arrived at Catch 22. On the way over, there'd been talk of the Hellhounds' pet brute, a hulking monstrosity stitched together in the lab by an unhinged doc who was no less fearsome, and dark thoughts pressed on the Jackers' minds as they entered the abandoned gambling hole. Rawshaq's Rogues had vacated the place a cycle ago, and already the power feeds had partially cut out. Shadows drenched the warren of gaming rooms, and inhuman growls and gurglings echoed through the halls.

Still, the job was simple - find the master codes for the zero-g roulette and other gambling tech, which would most likely be stashed in one of the crates scattered through the site. Find the codes, control the games, control the den. Thing was, the Hellhounds were fixing to do the same thing.

Vints took Gunn and Ijax down a needleways shortcut, but they ended up rejoining Akilles and Tzig as Dwice and Ivan scuttled around, gathering up two crates. The Jackers were edgy, but Gunn didn't blame them for their nerves - the indeterminate cries were now accompanied by rhythmic, guttural chanting. The Hellhounds had arrived, and were on the warpath.

Gunn listened, unimpressed, as Vints directed Ivan and Dwice to hang back and guard the loot while he led the rest of the crew through the heart of the den.  A narrow door led into the main chamber - displaying a lack of caution that had Gunn shaking his head, Vints strode forward, beckoning Tzig to ready Lil' Quake, his grenade launcher, and accompany him.

Standing just behind the pair as Vints opened the door, Gunn could just about make out the far wall of the chamber. His instincts told him something wasn't right - there were too many blind corners and ambush spots in this darkened warren.

He clocked it just before the others - a wide door hissing open on the far side, revealing a line of silhouettes. Two or three hunched cultists, and a towering horror, all bloated, malproportioned muscle and jagged chainblade edges.

Naturally, Vints hadn't noticed. As he stepped forward, he was banging on about the pain he intended to bring to the Hellhounds, and didn't even see the triple-pulse of plasma fire as it boomed across the chamber.

It hit him square in the chest, and he dropped like a rockcrete block.

Tzig didn't take this well, cursing and ducking back the way they'd come. The far door was hissing shut again, and Gunn saw an opportunity - he darted through the door and scrambled a few feet to the cover of an alcove wall, next to a needleway vent. Looking back at the door, he saw Akilles Lebow taking up cautious position, heavy stubber trained on the far wall.

'Lebow,' barked Gunn. 'Get in here! You and Ijax.'

Akilles shook his head. 'You think I was born last shift? The boss man's out of the fight and I saw that beast through the doorway, same as you! I'm gonna hang here and wait for them to come at us.'

The far door hissed again and another plasma volley flashed, blasting chunks out of Akilles's doorway cover. 'Sumpdammit!' he yelled, ducking back.

'They'll outflank us, man,' called Gunn. 'If we move now, we might keep 'em from mobbing us! Lebow? Dammit, Lebow!'

But Akilles was behind the doorframe, out of sight. Gunn weighed up his options. The Jackers were playing a cautious game, too cautious, he reckoned, but he wasn't fit to take on the whole Hellhound crew by himself. Probably better to run back and help the Jackers on their terms - as long as that was viable.

Which wasn't too long as it turned out. There were further shouts from the doorway Gunn had come through - the Hellhounds were rushing the flank already, bringing flamer and heavy stubber fire to bear. Ivan Kohl had gone out of action, and young Dwice was desperately asking Akilles what to do. Ijax Merckx was a flash of retreating orange, yelling how he'd rather save his own hide, and then Akilles was back at the doorframe.

'Gunn!' he called. 'There's just me and Tzig and Dwice back here. They're coming from the right, dunno how many.'

For Jonn Gunn, that settled it. 'Frag it, Lebow - you Jackers are on your own.'

He hauled the cover off the needleway vent and dived in. Just as well Vints had showed him these tunnels before the scrap.

The remaining Jackers hauled boots and their wounded out of Catch 22 a moment later, leaving the gambling den in the clutches of the notorious Hellhounds.

As for Jonn Gunn,  he hadn't carved out his career in the underhive by running suicide jobs. He could live without the Corpse Guild's pay. More to the point, he could live. Not for nothing do the downhive bounty hunter fraternity call it Gunn's Law:

Can't earn no cred if you're dead.