Edge of Darkness Session notes

Edge of Darkness

Session 1

15 June 2013
 
Novia and Kar found themselves on a large service lift. They have both been summoned. They hear heavy footfalls and a female adeptor siroras arrives. A vile short person wanders on the dias followed by a Tech enhanced adeptus mechanicus type. The final person arrives, he is an obvious imperial guardsman. The servitor passes and tells the occupants to board as the dias begins to descend. They reach the destined floor and have one corridor ahead. They reach a large metal door. There is a figure gesturing the group towards a medical device with suspended needles and a mirror. The figure makes himself known as Sand. He represents the holy order of the imperial inquisition. They are here to see a corpse. The body is Saul Arbis, male 23 years of age. The autopsy showed some anomalies that require this groups attention. The cause of death was systemic failure due to an implant. The graft was probably used for neuro control. Various other body functions were affected or modified in the surgery but it would appear he was unwilling in all this. The implant is illegal that would justify the death penalty for the users. His sister is Lilly Arbis.
 
They are taken in the next room and told this is to be a shadow investigation. They need to find out how this was done and by whom. They question the insectoid looking implants nature. It is completely biological. His sister reported him missing. He was recently laid off his unskilled labour job. He worked for a local trade family the Tentalis combine. His body was found on the train as it returned to the hub. He was possibly implanted about 8 days ago.
 
The group are all given aliases/disguises and personal com devises. They are given a bio-sample kit.
 
The journey to Coscarla will take several hours and will require several transport changes.
 
They arrive at Coscarla after a long and arduous trip. They plan to head to Lilly Arbis’ house. The tech priest pulls up the deceased information and sees much of what they were told previously. The area they are in is unusually empty for the lower area of hive they are in. They are very low in the heavily dilapidated area of this rung of the hive. The market nearby is very ramshackle, it is basically a trash market. They approach the havaloc where the sister’s apartment will be found. They need to get to level six and it appears the stairs are the only way up. They make their way up to 6^th floor and see that the door to the Arbis apartment has been forced open and the door is ajar. The girl is cowering in the corner gripping a satchel. She is frightened and wants to know how these people know about her brother’s death. He got fired for drinking. He was hanging out at the union hall. Kar looks around for signs of those who broke in. It appears she doesn’t know a lot about her brother’s disappearance and is very shaken and withdrawn. The door looks like it was forced open by a sledge hammer. Evard Zed, the sister tells the company to look for him. She departs and the group decide the room has little of interest for them. Arduon suggests heading to the union hall.
 
The hall is a bar of sorts with the usual scum and villainy milling about. Kar asks the bar tender about Zed but gets no answers. Novia approaches who she believes to be the warden. The Warden doesn’t want to talk and seems sketchy upon approach. The gang tells her to leave him alone and starts laughing. Garvel intercepts the warden at the door and intimidates him to sit down. This creates a scene and the gang members stand up and pull guns. There was a fire fight. The warden fleed and the battle took some time to resolve before the group could pursue him.
 
Once they get out they head to the pill box to chase down the warden. Kar finds a good high vantage point to climb up and view the pill box entry. Whilst he stays there the rest travel to the church and meet with the priest therein. They question him about the candles and the people that come through here during the day. They get little information out of him.
 

Back at the havaloc that Kar is camped out on, he waits for the others to come back. He sees there are big storm shutters closing for the night. He communicates this to the others and they come and get him. They send Nicodemus out to look for an abandoned place to rest for the night. He does and the other sneak through the city back to here to join him and Kar.

Session 2
29 June 2013

The night falls and the district is closed off from the rest of the city. The street lighting is poor in this havaloc. There is still a guard on duty at the enforcer house. They figure out that there is only one other person on this level and Rosaria decides to investigate. She wanders down to where they believe this person to be. The guard on duty meanwhile is preoccupied with his usual goings on. The refuse is plentiful and the level of danger is imminent. Kar sees 2 enforcers head south.

Rosaria moves to see the enforcers as they move past the building. Tracking their movements she notices they move further south away from this havaloc. Kar notices a red flare in the market district and when he looks back it’s gone. There are two points of red light in the distance that look like eyes. He calls Nicodemus and Arduon over to show them and follows the path to see where it is going. He sees nothing, but the others scan the area. Arduon tries to talk to the buildings wiring but is getting little help. Kar moves to the roof to get a better look and sees some activities on floor level but no idea what is going on.

Rosaria comes around to investigate and Garvil is investigating movement on the stairwell in their havaloc. Kar moves down to watch the helical stair well with Garvil and Nicodemus watches the market place. Rosaria is trying to figure out where to go from here. Arduon has pulled a section of mains out as an active wire weapon. He also drags out a sink ready to push it down the stairs. Kar moves in a stealthy way to conceal himself better whilst still being able to view the scum gang members moving up the stairs. Rosaria engages them and asks what they want. The speaker states they wish to parlay. They ask if they can move closer and they move into view for the rest of the party.

The voice of the gang asks to approach. Rosaria says he can parlay from there. He does convince the party to allow him to progress up a little so he is not shouting. He looks distinctly like hive scum. He is armed but his hands are high. There are more of them down stairs but not in a position of power. This one announces himself as Cord. He says he can be their friend. He says they can work for him which will help them escape in the morning. The enforcers won’t open the shutters in the morn until they find the party. The gang member goes on to say he believes this group will benefit him as they seem to possess a skill set he could use. Kar tracks the door with his scope and Garvil moves to the door Rosaria and Cord enter. The gang member says he works for the Churgeon who keeps the drugs coming if they do the work she needs. He wants her dead. Her underling that runs the arms house approached him. His name is Moran. Moran has something to do with the people disappearing. He has two underlings that run with him in the arms house. They are savage and know how to handle weapons. Churgeon is probably in the arms house, which is where they believe the arms will be. Cord doesn’t seem to know why the people are going missing. They are only taking live people as far as they know. Garvil asks for 2 doses of the drug they are peddling and takes them off Cord. The drug is very addictive; it messes with those who take it. He gets his boys to bring up the hardware he offers them for helping them out. There are pristine shotguns that look like they have come off the production line. Arduon heads down to inspect the weapons. They are good quality and new. Cord hands them a security pass that will get them in the arms house. Cord says the day cycle is not going to be there friend. The night has the risk of the body snatchers. Rosaria points out that they have a card and a location and then wants to know how they are to get there. Rosaria thanks Cord and asks him to set a distraction and states that the party will work towards the common goal of removing the Churgeon.

Arduon makes a claymore from some of the shells and sets a trap to plant later.

After some discussion about whether the warden or Moran is the first point of call they decide to head to the arms house to check it out. The ground level is very disturbing. There are no windows on the ground level. It is marble built but it is dilapidated over the years. There is a big brass door on the ground level. Nicodemus heads down the alley way while Kar conceals himself in the entrance to cover him.

Nicodemus gets to the end and sees a large loading bay. There are no cameras they can see. They reach a door where they can use the card Cord gave them. It opens after some time they enter into a blood smelling kitchen. The dusty dirty and unsanitary kitchen has set aside military rations and puts you in mind of unused army bunkers. After failing to communicate with the first servitor Arduon also manages to upset the second servitor and finds he can’t get them to activate the power. Rosaria opens the meat storage and gets hit with a horrible smell. They scan the room beyond. There are strange bar codes over the barrels. Next to the cool room Kar notices an open lift that open in old cage style loft lifts. The rest of the party heads into the cool room further. Garvil opens some barrels that have bio matter inside. The smell is horrendous and there is the possibility there are people in the barrels. Kar points the elevator shaft out to Arduon and suggests he tries to figure out how to use it.

Karvil looks out and sees 2 yellow eyes moving through the mess hall. He closes the doors and alerts the others. Foot-falls begin to approach the door to the kitchen then leads to about 6 seconds of silence. Then the door begins to move. A hulking silhouette enters the door swings quietly closed. The breathing of this creature sounds liquid. It sets it’s hand on a power plate to read the tech and it illuminates and they see that it is a mass of stretched skin and appears to be a tech abomination.

Garvil tries to use his bayonet to dispatch the abomination but fails to end it. Then Nicodemus shoots it with his new shotgun and turns it into a fine mist.

The party moves beyond into a large eating hall with a mirror on the right hand side that looks like a new addition. On the far end of the room is a double door. Rosaria analyses the mirror and butts it of the wall. They realise that the food here is all made from melted down humans. They all face their fears from this and Nicodemus finds himself slightly more insane from this information.

They move on and see 2 statues and another elevator shaft. The statues seem unnatural. Garvil moves to the big door. As they move on through the door the com links activate and they hear ‘They’re coming back’. As the party moves into the upper level they get set upon by an unseen shooter. Garvil charges at the first shooter and impales it with his bayonet and destroys it. Kar is set upon by another unknown shooter and wears a bit of damage but Nicodemus fires at the new enemy. Kar fires as well and does some damage. They dispatch the other shooter and then look out the windows at the far end of the landing. They move on through the right door after.

Nicodemus and Kar look in the door they are at on the left side of the landing. The shotgun bursts as a new shooter pops up when they enter the room. The 2 party members obliterate him but Kar takes a bit of damage. They search his body and take his auto pistol with silencer and a nice knife.

The plan is to set the lift up and then take the stairs. They come up the stairwell into a room that looks like a medical ward. There is a steel door at the end. A blank armoured door has been fitted recently. As they enter the room the armoured door opens. On a table splayed down is a man terrified with his chest open with his heart exposed surrounded be twisted mechanical limbs with a woman’s dead face on a mechanical abomination. It appears to be Churgeon. She stands surrounded by other abomination servitors. Novia freaks out and knocks out half the inhabitants of the room.

Kar begins to take aim at the Churgeon but her abominations move forward. Garvil sets them on fire and Kar loses line of sight. The Churgeon runs into the elevator shaft whilst Garvil sets many of the abominations on fire. The spider mech from her back detaches and attacks Rosaria. Arduon gets attacked badly by spider mechanical device and retaliates by attaching it to the shotgun shell claymore set up earlier and blew it to pieces.

Once they dispatch the abominations and Rosaria falls down the elevator shaft, the rest of the party go to the body with his chest open. They find a barrel with a huge snake like thing that looks like the queen of the implant creatures they were sent to investigate.