Post by Belisarius Vilebroth on May 14, 2022 13:04:46 GMT -8
On a frontier world bordering greater space, a modified Omicron-class attack shuttle descended through noxious clouds, streaking across the sky as it traced a locator beacon on the planet's surface. Visibility was limited due in part to the chemical ordnance the Grave-Scythes had dropped on the planet prior to launching their assault in earnest, while radioactive fallout made their sensors practically inoperable. If that at all troubled the freakish amalgamation of man and machine seated in the pilot's chair, Festus Phageblight showed no sign of it. The left half of his face was locked in a rictus metal grin of a skeletal visage, while the right side was a scarred mess barely discernable as human. A claw like droid hand held the flight yoke, while pale veiny jaundiced fingers with blackening nails flipped a series of switches. The landing gear extended from the underside of the shuttle as it swept over the tortured landscape and spun 180 degrees before coming in for a fast landing. Radioactive dust kicked up with a layer of sediment, eventually settling as the engines and repulsors were shut down. A whine sounded as the side hatch located before the cockpit unsealed and flipped up, extending a ramp down to the steaming terrain.
Emerging from the darkened interior of the shuttle, Belisarius Vilebroth appeared at the hatch, the long beak of his modified radzone trooper armour the first thing to exit the shadows. He looked out the filmy green lenses of his suit, studying the lethal effect their chemical bombs had on the surface. He casually walked down the ramp, carrying his tall war scythe 'Slake' is his right hand, tapping the haft on the ground with every heavy step of his armoured boots. Upon setting foot upon the chemical carpeted soil, he bent a leg and lowered his body until he was resting on his right knee. Connected to the power pack strapped to his back, his three servo-arms moved independently of one another. The arm ending in a vice like metal pincer came over his left shoulder and scraped at the top layer of dirt. Fiddling with a supply satchel around his waist, the Sith virologist retrieved a translucent specimen vial, then used his pincer arm to scoop up a palms worth of soil before carefully depositing it in the glass container and sealing it. He returned the full vial to his satchel and stood back up, the long brown robe he wore over his armour billowed around his lower half as nuclear winds swept the landing site.
Sickly green blaster fire flared in the deadly fog ahead, lighting a path for Belisarius to follow. He traveled through the cancerous mist, untroubled by the lethal miasma even as his rad counter continued to audibly protest. As he neared the sound of repeating bolts of sizzling death, he was just able to make out the appearance of a lumbering green form in what seemed to be a modified suit of hazard trooper armour. A tall war scythe to match Belisarius' own was held in the trooper's hand, though where the Sith's was coated in an animate swarm of nanogene spores, the trooper's was coated in a congealing mess of dark blood, dripping down the haft where it pooled and steamed on the hazard trooper's mechanized gauntlet. Nearby, Glory-class dark troopers holding portable blast cannons stood at the ready. The barrels of the weapons they carried still smoked. Strewn around the site was a mass collection of corpses wearing some sort of protective suits. The few that survived the dirty bombing appeared to have been put down personally by the Grave-Scythes. Belisarius reversed his scythe and used the jagged sickle head to flip one of the smoking cadavers over, revealing the faceplate of the victim's suit. Peering through the compromised transparent face shield, he could make out the distinct features of a chiss male. The smoking ruin of his suit and the boiled guts that dripped from the charred opening made it clear what had killed him. The Sith raised his scythe and motioned to the hazard trooper with a wave of the pestilential curved blade of the alchemized weapon.
"Did you have a chance to use it?" He inquired, his tone eager and phlegmatic. The recent scouring of life had left a vacuum in the Force that was easily filled by the corrupting nature of the darkside. Belisarius was already using his deep connection to those poisoned waters to manipulate the droid troopers into uploading the data they had collected to his personal device. Through his mastery of mechu-deru, the droid soldiers were slaves to his will, unable to resist. The hazard trooper, however, was no droid despite the mechanical nature of his combat suit.
Torviel Wormwood nodded his mechanized helm and swept his scythe across his body with his right gauntlet, resting his arm once the weapon was pointed towards a settlement behind him that was just coming into view as the wind blew away the toxic fog they were in. A steaming hiss sounded as the Captain of the Grave-Scythes helmet neck seals unlocked. He reached up and removed it, revealing the bald scalp and pale featured face that had been obscured behind it moments ago. A breath mask was positioned over his nose and mouth, connected on either side by two nozzles that plugged into ports inside the armoured suit. A potent cocktail of combat stims, narcotics, and viral matter pumped into his lungs and expelled through the grill of the triangular mask. His eyes were bloodshot and yellow, sickly and unwell. A mucus-wet growl sounded as he forced his throat to speak. "We doused the village with it. No survivors." One of the bodies scattered around the ground twitched, making noise as its protective suit scraped the dirt. The Glory-class dark trooper nearest reversed the blaster cannon in its hands and brought the handle down on the squirming Chiss' helmet with a powerful stroke, caving it in. He struck again, and again, only stopping once the skull had been pulped and grey matter soaked the blaster's stock.
If there was one thing he could say about the Grave-Scythes, it was that they were thorough, especially since Wormwood had taken command of the legion. His personality left a lot to be desired, but as long as he got the job done and followed orders, he was welcome to be as anti-social and unpleasant as he liked.
"My thanks." Replied Belisarius, saluting his subordinate with a flick and sweep of Slake. The air buzzed around the head of the war-scythe as the nanogene spores coating it scattered and reformed. The Sith virologist carefully stepped across the corpse thick clearing and approached the village. His beaked helm blocked out most scents, but he swore he could smell the rot of blue flesh as he neared the open grave that had been an isolated but thriving frontier settlement before they had arrived. He stopped occasionally to examine the bodies, noting several promising characteristics. Several of the expired Chiss showed signs of nanobot infection, their slowly sloughing flesh protruding with mechanical growths. He stopped to take samples, occasionally withdrawing a long filleting knife to saw off parts, or using his syringe headed servo-arm to extract infected blood. Far from having the effect he desired, the nano-virus was at least lethal, if nothing else. It wouldn't be enough to prove his theories to his former master, however. That black scaled bastard would sneer and point out that rakghoul plague not only infected its host, but transformed them on a biological level. If Belisarius' nanobots could not accomplish the same thing, how could be declare the supremacy of his techno-alchemy? He needed results.
After completing his sample collection at the village, he returned to the shuttle. By the time he had arrived he had already formulated a new variant of the virus to experiment with once they reached their final destination. He uploaded this latest version of the spores to the Ecruciator's databanks where it was distributed among the onboard manufacturing centers, then was mass produced and loaded into warheads.
Emerging from the darkened interior of the shuttle, Belisarius Vilebroth appeared at the hatch, the long beak of his modified radzone trooper armour the first thing to exit the shadows. He looked out the filmy green lenses of his suit, studying the lethal effect their chemical bombs had on the surface. He casually walked down the ramp, carrying his tall war scythe 'Slake' is his right hand, tapping the haft on the ground with every heavy step of his armoured boots. Upon setting foot upon the chemical carpeted soil, he bent a leg and lowered his body until he was resting on his right knee. Connected to the power pack strapped to his back, his three servo-arms moved independently of one another. The arm ending in a vice like metal pincer came over his left shoulder and scraped at the top layer of dirt. Fiddling with a supply satchel around his waist, the Sith virologist retrieved a translucent specimen vial, then used his pincer arm to scoop up a palms worth of soil before carefully depositing it in the glass container and sealing it. He returned the full vial to his satchel and stood back up, the long brown robe he wore over his armour billowed around his lower half as nuclear winds swept the landing site.
FWAP! FWAP! FWAP!
Sickly green blaster fire flared in the deadly fog ahead, lighting a path for Belisarius to follow. He traveled through the cancerous mist, untroubled by the lethal miasma even as his rad counter continued to audibly protest. As he neared the sound of repeating bolts of sizzling death, he was just able to make out the appearance of a lumbering green form in what seemed to be a modified suit of hazard trooper armour. A tall war scythe to match Belisarius' own was held in the trooper's hand, though where the Sith's was coated in an animate swarm of nanogene spores, the trooper's was coated in a congealing mess of dark blood, dripping down the haft where it pooled and steamed on the hazard trooper's mechanized gauntlet. Nearby, Glory-class dark troopers holding portable blast cannons stood at the ready. The barrels of the weapons they carried still smoked. Strewn around the site was a mass collection of corpses wearing some sort of protective suits. The few that survived the dirty bombing appeared to have been put down personally by the Grave-Scythes. Belisarius reversed his scythe and used the jagged sickle head to flip one of the smoking cadavers over, revealing the faceplate of the victim's suit. Peering through the compromised transparent face shield, he could make out the distinct features of a chiss male. The smoking ruin of his suit and the boiled guts that dripped from the charred opening made it clear what had killed him. The Sith raised his scythe and motioned to the hazard trooper with a wave of the pestilential curved blade of the alchemized weapon.
"Did you have a chance to use it?" He inquired, his tone eager and phlegmatic. The recent scouring of life had left a vacuum in the Force that was easily filled by the corrupting nature of the darkside. Belisarius was already using his deep connection to those poisoned waters to manipulate the droid troopers into uploading the data they had collected to his personal device. Through his mastery of mechu-deru, the droid soldiers were slaves to his will, unable to resist. The hazard trooper, however, was no droid despite the mechanical nature of his combat suit.
Torviel Wormwood nodded his mechanized helm and swept his scythe across his body with his right gauntlet, resting his arm once the weapon was pointed towards a settlement behind him that was just coming into view as the wind blew away the toxic fog they were in. A steaming hiss sounded as the Captain of the Grave-Scythes helmet neck seals unlocked. He reached up and removed it, revealing the bald scalp and pale featured face that had been obscured behind it moments ago. A breath mask was positioned over his nose and mouth, connected on either side by two nozzles that plugged into ports inside the armoured suit. A potent cocktail of combat stims, narcotics, and viral matter pumped into his lungs and expelled through the grill of the triangular mask. His eyes were bloodshot and yellow, sickly and unwell. A mucus-wet growl sounded as he forced his throat to speak. "We doused the village with it. No survivors." One of the bodies scattered around the ground twitched, making noise as its protective suit scraped the dirt. The Glory-class dark trooper nearest reversed the blaster cannon in its hands and brought the handle down on the squirming Chiss' helmet with a powerful stroke, caving it in. He struck again, and again, only stopping once the skull had been pulped and grey matter soaked the blaster's stock.
If there was one thing he could say about the Grave-Scythes, it was that they were thorough, especially since Wormwood had taken command of the legion. His personality left a lot to be desired, but as long as he got the job done and followed orders, he was welcome to be as anti-social and unpleasant as he liked.
"My thanks." Replied Belisarius, saluting his subordinate with a flick and sweep of Slake. The air buzzed around the head of the war-scythe as the nanogene spores coating it scattered and reformed. The Sith virologist carefully stepped across the corpse thick clearing and approached the village. His beaked helm blocked out most scents, but he swore he could smell the rot of blue flesh as he neared the open grave that had been an isolated but thriving frontier settlement before they had arrived. He stopped occasionally to examine the bodies, noting several promising characteristics. Several of the expired Chiss showed signs of nanobot infection, their slowly sloughing flesh protruding with mechanical growths. He stopped to take samples, occasionally withdrawing a long filleting knife to saw off parts, or using his syringe headed servo-arm to extract infected blood. Far from having the effect he desired, the nano-virus was at least lethal, if nothing else. It wouldn't be enough to prove his theories to his former master, however. That black scaled bastard would sneer and point out that rakghoul plague not only infected its host, but transformed them on a biological level. If Belisarius' nanobots could not accomplish the same thing, how could be declare the supremacy of his techno-alchemy? He needed results.
After completing his sample collection at the village, he returned to the shuttle. By the time he had arrived he had already formulated a new variant of the virus to experiment with once they reached their final destination. He uploaded this latest version of the spores to the Ecruciator's databanks where it was distributed among the onboard manufacturing centers, then was mass produced and loaded into warheads.