No Time For Sorrow

[Dorizzit]

"Oh, that'll leave a scar, Jurgis. See here and here? Those marks will never go away." Jakken turns to Jil. "We should sleep in the 'scraper itself. It provides chokeholds where we could hold off Orks and gives us a good vantage point of the surrounding city."

[laszarus]

Jill's measured shots drop three more grots, and those remaining run yet faster, something you hadn't thought possible.

Jurgis's wound is painful, but not too serious - several ribs are cracked, and he's going to have a lovely bruise, but otherwise he'll be fine. He may find breathing rather painful for the next few days, however. If he hadn't been wearing his armour, that hammer would have pulped him where he stood, so there's something to thank the Emperor for.

No-one (and nothing) has emerged from the tower, and the surrounding area seems eerily quiet. The ruins you are currently in are silent save for the occasional creak of settling stone, the sound of your breathing, and the clinking of cooling plascrete and molten grot.

Now that the more mobile scenery is out of the way, you can see that the tower is daubed with numerous Ork runes and images, in what seems to be a mixture of blood and mud (at least, you hope it's mud). To the left of the entrance is a pile of rotting, dismembered corpses, dressed in the drab greys you know are worn by the citizens of the city. It looks like the Orks killed everyone in the skyscraper, and then dragged the bottom few floors worth out to eat at leisure.

[Electric_Monkey]

"That's a stroke of luck,"replies Jurgis, "I thought I was going to have to pick a knife fight with one of these cleaver-wielders to get my cool scars." He waits until Jakken gives him the all clear, and then re-attaches his armour, grunting with pain as he tightens the straps.

"What's the plan now?"he asks, "We'd best get moving before more orks come, but first I want to see if these have any grenades. Permission to search?

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search - (1d20+1)[5]
(OOC: Have we had any briefings on ork equipment, such as how to prime a stikkbomb?)

[laszarus]

(OOC: Stikkbombs, being merely a basic variation of the fragmentation grenade, will be simple to use for any trained guardsman. The only grenades that I'd require a roll to work out or not let you use at all would be Eldar, Tau, Necron or Tyranid grenade analogues)

[purepolarpanzer]

Permission granted. Pick up anything we can use, but be quick about it. The faster we set up in that sky scraper, the faster we can get some rest.
Jil waits till all her men are prepared, her breaths more stable and deep as she realizes hat she could get used to war.

[Dorizzit]

Jakken clips his Medkit to his belt and searches the Ork and Grot bodies, his knife out in case some of them aren't dead yet:

(1d20+2)[9]

[Verruckt]

R'nshai leaves the others to their search and meanders over to the macabre mound of limbs. He looks into the unfeeling faces and glassed eyes, and turns back to the group, opens his mouth to speak, but reconsiders. He looks back again and then strides over to Jillikian. "Sir... eh, I'd like to lay those men and women to rest, but we don't have nearly enough time to bury them and the smell and smoke of a pyre would hardly be helpful. What would you have me do?"

[Viginti_tres]

"If we ready the fire now, but only start it when we leave it may actually work to our favor tactically as well as morally. Anything that might prevent any more loss would be welcomed, and I'm sure these people will be glad to help us avenge them. " Said Tauride to R'nshai

"Sarge, I'm ready to lead the entry if you need me to. While the men need rest, any time spent stationary is dangerous, This filth here found out first hand, so let not stay to long. " He said glancing around at the remnants of the building. Carefully fingering the bayonet, testing its edge before grabbing his second. Ready for what was to come.

[laszarus]

There are a number of guns, mostly autoguns and autopistols, and a few lasguns and laspistols, some clips, some automatic ammunition, 4 frag grenades, one big hammer (which Jurgis is intimately familiar with) and a number of other hand weapons.

R'nshai sees that if he uses a tank of promethium, he can douse the bodies and then ignite the pyre with his pilot light, which would cremate the poor souls successfully. However, it would be unwise to do this before entering the skyscraper.

[Verruckt]

R'nshai sets to prepping the pyre. Leaving the soaked pile as it lies for now, he walks back to take his place in the entry team.

[Electric_Monkey]

Jurgis takes the hammer and a couple of grenades. If he has time before the squad moves on, he knocks a tooth from the mouth of each of the two orks he has killed and puts them in his pocket.

Once done, he shoulders his pack and says "I'm ready to move, and I'd rather not spend too long looking at these poor souls."

[purepolarpanzer]

Yes. Lets get going. If your taking anything, get to it quick, cause in two minutes we head into the sky scraper. When we are all in you can burn the bodies, R'nshai, but be quick about it. If we're unlucky it will bring Xenos on us like flies. If we are lucky, that sky scraper will be empty of everything except good Kilandrian vodka and a vox station. I'd be happy with something in between.

[Dorizzit]

Jakken picks up an Autogun and a few clips before going back with the rest of the group.

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I have a few out of character questions. First, what are the stats on an Autogun? Also, who's carrying the Grenades and how many do we have?

[Penguinizer]

"Emperor bless those poor souls. After we contact from the tower, what will we do. We might not even get help." M'gn's eases his grip on the rocket launcher. Hanging it on his back, along with the rockets. He then draws his laspistol, seeing as a rocket would be detrimental inside a building.

[Verruckt]

"The least we can do is be useful to the Emperor, even if we do as little as relay intel to our comrades, we will be preforming a service in His name." R'nshai stares up at the building, hoping to find purpose at it's summit.

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diplomacy (1d20+3)[15] attempting to reassure everyone

[laszarus]

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Okay, some quick stats:
Autogun. Damage 1D8, Crit x2, Weight 8lbs, Size Medium, Range 80ft
Autopistol. Damage 1D4, Crit x3, Weight 3lbs, Size Small, Range 20ft
Hammer. Damage 2D6 + Str, Crit x2, Weight 15lbs, Size Large

Jurgis has, I presume, the 4 grenades he found. There are 6 other grenades in the squad, which I reccommend you share between the Troopers, Inspirer and Medic, 'cos the Flamer and Rocketman should be too busy to use one.

As a small note: Grenades can be used to make very good tripwire traps. As part of basic Guardsman training, you are taught how to use grenades and detpacks to create booby traps. Just say if you want to make a trap, and tell me where you've put it, no rolls necessary (And you can do clever stuff, like hide one tripwire right next to the dummy wire, so they might see the first one but not the real one). [sarcasm]And no, I wouldn't advise you to use this ability. At all. No DM recommendations in this game, nosiree.[/sarcasm]

In all seriousness, however, a trap may or may not be a good idea. Usually you'd want one on any entrance which may be compromising. I'm not going to start using traps against you guys until you start facing Chaos and such, but that doesn't mean you have to play fair.

(Assuming you want to enter the 'scraper)

As you approach the skyscraper, you get a true sense of how massive it really is. Looking up, you see that it stretches hundreds of metres into the air above your heads. It dwarfs even the largest Bisoxen, and its cold grey exterior, scarred and pitted though it may be, still radiates a sense of majesty. It took an enormous amount of effort to construct this building, and you can practically feel that emanating from it like a slow mist. However, now is not the time for poetic descriptions. And, of course, the vile stench of rotting bodies, Ork, dung, and must are overwhelming at the dim entrance to the building.

As you enter, you see that the corridor ahead is also covered with the grim and violent blood-runes which were scrawled on the exterior. There are four doorways in this corridor, two on each side of the hall, and the end of the passage goes up in a set of stairs, into the gloomy depths of the skyscraper.

Each doorway has been violently smashed in, and blood is spattered liberally across the entire area, with a thick, still sticky, trail on the floor, leading from the end of the hall to the entrance. This is presumably from the corpses that were dragged outside. There are three dead grots here - all of them look to have been smashed to death, probably from a burst of Ork violence. The stink of Ork grows even stronger as you enter the building, threatening to overwhelm your suffering noses.

The lighting is, surprisingly, still (barely) functional, allowing you to see, but only just, in the grim charnel house of the ground floor.

[Dorizzit]

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I'm going to assume Jakken has two of the grenades, unless anyone has other ideas...

Jakken, pistol drawn, looks around intently, his keen ears alert for the smallest sign of danger. He kneels down on the floor, his fingers tracing the ground slowly.

Listen: (1d20+7)[24]

Spot: (1d20+3)[4]

Track: (1d20+9)[28]

[Electric_Monkey]

Jurgis follows the rest of the squad into the tower. "Let's look for a plaque,"he says. "If we're lucky, this might be a government building or something that'll be on our maps." . After a few steps he drops the hammer. "This thing is really weighing me down. Survival kit has to take precedence over souveniers."

[Dorizzit]

After a few seconds of consideration, Jakken walks over and picks up the hammer. "Fine, if you don't want it, I'll take it," he says, hefting the hammer across his shoulder after sticking his Lasgun back in its holster. "I'd rather not get into a knife fight with one of these Orks."

[Shades of Gray]

What th'ell are you doin' you daft? None of us can use tha' 'ammer, it's jus' weighin' us down!

I stay at the back of the group, watching if anyone is following us.

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Spot=16
Listen=11

[Electric_Monkey]

whoopsie. Forgot to do my rolls.

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spot - (1d20+3)[21]
listen - (1d20)[14]

[Penguinizer]

M'gn's looks around intently, he holds his laspistol in a ready position. Raised at about shoulder height.

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Spot: (1d20+3)[18]
Listen: (1d20+2)[4]

[laszarus]

Jakken can see that the tracks in the blood, though all trodden over at least once, belong to more than four Orks (and more than grots, too).

A good look around and a careful listen turn up nothing for any of you. Not inside the building, at least. Outside, far, far outside, the sound of heavy cannonfire and the scream of surface-to-air, lander-destroying missiles begins to start up. You realise that this is probably the second wave coming in, although they are landing on the opposite side of the city to your designated drop zone.

A quick glance reveals the plaque - a massive, ornate brass thing, wrought into a twisted form, and now even more twisted from the Ork vandalism. It is scratched, smeared, and written on, although the writing is still legible. It reads:

HJALSANIR ADEPTUS ADMINISTRATUM
ADEPT HABITATION SKYSCRAPER XI

You realise that this may well be marked on the sergeant's map, and that, from this, you should be able to find where you are. However, it is not to be. Although skyscrapers are marked on the map, and, indeed, the "Adeptus Administratum Habitation Skyscraper" label appears, there are no numbers. And the city is perfectly symmetrical. However, using your compasses, you work you are somewhere in the south east quadrant of the city, and that the spaceport is somewhere to the north west. To find it would take days unless you got a better vantage point - if you couldn't see the landing spires from where you were, you know you wouldn't be able to find it, and guess what? There were no landing spires to be seen. This could be because they were obscured, or it could be they are damaged or destroyed. Either way, it means one thing: You need to see the city from high up, then you can make your way to wherever you want with that map reference. Of course, the same thing counts a hundred times over for the vital facilities - although marked on the map, they are mostly low buildings (save the shield generators, but they are on the walls, and you really don't want to be on the walls at the moment).

You all also notice that there is a PDF armoury in your quadrant - if you make a short detour once you've found where you are, you can probably have somewhere safe to hole up for the night, and also somewhere to get some arms.

[Electric_Monkey]

((OOC: Am I correct in understanding that we're still on the ground floor, and that this is the tallest building we can easily reach?))

Jurgis cranes his neck to see the map "What other landmarks could we look for from the top?" he says, with some painful effort, "Temples? Comms-masts?". He steps back and looks around for stairs, switching out his almost depleted power cell for a fresh one as he does so.

[Dorizzit]

Jakken nods. "Good, we finally know where we are."

[laszarus]

OOC: This is indeed the ground floor, and this is indeed the nearest building within easy reach.

IC: From the map, you can see that, so long as you get up high enough, you should be able to triangulate your location from the spaceport, your compass, and any other skyscraper.

[Verruckt]

"Right then, up we go?" R'nshai looks to Jil for confirmation. He holds his flamer low but ready to fire.

(ooc: dear god that's a nice avy laszarus)

[purepolarpanzer]

Up indeed. But stay frosty people- no pun intended. There are more green skins in this building, or I'm a grot myself.
Jil Moves towards the stairs. She readies her weapon, keeping it aimed in front of her.
I need one person to take the lead with me. Heavy weapons away people- we don't want his place comi down around us. Las it up.

[Dorizzit]

Jakken hefts the hammer and follows next to Jill.

[Electric_Monkey]

Jurgis nods his assent, and attaches his combat knife to the bayonet lug on his lasgun as he turns to cover the door by which the squad entered.