Two Sides of the Warp Token Update

2k words

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Emerging from the forests was another wave of man-things, carrying themselves upon the backs of strange creatures. Their mounts had four legs that ended in hooves, with elongated faces perched upon equally long necks, their manes of fur shaking as they galloped through the ankle-deep water. There were dozens of them, fifty at the least, their riders brandishing a mix of rifles and spears.

Skyseeker’s mouth formed a little ‘o’ of surprise as the mounts carried their riders swiftly into the flank, close enough that she could make out the eyes of the man-thing at the head of the riders. He was dressed in a suit of armour the colour of silver, the clanking sound of the plates overlapping the thunderous pounding of the charge. His helmet was the same colour as his suit, except for the top of it, where it extended into a blossoming trio of feathers as red as blood. Most of his face was obscured behind a grill, all save for his eyes, peering out of a sideways-angled visor.

His arm extended out, a pistol in his grip, his limb snapping upwards as the top of it seemed to explode. This weapon wasn’t like those the Skaven used, there was simply a spark of fire, a whoosh of air, and the gutter-runner to her left was dead, a bullet between his eyes.

Time seemed to slow as the rest of the riders raised their handguns, many of the gutter-runners still preoccupied watching the front to notice their approach. She thought she could feel the lead-rider’s eyes meet hers for a second as he raised a spear with his other arm, angling it towards the closest Skaven.

Skyseeker flopped to the ground, choking on dirty riverwater as she clutched her head in her arms, the thunderous report of a volley making her ears ring. Gutter-runners toppled around her by the dozens, dead before they even hit the ground, blood darkening the water. Those that survived the guns finally noticed the new threat, readying their weapons, but knives and daggers didn’t stand a chance against descending riders, the man-things trampling into the Skaven in a wave of sharp spears and stomping hooves.

Scrambling out the path of an oncoming rider, Skyseeker crawled out of the river on all fours, the wet gravel pinching her elbows and knees. The ground was quaking, like a Vermintide was burrowing up from below the earth, the hooves of the man-thing mounts shaking the earth with their ferocious charge. Everywhere she looked, crisscrossing legs of the mounts filled her vision, some close enough she could have reached out and touched them. Through the dozens of blurred legs she could see her fellow runners being skewered on spears, lifted off their feet by thrown javelins, crushed beneath the weight of the mounts, or a few morbid combinations of the three.

Fear threatened to paralyse her, but she summoned up the willpower to keep crawling, the forest and the underbrush that hugged the riverbank promising cover and safety. Darting her head to the right, she watched with a look of horror as a rider was moving straight towards her, the man-thing pulling the reigns of his mount so that she would be trampled in mere seconds.

Rising into a crouch, she leapt to the side, brandishing a weeping dagger as her feet touched the ground. Holding it out sideways, she slashed the abominable mount across the flank as it passed by, drawing a cut across its smooth, brown hide. The creature wailed, tossing its head back as its thin legs gave out beneath it, its rider flung from his saddle as it came crashing down. He hit the ground hard enough that the impact dented his plate armour, but the tough man-thing started to get back up, pushing his gloved hands into the silt.

Her tail flicking in anger, Skyseeker jumped on top of him, the man-thing grunting as she put her insubstantial weight on his legs. Keeping her dagger in the reverse-grip, she angled the blade down, and drove it into his back with a snarl. The armour barely resisted the corrosive power of the enchanted blade, Skyseeker feeling a soft crunch as her weapon tasted his flesh.

The man-thing jerked, then relaxed, as limp as his dead mount. She ripped her weapon free, blood sprouting from the pierced point, jumping on the spot as she tried to cover all her angles. The rest of the charging man-things raced around her, giving her a wide berth, and at first she thought this was because she’d shown them how a breeder fought, but this was not the case at all.

As the stampede tore through the gutter-runners, rather than turn around for another charge, the man-things spurred their mounts on, rebuilding their momentum as they prepared their weapons.

The runners had been butchered in mere seconds, and the occupied ratling gunners stood no chance, the man-things crashing into the rear ranks in a heartbeat. The riders pummeled furiously into their ranks, ratmen keeling over with spears sprouting from their chests, cries of dismay carrying across the battlefield.

A great ball of green flame erupted as one of the riders fired at an ammo pack, the flimsy machinery obliterating every Skaven and man-thing in a large radius around it. A few of the more fortunate gunners had managed to reload in time, Skyseeker seeing a pair of riders be caught in a cone of warpfire, but the man-things prioritised their targets, turning the powerful rear ranks into a group of unarmed, fleeing ratmen in seconds, the pride of Skryre reduced to a cowering mess.

She heard the call to flee rise above the sounds of battle, as well as those ordering the Skaven to hold, Skyseeker watching as two opposing ratmen voicing these orders began to fight each other, while riders dashed from left to right all around them. Like a disease, the confusion spread to other nearby Skaven, the warband turning on each other while the man-things continued to press the attack.

Seeing no point in giving her life to a Great Clan that couldn’t hold itself together, Skyseeker chose to make for the cover of the forest, along with the rest of her fleeing kin. She was paces away from the protection of the underbrush when the crack of a dangerously close shot rang out, followed by the worst pain she ever felt travelling down her arm. Crying out, she tumbled to the ground, rolling a few times before her momentum brought her to a stop.

Skyseeker nursed her ruined shoulder as she propped herself up, looking behind her to see the lead-rider ten or so paces away, his pistol trailing a wisp of smoke. The man-thing began to reload, Skyseeker baring her teeth at him as she drew her daggers out of their sheaths, holding them above her head in preparation for a throw.

The man-thing was almost done loading his handgun, when a metallic, hulking figure stood between the two, swiping a giant warp-blade over its shoulder. It was the Warlock Engineer, his harness whistling as the internal clockworks powered the swing of the strike.

The plumes on the man-thing’s helmet bobbing, the rider reared its mount back, the creature shrieking as the warp-blade missed its legs by a whisker, slamming into the ground it had been standing on a second ago.

“Eat-taste my warp-lightning!” the Warlock snarled, punching a switch on his harness. His arm-blade began to glow, streaks of lightning cocooning along the length of the weapon from hilt to tip. The man-thing shot him in the face, chips of armour falling away as the Warlock cradled his mask.

Instead of doing as the Warlock requested, the man-thing steered his mount away, narrowly dodging an electrified swipe of the empowered warp-blade. The man thing brandished his own sword, a pitiful lump steel compared to the Warlock’s weaponry, holding it aloft as the Warlock moved in to cut him down.

It looked like the two were about to duel, when the man-thing kicked the flanks of his mount, riding out of the Warlock’s reach. He began to shout something, drawing circles with the tip of his sword in a strange gesture, starting to ride back down the length of the river.

The other riders began to follow suit, cutting down a few Skaven on their way to rejoin their leader. Were they retreating? Did they not want to face a breeder and a Warlock head-on? She couldn’t blame them.

As quickly as they had arrived, the riders departed the battlefield, following the water until they vanished out of sight into the forest. The man-things engaging the slaves were also falling back now, most of the cowardly skavenslaves too afraid to take advantage and run them down. The warplock jezzails, free from the harassing riders, picked off the straggling man-things as they retreated, picking them off with musket shots to the backs. With one final volley of warpstone, the last man-thing was slain, the rest of them shuffling into the trees and out of sight.

“Another pitiful enemy destroyed by the mighty Clan Skryre!” the Warlock cheered, raising his mechanical arms in victory. The surviving Skaven cheered with varying degrees of enthusiasm, but the battle didn’t appear like a win to Skyseeker. For every dead man-thing, there were ten slain Skaven, and the weapon teams were all but decimated in that charge.

“Reequip yourselves, minions!” the Warlock shouted. “Clan Skryre will destroy these insolent man-things, make an example of them, yes-yes! All part of the Great Plan!”

The survivors of the warband began to pick over the corpses, Skyseeker joining them as she kneeled in the dirt. She had looted her dead foes her whole life, so she held no pity as she turned over the dead gutter-runners, looting their knives and stashing them in her belt. One could never have too many knives.

When she was loaded down with as many weapons as she could carry, she turned her attention to her wound. The stupid man-thing’s bullet was still rolling around inside her flesh, the amount of blood rolling down her fur make her head dizzy. Washing it as best she could in the rover – the water thick with more blood – she bit off a part of her cloak, wrapping it around her shoulder and tying the two ends together. The pain was worse than any stab or cut she’d felt in her life, but at least the bleeding was slowing down.

“Time’s up!” the Warlock shouted, his voice somehow amplified by his obscuring mask. “Sprint-march, minions! Find the man-things! The Horned Rat demands retribution!”

The Warlock ordered the warband to assemble, and Skyseeker took up her spot in the depleted rearguard, her thoughts drifting to that man-thing with the feathered helmet. His mount had been so swift despite its immense size, and it gave her an idea. Such a speedy mount could cut down her travel time to the south significantly, all she had to do was get her hands on one – the lead rider’s would do. Of course, she didn’t know how to control a mount, but she had a tried and tested solution that always worked whenever she needed something to go her way – threaten it with death.

“Follow their man-stink!” the Warlock ordered, smacking a skavenslave that wandered out of formation. “But do not fight-attack until I say so! I am hatching a brilliant scheme, and it requires complete discretion! If I hear so much as a squeak, you will all die-die!”