Tuesday, March 6, 2018

Part 3

Dock 113
A Rogue Trader is the master of a warp capable vessel and one of the few individuals in the Imperium with significant control over their destiny, he is independent and powerful, with the firepower to destroy cities at his command and the wealth to buy them instead. He is in essence a foreign dignitary anywhere he visits and is usually treated as such.

That in mind, a visit from a Rogue Trader is rarely as spur of the moment as it might seem. Guards must be chosen, arrangements for travel made, in many cases wardrobes must be planned as well as deciding who gets to enter a room first. When traveling to a potentially hostile zone, such as a large spaceport that has been wracked with insurrection. Things are both simpler and harder.

The guards disembarked first, a squad of ten garbed in identical black carapace armor and armed with large bore shotguns, ideal for void station battles as their shells would wreak havoc on flesh in close quarters but would be unlikely to cause a hull breach. Security doesn't end there though, Lord Bale and his retinue were also armed as is the right of their station. Bale had a preference for sword and plasma pistol, and the others were armed and armored in accordance with their own predilictions, Sugar Glider with an unreasonably large solid round pistol, Tech-Priest Gaetan had a finely crafted military issue hellgun, usually seen in the hands of army stormtroopers, as a member of the Mechanicum cult it was certain he possessed other less obvious weapons as well. The Navigator was armed too, but probably more for the look of it than anything, Bale had never seen her shoot before and Navigators had their own more terrifying natural weapons to rely on anyway.

First impression of Dock 113 was that they just might need it, House Krin security teams and workers were busily moving corpses and repairing battle damage, obviously suffered within the last few hours. Some of the bodies bore gear and insignia representing several of Port Wanders competing factions, but others appeared to be civilian originally.

Bale began to suspect that Pultarch Norn might not be able to guarantee his safety after all, still, the security teams seemed competent enough, and the House Representative insisted that their escort would be sufficient, so they began walking, “A short trip only” he promised.

Bale got the feeling they should have just teleported and damn the protocol, he put on his helmet.

Their path took them through a large trading hall, in better times this would be full of active stalls, vendors selling all manner of goods and people looking for cargo or travel opportunities, now it was abandoned, without vessels moving there was no trade to be done, and with the ongoing riots it was dangerous even to attempt.

It came as no surprise to the party when the sounds of stampeding feet began to echo through the halls, growing louder quite swiftly.

“This is why I hate walking” Said Bale to no one in particular as they readied weapons.

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