The Liberation of Salem Part IV: Sell Swords Broken
The landing pad was secure and reinforcements began to pour down from the skies. The Chaplain knew that so long as the mercenaries were free, they could be used by the enemies of the Imperium to interfere with restoring His law. Therefore, before they could manifest in force again, they would need to be crushed. He assembled a short tactical squad, a devastator squad, scouts, and a Storm Talon, recently arrived from orbit. At Captain Sicarius’ insistence, he donned his terminator armor.
The Ultras advanced on the enemy encampment on the edge of the urban cluster, catching them by surprise. They were armed with several Chimeras, a platoon of troops equipped like guardsmen, and unfortunately, a Hydra.
The Storm Talon made short work of the Hydra as the scouts opened up on the closest squad of mercenaries, wounding the gunner. The devastator squad cut through the Chimera supporting that squad with their krak missiles. Unfortunately, the enemy opened up with everything and a lucky multi-laser shot took down the Storm Talon. It spiraled out of the sky and exploded-a grievous loss.
The second mercenary squad moved forward, as did another Chimera. The chaplain and two squad members took hits as they charged forward, intent on eliminating the squad in the middle. Meanwhile the scouts and devastators were less effective in their role. The devastators would need to report for range penance if they did not improve their aim!
The closest squad was cut down by bolter fire as the second Chimera advanced in retaliation. The mercenaries advanced under the cover of the pylons, taking snap shots at the chaplain and his men.
The chaplain and his squad rushed the Chimera, tossing their melta bombs and krak grenades. They damaged the behemoth but failed to destroy it. In return, the sergeant was cut down by the advancing mercenaries.
The chaplain turned and charged the mercenaries, losing one of the tac marines to blistering but desperate fire. In turn he and his remaining companion cut the traitors down. At last the devastators redeemed themselves and the remaining Chimera was destroyed. The leaders used the opportunity to slink away. Their threat was ended for now but the Chaplain was left with an uncomfortable feeling with them left behind as loose ends. Upon investigation, a strange device was found in the mercenaries’ camp. Clearly of foul Xenos origin, it emanated some form of mind control. It was logged and the information passed on before purging it. Meanwhile, above in the ship, systems continued to fail, hampering, but not stopping the flow of troops and materiel to the planet’s surface. It was time to focus on the true threat to Salem. It would be liberated in the Emperor’s holy name!
These guys have been a total nightmare. First I simply bit off more than I usually chew and getting up the gumption to do twenty was harder than usual. Add to that I have had primer issues with the bases (basically what do you do with primer that refuses to dry!!!???) so I had to rescrub those all down and try again. Clearly I only partially learned my lesson because a could still turned out bad. Then the shoulder icon decal on the meltagun guy has been a pain in the butt and I am going to have to go back and redo that somehow. Currently debating either freehanding it (which I suck at) or doing up a press mould. The other big time drain was working on this project:
My only New Year's resolution this year was to knock out some projects that I have had sitting around for some time. This was one of them. Like most of my stuff it is supposed to be a multi-function engine/pump. It would be at home at the heart of a starship engine room, part of a promethium processing field, or on the floor of a hive factory. Equally important is that it blocks terrain but also has some points figures can climb for high ground. Good to get that one off of my chest. Now I think I will brave my Thunderhawk rebuild.
