ARMEGGEDON EMPIRES (Post-Apocalypse Conquest Quest!)

You stood beside the human woman, your voice quiet.

"Are you sure about this? We don't force anyone to take the plunge," you said, quietly.

The woman woman - Nyra - rubbed her shoulders. She had come to the tribal keep in nothing but a shift and scrap sandals, riding one of the beasts that, even now, carried material and fuel pods in from the collectors to the west. Those supply lines were what now drove the entire Dergath tribe's logistic success - pack animals had been joined by a growing fleet of land vehicles. Not suited to combat and driven primarily by hordelings and the smallest dragon species, those trucks and cargo haulers and hummers were buzzing across the wastes, from the Crater to Black Mesa to Pump Station Zeta. It was how you were able to accomplish as much as you could...but it was all nakedly vulnerable. You knew, thanks to the Eye (what mutants had taken to calling the orbital spy sat that Casica had bequeathed the tribe) that no one was close...at least...no major army.

But you weren't sure if the other factions that were vying for the wasteland could match the drakons you had fielded. If they couldn't, then you could rest easy. If they could...

Well.

Then you'd worry.

Nyra nodded. "I'm sure," she said. "I'm tired of being weak."

You nodded back to her. She walked towards the vats, where mutant technicians waited. You watched as she walked to the metal scaffolding, then cast aside her shift. She stood, naked, before the gleaming vat, and then stepped forward into it. She plunged and then the technicans sealed it. You took a clipboard, checking - she had chosen the 9-Drill variation of the mutagen. It was a risky one - there were more proven mutagens, but 9-Drill had a chance of going far beyond the more stable mutagens. You nodded slightly.

It seemed Nyra was playing for keeps. You supposed that made sense.

You turned back, leaving her to her change - and went back to collect the data that Letash and Detar were sending home.

"You...weren't exaggerating..." Letash muttered as he put the binoculars to his eye, while Gorax knelt beside him. THe Chameleons were parked right at the edge of the xenopod heartland - the Pnakotic Wastes. The wastes here weren't the same thriving mutant ecology that Letash had grown to love. Instead, spindly green pods emerged from the ground, semi-transparent and covered with small horns that thrust off in each direction. Thick green webbing spread between them - and as Letash watched, he saw that there were human settlements among them. He swung the view over one of them. Corrugated metal, rusted and left to decay in the sun, with half a dozen humans laying about. They looked emaciated, their eyes blank. But they still breathed. As he watched, a beetle-like green thing scuttled into the village, flanked by several xenopods.

A xenopod stood at about six, seven feet. Rippling muscle. Green skinned. Long tentacles, emerging from their face and occluding their mouth. Their skulls were elongated, as if to contain all the malign intelligence in their bodies. They carried bone-weapons, like someone had carved hooks and spikes from some massive beast's discarded ribs. As Letash watched, a pair of xenopods hooked a human body, then swung it onto the back of the beetle thing - heaping it up. Another checked a human woman, then waved his hand. The woman stood, then walked away - jerkily. Letash was glad to not see where she ended up behind the ruins.

"I can't wait for Casica to get here," Gorax growled. "Humans don't deserve this."

"Yeah, I-" Letash paused. "Shit. Shit! Shit!"

"What?" Gorax asked.

"There!" Letash pointed and the two Chameleons peered - Letash handing Gorax the binoculars.

"Shit," Gorax hissed.

Through the binoculars, the Chameleon could see it: A pair of figured, immense, striding across the grounds in a patrol. Both were gleaming green, covered with armored carapace, and between twenty and thirty feet tall. Thick tentacles emerged from its back, carrying immense weaponry. Anti-vehicle spore guns. Anti-infantry misters. Automatic bone launchers. And the only thing worse than the first biomecha was the biomecha behind it. Swarming around it were xenomorph warforms - burly xenopods carrying biolaunchers. Several had even larger brain-cases than the others. And behind them were bioforms that had quadrupedal frames, with bony barrels and heavy testicular carrying harnesses full of hideous green orbs.

"Devastator, Corruptor, brute infantry, spore launchers, and I think a psyker squad," Gorax grumbled, quietly.

"Can Casica take them?" Letash asked.

"Not a chance in hell." Gorax sighed. "We need to get the message back to the Warmaster."

"Wait, wait, wait," Letash said, pointing.

The village was showing signs of motion. Something...vast and hideous was there. Bulbous. Egg-sacks, straining on the edges of a soft, sluglike body, with a faintly humanoid torso rising from the center, spined, bladed claws reaching from it...from her. Groax hissed, softly. "It's one of their queens," he said, quietly. "They don't direct the hive - their intelligence is a gestalt. But the queen is loaded with the biological information that helps to guide their eggs. The Queen makes sure that eggs grow up into big bad monsters, not into simple thralls or...us." He chuckled, grimly.

"...how many do they have?" Letash asked, frowning. "On this planet, I mean. Not across the, uh, galaxy?"

"One, why?" Gorax asked.

Letash stood, turning to his Chameleons. "We have a chance, mutants," he said, firmly. "To pull a major fang right out of the Xenos. It'll be dangerous...but we have the chance. So, we're going to do it. We sneak in close - then we unload everything we have into that Queen. Then we fade and we fade fast."

Gorax was looking at Letash with a wide eyed expression. Then the old mutant did the same math that non-commissioned officers had done since well before humanity knew the lights in the skies were other stars. He weighed the plans of his officer, and he chose between clubbing him to death to save everyone in the platoon's life, and following the orders. Gorax grunted, then bellowed. "Come on, 'lons, lets get invisible!"

The first sign that something was wrong for the Queen came when a psyker bodyguard's neck burst open, blood streaming into the fetid air of the Pnakotic Wastes, as Gorax drew his dagger across its green throat. Two more psykers were dropped by similarly brutal means - as other Chameleons stepped past prone, empty eyed humans. Letash was the first to step out and find himself unexpectedly close to the Queen - who was busy implanting a hissing, wriggling larva into the body of a half-dead human. The Queen turned her gaze upon Letash as Letash froze. A psychic boom echoed inside of the mutant's mind.

One of the traitors. Kneel.

The booming voice rebounded inside of Letash's mind as he froze - the other Chameleons around him standing perfectly still, their eyes widened. Letash tried to move his finger - but it felt as if his finger had become steel, trapped inches from the curved trigger of his submachine gun. The weapon was toylike and small in his hands - but it was the only thing in the world that might save him. He trembled as the Queen started to slither closer.

Your kind thinks you're free...but submission is in your very genetics. You are of the Hive. You are mine. Kneel.

The voice hit Letash like a hammer. His finger twitched as he trembled...and if he had carried a weapon made for a mutant, he might have died. But the submachine gun was an ancient human kind, barely able to fit into his massive hands. A small twitch of his finger went further than it would have gone for a human - and so his submachine gun chattered and rattled. Five bullets thudded into the Queen's chest, green blood spurting. The psychic command became an audible screech as the Queen reared backwards and Letash found himself able to move.

"Open fire!" He shouted and twelve other Chameleons started to fire. Bullets thudded into carapace and tore into flesh. Green blood went flying and the claws sparked as the Queen lifted her hand to try and protect herself - but one of her fingers clipped in half as more and more bullets thudded into her. The last shriek made Letash's nose bleed as his submachine gun went dry, clicking loudly.

But the Queen laid on the ground, shredded into a green-red smear of gore.

"...fuck," one of his Chameleons muttered.

"I think we got her," Letash said, slowly. "Master's balls, we fucking did it."

A distant siren howl echoed out across the Pnakotic wastes. Letash lifted his head - and saw the two distant biomecha were turning towards their direction. Letash turned invisible, his skin shimmering as he matched the surrounding landscape.

Without a word, the Chameleons loped away.

You watched as the hand emerged from the vat. You tensed, not sure what else would come. Then, with glistening slowness, the woman who had once been Nyra emerged - not as a human, but as a mutant. Broad, rippling shoulders, long arms, slightly elongated head, orange-red skin, and fierce yellow eyes. She was as naked as she had been in the vat, and dripping with vatslime, as she swung herself out and over, then dropped to the ground before you. She stood and came up to your height, her hands brushing through her sopping wet black hair. "Oh that feels good," she said, laughing softly.

"I'm glad you came out," you said, dryly, offering her a towel. She took it. "The mutagen you chose was risky."

"Maybe for others. I have more willpower," she said, smirking.

"Lets see what you can do," you said, quietly.

"Oh, I know what I can do," she said, her smirk growing deeper. "I want to earn my name, Warmaster."

"Oh?" you asked, quietly.

And Nyra laid out how she would earn her mutant name.

And you had to admit...

She had ambition to go with her shoulders.

The mountain base of the Fist of the Wasteland loomed in the center of all - and from the carved balcony, General Fisk watched as his dreams came closer and closer to fruition. His grin grew across his craggy feature as he placed the heavy gauntlets of his power armor rested on the railing. He remembered the first time he had donned the Mark-2 Annihilator class suit, constructed centuries before to try and stem the onslaught of not one but two alien factions bent on exterminating all life on Earth. He smirked, his goatee rustling in the wind. His Doombringer regiments had cast aside the last of the old Republic's stupidity and short sightedness, and with Vault-13 under his command, he could begin to expand.

His vision was to the east. Always to the east. The Emperor of Man sat in his palace, doing the busy work of tricking every human that he could that serving him was worthy - his tanks and his armies roved further than their actual abilities could truly allow. He had already obliterated a few of them with lightning strikes from his vastness.

Yes.

Yes.

The Fist had it all. He simply had to reach out and take it.

He grinned, slightly, then winced slightly as something winked from the wasteland. He frowned, peering out at the deserts, wondering what it was.

He was still wondering what it was right at the moment a spinning, high caliber round struck his left eye. He ceased wondering in the infinitesimal moment between his eyeball rupturing and the back of his bald head exploding behind him. His body twitched, and the WALDOS in his power armor took those twitches and magnified them - sending his entire two ton carcass hurtling over the side of the balcony, where a Doombringer regiment was doing parade practice in their power armor. He didn't squish so much as he clanged and the Doombringer stood perfectly still.

Laying on her belly, a mile and a half away, the woman who had been Nyra tucked her rifle back onto her back and smirked.

If I know cults, she thought.

The sounds of gunfire started.

And I do, she thought. I'll give it...three days?

And so, three days later, she stepped in through the unguarded front doors of the Fortress of the Fist and found Doombringer bodies, some daubed with makeshift insignia, some shot in the back, scattered here and there. She came to the Fist's throneroom, where a Doombringer sat on the throne, feaverish and manic. "General Trevor...you'll send the forces to Vault-13...tell them! Tell them I'm in command!" the Doombringer said, frantically. "I...I didn't kill General Trevor, did I?" He was looking at a body who was sprawled on the ground, shot in hte back. "I'm in command! I'm in-"

His head snapped back as Nod, her name well and truly chosen, shot him with her rifle.

The fourth to last Doombringer pitched forward - the other three having fled into the wastes as convulsions of war and strife consumed their little would be empire.

Nod shook her head. "That's why you wear a fucking helmet. Dipshits." She spat on the ground.

---
Well! Good news, bad news! Good news: YOU DID IT!



Nod's slayer ability means she kills on 1+ wound, so, yeah, rest in pepperoni General Fisk. (His backstory is entirely made up by me to explain why he's here.) Normally, he sets off an atomic bomb when he's defeated, but, uh...if he's assassinated, he doesn't. Making this victory card EXTREMELY sarcastic.



Meanwhile, Letash saw a chance and took it. See, the AI (and sometimes, me, the player) will send an unescorted hero out. They're easy to move (1 AP, 3 movement speed) and they can build resource collectors! It's NOT a bad strategy if you think you can get away with it! ...the Xenos just didn't know Letash was RIGHT THERE. Sooooooo



This won't cripple the Xenopods, but it does vastly reduce their supply lines AND when they evolve an egg unit, it rolls 1d20 for what kind of monster it is. Well, without the Queen, they don't get a +4 modifier to it! Which is good for you, a 20+ roll result gets an Abomination, which can 100% solo entire armies sometimes.

Unfortunately for easy victory plans, Letash also found that the they had a much stronger army than anticipated (this is because Letash rolls 5 dice for observation, not just the 1 die of the Eye.) Still, without the Fist, you're free to operate in the center of the wastelands.

What are your plans, warmaster?

Homefront plans
[ ] Get the biggest dragons on the field, then get the best technologists on the field, and start buffing the hell out of them.
[ ] Focus purely on Drakkons to maintain our air supremacy - but also, get the best technologists on the field and start buffing the hell out of them.
[ ] Write In

Field Plans (Choose as many as make sense)
[ ] Take the Dragon Pens with Pax
[ ] Take Vault-13 First with Pax
[ ] Take the Air Field with Pax
[ ] Use Pax for defense/resource operations
[ ] Take the dragon pens with Casica
[ ] Take Vault-13 with Casica
[ ] Take the Air Field with Casica
[ ] Use Casica for defense/resource operations
[ ] Write In

Oh, and what's Nod going to do?
[ ] Hunt human leaders
[ ] Hunt machine leaders
[ ] Hunt xenopod leaders
[ ] wait patiently - no need to risk her neck yet.

(See, hunting leaders in a headquarters can be kinda dangerous, if they have scouts there, since they can hunt you and find you. Sometimes, the best time to assassinate someone is when the generals' on the march - but of course, the hard part is finding htem.)

Fun fact, though!
Say an army has, like, 5 units and a general. If you assassinate that general, every single unit's stats are HALVED because the max units you can have on a stack is 2 without a leader! (3 if you're human.)

Letash knew that his plan had failed when the first shout came.

"PODSHIP!"

"Ah shit," Letash hissed as he turned, while Gorax bellowed to the other Chameleons.

"Down! Down! Do-"

The podship was a hideous green bulbous thing, flying through the air like the world's most ungainly helicopter. If Letash had had a missile...but he didn't. He had to watch as the bone-nose that thrust from its belly began to stutter. Brilliant ultraviolet lasers streaked along the ground, leaving behind hissing molten glass. Three Chameleons immolated in seconds, screaming. Others dove for cover - but it was almost too late. The first of the spore mortars came in later, drifting down like seed pods blown on the wind. Gorax shouted.

"Don't shoot them! Move slowly, they react to movement-"

One of the Chameleons was not quite slow enough. She backed away hurriedly as the spore mortar pod drifted to her. It burst. She shrieked as acid doused her body and fell, trembling. More pods burst with wet Splop noises. But no one else shrieked, or screamed, or swore. But that didn't matter: They were doing their job.

They were keeping them still.

"Here they come!" Gorax shouted.

The first of the biomecha crested the hill. They remained at a distance.

It was the brutes that went in first.

Sprinting forward against the light submachine gun fire that Letash and Gorax managed to organize against them. One or two fell, but the burly, squid-headed xenopod infantry were carrying bone sculpted laser cannons of their species own design. Bioelectric discharges sent mutant men and women diving for cover - those that it didn't sear to pieces. The drones fanned outwards, and before Letash knew it, he was being shot at from left, from the right. "Fall back!" he shouted. "Gor-"

He stopped as he saw that Gorax had fallen silent - the upper half of his head missing, steam rising from above his jaw. The Chameleon laid sprawled on the ground as Letash hissed softly, then lifted his submachine gun. He fired at a Brute that was sprinting toward his cover, turned as invisible as he could, wriggled backwards. He saw more of his comrades fighting from a rock outcropping across a quick gulley. He sprinted, his body rippling with terror and fear.

He never saw the Drute that drew a bead on him.

Letash hit the ground, skidded. He hissed as he fell onto his chest. Through pain bleary eyes, he saw a spore mortar pod land on the outcropping. His last Chameleons screamed - but not for long. A bare Xenopod foot kicked at his back and swung him onto his back. The Xenopod general loomed over him, tentacles writhing.

I am S'lugpha... the creature's mind-voice rang in Letash's mind. Do you have any final screams for the hive?

Letash spat. The spittle ended up smearing on his cheek. "Fuck you, squiddy."

S'lugpha drew a bone spur pistol.

It's said these spurs are the most agonizing death a sentient can experience, gene-traitor. I intend to savor every second...only the best for a Queen slayer.

Letash tried to grab at a grenade. The only problem was he didn't have any. He closed his eyes and tensed. Tried to prepare himself for what was coming.

Letash found that S'lugpha had been underestimating the spur-gun.

A MoRV-IV Leopard was one of the fastest tanks that the Empire of Man could build. With advanced sensors and communications gear, a platoon of them could scout immense amounts of the Wasteland. For Staff Sergeant Tenja Karr, it was also fifteen thousand kilometers past its used by date, badly in need of an overhaul, and painfully low on fuel. She put her binoculars to her eyes, peering to the northeast, and turned to her pilot, Private Bente.

"Private, you know what I fucking hate about command?"

"No, Staff," Bente said, brushing his broad helmet backwards as he sat in the hatch of the Leopard-I. "What do you hate about command?"

"Their maps are shit," Karr said, turning back. "See that? That's the fucking airbase they've been sending us after."

"Yeah, what about it Staff?"

"It's northeast. We came at it from the west. They sent us round in a fucking loop!"

Bente nodded.

"Think we're going to find a water carrier before the canines run out?" he asked.

"If we don't, I'll just find a sand-worm and strangle it to death. You can drink sand worm blood. Hows that sound?" Karr asked, scrambling up onto the side of the Leopard-I. She slapped the top of the hull and Bente swung himself back into the driving seat, closing the hatch with a clang. Karr tapped her microphone.

"This is TF Phoenix-1 Actual to the rest of the task force - we're moving out now. And I-"

A dark shape shadowed the air ahead of her. Karr looked up. Being a Staff Sergeant, she was far beyond the human concept of nervousness and fear - but that didn't mean she was immune to shock. Seeing the big lizards that sometimes roosted in the western mountains flying in even chevrons and formation was not what she had expected. She gaped up at them, then shook her head as a whole platoon of the damn things arced around - swinging around and beginning to land ahead of her. "Dragon, front! HP!" She shouted.

"Hollow point!" Her loader shouted - and with a whirr CLUNK, the main gun of the Leopard loaded.

"On the way!" Sergeant Xira shouted.

The Leopard bucked as smoke blew around the barrel and the whole tank rocked backwards. The other three tanks in the platoon opened fire at the same time - and the shells whizzed out, thudding into the dust and sand as the dragons loped forward. Bullets began to ping off the armor of the Leopard, and Staff Sergeant Karr realized something.

The dragons had guns.

"Reverse," Karr barked into her radio. "Reverse!"

The tanks started to drive backwards. A dragon winged upwards as the coaxial machine gun started chattering. It landed on the side of the tank, and with a scream of metal, its claws ripped the hatch right off. Karr yanked her pistol from her coveralls without thinking, and then yelped as she was grabbed and hauled from the turret of her tank. Her helmet was knocked off her head and she saw stars as something metal slammed into her at some point during the transition from turret to bright, brilliant sunlight. She strained, got her arm free, and aimed it right at the dragon's snout.

The pistol roared as the dragon jerked its head aside at the last second - so the bullet drew a fierce line along its brow. Then her wrist was grabbed and the pistol yanked from her fingers.

"Well, now," a booming, male voice spoke. "Nice piece."

Staff Sergeant Karr glared venom up at the immense man that sat across the back of the dragon - the sounds of gunfire, screaming metal and screaming men having stopped for the moment.

"General Pax," the mutant said, lifting his chin - sharp bone spurs glittering in the sunlight. "I will take your surrender."

"Staff Sergeant Tenja Karr, Task Force Phoenix, 3rd Company, 5th Legion, Serial number 88-113A-22B. That's all I gotta tell you, mutie."

"Indeed it is," Pax said, sounding amused. He took his radio. "Lt. Vakash, do we have the airbase?"

"We do sir," a rumbling, female voice came from the radio.

Pax nodded. "I think next stop we have is the Dragon Pens." He looked down at Karr, then chuckled. "Maybe they'll have a vat."

Tenja Karr knew, for a fact, she didn't like the sound of that.

Nod lay on her belly, her sniper rifle perched against her rifle. Her eyes were narrowed as she peered through it at the xenopod army on the march. And that was the only word for it. It was streaming straight southwest, shooting past the troop-pod that was, even now, under siege from Casica and her Wasteland Rangers. It was entirely possible the xenopods didn't even know the pod was there - they had, after all, not had a living scout in this area since Letash...poor heroic Letash...had put out their eyes.

But that scout had come terribly close to the Mutant Headquarters.

That meant they knew where it was.

The army was heading right there.

She saw that there were two xenopods that were in the center of this swarming mass of infantry - there was the general, who was clearly in charge of everything. He was the one directing the biomecha, the spore carriers, the infantry, all with a fierce and driving ambition. They would get far and fast under him. The other lurked among the psykers, and took samples from every living thing they passed. A geneticist, she was sure of it.

Well.

Nod had earned her name by knocking down the Fist.

Time to earn it thrice more.

She sighted in on the general. He was standing near one of his biomecha, his hand lifted, psychic energy shimmering around his fingers. He snapped his head, suddenly, to the side, looking directly at her.

Don't-

The word echoed in her mind.

She pulled the trigger at the same moment.

The xenopod's head snapped backwards and he dropped. The entire army seemed to shudder as she swung her scope through it. The geneticst was looking around in confusion.

The rifle bucked against her shoulder again. The xenopod's next best choice for a leader in the army jerked, his spindly green fingers reaching up to his chest, his tentacles writhing in pain. Blood streamed between his fingers. Nod pulled the trigger again. He was flung backwards and hit the ground. The entire army stood perfectly still - then Nod got up and began to run.

They never found where she had been.

Pax flew down towards the Dragon Pens and whistled. The orbital observations had not done them justice: Huge, organic structures rising from the wastelands, with dragons peering from every niche, watching them as they came down. And standing before it was a mutant - bald, red skinned, tall and broad shouldered. Pax sprang off Rikal, and let out a booming laugh.

"Doctor Vrull!" he exclaimed. "What in the nine pits of a xenopod's stomach are you doing here?"
"Pax!" the huge mutant laughed. "Oh my goodness, I thought it was some savage marauder come to visit me!"

He threw his arms around Pax, hugging him tightly, then drew back. "Is that the Dergath tribe colors you're wearing?" Vrull asked.

"That it is, my old friend," Pax said. "I see no tribe's color on you...what are you doing out here?"

"I was sent forth from Yelash for..." Vrull made a face. "Politics. I don't care about votes and who gets the most snouts counted and who impresses what Warleader. I just wished to care for my children." He turned back, looking at the dragons, his eyes gentle and warm. He smiled slightly. "And I have done some great things."

"You can do far more with us," Pax said, nodding. "Come...I have a lot to tell you."

And he and Vrull headed into the building.

Outside, the Imperial prisons were looking nervous.

'...you sure you're not going to eat us?" Sergeant Xira muttered to Rikal.

"I'm getting increasingly tempted," Rikal growled.

Casica swore. "Ah shit."

That was all the time the Wasteland Rangers had before their camp faced the same thing faced by many a besieger when the enemy was desperate: A sally. In this case, the entire Scourge platoon came pounding from the headquarters of Volitilus. A Scourge was an anthroform robot of about three meters in height, with two arms, both equipped with heavy laser cutters and a pair of sharp, stabbing tentacles emerging from their shoulder blades. They sprinted right at the Wasteland Rangers.

The Rangers had been ready.

Each Ranger was clad in MOB-II-A power armor, with a DK-98 Particle Gun, and more importantly, they were well trained and well prepared. Heavy gauntlets clicked into place as Casica joined the firing line - and then her command cracked out. "Light em up!"

Particle beams strobed across the desert and slammed into the Scourges. One melted under Casica's weaponry, and another, and another - but then the first of the Scourges leaped over the parapet of their fortifications. It landed on the Ranger next to Casica and, within seconds, had slit the woman's throat by slamming the tentacles into the thin visor slit, working through with monomolecular precision, then slashed. The faceplate filled with blood as Casica swore.

"Motherfucker!" She grabbed onto the Scourge, then flung it off. It smashed into the wall as her Ranger dropped. Casica thrust the barrel of her DK-98 into the robot's chest, then fired upwards. The beam exploded out of its dome, and it dropped with hiss as more Rangers swore and screamed.

Casica thundered along the line, bellowing orders. "Squad-9, bring up more guns! Squad-10, Squad-11, you're free to flank! We can't let them keep getting into the frotifications!" She grabbed a Ranger who had been knocked over up, glancing over his hissing, molten shoulder pauldron. She grunted. "Use the gun left handed and suppress the fuckers!"

"Lt. Commander!" the Ranger gasped out.

Casica stepped up to the firing line again. She saw more Scourges sprinting - these ones aiming for the other platoon. She leveled her rifle and started to spray more high energy bolts down on the robots. One twitched, then fell. Another two got over the wall. Screams rang out - but so did more stuttering weapons fire. Then...
Silence.

"All Rangers advance!" Casica shouted.

The entire platoon - with only a few ragged, obvious holes - surged forward. Black painted armor thundered forward as what few Scourges were left peppered them with bolts of hissing plasma energy. Casica was near the front of the line as she shouldered through the doorway. Two Scourges were there. One lashed at her with a tentacle. Casica ducked, shouldered it down and turned to the other - only to see three of her Rangers were at her side, peppering it with beams of energy. She started forward as beamfire and crunching metal filled the troop pod.

A scream of fury rang out.

"Die die, human scum!"

A spider of gleaming metal dropped from the ceiling. Casica sprang backwards. Volitilus dropped onto the ground before her, squealing with insane fury.

Casica did what she did with most spiders.

She lifted her boot.

And she brought it smashing down with a crunch.

Crater-1 was not the most exciting place to be in the wasteland.

Tak Tak didn't mind that. The tiny hordeling technician - like most hordelings - thought fear was something that happened to other people. But what she did like way more than battlefields was tech. And Crater-1 was where THE tech was happening. Oh sure, the tribal keep in the center of the heartlands had just gotten some fancy new intelligence center that was going to better organize everything. Sure! Sure! And yes, Casica and her Wasteland Rangers had just captured a whole factory-ship from the Machines. Or from independents? It wasn't clear to Tak Tak and Tak Tak didn't care, really.

But Crater-1?

That was where mutants did for mutants. The ancient city was being mined, yes, but there were also factories. Facilities that were building new guns, new ammo, more trucks, more transports. Fuel pods and solar collectors. Cable! Cable, cable! there was so much cable, and there was enough energy to juice the cable to run transmissions throughout Dergath lands - it was what gave them such an operational and logistic capacity. They were running scouts and a com-sat network and two armies in the field and-

"Hey, Tak Tak!" A burly mutant from the Gen-3 line asked. "You worried about the xenopod army they're talking about?"

"Horde Thuul?" Tak Tak asked. 'Nah, it's a hundred clicks away and has no leader. Barely operational. Not worth worrying about."

The burly mutant nodded. "What about the clankers?"

"Clankers? Have you even SEEN a Clanker?" Tak Tak asked. "I'm beginning to think that there might be none left."

"Gurlghhh..." the burly mutant said.

Tak Tak scowled. "Glugh?" she asked. "What the fuck kind of...ques..."

The mutant dropped.

His head did not.

The spinal column continued to glisten in the air as shimmering air rippled behind him and a seven foot tall woman made of gleaming silver and steel stood there. Her hair was long, dreadlocked, and her face was a seamless death's mask that common to Machine Intelligence mobile units. Her left arm was no hand at all - but rather, a blunt double barreled energy weapon. Her right hand held a knife, which she had used to sever and rip and tear...

The mutant's head dropped as Tak Tak blinked, then said. "What's your name?" she asked.

"Diaboliqua," the Machine said, her voice a hissing, clicking recreation of a human's voice.

"What are you doing here?" Tak Tak asked.

"Extermination."

"Oh," Tak Tak said, frowning as the twin barrels swung around. She scowled slightly. "Well, that's-"

You sat in the new intelligence offices, surrounded by serious faced mutants, and regarded the operations map.

You knew, now, what it meant to be on the knife's edge.

Crater-1 was gone. In a single day, in an orgy of violence, the most famous assassin in the Machine Intelligence had struck and butchered almost every single mutant there by herself. Unarmed civilians had had no chance. But if she got to the headquarters, then she would target...everyone she could. You had seen the reports on her.

She was as good as Nod. And unlike Nod...she was here.

Detar and her chameleons were rushing towards the Crater as fast as they could. They might even reach it before Diaboliqua escaped - but even if they did get there, would they catch her?

But operations beyond your heartland were equally as dangerous. Casica had taken the Troop Pod - but the issue remained that while you were swimming in material, it was mutants you lacked. The xenopod army that was bypassing Casica was dangerous enough that it could defeat either or even both of your armies, even without a general. You simply lacked the force to defeat it.

But...

You looked at the map, frowning.

If this worked...

But was it the best choice?

You rubbed your chin.

Before you was a choice. Pax was too far, and Dr. Vull would not fully join your tribe until you had sent enough resources and mutants (again, what you lack) to help run his dragon farm. Once he did...well, once he did, you would be ready for the world. But surviving until then was the hard part.

Terrain bought you time. But did you have ENOUGH time?

Casica.

Casica was the fulcrum. A human without a home. Wasteland Rangers - their numbers bolstered by a few un-dipped humans and extra material that you had sent them in exchange for their valor and skill in battle - and a single human general. They had the supply and the speed to curve up and strike right into the Pnakotic Wastes. With the Hive slain, with the Wastes taken, with the humans there liberated to be dipped or to be vassals, then the xenopod army would simply cease moving, their motive intelligence drained away. They would die within a week, dropping from dehydration and ennui alike.

But could Casica do it?

Or should you try bringing her home - to defend the Homeland with your Slaughterers and the defensive fortifications you had?

"We're on a knife's edge," you murmured.

"Your orders, Warmaster?" Mitoch hissed, in eerie unison.

---
SO! Pax took out some Imp recon and took the airbase. The munitions there can't be used by you, but the imperials won't get them. Casica took the troop-pod. Your resource income is now 3 material, 6 fuel, 3 tech...AND ONE HUMAN PER TURN. However, thanks to your bases throughout the wasteland, you have enough supply to reach EVERY INCH OF THE MAP save the absolute corners and the rocky southeast. You can reach the headquarters of each faction.

But Pax? He's in a dragon roost that is not current in your control, so he can't airdrop. (It costs 2 human, 2 material and 2 tech to hire Dr. Vrull and his dragons.)

Detar has no options. She has to hunt Diaboliqua, or else your hero units are HOSED.

But Casica?

It all comes down to Casica...

The Xenopods have a single unit defending their home...and it's a doozy.



If the Rangers can take out this SINGLE UNIT, then they take the xenopod headquarters and the hive mind is DONE.

But if they don't...you have nothing but your Slaughterers versus this entire army.



Their stats are halved because they don't have a general. So, Casica with Slaughterers as backup COULD do it...maybe...



So, warmaster?

Your orders?

[ ] Roll the iron dice. Send Casica to attack the Wastes
[ ] Bring Casica home to defend.