Somewhere in Turgia, there is a town. It has a name, but everyone is too fucked up to remember it. It ain't easy being a mining town, so they must numb the pain. That's where drugs come in. Lots of them, and then some more.
R.I.P rangers make their rounds here, often buying some drugs for themselves. It's common sense really. Mining towns have the good shit. Parties are frequent, straight arrows don't belong here.
One such party goer sits against a building. She is waking up after one hel of a binger.
"Ugh."
A harsh glare strikes Omega's eyes. The sun is waking up, and it makes her want to puke. Being hungover is bad enough. Without her spectacled helmet, she has no way of blocking out the radiant onslaught. It increases by the minute, as dawn illuminates the miserable mining town.
"Crikey."
She is definitely going to vomit now. Throwing the raspirator off her face in the nick of time,her projectile barf hits a wandering dwarf centre mass. He slips and breaks his leg in half. Ouch!
The dwarf stands up on one leg. "Poota!"
She watches the dwarf hop away. She struggles to stand, her head ready to split like overripe fruit. She needs painkillers, and her bosom's weight in water. Maybe even more? Her hydration could use some work.
She wobbles around the town, looking for a solution to the pain. The buildings are ramshackle, barely holding together. One seems poised to collapse in the distance.
After a few minutes of aimless wandering, she stumbles upon a stall run by a shady looking man. An irritated crowd of miners, whores and the occasional child huddle around his kiosk, ready to spend their hard earned krôm on the good shit.
Time flies. The line shortens in front of her, and lengthens behind her. When it's finally her turn, she's greeted a bit too loudly.
"Name's Biggy Boffy, wanna buy some fucking drugs?!" the man has a rusty raspirator that reeks of ziggy. The whites of his grey eyes have a slight pink tinge. Omega can't recall what narcotic causes that, if any at all.
I miss my lore puppy.
Shaking off thoughts of white hair draped over porcelain skin, Omega puts both hands on the counter, trying to look cool. She knows what she needs. Painkillers, the strongest kind.
"Can I buy some drugs?"
A murmur flows through the crowd. Omega catches on to her verbal mistake a bit too late to stop what happens next. A disgruntled miner cuts the line, and slams his filthy hand on the table.
"She's right!"
Omega desperately tries to diffuse the situation. "Hold on-"
"NO MORE HOLDING ON!" he screams, pounding his chest with revolutionary fervour. "There was a time were any man, woman and child of any mankind could buy drugs of all shapes and fuckery! Now..." he grabs one of the vials and narrows his eyes. Judging by the metallic hissing from his raspirator, the anger isn't going anywhere.
"Instead, you peddle this milky shit at double the price! Two kaggs of krôm for one vial? HAH!" The crowd is starting to get agitated, and some even brandish their weapons.
"Look, I just wanted to-"
BANG goes a pistol! A random boy tried to shoot Biggy Boffy in the face, but the bullet pinged off the metal sign, hitting Omega in the upper arm! Despite hitting her in the bicep, the bullet merely broke the skin. A mere surface wound from a direct hit? It falls to the ground, flattened and...
"Blue...blood?!" Biggy Boff cries. In a blind panic, he turns the dial of some strange device and runs away before Omega has even finished reacting to the bullet.
"...ow."
Omega looks at her arm, confused. She has officially reacted to being shot...and now she's being shot at, stabbed at, punched at by a frenzied mob of frenzied miners. All they do is break skin, but it hurts all the same.
They keep at it. Punching, shooting, stabbing. Knives break, bullets flatten, fists break. And through it all, Omega sobers up completely. Out comes her kukri, and to work she goes.
Disembowelling.
Decapitation.
Stabbing and chopping.
Bloody murder.
The final thrasher jumps on her back like an amped up falcoda. Nails break, teeth shatter against Omega's unyielding muscles. Skin breaks easily though. Omega grimaces, finally reaching the end of her patience. She falls backward, landing hard on the ground with the thrasher still attached. It takes the brunt of the fall. Pinned by her bulk, the thrasher can do nothing but flail when Omega stabs him blindly until he stops moving.
She takes a moment to catch her breath. Several cuts and bruises on her skin, while only surface level, start stinging fiercely once the adrenaline of combat wears off.
Omega rises with a groan. She looks at the dead thrasher...
A boy, no more than twelve. In hindsight, his frame did feel kind of little. Her mind plunges into a dark place, unbidden.
Jack, make it stop.
...
They won't stop crying.
...
Their little necks snap as they land.
...
JACK, HELP ME!
She shakes her head free of the ancient guilt, punching in numbers on her bracer-tulva.
+++ RING / RING +++
...
+++ RING / RING +++
...*click*
A tired kazanjin with a brazen eye appears on the glitchy screen. There is drool in his neat beard, his bed head comical to Omega's eyes.
"What does the sun dream of when the sky is orange?"
Omega ignores Krow's question and gets down to business. "I'm in pursuit. Bring the Interceptor to town." she closes the tulva, looking at the distant building Biggy ran towards. The only significant landmark in this forgettable clusterfuck.
Biggy Boffy didn't get very far. He sprained his angle, then twisted his ankle. While he did make it to the front of his new benefactor's compound, he remains stuck near the entrance. Immobile and in pain.
Don't worry, it gets worse for him. Heavy, angry footsteps getting louder and louder thud rapidly behind him. He turns his head, then yelps in fear. Omega sprints towards him with alarming speed. He cannot crawl away fast enough. She's right in front of him in seconds. Her glare digs holes into him sure as any bullet. He urinates.
"I can explain, bronze! When a drug peddler and a deal they can't refuse love each other very-"
Omega kneels down on him, landing her knee directly on his chest. He goes "OOF", writhing like a worm caught in acid rain.
"Talk." her demand confuses him. When he doesn't answer, she applies more pressure to his chest.
"Agh! Brazen brutality!"
"You reckon?" she grabs his groin, firmly.
"You don't u-understan-STAND, bronze! This thing ain't manly, it's a creature from hel, is too! He'll-"
Omega proceeds to squeeze. She fully intends to turn her vice grip into a fist, regardless of Biggy's feelings on the matter. Finally, he cracks. "This thing called Dresin, offered me riches!"
She releases some pressure, though not entirely. "Go on."
"We're talking the kind of ka-chunks that'd make the snobbiest scags lick their folds!"
"Grody."
"He told me to sell this milk to the town! I had no choice, the krôm was good and I have seven kids to fee-"
Omega punches him in the face to shut him up. Standing up, she grabs him by the scruff, and punches him again. His nose broken, Biggy Boffy begs for mercy. "Please, I'll sell you some fucking drugs. The real shit, not this milky slop he fausted on me!"
Omega looks at the building ahead of her. It's some kind of factory, old enough to have seen the Bedlam. Pipes filled with white, milky liquid pump into a central processor which then goes into a distributor...or so I reckon.
"Do me a solid, scag." She lifts Biggy Boffy up, pulls out a container of milky, minty-green liquid, and shoves it into his reluctant hands.
"What's this?" he asks. She doesn't answer.
"Pour this into those milk pipes."
"After the processor?" Biggy Boffy offers, perceiving a flaw in her plan. Omega nods, crossing her arms. She waits while he does the thing, as stealthily as he can. When he returns, he meekly asks to be let go.
"Yeah, piss off."
Biggy Boffy runs off, and Omega waits for her backup.
A while later, the roar of thundering engines blares in the distance behind her. Finally.
The interceptor careens into town with reckless abandon, drives off a bendy ramp, corkscrews through the air, crashes upside down, slides forwards with a pained screech and crashes violently into a building which then explodes.
"Oh, for fuck’s sake Krow..."
Omega jogs towards the burning building, unphased by the golden explosions. She punches in numbers on her wrist-pad, and it beeps in acceptance, Runes appearing on the screen.
+++ Salvage Request Accepted. Ghast Inbound +++
Krow crawls out of the interceptor, his legs bent at unnatural angles. Despite this, he stands up and hold his side in the most melodramatic display Omega has seen today. "The strands of fate have me, pardner."
He walks over to her on broken legs, falling into her waiting arms theatrically, tears streaming down his cheeks.
"Hold me close, Ohm. It’s getting dark!"
He turns his head away.
COUGH
COUGH COUGH COUGH
COUGH
"Where’s your rasp-"
Krow snaps his head back to face her, breaking the sound barrier in the process. Crikey, that’s loud!
"Tell Giddy I won’t be making it home for our Tard-Wrangler tournament!"
COUGH
COUGH COUGH COUGH
COUGH
"Tell Scat she’s stiff and smelly!"
COUGH
COUGH COUGH
COUGH COUGH
"Tell Scotty I know he's a doctor, I just need his help with something."
"...who's Scott-"
COUGH
COUGH COUGH
COUGH COUGH COUGH
COUGH COUGH
COUGH
COUGH
FART
SHIT
"Gesundheit."
Krow throws his head back, dead. Omega drops him like a sack of potatoes, her sigh floating towards the steppes. She punches in numbers, adding to the previous request.
+++ Solid copy. Notifying inbound ghast of a B.R.D. +++
Shame about the wheeler...having extra armour wouldn’t have hurt.
With those thoughts out of the way, Omega heads off to the milk factory.
Omega's mystery milk didn't affect them immediately, but fast enough that pretty much all of the building is out of commission by the time she arrives. How lucky is that?
Omega strolls into the factory, careful to listen for any sign of activity. All she hears is the constant pumping of milk that has now been contaminated by her "gift".
Need a blaster.
She looks around for a weapon amidst twitching corpses. Like a shopper in a mall, she's spoilt for choice. Pistols, assault rifles, battle axes, tooth-glove, sub-machine guns, a spiked dildo, gyattlers, and-
No fucking way!
Omega gasps in delight. Like a child during yuletide of old, it takes a lot of restraint not to dance with joy.
A Derring blaster!?
She picks up the weapon, handling it like an artifact from the Schema. Her thoughts race, excitement making them go turbo.
No fuckin' way this random cunt managed the scatter model!
While inspecting it, she notices a few imperfections and faults. The hex-style cylinder doesn't rotate perfectly, and each chamber has the same ammo type applied to the feedpacks. Not just any ammo type either. Her least favorite.
Bare-bone?!
She resists the urge to gag. Upon witnessing such basic configuration in the feed-packs of such a beautiful blaster, another episode of nausea threatens to overcomes her. She takes out the all six feedpacks, and looks at them with disgust.
Let's make you more fun, yeah?
As a wyeking, Omega has a connection with the harja. She searches the zaturated atmosphere for any, not wanting to pull them out of her own soul without need. It proves difficult at first, due to most of the zaturation consisting of volts, garms and the typical noize. Luckily, she finds Runes of her own alignment infesting some of the weapons all over the factory. Probably belonging to some very violent people in the past. Now she just has to guide them towards the feedpacks.
ᛒᛇᚦᛖᚲᛣᚾᚻᚨᚱᛏᛊᛟᚹᚥᛚᚦᚨᚱ
The Runes shoot towards with radioactive speed. She uses her honing to apply harja to each ‘pack, specializing one after the other.
ᛒᛚᛟᚲᚲᛒᚥᛊᛏᚱ
ᚱᚥᛒᛒᚱᚱᛣᛒᚨᚥᚾᛞ
ᛊᚥᚱᛏᚱᛊᛚᚥᚷᛊ
ᚠᚱᚨᚷᚷᚠᛚᛸᚾᚷᚱ
ᛒᛸᚷᚷᛒᚥᚥᛗ
ᛊᛸᚾᛗᚨᚱᚨ
With every feedpack honed, she loads up her new derring blaster and moves to the upper offices with a smile on her face.
That smile fades fast when she enters the offices and beholds what lies within.
A man(?) with enormous proportions and absolute girth, grotesque to the extreme. He sits in a massive chair designed for giants of legend, and cradles two normal sized humanoids like a mother does to her children. Both of these creatures are busy suckling on the giant's massive teats, strains of milk escaping the suction and flowing down the giant's bare flesh. The scent of salted caramel penetrates Omega's raspirator, a sign that the zaturation in this room is reaching Uber levels..
"Is this a bad time?"
The fat-giant's eyes flutter open as if waking from a deep slumber. The whites of his mutated, misshapen eyes swim with orange. Red-gold upon red-gold. These are the eyes of a necromantic abomination. There is a powerful daem
on hiding inside that body. Omega knocks the hammer back on her new derring. A willing possession...fuck.
"Look, my darling pegs." the man rises from his seat, both of his "pegs" still cradled to his chest, mouths firmly attached to his overflowing nipples. Excess milk leaks down to his fat belly, and drips down on the floor like a leaky faucet.
"Red Iron Patrol pays us a visit!" no sooner do these words leave the giant's mouth than the two daemoniacs "unlatch" from the nipples and snap their attention to Omega. Their eyes are just like the giant's, corrupted with overzaturation, their mouths drenched in milk.
"Will you let her harm me, hm~?" he coos to both of them, rubbing their bottoms with his thumbs. They both snarl in rage, and jump down, ready to fight.
"You will not harm milk daddy!" Both of them shout in unison.
They don't attack right away, waiting for Dresin's order. He addresses Omega, barely able to contain his disgust for the blue blood leaking out of her surface wounds.
"There is no need for violence, brazen one. All I want is a safe haven for my children to play." He pats one of his milk-drenched "children" on the head. For reasons Omega can't fathom, it sounds wet. "This is Pyre. She's a real firebrand, and will burn you silly..."
"Yo momma!"
"...and this-" Dresin pats the other one on the head "-is Pube. Quite the rascal."
"Nice tits, bronze! But they ain't shit compared to daddy!"
They all laugh. They don't notice Omega lifting her revolver with malicious intent. Sucks to be them.
"Now, let us-"
ᛒᛸᚷᚷᛒᚥᚥᛗ
The blaster's hex-cylinder rotates, Omega aims the gun and fires. An explosive shell lands between both Pyre and Pube, sending both of them flying in opposite directions. Dresin is knocked back a few metres, and scrambles to escape the room. He's a lot faster than his weight would indicate.
ᛊᛸᚾᛗᚨᚱᚨ
The cylinder rotates again, and with alarming speed Omega turns the gun slightly towards Pube and pulls the trigger. She does the same for Pyre. Pyre and Pube get hit centre mass by heat seeking bullets, which kill them instantly.
Dresin managed to retreat three meters. Omega advances on him, but the blubbery bastard opens up a Mosh pit to escape.
ᛊᚥᚱᛏᚱᛊᛚᚥᚷᛊ
Right before he manages to portal himself out of danger, Omega shoots him one last time with an incendiary round. His greasy, milk stained skin catches on fire easily. His screams cut off as the Mosh pit pulls him in, then closes.
"I wonder where he went?" she muses, taking out her thrumball. As she starts shaking it towards activation, she stops, hearing familiar screams coming from outside. Looking out the window, she sees a vast mass of burning flesh rolling frantically in the distance, towards the town plaza she came from.
"Huh...didn't make it far, did he?"
As Omega approaches the plaza, her senses catch something sinister amidst all the stalls.
This is a problem.
What is?
Can't you see it?
I'm kind of busy with a tremendous problem.
Look at the drugs, you dumb cow!
What about them?
Smell that?
Omega picks up a claymorph inhaler. Despite the probable zaturation, she takes off her raspirator to get a good sniff. Her eyes go wide in momentary surprise.
Harja.
Lots of them.
...how?
Beats me!
Save it for the braniacs?
Right on.
Omega pockets the inhaler, and continues towards the absolute unit that is Dresin. The picture of carnage isn't helped by the deep fried mountain of blubber in its center, writhing in agony.
Like a fuzzy ankle-biter.
Omega aims her derring at him, ready to pump him full of high-caliber bullets.
"I don't think so, bronze!" he tries to sit up, but fails due to his immense...immensity. Milk leaks from his nipples, on to on the ground.
"Grody."
Eventually, Dresin gives up and decides to make due while prone. He waves his arms in the air, and screams the following with gurgling gusto: "Rise, my creatures! All the milkies you can have and then some, if you do me right! Kill this bronze twat, send her screaming to the Gulf! Then you shall have all milkies you can stomach!"
Omega sees a corpse twitch. Then another, and another. All the work she did earlier is reduced to nothing.
"Oh yes!"
The corpses rise, their transformation to neerogs complete.
Here we go again.
"Yes!"
Omega readies herself for another fight. Their eyes turn completely void black, their irises the same glowing orange found in Dresin's eyes.
"YES!"
Omega is about ready to pull the trigger towards the first corpse, when the situation flips like a coin. Necromantic orange is suddenly replaced by violent crimson.
"...huh?" Dresin's surprise is quickly replaced by stark fear as all the neerogs swarm him with malicious glee. "No! My children, attack the bronze, not m-" his pleas transform into incoherent, animalistic screams as one of the red-eyed corpses rips his jaw off and starts stabbing him with it. The violent ripping and tearing continues until Dresin is nothing more than a pile of necromantic gore.
The neerogs scan the environment for new targets. They notice Krow's corpse before they see Omega...
ᛒᛸᚷᚷᛒᚥᚥᛗ
She stares them down, the cylinder in her pistol rotating to her explosive rounds as per her soul's command. She pulls the trigger, and they charge. Their smiles widen, more potential violence making them glitter with glee. Half of them die from the explosive shell.
ᛒᛚᛟᚲᚲᛒᚥᛊᛏᚱ
The cylinder rotates back to the blockbuster rounds. She manages to shoot one more, popping one cadaver's head like a balloon. Their movements are predictable, their claws ineffective against Omega's natural defences. She cuts the rest of them down with her kukri.
No grace.
No cool moves.
Just busywork butchery.
Her heavy breathing turns to metallic hissing from her raspirator, like a broken machine in a slaughterhouse. Blue blood leaks from surface wounds to mix with the deep crimson of her recycled enemies.
Exhausted from the day's events, Omega puts a beacon down and waits for her fellow rangers. She slumps down against a building, and falls asleep.
...
...
...
"Zalve, somnalakh."
Omega refuses to be awake. The sun tries its best to penetrate her mind with its glare, but nothing works. The words of Deus Hasta fall on ears deafened by slumber. A somnalakh indeed.
Porcelain skin with nary a crack in it. Sassy lilac eyes, silently screaming for headpats. Long, white hair...fluttering like silken drapes on a warm summer window.
Is someone snapping a finger in front of my face?
Must’ve been the wind.
I reckon so.
Back to dreamy pastures.
Two tired ladies have a farm.
Hugs, perhaps even kisses.
Back before the raspirators, they weren’t so rare.
Less of a good thing, it becomes a rare treat.
I’m glad we made it.
I-
"RISE AND SHEEN, BUSTY!"
Omega screams as the shock-maul makes contact with her bare neck. She would’ve bitten through her own drooling tongue, hadn’t she retracted it back into her mouth seconds before electric impact.
Standing before her are two men. Deus Hasta stifles laughter. The dwarf is holding a necromantra in his hand, ready to do a check up.
Gideon Husker stands significantly taller than the dwarf, blocking out the high-noon sun. He discards the shock maul like a toy.
"Jack wants words. Haul it."
Omega groans. She rises to her feet clumsily, dusting herself off.
"Wish me luck, Giddy."
Gideon chuckles, a hearty roar of laughter. Whether or not he actually made the wish will remain a mystery. Omega makes her way towards the mutilated carcass of Dresin. The ghouls have consumed most of it by this point.
How many hours were we out?
Lots.
Of hours?
No clue.
Behind the carcass, a familiar looking figure leans against a familiar looking bike. The jack-suit is of the same make as Omega’s own, the one she left behind to go on a bender with...someone from her stride? The letters "FUK EM UP" are carved on the side of his helmet, making it very clear who it is.
"Oi, Jackie?"
Jack Bolter doesn’t turn his head. His gaze is fixed on Biggy Boffy’s stall, where he sold his fucking drugs. Jack’s refusal to remove his helmet and raspirator while on duty makes him utterly unreadable most of the time.
Is he mad at me?
Is he glad?
Horny?
All of the above?
Ask him?
"Report." his voice sounds neutral. No hint of emotion, though to Omega he always sounds annoyed. She snaps to attention on instinct, memories of the Schema flooding back into her brain.
"Woke up from a bender hungover. Tried to buy drugs from that stall, locals got funny ideas. One of them tried to shoot drug peddler, boolet richoshat...uhm, ricky-richocha..."
Omega imagines Jack’s glare from behind those silvery eye-lenses. "...bounced and hit me instead. The drug peddler panicked and turned a dial. Everyone in the town became thrashers, and I had to take them out."
Jack nods and tells her to go on. She relays everything about Dresin, the milk factory and the neerogs.
"Anything else?"
Omega takes out the claymorph inhaler and tosses it to Jack. He shakes it, waiting for Omega to explain further.
"Sniffed a lot of harja in that ‘haler. Maybe have Rally take a looky?"
Without another word, Jack pockets the inhaler, gets on his bike and rides off. Omega is left alone with her thoughts.
I hope he’s good.
Probably.
Hard to tell what he’s thinking.
As Omega goes back to see if Giddy and Hasta have a ride back to their rig, she notices Ylva’s white hair in the breeze, and is overcome with joy.
"Princess!" Omega tackles Ylva, locking her in a tight bear hug. The smaller woman struggles to breathe.
"I missed you, babe~"
"Ohm...you’re crushing me!"
"I know, I'm crushing on you so hard~"
"Ohm...please...I need...to breathe!"
Both Gideon and Hasta look at each other, smiling. "You can give her a ride. We’ll find her interceptor ourselves, and ride it back to HQ."
They head off, leaving both women alone. Omega loosens her grip to allow Ylva some breathing room, but doesn’t let go. Ylva returns the hug, rubbing Omega’s back slowly. They stay like this for a minute or two, until Ylva breaks the silence.
"What do you want for dinner?"
Omega looks Ylva up and down. Even with the raspirator, Ylva can tell she’s biting her lip. "You."
Ylva rolls her eyes. "I meant to eat."
"Still you."
Ylva pounds her fist on Omega’s chest. She barely feels it.
"Look what I found!" Omega produces her new gun, showing it off to Ylva like a kid with a new toy.
"Is that a derring scatterblaster?"
"With a hex-cylinder!" Omega's excitement radiates outwards. Ylva smiles while Omega goes into excruciating detail on the inner workings and history of the almighty derring blaster.
The sound of a dwarf clearing their throat snaps her out of her nerdy episode. Gideon and Hasta came back.
"How long were you standing there?"
"The whole time."
"We came right back."
"Why didn’t you-"
"Didn’t want to be rude."
"Krow crashed the interceptor. Can we get a ride back?"
Ylva nods, and they all leave on the interceptor together.
The mining town, whose name was too unimportant to remember, is now abandoned. All that remains are a bunch of ghouls, feasting on the remains of the carnage. One of them finds a vial filled with a milky liquid.
"Hey Chintail, drink this."
The other ghoul pops the lid, and drinks the milky goodness. He licks his canine lips with relish.
