WH40K: “Kal Jerico, Sinner's Bounty” (part ten)

Been a while, but it's time to resume this pointlessly long and meandering look into the grimmest, darkest, and memeiest possible future. Last chapter was a look at the Desolation Zoom fellow that everyone is after, who turned out to be a not-so-subtle thematic representation of the Imperium of Man itself and accordingly needs to be shot like the deluded, self-hating, nihilistic monster it is. In the chapter before that one, Team Jerico had failed to defeat Zoom and were all blaming each other for it as per habit.

Chapter 20: Road to Perdition
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I forgot how hilariously dissonant Mark Elsob's voice is with this story. Just hearing that posh, erudite voice reading the chapter title got me chuckling.

Unfortunately, a moment later he starts the chapter proper with some speech of Amenute's, and I'm reminded that he also really just cannot voice female characters.

Anyway, the new team psyker is guiding them along an old coolant pipe system toward the redemption stronghold of Perdition that they need to head Zoom off from reaching. Amenute mentions that this waterway used to be her tribe's territory until they were chased out of it, and Yolanda takes the opportunity to say some racist shit about ratskins. Amenute retaliates by telling her that the hivequakes and floods are a divine punishment for uphivers like her, and Yolanda starts threatening her.

Ooooh, yes Yolanda, do it. Low Willpower musclehead versus telepathy-specced psyker, let's see how that match goes. I definitely haven't wiped the floor with a dozen of you using more or less Amenute's build.

Unfortunately, Scabs steps in and deescalates before Yolanda sneezes out her own brain. What a buzzkill.

Kal takes Scabs and Amenute's side in this argument, which makes Yolanda even pissier, but whatever. He points out that they haven't had any random encounters since the sump devil that she summoned for use against their enemies, and correctly attributes this to her periodic singing and chanting, which makes Amenute happy to be acknowledged for. As they proceed, however, they hear a mutant warband moving through the tunnels not far from them, and Amenute's powers can't no-sell those like they can animals.

They hurry on to a powered gate sealing off an entrance to the pipeline and, after discussing some giant bat leavings that are laying around nearby, Scabs makes a skill check of his own to make the gate open. Apparently, it's still juuuuust intact enough to respond to the "pry open the motor and tear out/rearrange a handful of wires" treatment. Amenute is incredibly impressed with Scabs' technical knowhow. As he works, Yolanda takes Kal aside and bitches about Amenute some more. Kal shuts her down. This is starting to get really tiresome. Yolanda manages to make Kal jealous of her for Scabs' attention despite him brushing her off, which is...this party dynamic is weird af.

Well, meanwhile, Scabs gets the door open and...Amenute runs through ahead of them without a word. Huh? Kal tells Scabs and Cyberdog to go find out wtf she's doing while he and Yolanda move their stolen motorcycles through after them. On the other side of the gate are a lot of bones, ranging from decades old to extremely fresh. It's probably not the dire bats' work, though, unless they share the mutants' tendency to fashion some of the skulls and limb bones into barbed wire-covered totems and signposts. Which they might, this is 40K after all, but a mutant tribe is still a little bit more likely.

...oh wait, no, not axchuck mutants OR sapient dire bats. These bone and wire art pieces have recognizably ratskin script carved into them. Okay, guess that's a thing they do. The most recent bones were probably from just within the last year or so, right before they were chased out of the area. Or maybe much more recent than that, if another tribe braved the Cawdor hunters and just moved in within the last month or something.

Amenute then reveals her presence in a nook in the ceiling overhead, where she's clutching one of the skulls and finger-reading an inscription on it. She explains that this was the site of a battle her people won against another ratskin tribe who had tried to wipe them out via poisoned water supply. The skulls of the enemy leaders are mounted here as a warning to anyone else who might try to mess with her people, and the carvings spell out the dishonorable act that they committed to shame them to passerby for all time. Heh, well, at least that's Amenute's tribe's side of the story. She tosses Kal the skull, and drops back down to the floor beside him and Yolanda. Now, is she going to explain why she wordlessly ran ahead of them?

A moment later, Scabs and Cyberdog approach from up ahead. Wait, how did that happen? Did Amenute let them go on passed her without saying anything to Scabs? That seems out of character. Did Scabs meet her, but then keep scouting on ahead instead of reporting back to the others? Thatalsoseems out of character. I'm confused.

At any rate, just beyond the war monuments is a massive dip created in a not-too-long-ago hivequake, now turned into a fungus-covered lake by the many broken pipes overhead that are still dropping water into it. Is this wastewater, or fresh water? If the latter, I wonder how many worker districts uphive have had to be abandoned due to water shortages. There's an abandoned fishing village at the near shore, and - far across the lake - the much more militarized structures and barricades of Perdition. It's sort of a Venice or Tenochtitlan type construction, built on a series of broken foundations and pipes rising from the water connected by bridges and floating walkways, with some floating farms lashed to their sides. It's pretty impressive work, for such a recent settlement. There are also a few little shantytowns outside of Perdition proper, hugging the fortified access bridges. Amenute declares that the dark side of the force is strong in this place due to the Redemptionists' presence, and while I can't begrudge her for feeling that way about the people who have been genociding hers I can at least be more impressed by what they're building.

Anyway, Kal says that they should camp here before infiltrating the cult compound and figuring out how to cut off Zoom from there. With the damage that Zoom's hauler has taken, and the lack of visible excitement among the Perditionites, its clear that his arrival is still at least a couple days off. So, it's best to rest up now before doing anything especially strenuous again. They build a campfire, cook some food, and claim watches in typical player character style. The ratskins take first watch. Amenute complements Scabs on the smokeless fire accelerant he's got; apparently, its a fuel mixture he learned during his bounty hunting career. Scabs definitely has the most diverse skillset of anyone in the party, as well as being the most nuanced character. Amenute starts explaining that her own tribe might have some surviving remnants in the area around this lake, and that the main reason she's still traveling with the party is in hopes of finding them. That explains it. Why did she run ahead without telling anyone, though? Especially when she knows Yolanda is looking for an excuse?

Anyway, during the first watch they hear someone banging on the pipes with hammers or wrenches. This is a ratskin signaling method, apparently, using the pipes to carry the rythmic code over longish distances. Kal and Yolanda wake up on their own in response to the sound, or perhaps in response to the other two's loud reactions. Amenute listens to the tapping and thumping, and informs the others that the ratskins are warning each other about an incoming mutant attack. Kal exclaims that that's just as well, he was getting bored. Kal knows that there's a mandated fight scene per chapter, and he's decided to have a good attitude about it. He's more patient than I. Amenute offers to take Scabs off to one of the Ratskin camps that are apparently nearby and leave the upspire dickheads behind, but he refuses. Then, just as they're preparing for axchuck mutants, a dire bat attacks from above.

Either these things have a high enough will save to resist Amenute's Dr. Doolittle powers, or she's deliberately letting this thing attack for reasons of her own. End chapter.


This was a strong chapter to come back to. Lots of great worldbuilding and richly described scenery, and some interesting Scabs-and-Amenute-focused character development. I'm kind of hoping for Yolanda to leave the party by the end of this book (killing her off is unlikely, since there's probably a toy of her :/). She's just annoying to read about, and not even in a "love to hate her" way like Beatram. She makes every dialogue sequence less fun. And, of course, the need for an action sequence to at least start or finish if not play out in its entirety in EVERY SINGLE CHAPTER is as tiresome as always.

Well, next chapter.

Chapter 21: Shaft Haunters
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AKA dire bats.

A dire bat divebombs Scabs and knocks him to the ground. The prose tries to make the creature sound like some nigh-indescribable horror of a hellbeast, but...it's just a giant bat with antennae instead of eyes. It is an earnestly Lovecraftian description, though; Lovecraft also tried and failed to make bats scary on multiple occasions. Kal reacts in actual concern when Scabs gets mauled, in a classic "awww he really does care" display.

Also, the bat has a saddle on its back, and is being ridden by an axchuck mutant. That's...awfully technologically sophisticated, for what we've seen of those guys.

Anyway, for all their differences Amenute and Yolanda prove to fight pretty well together. While Kal draws the rider's fire (the mutant has a ranged weapon, unusually for them), Yolanda gets in the bat's face with her chainsaw, distracting it from Scabs and giving Amenute time to climb up onto its back and shank the rider. Unfortunately, more mutant infantry are on the way to assist the ill-fated rider. Fortunately, Amenute has taken control of the now riderless bat, so that's cool. It can't carry more than one person though, so the others are trying to evade the mutants on food along the lake's edge. A lot of these mutants have guns, so they have close calls a plenty. Fortunately, Kal has the brilliant plan of leading the mutants toward the nearest shantytown, which happens to have a Cawdor watch tower with a mounted minigun. Kal and Co hit the ground and let the Cawdor mow down the mutants behind them.

Kal figures that the mutants had been on their way to attack these shantytowns anyway when they happened to find their camp first. And, uh-oh, while they're busy letting the Cawdor and mutants fight it out more dire bat cavalry shows up! One of the riders has his mount grab Kal and...just fly off? IDK why. It drops him from high up, but then other bats grab him mid-fall and lift him further before...dropping him again? These guys all have riders, right? Are these mutants really all just letting their bats play with one random food item and totally ignoring the Cawdor who are shooting them with a big minigun? Apparently. I guess they're coded to target the player character first and prioritize each other second. Kal eventually manages to cut one of the saddles off of a bat's back and leaps onto its back himself, taking the reins.

He apparently knows how to ride a dire bat. Um...okay?

Kal does...something? that causes the bats to fight each other, and then gets dropped into the middle of the thick, overgrown lake over toward the Perdition side. He swims to shore, spooks some trash-scavenging shanty folk, and then suddenly is being held at gunpoint by Gor Halfhorn, the minotaur they briefly joined forces with a ways back. End chapter.


The best I can say about this chapter is that it was short. The action setpiece not only felt like an interruption from what the characters were doing, but was also just a bad fight scene in its own right. Why the weird focus on Kal? What the heck happened in the air, exactly? Etc.

I guess this fight at least has more consequence to it than a lot of the others, since it resulted in Kal getting separated from the others and meeting Gor. That's a change in the status quo, at least. It's a change that could have been done in a much simpler and less illogical way, but at least there was something approaching a point.


Anyway, that's two chapters. More Kal Jerico next week.