Jump 165: Warhammer 40,000: The Light of Terra

Jump #165: Warhammer 40,000: The Light of Terra
>Two of Pentacles (Taking two steps forward for every one step back.)

Okay, let's do something a little different from the usual writeup. We all know that the Light of Terra is an extensive jump, and quite honestly... rather than showing my work, a narrative seems much more in order.

Pulled in from the vacuum of space, it was obvious that something had gone wrong. Especially when I found myself subjected to vacuum again. A few times, in fact, before it relented. Once I got my bearings, I realized that I was berift of the majority of my abilities, and clearly dealing with a psychopath. It took a few moments of jogging my memory to realize where I was. At which point I found myself intensely unhappy.

>"Well, I'm bored now. Torture me."
>"Oh HELL no."
>"Whyever not?"
>"... uh. I don't have my tools! Help me find them, I'll be happy to torture you after."
>"Oh, very well. The sacrifices I make..."

And promptly noping the fuck out of there and to the bridge as quickly as possible. The space elf was clearly not the one in charge and I had to find whoever was, so I could rectify it. The captain was not what I expected. And set him free? Well... why not? If he doesn't like being adrift in space, I'll be happy to help. And also there... the Deadlight. Keeping me from using my abilities.

This is Warhammer 40,000. I'd like to live to see the end of the jump. Of COURSE I broke it.

>"Much better. Oh, and by the way, Xi'Cokemeq?"
>"Yes?"
>"Crucio."
>"Ahh! ...how delightful."
>"Okay, that's just fucked up."

Things went relatively quickly after that. I went through the ship and stretched myself rather thin, but did everything I could to repair the ship while making nice with everyone I could. The Redeemers were ... well, every who was not them were heretics and my coming was a sign of the great heresy to come, so they decided to start purging. I eliminated them with prejudice.

Things were a bit tense with the Void Walkers and Pale Sons for a bit, but we buried the hatchet (mostly not literally) and I managed to get everyone to pull together enough to get the ship in working order. And then the next thing I knew, we were in orbit, the ship was docking with the repair platform while I was planetside with the strange mishmash of cultures that came from the Light of Terra, helping them put together some sort of civilization.

The planet was largely mountainous terrain and everything smelled a bit off, but we set up shop near the Corpsegrinder, which chewed up the fungus and algae patches that grew everywhere and produced copious amounts of delicious food for everyone. The Aceria forests made it so that it was surprisingly easy to get the raw materials for everything, as well, and the city took shape rapidly.

I took samples of those plants for safekeeping, too, because I am DEFINITELY going to be transplanting them later after I study them further.

After getting settled in and appointing leaders to run things while I ran around doing other jumper-type activities, a nasty little warp storm blew in. It... ended poorly for the space elf, who quite clearly was eaten by Slaanesh, and quite frankly I'd rather deal with a bacon-smelling cultist than that sadomasochist anyway. Even if the cultist gets killed in ridiculous and improbable ways despite my best efforts. And I'm talking actively using precognition to keep her out of trouble.

Whatever.

Quite a lot of interesting things happened - the visit to Necromunda was rather entertaining (and holy shit those were some good rolls), going out for salvage and ending up on a space hulk was amusing (and we brought the Imperials back with us planetside), and the scrap between the cultist and the four not-worshippers of Necoho was absolutely fücking hilarious. (Yeah, we left those four behind, I wanted no part of that business.)

Once all was said and done, we returned planetside, all the while listening to the cultist's protests.

>"Hwee hwere going to kaptoor eet for kay-oss! Hyoo rhuined eet!"
>"Nah, chaos will still win, even if it loses. Those people are still free to do what they want, worship who they want, and so on, they just aren't allowed to ruin it for everyone else. Moderation. Get it, CC?"
>"Hwee theenk so... yay! Then whee kaptoored eet for kay-oss!"
>"...sure, I'll go with that. Say, have I told you about Loki yet? He's a pretty swell guy..."

And so we got on the Light of Terra, which as a result of holding off the legions of Chaos not been very well equipped at all, and set forth. And while on the way, came across a ship that was more akin to a small continent comprised of armor floating in space.

I finally got to confirm my theory: mass-produced propulsion gel, when applied in appropriate quantities, is in fact capable of causing massive structural damage. Sure, it didn't destroy the ship, but the motion reverberated and shook the insides badly enough to render it dead in space. And if they ever get the sucker moving again, it'll have the same effect unless they actually go out and clean that orange gunk off.

And then... well, the assault. The cultist insisted we help out, and honestly if chaos is so spooked that they're willing to throw seemingly everything at this one point, then I should definitely contribute and oh hello you're a big chap aren't you Orikan.

>"You think you can best me, even now?"
>"I already have. Surely you see."
>"Preposterous!"
>"You have versions of yourself from the past and future? That's fine - I saw them before they arrived, I see the flow of battle at its conclusion. The story was already written by your hand."
>"Such delusions, such blasphemy-"
>"Such a windbag."

The battle, as I told him, was a foregone conclusion no matter how close it was at times, and how long it took to claim my victory. Hours. Days. Hard to say. But I've travelled beside the Doctor when time itself was used as a weapon, Orikan's manipulations were nothing new and I knew how to counter them. Honestly, the most challenging part of that was trying to keep the cultist alive. Were it not for the ability to have multiple copies of myself running at once, it would not have happened, either.

And to the sound of the laughter of mad gods, I find myself moved to another part of this universe, this whole course of action unmade thanks to Orikan's own idiocy... and though I lose most of what I didn't put in the warehouse thanks to the shenanigans of Orikan trying to play god, when I next open my eyes, the cultist is standing next to me, looking perplexed.

How very interesting.