Edeka Head Office Hamburg

Martin Kohlhaas pushed the mouse the tiny bit forward that made the computer wake up from its lunchtime slumber. He entered a password he knew he should have changed weeks ago and watched the old computer ready itself again. Both Kohlhaas and the computer had seen some exciting, not to say desperate, times during the last dozen years since the Weltensprung. Practically the whole supply chain for Edeka's nonfood items collapsed after the Weltensprung and even the food range had been severely hit.

Like their competitors, the supermarket chain had nearly become bankrupt and had to be saved by a state-managed debt restructuring agreement. The company had invested heavily into new sources, often establishing chains that started at a Raiffeisen colony in the Empire and ended in a supermarket shelf. Those had been wild times, times where Kohlhaas had worked 14-hour-days for months on end and that had seen him wading through the literal muck of Imperial farms and the roads that connected them.

Martin was working for Edeka's quality management system, he had done his level best to teach German standards to Imperial farmers, Breton serfs, Vampire overseers of undead packers, Goblins and Skaven workers. He had done well, well enough that now he managed the people who did his former job. He was quite glad about it, he spent a lot more time with his family that way.

It was Bäckertag and that meant that he had to look for the bad news. Before the Weltensprung he would have checked the RAPEX system, established by the EU to report all items which had been identified as offending against one of the many regulations. It had been dead for a couple of years before it was revived for the Reiksbund which had agreed on a set of common standards.
Woe would betide him if any of Edeka's products would show up on these pages, he would have to explain himself to the management at the very least.

A quick scan showed that he had been lucky this week, none of his products were on it. Still, it paid to check what this week's report was about as it indicated where the customs inspectors set their priorities for checking. A lot of it was boring, like the perennial favorite of too-long strings on children's clothing. Supposedly the rugrats would throttle themselves with them and Martin wondered how he had survived his childhood surrounded by such insidious traps.
There was another batch of wooden toys from the Empire with too much lead in their paint, he was pretty sure that his inspectors knew how to detect that.

The same went, at least he hoped it did, for the action toys from the new Sylvania maker. The sign on the flag one held was deemed to be too close to the eight-pointed star of Chaos. Customs used a couple of former Witch Hunters as consultants in these matters, so there was always a measure of arbitrariness in their decisions. He hoped Edeka's designers had heard him this time and really made sure that nothing suspicious was used. "When in doubt add another hammer or double-tailed comet sign" was what he had told them, maybe they would listen if he showed them this time.

The next ones were new, looked like Fuchs&Konrad and their Skaven contractors had not gotten the news that the DIN 25420 about Warpstone content and radiation had been tightened again to 2.5 nanogram/kilogram and 13 millirandi of magical radiation. Lidl's customers would have to wait for their new computers a bit longer it would seem.
He called up the E-mail program to write to his inspectors. Edeka had productions runs for the Christmas business, it would really not do to fall into the same trap.

Naggaroth shore, 120 kilometers from Karond Kar

Ernutan Doomshackler found the ground a harsh mistress. He craved it, tried to come into contact with it as much of him as he could, tried to lose himself into it and it treated him with harshness, with the picks of small, sharp stones and the abrasions left by their larger cousins. Its embrace was wet, cold and clammy and yet it offered the alluring promise of safety.

And he had dire need of that safety, the evil whiz of bullets that passed far too close overhead mixed with meat-cleaver sounds and the screams of wounded bore testimony of it. He should have known it, this was just the bloody pointy ears to a "t". The nameless hamlet his battalion had been sent to occupy had seemingly been defended only by old-style troops, a couple of hundred spear-carriers, some crossbow shooters and a lone hydra. Anything more would have been a surprise, the village's sole purpose had been fishing. Now that was an important source of food in inhospitable Naggaroth and a mainland anchorage was not to be despised either. Still, the dandelion eaters could not be strong everywhere and there were many places such as this.

The local troops would not have been a challenge when Ernutan was still a member of ZharrNaggrund's old troops. With the new weapons blessed by Hashut and Lord Mordred, it should have been no problem. And it had not been, just that the lily-livered cowards had retreated after receiving the first salvos from afar. They had made their stand in a series of hills that reduced the range to the point where the crossbows had a chance to deal damage. Still, Ernutan had found a place where his troops could pummel the Druchii with mortar fire and snipe them to death.

That was a good plan and it worked after a fashion. His battalion was able to make its way to hilltop he had spotted and set up shop there. He was about to enjoy himself when the first mortar stopped firing after a few shots. He was about to see what kept the laggards when he had heard the other shots. They sounded very much like the rifles that his warriors used so ably, but more distant. A small dust cloud rose where their bullets hit, the sound of ricochets had filled his ears. He had barely spotted the muzzle flashes when the first member of his command staff had dropped like a puppet whose strings had been cut. Ever since then he had made love to the ground, trying to eke as much cover from the paucity that was about him.

What vexed him even more than the danger was that he had been had. He had been lured to this place, the place without cover that was so open to the higher hill that lay beyond it. He eyeballed the slope and did not like it any. It was not so steep that his warriors could not climb it, but they would not be fast. There was a lot of loose gravel that would make the footing treacherous and that did not provide any cover either.

That hill's crest, or what was visible of it, was a different proposition. Either nature, the enemy or a combination of both had provided for sufficient places for the thrice-damned dandelion eaters to hide and shoot with impunity. If he ordered the charge his battalion would be under fire for a couple of minutes before they would reach the top. There were probably less than a hundred rifles pointed in his direction, but the Druchii would be easily able to cripple his battalion with nothing to show for it. The hill was about ten kilometers from the next point deep enough to be used by the cruiser that supported the true dwarfs. The fishheads would gladly try their hand at fire support, but at this range, it was even money which force they would hit, if at all. He did not have a full mortar team and they received most of the enemy's attention. He had another card to play and this trump would be laid down soon he hoped. Until it did he made more communion with his new mistress the ground and waited.

The first indication that his waiting was at an end was the murmur of his warriors. And while the cracks of rifle fire did not abate the number of hits close to him did. He risked a peek and started to cheer like the rest of his warriors. Three of the flying disks that accompanied the raid had shown up and made their way to the hill. They hovered a few hundred meters above ground and sparks indicated where they were hit. Neither were they inconvenienced by that nor did they return fire till they finally arrived above the nearly unseen Druchii. They wavered about a bit, obviously looking for the right place to be and then stopped. For a moment nothing happened and then a couple of black shapes dropped from the flying disks. Explosions shattered the hilltop with a force that could be felt even where the DawiZHarr had hunkered down.

Ernutan left his harsh mistress as fast as he could and hardly found the time to call for a charge before his warriors started the assault. They were entertained by the sight of the flying disks strafing runs all the way.

Hansecontrol, Hamburg

The room was mostly white, interspersed with some stainless steel and lit with neon lights. It contained all the paraphernalia that a good chemical lab needed and a middle-sized, slender, brown-haired man working before a fume hood.
Jakub General cooked a squigleather glove, but he did not watch it. He watched his smartphone as if it contained poison or an especially poisonous spider. The inoffensive box hid nothing so harmless to him. Instead, it contained a rather short message from the woman that Jakub had hoped to spend his life with.

He had known the last weeks were not exactly smooth sailing, he had known in his heart that she no longer smiled when she saw him, he had seen their differences more clearly with every passing month. And still, he loved her, he still desired her, he still could smell her when he just closed his eyes and felt her smooth skin against his own. He had hoped that they could patch things up. The message had more effectively killed that hope than any spider or poison.

"Anything is better than another day with you"

The timer woke Jakub from his reverie and made him remove the glove from the boiling water before switching off the hot plate. He dipped a round piece of indicator paper into the cooling water and pulled it around a bit with tweezers. This task needed next to no brainpower and allowed him to muse a bit more. He had a knack to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, that was for sure. The school outing he had taken part in had been close to Czech-German border when the Weltensprung happened. Half of his schoolmates stayed back wherever the Czech Republic was now, he made the trip with Germany to another world in a universe that knew magic.

The elderly couple who had taken him in had been descendants of Sudeten Germans. That had taken care of the language problems at first and made for some very tense discussions later on. He had spent as much time at school and at the workshops, it offered to have a little breathing room. It had led him on a journey of discovery on the things that made the world tick, chemistry. He had taken that enthusiasm to University, coupled with the fact that his studies were in a different town than his foster parents. Even better, he had been approached by Hansecontrol, one of Germany's testing institutes and certifying agencies. He had also met Andrea there….
He nearly burned his fingers despite the tweezers, reminding him of the world outside his reminiscences. Jakub removed the paper from the water and set it in a petri dish before him so he could examine it.

The paper had retained its slightly off-colored white without developing any spots on it. That was a good thing as such spots would have indicated that the leather contained Chrome VI, a substance known to cause cancer.
It would also be a rather interesting surprise given that the Goblins cured the leather with plant extracts that contained many things, but certainly no chrome. Still, the regulations still said and the customers still asked that the leather products be tested for it.

The chemist looked at the indicator paper far longer than technically necessary. His eyes were still looking at it, his mind was in a very different place.
Jakub had been taken to a world of magic, a world where dragons roamed the skies, where new wonders were discovered every day and things got better in so many ways. At the same time, he spent his time in a pointless job longing for a woman that somehow decided to ditch him. Fuck this, time for big changes.

Adler 02, 2000 meters AGL, Mannslieb

"Adler 02, this is Oberth Control, confirm you are on path. Pad 01 is clear for use"
"Oberth Control, Adler 02 solid copy on path and Pad 01. ETA 3 minutes"
"Oberth control confirms Adler 02. Welcome to Oberth Base Oberstleutnant"

The spaceship might have been named for an eagle, but its appearance belied that moniker even at the first glance. Not meant to fly through any sort of atmosphere it lacked all and any streamlining. It was roughly cylindrical, with a frame that looked grown from chrome holding various boxes and tanks in place. It was topped by a cone-shaped capsule that did not even try to hide the fact that it was a Merkur craft that simply would not take another reentry.

A long white plume of steam was ejected from its back end, its end already started to push the dust on Oberth's landing pad around. The Rune of Fire engine would not allow a launch from the Warhammer World, but had no problem at all against Mannlieb`s 0.12 G. Like its sister it made the trip from the moon's orbit to the ground, nothing more. It had the delta-v to make for Kopernikus station in an emergency, but that would have wasted propellant.

Old Polarstern and a newly built freighter handled the Mannslieb-to-Warhammer orbit trip, shifting payload and personnel around.
Three minutes later the sensors on three landing legs concurred that Adler 02 had indeed touched down and the computers decided to cut the water supply to the engine.

Nathan Alpers and his co-pilot worked themselves through the lengthy shutdown checklists while Oberth base sent two trucks. They too were rather basic and were built without any regards for aesthetics. One of them positioned itself under Adler's hull, raising a platform on which a suited figure waited his turn to disengage the locks of the containers that were placed next to the spacecraft's engine.

Another raised a cylinder even higher and when it reached its final altitude it extended a tube that matched Adler's dock. Both Astronauts were barely inside the pressurized container when it lowered again and the truck made its way to the base. It was huge, having been erected by the Old Ones long before humans discovered writing. It was angular and gray as it had been here long enough to collect a coat of the dust. Given that said dust was accumulated from space and not from a non-existing atmosphere any layer of that indicated something very ancient.

The base rose like a cliff before the truck, mocking all human achievements in space. Nathan was not too sure if the numbers and signs painted on the sides were strictly necessary or an attempt to mark territory. The wall before Nathan swallowed all of the stars when they approached and a door as ancient as it was huge opened up when newly installed actuators compelled it to. The opening revealed a huge room beyond, but the view was distorted by a blue pane that filled the opening completely.

There was the briefest crackle of static energy when the truck went through the plasma window that kept Oberth base from evacuating the hangar every time a truck went through the base. The door closed quickly enough though, the plasma window did not insulate well and consumed an appreciable portion of the stations Tungsten Rune of Fire reactor output.

The truck stopped before a much smaller lock and extended its tube again. Nathan turned the handle and opened the lock when a green light indicated it was safe to do so. Picking up his kitbag before making his way into Oberth station.

He stepped into a sprayfoam-lined tunnel of maybe two meters diameter. The concrete poured by the Old Ones might still hold up structurally and did a marvelous job at shielding from radiation. So close to the surface nobody would trust it, seals installed 22000 years ago or the lining to be completely airtight. The Germans had installed tubes inside their corridors and installed pressurized pods inside the huge halls that lined them as needed.

A small group of people greeted him, most of them clad in overalls but for one. Luise Halev was the station commander and she was the only one to wear the Space Forces uniform. Nathan did his level best to hide a frown, these uniforms were normally worn groundside and/or on formal events. Given the difficulties to clean and press anything in space the spaceborne side of the Allstreitkräfte did usually not bother when embarked, using overalls that came directly from the washer/driers. The uniform mashed up well with what he had heard about Halev. Nathan was different, needed to be, but being caretaker of more energy reserves than humanity had used since the stone age and a treasure trove of archeotech probably demanded a stickler for rules.

"Welcome to Oberth base Oberstleutnant. I hope your trip had no problems?"
"I am glad to be here Major Halev, thanks for the welcoming committee."
"The man who opened this base for us will always be welcome. Kindly follow me for your quarters, the briefing will start in an hour."

The room that Nathan dropped his bag in was deep enough inside the base that the original walls could be used. The door sported hinges that were obviously made recently, the ceiling and the wall just above the floor had a couple of cables and tubes that did not match the rest. The room was unlike anything humans had done in space so far. It was huge, had proportions that would have appealed to the former owners and like anything else on the moon, had the wrong gravity. Nathan had been here before, so it did not unsettle him as much as it had done the first times. He was either used to the gravity on the Warhammer World, microgravity or the 0.2 G provided by Kopernikus' grav wheels. The latter always came with a Coriolis effect which was missing here. He already knew he would sleep badly the two night he was going to stay.

He took a few minutes to freshen up before he made his way to the meeting room. He stopped when his nose told him something that could not be right. Nathan followed that scent for a few meters before seeing the sign on the door before him. Palm met forehead when he realized that he could indeed smell something close to moist earth.

The sign on the door before him read "hydroponics".

He had flown some of the equipment in that room to Mannslieb himself, he just never had the opportunity to have a look at the finished product. He peeked through the small window set in the door and saw rows of shelves filled with all kinds of green stuff. He envied Oberth's staff for that, fresh vegetables were unheard of on Kopernikus or Morgenstern. Here they were a regular part of the diet.

Shaking his head again he resumed his way to the briefing room. Two of the corridors to the sides were covered with light doors . Not meant to keep a full atmosphere of pressure on one side they were just meant to keep human contamination from the area beyond. There the scientists roamed on their search of other bits of technology to salvage, of more data storage to analyze. Some of that was amazing stuff, other samples turned out to be dental cleaning kit or videos of Old Ones mating. One never knew what was on the small crystals, but humanity had a huge opportunity to learn here. Unlike the half-corroded parts of Old One gear that was still working in Lustria when it felt like it the stuff in Oberth base had been stored cold and in a vacuum, leaving things surprisingly intact after such a long time.

The meeting room was spectacular, an amphitheater used for assemblies when it was built and served the same purpose for the Germans. Even with most of the humans that worked on the station in this room, it was filled to a tenth of its capacity. Instead of the concrete, the Old Ones had used for most of the base this was made from alloys and one wall was a single, huge piece of alumina. Three-quarters of a meter thick it was probably the most solid piece of the whole base and very, very clear. The view was simply breathtaking, showing the landing pad in the foreground and a mountain range in the far background. The missing atmosphere made for a clear view and extremely harsh shadows.

Nathan and his co-pilot mingled a bit in the small crowd that had assembled before the mighty window and watched what promised to be the briefings center point.

"Ladies and gentlemen, if I may have your attention, it is time. What you see before you is the future of the Mannslieb research program. While this station will probably provide work for generations of scientists and the storage tanks hold enough He³ for a few centuries we need to venture out from Oberth . We have been tasked with studying the moon, making sure that no unpleasant surprises await the Reiksbund and further our understanding of this world. At the same time, there is the need for more surveys, for water and raw materials on the one hand, for suitable sites on the other. Sooner or later we want to be able to refurbish the Mannslieb Accelerator and shoot raw materials into Warhammer orbit. For all of that, we need to become mobile, far more than we currently are.

The Old Ones left a number of vehicles, all of which were unserviceable as was to be expected. We had to decide which of them to refurbish. In the end, it was decided to repair one of the mining rigs. We do not need to obtain He³ for quite some time, but it offers enough usable space that we can take it out for longer trips. Between the Old One energy banks, a Rune Reactor and a great lot of improvisation this has been accomplished, or so we believe. So today we are about to find out. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Mobile Base."

Nathan stepped to the window as did all of the others. The sound system started to fill the room with the crackles of wireless traffic.

"Oberth Base, this is Moba 1. Ready to roll."
"Moba 1, this Oberth. You are cleared for maneuvering."
"Moba 1 acknowledges clear to maneuver."

At first nothing, much seemed to happen besides some lights that started to rotate. When it started it seemed to do so with glacial slowness, which was an illusion, an illusion created by scale. When vehicles 50 meters long start to move they need a bot of time to travel their length. On Earth or the Warhammer World, any such vehicle would be useless, sinking into all but the firmest grounds. No bridges would accept such a behemoth and no road was wide enough for it. On Mannslieb no such restrictions applied and so Moba 1 began its first trip of many. Some would be the stuff of legend.