Whistles of the wind echoed in the town as a small group of armed people rode up. A few of them wore armour, but none of them had matching colours like the freeguild regiments. Instead, they wore a mishmash of colours, armour and weapons. As they entered the town, they sowed down to a stop before the lead climbed off her horse with the others following. The second walked up to her as he drew his sword and repeater pistol.
"Something wrong boss?" he asked but the woman remained silent as she sniffed the air.
"I smell blood, faint but it's in the air," she said as she drew her rapier while turning to face the others. "Ost, take the houses and tie them up somewhere, Ricktor see if you can find those tracks, the rest of you pair off and see if you can find anything,"
She got a quick response from them all as She, Ricktor and her second met at the head of the group. Ricktor Von Talius got down to one knee and began to hop/ crawl on the muddy ground looking for anything that may tell him what happened. The others moved from house to house but found nothing inside of them. After what seemed like an hour, Ricktor stopped as he found something in the ground.
He held up his hand to stop the others while he muttered to himself and began to follow the tracks. After a moment or two he returned shaking his head.
"These tracks," he muttered. "They appear and have the consistency of the undead but…"
"They aren't," his boss said as he nodded. "These aren't deadwalker tracks,"
"Yeah," was all he said as he stood. "Something's not right here,"
"BOSS!" a female voice called and the three followed the sound.
They ran into an open courtyard, as did the others, to see what one of their comrades had found. All of them had seen horrors before, but there was something about what they saw that seemed to be off. Before them sat several spikes that had what appeared to be roots in the ground and people impaled near the top. There was a faint blue glow from the roots and spike, but what shocked them was the bodies.
They shared the same black and blue colouring as the spikes they were on. They were covered in some kind of black vine like growths. The boss then sniffed the air again.
"No blood," she muttered before a low growl echoed in the group's ears making them stand ready.
The spikes retracted down and the bodies then stood before turning to show their blue eyes at the group. They roared before advancing at them at speed. Several guns opened up, but the creatures kept on coming. As the boss drew her blades before moving in with inhuman speed, the other's discarded their guns and drew their own blades. But as they began to cut into the strange creatures, they didn't fall down dead.
That wasn't a surprise, they had faced similar creatures before. The boss moved into the crowd with a grace that few could do. She cut into two of the creatures with her fencing sword and slashed the side of another with her dagger. While the creature did react, it didn't die like normal deadwalkers. It took a swing at her which she managed to dodge before fully taking it's head off.
As soon as she did that, the creature turned to ashes as it fell. But she didn't pay much attention as she turned to bisect another creature. a couple tried to attack her, but she removed their arms and part of its torso. This dance of death continued for another moment before the last creature fell. As it fell and turned to ashes, she took in a deed breath before she turned to the others. One of them had fell due to a scratch from the beasts and he had fallen as he tried to back up away from his fellows.
"Don't," he begged. "Please, I'm not going to turn,"
But even his boss could see that was a lie as black webbing began to from along his arm. She walked up to him.
"Mistress Ulrika please," he begged but was silenced as Ulrika drove her sword into his heat killing him instantly.
"Rana with me, the rest of you, wrap him up and burn him," she ordered.
The group nodded as she and Rana walked to the side. As they did so Rana pulled her glove off before offering it to her mistress. Ulrika gulped and hesitated trying to keep the hunger down. slowly, she moved in and sank her fangs into Rana's wrist and took a share of blood from. Her follower let a pleasurable moan escape her lips as she drank not too deeply. After a moment Rana pulled slightly, but Ulrika didn't let go.
"Mistress," the follower said but the vampire ignored her as she drank more. "Ulrika!" Rana yelled before slamming the pommel of her sword at the vampire.
Ulkira pulled away and hissed at Rana before recognition came to her. "Sorry," Ulrika said as she let her follower go.
She looked away as she wiped her mouth. "Sorry," she then walked off leaving her followers alone.
As night fell, Ulrika sat alone as her followers sat around a fire cooking some food. Earlier they had burned their friend and sent his soul of to Naggash. Ulrika didn't join them then either. While she didn't feel guilty about killing her follower, they all expected her to do so, she felt guilty about nearly draining Rana. Ever since she managed to escape Gabriella in Nuln she had found it difficult to keep her hunger down. While others did have the same problem, she had yet to find a way to control it outside of being hit.
Her followers began to sing making her smile as she pulled out a locket from her jacket. Opening it, she began to mutter a spell she had learnt from the man she got it from. Purple light flowed around her hand as she spoke. The smoke like light soon formed into a circle before her and three images appeared before her. The first was a pair of Ghur and Chamon, the second was a twin-tailed comet and the final one was a lightning bolt.
She stopped as she read the symbols before her before they vanished into purple smoke. After closing it, she sighed and slid the locket back into her jacket before she turned over to her followed. The smiles on their faces told her all she needed to know before she stood and joined them.
"Hey boss," a big muscular man said. "You finally decided to join us,"
Ulrika just smiled. "Well, I figured that I need to keep you all from trouble," that earned a few chuckles before her expression turned serious. "I've been asking the locket about what to do next, it showed me the symbols of Ghur and Chamon along with a twin tailed-comet and a lightning bolt," she looked at her followers. "Any ideas?"
Her followers fell silent for a moment. They were like that for a few moments before Ricktor spoke up.
"Could the two realms and twin-tailed comet mean one of the Cities of Simar," he suggested. "As for the lightning bolt, the only thing that comes to mind is the Stromcast,"
"I agree but that doesn't narrow it down," Rana said.
Ulrika had the same thoughts but now they made a little more sense despite the vagueness of it. She pulled the locket out again and her followers fell silent once more as she began to mutter the spell. As the purple smoke flowed over her arm only two symbols appeared this time. The first was a star with an anvil in the middle while the other a something that they had never seen before.
"N7?" one of her followers asked. "What's that?"
"I have no idea," Ulkria said and the lack of a response from the others told her the all she needed to know.
"An anvil in a star," Ven asked as he stroked his goatee.
Eyes turned to him expectantly. "Something you wish to add?" Ulrika asked.
"This is just a thought, but it could be talking about Jayne Starforged," he said. "A Stormcast eternal who is said to read the stars,"
That peaked the other's interest. "I heard about that. Rumour has it that Sigmar himself plucked her from the stars themselves,"
"Well," Ulrika said. "It's better than nothing. We leave at first light,"
OOOOO
Kaira just looked at the aliens before her, her mind buzzing with what she witnessed in front of her. But soon her eyes focused on Tali.
"Why are you wearing such strange armour?" she asked.
"My race has a weak immune system," Tali said before explaining the reasons why with Jayne chipping in explaining what Tali couldn't in simple terms.
"So, you and him," Kaira nodded towards Garrus. "Cannot eat our normal food?"
"Yes, at best we would fall ill, worst we'd die," Garrus clarified.
"I'll see if I can find some equivalent for you while you stay here," Kaira said before leaning on her desk.
"Wait so we're not allowed to leave?" Miranda asked.
"Well," the Lord Commander looked towards Jayne. "Since you know Jayne here, I'll leave you all in her care. But yes, you cannot leave. Not until I get in contact with Azyr at least,"
"But why?" the XO insisted.
Kaira looked toward Jayne. "I assume you told them," The commander nodded in response. "While most people will accept the humans, and if the…." She paused. "….none humans, wore cloaks and other clothing that covered their features, then no one would be the wiser. But what happens when a child pulls it off? When the wind blows them off. The fear of Chaos is still around, not to mention the Witch hunters and other zealous groups. They would assume that they are members of Chaos and burn them at the stake. So, holding you here is not without merit, but we do need to consider what we do very carefully otherwise… well I don't want to even know what happens,"
"Forgive me, but we've heard about this…." Liara paused as she saw Jayne make a cutting motion with her hand. "…enemy. But are we really that level of danger?"
"Yes," Both Kaira and Jayne said at the same time. "Think Reapers, but ten times as worse," Jayne continued. "There are some books in the library that will explain. But be aware some of the things are hard to look at,"
"You mean read?" James asked, but the shake of Jaynes head told him otherwise.
"There are wards and seals, but some of the pain still comes out," Kaira answered as she stood. "Look while I would love you all to experience the city, I also have to take your safety into account. Especially since you are friends of Jayne. There's more than just safety I need to think about here,"
"That's fair," Garrus nodded. "But studying isn't going to pass the time. And I have a feeling we are here for a reason,"
"You aren't the only one," a voice said making the group turn to see two men.
Both wore the Heraldry of the Knights but, just like the Lord Commander, wore ornate armour with long cloaks. Kaira stiffened slightly as the two men entered with the door closing behind them.
"I'm Eponoch," one said. "Lord-Exorcist of the Dawn Knights," he then indicated to his partner. "This is Lord-Veritant Demarch," the other nodded but said nothing.
"I assume those titles mean something," Ashley whispered as Jayne walked up next to her.
"Grand Wizard and Priest," the commander whispered.
"We hard heard that Gallus brought in some outsiders, and wanted to see who," the Lord-Exocist said as he walked up to the crew making them shrink a bit. "To see people from another world is truly special, especially when we have orders from Azyr,"
"What?" Kaira asked.
