Steel & Oil: Warhammer 32K

If this world turned out to be Monster Hunter, well — at least that would mean he'd escaped one cesspit for something marginally better. But he'd only ever heard of the Warp crossing through time, never through worlds.

Considering exactly who had thrown him out of the Warp and onto this planet, Lin began to seriously entertain the possibility that the old man on the Golden Throne had been playing Monster Hunter thirty thousand years ago.

Honestly — had the supreme evil god GW ever paid Capcom any licensing fees?

Lin hadn't quite finished processing that thought, but shouting the monster's name had caught Admir's attention. The lieutenant turned to him for confirmation: "Brachydios? Is that its academic designation? Is this creature common out there?"

"Not at all — I just happen to have a passing familiarity with it," Lin denied without missing a beat. "How many times have you engaged this thing? What are its attack patterns?"

"Fifteen times. Its patterns are straightforward — either hurling boulders, or charging at high speed with a roar. The destructive force is considerable, though. And its defenses are formidable. Bolter rounds can penetrate, but they don't inflict enough damage; if anything, they seem to aggravate it. Only targeting weak points like the eyes gives it any pause."

Well. Authentic to the source material, through and through.

"Have you tried anything besides bolters?" Lin asked, raising the plasma pistol in his hand. "Plasma weapons, for instance?"

"That would require having some."

Lin shrugged. He signaled the two Astartes dragging him along to slow their pace, and began charging the plasma pistol.

In the distance, the Brachydios was locked in combat with the two squads that had split off earlier to draw its attention. Timing his shot to the brief pause after the creature completed a sweeping tail spin, Lin released the trigger. The fully-charged muzzle erupted in a blaze of vivid blue, and a superheated plasma bolt crackling with electrical discharge slammed squarely into the Brachydios's back.

A single shot. The creature let out a pained, wailing shriek. Where the plasma had struck, the flesh had been seared into a gaping, unmistakable crater — as though a chunk of it had simply been scooped away. Blood was already seeping through the blackened, scorched scales.

In that opening, the squad that had been engaged with the Brachydios successfully disengaged. Admir and the two Space Marines carrying Lin stared at him with undisguised astonishment — clearly none of them had expected a single plasma round to achieve results like that.

But Lin, who knew perfectly well that Brachydios had a weakness to thunder, was far less impressed than the three of them. He turned the plasma pistol over in his hands, examining it with a frown. "Strange," he muttered. "Is the output on a Ryza-pattern plasma pistol really that low...?"

"Should we press the advantage?" Admir suggested. "Hit it a few more times?"

"No." Lin shook his head. "If a fully-charged plasma pistol only deals that much damage, we won't be able to kill the Brachydios before the gun overheats — and the aggravated creature would use that window to close distance. Any other weapon and we lose the elemental advantage. We won't get comparable results."

Lin declined Admir's suggestion. Knowing full well how tenacious a Brachydios's constitution was, he had absolutely no confidence that carving a few more shallow wounds into it would bleed the thing out. Even if they could whittle it down to critical condition, a plasma pistol that couldn't cool in time before the Brachydios fled would never land the finishing blow. "Fall back for now. We need to conserve ammunition. We'll work out the rest later."

Faced with Lin's display of professional competence, no one in Admir's group questioned the call. While the Brachydios was still disoriented, the group crossed the open ground and retreated into the next stretch of jungle. Once Lin confirmed there was no chance of pursuit, he took the opportunity to carry out a quick field repair on his legs. Mobility restored, he followed the Astartes through a winding series of turns — roughly twenty minutes on foot — before arriving at what served as the group's temporary base.

Lin surveyed the natural cave mouth in front of him. "So this is where you've been living?"

"We move frequently. No point investing heavily in any one shelter — a decent location is enough," Admir answered. "Though we have made some basic modifications to the interior."

"That's not quite what I meant. Let me rephrase." Lin pressed the point. "How did you all end up on this planet? If there was a ship that went down, the normal approach would be to use the wreck as a foundation — set up near the debris and conduct outward exploration from there." He glanced around the cave. "The way you've got this set up, you look like cavemen. Don't tell me the Warp just dropped each of you here individually, one by one?"

Admir's expression remained as blank as ever, but Lin could sense something quietly mournful underneath it.

He didn't answer the question. Instead, he redirected: "If we reach an agreement on cooperation, you'll learn all of that in time. What matters now is establishing your capability as a Mechanicus Priest — showing us whether you're worth working with."

"Fair enough." Lin readied himself to demonstrate. "How would you like to assess me?"

"Start by maintaining and servicing our weapons and equipment. I'll evaluate your skill level from the work itself," Admir replied. "The way you identified that creature made you look like a gene-specialist Apothecary. But what we need is a Techmarine — someone with maintenance and fabrication expertise. I'm hoping you're not too lacking in that department."

Lin raised an eyebrow. He couldn't be bothered explaining that his golden finger made him a generalist with a working knowledge of practically everything. "Where are we doing the repairs? We'll need basic materials."

"We've set up a rudimentary workshop inside the cave. I've already had someone go ahead to clear out some... less essential items. Follow me — I'll take you through. Until we've confirmed we can reach an agreement, you don't have free run of this place."

Seeing that this group had their own secrets to keep, Lin naturally chose understanding over objection. He followed Admir into the cave. There wasn't much to glimpse of anything sensitive, but the steady stream of Astartes moving in and out — over fifty in all — gave Lin a fairly solid estimate of their total numbers.

This group of Astartes showed no warmth toward an outsider like Lin; more than a few regarded him with undisguised suspicion. But Admir clearly commanded genuine authority among them, because not a single one moved to obstruct or challenge his decision. Before long, Admir led Lin into a side chamber — drier than the rest — where various pieces of equipment had been stacked against the walls. It was evidently doubling as an armoury.

Lin's eye was immediately drawn to a crude stone table, on which sat a powered backpack — still operational, fitted with a mechadendrite arm. Unmistakably the equipment of a Techmarine Sergeant.

"What happened to your Techmarine?" Lin asked. "Where is he?"

"He gave his life." Admir lowered his gaze. "A long time ago. We were facing a flying creature — green, reptilian, with well-developed venom glands and the ability to breathe fire. Fighting it without proper equipment nearly killed us all. At one point I nearly died myself, when it came in low and almost took my head off with its jaws."

"But at the critical moment, Sergeant Heipa stepped forward. He left his backpack behind, took the last melta bomb our squad had, charged the creature as it dived — and detonated it on contact. The blast severed the monster's tail. Critically wounded and stripped of its balance, it was forced to fight us on the ground. We killed it in the end."

"...No offence intended — his sacrifice was extraordinary."

"He died for his brothers' future. The only way I can honour that is to be strong enough to lead them out of this hell." Admir shook his head slowly. He reached over to the weapons rack and lifted a boltgun, holding it out to Lin. "I miss him every day. But we have to face what's in front of us. Show me whether you have what it takes to fill his place — to carry on the work he left unfinished. Perhaps even surpass what he could have done."