Arry's Ancestor .... Continued.

Chopper sat on top of a tall platform, suspended in the air by a networfk of girders and rails, bolted and welded in place by workmen of a ken, far superior to that of common man in today's times. Millenia ago they grafted to create and combine alloys from compounds long forgotten, mended by their idiot offspring with inferior iron and steel.

The platform groaned and heaved with every tiny movement, so Chopper stayed stock still and gazed into the blackness. His eyes attuned from a youth spent in the dark, waiting and biding. He would miss nothing when it came.

The Underhive holds fears for all men. Chopper was no different but he marshalled his emotions and directed them where needed, like a veteran general commanding his elite regiments. At the moment, the Fear and the Rage welled inside. Fear born of the battle to come; and Rage at the reasons for being there. The Guilders, the Ruling Houses, the Bounties, the Outlaws ... The Outlaws ... The Outlaws ...

Chopper grits his teeth in the shadows and the platform rocks gently ...

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Some time before, Charlie had been a miner, like everyone in the House of Orlock at some time. They held the most lucrative water-contracts and used their primary access to the Hive's most precious resources to cheapen their smelting and foundry operations. Charlie mined for water, for tin and for copper, for iron and for archeotech ... hidden vaults full of rare, prized and forgotten technology.

The best archeotech is found deep in the Underhive, near the sump ... where the beasts and the crazies and the sick dwell. When found, it is brought to Guilders who arrange all trade and licensing throughout the Hives on the planet of Necromunda. They buy their licenses to license from the ruling house of Helmawr.

Whenever Guilder licensed expeditions to the Underhive run into trouble, in the form of outlaws and stick-up men, they put out bounties on the rogues. Most of the time this is enough to deter them back into hiding at least. Yet, when they band together ... the denizens of the Underhive, the Muties and Scalies ... they often stand their ground, uncaring or unknowing of the bounties placed on their heads. Too stupid or too ignorant ... too brazen and too desperate, they descend upon larger settlements and sate their hunger.

Charlie used to be a miner. Then the Scavvies came. The Orlock mining settlement was equipped to defend itself from the usual scum that proliferate in the low down dark; but near the sump a vicious and tenacious being, known up-hive only as the Scion of the Pale King, had been dragging the lost and disassociate scavengers and freaks together. They feasted on the flesh of the first few parties that they came across and grew stronger. They took weapons left behind by the dead and organised themselves into a strong raiding party, then they came.

Chopper had come a long way since that day. A day that marred his soul and gave his face a grimaced and dire cast. Only a handful of the Orlocks escaped on that evening, with a much younger and fearful Charlie casting a glance back over his shoulder as they ran from the settlement. They weren't even being chased. The desperate and hungry scavengers had stopped in the street to feast on the fallen ... some still screaming as they were devoured.

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In a tunnel, off to Charlie's left, he spots movement. He doesn't move. He only waits and prays that these are the ones that he wants. He hopes that they are skin-blistered and flesh-rotten. He wishes for the stench of necrosis and disease. Instead, he smells kerosene and hears the chanting of a Redemptionist Hymn ... No matter. The bounty on these cultist scum are just as high as for mutants. He stands and bellows a war cry, as his dirt-grey and rust coloured cloak is tossed from his shoulders, revealing the dirty axe and bolter that is the sign of Orlock Vengence this deep down. The whole area seems to scream as the broken and twisted scaffold screeches under his sudden shift in movement.

The fight begins and the Redemptionist Hymn comes to an abrupt halt. The cloaked cultists spread out at the bellowed challenge of the crazed and embittered Orlock. They recognise the Guilders' pet terrier and head around the flanks of the collapsed dome, out of sight of the positioned marksmen, high up on the left.

Chopper sees this and counters by calling to his team of young fire-brands to head around to the right, with a flamer escort to back them up. This gang of wannabe bounty hunters is almost beneath his contempt but it was the best he could round up at short notice. He will serve as the distraction. Chopper jumps from his position on high and heads straight down the middle with his two shotgun weilding bodyguards.

The Cultists are making a bee-line for him, aware of his fearsome reputation. They want to finish him before he can utilise his famous and deadly bolter. Two crazed extremists run towards him with massive weapons, screaming in some High Gothic that Chopper can't understand. He calls to his boys to open fire but their paltry guns and poor discipline sees them fire high. Chopper is outraged. He's almost delighted when the Redemptionist leader steps out from behind a bulkhead and flames the both of them with purging fire. They flail uselessly at the flames, before dropping to try and extinguish them.

Chopper ignores the Leader and heads straight for the massive club-weilding crazies. A rictus grin of pleasure cracks his dread face. He charges and is punished for his arrogance. A club cracks down upon his right hand, and suddenly he finds it hard to raise his pistol. Only the screams from the Redemptionist Cult leader, as he goes down under a hail of bullets from Samuel Stubbs, keeps him laughing in the face of adversity. He's still laughing as another blow from a mighty swing takes his legs out from under him. He lands on his back, stunned. The two crazies close in for the kill ...

... and are distracted as they see the team of juves and a flamer pop around the corner they had previously disappeared from. Chopper raises his bolter and fires, taking the ear off of one of the Fervent Few, making him scream with anger and rage ... There are screams all around now as people are getting into combat, left, right and center. Blood-Oaths are exchanged and fulfilled. The last crazy puts the boot in on Chopper before being is over-run by the Orlock Juves with swords, flails and pistols. Chopper grins as his eyes shut ... the last thing he sees before he loses conciousness is his, recently hired, flamer dousing the Redemptionist Leader in flames, screaming "How'd you like that? A taste of your own medicine, you son of a bitch!"

He can't help but laugh as the darkness takes him and hands drag him away to safety ... He can't help but laugh, because crying is not an option. Saved by those that he disdained so much, that he couldn't even be bothered to learn their names.

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Bullet Nose looked up from the fire at the stoney faces of us Orlocks all around him. We all knew the stories of Chopper and his deeds. We knew of his bitter campaign of retribution against the Scavvies and his fearsome reputation as a bounty-hunter. We didn't know that he was a mad old bastard with a death wish. We didn't know that he didn't care much for those he went into battle with.

"So, like ... Chopper didn't respect his gang?" Vinny spoke up, breaking the silence. We were all pretty aghast. Loki was looking up at me with one puppy dog eye, seemingly asking me to tell him it wasn't so. I couldn't. I knew the old drokker.

Bullet-Nose shook his head ...

"No, Vinny-Spire-King. He was blind to the courage that he gave to his men. Ignorant of the way that they followed him and unknowing of the reasons why. He paid them, they followed him. Pay is necessary to bind a man to service but it does not explain loyalty, or the lengths and depths we go to, to follow those that have won our respect."

"Chopper had not yet learned this ... the need for vengeance still burned too strong in him ..."

Bullet-Nose was right ... The mad, one-eyed, old bastard told me everything, so many years ago. It was his stories that stopped me from getting into gangs when I was young. Never was desperate enough to need to fight until now, when I've nearly lost everything and those that I rely on suffer...

Arry's Ancestor ...

It's been a while and yes, it's been quiet. The lads have been itching for a scrap and I don't blame them. This is one of those times when you know trouble's just around the corner, with a length of two by four and a murderous expression. It's only natural to get grouchy and irritable. A few fights broke out between them but it just served to break the tension... Boys will be boys and all that ...

... I asked Bullet-Nose if he knew any secret spells or incantations, you know, any of that Ratskin mumbo-jumbo that might help their morale but he laughed at me and just walked away. Bloody Ratskins.

We're all sitting around, grumpy because we can't do anything. You've always got to have a full camp when you're expecting touble. Let up for a second and it'll come crashing down on you, like an upper level in a Hive-Quake. Another night of dross and the same old crap, same old stories: Vinny, banging on about being King of the Spire... Donny trying to get the lads going in a hymn to the Emperor (some of those hymns are actually pretty good but when you're hearing them for the fourth time in a day ...) ... and Loki flipping his new eyepatch up to scare locals (at least that still gets a laugh, hur hur!).

That's when Bee-En walks in with this massive thing chucked over his shoulder ... a wreck of an animal, it was ... all shell and claw. Never seen anything like it. Mutie, for sure.

"What's that?" I ask him ...

"Hatchet-Hand, not want to know ... Just want to eat!" ... That damned dirty, scar faced grin of his. Then we're all outside except Donny, who's a little bit funny about what he eats, around the grill pit, watching Bee-En take the shell and tail off of this thing ... The legs go and clatter somewhere in the dark, as he lobs them over his shoulder. The guts get lobbed in the fire, where they hiss and stink for a second, before actually smelling kind of nice. When the thing's finally on the spit and cooking, we all realise that this thing might actually taste alright.

I popped open a couple of bottles of Wildsnake. I'd kept them back for a while and the boys have been tense as anything so I thought to let them blow off a little steam. When it gets handed to Bee-En, sitting there solemnly, he leans back with a big sigh and says ... right in front of everyone, like! He says a name that I haven't heard in a few years, got a holo of him somewhere around here ...

"Chopper Charlie." Everyone turned and looked at him. Everyone knows Chopper Charlie. He was a legend among the Orlocks for a long while. Some of his tales were still being told when I was young and he was an old man by then. My Grampa Charlie. They've dried up of late but everyone gets told a story or two about Chopper when they're young. It wouldn't be an Orlock's bedtime without it, though everyone was stunned when Bullet-Nose mentioned the name.

"I meet him once ... at a Renegade camp. My Father's Badskin Tribe. I was very young then. He was old, like my Grandfather. He sat long one night with my Father and they swapped stories. They knew each other from a time, long past. This fire reminds me of that night. The head rags and everything ..." Bee En indicated our house attire. We wear bandanas and tabards, decorated with out family or gang markings, depending on where our allegiance lies strongest. There's a mix of markings in my gang. We're not too strict about gak like that.

"Chopper was a Hatchet Hand, like you Hatchet-Hand!" The boys laughed at Bee En's pet name for me... They almost never get to hear him speak ... they looked like little children, even Vinny. Donny had come outside to listen and was drinking something strong looking ... vapour was coming off of it.

"He was a very funny man. He told long stories about Grandfather and Himself, defending the Uphivers from the Fire-Spitters (Redemptionists, a fire cult ... Bee-En calls Donny a fire spitter) and the Grey-Skins (Scavvies ... they're a bit ... diseased ...). They lost many men but kept on fighting. They drank much, to the memories of their lost friends. They fell asleep. Chopper woke up and walk away, swearing and shaking his head. The Wildsnake is bad for the mind. Be careful Hatchet-Hand."

He made the boys laugh that night. Mostly at my expense but I didn't begrudge it to him. The lads were getting merry as hell and it'd been a long time since they'd even stuck their heads outside the bar.

"What did he look like?" That one from Loki, who'd never actually spoken to the Fearsome Ratskin.

"Like Hatchet-Hand ... but more bent, more broken. Scarred from many fights. One eye sat in his head, looking out at everything like it was ... big joke. He had eyepatch like you." Loki beamed at this and all the other lads threw their bandanas at him, groaning.

"Do you remember any of the stories he told?" This from Donny, who remembered all the stories Grampa used to tell, just fine. My suspicions started to be raised then.

"As it happens, Fire-Spitter ... I listened well: and I remember every, single word ..."

He took a deep breath and began ...