Setting:Cloudburst/Deathwatch

The Deathwatch are recent guests of the Cloudburst Sector on their current scale. The Sector had suffered relatively few alien invasions in the time between its founding and the middle M41 era. However, after the invasion of the Glasians and the discovery of their evil patron, the Inquisition sprang into action and sent Marines to Cloudburst. After the second, even worse Migration, the Deathwatch answered the Ordo Xenos’s call to expand permanently into the region. Some in the ancient order of Xenohunters did not agree with the necessity, given the preponderance of local Deathwatch assets in the northern Ultima region, but the Ordo Xenos insisted on the pressing need outweighing logistical costs. The great Forge Yards of Fabique reconditioned a Ramilies star fort to serve as the headquarters of the local Deathwatch, while Cognomen berths constructed the smaller Watch Stations.

The Deathwatch in Cloudburst rely on good relations with their member Chapters and with the Blue Daggers to accomplish anything. Distinctly undergunned compared to older Vigils like Jericho or Pykman, and also not as fully staffed, Dascomb provides coverage against alien incursions and subversions as far away as the Oldlight Exo-zone and the border of the Drumnos Voids, and even as far as the Pox Cluster in Naxos. The Blue Daggers are enthusiastic proponents of Deathwatch operations in the Sector, for the most part. The fact that the Deathwatch are allowed to deploy Exterminatus in their own backyard can put a damper on relations at times, but the Deathwatch is, if anything, even more stingy with this power than the Ordos, and has not employed their terrible weapons yet in Cloudburst.

In the halls of the Watch structures of the Deathwatch, the Watch Commander of Cloudburst and Master of the Vigil – long fused into a single position by tradition in this remote Sector – carefully observes Cloudburst for signs of the alien. As is so often the case, the incursions of the galaxy’s most pernicious parasites, the Ork, and previous masters, the Eldar, cause routine headaches for the Imperium in the sector. Other, local enemies, like the Tendrilites or the skin-scrawling horror of the Ghald Mountains, rarely extend their threat past their own world. The true foe of Cloudburst Sector, the evil Glasians, are a problem the Deathwatch understands better than anybody else except the Daggers themselves. Blue Daggers serve in the Deathwatch constantly, with as many as twelve Brothers and half that number of specialists deployed on their Vigil at any given time. Even the Chapter’s glorious founder, Augustus Alderoster, served for seven years in the black armor of the Watch. The present Chapter Master, Lord Ranult Arden, served as well, as have two Company Captains.

Specializations

One tradition unique to the Deathwatch of Cloudburst is their helm decorations. The ceremonial but combat-usable masks and visors that the Keepers of the Cloudburst Deathwatch wear receive ritual embossing on the metal covers that fit over their normal facial features. The masks themselves are a common pattern of helmet upgrade among Space Marines, frequently worn by Honor Guards and Techmarines. The images inscribed on those of the Cloudburst Keepers, however, are unique. The five Segmentae are represented by images of bird beaks and eyes. Solar is represented by stylized eagles, Ultima by hawks, Pacificus an owl, Tempestus a falcon, and Obscurus by the vulture. Marines drawn from those Segmentae have the images of those animals embossed on their masks, which they are allowed to keep after completing their service (though Keepers rarely leave the Deathwatch).

Another tradition of the local Deathwatch is to make each Watch Structure, from mighty Dascomb to tiny Octa, specialize in some way. Dascomb, for instance, has its huge ship hull classification library. Vault keeps records of Inquisitorial communications that concern the hunt for aliens. Earthquake has extensive records of Feral Ork development pathways, and Octa keeps records of the frequencies on which the dead aliens of its host world communicated at range. This trait is hardly unique to Cloudburst, of course; the entire concept of the Deathwatch is that they will keep in memory the secrets of dread xenos to ease the cost of their defeat if ever they return. Ever since the rampage of The Beast and his Slaughter, the Deathwatch have maintained records and tactics of aliens that would burn Mankind from the stars if they had the chance. In Cloudburst, however, thanks to the fact that the Deathwatch can go decades without significant challenge from migrating Glasians, the Deathwatch has the time to perform records-keeping and research that busier Vigils could not, such as the perennially overworked Excalibris and Erioch.

This is not to say the Deathwatch of Cloudburst are idle. That would be a disservice to the Vigilant. Instead, the Deathwatch of Cloudburst aggressively seek out hidden knowledge of the alien when they are not partaking of the desperate scramble to shield the sector from its avian attackers. Orks, Eldar, Tendrilites, Rak’gol, Kroot, and Vespid: there are no races the Cloudburst Deathwatch does not seek to capture for study and dissection. Of course, finding an Eldar or Ork willing to be taken alive is a challenge in the sparse and lightly inhabited Cloudburst.

Unlike the Blue Daggers, the Deathwatch of Cloudburst does not seek constantly to expand their fleet. A large battlefleet would defeat the purpose of the Deathwatch, in the minds of the Cloudburst Inquisition. The Deathwatch is to be a precise and unstoppable small-unit strike force, able to insert a team quietly, exert shattering force, and disappear. Instead, the Deathwatch of Dascomb focus their shipbuilding assets on upgrading and maintaining their existing forces to the highest possible standard. They do not allow their fleet of Thunderhawks and precious Blackstars to leave their bays with a single bolt untightened or cable out of place. Their shuttles and gunships bristle with weapons, and their small collection of Strike Cruisers are built to a standard of manufacture so high, Saturnyne Grand Yards could scarcely do better. In addition, the Deathwatch of Watch Fortress Dascomb maintain a small fleet of heavy escorts, mostly Destroyers and Frigates, as well as three Kill-ships. For emergency trips out into the Cloudburst Circuit, which is somewhat beyond the single-flight capacity of a Strike or Rapid Strike Cruiser, the fleet also maintains an Inquisitorial Longstrike ship, though it is only employed in the direst of circumstances. The Cloudburst Deathwatch would not refuse more ships, they simply prioritize maintaining what they have.

The composition of the Dascomb detachment of Marines is as flexible as any other Fortress’s would be. There are those Marines there for a short Vigil, those there on longer tasks, and those who joined and feel no compulsion to leave. One constant is the presence of a ten-Marine squad of the neighboring Celestial Knights. This Chapter of Dark Angel Successors has been present in the north of Ultima for thousands of years, and have contributed at least ten Marines to Dascomb’s Vigil continuously since M41.545. Although many Deathwatch veterans consider the Knights a provocative presence for their unconventional ‘recollection’ of the Primarchs, their presence is still welcome when the Centennial Migrations roll through the Cloudburst Sector.

Dreadnoughts

The first of the two Dreadnoughts to serve the Watch Fortress Dascomb is a former Third Company squad marksman of the Dark Angels named Lucien Insly. Brother Lucien was a member of the Dark Angels in good standing for many decades after his Initiation, and served as a capable but un-lauded member of his squad for fifty years before his talent was uncovered.

While assigned to a mission to purge a Kabal of Dark Eldar that had taken to capturing and enslaving the farmers of the Agri-world Vanlos 3 in the Drumnos Sector, Insly distinguished himself. When the Dark Eldar began using complex hit-and-run tactics to evade the Astartes retaliation, Insly kept detailed records and notes of their attacks, compiled on the fly during the course of his normal duties. In his head, he marshalled the data he had collected to precisely array his squad against the Eldar to cause maximum disruption of their plans. In conjunction with the local PDF and Imperial Guard forces, Brother Lucien was able to accurately determine which Dark Eldar present were the leaders of the enemy force.

This, in turn, led to his revelation that the reason the Dark Eldar had pressed their attack even after the Astartes had arrived to stop them was because the Dark Eldar leader’s subordinates were quietly trying to get him killed fighting the Imperium so they could replace him. Rather than play along, however, Insly instead used his combination of hard-won intelligence and marksman’s weapons to begin killing those lieutenants instead, over the course of several days’ hard fighting. The Dracons and other officers of the Archon who led the attack were caught off-guard by this, having underestimated the mon-keigh’s skill.

As soon as Insly began this purge, the Dark Eldar raids faltered. Other Dark Angel assets in the system took note and pressed their advantages. Within three weeks, the Dark Eldar force was all but rent in half, with the now-paranoid Archon and his few surviving Dracons bickering and blaming each other. The Dark Angels struck, shelling the Webway gate the Dark Eldar had used to arrive on the planet from orbit, and stranding the Dark Eldar on the planet.

Inquisitorial Ordo Xenos quarantines sealed the planet off, allowing the Dark Angels to be reassigned elsewhere, while the task of ferreting out the surviving aliens fell to local forces under Inquisitorial guidance. Brother Lucien Insly was commended for his creativity, and elevated to Squad Sergeant, though he preferred to retain his Stalker bolter rather than upgrade to a plasma weapon.

With every new chance to learn from the Dark Eldar and turn their own flaws against them, Insly proved himself adequate, and within a few decades more was considered the premiere hunter of the Dark Eldar in the Third Company and possibly the Chapter outside the Inner Circle. When he had the chance to serve the Deathwatch, he did so, and served with distinction in the Galactic North for over ten years.

He eventually met his end serving in the battles against the Corumbino Nebular foes who continue to snipe at Imperial assets when they get the chance. After a grueling battle against a Dark Eldar construct of malice and dark energy, Insly was cut in half at the waist. Eventually, he was resuscitated into a Dreadnought Construct after obtaining grudging permission from The Rock, and re-stationed on Dascomb as, at the time, its only Ancient.

The other Dreadnought assigned to Watch Fortress Dascomb is a Silver Skulls Techmarine who was granted the immense honor of internment in the station’s other Dreadnought sarcophagus. The Silver Skull, named Elder Brother Keyne, was once a master of what the Deathwatch and Ordo Xenos refer to as anti-de-sanctification. This is the process of salvaging technology that had been stolen or defiled by aliens and returning it to proper working order. The Orks are the most obvious perpetrators of this defilement, but not the only ones. Like all proper worshippers of the Machine God, Keyne loathed the mere thought of aliens defiling Imperial technology, especially weapons and ships. The task of laboriously scraping off Ork ‘improvements’ to their looted humie flash is one at which Keyne was a genuine master of the art. Shuttles, pistols, even a staggeringly rare Conversion Beamer; Keyne has restored a vast array of lost tech and ships, much of which went straight into the arsenal of either the Deathwatch or the Silver Skulls themselves.

Keyne was a normal Techbrother of low rank and experience when he learned of his skill. The Skulls had successfully boarded and retaken a captured Imperial ship that had been taken by Ork Freebootaz. Keyne’s team was able to restore the ship, a Viper-class, to Imperial working order with such speed and efficiency that Mars itself took note. When the Skulls later encountered a mongrel band of multi-species pirates and slavers on the outer edge of the Maelstrom, driven out by the expanding empire of Huron Blackheart, it was Keyne who led the team of Techmarines the Silver Skulls sent to analyze their weaknesses and eventually defeat them.

When the call came to lend an experienced xeno killer from the Tech Brotherhood to the Deathwatch, there was no real question who could be more qualified. Keyne served with distinction for four years before his internment into the Dreadnought following a failed attempt to defeat a Khornate daemon that had boarded his ship during a Geller Field malfunction. After the Field came back online and finished the weakened daemon off, the Deathwatch quickly interred him, lest his precious knowledge be lost forever. The Silver Skulls have barely tolerated this, but acknowledge that there is little to be done about it all, and it is better than Keyne simply dying without gain.

Watch Structures

The following is a listing of the named Deathwatch postings in the Cloudburst Sector and Circuit.

The home of the Deathwatch in Cloudburst

Each of these structures is unique, and each has a function that sets it apart from the others. Not all are staffed around the clock, and their usual personnel contingent is noted in each description where pertinent.

Watch Fortress Dascomb:

Primus inter pares for the Cloudburst Deathwatch, hub of the local Ordo Xenos, and a nigh-indestructible fortress of Imperial might, Dascomb lurks in the cold, dead space of AL4404 like a predator. The huge station outguns any Glasian ship thus far encountered by a factor of two, and at its full defensive complement, could engage a Subsector Battlefleet without difficulty. AL4404 is a useless system, with very few planets and a dim star. Its isolation is perfect for the Deathwatch, who can use the structure as a prison if needed without fear of escapes to surrounding systems.

Watch Fortress Dascomb controls seven smaller Watch Stations and eleven Watch Points. The Watch Stations range in scope from a planet-bound bunker on Cygnmo, there to observe the potentially alien-influenced local population and ready to enact a Sanction if needed, to the sprawling Watch Station Discus, the aptly-named Orbital Platform over Nauphry IV. Watch Points are tiny structures, often far smaller than the ships that carry the Marines who use them there, and are generally single data-gathering arrays that watch specific alien worlds. Friendly Imperial Commanders and local PDFs may provide data to the Inquisition along conventional means (or think they are doing so), but the Deathwatch is very much self-contained, and its missions may be enacted without immediate Inquisitorial oversight. This is rare, but it does happen. In emergencies, the Deathwatch in the region do have access to a single cache of Exterminatus weapons, including an Antimatter Collapser bomb from the Dark Age of Technology.

The hub of the Ordo Xenos Chamber Militant in the sector, the mighty Watch Fortress Dascomb, sits in a desolate and uninhabited system in the Cloudburst Sector’s trailing edge. The fortress has a small permanent garrison of lightly crewed Defense Monitors, but its main defenses consist of the default weapons of a Ramilies starbase, with the heaviest void shields the Inquisition could cram into it. The Fortress is large enough to dock any ship smaller than 18 kilometers in length, and contains numerous residency wings for both Deathwatch Brothers and guests. All systems extraneous to the goal of defending Cloudburst from aliens have long been stripped away, replaced with extra power generators, hydroponic bays, armor, and heavily shielded stasis cells. All of this was done to harden the security of the station, against threats from without and within.

A permanent posting of the Inquisition Ordo Xenos sits beneath the axis of the station, with its own docking clamp. The main feature of the station, however, is in one of its wings, where the largest library of alien ship hull classifications and shield signatures in the entire Segmentum Ultima lies, staffed at all times by five Inquisitorial scribes. This massive archive of starship configurations allows the Imperium to identify potential attackers and targets of xeno vessels, ranging from the Klirith Needles that are barely larger than a civilian car, to the colossal Planet-Killer of Abaddon, which Gothic savants eventually identified as a stolen alien vessel. Less impressive but still valued, the Fortress’s archive of human ship profiles allows its Deathwatch Brothers and visiting Inquisitors to help identify any vessel of human build they may encounter, going back to before the Unification Wars. The archive also includes images of non-Imperial human ships, which occasionally end up in the hands of pirates or in Space Hulks.

Dascomb’s other major asset is that it is, as noted before, not a stock Ramilies. The internal systems for the many thousands of extra crew the platform doesn’t have were removed long ago, and replaced with power generators, capacitor and battery banks, power conduits, and transformers. This allows Dascomb to power its overstrength Void shields, and achieve absurd ranges for its heavy energy weapons; perfect for fighting off aggressive aliens with a reduced crew complement.

Dascomb itself is a product of the times. Though the station is far older than its current posting, it is presently the hub of the Ordo Xenos in the region. Since the Ordo Xenos was given – with grudging consent from the Ordo Malleus – jurisdiction over the Glasian Migration problem, it was decided that the Inquisition needed a new hub for its vastly larger alien-suppression responsibilities. The use of the recently-refurbished Ramilies star fortress for the Deathwatch made perfect sense. It has far greater capacity for storage and refit than the Deathwatch could ever need by itself, leaving plenty of room for the other Ordo Xenos assets in the Sector to stock up and perform their research.

Inside the Fortress, there are a few unique features, such as the Deep Holds, a unique security system consisting of rearranging patterns of nigh-indestructible alloy wall plates that can be controlled remotely by a Forge Master, or directly by the Machine Spirit that oversees them. Beyond lies a long procession of statues of great heroes of the Deathwatch whose successes can not, for whatever reason, be made public. The Forge Core is another unique fixture. It consists of a large chamber, almost four hundred feet on a side, and cubical in shape. Across the chamber stretch large steel gantries, with wide walk paths on them. Each path forms a bridge that spans the chamber and other bridges, and each one has a distinct function. Some have molten metalworking stations, others have small soldering and circuit repair booths, and others yet have plastic injectors or chemical reaction cradles. On the solid floor of the chamber is a vast array of forges and metal alloy mixers, which together create most of the ammunition and simple parts of the Deathwatch’s equipment. On one wall, there is a separate chamber for Forgemaster Asutori, where he works alone, creating those things that either only knows how to make or the inquisition entrusts to him exclusively. This is also where he oversees the induction of new Techbrothers to the Deathwatch, and tests new designs from Cognomen, Mars, or Talasa Prime.

Watch Station Discus:

High in orbit over Nauphry IV, the Deathwatch waits. The space station known to planetside stargazers as ‘Object 1532,’ local government as ‘Death-posting,’ and the SDF as ‘stay the hell away,’ is actually Watch Station Discus. The Station is the largest offshoot of Dascomb, and was built in place over Nauphry while Fabique reconditioned Dascomb for its new role as a Deathwatch fort. As it was purpose-built for the Deathwatch, it has none of the extraneous space or systems a reconditioned station would have. Its interior vaults are far smaller than Dascomb’s, but its armory holds hundreds of bolters, flamers, plasma guns, and other common Astartes weapons. Like many Deathwatch postings, Discus has a specialization, and Discus’s is energetic forensics: identifying energy weapons and their owners by the radiation or burns that they leave behind. Over one hundred task-built Servitors work on samples brought in by Rogue Traders, Deathwatch Killbrothers, and Imperial Navy scouts, and process their results for wider dissemination. This makes Discus one of the few Deathwatch Stations in the galaxy with routine interaction with non-Inquisitorial assets, as the results of its research are highly valuable to the Mechanicus.

Discus is a circular space station of roughly three-kilometer diameter and two-kilometer height, and carries cruiser-weight defense weapons and void shields. It has no fighter complement, but it does carry a pair of Corvus Blackstars for emergency transport. The station can dock any vessel of up to Frigate weight, and its extensive sensor baffling systems render it all but invisible in the darkness of space. At all times, one of the five Companies of the Deathwatch in Cloudburst sorties from Discus, usually the one with the longest continual leadership. As such, the Watch Captain assigned to Discus is usually the de facto second in command of the Cloudburst Sector Deathwatch.

Discus has only come under fire once, and acquitted itself ably. Since then, the station has remained inviolate.

Watch Station Vault:

The structure named Watch Station Vault is more accurately an upgunned Watch Point. It is only barely large enough to house two Marines and a Techpriest comfortably, and perhaps a servitor or two. The structure is about as small as a long-term habitable structure can be, and occupies a high orbit over Maskos. The Station is termed a Station and not a Point because the structure also mounts a disproportionately large cogitator and server bank, for recording all Ordo Xenos-relevant communications that pass through the system, and permanently storing them. Obviously, there exists a philosophy among some Inquisitors that the past should be covered up and obscured, so to prevent their own masters from tinkering with their data, Marines allow only their own and a Mechanicus curator aboard the station. Its extra size comes from its six Turbolaser Destructors, each the size of the main gun of a Thunderhawk. Vault sometimes serves as a dispatch center for Inquisitorial assets mobilizing in Cloudburst during Migrations.

Watch Station Forthright:

This station is technically not in the Sector at all, but the northerly Circuit. At the time of building, Forthright was at the outermost edge of the Astronomican’s projection range. Now, as the Astronomican’s range shrinks, the station is technically outside enforceable Imperial space. However, its value for the Deathwatch has not shrunk. The station sits on the route that Glasian ships must take to cross into the Sector, and although their technology allows them to do so in a way Mankind can’t intercept, Forthright keeps vigil for any attempt by the Glasians to attack the Circuit on their way to Septiim and beyond. This Watch Station employs heavy void shielding and redundant radiation shields to ensure its mission is uninterrupted. It, like Discus, has come under attack by pirates in the past, but a passing Strike Cruiser saw off the attackers before they had a chance to do any real damage. Given how much smaller Forthright is than Discus, that is probably for the best.

Forthright is sometimes not crewed during the times between Migrations, when it is left to servitor control. Ships still stop by every so often to download sensor data and replace worn-out servitors.

Watch Station Bunker:

A name that is perhaps a bit on the nose, Bunker is a subterranean construct on the planet Cygnmo. Crewed around the clock by at least one Kill-Brother and a team of Mechanicus Electro-Priests, this unique construct observes a mystery that the greater Imperium is not aware exists.

Cygnmo’s puzzling history of colonization by non-Imperial humans is no secret, but what the populace today does not know is that the Adeptus Mechanicus found more than a Maskos machine on Cygnmo during their dig. The Techpriest team also uncovered relics of the Eldar, unmistakably recent of construction, and made of post-Fall wraithbone. The Techpriests found armor plating, something like a portable calculator, and a psy-active gemstone, as well as what they believed to be the remains of a Fire Prism, unscarred by battle.

Exactly what the Eldar were doing on Cygnmo, the Deathwatch has no idea, but between the possibility that the Eldar may return one day and the fact that the planet almost certainly will not survive a Migration, the Deathwatch sees fit to keep the station active. The station hides under a natural rock formation on an island just off the coast of the largest continent of the planet, with no native human residences for eight hundred miles: perfect for privacy and defense. In the tunnels below the solid steel roof, the Deathwatch maintain a small library, overseen by a diligent serf curator. The library is a repository of information the Deathwatch has collected on the interactions between aliens and primitive human cultures. Some regard the aliens as gods, others as enemies, some recognize them for what they are, and the Deathwatch seeks to understand them all. The Deathwatch is especially concerned with the possibility that Necron Praetorians may have visited some local cavemen in the past.

Watch Station Redshield:

The most heavily defended of the Cloudburst Watch Stations, Redshield is the formal outpost of the Deathwatch in the Adeptus Mechanicus satrap of ABX202020. The system presently serves as the proto-Knight World of Cognomen, and does not even have an official name in the Mechanicus and Departmento Astrocartigraphicae records.

Redshield is a space platform, not a void station. As such, it can move no more than 450 kilometers from the surface of the planet before its orbit destabilizes, unlike Discus, which could theoretically propel itself out of the Nauphry system. Redshield defends itself with an array of heavy laser weapons, installed by Cognomen and blessed by the Dascomb Forgemaster. The weapon array is potent enough to hull a Chaos Heavy Cruiser with three salvoes, the equivalent of a Battlecruiser’s guns in a station the size of a Luna. This disproportionate firepower comes at the cost of maneuverability. Redshield is locked into a single orbital path from which it cannot deviate, and while it has microthrusters to allow course correction to avoid asteroid impacts, it is essentially inert when not using them. Its shields are no stronger than would be expected from a normal space platform of equivalent size, but its sensorium suite can detect objects moving more than a few relative kilometers per minute at a distance of four AU.

The reason for these huge guns and expensive sensors is one of great sensitivity to the Mechanicus. The Techpriesthood views ABX202020 as a sacred and vital place to the Machine God. More specifically, the Cognomen Techpriesthood views ABX202020 as a sacred and vital place to the Machine God, while the Martian Techpriesthood do not know of it at all. If they did, they would no doubt react poorly to this perceived slight against the protections of the Machine, and Cognomen’s senior leadership knows that well.

Life aboard the station is watchful and routine. Of all the Stations of the Deathwatch, Redshield is the physically farthest from any place Glasians have ever attacked, and there is no indication that the Glasians even know it exists. The defenses of the station are self-maintaining, thanks to the extensive servitor contingent on the station. Above the station proper, tiny sensor buoys collect the IFFs of every passing ship, as do the larger sensors of the station itself. Any discrepancy (such as would be produced by a sensor baffle or tight-beam sensor override technology as the Eldar are known to have) results in immediate interdiction efforts by both Redshield and the small Basilikon detachment of the system.

The station’s senior-most Keeper, usually hand-chosen by the Watch Commander, must check in with the Basilikon at the slightest hint of alien incursion in the Subsector. In exchange, the Mechanicus has vowed to share with the Deathwatch any information about xenotech they recover with their Explorator fleets. Other regions of Imperial space practice this partnership, but rarely is it codified into a binding agreement between the Ordo Xenos and the Mechanicus as it is here. The Deathwatch are the premiere alien hunters in the galaxy, while Cognomen stood alone for thousands of years in the hot darkness of the Circuit. Any alien threat to the future Knight World merits the highest and best-informed response that can be mustered, after all.

For its part, the Deathwatch does not like being entrusted – some would say burdened – with the Mechanicus’s dirty secret. In practice, the Ordo Militarum would not greatly care that a single world in the absolute edges of the galaxy has a few technically illegal machines on it, but the Martian Priesthood could have significantly different ideas about Knight propriety. However, a compact is a compact, and a free, massive, hard-to-build space platform is a space platform the Inquisition need not pay for out of its own pocket. Redshield is no mere bulwark against prying aliens, either, for its internal databanks and laboratories are at the bleeding edge of the Mechanicus’s state of the art.

Redshield stores extensive knowledge of the Webway and the Eldar holofield technology. On the face of it, this may seem an odd focus for the huge station, given the very low density of Eldar ruins and Webway portals in Cloudburst. However, the Mechanicus asserts and Deathwatch agrees that that is part of why Redshield is perfectly located for such research. There is little chance of the research the Deathwatch and Mechanicus perform here accidentally activating a Webway gate, and the Eldar do not seem to know of the world at all (at least, not the ones from the Black City).

Moreover, the Redshield laboratories contain several dedicated hot labs, which Apothecaries and Techmarines can use to study alien diseases too potent to risk studying on Dascomb. The low traffic and high security of ABX202020 mean that there is little risk of a contaminant escaping confinement, and if it did, the Mechanicus could simply use its Basilikon peacekeepers to purge any offending ship, since they are already watching the system like cyberhawks.

Finally, Redshield serves as an outpost for the Deathwatch’s more esoteric training. The huge station has sufficient life support potential to allow eighty times its permanent population to dwell there year-round. The Deathwatch and Mechanicus have built one wing of the station to house a zero-gravity boarding simulator, and its grav plates can be overdriven to simulate firefighting conditions on a ship or platform with failed gravity. Theoretically, Dascomb could house such a training facility, but the Deathwatch sees no reason to build such a thing on their headquarters if they have one already.

Watch Station Peacekeeper:

This planetside base is a contentious and controversial Station of the Deathwatch, to their own indifference and the dismay of the local military. Lorelei is a Frontier world, one that values its independence. Aside from its tithes of psykers, food, and titanium ore, the planet barely interacts with the Imperium at all, and its colonists are rugged, self-reliant, and independent. When the Deathwatch suddenly showed up with a Maskos machine and began digging a subterranean warehouse for all manner of dangerous, expensive, and intimidating weapons and machines, it was the last thing the locals wanted.

Peacekeeper is an ironic name, but given its intended role, the Station’s title is apropos. The Station is the newest in Cloudburst, followed by Redshield, and is the pride of Watch Captain Paris. Paris is a Blue Dagger at heart and will always be so, but Lorelei is not Septiim, and he was slow to notice that. The huge underground structure is a network of tunnels and asymmetric corridors. Designed to confuse anybody who doesn’t live there or have a Space Marine’s enhanced memory and senses, Peacekeeper’s tunnels hold thousands of rounds of variable bolter and other projectile and particle weapon ammo in air-tight lockers, openable only by a member of a Loyalist Space Marine Chapter thanks to clever gene-scan machines. Paris is convinced, and readings of the Tarot do not prove him wrong, that the Glasians or their evil God will someday come for this world, and that if it manages to fight off the Glasian menace, it could serve as an ideal springboard for colonization and exploitation of the Exo-zone, Circuit, and maybe even the Ghoul Stars.

Watch Commander Domack and local Governor Konig do not share his enthusiasm, but both are supporters of human expansion, and so they have begrudgingly allowed his construction project to proceed. It is the locals of the planet itself that oppose Paris. So far, he has had to face protests, vandalism, and even an attempted theft of construction supplied. Hangings put a stop to the robbery, but the simmering resentment remains of the people of Lorelei for the Marine who hopes to save them all from aliens some believe do not even exist.

Inside its twisting halls, Peacekeeper stores more than ammo. An entire, self-powered Space Marine Chapel-Barracks sits between two looming stone walls, eighty feet below surface. Kill-brothers stationed here feed by regular shipments of nutrient blocks and fresh vegetables from local farmers, who tend to appreciate Imperial money more than the base’s neighbors. Since some locals were displaced to build the tunnels – another point of contention, given the vast building space available on Lorelei’s endless grasslands – the entire compound sports an electrified, triple-spaced border fence.

The base’s surface is well-protected, with multiple overlapping defense guns. The core of the local defense is a buried Defense Laser in a nearby hilltop, camouflaged by expensive Mechanicus technoarcana. The base proper enjoys several multilaser turrets in concrete shells, and two large triple-linked autocannon AA nests.

Its specialization is not yet online, but will be soon. Peacekeeper’s intended design allows for something that Dascomb could probably do, but a dedicated facility could do better. The tunnels extend deeper and deeper underground, and will terminate in a stasis vault upon completion. Within the vault, Paris intends to store the few pieces of Glasian technology that are not corrupted by Chaos. So far, the Inquisition and the Blue Daggers have recovered several pieces of technology from the wrecks of alien ships that the Mechanicus can find no taint upon, but are still too far from the designs of the Machine God to trust. These include datapads, ammunition magazines, and mundane household items from the Cylinders. Of course, in any given Cylinder, there may be millions of uncorrupted artifacts, but only one complete and operational sample from each wave need be preserved for the intended experiment.

The Glasians are unique. They are the only tool-using species from another galaxy ever encountered by the Imperium. The Tyranids do not use tools beyond their own gene-warping abilities, and the Necrons are local, if ancient. The Glasians are a contemporary species, and one that lags behind humanity in some areas while exceeding it in others. The Mechanicus insists that a fully operational STC library and databank with all of their few inventions made since the last STC was built in M25 would contain technology in advance of every aspect of Glasian technology. That may be true, the Deathwatch replies, but the Imperium doesn’t have one of those, and the Glasians are close enough to human anatomy for their technology to be recognizable. In the vault, Paris intends to house a Techmarine of the Deathwatch and a team of Techpriests from Cognomen, to study the relics of the aliens and find any technological equivalencies between Glasians and humans. Most Techpriests would express disgust at the idea of reverse-engineering xenotech, of course, but not all. The Inquisition is equally reluctant to sponsor such a venture, but did so anyway, knowing full well that it would not be the first time xenotech had made its way into the Imperial armory. The Grey Knights’ Psycannon, the Digital Weapons, the Laslance, and the Phase Knife all came from enterprising Rogue Traders finding useful xenotech and giving it to the Imperium. Perhaps the Glasians have something to teach the Imperium about their terrifyingly effective Ruin Guns, or intergalactic FTL technology, or their silent hoverpads.

In the meantime, what uncorrupted Glasian xenotech the Imperium has sits in a storage cell in Dascomb, awaiting transfer. Duplicate items that are not weapons are usually disposed of by stellar incineration, to be safe, even if uncorrupted.

Watch Station Sempre:

Inasmuch as one of Cloudburst’s distinct Watch Stations can be called ‘standard,’ Sempre is probably closest to standard. Small, matte-black, armed to the gills, and staffed by a solemn Kill-Brother with secret orders, Sempre sits vigil in the darkness outside Hapster’s Oort cloud, tasked with watching over the oldest human colony in the Sector.

Sempre floats through the cold void beyond Hapster, surrounded by a halo of tiny satellites. Each satellite is a copy of the ones that protect Septiim Tertius’s outer platforms. No larger than a Sparrow aircar, each one has four micro-missile pods and one larger anti-fighter missile tube. Were all thirty pods to fire on a target at the same time, the missile storm would overwhelm all but the best point defense systems. The station itself sports a few multilasers and a trio of plasma cannons for defense, but its only long-range gun is a Cognomen-built heavy defense laser, with barely half the power of that of a destroyer. However, given the small size of Sempre and the arduous task of finding it in the frigid vacuum of space outside a star system, that may be all it needs.

Inside, Sempre is sterile, quiet, and meditative, just the way the Deathwatch like it. The station’s cogitators hum in the chill air, under the eye of a trio of Techpriests in the Ordo Xenos’s employ. The station’s long-range sensors sweep the Hapster system for any sign of Warp energies to indicate ships coming and going, or the spatial displacement of the dirty xenotech drives that propel Glasian vessels between galaxies. Sempre’s corridors ring with metal footsteps as Kill-Brothers on the Vigil walk between the sensor stations and their isolation cells, and the station’s spartan eatery.

Sempre watches Hapster for any sign of invasion or corruption. It is the only Watch Station that fields Kill-Marines. The platform is a frequent stop for Deathwatch vessels that are collecting or preparing Kill-Marines for service with Rogue Traders or Imperial Commanders. The largest chamber in Sempre is a training hall, with extensive records of Imperial diplomatic protocol and communications. There, a Kill-Marine can hone their non-battlefield skills. Occasionally, the Inquisition will dispatch a diplomatically-trained Throne Agent or apprentice to the station, to assist a Kill-Marine with their task. Sempre predates the establishment of Dascomb by one thousand years; it is the only one to do so. Before the Glasians came, Sempre was the sole Watch Station in the Sector. Now, it is one of seven.

Watch Point Gravity:

Gorkypark is a massive threat to the Imperium. The mere existence of Beast-era Tek implies that the Orks here can inflict damage on a scale out of proportion to their numbers. So far, the only reasons the Inquisition has stayed its hand in annihilating the Orks here is the chance to capture the Graviton Compressor Array, and the fact that the Meks here refuse to ally with any other Ork. If Ghazghkull or another Ork Warchief were to force the issue, the Inquisition suspects that the Meks would fold. Thus, the Deathwatch commissioned Watch Point Gravity. The tiny structure is not a permanent space station as much as a floating hab unit in space. Anything larger, Orks might detect flying in and out of the system. As it is, the Inquisition only dares approach the Watch Point in single ships, slowly, and with their engines muffled.

Inside Gravity is a small archive of sensor recordings from Gorkypark, as well as the collected communication intercepts between the surface and passing Ork ships. Gravity’s data feed is the source of the Inquisition’s realization that Gorkypark is actively resisting any attempts at being snowballed into a Waaagh!. If the Orks ever found the station, it would have to self-destruct, passengers or not.

Watch Point Xenobreaker:

This tiny satellite is one of the few Deathwatch postings in the Segmentum that is disguised as something else. It floats among the halo of debris that orbits the planet, left over from a ruined pirate ship that attempted to capture a Delving ore hauling freighter. Shattered and empty cargo pods from the pirate vessel drift about the planet’s orbit, long picked over for anything of value and knocked out of unstable orbits by surface guns or bombing runs by SDF boats. However, one chunk of relatively intact ship is nothing of the kind. Inside an artfully messed-up chunk of ship sits Watch Point Xenobreaker, a focal point for local Deathwatch activity. This satellite peers into the dark depths outside the system, looking for any sign of Warp activity by vessels using non-Mechanicus Warp drives or Geller field analogues. Given Delving’s position at the intersection of an astonishing five Warp routes, accelerated to high speed by Hell’s Vortex, it makes a perfect transit hub, and thus, pirates slingshot around the system regularly. Marines visit the Watch Point remotely, by consulting it with tight-beam communication systems when they fly by, taking on supplies for Dascomb. The possibility that alien pirates employ the slingshot to raid Imperial space is too dire to go unaddressed. The Deathwatch has been able to steal ships for the Imperial Navy using this technique, including the pirates that attacked Discus long ago.

Watch Point Earthquake:

Oglith is an embarrassment to the Imperium of Man. The Imperial Commanders and Mechanicus Magos who first plotted the colony here knew full well that there was a subterranean Ork infestation, and landed the colony anyway. Plan after plan crossed the desks of Overlord after Overlord, and yet, for thousands of years, the Imperial military of Oglith managed to accomplish nothing.

The mere fact that Oglith has been allowed to play host to a resolvable infestation of Orks insults the Officio Munitorum, but the Deathwatch only stepped in relatively recently. Watch Point Earthquake was established in the aftermath of the Third Glasian Migration. The surge in sector-wide psychic turmoil that resulted naturally from a massive alien invasion produced demonstrable increases in feral Ork activity and spawning, though not quite enough to boost their numbers to critical levels. When the leaders of the Oglith military finally noticed this, they began frantically arming themselves for greater conflict, building military bases, stockpiling mining explosives, and generally sending out shamefaced calls for help.

The Deathwatch responded by installing Watch Point Earthquake. The Watch Point is technically an Administratum Climatological Observation Skyward, but it has been given over completely to the Deathwatch for the foreseeable future. The structure has only a few point defense guns, but its function isn’t military. Rather, it is an intelligence-gathering post. The satellite is over four times the size of Gravity or Xenobreaker, and has enough life support capacity to house a crew of one Marine and four serfs, plus a resident Techpriest, comfortably, or a few more serfs in an emergency with some discomfort. The satellite’s roots as a weather platform bestow on it something that most Deathwatch stations would never accept: an observation bubble with a large transparisteel vista window that allows for somebody inside the satellite to see the entire planet unobstructed. It is a huge tactical liability, to be sure, but it allows the Deathwatch to pursue their mission.

As would be expected of a world with subterranean Ork problems, the planet Oglith has its surface very well mapped. However, the planet’s population concentrates in the larger cities and on plateaus, and therefore has no observation of several points that Orks could use to attack the surface. The satellite’s large sensor arrays keep vigil for any sign of greenskin movement on the surface, and the observation blister makes this even easier. Earthquake carries advanced cogitator archive technology that allows it to reference instantly any observed changes in terrain on the planet below with historical norms.

In the time of the current Ork invasion, Earthquake is working constantly. Although the Deathwatch has calculated that the current groundswell in Orks does not require their direct intervention, that will change instantly if the ferals below meet the crusading Orks above. The combined force would be enough to conquer the planet in months, especially if more Greenskins arrive from Gorkypark. With their horde swelling so much from the arrival of fresh boyz, a Warboss could emerge from the ranks of the invaders, which may necessitate the intervention of a Deathwatch Kill-team. Oglith cannot be allowed to fall. If the millions of Imperial soldiers on Oglith are lost on the eve of a Migration, Cloudburst itself may be lost. Unlike certain other Deathwatch units elsewhere in the galaxy, oaths do not bind the Cloudburst Deathwatch to prioritize defending a specific place above all other strategic demands. They are bound to defend all of Cloudburst, and would not hesitate to attack Oglith’s Orks if needed. Several Kill-teams are on their way to the planet from Watch Fortress Dascomb to combat the beasts now, nearly a full Kill-Company’s worth, in case Lord General Halwart’s actions are insufficient to wrap up the invasion.

Watch Point Revenge:

Fathon Prime once spat on the Emperor’s throne, and for that, they suffered for thousands of years. It is not the place of the Deathwatch to establish penance or repentance, however, but to slay the alien. The Deathwatch’s second oldest Watch Point in the Sector is a bunker network built into a hilltop that overlooks the oldest human settlement on Fathon Prime. With its eight built-in lascannons, its five cluster mortars, and its four short-barrel assault cannons, the bunker has enough firepower to hold off a light infantry brigade. The spear-waving primitives of the world hardly merit such firepower, of course, but the planet is immensely vulnerable to invasion. The world also enjoys massive deposits of oil, timber, and simple construction materials like concrete sand. The world simply can’t be defended in the face of a Glasian Migration, and the Deathwatch knows it. The possibility of the world’s Horus-aligned history playing some role in Tzeentch’s plans troubles the Inquisition.

The bunkers house a heavily upgraded Aquila shuttle, in case the staff need to evacuate to a ship in orbit, and four Deathwatch Bikes, each a gift from Cognomen’s expanding forges. Each bike is tuned for maximum stealth, but is perfectly capable of fighting. The ones with sidecars sport a multi-melta for the passenger and a plasma pistol for the driver, while the ones with no sidecar have only a plasma pistol and whatever grenades the driver can carry. If the Watch Point is abandoned, the Bikes would be lost, but that is a small price to pay for not losing a Deathwatch team.

Revenge can house three Marines but rarely houses more than one, as well as four Tech-adepts from Cognomen to maintain the equipment. Most of the guns are cogitator-controlled, but the mortars are not, and have a dedicated crew of thirty-two Inquisitorial volunteer Guardsmen. The bunkers also use a long-range communication antenna disguised as a huge tree, with its own combination of solar and geothermal power that could let it contact a ship in the Oort Cloud if needed.

Watch Point Cyan:

Aule Windows is a system of beautiful blue gas giants, each brimming with all sorts of valuable chemicals. Small moon bases siphon gas and asteroid minerals from the planets. The stream of freighters and patrol ships through the system generally make it a valuable stop for vessels that need supplies or fuel. The Deathwatch is not greatly concerned about alien vessels in the system thanks to the constant stream of Navy and Mechanicus ships passing through. The problem, in their eyes, is the deposit of strange alien technology on one of the moons of the fifth gas giant, Aule 5. The planet itself shows signs of enormous alloy blocks on the surface of the solid core of the planet, perhaps the remains of harvesting stations. The largest moon has more xenotech on it. Some craters and artificial depressions on the surface have over eighty megatons of alloys, polymers, and constructions in them.

Why they’re there is hardly relevant. What troubles the Deathwatch is the fact that some of the ruins still have active power cells, and even void shields. Keeping troublesome Mechanicus scavengers away from the sites is an ordeal, and the Inquisition handles that independently of the Deathwatch, thanks to automated warning beacons.

Cyan is a void platform, barely smaller than a Watch Station, with room for over a dozen serfs and one Marine in its command room. The station is as large as it is because of simple need. Aule Windows is an enormous system, over five hundred AU across. To map and protect caches of dangerous xenotech over so broad an area is logistically impossible for a smaller station. Cyan is able to accomplish its mission because of its stealthy exterior and its battleship-scale sensors, which it can augment by tapping the telemetry feed of any Deathwatch ships in the system.

Every time the Deathwatch thinks it has found all the xenotech in the system, more pops up. In one notable incident, an initial pass established the ring system of Aule 2 to have no xenotech in it, only for a second pass, forty years later, to locate an entire wrecked alien escape pod lodged in an asteroid that had just happened to be facing away from the station the first time. In some cases, capacitors and batteries that would have died tens of thousands of years ago were they made by humans have been found intact and charged in alien wrecks.

Cyan has five cruiser-weight laser guns and a missile battery to defend itself, which is less than half of the armament of an actual Cruiser of its tonnage, but most of its exterior space is stealth armor and sensory equipment.

Watch Point Repent:

Oromet’s resident Watch Point is a remarkably unsubtle reminder of the Deathwatch’s presence in the sector. Unlike most, it makes no attempt to hide from the residents of its system. Oromet’s history of heresy is fresh in the Inquisition’s mind, but the Watch Point is officially there for other reasons. The satellite, barely half a mile long and protected by four banks of multi-laser and autocannon point defenses, watches over the planet’s feral Ork population. The Orks of Oromet were vicious and numerous enough to reduce the planet to barbarism prior to the recontact of the Imperium. Only after becoming an Imperial world were the locals well-equipped enough to drive the Orks back to the mountains.

Repent is named after the world’s driving motivation. After Archbishop Haggar’s psychic heresy was uncovered and punished, the populace was understandably driven to make up for their misconduct. The station remains under Ordo Xenos control despite the codename, however. The station maintains a teleporter, in case the one Marine stationed there needs to head down to the surface very quickly. It also enjoys an extensive three-dimensional hololibrary of feral Ork weapon configurations, to help the Deathwatch identify any potential Warbosses emerging from the hordes of feral vermin.

Watch Point Hammer:

This Watch Point is the oldest in the Cloudburst Sector by several thousand years. Hammer serves as a Deathwatch staging point, and contains nothing but supplies.

The Deathwatch of Cloudburst do not enjoy the luxury of wealth that those of other sectors do. With only one Forge World and one Hive World within their jurisdiction, they previously had to rely on donations from outside sources for much of their wargear and ammunition. However, with both Thimble and Cognomen stepping up their resource production dramatically, the Deathwatch may soon enjoy purely local supply. For thousands of years, however, that was not the case, and Hammer served as their warehouse for operations in the sector. The interior of Hammer is spartan and sparse even by the standards of the inaesthetic Deathwatch. Most of its chambers are nothing more than warehousing, although it does enjoy stately chapels to the Emperor and Omnissiah.

Each chamber sports racks and shelves of bolter shells, armor repair kits, guns, explosives, medical equipment, upgrade packs, and data storage devices. The few non-storage chambers are either the aforementioned chapels, or sensor/comm compartments, where visiting Marines can check electronic communications from elsewhere in the system. Before the Sector had its own Fortress, Hammer and later Sempre were the only assets of the Deathwatch in Cloudburst, and Hammer has historical archives of messages and missions going back thousands of years.

For defense, Hammer has only a few point defense weapons, but the fleets of Cognomen are all it really needs. Cognomen supplies Hammer with its precious cargo by sending up Cetacean shuttles whenever Hammer’s internal cogitators calculate that enough supplies have been drained to warrant it.

With Dascomb’s arrival in-sector, many of the Cognomen Magos have asked if Hammer even still serves a purpose. However, it is undeniably more convenient for Cognomen to deliver things to its own orbit than a secure system a dozen lightyears away, and so it stays, at least for now. The forges of Master Asutori on Watch Fortress Dascomb are now producing enough ammunition for all of Dascomb’s own Marines, and Discus’s too, and so the shipments from Hammer are becoming less frequent by the decade.

Watch Point Ocular:

Space Marines are generally not the most artistically-minded individuals, but even by that standard, Ocular is a singularly unimaginative name. The Watch Point is a single giant telescope, and it looks at things; such is its remit and codename. The platform spies on the Cloudburst Circuit, and it does this very well. The Circuit is a place of danger, exploration, and bountiful opportunity. Wrecks of human and alien colonies or homeworlds stretch from the very edge of the Sector all the way to the Terminus Warp Shock, the oval of Warp Storms that encircle the entire galaxy. Worlds in the darkness by the edges of Imperial space have been a source of plunder and territory for eleven thousand years, of course, but the Cloudburst Circuit is an especially lucrative prize, because much of it is within the light of the Astronomican. This allows ships with Navigators to travel through it orders of magnitude faster than in those regions where the Astronomican is invisible. Thus, unlike the Oldlight Exo-zone, the Circuit can be explored at faster than a snail’s pace, despite being farther from Terra than the Exo-zone.

Ocular serves a vital purpose for those Astartes and Inquisitors who enter the Circuit to pursue Rogue Trader and Explorator reports of dangerous aliens. The massive telescopic array is precise and accurate enough to detect planets in orbit around stars thousands of lightyears away, and can detect radiation along such a wide frequency spectrum that there are no known human or ancient Eldar radio signals it cannot detect (though deciphering them is a different story). Though Imperial reports casually refer to it as a single telescope, it is actually an array of seven, some for detecting light and others for detecting other radiation.

Ocular’s Deathwatch post is an attached habitation unit, and defies expectations by being the most comfortable posting a Deathwatch Marine can enjoy. It has a small gym, a cozy bunkroom, a well-stocked kitchen, and an extensive library. Since it was originally designed for Inquisitorial use and seconded to the Deathwatch thousands of years later, its habitation was originally built for Imperial Navy officers on the Inquisitorial payroll, and thus is far more comfortable than something purpose-built for Adeptus Astartes. Its defenses consist of five multi-lasers and two lascannons, and has only one savior pod, though it also has a sensor-baffled Aquila shuttle for emergency evacuation.

Unlike some other Deathwatch Watch Points, the Imperial Navy is fully aware of Ocular. Its reports are often sent discreetly to Battlefleets Naxos and Cloudburst, and to Subsector Battlefleets Septiim, Thimble, and Cognomen, the closest to the Circuit. Rogue Traders and Explorators can pay for its data maps, as well, since Ocular is perfectly positioned to map potential obstructions for exploration of the Circuit.

Watch Point Praefector:

This structure, which shares its name with a post-Age of Apostasy Terran Guard regiment, is not like most Watch Points. The majority of Watch Points, inside Cloudburst and out, are sensor platforms that watch for aliens and those corrupted by them. Praefector is a weapons platform, pure and straightforward. Usually left to the control of servitors, this station hangs in the void over AMH132-4, a rocky planet much like Terra. This planet is clearly uninhabited now, but served in the past as a refueling station for a yet unknown race of aliens. However, unlike the more recognizable resource needs of Orks or Eldar, the aliens that visited this world long ago harvested something other than petrochemicals or plasma for fuel: water. The archaeological record of the planet suggests that it was once completely covered in water but has since been drained to only covering about 50% of the surface.

The Inquisition and Mechanicus estimate this to have happened seventeen thousand years ago, which puts it during the peak of the human and Eldar empires. However, there is no record of either race interacting with the aliens that have drained much of AMH132. What kind of technology needed so much fuel – and how water could produce energy – are things the Inquisition would very much like to know. Servitors generally control Praefector, with Marines stopping by to check up on it infrequently. If the station were ever attacked by something that its three heavy lasers, twin-linked plasma cannon, and five point defense multilasers could not withstand, its simple cogitators would dump all of its sensor data into hundreds of tiny log modules, eject them at random into the system, and self-destruct. These modules are a common upgrade to the comm gear of many Rogue Trader ships, so they were an easy adoption for the Deathwatch.

Watch Point Octa:

While the Deathwatch combats the alien menace wherever it might be found, that problem is complicated by the fact that not all aliens announce their presence. Even beleaguered, the Imperium is the single most powerful faction in the galaxy, and can’t be overcome by force of arms alone. Watch Point Octa keeps vigil for those enemies of Man that would threaten it by means subtler than war or annexation. Some aliens threaten Mankind through techno-Heresy, bribery, drug smuggling, or parasitism. Octa keeps watch for the last. AMH75 has been visited by blood-drinking foes of humanity before.

The world Octa orbits is not in the Imperial Administratum Astrocartigraphicae. Dubbed AMH75, only Space Marines have ever visited it. The planet has no distinguishing characteristics, or even atmosphere. Its single moon, however, is of immense interest to the Deathwatch, because of its past. The moon has a thin atmosphere of carbon and nitrogen gasses, and was once the scene of a massive battle between the Black Templars and the Cythor Fiends. Wreckage from that battle still covers a plateau in the southern hemisphere of the moon. The Templars emerged victorious, and pushed the Fiends back from the edges of the Imperium. This world represents the farthest the Fiends have ever been sighted from the Ghoul Stars, and Octa sits vigilant in case of their return. The platform has few weapons, but does have large auspex and sensorium suites, able to detect living things millions of miles away, and moving metal objects at ranges of over two billion miles.

Watch Point Seabed:

As should be expected of a world with evidence of two alien civilizations on it, the Deathwatch keeps a sharp eye on Obelisk 2. The surface of the world is inimical to the kind of heavy military infrastructure the Adeptus Astartes normally need, but the presence of two alien forces on Obelisk 2 demands attention. Hanging in orbit over the world’s equator, Watch Point Seabed-alpha is a satellite, with a broad-spectrum sensorium suite, and little else. The machines of the satellite keep watch over the surface, looking for any sign of movement from the alien robots that exist in the secured bunker the Arbites found, hundreds of years ago. Watch Point Seabed-beta is a surface installation, consisting of a sub-oceanic structure with attached hydraulic pumps. The structure is an armored shell, affixed to exposed bedrock on the seafloor, with an internal power supply and some simple anti-torpedo countermeasures. The bunker contains a hydro-garage, with large jet-ski analogues to Space Marine Bikes. These machines have mounted heavy bolters and autoguns, carefully waterproofed by the Mechanicus. The Deathwatch has no submarines, but the bunker can deploy automated seafloor Tarantulas, if needed. Normally, the bunker remains unoccupied save for maintenance serfs, but Marines can make their way there quickly using their water-tight Power Armor if needed, by simply dropping on top of it and climbing up into the garage.

Killteams

Killteams
Steadfast
Coldwall
Vigilant
Red Line
Xerxes
Sentry
Copperhead
Arsonist
Excoriate
Bloodline
Purity
Voidhound
Defender
Annihilation
Safecracker
Spotlight
Bullwhip

Relics

As could be expected from a Watch Fortress that sees as much action as Dascomb, some equipment becomes so venerated by its users or so carefully upgraded that it comes to be considered a relic of the Fortress and an heirloom of the Deathwatch, and is not given to the Death Brother’s Chapter upon their departure or demise. These machines are stored in a stasis field in a locked room in the Forgemaster’s suite in the Forge Core, and are only used when their presence would be decisive, or their retrieval trivial. Only one was made by a Brother who remains at Dascomb now: the Eraser, a potent and frighteningly accurate shoulder-mount Conversion Beamer made by Forgemaster Asutori himself.

Relics of the Cloudburst Deathwatch
Relic Name	Function	Origin Chapter
Jovian Cutter	Power Sword	None
Vacuum Bulwark	Thunder Shield	Blue Daggers
Eraser	Conversion Beamer	Bone Knives
Castigant	Crozius Arcanum	Reclaimers
Ghost Finder	Auspex	Raven Guard
The Smith's Glove	Power Fist w/integrated bolt pistol	Celestial Knights
Alloy-Bane	Multimelta	Doom Eagles
Wildfire Engine	Heavy Flamer	Celestial Lions
Tome of Hatred	Scripture Book/Force Field	Emperor's Falchions
The Mountebank	Land Raider Ares	Celestial Knights
Hatred's Eye	Covert Reconnaissance Satellite	None
Fletching and Dart	Corvus Blackstars	None
The Charoiot	Damocles Command Rhino	Aurora Chapter

• Jovian Cutter) A one-handed Power Blade of exquisite balance. The blade is shaped like a medieval Terran arming sword and embossed with the sigil of the Forge Moon of Gantz. The blade was a gift from the Adeptus Mechanicus stationed there to maintain the Titans of the Legio Praesagius, after a Kill-Team from Watch Fortress Dascomb rooted out a genestealer cult that had spread among the Legio’s support staff. The Kill-Team did not visit the moon proper; rather, the Titans had served in anti-Tyranid operations in the northern Ultima Segmentum in the same theater as the Dascomb Kill-Team. The Kill-team’s eagle-eyed Apothecary noted the distinct symptoms of gene-bundle implantation among several of the menials the Techpriests brought with them, and averted catastrophe. Grumbling among the Deathwatch’s Techpriests would hold it that the Gantz Tech-clergy made the gift as much as a bribe for silence over their shame in failing to detect the cult as it was a genuine offering of respect and gratitude. Regardless, it is artificed and crafted to absurd heights of precision and durability, and often sees use by the Brothers of Dascomb in battle against the thick hide of the Ork.
• Vacuum Bulwark) At one point, this tower shield was the property of the native Chapter of Space Marines, the Blue Daggers. However, this solidly-crafted Thunder Shield changed hands when First Company Veteran Brother-Sergeant Alsterwicz gave his life to protect the sarcophagi of two downed Deathwatch Dreadnoughts that had been disabled by an EMP bomb in battle against Chaos-worshipping aliens in the Cloudburst Circuit. In honor of his sacrifice, the Blue Daggers allowed the Deathwatch to keep his masterwork Thunder Shield, to ensure that the Vigil never forgets the hero the Chapter lost that day.
• Eraser) This weapon is new enough that calling it a ‘relic’ is something of a misnomer. However, while some may contest its status as an artifact, none could contest its power. This is no mere Conversion Beamer. This weapon, the product of the temperamental genius of Forgemaster Asutori of the Bone Knives, is a shoulder-fired Conversion Beamer that uses a microgravitic stabilizer similar to the ones used on Fire Wasps to board Space Hulks. The weapon is bulky and runs quite hot, but its effect on enemy armor and buildings is nothing short of horrifying. Instead of a single energetic conversion beam, the device uses a tiny laser rangefinder to zero three smaller, converging beams on a target. Thus, the target does not slowly convert to energy in a process that ends in a single large explosion. Instead, the target is wildly thrown about as jets of energy and destabilized matter erupt from the impact site as the antimatter beams jostle each other. This has the effect of dissolving the target very rapidly, with no explosion at the end. Given the sheer cost of the weapon and Asutori’s lack of notes, the weapon will likely remain unique.
• Castigant) No Chaplain would be seen taking to the field without a Crozius Arcanum at their side, and the Castigant is unique among them. This was the first relic bequeathed to the Watch Fortress Dascomb by visiting Marines. The Castigant is an ancient Crozius, dating back to at least the Eighth Founding, although it is bereft of any icons or Chapter sigils. Like most Croziuses Arcanum, the Castigant sheathes a stave in a potent energy field that disrupts matter. Unlike most, the energy field of the Castigant can be independently modified by a technician prior to use in the field, to render the power field invisible, brilliantly glowing, sheathed in flame, sparking with electricity, or other visual effects. This allows the weapon to be fine-tuned to the needs of a circumstance.
• Ghost Finder) The Deathwatch holds the unhappy responsibility of second contact with many alien races, if the first contact was found to merit the race’s extinction. While no Brother of the Deathwatch would be anything but pleased to see xenos species rendered extinct, the first contact with hostile aliens is rarely one that allows the Imperium of Man a detailed understanding of those aliens’ strengths, numbers, anatomical features, and other combat factors. The auspex known as Ghost Finder was designed specifically for the Deathwatch and built on the Forge World of Cognomen for the purpose of scanning and recording the most expansive and esoteric information about any possible life form. This model of auspex was originally designed by the Raven Guard, and has proliferated slowly to the Forge Worlds that supply the Deathwatch over the centuries. Bulkier than usual but quite robust, Ghost Finder can track any object the user manually confirms to be a life-form, through walls, water, total darkness, sub-zero temperatures, and even hard vacuum. The machine tirelessly records data about whatever is tagged as a life-form, in rich detail, and serves thusly as a cataloguer as well as a tool of battle. After all, the Deathwatch is usually the first organization to whom Rogue Traders and Inquisitors turn when an alien race suddenly reappears after being declared extinct, and it would not do for the Deathwatch to be lacking information about defeated foes.
• The Smith’s Glove) Many find this relic annoying. Its performance in combat is sterling, and its Machine Spirit easily supplicated and hungry for blood, but the name is quite offensive. The Celestial Knights Chapter, an ancient Successor of the Dark Angels, holds it to be that the Iron Hands and Salamanders had the same Primarch, a being they call The Smith. This weapon was bequeathed as a gift from the Chapter to the Deathwatch, to help bind together their alliance against the hated Glasians, but the Knights’ insistence on naming it after a being that transparently did not exist vexes the Salamander and Iron Hands brothers of the Vigil. In combat, however, it is extraordinarily effective, and cleaves through ceramite, titanium, plasteel, and ferrocrete as if they were not there. Between the need to maintain close ties with the well-equipped Knights and the weapon’s admirable effectiveness, the Deathwatch shall probably not choose to change its name any time soon.
• Alloy-Bane) The Doom Eagles are an ancient and well-honored, if somewhat moody and dour, Chapter of Ultramarine Successors. In the never-ending task of shielding the easternmost portions of the galaxy from aliens that dwell beyond the range of easy reprisal for attacks, the Chapter has developed a need to repulse and destroy foul xenos armor as rapidly as can be safely managed. Rather than build up their own armor fleet, however, the mobile and rapid Chapter has built weapons such as these. The Alloy-Bane is a cut-down and light multimelta that uses two parallel thermic expansion coils and a tight zero to punch through nearly any metallic substance. Built with its barrels side-by-side and drawing power from the backpack feed of the user, this weapon is wielded like a comically-oversized shotgun by Assault Marines of the Deathwatch, punching through tanks and bunkers and darting away before escorting infantry can retaliate. Quite how these rare thermal weapons could have parted from their origin Chapter is unclear, but Watch Fortress Dascomb’s records claim the weapon was abandoned by a Doom Eagle sometime in the 900.M39 era with no further detail. However, Dascomb did not exist at that time, so this record is somewhat contentious.
• Wildfire Engine) Flamers are especially useful in large-scale operations of xeno extermination. The cleansing power of fire against spores and emissions of aliens is well-documented and easily-verified. For the same reason that the Blue Daggers like to use combi-Flamers on their bolters, the Deathwatch often brings this beautiful Heavy Flamer with them when doing battle against large numbers of aliens in the field. The Celestial Lions donated this weapon to the Deathwatch in 420.M41, and the Techmarines of Dascomb are grateful for their willingness to part with this work of art. The flamer’s hull is made of an expensive alloy of tungsten, titanium, and adamantine that is effectively immune to all small-arms fire and thermal damage. The alloy is difficult to work and must be forged at insanely high temperatures, which apparently did not stop the master smiths that forged it from decorating its every inch with expressive imagery of Space Marines setting whole alien towns and armies aflame. Its flames burn dark blue with air-rippling heat, matching the subtle gradients of metal color in its case and making the flames look like part of the weapon itself. It is a treasured tool of Dascomb’s elite Kill-teams, who rarely take to the field in large numbers without it.
• Tome of Hatred) This book was donated to the Watch Fortress Dascomb by a pair of Emperor’s Falchions Chaplains who were invited to the Fortress specifically for a mission. Among the very first missions undertaken by direct Inquisitorial request after Dascomb was finished and set in its place, it was an unqualified failure that saw millions slaughtered by ravenous alien marauders from a mongrel fleet of multi-racial spacers, driven mad by exposure to Warp energies from the Terminus Shock Warp Storms. After the mission, the two Chaplains together crafted this metal-clad book of prayers, historical anecdotes, tactical advice, and doctrinal chastisements for the Deathwatch to encourage and enable success in later missions. This book instills a certain superstition in the Marines who see it, thanks to its ugly history and biting tone of critical recrimination towards any Marine who would deserve the recitation of its contents in the field. Marines in Kill-teams whose Chaplain feels the need to bring along this book fight like men possessed.
• The Mountebank) Named for a legendary trickster from Old Terran storytelling, this Land Raider Ares was a long-term loan from the Celestial Knights Chapter to the Deathwatch. Given the Chapter’s secretive and ancient traditions, a loan such as this is somewhat out of character for them. However, the Chapter believes that the possibility of Cloudburst’s spinward edge being overrun, and the perilous Naxos borders severed from behind, is large enough that the Deathwatch there deserves this rare prize. This mighty tank sports two twin-linked heavy flamers, a twin-linked Assault Cannon, a Siege Shield, a Demolisher Cannon, extra armor plating, a pintle-mounted Storm Bolter, and a full complement of missile and smoke capsule dischargers. Its sheer armored bulk is sufficient to withstand all but the heaviest Glasian weapons.
• Hatred’s Eye) This tiny satellite is disguised as a ruptured Imperial Licensed Cargo storage container. If it were as it appeared to be, it would be one of untold hundreds of trillions of identical steel boxes, fourteen meters wide and six wide. It is large enough to detect with navigation sensors, small enough to not be worth shooting, and common enough to not be remotely worth salvaging. Inside its camouflaged exterior, however, sits a state-of-the-faith observation camera, with high-resolution topographic scanners, thermal and wind pattern analysis cogitators, a radio antenna, and an expensive fusion bottle, of the sort more usually found in Inquisitorial Power Armor. Standard doctrine for Cloudburst Deathwatch is to pay a freighter Captain to discharge this satellite ‘accidentally’ in orbit over a world on which the Deathwatch needs to spy to pick out the ideal landing site for future covert actions. They then retrieve it with whatever ship they use to depart when their holy task is complete, with none the wiser.
• Fletching and Dart) A matched pair of Corvus Blackstars, and the most heavily armed aircraft of their size in the Cloudburst Sector. These two dropships are the product of Adeptus Mechanicus ingenuity. When the Deathwatch needed to insert four Kill-Teams and a pair of Bikes into the rear of a Glasian formation in the Sixth Migration, they knew that speed and maneuverability would not be enough. They needed to be able to provide withering cover fire for the Kill-Teams as they inserted into the target zone. Thus, the Adepts of Watch Fortress Dascomb undertook the task of radically overhauling two of their precious Blackstars. The two ships mount a twin-linked Assault Cannon, two Blackstar Cluster Launchers, two missile launchers, and two Hurricane Bolters each. The extra weapons are heavy, and the craft have shorter operational range because of high fuel costs and the reduced on-board storage for fuel thanks to the larger ammunition wells, but the sheer volume of fire they can discharge into a landing zone make them well worth the cost for short-range operations.
• The Chariot) Despite not being a frontline combat vehicle in any way, the Chariot is a treasured relic of the Deathwatch. Originally, the Aurora Chapter donated this Damocles Rhino to the Deathwatch for temporary use in prosecuting the Fourth Glasian Migration, but after seeing its incredible value therein, decided to turn the loan into a gift. Although the vehicle has no unusual armaments, it does benefit from having the fullest variety of sensory and communication technotheology the Adeptus Mechanicus still knows how to build crammed into its hull. That allows the Space Marine operating its dispatch center to coordinate whole companies of Marines and other forces with ease. When patched into a satellite or starship overhead, the Chariot can easily contact any ship or formation in range, all the way down to a single solder, and provide full telemetry to them for coordinating fire missions or timed ambushes. It also benefits from a Flare Shield, perhaps the last operational one in the Galactic North, a secret that only the Aurora Chapter and Forgemaster Asutori know. Asutori is so determined to prevent its existence from becoming known to the Imperium’s enemies that he has authorized its use only if the alternative is the loss of the vehicle outright.