Mutant

Mutants, also known as twists and chem-dregs, can
be found on almost any human world in the galaxy,
and are often a fact of life that Imperial authorities
(and most Imperial citizens) would rather ignore. In its most
basic sense, mutation is the changing of the divine physical
form of mankind into something unnatural or even alien.
This twisting occurs within a person’s very genes, warping
them at the deepest level and ensuring that their progeny
will be tainted with mutation as well.
The degeneration of the holy human form is one of the
Ecclesiarchy’s greatest concerns. Environmental pollution,
deliberate genetic alteration, stellar radiation, alien diets
and simple evolutionary adaptation have wrought manifold
changes upon the physique of man across his empire of stars.
Some of these mutants have a standard, stable, morphological
type and are tolerated by the authorities---notable among
them being the abhuman Ogryns and the ancient and noble
Navigators. But to find whole worlds where the population
has no eyes due to never-ending darkness, or unusually long
legs because of millennia of nomadic living, is not unusual.
Whether these aberrant populations are declared acceptable
or not is the business of the Adeptus Terra.
The Magos Biologios has long striven to determine the
causes of mutation, often with varying levels of success. The
most accomplished Tech-priests theorize that mutation is
the result of extreme environmental conditions, radiation, or
toxins. It is certainly true that the largest concentrations of
mutants can be found in the rad-sumps beneath hives or on
heavily polluted worlds such as Solomon. However, families
have lived in the blighted Interior Zones of Solomon for
generations without exhibiting mutation, and some of the
wealthiest spire-families on Scintilla have abominations in
their family trees hidden away behind locked doors.
In the Calixis Sector, as with the Imperium as a whole,
mutants are dealt with in one of two ways. If they are not
exterminated, they are oppressed and controlled. Most worlds,
hive worlds in particular, have sizable mutant underclasses
that are employed as serfs or indentured laborers. They are
often responsible for handling the jobs no one else will take,
and work in hellish conditions with little in the way of rest
or recompense.
It is no surprise that while the Ecclesiarchy preaches that
the mutant should beg forgiveness for their sins of mutation,
many mutants rebel against this line of reasoning. Some
mutants take pride in their deformities, dubbing themselves
the next step in human evolution. This is dangerous for
the Imperium, for once a mutant believes itself superior to
‘true’ humans, it is but a short step before it actively resents
its position in Imperial society. Such resentment can breed
insurrection and all-out rebellion. These bitter, merciless wars
are usually fought to the total annihilation of one side or
the other, for the mutant knows better than to expect mercy
from the Imperium, and the Imperium knows mutantkind is
eager to extract retribution for a lifetime of oppression.
But mutation can also be a sign of the Dark gods. Just
as they twist and destroy the minds and souls of man, so
too do they toy with his flesh, bending it into profane
shapes, gifting strange abilities and creating monsters
for their perverse amusement. Where such mutation is
present, it is rightly abhorred. Few are willing to tolerate
such a aberration within their midst and fear of mutants
runs through the populations of many worlds, even those
where such things have happened but once in a hundred
generations. Perhaps worse still is the constant fear of
becoming a mutant oneself. Many folk pray that should
this worst of all things occur, they will have the strength
to end their own lives, before the mob or the Inquisition
does it for them.
Some poor fools are willing mutants, seeing the distortion
of their flesh as a sign of favor from the Dark gods. They
seek out ways to gain more of these gifts, either by begging
the Daemon gods for more of their touch or by doing their
bidding in the hope of reward. Others, more poignantly, claim
innocence of any wrong doing or foul worship. Whatever the
case, a mutant is a mutant and must be feared, hated and
destroyed. This is but one of the many reasons Imperial
citizens tend to be highly intolerant and many innocent men,
upon finding themselves on a new world, have been murdered
by a frenzied mob for merely appearing to be different.
==In the Calixis Sector==
Mutants are a common occurrence in the Calixis Sector, as with all other sectors of the galaxy. On Sepheris Secundus, one of the most economically important planets in the sector, much of the population that toils in the Shatters, the deepest part of the Gorgonid Mine are mutants and their labor is a valuable contribution to the planet's tithe. There is a cult within the mutant population, the Granite Crown.
On the war-torn world of Tranch, the oppressed mutant underclass rose up to create a bloody civil war that resulted in the birth of the Pale Throng, a mutant cult that has spread to other worlds in the interest of destroying all normal humans and propagating the mutant race.
Fenksworld is home to the Volg Hive, regarded as one of the worst places to live within all of the Calixis Sector. Within its depths, pale monsters lurk and occasionally find their way up to the surface, where they are dealt with by local Reclaimators or forced into gladiatorial death arenas against each other and (sometimes unwilling) humans for the amusement of those who watch.
The arch-heretek Sar Resque is known for having created the Sinners' Plagues which ravage the Drusus Marches, creating mutations and spreading madness. Her goal is to elevate mankind through the Golden Gene-Pattern, believing she will unlock the race of Men Beyond Men---beings of infinite knowledge, each one an Omnissiah.
==Hive Mutants==
Hive mutants are the result of a hive population’s exposure
to radiation, pollutants, carcinogens, and diseases that are
circulated though a hive’s food, air and water supplies.
Mutation is common in the largest hives, and relatively minor
mutations are tolerated by the main population in most hives
within the Calixis Sector, though the more refined circles
of hive nobility are not so forgiving. A degree of mutation
within a hive population is tolerated in the most part out of
of necessity. A hive exists on the toil of its population, and the
labor of a mutant is as good as that of any other. Indeed, in
many hives where slight mutation not tolerated, the industry
and wealth of the hive could not be sustained. This tolerance
is, of course, not universal or without bounds; mutation, after
all, is commonly regarded as a sign of sin and corruption. In
many hives gross mutation is not only shunned but rooted
out and purged by law. Many hive mutants flee down into the
deeper parts of a hive where they can exist out of the reach
of persecution.
As one descends through a hive, the levels of pollution and
toxicity increase until one reaches the deep places of a hive
where no true law reigns. Variously called the underhive, low
hive, or waste zones, here the rates of mutation are high and
it is common to find established populations of mutants. It
is only in these broken margins of the hive that mutants can
exist without being indentured to labor, persecuted, or killed
by the rest of the hive population. These clans and tribes
may have existed for as long as the hive has stood and their
mutation may have stabilized, resulting in consistent mutation
such as has produced the scaled ones of Hive Magnagorsk or the
twist brutes of the Tranch Soot Warrens. Deeper still are the
most polluted areas of hives, sometimes referred to as the
hive sump, hive bottom, or deep dark. These ancient areas are
so toxic that only the most disturbing creatures and fearful
mutants exist here: strange pale things with orb-like eyes and
soft flesh. Few of these deep-hive mutants are ever seen by
any, and those who do rarely live to tell of what dwells in the
deepest places of a hive.
While most hive mutants are doomed to dwell forever in
the polluted dark, a few succeed in leaving to make a life
amongst the stars. Almost all of these bold ‘hive twists’ exist
on the shadowy margins of the Imperium. Some become
affiliated with criminal organizations such as the notorious
Beast House, or are bound to a heretical organization such
as the Pale Throng that was born in the Soot Warrens of
Tranch. A few ply their trade as hired killers or muscle and,
in fact, a certain proportion of the feared Bloodsworn bounty
hunters are twists from [[Malfi]an] underhives. A rare few hive
mutants may come to the notice of an Inquisitor who values
the hardness of soul and determination that a mutant needs to
survive in a galaxy that loathes him.
==Hive Mutant Player Characters==
You are shunned and hated by those not of your kind, those
who are willing to kill you for your twisted flesh and cripple
your kind with merciless toil. You, however, have found
favour in the eyes of a great peer of the Imperium, one who
has eyes to see the strength of your soul and has the power to
raise you to do great service to the God Emperor.
Creating Hive Mutant Characters
Use the Hive World Home World template but replace the
Accustomed to Crowds Trait with the ones detailed here.
Twist
The Acolyte’s body has been mutated and his genes twisted by
the polluted water and air of the underhive.
Effects: During character creation the player may select one of
the following two options:
*Choose two different Minor Mutations. The player may not choose result 100 (which allows a roll on the Major Mutation Table).
*The Acolyte has one Minor Mutation determined by rolling on the Minor Mutations Table Mutations and one Major Mutation determined by rolling on the Major Mutations Table. The Acolyte reduces his initial Fate Points by 1.
Strength through Adversity
The Acolyte’s mutant status means that most people shun
him, and he has little chance of being easily accepted by most
within the Imperium. He is, however, physically tougher than
the general hive populace, as the weak never survive in the
underhive.
Effects: When generating Characteristics the character’s Home World modifier
for Toughness and Fellowship are swapped, so that starting
Toughness will be 2d10+25 and starting Fellowship will be
2d10+15.
==The Black Holds==
“Lieutenant Weems, inform the cogboys the power is still out in section 52. Still no sign of the repair team. Sir, can we confirm this was their last location? Lads, watch your footing, grav plating seems low. Opening shaft 52-Beta now... hey, what’s that?”
— Recorded Vox Transmission, Ensign Patel Carolis, Chartist vessel Steadfast Faith
As with many Imperial artefacts, most spacecraft have
lifespans measured in dozens of centuries or longer.
This is especially true for the truly gigantic vessels such
as Chartist Greatholds or Naval capital ships. As generations
pass, even regular repair and watchful maintenance leave some
areas falling into disuse as decks become sealed off and entire
subsections are abandoned. They become a dark home to the
unwanted and forgotten, renegades and runaways. These are
the “nightmare holds”, the black decks only whispered of
throughout the many fleets in the sector but known to all
that make their lives in the void.
In these miserable places entire biospheres have formed,
despite lack of power, fresh air or even reliable footing where
grav plating has failed. Flickering lights barely illuminate the
dank and toxic environs where fungus and beasts thrive amidst
the chemical and radioactive sludge. Unknown numbers of what
were once men also congregate here to survive. Even medium-sized
ships contain hundreds if not thousands of indentured
workers and others pressed into service, and escaping from their
oppression is a constant goal. Once free, though, many wish
they stayed in the dregs of their prior station. Other habitants
can include fleeing criminals, newly emerging mutants and
renegades. After years in the holds, most devolve into barely
human dregs as the hostile atmosphere twists them unkindly.
Now they lurk as bilge-scum, flesh eating hold-gaunts and
other unholy creatures, attacking any who venture into their
lairs. When desperate enough they venture topsides in search
of food, and woe unto anyone they find.
==Darkholds==
“Have you ever seen blood in zero-gravity my friend? It lives, it is a serpent, glorious and delightful, and how it twists and coils like a lover around your blade. It is the only thing hot enough to quench the cold, and I’m so very, very cold now my friend, so very cold...”
–Ezra Morbius, Void Reclaimator
Just as with some worlds, there are certain spacefaring vessels
both great and small with a dark reputation. Although all
starships have their own histories, not all of them pleasant,
and many have dark secrets and half-abandoned depths where
things best left unseen sometimes crawl, certain vessels hold
an infamy all their own. These ships, some of them ancient
and legendary in their own right, ply the dark void between
the stars but often hold a deeper darkness within, couched
in stories of dire curses, ill-omens, bleak fortunes, baleful
massacres, cannibalism, hauntings and worse. The void born
call such ships darkholds, and those that hail from them or
can find a berth nowhere else have an equally shadowed
reputation, shunned and considered to be unlucky and illfated
by their eccentric kind. Although such distinctions are
often lost on those outsiders who cannot tell the difference
from one ‘spook’ void born and another, those that spend
much of their lives sealed between the hulls of a great ship
fear the darkholds, mistrust those that call them home, and
hold their protective talismans tight when they draw close.
The darkholders are a breed apart to those with the wisdom
to see it, lean and hungry, with the cold black dancing in
their eyes.
The Calixis Sector has several notorious darkholds of its
own, from the gargantuan and blood-drenched Bountiful Beast,
to the blackly storied far trader Blinded Saint whose seven-year
course takes it out into the reaches of the Hazeroth Abyss,
to the sinister grand mausoleum barge Pale Sepulchre and the
infamous naval battlecruiser Chalice of Fire, recovered empty
and adrift centuries ago and taken back into service, said still
to be haunted by the thousands of souls of her former crew,
disappeared without trace.
==Darkholder Player Characters==
You cannot escape what you are, no matter how far you travel,
no matter that you put solid ground beneath your feet and
endless free air above you, no matter how fervently you pray
to the God-Emperor you can’t escape it. The cold black, the
fathomless dark, calling to you, whispering like a shadow
in your veins. Perhaps it isn’t all bad though, in a universe
fraught with monsters, being a monster yourself is perhaps
no bad thing...
Creating Characters from the Darkholds
In order to create characters with a Darkholder lineage, use
the Void Born template but remove the Charmed Trait and
replace it with those listed here.
Darkholder Skills
Those raised in the sinister atmosphere of a Darkhold vessel
begin with the Skills Speak Language (Int) (Ship Cant) and
treat Forbidden Lore (Warp) (Int) as a Basic Skill.
Ghillam Blood
Some say the darkholder’s blood is tainted, that they are
descended from half-human pale things that coil in the dark
shadows on the deep nightmare holds, that secretly they all
crave human blood and have the souls of daemons. They may
be right.
Effect: The character adds +5 to his starting Toughness
and Willpower Characteristics, and gains the Jaded and
Paranoia Talents.
Cold-Souled and Hungry
There is something ineffably sinister about darkholders, and
none feel it more than the other Void Born.
Effect: The character receives –5 to his starting Fellowship
and Intelligence Characteristics and begins the game with
1d5+1 Corruption Points. Darkholders also suffer with a
further –5 penalty on peaceful social interaction Tests.
== Gear of the Bilge-Scum ==
In these conditions, it is rare for regular weapons to be
common, as lack of ammunition quickly becomes an issue.
Instead most are crafted from the debris littered throughout
the black decks, creating a wide range of primitive weapons
often made of high-tech materials. Crude swords, axes and
shields are the most common. While simplistic in design,
they can be just as deadly as the more advanced weapons
these creatures face in combat.
Bilge Grenade
These are generally crude bombs containing a mix of
poisonous fungi, chemical waste, and diseased flesh. The
canisters burst open on impact, showering the area with
caustic sludge and noxious vapours. While their effect is not
very powerful, unprotected targets can be brought down by
the toxins, if not by the sheer nauseating smell of the attack.
Bilge grenades count as frag grenades with the Unreliable and
Toxic qualities.
Lumenmould
This phosphorescent fungus provides reliable lighting
for most of the Black Holds, where it thrives in the toxic
sludge lining most decks. By scraping the mould and
sludge into clear containers, crude light sources can be
created to offer this greenish-yellow glow in areas without
other sources of illumination. Others simply use the slime
as body paint, making their already unsettling forms even
more terrifying. A patch of lumenmould lights an area
dimly for five metres.
== Ghilliam ==
"Constant exposure to the Warp can taint even the strongest soul."
–From the journals of Inquisitor Felroth Gelt: 749.M41
Whether outcast, victim or fugitive, to join the Ghilliam
(as the void born call them) is to leave humanity forever,
descending to depths from which there is no return.
Haunting the dark spaces and abandoned holds of great
vessels, these debased, insane mutants and carrion eaters
subsist on whatever meat they can find and aren’t too
picky as to how they get it. Treated as dangerous and
clever vermin, they are exterminated mercilessly where
possible.
==Hullghast==
Deep in the forgotten reaches of voidship holds, scattered
in countless Space Hulks drifting through space, and hidden
away even in such innocuous vessels as bulk refinery and
pilgrim ships lurk two breeds of highly dangerous mutants—
the Ghilliam and, their more dangerous brethren, the
Hullghasts. These mutants have become inured to the worst
of the polluted and irradiated voidship decks and are able to
thrive there, albeit with a loss of any remaining humanity.
Some Hullghast corpses have been recovered (usually
from lifeless derelict vessels), and there is a clear indication
that Hullghasts share an origin with the far more common
Ghilliam and are a more mutated version of that wretched
creature. Hullghast bodies are twisted in the extreme, with
hairless leathery skin and vicious talon-like claws. Their
oversized mouths are filled with layers of huge teeth, ready
to rend flesh from bone. Pustules of flesh erupt in tusks and
horns, covering their bodies with natural weaponry. While
the more humanoid Ghilliam look like sickly and crazed
men, Hullghasts appear more akin to daemons or the stuff
of nightmares.
Also, unlike the wretched Ghilliam who exist primarily
as furtive scavengers, Hullghasts are more aggressive and
dangerous. Where the Ghilliam generally form groups to
overwhelm their prey, lone Hullghasts openly attack any
crewmen who dare venture too deep below decks. Often
times, they also prey on Ghilliam who drift too far from
their squalid hovels, though the cleaner meat of unmutated
humans seems preferred.
For those travelling through the void, these horrific
mutants present a danger within that matches the dangers
without, as terrifying as the warp entities held back only
by the ship’s Gellar Field. Just as travellers’ souls would be
devoured should the field collapse and fail, so their bodies
would be ripped apart as food if these terrors of the Black
Holds are unleashed.