sum1thtdiesalot wrote:You my friend are a GENIUS!!!!!!!! This is brilliant. What did you use to cut them in half

Rhich wrote: I wanted a Vortex Grenade but seeing them on Epay for $30 makes it tough to justify.
Now... thanks to you, there is hope....

InventionThirteen wrote:Woah that harlie looks awesome! Keen on the oily colours too! I like the skills on the diamond print clothing. Hmmm got me thinking about including some harlies in my own army...

Archon Rathiel Thaedrath of the Kabal of the Crystal Mantis is an oft-time patron of the enigmatic Coven of Homonculi known as the Tinkers. By these, he spends his extraordinary wealth of souls gathered from time before Vect, accumulating a variety of 'fun' gadgets for use in realspace raids. Amongst these are custom built Chronos, built in the image of the Kabal's namesake.

Lieutenant Garrin ducked under the curved blade of the xenos warrior, lashing out with his power sword and feeling the field slice cleanly through the wych. Still drugged, she screamed and thrashed in the dirt before death came. He shivered before turning back to the battle; it seemed almost like she enjoyed that. He allowed himself a second to analyse the fight. The xenos were losing heart, and their raid was faltering against the guns and bayonettes of the disciplined guard regiment. It was a battle already won.

His smile turned to a frown as one of the xenos leaders fell. Above the corpse, a rippling nothingness tore into a hole of crackling energy. Through it, Garrin barely glimpsed a harnessed sun and world of darkness before his attention focused on a more present threat. From the gate emerged a chittering construction of wraith-glowing metal and segmented yellow eyes. It clattered towards his men on four needle-like legs, graceful despite its size. Garrin had only ever seen an Ogryn once, and this dwarfed even that. From its shoulder, a glowing projection grew, blue in colour and brighter than a star. Garrin's practiced insticts dropped him to the ground, and the blast came roiling above his head. He heard the men behind him scream and watched in horror as they aged their lives away in a second, turning from healthy Cadians to skeletal figures, then fell to the ground as dust.

The xenos seemed to take heart in the display of sadistic sorcery, and they began their assault with a renewed vigour. Garrin turned back to the monster in time to leap out of the way as its chest began to glow, and another burst of energy geriatrified the men to his side. He turned, still kneeling, as the foul creature stood above him. He hadn't even heard it approach. From its chest, it unfolded two grasping claws, and closer now he could see various needles and scalpels emerging from its mouth. It stabbed its arm deep into him and the world instantly froze as a pain more intense than Garrin had ever felt raged through his chest. The pain continued for a time uncountable until he had the sense to open his eyes. Blinking away tears, Garrin noticed that the world had not unfrozen - everywhere around him, a tableaux of still models. He watched and screamed as the pain continued. Then he noticed something that made his heart skip, and he gave up hope. The world wasn't a tableaux, it was just slowed to the extreme. He was doomed to have his life drained as his men had been, and the pain, well the pain wasn't about to stop.

He stared into the many faceted eyes of his killer and asked silently, 'why?'. Lieutenant Garrin swore he heard laughter in his head. Laughter that would haunt him for the rest of his long, long life.

sum1thtdiesalot wrote:The banner came out really cool. The symbol reminds me of Chronos a bit.

sum1thtdiesalot wrote:Great conversion! what did you use to make the sweet backpack?

In the time before Vect, the pleasure palace of Aguta'tor Emortalis was known throughout the webway as a place where Eldar could go unrestrained through childhood desires, whether they be petty vandalism or operating gigantic magnifying glasses to burn slaves alive. In that time, it was ruled by the Lord Norvalan Istrid, an Eldar who took 'child at heart' too far. Through Coven compacts, his blood always ran fresh, constantly refreshed with captured child-slaves, his heart replaced by four newborn hearts each day. When Vect replaced the aristocracy with a meritocracy of Kabals, Istrid's son and heir reassured his father that they could continue as they once had. His father could relax and focus on his desires. He, Rathiel, would run the Kabal like a militant wing of the Lord's estates.

Over the next thousand years, Rathiel has strengthened his hold on the estates of his father. Lord Istrid still 'runs' everything, but through consumption of childrens' souls and hearts for thousands of years he has slowly gone mad. It is more convenient for Rathiel that his father remain head of the estates, as it halves the number of assassination attempts he must deal with. He still gives fealty to his father, but many say he does so only so long as it is convenient for him. His father rules as figurehead only.

Reanimator wrote:These are fantastic. The green highlighting looks great and I love the conversion work on your mantis beasty, as well as the wracks.

Must resist urge to buy dark eldar......

oldone wrote:Really like your models and the back ground on the army. i must say that the cronos is probly one of the best i've seen.

MajorTom11 wrote:I have loved your color choices up until the wracks, not sure about the blue robes... a little too bright for the creature itself to my taste. That being said, apart from that one thing I have greatly enjoyed watching this thread and look forward to more!

MajorTom11 wrote:Now, imagine black robes, and those cannisters and armor in brass... ?

Edit: Or better yet, make them look like your Wyches.

Vanq wrote:Nice work on the freehand! Can't wait to see it finished, what colour are you planning on making the sail?

Vanq wrote:Awesome! Love the sail, the pattern is tops. Did you have a template or just did it by eye?

1-i wrote:Great selection of colors and amazing scribbles that look freehanded.

I like the theme you have going, what was the inspiration for a crystal mantis?

Savnock wrote:Really great pose on that haemonculus, but not so sure on the arc of the two razorflails above his head. Something's just a bit off there. Perhaps if you bent one of them on a slightly more horizontal plane, so that their arcs didn't match so closely?

MajorTom11 wrote:Thats a load of great looking stuff, the wracks look awesome in black, glad my suggestion was of help to you!

Rabid Ferret wrote:Mother looks amazing. She is by far the coolest Haemonculi conversion I have seen.

sum1thtdiesalot wrote:Nice heamoculus! Is he sportin a hex rifle?

catharsix wrote:i see you are also using the IoB mage as a base for a Hemonoculus. did you get that idea from my Plog, or come up with it independently? (great minds think alike?)

sum1thtdiesalot wrote:Looks great Foxtale. You mind If I steal that standard bearer idea? I love the way that looks. Razorwing flock is looking pretty sweet as well. Keep up the good work

Pavei delicately extended his chain arm, placing lightly the small watch-cog that would make this entire piece run. He gave it a small spin and watched his handiwork come to life. Whirring cogs spun more cogs, dropping weights and swinging pendulums. It was perfectly balanced. Now it would never stop moving, so long as it itself moved. He smiled as the cogs interfaced with the nerves, so that every movement would bring spasms of pain to the hulk of a man 'strapped' into it. To not move would pinch a nerve and so cause a burst of such exquisite agony as to render the subject moving again.

The haemonculus stepped back to admire his handiwork. The man glared at him with a look of pure hatred. That was good. Pavei let the feelings of hate wash over him like a cool Spring shower. He shivered. It was almost too much. He heard a clear clicking noise, signalling that the clockwork signals had reached the man's brain. "Stand," Pavei commanded.

The man said nothing. His vocal tract had been removed early in the process when Pavei had gotten tired of listening to the space marine's litanies. Instead, Pavei smiled as small tuning plates resonated at his vocal frequency, picking up individual phonemes and dropping pins within the spined backplates of the new pain engine. Each pin pierced the victim, even as it translated the words into commands. Signals pulled wires, which tweaked electro-generators within the pilot's brain. The brain directed the engine to stand.

"Now you are perfect, toy. Walk over there and stand with the others," Pavei said, gesturing to a corner of the warehouse filled with other similar engines. "I will come and play with you when I am ready."

He turned to the second marine, held in an energy field to the wall, and drew out a small set of face paints and a brush with two chain arms. "Now tell me, what would you like me to make you?"

Tenebrae, The Solar Baron Returns wrote:
Lady Askiel regained consciousness slowly. The first thing she noticed was that she knelt on a white wraithbone decking, stripped of all clothing, arms behind her in chains. She had been dressed in a white robe with a golden chain about her waist. A shadow strode before her, its silhouette striking against the crackling green nebula through the viewing panel before her. Behind her, an alien entity in brown robes stood, or perhaps hovered, feeding on her psychic energy and silencing her sorceries.

A faint humming from the floor and walls told Askiel she was in transit on an Eldar ship. The only other sounds in the room came from the tapping of the shadow's feet and a white owl roosting near the window, cleaning its feathers of blood. She looked up as the shadow returned. It knelt down and materialised into an Eldar. "You?" She said, surprised.

The pirate returned her greeting with a polite nod. "Lady Askiel. The pleasure quite clearly belongs to me in our meeting. This is not the first time we have met." The voice spoke through an ivory Dire Avenger helmet and Askiel spotted an Avenger symbol hanging about its waist, but the rest of the pirate's armour was anything but. Black-green armour as heavy as a Scorpion Exarch shifted masterfully as the pirate knelt, and a deep purple coat spread around his legs like warpspider-silk. He appraised her. She knew him.

"Tene'n, what is the meaning of this?" The name sounded odd to her lips. She had not spoken it in decades.

The pirate nodded again, reached up and disconnected its helmet. The roguish grin of her once-student and mate framed eyes that looked back at her with recognition and sadness and... something else. Green electricity sparked behind his black pupils. "My lady," he spoke sarcastically.

"But, you died on Asthaith. I saw it happen." She spoke truth. The chaos incursion had almost taken the maiden world when Tene'n led an army to destroy the artifact corrupting it all. She had seen the armour disintegrate from his body, the flesh stripped away from his face as he pushed to reach it. And when the flash of green corruption engulfed his army, they, he, and it had all vanished. Like turning off the sun, the chaos forces had withered and died once their power anchor did. Askiel's grief at his passing had almost destroyed the survivors, so infectious it was.

"Asthaith was just the beginning. The corruption filled me, and I fought it in my soul. When I awoke, I was alone, surrounded by the twisted corpses of the army. Only a few of us survived the battles within our souls, and we were... changed."

She could sense it about him, even without her seer's senses.

He spoke before she could ask her question. "How did we get here?" He gestured around, "That is another matter entirely. But I have learned certain truths. We Eldar are failing and fading. The universe is so much more than we allow ourselves to experience. What use is life without joy, or sadness," he looked at her for a second in a way that he had once before, "or love."

"My corsairs and I have harnessed that corruption. We need no soul stones, we need not feed from others' pain. We have been to glowing novas and fought through burning space hulks, seen maiden worlds and worlds encasing frozen metal races." As he spoke, Askiel felt the energy change in the room. Her body pushed adrenaline through her veins, she quickened her breathing involuntarily. Tene'n spoke up a frenzy, she found herself agreeing wholeheartedly. "My plans are coming to fruition even now, and soon I will free our entire race from the clutches of She Who Thirsts." He moved closer to her as he said this. "And you are instrumental to my plans."

Askiel wasn't even breathing now. She hardly dared to, lest her breath stop his speech. "What can I do?" She asked, with the faintest of exhalations.

"Simply this," he said, moving close and kissing her. Askiel found her mental guards dropping, her emotions running wild for the first time in years. Elation. Elation and pain. The combination built within her until she succumbed to darkness.

Tene'n stood from her corpse, holding a bloodied knife in his left hand and her heart in his right. "Thank you, Askiel," he said to the still-smiling body of the seer. Blood was spreading to puddle on the floor and the white owl flew to it, stepping back to stay out of the wet, but drinking it where he could. Tene'n went to the intercom, composed himself and once more adopted the identity of Tene'brae, The Solar Baron.

* * *

The memory stopped. Tene'brae put a hand to his chest where his once-love's heart beat next to his own. He felt the dual-drumming and glanced out of the viewing window covering one wall. They were approaching the portal that would take them to the City of Nightmares. He turned to his attendant. "Again," he said, "play it again. This time let me dream it from the start."

speedfreek wrote:
Looking forward to beastmasters and more harlequins.
And more of those freehands!