Veer-myn are living beneath the surface of occupied planets led by Brood Mothers and Maligni
About
It would appear that Veer-myn are capable of learning from and copying the behaviour and technology of other races. Their weapons are generally less effective individually than those of others, but they are nonetheless formidable enough.
Much of their technology seems borrowed and heavily modified, and a great deal of it emits radioactive and other waste that would be quite toxic to humans. Whether they suffer similarly and just do not care or have some sort of natural immunity is unclear – certainly they seem unconcerned by the sort of toxins and poisons that would give humans pause.
If they communicate, it is in ways that are unclear to others, and they certainly have never attempted to initiate any contact with other races.
They are not generally aggressive, but will fight viciously if provoked. Their presence in Deadzones is usually because they are the cause, the Council preferring to keep planets subject to a Veer-myn infestation isolated. However occasionally they either happen to live beneath the surface of a planet which is locked down for some other reason, or they are drawn to a Deadzone from elsewhere, though by what and for what purpose is, like so much about them, unknown.
Speed, numbers and hiding are the keys to success for the Veer-myn. Keep your models shielded with smoke grenades in round one, so you can sneak up, ready to unleash chaos in rounds two and three.
The Volt Chasers form some kind of subfaction to the Veer-myn that are even more willing to experiment with technology and biology. They are armoured and able to overcharge themselves and often overseen by some Technorati responsible for these modifications.
First Contact, Origins & History
The exact origins of the Veer-myn race are lost to history. They keep no written records of their own and showed no interest in early attempts at diplomacy by the GCPS beyond eating the diplomats. But although the advent of the Corporation and, in particular, the McKinley drive, has certainly increased the dispersal and numbers of the Veer-myn, they were known as a menace to other civilisations long before man took to the stars.
Neither Asterians nor Forge Fathers have any tolerance for Veer-myn. The Dwarfs in particular have a low opinion of the Veer-myn race and most of their own space-going vessels have elaborate detection systems to prevent any infestation. Despite this, the widespread nature of Forge Father interests across the galaxy, their frequent interaction with GCPS sites, and the prevalence of mining operations amongst their concerns, means conflict between the two is more frequent than either side would like.
How many Veer-myn live within the territory of the Asterians is unknown - Asterians are even more closed to outside scrutiny than the Veer-myn. But, as the armies of Asteria make more frequent appearances in strength in the galaxy outside their borders, reports of war between Cyphers and Nightcrawlers are increasingly common.
As for the GCPS, in its early days when even intra-system journeys could take months or years, old navvies’ tales of giant rat-men and carnivorous saboteurs living in the darkest corners of their ships were widely believed to be the result of people having spent too long alone in space. Attitudes changed significantly when the crew of the Sitakund returned to port with the frozen torso of an unidentified stowaway in their deep-freezer.
It had been recovered, they said, from a cargo hold that had unexpectedly ruptured to vacuum during close passage with a rogue comet. It was dubbed a ‘Veer-myn’, in reference to its bestial resemblance of the kind of creatures that had historically infested ships back on Old Earth, and many sailors professed their presence on a ship was a kind of good luck charm. At least, they did until the disappearance of the Jindal Manjula.
The Jindal Manjula
At 950,000DWT, the Manjula was a big ship and she tanked massive quantities of chemicals under the banner of the Singh Corporation. During one such voyage, Corporation Central began receiving a series of increasingly panicked-sounding messages from the Manjula. The first came from her captain, reporting unusual Veer-myn activity near one of the forward storage tanks. A day later the first mate reported that her captain was dead and that she was now unlocking the emergency weapons lockers. Hours after that, a clearly terrified Second Mate Chaise Jaustin sent the final communication from the Manjula. Jaustin hurriedly explained that several of the crew had disappeared and several more were most certainly dead. As the transmission broke up into a cloud of garbled static, Jaustin’s last words spoke of sealing himself into his quarters until a rescue party arrived.
The Manjula was not seen or heard of again for twelve standard months, despite a private marine vessel being dispatched to her last known position and a system-wide alert notice being sent out by Central. Eventually she drifted near enough to a manned monitoring station to be recovered. Of her crew there were no survivors - there was no life on the ship at all, in fact.
There were signs of armed struggle aboard, including chemical burn marks around the barricaded entrances to the bridge and crew quarters, and members of the salvage team reported a smell like curdled milk pervaded the corridors. But the second mate was nowhere to be found. Neither were three of the Manjula’s massive chemical tanks.
Word of the ghost ship and speculation as to what had happened to her spread faster than Corporation Central’s rumour counter-measures could. Eventually the GCPS had no option but to confirm that rogue Veer-myn could present a ‘minor danger’ and announce all ships should take whatever measures they believed were necessary to prevent such losses. Most large vessels immediately upgraded their stored complement of firearms and many private security firms experienced a significant and very welcome uptick in contracts for onboard protection forces. But still, memories fade, and for the most part the Veer-myn kept away from humans. Occasions where they did not were quickly buried by Central. So their presence was tolerated and their nests, unseen and un-numbered, grew alongside and within the GCPS. The saying now goes, ‘wherever you are in the galaxy, you are never more than ten metres away from a Veer-myn’. In fact, in much of the GCPS, the real distance is actually considerably smaller.
Many more ships, both human or from other species, followed the same or similar fate, one example being the CSS Zloveshy Vassily. These infiltration attempts aren't just limited to ships, but often are connected to them. The Forge Fathers and their struggle to contain and wipe out the Veer-myn after the events of Exham IV are the living and dying witnesses.
Society
Many rumours and theories abound about the origin of the Veer-Myn, though the truth of any of them is impossible to verify. Veer-Myn are not given to philosophising on the nature of their existence. To them the question is not so much why they are here as where they can go next and whether there is enough food. One thing is certain – they are unlikely to ever vanish from the galaxy. Physically robust and tenacious, the similarities to rats of old earth are more than aesthetic.
There are many aspects of the Veer-myn which worry the Council of Seven. But the greatest concern is not the sicknesses the creatures spread carelessly, nor the ease with which they can spread undetected throughout GCPS space; it is that so far there has been no indication to what drives these clearly intelligent creatures. Broods had been found to abandon their nests and migrate from one city to another, or to take residence on bulk haulers to jump planet completely for no outward reason. There was no suggestion they’d outgrown local resources, nor did the planet later suffer some cataclysmic event (except for the Continental Shearing Incident of Axiom Secunde, however that was deemed to be anomalous) which would posit some group prescience.
There was also a pattern to the supplies they took and the apparatus they would rip from machinery, a correlation which would not become apparent until the materials were turned on their erstwhile corporation owners in ways more devious than even the foulest mind among them could devise. It suggested there was a deliberate intention behind the thefts towards a calculated purpose.
Brood Mother
It was not until the Auditing of Santa Catarina Sete when a Veer-myn nest was located, isolated, and gassed, that the question was believed to be answered. The result was the most complete specimen group the GCPS had yet seen, including a Veer-myn of a genus not yet encountered. What the scientists on Santa Catarina had discovered was a Brood Mother, and while they knew they had found the driving intelligence behind a brood, their wildest postulations would not come within touching distance of the importance the Brood Mothers played in Veer-myn life.
Brood Mothers are the matriarchs, the one binding factor relating every member of a Veer-myn brood, for it is through her that every member is related. That is not to say that the Brood Mother gives birth to each member of the brood personally. Instead there is a caste of females within each nest whose sole purpose is to aid the Mother in populating the brood. This serves the dual purpose of helping to support a larger population and also providing a measure of security, as it’s thought that when a new Mother is needed it is from this caste that one is selected. How is not known; however, glands have been found post-mortem from female Veer-myn which are thought to release a dense concentration of hormones into the body, promoting the growth of the reproductive system found inside a Brood Mother.
Brood Mothers’ bodies are larger than other Veer-myn. Topping well over two metres, the Mother’s physiology is mostly in proportion to its size, with the exception of its abdomen, which is distended with the enlarged reproductive organs within.
It is unusual to see a Brood Mother in direct combat. The purpose of conflict is usually to protect her at all costs, as without her there is no brood. However in the direst circumstances the Mother may take to the field, urging her brood onto feats of extraordinary savagery in their need to protect her, and laying into any enemy who come within striking distance with the ferocity of a mother bear.
Physically, the Brood Mother looks like any other Veer-myn on a larger scale, although with a distended midsection where her organs are. The release of hormones within a normal Veer-myn female to create a body capable of holding the swollen reproductive organs required to support an entire nest has augmented her size to a frightening degree, bringing with it great strength.
She is the very heart of the brood; without her, the nest does not exist. Because of this, her midsection has the best armour the Maligni can provide. Her body is encased in solid armour, although it is manoeuvrable enough to allow her to strike with her powerful arms to any enemy that comes close enough, or escape swiftly if needs be.
Progenitors
Because of the lack of solid data, there have been many far-reaching and eccentric theories surrounding the Veer-myn, their habits, abilities and social structure. Some of these theories have been supplanted as slowly more is learned of these creatures. One such theory which survived until only recently was that there was only a single male in the brood which bred with the Brood Mother. The theory was replaced after evidence of exponential growth in some broods was proved to be impossible with a single breeding male. It is currently thought that an unto-now undiscovered caste of males are instead used as breeders, milked of their reproductive DNA until they die and are replaced by their own male offspring.
The reason why the hypothesis remained for so long was due to combat encounters. In almost all cases the Veer-myn were led by a single male, apparently of the Malignus caste but with obvious authority across the brood. It was, and is still, believed that there is no discernible rank below Brood Mother, and the conclusion that this male would hold a unique place among the nest and therefore on the battlefield was accepted as logical. Even though this theory has been dismissed no other has been proposed as to how these males attain their authority, and the reasoning is marked down as another mystery surrounding the Veer-myn.
The Progenitor looks like a regular Malignus, armed with the most valuable, and usually experimental, weaponry available as befits its station. This weaponry tends to come in two load outs; a Spitter Rifle, or a Grenade Launcher. The Spitter Rifle fires a nitrogen based liquid, literally ‘spitting’ out a small glob at tremendous pressure. The result is a highly accurate cryogenic fluid bullet which can eat through armour.
Nightmares
One reason the existence of the creatures which would become known as the Veer-myn took so long to become accepted was the nature of the stories told by the ships crews who encountered them. In these stories the Veer-myn were mysterious, half-seen creatures scuttling away into the dark before one could be captured or, in the cases where the story tellers were more reluctant to convey what they’d witnessed, hulking monstrosities formed from the stuff of nightmares.
The stories had more than a flavour of the tales told by sailors of Old Earth who were quick to ascribe the unexplained to monsters and spirits, so it was no wonder that until the Sitakund incident that is how the tales were treated. The disappearance of the Jindal Manjula sparked a re-interest in those initial stories as people tried to put what they were learning into context, and when Corporation troops first encountered a huge breed of Veer-myn they had a name ready: Nightmares.
In combat Nightmares live up to and surpass their name. In stature they vastly outstrip the more common Veer-myn, reaching over three metres tall at a minimum. Their frame is bulked out with hard muscle, and further enhanced by overlapping layers of armour which offers an impressive degree of protection for the wearer. The Nightmares are almost exclusively encountered in tunnel and internal combat zones, leading to the theory that they are the tunnel clearers of the Veer-myn nest, a hypothesis supported by the close ranged nature of the weapons they carry.
The uncharacteristic ferocity of the Nightmares and their size has long been a mystery for scientists. Why are these Veer-myn so large and aggressive compared to all the others encountered? Study of Nightmare remains have given some clues. The non-repetitive DNA strands stand apart from that of their smaller kin, suggesting these Veer-myn have been purposefully altered post-birth to fit a niche unfulfilled in their society. If this is the case, what else the Veer-myn may be able to create from their own race is genuinely concerning.
Night Terrors / Terrors
The pro-existence movement, as the supporters of the theory that the Veer-myn were an existing species before the GCPS encountered them are known, have often postulated what an early Veer-myn would look like. With so few workable specimens recovered intact from battlefields, and virtually none from nests (it may be that Veer-myn perform cannibalism on dead brood members, perhaps due to some religious significance or a base drive), regressing the Veer-myn through potential past evolutionary steps is difficult. And the discovery of a massive Veermyn in the Rzeszow System had pro-existors in gleeful victory at the discovery of a proto-Veermyn sub-species. Or it did, until they had the chance to study it.
The troopers on Rzeszow report initial contact with the Veer-myn went as expected when the extermination of a nest was attempted, until they met stiff resistance, and the Veer-myn let loose a monster. The report states a large group of Night-Crawlers approached the troopers’ line, causing the officer in charge to hesitate at the unusual tactic, before their ranks opened and a Veer-myn the likes of which had never been seen charged forward and tore into the human line.
The creature took an extraordinary amount of firepower to put down, by which time the Veer-myn horde overran one of the human flanks, forcing the troopers back and making the theatre commander order a firebombing to contain the situation. Showing the unimaginative simplicity encouraged in Sphere line troopers, the soldiers dubbed this Veer-myn the Terror. Terrors are quadrupedic and heavily muscled around the front shoulders. Those seen in battle either wear a harness across the backs, grafted with elongated blades to scythe through any enemy the Night Terrors passes, or have a Chem-Thrower strapped between their shoulders, dousing the beast’s path in acrid chemicals.
However, post mortem examinations have shown the Night Terror to be, at least at the base level, genetically identical to other Veer-myn. The artificial bloating on hormonal glands and certain organs suggest these are not evolutionary offshoots, but deliberate creations; normal Veer-myn fed a soup of chemicals which force growth in the subject to many times its original size and weight. Such exponential growth could only be agony to the Veer-myn, which would explain the extreme aggression it shows on the battlefield.
However, given the uncontrollable aspect of the Night Terror and the variations in physiology between individual specimens suggests the Terrors are not intentional creations, but mistakes put to use on the battlefield.
Variants
Reaper: The Terror reaper is fitted with a harness across its shoulders, on which are grafted long scythed blades, intended to cut down infantry as it runs by.
Cutter: The Cutter is the ranged variant of the Terror. Like the Reaper it is fitted with a harness, fixing a Chem-Sprayer between its shoulders. The Chem-Sprayer is a variant of the Chem-Thrower, less accurate and shorter ranged, but with a larger injection reservoir, allowing it pump much more fluid over a target cube. The Sprayer is strapped firmly onto the Terror, and as such can only fire in the direction it is facing. However, given that that would be in the direction of the closest enemy that is not always a negative. The Cutter has been seen to spray its chemical ammunition continuously throughout an engagement. It’s thought the firing mechanism on the Chem-Sprayer is able to be triggered to spray continuously until empty. A simple tactic, but one which can misfire if the Cutter loses direction and charges through Veer-myn lines, as has been witnessed on more than one occasion.
Night-Crawlers
The average Veer-myn possess a cunning which can be fatally surprising to any corporation trooper who underestimates them. This resourceful aggression is not the level of intelligence most sentient races possess however, and can only take them so far. The use of complex tools and tactics are beyond these Veer-myn, and instead weight of numbers is employed in the place of martial prowess.
These Veer-myn are collected into large packs and armed with simple weapons. Ray guns used by Crawlers are rifles of comically primitive appearance, using an unsophisticated laser technology which fractures what would usually be a tight beam of focused energy into an inaccurate spread of high intensity light, capable of flash burning a whole area in a second. The backbone of a Veer-myn force, Stalkers are aptly named, slinking through the shadows to close with their foe with blade and pistol, preferably from behind. Creepers act as battlefield techs, overseeing the various heavy weapons and vehicles of their kin. They also carry detonation packs, using them to deadly effect on enemy vehicles.
As with all sections of Veer-myn society, within the Night-Crawlers there sit identifiable sub classes, one of the most numerous of which have been dubbed Frothers or Thralls. Frothers are some of the few Veer-myn which human troops have seen close up as the rabid creatures are driven into close combat with their enemy. Whether this is due to a genetic disorder or disease which overrides the Veer-myn’s natural caution, or the result of drugs bringing on violent episodes is unknown, and usually at the back of a corporation trooper’s mind as the Veer-myn leap across the battlefield, gobs of froth foaming across their jaws. Thralls are Veer-myn that have pledged their lives to serve the Brood Mother at the expense of all else. They’re scruffy, dirty creatures that will do whatever the Mother wills.
Maligni
Pathology and chemistry permeate Veer-myn culture. It is thought that hormones play a major part in deciding what caste a Veer-myn will belong to, and evidence suggests pheromones are a central element in Veer-myn language. For this reason, the social caste of the Maligni are one of the highest bands within a brood’s structure. It’s through the chemistry experts of the Maligni that the Veer-myn cultivate the viruses which act as their first strike weapons. Whether these are created artificially, or form part of the Veer-myn natural biology is not known.
What is known is that the Maligni also act as the brood’s engineers, and are responsible for the creation of the Ray-Guns and Chem-Throwers, as well as the more esoteric machinery such as the armour worn by the Brood Mother. Their primary role on the battlefield is to carry and operate the more capable weapons that the Night-Crawlers are deemed either too slow-witted to use or just too small to carry.
The mainstay of these weapons is the Chem-Thrower. More feared than the ray guns carried by the Night-Crawlers, and for good reason; the Chem-Throwers fire a jet of highly corrosive sludge over a wide area. The inherent inaccuracy of the weapon’s delivery means nothing when it is likely to hit everything in its path. Anything hit by the liquid will bubble and dissolve, and the GCPS scientists have yet to find a compound which can nullify the chemicals used.
In addition, they oversee the testing of new and experimental weapons, be they mechanical or biological. Only recently has it been identified that the more extreme Veer-myn specimens recovered from battlefields are not entirely natural. GCPS biologists have failed to sequence the genome of the various monstrosities encountered by human troops, however the lack of consistency outside of the non-repetitive DNA are clear signs of purposefully experimental mutation. This ability of the Maligni to manipulate biological matter is one of the few consensually accepted theories among the small group of GCPS Veer-myn experts.
Gallery
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External Links
- Mantic Store Firefight Veer-Myn - https://www.manticgames.com/firefight/veer-myn/
- Mantic Store Deadzone Veer-Myn - https://www.manticgames.com/deadzone/veer-myn/
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