Kardashian Prime – the planet of the feeble, the home of the slaves

When the Chernogood nox power plant was to be built, the hive merchant turned planetary governor, Tronald Dump*, insisted that his former business associate Pladimir Vutin** would supply the parts. Hence, the great Chernogood plant was built from parts imported through space from planet Crimero. A few administratum officials from the ‘Clergy of Indomitable Accountants’ on Kardashian Prime objected to the purchase as the price seemed to heavily favour Pladimir Vutin. But by clever political strong-arms-manship and sheer luck Dump was able to quell these voices indefinitely. Dissenting voices could be heard supporting the notion that the inquisition should be called in to make an investigation into the seemingly random death accidents of the entire Clergy of Indomitable Accountants. However, these voices were unfortunately drowned out by sudden and even louder voices of riots, with no identifiable origin, that forced Tronald Dump to insert the Planetary Defence Force and to quell them, incidentally also quelling the call for further investigations.

The Chernogood plant has now been in operation for nearly 3 years. The plant functions by processing vast amounts of nox fuel ore imported from the Melnibonean nox wastes. In the process, the nox ore is burned producing copious amounts of gas that drives the huge rusty turbines of the plant to make vast warp energy currents. The only by-product of the process is a foul smelling green sludge which is let out into the oceans of Kardashian Prime. Calculations by the Adeptus Biologis have shown that this is an environmentally safe solution since, when taking into account the size of the whole planetary water reserve, the sludge is effectively diluted to the point where it ‘diseappears’. Soon after the plant was built it turned out that it was necessary to make ‘adjustments’ to the safety protocols to make it run at all. The amount of work-arounds and redoes made over the 3 year operating period means that today it is only a small caste of adeptus that knows all the secrets of the buttons and levers. The nox fuel ore is dropped by plane directly in the vicinity of the plant and then transported manually by the workers to the furnace. The furnace emits to much static interference for any machinery to go near it.

The workers who man the plant are all locals and live in the nearby city of Pianopyat. They are transported to the plant in lead bolstered rhinos, and spend all day toiling in the sweltering heat of the plant fumes. Here, they shovel the semi-burning nox fuel ore unto wheelbarrows and then unload them into the funaces. Many of the workers have been physically altered by exposure to the polluting materials during the hard labour. Their skin tones have changed somewhat towards a more purple complexion and boils, often found in threes, filled with puss are prominent on their arms. The workers are all suited up in the distinct yellow nox suits, supplied by Tronald Dumps own tailor shops. Over the suit they wear a mask with particle filter, that filters out 83% of the small nox particles in the air. Spiritually, the workers find their strenght, praying to Neergol, the local partron deity of hard labour and radioactivity. Cries of “Lahslakhslakh slakh lakshl akshla la!” can often be heard around the plant, as the workers support each other in their beliefs and hard work by rallying to these words. Lately the cult of Neergol has been very active and several key plant workers are now also high ranking officials in the worker cult.

Recent events

Recently in Hive Maga, an enormous bright light suddenly flashed in the horizon over the area where Chernogood is located, and a few seconds later a large booming sound rang all around Hive Maga. This was accompanied by a large power outage in the Southern part of the hive, followed by a near total communication breakdown with other hives. Officials at Hive Maga have, fearing the worst, started making a plan for how to present this news to Tronald Dump, who still remains oblivous to the events. Meanwhile, they have sent word to The 42nd The Screaming Camels, that are stationed on the planet, to go to the site of Chernogood and investigate if there is a correlation between the plant and the power outage.

Painting and converting the workers

To make the workers of Chernogood I brought out my good old trusty Games Workshop (GW) zombies. This plastic kit is easily one of the oldest still in production. Today they call them ‘deadwalkers’ and the box has been updated, but other than that the song remains the same. These guys were notorious for being part of the bubble hands and heads period at GW, but also because several of the figures seemed to have unnatural features. For instance the loose leg being held by one guy below has 6 tendons connecting to 5 toes. I believe some of the hands have 4 finger joints too. Happy days!

Anyway, with my old zombies in hand (these have been with me since the hay days of my 6th edition fantasy necromancer army – hello 2002!), but were never actually made into a proper regiment. But to suit them up in the yellow nox suits of the Dump corporation, I simply added plenty of greenstuff here and there to make connections and smooth out surfaces. In many places I kept the fantasy look of the zombies, because even if this is supposed to be hazmat suits, they should look 40kish. Two thirds of the 12 models received a new head from Pig Iron Productions. I actually thought they’d gone out of business, but do check out their page – they have some really useful and cool stuff. The heads I used were bought aeons ago and are called Kolony Rebels. Adding new heads to old sculpts is one of my favourite hobby moments. Watching how it just transforms the figure is amazing!

Painting wise I tried to go as fast as posible on these. The basecoat was the brand spanking new GW greyseer contrast undercoat. The yellow was made with Ianden Yellow constrast, followed by P3 Sulphur Yellow highlights. The skin was Voluptous Purple constrast, followed by Coat D’arms Tank Light Grey highlights, followed by Army Painter White extreme highlights. The black was simply Black Templar constrast, with no additional work. All the eyes had a spot of Vallejo Model Colour Fluorescent Green paint. Metal was Army Painter Gun Metal with highlights in Vallejo Chain Silver.

A few very zealous followers of Neergol have been entirely transformed by working with the nox fuel ore. I used a few old skeletons to make these guys. The base was Vallejo Pea Green, drybrushed with Vallejo Lime Green, white and sulphur yellow was added to this to increase the highlights. Lastly the figures were washed with fluorescent green to give them a glow. The weapons were painted Army Painter gunmetal followed by Basilicanum Grey contrast wash. By the way – if you managed to read this far, please do leave a comment! I don’t even think it requires you to log in. ;-D

*Any name resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental

**Any rearrangement of syllables making names resemble persons living or dead is purely coincidental