Hormissar Gaunt

It is considered to be hope to the current Imperium,

It is a master of the swarm and

It is the bane of sandwiches!

It is... what happens when a Tyranid decides to put on a commissar's hat.

What is it? Made in a quest thread on /tg/, this tells the story of a mysterious new biomorph that compels hormagaunts to dress and act like Imperials. the original was the hormissar (or if you prefer, "Hormissar Gaunt")was originally a regular gaunt from the hive fleet of hydra, when it suddenly developed sentience.

Story

You are a Hormogaunt. Or at least you think you are. Fuck if you know, your brain can barely process much information beyond "Kill," "Charge," and "Eat." Right now, you are currently standing amid a giant swarm of fellow Hormagaunts. You then realized that you realized where you are. Shouldn't you be hunting, not wasting your time doing ridiculous things like having a mind? You decide to follow your brethren to your next meal, as normally. You wait around as the last of the group finish the remnants of their meal, a rather bothersome group of PDF soldiers. As you wait, you take in your surroundings. You are currently located in what seems to be a desert. No other lifeforms besides you and the other hormagaunts are here. As far as you can see, there is only sand. As you move, you suddenly hear a voice in your head. "MOVE. EAST. FOOD." You notice as the large swarm begins to head eastwards, or at least according to what your instincts tell you.

You head east, searching for rippers to eat. Always nice to have a snack before the main course. Seeing none, or more likely not getting to them before the other members of the swarm, you decide to run ahead of the horde surrounding you. After around an hour of travel, you see what looks to be a bright bolt of light flying at you. It luckily misses you. What had made the mistake of shooting at you appears to be a young human in heavily damaged flak armor. He appears to be screaming while hitting his weapon repeatedly. You wonder if this is your meal before you hear "MEAL. EAT. CONSUME." You assume this is it. You know that the rest of the swarm is a good 30 seconds behind you at least, so you get ready.

You begin to approach the human, hungry. You can see him begin to back up as you approach, trying to fire his weapon to no avail. After being realizing it is of no use to him, he throws it at you and begins to run away. You take this opportunity to pounce, using your powerful hind legs to propel yourself at the man, claws out. Your right claw pierces his back, while your left slices his arm off. The man screams in pain and anger, as you begin to slice him to pieces. Once you finish with your delightful task, you notice he has a sealed container. Inside seems to be a sandwich, which you happily eat before consuming the man himself. As you are around a quarter of the way done with the man, the rest of the swarm arrives, seemingly just as hungry as you are. The remains are quickly devoured, with nothing remaining afterwards.

your instincts instruct you to find a nice hat. Alas, the man has, not a hat, but a helmet! You are saddened by this turn of events, but you decide to keep the helmet with you for now, until you are able to find a suitable replacement. Knowing that you would not be directed for a meal this small, you and the rest of the swarm continue eastward, before quickly coming across a much larger group of humans. These ones seem to be in better shape, but for them that's not saying much. You see one, however, who has a fancy hat!

You know what you must do. As soon as you saw it, you knew it too. You heard the voice. It told you. "HAT. GET." You watch as your brethren charge forward, and get mowed down. You feel like if you had tear ducts, you would shed tears at this. One of the squad of eighteen men, his gun overheating in the hot desert after firing on full auto, begins to run, before being shot by the man with the fancy hat. The rest continue to lay down fire, killing many of your brothers. However, 5 men are quickly killed by the massed charge. The rest back up before resuming fire.

The fancy-hat man fires a few shots with his louder, scarier gun, before he quickly fumbles for another magazine. You know your moment when you see it. You quickly spring from the mound of sand you were hiding behind and decapitate him in one quick swoop. There is a very strange silence that falls on the men as they see their leader killed. Most begin to back off, but they are all quickly overtaken by your brothers. As you watch you take the mans hat, and place it on your head. You feel like the best Hormagaunt ever right now. You decide if you are going to take one part, you will take the rest. You quickly take the mans coat and try to put it on. You are at first frustrated with it, before realizing you need to remove HIS sliced off arms before putting yours. Of course, you end up ripping a hole for your other arms in the coat, but you still look pretty amazing. You feel like the Hive Mind would be proud of you right now. You begin your victory feast with your brothers. If Tyranids can feel joy, then you are now.

You decide to try and use the human's weapon, in hopes that it will be able to serve the hide mind. Perhaps an organic version could be produced somehow, who knows. Regardless, you stare at it for a second. Then a minute. Then half an hour. Your brothers seem to be too busy staring at you in confusion to notice what you are trying to do. After around an hour of simply looking at the strange device, you finally figure out how to use it. Sadly, you accidently shoot one of your brothers in the process, leaving quite a mess. Luckily, your other brothers quickly clean it all up.

You tell your brothers to dress in the clothing of the dead troopers you killed. None of them respond until a voice appears in your head. "LISTEN. ORDERS. FOLLOW." Some of the others attempt to dress in the clothing, but are visibly struggling to understand the idea of not tearing it apart in the first place. By the end of it, you have 5 Hormagaunt-"Guardsmen". While this is going on, you attempt to practice with using the fire arm you looted. The recoil is very strong, you notice, but if you hold it with 3 arms it remains stable. After a while you feel like you've actually gotten the hang of it, but that's not really saying much. You can now fire the gun and aim, but actually hitting your targets is still a challenge to you. Before you can continue, however, you are alerted by the voice once more. "NORTH. FOOD. SCOUT."

Before you head north, you tell your clothed brothers to take the weapons the men were using before. They stare at you for a few moments, before they trudge over and attempt to pick them up. It takes them awhile, and a lot of fumbling around, but they eventually manage to hold the weapons without dropping them while walking. You and your group head northwards. You notice as you go that the grounds begins to change. The desert you were so familiar with begins to vanish. The sand becomes soil. The air becomes less dry. In the distance, you can see trees. Can you eat trees, you wonder. But before that matters, you and your group stop. You see what seems to be a patrol ahead. Luckily, they seem to be slacking off, not doing their jobs, considering they missed a giant swarm of Hormagaunts. You feel it. You know that you must. You cannot resist. You run forward, waving your gun in the air, shouting at the men slacking off about how they are failing at what they are doing, how they are all disgraces and do not deserve the gifts they have been given. How they are failures to the Emperor or something like that, you don't know what's come over you, but you can't control yourself right now. You order them to maintain their watch and prevent invaders from entering the area. When they actually notice you they pause, and stare. You quickly shoot one in the head for disobeying a direct order. The others quickly attempt to grab their weapons, but another two are quickly executed in this manner. One tries to flee and he too is shot. The remaining three are too shocked to actually move. One attempts to salute, and says he will follow orders now properly. The other two stare at him as if he were crazy, before they see the rest of the swarm behind you. They then quickly salute you and do the very same.

You order the men to eat their own friends. They stare at you in shock and disgust before you explain to them that they were nothing but cowards, and they did not deserve to live. When ones ask why he has to eat another human being, you explain that the Emperor needs flesh. He needs biomass in order to fuel his armies. His new armies. You begin to think this hat is influencing you somewhat, but you shake it off. One of the men gets sick of this and grabs his lasgun and open fire. You quikcly respond by shooting him with your bolt pistol. The other two men look at each other, back at you, and slowly get down and attempt to eat their former comrades. You tell your brothers not to harm your new comrades, for they will soon be joined with the glorious hive mind. Soon they will be with us. After the men force down as much as they can (Which is very little) you and your brothers finish off the rest. You take the supplies of the newly deceased guardsmen and add them to your growing swarm. It takes awhile, but you get 2 more hormagaunts into guardsman flak armour, and arm 4 others with the lasguns.

You ask the men where the nearest settlement is. The man tells you that it is due north 6 miles. You send one of your brother forward, in order to scout the forest. While the fellow hormagaunt goes forward, you begin to preach to the entire swarm about the Hive-Emperor, which is what happens once the Tyranids have consumed humanity; the Hive-Mind shall fuse with the God Emperor to form the most powerful being in known existence. You can visibly see one of the guardsman trembling, his mind shattered. You continue your preaching, until you see your scout return. You notice he brought a friend with him: You see what appears to be a Lictor, dragging behind him a dead Imperial Storm Trooper. You nod at the Lictor, who stares at you. You can feel the Lictor judging you behind its emotionless eyes. Suddenly, you see him rip out the Stormtroopers brain and consume it. After one of the guardsmen near you vomits out all that he had eaten recently (his rations and old friends) and one of your brothers cleans up the mess, you notice the lictor seems to attempt to put on the stormtrooper outfit. Or as much as he can, being rather large. You take note of the hellgun on the corpse's body, unsure of what to do with it. You also notice a sealed container on the corpse. Opening it, you see a sandwich. You wish you had tear ducts so you could express your joy at this moment. After quickly consuming the delicious sandwich, you realize you have much to do.

You stare at the las weapon. You can tell just at sight that is the laser weapon you have seen so much. But even better.You holster your bolt pistol and, with the help of one of the guardsman, put on the Hellgun. You tell the Lictor to ambush anyone you meet on your command. It nods, and vanishes from sight. One of the guardsman is shivering in fright still. You turn your head and he forces himself to stop out of fear.

You get to the settlement nice and safely. Surprisingly, there weren't any other guards the whole 6 miles. When asked why, the Guardsman explains that the area was being abandoned by the Imperium, but they didn't have time to get the locals out, nor all of the troopers. You walk into the center of the village. It is around the middle of the night. The moon is out. It is beautiful. You begin to preach to them all of the truth. Of the Hive-Emperor. Of how they shall serve him with their beings. How they shall know true piece. How they shall be one with him for all eternity. Slowly, windows open and some civilians wander out. Once they realize it is a tyranid that is speaking to them, they seem scared and frightened. Some attempt to flee the village. However, your brothers stop them. They are forced back into the center with you.

You explain to them that they are being placed back under Imperial control. The True Imperial control. Many are sobbing, Others are in the fetal position, rocking back in forth. There are a few, however, who have accepted their fate, and are quiet. They are peaceful. You stare at them, and then stare at the others. You decide to offer the unworthies one final chance. You ask them if they can make sandwiches. There is a slight awkward pause, before a few slowly raise their hand. You look at them and order them to make some for you. Now. They quickly get up and run to their homes in order to do so. You order all the rest of the unworthies to be food for your swarm. Many begin running, and crying. But it's too late for them. They are all hunted down and eaten by the swarm. You smile as you are brought numerous sandwiches from the unworthies you kindly spared. You hear a voice in your head. "GOOD. JOB." You feel proud.

<to be continued>

thread: [1]