A tale of two worlds

The warehouse district of New Brighton, Mars – a sprawling labyrinth of iron-framed storehouses, canal docks, and soot-blackened brick—sits beneath a dim, rust-coloured sky.

Gas lamps flicker against the creeping red fog, and somewhere beneath the cobbles, unseen things move.

At the centre of it all stands Warehouse 57, housing a secret shipment of volatile aether-crystals. A small detachment of British soldiers has been assigned to guard the site. However, they are being inspected tonight.

Regimental Sergeant Major (RSM) Perry Mason paces back and forth in front of the line with razor-edged precision. Boots are scrutinised, rifles examined, and every man is expected to meet his uncompromising standards.

The soldiers stand rigid—more afraid of earning Mason’s wrath than any unseen threat. But beneath their feet, something has already breached the city.

The excavation tunnels beneath the city—long abandoned—have been disturbed. From below, the Termigons have emerged: pale, sinewy, and ravenous cave-dwellers drawn by the strange energies of the crystals… or perhaps by the scent of flesh.

They have expanded their vast tunnel networks and forced their way into New Brighton’s sewer system, turning it into a hidden web of movement beneath the city streets.

They are no longer distant horrors of the Martian deep. They are already among the district’s foundations.

At the same time, a covert Prussian expeditionary force, led by Hauptmann Dieter Voss, has infiltrated the city. Their objective: seize the aether-crystals for the Kaiser’s scientists.

As Mason’s inspection reaches its crescendo, the illusion of order shatters and all hell breaks loose.

The warehouse erupted into chaos.

Mason’s bark of “Stand fast!” cut through the din as the cobbles split open and Termigons boiled up from the sewers like pale, screaming smoke. Bayonets flashed in the gaslight. The small detachment of British soldiers, drilled to perfection by Mason’s wrath, formed a ragged square around Warehouse 57 and met the surge with steel and discipline. They fought like men cornered with nothing left to lose—volley fire cracking, boots locked, every missed shot answered with a rifle butt to sinew and bone.

Above the shrieks and gunfire, the two Clockwork Clanks came alive. One lurched forward, pistons hissing, and tore into the seething tide of Termigons as they spilt from the drains. Gears ground. Steam vented. Each brass fist came down like a judgment, pulping the cave-dwellers before they could reach the aether-crystals. The second Clank, key winding down into the dark—a silent, useless sentinel as the battle raged past it.

Hauptmann Voss and his Prussians surged from the fog, dark uniforms stark against the rust-coloured sky. They came for the crystals, carbines spitting. For a heartbeat, three forces collided in the narrow street. The Termigons didn’t care who bled. They took Voss’s men first—dragging a pair of Prussians screaming into the shadows, their jaws closing on throats. A young British private went down beside them, pulled beneath the cobbles before Mason could reach him. The Termigons’ fury was indiscriminate and costly.

The losses sobered Voss. His expeditionary force was already decimated, caught between British discipline and Martian hunger. Then the sound rolled over the rooftops: marching boots, distant but growing. More British reinforcements, drawn by the gunfire and the roar of the Clank’s machine gun.

Voss snarled an order. The surviving Prussians broke off, melting back into the red fog with empty hands and fewer men than they’d arrived with. They vanished between the warehouses, leaving only boot prints and blood on the bricks.

Silence didn’t follow. From beneath the streets came the screams of the injured British, Prussian, and Termigon alike—being dragged down into the tunnel-web below. A fate worse than death, swallowed by the foundations of New Brighton as the red fog curled over Warehouse 57 once more.

Mason stood among his battered men, breath steaming in the cold. The aether-crystals still pulsed behind him, untouched. He looked down at the shattered cobbles, then at the stationary Clank.

“Secure the perimeter,” he said quietly. “And someone fetch a bloody key.”

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For this game, we tried out Glorious Adventures in the Age of Steam.

I rather liked this set of rules, and it played pretty well.   I think going forward, we would probably use the ‘Bigger Battles’ additional rules to accommodate units.

All in all, a fun rules set and one I am keen to play again.