Author: The Lord J
Rating: Right now probably PG-13, but expect NC-17 to appear in this later on.
Feedback: Yep, please Constructive criticism is always welcome. Please leave feedback on the Alpha Plus thread on the Kitten Board.
Disclaimer: I own nothing, we all know who owns the Buffy characters etc blah blah, Joss, blah blah ME etc. A lot of other characters were borrowed from Dan Abnett's "Eisenhorn" Novel.
Summary: This is AU. Completely. Forget Sunnydale, this is set in the Warhammer 40,000 universe - war, death, and everything nasty you could ever imagine is part of everyday life, it's a bleak outlook. This is set somewhere in the middle of the novel "Eisenhorn" by Dan Abnett; Eisenhorn had just taken on a new member of his retinue, a certain redhead by the name of Willow Rosenberg...
Notes: I've been thinking about doing this for a while. I love the Warhammer 40K fluff, and I've been wondering whether a 40K/Buffy crossover fic would work...well, we're about to find out. Basically, I'm only going to continue this if it gets enough interest; if it doesn't, I'll let it rot until I've finished 'Connections' (if it ever finishes). Then I might revive it. I've tried to make it readable as a stand alone piece, and it's not beta'd, nor can I be bothered to have it beta'd at the moment. It will, however, help immensely if you've read "Eisenhorn", or are at least familiar with the 40K universe. This will probably be kept quite short unless I feel inspired to continue it.

Eisenhorn finally ground to a standstill, doubled over and out of breath. The foul abomination he'd been chasing had had far superior stamina to the inquisitor, and had outrun him, scuttling off into the night, claws flailing. He emptied his last autopistol rounds into the shadows just as it ducked down an alley, struggling to get anything resembling enough strength to aim the gun.

He growled in frustration, and threw down the empty autopistol in a gesture of annoyance. Genestealer's just didn't run away. It went against all the intelligence they had ever gathered about the Tyranid race. The things were reported to be fearless, and yet he had just had to chase one to force a confrontation. Something was not right here.

"Gregor?" A familiar female voice called through the night. "Gregor! Where the hell are-"

"Rosenberg." Eisenhorn bent down, retrieved the autopistol, and straightened himself up. He turned around to face the redhead advancing towards him. The woman's slim form was covered in a tight black Flexamite bodysuit, which although flexible, could stop an autogun shell in favourable circumstances. Over this she wore a long leather coat, which seemed to flow around her in slow motion. Her red hair was tied up in a ponytail and her eyes were hidden behind a pair of dark glasses.

"It got away," he stated bluntly.

"I'm not surprised, you shouldn't be chasing genestealers at your age," she scolded.

He shot her a steely glance. "Where's Bequin?"

"She's coming, she kinda tripped and fell awkwardly on her ankle." Willow explained.

Eisenhorn's face didn't betray a sliver of emotion. Not that it could have even if he had wanted to. Interrogation at the hands of a vicious enemy had seen to that. It didn't stop the concern creeping into his voice though. "Is she alright?"

"She's fine. More worried about you than herself," Willow replied. "Midas got the second one with his needle guns."

"Good." He grunted. Midas Betancore, his pilot, could always be relied upon. "Can you sense anything?" He asked.

Willow tuned out the background noise and focussed on the psychic signatures in the vicinity. A Tyranid presence would stand out like a sore thumb. She gradually swept her mind across the surrounding buildings, scanning over most of the dull glows that represented the non-psyker human population. She covered most of the terrain around them, mainly second-rate hab-blocks and slums, and stopped suddenly. There was a bright white light emanating from one of the hab-blocks; searing in it's intensity. It wasn't Tyranid though; this was human...but there was something...something different about it.

"Can you see it?" Eisenhorn pushed.

"No." Willow sighed. She thought about telling him about the psychic presence she could see so clearly, but thought better of it. It was an unnecessary distraction, and besides, it was probably just some local psyker. It didn't seem malicious, and if it was, it would come to light soon enough and the local Arbites would take care of it. Still, she took a mental note of where it was. "No sign of the genestealer."

"Show me the dead one." He commanded, holstering his autopistol.