| abstract
| - Should a Phaeron wish to reach out his hand and reclaim one of the planets sundered long ago from Necron rule, his first wave of attack inevitably includes a fleet of Night Scythes. Manoeuvrable enough to evade incoming fire from orbital defence platforms and swift enough to outpace mustering defenders, Night Scythes can ghost through a defence perimeter to deploy invasion forces directly at the heart of key enemy installations and strategic locations. Once a foothold has been established, coordinates are relayed to the main army, enabling Monoliths and other Necron forces to teleport into position, and the invasion to begin. Night Scythes are piloted by a Necron Immortal who is hard-wired into his aircraft. Because of this robotic nature, the pilot is uninhibited by mortal frailties and is able to steer the aircraft to higher speeds and perform more extreme manoeuvres than pilots of flesh and blood. Likewise, a Night Scythe is also a small spacecraft that fulfils the attack craft role in Necron fleets, despite the lack of a cockpit to protect the pilot; such niceties as oxygen and pressure are of little consequence for the undying form of the Necrons. Unlike the armoured carriers employed by other races, the Night Scythe does not have a transport compartment as such. Instead, it deploys its troops by means of a captive wormhole whose far end is anchored on a distant Tomb World. Through this is less flexible than a Monolith’s Eternity Gate, it does allow a Night Scythe to mimic the battlefield role of a more conventional transport vehicle without jeopardising the existence of its assigned squad. If the Night Scythe is destroyed, its payload squad is simply isolated from the battle until an alternate means of deployment can be established. Though this invariably prevents the squad from taking part in the immediate battle, this is preferable to them being destroyed outright as they can join the campaign’s later stages. Night Scythes are often employed as far-ranging scout ships, tasked with making contact with other Tomb Worlds or searching out lost Necron planets suitable for reclamation. On worlds where the interlopers are either few in number or primitive in nature, a Night Scythe spearheads a ruthless subjugation. On worlds where other life forms have taken strong root, the pilot of a Night Scythe clandestinely performs probes and biopsies of the inhabitants, preying on isolated settlements and convoys whilst it searches for clues that will identify the inhabiting race’s suitability for apotheosis. Such tests are long and exhaustive, and the pilot is often forced to dissect entire townships in order to harvest sufficient data. On a particularly promising planet, a Night Scythe’s pilot may go as far as to transport living samples back to its Tomb World for further inspection by its Crypteks. Most such subjects do not survive the scientific method that follows, but are instead stripped down molecule by molecule and neuron by neuron. A few abductees are returned to their homes, but even in these cases they are most likely implanted with Mindshackle Scarabs or other mental control mechanisms to enable them to function as unsuspecting Necron spies and saboteurs who will pave the way for an imminent invasion.
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![[RDF Data]](/fct/images/sw-rdf-blue.png)