"Best money I ever spent wasn’t for their guns, it was for keeping those demons out of my enemy’s camp. The moment I signed their contract, I could sleep at night knowing the Wail would never come for me."

— Captain Orlan Sune, Ringside Army Command

Identity and Role

The Damned Company is the conglomeration of Ixion’s infamous mercenary outfits, a force of soldiers whose very name inspires dread across Human Space. Though Ixion is far from the only system with mercenary traditions, the Damned thrive by cultivating an aura of supernatural terror as much as martial skill. To hire them is to buy both firepower and fear—fear in the hearts of the enemy, and fear of what happens if they fight for your rivals instead.

Their value lies not merely in their combat record but in their exclusivity. Commanders often say that a contract with the Damned is as much a denial of their services to the enemy as it is an augmentation of one’s own army.

Uniforms and Aesthetic

The Company’s aesthetic is deliberately unsettling, bordering on ritualistic.

• Parade Uniforms: Black military tunics trimmed in red, marked with bone-white stripes across the chest, arms, and legs, forming an abstract skeletal motif.
• Field Gear: Black Spidersilk fatigues worn beneath red-hued VrGraphene combat armor. Over this, each soldier wears a sleeveless white reflec longcoat, gleaming under battlefield light.
• Helmets and Masks: Their helmets are pickelhaub-like but crowned with rows of cruel spikes. Every trooper dons a demonic mempo mask fitted with holographic lenses that provide a full HUD. The masks’ snarling visages are unique, a twisted parody of individuality amid the uniform.

The whole ensemble evokes a living skeleton cloaked in fire and shadow, an image calculated to unnerve both enemies and allies.

Armaments

The Damned Company favors weapons that combine modern lethality with brutal character.

• Primary Weapons:
• Smartguns linked directly into their helmet HUDs, allowing for surgical precision.
• Gyroc Guns for marksmen confident enough to use rounds without computer correction.
• Ammunition: The 15mm LAR round, a product of Ixion’s Kireinamachi Gigafactorum, is their staple. With a wide array of warheads—incendiary, shaped charge, flechette—it allows adaptability against both infantry and armor.
• Melee Weapons: Molecular-ceramic blades are standard, with their signature being a rear-barbed handaxe balanced for throwing and close-quarters combat. Its cruel design ensures lasting wounds even from glancing strikes.

Unlike many mercenary companies, they rarely field drones or synths. In Ixion’s martial psyche, such weapons are tools for police Suppression, not for honorable war.

The Darkheart Edge

What truly sets the Damned apart is their frequent use of Darkhearts—fungal microchips infested with Redspace Adversarial Intelligences. Slotted into weapons or armor where an AI core might normally reside, these symbiotic chips grant heightened performance at the cost of willfulness.

A Darkheart-guided weapon might prefer to cripple an enemy rather than kill, but in the hands of a disciplined Damned trooper, it becomes an asset of terrifying ingenuity. Their near-universal adherence to the Hollow Quintessence faith makes them uniquely capable of dominating these willful systems. Though such practices are illegal in most of Human Space, clients turn a blind eye when the results are so decisive.

The Wailing

Perhaps the most infamous hallmark of the Damned Company is the Wailing—a dissonant, keening war cry with no equal in human or alien warfare.

• On the Field: Issued as a massed cry during charges, the Wailing is said to freeze enemies in their tracks before the first shot is even fired.
• On the Comms: Used as a form of jamming, the Damned flood enemy frequencies with the screech until all but the hardiest break.
• Psychological Impact: Survivors of battles against the Damned often report nightmares, trembling, and long-term trauma from exposure to the sound.

The Wail is not merely a cry of battle; it is a weapon in its own right.

Value and Reputation

The Damned Company is expensive, and their contracts exact more than coin. To hire them is to tolerate their aesthetics, their faith, and their unsettling practices. But their presence on a battlefield guarantees a chilling effect on the enemy, and ensures that they will not be arrayed against you.

Commanders across the Pan-Solar Consortium know this truth: it is not always about what the Damned can do for you—it is about what they might do if you let someone else buy their loyalty first.