"I am Aeternus Rex, Thunder Primarch of the God-Slayers and the Emperor’s Champion. I have walked Terra for a century and brought to heel the warlords of the Dark Age. I have brought doom to the greatest witches that have ever lived and slain great creatures born from the wyrd "
D E S C R I P T I O N _________________________________________________________
Arthur, Knight-Errant of the Imperium and Emperor’s Champion, strides the most horrific battlefields known to man clad in black auramite. Reminiscent of the fabled God-Slayer, his armor is a reminder of ancient Terran knights that once fought and killed in the name of kings. A greathelm topped with an usurper’s crown and flanked by raptor’s wings covers his facial features, while an ash-stained pelt of an unknown Terran creature unfurls from his back. His warplate is a thing of dark majesty, ornate with hexagrammic wards, Sigilite symbols, and leering skulls. A shaven skull of a forgotten, draconic creature haunts his left pauldron, while his right beholds the Eye of Malcador. A superior, sophisticated adamantine augment replaces the flesh of his left gauntlet, stained in obsidian hues to compliment the rest of his armor. A legendary greatsword once used by the Thunderbearer is forever seen chained to his right gauntlet, reforged and artificed to celebrate the Hero of Unity’s life.
D E T A I L S _________________________________________________________
Allegiance: Imperium
Status: Operating in the fringes of space as an Agent of the Emperor
Location: Terra
C O N C E P T ________________________________________________________________________________________
History & Background: Once there was a man born to the damned and dying of wartorn Terra. His early life is all but forgotten for he was reborn for the first time in the halls of the Emperor’s Himalazian Enclave. The first of the Thunder Warriors. The first of the Thunder Primarchs. The first of the First Legio Cataegis - the God-Slayers. He was a man that upheld the duties of the Master of the Line alongside His early companion. Even as the geneflaws of the Cataegis forced his hand, he never gave forswore the allegiance that turned him into the man he had become.
In the early days of the Unification Wars, after the Himalazian tribes had been subjugated, he slew the Great King of Akkad and his Udug Hul. The God-Slayer was granted the blade - Apocrypha - from the hands of the Emperor, taken and reborn by His hands from the enemy’s warlord. It was in Akkad that the First Legio Cataegis became the God-Slayers and their fate was written. He continued to war across Terra with the Raptor above him and his sibling Thunder Primarchs alongside him.
He saw the kneeling of the Achaemenids following the fall of Gyptus. He persecuted the exalted priesthood of Northern Indoi into their compliance. He struck Urartu with an ultra-violent assault, forcing their utter annihilation. Jermani collapsed beneath the weight of his boots and his sibling Cataegis. The Ethnarchy was cleansed of their warlords and put to the God-Slayer’s sword. The great, technocratic city of Sanctii saw it’s downfall from his strategic might. He witnessed the downfall of Ursh with the final vestiges of the Legio Cataegis.
And he died on Mount Ararat after slaying the Mountain King that dared to rebel against the Emperor of Mankind. His name was forever etched into the annals of history as the one of the greatest Thunder Warriors to ever live. Aeternus Rex. First Thunder Primarch of the First Legio Cataegis. God-Slayer. The Emperor’s Blade. The Emperor’s Champion. The Thunderbearer. His achievements were never forgotten, forever etched into the ruins of Mount Ararat’s cleansed corpse.
That is what the histories say. None survived the massacre on Mount Ararat. All of the Cataegis perished. All of the Thunder Primarchs had been slain by the enemy. The Custodes and the Astartes present had witnessed their doom even as they themselves drowned in the enemy’s blood. It was a slaughter beyond comprehension, such that few speak of the event now except to celebrate the Cataegis.
The histories did not speak of the duel between Aeternus Rex and the Black Hawk nor did it tell of the fight between the Emperor’s Blade and Spear. History would never tell the tale of a dying Thunder Primarch that was granted mercy by the Captain-General. It would never tell of the enormous effort spent spiriting away the Hero of Unity to the darkest cells of the Himalazians. None would ever know the Sisyphean task it took to bring him back to life through the power of augmentations, genealchemy, and untold sorceries.
The legend that was known as Aeternus Rex perished at Unity’s conclusion and the warrior known as Arthur rose. This Thesean man was neither the Thunder Primarch of the Unification Wars nor was he one of the vaunted Custodians. He had become a being that far exceeded what it was to be Cataegis and the power that resided with it. Clad in black auramite and forged in adamantium augments, he is the ghost of a forgotten warrior-king bound in service to the Emperor of Mankind.
And in his second rebirth, Arthur would have it no other way.
Goals & Objectives: Arthur is an Agent of the Imperium and a Chosen of Malcador. As a Knight-Errant, he is personally tasked by the Sigilite in delicate matters that require his direct intervention. It is through Arthur that he conducts the Sigilite’s will no matter what task is set before him.
"I am Aeternus Rex, Thunder Primarch of the God-Slayers and the Emperor’s Champion. I have walked Terra for a century and brought to heel the warlords of the Dark Age. I have brought doom to the greatest witches that have ever lived and slain great creatures born from the wyrd "
D E S C R I P T I O N _________________________________________________________
Arthur, Knight-Errant of the Imperium and Emperor’s Champion, strides the most horrific battlefields known to man clad in black auramite. Reminiscent of the fabled God-Slayer, his armor is a reminder of ancient Terran knights that once fought and killed in the name of kings. A greathelm topped with an usurper’s crown and flanked by raptor’s wings covers his facial features, while an ash-stained pelt of an unknown Terran creature unfurls from his back. His warplate is a thing of dark majesty, ornate with hexagrammic wards, Sigilite symbols, and leering skulls. A shaven skull of a forgotten, draconic creature haunts his left pauldron, while his right beholds the Eye of Malcador. A superior, sophisticated adamantine augment replaces the flesh of his left gauntlet, stained in obsidian hues to compliment the rest of his armor. A legendary greatsword once used by the Thunderbearer is forever seen chained to his right gauntlet, reforged and artificed to celebrate the Hero of Unity’s life.
D E T A I L S _________________________________________________________ Allegiance: Imperium
Status: Operating in the fringes of space as an Agent of the Emperor
Location: Terra
C O N C E P T ________________________________________________________________________________________ History & Background: Once there was a man born to the damned and dying of wartorn Terra. His early life is all but forgotten for he was reborn for the first time in the halls of the Emperor’s Himalazian Enclave. The first of the Thunder Warriors. The first of the Thunder Primarchs. The first of the First Legio Cataegis - the God-Slayers. He was a man that upheld the duties of the Master of the Line alongside His early companion. Even as the geneflaws of the Cataegis forced his hand, he never gave forswore the allegiance that turned him into the man he had become.
In the early days of the Unification Wars, after the Himalazian tribes had been subjugated, he slew the Great King of Akkad and his Udug Hul. The God-Slayer was granted the blade - Apocrypha - from the hands of the Emperor, taken and reborn by His hands from the enemy’s warlord. It was in Akkad that the First Legio Cataegis became the God-Slayers and their fate was written. He continued to war across Terra with the Raptor above him and his sibling Thunder Primarchs alongside him.
He saw the kneeling of the Achaemenids following the fall of Gyptus. He persecuted the exalted priesthood of Northern Indoi into their compliance. He struck Urartu with an ultra-violent assault, forcing their utter annihilation. Jermani collapsed beneath the weight of his boots and his sibling Cataegis. The Ethnarchy was cleansed of their warlords and put to the God-Slayer’s sword. The great, technocratic city of Sanctii saw it’s downfall from his strategic might. He witnessed the downfall of Ursh with the final vestiges of the Legio Cataegis.
And he died on Mount Ararat after slaying the Mountain King that dared to rebel against the Emperor of Mankind. His name was forever etched into the annals of history as the one of the greatest Thunder Warriors to ever live. Aeternus Rex. First Thunder Primarch of the First Legio Cataegis. God-Slayer. The Emperor’s Blade. The Emperor’s Champion. The Thunderbearer. His achievements were never forgotten, forever etched into the ruins of Mount Ararat’s cleansed corpse.
That is what the histories say. None survived the massacre on Mount Ararat. All of the Cataegis perished. All of the Thunder Primarchs had been slain by the enemy. The Custodes and the Astartes present had witnessed their doom even as they themselves drowned in the enemy’s blood. It was a slaughter beyond comprehension, such that few speak of the event now except to celebrate the Cataegis.
The histories did not speak of the duel between Aeternus Rex and the Black Hawk nor did it tell of the fight between the Emperor’s Blade and Spear. History would never tell the tale of a dying Thunder Primarch that was granted mercy by the Captain-General. It would never tell of the enormous effort spent spiriting away the Hero of Unity to the darkest cells of the Himalazians. None would ever know the Sisyphean task it took to bring him back to life through the power of augmentations, genealchemy, and untold sorceries.
The legend that was known as Aeternus Rex perished at Unity’s conclusion and the warrior known as Arthur rose. This Thesean man was neither the Thunder Primarch of the Unification Wars nor was he one of the vaunted Custodians. He had become a being that far exceeded what it was to be Cataegis and the power that resided with it. Clad in black auramite and forged in adamantium augments, he is the ghost of a forgotten warrior-king bound in service to the Emperor of Mankind.
And in his second rebirth, Arthur would have it no other way.
Goals & Objectives: Arthur is an Agent of the Imperium and a Chosen of Malcador. As a Knight-Errant, he is personally tasked by the Sigilite in delicate matters that require his direct intervention. It is through Arthur that he conducts the Sigilite’s will no matter what task is set before him.
" “You’ve done well, my friends. You are all born of Pandjoras. Serpent vitae is your blood. Black sand is your air. Gravitic stone is your skin. The dusken sky is your mind. You have survived a thousand and one perils. It only furthers my pride to see you persevere against anomalous odds. Glory unto you, my duskborn, and glory unto Pandjoras!” "
A P P E A R A N C E _________________________________________________________
The Thirteenth Son is an ancient, Terran replica of the Master of Mankind, as beautiful and dazzling as the hero-king was rumored to be. Tanned skin kisses dusk air. Orange eyes with serpentine slits leer out from beneath a mess of long, black hair. Thin lines of dark, artificial pigment coat the edge of his eyes, drawing other’s gaze to his most prominent feature. A thin, groomed beard compliments a pair of lips eternally pulled into a coy, toothy grin. A long and thin, masculine face disarms his opponents with sheer charisma In comparison to his siblings, Zaphariel stands at nine feet and seven inches, yet despite his height, his body is a killing machine fashioned from the dark world of Pandjoras.
When lounging and entertaining the lords of farflung worlds, the Malik of Pandjoras wears an exquisite, void-hued robe fashioned from elder serpent silk and embroidered with his prophecy in ocher colors. A midnight cloak hung from his shoulders, cascading down his body past regal gloves with talon-tipped rings and imperial balgha with metallic tips. A marigold laurel compliments an eight-horned crown split in evenly by thirteen, eye-shaped gems topped by a dusken halo lifted by a miniature gravity engine within the jewelry.
When the call of battle brings him to the field, the dusken deity embraces the artificer warplate gifted to him from the forges of Mars. A perfected union of serpentscale robe, reinforced ceramite, and Pandjoran graviton technology clings to his form. A plethora of eyes similar to his own decorate his warplate, while a greater descending sun rises from his back in the form of an enhanced refractor field generator. Thin tubes run across the entirety of his armor, feeding vital graviton particles to be used in several applications. His gauntlets end in clawed tips with extraordinarily thin nuzzles at their end, capable of slashing graviton into his enemies. As he steps into combat, he wields Azrael - the vaunted archeotech blade of his adopted father - and in the other he prepares energies from the Empyrean.
D E T A I L S _________________________________________________________ Legion Name: Bronze Scorpions / Dusk Wardens
Homeworld: Pandjoras of the Illuminated Star Sultanate
Psyker Grade: Beta
C O N C E P T ________________________________________________________________________________________ Background: The Unifier. Born to be the Emperor’s Voice incarnate, supplanted with the charisma and guile known to His name. He bears a level of unnatural cunning and persuasion that mirrors His feats across the annals of history. At the genetic level, the Thirteenth Primarch was built to sway the hearts of the many for Him and march across the galaxy to reclaim their birthright. The Emperor failed to account for what such a man is capable of, free of His grasp.
For forty years, the Thirteenth Primarch has ruled as the Malik of Pandjoras. Discovered by the Caliphate House of Varranis, Zaphariel was raised by the Old Man of the Mountain to be a hassan - an assassin of the dusk planet - of unparalleled strength and intelligence. He proved his worth when he conquered the black sands and claimed the void wyrm, Falak, as his own. From then on, he led a global unification to tie the disparate houses to his own. Ultimately, he succeeded in doing so and allowed the wild tribes of the deserts to wander under his rule. He elevated the Pandjoran people into the Illuminated Star Sultanate and raced across the stars to reclaim their ancient heritage. His story as the Primarch of the Thirteenth Legion starts during the celebrations of the three-hundredth world added to the Sultanate…
Skills: The King of the Void: Raised beneath the impossible gravity and anomalous physics of Pandjoras, the Malik of Pandjoras possesses an innate mastery over movement. His body moves with uncanny buoyancy, allowing him to fight as though untouched by gravity itself. Whether amidst crushing gravitational fields or the vacuum of the void, he glides like a wraith between blows, his impossible agility making him an elusive and unpredictable duellist. This unnatural lightness comes at a cost. Unlike his more resilient siblings, Zaphariel is unable to resist extremely sturdy attacks that would otherwise not phase a Primarch.
The Voice That Shapes Reality: Zaphariel's greatest weapon has never been his blade, but his words. Gifted with extraordinary charisma and a subconscious grasp of the primordial language of creation, his voice possesses an unsettling authority capable of bending minds and, in rare moments, reality itself. Whether through calculated rhetoric, irresistible command, or fragments of the forgotten tongue, he can compel obedience with little more than a whispered sentence.
The Sultan of Ser’ath: Ser’ath - or Ordo Serpentis Pandjoras in High Gothic - is a form of furusiyya that the Malik of Pandjoras cultivated through all of his experiences on the dusken planet. A martial philosophy composed of the Old Man’s lessons, the arts of the black sand deserts, and the very endemic life that haunts the world. He strikes with the speed of a void serpents snap. He dances effortlessly on a thousand and one grains. Little did he know that he had created a variation of the martial ka’tah with thirteen different fighting styles.
The Grandmaster of Assassins: A title, a duty, and a skill. Everything that makes up the Lessons of the Hassan is distilled into the essence of Zaphariel ibn Varranis. The Grandmaster of Assassins was formerly used by Muahad - the Old Man of the Mountain - and later succeeded by the Malik of Pandjoras when he had nothing left to teach. It is the thirteen lessons that guide the dusken deity to become one with the shadows, to use everything and anything as a weapon, and to kill anything that is unkillable. He is the perfect culmination of the hassan and the ultimate end goal of a thousand-year prophecy. There are no gods on Pandjoras. They were slain by the Old Man of the Mountain.
The Master of the Living Form: As if born from the maw of the Empyrean, Zaphariel is a masterful and natural talent with biomancy. It is purely the perfection of the body and utilizing the energies within that retains this discipline as his sole, psionic focus. Every other potential of the Sea of Souls is abandoned for this one exception. He awakens the full potential of his Primarch physiology through biomancy, rewriting and enhancing
Titles:
Zaphariel ibn Varranis, Malik of the Illuminated Pandjoras Star Sultanate, The Star Sultan, Sheikh of the Star Serpent, Unifier of the Thirteen Houses, Child of the Hassan, Star Emir of the Dusk Sands, Master of the Suma'tah, Grand Faris of the Thirty Palaces, Grandmaster of the Assassins, Emissary of Falak, Nazim of the Seventy Sectors, Padishah of the Umbral Armada, Conciliator of the Three Hundred Worlds, The Arbitrator, Caliph of Neu Amalut, The Steel Companion, Grand Rival of the Dawn, The Last Light Before Nightfall, The First Shadow After Noon, Sovereign of the Thirteenth Horizon, He Who Keeps the Covenant of Dusk, Bearer of the Thousand-and-One Secrets, Guardian of the Black Sands Eternal, The Serpent Enthroned Beneath the Evening Sky, Lord of the Veiled Constellations, Keeper of the Dusk Throne, Master of the Thirteen Veils, The Twilight Incarnate, Warden of the Silent Horizons, Prince of the Dimming Firmament, The Veil Between Day and Night, The Evening Star Crowned in Iron, Voice of the Forgotten Dusk, The One Before Whom the Sunset Bows, Architect of the Endless Evening, Sovereign of the Gloaming Dominion, The Horizon's Final Judgment, Master of the Black Horizon, Keeper of the Dusk Lantern, Lord of the Last Ember of Day, He Who Walks Where Day Dies, The Silent Majesty of Twilight, Companion of the Endless Dusk, The Candle That Outshines the Dawn, The Dusk-Crowned, The Twilight Ascendant, The Ever-Returning Evening, The Shadow Between Suns, Bearer of the Gloaming Mantle, The Hidden King Beneath the Violet Sky, The Last Sultan Before Midnight, Master of the Sunset Gates, The Evening Emperor, The Undying Dusk, The Long Shadow Cast Across the Galaxy, He Who Measures Empires by Their Twilight, The Patience of the Setting Sun, The Serpent Upon the Celestial Dunes, The Serpent Whose Coils Bind the Horizon, He Whose Crown is Wrought from the Last Rays of Day, The Whisper Behind Every Eclipse, The Dusk Made Flesh, The Sultan of the Black Zenith, The One Who Waits Beyond the Horizon, The Unbroken Twilight, The Immutable Evening, Lord of the Star-Woven Dunes, The Gilded Shadow, Master of the Obsidian Caravan, The Pilgrim of the Last Light, The Flame That Refuses the Dawn, The Serpent Whose Name is Written Among the Stars, He Who Counts the Thousand-and-One Grains of Black Sand, The Keeper of the Thousand-and-First Grain, The Veiled King of Endless Dusk, The Sultan Beneath the Silent Stars, The One Who Remembers the First Sunset, The One Who Shall Witness the Last, The Dream Upon Which Pandjoras Was Built, The Shadow Cast by Eternity, The Evening's Most Faithful Son, The Immovable Pillar Between Light and Darkness, The One Before Whom Serpents Lower Their Heads, The Crown of the Dusk Sands, The Lantern of Neu Amalut, The Thirteenth Star Above the Black Desert, The Last Word of Kings, The First Silence After Victory, The Keeper of the Star Serpent's Covenant, The Heir to the Endless Evening, The Lord Whose Shadow Covers Empires, The Master of the Thousand-and-One Horizons, The Sultan Whom Even Night Greets as Brother The Thousand-And-First Grain And Many More...
D E S C R I P T I O N _________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________ The Bronze Scorpions. The Thirteenth Legion. Assassin-dreamers of the Thirteenth Primarch. Clad in bronze and black, these insects of the Emperor march across the galaxy with chains, trinkets, and trophies of their slain. Effigies of their insectile namesake decorate their warplate from pauldron to breastplate to helmet. Their minds forever changed by the dusken dreams they suffer.
D E T A I L S _________________________________________________________ Allegiance: Thirteenth Primarch. Master of Mankind. The Imperium.
Status: Ten-Thousand Strong. Crusadebound.
Location: Sol & Beyond
C O N C E P T ________________________________________________________________________________________
History & Background: The Thirteenth Legion was born in the blasted sands of the Achaemenid Empire, drawn from the steppes and the badlands that surrounded it. From these dredges were born the Emperor’s most staunch, devious, and clever Astartes in His name. It was these Space Marines that tore down the walls of Abyssna. A thousand of their number butchered the exalted priesthood of Indoi. Two-thousand of their name bled in the Pan-Pacific Empire. Five-thousand Scorpions ushered into the stars and saw the downfall of the Saturnyne Ordo’s separatists with their moonbound xenos allies. Ten thousand more spread out into the northwestern fringes of space.
Originally, the Thirteenth Legion were vitae-soaked warriors drenched in the corpse fluid of their enemies. Swift, terrorizing warfare with an emphasis on psychologically-charged brutality was their means of serving the Emperor. There were no means to which they wouldn’t descend to accomplish His objectives. This hubris led to their censer in the Pan-Pacific Empire, where their number murdered untold numbers of allies on Macroway 88. Their legion master, Zaid ibn N’dar, was shorn of his right hand and replaced with a crimson, augmented gauntlet. His legion followed it as a tradition for warriors that disrespected their creed, coating their fists in crimson or dismembering themselves in repentance. Despite their sanctioning, the Thirteenth remained stalwart allies to the Imperium and particularly to the Nineteenth and the Fifteenth Legion. They fought with the Sirens in Abyssna and continued to learn the psionic trade through them. They fought with the Nineteenth on Saturn, where they learned the power of an immovable force.
Their experiences with sanctioning and their battles with their closely-tied legions saw their tactics rapidly change from the Unification Wars. As the dreams of unknown worlds filter through their geneseed, the Thirteen Legion began to experience a metamorphosis. Entire psyker detachments were born, witch-minds with knowledge inherited from the Fifteenth and approved by the Sigilite. Zone Mortalis veterans became the bulwark of hunter-killer squads, specifically built by the Legion Master, inspired by the monster slayers of the Nineteenth. The Legion greatly adhered to Principia Belicosa, redistributing their great numbers into chapters, battalions, and companies. The days of clades had passed. These Astartes retain their brutal, terror actions when applicable, but it no longer remains their modus operati. Now they hunt as Scorpions proper, professional murders and proficient killers to an unnatural degree.
Yet despite all of their efforts, the Thirteenth Legion still suffered from internal mutation. Their geneseed benefitted greatly from a higher rate of acceptance, yet the cost of such a boon was the twisting of their augmentations. High mutability, high adaptability, and high acceptance rate pave the way for the degradation of the Black Carapace and fusing of the Omophagea and Sus-an Membrane. The first years of an aspirant’s implant of the Black Carapace see the augment rapidly degrade, exchanging durability for deftness. The odd fusion of the Omophagea and Sus-an Membrane into a single organism plagues the Scorpions with heightened use of both augments and strange dreams of their genefather’s memory.
Goals & Objectives: Expand the sphere of the Imperium’s influence across the galaxy.
Notable Members / Associates: Legion Master Zaid ibn N’dar: The master of the legion, lord of the First Chapter, and first of the Thirteenth. He who bore the geneseed of their genefather first amongst countless others and survived the process. Once a man in service to the Master of the Line. Now an Angel of Death leading one of His legions across the galaxy. He who saw the downfall of Abyssna, Nabatae, Indoi and the Pan-Pacific Empire. He who was torn of his right hand for disservice to the Emperor. Zaid has been forever shaped by his time on Terra and the waking dreams that haunt him. He continues to lead the Legion through the approval of the Captain-General and mercy of the Emperor with the Spear of Abbaba. He will not forget this kindness. Not now. Not ever. He has found lifelong friends in the form of Legion Mistress Pantea of the Fifteenth and Legion Master Arturas
Legion Praetor Zameel al-Beshara of the Second Chapter: The Second Praetor of the Second Chapter, born in the steppes of Achaemenid badlands and raised to be a warrior unparalleled in the blade. A diamond in the rough and a champion of the Thirteenth Legion, Zameel is swordmaster nurtured from his countless skirmishes on Terra and time spent alongside the likes of the Custodes, namely Aristagoras. The Saturn conflict saw his abilities shine in the dark passages of the moons and separatist voidships, slaughtering enemy champions with practised ease. It is unlikely that the Praetor has manifested any psionic ability, but the argument is brought up frequently when his movements are compared to their shared, dark dreams. Zameel has found many likeminded individuals in the Nineteenth Legion, despite his humorous nature.
Legion Praetor Raamiz Ismail of the Third Chapter: The Third Praetor of the Third Chapter. Master of the Empyrean. Raamiz Ismail was once a noble son to the ruling caste of the Achaemenid Empire and twin to their daughter, Pantea. That son has long since perished in the fires of the Unification Wars, born anew as the talented witch-mind that saw the fall of Hongol's Meridian Gate. This Scorpion suffers the most intense, deep dreams plagued by their Legion. Whether it is due to his nature as a psyker or if it is earnest obsession, it cannot be said for none know save for the genefather in his dreams. Raamiz fights at the front of a large scale detachment of witch-minds like him, armed with the knowledge that the Fifteenth Legion primed them with in the Unification. Hundreds of skirmishes were led to victory through their combined might. Their actions on Saturn saw an overwhelming victory across several moons, where his psionic might proved extraordinarily effective against the xenos monsters that plagued those astral bodies. Raamiz has found himself fond of the Nineteenth Legion for their teachings, though oddly repulsed by their Legion Mistress.
Legion Praetor Alim ibn Sharif of the Fourth Chapter: The Fourth Praetor of the Fourth Chapter. Forgemaster of the Thirteenth Legion. A child born to a great smithing cabal in the steppes of the Achaemenid Empire, Alim readily left his tribe to be reborn as an Angel of Death. He was forged in the fires of the Unification Wars. His mastery of the crafted arts smithed from the fallen city of Nabatae. The Forgemaster had always been a warrior-craftsmen and a deadly duelist, leading his brothers to victory in the Himalazians against the Scourge of the Xeric. He truly found himself after surviving a thermonuclear blast in Ouran, forever changing himself into a part-mechanical monstrosity reshaped in auramite. Some would balk at such a disgrace. Alim found the certain of steel alluring. Before the Legion left for Saturn, Alim was granted approval to apprentice on Mars after the Treaty of Olympus Mons. It was in the halls of the Machine Cult that the Scorpion earned his carapace. In the Rings of Saturn, Alim proved his worth and new appreciation for the Machine Cult against the separatists. Through him, the Legion began their deeper cooperation with the Mechanicum.
The slope was still burning in three places when the Custodians turned on them.
The taste of victory had been on their lips, the final victory as the last bastion of the old world died.
Harrak didn't understand it at first. His mind was still in the fight, cataloguing the living, the angle of the remaining enemy positions, whether the left flank had pushed far enough. The banner was going up on the ridge above. Someone was shouting the declaration. His hands were shaking and he had forty seconds ago driven a man's skull into the rock he was sitting on. For a moment when the first gold-armoured figure turned and raised a weapon he thought it was a mistake.
Then the man beside him dropped.
The sound that went through the camp wasn't a battle-sound. He had enough years to know the difference. Thirty metres away a brother called Ossa had both hands up, still holding his weapon, and was shouting something into the face of the Custodian walking toward him, not a war-cry, something else, something with a question in it. The Custodian didn't slow.
Harrak's body moved before the rest of him arrived at a decision. He got his arm up in time to take the first blow across the vambrace, the impact driving him sideways into the loose scree of the slope. Above him the Custodian was already repositioning, unhurried, His head was full of a sound like the ringing of iron. The battle before this one had given him three cracked ribs and he felt all three of them now with a sharpness that burned through the noise.
Across the slope the rest of it was unfolding. The new legionaries were coming up from the eastern approach, and he could see his brothers dying in ones and twos between them and the Custodians, caught between, disoriented, some still turning to face the wrong direction. Twelve years of war, twenty, thirty. Men who had held the line at Urals. Men who had broken a mountain fortress in nine hours. Dying in the wreckage of their own victory.
He got his weapon up. The Custodian came back at him with a speed that the size of the armour had no right to produce and Harrak took the strike across the chest and felt something give. The world tipped. His back found the ground.
The sky above Mount Ararat was going amber, the smoke from the fires below threading through it. The banner was still up there. He could see the bottom edge of it against the light, snapping once in the wind off the mountain.
It was the last thing he saw.
Cassius rammed his shoulder into the metallic rubble of a shattered barricade. The staccato of bolterfire echoed above his head in precise volleys, followed shortly after by the snap of volkite conflagration rays. He took the spare second he was offered to empty his bolter magazine and slapped a new one in. His red gauntlets brought the weapon close, offering a short prayer to whatever was listening. He’d need the luck to overturn this betrayal.
“For Uni-” he had begun to shout as his genetically enhanced body vaulted the barricade. His bolter had been outstretched to open fire on his golden opponents; however, they had been faster. By the Emperor, they had been faster than he ever could’ve imagined.
A spear with a smoking barrel on the end had caught his chestplate square in the center, hoisting him from his sprint and churning his insides. He coughed out blood from his half-helmet, splattering crimson vitae onto the conical dome of the warrior beneath him. Cassius grit his teeth, reaching down to the shaft of his opponent’s weapon. The emotionless, golden geneknight watched as he pulled himself further down onto the spear.
“T… Traitors!” Legionnaire Cassius of the Storm Callers, Veteran of the Ur-Atalan Slaughter, screamed out. He point-blank fired the bolter into the golden plating of the Custodes aiming for whatever soft spot was visible. The Thunder Warrior would never get the chance.
Another golden effigy stepped effortlessly behind their comrade, piercing through the Cataegis’ helmet with the ease of a genecrafted killer. Cassius fell silent as crimson cascaded down his forehead. A twist of the Custodes’ wrist saw the body of the genewarrior fall from the spear, emphasized further by a deft kick to wrench his weapon free from the ceramite carapace.
The golden pair stared behind the fallen Thunder Warrior, witnessing the carnage that a single one of their number had committed in such a short time. Several Astartes lay mangled and butchered in their slate-grey ceramite, emphasized further by a single Custodes among their midst. Each had been savaged beyond recollection.
This was their duty. This was their reason.
Vortax maniacally laughed as he cut through the Astartes. His two-handed plasma axe was a knife to butter against their freshly crafted, slate-grey ceramite. Even as they attempted to reunite with their pack-mates, he’d simply cut them off and butcher them. Five others of his kindred followed after him, each in brilliant crimson-yellow offset plating. They were the same as he was, cackling and chortling at the carnage that had been unleashed.
It wasn’t his fault that they had slipped the collar that the Custodes had so wrongfully leashed them in. If they didn’t want this type of response, then they should’ve started this sooner.
The mega-furnaces of the mountain pumped fresh lava around them in tumultuous droves, filling the basins of the macrosmithing complexes with new life. Being in the proximity of these leviathan machines was enough to melt the skin off an unenhanced mortal; however, Legionnaire Vortax of the Infernal Phoenixes wasn’t a mere mortal, nor were the rest of his kindred.
He would’ve loved to reunite with the rest of the legion and continue the butcher, but the Custodes had been smart. Vortax remembered the moment as the last of the Araratian insurgents fell and Unity was proclaimed. The vox had cut out. His auspex had gone dim. Everything had changed in a heartbeat and his squad was separated from the legion. The gunfire had started after that. The butchery by the Spears of the Emperor not long after. They had made a deadly mistake. They were Thunder Warriors. Built for defiance from all and any odds. He’d never forget the moment that his axe had bisected one of the Emperor’s own, golden knights. A glorious feat. One of many tonight.
“Unity! Slaught-” One of his squadmates began to roar out in praise before her waist exploded into visceral gore. An aftermath explosion saw her torso jettison from the rest of her corpse.
The Cataegis responded immediately, unloading their sidearms into the left flank of the superheated thoroughfare. Their own bolters collided with slate-grey ceramite, devastating a squad of Astartes that had awaited them. One of his brethren rushed forward, nearly hunched over in a dead-sprint like a rabid animal. Their freshly minted cousins attempted to tactically retreat to an advantageous position. Vortax’s brother ripped them apart for their folly.
His bliss wouldn’t last. Another one of his squadmates fell behind him as bolter rounds flew through the air to their immediate right. Rays of brilliant orange perforated the air, melting the ceramite of one of his brethren into superheated slag. How had he not noticed the ambush? A century of pure war, fighting against the Jermani and Nordafrik, and he had not noticed such an easy-to-notice tactic?
Vortax screamed in rejection. Some part of his brain snapped as he sprinted into the midst of the Astartes. None of his comrades followed him. They had already perished in the ambush set by their gene-cousins. He couldn’t feel his left arm anymore, but that didn’t matter to him. Only slaughter. Only Unity. Only-
The Infernal Phoenix never got to finish the last thought as the Astartes easily parted away from his deadlong sprint. They moved as a single, functional organism. The first of their number lured the Cataegis in and feinted behind a pillar of the macrofurnace. The second shot out his left leg. The third shot out his right leg. The fourth cut the plasma axe from his remaining arm. The final genewarrior plunged their combat knife into the Thunder Warrior’s exposed neck.
As the last of the Cataegis’ squad died, the Astartes calmly rallied to the center of their ambush site. Several clicks passed between their emotionless helmets. In unison, they turned away from the dispatched Thunder Warriors and ran down the thoroughfare without a second glance.
Ghothar watched the five Custodes descend on their fireteam with the calm ferocity known to their number. Their red-plumed helmets appeared like fiery tendrils from the scalp of some primordial warrior being. At that moment, he felt as if they were godlike. Too calm to be mortal. Too powerful to be a human. Too perfect to be a natural creature of mankind. That made the next part easy for him.
He lifted the volkite caliver and unleashed a ray of superheated death upon the first of the Custodes. Five other rays echoed beside him as his squad performed righteous vengeance on the Emperor’s dogs. The godlike, golden warriors were found wanting as the first of their number died to concentrated fire. Ghothar always knew that they could be easily killed, especially when hunting in packs. Those creatures made from genealchemy were never built to fight together like this.
“Vox?” Ghothar rumbled out to a Cataegis behind him. His voice was filled with the smog of Mount Ararat and tinged with the quiet fury known to the Fourth Legion.
“As the Primarch expected. Dead,” Ralran responded, a sturdy Thunder Warrior with a bulky voxpack attached to his ceramite plate. Dark blood stained the metallic steel of the Fourth Legion’s colors on his greaves.
“Not surprising,” Mordak grimaced. He dropped his volkite weapon, quickdrawing a multi-barreled plasma pistol with practiced ease. A squeeze of the trigger saw another Custodes dispatched as they rushed on towards their position.
The remaining three headlong sprinted at them with their emptied guardian spears behind them and their misercordia drawn. Attendants, nigh-invisible on the battlefield of demigods, were hurriedly snatching the weapons and reloading them with stress plain on their face. Ghothar would remember to rip them apart. Limb by limb.
The six Steel Lords pulled out their variety of melee weapons, each a trophy from a century of warfare across Terra. Ghothar himself bore a reward from the Primarch - a savage, one-handed chainaxe with monomolecular teeth stolen from Indoi. He had named it Priestkiller once; however, it would need a new name after this. He smiled. Maybe Emperorkiller.
All three of the golden deities dived into the melee with the prowess suited for their kind. Dodging, slashing, piercing, and feinting where possible and refraining from any unnecessary movements. Ghothar could see why so many of their kind had already fallen to them. His legion would’ve been the same once had their Primarch not been so astute - or perhaps it was their tie with the First Legion. It didn’t matter. His fist met the conical faceplate of the first Custodes, whiplashing them with his unnatural strength. Priestkiller met their cracked helmet soon after, tearing perfected skin and driving their form to the ground. He didn’t stop moving, lunging into the next Spear without hesitation.
His brethren weren’t nearly as skilled as him, but they still put up enough of a fight. Enough that Ushotan would be proud. Mordak had been cut at the throat, but he remained standing long enough to smash his cranium against his engaged Custodes. The imbalance was sufficient enough for him to drive his plasma pistol into the gut of the golden warrior. A laugh echoed from within the Cataegis’ helmet as he overcharged the sidearm and caught both of them in the explosion. Ghothar grimaced at the loss of his friend. The other had already been butchered by the remaining Cataegis, their shining auramite rendered by the brutalist weapons of the Old Night.
“There’ll be more coming, especially their Astartes hounds. Rendezvous at the gathering point as Ushotan had planned,” Ghothar commanded. The other Cataegis responded in their own, failing manner. He reached down before leaving and tore the helmet from his slain Custodes. A new trophy to decorate his armor once this was all over.
Maybe Custodeskiller would be a good name for his axe for now.
Doran had remembered the silence following the call of victory over Mount Ararat. The outskirts of the stronghold-volcano had been filled with untold numbers of Legio Astartes in any manner of color. Most were slate-grey. A few groups echoed the patterns of their own Cataegis. It was a sobering thought that their replacements sought to emulate them.
The next moment he remembered was when they all started to move. It wasn’t the staggered forward-march of a military unit that had just been given orders. It was the elicit call of some foreign deity that compelled them on. To him, they appeared like walking statues awoken to a long-awaited duty. They would’ve amazed him were it not for the slaughter that began seconds later.
The Dawnhunters that had held the lower floors of Ararat’s ingress were butchered by precise, crisscrossing boltfire. They didn’t stand a chance against a menace of that caliber. The Legio Cataegis assault vehicles on the perimeter were invaded, their occupants slaughtered, and their weapons turned on bystanders. His chronometer had recorded it all in seconds. Several seconds was all it took for their genecousins to dismantle their carefully crafted siege.
Betrayal. They had been betrayed by the Astartes. He grit his teeth beneath his plumed helmet and tried to activate the vox. The Master of the Lines must be alerted. The Primarchs needed to know about this. Their numbers were so few, including the Custodes.
Fear. The forcewide vox was dead. Their longstanding interlegion vox was scrambled with static overlaying what little messages attempted to pierce the veil. Doran quickly rationalized the possibility of enemy interference. Even dead opposition could lay traps after they had expired to the might of the Emperor. A quick glance at the oncoming Astartes below told him everything that he needed to know.
It wasn’t that the vox was dead. The Cataegis - sworn-warriors of the Master of the Lines for over a century - had been cut from the voxnet.
“My Emperor…” Legionnaire Doran of the Dawnhunters whimpered as he dropped his magnoculars. He could hear the calls for action from his squadmates behind him. They were already beginning to organize guerrilla actions against their attackers. Some had grenades tied together into explosive clumps. Others readied meltabombs to be used on support pillars.
The legionnaire, however, had a different solution. His armored feet brought him to the parapet overseeing the outskirts of Mount Ararat on the second level. The descent below him was untold kilometers high. He closed his eyes as his kin rushed towards him, calling his name over and over again. He wouldn’t listen to them. The pain of betrayal was too much.
Doran leapt from the parapet.
The tunnels of Mount Ararat, once used for quick egress and ingress of the stronghold, were now repurposed into a mausoleum of macabre proportions. Bodies of Imperials and insurgents crammed the hallways from floor to ceiling. Carefully carved walls reinforced with plasteel supports were slick with dripping vitae, heated from magmatunnels that ran parallel. Flickering glowglobes, those that weren’t shattered in the siege, scarcely lit the passages through the haze of blood and gunfire. An awful, mixed stench of fresh corpses, gunpowder, and sulphurous compounds carried through the unnatural caverns.
All of these would’ve made him sick were it not for the intoxicating familiarity he had with them. In places such as these, Corvinius felt more at home than he did in the cold passages of the Himalazians. Perhaps it spoke to his morbid twist on the geneflaw experienced by his legion. Perhaps it was these feelings that he felt that led him to his current situation. Questions that he’d never get proper responses to. After all, he was going to die here.
But not before he killed every Astartes and Custodes that dared to stalk these tunnels.
Corvinius flicked a claw-tipped gauntlet free of recently drawn blood. The Astartes that he had murdered hadn’t been aware of his presence. They died similar to the rest of their squad, butchered by the rest of his Obsidian Crows spread out across the tunnels. He reached down to the ceramite, collecting much-needed boltrounds for his revolver and thieved them away into chest-strapped pouches. His feathered cloak shuffled with each movement, torn in several places by bolterfire and singed by magma runoff from Ararat.
The bark of a bolter drew his attention. He listened deeply to the sound. The dull thud of a bulky weapon. The sharp slam of mechanisms colliding. The rhythmic thunk of new shells sliding into the barrel and out the muzzle. The nigh silent tap of a paddle against a shaft. It was a sound intrinsically familiar to him. A guardian spear.
How many of the Custodes had he already killed in the tunnels? Their pride broken by a Thunder Primarch with a bolt revolver and a plasma knife. How many of his legionnaires had waylaid them for ample ambushes? Enough to give them several minutes of pause before sending fresh, golden reinforcements into the passages. Enough to force them to divert precious, special weapons to force out the Crows. From this distance, Corvinius could hear the infernal blast of firepikes and nauseating disintegration rays.
He smiled at the thought as his body sprinted forward through the darkening haze. His presence alone had warranted the usage of such intricate technologies. It was a warm notion to know he was remarked so highly. He had long eschewed the use of heavier, rudimentary systems on his power armor in favor of speed and silence – something he appreciated more than ever in this moment. One would say that he was more silent than the Black Hawk.
Corvinius’ quarry lies at the end of several crisscrossing passages. A lone Custodes backed by a pair of Astartes in jet-black ceramite. He could’ve easily mistaken them for God-Slayers were it not for their lack of alabaster cape and diminutive, comparative size. His eyes picked out disintegration rifles in their gauntlets, actively utilized in dispatching a trio of midnight clad Cataegis. Their sacrifice would be necessary for his success.
Approximately fifteen meters out, the Astartes snapped their helmets towards his direction and aimed their rifles for accurate fire; however, they’d never make their shots. Deadeye shots from his bolt revolver saw their helmets crumple into smoking craters, one shot perfectly pierced between their eyes. The genewarriors fell limp as the Custodes strode forward, drawing their misericordia upon recognizing the Cataegis before them.
The golden knight was fast, bred for superiority and overwhelming swiftness. Their spear struck out first, followed shortly after by their misericordia to make Corvinius dance. The Primarch recognized their martial ka’tah for what it was. His bolt revolver hipfired against the sword, angling the implement out of the way as he brought his plasma knife to bear. A corona of azure lined the blade as he cut into the powerfield of the guardian spear. Unconventional energy collided, igniting a small explosion between the two. Enough to separate them briefly, yet the Cataegis was already on the Custodes with a speed unlike his siblings.
The fight was over. His bolt revolver unloaded into the Custodes’ right thigh, blasting the soft tissue of the armor and tearing through muscle. It would never be enough to bring down one of the Emperor’s spears; however, it was sufficient in giving a minute pause, allowing his plasma knife the time it needed to find the genewarrior’s throat. Corvinius’ tore through the golden warrior, tearing the conical helmet from their body and moving on. He couldn’t remain in one spot to relish his kill, neither could he mourn the loss of his legionnaires. The Primarch knew that the Black Hawk’s own would be upon him soon enough.
His greaves brought him a hundred and fifty meters further east, while his hands saw the bolt revolver reloaded with uncanny, practiced speed. The Primarch heard boots bouncing off the tunnel walls. It quickened his step in haste to the next kill like a predator drawn to wounded prey. A grim smile grew on his lips at the realization that he enjoyed this hunt. He wondered if this was what his flaw was. Clairvoyant in thought. Obsessive in nature. Corvinius would’ve laughed if the situation was different.
At last, the Primarch stopped at the edge of a clearing in a hunched position. The tunnel slightly widened out into the cross section, meticulously carved to allow a larger thoroughfare into the main artery of Ararat’s underpass. Corvinius would’ve pressed on were it not for the sheer quantity of Cataegis corpses. He narrowed his eyes, quickly dissecting their wounds by sight alone. All of them shared crisscrossing scars in the form of powersword burns. Some were pierced through the ceramite. Others were cleanly decapitated.
Corvinius, Primarch of the Obsidian Crows, was not alone, and that was a fatal error.
These cramped tunnels were not built for the gods that now stalked them. Golden armor swallowed up the choked passageways, and blood-spattered boots crunched corpses underfoot. Signs of carnage ran in great rivers through the serpentine passageways, Imperials and insurgents united in common cause now as their blood flowed together. Reva wondered if they had seen the morbid humor in that, barbarian and Thunder Warrior alike dying with defiance of the Emperor upon their lips.
Probably not, she reasoned as she stepped over another fallen Cataegis, his face gnarled up in a hateful deathmask. They weren’t clever enough.
But these pitiable members of the rank and vile weren’t why she stalked further through these tunnels, following a trail first comprised of Astartes, then finally some of her own cohort. The thrill of the hunt roused in her blood, and already she gorged herself on sensory data spooling through her helmet. With it, she could track the Cataegis remnants that resupplied themselves in the clearing ahead, licking their wounds and scavenging for ammunition while the battle raged all around them.
They had done well, carving a path through Imperial opposition and finding a defensible position with legionnaires watching each of the entrances. They had even collapsed two of the tunnels that approached the thoroughfare, limiting the approach of their erstwhile allies to just a few passages that now served as kill boxes. Imperial forces had abandoned this theater of slaughter for the time being, seeking easier prey elsewhere within these blood-soaked catacombs, but Reva knew better. Within their hijacked comms, she could hear a name upon their cracked lips. Corvinius still lived, and he kindled resolve in these broken ranks as word spread of his continued defiance.
She’d put a stop to that.
Bursting through the entryway, bolter fire ricocheted off her armor, and she slipped past volkite volleys with ease, the shots sizzling against the wall behind her. There were at least fifty of the remnants arranged in ragged formation and in various states of lucidity. Some barked orders, while others just bellowed in defiance at their approaching doom.
She lashed out with one of her swords towards one of the warriors ostensibly meant to be guarding the entrance, making minute adjustments and passing through the startled warrior’s defenses. She brought his face near to hers when she caught him in the neck, making sure he could see the strike coming in the instant before she’d decapitated him. Misshapen and ill-suited tools though they were, the Thunder Warriors remained children of the Emperor, and she would give them a death befitting their station. If they must die, it would be quick and clean.
Once the brute’s body started to sag, Reva shoved it hard enough to send the corpse flying towards his allies. The remnants avoided it easily, but the Champion made the most of that split second, crossing the yawning length of the room and leaving death in her wake.
Weapons roared as the Thunder Warriors died, each one put down as quickly as she could manage. Arteries burst and heads rolled from shoulders, all while the Blade Champion shrugged off their assault like they were children. She waded through them, batting aside their grasping hands or severing them at the wrists. It was cruel, Reva thought, for their last moments to be spent feeling so powerless, but these legions had earned a bit of cruelty after dealing out so much of their own.
Blow by blow, she cut down humanity’s heroes, bodies piling atop one another as they first fought as one. but when they realized how woefully outmatched they were, a few of the Cataegis had tried to withdraw back towards one of the tunnels. None of them made it that far. Perhaps it was more merciful that they’d died with their backs to her. At least they hadn’t seen it coming.
When the wicked work was done, the Blade Champion turned away from the field of the dead and pressed on down another corridor. But right when she did, she plucked out a distinct sound from among the din of battle. The sound of crashing, preternatural footfalls approaching from the south.
Something that sounded very much like her.
She smiled under her helmet, and stepped back into the dimly lit entryway, turning to face Corvinius.
“Some of them were yours, Primarch. They fought well,” Reva said, gesturing to the corpses with the tip of her blade while she held the other at the ready. The pair crackled with power, smoke coiling off of them in thin columns and catching in the already dismally low light.
“I am sorry, Corvinius,” She sounded genuine, for all that it mattered. “Sorry that your warriors have no place among the stars, and no lands on Terra that might hold them.” Reva brought both blades around and lowered into a Victus stance, one blade held forth while the other remained coiled back to strike. “For everything else you have done in His name, you were a terrible remedy to a terrible sickness.”
“Champion Reva,” Corvinius stated as he took a cautious step closer, uninterested in his butchered comrades. He had anticipated one of the many venerable warriors of the Emperor, yet the Primarch had not expected her. His plasmaknife was brought up reversed in a defensive stance, while his bolt revolver lowered to counterattack. The Thunder Warrior smirked as he continued, “don’t offer sympathy when you have none. We both know the Custodes and Cataegis were ready for this. The Emperor more so than anyone.”
“It’s a shame you’ll have to contend with me, Custodes. I’m sure Aeternus would’ve given you the duel you’ve always wanted,” the Primarch joked as his thumb cocked back the hammer of his revolver. Corvinius knew that he was going to die here. This was as far as he went. He hoped that his siblings would make it further. “Raptor Imperialis, Reva,” he said in the moments before she moved.
She lunged, her first blow a feint to hide the second that aimed for his head. She was not half as cavalier as she’d been with the chaff, carefully taking her measure of him with each strike. But what was considered careful for a Custodian remained downright blistering, and each sweep, stab and riposte coming faster than the last, building up a combat catalog of the Primarch that would long outlive him.
The two complimented each other in dueling technique to a surprising degree. Corvinius anticipated her feints and parries as if he would’ve performed them himself. Each stab of her sword saw his bolt revolver hammer a reactive round into close combat, forcing the blade off-balance and a swift repositioning of her stance. Every strike of his plasmaknife was countered with her left sword, carefully gliding off of the plasmicfield of the implement so as to not detonate her own powerfield. A martial method that few could master in this era, but if any could do it, then he would’ve bet on Reva and Valdor. His senses honed in to a dangerous degree, ignoring all other instances of sensory distraction to fight against the Custodes. It was all he could do to remain engaged, but he was already losing ground.
Together, the godlings danced, circling ‘round and ‘round the makeshift arena, scoring the walls in their grand struggle.
The echo and boom of bolt shells rang across the tunnels as Corvinius fiercely fought to maintain some semblance of superiority. Dueling was never his speciality. Patient, precise, and instantaneous combat was what he excelled at. His bolt revolver remained the only reason the duel lasted as long as it had, each shot grossly accurate and superiorly reactive. His plasmaknife was already losing effectiveness as Reva’s powerswords hammered his left side. The ammo count of his sidearm was rapidly dwindling.
Reva’s armor was a mess, a pauldron stripped off with a crushed gauntlet laying beside it in the dirt. Her cuirass was crushed in a half dozen places, and a lucky strike from the plasma knife had caught her under the right arm, shredding redundant muscle and reminding her how sluggish she felt with power armor alone. Another shot shattered the left lens of her helmet and caved in the metal around her eye. Slick, oily blood flecked in gold sluiced from the wound when she tore her helmet off entirely and threw it at Corvinius before resuming her assault.
She could see his resources wavering, and pressed the advantage. Anticipating his shots, her grip shifted subtly in the instant it took the primarch to fire his revolver. Her blade carved through his armor, tearing off chunks from the supportive exoskeleton beneath, but still she could not land a mortal strike
As the ammo count of his bolt revolver tracked to a singular ‘I’ over his helmet’s display, the Primarch tossed the weapon in front of Reva. His plasmaknife sliced downwards like a bolt of lighting, bisecting the sidearm with a single bullet left in the chamber. Corvinius’ beloved revolver exploded, separating the duel for a brief moment in a small shower of smoke and debris. He lunged forward through the smoke, utilizing the haze as cover to launch an attack on the Custodes. His right gauntlet pressed against the hilt of the plasmaknife to strengthen the strike as he emerged from the explosive wake.
The explosion drove Reva back, and she commended the primarch for his ingenuity. Even here, even now, he hadn’t lost himself. But she knew a forlorn hope when she saw one, and she rose to meet his strike head-on.
“Unity!” Corvinius cried out beneath his avian-shaped helmet. He put all of his soul into the cry. All of his desperation. All of his pride as a Thunder Warrior. All of the love for his siblings. All of his devotion to the Master of Mankind.
Reva took his charge, her armor splitting as the blade sunk deep between her ribs, bursting one of her hearts before the hilt hammered against her chest. She glanced down at it, admiring her prey’s handiwork as blood pooled inside her abdomen, then dropped one sword and closed her fist around his, crushing his fingers and deforming the hilt of his knife while leaving the blade lodged in her abdomen.
“Unity,” Reva agreed in a somber voice, and plunged her blade into the primarch’s neck.
She left him there, surrounded by his misbegotten siblings, and staggered over to retrieve her helmet. Too misshapen now to be worn effectively, Reva instead spoke directly into the comm-link to deliver word.
“Corvinius, Thunder Primarch of the Obsidian Crows, has fallen.”
The Stone Wolves had come to Mount Ararat, at the entrance to their tunnels. The air permeating from them was thick and foreboding, something was pushing back against them even before the fighting started. They were known for their mastery of the Earth but even the Earth here seemed to growl against them. It unnerved even their most hardened. But they had their duty and they were ready to die if necessary.
For the first of their battles, that’s exactly what so many of them did. Even as Stone Wolves heaved the ground beneath them, they had been so used to victory and so used to the land enabling their warpath they almost didn’t know what to do when that advantage evaporated. When pieces of the outlying tunnels had come heaving in towards them, crushing swaths of the Legionnaires, and yet leaving a causeway for anyone who came behind them. Those Stone Wolves who did not respond in time to the frantic drop of stone so perfectly manipulated to bury them did not block the passage. It did what it intended, it buried many of the wolves beneath dirt and those who survived and dodged relied upon their wits and their personal skill. Those who died fell forgotten while their compatriots pushed forward over them. There was nothing left to do but push on. No way to save those buried, for doing so risked making the collapse more permanent. They had to move on or be consumed by the failure of their old tricks and tactics that proved ineffective.
“Advance forward, don’t unbury the lost, we can’t afford to! We will not taste defeat on this day!” One of the Stone Wolves commanders demanded.
But it was not to be so easily done. It was clear they were rocked, and the Earth cried in rebellion against them. Having lost some of their most valuable advantages, they could barely make do. The mountain was clearly not their ally here. The Legion began to splinter and crack.
“Turn back, and the earth behind you will swallow you. whole” The Commanders yelled. “If you can’t push forward, hold steady.”
So they held the tunnels, only giving passage to those who pushed up, while letting no enemy break their rank. They had become that bulwark that held onto the tunnels at their entrance and along the outside.
That’s what they did, the Stone Wolves dug in and they made themselves into a barrier that would not, could not, be broken. Glory was not theirs on this field, but even sacrificing that, their duty never waivered. It would be disastrous for the Legion as their numbers of dead piled up.
But in their entrenchment, they did not let themselves give in to the urge to flee. And so many of them died to give the other legions the time they needed to advance beyond them.
The center of Mount Ararat was a storm unlike all others, where the magma veins poured into the Araratian macrofurnaces. Great falls of molten fury spilled out from tunnels into adamantine funnels, then further divided into enormous thermal generators below. A complex system that rewarded the defenders until their dying breath. Ironic, then, that their final words would be posthumous laughter. For all of their ingenuity and valor, it would never be the infernal dwellers of this mountain that waylaid the Emperor’s Thunder Warriors.
Their deaths came now in the form of the Legiones Astartes, clad in their slate-grey ceramite in tactical groups or dispersing others in vibrant wargear. The angels of the death had come for them and it was a perfect farewell for a life beholden to war and war alone. Primarch Alfovathan, Lord of the Umbra Paladins, thought as he fought through the onrushing tide of genecrafted warriors.
They had spilled out of the tunnels in perfect synchronization like insectile warriors subservient to a higher power. His patchwork company of legionnaires had already been exhausted from fighting the Araratians with their Solarite weaponry. The Astartes cut through them like a scythe through grain, attempting to finish what the insurgents had started with horrific precision. He was thankful that none of the Custodes were present, but Alfovathan could see their golden figures sprinting behind them further up the mountain.
Another legionnaires’ skull exploded into pink-misted particles as the Astartes advanced on their position. He grit his teeth and pulled up the thermal pistol, unleashing a wave of molten-core fueled ray into the genewarriors. Their ceramite melted at the barest touch, slagging them within microseconds of contact. It was a small fortune that the Araratians had left their weapons behind. A shame it had to be used on the Emperor’s ‘finest creations’.
Alfovathan’s shield flared as combined fire attempted to pull him down. His obsidian hued form remained standing against the onslaught, yet the Primarch took cover behind the industrial wreckage. Whatever remained of his Cataegis had managed to pull the Heart of Ararat from insurgent hands; however, it left them split across the entire chamber and locked in with the Astartes. He was tempted to sacrifice it all and ignite the core. Rationality won him over as he’d prefer to give his kindred a fighting chance. The thought remained throughout the fight, regardless of his desire.
“They’re switching tactics! Ready your blades!” One of his legionnaires, Karrak, called out as the gunfire died down.
His call was astute for the Astartes had begun to descend from their elevated positions with a myriad of melee weapons drawn. By Terra, he’d never seen so many since the dawn of the Unification Wars. Combat knives, chainswords, chainaxes, powerblades, and more descended with cold, calculated vigor. He felt a pang of disappointment as they wordlessly charged towards his position.
“For the Emperor!” One of the Astartes called out in a bloodthirsty tone. Their call to arms riled the rest of the prismatic, ceramite-clad horde. A series of shouts rose from their lungs to the top of the chamber. It made his hearts pound with something akin to jealousy and pride.
“Damnable traitors,” Alfovathan said through smiling lips. He refused to allow them their pitiful victory. They, who had not witnessed the birth of the Unification Wars, had yet to witness the glory that were the Thunder Warriors. He’d change that today.
“Raptor Imperialis! Unity!” The Primarch of the Umbra Paladins shouted aloud with his executioner’s blade raised high. He put every ounce of his soul into that warcall. A final call to welcome their death. A final cry against the injustice visited upon them. A glorious echo of a glorious era with glorious battles.
The Cataegis replied in kind with a cry that could shatter Mount Ararat’s earthly walls. They had practiced such a call for a century and more from fighting against the worst that mankind could muster. Their shout was a crack of thunder so powerful that some Astartes hesitated for a fraction of a second. It was their death knell as they drove into the Astartes with suicidal abandon.
Alfovathan laughed and smiled as he tore apart the Astartes with his two-handed sword. Even as diamantine teeth tore his ceramite and bolt rounds shattered his flesh, the Primarch of the Umbra Paladins continued on. The Thunder Warriors died around him with the same energy, lost to their flaws or living in the glory of their final moments. He would never find out how many of the Space Marines he’d killed nor did he care to learn.
His final moments came as a thunderhammer caved in his plumed, knightly helmet. The Primarch’s regal, ceramite form continued on even without consciousness. Black gauntlets tore through the masses of Astartes like a wyrd-stricken giant possessed by an infernal spirit. It lasted for several seconds as the Thunder Warrior’s body finally caught up with its demise. The Twelfth Lord of the Cataegis crumbled forward with his armor cut to ribbons. The rest of his company followed soon after as the Space Marines finished their gruesome work.
“Betrayal! The golden bastards are shooting at us!”
There was more bitterness than surprise in Voslek’s voice as he peered over the ruined parapet at the mountainside below, lit afresh by energy fire despite the call of victory having gone out moments prior.
Ushotan merely grunted in reply, tossing away the now useless vox.
“Then this is the field they’ve chosen.”
The Steel Lords command squad was hunkered by the remains of an Araratian fortified barracks, the last crucial objective they had taken in the quelling of the short-lived rebellion. The sturdy dome-roofed building, its facade now cracked and floors strewn with the bodies of its garrison, sat high on the mountain’s upper slopes. Before its breached entrance, a terrace had been flattened to form a narrow parade ground, now occupied by the Cataegis. The sentry points around its cliffside edge had been toppled, and the parapet their lookout leaned on was a jaw from which the teeth had been torn.
With heavy, unhurried steps, the Thunder Warriors filed out into the thin, polluted mountain air. They were the last, few proud remnants of the Legion that had once brought Maulland Sen to its knees, a small shard of the thousands-strong ranks that had marched to battle like a wall of steel. But it was a shard that had lost none of its sharpness. Unlike the more fatalistic of their siblings, the warriors of the Fourth Legion had not allowed their equipment to degrade in the wake of the last great battles of the Urshic campaign, but stubbornly maintained their armour and weapons in preparation for a sterner final battle than Terra seemed capable of giving them.
A battle that was now upon them.
“Ready to die for Unity?” Roldran smirked with lips as scarred as the mountain beneath them.
“For Unity, any day,” the Primarch replied, flexing his shoulders in anticipation, “But not so that I’ll be replaced by the likes of them.”
He spat in disgust as he looked at the gold-gleaming figures that were already ascending towards them. The Custodians moved with astonishing speed despite their size and smooth, unhurried strides. Like soulless machines, not men, Ushotan thought contemptuously, and those starch-arse Astartes are even worse.
His sneer turned to a ferocious grin. “Let’s see if they can at least die like men.”
For many among the Cataegis, the auramite blade thrust into their backs had been a shock, an impossible betrayal. But Ushotan and his brothers were crafty beneath their coarse appearances, and they had seen the signs mounting ever since Aeternus had summoned them on the eve of Mosvoroth’s siege. The Master of the Lines was letting the Thunder Warriors’ fire die out, little by little, and in its place building files of stiff little puppets, obedient toys He could arrange to his liking. But the soon-to-be Emperor had misjudged how hot those last embers could still burn, and He would pay for it.
As the Custodes climbed the last steps onto the road that wound up Ararat’s upper reaches and to the barracks, the Primarch thumbed the detonation rune on the device in his hand. The Steel Lords were masters of the siege, the rip of the ram hurled at the hardest wall, and this had served them well in these last engagements, when their looming fate weighed on their shoulders. Their skill had revealed the paths they could take in a swift retreat, and their fury had carried them far ahead of the rearguard, buying them time to prepare.
The lip of the road exploded under the golden warriors’ feet. Two were hurled into the air and tumbled into the rocks below. The three others had soon regained their footing, but their moment of hesitation had been enough. As Ushotan’s command, the Steel Lords opened fire. One Custodian was torn from the ground by Voslek’s missile, the impact hurling him in the wake of his fellows. Another fell to the supercharged plasma shot from the Primarch’s own pistol. The last one snapped his spear forward in a blindingly swift motion, loosing an adrathic beam that shore through the parapet, but before it could cut down any of the Cataegis its wielder fell to a crossed volley of bolter fire.
“After me!” Ushotan shouted, taking off down the shattered road, “We cut through the crags, link up with Ghothar and the others at the first command post, then break from the slopes!”
The Steel Lords followed like the beginnings of an avalanche, leaping down from the elevated road their mines had shattered and into the rocks of the untended mountainside. The conurbation of what had been the city-state of Ararat did not cover the entirety of the peak, and the Cataegis had calculated that the swathes of rough terrain would afford them the best protection.
Yet they were not the only ones, and the Primarch cursed as another squad of Custodes stepped out, with disconcerting suddenness, from behind a sharply descending cliffside. They were too close to avoid the fire of their guardian spears, and three Thunder Warriors were felled with hoarse cries and the crack of breaking metal. There was only one way forward.
“Charge!” roared the conqueror of Nordyc, swinging his plasma-blade over his head like a bloodlit torch, “Show these husks how real warriors fight!”
The bellowing line of the Cataegis crashed into the deathly silent one of the Custodes, and a bloody, desperate battle was joined. A lesser force would have broken against that wall of gold and black, all the fury in the world powerless to so much as dent it. But the Steel Lords were themselves wrought by the Emperor’s hand, masterfully sharpened for their one and only purpose, and where their opponents had seldom seen true combat, they were each a veteran of a hundred campaigns.
Ushotan found himself facing the blank, resplendent helm of one adversary. The Custodian thrust forward with inhuman precision, but though the Primarch was a fraction slower, there was no strike that could surprise him. His sword, beaten and leaking corrosive red light, came forward to deflect the speartip, then smoothly dipped into a vicious upward swing. The enemy showed no sign of surprise as he grabbed the haft of his spear with both hands to stop it, then pressed forward with a horizontal sweep at Ushotan’s head.
He ducked under the swing and twisted his sword sideways, an abrupt movement that soon revealed itself as a thrust of his own. The unconventional attack caught the Custodian’s left arm, piercing through auramite, flesh and bone alike, and his hand fell limply from the spear. Though the golden warrior did not move a step back or even hesitate, uncaring of the pain, Ushotan now had the advantage, and pressed it brutally. With only one good arm, the Custodian now had a whole flank open despite the superior reach of his weapon, and in a moment the blood-red broadsword was cleaving between his neck and shoulder. He fell without a sound, and the Primarch disdainfully kicked the body before turning to aid his warriors.
The melee had taken less of a toll than the volley, the Cataegis’ slight numerical advantage and greater experience allowing them to hold their own against the enemy’s superior vigour. Two more brothers had fallen, though more were wounded, and Voslek had to discard his missile launcher as his maimed hand could no longer aim it.
“It will make a good scar,” he laughed.
“Don’t waste yourselves bleeding them,” the Primarch’s snarl of victory was metallic with the effort to hold back the rage that even now threatened to surge, “It’s what he wants. We’ll put a bigger spit in his eye the more of us make it down alive.”
The Thunder Warriors had always been strong in how they fought without avoiding death, he thought as he led the way down the treacherous slope once more. But not anymore. This time, they would make their own victory.
Blood. It was all Rutgier saw. One moment, it was the blood of the enemy, warm and steaming on the frozen ground.
The next, it was his own, a fresh wave of vital red on the crimson of his armour.
He stared, uncomprehending, at the sanguine blotch. His mind was a faultless mechanism of battle, subconsciously charting the trajectory of every strike, and it now struggled vainly to understand what had wounded him. The last enemy had fallen before his blade moments before, and his brothers had felled the final strongpoint that had scourged them with its solar cannon. The vox spoke of total victory on all fronts, of the final demise of Ararat. There was nothing that could have struck him, unless…
He threw himself to the ground as the inevitable conclusion lit up the haze of his thoughts like a flash of lightning. The killing blow of the Custodian’s guardian spear cut through the air millimetres above his head, the blade’s power field carving a gouge into his already scarred helmet. Charmagnol had warned them, echoed a voice in his ringing skull, he had warned them, but remembering was so difficult. The rage hung about him day and night like a bloody fog, and the unfamiliar confusion that set upon him now had robbed him even of the strength of that red fire. What remained of his mind knew the golden killer for an enemy, but some unthinking part of him hesitated to understand the magnitude of what this meant. He rolled aside, sluggishly, and saw his doom come down towards him on the tip of the spear.
There was a cry, a roar, and the blade wavered as a crash of metal stirred the murk from Rutgier’s brain. A mass of black and yellow struck the golden silhouette like an avalanche. He knew that voice, one of the few things he could trust not to lose - the war cry of Torgal the Annihilator, once a bitter rival, now his brother in a fellowship forged over the ashes of their Legions. Seeing his comrade spring to battle dissipated Rutgier’s doubts. It was clear now the Custodes were the enemy. They had betrayed - them, the Master, Unity, someone - it did not matter, they had betrayed, and now he would kill them.
Screaming his defiance, Rutgier, Red Knight of Thunder, rose from his knees and ran to the aid of his sworn brother. The Custodian had already turned on Torgal, the gleaming arc of his spear drawing blood from a pierced vambrace, but he could not hope to survive being flanked by two Cataegis. He stepped back, attempting to regain distance, and the Annihilator’s chainaxe screeched to his right. Simultaneously, Rutgier’s broadsword stabbed at his gorget, and he fell.
“I can’t believe it,” the Knight clutched his head, clinging to the scraps of clarity left to him, “What is this madness? Is it the end?”
The vox screeched at him with an useless garble of static, grinding the thread of his thoughts, and he crushed the unit in his hand in annoyance.
“Maybe,” Torgal shrugged, as terse as ever, “Still. We fight.”
“We fight,” Rutgier nodded, the rage boiling in his words. He felt the world fall to pieces around him, and the Thunder Warriors had only one answer to chaos. They fought.
Clouds of smoke and dust were rolling down Ararat’s lower slopes, stirred by the violence of the battle, and all of Terra’s immensity seemed to be lost in this acrid mist. He heard heavy steps approach, and braced himself as two huge shapes emerged into sight, immediately relaxing a fraction as he saw they were fellow Cataegis. He recognised them both, the once proud ranks of their kind having grown as thin as the populace of a wasteland town - Maire of the Verdant Raiders, her ice-blue eyes wild with frenzy, and Pheidipas of the Infernal Phoenixes, beard matted with blood and the filth of battle.
“The Custodes!” the Raider raved, brandishing her two-headed axe as if beset by ghostly enemies, “They’ve turned on us! All of them!”
“The Astartes, too,” Pheidipas added grimly, “They are all coming for us. The vox is dead. This will be our grave.”
Rutgier heard Torgal snarl something in response, but could not make out his brother’s few disjointed words. The static of the vox seemed to have flowed into his head, eroding his thoughts like a sandstorm. The sands of Midafrik crunched under his feet as he swung his blade against the massed armies of the hive despots…
“No, we won’t die,” he managed, every word a struggle, “Not as long as we fight. We’re surrounded - we must break through the encirclement. Then we’ll make sense of this.”
A plan of action was something the Cataegis took readily to, and the four turned towards the descending slope of the mountain. They were not far up the side of Ararat, well within reach of its foot, and the smoky haze was covering their movements for now. It was not hopeless.
“Now,” Torgal growled through rigid jaws, “Run.”
They rushed forth without a war cry, four lost and unremembered dregs of a fading age, disparate in their stained liveries, but alike in the singleminded fury that rose raging within them. Gunfire and rays of lethal energy streaked around them through the fog, and they answered with their own bolters, nescient of whom or what they fired at.
A golden figure stepped out from the smoke to bar their path, its spear sweeping wide in a stance each of them knew could not be escaped. With a howl, Maire cast away her axe and charged at the towering Custodian barehanded. The spear pierced her chest with almost contemptuous ease, but still she ran, tackling the massive warrior and hurling all her weight against him. They disappeared into the fog with a dying shout and a scrabble of feet over yielding stone, and Rutgier heard the Raider’s voice fall away and downward, cut off by a terrible crash.
Then the shroud of smoke was behind them, and the remote sunlight was a balm on their eyes. The chaos of battle seemed to fall away with it. Ahead of the three surviving warriors, a steeply hanging crag formed a shadowed passage towards where Ararat’s foot met the land below. A natural fortification, it had remained largely untouched by the forces of the city-state. The few defensive emplacements had been knocked out at the very beginning of the assault, and Imperial forces appeared to have left the place behind. This negligence would serve Rutgier and his brothers well.
He strode into the darkness, squinting to find the way ahead. The sun was now so high that everything under the crag’s overhang was plunged in shadow. Like in the underhives he had cleared with bolt and blade…
Rutgier’s foot struck something with a clang. He looked down, and grunted in dismay as he saw the corpse of a fellow Cataegis, his armour in the colours of the Titan Scythes.
“Look,” Pheidipas whispered hoarsely behind him, and he blinked away the haze lingering in his eyes, straining to pierce the shadows with his sight.
He almost wished he had not.
More bodies yet lay strewn on the stony ground ahead, Thunder Warriors who had sought escape by this concealed path. It was not so much their number that dismayed him as their state. Their bodies had been brutally desecrated, armour sliced away to expose the flesh to barbarous predations. Their heads were missing. Raw muscle glistened where skin had been flayed away. Limbs and chests were torn open and their bones ripped out. The vilest and most debased of the Empire’s foes had fought so, the warp-cults and the mutants and the dark priests.
Rage surged unstoppably in the Red Knight’s breast at the sight of such brave warriors so cruelly mocked in death, and he unleashed it in a wordless roar that shook the earth. His two brothers joined him, shouting their challenge to the shadows.
The shadows answered.
The shadows had teeth.
Shapes of nightmare stepped out from the darkness, and in Rutgier’s feverish eyes they seemed to materialise from the murk itself. They were daemons, there was no doubt, hellspawn like the ones he had faced in the catacombs under Baoungai. Smaller than him, yet much larger than mortal men, their skin was dim green metal, their bones black iron, and their hands cruel knives and whirring chainblades. Some had skulls for heads, others bared snarls with dozens of long, sharp teeth; some were cloaked in ragged human skin; some were studded with spikes and broken blades, the walking ghosts of forsaken battlefields. They screeched and chittered in an abominable tongue as they advanced, closing in from both sides, outnumbering the Thunder Warriors ten to one.
Horrors of Old Night. He had fought long and hard to cast them into oblivion, but they had returned, and they were coming to take his soul.
“For Unity! Kill!” he barely knew what he shouted as he charged at the daemons, swinging his sword at their hateful glowing eyes. They parted before him, loping and springing with insectile grace, wicked blades slashing from every side.
Metal struck metal heavily at his side, and Torgal grunted. With the corner of his eye, he saw that three daemons had jumped on the Annihilator from the dark above, and now clung to him like hounds to a bear, stabbing ferociously at his neck with long recurve knives. The warrior drew his bolt pistol with a superhuman effort, shattering the leering skull-face of one monster with a point-blank shot, before collapsing under his wounds.
Rutgier howled in anguished fury and lunged, bisecting a daemon as it swung at him. Another one leapt at him from behind, and deftly turning about himself he ran his blade through its chest, cutting though hellish armour and flayed skin. Pain stabbed his flank as a third fiend seized the opening and gouged him with a screaming chainblade.
A burst from Pheidipas’ bolter made the creatures recoil, but the reprieve was short-lived. Ponderous steps thundered from the shadows, and blackness knit itself into large, lumbering figures. They looked like abyssal mockeries of Thunder Warriors, massive and bloated, ill-fitting armour straining and cracked over bulging folds of pale flesh. Eyeless faces. Maws of long bestial teeth. The brutes’ pestilentially swollen hands bore autocannons, painted with arcane symbols, and they spat a storm of death. The last Phoenix slumped to the ground, his plate breached by the mighty shells.
Rutgier did not scream again. His throat burned, and he preserved his breath, pouring all his strength and fury into his strikes. The daemons closed in on him, their misaligned bones and tattered skin crowding his sight repulsively, and he hacked ferociously at them. Some crumpled with hideous shrieks, but for each one he felt more blades biting into his own body. His plate was twice-red with his own blood. He would die here.
With a desperate effort, he battered through the ring of bone and darkness and cruel blades that was closing ever tighter around him, but blows slashed at him from all sides, and he fell at last, the last of his strength oozing from his wounds. The last thing he saw was the rictus grin of a skull-faced daemon hunched over him, and then the shadows took him.
Legion Master Scraphurst had long foreseen the death of the Thunder Warriors. Most of the Praetors of the 8th legion had, even if they had never spoken about it in detail. Memories of their mortal days as gangers had taught them important, if cold and brutal lessons about loyalty and the burdens of leadership… and what needs to happen when a fellow ganger starts to unwind at the steams.
There were many reasons that it could happen. The lifestyle came with no end of pressure or vices that could start to tear apart a man’s sanity. Everyone who survived for long would develop their quirks. But there was always an ill defined point where the instability could no longer be tolerated. Where the negatives of keeping someone around outweighed the positives and a brutal calculus needed to be employed for the sake of survival.
Did they know in advance that it was to be this day? This mountain? No. At least not before they had been informed of what was to occur after the Mountain King and his forces had been broken. But a day like this had always been on the cards.
As such, it was why Pho had offered his legion to take on an important, but not glorious task for the operation that kept them well out of the fighting. As far as the official plan and the Thunder Warriors were concerned, the 8th legion had been tasked with preventing enemy forces from either fleeing the mountain, or reinforcements from unknown quarters from coming in.
In fairness, that was what the 8th was there to do. It was just that the term ‘enemy force’ was a bit broader than what was originally stated at the briefing.
A few Thunder Warriors had tried to break through their lines. Between the firing positions and the mine fields they had set up, they hadn’t even gotten to them. Didn’t stop them sending some people out to collect their gear. Waste not after all.
Of the countless dead Astartes that would no doubt be littering Mount Ararat on this day, Pho took some pride in the fact that the black and red of the Alchemists would not be joining them in any notable numbers.
“It is done,” Aeternus breathed out in eternal relief as he closed his blackened gauntlet. Meat and bone shattered as the Mountain King screamed in agony. All of the pleas and cries had been drowned out by the onrush of agonizing pain. A jet of viscera escaped his clawed digits as the man finally perished. His horrifically altered, solarite-reinforced armor fell to the floor free of its skeletal binding.
The Primarch of the God-Slayers turned around with the fleshy mess in his gauntlet. His legionnaires remained standing, twenty-five in all, with their myriad weaponry freshly utilized. Amber giants in suits akin to the Mountain King were strewn across the entirety of the summit-citadel, torn asunder by his warriors. He’d remember this moment forever as their knightly helmets watched him with bated breaths.
“Unity!” Rex called out to them with a raised fist. The zmaj skull twisted against his pauldron whispering, “Your time has come, O conqueror mine,” into his ear as he lifted the skull fragments of the Araratian pretender-lord. His alabaster cape slapped against his plating, dyed midnight black by the mountain cinders.
“Unity!” His legionnaires replied with a pride that he had not seen in nearly a century. Energy entered their voice for the first time in decades. A purpose fulfilled. An endeavor accomplished. A quest completed. The dream of Unity had arrived. Their hollers and cries filled the night air for several minutes.
The Primarch stepped down the obsidian dais of the Mountain King’s summit-throne. All of it had been maimed by their fight as Apocrypha collided with the Araratian’s solar sword. His wounds ached from the duel and his muscles cried out for respite. He would not give his body the rest that it wished for. Rex owed it to the warriors that would never see Unity. Even in the Cataegis that remained, Aeternus could see the vestiges of Nero and Caligula. He offered a smile for their absence.
“It is finally done,” Tiberius said as he approached. There was an unmistakable giddiness to the Cataegis’ tone. One that was known only to Aeternus in their decades-long friendship.
“It is,” the Primarch of the God-Slayers replied in a tired voice. There was no lion left in him to roar its courageous cry. There would soon be a time to rest and he was preparing for the inevitability of a slow death. One spent in garrisons, training the future warriors of the Imperium as the Emperor fought for their birthright.
“I wish that the rest of the legion was here for this,” Tiberius mentioned in a somber tone. Rex halted in his tracks as they crossed the throneroom.
“I wish that all of them were here for this,” Aeternus finally replied. The words left unspoken wafted in the dying embers of their conversation.
Aeternus pressed on through the remnants of the Araratian pretender-king’s chamber. He peered out through his winged helmet at the Heart of Ararat far below them. The Mountain King’s throne had been built on obsession and hubris - a wide, circular chamber with plascrete pillars and no walls for his viewing pleasures. He had watched the downfall of his empire from a coward’s seat, clad in armor not built by his own people’s hands, and surrounded by elite warriors that could’ve turned the tide. It was a glorious and righteous battle regardless, one that could fill a man’s stomach for eternity
His God-Slayers fell in as he passed them, each falling into step in their own way. Veterans of a hundred wars and the last survivors of the First Legio Cataegis, Rex couldn’t be more pleased with them. They would never see a death more glorious than it could’ve been in this battle. They still fought with all the valor and courage that was known to their namesake. It brought a grim smile to his lips as he crossed the archway onto the summit proper
Mount Ararat greeted him and his warriors with all of the death and carnage that accompanied it. Leagues of soot-blackened mountain traced Terra’s spine for untold distances. Great, ruptured Araratian structures lay shattered in eerie silence against the rigid slopes. Volcanic ash and industrious smog painted the tainted sky above in a darker hue, cinders dancing around them in a perpetual dance. Igneous stone crunched beneath their greaves as they perforated a magmatic haze. Steam threateningly hissed out of gaping thermal fractures, further torn open by mountainous machinery. A manmade, miniature caldera awaited them several steps ahead with plascrete stairs leading down.
The Cataegis descended out of the Mountain King’s domed palace into a thermal courtyard ninety meters wide and a hundred meters deep. A miniature Ararat fashioned from obsidian-plascrete composite stone. A sanctuary for the Araratian lord to enjoy the fruits of his people’s labors in a lavish thermae. Now it was a charnel house filled with the dead attendants and sentinels to the rebel leader. They had been butchered to an extreme degree, precisely dismantled by bolter rounds and flensed of skin by volkite rays. Limbs had been cut by powered weaponry. Their bodies torn to ribbons by chainswords. The mixture of all their vitae pooled at the bottom of the crater with their allies.
A throng of Thunder Warriors awaited below. Aeternus could see Cataegis from every legion that had once marched across Terra. Amongst their number, Rex could pick out the Sixteenth and Second Thunder Primarchs: Bodiciia and Gilgamenses. The former towered over the other geneknights with her greataxe hefted against her shoulder. The latter was pacing back and forth, stabbing his reforged trident into freshly dispatched Araratian corpses. The rest of the cohort recovered their strength while their weapons cooled from recent combat. All of them snapped their eyes to the arrival of the God-Slayer. The First Primarch raised his blood-splattered gauntlet into the sky. His final vexillarius, Gaius, echoed the sentiment with his banner.
The false caldera erupted into a shockwave of warcries. Thunder Warriors raised their weapons into the air. Some wildly shot their bolters with gleeful abandon. Others revved their chainweapons with childish joy. His God-Slayers echoed the sentiment, calling out to their genekin with praises to the Emperor. He cherished their savage screams and committed it to memory as he descended the final step into the thermae. Bodiciia approached him without her helmet, a grizzly grin growing across her severely scarred face. Gilgamenses began to saunter towards him with his helmet’s visor cast across the ridges.
Then the vox died. A terrible, eerie silence filled the ‘net where battle orders and statuses would’ve once chimed in. He momentarily turned away, beginning to believe it was a trap laid by the Araratians. Apocrypha fell from his pauldron tip first against the false caldera’s tile. Aeternus raised the other gauntlet against his helmet to listen deeply. A moment’s mistake.
There was a roar of a jet and a sickening sound of wet meat and metal colliding with each other and the Categis began to take solace in their victory. A single knife had fallen amongst the gene-enhanced soldiers who had fought so valiantly for Imperium and given their bodies and minds to its victories. Primarch Gilgamenses, one of the hallowed few who had walked amongst the Imperium since its inception, had scarcely begun to speak of their victory and the uselessness of their Astartes counterpart when his body lurched to the side.
Time slowed to a crawl for all of the warriors present, witnessing one of their vaunted gene-fathers falling to a strike so swift and precise that all that could be seen was the silhouette whose blade had taken the head of Sixteenth Thunder Primarch. It was the knife, and that knife was an executioner's blade falling upon all the Categis in that moment. Their victory, their triumph, brought to its bloody beheading in a sickening celebration of the work that they had done in His name. All could recognise the black-clad figure that had already recovered from their strike, preparing her blades for the lesser of the Categis present as the momentum of her pack carried her across the ground, metal against stone.
It was the Black-Hawk, the executioner of the Categis - and she had arrived to do her duty.
Amalasuntha’s blade carved through flesh and armor alike, the blade Aeternus had given her masterfully cutting through two as she surfed past them, hardly able to react to the bird of prey that had fallen upon its quarry. Those that could bring up their weapons to defend themselves, but she was already gone at that moment. Her pack activated, carrying her faster than the warriors could aim their weapons. They would hardly have time to prepare themselves once more before true carnage would follow.
The rim of the caldera rumbled with the sound of a hundred greaves moving in synchronized step. Figures clad in black ceramite streaked with silver appeared as Amalasuntha began her slaughter. Hefty bolters began to fire precise salvos into the Cataegis, while volkite beams superheated the air in tight firing solutions. Bulky disintegrator rifles momentarily illuminated the air around the wielder in azure light as they shot. Thunder Warriors died in the first, unwavering volley of the ambush. Ceramite exploded inward, melted to slag, and was torn apart atom by atom.
“We are the final judgement,” spoke the Legion Mistress of the First Astartes, not as battle-cry but mere statement of fact. She and her gene-warriors, who had dogged every step of the First Categis, bore their colors upon their armor and learnt at their feet the arts of war, had changed after the victory at Ursh. Their own identity had been forged in the unspeakable horrors of that final siege, one that some of the Thunder Warriors had once hoped would serve to at last set apart the two Firsts.
Few would live to discover just how right they had been.
“Kill them all! Raptor Imperialis!” Primarch Bodiciia roared to life as she charged the Black Hawk, pulling her greataxe into her gauntlets.
The Thunder Warriors woke from their momentary shock with the Primarch’s call to action. Cataegis scattered in all directions, forcing over thermae decoration as cover to use as the Astartes advanced on their position. As if the essence of their soul had come to fruition, they moved as a single organism just as their genecrafted descendants. The staccato of bolterfire from the arriving warriors was rewarded with the boom of heavier instruments from the Dark Age. Rays of volkite danced across the distance from both sides while bolt shells snapped and exploded in a torrent of furious gunpowder. A vortex rifle snapped from the Cataegis’ line, warping a column of Astartes in a miniature blackhole. A plasma chain-cannon cut through the Astartes in the southern rim.
Aeternus, Primarch of the God-Slayers, froze as the world around him turned into chaos unbridled. Gilgamenses’ headless corpse was falling in front of him in slow motion. Bodiciia was charging at Amalasuntha with her chaingreataxe raised. The Black Hawk was already repositioning to riposte the attack and kill the Second Thunder Primarch. His God-Slayers were spreading out around him in a protective circle. His refractor field was already igniting around him. The zmaj skull on his pauldron smiled knowingly. “She will not slay you, O victor mine.” Rex could hear the Astartes advancing in behind him.
“Brother-” Tiberius had begun to speak as his helmet exploded. A well-placed headshot from a bolter saw ceramite, vitae and bone ejected into Aeternus’ warplate. His outstretched gauntlet slipped from his pauldron as the Cataegis’ corpse slumped forward. The last Praetor of the First Legion.
Time dilated further for the First Primarch. He heard the rattle of chains pull tight and snap into a thousand, separated links. An ancient monster cooed and cackled into his ear. The last words traded with the Emperor loomed over him like a guillotine. The last sight of the Thunder Primarchs lingered on the edge of his vision. Rex saw them all as they once were, fresh from their Master’s Himalazian enclave and untainted by the flaw. A spectral hand held his cheek from behind and a blade against his back. He felt phantom blood spill from his spine.
Reality clicked forward in a dead sprint as a combat cocktail filtered through his system. His left gauntlet snapped out and unloaded Ea into Astartes descending the stairway. Their ceramite blossomed into azure flame as the Primarch of the God-Slayers began to move. His grip tightened on Apocrypha, plunging it further into the false caldera with all the strength that could be afforded to his genewrought body. He grit his teeth as the black blade pierced the stone composite. As the sword reached into the thermae, Aeternus thumbed the activation rune and ignited the blade in a crimson corona. Steam violently hissed out of the sword, unfurling the wings that made up the weapon’s crossguard. The empty eye sockets of the weapon’s skull burst to life with red wisps.
An eruption reverberated from beneath the false-caldera. Crimson plasma spilled out in an explosive web around the foundation of the thermae. The ground beneath their feet violently shook as the destructive feat unraveled the environment around them. Pieces of the rim shattered and broke, forcing the Astartes from their advantageous position. All were unbalanced by the seismic force produced by the event. It was not enough to break the Mountain King’s pleasure-abode, yet it was enough to stun the battle.
“I am Aeternus Rex, Thunder Primarch of the God-Slayers and the Emperor’s Champion. I have walked Terra for a century and brought to heel the warlords of the Dark Age. I have brought doom to the greatest witches that have ever lived and slain great creatures born from the wyrd,” the Blade of the Emperor stated with a lion’s roar. His helmet amplified the sound, projecting it throughout the fractured caldera and funneling it out into Mount Ararat’s sky. He pulled Apocrypha from the smoking fracture in the ground, the blade still wreathed in crimson plasma.
“I demand retribution! I demand Him to account for His betrayal! I demand His greatest to come forth and dare,” Aeternus continued to yell as the battle came to a halt. His warplated form stepped forward toward Amalasuntha with Apocrypha in his right gauntlet and her misericordia unsheathed in his left. He stopped several paces away from her as the Second Primarch backed away.
“I demand the Emperor of Mankind,” the God-Slayer growled with a certainty unlike any tone he had held before.
The zmaj head cackled on his pauldron, a sound that struck through his resolve like a chime through glass. “He will not see you, O child mine.”
Amalasuntha wanted to press the advantage on Bodiciia, but she recognized the words of Aeternus instantly. A sorrowful anger filled her heart as he made his demand, but it was her duty to act as their executioner. His will had led to this, laying down defective tools that would no longer be needed for the age to come. Her pack idled as she stared upon the only of the Categis to earn her respect, eyes peering onto him as a raptor its prey.
“Your demand rings hollow, Aeternus. Accept your death with dignity, accept that you are no longer needed in this cruel world,” Amalasuntha spoke with an eerie calmness. She hefted her blade to ready herself, but she dared not move - waiting patiently as the sounds of battle increased around them. The Categis would be too concerned for the pressing Astartes to interfere now, but with two of their Primarchs staring her down she could not afford to attack so recklessly now that she has lost the element of surprise.
“I will not,” Aeternus responded as he rushed forward to the Black Hawk. In ages past, the First Primarch had been compared to Valdor in brutality, yet subpar in swiftness; however, this Cataegis was now peerless in might, free of his chains. He met the Custodes in a fraction of a second, his greaves booming like the crack of thunder and his form advancing with the restless volatility of a macrotempest. The understanding, patient Thunder Primarch was gone, replaced by the entity known as the God Slayer.
The misericordia lashed out first with bristling speed, cutting the air and throwing a shockwave of force with it. A feint. Apocrypha followed up in quick succession, swung with impossible might for a weapon of such weight and size. Crimson plasma ionized the air as the greatblade cut downwards, arcing down with the thunderous strength of an angry deity. As the blade collided with the ground, Aeternus cut upwards with the shorter sword to move Amalasuntha further backwards into the caldera. As she moved with geneforged reflexes, the Cataegis was already swinging his other implement sidewards toward her.
As the two legendary warriors fought in a theater built by destiny, the ongoing battle continued from its momentarily stalemate. Primarch Bodiciia bounced back away from the Black Hawk, knowing full well that only a few select warriors could match the Custodes in might. She moved close to a group of Thunder Warriors readying their heavy armaments for another barrage.
“Pull back to the center! If Amalasuntha has arrived, then-” She would never get to finish the sentence as her words were cut off by the familiar, piercing cry of null-grav generators and precision thrusters. Their silhouettes filled the sky as they descended from above. A flock of auramite clad hawks, cultivated by the Emperor’s greatest aerial warrior - the Stygian Talons had arrived.
Bodiciia heaved her great-axe ready for their onslaught, but the Custodians never had the intention of granting her a death worthy of a warrior. Whereas Aeternus would’ve had the cunning to divert fire upon their descent - Bodiciia was never the greater tactician of the two. The Venetarri of the Stygian Talons descended wielding blades in one hand and melta-charge packs in the other. The Primarch’s eyes widened in last minute recognition as the custodians found their demolitions down upon them. In her last moments, not even a sound came out of her before the onslaught of explosives encompassed her being.
Those near her died to the rain of charges near instantly as weapons meant for tanks and structure proved more than able to dispatch the Categis as well. Auramite clad figures landed and charged through smoke and debris, falling upon the Thunder Warriors with speed and savagery afforded to them by their creator. By the time the smoke from the initial charge cleared, dissipated by the rushing of gene-perfected soldiers advanced, there was little left of Bodiciia save for scraps of her armor and her axe which lay broken several meters away from where she had stood.
The sudden charge meant little to the two engaged in a desperate battle, Amalasuntha danced around the twin blades of Aeternus. Knowing she could not directly parry the Primarch, the Black Hawk relied on her agility, aided by her jump pack she remained just out of her opponents reach. Even still, Amalasuntha was hard pressed on her defense - all her movement had to be calculated in the moments even before Aeternus’ movements began. No, she knew she would not be able to beat him, but perhaps she could last long enough for victory to be secured.
The First Legio Astartes advanced on cue of the Custodes’ arrival, the last veterans of Sanctii at the van. Several squads descended the false-caldera, sliding down the fractured stone with their weaponry lowered. More of the dark clad Space Marines took their spot on the rim, steadying themselves for suppressive fire on the Cataegis position. Those that made their way to the thermae pulled free their melee weapons, activating runes to ignite powerswords and chainsword engines. Doom lingered over the cohort.
Until the first of the Venatari died to a God-Slayer. As auramite plate met the composite tile of the Araratian thermae for their descent, the First Legio Cataegis engaged with a ferocity unmatched. They echoed their leader in overwhelming, brutalistic superiority, discarding whatever remained of their leashed doctrine. A black gauntlet collided with a venatari half-mask as they sprinted out of the smoke, bursting the skull of the genecrafted warrior into fine mist. Twenty-two other God-Slayers followed after with a mixture of dangerous, Unification Wars trophies. Their last vexillarius dug their banner into the stone as they pressed on. A symbol of Unity. They became the sole focus of the Talons.
The cohort rallied even as they perished under the arrival of the Custodes and the advancing Astartes. Whatever remained of their heavy weapons turned away from the false-caldera’s rim to the skies above, unleashing hell and fury into the descending Custodes. A squad of Red Knights filled in the area that the God-Slayers left, hefting their stormshields and meeting the First Legio Astartes with powersword in hand. The remainder frequently swapped cover, discarding their spent weapons and reclaiming their fallen kindreds or acquiring the decimated Araratian insurgents armaments. They persisted and died, fighting until the last of them were ready to keel over. Except for one.
“A mistake,” Aeternus coldly stated as Amalasuntha continued to successfully parry and dodge his strikes. The lack of offensive bite to her form was telling and he utilized that weakness to his fullest advantage. He had spent hundreds of accumulated hours throughout the Unification War witnessing her martial ka’tah. Rex knew her more than any of her geneforged kindred.
The misericordia lashed out like a venomous serpent, angling for her jugular with persistent intensity. She dodged the strike as it bit the air directly next to her half-mask, switching her position with assistance of her auramite pinion. The Custodes came face-to-face with the wrist-mounted weapon of the First Primarch, Ea, as it savagely shot azure-tinted bullets into the space between them. Air ignited into cobalt flame as bolt rounds shot across the gap. Amalasuntha evaded the shots as if she were wind itself, utilizing short controlled bursts of her pinion combined with her advanced genealchemy to throw her into a favorable position; however, Aeternus advanced on her for every step that she took and forced the advantage as it made itself aware.
Apocrypha sliced up from the lower right of Amalasuntha’s position, its crimson corona a telltale sign of the oncoming weapon. She anticipated the strike and dodged back, continuing the dance with every ounce of genewrought agility that she had as a Custodes. Aeternus thumbed the activation rune in the brief second before potential contact, expelling steam from its winged crossguard and throwing a plasmic projectile. A wide, vertical slash of brilliant red cut through the right wing of her auramite pinion, bypassing her refractor field through close contact. The plasma tore across the battlefield, melting thermae wall into slag and bisecting Astartes enroute to the fight.
Amalasuntha remained hardpressed and now that Aeturnus recognized his advantage, an expected result and one she had accepted would come since even the planning of this engagement. There could be no miscalculation in her movement, to do so would mean death but even then the question remained of how long she could keep up with the God-Slayer. She had to find a way to give Aeternus pause, a way to put him on the backfoot for even a fraction of a millisecond.
Being unable to rely on the now engaged Stygian Talon, who fought tooth and nail with the remaining God-Slayers in an untold number of one-on-one combats where they could, the Black Hawk would have to rely on her own cunning. In the moment, he was recovering from using Apocrypha, there was a moment where Aeternus was vulnerable enough to take the risk of assault. Instinctually, Amalasuntha flung her spear as if it were a javelin - sailing center mass toward the thunderous Primarch with the force of His will behind it.
The First Primarch hurled himself into the path of Amalasuntha’s spear, expertly twisting his body to receive the attack head-on. Her strike landed with a thundering shriek of powerfield punching through refractor field and churning ceramite armor. Instead of punching through his chestplate, her attack raked across the lower left side of Rex’s armor. She scored a new scar on his body, opening his waist and exposing the searing muscle beneath. Vitae would’ve spilled free were it not a powerweapon, instead cauterising the meat and armor together. The weapon sailed past the Primarch with its pound of flesh taken. It did little to stop the Cataegis’ charge, but the Black Hawk could see his left side weaken by a fraction. A sight that she had trained for for a hundred years.
Aeternus repaid her in kind. The Thunder Primarch launched his right knee up as she attempted to recover from her mighty throw. A physical blow from his genewrought might was astonishing even for a genecrafted being such as herself. To some degree, it was comparable to the Axe of the Emperor’s indomitable strength. She was pushed backwards several inches away, splitting apart a God-Slayer and Stygian Talon dueling for their lives. Amalasuntha recovered as her comrade was decapitated by Rex’s greatsword, treated like a simple annoyance instead of an actual threat. The duel continued as he hurled back into her with the misericordia lowered and Apocrypha raised.
The battlefield grew heavy with ashen smog pouring out of Mount Ararat, cinders piling up over the false-caldera like fresh snow on the Nordyc plateaus. Cataegis squads were quickly dwindling into fractured duos or trios as their positions were overwhelmed. The Astartes advanced as a horrifying, endless horde of hounds unleashed by an uncaring master. Those daring enough to enter melee with the Thunder Warriors found themselves brutalized, yet their sacrifice was sufficient in cutting down another of their dreadful numbers. Heavy armaments no longer barked into the skies, allowing the Stygian Talons free reign to descend into their desperate cohort. They were struggling to survive. Their end was nigh.
The God-Slayers did not care any longer for their duty, even as their comrades failed to hold the perimeter. Caesar had managed to outwit a Venatari, smashing his skull into their faceplate and bisecting their body through brute strength. Claudior was slain by another Talon, who wielded her buckler like a mythological guardian and evaporated her opponent with an archeotech pistol. Aulon was fiercely dancing with another, trading blow for blow with a Custodes who perfectly matched his attacks.
The perimeter continued to shrink as the Red Knights died behind the God-Slayers, dissolved into imperceivable atoms by disintegration rifles. Vena, Caedis, and Regia returned to the throneward flank as they finished off their Stygian opponents. Several Astartes were already advancing on them with chainswords and bolt-pistols, sprinting to fill in the space their allies had made. The First Legio Cataegis made quick work of them with paragon blade and powersword, slaughtering their genedescendants with swift, precise slices. Already, they could feel more Stygian Talons descending from overhead; however, their duty remained for their brethren. They readied themselves for the next warriors to take their place.
This duel’s crescendo was wrong - it felt off and it had felt off since its inception, the Black Hawk knew this. Aeternus should have killed her by now, he should be moving into range for her gunship to be finishing him off. That window had passed - the Talons had to improvise as they should’ve been pulling back to allow the Astartes to suffer the blunt of the casualties. Amalasuntha felt vague annoyance cross her mind that her own time table had been breached.
She flew back - far enough that it would take Aeternus several bounds to reach her. Then she spoke in a flat and plain voice, “You toy with me, Aeternus. You delay doing what must be done. Why?”
“The Emperor values you,” the First Primarch dispassionately stated as he followed after her. Even with her auramite pinion half-destroyed, Amalasuntha was still the most agile of her kindred and had leapt far out of his reach. He sprayed Ea in the Black Hawk’s direction to keep her moving as he sprinted, azure bolt rounds splashing off of her refractor field. A sigil in his helmet warned of a low ammo count. Aeternus continued to speak as he closed the distance, “and Valdor demands your victory in this fight. I will defeat you and I will force his hand, but I will not kill you Amalasuntha.”
There was no further explanation for his words as he reached her within several, specific bounds. His suppressive fire had been inefficient in inflicting any damage, yet it held back support from the Astartes and limited her movement. Several Space Marines had attempted to move to Amalasuntha’s aid to no avail as they were caught in Aeternus’ and the surviving Cataegis’ crossfire. The Talons were slowly winning, yet they remained bogged down in fighting the best that the First Legion could offer.
“Every passing moment is a Cataegis granted the promise of a glorious death,” the God-Slayer growled as he reached Amalasuntha. The misericordia lashed out, splashing against the refractor field’s weakening grasp. His greatblade followed after as quick as a lightning bolt, throwing a shockwave of physical energy and cinders into the surrounding area. As she attempted to recover from the onslaught of attacks, Aeternus threw a punch with his left gauntlet that sent her sprawling; however, the force of the attack was weakened by her earlier strike. He spoke as she recovered, “and I will allow them their glory until the moment my own demise arrives.”
Their duel became the centerpiece of the battlefield as the original Cataegis perimeter broke, transforming into several desperate brawls and close combat skirmishes. The Astartes on the ridge of the false-caldera were forced to holster their hefty armaments lest they hit ally and enemy alike. Slowly, they followed their melee-focused kindred down into the thermae with their sidearms unholstered and ready. The Stygian Talons broke into pairs as reinforcements arrived from above, expediting their God-Slayer duels and maximizing their efficiency at the cost of honor.
Legionnaire Titus watched as the last Annihilators were slaughtered by a trio of Astarters, systematically cut down with combat knives and chainswords. The brief distraction was enough for his dueling Talon to skewer him through the chest with her lance and he fell limp against her weapon. In his dying moments, he held onto her spear and forced his bolt pistol into her midriff, unloading whatever remained in the magazine by that point. The two fell atop each other in death as bolt rounds tore through the soft joints in her auramite armor.
Legionnaires Vena, Caedis, and Regia had perished with a dozen and a half Astartes corpses spread between them in the throneward flank. Lucius took their place alone, his Stygian opponent butchered by the Emperor’s Champion himself. He struggled to hold both paragon blades, yet the Thunder Warrior was beyond the point of no return. The Astartes came for him with volatile firearms. Lucius was quicker and deadlier, bisecting them as they arrived and suicidally rushing into their midst. He smiled wide beneath his knightly helmet, grateful for the time he had left spent like this.
A flurry of melees that spawned behind the First Primarch began to reach their climax as Legionnaire Traijan pierced through a Venatari’s skull with his archeospear. Gilgamenses would no longer need it and he thrived in the satisfaction of using the weapon. He witnessed Aulan perish with a decapitating salvo from an arriving Custodes, their sidearm blasting apart his cranium in three shots. The Thunder Warrior raised the trident like a javelin and hurled it like a bolt of lightning, skewering the golden warrior before he himself was slain by a new auramite-clad opponent.
Whatever remained of the pleasant waters of the false-caldera thermae were now saturated with the meat of Cataegis, Astartes, and Custodes. The raw stink of cooked meat, ionized and roasted, wafted through the area above the scent of volcanic sulphur. Mount Ararat hissed and boiled with reinvigorated, molten energy as she quaked with inconceivable amounts of death. It was as if the spirit of the land cried out in primordial agony.
“A glorious death?” Amalasuntha hissed in response as she steadied herself - recovering from her sprawl as easily as Aeternus had sent her. There was movement below her half-plate, she was speaking into the vox, Aeternus could tell. Yet, Aeternus could tell in an instant what it meant, the Stygian Talons began breaking away from those left alive, clearly unwilling to allow themselves to be felled in some twisted notion of honor. The Astartes of the first would suffer the blows, not the Emperor’s own.
Then it revealed itself, the Black Hawks’s own dropship screamed into view at its mistress’ decree and it would spit death into the ranks of Categis and Astartes alike in cold efficiency. Aeternus had forestalled her enough. “You waste my time, you waste His resources in such a foolish endeavor of a warrior’s death,” she called as she dodged more of his blows, lashing out and barely slicing his wrists with his own blade.
“We are all nothing more than His tools and if he told me to die then I would do so happily!” She roared as she finally moved for a proper attack, believing he had swung with his great sword. Aeternus’ own knife moved to his neck in the motion of the mercy killing he had done so many times. Amalasuntha knew that this would need to end, and she knew this would force him to either die or kill her in self-defense. There would be no more honor.
“Then you are unworthy of His servitude,” Aeternus callously responded. The First Primarch dropped Amalasuntha’s misericordia in his left gauntlet and forced his open gauntlet onto his diamantine blade with surprising speed. It pierced the ceramite, sliced through the flesh and broke the bone beneath in a single, fell stab. Rex pushed his hand further down the blade until his fingers overlapped hers. Firmly caught within his grasp and unable to escape, the Cataegis rolled back his head and slammed it against her skull. Precisely hard enough to incapacitate and fracture, but not enough to shatter her cranium.
Even then, the Black Hawk continued to her best to fight on, futilely and weakly did she attempt to raise the blade Aeternus had gifted her to his throat. Consciousness flickered in her mind as her senses all screamed for her to do her duty to the Emperor. Even then, her mind knew that this wasn’t a lethal blow, Aeternus surely knew - and she questioned why he wouldn’t kill her at that moment. Amalasuntha sputtered what words she could, the blade falling from her hands, “Y-you are -“
As the Custodes went limp, Aeternus calmly set her down and flung the diamantine blade out of his gauntlet with immeasurable force. The dagger disappeared in the bloody cinderpiles of Mount Ararat. Amalasuntha’s misericordia returned to the scabbard on his left side. The Stygian Talon dropship loomed overhead, massacring the Astartes and the Cataegis in a violent tempest of bolts and lasers. Little remained of the Cataegis aside from a few God-Slayers and a handful of other legionnaires. His refractor field threatened to explode with each salvo that strayed too close. Rex ignored it as he approached a fallen Custodes with an archeotech spear jutting out of their auramite - Gilgamenses trident. Even in death, the Sixteenth Primarch remained a stubborn thorn.
Aeternus quickened his pace, sprinting to the spear and breaking into a leaping lunge even as his body screamed for rest. His cut and broken hand violently spilled vitae as the archeotech spear - Enūma Eliš - entered the First Primarch grasp. The Talons couldn’t respond in time, having retreated moments ago to Amalasuntha’s order. Rex thumbed the weapons activation rune, electrifying the trident’s shattered head. A fulguris coat of lightning wrapped around the spear like an angry thunderbolt. He flung himself into a screeching halt, tearing muscles and tendons in his legs to perform the feat. Just as the Black Hawk had thrown her own spear with all of His might, the Thunderbearer launched the spear out of his hand like a streak of lightning at the dropship. The repercussive force of the throw was enough to toss him backwards and erupt a flurry of wind around him.
The thunderbolt connected with the dropship echoing a clap of electromagnetic energy. A shower of smoke and debris plumed up over the vehicle as the archeotech spear disappeared. The battlefield fell silent in the fallout of Aeternus’ herculean throw. A serenity began to blossom over the silence until the dull scream of null-gravity engines broke through. The compact voidshield of the Custodes’ warship flickered for a brief second as it spooled up to fight once more. All of its weapons honed in on the First Primarch, who readied Apocrypha for another futile assault.
Then the sky split open.
It was not the Stygian Talons' vessel that descended. The Orion gunship that tore through the smog-choked firmament. Its hull scarred with the evidence of a hundred campaigns. Its engines roared with a basso profundo that shook loose cinders from the caldera walls, and its descent was not the graceful hover of the auramite-clad but a violent, deliberate plunge. It sought a target.
The craft punched through the layer of ash and sulfur like a fist through rotten timber, its void-shields flaring white as they shrugged off stray small arms fire. It drove downward at an angle that would have shattered any mortal craft, and at the last possible moment, when the ground seemed certain to claim it, its thrusters ignited in a screaming column of incandescent flame. The landing struts struck the volcanic rock with a sound like the tolling of a funeral bell, and the shockwave alone cracked stone and bone.
The boarding ramp descended before the landing struts had finished groaning under their burden. The figure that emerged from within the shadowed interior did so without haste, without ceremony, without the theatrical flair that lesser warriors might have employed. As he descended the battlefield seemed to contract around him the way water contracts around a stone dropped into still water.
Constantin Valdor.
The Captain-General of the Legio Custodes wore no helmet. His face was a mask of cold, imperial marble. His eyes were the color of winter steel, and held just as much warmth. They found Aeternus with the mechanical precision of a targeting auspex. In his right hand he held his spear. Its blade caught the hellish light of Mount Ararat and threw it back in shards of molten gold. The great red cloak set about his shoulders snapping in the raging tempest of the air.
He did not speak immediately. He surveyed the battlefield with the dispassionate efficiency of an auditor reviewing a ledger. The dead Cataegis, the fallen Astartes, the site of the great betrayal.
Valdor paused a moment further, helm detaching from its mag-lock at his belt, before he set it over his features. When the gleam of his lenses set on the Primarch once more the blade of the Apollonian Spear crackled into life.
Finally, Aeternus thought with grim relief. He flexed his left gauntlet, cutting the river of blood pouring from his palm. The alchemy of his artificial body dammed the crimson torrent for now. Rex brought the greatsword into a two-handed grip and stepped toward Valdor. Amalasuntha’s misericordia remained sheathed on his hip. The First of the Cataegis and the First of the Custodes met as cinders danced around them. The Thunder Primarch raised his greatsword into a duelist stance, its brilliant red corona pointing at the sky above.
The First Primarch exploded forward with a genetic might known to his name. Apocrypha arced downwards, ionizing the air and sending a shockwave of dust and debris scattering the impact zone. The Emperor’s Spear had dodged the attack with ease, minimizing the space between himself and Rex’s attack. Aeternus had anticipated the attack, brutally carving diagonally and upwards to meet the Apollonian Spear. Both of their powerfields collided, illuminating the nearby area in a flash of destructive brilliance. Neither giants of the Unification Wars were moved by the eruption, maintaining their indomitable stance.
Both of the warriors breathed the same immediate air in their macabre waltz. They did not dance as duelists. Their powerful, unyielding forms were too brutal for such a delicate word. An invincible titan fought against an unconquerable giant. Every step of their greaves was a shattering of tectonic plates. Every strike was a fracturing of mountains. Every movement was a deafening crack of thunder in a tempest. They were locked in a supernatural contest of insurmountable strength, impregnable toughness, and methodical speed. The two legends were a match unlike any other in martial prowess.
Rex did not speak as he fought Valdor. He refused to think of anything other than the fight in front of him. What remained of the Thunder Warriors had dwindled to so few that their end was inevitable. He had achieved his goal in delivering them a glorious death. No doubts remained for the God-Slayer. His stance echoed the mentality, every movement reflecting his mental tranquility. Every attack was practised, perfect, and strengthened by a resolve made years ago.
Apocrypha came in fast and low, angled for the hip. Valdor stepped off the line, the powerfield's discharge scorching a black seam across his pauldron, and drove the shaft of the Apollonian Spear across the inside of Rex's lead arm.
Rex turned with the pressure rather than against it, and the greatsword came back across his body in a shortened arc that offered no wind-up to read. It caught the spear's haft and dragged. Valdor released the bind, stepped through the gap it created, and struck with the butt-end at the base of Rex's gorget. Stone cracked under the Primarch's heel as he absorbed it. One pace back.
Valdor pressed. His attacks carried no signature, no preference of side or angle — each one placed where the pattern of Rex's last position made defence hardest. While the blows of each fighter met with the shuddering force of a block or parry, it was Valdor who controlled the space, moving the Primarch steadily in whichever direction he designed. The caldera edge was thirty meters behind the Primarch. He began to account for this.
The greatsword came diagonal and two-handed, the blow that had opened the first exchange. Valdor did not dodge it a second time. He caught it on the spear's haft, planted his rear foot, and held. The shockwave pushed cinders outward in a ring. His boots did not move. He released the bind and stepped back once, putting space between them.
Valdor spun his spear in his grip, while his focus remained entirely on the Primarch, the head of his spear spat death into the torment of ash and dust surrounding them, surging into the darkness to fell a pair of warriors, anonymised by the dust and smoke, as they looked to approach him from the rear. Rex was fast enough that before the spear could be swung back into position he was on the Custodian, but not fast enough to prevent Valdor fighting back with precision, the rear pummel of the Apollonian Spear jabbing with enough force to turn away blows that would sunder any mortal attempt at a parry. The last swing of an otherwise masterful flourish of killing strikes was turned ever so slightly wide, just enough for Valdor to have the space to reverse his grip, the momentum of his movement bring the head of the spear around with such force it rippled through the rock of the mountain, let alone the point of impact.
The Spear of the Emperor was well renown for decisive killing strikes, but this was not how he was killing Rex, nor would it seem, was that an option for so capable an opponent. Here Valdor called upon techniques he had not required for an age, yet always honed. The death of a thousand cuts. The Primarch was pushing the Custodian, challenging him in ways few foes ever had, but for every additional effort he forced on Valdor, the Custodian took blood.
For a moment it looked as if the Primarch had achieved a decisive blow, a surprise attack among the otherwise controlled maelstrom. His blade cut upwards, renting the chestplate of Valdor’s armour with an ugly crack that bled molten armour. There was enough force behind that blow to crack and harm even a Custodian, and perhaps any other of his order would have stumbled back from the blow. But this was not any other member, and despite the near killing blow, Valdor instead stepped into the assault, one hand leaving the grip of his spear to pull the misericordia from its place at his thigh. The weapon plunged up and towards the Primarch, made with the precision of one of the few beings alive who knew the genecraft of the Emperor’s warriors, and where exactly the lie of their immortality was most exposed.
A heartbeat before Valdor’s misericordia shot at him like a lance of lightning, the First Primarch reacted. His black gauntlet released the two-handed grip on Apocrypha to pull free Amalasuntha’s treasured misericordia. The dagger flew from the scabbard like a shadowed hawk, glancing against his opponent’s mirrored weapon. His fatal attack was forcefully diverted away from Rex’s neck towards his helmet, sundering the battleworn ceramite with genewrought might. Blood jettisoned out of Aeternus’ cleanly sliced face, revealing his scarred features beneath. A cut eye stared out from beneath the damage. The Thunder Warrior responded with a flurry of new attacks.
Aeternus’ misericordia plunged downwards towards Valdor’s gauntlet. The Custodes responded by parrying the blow and maneuvering his blade against the Primarch’s dagger tip. Metal viciously sparked as the two weapons met, scattering shredded cinder in their proximity. Their balance broke a split second later. Both of their swords remained in their gauntlets, symbols of conquered tyrants with renewed purposes.
The Thunder Primarch threw himself back into Valdor’s reach, slamming his misericordia into the other’s dagger. Apocrypha was swung one-handed downwards, arcing unstable, crimson plasma as it fell like a guillotine. His body screamed out in desperation as blood spilled from all of his injuries. His left gauntlet ran slick with a torrent of vitae, his chest and waist with smaller punctures courtesy of the black hawk, and his helmet cried a river of red. He was dying with each and every attack thrown at the Emperor’s Spear.
Valdor exploited the First Primarch’s growing weakness, turning aside Amalasuntha’s misericordia and slicing through his wounded palm. His own misericordia left Rex’s gauntlet a mess of severed digits and gore. The God-Slayer’s dagger flew from his shattered grip. He shifted his bodyweight, accounting for Aeternus’ proximity and twisted the Apollonian Spear upward to meet Apocrypha. The spearhead of his weapon bypassed the thin, crimson weave of the greatsword’s plasmafield, striking the Primarch through the right armpit. A pained grunt escaped his opponent’s lips.
Apocrypha fell lightly against Valdor’s right pauldron, ineffectively hitting its intended target. Aeternus’ black gauntlet slid free of the greatsword’s hilt and its crimson corona disappeared into the aether. A cough of blood escaped his mouth, splattering against the Custodian-General’s auramite. With a final act of desperation, the First Primarch pulled himself further upon the Apollonian Spear with agonized determination. The Custodes impassively watched him as he struggled.
The God-Slayer rolled his head back and prepared to slam it against Valdor’s sculpted helmet, but the strike never came. Aeternus’ strength gave out at last, his fractured helmet slumping against the Custodes’ headwear. His consciousness began to flee away along with the righteous retribution that puppeted his body. The zmaj skull cooed empathetically. He fell limp against the Apollonian Spear, his breathing slowing with every passing second. Rex felt the spear pulled free and the Custodian-General’s arm grab him as he descended.
It was a slow descent to the ground, Valdor almost cradling the Primarch as they did so. There would be no errant tumble for these honed killing machines. Around them, the pair of Custodian Gunships opened up in full around the summit. There would be no cover allowed for any who might seek to make the summit now.
Despite the almost respectful manner that the Custodian-General held his stricken foe, Valdor was not the first to speak, the lenses of his helm boring into his opposite with the same appraising coldness as they had the moment before their combat had begun.
“Unity…” Aeternus Rex, Thunder Primarch of the First Legio Cataegis, gurgled out with the last whispers of his consciousness. His ruined eye peered past Valdor into Terra’s tainted sky. The God-Slayer’s ugly, scarred lips curled in a satisfied, knowing smile.
“Few have fought harder in its name.” Any emotion that may have been in Valdor’s words were robbed by the modulation of his helmet. The purpose of the embrace revealed itself in the pressure the Custodian was placing upon the lethal wound to Aeternus. That those were wounds he had inflicted made little difference to Valdor. “That service is not yet at its end, we will speak further.” The words of the Custodian were almost drowned out as his Orion gunship settled down, its disembarkment ram slamming to the mountain’s summit to disgorge a retinue of smaller figures. Not other Custodians, as would be customary, but instead a number of the Emperor’s mortal servants. Those skilled in the craft of bringing the living back from the cusp of their final rest - the genewrights who had brought forth the Astartes, gazing upon the charnelhouse of their final proving.
The last Aeturnus heard as blackness took him, and the almost childlike hands of mortals began to tend to his wounds, was the zmaj laughing once more. “Death is a release you have not yet earned, O prisoner mine.”
Valdor stood to allow them access to Aeternus, speaking to the leader of their number. “The Emperor has need of his service, speak not of this to any others. Fly from here.” Whatever subterfuge the Custodian-General was committing, his loyal attendants did not even blink at the order, swiftly stabilizing, and restraining, the Primarch before whisking him into the hold of the gunship.
Constantin Valdor strode away from the ramp, moving to the peak of the Summit. The devastation all around was total, but easing, smoke and ash drifting higher still than even the summit as he surveyed all.
The battle was over. The dying embers of Ursh’s ambition lingered as smoldering skirmishes across Mosvoroth. Torn reality had been reknit, closing wounds that threatened to unleash unfathomable wyrd. What remained of the blood haze dispersed like morning fog. An acrid scent remained, yet only the stench of blood and promethium was present. The taint that the Urshites had known for untold generations was vanquished with the Raptor flying high above Kalagann’s ruined citadel.
Aeternus flicked his misericordia – a gift from Amalasuntha – free of tainted blood. The last vestiges of wyrd had been stolen from his vityaz opponents, enfeebling their form back to what a mortal’s rightful strength. Their clouded judgement would not save them from his blade, nor the weapons of His golden companions. Aristagoras, the Emperor’s Second Spear, kicked away the defeated Urshites and parted a path for his mortal charges. The rest of the Custodes prepared for the departure of their Master. He descended the fractured stairway before the Emperor returned, unable to face his liege in failure. He had not died in this battle. His future was now uncertain.
A courtyard greeted him at the bottom of the citadel’s stairs. None of the flesh amalgamations or horrors of the wyrd remained to witness. Only the carcasses of slaves to darkness, loyal auxilia, and genecrafted giants silently waited. He was certain that they died in the chaos, sacrifices to allow their greater tainted kin to pursue the Emperor. Their struggle had been pointless. Just as his own had been in pursuit of his demise.
The voxnet crackled to life with renewed vigor. Battle reports flited through the haze of Ursh’s aftermath. He wasn’t surprised to learn that millions had died on both sides. Kalagann had bled his own people of their vitae, spilling their sacrifice into the wyrd for momentary power. The cost for his ambition was immeasurable. It paralleled the Master of the Line’s desire for Unity. His auspex pulsed awake, reporting sensory data around him as unreality made way for clarity. He could see the various Cataegis squads moving in the nearby theater. The Primarch had started to tune the radius with a blink when the vox spoke to him.
+’Brother,’+ the voice whispered to him. It was hoarse, deep and teetered on the edge of sanity. The voice slowly panted, drawing in air as if his lung had been punctured with a knife. The unmistakable drip of bloodlust clung to their words. They were a Thunder Warrior. One that had waged war for longer than any other of his retinue. One that had barely held himself together from the beginning.
+’Nero,’+ Aeternus replied. There was no tender, familiar love in the reply. Only the sharp, somber words of a God-Slayer. He narrowed his eyes in frustration, threatening to boil over into anger. ‘One last death’ He thought to himself as Nero panted into the vox.
+’I need help, Rex,’ the Praetor stated. His voice was disingenuous, filled with the desire for murder and carnage. Aeternus knew that he was being baited. He knew that the Thunder Warrior had likely slain something that he shouldn’t. Rex knew that he was going to answer the call regardless.
+’Send me your position,’+ the Primarch of the God-Slayers ordered. There was no lion’s roar to blast his Praetor’s eardrums, yet his voice was the dull rumble of a resigned beast. He tightened his grip on the misericordia, sheathing it into Amalasuntha’s scabbard as his auspex began to ping.
+’I am here,’+ Nero grunted with effort. Aeternus heard the Thunder Warrior’s chainaxe spool to life and the tearing of armored meat. A crunch followed the noise as the Cataegis found his prize. The Primarch doubted that Nero left anything alive at his location. Regardless, he followed the pulse that Praetor sent out as coordinates displayed over his helmet’s lenses. Nero had found himself in a plaza away from the heat of the battle.
The First Primarch hefted Apocrypha against his right pauldron, quickening his pace away from the ruins of Kalagann’s Citadel. None followed him down the thoroughfare to his location. Mortals parted away and Cataegis tended to their own wounds. Outlying Custodes in shimmering auramite casually hurried past him to the heart of Ursh. He left as a brilliant light had begun to pour out of the ruins. A light that he would never see again for as long as he lived.
Nero’s destination was close. Aeternus weaved through several alleyways, some blocked entirely by the destruction wrought upon Mosvoroth. An impossible quantity of carcasses filled the path, each as mangled as the last. Most were the slaughtered remains of Urshite slave-soldiers. Others were the desecrated cadavers of auxilia. Occasionally, Rex spotted the burnt husk of a wyrd-creatures locked in death with one of His warmachines. He passed them as Imperial workcrews began to filter in from the outskirts, eager to cleanse Ursh of it’s fallen worth.
Several minutes elapsed before the plaza came into view. It was a small, outdoor area enclosed by several habzones. Countless statues of Ursh’s past rose like death-defying giants across the area. Each edifice was as painstakingly sculpted as the last, yet it was not their pristine features that drew his attention. It was the lone Thunder Warrior standing in the center of a gorefest. Dozens of Astartes in black and yellow lay in various states of mutilation. Heads were decapitated, limbs were maimed, and bodies were torn open to reveal the meat beneath. They were precisely killed by one man, but all of them were defiled afterwards with a chainaxe. The culprit was clear.
“They aren’t like us, Aeternus,” the Thunder Warrior began to speak as the Primarch arrived. He turned towards Rex with a chainaxe in each hand. Nero had eschewed his gauntlets, pauldrons, and helmet. Vitae from his kills painted his exposed flesh and dark armor in a dull red, detailing it further with small clumps of meat. His horrifically scarred features stared at him. A bald head with skin as thick as leather and augments as plentiful as a technobarbarian. He appeared as the very enemies they had originally been created to slay.
“They are not. They are our future. Created without the flaw and born to fight the wars we cannot fight,” Aeternus replied. Apocrypha fell from his pauldron, casually swinging downward in preparation. The Primarch made no move to pull free the misericordia from it’s sheath.
“You defend them? Even now as the last of us die for Unity? Do you truly love them more than us, brother?” Nero asked with a mixed tone. He pleaded for the Primarch to answer him and cursed him in the same breath for abandoning them. His chainaxes revved in anticipation. Rex witnessed combat cocktail filtered through his veins in real-time.
“They are to be what we could never become,” Aeternus responded as Apocrypha activated. A crimson corona coated the weapon, washing the plaza in a red light and ionizing the air. He stepped closer to the warrior he once knew as his closest friend. He no longer recognized the man that stood before him. Only a murderer remained, unchained and unbound by the flaw that consumed them.
“He’s betrayed us. The Emperor has abandoned us! We will never see Unity! We will never know peace!” Nero screamed out in frothing anger. The Thunder Warrior lunged at him with a fury known to their legion. It mirrored the moment that Caligula lost his mind. This differed heavily from that time. Aeternus was ready for him.
The First Primarch effortlessly sidestepped the attack in his Tyrant plate, allowing the Thunder Warrior to fall past him. Paired chainaxes cut into the ground, digging up masonic tile and dirt alike. Nero was already spinning around to continue his assault when Aeternus fell upon him. His left fist connected with the Praetor’s skull at a speed thought unimaginable for a Cataegis. The geneknight was forced backwards by the attack, gritting his teeth through the pain as Rex advanced.
“Traitor!” Nero cried out in desperate anger. What remained of the warrior that had crusaded across Terra was gone. He had used whatever was left, murdering countless Astartes and saved none of his former prowess for the Primarch. It was an insult and a blessing. A cruelty visited upon him by fate.
Praetor Nero jumped at him with both of his chainaxes raised. Aeternus did not hesitate to take the attack head-on, letting the weapons crash against him. The warsuit failed to register the attack, negating damage that would tear through standard ceramite. Rex’s helmet stared at the warrior. A point in time existed where the Thunder Warrior would’ve realized his foolish mistake. The Primarch reached out and grabbed Nero by his gorget, then drove his heavily clad knee into his stomach. The attack was immediately felt as his axes fell away. The Cataegis doubled over, wincing in obvious pain.
“I’m sorry, Nero,” the God-Slayer apologized as the Praetor looked up at him. A flicker of recognition crossed his cloudy eyes and tears began to fall. Aeternus saw a mirrored image of golden light spilling out of Kalagann’s citadel. He gripped Apocrypha tight and raised it for an executioner’s strike.
“I will cherish your memory forever, Victorius," the Primarch solemnly said. His hearts pounded against his ribcage and he felt a spike of regret start to fill his limbs. He pushed it down as he did with every single brother and sister that had passed on. A part of him didn’t have the strength to kill his friend. A part of him wanted to offer the warrior peace. A final part of him wanted to fulfill his duty. His mind screamed for relief.
Apocrypha slashed sideways at breakneck speed, decapitating Praetor Victorius Nero of the First Legio Cataegis. The crimson edge of the greatsword split the neck, ionizing the flesh and bringing the warrior’s life to a quick end. An aftershock of conductive force saw a burst of air generate past the slash. His arms screamed in pain as the muscles nearly tore to perform the slice. It was the only peace that Aeternus could give to his dying friend.
Rex thumbed the activation rune on Apocrypha’s hilt, commanding the crimson corona to disappear. He rested the blade against his pauldron and leant down to retrieve Nero’s decapitated corpse. The warrior felt weightless as he pulled him up by the gorget, now tinged with his greatsword’s plasmic edge. To him, it brought a small amount of peace to the task. Another soul, burdened with the flaw, given relief at last. His gauntlet tightened on the gorget as he marched out of Mosvoroth. The voxnet was already abuzz with the sound of their next destination.
In ages long past the capital of what had become the barbarian confederacy of Ursh had been fed by a river, the long forgotten dream of drinkable surface water flowing into a community of untainted humanity. That dream was long dead, and all that remained of the river was steep blasted cliffs, a chasm running into the heart of the citadel that had been a city.
It was an obvious point of ingress and the enemy knew that too, the terrain around the valley had been blasted flat and festooned with defensive emplacements, while the walls of the valley bristled with horror ready to descend upon any that dared the journey.
Perhaps in challenge, the Imperium had answered.
Bombardment of epic scale had given the forces of the Emperor the ability to approach, to prepare their own positions across the blasted wasteland around the valley, holding the enemy in place while hardier, more mobile, forces prepared to risk the gauntlet of the valley. A blade right to the heart of the Ursh citadel if they would succeed, a death of nightmares in failure.
The forces of Ursh, encamped in trenches, dugouts, and shielded fortifications running the length of the valley wall, were well prepared to weather conventional bombardment by even the most ferocious of artillery fire. They were not granted the opportunity to demonstrate their resilience. Basilisks of the XXI Astartes Legion, behind the cover of other Imperial Forces were deployed, and began to saturate the trenchlines of the valley walls with what was quickly becoming the reputed principle tactical armament of choice for the irregular Legion - specialized chaff artillery. The defender’s lines were saturated with suffocating silvery fog that disrupted auspex and vox in turn, leaving the entire length of the defenses in disarray, unable to see or call out in alarm.
The defenders were not so helpless as most opponents, however. Armed with enigmatic and terrifying weapons from the height of the Dark Age of Technology, they opened fire, blindly, and saturated the already flattened approach to their lines with mortars that unleashed devastating chemical weaponry upon the land; already calibrated and zeroed in to allow for perfect area denial in spite of the crews manning them having been rendered blind. Humming, energetic area-denial emplacements crackled with invisible energies, reducing anybody caught in their cones of effect to heaps of steaming, flash-vaporized meat and metal. Slavering mutant hounds infused with the howling energies and denizens of the Warp prowled the lengths of the trenches, undeterred by the loss of vision - for they did not need eyes to see. They called out warnings along the lines and jumped up onto the trenchtops as the Astartes of the XXI approached through the fires and seething hazards of the approach, many of them falling even as they reached the trenchlines - but the survivors bent to their grim purpose, adapted to mastery of the environment they had prepared with their bombardment. With storm bolters, auto-launchers, and specially crafted melee claw-blades, they crested the ridge of the trenches and rained hellish mayhem down upon their trapped and ambling enemies - able to see each other and their foes with perfect clarity even as the defenders flailed and died blindly in their pit.
The conflict was not quite so one-sided as the XXI would have preferred. As the defending trenchlines began to break, individual section leaders saw to the deployment of their most fearsome weapons before they were cut down. Large, trench-clearing leveler machines, bristling with servo arms, faced with screaming drill-pieces, and spewing noxious chemical fumes that flooded the trenches even further, stirred to life and began to take to pieces anything that dared stand before them - both their own supposed allies, as well as the marines of the XXI.
The Astartes served their purpose as they fought on however - fully occupying and deteriorating the defenders in their trenches, the billowing silvery mist from their chaff munitions spreading over the course of the battle, licks of it blowing along the ground and over the edge of the valley sides. Not enough to spill down into the valley proper, but enough to signal the efforts of the XXI and indicate that the enemy was being met and occupied. Below, the thrust of the Imperium’s attack along the valley floor began in earnest - the dagger thrust.
That blade was the greatest that the Imperium could offer, born from centuries of war and drowned in tempests of blood. They had been there from the start, propelling the Master of the Lines from His enclave in the Himalazians down into the blood-soaked hills of Akkad and across the apocalyptic wastes of Terra. They were born for war, made greater by war, and created to die in war. They were forged with lightning strikes from a brewing tempest. They were born from the ingenious mind of Humanity’s greatest conqueror. They were guided through the conviction, will, and strength of their Master. Their footsteps were the rumble of thunder on a dry plain. Their voices were the crescendo of fulguration. Their will was as indomitable as their souls were pure. Their might was unparalleled, even in the face of Mankind’s oldest monstrosities. Their ferocity was the demise of Terra’s scattered arch-tyrants and cynical hierophants. Their strength cleaved the likes of fleshborn nightmares of titanic proportion.
Thunder Warriors.
A thousand of them strode the blasted rock of the desecrated, shattered valley as if they were thunder itself. Their banners were raised high, each bearing symbols from each of the twenty Legiones Cataegis that conquered all of Terra. They sprinted into the fray with screams on their lips, garbed in the best that the Imperium could offer in their dying throes. The vaults of Himalazia had been opened to them to conquer their last and greatest foe. Shields, old and new, crackled as autocannons and heavy stubbers ceaselessly pelted their great host. Disintegrators, vortex cannons, and magrails unraveled those in the valley. Blades and lances of plasma pierced carapace and shield alike as they descended on the Urshic hordes that awaited them.
None could tell that there was strategy amongst them. Each bore heraldry vastly different from the next, yet each proudly held the Raptor on their chestplate and pauldron. Armored, mechanized machines of flesh locked in steel trudged alongside them, spraying death across the valley from ill-fitted heavy weapons that replaced arms. Great warmachines, akin to the Imperialis Praetoros of the God-Slayers, viciously raced to meet Urshic vehicles that awaited them. The host was everything and all that the Legio Cataegis could offer; nothing was spared from the final task given to them by the Emperor.
At the forefront, the God-Slayers led the way as living legends given form. Fifty was their number. Fifty bore equipment specialized to handle the task before them. They were midnight clad in great suits of heavy ceramite-plasteel composite that rivaled the technobarbarian warlords of the early years. Their helmets were knightly raiments with piercing, crimson glares. Cloaks of alabaster white billowed behind them as their kinetic fields flashed with prismatic light. They bore the weapons of fallen tyrants in one hand and the apocalyptic deathspitters of the Dark Age in the other. Their path was drenched in Urshic blood, caked in the splattered bodies of Kalagann’s followers. They led the way forward.
Primarch Aeternus swung Apocrypha to his right, slicing into a vityaz that had raised their blasphemous axe to defend himself. In the last second before contact, Rex activated the plasmafield and cut through the enemy’s weapon with disgusting ease. He snapped his wrist left, unloading Ea into a group of raiders charging into a formation of Steel Lords. Each of their number exploded into viscera as the bolts connected with pierced flesh. The Emperor’s Blade shouldered his way into the next group of Urshites as explosions and bullets surrounded him. For every enemy that he could not personally slay, any number of the Cataegis died. Every enemy that laid before him, slain by his black blade, was replaced with another that dared to fight back. Their numbers were ceaseless, some were clearly born from Mosvoroth and others as slave-warriors from other techno-barbarian states. He killed them all the same.
A spare glance at his auspex confirmed that they had pushed no further than a third of the way into the valley. Dozens of voices gave their reports over the vox. Some were from Cataegis that were coherent enough to retain their mental faculties. Others were from the Thunder Warriors that were quickly devolving into things that simply fought and died without concern. He had been forced to tune his vox to the command net, linked to the various Thunder Primarchs and their praetors. Regardless of their cognitive resilience, they all said the same thing. They were dying faster than they could charge and the Urshites were filling in from everywhere. Artillery pounded the valley walls, yet they continued to reinforce where they died.
The enthusiastic roar of Alexamandes drew his attention as the Primarch flung himself into a group of vukodlak. Their flesh-metal claws tried to claw into the Infernal Phoenix to no avail, his greataxe cutting into them faster than they could respond. The warriors of his legion followed shortly after, recklessly plunging into the abyss as they died. Coherency amongst the Legio Cataegis was pointless. Too many had lost their minds already. Only a handful of the Thunder Primarchs and their legion were aware enough to execute combat doctrine. He was thankful that the God-Slayers led from the front, guiding those who had lost themselves to the flaws.
He raised his boot and caved in the chest of an Urshic gunman, stepping back down onto his skull to ensure that their corpse wouldn’t reanimate. Aeternus felt every inch of strain in the warsuit as he pushed it forward on unfamiliar limbs. The fibre-bundle muscles of the armor were a mess, yet each movement, regardless of input, saw his enemy flee or die. It was a boon and a burden. Tyrant Armor. The heaviest plating available to the Cataegis, scavenged and repurposed from the deities they had slain across Terra. It was fitting to use the refitted armor and weapons of the technobarbarian warlords to slay the last tyrant.
“Push onward! Glory to the Emperor! Glory to the Imperium! Raptor Imperialis!” Aeternus roared out through his helmet. He raised the banner of the Imperium in his left hand and slammed it down where he stood. Hundreds of voices joined him in their own indistinct cries for their Emperor or Unity. Warriors that had lost themselves to the flaw recovered as the Raptor Imperialis flew over them. They pushed on in their uncertain state, killing and slaying Urshites where they could.
+’We must break the stalemate. Rally to the banner and push!’+ His voice broke through the voxnet, clear and proud as a lion’s roar. If he could not force a breakthrough with the God-Slayers alone, then the combined weight of the Thunder Primarchs would shatter their armor like glass.
+’All that plate, and you’re still too light?’+ Ushotan’s sneer carried through the vox, but Aeternus could have seen it himself had he but a moment to glance back. The Steel Lords held close behind the God-Slayers’ shoulder, a grim monolith of grey metal that caught what was shattered by the speartip and ground it ruthlessly underfoot. Very few of them now remained, a pitiful shadow of the unbreakable phalanx that had once ground Maulland Sen to dust, but each was a veteran of a hundred sieges, a blooded slayer of witches and daemons, and this battle was their element. Perhaps it was that, or merely their legendary stubbornness, but none of them was yet clouded by bloodlust, their squared ranks as firm and close as they had ever been.
The grey-clad Primarch bellowed an order, and like sliding plates of armour the Fourth Cataegis rearranged themselves, forming a marching line before the flag. A fusillade of bolter fire brought low a flock of skeletal gargoyles that had once been men, tearing the fiends out of the grimy sky as they sought to sweep down on the Thunder Warriors’ loose flank. Waves of the dead and the plagued rose to crash into them, the sheer mass of flesh dragging steelclad giants to the ground, but still they grimly held, their deaths buying time for their brethren to assemble.
Aeternus’ rallying cry had come at a providential moment for one of those selfsame scattered wings. There the Red Knights had broken away from the charge in an ill-advised rush, their sight by now misted over with crimson to match their armour. A pack of wily long-toothed oupires had baited them close to the withered riverbank with the temptation of cutting open their blood-swollen bellies, and thus they had strayed into the fire of infernal cannons above. The last of Charmagnol’s lot would have heedlessly perished under the blasts of tainted flame, had the call not snapped their eyes back to the center - and there their old rivals the Annihilators, converging to it from the other end in a feral rush. Where sanity had yielded, enmity won over, and unwilling to be beaten to any prize by Jotharion the Knights turned to rejoin the heart of the fight.
Whereas the frenzied howls and charges of the final Cataegis strewn about the valley, there came a calculated and deliberate movement through the blasted No-man’s Land that had become the valley. The dogs of war had been loosed from their leashes in a maddening final battle, yet there came the forces that brought order to the battlefield. The Steel Sentinels strode forward, operating nothing more than as a reserve force as the tumultuous battles of Ursh had whittled their numbers low. Where the Red Knights had run forwards in a final blood frenzy, the Sentinels came to restore order. Shields were activated, swords flashed as they cleaved through those that the Categis did not, offering a secure rear so that the Thunder Warriors would not be wasted in an encirclement.
Volkite fusilades blared as they stepped slowly and methodically behind those final sources, footholds were secured by their presence, and ground would not be given should the Categis meet their end. Arturas stabbed his sword into the heart of a wyrd, struggling to claw back towards the fight, his entrails spilling as the astartes brought his sword up. He looked to his left to meet the gaze of a Gallahad, speaking, “The Categis push hard, too hard. They risk encirclement the more they lose themselves.”
“Shall I request the Black Hawk to restore order?”
There was a swift response to the question, “No.”
A vox blared as Arturas spoke to Aeturnus, not concerning himself with those who were too lost in the blindness of battle. ‘+ Lord Aeternus, the Categis are at risk of encirclement. We are attempting to secure your rear; be cognizant of this. +’
The vox warbled, a new voice, sanity fraying in the edges of the tinny vox feedback, responded before even Aeternus could, ‘+ Lord Aeternus is aware, we are all aware, runt. My forces push the ridge; the toll is heavy. We push the ridge. +’ the vox cut out
Apocalypsos, his duel-wielded axes thick with blood and unidentifiable ichor, pressed forward on Aeternus’ flank. His men slaughtered all that stood before them, silent rage propelling them to their final glorious deaths as surely as it brought the end of any Urshiite standing before them.
Apocalypsos had seen it first, a gap in the defenses, a stretch of emplacements and trenches where the heads of the defenders numbered just a few less per squad than elsewhere. As much as he found the Astartes loathsome, he could not deny the effectiveness of the suicidal assault taking place at the lip of the ridge. The XXI, for all their worth, were thinning the herd.
‘+ Aeternus, my men break their flank, +’ he voxxed, conveniently leaving out the role the Astartes above were playing in this act, ‘+ Expect opportunity for a breakthrough shortly, Raptor Imperialis. +’ The vox dropped dead as the Primarch of the XVII Legio Cataegis let himself be lost in the bloodshed and smoke of war.
The fighting in the valley grew into a new crescendo of violence. Aeternus could feel the thrum of malevolent power, motorized engines, and the screaming of men and women as if it pounded against his soul. He knew that further afield of the valley was a greater war being won by the Emperor. The battle in front of him, however, was all that he needed to win. Win and survive, he thought grimly as the Cataegis began to reform a coherent line. Fresh vigor filled his lungs as the Legiones conformed to his will.
The western flank reformed as Charmagnol and Jotharion reeled in their Red Knights and Annihilators respectively. Napoleos and his Dawnhunters anchored themselves into the leftmost approach, their spears rallying the Nineteenth and Fifth Legiones back into fighting form. Aeternus was thankful that the regrouping was possible with the assistance of Corvinius and Sunxian on the opposite ridges of Apocalypsos. How many had already died for the ridgeward Cataegis to claim their advantage? It was a thought quickly expelled as the eastern flank returned to fighting form.
Alfovathan and Gilgamenses torched the earth with their combined strength to recuperate, aided significantly by Apocalypsos’ contributions above them. The Umbra Paladins and the Amethyst Tridents pushed the rightmost wing as a single unit. The former echoing the Steel Sentinel’s sword-and-shield tactics, while the latter cautiously used their disciplined polearms and long-range armaments to pound into the Urshic menace. No doubt their advance would’ve faltered were it not for the leaderless legions that blended into their number.
The Radiant Spears, Raptor’s Claws, Titan Scythes, Ashen Marauders, Cobalt Phantoms, and Storm Blades reinforced what remained of their legions. Without their own Primarch to guide them, Aeternus knew they were significantly less effective even with their praetor replacements. It was a fact that was evident in the way they spilled their own blood on Urshic blades or willingly sacrificed themselves to push the advance a single inch. Their valiant sacrifice would be forever remembered to him.
Primarch Bodiciia pulled herself back from the slaughter, her Verdant Raiders now falling into line with the center of the Cataegis Blade. Urshic ichor of varying hues drenched her armor, while fresh wounds weeped Imperial blood from her limbs. The Nightbringers fell in with the Second Legion, Aeternus had no doubt that Theaddon still lived and remained close to what remained of his Thunder Warriors. As Ushotan and the Steel Lords found their ground around him, Rex spared a glance at the auspex one final time. He grit his teeth in frustration. The Infernal Phoenixes and Caged Dogs were far ahead of the advance, lost to their geneflaw or drawn into bloodlust. The Primarch of the First could waste no more time on them.
+’Advance!’+
The continued barrage from the XXI, support from the rearward Imperial Army, and the ridgeward advance from the Cataegis allowed their movement. Aeterneus Rex hefted the banner in his left hand, raising it up into the sky to signal the continuation of the attack. Few and far were the times that the Cataegis ever moved as a single unit. This became one of those times as the Thunder Warriors simultaneously pushed forward with bolter and chainsword. The lumbering dreadnoughts, formidable and slow, lunged into the valley with reckless abandon. The heavy bark of Imperial tanks resounded behind the march, breaking apart mutants and mortals for their continued aggression.
Every step that the Imperials took was a titanic effort. The uneven grounds of the valley were quickly filling with the shattered bodies of the Thunder Warriors, eviscerated carcasses of the slave-mutants, and the remains of Kalagann’s preternatural monsters. The Cataegis, however, were making progress beyond the scope of possibility. Groups of Urshites died for every one Imperial laid low. Sorcerers were crushed by fist and fury. Monstrosities were torn apart by frenzying genewarriors, lost to the geneflaw born to them by the Emperor.
Primarch Aeternus could feel the strain on his mind as he fought from the forefront. His attention was divided a hundredfold between the various Cataegis Legions, the fighting in his immediate vicinity, and the plethora of chronometers screaming in his ear. Perhaps it would’ve been better to command from the rear, guiding his warriors like the Emperor had once upon a time. He refused. He would fight, command, and win from the front. There was no realm where he would accept leading from a comfortable position.
A body flew past him. One of the many Infernal Phoenixes’ who lost their mind, floundered into the backlines of their advance. He didn’t have the time to register it. His attention was affixed to the beings that barred their way past the middle of the valley. The first of many tribulations that would come to meet them. The first of Kalagann’s titanic monstrosities that dared to rear its ugly maw at the Emperor’s vanguard. Where the unwashed masses of arisen corpses, half-bestial slave-warriors, and low-ranking vityaz had battered against the mass of the Cataegis, the true might of Ursh awaited them.
A vast line of unholy creatures with cannons strapped to their back launched wyrd ammunition into the Cataegis. Vityaz with powered armor glowing with the corruption of their unsaid gods patiently waited, guarding the instruments of their God-King against the Imperial advance. Lumbering far and above them, a trio of titanic creatures reminiscent of the Urshic migou waited with their toothy maws splayed open. Warplating was haphazardly bolted to various portions of the creatures’ flesh. As if they needed to be protected from conventional weapons, Aeternus thought grimly.
+’XXI, bring down the wrath of the Emperor on those creatures. Apocalypsos, Corvinius, Sunxian. Butcher the ridges and buy us the advance with blade and bolter. Spread the line and push to the beasts!’+ Aeternus commanded with a roar, affixing the auspex with new telemetry. Fresh battle lines were drawn across the map from tacticians and vox-operators far behind the advance.
“Arturas! Theaddon!” the Primarch of the First yelled, passing off the banner to a nearby Steel Lord. Aeternus began to sprint, charging through a group of dredges and flattening them into pink mist. He had a small window to act in the moments following the Astartes’ artillery barrage. Rex needed to reach the center as the first shells began to pelt the creatures or the advance would flounder. As if notifying the sudden aggression from their commander, the heavily armored God-Slayers started to push the line.
+’Received, Primarch.’+ Came the punctual response from one of the XXI Legion’s Astartes Captains. +’Mechanized artillery repositioning now. Firing for effect in t-minus thirty seconds with standard high-explosive fragmentation shells. We are patching a spotting vox frequency to you and your elements; our Basilisks have an allotment of hunter-killer missiles ready to fire at your designation. Make free use of them.’+
There was a momentary break in the vox signal as the thunder warriors arrayed for their charge - and then the signal came, accompanied by the shrill, keening, resonant hum of a multitude of Earthshaker shells raining down along a parabolic arc to fall straight down onto the assembled Urshic lines in a rolling, staggered wave of munitions, striking first at the titan creatures and the Vityaz vanguard before the curtain of fire drew back to hammer the beasts situated in the rear with their wyrd-cannons.
+’We now greet the enemy with the closed fist of the Emperor’s Contempt.’+
The first wave of shells stabbed into the earth, several slicing directly into the backs of the titanic monstrosities and other landing adjacent to or amongst the Vityaz vanguards. Plumes of explosive flames specked with piercing shrapnel surged like the tide itself, the Thunder Warriors charging towards a wall of flame and death. As the fires began to recede, the damage became evident - Each shell left an impact crater between eight and fifteen meters in diameter, many of them overlapping substantially, the floor of the ravine having been pounded flat in many places by the amassed bombardment. The Vityaz forces had been scattered - the corrupted forces empowering them had prevented many of them from succumbing even to the immense force of the bombardment strikes, but even though could not withstand the raw force that had tossed them about like dolls and upheaved the very earth beneath their feet, disrupting their fortifications and lines. The Earthshaker cannons had lived up to their name, and the Urshic vanguard was left in disarray.
Mortal men died as the XXIst swept the trenches of all life. Methodical and smooth, the Astartes snuffed out every bastion of resistance, every pocket of heroic last stands was met with disgrace at the end of Imperial bolter and blade, and every attempted withdrawal was slaughtered as they broke from the cover of their trenches and dugouts to find shelter in a more rearward line. The squads of the XXIst, their senses enhanced by their armor systems able to cut through the dense chaff they had laid in advance of themselves, moved inexorably toward victory.
Out beyond the trenchline, in the blasted land between the Emperor’s transhumans and mortals of Ursh, the damned moved in silence toward the Imperial advance. The systems of the XXIst, honed and tested to cut through the dense chaff, found no signs of the incoming raiders. Cloven hooves splashed through puddles of radwater and blood, wicked curved blades sliced through the smoke of battle, leaving fresh air in their wake as they ghosted toward the bleeding edge of the XXIst legion.
A bipedal, avian-headed, humanoid burst from the smoke and chaff in no-mans-land with a screech, its blade arcing out for a decapitating strike against a legionnaire, too slow. It was blasted back by a bolt round from another of the astartes’ squad, iridescent blue blood raining across the trench as the body simply disappeared into the mist. The only sign it had ever existed at all was the pungent smell of lapping oils and incense penetrating the filter systems of the Astartes armor.
With the first strike failed by the new Urshic raiders, the charge began in earnest. A cacophony of animalistic clicks, brays, and bird-like calls rang out from the smoke and chaff, dulled only slightly as the creatures barreled toward the Imperials, and hundreds of the beasts descended upon the XXIst’s forward squads as one.
It was then that the XXI’s lethal sweep through the trenchlines was stalled - and then driven back. The Astartes had prepared to create a battlefield of their choice; to blind and hamstring the enemy and to fight in an environment where the foe could not strike back - but these new creatures were bound by no earthly sensory limitations. They did not need eyes to see, noses to scent, tongues to taste, or flesh to feel. The Astartes, for all their plans, had partially blinded themselves - and when these new fiendish enemies fell upon them, their lines could not even call out to reorganize, the hideous haze of chaff rendering their own vox all but useless.
The marines of the XXI had trained for this form of scenario - and their squads began to make back in a fighting retreat, looking for their kin to form a stable battleline once more as they did so. Those squads who did not sense that the conflict had gone awry, who did not fall back swiftly enough, who could not find the line reforming behind them - were set upon and torn asunder by the Avian creatures.
The XXI suffered, then. But as they suffered, they continued to embattle the trenchlines surrounding the valley proper - whenever it seemed their wavering lines would be fully repulsed, the lines of Basilisks and Chimera that formed the backbone of their assault would scythe the Daemons down with volleys of rockets and heavy bolter fire - and time and time again, the Astartes drove the Daemons back into the glinting dagger mist of their chaff artillery to renew their prosecution in earnest. Charged by not only Primarch Aeternus, but by the decree of the Emperor himself, unfearing of death or loss, they held the ridge of the vale - even as the pitiless Daemons tore their uneven flanks and exposed squads to shreds.
The Steel Sentinels had continued their primary objective and ensured that the forces of the Cataegis did not fall to encirclement. Yet, with the surge the Thunder Warriors took at Aeturnus’ orders, those of the nineteenth legion could not stand idle. They were forced to advance rapidly, cutting down foes that did not die or were simply ignored by those maddened in blood frenzy. The small force of sentinels were cursed to begin spreading themselves to cover more of the valley proper. Each of them had to fight as two Astartes, none firing Volkite and hacking into the ranks of wyrds and abominations.
Arturas knew that he lacked the firepower to deal with the titanic threat that stalked the battlefield and merely needed to hope that the artillery of the XXI could fell them - or merely distract them. He and his first brothers, however, were not ones to shy away from a challenge for they had fought beside the God-Slayers before and they knew how to kill monsters. His retinue prepared what Melta-charges they carried.
The path forwards would be cleared with blood and sacrifice of need be. Those of the most senior of the legion surged forwards quickly embroiling themselves within the ranks of the Cataegis, killing and moving as quickly as their gene-crafted bodies allowed them. They forced themselves through, while the Cataegis gorged themselves on slaughter needing to move faster and faster than what their bodies could allow. Arturas could see the Primarch advancing, yet, he would not stop for him as unstoppable as Aeternus was in the sea of blood and gore.
“Forwards, brothers!” Arturas roared as his brothers sprinted through all they could, not stopping as rounds bounced off their armor or as explosives rocked against their shields, “Bring down the central-most titan! Designate the others for hunter-killer strikes!”
The Urshic line was shattered by the onslaught orchestrated by the XXI. Slave-warriors buckled under the reinvigorated assault of the Imperials. Vityaz desperately tried to rally through prayer and slaughter. Creatures of the Empyrean brayed and screamed in desperation to remain in the mortal realm. The Cataegis and the Astartes annihilated their way through the valley, butchering mortal and godbound alike in remorseless brutality. Unlike in the initial stages, the genewarriors of the Emperor did not suffer under the overwhelming bite of Kalagann’s horde. The valley rigids were contested, their daemonic allies killed, and their morale scattered to the wind.
As if smelling their victory, the Imperial line suddenly began to naturally shift into a three-pronged trident. The Primarch of the First led the center of the spear, Charmagnol on the left, and Gilgamenses on the right. There was no overt command to do so. The Cataegis simply did, executing orders unsung and massacring the enemy before them. The western ridge remained locked in a constant state of conflict, threatening to spill over into the valley with every passing second. The eastern ridge was pressed by the sudden appearance of monsters, though the XXI and Apocalypsos handled it with practised ease.
Each prong of the Imperial trident met with the wayward elements of the Infernal Phoenixes and the Caged Dogs, though they were heavily depleted and still fighting as recklessly as before. They fought faster, harder, and more manic than they had at the start of the fight. For every Cataegis of those legions lost in their geneflaw, the Urshic horde lost entire groups worth of combatants. Their butchery saw even the dead remain unrisen, cut to pieces with such brutality that they could not reanimate. By sheer luck, those that lost their mind hurled themselves into the enemy and not their allies.
Aeternus did not have time to account for the losses of the Tenth and Fifteenth, nor did he have time to figure out which Primarchs were still alive. He barely had time to register that Corvinius and Sunxian had yet to acknowledge his orders. His brain burned in a desperate attempt to keep track of everything while he butchered through a horde of Urshites. Out of the corner of his vision, Rex could see the indicators of his God-Slayers slowly tick down to forty-one of their original fifty. The Primarch, with his sense alone, could feel Ushotan, Theaddon, Arturas, and Bodiciia close to him. Every time he flicked his blade to the right, he could see Gilgamense’s flank fighting and dying. Every time he flicked Ea to the left, Charmagnol was ferociously tearing into the enemy. It was chaotic - yet it was manageable.
Briefly, he could make out the sound of Arturas’ call for hunter-killer strikes. He couldn’t have agreed more as he crashed through a vityaz, whose strength had left them in the artillery aftermath. Apocrypha, edged in crimson, cut through flesh and armor with disgusting ease - beyond what he thought was acceptable. Despite the thought, the Primarch didn’t hesitate to continue cutting them down. An auspex ping alerted him to the location of his last few surviving Captains - Nero - as they assisted leading the God-Slayers on the western flank. Another chime saw Tiberius coldly operating on the eastern flank. Each led ramshackle squads of the remaining First Legio, acting as rallying points and balls of utter annihilation. He was glad they still lived. Few would survive this encounter.
The center of the valley finally greeted his sight as the vityaz attempted to rally out of their battleshocked formation. It was too late for Kalagann’s knights. The thunder had come. He barreled into the first enemy with such herculean strength that their skeleton threatened to rip from their skin. Apocrypha licked out once to the right, slaughtering a pair attempting to flank him. Ea flicked out to the left, demolishing an Urshite with his fist and suppressing a cluster of encroaching migou. An avian creature attempted to ambush him. He headbutted it with his helmet, splattering the wyrd corvid into sulphur-scented ash. Every kill brought him closer to the titans.
Those horrible, abominable titans loomed overhead as he killed more and more of the vityaz. They were still reeling from the artillery, desperately waving their elongated limbs out in vain defense. The gargantuan on the western flank lashed out like a petulant child, slamming their claws into the valley floor to pulverize enemy and ally alike. An untold amount of Cataegis died in that one fit of rage, yet Aeternus couldn’t focus on it. The being in the center, slightly taller than the other two, was his target. He wasn’t alone in aiming for the beast. Bodiciia fought savagely to his immediate left with her axe, while Theaddon lashed out to his immediate right with his powersword. The staccato of bolterfire behind him warned of Ushotan and his Steel Lord’s closeness. The Primarch of the First rushed to the titan with Arturas close behind him.
“Ushotan! Handle the cannons!” Primarch Aeternus ordered. His voice was hoarse from screaming by this point, enough that he wasn’t sure if the command was heard. It mattered little. Those lumbering creatures with metal-flesh, humming cannons would die to one of his allies. Rex deliberately chose to ignore them, trusting in the skill and prowess of the Imperials around him.
+’Bring down His wrath!’+ The Primarch of the First roared over the vox. Their targeting solution had been acquired for several minutes already due to Arturas. All that was required of the XXI was a press of the button and the men to orchestrate another wave of devastation.
The order for the missile strikes went out. This time, there was no preceding vox affirmation or countdown from the XXI. The hunter-killer missiles launched from their chimeras were a breed apart from the earthshaker artillery they mounted. Using solid rocket fuel for propellant and with dedicated logis-engines and gyroscopic guidance, they combined power, agility, and speed that even a Thunder Warrior would have envied. Even launched straight up from the tops of their parent Chimeras, they were able to parabolically loop through the air, dive downwards into the valley, and strike their targets in under a second and a half.
The sight of it could only inspire awe in onlookers. In that second-and-a-half span, the nail-shaped munitions tore down from atop the vale like scathing claws, riding crowns of flame and leaving scars of emission behind them in the air tracing their trajectory in reverse. On approach, the air itself shattered as the missiles violently parted it, a keening wail heralding their approach and a thunderous crescendo accompanied them. Six in total rode down from atop the edge of the vale. The two titanic monstrosities striding abreast the one leading their triad were stabbed into by two of the missiles each. The titan on the eastern flank, reacting to the sound of the approaching hunter-killers, had turned partially to behold them and suffered the misfortune of one of the missiles diving headlong into its gaping maw while a second cleaved directly downwards into its crown. The simultaneous detonations that followed blew the monstrous creature apart from the inside-out while compressing the shredded, visceral remnants and jagged armor metal fragments downward, reconfiguring the titan into a stew of bubbling flash-cooked organic resin heaped with chunks of armor fragments pooling inside a crater where once the Urshic monster had stood while a majestic plume of flame unfurled into the sky, incandescent flames marking the spot where an enemy of the Emperor had been unmade. The second titan fared better than the first, not having turned to look at the oncoming strikes. One missile slammed directly into its armored flanks, while the other obliquely skewered into one of its gargantuan eyes. This time, the twin detonations did not quite kill it - the first missile’s melta-warhead burning straight through the armor with a concentrated lance of fusion-fire that reduced its innards to smoke and caused the crude armor plating bolted to its hide to dissolve into luminous molten fluid that dribbled across its hide and mutilated the creature further. The second missile caused its giant eye to rupture, organic membranes and cerebral fluid alike boiling away as fusion-fire screamed its way through the creature’s cranium to vaporize an entire hemisphere of its brain. That entire half of its bulbous, misshapen cranium deformed and deflated as flames filled it with the molten rudiments of its own skull and nervous tissue - but the creature did not die, instead falling to the ground with a harrowing cry from its gaping maw that would surely induce as much pain in mortal men as the creature actually felt, the resonance of its anguish bearing otherworldly potency.
Two more hunter-killer missiles curved into the back lanes of the cannon-bearing creatures situated behind the titans and their Vityaz elements, striking and eliminating two of the monstrous creatures in an instant, reducing them to billowing wafts of shredded, burning skin. Many more of the wyrd-projectile firing creatures remained, but the raw shock and awe of the strikes in the back lines caused several other of the creatures to be briefly unsettled and distracted from the battle itself as they reacted to two of their own being erased from the face of the Earth, while the Vityaz soldiers were still panicked and seeking cover along the nearby terrain.
That moment of disorientation would prove fatal. The giant gun-beasts that staggered forward, instinctively avoiding the deflagration, found themselves stumbling into a crossfire that suddenly opened its jaws before them. A loose line of Thunder Warriors emerged from the haze, bolters roaring in the hands of those of them who still had not spent all their magazines. At a glance it was impossible to say which Legion they had once been - the metal of their armour was painted many times over with the black of ash, the red of blood and the less mentionable hues of infernal ichors. But there was no mistaking their grim snarls, the ferocious curl of their scarred lips, the guttering red flame of their Primarch’s sword. Firm as the hardest metal, ragged and dented but yet unbroken, Ushotan’s Steel Lords had rallied to Aeternus’ call.
“The whelps beat us to sparking the kindling!” the Primarch bellowed, voice hoarse but vibrant with bloodlust, “Are you going to let them claim the fire, you sons of dogs?!”
The reply was more of a disjointed and elemental roar than a concerted “NO!”, but it was vehemently punctuated by a new bolter volley. The Steel Lords were a paradox; rampant and savage when in the company of more orderly forces, but now that they were among their own, their rage seemed cooler and more directed than that of most Cataegis. While the warriors who had exhausted their bolts hewed into the disorganised vityaz with their blades, the rest aimed their fire upwards. Not at the heads of the cannon-giants, nor even at the joints of their clublike limbs, but at the howling contraptions of brass and wyrdflame chained to their backs.
Horrifically destructive though they were, the cannons were not things of balanced artifice, but volatile amalgams of hellish alchemy, witchcraft and bound spirits. The Steel Lords’ bolter fire would not have been enough to destroy them, but it did damage their perilous construction, puncturing vitriol sacs, cracking blood-painted sigils, splintering warding talismans. The effects did not let themselves be expected for long. One of the stumbling beasts was instantaneously immolated as a pillar of venom-green flame erupted from its back, reducing its midsection to irradiated cinders. Another began to clumsily turn its hunched frame away from the collapse and left itself exposed to a cluster of grenades, whose initial blast bloomed into a streaming cataract of howling brimstone and struck through the knotted shoulder of its neighbour.
Ushotan himself all but vaulted over the staggered bands of Urshite warriors, charging at a particularly large and hideous cannon-beast. It lowered its horned head as it saw him approach, snapping at him with misaligned slanted jaws, but the Primarch was faster. He pushed past its stomping forelimbs and swung his sword in an upward arc, cleaving into the creature’s sagging underbelly. The plasma-coated blade sank into misbegotten flesh and struck churning unearthly organs. A howl broke out from the giant as its own burning bile consumed it from within, turning to wafts of scorching smoke as it reached the air. Clouded in the putrid fog, the remainder of the monsters ceased firing, vainly stumbling to reposition and only opening themselves further to be cut down by the Steel Lords’ onslaught.
Surging forwards with unending determination, the small squad of the Steel Sentinels had carved a bloody path towards the remaining Titan. The force of the Legion’s finest cut hard and fast - beset on all sides by wyrds, witches, and monstrosities alike. Gallahad swung his sword wide, catching many in a wide arc of gore and death. He had spearheaded this assault, acting as a bulldozer that ran through all he could. Yet, the toll of their spearhead had blunted him, his armor cracked and pierced by all manner of weapon. For the Astartes, it took all his strength to continue the rapid surge forth.
A projectile pierced his side, blowing a hole straight through both sides of his armor and almost forcing him to the ground. The Steel Sentinel held his ground, lungs quickly filling with blood that began to travel up his throat. Each of the command squad knew they had traveled too far to turn back now in their blind charge, each of them began to tire and feel the wounds of the damned they fought begin to catch them. Gallahad turned his head just enough for himself and the Legion Master to meet gazes. Arturas nodded in a wordless order and Gallahad obeyed, priming his Melta-bomb as with all the strength he could yet muster began to run forward, dropping his weapon. He gripped the bomb and held it close - none of the wretched stopped him, not that they could as he trampled mortal and abomination alike under his boot. After getting far enough, there was a small eruption in the disorganized melee as the Melta erupted sending hordes of gore and metal into the air.
Arturas noted the loss of his brother, as he and his remaining few continued to surge forwards - through the broken line. The titanic beast had continued its rampage all the while doing what it could to blunt the Imperial line. The Astartes would, in short order, bring this rampage to an end as Arturas shouted clearly into his vox ‘+Bring it down!+’
Those that could threw their Melta-charges upwards, not heeding the enemies that descended upon them to stop this attack. A cacophony of explosions hit the knee of the titan, a pained roar filling the air as its weight caused its leg to break down causing the great beast to collapse upon itself. Still alive - but crippled as it held itself up on its massive arms, trying to steady itself.
The sea of bodies was parted for the thrust of the dagger. The wyrd-beasts could no longer perform their duties as they were butchered by the Steel Lords, Infernal Phoenixes and Caged Dogs. The Verdant Raiders swept left around the kneeling titan, butchering into the defending vityaz with ruthless abandon. The Nightbringers slaughtered to the right, massacring with what little of them remained to fight. Primarchs Aeternus, Bodiciia, and Theadon sprinted on a warpath to the titan. The final blow before the breach of Mosvoroth.
The Lord of the Verdant Raiders vaulted towards the titan’s raised knee, bashing aside a vityaz that tried to defy her. Weeping wounds dotted her ceramite plating, freshly spilling blood onto the battlefield. She mustered on with a single purpose in mind. With the force of forty-thousand superhumans, Bodiciia of the Second Legio Cataegis hefted her greataxe far behind her and hurled it. The weapon ripped through the air like a javelin thrown by a god, threatening to perforate the soundbarrier from her sheer, murderous force. It did not merely bite into the Urshic giant - it tore through plate, flesh, and bone in a single, brutal maneuver. The Primarch disappeared in a sea of bodies as she collapsed in exhaustion.
The response was felt across the valley. The beast bellowed in outraged agony as another knee had been taken, sundering what remained of its strength to stand. It lashed out with one of its colossal arms to swipe away anything and everything that dared to harm it. Urshites and Imperials were tossed like ragdolls or smashed into gory paste by the attack. It’s rampage didn’t last long as Theaddon closed in on the right arm of the titan, leaping onto the giant’s planted hand to slash with his powersword. The beast attempted to pull back in fury, yet the Nightbringer was already unloading his bolt pistol into cut and exposed flesh. Sinew erupted and tore as the gargantuan ripped free from its forsaken extremity. The Primarch of the Eighteenth leapt back into the melee bathed in titan ichor.
Primarch Aeternus thundered forward as the battle unfolded around him. The Steel Lords had cleared the path. The XXI had allowed them the strike. The Verdant Raiders, Steel Sentinels, and Nightbringers had brought the titan down. All that was left was the killing strike. None of the Urshites remained before him except the gargantuan itself. Reality seemed to waver as the Lord of the First Legio sprinted closer to the being. Killing deities was what he was born for.
The titan snapped out at him as the distance was finally closed. Even in tyrant armor, Aeternus was meteoric in comparison to the Urshic monstrosity. The Emperor’s Blade side-stepped the bite and drove his fist into the left hand of the colossus. Bone and sinew detonated as the Primarch shattered the joint connecting the extremity with a resounding punch. Kalagann’s creature roared in defiance as it finally collapsed, writhing on the ground like the long forgotten worms of Terra’s past. The howl was cut short as Aeternus stepped back to his right, swinging Apocrypha into the beast’s cranium. Crimson-wreathed plasma sawed through the armor protecting it’s skull, then into hardened hide, then into maroon sinew, and finally into bone and grey matter. Vitae ejected out onto the Godslayer in burning chunks, unstable plasmic energy cascading out of the being like a river of blood. It screamed anew in an agonizing song most foul, threatening to burst his eardrums with each cry. He ignored it as he did every monster that he slayed.
“Suffer not the unclean to live!” Aeternus roared as he thumbed the activation rune on his greatsword. Steam violently vented out of the crossguard in a thin veil, rapidly cooling the weapon’s systems as it awakened. He lifted and planted his foot atop the creature’s skull for balance, pressing down with enough force not to be blown backwards by his blade’s plasmic power.
A thunderous crack rolled across the battlefield as Apocrypha finally discharged into the dying titan. The body of the gargantuan bloated and swelled, becoming a self-contained plasmic sun, unstable plasma flowing through it’s veins with living crimson energy. It finally burst into a miniature mushroom cloud of vitae and sinew, cascading titan gore in a short blood-fueled shower around Aeternus. His boot lifted and stomped on the creature’s cranial remains, crushing feeble bone beneath him. Molten plasma seeped from beneath his foot, soaking the valley floor with life once more. The beast was slain, leaving one final gargantuan to finish the valley invasion. The vityaz around him were slaughtered as the last of their morale was crushed, butchered by Astartes and Cataegis alike. Aeternus lifted his gaze to Mosvoroth as the last titan began to topple, doomed to follow it’s kin into oblivion.
At its feet, the ground churned with steel and blood, a spiny morass where the frenzied shapes of men seemed to melt into one another. The Annihilators and Red Knights had charged in to fell the beast, blinded in the last throes of maddened rage to anything but the largest living thing they could see - just as well, for all they saw now was to them an enemy to cut down. Aeternus could barely distinguish between the warriors of the two legions now, washed from head to foot in crimson gore, their armour gouged and broken. Only his expert knowledge of his brothers’ ways let him discern better - here were Knights carving into the monster's ankle with their long overhead strikes, there the last sons of the Fifth Cataegis struck at its pillarlike bones with the sweeps of their axes.
He saw, unmistakable, the two Primarchs emerge from the seething quagmire, made more alike than nature or the Emperor ever could by the sanguine fires of battle. Like the closest of brothers and the bitterest of rivals, they jostled and vied for every step, each burning with the singular will to strike the killing blow. They did not see how the titan's rampant swipes thinned ever more the shrunken ranks of their legionaries, carving gouges of viscera and torn limbs into the dense mass of Thunder Warriors who had lost all thought of their own safety. Blades broke, stuck in masses of impious flesh, glanced from bone spurs and clattered away, and so they fought on with nails and teeth like beasts.
Like a mastodon harried by a pack of slavering hounds, the monstrosity bled out, its legs a ruin of wounded meat that could not hope to support its unnatural mass. With a keening howl, it began to fall, first to its knees and then down to the corpse-choked earth. In a final blaze of animal rage, it opened wide its jaws, and its throat shone from within with the bio-plasmic glow of a scream that would incinerate its slayers.
Jotharion and Charmagnol could have seen their demise rising from the titan’s innards, could have taken a single step back, avoided their doom - if there had been anything left in them but the rabid fervour of carnage. The gigantic head plunged towards them, and as one single body they leapt to meet it. All they felt was the hated enemy approaching within reach of their arms, and the other at their side, that hated and inseparable presence that spurred each of them to strive and surpass someone they could not name for a challenge long forgotten.
As one, the two blades struck deep into the colossal skull, and as one the Primarchs screamed their victory. The titan screamed with them, and its voice was blinding death.
When the glare was gone, Aeternus could see nothing move around the enormous corpse. Gone were the Thunder Warriors, crushed under the toppled enormity or scorched to blackened heaps by the plasmic cry. Gone was the horror’s very head, a carbonised gash all that remained above its shoulders. And gone were Jotharion and Charmagnol, vanquishers and vanquished, who had raced one another into the maw of death itself, and whose contest would now only ever be adjudicated by memory.
And in memory did they become immortal. The Godslayer witnessed their final, glorious moments with bittersweet sorrow beginning to fill his chest. He’d never forget any of their valiant sacrifices - so long as his mind remained his own as the Emperor had said. He was grateful that their deaths were as righteous as they had wanted. The moment of remorse passed no quicker than it had begun, but the pain of their loss remained. His attention was drawn back to the immediate battlelines, now beginning to progressively thin.
An endless cry of victory rose up from across the battlelines as the vityaz attempted to retreat. They were butchered for their cowardice by Astartes and Cataegis - those that had managed to survive the reckless assault on the valley. The last of Kalagann’s wyrd-managerie were slaughtered by relentless cavalcades of scissoring bolter rounds and volkite beams. Combat blade, motorized chainsword, and powered blade mercilessly murdered the wretches that attempted to surrender. Banners were raised in righteous victory, each bearing the raptor and thunderbolt of the Emperor. Glory for Him of Himalazia was on every scarred lip across the battlefield.
The Urshic defense collapsed as whatever remained of their stalwart defenders began to retreat back into Mosvoroth proper. Heavy weapon crews attempted to organize a tactical withdraw, only to be hammered by Imperial artillery and surgical strikes from surviving genewarriors. Limping warmachines tried to scurry back into the gates of the hive-citadel, where murderholes poured out an ever-dwindling deluge of lasfire and bullet into the invaders. The bulk of the Imperial Army quickly filled in where the Cataegis charge had butchered the darktide, units beginning to set up new firing solutions and reinforce the genewarriors where necessary.
Yet the Cataegis continued onward, leaving their dead in the blood-soaked ground of Ursh. Primarch Aeternus remained as the Imperial line readjusted for the final dagger thrust into Mosvoroth. Their objective was completed in the valley - only the fight for the hive remained. He dared not request for the Primarchs to take stock of their numbers. Rex already knew what the casualty list would look like. Twenty five of his God-Slayers remained to fight in Kalagann’s fortress. How many of his siblings remained? He shrugged off the thought. Not now, he thought to himself. He would mourn their loss when Kalagann was dethroned. When the Raptor flew over Mosvoroth - or what remained of it.
+’Reform the line! We will not stop until Kalagann’s head has been cleaved from his body and the Raptor flies over Ursh! For Him of Himalazia! For Unity! Raptor Imperialis!’+ Primarch Aeternus roared over the vox, pushing the Cataegis onward even as they fell to the geneflaw. He knew that he pushed them to their death. In the words of the Emperor - it was His final gift and His last mercy.
The titan-gates of Mosvoroth that had held Ursh from invaders for centuries fell within several seconds of the order. Their defense fell in a shower of artillery fire that rivaled the destruction of Sanctii, vomited from Basilisks, Minotaurs, and Baneblades. The walls of the citadel fractured and cracked from Imperial reckoning, sundering new breaches for the various Imperial forces to enter through. Death sang from every mouth on the battlefield. Glory was gained from every Urshite murdered in their bastion. The end of Ursh was upon them. Credits: @MarshalSolgriev@FrostedCaramel@Terminal@Oraculum@Lauder
Two minutes remained on the chronometer until the siege was to begin. The rumble of explosions and the staccato of gunfire was drifting over the positions of the waiting Imperials. Pillars of thick black smoke were rising from the abhuman ghetto courtesy of the Magh Meallan infiltrators, and vox intercepts were already signalling that the diversion was working. Several reserve formations of Pacificans, meant to reinforce breaches along the curtain wall or the Harmony and Meridian gates, were surging toward the ghetto to contain what they believed to be a full-scale incursion into the city from the North.
One minute remained on the operation chronometer. The artillery batteries, bloodied but unbroken, renewed their bombardment. All along the imperial lines, the flash of massive cannons and siege guns lit up the fading light of dusk anew.
The shells impacted all along the curtain wall, great gouts of orange flame consuming sections of defenders and reducing emplacements to rubble in moments. Other explosions resounded behind the curtain wall, observation groups and signals intelligence having pinned muster points for reserve units and command posts. But the most intense fire was concentrated along the Meridian Gate. Relentless impacts tore rockrete and reinforced plating from its face as the shells found their marks.
“Command to Battle Group Pacificus, commence the assault. For the Emperor.” The battlegroup-wide command net crackled off as formations of tanks and armored transports rolled forward from their dugouts with their weapons silent.
The battlegroup command sent a ripple of activity throughout the entire legion. Where the black-bronze carapace of the Thirteenth hadn’t been there previously, thousands of scorpions now appeared. They shed their cameoline cloaks, emerged from earthen ground, and leapt out from the poisonous waters of the Pacific. Each was a blur of lightning that swiftly began their thousand-meter ascent with claw and sword. The bloom of artillery shells, the lance of lasfire, and the eruption of tank ordinance did not falter them. Like insects swarming a carcass, the assassin-dreamers died and rose as an endless tide of genewarriors.
It was the same for Captain Raamiz’s own squad of witch-minds and wyrd-wielders. He felt the draw of the aether as he used its power to scale the walls at a speed incomprehensible to the Pacificans. Ten Scorpions followed him closely, each a product of his own mentoring and refining with the Sirens of Terra. They were the first over the parapets and the first to begin the slaughter in brutal close-combat. Psionic power weaved around him like a gale of black sand as he crossed the threshold. He came face-to-face with one of many defenders. The poor mortal identified him with rapidly increasing terror.
“Wit-“ the Pacifican tried to speak, yet lacked the vocal cords for such an utterance. Their throat had been torn out by wyrd-wreathed claws. Their body slumped to the floor, wyrd coursing through their wounds and out their extremities.
Chaos erupted from that moment as the Scorpions spread out with a speed known only to them. The wyrd enhanced their movements, pushing their genetically-enhanced body beyond the standard capabilities. The defenders died as bioelectricity, wyrd-enhanced claws, and raw strength cleaved through their numbers. Raamiz relished in their dismay, actively observing their spirits breaking as they perished. He was thankful that this most noble of tasks had been given to him. A single choice had secured the usefulness of his wyrd-wielders in the Thirteenth.
The pandemonium of the parapet paled in comparison to the chaos of a full-scale invasion. He could hear the wail of klaxons, the blossoming of bombards, and the screeching of aircraft beyond the dying of a million men. It would’ve been bliss if it weren’t for the advantage given to them. A noticeable lack of defenders in their section of the wall confirmed his suspicions in this regard. The Magh Meallans had completed their task. He clicked his tongue in annoyance. Many amongst the legion had grown a dislike for the abhuman islanders. A remedy for the future, he thought.
The last defender was hoisted up and torn in half by one of his brethren, Ismaal. The lower half of the man was tossed aside, yet the top remained in one of his claw-tipped gauntlets. The hooded Scorpion approached him and offered the defender, who screamed in agony.
Intelligence had been severely limited in navigating the great walls of Hongol, even for the infiltrators of Magh Meallan and the Sigilite Order. That left the Astartes saboteurs with one alternative. The ten gathered around the torn man as Raamiz removed the upper half of his skull with a swipe of his gauntlet. Pieces of gray matter were delicately plucked and placed into their mouths.
The effect was immediate, enhanced further by their witch-minds. The whole of Hongol’s labyrinthine wall-matrix was revealed to them in that instant. They felt the entirety of the individual’s being, their life, and their aspirations. Everything that they had experienced was given freely to the Scorpions. Everything was unlocked, their way unbarred by a lack of knowledge.
Captain Raamiz breathed in deeply as the knowledge came to a close. He held himself as the best of their number in this regard. Absorbing information from the deceased and growing from it. For him, there was no lag between reality and unreality. They were one and the same. His brethren were similar to a minor degree. The wyrd-wielders shared a look of understanding before moving. Powered weapons were freed from sheaths and foci were born into claw-tipped gauntlets.
They moved in warp-infused synchronization for the Meridian Gate.
Around the witch-minds of the Thirteenth, pict-feeds watched the swift slaughter with machine disinterest. But the Pacifican command center staff were anything but disinterested.
Alerts went up across the units charged with the defense of the walls, priority messages filling the screens of headquarters staffers and platoon commanders with dire warnings of the witch-minds infiltration.
At the Meridian Gate, reserve units that had been secreted away in the safety of the deep foundations of the massive fortress gate were assembled. Hundreds of defenders began making their way to the upper levels on great lifts and stairways wide enough for ten men shoulder to shoulder. They were being sent to man ancillary hard points normally used to defend within the structure itself were a breach to occur. Pacifican troopers grumbled as they were directed to emplace their crew served weapons at the ends of long hallways and to man murder holes around deadly blind corners, for to these Pacificans the war was outside the gates and never, not in all the years since the Meridian Gate had been erected in Narthan Dume’s name, had it ever made it inside these halls.
Raamiz glanced at the auspex pressed against his eye as he dashed through Hongol’s defenses. Vox chatter confirmed that the majority of his legion and cousin-legions were heavily engaged. He knew that the Meridian gate would fall before the Harmony gate, yet the Scorpion wondered how many of his brethren would die in that gamble. Every second counted. Every death was a loss slated against his own efforts. He would not allow this.
A corridor opened up ahead from the labyrinthine ferrocrete they navigated. The Pacifican sentinel that they had ingested, Soichiro, claimed that the entrance into the Meridian Gate complex lay before them. Their knowledge alerted them to what would’ve been surprising, if not for their abilities as transhumans. The witch-minds remained synchronized as the first of the defenders revealed themselves from a pair of murder holes. Close-range shrapnel from shotguns should’ve killed a normal man. They were no mortals. They were beyond that.
The Scorpion on the left clotted a defender’s blood in an instant, holding their power until the mortal exploded into a gore mess. The Astartes on the right wreathed the wyrd around his opponent, turning them inside out into a screaming mess of vitae. They pressed onward. Their corridor came to an end, expanding out into a kill-field with parapets faced out into the Pacifican wastes. Toxic-infused water, evaporated by a thousand and one weapons, wafted in the open air. Hundreds of soldiers were engaged in a brutal defense against myriad bronze-black giants. The witch-minds rushed past, allowing their brethren to complete their objective. An entrance into the Meridian Gate lay bare, its defenders torn asunder by ferocious invaders.
As the first witch-mind crossed into the Gate’s threshold at the mid-levels, their body exploded into a shower of gore. Lances of lascannons, shells from autocannons, and missiles from launchers obliterated their corporeal form alongside countless other munitions. The following Scorpions would not suffer such failure as the lead formed wyrd-barriers that caught stubberfire from above. Pacificans emerged from more murder holes, attempting to flank. They were cut down before they could engage, immolated by the Empyrean and soul-shattered by the Thirteenth.
Under the protection of their wyrd-barriers, Raamiz led the warriors in as an angry deity. Warp lightning wreathed his limbs, wyrd-energy danced within his muscles, and blood pumped faster than his enhanced body was naturally capable of. His power spear was thrown across the room, shockwaves of lightning arcing from behind it. Defenders perished as it passed, electrocuted into flesh-tinged corpses. The witch-mind followed after it in milliseconds, aided by the wyrd, and caught the spear midair. A weapons team had a mere moment before they disappeared into a pink mist of gore.
The Scorpions descended on the fleeing Pacificans of the mid-levels, cutting them down or forcing their skeletons out of their body. A witch-mind clattered to the floor onto his knees, grabbing at his head in searing agony. Before the Astartes could recover, the defenders descended upon him with unfiltered joy. Their last moments were filled with terror as the warlock warped the area around himself, culling the immediate vicinity like a blackhole. It ended the second it appeared, yet the Astartes was gone. The Thirteenth pressed onward, slaughtering the crew weapons with the power of the wyrd.
The mid-levels would never be cleared, yet Raamiz found a moment of serenity as the last ascender left for the upper-levels. He counted the life-links within his squad. Three had perished in total, leaving seven including himself. For the hundreds of mortals that had died, it was an impressive number. The Scorpion knew more remained above, yet he refused to walk into their ambush. One witch-mind was enough to learn from their hubris. A blink-command saw their squad rally.
“Egress the gate murder holes and begin scaling into separate ingresses. Remember, we are His scorpions. Act as such. Gloria Scorpii!” Raamiz growled as he dashed towards the closest hole. His auspex confirmed the remaining witch-minds had scattered and began their ascent anew. The battlefield awaited outside, growing fiercer and more grandiose as time passed. The shockwave of tower-mounted macrocannons were followed by the erroneous thundering of aerial ordinance. It would do little to affect their climb.
Or so he hoped. A fourth life signal broke. Another began to falter dangerously into crimson territory. The remaining climbed for several seconds, their limbs enhanced by the wyrd. Myriad munitions attempted to murder him. They would not be able to touch His scorpions with such slow ammunition. A murderhole to the upper levels arrived in his view, manned by a terrified Pacifican. A toothy grin spread across his lips as he descended, breaching the wall with wyrd-enhanced strength, siphoning it from his speed. The defender crumpled into a contorted mess. Others cried out on the same floor as the rest of the Scorpions arrived, descending into the unsuspecting sentinels with ease.
The Pacifican’s on this firing level broke in mere moments. At the head of the Thirteenth's assault, no mortal man stood defiant. The troopers fled for their lives, many cut down in only a handful of steps as they made for the already closing blast doors on the far side of the firing theater.
Several of the defenders managed to slip through the closing gap ahead of the Astartes, salvation reached as the transhuman warriors slaughtered those too slow or unable to move behind them. A pair of Pacifican troopers, the last within reach of salvation, were skewered through by silver tendrils that emerged from beyond the door.
One of Narthan Dume’s war machines arrived in a spectacularly visceral display as the two Pacificans it had speared from head to toe were cast off its mechanical tentacles in a shower of vitae.
The machine was silver from top to bottom, six rotating pairs of armored tentacles carrying it across the floor in swirling movements. Interlocking plates of armor comprised the entirety of the machine's spindly limbs, each movement heralded by tortured metal and clunking armor as it picked up speed toward the Scorpions. Its head, or what could be called such, was an upside-down teardrop shape with auspex lenses of seemingly random sizes protruding from it with no rhyme or reason to their position.
The tendril machine lashed out at the closest Astartes, a buzzing transonic blade at the very tip of the tentacle passing through the chestplate of the Scorpion with a high-pitched whine as it spun past. The machine whipped out with another tendril, sparks flying as its blade met a wyrd-enhanced parry.
+’Obscure yourselves and ascend!’+ Raamiz demanded over the vox-link, meeting the transonic blade with his spear. The powerfield wobbled violently as the metallic monstrosity’s armament threatened to break through the azure coating. A wyrd-infused push from his other gauntlet saw the machine pushed back briefly, widening the distance between the two combatants.
No sooner had the Scorpions split, the silvery machine was already upon him with the chilling logic of its namesake. Something within it had deemed him a higher threat than some of his brethren, yet it did little to shield them from its flaying tentacles. Another Astartes was sliced cleanly in half by a clunking, transonic limb as they attempted to meld into the darkness. Two remained to fight alongside him, while another two departed for the corners of the chamber. Four of its enormous appendages thrust out at him with devastating precision.
He sucked in air as a cold calmness overtook him. It was a sensation that he had experienced before in the dusken visions that blessed his brethren. An aura of oneness permeated through his limbs, wyrd coursing through his body as if it were blood pumping in his hearts. Raamiz parried the first strike, utilizing the momentum to dash into the second to pierce through one of the interlocking plates. His warp-infused fist met the third appendage, heavily knocking back the machine’s tentacle upwards. Biolightning wreathed his claw-tipped gauntlet thrust into the fourth, locking the machinery within and wreaking havoc within the automata.
His brethren watched it all occur within milliseconds of the command over their vox. Their actions took place a second later as Raamiz danced with the silvery machine, logics firing on all cylinders as chugging cogitators rapidly swapped priorities. The two Scorpions that disengaged sprinted to the ascender with wyrd-infused strength, while the remaining two joined the fight a second later. Both took a single appendage as their opponent while the automata was forced to dance between three separate entities. Power sword met transonic blade, while lightning arced off interlocking-plate.
The machine spun where it stood, oil and other unknown fluids flowing freely from a limp tentacle where Raamiz had found purchase with his gauntlet. It’s tentacles whipped around, following the spin as its internal cogitators and calculations began to correct the logic pathways and maths that had led it so deep into the enemy formation. The tentacles pulled in, parrying blows and allowing others to land with the cold logic of a machine sacrificing everything for survival. The tentacles tensed, and the machine leapt from its place between the three warriors of the Thirteenth with surprising dexterity.
The machine soared above the Witchminds, several tentacles finding purchase along the ceiling and walls as it rocketed itself to the now-moving ascender platform. It landed in a screeching crumple of metal on metal, crushing one of the Astartes as it did so. A moment later, the tentacles lashed out as the tear-drop machine attempted to right itself on the rising platform. The second Astartes danced deftly around the tentacles, the son of the Thirteenth meeting transonic blades with wyrd-enhanced steel in a test of speed and skill.
Raamiz cursed loudly as another Astartes was crushed by the tentacled machine, their vitals zeroing out across his augmented display. Three remained outside of himself. He rushed forward towards the ascender, eager to catch the prey that had escaped his clutches. Oneness quickly left his mindscape as reality set in. They could no longer suffer any more casualties.
+’Brothers! Hold the ascender!’+ He commanded as biolightning coursed down his greaves. The two remaining Astartes outside of the ascending cage halted, drawing the wyrd to their claw-tipped gauntlets. Metal began to crunch and bend as the ascender was forcefully halted from it’s ascension. The cage began to buckle and bend around the machine and the final witch-mind within.
As the cold logic of the abominable machine began to stir, the witch-mind before it suddenly dropped their weapon and clung to the metallic being. Warp-enhanced strength saw the gauntlets of the transhuman dig into the teardrop-machine’s body. Even as the transonic blades pierced their twin hearts, slashed their ceramite, and punctured their skull, the Astartes remained.
Their death was quickly avenged as Raamiz launched into the silver machine like a maritime hunter of old. His body crackled and stormed with fulmination akin to a storm. His spear, wreathed in the lightning of the wyrd, pierced into the machine as if it were a creature of prey from Terra’s forgotten oceans. Thunderbolts erupted from the wound in the abomination’s metallic flesh, coursing across it’s silvered surface. The Scorpion remained atop it, pushing the spear further down into it with every ounce of genewrought strength he could muster.
“By the Malik, drown in dusk!” Raamiz screamed out, his eyes glowing with the power of the Empyrean. He felt his body burn with all the accumulated energy within him. It felt as if he would explode into a storm of electricity at any moment. His mind ached with uncontrollable strain as he vented everything he could into the machine. The cage continued to coil around them as his remaining two brethren maintained their telekinetic entanglement.
The machine crumpled under the blow from the Scorpion. The deadweight of it’s teardrop shaped body piercing the floor of the ascender as the last of its motive forces leached from its cogitator.
The room fell silent, the crescendo of battle outside the walls the only companion for the remaining Astartes as they regrouped in the wake of the thinking machine.
A new sound joined the staccato of gunfire and bass thumps of artillery shells and energy weapons, a whine of engines and screech of metal. Tortured gears above them began to recall the ascender to the gatehouse’s main level, the mechanism of the lift raising the platform ever higher against the will of the Scorpion within.
Raamiz panted as adrenaline fled his body. His wrist jerked the power spear out of the silvery machine, though the head of the weapon remained firmly lodged inside. He tossed the weapon aside, it’s purpose fulfilled and no longer useful to the Scorpion. Perhaps he would agonize more over the loss of his favored spear, but his entire body was currently wracked with the aftermath of intense psionic backlash. Every inch of his skin wanted to blister as if it were bathed in promethium or peel like it had been under direct sunlight for months without a break. The edges of his vision were etched with lilac strands that threatened to curl inwards.
This is my limit, he thought to himself as his brethren pushed aside the Pacifican abomination to stand beside him. The remaining two Astartes of his squad appeared nearly as worn as he was, save for their weapons remaining in usable condition. He knew that they would not need them for much longer. One final obstacle remained.
“A scant amount remains above us,” one of his brothers, Khalid, said with serene certainty. He followed the direction that the Scorpion was staring at as the ascender began to rise. Raamiz dared not push the limit of his abilities any further lest he risk the wrath of the wyrd. He simply replied with a nod, calming himself through several deep breaths. His fingers flexed twice over as he prepared himself for another fight.
The ascender slowed to a halt, grinding the last inch of it’s remaining gears to deliver those within to their desired destination. It squealed loud enough to momentarily drown out the wail of death mere inches outside of it’s metal abode. An air of tranquility wrapped around the Astartes, who waited in utter silence as their bodies readied fresh cocktails of adrenaline into their forms. The portal before them - a heavyset pair of sliding doors - began to hiss with hydraulic pressure as they unlocked to their arrivals. Small klaxons warned the three to wait for the process to finish before a new chamber opened up before them.
“Perfect, did you kil-” a man in a Pan-Pacifican uniform began to ask before his skull disappeared into paste. The Astartes were already upon the Pacificans. Fifteen individuals tried to flee in every direction, each as terrified as the last. Khalid maneuvered to his left like a reaper to a grown field, dismembering and butchering the men and women without emotion. Sethal sprinted to his right, throwing one of the occupants into another with rightful anger.
He memorized the chamber even before he started killing anything that moved within. A squat, rectangular room with armored plasglass overlooking the macroway leading out of Hongol. Consoles, terminals, cogitators, and more encircled the area around him. No turrets unfurled from the roof or floor, nor were there any autonomous machines to intercept them. It was as if they had never prepared for an unlikely attack within the Meridian Gate’s control room. For their complacency, the Pacificans now decorated their abode with their own entrails.
“Please! Spare me!” One of them cried out as Raamiz seized them by the throat. He was milliseconds from crushing the man’s throat, yet the Scorpion changed his mind. The Pacifican in his grip was young, devoid of exemplary rank or decoration on his pale blue and grey uniform. He wore neither carapace nor exoskeleton to protect his meager form. None of them did. Victory was so certain to them that they elected not to prepare for defeat.
It angered him. His lips curled in a toothy grin that turned the man’s face ghostly pale. His claw-tipped fingers remained snug around the officer’s neck as he approached a particular console in the chamber. A variety of displays delicately hung over the device, each showing the status of the various gates that protected Hongol. Many runes decorated the surface of it, yet only the enormous lever in the middle drew his attention. The man squirmed in his grip as Raamiz reached down to the lever, softly placing his free hand on the handle.
“As you wish. I will spare you the details of what we will do to your people after you failed to defend your gate. I will spare you the future that awaits those within Hongol when the Emperor’s Legions claim them. I will spare you what will happen to your families as the Scorpions tear them to pieces.” Raamiz said as he began to pull the lever back towards him. Perhaps for a normal man it would’ve been difficult, yet for an Astartes it was a simple task. It slid into place with a loud thunk. The noise was nearly drowned out by the rest of his warriors massacring the remaining occupants in the Gate.
An unearthly sound like a thousand and one sheets of metal grinding on one another reverberated throughout the gatehouse. A cacophony of grinding gears, screaming cogitators, and shrieking chains bellowed out of the structure. Raamiz could feel the gates open thousands of feet below him, welcoming in hundreds of thousands of the Emperor’s finest warriors into Hongol. It was music to his ears, second only to the sobbing of the man still in his grip. He approached the plasglass looking down over the macroway, where the Astartes watched the fruit of their work ripen immediately.
Raamiz pressed the man against the plasglass as the Imperium rushed into the city. With his objective completed, the Scorpion took precious seconds to slowly squeeze the Pacifican’s throat until it spilled out over his claw-tipped gauntlets. He threw the corpse to the side after their life was finally drained. It dawned on him that the action gave him little satisfaction compared to completing his task. Then why did he do it? The thought was forgotten seconds later as the vox burst to life with the voice of his Legion Master.
+’Raamiz, status?’+ The harsh voice of the older Astartes requested. Raamiz could hear the raucous sound of warfare in the background, though the telltale noise of a rout was clear to him. He didn’t doubt that the Harmony Gate would soon fall to Zaid and his company.
+’The Meridian Gate has fallen, Legion Master,’+ the Scorpion announced with reinvigorated joy in his tone. The actions of a second ago were behind him as far as he was concerned. All that remained was his next objective. Another chance to prove his abilities to the Emperor and to the Malik. He shook his head in confusion, placing a gauntlet to his temple to steady it. Raamiz recognized combat exhaustion and wyrd overload as clear as the other Astartes, yet perhaps these words were springing up from the Visions. A response snapped him out of his thoughts.
+’Good. Regroup and plunge into the city. Assist our brethren and cousins. Raptor Imperialis, Raamiz,’+ The vox fell quiet as soon as the last words left the Legion Master’s lips.
+’Gloria Scorpii, Zaid,’+ the Scorpion replied to an unresponsive vox as he turned away from the console.
The Asiatic Dustfields stretched out across the vast southern reaches of Ursh. Ruins rose like antediluvian monoliths throughout the landscape, reaching up to the sky with shattered fingers of corroded metal. Arid ground fell below the eternal cloud of dust, perforating metal and plastek like a swarm of insects. The streets of what may have once been a hive were shattered, broken, and strewn apart by things unknown. Wrecks, long eaten by Terra’s radioactive fallout, remained as statues of a far distant past. Signages of a language forgotten hung from needle-thin rails, always on the verge of dropping. Things moved in the rusted shroud. A humanoid shape clambered through the broken streets, sprinting with all their life could muster. Quadrupedal beings skittered around on thin legs, their strange proportions growing their shadows like molting insects. Great shadows, larger than mortal men, skulked through the dust with a variety of menacing objects planted in their appendages. None of these were plain to see for even Sol could not perfectly penetrate the wide spun rust-cloud.
It was a miracle that Primarch Corvinius of the Obsidian Crows could see anything beneath the orange hued storm. The night sky did little to improve this fact. His helmet, enhanced by built-in magnification oculars, attempted to pick out shapes in the rust; however, their vague outlines could only bring forth theories and hypotheses. He reached a midnight blue gauntlet to the ground, holding the magnarail as he prepared to move positions. He lambasted himself for having to move with such frequency around the Dustfields. The clouds shifted unfavorably no matter how close or how far he moved. His warplate only further capitalized on his positioning as it blasted sand in a small area around him. He had much preferred the lighter armor of their younger years, devoid of power armor and exoskeletal frames.
+‘Crow Primus to Crow All, begin ingress of the hive perimeter by two miles. Mark egress routes. No combat. Blades ready if necessary. Calm the blood-rage.’+ He spoke, his voice a mixture of deep and nasally. His cloak of feathers drooped idly over his shoulders as he moved forward in a half-crouch, half-sprint. Several others moved behind him in integers of two, spaced out by fifteen feet. Each step was a practiced movement, their hulking forms now accustomed to the peculiar gait of the Obsidian Crows. Silence was never a word that one would use when describing Thunder Warriors, yet the Thirteenth defied this with their exceptionalism.
Corvinius watched the auspex as a hawk would watch its prey, waiting for the rest of the Legio to finish their movements. The lingering dust was beginning to grow denser as they closed the distance from the outskirts of the hive. What few obstacles they’d faced in outside of the hive were quickly dealt with, obliterated into nothingness from raw aggression and genewrought might. They were nearly in the city proper now, way markers annotated by rusted signage and a greater occurrence of ruined groundcars or wrecked macrohaulers. He felt the cloth-feather fusion around him whip violently in the surging rust-storm, threatening to reveal his warplate beneath. A precarious ping alerted him as each of his genewarriors complied with his orders.
+‘Crow Primus to Crow All. Mark targets. On command, clear the way.’+ His voice crackled through the vox, now blunted by the static haze of the rust-storm. He suspected their infiltration would amount to this, but it was necessary. Their objective was well within the hive, deep beneath the surface and shrouded from their continental augur-array. It mattered little to their Master, only that their mission was completed. He hefted the magnarail up against a rusted vehicle roughly the same height as him. His talon-tipped gauntlets adjusted the scope as it linked with his helmet-mounted ocular system. The scope fell on a figure walking through the dust, a giant of a being with a heavy-duty ballistic weapon of unknown caliber.
Those genewarriors that had followed him began to echo his movements. Dark blue-yellow Cataegis in midnight hued cloth covertly entered their desired cover, unholstering their myriad instruments of vengeance. Gigantic longlas, heavy ballistic snipers, and elegant plasrails were prepared in various ways. Regardless, the telltale silence of an alpha strike loomed over their formation. Several more figures emerged from the dust, some smaller and more delicate and some of medium description in bulky attire. Their silhouettes did not reveal who they were. It didn’t matter to the Obsidian Crows. All that was required was annihilation.
+‘Begin,’+ Corvinius flatly stated as he pulled the trigger, a bullet vomited forth from a magnetically driven rail-barrel hybrid. Dust was pierced as it crossed the distance in a fraction of a second, piercing the hulking shape and exploding them into a rust-infused mist. A cacophony of ballistics, lasers, and plasmic projectiles perforated the shrouding storm, streaking into the hive-city from several distinct vantage points. For a single moment, the once-dead city was alive with the sound of gunfire and the cries of a hundred whimpering corpses. No ordinance was returned. Only the sound of shrieking, muted by the dustfields, started to sow panic in the city.
+‘Sixteenth. You’re approved for deployment. Reconvene at the central hive spire.’+ Corvinius spoke into the vox to a distant listener. It’d be miraculous if the listeners managed to hone in on their signal, but the Primarch was well aware that the Sigilites had a way of listening. Their message would be heard for certain. He quickly rose from his position, hurling into the dustbound city with his sniper holstered and his curved knife drawn. Of the things he was certain of, Corivinius was sure that the Sixteenth would move unopposed.
Alfdis watched the grim floor of their transport as it sped through the dust kicked up from the petrified death throes of cities long gone. She imagined for a moment that she could see her reflection in the corrugated metal, a reflection she used to know well but would undoubtedly now reveal a woman she was far less familiar with. She'd not been blessed with the striking beauty of her sisters, although with what had happened to pleasing girls beneath the overlordship of the mutant and the Wych she doubted the true gift of such. Still, familiarity had grown fondness and she found her remade features difficult to connect with her sense of self. Her brown eyes had burnished Hazel, a creeping of blue and gold across each iris. The roundness of her face, somewhat hollowed out by lack of nutrition, was increasingly vanishing behind sculpted cheek bones that only added to her increasingly withering gaze. It was as if the ghost of another woman's face was surplanting her own. Her gaze fell upon the small item in her palm, a memento of home. She couldn't quite recall if it had been a toy or a totem, she contended that it didn't really matter. With grace that belied the clunking fingers of her armour she placed it back within the folds of her combat belt.
“Why do you keep such things?” The voice beside her was modulated by a helmet, but it did not entirely hide the combination of curiosity and scorn. Sister Thyre was sister twice over, in blood and in the furnace of the Emperor's making.
“I wish to remember home, what we fight for.”
A metallic crackle from her sister's helm no doubt masked an exasperated sigh. “There is nothing but shame in our home, holding on to it will only challenge what little trust we have.”
“We cannot pretend to be born elsewhere sister, I think honesty will work better for us than a false hope they will ever forget.” Alfdis didn't match her sister's contempt in her response, she understood her sister, the desire many of her genesisters shared that the only way the other scions of the Emperor would ever trust their new sisters was to leave behind any thought and memory of home. She wasn't even sure they were wrong, it was simply something she couldn't do.
“Be at peace, sisters, we have our Mark, make ready.” The words of Sister-Captain Estrid stilled any further retort, as the full squad of Purifiers present in the skimmer transport drew themselves up to their full height, helms beating back against the whip cords of grit in the air that might flense flesh at such speeds. The Purifiers did not have the grand arsenals of their peers, of even the more well supplied army regiments or the brutal Thunder Warriors. This was their test, set by their Sentinel forgemasters. You will fight with what you acquire, all that you have is what you have bled for. It was quite fortunate some of their first deployments had seen them scouring ancient hives of guerilla fighters left behind in the wake of conquest, they had gathered what they could from the rubble.
The skimmer the squad moved on, a wide set and open topped vehicle of ancient days, may not have been as solid as the armoured transports of their peers, but it whipped through the rubble and ruin with little pause, approaching the spire.
“Set yourself to his task, Vindication in Righteousness.” The words of the Captain now crackled solely through the vox, the wind too fierce to allow the words to carry.
“Purity in Vengeance.” The sisters echoed back to their leader, each of the genewomen bracing themselves for the coming impact.
With force that would simply shatter mortal humans, regardless of armour, the skimmer struck hard into the base wall of the spire. Ancient rock and rebar pulverised by the force, the immediate fireball was small, for the transport had only been fueled for the one journey. It was enough, though, to scatter the foe within. A flashout of such intensity it robbed the lungs of air of those too close to the now crumbling wall. Braced against the impact within armour of Terrawatt forge, the Purifiers were thrown into the mess, and immediately set about their task.
Pulses of thermal power leapt from volkite weapons, searing the enemy as they stood. Even those foes who were injured beyond hope of recovery by the explosive impact of the marines were not spared lashings of the sisters’ weapons, so total in their destruction of the enemy was their aim. The first hidden bastion of the enemy fell in moments, the full squad of sisters fanning out to hold the acquired bulkhead against counterattack.
As the blisteringly brief combat ended, Sister-Captain Estrid paused in her stride to listen to the incoming reports of the other squads she had dispatched. No two assaults were the same in anything but their ferocity, wielding the scavenged equipment they had earned, each squad had been responsible for their own form of egress. For now, all were reporting in.
“Vox our appreciation for the smooth ride into the spire, and let me know if they wish for any part in the fighting to come, they had best hurry.” She spoke to her squad communications officer, before taking point into the dark ruins of the spire.
As silence began to coalesce around the bulkhead, guarded by the Purifiers, a louder noise began to make itself known. A squad of Cataegis maneuvered out of the nearby ruins, crossing the distance from their temporary hideout to the spire. Their forms were as well concealed as one of their make could be with heavy black shrouds and red-glinted ocularae. Dust covered their shrouds, coating them in a dull orange hue that blended with the hive’s miles-long rust-cloud. Pairs broke off from the squad as they moved, fanning out and verifying the integrity of their perimeter. Only three advanced forward regardless of their squads composition.
“Well executed.” The one in the lead spoke, his voice dry and nasally beneath his vox grilles. His helmet was a strange mixture of things, most likely added to over the course of a dozen campaigns. A beak-like nasal extended out from the muzzle, while several circular lenses of dull crimson whined where its eyes should be. Myriad runes etched with names, places, and locations were inscribed across the length of the beak. The rest of his armor was shrouded by a cloak of faux-feathers, though the Astartes could quickly discern the ‘feathers’ for ease-to-use knives.
The Cataegis began to funnel in after him, taking point beside the Astartes with their plethora of long-barreled armaments ready. Curiously, they kept within five paces of the Purifiers with a combat knife drawn in their left gauntlets. From what the Astartes could tell, there seemed to be ten in total with more on the way. Their helmets were lesser mirrors of their leaders, each a beak with enhancing lenses. None bore the privilege of their leader's cloak, not even in a minor fashion.
The one that had spoken removed a device from a pouch clipped to his belt. A spherical object was produced in his midnight-blue gauntlet and then dropped to the ground. The familiar humming of a cogitator began to whine from the sphere as it expanded out onto the ground. A small-scale projection revealed itself in a vastly inferior radius compared to the hololithic devices of any proper command chamber. It mapped out the relative ruins around them, yet it extended far above and far below in comparison.
Corvinius turned his gaze to the one he’d spoken to prior to this operation, Sister-Captain Estrid, and firmly gestured to join him. He had no interest in having to repeat the details of the next part, nor did he feel the need to suffer further recklessness. Their assault on the outskirts was already providing the level of recklessness required for their siege of the depths. The far off cacophony of gunfire was all that he needed to hear to know that such was the case.
“The Sigilite has reason to believe that this particular expanse of the Asiatic Dustfields has catastrophic armaments beneath the surface. Ursh has had no luck in finding these weapons if they exist and they no longer have the manpower from the Xeric Tribes to delve further. All of their most experienced warriors have been shuffled to the Imperial Front.” Primarch Corvinius spoke with a matter of fact tone. As he talked, the device began to pull telemetry from the nearby area and started mapping out the expanse below their current location. The scars of Old Terra were plentiful, expanding further down than he previously thought.
“Kalagann has shown an interest in this place. There is no doubt that a compliment of vityaz remains behind to guard their secrets here. We will murder them and their servants,” the Primarch continued as he switched his attention to the map. It audibly pinged as the closest mouth into the depths was revealed to them. Subterranean tunnels stretched beneath their feet for an incomprehensible length, their original purpose lost to time. Several openings were available to them, but each was hazy with the telltale sign of wreckage. Only one remained clear on the hologram: the entrance beneath the central spire. The device sparked moments afterwards, its cogitator thoroughly fried and cooked from the rusted interference. Corvinius spoke once more with some venom on his tongue, “any questions, Astartes?”
Sister-Captain Estrid tilted her head slightly as she processed the information, her helm’s lenses flashing momentarily in the dim light of the spire’s interior. The rust-clouds beyond still swirled violently, a howling tempest of dust and decay that would conceal their ingress but also cut off retreat should things turn against them. “No questions, Corvinius,” she said at last, her voice crisp through the vox. “Only the certainty that our enemies will die screaming.”
The Primarch was momentarily taken aback by the response, but something of an approving chuckle passed through his helmet’s beak. He nodded in affirmation to the last words of Sister-Captain Estrid. For whatever reason, Corvinius approved of the Astartes’ reasoning. Perfect little murder machines fit to be our descendants, he thought.
Estrid turned to her squad. “We take the entrance below the central spire. Maintain formation, and keep your weapons primed. We do not know what manner of defenses or beasts Ursh has left behind.”
The Purifiers nodded in unison. Their volkite weaponry still smoked from the recent engagement, the lingering scent of scorched flesh and ozone hanging in the air. Each sister moved with a silent precision honed through war and hardship, their battered scavenged weapons a testament to the brutal trials they had overcome to stand here.
With a sharp hand signal from Corvinius, the Thunder Warriors moved ahead, their heavy footfalls echoing through the ruined spire as they took point. The sisters followed close behind, their slimmer forms slipping through the wreckage with practiced ease. The remains of Ursh’s defenders were scattered like broken dolls, flesh scorched away or bodies slumped against cracked pillars. The deeper they went, the fewer signs of life they encountered. There were no retreating footsteps, no cries of the wounded, no alarms blaring in warning. Only silence. The air was thick with the scent of rust and something else—something deeper, something foul. The spire groaned as they descended into its depths, the metal walls seeming to shift as if disturbed by their presence.
“This is wrong,” Sister Thyre muttered over the squad-channel. “They should be resisting.”
They reached the first descent shaft. A vast service elevator lay ahead, its ancient frame encrusted with rust and filth. The entrance was flanked by two grotesque statues of Urshite design, their elongated faces carved into sneering grimaces of mockery. Bloodstains old and new decorated the floor, though there were no bodies. The tunnel below was pitch-black.
The Purifiers and Cataegis filed onto the platform, fanning out to cover every angle. Volkite barrels glowed in the dim light, their crackling heat a stark contrast to the cold air rising from below. The Thunder Warriors took their positions at the edges, weapons hefted, their breath audible even through their helms.
Without hesitation, Estrid moved forward, activating the manual release. With a screech of protesting metal, the ancient platform shuddered and began its slow descent into the abyss.
Darkness swallowed them as they sank deeper into the spire’s underbelly. The only sound was the distant groan of shifting metal and the dull thrum of the elevator’s struggling mechanisms.
Then the lights flickered and died.
A metallic screech echoed from the depths below, inhuman and furious. Something was waiting for them in the dark.
A pulse of crimson light erupted from the Cataegis’ optics as they switched to low-light vision. Estrid’s voice was calm, almost eager.
“Let them come.”
An uncanny chortle passed between the Cataegis at Sister-Captain Estrid’s word. Her eagerness for battle was echoed by the Thunder Warriors around her, each swapping their long-barreled weapons for side arms and brutal combat knives. Bulky bolt pistols were swiftly checked, while their close combat blades were whetted against their ceramite. Small embers burned in the aftermath of their sharpening, illuminating the dark space briefly.
“Well said, Astartes,” Corvinius said as he activated the plasmafield on his combat knife, coating the blade in an azure corona that lit up the elevator around them. He holstered his magnarail against his powerpack, then swiftly drew a bolt revolver as his chosen sidearm.
His Thunder Warriors huffed and snarled as their augmentations began to build up copious amounts of adrenaline in their system. A violent cocktail of biomechanical alchemy shot through their veins, alighting them from their previous docile stoicism to prepare for the coming conflict. They would certainly need it as the elevator continued to descend further down into the darkness. Several seconds passed by as the descender began to slow. Cinches squealed, pulleys groaned, and metal continued to screech as the final feet met them.
Their descent would never be met as the elevator stopped inches short of their destination. Something crunched beneath their strike force’s greaves, causing a few to falter and adjust their weight in response. They understood quickly exactly why they heard the telltale sign of contact in the darkness as it rushed towards them on feral limbs and frothing maws.
They were bestial things. Biomechanical monstrosities born from the fruits of Kalagann’s relentless research, bred for pure annihilation against his foes. Where skin would’ve been abundantly displayed, only bloodsoaked fur and exoskeletal frame remained. Snarling snouts with mechanical maws seeped with burning saliva. Claws, unpowered and rusted by use, replaced their hands. They were legion in those dark depths, visible to the unenhanced eye only by their predatory eyes.
“Terra’s Teeth! Vukodlak!” The Primarch of the Obsidian Crows snarled, his bolt revolver opening up at first sight of the monstrosities. Post-reactive shells detonated against matted fur, exploding pieces of their huge bodies with brutal efficiency; however, they were not things to be easily cowed. They rushed towards the ascender even as meat fell from their body, unaffected by the shock and deadly efficiency of his weapons.
Corvinius was not alone. The Cataegis roared out in grim defiance of the Urshic monstrosities with their own sidearms. A flurry of gunshots echoed down the blood-drenched service tunnel, slaughtering the beasts as they grew closer to their strike force. A decent portion of the creatures were defeated, their hides erupting into gore piles or their craniums obliterated. The loss of their comrades did little to slow their screeching advance. His Thunder Warriors confidently strode forward of the Astartes with their close combat weapons ready. They would accept the brunt of the darktide.
The vukodlak surged forward, their feral howls mingling with the mechanical screech of their failing bodies. Estrid gritted her teeth as she stepped forward, raising her volkite charger and unleashing a searing pulse of crimson fire. The beam lanced through the darkness, igniting flesh and melting bone in an instant. The beast before her howled as it fell, its body splitting apart as the heat of the weapon vaporized its vital fluids.
"Hold the line! Do not falter!" she barked, her voice cutting through the cacophony of snarling. Her sisters formed a tight semi-circle, volkite fire and scavenged ballistics filling the narrow space, each blast illuminating the grim tunnel in flashes of burning light.
Alfdis moved beside Estrid. Every shot she placed was precise, aimed to rupture skulls or sever limbs. One of the vukodlak, half of its face missing from an earlier shot, lunged towards her, its rusted claws outstretched. With a practiced motion, she sidestepped, drawing her combat blade in a fluid arc. The blade, scavenged but honed, plunged deep into the creature's exposed throat, silencing its screams in a gurgle of hot blood.
Thyre fought with raw ferocity, her volkite weapon overheating as she used it to batter a vukodlak aside before drawing her pistol and putting a shot through its skull. "These things stink of corruption!" she growled, her voice thick with disgust. "Ursh breeds only filth and nightmares!"
The beasts continued to swarm, heedless of their losses. Some clambered across the walls, their claws screeching against metal as they attempted to flank the warriors below. But the Purifiers were not so easily outmaneuvered. Estrid's vox crackled. "Burn them out."
With a single motion, several of the sisters unhooked their makeshift incendiary charges and hurled them into the advancing horde. The detonation was instant. Fire erupted in the confined space, roaring to life as it clung to flesh and metal alike. The vukodlak screamed, their bodies igniting as promethium licked at their frames. The tunnel became an inferno of thrashing limbs and inhuman howls.
For a moment, silence reigned. The vukodlak lay dead, charred husks twitching as their corrupted forms finally ceased their unnatural motion. Smoke filled the chamber, curling in thick tendrils around the warriors who stood victorious amid the carnage.
Estrid exhaled, glancing toward Corvinius. "We push forward. If this was only the first of Ursh's defenses, then worse lies ahead."
The Purifiers and Cataegis advanced into the darkness, their weapons ready, their resolve unshaken. The deeper they went, the more the air itself seemed to hum with something ancient and malevolent. Whatever lay at the heart of this spire was waiting for them, and it would not die easily.
The Cataegis and Astartes trudged through the darkened corridors of the underspire. Armored boots crushed broken bone, scorched fur, and brittle metal as they trampled over the remains of the vukodlak. Silence greeted them as the trail of tainted bodies began to dwindle to nothingness. The carnage above the surface was muted by the thick, plasteel structure that wrapped around them in an icy grip. Only the footfalls of their tread, the hum of bulky powerpacks, and the eager grunting of the Thunder Warriors filled their augury.
Through recollection, instinct, and telemetry, Primarch Corvinius guided them out from tertiary passages to the primary corridor. Several blockages had momentarily eluded their pursuit into the undergrounds, either intentionally placed by saboteurs or by dereliction of maintenance for untold eons. Corruption was evident where the abhorrent of Ursh were not. Fetishes, scratchings, and blood-painted symbols slowly began to fill the halls as they passed. The air stank of sulphur and vitae, freshly spilled and reeking of the wyrd.
The two groups of genewarriors weaved into each other naturally. The Astartes filled the gaps between the Cataegis, their senses honed and reflexes maximized. The Thunder Warriors strode forth, evenly spaced to allow the Space Marines to adapt to oncoming challenges. It was a natural reaction due to confined proximity. It was something that the Thunder Primarch noticed as he led the strike force further in.
A claw-tipped gauntlet shot up to halt the formation, who swiftly readied their armaments with unimaginable speed. Corvinius half-crouched as fresh light began to spill in from the next passage. Autolenses on the Astartes’ and Cataegis’ helmets adjusted to the growing lumens. Another opening, unlike the descender chambers, opened up beyond the Thunder Primarch. A half-circular room with a plethora of demolished platforms, destroyed passageways, and half-functioning glowglobes met their sight. At the furthest end, some two-hundred meters away, was a pair of doors as large and thick as the Pan-Pacific Titans of the East. A single, thirty-meter-wide stairway rose up to greet the gates.
As the formation began to shift again, the Primarch lowered his other gauntlet to halt their movements. A single movement of his claw-tipped fingers saw the Captain of the Purifiers appear from beside him to look in. From her vantage to his right side, Estrid saw within the chamber several figures facing out from the gargantuan doors. Her enhanced senses saw fifteen, each standing proudly in bulky armor with exquisite melee weapons of sizable proportion. She noted the suspicious lack of vukodlak among their number. Concerningly, however, the gates further in were cracked open.
“Tell me, Captain, what do you see and how would you deal with this enemy?” Corvinius asked, his voice as quiet as the voxgrill would allow. The question was posed to Estrid. He gave no inclination to the environment, the type of foe, or the weaponry involved. His tone spoke as if he already knew the answer. Another test to the Astartes.
“I see those who’s purpose is to die and bleed us in the process.” The modulating tone of the Captain’s helmet could not entirely hide the remnant of combat adrenaline pumping through her form. The daughters of twisted Nordyc knew the howl of battle well, but remade into the Emperor’s chosen and they had the means to meet it out themselves. It was intoxicating, but she was Captain because she would not allow it to claim her entirely. “Whether it is for their own savage delight or fouler sorcery, that is what they will seek to do, and we should deny them what we can.” Estrid watched the towering figures from distance, equipped as powerfully as they were, they lacked the uniform discipline of her Sisters. “I would use our full might at range, it will expend more than we would wish to replenish, but it would put down the beast before it bites.”
“Tactical,” the Primarch of the Obsidian Crows said with a muted smile, “but ignorant. Psycho-conditioning and hypnotraining can only do so much to help you recognize an unassuming threat. Those are vityaz - the mutant knights of Ursh. They’ve been around since before we marched out beyond the Master of the Line’s Himalazian home. Each is said to be stronger than a Thunder Warrior, ‘blessed’ with the gifts of the wyrd.”
As the Thunder Warrior spoke, the two watched as the vityaz patrolled the area before the gate into the unknown. A pair would break off, kneel down between them and uncork unseen canisters to bathe themselves in fresh vitae. They offered up words in the Urshic tongue, harsh and savage, to profane deities and spirits. If the spirits were truly paying attention, then they made no effort to reveal themselves. The effect, however, was immediate as the runes on their armor began to radiate menacingly red with the wyrd.
“When fighting a foe of unknown or greater strength, it’s best to gauge their abilities with feints and ambushes. Bleed the slower ones or wear down the faster ones. Seize the initiative as they grow weaker. Prepare yourself, Estrid,” Corvinius elaborated, then pointed to key points for ambushing leading up to the vityaz. He sheathed the plasmaknife and revolver, drawing his magnarail in one swift, practised movement. His posture quickly shifted to a sniper’s comfort, lining up the first shot on one of the vityaz. A shuffling sound behind him verified that his Cataegis were similarly preparing. He continued, “and kill them as they come.”
Estrid inclined her head once, sharply, committing the Primarch’s words to memory. There was no wounded pride in the correction, only clarity. She turned and issued her orders in a series of clipped hand-signals and subvocal commands, her voice low and controlled over the squad-channel.
“By twos. Break sightlines. Kill-lanes only when I call them. We do not rush.”
The Purifiers flowed apart wolves on the hunt. What moments ago had been a single armored knot became fragments of shadow and heat haze, each sister slipping into cover among shattered platforms, collapsed gantries, and broken machinery. Volkite weapons were powered down to low-emission standby, their coils dimmed to prevent premature detection. Blades were drawn instead, quiet, patient tools.
Alfdis took position high, clambering with practiced ease onto a slanted ruin of plasteel overlooking the stairway. She felt the old unease stir in her chest, the instinct to act, to strike first and hard, but she mastered it, breathing slowly, counting heartbeats. Remember home, she told herself, but do not let it rule you.
Below, Thyre ghosted into a maintenance alcove half-choked with debris, her bulk hidden behind a fallen glowglobe casing. She bared her teeth behind her helm in a feral grin, fingers tight on her combat blade. Waiting went against her nature, but she trusted Estrid, and the Primarch’s cold certainty carried weight even here.
The Cataegis vanished almost entirely. Where they had stood moments before, there was now only ruin and dust. Corvinius himself withdrew into the upper shadows of a collapsed balcony, magnarail braced against a corroded support beam. His lenses tracked the vityaz with merciless focus, already cataloguing their movements, their rituals, and the cadence of their patrol.
The vityaz advanced and retreated in slow, confident patterns. They did not hurry. They did not fear. Each knight was a towering mass of warped muscle and rune-etched armor, carrying axes, glaives, and mauls whose edges shimmered faintly with the wyrd. Their chanting rose and fell like a heartbeat, echoed by the pulsing glow of the cracked portal behind them.
Then Estrid made her first move. A single scavenged charge, small, crude, and deliberately underpowered, clattered across the floor near the base of the stairway. It detonated with a sharp, concussive crack. Not lethal. Not even close.
The reaction was immediate.
Three vityaz surged forward with snarls of challenge, their armor flaring red as they thundered down the stairs, eager to meet whatever dared announce itself. The others held position, weapons raised, eyes searching for a threat that did not yet exist. That was the opening.
A single shot rang out, flat, thunderous, and final.
Corvinius’ magnarail round punched through the lead vityaz’s chestplate, detonating within its ribcage. The mutant knight was lifted off its feet, hurled backward in a spray of blood and rune-lit fragments that spattered the steps behind it.
Before the echo faded, Alfdis struck. Her volkite charger flared to life, releasing a focused lance of heat that scythed through the knee joint of the second vityaz. Superheated flesh cooked instantly. The knight roared as it collapsed, its mass shaking the chamber.
The third made it two steps further, then Thyre was on it.
She burst from concealment with a wordless cry, ramming her blade up beneath the creature’s gorget. The wyrd flared in angry defiance, runes blazing as the vityaz swung blindly, but Thyre was already gone, rolling aside as the Thunder Warriors surged in to finish the work.
The chamber erupted into motion.
The remaining vityaz charged, bellowing invocations and curses, but their cohesion was broken. They came not as a wall, but in staggered fury.
“Now,” Estrid commanded.
Volkite fire stitched the air in disciplined arcs. Not sustained beams, but short, precise bursts meant to cripple rather than kill. Armor softened. Limbs burned. One knight lost an arm to a Cataegis sniper round before it ever reached striking distance.
The Thunder Warriors met the first of them head-on, roaring in savage delight as chainblades and power weapons crashed together. Even then, they did not overcommit. They struck, disengaged, then struck again, bleeding the vityaz and forcing them to expend their unnatural strength in wild, furious swings.
Estrid watched it all with cold focus, adjusting her commands in real time.
“Second-team, shift left. Box them in. Do not let them retreat.”
A vityaz broke through, barreling toward her in a storm of red-lit runes and shrieking metal. Estrid did not retreat. She sidestepped at the last instant, driving her blade into the creature’s exposed flank as it passed. Alfdis finished it with a volkite burst to the spine.
One by one, the mutant knights fell. Not in glorious duels. Not in the frenzy they craved. They were bled out, burned down, and dismantled by method and patience. At last, silence returned to the chamber.
A perfect symphony of death. The dead vityaz remained broken on the ruined tile of the spire. As the dust began to settle, the Purifiers and the Cataegis broke apart to search the area for further threats. The Astartes, ever fastidious in their scavenging, claimed the great warblades of the vityaz for their own. No doubt the Sigilites would cleanse them later. Others took trophies from the Urshic mutant-knights. The Cataegis joined them sparingly in trophy taking, delighting in an enemy that was well-fought.
Corvinius maneuvered off of the balcony with his magrail slung over his back, moving to join up with Estrid. A few of the Astartes, namely Thyre and Alfdis, remained near their commander as the Primarch approached. He harshly stepped over the helmet of a vityaz, crunching the skull of the Urshite beneath his ceramite boot.
“Superb,” the Primarch remarked, stopping only once to congratulate her before continuing on his path. The Purifier commander walked with him, shortly followed by the previously stated Astartes. The remainder of their task group remained within a fifty foot perimeter of the gates. A small cacophony of noise filtered through the area as the two groups spoke at length of their battle.
Inside of the leviathan gates resided their objective. Sterile air filtered in where once the stagnant decay of a rusting spire wafted. Amber glowglobes illuminated a long chamber that appeared to stretch indefinitely beyond the entrance. Broken voxspeakers and crackling terminals lined every corner, ready to deliver and receive information in great quantities. Enormous pits of creeping shadow dotted the expanse in specifically patterned spots. Hoarfrost creeped against hexagrammic sigils littered against grey tile and metallic railing alike. Despite all of this, it paled in comparison to the Emperor’s desire deep within.
Hundreds - perhaps even thousands - of missiles as tall as the smallest of the Himalazians stood sentinel within the chamber. Conical tops ended in speartips primed for annihilation. Fat bodies of promethium and metal carried the vast majority of their lengths. Shapely fins decorated the end of the objects like some primordial serpentine creature born to fly. A plethora of purifying sigils lined the weapons, each as unique as the last. The faint hiss and wheeze of a dying cooling system confirmed the upkeep of these myriad devices. There were enough within the chamber alone to see Terra devastated twice over - and then some more.
The discovery was a staggering monument to humankind’s wanton destruction; however, to the Primarch, it was merely another duty performed for Him of Himalazia. His ceramite crunched the sterile tile beneath his boot as he crept forward into the chamber. He had no desire to unlock the tempting secrets within, only to serve his duty. Corvinius did so as his body crossed the threshold of the entrance.
A device was procured from a satchel attached to his chestplate and delicately activated. The object was dropped onto a balcony overlooking the slumbering weapons beneath the Dustfields. It beeped thrice over with a eerie green light like the eyes of the Norsyc Wyrd-Weaver. Several of the terminals awoke from their sleep in a flurry of activity. An eternity of emerald runes passed over the screens, transmitting a cadence unknown to neither the Cataegis or the Astartes.
The Cataegis remained not a moment longer as the device suddenly died, leaving only a metallic shell in the emptiness of the chamber. He turned from the missile depot with solemn pride, exiting back into the broken corridors of the spire once again. The Cataegis and the Astartes had begun to gather - yet the Primarch waited for Estrid to exit the chamber. He turned to her as she did.
“The will of the Emperor has been achieved. We will now begin exfiltration operations,” Corvinius began to speak. His voice was clearly congratulatory in it’s own nasally way, garbled even further by his unusual helmet. Before Estrid could give him a reply, the Cataegis surprisingly put a hand on her gauntlet and continued to speak. His tone turned gravely cold, “you will replace us well, Astartes. When the time comes, I expect the Purifiers to perform as ruthlessly and as cold as the Crows.”
The Primarch stared at her for several tense seconds before turning away and removing his gauntlet. His silent gait brought him back into his pack of Cataegis, who began to follow him back into the spire. Their hoots and hollers were filled with celebrations of trophies gained and weapons claimed. As Estrid regarded the leaving Thunder Warriors, she realized that the Crow had left small indents from his claws in her ceramite pauldron. Credits: Legio Cataegis/Primarch Corvinius @MarshalSolgriev , Legio Astartes Purifiers/Estrid/Alfdis/Thyre @Ezekiel
The penumbral sky was awash with spectral lights that danced like frantic, bioluminescent insects over a fresh feast. Lilac lightning arced between floating stone to swarming clouds to ashen tempests far above the black dunes. Astral bodies, natural and fabricated, decorated the dusk that ever blanketed the dark world. It was a never-ending performance that illustrated the penumbral planet and the dusken denizens within – and it was only the beginning of a long, drawn-out performance.
Zaphariel, Malik of Pandjoras, peered up from within the lavishly decorated chambers of Neu Alamut. The weathered armaglass of old had been replaced with crystalline, gilded glasscrete, bordered with imagery of his reign. Draconian rockrete had been meticulously renovated with gravcrete, a precious material harvested from the atmospheric stone-like anomalies. A thousand and one different effigies of the dusken world had been painstakingly carved into the structure. His environment had rapidly changed, yet the Palace of Varranis was the least important.
Even to the naked eye, the Malik could see the work that he had prepared a year ago taking shape. The metallic corpses of Old Pandjoras floating in orbit were being repurposed. Stations, orbital elevators, starships, and more were beginning to populate Pandjoras’ virgin atmosphere. Where once the sky was devoid of traffic aside from harvesters and void serpents, now there was a constant trail of blinking lights and atmospheric stabilizers. Even the immediate sands outside of Neu Alamut were transforming from the barren fortress of House Varranis to the Metropolis of the Malik. How many years would pass before his home would appear like the cities of legend?
The dusken deity turned his attention away from the sight of his rapidly transforming world – the world that he had walked down the path of metamorphosis. He was greeted with the original reason for his current setting. Albeit not nearly as grandiose as the council chambers of Neu Antioch, Zaphariel sat in the middle of a utilitarian audience chamber. He was adorned in a Varranian robe, dyed in charcoal-and-orange with his gravitational crown overhead. What had once been the Grandmaster’s meditation room was replaced with seats, rugs, cogitators, and tables necessary to receive envoys on a grander scale. Several Pandjorans patiently waited in front of a table carved in the shape of House Varranis’ sigil – the blade and dusk sun. To the administration of the Sultanate, he knew they were ministers of the minor houses. To himself, they were nobodies of importance outside of being Pandjorans.
“Continue, Hajib Armarr’z,” the Malik of Pandjoras said. His orange eyes had never left the delegate. Only through his peripherals did he enjoy the way that his dusken world changed.
“Thank you, al-Malik,” the minister replied. He closed his eyes and bowed his head thirteen times in Zaphariel’s direction. A custom in some courts across Pandjoras that the dusken deity wished to destroy. The Malik resolved to accept it until he could standardize their customs. After bowing his head, Armarr’z opened his eyes and spoke once again.
“An alliance between House Korvaix and House Tuturan has been announced, cementing their blood in marriage between the fourth son and fourth daughter. House Abdullahar and House Delukar have come together in unity to merge the Penumbra Fields and the Gravity Ocean through a mesa-canal. House Bahamut has lifted exploratory sanctions from House Galos after a series of inner house punishments.” The delegate concluded after presenting his dataslate for inspection. Zaphariel refused, offering a thin, toothy grin in response.
“Very pleasing, Armarr’z! Thirteen days and thirteen nights of preparing these events was well worth the fruit it bore,” the Malik responded with a pleasing lilt. He would’ve preferred the words being directly communicated by the House leaders or their heirs, but the exploitation of the minor houses was a normality. One that would persist.
Hajib Armarr’z bowed his head thirteen more times before stepping back and taking his seat, allowing another to replace him before the Malik. Another minor noble dressed in the finery of House Tallora, decorated in azure, alabaster, and amber. This one was more experienced than the last, forgoing the old customs of the minor houses and bowing her head once before speaking.
“Hajib Shamaara, al-Malik,” she said as she bowed. Zaphariel nodded in approval, gesturing with one of his talon-ringed fingers to raise her head. She continued with her eyes glued to a dataslate, “per your instructions, the previously untouched mesas surrounding the Valley of the Void have been excavated for minerals. Extraordinarily deep reservoirs of precious metals have been discovered with House Tallora beginning extraction and processing. Emir-i-Thanaa reports several days before the first products are ready.”
“And House Tallora shall prosper, no doubt,” Malik Zaphariel remarked. “The gravitic density surrounding the Valley was immeasurable for decades and unconquerable due to Falak’s presence. Without a void wyrm to haunt the slopes, the Sultanate can prosper from Emir Thanaa’s diligence. Cooperate with House Nathaz and begin shipment to the cities.”
As Hajib Shamaara bowed her head and stepped back, the dusken deity was reminded of previous progress reports. The unification had brought the dunemen, ashwasters, and serpent-tamers from their tribal homes. All of the Houses had grown in just a single year, Neu Alamut most of all. With a new influx of materials from the Valley, Zaphariel knew that they would grow ever closer to an ecumenopolis. Everchanging, ever shifting sands, he thought grimly as the final courtier approached.
“Hajib Jerul, al-Malik!” An androgynous courtier said with enthusiasm. Their dusken skin was blanched with the telltale signs of an ashwaster, reinforced only by the Bahamutian robe they wore. The faded stench of oil and machinery clung to the courtier’s grey-and-purple clothing, typical for their allegiance. A faint clicking, audible only to the dusken deity, confirmed the presence of hidden augmentations. Their cowled head dipped once in a bow before rising again to speak.
“Three more gravity palaces have been restored by your will, Prophet of Dreams! Your ten-year plan has shaken the very foundation of the Bahamutian maintenance cycle. We are truly in awe of your incredible intelligence, Malik of the Black Sands! Your dream of the thirty palaces is achievable, so report the great Saahir!” Jerul concluded, splaying both of his arms wide in a reverent bow. Zaphariel had become accustomed to the overt display of religious infatuation. This was one of many that he had received just today.
“Magnificent! Inform Saahir that these three are to be properly relinquished to the subsequent Houses without one. What of the seer-taming devices and agricultural experiments?” The Malik of Pandjoras asked, already knowing the answer. He had a thousand and one hassan spread across Pandjoras. There was never a moment he wasn’t aware of the situation on his homeworld.
“The Great Saahir reports that the augmentations are taking hold in the Urahalan desert-singers, allowing them greater control of the spirits. The first interstellar prototype will be ready for the reclaiming of the Star Serpent in months, al-Malik!” Jerul quickly responded, their milky eyes reading from something in front of them. Zaphariel could read the sigils that flitted across the surface of the courtier’s eyes. A recent creation from the mind of Saahir.
“The development of genespliced flora to weather Pandjoras’ dusk is progressing slowly, Deity of the Dusk Ring. Even with the assistance of House Delukar, we have reached an impasse. Concurrently, however, Emir Bahamut has made astonishing strides in genemanipulation. He believes that the creation and implementation of several organs could make the average Pandjoran-“
“I understand, Jerul,” Zaphariel interrupted with a soft chuckle. The response was enough to nearly melt the Bahamutian, who locked their legs to refrain from descending into a deep bow. “Tell Saahir to continue delving into the dark sands of gene-research, if he cannot make more strides with agriculture. The Star Serpent will open a thousand and one new avenues on that front.”
As the Bahamutia Hajib bowed low, Zaphariel watched him leave with fresh thoughts on his mind. How would the duskborn look after genemodding? Would they become svelte asasiyun with skin as dark as the black sands, as pale and hardy as the most legendary of ashwasters, or as scaled and monstrous as the void serpents of their home? Perhaps, he thought with excitement, they would be like me.
Siblings, just like himself, it was a thought that excited him greatly. His kin were family. Ramses, the Old Man, and all the people of Pandjoras, yet there was an obvious barrier between himself and them. His stature, abilities, and charisma were beyond that of a normal duskborn. He was not one-in-a-thousand born with special gifts. He was more than that, though Zaphariel did not know why. It dawned on him that his gleefulness was drawing attention to himself from the ministers. The train of thought was forgotten as he stood.
“Glory to you, Hajib of the Minor Houses! Continue to pursue the dusk dreams that we all see and the Star Serpent will soon be ours. Glory to Pandjoras!” Malik Varranis roared with delight, earning himself a cheer from the delegates as they quickly left the chamber. The dusken deity fell back into the seat he had just risen from, allowing himself a momentary rest as the envoys left. His thoughts lingered back to Saahir’s genetic attempts and the things he had seen in various different ruins across Old Pandjoras. How many times had those before the Cataclysm attempted the same experiments? He wondered how successful they were. Ultimately, it mattered little as they were dead and gone. The silence was quickly replaced with the bickering of Pandjorans in the Varranian dialect.
“The young sheik that grew up tormenting Neu Alamut is quite busy!” Ramses said as he entered first, throwing back his cowl to reveal his maturing features.
“Thy days of terror are eternal and unbound,” Muahad, the Old Man of the Mountain, responded in a voice as tough and stony as gravitic rock. The alabaster skull mask warped his voice, deepening it into a grim tone.
“If I had known unification would bring endless torment in the form of endless sycophants, then I would’ve stayed in Neu Alamut to count a thousand and one grains of black sand.” Zaphariel replied, throwing his hands up in feigned defeat.
“The price of leadership is grievously steep, dreamer, yet it is among the most honorable burdens a soul may bear.”The Old Man spoke, seating himself into one of the vacant seats left by the courtiers. He carefully swept his long robes from his knees as he sat, though Zaphariel knew that his adoptive father had never once relaxed in his life. Azrael, the Old Man’s blade, laid across his lap in a silence more daunting than any roar.
“That would be true of any Pandjoran of respectable age, but I don’t think many thirteen-year-old duskborn can say they lead an entire planet. I’d bet it upon thirteen days and thirteen nights of sobriety!” Ramses playfully scoffed, sitting himself next to the strong-yet-ancient Old Man. He was rarely outside of power armor, so it was a rarity to find him in a bodyglove fitted with serpentscale.
“Would that I could sprint across the black sands without care anymore, but the Star Serpent calls for all of us and we will answer.” Zaphariel retorted, resting his palms against the Varranian table. His taloned jewelry traced the engravings of the piece as he admired the work that he put into it. He continued to speak, “Saahir has begun working on genesplicing the duskborn. No doubt in order to prepare Pandjoras for the stars.”
If the news had rattled either of the hassan, then they did not show it openly with their body language or facial expressions. Ramses raised an eyebrow yet remained nonplussed. Muahad nodded in understanding.
“Thou hast known this truth for some time, Zaphariel. It is the road once walked by the ancients of Old Pandjoras and now thou wouldst walk in their shadow, seeking to claim the honors left untaken.” The Old Man of the Mountain explained, his words carved with weight. The Malik knew it was primarily for Ramses, who wasn’t nearly as proficient of a hassan as either of them.
“I can hide nothing from you, Grandmaster,” Zaphariel chortled, bowing his head once to Muahad in defeat. “Saahir is a unique existence. An ashwaster with deep understanding of Old Pandjoras. Without him, there would be no Star Sultanate. In some ways, he reminds me of you. Otherwise, he feels born from another world. It is why we have such a strong kinship.”
“In another age, he would have drawn first breath upon a red world, not one veiled in dusk,” Muahad growled in an unnatural way. Zaphariel could tell when the Old Man felt uncomfortable in a conversation. His tone, scent, and body language said it all despite his excellent attempts to hide it. Despite this, he persisted, “the path thy take is like that of the oldest legends. From a world far beyond the Star Serpent’s coil. Tread it carefully, Dreamer.”
“It will take me another thirteen days and nights to understand either of you! Speak plainly for the sake of your uncle, yes?” Ramses spurted out, growing increasingly frustrated with the way the two spoke.
“Genemodding is the work of Old Pandjoras. It is fundamental to our success in reclaiming the Star Serpent, among many other things. The Old Man is warning me because of the Cataclysm; however, there is a way to dispel his fears.” Zaphariel calmly explained with a growing smile on his lips. One that spelled doom for the retainers of House Varranis many times before. Ramses felt an unnatural chill as the dusken deity spoke.
“We will announce another Scouring of the Ancients. The likelihood of finding the Old Pandjoran genevaults is higher now that we’ve unified. All will join this time, regardless of hierarchy. Even the ashborn, the dunemen, and the jinn will come.” Zaphariel stated. It was not a question or an expression of opinion. What he had said was an announcement. One that Ramses shook his head in distress.
“… The logistics of this will shake the wealth of the Houses for a decade, but it’s the sort of trouble I expected from you, al-Malik.” Ramses groaned at first but started to chuckle and picked himself up from his seat. He clapped his hands together and looked down to Muahad.
“Such an endeavor shall swell the fate of Pandjoras, yet do not think thy desires hidden from mine eyes,” Muahad calmly spoke, using Azrael as an instrument to rise. The action was pointless. Zaphariel knew how strong the Old Man was instinctively. Just the same, the Old Man knew exactly how the Malik thought.
The time for hiding within an audience chamber was at an end. The Malik of Pandjoras could barely hide his excitement behind his carefully crafted emotional mask. Freedom from the unending quagmire of building a global government from scratch. Something to benefit Pandjoras and to drag him out of the endless torrent of bureaucracy. A year of pure planning to momentarily halt and engage in a frivolous, fruitful adventure.
The sunrise peaked behind the carcasses of a thousand and one metallic ruins, worn into rust by gravitic anomalies and black sand. Although it only shone for an hour of the day before ascending into the Ring of Muahad, it was one of the few natural beauties of the dusken planet. To view it was to understand the Tears of Pandjoras – the brilliant orange of a duskborn’s iris. The sun danced off of the metals, spraying rays of light across the Ruins of the Old World. Magnificent, teardrop-domed palaces with enormous, broken engines were scattered throughout the region. Monolithic, spiraling towers with weathered engravings poked out of the black sands, while rivers of green-silver liquid flowed from the corpses of ancient reservoirs. They were the bones of an era that had perished during the Long Night.
The dreadful silence of the region was broken by rhythmic thumping. An unfathomable amount of gravitic engines hummed in the air, twisting the tranquility of the dead into an uproar. The sky became blotted with hovercraft, each in varying states of evolution. Some carried the vestiges of the harvester dropships of the old times, while others were resplendent with newly invented Bahamutian technology. Far behind the swarm, a pair of gravity palaces waited like titanic guardians. Their towering walls, grandiose spires, and bulbous domes watched over the region with their gargantuan engines vibrating the black sands beneath. Great banners of serpent silk unfurled from the top of towers, wildly whipping in the harsh winds.
At the fore of the swarm, a great vessel cut through the sunlight like a scythe through penumbral stalk. Half as long as the great wyrm, Falak, and as thick as three gravitic boulders, it was a monstrous thing in comparison to the rest of the fleet. The prow was shaped into the visage of a void serpent, while the body was reminiscent of a harvester dropship and a bronze scorpion. A three-tiered monstrosity, the middle deck was fitted with two dozen graviton multi-cannons. The bottom deck beheld reinforced glass flanking a huge door, while the top deck connected the ship to the sextuple heavy gravitic engines. A pair of orange-and-black banners unfurled from either side of the craft, proudly displaying the kingly insignia of House Varranis upon them.
Within the vessel’s cockpit, a wide command deck flowed out naturally like a freshly developed dune after a gravity tempest. Graciously sculpted pillars with spiraling snakes held glowglobes around the chamber, while incense burners wafted fresh spice into the area from the walls. A pilot’s throne sat just before an armaglass window, while several stations behind silently assisted. Overlooking the pilot and her entourage was a dais without railing. A meticulously sculpted seat of gravitic stone remained, fashioned with serpents, dunes, and bulbous palaces. Serpent silk rugs and banners with the sword and dusk sun filled the area where black sand did not.
Upon the seat, a dusken deity sanguinely watched the pilot and her crew with a thin smile on his lips. Golden, serpentine eyes peaked out from beneath a dusken cowl. His body was fitted with the ever-evolving powered armor of Pandjoras, thin as a bodyglove and swimming with graviton-particle tubes. Serpent silk robes spilled out from beneath him onto the vessel’s floor, while claw-tipped gauntlets tapped against the arms of his throne. To either side of the being were a pair of men. On his left, a mature hassan with his grizzled features hidden beneath an umbral hood and tabard overlaying his powered armor. On his right, an elder of Neu Alamut with a skull mask and piercing blue eyes.
“Lord Zaphariel, we have passed Neu Babylos and the Great Ruin. Sensors indicate a great clustering of the old empire within thirty kilometers to the north and northwest. The host eagerly awaits your permission.” The pilot, Zahia al-Bahamut, stated through the intercomms. Her slender form was slaved into her throne, extensive cables running from all parts of her body to several cogitators spread across the chamber.
“And do you eagerly await my permission, Zahia?” Zaphariel ibn Varranis pleasantly asked, leaning forward on his throne to peer down directly on the pilot. He could feel her heartbeat quicken and anxiety filter through her body as the Malik loomed. Teasing others never failed to amuse him, though Muahad heavily discouraged the act. The Old Man had always punished him for indulging in this one vice.
“I do, al-Malik,” the pilot responded with a flat tone. While her body responded naturally to the dusken deity’s words, Zahia’s mind had been further stapled of emotion for more augmentations in Neu Babylos. Her response saw the dreamer softly chuckle before rising from his throne.
“As it should be, my little Bahamutian,” he said with an emphasis on ownership. The nerve-stapler did little to suppress the turmoil within. Luckily, the dusken deity had already moved on from his teasing to begin orchestrating the Scouring. A terminal unveiled from the front of the dais with a long board containing a complete set of Pandjoran sigils. He rapidly pressed several of them in a rhythmic pattern, personally seeing to the completion of his project. The voxnet burst to life as the screen displayed innumerable connected devices across the fleet.
+’People of Pandjoras! Duskborn of the Black Sands! Children of the Dusken Planet! Today we repeat what our ancestors have done time and again from the Cataclysm to the Unification. By right of serpent and scarab, we descend upon the ruins graciously left by the spirits of the old empire. To my people, it is your day to prove your worth in a way that benefits all of Pandjoras. By my authority as Malik of Pandjoras, I announce the beginning of a new Scouring! Drown in dusk, my kin, and parse a thousand and one grains of black sand for your rewards!’+ Zaphariel heartily spoke with the guile and charisma he was known for. His voice reverberated several times over, dancing across the wavelength of time and space.
The response was monumental. Each of the speakers within the vessel threatened to burst into azure flame from the cacophony they transmitted. Zahia recoiled on her throne from the noise directly relayed into her skull. The attendants shielded their ears to avoid the worst of the pain. All of their agony was ignored. The Malik of Pandjoras greatly smiled as his eyes watched the sight beyond his descending terminal. A swarm of duskborn descended upon the corpses of the old world, eager to claim riches and glory for themselves. To him, it was the most beautiful display of humanity. Each one rushing to their potential doom for reasons as myriad as the shifting dunes of the black desert. How many of them sought riches simply for him? How many for their own glory? How many for their houses?
“Not too bad, nephew,” Ramses remarked with a guffaw, slapping the back of the dreamer in approval. Unfortunately for his hand, Zaphariel was as tough as an elder serpent’s scales and gravitic stone combined. He could feel his digits throb in protest after the action. The Malik of Pandjoras turned to his uncle and flashed his pristine teeth in a wide, cocky grin. Out of the corner of his eye, the Old Man slowly shook his head in disappointment.
“A zone of caution has been deployed, al-Malik. We are prepared for descent when you wish it,” Zahia stated as she recovered from the audible distortion. Her mind processed all that Zaphariel had queued into his terminal in a fraction of a second. She could feel scarab-like objects descend from the vessel as if it were from her own skin. The sensors within loudly communicated her intent while she awaited the Malik’s response.
“I wish for everything, Zahia,” Zaphariel replied with a wistful tinge to his voice. The pilot knew without guessing that the Malik of Pandjoras mocked her. She disregarded it as she did most of his playing. A thought-pulse from her command throne saw the vessel begin to descend.
As if signaling the start of the Scouring, Pandjoras’ sun dipped back into the Ring of Muahad and dusk claimed the world once more. A blanket of orange, purple, and black fell atop the Pandjorans. The swarm had rushed past the imperial vessel of the Malik, bursting forward to claim glory on their own terms. A great tempest of black sand was unnaturally produced, colliding with the oncoming gravity rain that plagued the umbral world. All manners of wildlife erupted from their hidden dens, terrified by the onslaught of noise drowning their homes. Rough-furred jakaal, bronze-carapaced scorpions, obsidian-shelled beetles, black-scaled serpents, and more stormed across the desert in fear.
“It seems this adventure will take less than thirteen days and nights,” Zaphariel clicked his tongue in disappointment. He watched the stampede of wildlife from the external monitors as they descended. A part of him had imagined that the delve would’ve been fraught with endless danger, yet this display of overwhelming numbers dismayed him.
“Thou art one who bears the burden of destiny, dreamer,” the Old Man of the Mountain responded to his adoptive son’s disappointment. His piercing, azure eyes witnessed the swarm and stampede with callous disregard. As if it was something he had expected. He continued without turning his attention, “know this: many happenings will slip beyond thy grasp. Still thy expectations. Everything is a weapon.”
“Everything is a weapon.” Both Zaphariel and Ramses replied automatically. The former riding off the waves of disappointment. The latter was more than happy to not have to deal with an onslaught of ferocious creatures. All three of them remained silent as the vessel entered it’s final descent onto the black sands of their beloved home. Klaxons began to bark while crimson lights drowned out the soft glow of alabaster glowglobes.
All six of the gravitic engines whorled and clicked audibly to confirm their engagement into low-intensity form. A horrible noise of metal grinding on metal, similar to that of a sword drawn from a sheathe, was heard from below. The vessel lightly rumbled as the ship finally settled into the desert floor. The objects previously dropped from the vessel illuminated a wide, circular zone around them in soft, orange light. The klaxons fell silent and the deck resumed a natural glow as adjutants shuffled about.
“As you ordained, so it is, al-Malik. Glory to you, Zaphariel ibn Varranis,” Zahia announced in a monotone voice. Although she could not turn her head or body to regard the Malik, Zaphariel felt as if she watched and waved him off with a smile. The adjutants around her began to swap out cables, tubing, and vats of synthesized fluid in preparation for the next flight. He regarded her one last time before absconding the chamber.
The three hassan of House Varranis crossed from the command deck to the hangar in a matter of seconds, offering nods and salaams to other personnel as they passed. None dared to follow the Varranians as they crossed the threshold into the lower deck, entering an automatic descender without a sizable retinue. Unlike during his days as a sheik, Zaphariel no longer needed a large party of asasiyun to go where he pleased. He would be lying if it said it made him lonely, but the banter was always appreciated between the Pandjorans of Neu Alamut.
The lower deck of the vessel greeted them for one final stretch. Where once a harvester’s dropship butchering-bay doors would await them, there now remained a diagonal ramp ready to be lowered. Stasis chambers and suit lockers stood at either side of the chamber with a plethora of serpent silk paraphernalia of House Varranis on the walls. Powered armor, gravguns, monomolecular armaments, and more could be equipped from the inventory. The three hassan had no need for any of them. Only Ramses paused momentarily to push a rebreather over his mouth before pressing a nearby rune.
Pandjoras welcomed the hassan as it did to all of its beloved inhabitants. A torrent of wind blasted their bodies with a thousand and one grains of black sand. The air filled with the scent of depleted ozone, pleasing cinnamon, and acrid sulphur. A sky of purple, black and orange loomed overhead, where dark clouds had since started to congregate. The patter of gravitic droplets warped the dark grains before them in miniature tempests from above. Chunks of gravitic stone clung to the air, lilac lightning arcing off of their stony surfaces. It was home to all of them.
“Can you imagine how many more ruins we’ll find of Old Pandjoras in another decade? A thousand and one? Perhaps two?” Ramses audibly proclaimed as he stepped out into the black sands, effortlessly stepping into the bottom of a small dune. The Malik calmly followed with Muahad a step behind.
“The amount doesn’t matter, uncle, all of it will be claimed by the time we rule the Star Serpent,” Zaphariel replied without pause. Although it wasn’t voiced, he was certain that the Old Man could discern his true intentions. He passed Ramses as they walked up the first black dune with ease, only stopping at the top to listen to continue speaking. “The Ruins of Old Pandjoras aren’t the only region that holds a thousand and one secrets beneath black sand. Pandjoras is a treasure, hidden in the penumbral stalks like a golden scarab.”
“Pandjoras is no mere treasure, dreamer. It is a fruit long-ripened, meant to unseal a destiny that stretches into the stars. That sacred fruit lies squandered,” the Old Man of the Mountain said callously as he crossed the dune. The response bristled against Zaphariel’s perfect skin, yet the Promised Dreamer merely smiled down to his adoptive father.
“Come now, brother, we could act like a trio of jakaal barking over a frightened ashwaster, or we could celebrate like a Delukarian on harvest day. We should celebrate that the fruit - which is Pandjoras - even ripened in the first place. Our planet could be much worse,” Ramses cackled, spreading both of his arms out in a welcoming gesture. The act is enough to see the dusken deity alight with laughter.
“Exquisitely said, uncle! I will reflect on my transgressions for thirteen days and thirteen nights, Grandmaster,” Zaphariel said with a deep, exaggerated bow. As ever the Promised Dreamer acted, it was a mocking attempt that was discerned by the Old Man of the Mountain. Despite his display, Muahad’s words would remain on his mind for the rest of their journey. He continued to speak after bowing, “but we shall see what seeds Pandjoras has awaiting for us from here on out.”
The Grandmaster of the Hassan simply stared at the Unifier of Pandjoras like one would look at a humorless, theatrical performer. The glance was enough to unsettle Zaphariel from his exaggerated mocking into a humbled stance. He threw his claw-tipped gauntlets up in defeat, shrugging his shoulders before dipping over the dune with fresh energy in his step. Muahad and Ramses followed after with a silence pregnant in the air, interrupted only by the natural drone of Pandjoras.
A world of ruins laid before as endless as the black sands of Pandjoras. Although the sun of the dusk world no longer shone on them, they still glistened in the umbral shade. Far in the distance, beams of illumination revealed the searching eyes of other duskborn from their dropships. The stampeding fauna had since fallen to a trickle as stragglers quickly found shelter within abandoned dens and unmolested dunes alike. Only three hassan journeyed across the dark desert in a wide radius around them. Any of the wreckages could’ve been their target, yet the tallest of their number aimed for one in particular.
Jutting from the sands like a megalithic serpent of unnatural proportion, a tower with a broken glass dome awaited. The structure stuck out diagonally out of the black dunes, low enough to enter from the top yet tall enough to require assistance climbing into. As the trio of hassan stepped closer to the wreckage, the detailing on the tower became apparent. Hexagonal in shape, each edge was reinforced with rusted armor. Shards of durable glass stuck out of the sand like spears ready to impale unsuspecting foes. Erosion had scraped away whatever color and imagery it had once possessed. Severely warped metal reflected wherever tempest flakes landed in the great storms of the northern hemisphere. Corrosion dissolved what remained of the engravings on the wreck’s surface. These types of structural remains were typical of the region; however, the Malik of Pandjoras saw something else.
As Zaphariel approached the tower, he instinctively picked up a piece of rubble and lobbed it into the air. His golden, serpentine eyes watched it descend for several seconds before confirming the gravitic density of the area. After the confirmation, the dusken deity launched himself up from standing position to the top of the tower. He rolled through the opening in the dome, avoiding the serrated edges of glass in a feat of practised acrobatics. The act was second nature to the Malik, who calmly awaited the rest of his party with a toothy grin plastered across his lips. He wouldn’t dare to provide aid to the other two hassan, both of which wouldn’t accept his assistance for fear of the dreamer’s mockery.
True to his thoughts, the Old Man wordlessly approached an area below the top of the tower and crouched down. He launched up, utilizing absurdly strong leg muscles and Pandjoras’ unique gravity to leap into the structure. His boot-covered feet lightly landed next to the Promised Dreamer. Ramses, a younger hassan than Muahad, groaned as he stepped several feet back to prepare himself for a running jump. Instead of relying on absurdism, the hassan raced forward and lunged into a somersault with the assistance of his powered armor. He fell into the ruin, recovering from the roll as if he had done so a thousand and one times.
“Do you desire this old man to suffer thirteen days and thirteen nights of joint pain, nephew? Have pity on this seneschal of yours!” Ramses feigned an injury, pressing a hand against his back as he turned to Zaphariel. As requested, the Malik of Pandjoras gave him a pitiful look and inclined his head.
“Oh spirits of Pandjoras, behold, my uncle who is weaker than a duskborn of thirteen cycles! Grant him the pity that I cannot,” Zaphariel meekly requested, clasping his claw-tipped gauntlets together in a feigned prayer. As soon as the dreamer put his hands together, the Old Man split his fingers apart from each other to prevent the conjoining. The dusken deity never had a chance to react.
“Fool. No spirits inhabit Pandjoras. We do not pray. Seek atonement from within to purge thy confusion,” the Old Man of the Mountain firmly stated. His words allowed no reply. The pair that played their small game physically and mentally straightened themselves out. Zaphariel was reminded why he never took the Grandmaster on journeys such as these. The dreamer simply shook his head and continued down the tower’s length.
From the inside of the structure, Zaphariel could confirm that the length continued far below the black sands of Pandjoras. The tower presented itself less as a living space and more of a corridor directly into the heart of what dwelled beneath. Skeletal remains of unidentified chambers reminded him that the wreckage wasn’t simply an ascender to an observatorium. Corrosion had taken it’s toll from within, callouslessly erasing markings and engravings on structural supports. Thankfully, the rush of wind defeated any amount of horrifying silence.
As his eyes quickly adapted to the dark, the dreamer became aware of several shapes awaiting them. A gang of jakaal - canid scavengers of the ashwastes - viciously tore at a void serpent’s corpse. He approached without care, testing the limits of his unnatural silence. Zaphariel loomed over the first and managed to reach down to touch the shaggy fur of the beast before it noticed him. The creatures yipped and barked in horror, scurrying off further into the tower with adrenaline pounding through their comparatively tiny bodies. If he so wished, Zaphariel could track them for thirteen days and thirteen nights to hunt the hounds; however, there was no need for it.
“It never ceases to surprise me that the jakaal managed to survive on Pandjoras,” the Malik announced as he leaned down. His claw-tipped fingers pressed into the meat of the void serpent, gauging how much blood he could squeeze out in one sitting for a momentary drink. He decided against it after removing a broken jakaal fang, dripping with blackened ichor. The meat had been ruined and so too was the vitae. “Pandjoras was once cradle to a thousand and one species. Yet the folly of thy ancestors sundered a world in harmony. The jakaal remain - stubborn strugglers born of maleficence," the Old Man responded. The warning was apparent to Zaphariel. How would the future of the dusk world look with even more tampering?
“I’d rather deal with jakaal than void serpents in any given scenario. I’m thankful for their existence, even if they’re typically a nuisance. Now, as much as I love the wildlife, let’s move on,” Ramses said with exasperation. He walked past the dreamer, who finished observing the ophidian’s corpse. The hassan was preparing himself for the worst to come deeper in the ruin. He understood that delves like these had no guarantee of survival, even if the Malik of Pandjoras was with him.
The incline of the tower grew ever closer to upright as the entrance of their section met the trio. A small gap between an ascender platform and an alcove into the ruin proper required no shortage of acrobatics to cross; however, the hassan had no issue in environments such as these. They naturally excelled, regardless of whether they raced across the black sands, danced on gravitic stone, or leapt between buildings. They were born of House Varranis. The depths of Old Pandjoras required higher levels of focus as each was different from the last. Such was the case for this wreckage.
Zaphariel led the way through the structure, which was quickly proving to be an infinitely larger ruin than he originally predicted. Auspex scans and practical experience could only go so far without scouting. In his earlier days, the dreamer assured himself that he would’ve conducted proper reconnaissance before a delve. He made a mental note to refrain from further laxity. It hardly stopped him from enjoying the experience, with or without the Grandmaster of the Hassan observing every one of his actions.
As the Malik of Pandjoras guided them through a large, circular atrium, he couldn’t hide his curiosity for the ruin. Torches, arranged at sporadic intervals, were permanently affixed with blue, burning fire. Murals on the walls were still as pristine as they were before the cataclysm, yet each would momentarily generate static as if they weren’t properly real. Tarnished gold lavishly decorated wall lining and intricate engravings into every surface regardless of relevance. Sigils in a tongue familiar to him flitted in and out of his vision across overhead arches. The wreckages were a great many things, but he always appreciated their majestic sorcery for lack of better terms. The absence of serpent imagery stole his attention more than anything else.
“This one is just like the others, completely devoid of the black serpents of our home,” Zaphariel spoke aloud in feigned ignorance. He ran his claw-tipped gauntlets over the walls, spreading the hazy imagery around as if it were Pandjoras’ dark sand. It coated his digits in phantom slim, which disappeared the further he moved away from the walls. He turned his attention to Muahad, “Old Man, did the ancients not have any kind of snakes during their time?”
The conversation was interrupted by the sound of shattered ceramics, accompanied by a short gasp of surprise from Ramses. Zaphariel and the Old Man placidly turned to regard the hassan with his fingers hovering over the scattered remains of a peculiar storage device. He offered a short, wordless bow as an apology and returned to his exploration. The dreamer breathed a sigh of relief before returning his attention to his adoptive father.
“Thy ancestors claimed not the void serpents, yet serpentine creatures they did claim. The void serpent, as thou knowest, came after the Long Night - terrors born of the Empyrean,” the Old Man coldly explained. Zaphariel’s eyes widened in surprise. He had never made the connection, but it made sense to him. His golden orbs scanned Muahad for further answers. None came except for what he perceived as mockery, “Didst thou not realize when thou feasted upon serpentine vitae?”
It explained nothing, serving only to frustrate his thoughts. What was the correlation between the void serpents and the cataclysm? What did eating and drinking their meat have anything to do with their origin? How did the Old Man of the Mountain know any of this? A thousand and one questions flitted through his mind at a speed incomparable to another duskborn. Ultimately, he realized that none of them would be answered by his adoptive father. Muahad was the Grandmaster of the Hassan for a reason, he thought with grim reluctance.
The trio of hassan pressed further into the structure, now categorized by the dreamer as a fallen gravity palace. Many of the chambers remained the same as the tower or the atrium, devoid of life and filled with the exotic trappings of Old Pandjoras. Some traps remained, set by long-forgotten automata without masters, yet each was quickly disarmed by Zaphariel. Ticking energy bombs, laser rails, screaming vox-scramblers, classical pitfalls, and more awaited them but were all avoided.
In the dim light of safer alcoves, Zaphariel observed ramshackle belongings from ashwasters and sandlooters. If he so wished, the dreamer was confident in tracking them down; however, he already knew their fates. They had already passed myriad corpses in different states of decay. Some were torn apart by void serpents and others by ancient traps. Few were warped beyond recognition, their disfiguration a result of consuming graviton particles from tempest runoff out of desperation. An understandable, suicidal act. There was no water on Pandjoras. Only blood remained for the duskborn.
Their footsteps, muffled and silent, led them into a large half-circle chamber with an enormous, triangle-shaped door at the other end. The gate was large and slanted, built to deflect energized weapons back into oncoming attackers. Myriad sigils in the language of the ancients dotted across the entrance’s surface. To the right of it remained a terminal with a blank, dustless screen. Curiously, there were no intruders in the area yet trappings remained from absent ashwasters. Of course they couldn’t figure it out, Zaphariel thought to himself as he approached the center of the room.
“Ordinary security of the ancients,” the dreamer remarked with a sigh. His form crossed the room in two paces to the terminal on the side of the gate. He hovered a hand over the sterile screen, awakening the machinery with presence alone. The chamber began to illuminate as it was roused from slumber, azure fire lining the upper rim of the ceiling. His orange, serpentine eyes glanced up to the triangular door once before returning his attention to the terminal.
“Ut pretiosa semina intus aperiantur ac revelentur, vitam nostram in persequendo damus,” Zaphariel enunciated with practiced, lethargic ease. His voice reverberated several times over, reality bending to his will as he spoke aloud. The terminal blinked three times in response, but the dreamer was prepared for such a thing. Wyrd like shifting, black sand swarmed over his claw-tipped gauntlet as he engaged the screen. A single touch from his digits saw the soundless cogitator illuminate a soothing, green light.
“You speak the language of the ancients?” Ramses asked in a surprised tone. He was aware that the Malik of Pandjoras was a ludicrously successful and well-known relic hunter; however, the hassan had not realized to what degree.
“I can speak it, but I do not understand it. These ‘systems’ that the ancients used are tricky. It isn’t just about speaking. It requires a serpent’s song, a bit of wyrd-wielding, and my illustrious intelligence!” Zaphariel responded with a coy grin. Diving into the ruins of Old Pandjoras was one of his favorite hobbies. It was one of the few skills that Muahad had never taught him that the dreamer was truly proud of.
“So that the precious seeds within may be opened and revealed, we giveth our lives in pursuit,” the Old Man of the Mountain abruptly explained to the surprise of the other two. Zaphariel blinked several times in muted astonishment. He felt humbled in a way that only Muahad could make him feel. The other hassan, Ramses, offered snorting laughter at his nephew’s crushing defeat. The elder calmly strolled into the guarded room, leaving the duskborn in his wake.
As the Malik of Pandjoras had originally suspected, despite his verbal loss, this chamber was indeed their target. White tile stretched from the aperture across a distance as long as Falak and as wide as Neu Alamut’s training grounds. The room was illuminated by soft, alabaster glowglobes as thin as a fingernail. Sterile, fresh air unlike that of Pandjoras filtered through unseen vents. Wards, unlike the scrawlings of the dunesingers, lined the walls in harmonic defense against the unknown. Rows upon rows of sealed shelves dotted the aseptic expanse for untold quantities. Stasis chests as large as a jakaal accompanied each shelf in infrequent pairs. Sculptures, fashioned from varying antiseptic metal compounds, ringed the area just a hair away from the strange glyphs.
“As I wish it, so shall it be,” Zaphariel’s triumphant attitude returned no sooner than it had been defeated. He ambled past the Old Man of the Mountain with a toothy grin spreading across his lips. In his own way, the dreamer had defeated Muahad in a game untold and unsung. The elder quietly observed the Malik of Pandjoras as he investigated their new surroundings.
“It’s impressive that the ancients managed to keep this all going through the Cataclysm,” Ramses stated. His own claw-tipped gauntlets idly massaged his scratchy beard as he passed the Old Man of the Mountain. The hassan’s orange eyes primarily fell on the stasis chests which broadly displayed the contents within. Sigils of the ancients hovered aetherically nearby. He surmised it was the name of the sterile trunk or a date of some kind.
“Reckless meddling. Thy ancestors hungered for immortality, yet none endure to claim the seeds of their folly. A reckoning unseen descended upon them—like a grave tempest of black sand—and swept them into oblivion. All their preparations were for nought.” Muahad intoned, stepping in sync with the inquisitive form of Zaphariel. His azure eyes scanned the shelves as they passed, though it wasn’t the contents of such that fully drew his attention. Nor, did it seem, that they stole the notice of the dreamer.
The sterile shelves with the seeds of the genevault were forgotten for the sculptures lining the edge of the room. Zaphariel’s pupils sharpened as he scanned the first of many. He had never seen compositions of such mysterious perfection in his many ventures into Old Pandjoras. A claw-tipped gauntlet reached out and touched the metallic facsimile. The surface of the statue was surprisingly soft with a warm tinge felt even through powered armor. Each one was dressed in similar fashion to the elder that walked with him. Skeletal masks, suctioned to the face, in various forms of half or full. Long, dark robes accented a large, lanky body fitted with different manners of ceremonial armor unknown to him. Every single sculpture was dissimilar in variation. No two were alike as if ages passed between all of them.
“Old Man, it seems your ancestors had admirers in the days of the ancient empire,” Zaphariel frigidly joked. They were all exquisitely beautiful to him in their own way. It spurred the muse within to develop his own line of statues locked in ageless tranquility; however, their appearance was too similar to ignore. He couldn’t look past the incredible likeness between them and the Old Man of the Mountain.
“The fashion of the old empire, passed down from grandmaster to grandmaster in remembrance. Thy instincts serve thee well, dreamer. The title of Old Man of the Mountain long predated the Cataclysm. Their tales—shrewd memories carved to resist the yearning aetheric tide—endured through their inheritors.” Muahad explained in a rare display of humility. There was no emotion in his voice as he spoke. Only the austere timbre of duty remained. He continued, “Mine own title in the aeons before was borne to rouse the disheartened and safeguard their remembrances. The Old Men were solemn and ingenious warriors, devoted to the pursuit of knowledge - yet the avarice of the old empire was abhorrent. Short were the lives of thy ancestors, forced to wither in squalor beneath the decadence of hedonistic, god-like aristocracy.”
“Thus was it their duty to take their heads… and deliver them as feast unto Azrael,” the Old Man spoke as though Pandjoras herself spoke through him. Zaphariel hadn’t noticed that the black blade had been drawn and pointed into the sterile tile. The weight of infinity dawned on the dreamer. To emphasize his own astonishment, his adoptive father continued to speak. His tone became deathly and devoid of what warmth remained. “There are no gods on Pandjoras.”
“And these are your ancestors, hidden away in a forgotten datavault far from Neu Alamut?” Zaphariel cautiously probed with a question. A thousand and one thoughts crossed his mind, yet each one was only sparsely connected. Suspicions unbound filtered through the dusken deity’s mind, his genealogy assisting in bridging his many hypotheses. He arrived at a conclusion that toed the line between insane and mystical
“Nay — naught but pretenders, who clawed for dominion over the mortal coil to sate their own vain hunger. Thy forebears were wrought of a sublime genome, aye—but the usurpers dared stride beyond the true path. Mine ancestors visage they stole, seeking to bind their wayward creed in stolen flesh. Yet all their striving was for naught — for they foresaw not the coming of the Long Night, nor the doom it bore upon their folly.” Muahad concluded. It had been the longest that the Old Man of the Mountain had spoken in Zaphariel’s entire life. To the dreamer, his adoptive father’s words were ringed with truths and lies that weaved naturally together. How much of it was a tale passed down from the inheritors? How much of it was personally witnessed by the Old Man? He offered a reinvigorated grin in response.
“I don’t believe that the Old Man of the Mountain is a title. I believe that you - and your supposed inheritors - are all the same,” Zaphariel announced quietly to his adoptive father. He never turned to regard him with the accusation, simply saying it aloud to the elder. Muahad, after all, was known throughout Pandjoras as the Grandmaster of the Hassan. Some even referred to him as Malik-i-Hassan in shadows before his ascendancy.
A hushed, gravid silence descended betwixt them after the dreamer’s accusation. Slowly, the Old Man of the Mountain unleashed a noise - not wholly a gasp, yet not wholly a cough - that rasped against the alabaster tile. Zaphariel knew it for what it was: laughter. The first such utterance he had ever heard from his adoptive father. The action terrified him more than any possible fate that awaited his long reign as Malik of Pandjoras. His eyes - azure, cold-burning stars each - narrowed in baleful delight as he turned his gaze to his adoptive son.
"O’ foolish whelp - clever, covetous, thief-born son of mine. I am no more mine ancestors than thy are naturally born of Pandjoras’ black sands. Thy boldness amuseth me. Thy suspicion nourishes me. Thy hunger for truth stirreth mine own heart. Thy meddling shall be the grave that closes ‘round thee, my son. Temper thy hand, lest it carve thy epitaph upon the dark dunes," the Old Man of the Mountain responded. For a heart beat, Zaphariel saw it beneath bone and shadow - a fleeting glimmer of a toothy grin alight in azure flame. In that moment, the dreamer felt as if his adoptive father was stronger and taller than he had ever chosen to appear. A grim specter, midnight-clad bearing the apocalyptic blade that murdered the gods of a bygone era.
“Those are amazing statues! Thinking of bringing them back to start a new hobby?” Ramses interrupted from behind, several serpent silk sacks full of unidentified objects. The hassan’s tone indicated no knowledge regarding their conversation. An ignorant intruder. The dreamer was thankful for his uncle’s naivete. The heavy atmosphere deflated into a mute tranquility, yet Zaphariel could feel precipitation bead across his forehead. His heartbeat refused to calm.
“Of course, uncle! They’ll be visual practice for when I travel across the Star Serpent, sculpting my own image and whatever other fantastical beings that cross my path. Perhaps there will be individuals nearly as perfect as I am,” Zaphariel laughed. He couldn’t calm himself, instead resorting to absurdity to quell the turmoil within. The Malik of Pandjoras gestured widely with his hands to the sculptures to emphasize their particular assets.
“I wouldn’t expect any less from you, nephew! From my limited knowledge of the ancients, I’ve confirmed that this place seems to be the genevault you were looking for. I’ll send a vox to the surface and instruct a team to extract the lab. Shall we leave?” Ramses responded with his own raspy laughter before gesturing to the exit. At this current point in time, Zaphariel desired nothing more than to leave with his goal completed. His curiosity was beyond sated - dangerously so.
“Does a serpent simply wait while others dare to feast upon its prey? Set a thousand and one duskborn on this location and ship the contents to Neu Babylos. Let’s leave this place-” Zaphariel had begun to instruct the Seneschal of Neu Alamut when his golden, serpentine eyes were drawn to the exit. It had never occurred to him that there were more statues that lined the edge of the genevault. He had thought that he had committed all of them to memory, yet one last sculpture managed to escape his vision. The dreamer felt the piercing eyes of Muahad fall upon him as he calmly ambled up to the effigy. Reality felt weak to him in that moment as he crossed the distance.
A shimmering haze obscured the statue's fine details, like the stasis fields aboard the Midnight Serpent’s arming chambers. Perhaps it was this field that had hidden the statue from the Malik’s sight, or perhaps there was some other, more esoteric reason behind the lapse in his awareness. Whatever the reason, it did not matter now, for the Dreamer saw the statue before his eyes. He could discern no hidden energy source, no thrum of power emanating from the statue's plinth, no reason for the statue to appear as though it were shrouded in silken draperies of dusk. As though the statue's unnatural obscuration had been waiting specifically for him to approach it, the shimmer resolved. The statue beneath revealed itself as though a malady were removed from the Dreamer’s eyes all at once.
It was another rendering of a figure. This one was a dark-haired woman, dressed in a long, nearly floor-length cloak of vibrant blues, greens, and reds in interlocking geometric patterns. She had a shoulder exposed on her right side where the cloak came together in a simple knot, and a club of exotic wood and lava glass blades was held effortlessly in her right hand. The woman was staring outward, upward even, toward the Dreamer. Her eyes were the rich brown of a fine qahwa, brewed among friends and companions on a short reprieve from a hunt out among the penumbral sands. They were full of life, a burning desire for greatness radiated from them, and an overwhelming sensation of violence barely restrained crept in at the corners of her eyes and the way her smile had been ever-so-creased at the edges.
To Zaphariel ibn Varranis, it was one of the most beautiful sculptures he’d ever laid his eyes on. The ancestral statues of the Thirteen Houses of Pandjoras didn’t come close to the level of perfection that this effigy exhibited. His lips grew into a toothy grin as he caressed the statue’s face with his claw-tipped fingers. An unusual warmth permeated throughout his limb. A word threatened to bubble to the surface of his mind from the unknowing void. As his mouth began to form the words, the Dreamer’s body screamed in anticipation of danger. He jerked backwards just in time.
Azrael - the black blade of the Old Man - cleaved through the statue with the force of an angry god. The powerfield of the blade alighted in azure flame, melting the metal surface of the effigy with a single slash. Muahad had appeared next to him with a hand firmly pressed against his shoulder and another wielding the handle of the apocalyptic sword. Zaphariel’s mind and body writhed in agony as he watched the beautiful sculpture quickly transform into prismatic slag. The dreamer felt as if his legs would give out in despair.
“Father, what’ve you done!?” Zaphariel screamed out, eschewing what remained of his carefully crafted emotional mask. He bared his teeth in an animalistic snarl akin to a void serpent with its frills splayed in anger. A hiss escaped his lips in fury. How dare the Old Man take away something so precious!
“Such women dwell not upon Pandjoras, Zaphariel, nor have they ever walked its black sands,” the Old Man stated. There was a cold fury to his eyes unlike anything that Zaphariel had ever seen. His azure orbs bored through the slag as if it were a thousand and one insults given physical form. The blue flames that licked at the edge of Azrael disappeared, deactivated by an imperceptible move from Muahad. He quickly turned away, callously disregarding his adoptive son in that second.
A desire bloomed into his mind like blossoming azure roses in gravity rain. The features, the touch, and the appearance of the effigy had been committed to the peerless memory of the Dreamer. Determination replaced despair in half a heartbeat. His fingers demanded to carve endless sculptures in the likeness of all that he came across. In the absence of a beauty lost, Zaphariel made a promise to sculpt a thousand and one statues of the things that he loved. They would never escape him again. Credits: @MarshalSolgriev (Zaphariel/Muahad/Ramses), @FrostedCaramel (Weird Statue)
The conquered city of Ouran still reeked of blood.
The rain had washed much of it away, and what little it hadn’t, human hands had cleaned. But despite their efforts, and that of the wind, the smell- the taste in the back of the city’s throat- lingered.
Whole swathes of the city were in ruin, entire families dead in moments. Those few locals that survived huddled in their homes as the Imperium reshaped it around them in glorious homage to their Emperor of Mankind.
But the city was not silent.
To a child for whom everything is new, a ruin is a playground.
The Crimson children raced through the streets, aiming directly for a collapsed building once taller than the masts of their ship and now reduced to a pile of mismatched rubble.
“LAST ONE THERE HAS TO STICK A FINGER IN THE OCEAN!”
“Yeah well, last one to the top has to do EVERYBODY’S LAUNDRY!”
The youngest girl nearly collapsed in a fit of laughter- lucky indeed she was being carried. They all waved as people poked their heads out of buildings and around corners to look at them. One local called out nervously, “The Magpies?”
“MAGPIES ARE AT THE DOCKS!” They yelled in perfect sync. “TRADE TO BE HAD! BYE!” Never once did they stop running.
But then something stopped them.
Through the vast patrols of the auxilia, each as resplendent as the next in black trenchcoat and charcoal carapace, the children could see them from hundreds of meters away. It was impossible not to see them in their various hues throughout the captured city of Ouran. Grey, lilac-white, yellow, and bronze-black were their colors, effortlessly applied to hulking pieces of ceramite. Their weapons were just as myriad, either with bulky man-sized armaments in their hands or vicious chainweapon strapped to their thighs.
The two in particular that the children saw were black-bronze giants with the strangest assortment of decorations they’d seen yet. Unlike the rest, they wore charcoal cloth attached to their front and back belts. Trophies from unseen lands dangled from their pauldron as bits of engraved ceramic, mutant pelts, or bullet casings. Chains clinked with each of their steps, their weapons locked to their vambraces through thick metal links. Snarling, sloped helmets covered their features from the rest of the world. Both bore bulky weapons in two-hands as they continued their patrol through the shattered parts of Ouran.
The children paused, glanced at each other, and came to a unanimous decision. They raced after the two warriors as fast as they could. Of course, next to the walking speed of a man as big as these, the fastest run of 5 children (and one more being carried) did not appear very fast.
One of them, a girl no older than 7, yelled. “Um hiiiii!!!!! Shiny ones!!!!!!”
An older boy chimed in as well. “You don't look busy, do you want to play with us?”
The giants turned their orange-lensed gaze down to the children that had begun to swarm around them. Either out of kindness or a desire to prevent further injuries, the Astartes slowed their pace to a portion of what they’d normally be capable of walking. It was enough for the children to be able to comfortably catch up with the warriors whose steps were measured in tens of meters instead of inches. The silence of the genemen were broken by their stomps, their rumbling powerpack, and their jostling ornamentations.
And the faint sound of clicks coming from their helmets. The Scorpion on the left was looking to his left down at the children as he walked, his action mirrored by his counterpart but to his respective side. Their gaze turned away from the smaller mortals and slightly towards each other.
+’Children?’+ The leftmost one inquired into his private vox, shared by the warrior to his right. His voice was young and spirited, a tone of curiosity as if the word felt new to him.
+’Magpies. Mortals. It was briefed by the Sigilite. Try not to harm them or engage them,’+ the rightmost warrior responded in the vox. His voice was older and rough, a tone of experience that spoke of the Unification War’s campaigns. His stance, gait, and actions were more composed.
The leftmost one’s helmet turned slightly away from the rightmost and down towards the children that flanked around him. His autolenses captured their image in his helmet, reflected as data that displayed what they were and what their affiliation was. The psycho-indoctrination that compelled him to obey his veteran Astartes pulled at his soul; however, something else had snaked into his stapled emotions. A brotherhood of dusk is only as close knit as their most humble warrior.
He blinked in confusion. Strange words had been spoken to him in a tongue he didn’t understand, but the intent was real. His greaves came to a sudden halt, nearly causing one of the children to run into his bulky ceramite. The other warrior stopped, snapping his helmet to the younger. There was an underlying layer of confusion and frustration evident in the sharpness of his helmet’s snap.
“Greetings, little ones,” The Astartes said, automatically tuning the sensitivity of his voxgrille to acceptable levels for a mortal. He lowered himself down slightly, his orange lenses observing the children as they came to a full stop. From that point, he wasn’t entirely sure how to proceed. He’d never had to deal with children since his ascension. It suddenly dawned on him that this was likely what Captain Alim felt. The eyes of the older warrior burned into the back of his skull.
“I believe we have a patrol route nearby that would be sufficient enough for ‘playing’. You may call me Idris. The one behind me is my brother, Ghaalib,” Idris spoke again, finally introducing himself. Ghaalib rolled his shoulders in response, frustration building on his body but too stubborn enough to interrupt. He couldn’t tell if the older warrior was curious or if he had heard the same words as him.
The children caught up and stared at the Astartes.
The oldest, a girl about thirteen, with long hair dyed violent, splotchy red, spoke for them. “We’re Crimson.”
“Do you like hide’n’seek??????” The youngest added, still being carried.
Meanwhile, one of the boys, who wore a red scarf like a tiny flag in the wind, was sidling slowly closer to Ghaalib, trying to look casual and unassuming but stealing glances.
“Hide and seek is it? The Thirteenth are some of the best infiltrators compared to our peers.” Idris responded with a chuckle. He didn’t lie to the child, the Thirteenth were the best known Astartes legion specialized in clandestine operations. Even as a warrior as young as he was, Idris couldn’t count the amount of infiltrations he’d performed on both hands. Ghaalib was certain to have more.
Idris picked himself up, rising to his full height in preparation for the game. Ghaalib, who’d noticed the boy with the red scarf approaching, turned towards the younger Astartes with disappointment clear in his aura. The junior warrior shrugged his shoulders in acceptance of the children’s playing. Their next noises were a series of clicks emitted from their helmets.
+’Do you truly intend to enable these children?’+ Ghaalib said with no shortage of irritation. The private vox continued with a blink of his eye from their previous interaction. His stance didn’t meet his tone.
+’There will always be monsters and men to slay. We are His warriors, but the Sigilite has mentioned previously that our humanity is a rare resource. Perhaps, this once, we engage with it if you are willing, brother.’+ Idris responded, maglocking the bolter to his right thigh with an audible thunk. His hands free of weapons, the younger Astartes gestured with one talon-tipped gauntlet towards the end of the road. As the children began to move forward, so did he.
+’You confuse me, but I’ll indulge you as a reward for your recent accomplishments here. I’ll vox to local command that we’ve deviated due to the Magpies. They seem to have some sway over hierarchy.’+ Ghaalib shook his head in defeat, joining Idris in his extended gait with his bolter maglocked to his thigh. He shared a brief dialogue with the vox-operator at Ouran’s command center before switching to local vox. The veteran Astartes, noticing the scarfed boy, made a sound through his helmet.
“Go along. Idris will play. I have a duty to uphold,” Ghaalib said to the boy, adjusting his voxgrille output to the acceptable level for conversation with mortals. He’d follow some distance behind the younger warrior, his eyes still watching the ruins with a wealth of experience only known to weapons like him. The last words of the vox-operator put him on edge. Members of the Seventeenth in the local area if you require reinforcements, they had said to him. Ghaalib disliked the kind of reputation that came with endearment towards mortals for the Thirteenth. He’d dislike it further if other legions began to talk of it.
The boy stared at him silently for a few seconds, then nodded. “I don’t like hide’n’seek. I’ll help you.” And with no further warning, the boy ran over to climb Ghaalib.
Meanwhile, the rest of the flock had gathered around Idris to explain the rules.
“You can be It first!” “That means you gotta seek first.” “You count to… um…” “Count to 30!” “No no 40!!!!!” “Okay fine count to 40 and then-” “THEN YOU COME FIND US!” “Don’t interrupt me!!!” “While they’re arguing, you gotta close your eyes while you count so we can go hide.” “ANYWAY! After you’re done counting you come find us!!!!!”
Chaos erupted as five children attempted to simultaneously explain the rules. When they finished, they stood silently waiting for him to close his eyes and start counting.
Idris stared at them blanky from beneath his helmet. He hadn’t considered that they couldn’t see expression behind the slopped wargear of his legion. The Space Marine turned towards Ghaalib for acknowledgement and was met with a shake of his head. That was one step too far for their deviation. He understood why without having to ask as there were insurgents still in Ouran.
“Very well. I’ll close my eyes and count to forty standard Terran seconds. I wish you luck, little ones, for the Scorpions are very good hunters.” Idris replied with a toothy grin beneath his mask. He turned off his photolenses with a blink, powering down the illuminated orange of his helmet for the children. Then a rumble from within the wargear began to emit in growing volume.
“One…” Idris stated. His voice was low, deep and dangerous beneath the mask. A subconscious switch from playful to combative. His tongue trilled with each draw of a number as if rasped from a serpent’s maw. He started to crouch down in a hunter’s posture with claw-tipped gauntlets resting just above the ground.
Ghaalib watched his fellow genewarrior with wary eyes. Neither of them had interacted with children in such a long period of time. A small worry grew on his conscience that Idris wouldn’t be able to distinguish the difference between non-combatants and enemies. In their duties to Unity, there was hardly a difference between the two. His stance shifted to allow the red scarfed child up and to be ready to intercept if necessary.
“Be ready, child,” Ghaalib warned. His voice was neutral, yet his tone suggested something dangerous may occur. He uncrossed his armored arms and let them hover by his sides. The Space Marine knew that using weaponry against his brother was unwarranted, but it wouldn’t be the first time they had used weapons against Astartes.
The scarf boy nodded as he reached a comfortable perch on Ghaalib’s shoulder. The two of them watched as the five children scattered as fast as their little legs could take them. The two youngest girls vanished behind chunks of rubble and hunkered down, the very youngest with the tips of her little red shoes pointing out behind her. The younger of the two boys, who hadn’t yet spoken a word, started climbing a building and slipped nimbly through a broken window, lost to sight.
The oldest two, boy and girl, took one competitive look at each other and bolted down the street, turning corners in opposite directions. Within 20 seconds, the only visible part of any of the children was the little red shoes of the youngest girl.
An auspex alert sounded before the human child burst around the corner. The power armored figure rose from their spot in the rubble, stepping in front of the faint outline of another giant recumbent in the heap of debris. With the whine of servomotors the giant blocked the young girl's way forward, and sheathed a wickedly shaped saw at its hip.
This giant’s armor was not black and bronze as the two from before, but uncolored. Slate grey as the day it had rolled off the forge lines in the Terrawatt Clans. No trinkets or trophies hung from chains or dangled from its pauldrons. A simple black stenciled “XVII” on the left shoulder was the only thing that gave the giant any form of belonging.
It turned its helmeted gaze to the girl, turquoise lenses staring as the giant stood impossibly still before the child.
“Declare yourself.” the giant spoke, the voxgrill of its helmet distorting its voice into a painfully loud command.
The girl glared. “Shhhhh!!! I’ll lose the game if you keep being that loud! I’m Crimson.” She gestured at her red-dyed hair with evident annoyance. Surveying the place she stopped, she shrugged and, instead of trying to pass the warrior before her, simply darted sideways to begin climbing.
The giant in grey took a minor step toward the girl as she began her scramble up the rubble. Servomotors whined as the Astartes reached out and scooped the girl up with one hand closed around an arm.
“This is no game, child.” it boomed at Crimson, the girl held up in front of the Astartes like a doll before a toddler uncertain of how not to harm it, “Imperial passcode and business.” the Astartes commanded once more.
The girl, who among her various cousins was usually the biggest and smartest, went very very still. “H-Heyyyy,” she said, “I don’t really have one but um, I’m sure that’s fine right? We got told th-that um. That it was okay to c-come play in the city and. Th-The bronze ones were playing with us. There was a guy n-named M-Markus who said it was… said it was okay.” She trembled in the hands of her captor, glad it was her here, and not any of the younger kids.
The giant silently regarded the girl through the turquoise lenses, the slight static of vox traffic inside the helmet the only indication that the Astartes was in fact not a statue as it did.
“All citizens and refugees must have a passcode,” the giant still boomed from its voxgrill, “You have been assigned ‘8-9-7-7-2-8 Crimson’, commit this to memory.” the giant declared as it simply let the girl drop free from its ceramite gauntlet, gravity taking Crimson the remaining distance to the rubble.
The Astartes lowered its hand to its side like a soldier at inspection, “897728 Crimson, you are not free to go,” it began, its head tilting down as the turquoise lenses gave off the odd sensation of being scrutinized, “deviation from this command is not recommended.”
“Ow…” the girl replied, sitting dazed on the ground.
“Forty…” Idris finally counted down. His voxgrille was turned up to maximum volume, blaring out the number to be heard. Both of his eyes opened to the world around him as the environment laid bare of children. A blink saw his orange lenses illuminate. A toothy grin sprawled across his lips. The dusken hunter is a master of black sands and a master of the dagger.
His body exploded into action with such intensity that his tabard nearly tore off. Both of his clawed-tipped gauntlets hovered just above the ground as he sprinted forward. The sound of ceramite boots against ground reverberated intensely, causing the unaugmented to flinch in response; however, it was lighter than expected. He was lighter than Astartes of other legio. He was a son of the Thirteenth and he was a hunter.
He could smell them. Their excitement, their curiosity, their fear. It reeked off of their bodies like an acute odor. It appeared to him like a trail directly to where they hid. Idris couldn’t feel bad for the little mortals. He was too invigorated by the hunt.
His power armoured body leapt with surprising nimbleness over the rubble the two girls hid behind. A practised movement of a warrior built for assassination. He lightly pressed both of his hands over their heads and tagged them. The action could’ve crushed mortal skulls with ease, yet Idris was a geneson of the Thirteenth Legio. Delicate manipulation was a staple of their geneseed.
Like a predator stalking through its natural environment, he lunged upwards to the closest building. His gauntlets dove precisely into the rockrete hab, pulling him upwards to the window where the next child hid. Orange lenses illuminated the next Crimson Magpie behind the broken window. His body nimbly snaked through the opening, crushing the glass beneath his armored form as he crept towards the young mortal. A simple pat on his head, a light and swift action, saw the child discovered and ‘tagged’.
He chuckled lightly to himself as his armored form snaked out the window, falling backwards to meet the ground beneath. The momentum was used to spring to his next objective, his tabard trailing behind him like a wavering flag. Two remained. He had decided to hunt the boy first as Idris rushed down the road. His grin deepened as he leapt into the split of the road, where the two had separated. Both of his eyes turned right and saw the object of his game restrained.
He would not allow this. They were his to hunt.
The auspex ping of his armor’s identification appeared on the Seventeenth Astartes’ display just as he sprinted up. It chimed at the same second that Idris physically appeared in close proximity to the slate-gray genewarrior. A taloned gauntlet was defensive on the older girl’s head and another reached up to the other genewarrior. The digits stopped mere seconds away from their helmet. His aura was dangerous.
“What are you doing, Seventeenth?" Idris scowled out with a dangerous rasp. It was an automatic, aggressive reaction. He hadn’t even noticed other Astartes in the area during his hunt. An intense focus had consumed him in the height of the game. The entire hunt had taken several seconds to discover all of the children. An adrenaline cocktail still pumped in his veins. The sound of power armored feet followed behind him as Ghaalib rounded the corner.
“Oh no,” muttered scarf boy.
Ana’s armor blared a proximity alert at the same moment that the auspex identified the contact with a solid “XIII”.
She did not manage to step away as the bronze and gold armored form of the Thirteenth’s warrior slipped into her guard, their claws finding a new home before the soft armor of her neck.
Her voxgrill crackled back to life, her form unmoving even with the claws so close, “Recovering geneseed Cousin, this mortal interrupted. She has seen the work,” Ana replied as she motioned back toward the slate-grey form of a fallen sister of the Seventeenth in the rubble behind her.
As she awaited the warrior's response, her armor highlighted identifying markings, trinkets, and baubles hanging off her cousin's armor.
“Your armor is in violation of general Imperial regulation. I trust you will ensure compliance, and will file a report with Legio liaisons.” she stated flatly through the voxgrill.
Split second recognition finally flashed across Idris’ eyes as the combat stimulation dulled. The hunt had faded. He withdrew his fingers away from the Astartes’ throat. The Scorpion could feel no fear, yet the quickness with which he was ready to kill gave him pause. Even another Astartes. Their Legion Master would’ve simply stated that this was a natural response as they were weapons first and people second. His talon-tipped digits slipped away to the right pauldron of the other Astartes. The claw fell away from the older girl’s hair, yet it hovered nearby to react if needed.
“Ah, dear cousin, you interrupted my hunt. You have my apologies for the indiscretion, but these children are in my charge,” Idris finally replied after another second of silence. His desires melted into nothingness like irradiated morning dew. He never lost the toothy grin beneath his mask, even as Ghaalib finally crossed the distance between the corner and his fellow Scorpion.
The veteran Astartes came to a slow stop next to Idris. The older girl was positioned between them as the older warrior started to speak. It seemed the presence of the scarfed boy no longer mattered to him as the Imperials started to converse.
“Sergeant Ghaalib of the Thirteenth Legio Astartes, Immortal of the Third Company. Initiating protocol Angelus Primus. Private vox now,” the older genewarrior stated with the voice of authority. On command, all three entered private, interlegionary vox spread across their multitude of companies. From the children’s perspective, the giants suddenly started to speak in squeaks as their voxgrilles shuttered. Only the initiation of vox speech could be heard from their helmets. Their Legion Master had instilled some sense of caution in them, wary of the cluttered hierarchy that the Legio Astartes was becoming.
As the Astartes attention left them, the boy on Ghaalib’s shoulder called down, “Hey Ma- cousin. You okay?”
The girl flopped backwards on the ground, still shaking a little. “Nobody told me the grey ones were rude,” she whined. “I was lied to! Did our bronze one find the others?”
“Yeah, except… Uh. Well. You’ve lost the bet, I’m sure of it.”
She made a face. “I guess the colors are like our colors? Grey ones… boring and terrifying about it. Bronze ones…”
“Fun and terrifying about it. We should play sardines next.”
“Rank and designation, Astartes,” Ghaalib requested over the private vox that the three suddenly shared. It was a trick question. His helmet firmly displayed the datapacket attached to their armor. The punctuation with which they spoke gave him most of the information he required, yet Ghaalib had to ascertain factors that weren’t present. He needed to see how obedient this younger Astartes was. The mind is like the shifting sands, bare to all and moldable to the wise.
Ana switched to the proximity interlegionary vox without a word, her armor systems handling the frequency scrambling and encryption that allowed the three Astartes to converse privately, and psychoindoctrination ensured she followed the discretion of a more experienced Legionnaire without a moment of hesitation.
“Sister Ana Alves, Medicae Secundus of the Second Company, Seventeenth Legio,” she replied dutifully, the words rolling off her lips as though a machine answered for her, “I was not informed of any hunt in the area. I was instructed that it was safe to recover our fallen’s gene-gifts for the next generation.”
Ana did not move inside her armor, though her enhanced medicae suite scanned the children before her as she spoke, “I fail to see how these mortals could be of assistance in a hunt, surely a request to the Seventeenth or even Imperialis forces would have been more sufficient.” she questioned her cousins.
The Astartes of the Thirteenth shared a look. Their features were hidden behind their helmets, yet both understood the other without the use of vox. They were encountering a warrior fresh from the forge, clad in warplate that was newly painted and pushed out by the Terrawatt Clans. The Legion Master had made it plain amongst them that the recently ascended were to be brought under their proverbial wings. It’d mitigate the time spent as a psycho-indoctrinated automata.
“Second Company hasn’t been briefed on the arrival of the Magpies then? These children are members of a Terran faction that the Imperium is currently undergoing unification efforts with. They are Imperialis Socius until further mandated otherwise by order of the Sigilite. You may continue your work, Medicae,” Sergeant Ghaalib responded as he registered the local datapacket and quickly addressed it to Sister Ana. It contained fragmentary data about the Magpies with recent, professionally doctored notes from the Thirteenth’s observations. He turned to regard Idris, who simply nodded in affirmation.
“However, recent Imperial doctrine dictates that it’d be best if you accompany us after your operation is performed. Your duties would be augmented by our presence as a joint legionary exercise,” the veteran Astartes continued with a firm tone. He frowned in distaste. This had all begun with Idris’ sudden clemency for mortals, yet it was rapidly becoming an issue evolving beyond that. His helmet turned as the younger warrior spoke after him.
“You were mortal once, cousin, if you are able to remember. I will tell you what the Sigilite had once told us - humanity is the rarest, most valuable resource that a warrior could have. These children are a conduit for channeling those attributes,” Idris said with a tinge of aggression and clarity. The combat cocktail in his system had fully run its course through both of his hearts, thoroughly flushed from his veins. He felt an unusual clairvoyance and benevolence in his mind like a purifying wash of steam over blood soaked armor. A warden of clear mind is a dusken warrior of pure intent.
“As my brother has said, you should join us in this little game that we’re playing,” the younger Astartes suggested as he turned away from Ana. His lenses landed on the gathering crowd of children behind them, then flickered back to the slate-grey medicae with anticipation evident in his movements.
The children already found had indeed gathered, peeking around the corner with some apprehension at the scene before them- their temporary guardian sprawled on the ground, still shaking slightly.
Maz, as her cousin had almost called her outloud, stood quickly, the reminder of her responsibilities as oldest enough to shake the last of the (visible) fear from her bones. She ran to them and they began a whispered conversation.
Ana, for all the reeducation, psychoindoctrination and relentless battle drills had done to her ego still felt disappointment as she spoke next.
“The Second Company is reduced to just seventeen, Cousin Ghaalib. It is not my station to venture, but it would appear we are withdrawn from the current events of Ouran. No doubt theater command wishes us to recover our strength before involving us in such,” her words stung of failure as her helmet turned to regard the children gathering once more, “…pleasantries.” She finished.
Even as she spoke she consumed the data packet sent by the Brother Ghaalib, her enhanced mind easily carrying conversation and committing the packet to memory for future recall. She marked it for forward to Company Command and offered a nod to the two warriors of the Thirteenth.
“I have forwarded the data packet, you have my thanks.”
She turned where she stood, her armored form moving no doubt suddenly to the assembled children as she crouched once more and removed her tools.
“Just a moment,” she stated over her voxgrill, the amplification still far too high for the assembled children’s ears. The sounds of cracking bone and tearing sinew resonated from her as she worked on her fallen sister, and she stood as suddenly as she had knelt.
Ana turned back to the assembled group, slipping a pair of fleshy spheres into stasis tubes as she did and nodded.
“We may proceed.” she stated, her voxgrill still loud enough to be heard a block away.
The younger children covered their ears. The older ones merely scrunched their faces up in discomfort. The boy on Ghalib’s shoulder muttered, “She’s like that one old Verdant who can’t hear anymore.”
Then the youngest girl pointed to what Ana had just done. “Is that like what the Azure do?” Maz immediately started shaking her head.
“I hope not!!!”
“My auditory sensors and functions read nominal. I can detect sound without issue.” Ana replied, practically screaming without turning her gaze to address the boy on the warrior's shoulders.
The boy, in return, rolled his eyes. “Oh, and just as stupid-”
Maz cut in. “HEY! You have to be polite to big scary things, idiot!”
He turned to stick his tongue out at her. “Yeah well I’ve got a big scary friend who’s way cooler sooo…” He tapped Ghalib lightly on the head.
The two children glared at each other.
“Then it is decided,” Sergeant Ghaalib said with a satisfied nod. His voice had automatically switched from private vox to outward speech. He anticipated a great many things as a son of the Thirteenth, yet the veteran Astartes hadn’t expected to persuade another genewarrior from a different legio. The Scorpion turned away from the Medicae at the same moment that Idris readied himself once more. Ghaalib would’ve begun speaking with the younger warrior if he hadn’t received a warning from his receptors. His eyes rolled to the side of his helmet as the scarfed child spoke.
“Mind yourself, young one, I may seem calm now but there are actions that can incite my anger.” He warned, yet his voice lacked the bite necessary to fully drive the child away. Ghaalib made a mental note that he had grown used to carrying the boy aloft on his pauldrons. An active note was made regarding the possibility of recruitment within the Magpies, yet it was hidden beneath his display and to wider command. His greaves brought him back to Idris, who flexed their finger talons out in preparation. The younger warrior caught the gaze of his superior, gave a muffled chortle, and moved towards the group of children.
“I’ve two things to tell you, little ones. The first is that this warrior of the Seventeenth is joining us for our games. Her name is Sister Ana Alves. She is a Medicae, or perhaps you’d better understand it as a healer or apothecary. She is new to interaction with mortals, so treat her well.” Idris said, swapping from his private vox back to the outwardly voice he had previously used. The younger warrior planted his hands against his midriff as he explained the situation. As he finished, the Scorpion raised a finger to prevent any further questions about her.
“The second is that the game is still on. I shall find the last of your number in the next five seconds, or shall we conclude this for something else? I believe that the scarfed one on Ghaalib mentioned something regarding ‘sardines’?” Idris asked, particularly pointing his orange lenses at the girl who had been assaulted by the Seventeenth. The younger warrior was less daunting now that the combat adrenaline had been purged from his system. Still, Idris itched for another contest of speed and strength. It brought him a small amount of joy.
Maz left the other kids and approached Ana again warily. Then, in what was clearly her best approximation of the Crimson Emissary’s confidence, she said, “If you want to play with us, you have to talk quieter.”
Ana regarded the girl, her enhanced medicae sensor suite displaying data and lab results taken from samples of the girls breath and excreted sweat from exertion and fear.
The Medicae nodded and with a thought lowered her voxgrill volume from “COMBAT” to “Leisure”.
“This should be more acceptable.” Ana said with a feminine voice sweet as honey, an accent unknown to the Magpie’s creeping in as she spoke..
“I apologize for the volume,” she offered, every syllable rolling from her tongue like the flow of a gentle river as the distortion of her helmet volume no longer hid the Astartes’ voice beneath.
As she did, the 7-year-old was running to Idris, arms upstretched in the universal child’s gesture of ‘pick me up!’ “We gotta play Sardines cause you’re too good at seeking,” she said, “but if we don’t find my brother first he’ll be reaaaaaally mad.”
The younger Astartes calmly knelt, claiming the younger girl and raising her up on one of his pauldrons. She sat just above where the pincers of his twinned scorpions met around the ‘XIII’. Idris grinned beneath his helmet at the praise, yet he decided to bottle it up for later satisfaction as his greaves moved forward. His movement signalled the overall group to begin moving towards where the Scorpion sensed the last boy.
And, on Ghalib’s shoulder, scarf-boy huffed. After a pause, though, sounding more admiring than scared he asked, “Do you kill people when you get mad?”
Ana, for all her confusion at the children and her cousins, found the answer spring to her lips before she could truly give thought to why she was even answering the boy’s question.
“We kill when we must, when commanded, anger plays little part.” she offered the child on Ghaalib’s shoulders.
“Sister Ana speaks correctly, young one, yet there are times when emotions can be used. Anything is a weapon. There are times where my duties as a weapon and my passions as a warrior intermingle. So, yes, I do extinguish the lives of the Emperor’s enemy when angered,” Ghaalib responded. He’d considered the question as it was posed, yet the Immortal hadn’t considered that the Medicae would respond. The image of Legion Master Zaid appeared in his head as he considered if anger dictated his own actions. The Scorpion hoped it broadened the emotional horizon of his legionary cousin.
The boy considered, said “I’m not the enemy of the Emperor,” then turned his head to Ana. “What do you do when you’re mad?”
Ana contemplated the question a moment, her mind moving through rote battle drill and theory as quickly as her hearts beat.
“I have not been mad since I was raised up,” she lied to the child, “the Emperor has need of my sisters and I for our abilities. He does not require my anger.” she finished, suppressing the memories of the vaults deep beneath the Himalazias, of the anger she had felt after she had survived the remaking while so many had not.
The boy narrowed his eyes at her, but saved his (extensive) further questions for later.
All of them followed after the dexterous movements of Idris back down the tortured, shattered roads of Ouran. The Astartes of the Thirteenth intentionally walked at a certain speed, allowing the children to keep pace with their lithe strides and meter wide steps. The Scorpion in the lead chose not to speak as he revitalized the hunt within to determine the location of the last child. His orange lenses flashed across the swathe of land that stretched out before him. He eventually sensed the boy before physical cues presented themselves.
“Come out, little one, your siblings desire for a new game and we have a new member added to our group,” Idris called out. He raised the volume of his helmet slightly with a blink, enough to be heard but not enough to damage the eardrums of nearby mortals. The Scorpion crossed his arms as he awaited the boy to remove themselves from their hiding spot. He reeked of curiosity and fear.
The boy didn’t move until Maz called out, “You won! I lost the bet this time. We’re gonna play sardines now so we gotta explain how it works to the Bronze and the….” She eyed Ana. “And the not-Mist.”
As he came out he grinned, and Maz scoffed. “Sardines, huh? That makes sense. I wasn’t hidden very long. Wait, do you guys know what a sardines is???”
Ana had been following close behind her cousins of the Thirteenth, her mind had been consumed with the next steps of geneseed extraction that would see her sisters live on in new recruits to the legio. She had been planning her routes for the next of her fallen sisters deep in concentration and hadn’t noticed the boy beginning to crawl from his hiding spot in the rubble. On instinct her hand shot to the bolt pistol maglocked to her thigh, uncoupling the lock with a barely noticeable click she began to raise the weapon toward the surprise threat before she stopped herself. Her armor categorized the child a non-threat, and she quietly placed the weapon back at its holstered position as quickly as she had removed it.
“Sardines, they are an extinct species of land animal. Imperial scientists and archeotechnicians have classified them as limbless serpents. It is postulated that Sardines used air sacks located internally along their dorsal spine to take flight for short periods of time and escape land predators.” she made a poor imitation with her hand held out flat floating toward the sky as a Sardine would, “it is why they appear to have small air veins along their bodies, to ride the air currents, as your sails do.” she stated with a sagely nod.
The duo of Bronze Scorpions cocked their head towards Sister Ana as she had begun to unholster her bolt pistol. They both shared a collective look as the weapon was quickly, silently restored to the holster in the same moment. To the mortals, it was nothing but a quick hand movement. To the genewarriors, though, it was a threat registered and then delisted from their priorities. Their finger claws had hovered over their weapons for a half of a second before returning to their neutral affairs.
“You remained in the ‘recreation’ pod for more than most then, Sister Ana,” Idris responded with a smirk. Ghaalib’s body faintly moved in a way that only a genewarrior would notice. It was a measure of disappointment at the apparent jab from him. The younger Astartes shrugged his shoulders and flared his fingers in response.
Ana perked up a little at her cousin's jab. Not recognizing it for the insult it was, she made a mental note to find and utilize a “recreation pod” next time she was sequestered beneath the Himalazias under the tutelage of Doctor Astarte for further Medicae training. If there would ever be a next time.
“Indeed, Sister Ana has been bestowed with a breadth of knowledge. I imagine it was due to her becoming a Medicae,” Sergeant Ghaalib stated, aware that her profession was not simply a choice but a mandate. If she were anything like how the Thirteenth used to be, then her expertise was granted straight from the psycho-indoctrination chambers. After all that the Bronze Scorpions have achieved, Ghaalib couldn’t believe what they had been like once. He was thankful to be made a member of the earlier legions for that reason alone.
“A long passed animal from Old Terra or not, it seems to be the topic of this game that you all wish to play,” Idris said, finally turning his attention away from the other Astartes to the children. He crossed his arms over his chestplate as the children finished discussing amongst themselves. The younger warrior was still aware of the girl on his pauldron as he spoke again. “How do you play ‘Sardines’?”
“It’s like the opposite of hide-and-seek!” The girl on Idris’ shoulder nearly slipped off in her excitement, grabbing his head for balance.
“Best played at sunset,” added the boy who had been found last. “One person hides somewhere, everyone else searches for them.”
“BUT,” the youngest girl cut in, “when you FIND THEM, you JOIN THEM IN THEIR SPOT.”
Maz nodded. “So the longer it takes you to find them the more alone you are. A couple years ago we played with the adults too in this huge abandoned city.”
The scarf boy nodded. “It was terrifying.”
Ana turned to the girl, confusion rife in her mind at the last comment, “According to records, Ouran was not abandoned years ago. I fail to see how you could have conducted such an operation as ‘Sardines’ in a hostile city as Ouran during that time,” she paused a moment, pondering the statement before continuing, “Perhaps your memory is mistaken, and it was not this city but a different one.”
Her comment made, she took a step forward, silencing a request from the Seventeenth for an updated position as she did, “How does one get chosen to hide?”
Maz drew herself up with obvious anger. “My memory is NOT mistaken, Grey. I am NOT talking about Ouran. That city was far away. And empty.” She scoffed. “Maybe you should get your ears checked.”
Idris hovered a bronze-black gauntlet nearby to calm the older Crimson girl. Her hostility could be felt as a palpable haze to the Astartes. A chemical flair of adrenaline from Maz’s tiny body. He doubted that Ana suspected that the Crimson Magpies were a threat after their encounter, but the Scorpion had to be cautious. The uninitiated were always temperamental at best and abominable at worst.
“Easy, young one, Sister Ana means well. Even going so far as to wonder who will be hiding when the answer is obvious,” Idris stated with a toothy grin beneath his helmet. His orange lenses turned to each of the children, ascertaining the next words he was planning to speak. He triumphantly planted both of his gauntlets on his sides and puffed out his ceramite pauldrons proudly. “It is none other than me, cousin, for I won the last game.”
All the children, except the glaring Maz, nodded in agreement at Idris’ assertion. It only made sense, after all.
A chortle bubbled up from the Astartes as Sergeant Ghaalib moved between Idris and Ana. He shook his head in vague disappointment to the younger Scorpion before resting his gaze on the warrior from the Seventeenth.
“I did not participate in the last game. I believed that Idris wouldn’t have a hard time finding these children. It is the same for this game, however, I believe it’d serve as exceptional practice if you joined in as one of the seekers,” Ghaalib said. He hadn’t seen or experienced much from the Seventeenth during the Siege of Ouran. A small part of him was interested in seeing if the younger member from the younger legion could match the younger members from the older legion.
The Medicae took a moment to decide on her involvement before nodding in agreement at Idris’ position as the one hiding
“I am agreeable to the idea of seeking,” she dropped her automatic monitoring of Idris’ armor signature from her own armor’s tasks and smiled slightly behind her helmet, “I believe my armor medicae systems would make this too easy, I shall disable them for the time being.”
With that, she took a step forward, her hands dancing over her equipment for the briefest of moments as she ensured everything was in its proper position.
“Cousin Ghaalib, Cousin Idris, Crimson children, I am reporting readiness for sardines.”
All the children stared expectantly at Idris.
“Rest your eyes on a blanket of dusk, my friends,” Idris said as he took a step backwards. There was a skip in his step, joyful at the prospect of being hunted instead of being the hunter. A fresh voice entered his mind at the thought. Dark sands guide the hunter and the hunted, yet only the scorpion survives the greedy serpent. He offered an Achaemenid’s bow as he watched the children and Astartes close their eyes. A clip of his belt saw the bolter and chainsword drop from his form, falling by the side of Ghaalib who watched with annoyance.
The Bronze Scorpion erupted into a blur of movement as they all started to count. He sprinted away as fast as his genemodified body could with all the added benefit of being a warrior of the Thirteenth. His boots fell as lightly as he could allow, muting their noise as effectively as one could to others. He ran as those clad in dusk, galloping over imaginary grains of sand as he vaulted urban rubble. His objective was well within sight. The building that one of the boys had hidden in would suffice for his hunting ground. He zigzagged in the urban rubble, obscuring his true path as if he were dispersing sand.
His clawed fingers picked up a small piece of rubble, flicked it sideways to simulate the sound of an armored form jumping and then jumped himself upon the building. A loud shattering of a window resounded across the area, reverberated only by the accompanying bang of a ferrocrete wall nearly collapsing. Idris slithered into the ferrocrete structure with the guile of a practised assassin, slinking down into a prone position two stories up from where the boy had been found. He yanked a piece of stained cloth from a toppled table and threw it over himself in a single motion. Finally, in a cunning act, Idris deactivated the generator in his power armor and removed his helmet.
Young, Achaemenidian features bristling with scars stared out with dark eyes as the sky slowly began to transform into dusk. He offered a toothy grin to the wind. A pair of claw-tipped fingers turned the helmet’s lenses away from the sun, aware that it could give away his position. Now, only time would tell if the children managed to discover him.
As the children finished counting and opened their eyes, the sun shone bright in their faces, close to setting. Ghaalib’s friend scrambled down from his shoulder to join the others in their search. Maz sighed as she scooped up the Captain’s 5-year old daughter, seeing her rival do the same for his little sister. “Last game.” The children all grumbled for a few seconds, and then, without warning, they scattered.
“I’m winning this time!” Maz called. She heard him reply but didn't bother paying attention. She half-skipped and half-ran, the little girl in her arms giggling with every bounce. She had no doubt of her direction, after that sound they’d heard- although it wouldn’t surprise her if it was some kind of trick. She climbed up a pile of boulders just to make her little charge giggle.
At the top she paused. “Alright little Captain, what wind shall we catch?”
The little girl thought for a moment, her face scrunched up. “Mama says that when we do new things we usually copy what we see other people do. So maybe he used one of our hiding spots!!!”
Maz grinned, hearing the others yell in frustration. “Clever girl. Let's go check them.”
Sister Ana watched stoically as the children took off on their search in the wrong direction. She remained stationary, allowing the children to disappear before her helmet's gaze turned toward Cousin Idris’ most likely direction of travel. She was basing her assumption off of the footsteps she was able to distinguish through her muted helmet’s auditory inputs and the vibration of the over thousand pound Astartes’ every footstep made in her own armored soles. She made note of the warrior of the Thirteenth’s silence and muted footfalls for after action review, her armor sensors had still recorded the event though she allowed herself not to access the information in the name of sportsmanship.
She began to walk calmly down the road, unsure of any valid reason to rush as she picked out likely avenues of egress from the starting position. She studied a mound of rubble ahead, noting fresh movement as stone debris settled at the base of the obliterated building and continued toward it with silent determination. She walked quietly around the pile of rockcrete and death, her eyes following an eddy of dust in the air some distance down the road.
Her every armored footfall crunched rock and stone beneath her feet, and she observed the area around her with clinical precision. She stopped at the spot of the since dissipated billowing dust and surveyed her surroundings. She recalled the sound of shattering glass and began to spin where she stood, her genehanced mind picking out broken windows around her. She lamented the fact that there was no shortage of shattered glass to choose from, but her transhuman mind began to filter out windows that did not match patterns of external forced entry.
She ruled out a number of buildings from nearby blast craters and glass fragmentation patterns that led out onto the street rather than into the buildings. She narrowed her search down to just two buildings in a matter of heartbeats.
She turned to face her two most likely culprits, scrutinizing the shadowed interiors as she stood in the middle of the road. She turned her head to the side as the approaching sound of the Crimson children began to grow.
The oldest boy sang a wordless song as he carried his younger sister piggyback through the streets. They were, of course, following Ana. Maz would say it was cheating, but the huge woman had an obvious advantage in finding the Bronze they were searching for. He stopped singing as they got closer, stopped walking just out of her sight, around a corner. His sister giggled quietly, and he shushed her with a wide smile.
To Ana, of course, they were obvious.
With the Crimson children just out of sight Ana now had reason to move with more urgency. Her first step sent her bounding for the first of the two buildings, the second had her armored form rising through the air as she reached for the window frame. Her gauntleted fingers gripped onto the rockcrete of the wall and she swung her second hand up to gain a better hold. For the briefest of moments she began to haul herself up toward the shattered window and then she was falling.
The bulk of her form, weighing close to that of an automover, slammed into the already broken street with an unceremonious crunch. She rolled off her back not a moment after making contact with the ground and took off for the street level entrance to the habblock this time, leaving the acrobatics to her cousins in the Thirteenth. She stomped noisily through the interior hall as she made for the quickest path to an interior stairwell.
Inside the stairwell she slowed her movement once more, attempting her best to emulate the deafened sounds of her cousin Astartes as she climbed the interior floor by floor in an attempt to leave the children guessing where she had exited.
Ghaalib had watched the affair from the start. As Sol began to dip into the toxin-tinged clouds of Terra, he couldn’t help but feel sorry for the children. They were up against one of the oldest active legions bar the First and specialized in infiltration. A chronometer within his helmet ticked down the time it’d take for the children to discover Idris. The real challenger, he assumed correctly, was the woman from the Seventeenth.
She had sieved through the deception that Idris had laid as bait. Even the children were starting to realize. Ghaalib wondered if it was coincidence with the mortals or was it a sign of higher cognitive function, he previously thought they were bereft of. Regardless, freshly awakened Astartes never ceased to amaze him in their raw capabilities. Some of that raw experience was now gone from the Scorpions, leaving only black sand and dusken skies in its wake.
Maz hoisted her small charge higher in her arms as they made it back to where their game of hide and seek had started- just in time to watch the not-Mist woman go into one of the buildings. Her face twisted up in frustration. It was cheating to follow someone else in Sardines- it defeated the point of the game. And yet…
Her thoughts were interrupted by the little girl in her arms. “Can’t be cheating if we were already gonna look there! Come ON, cousin!” Maz’s sleeve was thoroughly tugged on in an effort to get her to head for where Ana had gone.
She sighed. “Alright fine. But if he says we’re cheating I’m telling him it was your idea, my little Captain.”
Meanwhile, the oldest boy and his sister waited patiently across the street, watching to see if Ana would finish searching and leave the building, or if one of the other children had the same plan.
Well, not so patiently. His sister wiggled. “Let’s just go in. I wanna see!”
And, well, why would he deny her? He bounced their way across the street into the door Ana had entered.
And he didn’t notice Maz and her young charge watching him from down the road.
The slate grey armored form of Ana slipped through a doorway, her steps crunching glass and debris as lightly as she could manage, though still far louder than her cousin of the XIII had managed. She peered through each doorway down the hall of the habblock, trying to find anything that would give away her cousin— loose dust here, scuffed floors there, broken glass strewn about this room or that. She found herself becoming frustrated as she searched. Every room was empty of the Space Marine she expected to find. Her choler rose with each vacant room.
Ana fought back the urge to smash a mostly intact door aside as she stepped back from another failed search. She would not lose this day, not to mortals, and certainly not to her cousin in the XIII.
She peered into a room, darkness shrouding most of it, and began to step back in defeat before she stopped midstride. Her power pack whined, the sound of her breathing filled her helmet, and the acrid tang of her sweat suffused every breath. Something was off in the room. Her helmet turned to the right, her eyes surveying the room again as her body followed her line of sight back into the destroyed apartment.
The meager belongings of the apartment's last inhabitant were strewn across the ground in a manner indicative of blast pressure, and yet a set of silverware and a shattered plate told a different story. The objects in question were dispersed almost perpendicular to the direction the rest of the objects had landed. Perhaps they had been too heavy for the pressure wave to dislodge initially and had been moved after the violence had ended.
She followed the direction of the cutlery and settled her gaze upon the stained tablecloth in the darkness of the shadows. It had fooled her, at least initially. Such a light object would easily have been blown about in the city-wide pandemonium of the battle that had taken place just hours earlier. But the cutlery that had been set atop it and yanked from the table with the tablecloth had been her cousin's downfall.
She still couldn’t see Idris in his hiding spot, his armor somehow melted away beneath the stained linen and lost in the rubble alongside it, but she knew he was there. Her second heart began to beat faster on instinct, that untameable part of Ana’s brain unchanged by hypnoindoctrination and drills that warned her of a predator unseen in the dark, spurred her reforged biology to prepare for combat even as she unlatched her helmet.
A hiss of pressurized air followed as she lifted her helmet from its place in her gorget and smiled at the cousin she still could not see.
“I must admit, I was becoming frustrated that I would never find you, Cousin Idris,” she smiled.
“And yet, you found me, Cousin,” the darkness of the room replied as the linen began to move. The Bronze Scorpion picked himself up from the ground, pushing aside rubble and debris to stand to his full height. Each movement was strained with the groan of unpowered warplate. He scooped up his helmet with one hand and brushed off dust from his armor with the other. His powerpack began to hum with energy as it chugged to life once more.
“Though, you’re quite an aggressive hunter! I counted at least five different moments I could’ve shot you if I had a ranged weapon available,” Idris said with a coy grin as he turned to regard the other Astartes, his tanned and scarred skin greeting her sight. The Scorpion locked his helmet to his waist as he stepped closer to Ana. He stepped close and clapped a gauntlet on her pauldron.
“I admit defeat. Well done, Ana,” the Scorpion said with a toothy grin.
Ana turned, a quizzical look on her face as she answered her cousin Astartes, “The parameters of this exercise did not include live fire training, so I did not take steps to ensure my safety against ranged or more, personal weapons.” She nodded, “it was not a necessary consideration.”
She turned her gaze to follow his hand as it came down on her pauldron, she had no doubt that had her armor system been on they would have warned her of the approaching strike, but they were silent now.
“I do not believe the game is over Cousin, I must hide, and the children must now seek us both.” She confirmed, recalling the earlier rules discussion from her didactic memory banks with practiced ease.
As the last words left her mouth, Idris quickly raised his other gauntlet to quiet any further discussion. His head turned towards the hallway that she entered from. He listened silently with his right ear turned slightly towards the ruined floor. The grin that grew on his face turned toothy as he realized their mistake with joy. A small pitter-patter of feet echoed below them at a clipped pace.
“Deadly little hunters aren’t they?” He cooed. Words were left unsaid of their possible recruitment. The Scorpion knew that there was roughly enough time to quickly egress the room and escape detection. His mind whiplashed through all possible scenarios, including ones where he disabled Ana and pursued his own victory. Ultimately, he remained stationary as the first of the children appeared through the doorway into their present room.
Although the boy and his sister had been the first into the building, Maz and her small charge were the first to find the Astartes. Maz set the little girl down as soon as they entered the room, and she immediately ran to Idris and tucked herself in near him, curling up as small as she could, which was quite small. Maz grinned and whispered, “Quick, if you hide better than that they might walk in and not know we’re here.” She looked around, shrugged, then tucked herself in beside Idris as well, wrapping the darkest of her red clothes around her and the youngest child.
Unfortunately for Maz’s hopes, the other children were close behind them. Soon after she arrived, the boy with the scarf peeked in through the broken window and grinned at the sight of them. He clambered through, careful of the glass, and quietly tucked himself in beside them. Only seconds later, the two siblings arrived, the little girl clambering over to stand very still on Ana’s foot, and the boy sighing before tucking himself into a corner behind Idris. Maz grinned at him.
Only one child left.
Sergeant Ghaalib could be heard before he could be felt. The grind and wail of his armor became more apparent as he ascended the stairs. A final step into the gathering of Astartes and children saw the short journey completed, though there was a leisure lag to the veteran’s movements.
“Your game is completed then?” He asked with feigned exasperation. The lenses of his helmet peered down at each of the children, then finally rested on both of the Astartes. As if affirming his own thoughts, Ghaalib nodded in satisfaction. “Good. Imperial Command has sent out a withdrawal demand for all employed units.”
He turned his attention away from the gathering out to Sol as it slowly descended into the horizon. Ghaalib refused to elaborate on the subject, turning away from the children and descending down from the building. What he had said could’ve been shared privately over vox, yet it was spoken aloud for a reason. It was something that he chose not to reveal as he awaited the rest of the Astartes in the streets below.
“Then it is finally time,” Idris said with unwavering finality. He removed the helmet from his waist and pressed it atop his skull, sheathing his dusken features away from the children. His gauntlets softly ruffled the hair of the crimson youths as he stepped away from them. He turned back before crossing the threshold down into the streets, awaiting Sister Ana and the farewells of the Crimsons.
Ana followed her seniors out, a portion of her mind confirming written notes on the children and attaching suspect and biologis readings to each child as she stepped out into the streets.
“The time comes then, Dume shall fall?” She asked rhetorically, almost as much for the children as for her own sense of childlike awe at taking part in her first true conquest.
But the children never heard an answer. Tumbling over each other, they quickly ran off to find their last companion and return to the ship they called home. But one thing was left behind.
A red scarf, tied quietly around Ghaalib’s ankle in the chaos as they left. Credits: @MarshalSolgriev (Idris/Ghalib of the XIII) @FrostedCaramel (Sister Ana of the XVII) @mothnoodle (Crimson Magpies)
Floofenstein
Scrawl Banditta
Not a Sayan
Mjolnir
