Authors notes: So this is the prologue to the Sister Insane sequel, Daughters of Darkness. I finished this a while back and have been itching to post it but I wanted to make sure I knew where the story was going first. Anyway stay tuned for more. I hope you enjoy. Please let me know. Warning, this story will contain some very dark moments, extreme depictions of torture and violence as well as some sex.
Hive World: Thanixx V was about to come under attack. Its citizens were not aware of this. They would not be until it was too late. Thanninhive, the location of the first and heaviest assault was only just pushing into the waking hours. Its bleary eyed workers ready to start their morning shift as those that toiled through the night returned to their beds. In an hour or so the streets would be full of vehicles and pedestrians. They had no idea of the horrors to come or how many of them would never see another morning.
Thanixx was a mining and manufacturing world, one that provided minerals and weapons for the rest of the Imperium, not a true forge world, not yet. Thanninhive was the primary hive and by far the largest of the four cities that were spread across the Thanixx's sun blasted surface. It was here in the highest spire of the city the Planetary Governor was informed of a discovery deep below the surface in the excavation tunnels. An ancient sword they said, with a blade the colour of fresh blood. An alien relic perhaps? He ordered it brought to the surface and to the council rooms. It was reported that upon receiving it he barricaded himself in the towers highest chambers for days on end only emerging to attend high end functions and dinners. His staff began acting oddly, more aggressive and secretive. Soon this spread to higher ranking PDF officers and eventually down through to the lower ends until even the average man or woman on the street exhibited this same odd behaviour.
Unknown to the Governor there were spies in this staff. Men from the Inquisition, placed there years before. There were men like this on almost every world, embedded in every government, watching, waiting for signs of treachery. These men recognised the signs immediately even if others in the city did not. They had their contacts to inform and procedures to follow in such an event and it was those spies that brought doom to the world of Thanixx.
Nestled in the foot of a vast mountain range above the planets largest mineral deposits, Thanninhive was a black spot in a dull, rust coloured wilderness. Gigantic black spires pierced the scorching sky below a shimmering shield, erected to prevent the harsh sun's rays from cooking the citizens below. Huge smoke stacks billowed black clouds through the shield and into the atmosphere. It looked every bit as dirty and dishevelled as Sister Superior Elexyr had expected. One hand gripped the over head netting the other on the pommel of her power sword.
"We'll be at the DZ in two minutes!" The Valkyrie's pilot announced through her Vox ear piece.
Elexyr turned away from the viewport and the view of Thanninhive to regard her Celestian squad with intense brown eyes.
"Your heard him Sisters. Ready your weapons. We follow the Canoness directly into Governor Herthall's office at the top of the council spire. Resistance is likely to be heavy so be prepared."
Elexyr checked her Bolt pistol and returned it to its holster. She was ready, she had always been ready for this.
"Hear me Sisters." Canoness Maria's sharp voice filled Elexyr's ear piece. "Our intelligence has confirmed the blades presence on the top level of the Council building, myself and two units of Celestian's will take the tower and execute the Governor and all of his staff showing the mark of Chaos. All other units are to assault at ground level and work your way up. Every citizen is to be checked for the mark, those carrying it are to be killed on sight, regardless of age or gender. The order has been given that this corruption is weeded out and destroyed. Understood?"
All squad commanders gave their affirmative.
"Excellent. Ave Imperator." Maria finished.
Elexyr winced. Across from her Sister Lilith, a sharply attractive woman with a hard forest green stare, caught her eye and nodded grimly. Elexyr returned the gesture, they both knew what had to be done.
"One minute!" The pilot declared and the transports side hatches rolled open. Two Sisters manning the door mounted heavy Bolters cycled the weapons ammo hoppers and slid them into position.
"DZ in sight!"
Elexyr moved to the view port again as the Valkyrie passed through the void shield. The council building was the biggest thing in the hive, apart from the smoke stacks, it was black walled like the rest save its ten highest levels, they were almost entirely glass and polished steel. There were two landing pads jutting out either side with enough room for one transport each. One of the pads was occupied but the Valkyrie pilot unleashed a salvo of lascannon fire and ripped the smaller shuttle apart and pitched most of its remains over the side. Elexyr shielded her eyes from the glare reflecting from the buildings glass panels as she watched the little craft plummet to the street and then looked back at her squad.
"Gear up!" she ordered.
Her Celestian's responded swiftly, they stood and lined up at the rear ramp, weapons safety's deactivated with a series of soft clicks. Elexyr moved to the front of the group, flanked by Lilith and the rapier thin Sister Maya.
"Resistance on the landing pad!" one of the door gunners yelled.
Elexyr glanced over her shoulder. "Give them hell Sister." she replied as las fire whined passed the open side door.
Immediately the air with filled with the roar of heavy Bolters and the clash of shattering glass. After a few moments the barrage ceased.
"Targets neutralised."
The Valkyrie began to turn.
"Lowering ramp!" Elexyr called out and punched the release switch.
They were still a few feet off the ground. Elexyr bounded down the ramp and jumped, her power sword clenched in her right gauntlet and her pistol in the left. She regarded the devastation wrought by heavy Bolters coldly, her lips turned to a sneer. Behind her the Celestians disembarked, their black sashes and hair whipping in the downdraft of the ship. Elexyr pushed strands of her own dyed violet locks from her face and gestured with her sword. Across from them Canoness Maria and her Celestians were dropping onto the other landing pad, their powder blue power armour a stark contrast to the dark background of the hive. They'd meet in the main council chambers. Their intelligence had provided detailed maps of the buildings upper levels and each Sister had committed them to memory.
Bolter fire had all but destroyed the doors leading into the building. Elexyr stepped over a pulped body and peered into the smoke. Glass was strewn across the marble floor. Great gouges had been blown out of the walls, scattering yet more debris. There were only three corpses, ragged pieces of green PDF uniforms still clung to mangled limbs. Elexyr wrinkled her nose, the air stank of ruptured bowels and spilt innards.
"On me." She commanded and the Sisters advanced.
Away from the Bolter damage the walls and floors were pristine white marble and sparsely decorated with the occasional potted plant or paintings of former, notable council members. One of them Elexyr recognised from the reports was the founder of Thanninhive, his name eluded her for the moment. Through the windows was an impressive view of the hive, this high up they could see right over the outer wall. Elexyr peered downwards. Smoke was rising from the streets, Valkyries dipped between buildings disgorging their cargo onto the population below. Some tracer rounds cut the air, anti aircraft guns were opening up. Elexyr saw a Valkyrie brought down, that was ten Battle Sisters dead in an instant but such was the nature of war.
"Contacts!" Maya announced.
Elexyr spun, her Bolt pistol rising.
Two men, dressed in pale grey councilmen robes, came out of an elevator bewildered and frightened.
"You!" Elexyr yelled, "On your knees!"
They obeyed glancing at each other in shock.
"The mark should be upon the back of the neck, below the collar." Elexyr explained as Maya and Lilith moved in to check.
"What's happening?" One of the men blurted.
"Silence." Maya hissed and tearing his robes to look at his neck. "Clear." she hauled him aside.
Lilith snarled, "I have a mark!" she raised her Bolter and disintegrated the man's head with a single shot before he could move.
His comrade screamed. Maya covered his mouth with her palm.
"Calm down!"
He struggled.
"Your friend was a traitor, he deserved death!"
The councilman vomited and Maya jerked away, disgust on her face.
Elexyr shot her a hard look, "Leave him."
The man whirled on Maya screaming and sobbing, his hands clawing at her armour, "Murderers!"
Maya punched him to the ground. "Politician's!" she spat.
They ascended the tower quickly. Resistance was heavier on each level. Traitor PDF troopers with mounted heavy stubbers attempted to block hallways but were easily dealt with using grenades or flanking manoeuvres. Elexyr's Celestians were veterans of hundreds of warzones. They had faced far tougher enemies than these men, though Elexyr had to admit the determination of the PDF troops was commendable. Her squad never stopped moving, they never allowed themselves to become pinned even when the PDF managed to surround them. It could have been argued by some that the Sisters use of extreme force was excessive and unnecessary, that perhaps many of the PDF men killed were not traitors at all and most likely just following orders. In the heat of the moment though, there had been no time to check everyone of them for the mark, especially with las fire lancing towards you. This utter lack of emotion and conscious meant that not a single Sister was wounded or killed on the way to the highest council chamber.
Elexyr bounded up the last stair case, her power sword humming as she split a man from shoulder to hip and sent his halves tumbling down the stair well. Her bolter slammed another into a wall and detonated in his chest splattering her with scraps of flesh and blood. A third man wailed a name, likely his wife's or daughters, maybe even his mothers, and attacked her with his bayonet. Elexyr side stepped him and cut his legs off at the knees with a back sweep of her sword. He fell screaming until Maya silenced him with a shot to the head as she followed her Superior. Elexyr kept up her charge, breaking a nose with the butt of her pistol, removing a head with her sword or barging a man over the handrail to his death hundreds of stories below.
Eventually they burst out into a wide room with three wooden doors, each branded with the Aquila in silver at the far end. Two robed men waited for them, one screamed and ducked, the other produced a las pistol from the folds of his cloak and opened fire. Sister Annabelle took a shot to the neck and crumpled, her throat blown out, she marked the first Celestian death. Sister Lilith filled the man with Bolter shells in response, reducing his body to little more than pink mist and scraps. His comrade crawled for the fallen pistol but Elexyr shot him in the head, spattering blood and skull fragments up the door behind him.
Across the room another door banged open and the Canoness appeared in a flurry of black robes.
"Well met Elexyr." she said as her unit filed in behind her. "This is the entrance to the council chambers. The Governor awaits his sentence." she explained, hatred in her words.
"Let's be done with it then." Elexyr replied.
She crossed the room and kicked open the middle door, Maria took the left and Maya the right.
There were only a few PDF men in the circular chamber the rest having been deployed to the lower levels, clearly believing the Sisters would never get this far. They died before they realised they were under attack, bodies spilled over the amphitheatre style seating.
At the centre of the room the Governor sat in front of glass display case, behind a mahogany desk that could seat three. The Battles Sisters filed around the room, their weapons trained down across the chamber, all of them aimed for his head.
"I wondered when the Emperors whores would show up." he sneered.
Herthall was a podgy gentleman, dressed in heavy white robes that did little to conceal his weight. His head was balding and damp with sweat. His eyes bright and intelligent.
"I know I did wrong in the eyes of Him." he grumbled. "But do I care? No. I'm not the first or the last that will realise what a sham the Imperium is. All it takes is a little knowledge they would rather we didn't have." he smiled thinly, inclining his head slightly to the cabinet behind him.
Maria approached him, Elexyr at her back.
"Governor Marterro Herthall..." she began but the man cut her off.
"Oh spare me the bloody pleasantries and get it over with!"
Maria bobbed her head slightly, "As you wish. In the name of the Emperor you are sentenced to death." she levelled her pistol at his forehead. "Any last words?"
Herthall laughed, "Yes actually. Go fuck yourself!"
Maria shot him between the eyes, tipping his large frame backwards off his chair with a heavy thud of flesh on stone. Elexyr licked her lips, her eyes caught Maya's who nodded, then Lilith's who simply smiled grimly.
The Canoness approached the cabinet behind Herthall's corpse, there were splashes of crimson upon its surface. She peered inside, Elexyr did too and whistled softly at the sight.
It was a sword as the intelligence suggested, its diamond sharp blade the colour of freshly spilt blood, glimmered in the lights above them. There seemed to be no distinction between blade and grip, it simply narrowed at one end, that was wrapped in black leather with a silver pommel in the shape of a snarling dragons head. Elexyr could feel its presence and power through the case. Its aura was one of menace and hatred. She could feel its lust for violence, it was a weapon starved of blood. She retreated a few steps from the case. This weapon was not made by mortals, it was demon blade spawned in the warp and wielded by creatures fouler than any imaginable. How it had become buried on Thanixx would forever remain a mystery.
Maria leaned away from the case. She sighed. "Weapons like this do not belong the hands of mortal men."
Elexyr smiled sadly, "No, they do not." She replied and shot Maria in the back of the head spraying the cabinet in brain matter. Inside the blade growled.
Around the room roughly half of the Celestian's turned upon the others and opened fire. It was over in seconds. Smoke filled the room. Corpses in blue power armour lay sprawled across seats, or curled in foot wells. Those without helmets stared at the ceiling in pure incomprehensible shock.
Elexyr put her fist through the glass case and took the weapons grip. Her eyes glowed red.
"Ah!" she sighed happily. "Oh that feels good!" she laughed smashing the case completely as she lifted the blade from the pillow upon which it sat.
She gave it a few test swings, it was light and easy to wield. It almost felt like she had been born to carry it.
Sisters Maya and Lilith strode forwards and knelt before her, their fists clenched to their breast plates. Behind them the rest of the former Celestians did the same.
Elexyr allowed her fangs to show behind her purple painted lips, her finger rising to her ear piece.
"This is your mistress speaking. We have the blade. You know what to do."
Below the tower on the streets of Thanninhive the citizens and surviving PDF stared on in horrid disbelief as the Battle Sisters turned on each other. Roughly half of them simply pointed their guns at their Sisters backs or turned to face them at point blank range. Most of the loyal Sisters didn't even return fire, so astounded as they were by their comrades actions, they died with a mixture of confusion and anger on their faces. When the work was done the traitors turned their guns once again on the PDF and it wasn't long before they held the city. It was later reported that the other three hives suffered the same fate and the Inquisitorial spies were murdered before another transmission could be sent. In less than one hour Thanixx had fallen and now it had a new ruler.