WHISPERING. Wind. Whispering on the wind, a whistle now. Growing higher in pitch, lower in volume, until it's only a memory, a fading mental marking in the mind of Haitus Craim, a prolific symbol of all that man has done, but does not regret. Hiatus stands chin high, eyes watering, scars tingling.
"The warp storm is almost upon us. Soon, we shall have our reinforcements", he gritted, tongue blue, teeth black, heart a darker black.
In his peripheral, an abomination flowed, seething and contorting, a mass of tentacles. He turned his head to it, his neck twisting and revealing scars in the shapes of wheels with spikes. Contrite sadness read from each one.
The unholy Thing, as he looked upon it, was a hunched creature, resembling that of a man, or what once was a man, but was now a four armed biped with tentacles expanding from the back of its cranium. Each with what seemed like a mind of its own. Its mouth lay open and it's tongue hung upon its chest, sweeping, like a deadly pendulum. A great sense of brotherhood bound the two in unholy harmony, demon and conjurer.
Beyond this, Haitus saw a small legion of great machines. These machines all stood, waiting, listening to the whispering, whistling wind. In each machine, was a nightmare infested human being, who looked Chaos straight in the eye, whose sanity is not so quite existent, and who's will to fight for Chaos was unlike any other will in the universe. The great machines were not really machines at all, just suits of armor, massive battle gear, harnessing the thought of destruction and putting it into a tangible idea, a protector of the operator, and a bearer of Chaos.
Many of the suits had great spikes rising from random places, some spikes of the metal the armor was forged, others from the very bone of the cultist inside. A number of the soldiers had a banner in one hand, upon which were elaborate tapestries, displaying acts of bloodlust, conquest, rage, and horror. These great banners stood contrasted against the darkening sky.
The sky was an ocean of red, great billows of purple warp energy belting down unto the barren earth a few miles ahead of the congregation. The ground around the lightning was opening up, leaving a large gaping hole. From their distance, the marines could not see the edge, but could only feel their God's presence.
"Khorne, eternally we serve. What is your wish? What are your desires? For they are also ours. Our duty, my lord, is to SERVE you." Haitus glared into the source of lightning, a vortex of pink, blue and purple in the sky. Slowly, a blood red beam of light made its way to the gaping hole. When it hit the bottom of the hole, there was an explosion of light.
Haitus stands chin high, eyes watering, scars bleeding.
Suddenly a marine stood high, and screamed "I FEEL THE WARP OVERTAKING ME! IT IS A GOOD PAIN!" He went back down and hung his head like the rest. As Haitus surveyed his troops, he analyzed three or more who bent back and laughed gratuitously, loudly, and insanely. "BWAHAAAHAAAHAA!", they bellowed into the warp, feeling the touch of forever screaming Khorne.
The top of the large, red beam began to lower, and soon it was all the way to the bottom of the hole. When it was completely concealed inside the pit, Haitus screamed "To the warp!"
His battalion surged forward, helmets scraping shoulder-plates, arms misshapen, and legs hyper extended. When he looked the storm in the eye, upon his mind was thrust a vision of blood flying, splashing, a pool of it, a sea, an ocean, an island. An island of bones, of corpses. Skulls. Blood. Khorne. He slammed back into reality. He was kneeling, vomiting blood. The marines had stopped to wait. It was flinging between his face and the floor, splashing off the dried, caked earth, shining in all its majesty. As he finished, he stood, cackled, and yelled, "BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD, SKULLS FOR THE SKULL THRONE!"
His men answered "For Khorne!" and they sprinted the rest of the way.
When they arrived at the hole, they saw it was filled to the brim with a dark, thick fluid. Haitus bent at the edge, his huge knee crushing a small desert lily, and put his finger in the liquid. As he crushed the lily, he heard the whisper of a scream, the stifling of an unprecedented sound, unseen madness being snuffed out. He had a small connection with the plant when his armor touched it, and then it was gone. He pulled his digit out, feeling the happiness inside of him grow, and realized he was looking at a pool of blood.
He stood, Power Armor wheeling, grinding, Shoulder plate smacking chest plate. He smiled. Khorne Blesses Us.
The men stood around the pool, waiting, listening. The wind whistled by, touching their ears, their minds, but not their attention.
An hour passed, and nothing happened. The marines stood, omnipatient, awaiting the arrival of the foreseen demons. They felt the pounding of Khorne's heart, his mind pressing onto theirs, his tongue imbuing them with untold courage.
Haitus saw a marine's leg part move an inch forward, a sign of discomfort and impatience. He sighed, but Khorne grinned. Haitus wondered at this. Suddenly, the surface of the pool began to boil, bubbles and splashes, spilling onto the dried dead ground at the feet of the war machines.
Some of the blood touched the dead lily, and it was revitalized, revived in a new life of slavery and violence. What was once a beautiful flower was now a large, ravenous spike, glowering in a bullying hatred toward Haitus. He looked upon it in disgust, and kicked the dead plant into the boiling muddle. The moment that the leaves submerged in the blood, a huge hand reached out of the blood and grabbed a space marine. The marine was pulled into the pool, laughing, choking. There was a splash as he plunged in, and the marines surrounding the pool all grinned, feeling the power of the warp, of the Gods.
A minute later, the marine's corpse submerged, ripped and mutilated beyond description. But in his wake, three or more enormous creatures rose from the blood, dripping, moaning, masked by great Power Armor. Their arms were loaded with every weapon imaginable. One fist was a ravenous demon claw. The other was rigged with huge demon weapons, unfathomable destruction. These demons were twice the size as a normal Space Marine, but their heads were actually only half the height up. The rest was just excess metal, jutting up, pipes, pulleys and tanks piled and connected, all one great machine, livid, huge, titanic.
Haitus muttered, "Obliterators. One of them can destroy legions of enemies. These warriors are legendary, said to be the Honor Guard of Khorne Himself." Khorne blesses us. Khorne HAS blessed us greatly.
"FOR KHORNE!"
Roars, a war cry, a beckoning to all who live in the savagery and ignorance of normalcy. It was a mockery of those who do not see the light of Chaos, the true peace that awaits all who fight in the name of Chaos. Chaos is ready for War.
GANNEY and Crisdt stood meticulously, smelling faint change in the dainty wind. The two brothers felt the change in the pressure. Not the air pressure, no, their Power Armor would not allow them to feel that, but the spiritual pressure. The feeling that someone is near. Not too close, not too far… just near.
They could feel the ground moan and rumble beneath them, as they both realized with a jolt that near one hundred individuals were travelling their way. But these individuals walked lightly, and fast. They were little pecks in the two Berserkers sixth senses, tickling their minds and nagging at their feet.
They dodged to the side of the small path and hid in the trees. Ha-ha! Chaos Space Marines hiding in the trees? Not possible. So they decided to lie in the brush, concealed by the enormous overgrowth. They lay there, still, but not still. On the outside, the armor was quiet, ravenous as it was, but on the inside, their muscle spasms and jaw twitches were as often as ever.
Soon, the many were upon them. There actually were about seventy of them.
Eldar. Humph. Flamers
As the two watched, they saw that it was a caravan, the inner troops looked to be transporting a small cargo box, which was glowing white. It was probably very important. Important things are fun to break.
Crisdt lay shaking, too tempted to feel the flesh of the puny Eldar tear for his instruments of Chaos (his two axes). He closed his eyes. He was greeted by a wave of darkness. The sickening feeling of a hand reaching into his chest and pulling his stomach away.
He was also greeted by Khorne. Blood was due. The Eldar bleed, don't they? Yeah, they do. Wait, maybe they don't. They'd better.
Khorne chuckled. A deep throbbing. A bubble in Crisdt's throat. A tickle. A pinch.
It was too much for Cridst to hold back. It was irrepressible. Finally, he broke.
"Bwaaahaaahahahaaaaa!!!" he roared, standing. Ganney stood, too.
The Eldar troop stopped and was instantly unleashing on them. They had set the box down, and were now defending against their outnumbered assailants. As the little weak pellets bounced and smacked off of the massive and thick metal of the Berserkers' Power Armor, they demonstrated their axes. The blood red and black blades shook with blood thirst, and the mono-molecular sharp edges caused the air around them to steam up and crackle. The two embraced the final moments of their calm
One-two-three-FOR-KHORNE!
The two sped into the ranks, side by side, their muscles on fire, and their feet a blur. Their shoulders were like pinwheels, arms flailing. Their axes were tearing, ripping, and shredding, Eldar blood spilling onto the muddy ground. The pure ferocity of the two was mind numbing. Some of the Eldar retreated, realizing that their weapons were not affective.
"We dance! With Khorne!" Ganney said as he leapt over an Eldar weakling and cut him down with a comet strike. He reveled in the feeling of the skull splitting and the mushy body parts parting ways, making a path for his godly war-axes.
As soon as the horrible Genocide had begun, it had stopped. The two looked around, still in frenzy, still feeling the adrenaline glands pumping kill fuel.
The scene was an utter bloodbath. Every last Eldar that had marched through here was a bloody, mutilated corpse of Eldar armor or pale flesh torn and twisted. The blood was very plentiful. It was everywhere. Looking up, the panting Berserkers saw bloodstains on the higher leaves and branches of the nearby trees.
But yet, there was still one Eldar weakling who survived, his body crushed, his soul crushed more, but his life still ongoing. He lay shaking, air coming hard to him. His each and every breath was laborious, and harsh. The wheezing was horrible, and hilarious. The two approached the fallen with thumping noise, crushing the dead underfoot.
"You, you…", spitted the near dead Eldar. "you have done a terrible thing. Foolish, foolish." He coughed up a mixture of blood and what looked like an organ. "You insane bastards, you have done something horrible. Insane…" He died.
Ganney stooped over the mashed carcass. He chuckled, then as he jumped with both feet onto the skull of the dead man, he roared, "SANITY, IS FOR THE WEAK!"
As the two surveyed their little carnage session, they saw each other. Their Power Armor was torn to shreds, Ganney completely missing his helmet. Cridst no longer had a chest plate, but instead had a mangled mess of metal and blood. Both their shoulder plates were trashed and they had horrible gashes everywhere. Suddenly, the gnarly truth hit them. These atrocious wounds they suffered were given to them, not by the Eldar but by themselves.
Khorne Approves.
CARNAGE opened his eyes. The caked blood around his eyelids made it really hard to do, so he closed them again. He breathed in, feeling the dried blood all around his face crack and shift, his dry lips peeling from each other as he opened his mouth to groan. He was face first, with his nose in the dirt. He exhaled. Dirt and dust shot up into his face and his mouth. He couldn't move his left arm or both his legs. They seemed to not even have any feeling.
He used his right arm to sit himself up. As his body shifted, he could feel the broken bones in his body scream, their unheard cries waking the silence of his pain. On his legs were the obliterated remains of two Greenies. His left arm was covered with blood and was ripped up. He could not move it or feel it, and that was very good. His gun was nowhere to be found, but his chainsword was sticking out of the top Greenskin. He lurched forward to grab it when he heard something.
Growling, something moaning, metal hitting the ground, and a heavy footstep. Someone was muttering something, inaudible, but perceptible. Carnage slowly pulled the chainsword from the corpse and kept a broken finger on the ignition. He lay back down, and waited. The thing was coming his way, he could judge by the feet thumping. He paid close attention.
The person was injured, the way they walked, thump, shhhhh, thump, shhhhh. They were dragging one of their feet; obviously they had been in the previous fight too. But also, there was a clanking, like tons of little metal pieces hitting each other.
He waited another few seconds, and the thing staggered over a corpse within the vicinity. It was a massive Greenskin, probably a Warboss. He hulked over the scattered bodies that lay strewn across the forest floor, the small beams of sunlight that penetrated the canopy hitting him in dispersed droplets. He breathed heavily, his breath showing in the 10° Celsius air as a puff of white smoke, breaking the stillness of the cold.
Carnage lay still, silently coughing, shutting his eyes and waiting. His reluctance to fight in his state of agony and brokenness angered Khorne. The wind smells like blood. Taste it.
You lay cowering in your pain, a small boy hiding from the bear. Does the Greenskin put fear into the heart of a so-called Khorneling? Pussy!
Khorne was bullying him, taunting him, trying to encourage a chud-fest. It worked.
Fine. "Yhaaaaaaaaaaaagh", Carnage bellowed as his legs pulled him into a shredding charge. His chainsword was already roaring, spewing previously spilled blood in all directions. The Greenskin had only enough time to spin and open it's maw before the lunatic was on him, a freight train in his power armor. As his shoulder plate pushed the creature to the mud/blood, his massive arms swung the heavy chainsword straight into the side of the Greenskin, the sudden amount of meat stopping it suddenly.
The weapon rattled as it clanged through the thick chest cavity of the Greenskin, and then slowed as it fought through the back muscles and the spine. When it finally broke for the sun, the immediate area was splayed with tissue and guts. The foul beast was dead, a small triumph in a bleak reality.
Carnage was alone. Alone to revel in his pain, in his glory, in his bloodlust. "Thank you", he muttered, spitting up blood.
He sat in the newly unsettled dirt, coughing and choking. His broken hand lay limp by his side and his legs slumped to the earth. The sudden burst of action caused most of his recently healed wounds to bleed freely again. He smiled. Blood for the Blood God.
"AND SKULLS FOR THE SKULL THRONE!"
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