Sworn To Remnant
-CHAPTER 4 - The Angels of Death-
"They shall be my finest warriors, these men who give of themselves to me. Like clay I shall mould them and in the furnace of war I shall forge them.
They shall be of iron will and steely sinew. In great armour I shall clad them and with the mightiest weapons shall they be armed.
They will be untouched by plague or disease; no sickness shall blight them. They shall have such tactics, strategies and machines that no foe will best them in battle. They are my bulwark against the Terror. They are the Defenders of Humanity.
They are my Space Marines...and they shall know no fear."
— Attributed to The Emperor of Mankind, in regards to the Legiones Astartes
(Unmarked World of Remnant, Solitas - Northern Glacial Expanse)
"ARH-WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
A bellowing howl rang true across the icy tundras and snow laced fields, a pure white expanse stained by a handful loping shapes covered head to claw in ragged tufts of fur as black as the endless void between the stars.
Odd Redtooth, Astartes of the Vlka Fenryka...the Space Wolves, could smell the evil upon the beasts ranging below towards his position atop the ridge line, as ridiculous as some might find the notion, tasting the stench of their musk as his nostrils flared and the protective totems hanging about his wargear rattled omnously.
The dark miasma they exuded with every baying motion tainting the crisp air an acrid fetor of ancient bitterness, cruel anger, and meat long left to spoil...he'd smelt days old dead Kraken more enticing.
That these Daemons, these Maleficarum, so closely resembled those wolven companions of the Rout, only heaped upon further insult. That such filth would dare to sully the image and nature of those noble hunters, however poorly, even going so far as to travel in clusters vaguely resembling a pack.
The mere thought of it was enough to set a feral growl building in his throat, one swiftly echoed by the lupine Fenrisian beast hunched by his side, brown dappled hackles raised and fangs the size of a mortal's hand bared, settling instinctively in position to guard her partner's back as he scoured the valley below.
"They just keep coming, eh Bruna?" The Space Marine spat to rid his mouth of the flavor before shaking out his braided crimson mane, a flash of pearly white fangs glistening from the depths of a pleated beard the same fiery shade as he laid a gauntlet clad hand on the Fenrisian Wolf's muzzle affectionately. "Go fetch our new friend, if he's done brooding over that fekking Skíthof infesting the Vox."
As if to underline the point, Redtooth tapped the side of his temple, keying the Micro-bead implant set within his cochlea open. Listening to the garbled mess of chirping clicks and unintelligible whistling squeals playing incessantly over all channels for a few more heartbeats before dismissing the connection with a sigh.
Useless, but their new ally insisted on attempting to track the curious signal to its source.
It was an objective at least...and it did have its moments.
"In the meantime, I think I'll introduce myself to these local hundr. Show them what a real Wolf looks like."
Bruna's growl subsided to almost a purr of contented understanding, Odd's hand moving to massage his friend's scalp to further relieve her tension, feeling the studded metallic plate that had replaced much of the left side of her head along with her ear and eye, listening to the way the Cyberwolf's augmetic paw easily dug furrows even in the thick ice and stone.
Another nod sent her bounding off back the way they had come, gone in an instant in the flurry of snow dust. A consummate predator even in these strange lands.
Scarred by the forge of war as the Space Wolf was in his way, and no less beautiful for it. No, these imitations were not true wolves, far from it he decided as the hand that had soothed Bruna dipped to the two handed Power Ax that law at his feet, Stormurstjórn, 'Stormcaller'.
The weapon thrumming to life as a finger thumbed the rune at the base of it's single curved blade, the steel crackling with sheer crimson energy like that of it's namesake as snow in the air played against the energized field surrounding it.
If they were true wolves, Odd might have reconsidered his next course of action more carefully...at least for the few seconds it took for the turbines of his jump pack to vault him back into the air, leaving not behind on his previous perch but flash evaporated steam and dripping slurry.
For a few precious beats of his twin hearts, Redtooth soared free, truly free in the skies of this new world. The feeling of it, flying amidst the howling gales and ice storms that nipped at his exposed flesh, hazards that would flaw the flesh of an unaugmented mortal but were merely proved a mild discomfort at best to the Space Marine. The cutting winds whistling through his beard, massaging the shorn bristles of his undercut, setting his braids flapping wildly behind him in a way that set the fangs and bone fragments within jingling to his transhuman senses.
It was glorious, almost akin to flying back home on Fenris during the long Hel-Winter, though a pale imitation of it, too warm...and then gravity reclaimed him, and he fell feet first into the murder-make. The kill urge, that instinct for violence that drove all of the Wolf King's gene-sons to acts of purest savagery, consuming him once more in a welter of crimson for but a moment until it was beaten back once more.
Angling his descent and howling his hatred to the heavens for the Allfather to hear, Odd came down like a meteor in a bone-jarring crash directly on top of the lead Maleficarum, crushing its spine to jelly with a vaguely lupine yelp that only made it more satisfying to grind beneath his heel, at least until it dissolved like the others the Wolf had slain since the Hel-Storm had deposited he and his companions here.
'Speaking of which...'
"AH HA HA! Another! That makes sjaután! Seventeen! And your tally stands at what, Flesh Weaver!?"
Odd laughed as he kicked himself out of his self-made crater, spinning about to strike at another of the Maleficarum that had thought to take him unawares and lunge for his back. Stormcaller made quick work of that, the Power Field cleaving through the monster's neck, sinew, muscle, and bone, all. Parting head from shoulders like a hot blade through fresh snow.
The Space Wolf's fanged grin growing ever broader as he shouldered the swiftly dissipating body aside roughly with the pauldron bearing the jagged lightning bolt of the his Company's Stormbringers, already turning to meet what other dangers might be lurking in the wastes.
"Fekke...never mind, I'm winning! Eighteen!"
"You can...ah! You can hardly claim this a fair race! And your wolf's doesn't count!"
A reply called from several meters distant from the helm of a Space Marine in armor painted bone white and marked clearly with the symbols of both the Prime Helix of the Apothecarion, marking his status as both Battle-Brother and Field Medicae, as well as the distinctive black Cross of his Chapter on a field of white.
Drawn or so it was said from one of the ancient knightly orders of Terra, an heir to the line of the vaunted Sigismund.
A Black Templar...
Odd knew him simply as Niall, an Apothecary that had been deposited in this place at the same time he had been along with the corpse of another of his Brothers, though they'd never seen one another before today.
Redtooth and Bruna had been fighting alongside their Jarl Sven Bloodhowl and the other Firehowlers upon the Despoiler's Blackstone Fortress, a massive Starship designed in a bygone age with the power to destroy entire planets and would have destroyed Cadia and the Imperium's defenders if the Space Wolves hadn't lowered its shields and exposed its vulnerability.
The ship had been falling, fire and explosions everywhere, both from the failing ship and those few Traitors still clinging to life and hoping to cut at least one more loyal thread. Odd had been tumbling out a bulkhead into the void after a krak-grenade had detonated, clutching tight to Bruna as the pair fell into nothingness, with only the sight of a furious storm front crackling with Aetheric energy to greet them.
It should have been a good omen, given his affinity for the storms of his homeworld, but when a flicker of lightning had altered its path to intercept Man and Wolf like some questing tendril Odd had felt only unease.
Niall had arrived under similar duress given the dents and stains about his armor, none of which he deigned to explain. So an accord was struck, Brothers in purpose if not Sire, formed over the body of one of the fallen.
His Progenoid Glands, that precious genetic resource all Space Marines carried to ensure their legacy and spirit would continue on long after even death itself, safely harvested and carried by the Apothecary alongside far too many others. His sword taken as well, chained to his Brother's wrist as a show of honor.
"Really? A jump pack of all things...Hyah! I was under the impression your kind...grr! Your kind disdained fighting in the air, though I cannot fathom the reasoning!"
He was rather taken up at the moment with a Maleficarum Wolf-thing of his own, having more far difficulty fighting and maneuvering in the waist deep snow than Odd himself had, no doubt unused to the experience.
But he was learning quickly, as all Astartes did, his borrowed chainsword weaving a complex series of blocks and parries that had already severed one of the monster's forelimbs.
Bruna herself was nowhere to be seen, but Odd hardly worried. She had long since proven able to handle herself without his watchful eye, no doubt hunting at the edges.
Seeking those Shadow-Things attempting to flee and regroup. So thoughtful of her...
"Something trivial and tribal, no doubt!"
"More a matter of honor in truth!" Redtooth called back, allowing only the slightest grimace of annoyance to grace his cheery exterior. His cousin didn't know any better, not yet. "The Wolf King was content to earn his glories fighting upon the surface of a world, so in my brother's minds that too must be the only proper way of making war!"
Reacting quickly, the Skyclaw used a quick burst of his jump pack to dart aside from one of the larger beasts he'd seen so far, skidding for several meters before blasting back into range with a gleeful howl, sidestepping and knocking aside the feral claws that did little more than scrape the paint of his armor.
From there it was simply a matter of cutting the beast down like one of the ancient ice veined trees dotting the base of Asaheim, hewing the legs out from under it in one great swing.
"I...respectfully disagree, though thankfully my Jarl is...was of a similar mind."
In a smooth motion he drew the Bolt Pistol mag-locked to his thigh and put a bolt through the back of the mewling creature's skull. The mass-reactive shell punching clean through the thick bone before detonating in a brilliant blossom of foul smelling dark matter and dispelling the morose air that had accompanied the words.
The time to mourn Sven Bloodhowl and his Packmates would come later, now was the time to kill or be killed, the hunt...
"Nítján! Nineteen!"
"Somehow I doubt you ever having done anything 'respectfully' in your life, Redtooth!" Niall scoffed, bringing his blade about in a flourish of whirring teeth that disemboweled the Shadow-Thing handily, a dire wound though not immediately lethal.
A Flesh-Cutter's stroke, neat and precise, full of purpose...
Rather than finish the monster whining piteously at his feet, the Templar raised his Narthecium high. A wrist mounted medical device crucial to his trade, the device contained a variety of functions that would assist a servant of the Apothecarion in tending to his charges, including a suite of injectors and drug cocktails tailored to the transhuman physiology of an Astartes, cogitator systems meant to analyze a host of toxins and biological material, as well as a host of cutting tools useful for treating a wounded Battle-Brother in full armor.
The Reductor was one such tool, designed to piece the flesh and musculature of a fallen warrior and reclaim the precious Gene-Seed and store it in cryo-receptacles. The Apothecary had a different use in mind, driving the needle-like device deep into the creatures meat and viscera.
The Narthecium chimed loudly as it attempted to read the beasts genetic material, then a red light shone and a series of runes dancing across the device's vid-screen. Gibberish to Odd, but Niall examined it succinctly with a grunt of concerned understanding.
"Hmm, how curious..." Only then did he regard his unwilling donor, snapping its neck under his heel with a perfectly weighted stomp.
"Eh, what's that!? Find something!?" Odd punched one of the Shadow Wolves, sending it reeling back with a mouthful of shattered teeth, bounding away before he could get at it. A shame, though Bruna would claim it certainly.
"This Xenos breed, they appear to leave no physical traces after expiring, no corpses or leavings by which to study."That much was obvious, the pair had learned that particular trait early on when the Apothecary had sought to dissect one after their first encounter. "Even material claimed while they yet breathe fades to nothing soon after extraction, more akin to the foul spawn of the Empyrean than anything of flesh and blood. A disturbing notion..."
"Have you considered the possibility, Templar, that perhaps our threads might have already been cut?"
It made some sense after a fashion, given the circumstances that saw them here. By all rights both Vlka and Cyberwolf should have fallen, their bodies drifting in the void about the Cadian Gate or lost with the Despoiler's Planet-Killer. To stand here now...
Odd made a swift gesture of warding, dispelling the negative malaise before it could settle and give the Spirits a place in his soul to spread their poison.
"Waylaid along the path to the Underverse by the Svikaris' Maleficarum, the Traitors' dark sorcery...grr!? "Our Souls charged with joining battle against these Banisvatr at the gates of Hel for Morkai's merriment?""
A slavering muzzle clamped down against Redtooth's forearm, tearing the hand from the haft of his ax if little else, such feeble jaws hardly able to do more to the Ceramite than scratch the paint.
Still it was annoying, a swift jab to the gut with the butte of his weapon's handle and getting the monster to release his limb if only so he could snatch hold of its lower jaw before shoving Stormcaller into its mouth.
The ax providing the perfect lever to unhinge and then tear the Daemon-thing's jaw off in a squeal of agony that might've been an attempt at a howl but only succeeded in spraying the Space Wolf's bare face with dark ichor.
'Twenty...'
"Hmm...Poetic, if nigh on blasphemous to the Throne itself." Niall considered, shoving the drill of his Narthecium into the gut of a brutish apelike creature not all too dissimilar to a greenskin if possessing the same dark matter flesh, white masked chitin, and the same sour stench as the not-wolves. "Forced to fight these wretched beasts for the amusement of some tribal myth, and upon some accursed frozen wasteland no less?" The drill keened to life, it's victim dissolving in an instant while its owner made a warding gesture to the land at large, voice laden with the righteous fervor indicative of his kind."Ridiculous! What sort of accursed Afterlife would that make!?
"Oh, I don't know. Endless foes to slay, and a proper breeze upon our skins?"
The last of the creatures fell swiftly, either to Odd's ax or Niall's fury, the two suddenly alone in the icy field, the snow still pure as though they'd only just arrived rather than commit a massacre. No signs of their glory to mark the ground, no trophies with which to inspire the Skalds...
"Why, this sounds like a proper Fenrisian ending to my ears, Cousin! All it lacks is some endless fountains of Mjod to warm our bones, a few buxom Kvinnfolka to sing our praises, ooh and something larger to sink our fangs into!" He raised Stormcaller high above his head, feeling the ambient crackle of the disparate energies dancing across the blade, reacting to the stinging shards of ice filling the air. "If it is our wyrd to seek glory beyond the halls of death, Redtooth demands proper contest!"
As if in answer, a titanic roar echoed through the valley with enough force to rattle even a Space Marine's bones, birthing avalanches in the distance with the force of its passage.
A shadow began to coalesce in the mist at the edges of their chosen battleground, easily twice the size of the previous Maleficarum, those Banisvatr, and far broader besides, horns curling up the sides of its distended skull.
For a mad instant, Odd wondered what in the Allfather's name a Fenrisian Ice Troll was doing on this alien world? A question he swiftly discard as he noted the direction it charged in...
"Throne of Terra!" The Apothecary at his side braced himself, sword held in a duelist's defensive stance tensed and at the read, completely at odds with Redtooth's own savage eagerness. "You just had to tempt fate, didn't you?"
"Ah Skítja!"
True, Bloodhowl and his Packleaders over the years had often chided him for angering the spirits with his willfulness. Only the Trickster himself had ever shown any kind of support for the practice, saying it made Odd well...odd. Whether or not that was a compliment was never truly explained.
"Alright then...Maybe a might bit bigger than I was expecting all at once!"
"Perhaps its one of your buxom...what did you call them again, Wolf?"
He didn't have to sound so smug about it, though was that a trace of excitement in the Templar's voice? It was often said they were the most zealous of Dorn's Pack of Pups, always the first onto the field and the last to leave only when the enemy had been purged, the murder-make complete, and blood still fresh upon the ground. At least that his Chapter and the Rout had in common.
Both liked to look into the eyes of whose threads they cut, to carve their doom upon the Imperium's many foes in the name of the Allfather and his long vanished Sons.
"No matter, this one we take together! In the Emperor's Name!"
"Oh ho! Not so fast, Flesh Weaver! I laid eyes on it first! By rights, this monster's pelt will make a fine addition to my Tally!"
"Bold words, Skyclaw! Of course, they will ring quite hollow after I've claimed this filth's head for myself!"
"Ha HA! Now you're getting the spirit, Templar!" Odd laughed, moving into closer position with his new ally even as the old seemed to melt from the mists at their back. Bruna stalking to take her customary place guarding his flank, her Augmetic eye whirring and teeth bared a fierce white. She'd hunted well it seemed, the scent of her prey still clinging to her even in death.
Three heroes against a mighty Jova, a Giant, in a land of monsters...oh what a tale for the Sagas that would make...
"Heidur Rus!" Odd howled, Bruna joining him in chorusing harmony, mailed fingers digging into the well worn haft of his ax. The totemic charms hanging across both his armor and Storm's Heart jingling in the harsh winds whipping about them. "Fenrys Hjølda!"
"No Pity! No Remorse! No Fear!" Niall declared, the ancient battle cry of the Eternal Crusade spilling from his modified vox-grille. The two Astartes and the bestial Bruna poised at the ready to meet the Jova in battle as it stepped from the mists, or staggered...
Once it had been an intimidating creature of some note, easily of a size with the mammoth Ork Warbosses that stood at the head of Greenskin forces and roughly as broad about. Covered in shaggy tufts of insulating fur and weathered bone-like spiked plating about its vital areas, laden by freakishly long arms tipped in rending talons, and a gaping mouth that looked as though it could swallow a mortal whole in a single bite and chew them apart with rows upon rows of distended yellow fangs.
A formidable foe, a worthy adversary to mark what may well have been the last stand of some of the Imperium's finest... Once...but no longer.
The Jova wasn't lost in a maddening blood rage as Odd had suspected from its haste, enraged at the slaying of its kin, the scent of something far removed wafting to the forefront now that it was closer, unmistakable to the veteran Skyclaw's senses.
The oily slick scent of these monsters' lifeblood, oozing slowly like tar from over a dozen gaping rents and tears carved into the giant's flesh, dripping from the mangled stump of what had once been its forearm. .
Their Alpha foe wasn't charging to battle, it was fleeing from one. Retreating with all haste in a desperate bid for not in anger, but in terror, crying for reinforcement from it's fellows, its servants perhaps...unaware their threat had been ended by the trio before it.
Though upon witnessing the true nature of its pursuer, Redtooth could hardly blame the beast's primitive instincts for hoping...or for retreating, the ground shuddering beneath its mighty tread. The hesitation of its prey upon seeing the three newcomers ringing its demise.
"-SILENCE! YOUR MEWLING WEAKNESS OFFENDS DEARG!-"
A sonorous roar swimming with corrupted Vox-distortion yet unmistakable in the might of its conviction tolled like a mighty bell through the audible range, reverberating through the air as a nigh on physical force.
So much so that Bruna whined shrilly in show of her discomfort and nudged closer to the Space Wolf, Odd for but a moment wishing his own helm back in place when his own ears popped painfully and an unfamiliar wave of disorientation hit him before his enhance physiology compensated, envious of the sound dampening systems Niall no doubt enjoyed despite the confining nature of the head gear.
Another giant thundered from the wall of white fog smashing aside the ridge of icy sleet rather than traversing it, this one a behemoth of quartered Crimson and Cerulean lined Adamantium armor plating lined with Gold embossed Ceramite rather than corrupted flesh or tainted sinew. Born aloft by 'muscle' of electro-fibre and ancient magna-coils thrumming with the blessed sunburst power of its Reactor Heart, guided not by some feral instinct but the will of a force of will both Ancient and Unrelenting even in death.
Standing easily at over five meters in height and vaguely resembling the outline of a Space Marine, the War-Machine collided with the Jova in a blow more meteor strike than glancing tackle. One that would have doubtless shattered every bone in even an fully armored Astartes' body with careless ease, the force of the impact sending up a spray of icy shrapnel that necessitated the Space Wolf shielding his feral partner lest she be torn apart.
The Maleficarum fared little better, a full half its body appearing to fold in on itself, what was left crumpling to the snowy ground broken if not lifeless.
A fact that would soon change...
"-HERE DEARG STANDS, XENOS!-"
The Venerable Hero dwelling within the shell that was his armor and tomb both voxed once more for all enemies to hear and tremble. Hefting a crackling serrated Power Claw of blood red steel that looked as though it could crush a Land Raider in its mighty talons without effort.
"-AND HERE...HERE YOUR CHAMPION FALLS!-"
Crouching low on hissing hydraulics, the Dreadnought delivered a stabbing thrust to the prone beast, tearing out its chest in a fountain of dark matter before straightening to stomp the misshapen head into jellied paste.
An action that alone sent tremors rocking the world and prompted avalanches in nearby mountain ranges, the world itself quailing before its footfalls.
"-FOR THE IMPERIUM! FOR THE PRIMARCH!-"
"Is that...?" Odd was forced back a lurching step, still shielding the stunned Cyberwolf behind him. Her augmetic senses no doubt scrambled by the influx of noise, and his own faring little better. "...Templar, is that truly what I think it is?"
"That would imply a capacity for thought on your part." Niall replied breathlessly, the levity in his tone lost somewhat under awed reverence. "But yes, Redtooth. I can see it, and hear it...So beautiful..."
And that it was, a creation hailing from a time of progress and glory well beyond the present days of darkness and uncertainty. A time when the Allfather himself was not confined upon his Golden Throne and instead walked side by side with the Legions of his Son's Sons.
Armed with its might claw as well as what the Skyclaw dimly recognized as an ancient Assault Cannon of the Kheres Pattern, a predecessor of the smaller Patterns gifted to the vaunted Terminators of modern Chapters, together this machine was perhaps one of the most lethal examples of Warcraft that the Space Wolf had ever seen, a bane of foes upon the field of Battle.
A Contemptor Pattern Dreadnought...
"Glory to Him on Terra in this time of doubt!" Niall's legs buckled gracelessly in his haste to kneel before the Venerable Contemptor, sword driven into the ground before him, helmeted forehead resting against the guard. "For He has graced his servants with deliverance at the hand of his Immortal Paladin! in His name...Praise be! Praise be!"
Odd watched the show with dim amusement, before realizing the Dreadnought had ceased its stomping, the corpse having faded to nothingness, and now stood still as a statue regarding them, in much the way one might peer at a semi-interesting insect. Right before crushing it under heel...
"Cease the howling will you? Let us at least see if our new 'Deliverer' is amiable before dropping to our knees and praising his steps, shall we? Just in case." Bruna growled in worried warning but Odd shushed her swiftly with a firm pat before striding forward to meet their 'savior', Storm's Heart held loosely at the ready as a show of deep respect.
A Warrior bloodsworn of the Rout showed honor by regarding their friends with the same regard as they did their foes, to be ignored or worse dismissed a showing of the greatest insult.
"Hja, Cousin! Fancy meeting one of your uh...stature out in these parts. Enjoying the view as we are?"
"-...-"
The Ancient's terse silence was almost enough to spur Odd to attack, instincts not easily silenced. Small Talk was not a thing that came easily to the sons of Russ.
The Dreadnought wasn't one for humor then, very well, another tactic then... "Let me take a guess, my Iron friend, and say you arrived here from Cadia as well? With the Storm?" Still no response, aside from a slight twitch of the Dreadnought's massive claw, a crackle of energy coursing its way down the tip of a jagged talon. "You must have, your Packmates...your Brothers, were still on the field of battle last I was aware. Though I would have remembered seeing one such as yo...!?"
"-YOU...YOU KNOW OF THE CHAPTER, SPACE WOLF?-" A voice, low and sonorous, issued like sand from vox-speakers set within the heart of the Contemptor. The tone wary, uncertain...that twitch of a claw becoming a full fledged step that vibrated through Odd's bones, making it difficult to breathe. It was faint, but there was a scent as well.
Old flesh, old bitterness, old anger...
"-YOU KNOW OF...OF THE OTHERS?-"
"Ha ha! Indeed...well, some at least! The sigil and colors you bear are known to me, Brazen Claw." ... "As is the doom visited upon the heads of the Despoiler's fell dogs on the Fields of Tyrok, many a Traitor saw their threads cut short under your Brothers' steel. Admittedly your Packs gave the mortals quite a fright with that sudden appearance, fearing more traitors no doubt!?"
As it turns out, that had been the wrong thing to say. The Contemptor loosing a snarl as fierce as the Ice Wyrms that dwelt beneath in the glacial depths of the Aett back on distant Fenris, Assault Cannon whirring to dangerous life, claw now crackling in a way that set Redtooth's hair on end.
"-WE ARE NO TRAITORS! DEARG IS NO TRAITOR! WE STAND LOYAL! DEARG STANDS! DEARG STANDS...!-"
Niall cursed loudly though the words were lost as the incoherent roars in a guttural tongue, corrupted further by vox-distortion, overwhelmed even his armor's dampening systems. Odd and his wolf didn't even have that luxury, the Space Wolf quite certain he felt liquid warmth dribbling from his eardrums.
Still he had to stand resolute, show no hesitation. Know no fear...even in the face of a Mad Giant.
"O-Of course you do, Cousin! Of course!"
He grinned a wolfish smirk through gritted fangs, staring into the helm like sensor array that comprised the Contemptor's 'Head'. Such Warriors didn't like to be reminded of their state, Odd had interacted with enough of his own Chapter's Sacred Ancients, especially those Battle-Brothers entombed in similar Dreadnought Patterns.
Contempters were powerful forces of violence upon the battlefield, but had a reputation among the Space Wolves as being particularly...erratic. Overly savage, the natures of noble Warriors buried beneath the ferocity of the bestial spirit housed within the machine.
Combine such a fate with the passing of ages, millennia spent in an endless cycle of fierce war both internal and external, isolation from ones kin, and the dreamless sleep of stasis it was no wonder the lasting effects on the mind of even an Astartes could be...severe.
This one seemed little different, the Ancient Warrior settling into a feral hunch despite the grinding of protesting metal plates. Servo-bundles twitching as synaptic impulses stemming from the Space Marine within wracked its metal body, attempting to show in iron what they once would have in flesh. Humor did not seem to work, so perhaps blunt truth...
"You must be loyal. Else wise the Rout would have no doubt painted the field red with the blood of your kin, as is our Wyrdset by the Allfather himself." The Apothecary gagged, and even his Wolf stared back at her companion with a look of minor disbelief.
Of the Contemptor their was again only silence, and then a broken series of shrieking caterwauls that set Odd's fangs rattling in his gums. For a moment he wondered if the Ancient was screaming again, and if the next few seconds might just be his last. And then he realized that the War Machine wasn't crying out, he was laughing...a sound that was somehow even more disconcerting.
"Heh heh...Nothing personal, mind you. And it mattered little in the end."
"-I...YES...DEARG GREETS YOU THEN, SON OF FENRIS.-"Speaking in third person, a common enough sign of degradation in Dreadnought implantees, their identity subsumed by the Machine. This case was actually quite minor in a way. "-THIS SARCOPHAGUS DETECTED A SWELL OF XENOS ACTIVITY CENTERED IN THIS REGION, THOUGH IT WAS NOT UNTIL COMING IN RANGE OF YOUR ARMORS' SIGNUM BEACON THAT DEARG KNEW OF YOUR EXISTENCE-" A momentary tension as the Dreadnought chassis shifted, leaning to examine the Space Marine at its feet.
"And your allegiance..." The unspoken threat of his twitching claws appeared to convey in no uncertain terms. Each one capable of shearing apart a Space Marine clad even in full Terminator Plate with nigh laughable ease.
It was perhaps a testament to the desperation felt amidst the destruction wrought at the Despoiler's hands that the Brazen Claw's would even risk, with his mind so scattered and his tempers so obivously raw, waking such a Warrior from his well-earned slumber.
There was a reason the Rout only employed their Honored Dead in the most dire circumstances, lest their souls be born down by the weight of their trials.
It was Glory beyond death, but a lonely and arduous nonetheless. Forever denied the companionship of the Pack, forced to watch those set still firmly in life pass you by to obtain further glories as you slumber away the centuries, the knowledge that when you wake it is likely they will have long faded into memory.
"Hjolda, Ancient...Dearg, is it?"
A meager twitch of the helm apparatus, an attempt at a nod perhaps? Progress! "Brother Dearg then, it warms my hearts as well to know we are not alone in Dreaming this place, though you did steal my Prey." Another nervous grunt from the Templar, the Son of Dorn watching the back and forth with a tensed Cyberwolf by his side. Still it had to be said, Odd had claimed the Jova's skull as his own after all.
"Though I won't hold it against you, Friend. It was well earned!"
"-SON...SON OF THE WOLF KING...-"
"Aye! My brothers know me as Odd Redtooth, Glorious Skyclaw of the Vlka Fenryka. Blood-sworn to the Great Company of Jarl Sven Bloodhowl...or so I was."
If the Dreadnought had, or even could, notice the tension in those words, it gave no sign. A fact for which Redtooth was grateful, his gauntlet seeking Bruna's fur and finding some measure of comfort and offering some in turn.
"And this fetching vision at my side is Bruna, einherjar in service of the Rout.Sworn Companion of Odd Redtooth, Slayer of the Greenskin Warboss Grakus Bazgal the 'Scourge of Seshat' in single combat, Troll-Bane, Huntress of the Fenrisian Ash Wastes, Lady of..."
"Ahem..." A firm grip fastened upon Odd's pauldron, the Templar almost earning a fist for the act rather than recognition. Never good to startle a Sky-Warrior of the Vlka, though he could be forgiven.
"Ah yes, pardon Cousin I did not forget. This rather dreary soul here calls himself...!?"
"Brother Apothecary Niall of the Black Templars. Servant of the Emperor and the Eternal Crusade."
The Flesh Weaver took it upon himself to make proper introduction, no doubt distrusting the Space Wolf to focus on the specifics and hoping to stick to decorum. Even going so far as to unfasten the neck seals about his armored gorget in a whistle of air pressure, lifting the custom helm to reveal once noble statuesque features the color and consistency of rawhide ocher leather, marred and puckered by several lifetimes worth of scars earned across dozens of worlds under alien suns.
The worst of which left much of the upper left side of his bare scalp a mask of burnt wax-like tissue, an augmetic shining a fierce crimson from where the eye had been consumed. The other a warm pool of pale amber, stern, ageless...Odd hoped his eyes didn't look like that.
"Ahhh...Sworn in Service to the Banner of Marshal Marius Amalrich." Without the distorting effects of his Helm, the Templar's voice wasn't nearly so grating. A calm even tone fit for an orator, a preacher, or more simply a caregiver. Though Odd had met enough of his Cousin's ilk to know that such a tone would easily rise to heights untold in veneration of the Allfather, the Emperor. "Charged by High Marshall Helbrecht with the prosecution of the Cadian Crusade against the forces of Abaddon and his foul ilk. An Honor to stand before one of the Emperor's Immortals, Lord."
"-THE HONOR IS DEARG'S. HE DID NOT THINK TO MEET ANOTHER LOYAL SON OF THE IMPERIUM IN THIS STRANGE PLACE, MUCH LESS TWO.-"
The Dreadnought's chassis rotated, evoking the impression of a war-weary warrior gazing out at an unknown wilderness. The emotion however was genuine, if concealed by the morose echo of the ancient speakers. How old was the man inside that walking cage? How many wars had he made, threads had he cut?
Wait...that scent...
"Excuse me, Lord Dearg, did you say you met another Space Marine. Before us...?"
"-DEARG DID, THE NEOPHYTE...IT WAS HE WHO GREETED DEARG IN THIS PLACE...HE WHO...NEOPHYTE!-"
"H-Here, My Lord!"
A voice of a higher pitch, lacking both the distorting influence of a helm or even the usual bass authoritative timbre of experience most Space Marines grew into. The scent in Odd's mind resolving itself into a staggering dark haired youth working his way ardently through the thick snow underfoot. Trailing in the path left by the great Dreadnought's initial charge, staring at them all with wide blue eyes both nervous yet determined.
Smaller and leaner of build than a true Astartes, the boy nevertheless was taller and broader than any mere mortals had any right to be, especially one so obviously in the grasp of adolescence.
Already showing signs of the myriad physical effects induced through gene-craft in his nascent patrician features, as well as the first hints of developing hyper-muscle at work underneath layers of deep blue painted carapace plate, the symbol of his chapter showing proudly in white on one buffed shoulder plate opposite the numeral 'X'.
The broad squarish outline of a bolter slung across his shoulder, and a sword...a well worn gladius Odd noted with passing interest, hanging at his belt off balanced.
"Apologies, Lord Dearg. I was...hah...I was delayed by more of the local wildlife drawn in your wake. And your tread...I couldn't hope to...!?"
"-DEARG DOESN'T WANT EXCUSES! YOU FELL BEHIND DEARG, NEOPHYTE! YOU WERE SLOW, BE BETTER NEXT TIME!-"
"I...Yes, Venerable One. I understand." The Dreadnought wasn't listening, his point evidently made.
"Oh ho! Have a look at this, Flesh Weaver!" Redtooth stalked closer with a grin, in his power armor looming head and shoulders above the chastened lad. The boy holding his ground, if only just, his nose wrinkled at the heavy musk wafting off the Space Wolf. "An Ultramarine Pup, eh!? I've never seen one of their Blood Claws in the flesh before." He sniffed, narrowing his eyes dangerously, "Little Tilbrád, scurrying about...so small."
"Scout Lividus, Ultramarines Tenth Company!" The Scout snapped to attention and stood tall as he could, grimacing as the effect was ruined somewhat by his scabbard flopping about. His stance all wrong, unused to the extra weight hanging opposite his combat knife. "Seconded to the Honor Company under Captain Echion, sworn in defense of the Cadian Gate."
"I served with your Captain Echion, Boy."
Niall regarded the boy, this time putting the Ultramarine back a step. The memories of the surgeries undergone at the hands of his own Chapter's Apothecaries clearly still in his mind.
"His actions and those of his fellows are worthy of great praise, lauded by the High Marshall himself. You claim to stand in his Company, you, a mere Neophyte?"
The Challenge was clear, as was the implied insult.
"A great honor, Lord Apothecary." Lividus declared, not quite defensively though close to it. Glaring the Apothecary in the face, an act that had Odd nodding in approval despite himself. "One earned not absent great effort and dedicated service. Meant as a chance to serve and learn at the feet of the finest of my Bloodline."
"No one's doubting your right, Pup." Odd interjected swiftly, moving to block the Apothecary as he made to advance, Bruna doing the same to the tiny Ultramarine. Niall seemed ready to declare otherwise, the words becoming a low growl in his throat as Odd tapped his ax blade across his breastplate hard enough to ring like a bell. "You fought on the Fortress World, yes?"
"Indeed, my Lord. I...!?"
"I'm no Lord, Redtooth will do."
"Y-Yes, Redtooth, we saw battle aboard the Space Hulks the Despoiler used to transport his mortal soldiers. Most recently The Herald of Grief, destroyed via Seismic detonator." The pride in his voice was almost enough to put a smile back on Odd's face, though the implication was there beneath the surface, a nod seeing the boy continue. "We...My Brother Initiates and I in the Scout Squad were fighting our way back toward the Extraction Point when we were pinned down by surviving Traitor Marines. My Squad Sergeant and were caught out by a Sorcerer, exposed, when suddenly this strange light filled the corridor we were fighting in. After that..."
"You woke up here, and met our metal friend?" A somber nod, a hand drifting to the hilt of the gladius. That question left unasked, the answer clear. The scout was here, his Sergeant however... "Well, an Ultramarine, even a Pup, is welcome. From the sagas, its clear your Chapter's Wyrd has something of reputation for good fortune."
"The deeds and honors attributed to the scions of Ultramar are due to skill, my Lor...?" He blanched at the glowering look the Space Wolf laid him with, gulping audibly to ears of every trans-human present. "N-Not...Not simple luck."
"Of course it is. Still we were rather fortunate we met up with you both all the same, you especially Honored One!" He nodded to the Dreadnought, receiving a mimicked gesture in return, more mirror than a reciprocation of respect.
"-DEARG WAS...FORTUNATE. FORTUNATE HE FOLLOWED THE BLEATING BINARY...SO LOUD...SO GRATING...-"
"Binary?" Niall's flesh and blood brow rose, the Templar and Wolf sharing a startled look between them, the latter shrugging broad shoulders. "The tongue of the Martian Priests? Then the disruption playing over the Vox was...Blast it, I should have recognized...!?"
"It is...well, it is an old dialect, Lord Apothecary." Lividus piped up, the scent and eagerness of youth heavy upon him, though in this he seemed almost reluctant. "Quite simple as well, broken yet basic in the extreme, and..."
"-AND VERY GRATING TO DEARG...IT SHOULD CEASE LEST IT BE CRUSHED...-" The Ancient intoned, voice rising once more in a growl that was fast becoming familiar. The Scout taking the hint and silencing himself abruptly, standing awkwardly at loose parade rest.
"Peace, my metal Friend, at least for the moment." Redtooth chuckled, hoping to head off the impulses quickly as Bruna loosed a harsh bark of warning and Niall replaced his helm in preparation. "The Red Robes aren't very useful when crushed underfoot, at least in my experience." That jibe earned another sidelong look from the Templar and an exasperated whine from Bruna, Odd merely smiling another wolfish smirk in response to both. "What, so many clicking parts. So delicate..."
"The Wolf is correct in this assertion, if crass. We lack proper knowledge of our situation, the circumstances that saw us here, and most importantly the state of what we left behind." A stoic nod, a growl, and a low burble of rumbling internal actuators within the ancient Contemptor met this dark revelation. "Our duty to both Imperium and Emperor is clear, our war not yet done. We must pursue any lead, however small, that may see us rejoining our Brothers."
"Or avenging them." Odd added, grip tightening visibly around Stormcaller's scarred haft as the weapon shuddered in his grasp, it's Spirit hungering for battle once more.
No...the weapon merely echoed the heart of the wielder, the kill-urge burning underneath the easy smirks and japes. A tenseness of the jaw, a stirring in the breast that threatened to jump his secondary heart into action, a coppery sweet tang on his tongue as natural stimulants coursed through his gene-hanced physiology.
"We can't be certain we alone were stolen away to this place, nor that any others walk in the Allfather's sight. Their wyrd saw them here, let it be to fall under our steel."
"So, we follow the signal, determine its source and allegiance, and pray that He on Terra grants us a path by which to follow. Or foes upon which to vent his Wrath." The Templar spoke, directing that last directive towards the two wolves, both Transhuman and beast alike. He even tried to reach out for Bruna's hackles tentatively before a low snarl saw him wisely reconsider.
She must've taken a liking to the Flesh Weaver, usually the Cyberwolf stole away the limbs that tried such, aside from Odd himself.
"We would welcome your presence, Honored One. Your Sarcophagus is mighty indeed, and your zeal twice so. You will follow our lead?" He didn't bother asking after the Scout's intentions, the answer to him never in doubt. Though he thought he might've heard something about 'Theoretical' and 'Practical'.
"-A LOGICAL COURSE OF ACTION, DEARG APPROVES.-"
The Contemptor lurched into trundling motion, sounding almost excited at the prospect of renewed purpose, slow steps swiftly becoming a charge through the devolving blizzard that try as they might Odd, Niall, and even Bruna failed to match.
Who had Dearg been, a Chapter Hero clearly to ear eternity in such a Tomb but of what age and stripe? Did the once trio now walk in the presence of a venerated Brother fallen in glorious battle? A new blood fallen before his time in an act of honorable sacrifice? A Jarl, a former Chapter Master...?
"-COME BROTHERS...WE MUST...W-WE MUST REJOIN THE LEGION!..."The newly formed quartet of the living halted abruptly, or at least those struggling to trail in the wake of the mighty War-Machine did. Neither sure they had heard the Dreadnought correctly. "AUTEK WAS CORRECT, THIS IS NO TIME TO MOURN OUR LOSS...-"
"Eh?"
"Venerable Dearg, I...I'm afraid we don't quite follow! Could you...!?"
Dearg did not slow, or even acknowledge that his companions had fallen away, so intent was he on his new task to the exclusion of all else. Niall left shaking his helmeted head, Odd looking in in bemused disquiet while the Ultramarine pup shifted uncomfortably.
"What was that he said? Rejoin the 'Legion', as in before the Warmaster's treachery? And who's this 'Autek'?"
"I do not know, Lor...uh, Redtooth. Since we encountered one another, the Lord Dearg has been um...less than forthcoming with such things." Lividus said, shrinking back under a look from the two Veterans, indoctrination warring with curiosity. "His sacred Tomb appears undamaged, although I can't be certain until...nevermind."
Ah, so the Scout had some knowledge of Machines then? Or he was merely arrogant, as the Sons of Guiliman were wont to be.
"Those trials the Chapters' Immortals endure can prove arduous, Neophyte. And not always of the flesh." The Apothecary spoke, voice low as though fearing Dearg might overhear, meant to instruct. "Such a battle would be far more simple, and within my scope to treat."
"Lord?"
Niall needn't have bothered lowering his voice, the Dreadnought having long ventured ahead, leaving a trail of large depressions and slurry in his wake, a perfect trail to follow even over distance.
"Their Honor is boundless, their devotion to Him on Terra unquestionable and their experience valuable beyond measure. But their minds, especially those clearly as ancient as this one, can be..." He didn't dare insult Dearg further by insinuating or voicing his thoughts, he didn't need too.
Odd felt no such compunction, the Space Wolves a blunt and straightforward Chapter. It was their way to voice the truth, however unsavory.
"So, brave Warriors, mightiest of their kind, led through a strange land of Beasts aplenty by the whim of an Ancient Madman in a metal shell." He murmured soberly, seeking Bruna's comforting warmth once more, biting back a curse even as a rogue thrill of excitement pulsed through him. "Ah Fekke, what a Saga that'll be to tell, eh?"
"Twenty-Four, Wolf."
The Son of Russ' eyebrows shot up at the Templar's words, the Apothecary already resuming his stride with the Ultramarine and Bruna in tow. "Mm? What was that, Flesh Weaver?"
"My count, Twenty-Four. Seems I'm winning our little race, just thought you should be made aware." The smug expression was clear, even underneath the helm, a snicker of hearty challenge. "Do try to keep up, will you?"
Where once the sounds of battle and anger had raged throughout the Frozen Expanse, now their was only laughter. The joyful howls of a wolf who'd met his match.
'Perhaps this venture might prove worthwhile after all...'
- END
A/N: Well, been awhile everybody, not that I have much of an excuse other than these last few weeks being crazy for work and a graduation trip for the whole family half way across the US. I haven't abandoned this though, you can be sure of that. I'm actually surprised how much support this story has gotten so far, and I hope it proves worthy of it now we've got Imperial boots on Remnant.
+Four Space Marines/Four Chapters+
- Odd Redtooth of the Space Wolves, Skyclaw. As well as Bruna the Cyberwolf (Saw that on the WH40K Wiki, just had to throw one of those in.)
- Niall of the Black Templars, Apothecary. (For good ol' genetic purity and dissection of the unclean Xenos. See the Helsreach Animation by Richard Boylan for inspiration on how he looks, in fact just go see it on Youtube if you haven't.)
- Lividus of the Ultramarines, Scout. (Wanted to have a scout in this story, it provides a good perspective I think. Never fear, he's not the only one.)
- Ancient Dearg of the Brazen Claws. (Because Dreadnoughts are amazing. As for him being a Contemptor, with the Brazen Claws being a Second Founding Chapter I thought it appropriate. He's old, grouchy, and a bit senile, with the power to take on Atlas. What could go wrong?)
Hope they were entertaining or at least fittingly Space Marine-esque, a bit harder to write I've found then normal Mortals like Lux or Sister Delphine.
This chapter was originally quite a bit longer, but rather than delay I chose to spit it up like the first few chapters, I swear I'll get a standard length down eventually...I hope. Expect at least three more Astartes in the next chapter before we focus on our other arrivals once again, any more than that and Chaos might not have a fair fight on their hands. - Mojo
