Aurelius's hushed footsteps barely touched the stairs as he descended, the knowledge from his archival memory of the repurposed Administratum headquarters that the stairway would take them to any floor firmly in his mind.
There would be elevators present in the building as well, which would have saved time – but it was unknown whether or not the Red Eyes would have maintained their state of repair and using one could easily lead them directly into gangers without the ability to backtrack.
All of this he had quietly explained to the Inquisitor when questioned on his rationale for choosing the stairs that they had located after their ad hoc interrogation of a Red Eye. It was a strange thing to query him on, in the Pariah's mind at least, but then he supposed that to become an Inquisitor he needed the ability to act logically in the field as well as conduct grand investigations on the macro scale and possess an extensive knowledge of Imperial structure and law.
Florencia darted down the stairs in front of him, before halting when they came to the next floor. Aurelius watched as she stared down the doorway presented to them, an identical corridor to the previous layer extending out from it.
They kept moving after that. Checking the levels that weren't their current target had a twofold purpose – to ensure that no Red Eyes were patrolling them in great numbers that could be detrimental when it came to make their exit, and to check if there wasn't anything significant that could be seen from a cursory inspection alone.
So far the operation had gone smoothly enough. His master had contacted Udanya once more over his private channel, but hadn't mentioned anything to Aurelius about the other team's status. If he had more pride than sense, he might have been irked that despite Julion's assertions that this was his operation the Inquisitor had essentially assumed command over his retinue inside the stronghold, but Aurelius didn't truly mind.
As long as it wasn't a poor reflection of his own abilities, he was happy to defer to Julion's directions. Besides, the man was letting him make plenty of decisions, and he was in charge of the gangers.
Speaking of …
"Garulf here. The Red Eyes are starting to send more troops," emotions didn't carry well over the vox, but even Aurelius could tell that the Chief was concerned, "A status report would be appreciated."
"Interrogator Aurelius here," the boy replied quietly, glad that the high-power vox would pick up even his mumblings as they moved, "We are closing in on the target as I speak. I will tell you when we have located it and will alert the Arbites."
It was a lie, nonetheless a necessary one. They couldn't be certain that the Enslavers or evidence of them were even situated on the fourth subterranean floor, but telling the Chrome Fangs that would only end in reducing their morale and resolution to continue fighting.
They needed to think that their Inquisition allies were almost finished, otherwise they could easily decided to retreat and abandon their duties.
"You'd better be quick," Seleste near hissed. Aurelius blinked, not expecting the sudden vehemence in her tone. The gangers they had aligned with were unmistakably in the thick of it now. "That was Seleste."
"Samias here. Stay safe, Aurelius," if Seleste's response had been surprising, Samias's definitely caught him off guard. Though perhaps it shouldn't have given the personality model he had assigned to the older boy.
He felt something warm and unfamiliar in his chest, something fleeting that vanished before he could capture and dissect it, and without even considering the course of action murmured, "You too."
Aurelius would have stood still if they hadn't have needed to keep descending, such was his shock in replying before thinking what he was doing. Idiot. Why did you do that?
Belatedly, he realised that he hadn't activated his bead's voice transmitting, and breathed a sigh of strangely conflicted relief that his lapse hadn't been captured and projected over the vox. It would seem to them that he had ignored the concern for him that Samias had shown – exactly how he would prefer to keep it.
The seventeen year old dismissed the distractions from the task at hand. He needed to retain focus, and was glad that his master probably wouldn't have noticed his stark slip in concentration.
They passed by the second and third underground levels, the corridors leading out from the entrances to each less furnished, unpainted bare rock that progressed into rooms with a faint crimson glow emanating from within.
Soon enough, the doorway to the fourth loomed, prompting the trio to halt in their rapid descent. Florencia approached the metal door warily, the lack of an observation panel as with those for the levels above the first sign of something differently.
Aurelius relaxed his breathing, hot-shot laspistol firm in his hands but not in an overly tight grip. The Sister slowly opened the door, stepping into another passage carved from the rock, lumen bulbs hammered into the ceiling providing weak illumination overhead.
It was cold, and the blonde's breath was visible as he entered. It was expected for the underground regions to be so in times where their use wasn't required by the governor's family and staff, but this low of a temperature signified something else.
Small wisps of steam rose up from Florencia's armour, the woman stalking forwards as quietly as Aurelius himself despite weighing roughly triple in the powered plate. The youngest suppressed a shiver, flinching violently as condensation dripped down onto him from above. He squared his shoulders, pretending that he hadn't been about to unleash a volley of death at the ceiling.
This corridor was shorter than the others, leading to only one destination – what looked to be a very secure door on the other side, layers of metal plating reminiscent of the ablative armour used in the Astra Militarum's war machines defiantly blocking their path.
There was a unlocking mechanism of some sort, a key card identification system that gangers in the undercity shouldn't have access to. Aside from that, there seemed to be no other way of opening the thick door.
If only Maratha was down here, Aurelius scowled as he scanned it for any weak points. The Mechanicum priest would have been able to hack the lock with reasonable ease and could have overrode its system with a concentrated pulse of electricity if the former proved too difficult.
"How do you suggest we proceed, Aurelius?" Julion's inquiry brought him back into the present. Given that the Red Eyes had gone to such lengths protecting whatever was in here it was obvious that something of interest to their operation was held within, but none of the three would know a way to hack into it. Right now, they were stuck.
"It's too thick for me to break it open," Florencia muttered, gently tapping the surface with metal-clad fingers before pushing against it. Aurelius hadn't intended to suggest that at any rate – such had been evident from a cursory glance alone – but she had nevertheless given him an idea.
He stepped forwards, splaying his own hand onto the cold metal as Florencia moved back. It was thick, but he couldn't tell exactly how. It was a blast door, a similar type to that which probably would have been in the building long ago, but denser than even that.
"We could use a single melta charge?" he proposed, voice unfortunately carrying how unsure he was of the dubious idea as he flicked his eyes back to the Inquisitor. If his estimations were correct, the door should be thick enough to allow the superheated, controlled explosion to pierce through without any excess energy to destroy everything else in the vicinity.
A krak explosive would have been preferred to breach something that wasn't quite vault grade thickness, but they would have to make do with what they possessed. Aurelius hoped the idea wouldn't be viewed as idiotic.
"A good strategy," the Inquisitor gave him a small grin, though his ferocious eyes showed more ardent conviction than satisfaction at his suggestion or praise. Julion always became more passionate when they were close to reaching their goals, shifting from a stern and ruthlessly analytical presence to one filled with holy purpose. "Florencia, if you would?"
"As you command," the Adepta Sororitas warrior nodded dutifully, detaching one hemispherical charge from a small belt around her armoured waist as the Inquisitor and his apprentice paced away from the door. She twisted the short detonation pin at the top, setting the timer for twenty seconds and mag-locking it to the door next to its left edge before following the example of the two men and retreating from the set melta bomb.
Aurelius halted when they reached the staircase – it should be safe enough at this distance, but any more than that and whoever (or whatever) was located inside would be afforded too great an opportunity to react.
"We must be ready to act as soon as the melta activates," Julion told him, an unnecessary reminder but one that Aurelius didn't truly mind. Florencia unclasped her helm from where it had rested at her hip, fixing the seals over the black gorget as yellow light emanated from the eyepieces of the attached helmet.
The boy averted his eyes to the floor, placing his hand above them to provide more cover. It was most likely pointless this far away, but there was no reason to risk being blinded if the superheated ignition reaction produced more light than was expected.
The second-spaced ticks of the charge were barely audible over the plinks of condensed water dripping down from above and his own frosted breaths.
Aurelius mentally counted down the time, hellpistol ready at his side.
Five … four … three …
With a sudden displacement of air, the door began to open, prompting the blonde to abandon the deference of his gaze to the floor and glance up in alarm. A ganger stood in the doorway, the Munitorum grade lasrifle lazily hanging from a strap round her shoulder raised in startled bemusement at the three stood at the opposite end of the corridor.
Two … one …
A whoosh of scorching hot air was all the warning she got before a blue-white ball of fire melted through the metal door, blowing it clean off the hinges embedded in the rock. It slammed into the ganger, crushing her against the wall with a sickening crunch of broken bones.
Well, that works.
Florencia was the first to move, striding across the half-molten ruin of the door and the unseen corpse beneath it before beginning a charge, metal footfalls pounding on the stone floor and her chainsword whirring into violent motion. Aurelius and Julion ran after her, leaping over the obstruction (having to take more care than the armour clad Sister), the sounds of confused shouts resounding from the room they had just breached.
Florencia crashed into a ganger as she entered, a heavy torrent of autorifle rounds pattering ineffectually off of her power armoured bulk. The man was sent flying by the momentum, and she swung her chainsword in a wide arc into a ganger firing on her from the right.
The whirling blades met flesh, tearing it apart in a fountain of blood as their victim screamed. Florencia bisected the Red Eye, his separated upper and lower body falling to the now metal floor like some cartoonish mockery of violence even as the ground was drenched in his vitae.
The Sister of Battle rolled behind a table, autorifle fire following her movements in stitching patterns of bullets before their sewers registered that she wasn't the only threat. Her power armour was formidable, but it didn't render her invulnerable, and she had pushed its integrity to the limit.
Julion put a pinpoint bolt into the throat of one, the mass reactive piercing through the unprotected skin before detonating in a cloud of gore. Aurelius shot the second, an equally precise streak of light catching the gunner in the chest and knocking her off of her feet. He followed it up with another shot, this one a killing blow.
The Inquisitor strode into the room proper, almost contemptuously executing the ganger Florencia had initially incapacitated as he writhed on the ground in agony clutching his leg.
"Was that the last of them?" Florencia's voice, modified by her helm's vocal receptors into something more akin to a mechanical angel than a woman, rang out into the sudden silence as she emerged from cover.
"I believe so," Julion replied, slotting a couple of extra bolts into his clip to replenish those he had expended. The area they had entered was starkly different to those they had passed through, more akin to a laboratory than a storage space.
Large reactors hummed quietly to themselves and were surrounded by coolant generators absorbing the excess heat and keeping the room at a constantly low temperature. An array of scientific apparatus was situated in the centre of white tables that, while not completely aseptic, were the cleanest things Aurelius had laid eyes upon in the wretched underbelly of Enchellus so far, excluding the one covered in freshly spilt blood.
There was equipment – some the boy recognised but more that he didn't (though could probably infer the function of) scattered sparsely around the tables, but what was far more interesting were the glass cylinders, a few partially filled with amniotic fluids arranged across one wall. Aurelius hadn't seen specimen containers before, yet these matched with what the mental picture he had conjured up looked like.
About half of the support sockets did not have a corresponding cylinder, and the rest were inactive, which meant-
"The Enslavers aren't here," Julion uttered darkly, frustration coiling in his suddenly murderous tone, "But they were. These containers unmistakably must have held them."
"Did they anticipate us coming?" Aurelius asked, suppressing his own futile anger at the fact they were too late by occupying his mind scanning the rest of the makeshift laboratory.
"Unlikely. See how exactly half of the cells have been detached from their supports, and how everything seems relatively organised? Whoever was consorting with the Enslavers here didn't leave it in a hurry," Julion concluded, clenching his fists, "But that's merely conjecture. Damnit all to hell."
Aurelius noticed a vial of faintly glowing scarlet held in a rack next to one of the distillation sets, gazing at the dataslate conveniently laid out next to it with curious interest.
He scrolled to the top of the file imprinted on the slate, eyes widening as he read what appeared to be detailed instructions for synthesis of an array of liquids – all of which shared a similar chemical composition but differed in small amounts, via procedural changes or slightly different starting materials.
"Sir?" Aurelius meekly beckoned his master over once the man's attention had fixed on him as he spoke, "The Red Eyes in here were still using this facility to manufacture what I think are variations on the Red EX drug."
He passed the sample vial over to the Inquisitor, who glanced into its murky crimson depths for a short moment before spearing the dataslate in Aurelius's hands with a piercing gaze as the blonde showed him what he had perused.
"Ah," was all the response he got, the anger fading somewhat from the man's grey eyes, before he cast them across the room with renewed determination, "We'll see if we can find anything else – particularly any mention of the Enslavers. Maratha can analyse this," he carefully pocketed the sample Aurelius had found, "later."
Aurelius flicked through the virtual pages interred within the dataslate, acutely aware that he was directly ignoring the Inquisitor's order to continue searching around the laboratory for any more information concerning the Red Eye's goals and what they had done with the Enslavers. It was quite an extensive document, prepared by someone who was clearly unconcerned with outlining each painstaking detail of the actual synthesis process without elucidating on the actual reasoning behind changes.
There seems to be a dual emphasis on increasing stimulatory potency and solubility – two things that fight directly against one another. He mused, before frowning at a line that seemed out of place within the reams of step-by-step instruction tailored towards an enactor with only rudimentary scientific experience, this section concerning administering the newly produced drugs.
"Proceeding the injection of peak dosage, urge the patient to open the Third and Fourth Eyes and stare beyond. Expiration of the patient is predicted at a currently 100% rate during this juncture with all previous subjects saying nothing before spasms begin. If survival occurs, report all information to the Crimson Twins."
"I've just read something- "
Julion cut him off with a sharp wave, listening intently to what could only be the vox channel to Interrogator Udanya, his eyes narrowing.
"The Interrogator's group cornered a high ranking member of the gang near the pinnacle of the tower but were unsuccessful in restraining the target before they injected a lethal dose of Red EX," his master told him, "They also extracted a few files, written documents concerning shipments of material to and from the undercity with the upper hive – one of which was dated yesterday. What was it that you were going to say?"
Aurelius read out the concerning passage to the Inquisitor, whose face twisted into consternation as he mused, "Intriguing. We will analyse this further once we have reached safety, though it seems our investigation into the upper hive is now of upmost priority. For now, we need to regroup with the others and exit."
The Pariah nodded dutifully, shelving the issue of the strange, most likely heretical instructions and the implications it had for these batches of experimental Red EX as well as the overarching nature of the psychoactive in lieu of focussing on their current situation.
"So, Interrogator – do we deploy the remaining melta charges here or not?" Julion questioned, gazing thoughtfully at the power generators thrumming gently in the corners of the room. The question caught the boy off guard for a moment, having ran under the assumption that they would without considering the finer implications.
"These reactors – is it far fetched to presume that they power both this laboratory and the production of standard Red EX above?" he asked, resolving to make his decision quickly so that they would reacquaint themselves with the remaining members of the retinue in as little time as possible.
Julion merely shrugged, a casual gesture morphed into something far more formal by the Inquisitor's sharp movements, "I'd say that is a logical supposition. But I'm no expert on the energy required for mass production of the drug."
Either we save the charges for later use and leave the fortress undamaged or cripple their chemical endeavours but cause large amounts of disruption. If the Enslavers have been moved from here to somewhere else in Hive Enchellus proper it is likely that the Red Eyes aside from their drug might not be relevant much longer – and whoever wrote the method would be able to replicate it themselves.
But then again I doubt we'll be here again.
"We should use some charges, enough to destroy the reactors but cause no more destruction than that," Aurelius began the statement nervously, almost as if he was asking Julion for permission, but injected steel into his voice as he finished it – not that any of this would be audible to anyone but himself and maybe his master, blank as his tone was to those unused to the small flickers of emotion within.
Julion merely nodded, motioning to Florencia to prosecute the seventeen year old's suggestion and otherwise giving no indication as to whether or not he approved of Aurelius's plan. I suppose the fact that he's enacting it means it was acceptable? The timer was set for forty-five minutes, long enough for them to be decently far away from the stronghold when the detonation occurred.
They departed, tensely ascending the metal staircase back to the ground floor. No retaliation for their intrusion met them on the way back up, their progress almost identical to their descent – until the Inquisitor suddenly spoke.
"We'll assist you as soon as possible," he turned to his two acolytes before continuing, "Udanya's group has met medium resistance."
They ran back the rest of the way, not a blind sprint as they were still wary of attracting unwanted attention from any who might be traversing the floors they passed through but with nowhere near as much care as they had been applying.
"What is the situation?" Julion demanded as he jogged up the final set of stairs, the intensity of his words unsubdued by the exertion and the man's breathing only slightly elevated. As Florencia was the same, Aurelius felt somewhat embarrassed by the fact that he was taking heavy breaths – he was adept as short bursts of exercise, but obviously needed to commit more time towards endurance training.
"Understood. We've reached the ground floor and will approach from the right flank. The Emperor protects," Julion shifted his bolt pistol to his left hand, unsheathing a gleaming sabre from a scabbard at his belt and pressing an ornate button on its handle.
The power field of the short-sword shimmered into deadly life, hissing as it cut through the air whilst its wielder ran. It wasn't often the Inquisitor resorted to personally employing melee weaponry, despite the multiple armaments within his reliquary upon the Persephone, preferring to dispatch his enemies from range instead of deliver judgement up close.
This particular power weapon, a gift from the Archmagos of Mechanicum forge world Lateu, was one of the more practical arms Julion had in his possession, and Aurelius had often seen him use it in situations where the more esoteric or blatant weapons would be unsuitable.
The boy drew his own elegant combat knife – nowhere near as effective as the power weapon that could slice through even the plate of the Adeptus Astartes with contemptuous ease, but it got the job done and had been at his side for years.
The sounds of gunfire blended with screams of both rage and agony as they closed in on the former reception hall. The prospect of violence never failed to put Aurelius on edge, even if that was kept internal and numbed by years of experiencing it.
It had unnerved him, all those years ago, after his Pariah activation. Battle was something he couldn't control, couldn't dominate through application of iron willpower or intelligent deductions, too many unpredictable variables and too much emotion.
Or so he had thought. Recently, Aurelius had begun to convince himself that everything could be broken down into smaller constants, that every piece of information he could capture could be vital for success – that by mapping the characters of his opponents, every action he performed could stimulate the reaction he wished.
He knew, practically, that such wasn't truly the case, that unless he underwent heavy cybernetic modifications that would most likely be impossible with his Pariah physiology he would never be able to make completely accurate predictions of the flow of combat. But it helped him feel more comfortable within it, more adept at slaying his foes, so it was how he would continue.
The battle that they were verging on the cusp of had already claimed the lives of several Red Eyes, their bodies strewn across the floor like discarded marionettes. There were about four or so clustered in the limited cover of each of two pillars extending to the ceiling, with the other members of Julion's retinue located in the entrance of a corridor leading further into the structure.
Udanya was clutching her arm, probably injured, though from the way her face was filled with more anger than pain it most likely wasn't serious.
It seemed that the confrontation had reached an impasse – neither side could advance into the sparse, open foyer without provoking an onslaught of fire from the group still in cover, yet both were out of sight of the other and couldn't attack.
The situation was in the gang's favour – the longer they held off, the more likely reinforcements would arrive from elsewhere in their headquarters. It was evident that they had not expected the reinforcements to be allied to those they had pinned down.
"For the Emperor!" Florencia's altered voice screamed as the Sister charged into the open, laying down a hail of bolts at the approximate position of the gangers. Not many of the mass reactive rounds hit their targets, but that was expected. Flushing the Red Eyes into the open was the woman's intended goal as they quickly turned towards the new member of the combat and skidded out of her way, firing as they did so.
Aurelius and Julion sprinted in her wake, the former splitting off to the left (closer to the main entrance) and cranking down the restraints on his Null aura. Darkness swirled around him, barely visible in the already dim lighting but unmistakably there, a pulse of terror following in its wake as he engaged three gangers split off from the others in Florencia's storming assault.
His hellpistol spat death at one Red Eye who halted in his repositioning the moment bleak emptiness had enveloped him, a yelp of horror at the encroaching void intermixed with shrieks of pain as the high-intensity lasbolts blew out his chest.
Another woman fled, dropping her shotgun and wailing like a child before her cries were cut short by a well placed shot Aurelius couldn't identify the firer of.
The third, his eyes filled with a crimson mist and red-flecked saliva dripping from his chin, howled so loudly that the Interrogator was sure he would be damaging his throat. Faster than Aurelius had expected, he hurtled at the source of his pain, gun already abandoned.
"Waa-!" the boy yelped as the heavy weight of the Red Eye crashed into him, four hastily fired streaks of burning orange piercing his abdomen but doing nothing to slow the man's momentum. He jabbed forwards with the combat knife, lower body pinned beneath the much larger man on top of him as his assailant reached towards him with large hands.
It met the resistance of flesh, and Aurelius drove it deeper, instinctively blocking his face with his other arm. The blade scraped along bone and stuck, warm blood pouring onto the boy's gloved hands as he thrust his body back and squirmed wildly with his trapped legs.
The ganger screamed, one punch blocked by a jab of Aurelius's elbow before the offending arm was removed and pinned painfully above the boy's head, a big hand grasping his wrist so hard he thought it might break. He let go of the knife where it remained lodged in the man's chest, driving slender fingers into the brute's eyes before reaching back and grabbing his hellpistol from his trapped hand.
He shrieked, clutching at his face but not recoiling as much as Aurelius had hoped. Bloody phlegm spat onto the blonde's eyes and face in the psycho's howls, blurring his vision as the enraged ganger wrapped a hand around his face and twisted his head to the side, shoving it hard into the rockcrete floor and digging his nails in.
Aurelius yelped at the pain, swiping at the man's wrist with butt of his pistol in a precise series of blows that managed to dislodge his grip enough for him to wrench his head free, the hand of his enemy slamming to the ground beside it. He pressed the gun into the man's chest, firing off the last shot – forgetting that he had already released the rest of the clip's charge into the manic ganger.
What the hell? Why is he not dead yet?
"Die … you … freak," Aurelius barely heard the slurred words over his pounding heartbeat as a huge hand clenched round his throat. Before the Red Eye could properly apply any sort of pressure or Aurelius could react to defend himself, a metal pincer shot around his head, crushing it to a bloody pulp that rained vital fluids and shards of bone down on the boy.
That same augmetic claw, with effortless ease, tossed the headless psychopath aside in a whirling spray of red as his body twirled through the air. A second mechadendrite snaked down and clamped round Aurelius's thin shoulder, roughly hauling him to his feet with a painful grip that was certain to bruise.
"Ow," he muttered, rubbing his shoulder with one hand whilst wiping the blood from his eyes with the other. The drugged Red Eyes are certainly resilient. It wasn't the first time he'd seen unthinking violence as an initial reaction to being exposed to his Pariah influence – but it was the first time he'd been exposed to it with so much ferocity.
"My calculations predict that you'll live," Maratha replied sardonically, nudging him in the direction of the corpse with the mechanical claw – an unspoken reminder to retrieve his knife. In all honesty, Aurelius had forgotten about the weapon, still lodged in the chest of his momentary assailant. He was grateful for the prompt – it was bad enough he'd succumbed so easily to the attack, his master berating him for losing his knife would be salt in the wound.
He didn't bother to verbally thank Maratha for saving his life. He'd done the same for her multiple times in the seven years they had worked together, and she'd known him since he was a ten year old boy, still relatively innocent despite the void reigning where his soul should have.
Like all of those who still remained from the group Aurelius had been inducted into all those years ago, Maratha knew him better than most and acted almost as a mentor to him through the violence of the past. A nod of gratitude would suffice.
The other Red Eyes were all dead, Florencia's armour and chainsword bathed in crimson as she strode past him, favouring her left leg. He could feel eyes on him as he ripped his blade from the Red Eye, but shook off the sudden shame that pulsated through his slender form. It could have happened to anyone. It wasn't my fault my Null field drove him into a frenzy that made him apparently immune to six high power lasbolts and a knife to the lungs.
"Are we clear to continue?" the Inquisitor's stern voice cut into his thoughts, and Aurelius whirled back to gaze at him, perhaps too fast to be respectful.
He had perceived criticism in the man's tone, disgust at the boy and his failure to protect himself, but all he saw in those granite eyes was the usual iron focus on the task at hand – no concern, yet no censure either. Julion was simply asking whether or not his Interrogator was ready for them to depart, still deferring some command over their course to the teenager.
Belatedly, he realised his Animus crystal, shining with empty blackness, was still allowing his Pariah aura to leak into the atmosphere around him at a significant extent – most likely the source of his sudden emotion. He locked it down, before nodding and adding on a short, "Yes sir."
He followed as they snuck back out of the palace, shuddering internally when his touch-starved body reminded him of the vulnerable position he had been in with another person restraining him, trying to kill him but nonetheless still touching him.
Get yourself under control. You did all you could in fighting the drugged up underhive scum. Aurelius took a deep breath, erasing both the irritated and hypersensitive, adrenalized mindset and the sensation of the ganger on top of him. It was the second time someone had pinned him to the ground in as many days, though for markedly different reasons. Thinking of Samias for some reason made the imprint of the Red Eye's hands on him fade into the background, but he soon bade both unwanted feelings to go elsewhere.
It was undoubtedly worse for whoever had the misfortune of coming into contact with him – the only reason he reacted such a way in the first place was a direct result of the inability of others to touch him and being heavily unaccustomed to it, not because of any actual reaction he suffered.
That's enough. Think of something else … Perhaps I should devote more time to hand to hand combat, though I wasn't quite expecting such an assault. At any rate, whilst our operation wasn't a complete success we have vital information and new leads to pursue.
.*.*.*.
Samias and his fellow Chrome Fangs laid down a withering haze of irregularly spaced fire at the Red Eyes the moment they entered the dead end street, a barrage of many types of ammunition crashing into the onrushing tide of drug-addled gangers.
The Red Eyes shot back, filling the night air with bullets and streaks of lasfire that cut into the intruders. The Chrome Fangs in the open were only afforded the cover of irregular debris, and Sam ducked behind a piece of grey, nondescript rubble as the retaliatory storm whizzed overhead. He reloaded his pistols, grimacing as he saw Vexe – exposed by the weak wall she was hid behind crumbling to dust under the weight of the firepower – downed by a shot to the back.
She wasn't the only one: another group of Fangs Samias couldn't identify from this distance had to abandon their cover when a crudely constructed grenade landed amongst them, spraying shrapnel and rinsing them into vulnerability. Bullets rained down upon the panicking group, riddling barely-armoured flesh with bloody holes.
Acting purely on instinct, he rushed back to them, grabbing the closest to him by the back of his shirt and yanking him back, narrowly avoiding the sprays of myriad projectiles impacting into the ruined road as he ran. He shoved the man into where Michael, Valeria and Jamie stared dumbfounded at him behind their own collapsed pillar.
Samias didn't have time to check whether or not his fellow Fang was alright and identify him or dash towards the other wounded women and men before the frontline of the Red Eyes were upon them.
The gangers, their berserk gazes lit with sinister claret, wielded naught but an assortment of barbed, vicious melee weapons. Many had been shredded by gunfire, flesh falling from their emaciated underhive forms, yet still they charged as if their minds were incapable of accepting that they should be dead.
Samias put a bullet through the brain of one that cackled something incoherent at him, allowing himself a small smile at the accuracy of the pistol shot, unsure whether he should be discarding the cover in order to fire a fresh fusillade into the range-bereft intoxicated or if that was just a ruse to get the Fangs out into the open as he ducked back behind the rock with his closest friends.
His heart pounding so loud it almost drowned out the gunfire and screaming, threatening to tear his ribcage open in its frenzy, the teenager found it hard to think clearly. He'd never been in something like this before, not even District Elestra's firefight that had dragged the entire gang into this spiralling mess of a situation was comparable to the intensity of this confrontation.
Come on, come on! You know what you have to do – protect your friends! Don't worry about yourself, stop worrying about yourself … they'll do the same for you-
"Grenade!" Valeria screamed, pulling Michael with her as she sprinted out of the cover, Jamie following quickly behind. Samias blinked, stunned for a moment, and Val shoved Michael forwards before turning to drag the taller teen as his instincts kicked in.
The explosive went off with a muffled bang, shards of metal raining into the air and down into the panicking gangers. Samias threw himself to the floor, yelping as one cut into his side – his own voice barely audible over the ringing in his ears.
He pressed a hand to the wound, wincing at the stinging pain but counting himself lucky it had merely cut him open instead of being embedded. Next to him, Valeria screamed and growled, sound slowly returning as the boy rolled over to his front. She ripped a long sliver of metal dripping with blood from her left forearm, hurling it to the ground with equal parts fury and hurt.
Sam gazed over at the place where the shrapnel bomb had landed, revulsion swirling in his stomach as he beheld the ruin it had left in its wake. He and the others had been spared from the worst of it by the unconscious ganger he had dragged over, the grenade landing at his side.
The metal had eviscerated the man, shredding and embedding within his skin and nearly carving his torso from his waist – only the thin ruin of his spine still kept the two halves connected. The unwilling martyr had been blown closer to them by the force of the blast, and Samias could see blood-drenched bone peaking out from the minced cadaver of his face still contorting in pain.
Fucking hell … he's still alive …
The eighteen year old had to put a hand to his mouth to stop vomit spilling over as the Chrome Fang reached out the bloody stump of an arm towards him, horrible groans eked out from shrapnel-punctured lungs somehow making their way over the din of battle to Samias.
He felt frozen in place, utterly disgusted and yet consumed by the violent wreck left of the man he had only tried to help, before that paralysing fear was replaced by boiling anger. He didn't know who it was that had been left this way – and now never could – but that didn't matter. No onedeserved a fate like this. No one.
Except the Red Eyes.
Samias flicked his eyes towards the front line embroiled in brutal melee with the Chrome Fangs, more Red Eyes hurtling into the chaos like excited mutts eager for a hunt, sighting a target. He was grateful for his strong, too-tight grip on his pistols, one the single-shot pistol that had belonged to his mother before him and the other an old autopistol the Fangs had had in their stockpile a while.
"Red … red ... red sings!" a woman with a cascade of spiky scarlet hair ran towards him, howling out the words between shuddering gasps whilst brandishing a spiked bat wildly. Samias shot her in the leg, blowing out her right kneecap and causing her to cartwheel over from her suddenly unbalanced momentum.
He then fired a spray of bullets into her back as she fell, rage bubbling within him as she screamed almost gleefully and tried to push herself to her feet, the pain unregistered by an abused nervous system.
"Die, just fucking die, you bastard!" he spat, the ganger finally collapsing in a pool of her own blood.
"Watch out!" Samias turned to see another intoxicated Red Eye shot down by a hail of bullets originating from Michael, the smaller boy coming to his side and reloading his autorifle, gazing warily at more of the charging gangers.
"Thanks, Mikey," Sam murmured, though the silver haired youth most likely didn't hear him over the din of battle. The chaos of the melee made it hard to ascertain exactly what was going on, though Samias wasted no time in targeting two approaching Red Eyes.
"Blood! I want your blood!" one of them screamed in tandem a warbled, mechanical grating noise emanating from the crude cybernetic rebreather of the other in a pitiful imitation of human speech. Samias backstepped from a blade thrust at him, firing his pistols carefully in spite of his anger – too worried about hitting Mikey and the other Red Eye squaring off against one another. The serrated sword slashed through the air in front of him, a second stroke that he dodged.
Heedless of the danger, Sam tackled the ganger as he was carried forwards by the momentum of the slice. He knocked the smaller man to the ground and released a point-blank shot from each of his pistols into the Red Eye's head, blood exploding out from two gaping wounds. It seemed that shooting the Red EX infused warriors in the head was the only sure-fire way of killing them quickly.
The teen scrambled to his feet, juddering forwards out of instinct when he saw something approaching out of the corner of his eye. He tripped and fell onto the corpse of the man he had killed mere seconds ago, rolling to the side as a spike-tipped mace crashed into the body.
Streaks of vitae fountained from the impact, covering Samias's lower half in its sticky crimson. The mace hurtled towards him again, a sideways arc of death traced through the air this time, its wielder a huge woman with a mechanical arm that looked like it had originated from heavy duty factory machinery.
He tried to roll again, but the tail-end of the scrap mace caught him in the arm as it passed. It smashed Samias across the hard ground, the boy howling as he tumbled and dropping his autopistol. The boy fired at the Red Eye as she closed, a few of the shots missing but most finding their mark in her chest, but it seemed not to affect her.
She raised the mace for another strike before her chest blew out, another spray of simultaneous rounds sealing the deal and causing her to pitch forwards. Samias shoved himself to his feet, nodding his thanks to Seleste as she loaded more ammo into her smoking shotgun.
A stray bullet whizzed past Samias, narrowly missing his head before carving into Seleste's as she twisted in an instinctive flinch. It tore into her ear before continuing on its path, ripping through the flesh and carving half of the organ clean off. The woman screamed, dropping her bullets and cradling her head as blood cascaded from the wound.
Samias was at her side in a heartbeat, grimacing at the steaming ruin of the vox bead fusing with the remnants of Seleste's ear. She shove away his outstretched hands, pointing frantically and yelling, "Mikey! Go help Mikey!"
The eighteen year old barely felt he could deny the command inherent in the senior Chrome Fang's tone even if he had wanted to, and span around to where his best friend was battling desperately against the Red Eye with the shrieking cybernetic voice box.
He sprinted over, Michael's skinny form and the man rolling over one another as they wrestled on the ground – the ganger's back pockmarked with bullet holes giving Samias some impression of what had happened.
The man clawed at Mikey's face and throat, long nails tearing into the skin and drawing blood as the boy cried in pain.
"Get off me! Get off me!" he half sobbed, half hissed as he shoved desperately into his assailant, failing to release himself as the man gripped his head with both hands and began to press thumbs into his eyes.
Samias holstered his pistol in a swift motion (it being impossible to shoot the ganger without hitting his friend) and wrenched the Red Eye off of his friend, wrapping a muscular arm around his neck and bringing round the other to secure the choke-hold.
Snarling in his unnatural voice, the ganger managed to shoved Sam's constricting arm above his chin and bit into the flesh, sinking sharpened teeth deep into the boy's forearm. He yelped in pain and shoved the other away, only for Michael to smash the butt of his autorifle into the man's face as he tried to recover and stumble to his feet.
It didn't keep him down for long, so a second swipe crunched into his face, breaking his nose and bouncing his head off of the ground. Michael swung again, thin streams of blood leaking from the wounds inflicted upon him contorting with his face in a snarl of rage. Samias almost felt the impact of the metal rifle into the vulnerable flesh of the man's face the fourth time it hit, bone shattering beneath the blows as Mikey wielded his gun like a bludgeon.
"Get off get off get off!" he howled, smashing the autorifle into the ganger again with all of his strength. This time, there was no resounding metallic screech in response, nor did the Red Eye attempt to stand again. Michael kept swinging and crying, a flurry of frenzied blows reducing the man's face to a barely-recognisable pulp.
"Mikey, stop! He's dead! Mikey!" Samias yelled, grabbing onto the boy's shoulder as he ignored the words, jerking him away from the dead man and catching the panicked arc Michael lashed in his direction. The butt of the gun smacked into his hand hard, but the eighteen year old ignored the pain as she shoved the blood-drenched weapon back into Mikey's shaking hands as the smaller male whimpered, "Shit, Samias, I'm s-sorry…"
"Come on, pull yourself together!" he snarled, gripping the boy's shoulders hard and shaking him for a short moment before turning away and pulling out his own gun again. Much as he wanted to comfort Mikey, pull him into a brotherly hug and gently tease him until he'd recovered and his eyes were no longer streaming with frightened tears, there wasn't the time – so harshness had to suffice. At least until the Inquisitor was done with his work and Aurelius gave the signal to get out of this wretched place.
Streaks of sizzling orange cut themselves into the boy's retinas as he stared out across the brutal conflict, accompanied shortly by several short wails of agony. He saw a Red Eye swapping magazines on a type of lasrifle Samias hadn't seen before a decent distance away and aimed at them down the sights of his pistol.
The enemy took notice, ducking behind a ridge in the street before Samias could fire. A hand brushed his shoulder, Valeria slipping past him and priming a laspistol that didn't belong to her as she instructed, "I'll take care of that one. You deal with him."
Samias gazed at where she motioned, a Red Eye stalking towards them in the cover of the ruined buildings populating the sides of the avenue, two long machetes twinkling malevolently in the perpetual ruby radiance cast by the central stronghold tower.
The boy aimed and fired, his opponent breaking into a ducking sprint and spinning his blades. He'd misjudged the angle in the darkness, the bullet impacting into crumbling masonry behind the ganger. Samias shot again, sharply feeling the loss of his autopistol which could rain death (or minor inconvenience in the case of these Red Eyes) at a significantly faster rate.
It hit the man in the arm, but didn't even cause him to drop his knife as he ran at Samias. The boy shouted a warning as a Chrome Fang suddenly appeared in his field of vision, his next shot fired at a wide angle as he pulled the gun away.
The Red Eye snarled, leaping at the obstructing ganger (who herself was diving away from another foe) and ramming his blades into her throat. Choking on her blood and the metal stabbed into her neck, the woman – Menerva – died quickly, dropping her own improvised scrap-metal sword.
Sam's opponent – a tall, wiry man with a shock of badly dyed red hair and metal goggles - wrenched his machetes free, before kicking the Fang's weapon towards the eighteen year old. A challenge, huh?
The boy scraped up the sword, heavy but suited for his strong frame, and fired his last few rounds into the Red Eye that had been fighting Menerva, leaving just him and his opponent in the immediate area.
"You wanna fucking go, you bastard?" he taunted at the knife-wielder, blood rushing in his skull. He knew this was stupid, foolish posturing, but it got the man's attention away from any of the other Fangs – especially Val trying to snipe the lasrifle equipped thug and Jamie and Michael taking on a pair of cackling maniacs.
A fusillade of lasbolts interspersed between the two as they circled one another, sizzling orange that lit up their blades. A crimson mist accumulated around the Red Eye's mouth with every exhalation, staining the air with the sinister chemicals of the Red EX. It was a sight all too familiar to Samias, evidence of a high dosage of the drug.
His opponent acted first, Sam all too happy to drag out the confrontation even if he longed to get to grips with the ganger. Samias parried one parabolic overhead knife blow, jumping back as the second stabbed in from below. He'd seen through the man's ruse – the first strike had been exaggerated, obviously a feint intended to cause him to overextend his guard – but in turn the Red Eye didn't take his bait in coming closer and overreach himself.
Samias struck next, snarling as he slashed his sword in a wide arc. The greater reach of his weapon meant that if he could keep his foe at bay he'd probably emerge victorious, whereas the lighter dual knives of the maniac would be deadly up close.
The Red Eye twirled backwards, an almost elegant movement ruined by his intoxicated jittering, grinning maliciously at Samias and flicking his knives.
"I'm gonna enjoy cutting you up. After you, I think I'll slice up your little girlfriend next," the man ran his tongue over mostly broken teeth as if savouring the thought. Samias wasn't an idiot. He often let his emotions dictate his path but at the same time allowed his honed instincts to take over and get him out of sticky situations. Those same instincts were telling him that it was a very clear lure designed to provoke him into action.
Don't reply. You're better than he is.
In spite of the rational thoughts, Samias found himself growling a retort, "It'll be hard to do that when you're dead."
The man suddenly moved in what looked like a spasm, juddering forwards as if to attack before hurling one of his knives. Startled, the eighteen year old swung his sword in an automatic response, having begun reacting as if towards a melee attack.
The blade hit him in his weapon holding arm, ramming into the flesh and sending agonising fire through the boy's whole body. Before he could even finish a scream, the Red Eye had leapt at him.
Samias couldn't hear anything above the blood pounding in his head and the blood-curdling screech of his opponent, swinging his sword wildly and shutting his eyes in sudden fear.
He expected pain, slices of agony that would herald the man's remaining dagger hacking into him. Wet splashes of warmth on his face were all he felt instead, and the shuddering, sagging weight of a body on his lower half.
The boy tentatively opened his eyes, reflexively closing them out of panic when they were stung with overwhelming red. He reached the hand not clenched around the handle of his blade, tilting his head back and wiping his eyes before presenting them to the world once again.
The blade of his sword was rammed through the man's head, extending up from below the chin and piercing out through the other side. Having dropped the machete, the Red Eye's hands were cut up from trying to somehow remove the impaling metal, blood cascading down the blade and onto Samias. The warmth of it made him want to gag.
He took a stuttering, horrified breath, trying not to let himself comprehend how close he'd come to dying, before heaving the body off of him and ripping Menerva's sword free. A sharp sting from his wounded arm had him hissing and panting for breath, throbbing all the way from the wound to his shoulder.
Samias grasped it gently with his left hand, biting his tongue at the intensity of the agony. The thrown knife was still embedded there, not completely submerged in flesh (as it would have pierced through to the other side of his forearm) but not surface level either.
"Ah … ahhh," he breathed, trying to push back the tears gathering at the edges of his vision. Now that the adrenaline of the fight had begun to dissipate the pain quickly rose to replace it. He'd already been cut up in this battle by shrapnel, and his injuries from the District Electra confrontation still pulsated with a mildly uncomfortable note as if craving attention now that something else had appeared to vie for it, but this was significantly worse.
He didn't want to touch the blade – moving it only caused him more pain – but even over the agony he was acutely aware of the violence still raging around him. It wouldn't be long until he was attacked by an opportunistic Red Eye looking for an easy target.
Wrapping his hand around the handle, Samias screamed as he pulled the knife free, blood fountaining from the deep laceration before he shoved already slick fingers around the wound to try and stem the flow.
A presence quickly knelt down beside him, causing him to flinch and reach for his sword before he identified who it was. Jamie tore a piece of his shirt off (the clothes already abused in such a manner to aid his own arm after the chain entanglement from earlier), gently shoving Samias's hand away before wrapping it round. The younger cursed with a mutter, prompting the other to chuckle quietly
"Yeah, I have no sympathy whatsoever. Apply pressure on that. It should help," Jamie told him softly with a fond smile, before hooking his arm underneath Samias's armpit and helping him to his feet.
The eighteen year old didn't need the assistance but appreciated it all the same; closeness to one of his friends in a dire time was never amiss despite the fact that they were still in a battle. The blonde let him go before guiding him to some cover, firing a couple of shots over in the general direction of the Red Eyes that Sam couldn't discern the accuracy of.
Samias's words of thanks died on his lips as the largest Red Eye – largest person in fact – he had ever seen strode out into the street in front of them. He towered over the boys, both of which were quite a bit taller than average, almost reaching eight feet and bristling with muscle. He must have been a mutant; no ordinary man could reach such a height without horribly distended proportions.
Scar tissue covered his face, a haemorrhage of wounds that had been poorly repaired with basic grafts of new flesh leaving eyes tainted crimson gazing bloodthirstily into the Chrome Fangs. A sudden twist in his gut told Sam with utter certainty that this giant of a man was the same Goresc who had announced himself at the onset of this renewed onslaught.
"Let's see what we have here," he sneered in a deep, gurgling tone, the air around him seething with malice. Both Jamie and Samias fired at him, but a wave of visceral, crackling red energy rose up to intercept and repel the attack, contorting and writhing as it absorbed the bullets like it was pained by existing in this realm.
"What the fuck …" Jamie blinked, disbelieving what he had just borne witness to.
With widened eyes, the boy pulled out his last clip for his pistol, taking an instinctive step back from the Marshal before grabbing onto Jamie's stunned arm and freeing him from his stupor as he broke into a run.
He was no stranger to the existence of psykers, but hadn't ever seen one in person before. By all accounts he had heard and through his own imagination, he had thought of them as frail, ethereal beings who wielded a dangerous power no one truly understood, the strength of their mutant minds compounded by a weakness of flesh. Goresc seemed to fly in the face of all that.
"Oh I don't think so," the man rumbled, reaching out his free hand as a tendril of hissing, electric-esque warpstuff extended outwards and ensnared the fleeing Jamie. Samias turned to snatch onto the older male's hand as he shot backwards, but the blonde slid out of his blood slick grip with a panicked yelp.
Samias watched with muted horror as Goresc raised the struggling Jamie so that their faces were level, horrible choked whimpers escaping the terrified youngster as the brute squeezed the life from him.
There's nothing I can do, a small, pathetic part of his mind told him, whispering that he should just run, before Samias snapped into action. He fired off a spray of bullets aimed squarely at the Marshall's head, the snaking wire of crimson lashing up and expanding to block the projectiles.
"Please … please …" Jamie's frightened gasps should have been too quiet to hear over the violence around them, yet to Samias they were the loudest thing in the world. He brandished Menerva's sword two handed as he charged at the Red Eye leader, mind utterly consumed by the unrelenting desire to protect his friend overriding any concerns he might have had for himself.
The boy leapt to the side as Goresc took aim with an oversized autogun held in a single hand, huge muzzle spitting death as larger shells than those loaded by normal autorifles and pistols ripped into the earth at his feet.
Crackling energy suddenly reared up in front of Samias, whose startled attempt at a block did nothing to prevent it smashing him backwards and sending him tumbling. It was an unnatural perversion of physical laws that something so clearly consisting of light could impact into the boy with so much force.
Coughing and winded as he skidded to a halt next to a ruined wall, a frenzied drumbeat crashing around his skull, Samias's vision blurred, the image of Goresc holding Jamie by the throat splitting into two equally nightmarish distortions.
"Pathetic and weak, like all of you Chrome Fangs," the Marshal snarled, his massive hand tightening as Jamie kicked his legs wildly, clawing desperately at a huge arm. Samias reached out a hand, as if he could pull the other male from danger, deliver his salvation with this meaningless gesture alone.
Jamie's hazel eyes met his for a moment, the boy's terrified gaze begging Samias to help him.
A horrible, cracking noise broke into Samias's mind, Jamie's struggles immediately ceasing as the older teen's body hung limp in Goresc's grip. The Red Eye dropped him, the boy's form loosely dropping to the floor, a puppet with strings cut.
No … no … no no no no nononononono …
Samias was barely aware that he was screaming his throat out until Goresc fixed him with a threatening glare, claret power pooling around him and infecting the atmosphere with a violent, sick energy.
Hate and rage became the only thoughts in Samias's head, crowding out everything else with their intensity. He rose to his feet, hurling himself at the man again before the manifestation of his twisted abilities slammed into him once more, appearing too fast for him to dodge it.
Goresc advanced as the bloody tendril wrapped around the boy's chest, constricting it tight in tandem with the clenching of the man's unoccupied fist. Samias pushed against it with all of his might, growling and snarling like a trapped animal. Ah … can't breathe … doesn't matter … have to kill … must avenge …
The weight around his upper body suddenly vanished as multiple bright beams speared past his eyes, psychic force nullifying the attempted attack on the towering Marshal as it spread like a visceral puddle around him.
Valeria's face appeared in front of Sam's own as he hauled himself to his feet and shoving him into the building, instinctively shaking away her offered aid and gripping his sword tight. It took him a moment to register that the girl was shouting something at him, all of his attention so focussed upon Goresc as the goliath shielded himself from a barrage of shots by Mikey and his cousin.
"Come on Samias, we need to move, now!" she shouted, voice seemingly incredibly distant.
He made to shove past her, to launch himself at the murdering bastard again and again until either one of them met the same fate as Jamie, but her strong hands on his shoulders only just held him at bay.
Belatedly, he saw that the girl's face was streaked with tears, suddenly realising that his own was as well as she almost gently cupped his cheeks, "We'll fight him – together. But you're just throwing your life away going at him on your own."
Her words were meant to be encouraging, but she belted them out quickly with a tone full of steel. Samias nodded numbly. What Val was saying was right, logical – he couldn't avenge Jamie on his own, not against the Marshal's dominating powers. Nor could he protect the friends he still had left if he thrust himself into absurd danger.
Not that I can protect them anyway, he thought bitterly, Jamie's frightened but trusting eyes spearing into his own once again. He knew, rationally, that he couldn't have defeated Goresc. But at the same time, he had deserved to die, not Jamie, who had only been with him to help Samias in the first place.
Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!
Samias banished the maddening thoughts from his mind. I'll kill Goresc. I will end his horrible life. That doesn't mean I have to die as well.
"Where is your chieftain?" the Marshal howled as Samias and Valeria stalked through the interior of the building. There almost seemed to be a lull in the violence, the ranks of this wave of Red Eyes thinned enough so that there wasn't constant fighting and any Chrome Fangs in the vicinity of Goresc having temporarily halted firing at him.
Even in their state of Red EX induced psychosis, it seemed that most of the enemy gang had the presence of mind to slink off into cover, aware that their Marshal drawing the ire of the Chrome Fangs would spell a quick death for any of them should they show themselves in his vicinity. Doubtlessly they would surge into the open once the Fangs committed to an attack themselves.
"I'm right here, you monster," the Chief declared, stepping proudly out of cover and presenting himself to the gargantuan Red Eye. Samias gaped in disbelief, having expected the man to do the reasonable thing and remain hidden instead of presenting himself openly to Goresc. The old man had no chance against the psychic murderer.
He knew what Garulf was doing, of course. The sinking pit opening up at the bottom of his stomach told him as much. The Chief was buying for time, willing to give his own life so that his gang could come up with a strategy for defeating Goresc – or fleeing from him.
"Seriously? An augmetic cripple? I anticipated someone who might pose a challenge," the Marshal ground out, his words dripping with cruel intent. "But then, I don't I'd even heard of the Chrome Fangs before tonight."
"Guys?" a whispered voice broke into the two's silence. Samias snapped his head towards the noise, lowering his sword when a frightening looking Mikey stared up at him. He had no idea how the silver haired boy had managed to sneak up on both him and Valeria, but then again he at least had been transfixed upon the confrontation between the leaders of each gang.
"What?" Val hissed, grabbing onto Michael's shoulder and dragging him out of sight. The boy's face was ashen aside from where viscera had coated it a sticky red, the bloodied autorifle trembling in his hands. Nervously, he began: "I think – I think I know how we kill him."
"You won't be forgetting our name past tonight. That's assuming you even survive it," Garulf replied, his voice remarkably calm in the situation. Goresc made a wet, gurgling sound, and it took a moment for Sam to process that it was an amused chuckle.
"How?" Samias didn't care that he had gripped the smaller male's arm tight and shook him harder than necessary. They didn't have the luxury of wasting time because of Mikey's lack of self-confidence.
"His shield – he can't use it at the same time as he attacks. He had to pull it back to protect himself from Val when he had trapped you," Michael exposited in a flood of words, "If we can somehow fuck up his gun or make him run out of ammo, he shouldn't be able to use that shitty red tentacle to stop Sam from getting close to him with that if we're shooting. He can't protect himself up close, otherwise why would be bother constantly forcing you away from him?"
He motioned emphatically towards the blood-drenched blade held in Samias's right hand. He took a short moment to consider the plan – he wasn't certain he could defeat the Marshal at melee range even without his psychic assaults preventing him from getting close, but it was all they had.
"I think it's all we have," Valeria murmured, pinning Samias with a concerned glance that he met with fierce determination. He could tell she wasn't happy with him being the one to engage Goresc and put himself at the most risk, especially since the other Red Eyes would be all too happy to attack him.
"It is," he spoke with a note of finality, easing the pressure of his hand on Michael when he realised he still had it squeezing hard. Belatedly, he added a few words of encouragement, "Good thinking, Mikey."
"Weak words from a weak man," Goresc snarled, all contemptuous mirth gone as he raised his palm. Samias felt sick to his stomach as a bloody tendril flashed out towards the Chief, suppressing bile at the crawling sensation the psyker induced. It was the opposite effect to Aurelius's dark nature – the boy engendered agonising clarity in reality and smothered all else in a black void, whereas the Marshal bent and twisted the physical world, infecting it with an alien sickness.
It yanked Garulf into the air, an angiogenic vessel splitting off to tear the laspistol from the Chief's human hand, bringing him closer. Samias inched towards the exit of the building, his green eyes trained on the huge man and his newest victim even as his mind began to sob once again.
The Chief snarled something, too quiet for Sam to pick out, before spitting into Goresc's scarred face. Goresc fired, chunks of flesh blown out of Garulf's thrashing body as massive shells were unloaded into him at point blank range, the old man's cries mercifully cut short by the sheer physical damage the gunshots inflicted.
Sam had known that the Chief was going to die the second he accepted the Marshal's roared challenge, but that didn't make the harsh reality of it any easier to comprehend. The boy choked back tears – Garulf was the man who had taken him in, given him a home, a family, when he had nothing and no one.
The Chief's motivations weren't entirely altruistic, as recruiting more members into the Chrome Fangs was always a priority no matter what age they were, though that only furthered his goal of carving out a place of safety in the ruthless undercity. Yet Samias had always respected him, loved him, even, as one would love a nurturing uncle who wanted nothing but the best for his family.
It was one more thing that the Red Eyes had taken from him. One more strike on the tally of their transgressions.
One more thing he would make them pay for.
Samias broke from cover, Valeria and Michael launching a covering arc of fire that forced Goresc into protecting himself. A Red Eye hurled himself at the boy, screeching in pent-up psychosis that they had been forced to repress in the wake of their Marshal's arrival.
He barely even registered himself tearing the ganger apart with a brutal slash of his sword, decapitating them in a spray of blood before carrying on in his charge. Another Red Eye interspersed themselves between Samias and the colossus he was aiming for, before their body was shredded in a wave of bullets as Seleste appeared at his side, spitting expletives in rage herself.
Writing on the ground, the woman tried to stand and achieve her goal of smashing her maul into Sam before Michael's cousin finished her off with a violent kick to the head.
All around them, the street end had exploded into brutality once more, the Chrome Fangs emerging to avenge their Chief and spurred on by Samias's own mad offensive, with the Red Eyes engaging to protect their own leader.
Goresc ran through the violence as a blood hued sphere, spraying bullets into his own gangers and the Fangs they were fighting against without a hint of vacillation. Men and women of both gangs were mowed down, obliterated by the sheer power of the weapon.
"Get back here!" Samias screamed, blind to the battle raging around him as he chased Goresc through the massacre. The Marshal turned, throwing a frothing Red Eye that was in between the two out of his way, gunfire still pattering ineffectually off of his rippling shield.
"You again," he snarled, raising his huge gun. The eighteen year old suddenly came to the dread realisation of how exposed he was, icy fear flooding his veins where molten rage had been seething within moments earlier.
Before a single shot was fired from it, a pinpoint sniper bolt pierced through the tip of the weapon, severing the barrel. Goresc's psychic defences had coated his fingers out of instinct, but left the gun vulnerable.
Samias whispered a thought of thanks for Dragas's accuracy and the fact that the sniper was looking out for him, apparently catching onto his plan. He sidestepped the ruin of the autogun as it was hurled in his direction, accompanied by a roar of anger.
The Marshal leapt at him, far further than a normal human could hope to manage without significant cybernetic enhancements. The boy jumped back himself as the man's huge fists cracked the ground with their impact, stumbling in the wake of the resultant shockwave.
"You think you can fight me, little brat?" Goresc growled, sending the potent cocktail of fear and fury surging throughout Samias's head into overdrive. The towering Red Eye stalked forwards, tensing like a predatory feline preparing to finish off wounded prey.
Samias hefted his blade, its bloody edge shaking with either terror or hate. He couldn't tell which.
"Bring it on. I'll make you pay," his voice was quiet, choked by emotion. He doubted the Marshal would have heard, but that didn't make the words any less true.
Goresc swung at him, not distracted by the barrage of gunfire laying into his giant form, its intensity lessened as he neared Samias.
The boy rolled to the side, slashing up with his sword. It hit flesh, carving into the man's leg as he ran past. He span, each split-second action drawn out by his adrenaline-fuelled mind, hacking again at Goresc.
This time, the blade met resistance. Samias's eyes widened as the Marshal caught the blow in a large palm, sharp metal slicing into skin and bone as he twisted and bent. The sword broke in half, the boy's disbelief quickly quashed by another fist streaking towards him.
Samias was too late to dodge the blow that cracked into his side, knocked off of his feet by the prodigious strength of the punch. He forced himself upright, defiance streaking through him as a kick caught him in the legs, sending the youth sprawling once again.
"WEAK!" Goresc howled in frustration, jumping into a strike again. Samias raised his broken sword, knowing it wouldn't stop the Marshal but hoping to inflict as much damage as possible before the end.
It didn't have to. A form leapt into Samias from the left, shoving him away as Goresc's attack hit the spot it had intercepted. Arad barely had time to shriek in pain before his ribcage was crushed, blood cascading down his chin from crumpled lungs.
No … not him as well … why?
Samias fired his pistol, knowing full well that it couldn't damage the Red Eye past his sickening powers, and let out a primal scream. Seleste's shotgun blasts accompanied this, the woman on the other side of the Marshal and aiming at his legs – trying to see how far his shield could stretch before it broke.
Another Fang leapt at him with a knife, Goresc whirling and smashing her with an extended palm. It rammed through her chest, the man spinning again and launching the dying ganger at Seleste. She was sent sprawling by the impact just as Samias hurled himself at the Marshal again. He rammed Menerva's fractured blade deep into his back, Goresc arching away with a roar as blood poured from the wound.
Samias pulled it out with a twist, stabbing it forwards again. A hand encircled his wrist, squeezing so hard that the circulation was instantly cut off and he dropped his sword, before yanking him forwards so that they were face to face.
Goresc breathed a red mist into Samias as he hissed, vicious malevolence inflecting every syllable, "I'm going to make you regret that."
Samias punched with his free arm and kicked with his legs as Goresc wrapped a hand round his throat, slamming him into the hard ground with a knee pinning his stomach. He tore the pistol away from the boy as he made to fire before resuming its tight grip on his neck.
The Marshal began to slowly tug with his hand on Samias's right arm, stretching the limb out and pulling so hard the boy though it might tear from his socket.
He screamed, tears filling his eyes and spilling relentlessly down his cheeks, scraping desperately at the man with his one free hand. The pain was immense, filling Samias with its intensity, and the boy floundered, whimpering and gasping for breath. His sword was just out of reach, tauntingly scraping the edges of his fingertips as he reached for it.
Yet even over the agony of having his arm gradually ripped from him another smaller, almost imperceptible annoyance somehow penetrated his senses. The rusted, crude Aquilla pendant he always kept in his pocket was digging into his leg at an awkward angle.
Samias didn't believe in divine providence. He didn't believe in the guiding hand of the God-Emperor lighting his path from the other side of the galaxy.
But he did believe in the sharpness of metal, no matter how corroded.
Samias pulled it out, the torture being inflicted by Goresc heightening his desperate rage, and sliced its edge across the man's red eyes.
The Marshal howled, instantly releasing the boy as he reeled back and gripped his eyes, the pressure on Samias's arm removed. Samias wrenched himself free, scrambling for his sword. He grabbed the blade as Goresc towered over him, reaching blindly towards the object of his pain.
Samias stabbed the broken blade into Goresc's throat. Choking on blood, he let out a gurgling cry, a crimson tendril lashing out and battering Samias away, but the damage had already been done.
The moment the Marshal's psychic shield was lowered in his frantic attempt to get Samias away from him, the endless rain of gunfire ripped into him. Stumbling, his body becoming a bloody pincushion of unleashed bullets and scorched by lasfire, Goresc let out a choked bellow of impotent rage, before crashing to the ground.
Even his drug-infused resilience couldn't prevent that many gunshots from taking their due.
Panting for breath and aching, Samias laid back on the hard ground, rain beginning to spill from the heavens and mingling with his tears.
"Come on, get up. We're still fighting," Seleste's voice broke into his brief reverie, the woman's hand on his shoulder as she knelt beside him. Her voice was warm, cracked with sorrow even as she tried to keep it commanding. Samias let her help him to his feet, sparing not even a glance for the ruined corpse of the Marshal, before his pistol was thrust into his hands.
"Thanks," he murmured, trying not to let fatigue from the desperate fight settle in with more Red Eyes left to kill.
The remaining Red Eyes didn't seem at all concerned by the death of their leader. In fact, they seemed emboldened by it, launching themselves at the Chrome Fangs in a renewed frenzy, though perhaps it was because they knew they were now outnumbered. Samias fought off one with Seleste, shuddering as it bit into the flesh of whoever it had killed, before the street became bereft of violence once more.
"That seems like the last of them. For now, at least," she declared. The boy's eyes roved over the remaining Chrome Fangs – there wasn't one member of the gang who wasn't injured in some way, and at least a third were dead - before he replied, "Seems like it."
"Huh? Did you say something?" Seleste turned to him, Sam sharply reminded of the ruin of her ear as she did so. She'd ripped out the wrecked vox bead, and with their Chief dead that left Samias the only one left who could contact the Inquisition.
"Samias!" Valeria yelled in his direction, before the girl skidded to a halt in front of him. Before he could respond she had already wrapped her arms around him, pressing her head to his chest in order to ensure that he was still breathing, still here.
The eighteen year old ignored her sniffles, unable to muster a smile as Mikey grinned grimly at him, gently patting the taller boy on the arm.
Samias quickly registered that they hadn't received any instructions from Aurelius in quite some time – he wasn't sure how long they'd been fighting this most recent wave for, but surely it had to be long enough for the Inquisitor's retinue to have completed their infiltration.
"Aurelius, it's Samias. How-"
His heart leapt into his throat as another voice was suddenly broadcast into the cul de sac, bombarding the beleaguered Fangs with more crackling taunts.
"So you've killed Marshal Goresc? Truly, I must congratulate you on that. We've been trying for years,"high-pitched giggling drenched in insanity shrieked through the amplifiers. Samias let out a small, defeated sob, Michael falling to his knees next to him.
"Maybe whoever killed him wants to become a member of the Red Eyes?" a similar, but different voice jeered, "Of course, I'm joking. You're all going to die."
Silence fell once more. Samias pressed the vox bead's activation button again, "This is Samias. Aurelius, please respond. Aurelius, we need to know how long until the Arbites arrive! We can't hold out much longer."
"Maybe there's … interference?" Val questioned, emotion seeping through her words. Neither her nor Samias wanted to entertain the thought of Julion's group having failed, having held out until now for nothing.
Michael's laughter caused both to snap their heads towards the kneeling boy. It was hysterical, desperate, and he gazed up at the two with wide eyes.
"There's no point. Don't you see? They were never going to call the Arbites in the first place."
"What do you mean?" Samias growled, leaning angrily over the youth. The boy's laughter continued as he gesticulated hopelessly, "We were lied to, Samias. Think about it. Why would they compromise their investigation for an underhive gang?"
"You're – you're wrong," the taller snarled, slivers of bleak misery opening up within his mind. He refused to accept Michael's words, refused to accept that the Inquisitor's retinue – Aurelius – would betray them like that.
He violently mashed down on the communication activator again, yelling desperately into the vox, "Aurelius! Please, please respond! If you're alive, please speak to me! Tell me when the Arbites are coming!"
"It's no use!" Michael suddenly shouting, rising to his feet and shoving Samias with a distraught anger, "They aren't coming! No one's coming to help us! Your precious Aurelius isn't going to say anything because they've left us here to die! Once we're gone, no one will know they're here!"
"Please, Aurelius," Samias felt warm tears splashing down his face again and wiped them violently as Val pulled Mikey away. "Please … just say something. Anything."
He paused for a moment, sniffling and stifling a miserable sob that he didn't want the other boy to hear, "It's true, isn't it? You aren't sending the Arbites to help us. We were supposed to die here. You've just left us all to die here!"
"Samias … you're right. I'm … sorry. We aren't contacting the Arbites," Aurelius's young voice crackled into the boy's ear, crushing all of his hope, "Strask and Florencia are heading your way to provide an opportunity to secure your extraction."
"Two? You're just sending two people?! You promised us the whole-"
"There's nothing more we can do. The Emperor protects."
With that, Samias knew the communication had been severed. Samias gazed over in muted horror at Valeria and Michael, realising with a jolt that almost all of the Chrome Fangs remaining had gathered round him.
"We need to leave. Now!" he shouted, panic breaking the attempted strength of his words. With the fresh force of Red Eyes brewing at the other side of the long avenue, he knew it would be a near impossible order.