The whole hive was on fire. The smoke blotted out the sun. Everything was gravestone gray, scorched charcoal black in some places and all tinged by a warm orange glow of the hellish fires around them. With an impenetrable black cloud overhead and the colour of brimstone cast flickering across the rubble-strewn killing field, Spectros felt like he had entered hell. The screams of the dying came from far off through the wrecked layers of hive cities. Mountains of powdered rockrete lay in imposing mountains beneath gutted spires. Bodies lay across the platform in a sporadic layer, most of which were leftovers from the previous day's fighting.

They had come every day for the past three days. Each time, there were millions. They came in a storm of falling shells and mayhem, killing and burning their way across Terra. Each time, the PDF rose up to fend them off and each day they were victorious. For three days the heretics had come only to run straight into a wall of determined defenders who cut them down by the million. Each day they were pushed back but like a lapping wave against a rock, they were eroding the defender's numbers and strength. To the heretics, there was no number. They kept coming and coming. Spectros wondered that even if they did win, the rot of these bodies would ruin Terra forever.

"Blood and tears Lamenters," Spectros said to the assembled maines that stood on the platform with him, straddling the kilometer-wide gap between the burning hive and the fresher one. Big enough to carry a small city, the platform had weathered some fierce assaults so far. The scattered dead and skeletal structures lining it was an appropriate testimony.

"Blood and tears!" echoed the Lamenters.

"Blood and tears!" echoed six thousand PDF troopers in their trenchcoats with their Guard X breather units over their mouths, crushing their voices to a dim mumble. They were better than any Imperial Guard unit Spectors had ever seen. Their well-oiled lasguns were each a hereditary relic.

Spectros steeled himself as he heard the first gunshots. First one, then two. Like the beginning of a rainstorm, the patter of gunfire grew louder and more frequent. The first Imperial Guard units emerged from the gaping gate to the burning hive moments later, their ashen uniforms and bloody faces all spoke of a terrible battle. Fleeing defeat, the cowards fled in blind terror, some even unarmed. They rushed by Spectros without a turn of the head, by his company of Lamenters without a word. All Spectros thought of them was this meant there was one less Guard regiment on Terra. Whoever these cowards were, they would not be allowed to live after such a shameful retreat.

"Into hell!" Spectors roared through the smoke. Pointing his powersword forward, Spectros rushed through the onslaught of retreating young men like a madman into a bear's cave. The tramp of Lamenter feet chased him and the ordered advance of the PDF followed them. Within moments, Spectros could not see the hive's walls through the choking smoke. It was like he was standing inside a black cloud. The shapes of fleeing men and the flashes of muzzles was all that could guide him. Calling upon his senses, Spectros began to fight.

Centuries of training took over as he picked out the silhouettes of his dim-witted enemies through the wall of smoke. These heretics were dressed in flak armor, festooned with spikes and wearing iron helmets. Charging, hungry for blood, these fanatics were too dim to spot Spectros or the other Lamenters. Bolterfire split through the smoke. Strobe flashes in the darkness that each announced the death of another damned invader.

Spectros clove the head from a passing attacker with fluid grace, then drove his power sword into another who did not see him. He felt a shot glance off his armor and turned to the attacker: a loyalist guardsman who'd been startled. With a start, the man retreated, allowing Spectros to continue.

"Widow formation!" Spectros bellowed. "Widow formation!" his powersword split a man from head to groin. He raised his bolt pistol and cracked off a shot into the head of a hooded overseer he spotted through the darkness. Around him, the thump of Astartes feet closed in about him like the beating wings of a passing bat colony. He did not even need to check on them to know they were in the dreaded Widow Formation. Maximizing their low numbers, the Lamenters advanced forward, leaving a carpet of dead heretics in their terrible wake. Now it was only invaders they spotted through the smoke. Cutting them down was a simple task, every way like killing blind lambs. Behind him, the crack of lasguns confirmed the presence of the PDF.

"Ahead brothers!" the bellow of a Lamenter warned through the fighting. Spectros blasted the last visible heretic from his feet, bringing his personal tally for the day to one hundred. He saw nothing at first, but froze when a pair of red ember eyes flashed at him through the black curtain. The thunder of bolterfire followed to kill the owner of those otherworldly eyes, but it was futile. They came anyway, colossal and terrilble.

"Fall back! Martyr formation!" Spectros cried, emptying his pistol and holstering it. The Lamenters withdrew, hopefully quickly enough to fight against the creatures that came bounding thorugh the flames. If this was hell, now it was complete. Daemons: on Terra!

They were the beasts known as bloodletters, blood-skinned and horned, wielding bastard swords of black iron. The creatures they rode were formidable monstrosities of solid golden brass. Their eyes were coals and from their fuming snouts emerged a tall spike. They resembled cattle-animals in spirit and bull-charge. Their untamable ferocity however was only that of a daemonic predator. Bolts left lines of sparks dancing across their metal bodies. Their riders hooted and swung their blades in decaptitating arcs.

The daemonic cavalry rode through the Lamenters, who ducked low. With the sound of two gods colliding, two of the brass daemons crashed into a space marine, impaling him and dragging him along behind while it charged onward. Death was not instant, as evidenced by the cries his Lamenters made. Eight Lamenters did not rise, heads separated from their shoulders, blood leaking down across their yellow armor, staining ancient heraldry. Enraged, Spectros rose and leapt onto the back of the nearest brass daemon. The riding bloodletter only had time to glance at him before Spectros clove the thing in two. It burned to ash as he raised himself up the beast's heaving flanks and drove his powersword into its neck. It took five monumental stabs to break the thing's hide. With a scream that sounded like a cross between a buckling hull and a lion, the beast burst into flame from within while deforming hideously. Spectros was hurled from the beast's back and painfully onto the ground.

For a moment, he was totally disoriented. Up was down, the world was only smoke, the sounds of screams and gunfire tearing through the air like knives. A lasbolt cracked off the ground to his right. Spectros felt something hit his side. He shook his dizzy head and rose up through the smoke, coughing slightly, and felt for his weapons, which he had lost when the beast had thrown him.

"[b] Your songs are at an end, mortal [/b] growled an unholy voice with the malevolence of the Eye of Terror in its words."[b]Submit yourself to chaos and you may still live as one of us [/b]." The speaker was shrouded in darkness that proved too thick even for Spectros. A shapless cloud amidst the smoke, blacker than the depths of the abyss was what rose up in front of him. Suspended in the depths of it were burning coal-eyes of bloody red. Spectros could vaguely see twin arms from either side of the daemon's torso.

"The Emperor protects daemon. My place is by his side!" Spectros spat aggressively. From the corner of his eye he could see a Lamenter getting cut down by a bloodletter. The shrieks of dying humans echoed from the way he'd come. Daemonic laughter met his ears every so often. The Terran air stank not only of smoke but of the warp itself. To show his commitment, Spectros rushed the daemon, his fists flying into the thing's gaseuous form.

"[b] As you wish, Lamenter. I will make you sing your last song…[/b]" the daemon said as Spectros was wrapped in the thick coils of inky smoke.

…

This wasn't a stop Usoran believed he could make, but he stopped none-the-less. His visions insisted and he would not dare disobey them. The unassuming research facility grew out of the side of the little dead world's moon like a fungus. Glassy domes formed a garden across its dusty surface. Usoran docked by the main entrance while the remainder of the fleet stayed over the moon. Stepping from his thunderhawk, Usoran, Odeen and five Dark Angels entered the abandoned facility.

"What is it in here that is more important than Terra?" asked Odeen with a grunt.

"Do not doubt the Lion's words, wolf," snapped one of the Dark Angels, Usoran neither noticed nor cared who.

"I know the Lion will not fail us," Usoran added as they shifted through the darkened hallways of the facility, passing empty rooms that had long ago been stripped bare of any useful gear. Only the looming shapes of counters and desks stood out, pale in the starlight, amidst the constant shadows of the hollow rooms.

"There's nothing here," Odeen grunted after the first half hour of empty rooms, "I do not want to keep Terra waiting." They turned another empty hallway and paused. There on the wall! A single closed hatch, a soft light above it. Upon the light in white paint was written "do not disturb." Usoran defied the sign with a kick of his might heel.

Beyond was a square chamber, a laboratory perhaps. Lockers lined the walls and a table rose from the middle of the room. But it was not the lockers that harnessed their attention.

"Inquisitor Rarend?" Usoran asked in bewilderment.

"AH!" the startled man was halfway across the room before stopping and squinting at the Astartes. It was him, dressed now in a merchant captain's uniform. In his hands he clutched his plasma pistol and a crude projectile pistol lay in the other. Only when he saw Usoran's face did Rarend's dirty mouth give a soft grin.

"The Emperor unites us," Rarend replied with a shallow nod of his head.

"This pirate is an inquisitor?" asked Odeen with a laugh when he spotted the other space marines bowing their heads. "You are not serious."

"Times are difficult, Space Wolf," replied Rarend. "I have taken to raiding stores like this one for supplies. All is not well in the worlds I have been to." Usoran nodded darkly, fearing Rarend already knew about Terra. "Warp storms have opened across the whole sector so it seems, small ones, but ever present. Chaos insurgents take this as a sign of chaos' imminent victory. There are revolts all across this whole sector. And so close to Terra too. The governors are struggling to keep the peace. I myself have been caught up in many of these rebellions." Rarend shook his head. "Mutants and heretics are everywhere. I cannot even wear my inquisitorial robes without attracting the wrath of heretics." Usoran and Odeen looked fearfully at one another. If there were revolts going around all across this sector, then why not others? Why not the sector where Holy Terra itself sat? Why not the whole Imperium? The implications were staggering. Usoran was all but certain that a weakening of the Emperor's power was causing the storms.

"Have you not seen them?" Rarend asked when he caught the dumb look on Usoran's face.

"We have been travelling too quickly," Usoran said, looking to the others.

"My ship noticed one last week. It was small, but we saw it," Odeen said. "The nose of the wolf is stronger than the eyes of the lion," he mumbled.

"Damnation. Then Terra cannot receive reinforcements," whispered one of the Dark Angels. Rarend said nothing, but there was a look of knowing in his face that made Usoran suspect he knew what was happening on Terra. Unable to continue guessing, Usoran finally asked.

"I knew it was true, I knew it was where you were headed," Rarend sighed. "Yes, I know. Distress signals are being sent out every minute. I would be amazed if the rest of the space marines do not soon get them." This was good to know. If Terra itself was broadcasting distress calls then surely the invasion fleets bogged down against Abaddon's daemon worlds would surely answer. Hopefully, any forces near Terra that weren't immobilized, fighting revolts would also answer.

"Come with us to Terra," Usoran offered, "you can bring His words to the besieged." Usoran didn't expect Rarend to decline, yet he did.

"There is other work for me. I am truly sorry," Rarend whispered. Usoran noticed him clutching his pocket. It wouldn't be until he was flying away from the research station that he began to think about it. For now, he ignored the detail and pressed Rarend for answers.

"Inquisitorial duty? What could be more important than the Emperor's personal safety?" Usoran asked. Again, Rarend's mood declined.

"I…I have to call others to Terra's aid," Rarend quickly said. "I cannot come. And…Usoran there's something else." He handed Usoran a data chip. "It's the latest distress call. In case you must know how dire the situation is." Usoran would listen to it later.

"What manner of inquisitor is this?" asked Odeen loudly with a scoff. "He looks like a ganger and speaks like the Emperor cannot be saved and chaos will prevail." Rarend glared at Odeen. Even in his lesser state, Rarend's glare could still freeze a man's soul.

"If you need encouragement like a common sled dog then…" Rarned's voice dropped to a whisper. "I do not know if it is heresy or not, but as storms blossom, there are Imperial cults who preach a new message." Odeen looked bored but Usoran listened closely. "They say that the final battle is here, that mankind will rise above chaos and win, destroying it forever, so we may rule the stars without fear. And they say…" Rarend looked from Odeen to Usoran. "…They say that the primarchs are returning. That they will be with you at the battle for Terra. Make of that what you will."

Less than an hour later, Usoran was once more in his ship with his fleet, meditating in an isolated room. Rarend's words still echoed in his ears. "The primarchs are returning."

He turned on the data-chip. The sound of a space marine's tortured screams filled his ears. He recognized the voice anywhere: it was Spectros, giving his last lament.

The combined fleet sailed through the warp, approaching Terra quickly, soon to join the final battle.

[i] The primarchs are returning [/i]

…

The hive it was on rose miles into the sky, pumping fresh oxygen to those who visited it from vents across its surface. The monastary was located on the hive's flat top: on a short plateau of marble that raised it powerfully above the mounds of shorter structures that reared their heads into the clouds around it. About it were the termite mounds of Terra, ugly and towering. Like a tiny pearl in the depths of an oyster's rough shell, the monastery was the most beautiful thing for miles around. The clouds drifted around its spires like hair. The hive itself did not rise above the monastary's shining black foundations in humble respect for the Astartes structure. There it stood, squat and foreboding, the only noteworthy building in sight atop the flat top of the mountainous hive.

In vile disrespect to the squat monastery, shells exploded throughout the buildings around it, throwing sooty smoke into the pale clouds overhead. Flames leapt up from collapsed structures. Overhead, planes of the Imperial Navy fought the invaders. The sound of battle echoed through every street, every building and every room.

The bald serf shook his head sadly and shut the windows. Only inside the monastery could there be any peace from the carnage outside. The thick walls were absolutely indominable and not even heretical artillery could crack them. The sound of their detonations was like a distant thunder in this hallowed place.

"Does the Imperial Guard hold its ground?" asked an ancient serf from inside the round room, his voice neither afraid nor inquiring, but dull with the weight of ages. The younger serf turned to his elder and bowed.

"It fights with all its stength. Emperor willing, they will hold chaos back from this sacred place," the young serf said powerfully. "Even without the Ultramarines here in flesh, the chapter's property will be protected." He turned to the center of the room, where a stone sarcophagus coloured the room with its grim but peaceful mood. The light grey of its stone fit well with the dimly lit blues and whites of the Ultramarines heraldry hanging from the walls. A cold effigy of Marneus Calgar lay atop it, marking the hero's last resting place. Standing, lorded over the body it had held, was the Black Tomb dreadnought, now forever still and forever watching. The blasphemous damage done to it was mended perfectly. The carving on the screaming man on its front was all that was ugly about the squatting giant. This part of the monastery was Calgar's tomb and the dreadnought was its guardian.

…

Swinging his lasgun around, Trooper Pylael loosed a volley of hot lasfire into the room. Charging through the dust left by the grenade, he spotted a man on the floor, squirming in pain. Pylael shot the man dead.

"Clear!" he shouted to his squad mates behind him. He ducked away from the window and peeked out a small hole blown into the building's side. The burning leman russ in the street was all that caught his eye. From this apartment, he could see the Ultramarine's monastery above the skyline.

"Get the door! Get the door!" said Hallken, drawing a grenade and running over to the next door leading from the room. Before the other guardsmen could get into position, lasfire cut through the door, hurled in from a heretic on the other side. The guardsmen took to the walls, avoiding the shots. Pylael pointed his gun at the door and shot back. The wooden door was cut to splinters under lasgun bolts. Hallken moved to use his grenade but dropped to the ground: a bolt through his chest. There were now eight men left in Pylael's squad.

Coming through the door came the first enemy soldier. The iron plates on his body creaked and thudded as he rushed into the room, firing his lasgun. The guardsmen put this crazed fool down and the one behind him, but the third one shot Pake in the forhead with his revolver. Pylael lunged forward, planting the heretic in the throat with his bayonette. A mutant came behind this one, a chainsword in his two hands. Pylael's squadmates came forward, bayonettes fixed, to answer the mutant and the others behind him.

The next moments were lost in a frenzy of shrieking and spilling blood. Pylael only felt a hot knife pulling across his hand and he only felt blood spray in his face from a cut neck. Who's neck was it? Did he make the kill? Pylael was too busy whacking away mutant blades.

The crack of a rifle split the melee, then another. Pylael nursed his hand as the fighting ended. The last of the mutants was dead and five of his squad was still breathing. Pylael froze when he saw a man of great size enter the room from the way the mutants had come in, shouldering a sniper rifle that looked capable of immobilizing a baneblade. He was dressed in flowing rags but carried the drawn likeness of the Ultramarine insignia proudly on his broad chest.

"Are you alright?" Afennor asked the bewildered squad of guardsmen in the room.

"Are you a space marine?" asked one of the guardsmen.

"A scout. I'm making my way to the monastery. Are there Ultramarines here?"

"No." Afennor nodded quickly.

"I need a transport. I need to get to the monastery and rejoin my chapter. I have much to say," Afennor replied. "Can you vox one in?" Two of the weary soldiers chuckled.

"Sir, the streets are full of mutants. A transport will get a rocket in the wheels," one stated with certainty. Afennor nodded.

"The rest of this floor is clear by the way," he said.

…

The hive had fallen. Flames coming from it blackened the sky. Columns and columns of enslaved civilians were being rounded up by the Death Guard and prepared for processing. Watching them was Paskatera, who had been selected by Vashuss personally for this attack. He was biting his lip and shivering in excitement at the slaughter to come. His daemon weapon bid him kill. Very soon, the assault on the Lamenter's fortress would be underway. Staring across the flatness of the leveled city that shuddered in fear at the burning hive before it, the fortress' walls bristled with defenders. The Lamenters would not die quickly.

Unfortunately, the attack could not begin until it had been sufficiently bombarded and their huge daemonic cannons were empty: depleted after leveling this part of the city. This would soon be changed. Paskatera wanted to see the whole thing.

A shift in time and space occurred and a brief hole in the warp coughed Mortarion forward before it was closed by the Emperor's distant presence. Paskatera smiled at the terrified whimpering of the Imperial citizens at the sight of the monster.

Soon they would have ammunition.

…

Afennor ducked behind the burning chimera, narrowly avoiding the stub fire from the nearby gun nest in the tower. He was nearly there. Afennor poked his rifle out from behind the machine and sighted the mutant's head from behind the pile of rubble he hid behind. Squeezing the trigger once, Afennor saw the mutant's head come apart. He dashed across the street and into another building. His knife was out in a flash.

"Ah! A space marine!" a horned man shouted when Afennor stormed the building to find eight heretics stuffing it. Afennor slashed down three of them before any had a chance to leave their firing positions at the shattered window. His knife moved up to block, stabbed, then ducked aside to slash a throat. A crazed heretic did manage to stab his back with a bayonette but Afennor carried an Ultramarine's form. He shrugged off the attack and kicked the hetetic's knees out from beneath him. Afennor jumped back to the door, allowing the survivors to chase him with their knives and bayonettes. Forcing them into the door one at a time, the young scout sent each heretic to the floor, bleeding and dying. The final heretic fled the scout, reloading his lasgun to try and give him a ranged death. Afennor shot this last man in the skull.

Afennor slunk over the the window and stopped in disgust. In the street, as clear as day, stood the giant skinless form of a great horned beast. Across it was carved the symbol of Khorne and from its head came black ivory horns. It was stomping towards the far buildings, away from Afennor. He could not behold its fierce face as was glad he could not.

'A daemon? On Terra?' Afennor thought. With little difficulty, lined up its head with his scope. He held his breath and fired. The daemon's head snapped forward while one of its horns broke from its scalp. The beast collapsed into a puddle of blood as it died, splashing loosely on the tortured street. The puddle remained for a moment before catching fire and burning away to oblivion.

'No,' Afennor thought in some fear. He felt little comfort when he spotted a squad of loyalist guardsmen coming across the street. He felt little comfort when they told him he had made it to the Imperial-controlled section of the city. Even as he ascended the stairs to his chapter's monastery amid cheers from exhausted Imperial Guard, Afennor couldn't forget the daemon.

He took his first step into the monastery.

…

"Master," the young serf said from the window, "a man…he looks like an Astartes." The older serf rushed to the window and looked down at the plateau below. Indeed there was a man with a tall frame and carrying an Ultramarine's sniper rifle walking into the monastery. They exchanged confused looks.

The sound of a creaking metal behind them caught their attention. They turned to the source: the Black Tomb, the dreadnought. Its two huge arms shifted and it stepped forward. With a swing of its mighty form, the Black Tomb took a step, then another, then another. The dreadnought's mighty frame stomped around Calgar's sarcophagus. With a swing of its bulk, the dreadnought briefly inspected the effigy, then the two serfs, before the metal giant carried its thunderous bulk from the chamber. Both serfs were left gaping at the doorway.

"Can it…do that?" asked the younger serf to the older. He didn't need to be reminded that the dreadnought was empty.

"It…it…" the older serf was an ancient man many centuries of experience. But this had even him silenced.

"The machine spirit must have sensed the Ultramarine," the younger serf suggested, fumbling for answers as three serfs rushed into the tomb so they could see for themselves the empty space where the Black Tomb had stood.

"No," the older serf said as he fell to his knees. Tears dribbled from his gray eyes. "That dreadnought was built with parts scavenged from Robute Guilliman's stasis chamber. It's him, it must be him, from beyond." One by one, the other serfs fell to their knees. Each one was crying.