Abaddon marched through the wreckage of The Eternity Gate, treading upon the corpses of mortal, Astartes, and Custodes alike. Behind him were all the armies of Chaos, gathered together under one banner – His banner – to lay waste to the Throneworld itself. Abaddon allowed himself a moment of pride for accomplishing something that weakling fool Horus could not, entering into the Imperial Palace itself.
As the Warmaster of Chaos strode forward he glanced around at the carnage surrounding him. The Imperials had made a pitiful last stand here, as though they could hold back a tide that the Gate could not. Abaddon had long since grown used to the hubris of the modern Imperium, but even now it brought a sneer to his face to see what had become of the once-proud civilization. The bodies of the Imperial Guard in particular drew his ire, for mere mortals such as them should have no place in a battle of gods and daemons.
Suddenly, Abaddon heard a slight scrape emanating from off to his left. Coming to a halt, Abaddon signaled for the forces around him to hold. He wished to deal with this final defender himself. "Show yourself." he demanded, slowly advancing on the rubble from which the sound had originated. With a short warcry, a young woman, a child really, wearing flak armor charged at Abaddon from behind the shattered masonry. Abaddon could easily have slain her from afar with a single shot from the Talon of Horus, but he decided to let the fool approach him.
With a single lunge, the Despoiler impaled the child upon the Talon of Horus, her lasgun falling from her grasp as Abaddon raised her upwards. He clenched his hand slightly, relishing the shout of pain it brought from her. The Warmaster then drew his arm inwards, to allow him the pleasure of looking into the child's eyes as he tore the life from her. "Any last words, wretch?"
The child raised her head to stare Abaddon in the eye, and as the Despoiler looked at her he did not see the hopelessness that he had expected, the fear and dread that he had inspired in so many billions prior. Instead, he saw defiance in the soldier's eye, a supernova of righteous fury shining through a window of amethyst. The soldier before him choked out her final words, two words that incited a rage in Abaddon the likes of which he had not felt since the day that Sigismund had spoken his own dying words, ten millennia ago.
"Cadia Stands."