Chapter 32: Reunion
A pair of elegant grey shapes swoop through the starry depths between the gathering of astral predators. Slowly and surely they turn, sunlight from Davin's local star winking off long swept back wings as they glide through the void. They slowly circle to watch the hustle and bustle of activity below.
Days prior had seen a flurry of activity, from ugly barely void capable ships to unsightly landing dories raced down to the surface of the unremarkable rock. But now, craft every bit the equal of their own stream from the monolithic hold of the unmatched destroyer. Once again, the immense voidship, the Vengeful Spirit, is alight in activity.
Groups of sea green Stormbirds shoot from mag-rails and streak towards the surface while smaller flights of nimble Storm Eagle gunships stream out and pitch down in showy barrel rolls as they bank hard in their descent. But both are escorted by flights of bat-winged Xiphons or gull winged Lightning Crow attack craft. Together, they decent like clusters of meteors to the unfortunate world.
"That's not their standard deployment pattern." A nervous Colchisian flight officer looks up from the rhythmic click of the servitor plugging in astral coordination data into the cogitator. He turns back, looking over his shoulder at the grey clad legion officer.
His opposite nods, staring out the slanted forward window of the Stormbird at the activity. "No, it's not, Hacari. It's a rapid deployment scramble. Emergency rescue formation, just like their second wave on Murder."
"Lieutenant Ahlkar?" flight officer Hacari Amphoshe starts and nods towards the yawning bays of the Vengeful Spirit, protected by its overhanging gantries and crenelations pocked with secondary ordnance batteries pods. The flight officer looks past the constantly swiveling automatic gun turrets. "Are you sure we're going to be able to land in there?"
"Oh ye of little faith." The lieutenant smiles patronizingly before lifting a pair of fingers to his ear socket. He listens, visibly stiffening before the smile spreads further across his bronzed face.
The astartes reaches out, flipping a communications toggle next to the pilot. A tinny and unfamiliar voice echoes over the short range vox net.
"This is ATC-sixty three, actual: acknowledge request for landing coordinates of Candor-flight. Vox-check, Candor-one."
"Copy, ATC-sixty three. Reading you two by five." The voice of Eliza Khabet rolls over the vox net, the flight officer of their sister Stormbird.
Hacari lofts a brow and looks back to the lieutenant. Their own vox systems were working fine, not 'interspersed and sporadic' at all. But Ahlkar merely places a finger to his own lips, the maddening grin never disappearing.
"ATC-sixty three Actual copies, Candor-one. Standby for instructions, over."
"Wilco, ATC-sixty three."
The wait was rather lengthy, and Amphoshe was left to look out the window as another company's worth of Stormbirds in the dull black of the sixteenth legion's vaunted first company stream from the forward launch bays and angle straight down towards the surface at unsafe speed. If the First was deploying to the field, there had to be a good reason. And not one the flight officer was privy too.
"This is ATC-sixty three." the sudden reply jolts the flight officer who stares towards the mass of protruding sensor spires the Stormbirds were gliding past. The automated guns had been tracking them like hawks for the past two minutes. "Landing cleared in docking bay four-four. Turn right to heading zero-ninery-zero, Candor flight, confirm."
Amphoshe reaches for the transmit toggle, waiting the respectable time for Flight Officer Khabet to respond. He clears his throat, "Roger, ATC-sixty three." and lets go. It was surprisingly nerve racking for some reason, though some of that may have been due to looking down the barrel of anti-lander flak batteries and knowing that their Stormbird was a sheet of elegant paper in comparison.
The mortal flight officer feels an astartes' hand on his shoulder, and Ahlkar nods reassuringly. "Everything is good, Hecari. Just guide us in and we'll keep you updated on the mission as it progresses." With that same smile never departing, he turns and reaches for the helmet mag-locked to his hip.
Amphoshe swallows and taps his pilot, who watches as the other grey gull-winged Stormbird takes a long looping turn and heads for one of the bays yawning open. "Take us in slow and ste-holy hell!" A pair of Fire Raptors scream by close enough to spatter the windshield with exhaust vapor. With his heart thundering in his chest, the flight officer cracks a grin, "Astartes jocks... alright, lets hope that's all the excitement for one day." The pilot nods, their servitor click-clacking from down beneath in the forward observation vestibule with its hypnotic rhythm.
Still, he couldn't help but feel the nervous pit in his stomach.
Sergar Targhost stands on the observation post of the embarkation deck, watching the pair of enormous Stormbirds slip into their recovery cradles as the whine of embarkation klaxons wail unceasingly through the cavernous expanse. The mag-locks snap the pair of grey landers in place as their wings furl up into their storage position among the rafters of one of the Vengeful Spirits main hangars.
Targhost grates his teeth with a base snarl, willing back the pain balms soothing his inflamed ire. His hand itched, even though the damned thing wasn't there anymore. His armor had hidden that only just, keeping his empty gauntlet clenched behind his back as he stands at attention in the fineries of the seventh assault company... which was to say, his slightly dented black plated reaver armor.
He casts a sidelong glare as the umbilical gangway extends upward from the third level gantries where he stood. The whir of its servos bother him with its idiotic stillness, propelled by a glassy eyed servitor at its end.
Down below, Sedirae's thirteenth company were deployed in serried ranks, waiting along with Goshen's twenty-fifth. The fellow assault captain prowled the blocked ranks of his company, waiting for the return of more Stormbirds to ferry them to the surface.
The umbilical locks into place with a resounding 'thump' and a few of the legionnaires below look up at the Word Bearer's transports as if wondering if they might be 'borrowed'.
Targhost strides the gantries, already tiring of waiting for the Word Bearers arrival. Turning into the umbilical, he sees the loading hatch open, and is greeted by a red crested lieutenant emerging from the green-lit hold.
"Ah, Captain Tar-"
"Who in the blazes are you?" Targhost snarls, the irritation and pangs of discomfort twisting his features into a feral glower.
The lieutenant merely nods, approaching in his leisurely stroll with more legionnaires filing out behind him. "Lieutenant Ahlkar, ninety forth company, at your service." He wasn't clipped or overly fawning like some Targhost had met. Instead, the Lieutenant's jaunty lilt and even the almost inconsequential tip of a wave was strangely disarming.
"Let me guess, some diplomatic equerry of the First Chaplains?" Targhost snuffs back some of the ease the lieutenant radiated.
"Something like that, sir." he continues his approach, the glory squad of grey-bedecked warriors following in his wake. "But we're no iterator core, I can assure you of that. But would I be mistaken in assuming that you're captain Sergar Targhost?"
"You're not wrong." The lieutenant was nearly within arms reach, and the captain merely nods his head but doesn't step aside. "What's this about?"
The Lieutenant merely nods again and bobs his head before reaching up to doff the helm. It exposes a bright and cheery bronzed skin man with just a single line of etched Colchisian tattoos vertically traced in gold ink across his cheek.
"Compliments of First Chaplain Erebus, we're here to take care of some of our combined problems. I take it you're still taking care of the 'individual'?"
"Not so loud, the vox-thiefs might pick you up." the captain whispers before sharply tilting his head, indicating the Word Bearers filing out from the landing ship were to follow him.
"I wouldn't worry about that. We'll also be sure to take care of anything that may have been too sensitive." The lieutenant says, following after the assault captain. Targhost hadn't noticed it until the lesser officer was right in front of him, but Ahlkar was short for an astartes, able to pass for a genhanced Imperial army trooper at a pinch. But the Colchisian heritage was still plain across his face.
"So you already have a plan?" Targhost snorts and the Lieutenant silently smiles and inclines his head in affirmation. "Then mind telling me what it is?"
"Certainly, captain. Bear in mind, we are somewhat short on time and a number of methods must still be observed. But I have been instructed that I may reveal our operations to you."
"You were in the recon corps, weren't you?" Targost looks back, some disdain clear on his scarred visage. The astartes was clearly more than he seemed, and already a nagging sensation was eating at him.
"Vigilator, actually." Alkhar replies as if mentioning a favorite beverage.
"Assassin saboteur..." Targhost fixes him a more serious glare. "Who?"
"No one of importance, Just that I'm here is good enough." The second umbilical stretches out from a second story gantry to connect the second Stormbird. "Would it be possible to get a billet for the rest of the company?"
"Sure." In no way did Targhost sound certain of that, "Where's your captain, I expected to see at least Belekar here."
"Captain Belekar is... engaged, at the moment."
"Submit to the will of the First Chaplain, and you may still be given a reprieve despite your transgressions upon this sacred ground." Kal Belekar nods once, "We shall be in this new Great Crusade together, brother. Led by the Warmaster reborn, with all the Powers of the galaxy at his side!"
The sudden shuddering cacophony of combi-bolter fire slices a torrent across the Word Bearer captain and his glory squad, slamming one in the chest and rolling them back while a second slumps forward as a shot detonates in their throat with a wet pop. Abaddon's combi-bolter eats through rounds and as the glory squad raises combat shields and hunkers down, bearing blades and taking the barrage from the irate First Captain. Explosive shells skirt off a glittering golden energy shield, flaring a great halo of light from around the Word Bearer captain's head.
The Iron Halo's energy shield holds a brief moment of deistic brilliance, illuminating the unhallowed chamber steps as its capacitors soak up the rippling blossoms of yellow fire that licks at its rippling edges. In less than a second, it's joined by others. The Justarian's weapons howl a shrill chorus of death as yellow tracer shots and blinding phosphorescent shells streak through the gloom. Primeval stone blasts apart and flesh is shredded to ragged ruin under the fusillade, eliciting a shift from both fur-clad cultist and grey armored warrior alike.
There is no order to advance, but the Justarian surge forward led by the steady measured pace of Falkus Kibre, the Widowmaker. He cradles his long handled power axe in both hands as the deluge of return fire erupts from the staggered pockets of defenders. The horizontal rain of shells trace nonsensical zodiacs across the Justarian, illuminating the black clad juggernauts.
Where the legion's power armor was proof against most mortal arms, and could deflect or absorb bolter impacts at a distance, the Justarian warplate completely shrugs off the meager attempts. It blunts armor piercing tips and spreads out explosive rounds across crackling energy fields at arms reach as the tidal wave of obsidian killers closes with the staggered ranks of grey legionnaires.
Kibre reaches out and points at Kal Belekar standing at the summit of the steps, "Kill those unworthy dogs, but that one is mine!" The Widowmaker's amplified voice booms over the vast grotto.
"Then you'll have to fight me for him, Kibre!" Abaddon growls in what had to pass as competition in the first company.
The cascade of combi-bolter fire rebounds from monoliths and vaulted ceilings, lighting the darkness in stark white hot flashes. What seems like wildly incoherent bursts of sprayed fire connect exactly where they need to: punching grey armored forms from plinths and shredding knots of decidedly muscled abhumans on distant steps. The blood flows in thick runnels as the ten warrior kings surge forward in an arrowhead, sheltering the tiny knot of wounded grey-green soldiers who snap fire from purloined weapons.
Another Word Bearer falls as Abaddon turns his combi-bolter on him, a single low whistling 'thump' driving the krak grenade into his chest before exploding in messy scraps of ceramite and puffs of vaporized flesh. Next to him, the multi-melta whines, pressure building inside the roiling fuel air mixing chamber, before letting out a screaming hiss of super-heated gas. The high pitched scream turns into a rolling roar as a pair of Word Bearer chosen at the top of the stairs are turned to steam. They weren't even the target.
The screaming lance of heat slices through the legionnaires and slams into the towering male minotaur shackled to the doorway. With a haunting bellow of abject pain, the creature's flesh boils away and blackens the doors behind it in a massive heat wash. With a metallic clunk the spent fuel cell drops to the ground and rolls away.
"Tarik, keep back. Your armor won't hold together for another shot!" Loken warns, ducking out from behind a Justarian and snapping off bolter shots at Davinite cultists clustered around a fire, turning them to chunks of red meat.
"Stop being such a stickler, I'm fine Garvi!" The fellow captain huffs disdainfully while turning his shoulder into the shots. Not a moment too soon, a shower of sparks flecks off his scarred pauldron. His hop-skip advance keeps the chainbladed bolter high up and across his ruined cuirass, protecting his chest from another lethal impact. The snap shots blast apart the unprotected Davinite warriors as Abaddon leads the spearhead towards the steps leading to the massive carved door. Or just as likely, the still defiant Word Bearer captain.
Marcellus brackets another Word bearer behind a pillar and ducks back in just in time for the legionnaire to peer around the corner of a nearby monolith. Bracing his bolter, the high pitched clatter of their forgeworlds Tigrus pattern weapon sends a burst of fire whining past Loken's head. Rounding on the figure, the unfamiliar judder of the bolter skips rounds off the stone and gouges enormous craters in the pristine surface.
"Lupercal's oath!" Vipus hisses as a solid slug whines off his helmet leaving a massive silver-grey groove in the comb, "Really, how many of them are there?"
The Justarian to Loken's immediate left takes a full barrage of explosive rounds that ring off the adamantium plates like rain off a metal roof.
"Enough!" Loken mutters, "He had a company with him when we took the Glory of Terra, could be hundreds."
"Well, I'd say less than that." Marr growls and pops up over Abaddon's shoulder from near the front of the formation, snapping bolt pistol shots off and sending two Davinite's tumbling down the blood soaked steps.
"How can you be sure?" Loken growls, taking the left and watching the formation bow as a horde of bestial warriors creeps cautiously around the edge of the room to flank the over-extended Justarian. Behind them are an evenly spaced line of Word Bearer legionnaires, using their charges as meat shields.
"Because we'd be dead by now." Marr snarls and shakes his head before tucking his pistol away
Torgaddon's laugh still comes out wet, but sincere, "We might be dead soon enough. We could fire every bolt and still drown in their blood. What do you wanna bet there's something worse beyond that door? Couple hundred Word Bearers worse."
"Shut up and fight!" Abaddon's snarl echoes into their vox links. The hulking First Captain half turns, shooting the other officers an angry glower before turning his bolter on the steps and stitching shots up the huddled mass of shocked cultists, shredding them to rags and pumping another grenade into their midst. The muffled thump kicks up a rain of falling bodyparts that spatter wetly across black, green, and grey armor alike.
Weapon running dry, the captain snarls and tosses it aside, clutching the enormous sword even more massive and vicious than Marr's culling blade. The pace inelegantly changes, and Loken can only curl his lip in distaste at the First Captain. But he had come, and standing in his way now was like a man standing in front of a speeding cargo tram.
The ragged arrowhead of Justarian increased their pace, the slow ominous shuffle turning into a lumbering lope that shook the very ground as tons of adamantine thundered across the hall. At their head was the irate beast of a man, hand up in front of his face as cultists gave way and crowded back along the edges of the steps, hoping to avoid his wrath.
At the orders of a white plumed sergeant, the first line of a score of Word Bearers on the stone steps drop into a practiced firing crouch. And with a single nod, they slake their bolter's thirst in tides of automatic fire, emptying an entire magazine into the Justarian terminator elite at less than fifteen meters. The roar of bolter shells is deafening, supplemented by the wild animal cries from Davinite cultists and martial roar of astartes. Energy fields crackle and dance in hazy blue sparks, the rest ricochet off armor or shreds the red leather pteruges hanging from pauldrons and waist belts.
Abaddon' closes first, and with a bellow, he throws all his anger and rage into a wild sideways swing as the Word Bearer sergeant raises his own gladius to parry the massive war blade. The vicious swipe smashes the petty short sword away and bisects the Word bearer straight across the chest, cleaving off both arms and slicing him back to the spine. The blade carries straight through the sergeant, cutting through the legionnaire on his right, and ended embedded halfway through a third crouching on the step. Abaddon's knee slams into the sergeant, tossing the corpse back into another legionnaire and toppling them to the steps. They'd soon be ground to mush under the other Justarian.
Not a pace away, Kibre swings his massive shimmering axe and sheers through three more in a violent mirror swing of Abaddon's own. The base of the stairs was a choke point, funneled to the top where two immense monoliths rise up over most of the temple's inner neos. But as the Justarian hurtle forward, the Word Bearers were trapped by a tide of fur clad cultists wielding picks and chains as they surge down the steps.
After a scrabble of armored feet, more Word Bearers emerge. Another score of them line up at the top, ready to receive the Justarian elite, clad in thickest ablative grey plate banded in bronze and affixed with dozens of flapping red seals and scraps of parchment. Each hefts a softly humming axe-rake, pilot lights on wrist mounted flamers guttering in the stale air. Each of the captains knew them by reputation, though none by name.
Ashen Circle.
"Be the instrument of the Hand of Fate." Kal Belekar rasps as he points the leader of the Ashen Circle forward.
The gold helmed leader nods once, "We obey, lord." he rasps in a mournful dirge, made all the more unpalatable by the metallic scrape of his raise gorget's vox amp. "Come, brothers, let us receive the unbelievers."
"So let it be, Iconoclast." nineteen other voices reply at the same moment the first percussive 'choom' of a red lance snaps overhead. The ruby lance slams into a Justarian's arm with a rippling tear of micro explosions and consumes its left side.
Loken calls out before the second beam slams into Marcellus's leg,"Volkite squad!" the ruby beam cuts through the armor with its distinct whine, and sears through the limb in a cascade of fire. Marcellus drops to one knee with a hiss, flames licking up from the neat hole punched into his greaves. The armor glows from the inside out in wisps of consuming flame.
A small cluster of Legionnaires had gathered atop a monolith flanking them, setting up long barreled volkite caliver rifles and snapping off a few shots at the tightly packed Sons of Horus.
"Garvi, they're gonna become a problem real soon!" Vipus shoulder-slams a Davinite from the walkway, sending them toppling over the narrow edge and to the ground eight feet below. Bracing the bolter on the low ledge, he slams his palm against the top slide and holds the trigger. The bucking clatter of the automatic shots echoes in the enclosure, flashing off the monolith giving them a sliver of cover from the murderous enfilade. Brass casings spit out in a torrent, and the splashes of colour and sparks ringing off the long-rifle squad in the distance lights that section of the darkened chamber.
By the time Vipus ran his bolter dry, Loken was already snapping shots off, and though the light show rebounding off their hardened armor was something, the half score of figures wouldn't stay down. A shot dims Loken's visor and streams past. The ruby beam catches a Justarian in the back of the leg, the small gap showing flex steel between thick slatted plates. But it was enough. With an amplified roar, the behemoth Terminator drops to one knee, lightning claw splayed on the floor.
The rest of the Justarian slice through the chaff, felling mortals in droves as they're sprayed and smeared across the Delphos's steps. Blood washes down from the stairwell, forming a grisly stepped river where once was stone stairs. In moments, the roar of fighting wasn't just from shots or clattering spears, but the ring of shattered ceramite and carved open adamantium as the Ashen Circle spring forward, crushing the last few cultists beneath their armored boots.
The Ashen Circle were lighter armored, lighter armed, but quick. One of the hulking Justarian already lay motionless against the stone, his visor torn to bloody ruin after a pick was shoved through the lens and the chainblade opened his head like a tin can. Another hooked the multi-melta warrior, the axe-rake catching the melta's perforated barrel shroud as another axe slid behind the swatting power fist and activated its keening chainblade. It tears apart the weakened joint and pulls him open wide, then thrusts a flamer nozzle through the gap and ignites with a white hot promethium scream.
But for every victory there was losses. Many from the lethal spearhead. Abaddon wades through the grey tide, using his bulk and remarkable swiftness to press the advance, even when his Justarian were falling behind. But he'd felled two with his warblade, a third is clutched by the claws of his powerfist as the pneumatics start to scissor into the warrior's neck. His blade staves off another Ashen Circle incendiary who's axe rake tried to tug at the hand guard. Abaddon lifts his sword with a gruff growl of heated breath, sending the exotic blade spinning off into the darkened corners of the room. A sharp counter-thrust plunges straight through the Word Bearer's chest, shearing through at least one heart as the blue spitting blade sinks in to the hilt.
Another of the legionnaires falls to his knees, holding his innards in both hands as the Widowmaker pulls his axe back for an executioner's strike. The two sides had devolved into a tightly clustered knot two-thirds the way up the steps, stringing the rest of the Justarian and the few warriors from Locasta at their back along the exposed stairway.
Marr's questing blade met with less success in the close quarters confines as the Ashen Circle's leader had slipped past Abaddon only to be met with the captain. Hemmed in by a Justarian to his left and the slain terminator heaped against the monolith to his right, Marr was barely able to ward away the Iconoclast's awkward backswings and hooking sweeps. His hilt had slammed into the Ashen Circle leader's helmet twice, and thrice scraped off his pauldrons, but he couldn't quite turn the razor edge on his opponent.
The iconoclast had torn off the wrist guard of his left bracer, leaving the recently marked right untouched. But Marr's helmet's other air hose was swiftly sliced through by the axe rake's near deflection, leaving that and another fresh gouge on his cuirass that landed just shy of his shoulder joint.
"Rejoice, profligate. For your screams shall be as psalms to the Powers, and blood as oblation to the Neverborn." His voice never rose beyond the measured cadence of a droning homily.
Marr bats the seeking nozzle away and barely avoids a backstroke of the axe rake trying to snag the Culling Blade's quillion. He snarls for a moment, then throws himself forward, blade pressed to his chest as he slams into the Iconoclast. The fierce shove staggers his opponent, opening up a small opportunity.
An overhand chop rings loudly off the Word Bearer's pauldron, taking with it leafs of oath papers, but the second merely deflects down between the legionnaire's feet. With a twist, the Ashen Circle's leader leans back, and a shoulder shove finally tosses him back into another of his disciples. It's not enough to turn the blade on him, but a quick upwards strike traces the inside of another incendiary's leg, meeting the flexsteel joint of his groin. With a sharp heave, the joint splits and the leg separates. The Word Bearer stumbles with a surprised cry, axe clanging down on stone as Marr wards off an errant blow from the Iconoclast.
The Widowmaker glances to the side, barely peering past his pauldron. But sensing the fallen foe, the Justarians' captain stamps his boot down on the incendiary's head and crushes it with a splattered crunch. Swinging his axe hard, he cleaves into another incendiary's chest and slams the butt of the weapon into the iconoclast's back, knocking the warrior prone. Hefting the cthonic culling blade in both hands, Marr slams it down into the gap and sends the blade plunging deep into the legionnaire's core. He twists it with a wet rasp and drags it out as the axe rake hooks his blade.
The Iconoclast struggles with a grunt of effort, twisting his weapon to pry Marr's blade away, "Our lives are meaningless," blood bubbles from wet lips behind the helmet, "Our deeds are legenda-"
With the iconoclast's arm extended, the amplified roar and keening scream of a chainfist interrupts the soliloquy and crashes down on his outstretched limb. The toothed blade all but instantly severs the limb in a fountain of crimson. With a momentary pause of bewilderment, the iconoclast looks up and stares down the dual barrels of the combi-bolter shoved in his face.
It barks briefly, blowing his helmet to wet shards and dropping their leader in an instant. "Keep up, Captain Marr." The bass voice intones, giving Marr a curt nod before pushing past and up the steps. He'd opened the gap, knowingly or not.
Abaddon grunts, tossing another Ashen Circle like a rag doll as a volkite beam skims past his armor. "Tarik, Loken, haven't you killed that gormless file scum yet!"
"Working on it, got some of these degenerates being a nuisance here, too." Sure enough, between a few errant shots and a whirring chainblade from him and Loken, they were just managing to hold back the press of frenzied Davinite cultists. Clad in furs and wielding flint tipped spears and maces, they press in at the staggered rear of the spearhead as dozens of Word Bearers fire from lengthy lines or from atop other plinths raised up elsewhere in the cavern.
Marcellus, Kamphaddon, and Setar kill with every skull shattering pistol whip, or sharp punch that caves in chests. But Torgaddon's bolter whines and roars above the din. His shattered battle plate is covered with a wet sheen of vibrant red gore, though he still keeps the weapon close to his chest and carves swathes through anything getting close. Short chopping bursts from his bolter scythe down two or three unarmored forms with every shot, the bolts passing through and bursting among the masses.
But Word Bearers were gathering in packs, waiting for the munitions to run out. a small squad of perhaps just ten were lingering behind the current pack, and already between them and the snapping shots from the ruby-red volkite support, the Sons of Horus were wedged onto the exposed stairway leading between the two stone rises.
"Got another one!" Vipus said as another magazine pours chattering fire into the volkite squad, tipping one from the top of the plinth to land in a crunching heap at its base.
A shot tears past and with a sharp cry, Vipus is flung on his back.
"Nero!" Loken turns, abandoning the rail and ducking down to clutch at his friend. The legionnaire sergeant gurgles, and Loken's adrenal surge turns it into anger.
And then confusion.
Vipus was laughing. One of his power pack's round exhausts had been blasted to twisted scrap, exposing the long cooling conduits from the perforated cowling.
"I thought it got me in the face, couldn't see a damned thing, Garvi!" Vipus cackles as Loken grabs him by the wrist and hauls him back into cover.
"Well don't let it happen again and I'll forgive you." He nods up the stairs as the Justarian grind forward. With a sharp hiss-crack, Marcellus snarls again and stumbles as a bolt clips his pauldron and rings off. Another percussive roar and his chest is engulfed in flames His grunting, seizing breaths swiftly stills as the flames lick through his helmet. The tide of primitive savages swarm over him, stabbing with spears and short swords at every conceivable gap as stray bolts from Word Bearers rake across green-clad legionnaires and fur clothed savage indiscriminately.
"Get off!" Kamphaddon pistol whips another, smashing their jaw and shoving the muzzle into the chest of another. The weapon doesn't fire, but the Davinite's wide eyes didn't comprehend it. Instead, the legionnaire roughly shoves the weapon forward with a crack of breaking ribs.
The magazine slips from the empty weapon. Stowing it in his belt, the lamed legionnaire grasps Marcellus's gorget and hauls. But another bolt shell slams into the side of his knee, collapsing him in a heap. The swarm quickly leaps at him only to be held at bay by Torgaddon emptying a magazine into the oncoming host, shredding them to gobbets.
The first rattling volley of bolter fire from the advancing Word Bearer squad rakes the stairway, blasting bestial cultist into pink mist and rattling off battle plate. But another Justarian grunts as the fusillade cuts into his back and blasts apart a mostly shielded flexteel joint in his hip. The monstrous black figure careens sideways, shattering the granite rail and slumping down onto the steps with a wafting smoke hissing from the warrior. With a verbal growl like a demon, he turns over his combi-bolter and fires into the hordes as they descend upon the rearguard.
"Get into cover, they're murdering us!" Torgaddon lets his guard drop for an instant and grasps Kamphaddon's dead limb before heaving him up the stairs with an undignified 'bump' at each step.
The volkites blaze, silhouetting the stone blocks with vaporous light as the legionnaires stumble into cover. Abaddon's Justarians advance to the landing in front of the door, sweeping left and right in an obsidian bulwark while the rest of the Ashen Circle melt back into a semi circle around their stalwart captain.
"First Captain Abaddon," Kal Belekar nods, but turns his gaze to Marr and rears his head back as if slapped.
"Surrender or I'll carve your head from your shoulders, captain." Abaddon snarls as he wades forward, Kibre a half step behind him. The First Captain waves his Justarian subordinate back, letting the murderous warrior take another step closer to the ruined ranks of the blood soaked Ashen Circle instead.
But at the bottom of the steps, Loken was craning his head. "Hear that?"
"Hear what?" Torgaddon grumbles, taking a knee and sending a few select shots back down into the foot of the stairs, though by now it was mostly a motley ruin of corps parts strewn over nearly every centimeter.
But he slowly tilts his head, something is heard in the distance. Above the sound of Kamphaddon's light growl, a rising chant bubbles up from the crowds around them. Combi-bolters chatter and the volkite's roar past to impact against nigh impregnable plate, but the sound of stamping feet and shaking totems does reach Torgaddon's ears. And Vipus' a moment later as he peers around cover and ducks back in, chased by a volkite beam.
"Damn they've got us dialed in. Didn't get more than a glimpse, they're just milling around the fires again." The sergeant turns back to
"No-no, that." Loken taps his helmet as Torgaddon takes up a kneeling stance behind them. Loken holds up a hand for silence. "More bolt fire, something else too. Vox isn't picking anything up but there's a lot more snaps and clacks. Getting louder and more steady."
"That's what I was gonna say," Torgaddon mutters, "It's not static. It feels too 'wrong' to be static. It's interference of some kind, gotta be."
"I know, you don't need to say it, I know." Loken grumbles, the memory of the Whisperhead mountain fane and its distorted com chatter was still a fresh memory. "Look, the volkites are more of a threat right now. Get at them first, then we'll find and kill whatever's at the heart of this. That'll stop-"
A thunderous crack echoes from the far side of the chamber. Thin, dingy light pours in, though much of it is lost in a indiscernible blob. In pairs and trios, figures spread out to form a single thin line that expands as more and more shapes bleed through.
Marr grunts, "Tarik, you idiot, that better not be the couple hundred Word Bearers you bet on! If it is, they'll kill us, and when they're done, I'm going to beat you senseless!"
But the cry comes hard and fast as ruby eyes shine through the gloom.
"LUPERCAL! LUPERCAL! LUPERCAL!"
Scores of voices take up the cry, and a single red banner hangs from a steel crossbar illuminating the wolf head over the eye of Terra and a stylized V. A familiar figure leads the arrowhead formation from the front, shield raised and massive greatblade slung over his shoulder.
Torgaddon stands sharply, tearing off his helmet and waving it amid the confused lull. His voice carries over the din, "Aximand! You magnificent bastard, you're late but I'll forgive you!"
The rippling roar of dozens of serried bolters rises like a musical crescendo. The breachers form up with even more legionnaires of 5th company mustering behind them. Volkite beams scintillate, switching from Locasta to the platoon of breachers. But it was already a vain hope as red rippling rays of energy harmlessly patter off thick slabs of interlocking shields.
"No time to lay down and die, get up!" Abaddon calls from the top of the stairs, a vicious smirk playing on his features as he turns his sights on the captain of the Word Bearers and gnaws on his lip like a wolf. "Time's up, captain. Drop your arms, or I'll carve them off you myself."
"I'm afraid that's simply impossible." Kal Belekar solemnly nods and inclines his head.
"I was hoping I didn't have to explain this to Erebus, but fine." Abaddon surges forward, two handed warblade upraised. The Word Bearer's captain settles into a predatory crouch, his blade the equal of Abaddon's Cthonic cold steel. The captain grasps his long blade, poising himself in a swordsmen's low guard for a moment before darting forward to meet the Horusian juggernaut.
The blades crash together like a hammer and anvil, ringing to the furthest corners of the cavern. Abaddon's spittle flecked roar matches the Word Bearers amplified grunt of effort. When aiming to slip the blade through the First Captain's guard, the Colchisian captain's blade is neatly turned aside by a simple swat of Abaddon's power claw.
A sweep from Abaddon's blade halts inches from the captain in a whir of capacitors and the sharp glow of golden light. As Abaddon's blade spits blue sparks, they crackle over a mostly unseen energy shield hovering around the captain. The Word Bearers iron halo hums to life, forming a crackling nimbus of light around Kal Belekar's head.
But Abaddon was no simple brute, the First Captain's massive strength and skill turns aside a blade seeking his vulnerable elbow joint. But another vicious overhead strike slams both Colchisian and Cthonic blade together in a shower of gold and azure sparks. Abaddon struggles upwards, gaining more height as Kal Belekar struggles against the immense power of the Cthonian. Abaddon brings his face close, glow sparking across a sheen of sweat and reflecting off polished obsidian and burnished grey plate.
"Abaddon, none of us wanted this. You were meant to join us, to usher in the start of something different. It's not too late." Kal Belekar's voice comes out as a hoarse grunt of effort.
Abaddon roars his reply, "Maybe, maybe not. But damned if I'm going to kneel and grovel before a witless Colchisian whelp!" With blades crossed and locked, the hulking form of Ezekyle Abaddon shoves the captain back and nearly sends him sprawling.
Reeling back and skidding a few paces, the warrior in glossy grey plate recovers, his white cloak billowing around him, nimbus of light cresting over his head to cast its radiant light. He readies himself again, head turning to the side, as if listening for something.
The First Captain gives him no time or chance before rushing at him again. Again and again, the wild sweeps meet neat backhand parries and lunging feints as the hulking black armored monster ceaselessly attacks the nearly angelic Colchisian warrior. A counter-thrust and neat sweep rings off Abaddon's pauldron but merely makes the First Captain sidestep, not retreat. Never retreat.
Step by step, the Colchisian is driven back as Abaddon's blade whirls in a figure eight pattern, held in a single hand. It sweeps with a resonant hum as he swings it in his grasp and brings it down with murderous force.
Kal Belekar throws himself to the side, crashing into the smooth primordial stone and rolling back onto his feet. "Abaddon!" he huffs through clenched teeth, spreading his arms wide as if in an embrace or to prove a point. "This is not the way! Your hand was forced, you are simply not seeing the big picture! The loss of legion warriors is regrettable, it should never have come to this!"
The Word Bearer has to resume his two handed grip as Abaddon hurtles towards him, driving him nearly from the edge of the platform before the wide open doors. "The big picture? It's simple. I win, you die!" he swings the Cthonic greatblade in a single decapitating strike, only to have the fellow paragon blade deflect it aside. "You admitted it: sure, the legionnaires you killed were deluded fools and miscreants but damnation, they were MY deluded fools! You here me, Word Bearer, they were MINE! I don't care if it's you, or Erebus, or Lorgar himself; no one takes from the Wolves of Horus Lupercal!"
"Abaddon, here, in front of all these witnesses, I say this is a mistake! I have been told by Erebus himself, this was not the plan. We are not meant to be at war!" The Word Bearer looks back over his shoulder again, only just in time to see Abaddon's blade sweep out. He darts back, the tip crackling against the edge of the power field and deflecting it just enough to keep the tip from tearing out his throat.
"Where is he?! The First Chaplain can save your miserable life if he'd just answer me! Where are you Erebus?!" For a moment, Abaddon pauses. He looks around, as if the trance were broken.
Around him was the small group of Justarian, the ring of wounded Sons of Horus. Aside from Loken's stoic glower, Torgaddon's wane grin, even Marr's unreadable glare, he could see Kibre's faceless mask and that of the others... alone in a sea of degenerate monsters and wild unwashed cultists.
"It will only get worse." Kal Belekar states dryly, "No matter what, everything has changed."
Quick as lightning, Abaddon spins and thrusts his Cthonic greatsword. It's neatly parried by Kal Belekar's dancing paragon blade, only for the captain's over extension to slip too far. Abaddon lunges, claw seizing the Word Bearer around the neck and hauling him off the ground. Abaddon's face forms an unmistakable snarl of anger, a throbbing vein in his forehead proof of it as he slowly squeezes.
A call, like some unearthly sigh, made the immense doors just in front of the Justarian crack and groan. Activity on the landing and stairway ceases as the carved tree splits down the center and the thought-to-be sealed door, creaks.
The lone remaining Minotaur slowly snuffles and flicks its ears, her eyes rolling into the back of her head. The immense creature slumps to its knees and prostrates itself in front of the doors. But most of the congregation merely stare as, with an echoing feral bellow, the doors to the innermost sanctum are rocked open. One sweeps back, bouncing off the stone wall, the other crashes into the prostrate Minotaur with a meaty 'thump'.
The dozen meter high stone door yields to the strength of a demigod. And from the darkened pall of the central corridor strides the arisen lord of the legion.
Horus Lupercal.
The primarch stands swathed in a blood soaked sheet hanging loosely from his immense frame, the body of some decadent priest hanging broken in one hand. But his blood soaked and shaking limbs were the least noteworthy feature; the primarch's perfect marble features were screwed into a red-faced snarl of unadulterated fury. But Horus's golden eyes shine with the light of equal parts discovery and indignation. Each step leaves a bloody footprint, leading back into the chamber behind him that is little more than a slaughterhouse. White robed bodies and deviant fur clad Davinites lay in ruined heaps around the interior of the chamber, the round burial stone rolled away to expose the inner sanctum.
"Horus." Abaddon's awed voice doesn't carry, but it doesn't need to.
"WHERE IS SHE?!" Horus looks left and right, his face set in a manic scowl to the surprise of his sons. "WHERE IS THAT LITTLE BLUE HORSE?!"
And for once, there was no way to answer him.
But his voice deepens, stilling as he shakes with the effort to contain himself, "Or, better yet, where. Is. Erebus?" The Warmaster merely flexes his fist, the corpse's neck and chest snapping like dry twigs.
Abaddon looks to the crowd, glancing back at the ring of bloodied and battered Ashen Circle as the rest of the legionnaires seem to shy away from the immense presence of an incandescent Horus Lupercal. The First Captain looks up to the struggling Word Bearer officer, then tosses the sprawling astartes at the feet of the awakened blood soaked god of war.
Kal Belekar doesn't even look up to meet the piercing golden eyes of a snarling master or his circle of wolves. In that moment, no mortal could.
