Chapter 6(orphan)

The bus continued hurtling through the dark pelting rain, as lightning crashed in the sky above with deafening booms. Apart from the unpredictable periodic brief flashes of the lightning, the only light they could see outside was the high beams of the bus headlights, struggling to penetrate into the driving rain.

The tall trees towered above them on each side of the twisting road, dark and immense, making the bus more difficult to see, somewhat hidden even from the view of the air. The flying armoured monsters would not be far behind, but even they would struggle to see far in such extremely heavy rain.

Onboard the bus Franklin Sevenson sat, still on the lap of Sister Mary, her arms wrapped tightly around him, clutching tightly as though she feared him to be ripped away from her forever if she relaxed her grip. She had been sobbing on and off, and was currently rocking Franklin back and forth in her lap like an infant.

It had been almost an hour since the first checkpoint, and the monsters still hadn't caught up with them since, but there was no doubt that they were still out there, somewhere in the terrible dark.

Franklin was still afraid, still on edge, but his adrenaline could not maintain it's peak for so long without gradually dropping, the former sharp kick of fear replaced with a softer feeling of general dread and unease. The fear was ever present, but he was no longer right on edge.

Sister Mary continued to rock his body in her tight embrace, the intense warmth of her chest and lap seeping into his back and bottom, and Franklin felt some of the terrible tension flow out of him. The comfort he was currently experiencing was unique, in his normal life of constant discipline and punishment, this sort of comfort was never experienced.

Stressed and afraid as he was, he just couldn't help it as the tension just slowly leaked out of him in this remarkably pleasant sensation. His muscles steadily relaxed, his turbulent mind soothed, and he felt intensely warm and comfortable in her tight embrace.

Franklin relaxed so much that he even got another one of his chronic erections. The fear and stress of tonight had temporarily cured him of his unwanted swellings, but this cuddle was so deeply soothing that even the hated erections had returned now.

Sister Mary shifted her grip slightly, and inadvertently had her palm over the hard outline in his pants. She noticed it instantly and her hand retreated to hold him further up his midsection, but to his surprise she actually gave a little laugh.

"Oh Franklin, you are true to form if nothing else. Just this once I think that I am almost comforted by it, even in the darkest hours the Emperor can find the most surprising things to make us smile." Sister Mary said with a little laugh and a sigh.

Sister Mary kept her hands well clear of the swelling, but seemed to have found some new feeling of hope now. The grace of the Emperor was forever surprising in the forms it could take.

Franklin felt ashamed, but also felt some strange sort of hope from the lifting of Sister Mary's spirits. The grace of the Emperor is given in small mercies, he always gives that little bit of extra strength needed to face any hardship.

Franklin's thoughts were distracted by the attempts of the Battle Sister to once more try to vox the other Sisters of Battle in the area. She was once again met with blaring static from the vox built into her sacred power armour.

"The Night Lords are still jamming the Order's frequencies, they must still be close, we must be vigilant," the Battle Sister pronounced grimly.

The nuns all nodded darkly in grim understanding.

Franklin looked at the holy Sister of Battle, inspired by her intimidating presence. She was Sister Superior Clementine of the Order of the Painful Path, ranking leader in charge of the Sisters of Battle who had manned the first checkpoint.

Sister Superior Clementine had her hair dyed a dark bluish purple, the colour of an angry bruise, the mandatory dyed hair colour of all Battle Sisters of the Order of the Painful Path. Her sacred power armour was the colour of fresh blood, with secondary decorative armour features the same bruise colour as her hair.

Her armour heraldry depicted a crossed whip and cane, floating above a twisting pathway, and the whites of her eyeballs were excessively tattooed with the word "pain" repeated over and over again in intricate ink script, the mark of an ordained member of the Order of the Painful Path.

Franklin's own orphanage, the Orphanage of Strict Chastisement, was owned and guarded by the Sisters of Battle of the Order of the Painful Path, a minor Order Militant dedicated to purity through pain. The nuns who raised the children were from other Orders, not members of the Chamber Militant at all, and seconded to the Orphanage from their original Orders in non-militant Chambers of the Adepta Sororitas.

Only progena women with the most extreme discipline in the face of pain could join the Chamber Militant Order of the Painful Path, almost always recruited from the children of heretics, like Franklin himself was, that were raised in orphanages like Franklin's own. Those who would join had to keep their eyes open and hold their eyeballs still with perfect discipline, as the word "pain" was agonisingly tattooed on their eyes with a tattoo method designed to maximally amplify pain.

The Orphanage of Strict Chastisement had an identical ritual, that all orphans must perfectly endure before they could graduate to life beyond the orphanage. To be so disciplined that your very eyeballs could be tattooed without flinching was the test that all had to one day pass.

Franklin's life of constant pain and discipline was shaping him to reach this level of perfection, to reach the end of the Painful Path and be declared forgiven for the sins of his parents. When Franklin attained this point of perfection he would be cleansed forever from the guilt of his birth, and be declared a Progena, with the same opportunities available to him as any other!

If he could just attain this perfect cleansing then he would be FREE! Free from all the guilt of being born a Sevenson, free from all the shame, free to become a servant of the Inquisition and maybe even become an Inquisitor himself one day! He would be able to hunt down the vile Night Lords, and hang every single one of them by their own guts! He would purge the Emperor's galaxy of all heretics and filth!

The Sisters of Battle of the Order of the Painful Path were his greatest inspiration. Once upon a time every single one of them had been born the infant female child of a heretic, and every single one of them had been cleansed and made holy by a lifetime of cleansing pain! They were REDEEMED!

The mere presence of Sister Superior Clementine was inspirational, a shining beacon of hope that complete redemption was possible. She had once been just as these boys were, and she had completed the Painful Path to final, GLORIOUS redemption!

A demonic roar off in the distance sounded, roaring the word "FRANKLIN", and Sister Mary whimpered and clutched him tighter. Franklin tensed from his previous relaxed state.

If the Night Lords got him then there would be no redemption, no revenge, no cleansing. They would carry him back with them to hell and he would be forever damned.

Franklin didn't believe for a moment that they would spare his precious nuns if he gave himself up to them. Night Lords didn't show mercy, they could not be bargained with or bought. They were treacherous liars, their promises were empty.

Even if Franklin turned himself over to them, he had no doubt at all that these villains would rape and gut all the nuns anyway. The forces of chaos could never be trusted, only fought at every stage.

Franklin walked the Painful Path towards redemption, and there were no easy shortcuts on the path of pain. No matter how much it hurt, no matter how great the burden, you simply had to keep walking forward along the narrow path. This was another test from the Emperor, one that he must pass the hard way.

At the moment the enemies of the Emperor desired to possess Franklin for whatever reason they had, so depriving them of their goal was a worthy goal in and of itself. Everyone who had died so far had died doing their duty, and no faithful servant of the Emperor ever dies in vain.

Franklin's duty was to evade the heretics, to lead them into the guns of one checkpoint after another until the heretics all lay dead. His duty was to escape them if possible, and one day join the Inquisition to destroy them all for good.

No matter how hard and painful it became, he had to do his duty. He had to walk his Painful Path.

***...

The bus sped past the listening gargoyle to the second checkpoint, setting off its deafening pipe organ alert hymn, and the passengers all became tense. They would likely be attacked by the monsters the moment they slowed down for the checkpoint!

The harsh floodlights of the checkpoint were already visible in the distance ahead, and with the communication frequencies jammed the checkpoint Sisters would not know to have the gate opened ready for them.

The road towards this checkpoint was very straight and clear, and the vegetation on both sides had been well cleared to provide better visibility for the checkpoint to see approaching enemies. This was horribly exposed.

As if to confirm this, demonic roars of triumph erupted from the sky above! With the obscuring tall trees no longer hiding them from view, the monsters could now SEE them!

There was a terrible demonic snarling, approaching with terrible speed from above!

The armoured roof of the bus suddenly dented inwards terribly as a colossal impact slammed onto the bus from above!

Horribly familiar lightning covered blade fingers poked through the armoured metal ceiling like it was made of wet cardboard!

The nuns screamed in terror.

The lightning hand tore open a huge hole in the roof, and pelting rain flew into the bus, drenching them!

Sister Superior Clementine fired up into the hole.

More huge impacts slammed down onto the bus from above, and huge blades and chainsaw swords stabbed through the ceiling, joining the first attack!

Huge baroque power armoured hands poked into the new cuts, and peeled away the metal with horrifying strength!

8 huge baroque monsters looked in at them through the huge holes!

Arms reached inside, hands reaching towards Franklin!

Sister Mary screamed and hurled him under her seat! She crawled under the seat with him.

The monsters roared with rage and ripped the entire seat up from the floor, snapping the floor bolts like twigs!

Sister Mary urged him on, to hide under the next chair with her. Franklin obeyed.

The hands reached for him again!

The new seat was ripped from the floor, as nuns scrambled for cover!

Franklin and Sister Mary kept crawling.

Hands reached down and grabbed random boys, thinking them to be Franklin.

The ripped up dead bodies of these boys dropped back down inside the bus when the monsters realised their mistake!

More chairs were ripped up from the floor of the bus!

Some of the boys tried to attack the arms.

Their heads were grabbed and crushed to paste in strong grips!

The ceiling was almost entirely peeled away now!

This was the end!

Bolter fire suddenly erupted off the monsters on the roof! The checkpoint Sisters had seen them and were shooting them!

One of the monsters was hit in the neck in the gap below his helmet! His head blew clean off in a fountain of gore as the bolt exploded inside his neck!

The headless monster fell down into the bus dead, crushing 3 boys to death under him!

More fire exploded off the monsters on the roof.

The monsters snarled and took off to the air on their fire wings.

The monsters tore down among the Sisters of Battle on the checkpoint, ripping them apart!

The gate was already lowered, the checkpoint had seen the Night Lords attacking the bus and instantly started to open the gate. The bus sped through the open gate and continued as the monsters were distracted!

The horribly damaged bus went around a corner, leaving the checkpoint behind.

The trees around the road became heavier, they were harder to see once again.

The sounds of battle continued for a while behind them, they were putting distance between them now.

The horrifically mutilated bus sped off into the night. The next checkpoint they might not have a bus left to flee in!

They drove, they could only drive.

If they stopped they died.

***...