A Pack of Wolves
Mortuus Anima, the dead soul. It was he who killed the warlord Tarsuus, who burned The Serpent to ash, who conquered the Devines, who grinned as Pueblo burned. Those under him were called the dead souls and Caesar himself praised their viciousness. Dead Soul's men contained the Legion's only ghoul legionaries, savage creatures and semi-feral as was befitting the dead souls' contubernia.
Mortuus was decanus only in a nominal sense. In the hierarchy he held the rank of decanus, and commanded his contubernia under a centurion. His men certainly gave him great respect, and followed him wherever he lead them. He was bestowed authority over them by the authority over himself. But to say he was a leader, a commander was absurd. He could lead or command no more than an animal, a particularly savage animal. The legion pointed him in the direction of things to be killed, even let him hand pick his own coterie of other savage animals, but he was little more than a creature bred and bought for the purposes of killing, and it reflected in his every manner.
When the dead souls took on the warlord Tarsuus, it was a frontal assault, straightforward and uncomplicated. They lost men but at a ratio of nearly five to one, their attacks so brutal and swift. Mortuus himself wielded only a piece of lead pipe and crushed a dozen skulls. The sounds of the legionaries' battle calls, the hellish howls of the ghoul legionaries broke the spirit of the defenders, and they surrendered before the dead souls' bloodlust was satisfied.
Perhaps if Tarsuus had been a more inspiring leader, maybe if he had encouraged more loyalty from his personal militia more of them would have been willing to fall for him. Perhaps if the dead souls' had more opportunity to sate their base desires to destroy and kill and maim, if during the battle they had been given more opportunity to sate their lust for carnage, more shattered skulls for their own satisfaction, then maybe the warlord Tarsuus would have been spared. Perhaps if he hadn't spent the entire battle sitting on his ass on a throne built of garbage, assured that this fight was a little skirmish no different from the other raider skirmishes his compound often faced, despite the fact that he was warned well in advance that the legion wasn't just another raiding party by the small townships he used to extort money from, perhaps if he had been at the balustrade commanding his warriors with bravery and courage, well he certainly wouldn't have won but then perhaps the dead souls' wouldn't have seen fit to make an example of him. Perhaps if he hadn't pissed off his most skilled warrior, a former Brotherhood of Steel soldier whose deadly aim with a magnum afforded Tarsuus the luxury to grow complacent, by making an aggressive, entitled pass at her less than a week before so that after killing two dead souls with her entire chamber and realizing that this was the most powerful enemy the warlord had ever faced she made a sensible escape rather than staying and defending and with her skill alone possibly turning the tide of the battle... perhaps Tarsuus would have lived.
As it stood when his defenders surrendered, the dead souls marched into his hall, ignored his protests, grabbed him and dragged him outside to his own courtyard and threw him down into the dirt. Then they wordlessly removed to the edges of the courtyard, forming a circle. Tarsuus saw his men and women at the mercy of the legion, saw the destruction to his fortifications, one tower still engulfed in flames smelling rich of burning rubber and trash. He rose from the dirt and saw him. Mortuus Anima. He wore unique armor, all black leather topped with the legionary shoulder-pads, and a white cowboy hat that cast his face in shadow. Tarsuus wasn't a small man, certainly, but the figure plodding assuredly through the ruined archways of the compound's former gate was massive, a brutish walking tank. He was wrapping his fists in tape and cracking his knuckles hungrily. There was nowhere for Tarsuus to run from this giant black mass of muscle and hatred, but to the warlord's credit he had no intention of running. It was a poor choice, to stand and fight, but the warlord didn't think of anything else.
Mortuus let the warlord have the first hit. Tarsuus charged him with a blow to the face, which the decanus did not react to. Instead, he grabbed Tarsuus by the shoulders and kneed him in the stomach, twice. While the warlord was doubled over Mortuus punched him in the face. The smack of fist against cheek echoed. The decanus kneed the warlord again, this time lifting him off the ground. The warlord fell, and the decanus kicked him viciously. The decanus felt the warlord's ribs splinter through his leather boot. The decanus picked the warlord up by the shoulders and led him to the wall, which he threw the warlord into repeatedly. The warlord stumbled backwards, vision blurred and blood trickling down his weathered face. The decanus broke his nose with a left-handed punch. He fell to the ground and Mortuus pounced. When he looked up, he could see the decanus smiling. His big brown eyes were wide with an unrestrained glee. He gripped the warlord's face in his hands, oblivious to the warlord's desperate attempts to push him off. He slowly drove his thumb into the warlord's eye, deeper and deeper as he screamed. He dug around in the socket, then did the same to the other eye. He felt the fight drain from his opponent's body. He got up and began to walk away, seemingly leaving in disgust, only to turn around and finish the warlord off by stomping on his face until all that remained was dirt muddied by blood. The Dead Soul never fought without killing.
He very rarely gave orders. After killing Tarsuus, the Dead Soul merely walked away, leaving his unofficial second-in-command, Reave, to order the dead souls to round up prisoners and return to camp. The slaves would gather supplies. Reave always spoke for Mortuus, as though they had some special connection, an invisible bond which allowed Reave to give Mortuus' orders, even though Mortuus never spoke to him or anyone. Although it wasn't ever difficult to guess what Mortuus wanted done. March, kill, or guard, they anticipated his every theoretical command and followed them to the letter. A pack of wolves, not men. Animals for the legion.