CAST:
Mortarion, Primarch of the XIV Legion
Durak Rask, Marshal of Ordinance, Siegemaster
Ignatius Grulgor, Commander (Captain) of the Second Company
Ullis Temeter, Captain of the Fourth Company
Kajor. A name that had seared itself into the grey matter of Mortarion's brain in the weeks that the Death Guard had fought, bled, and died on this world. A world that had barely mastered the technology necessary for flintlock rifles, a world that the fleet scouts and assured the Reaper of Men would be crushed underneath their heel within days.
And yet here Mortarion found himself, consulting with his Captains after yet another hard fought stalemate. Another time the defensive lines of his Legion were broken. Something that even many of his brothers were incapable of, and yet...
"Since the last attack the defensive lines have held against the creature's attacks, but my…"
The voice of Ulls Temeter, Captain of the Fourth Company, continued on but fell on deaf ears for his Primarch. Stalemate. Mortarion hadn't experienced this since Barbarus...since he had reforged his Legion into-
"...my company has borne the brunt of the assaults on the left flank, I will order them to begin rotating off the front-"
"No." Mortarion's gravelly voice barked, silencing Ullis. "They will remain where I have ordered them until the enemy is ground beneath their feet, or they die."
"My lord, we have lost nearly three thousand astartes in the past week alone," any other words the captain may have wished to speak were silenced as the Reaper of Men closed his fist, dropping it against the table. Not a true blow, for it created barely a whisper of sound that even the transhumans in the tent would only just make out, but it had all the authority of a battle cannon.
"What did I declare when this Legion came to Barbarus?" Mortarion asked simply, sickly yellow eyes moving between the assembled figures. Durak Rask, the Master of Ordinance, spoke in response, voice rasping through his mask that served as a crude representation of the Primarch's own rebreather.
"Your unbroken blades." He rasped, casting a glare towards Ullis. The Barbaran had never been one to hide his disdain for the Terran members of the Legion, and Kajor had done nothing but amplify the divisions present within the Legion.
"And they will remain so, until the enemy is ground into dust, or every one of them has fallen." Mortarion stood taller and inhaled deeply from his rebreather, the toxic fumes filling his lungs as he closed his yellow eyes. Allowing them to fill his lungs, pangs of familiar pain radiating through the flesh despite his heightened physiology. Some escaped from the pipes of his Barbaran Plate, the noxious odor filling the room. For a moment, he was on Barbarus again, fighting alongside his people against the Overlords and their abominations. The death screams of sorcerous monstrosities, battle cries of his followers, the sound of Silence arcing through the air while it reaped a bloody toll.
And as quickly as it had come, the moment was gone. Eyes opened, and the Reaper of Men focused his eyes upon his officers. "Siegemaster, begin the bombardment at dawn. Everything but the Phospex shall be unleashed upon the walls of the citadel, and the fields before it to prepare for our advance." Rask nodded and hammered his fist on his breastplate, his great thunder hammer still in his grasp. "Grulgor, the Second Company will lead from the front alongside the Fourth. Do not fail me."
"It shall be done, my lord." The Barbaran bowed his head simply, his expression nearly as hard and unflinching as his gene father. The three astartes moved to exit the structure, before Mortarion rapped the haft of Silence on the ground. The simple gesture was enough to freeze the transhumans in place in a handful of milliseconds.
"Grulgor, you shall also relieve the Seventh of their line duty before the assault. Temetor will command them as our rear guard, lest they become...overwhelmed, by the enemy." Grulgor nodded, both him and Rask taking a moment to relish in the humiliation of the Terran Captain besides them. Temetor's jaw tightened, he knew better than to speak, but it did not stop his Primarch's remark from striking deep. With a nod of acknowledgement he stormed out into the Death Guard camp, the two Barbarans following behind.
Mortarion was alone again, and for the first time in many days, allowed himself a moment of respite. A moment to steel himself for what was to come the next day.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
What had once been the greatest citadel upon Kajor stood before the Death Guard, its high and imposing walls little more than rubble and ruin. The Master of Ordinance had done what Mortarion had asked, unleashing the grandest and most feared siege weapons of the Legiones Astartes upon this place, this place that stood as a grand insult to his Primarch.
And yet, Mortarion found his cold fury grow with each passing second. The citadel city was not pounded to dust, still standing despite facing bombardment that had wiped the technological marvels of Ultrak V and Yzak Prime to mere whispers upon blasted earth. Meanwhile, a city that had barely developed primitive firearms stood before him, damaged and ruined but still standing. And so the Lord of Death would ensure its defenders paid dearly for such an insult.
He raised Silence, the massive scythe's point directed at the citadel. Then, the weapon fell, and the slow march of the Death Guard began.
The sound of primitive firearms sounded from the walls, bullets bouncing off the ceramite armor of his gene-sons like pebbles thrown against a tank. Their pace was not hurried, nothing like the ragged charges of their cousins in the VIth Legion. They simply advanced, silent as the grave and as inexorable as the rising tide. Bolter and autocannon fire rake the walls in response, tearing holes in the stone and flesh alike. Bodies shredded by bullets, or simply burst from the force of the explosive bolter shells, formed something of a welcome mat for the XIVth.
Then came the citadel's true counterattack.
Hooded figures emerged from the gaps in the walls and atop what few palisades were not completely decimated, who chanted in a barbaric, sickly language. Bolts of energy, lighting, and things not entirely perceivable raced out towards the tide of astartes. Each time one connected, ceramite cracked and bodies tore in two. Lines of huddled, trembling figures were linked by barbaric chains to the warlocks, with one expiring as their life energy was consumed in each bolt.
Mortarion's hatred grew as he finally saw them, ordering the Death Guard to advance and focus their fire on the warlocks. Bolter fire flew towards them in a veritable storm of explosive ordnance, but much of it was stopped just short of their targets by shimmering fields of energy. His hatred spiked again, as he sped the pace of his march, the Deathshroud around him doing the same to ensure they remained no more than 49 nine paces from him. Lantern was in his hand in an instant, the ancient weapon pointing towards the warlock that commanded these wretched psykers, if the grizzly ornamentation upon his wine red robes was any indication. A pulse of searing white light erased them from existence a moment later, their bodies becoming a faint trace of vapour in the moment of discharge. Lantern's ancient power atomised the warlocks, and Mortarion watched in grim satisfaction as the other warlocks began to grow weaker after the loss of their leader.
Lantern continued to alight as the primarch advanced, each shot reducing a warlock and its human batteries into nothing more than glassed earth. The Death Guard were advancing, they were climbing through the crumbling remains of fortifications and making headway against the warlocks that remained.
Then came the howls that sent a shiver down even the Reaper's spine. A howl that dredged up the emotions humans were barely equipped to understand, a howl of something that violated all the laws of existence and reality.
And soon they were upon the astartes. Their forms not quite solid, shifting between nightmarish amalgamations of animals and humans, then things utterly incomprehensible to mortal minds. Claws rent through ceramite as if it were paper, snapping jaws distended to swallow marines whole. Dark energies lanced out to cook astartes in their own plate, reducing his gene-sons to pools of running flesh and bone. Soon they were even upon the Primarch and his retinue, slabbering jaws and appendages hungering to tear the Deathshroud into ribbons. It sickened him, drew from him a fury that driven him ever since those first days on Barbarus. He moved to intercept the abominations, his Deathshroud parting before him even as they hacked and slashed at their own enemies.
The flat of Silence's blade swung out almost offhandedly towards the first creature. It was sent flying into the remains of the wall behind Mortarion, the force of the impact shattering much of the stone and causing it to bury the creature beneath a mountain of rubble. Mortarion's next blows landed with nearly machine-like precision and smoothness, monstrosities and human soldiers cut down by each sweep of the scythe. His Deathshroud using their own manreapers to mop up any of the monstrosities that escaped the kiss of Silence's edge.
One of the creatures launched itself at Mortarion, larger than the others and body rippling with forbidden energies that tore at the edges of reality itself. It knocked away the two lead Deathshroud like broken dolls, intent only on reaching the Lord of Death. A blade of twisted bone thrusting at Mortartion's mask.
The blade stopped mere inches from its target, Mortarion's gauntlet gripping it with strength that would have shattered a normal blade. The creature roared and tried to wrench the blade away, but Mortarion's strength was as unwavering as his resolve. It was he who ripped the blade from its owner's hand, tossing it aside as if it were no heavier than a stick. The creature bellowed and slammed itself into the Primarch, driving its whole body into his own and slashing with its claws at his breastplate. Mortartion skidded back several steps, his armor sparking as grooves were traced in the pale surface.
Mortarion was utterly disgusted, and reared his free fist back. It thundered against the creature's head with the force of a thunder hammer, snapping its head back as bone cracked and unnatural flesh tore away. Disgusting black ichor spewing out as the creature stumbled. Mortarion did not give it time to recuperate, as Silence swung out. Lopping off an arm here, then part of the chest cavity, then another arm, and another and another. Mortarion moving like the personification of death itself, unflinching and unyielding. Yellow eyes filled with a disgust deeper than the gulf between the stars, as he battled this creature that stood as the epitome of everything Mortarion despised. No, battle was the wrong word. This was simply destruction, complete and without hesitation or remorse.
Even with all this, the creature continued to use its abominable biology to regenerate and continue to struggle against the Reaper of Men. Finally, Mortation lashed out with a kick, knocking the creature on its back and cracking its chest cavity open. The armor clad boot stomped down again, pinning the creature by its neck as Mortarion removed one of the orbs around his neck. He rolled the metal ball around in his hand, stimulating the chemicals within as the poured through a thousand holes into the center and began reacting.
"You think you can deny us?" The creature spat, its obscene mouths grinning as even as its end drew near. Mortarion paid it no heed, as wisps of white smoke issued forth from the orb. Then, with a flick of his wrist, the orb slammed down into the creature's chest. The hyperacidic compounds quickly began to pour into its unnatural body, burning away bone, flesh, and the very ground beneath it. It screamed in agony, even its otherworldly physiology failing as it began to dissipate into sludge.
Mortarion removed his boot from it, and began to march away. His work with the creature was done.
"Soon you will see, Lord of Death. Soon you will embrace the very thing you deny." The creature spat with its last moments in this world, before it became little more than rapidly diminishing sludge. A scream resonating across the battlefield, echoing deep within the minds of all and, even for a moment, freezing them in place.
All except the Reaper.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
And so it continued for nearly an hour, as his Legion cut through desperate defense after desperate defense. Their gene-father at their head, culling thousands before his blade and pistol. Finally, he knew he was at the stronghold. Nothing was left standing of the enemy who had sold themselves dearly to defend this place. Who had bled his Legion more than countless worlds they had assaulted.
What rose before Mortarion was not the headquarters of a commander, nor the final bunker of a doomed city. It was not even a church built to some pitiful deity. No, it was something more horrific. Something that sickened Mortarion just as much as his adoptive father had.
The structure rose for many meters above the assembled Death Guard, twisted and crude in a way only pure savagery could envision. It stretched out as far as his eye could see, having been somehow hidden from the view of any instrument or other being before now. All of it jagged blades, twisted altars, great channels and pooling pits. And every inch of it was festooned with blood, viscera, and corpses. A place of slaughter, a place of worship...of the greatest abomination.
Mortarion understood then how the warlocks of Kajor had proven so troublesome. How they had summoned beasts capable of driving back his Legion. Sacrifice.
"Burn it." Mortarion's voice rasped as he turned away suddenly, his Deathshroud immediately falling into formation around him even as the Grave Wardens still stood. The weapons of the Terminators aiming towards the structure. The Blood Vane.
"Let nothing remain." Mortarion's pace quickened, as anger burned hotter through him. Anger that may have been quenched in the respite of victory, but now was all the more fueled by his revelation.
"This world will be wiped clean." It was not an order, not a statement, it was something more powerful. An expression of Mortarion's iron will. He would not allow a single stone to remain standing upon this world, even as the warlocks sacrificed more of their own people to this twisted power. Not one of them would survive. The world would be scoured of its cancer.
Mortarion would accept nothing less.