With some enemies, there is no 'Overkill'
Violet was laughing as she lit the area up. The source of her pain and frustration howled as his slave soldiers fell in droves. Then her guns turned to him again. In the distance, Karl battled the Bloothirster and it seemed an even fight especially when Will joined in and the two Tenno forced the abomination away from the square.
"You cannot hurt me with those." Horus said contemptuously.
"No?" Violet asked, sounding honestly curious. "Let's find out!" The glow from her weapons intensified, each firing in sequence. Each tiny projectile that was sped up to a decent fraction of lightspeed slammed into the Chaos Sorcerer. Far from hurt... Horus laughed.
"Oh, Violet..." The mad Tenno said with glee. "You are such a bad girl and bad girls get punished!" Then one of the railgun rounds hit his staff and it sparked. "What? No!" He snapped as she retargeted and all of her next several rounds slammed into his staff. "You are being silly, girl." Horus declared, purple energy suddenly surrounding him. "I have no quarrel with you. Only the Orokin."
"Considering that every human in this system is descended from the Orokin..." Violet snapped right back, firing again, but this time to no apparent effect. "Then yes, your quarrel is with me!" A pair of black armored forms moved to aim at her and quick as light, two blue flashes heralded their demise. "Then again, I can fight back!"
"You will serve again once I have curbed this rebelliousness." Horus said firmly. He raised his hand and Violet gave a shriek of agony as power poured from his fingers and lanced into the battlesuit she was ensconced in. "Know your place, slave!" But then... it stopped. Horus stared at his hands and then...
"I think she does." Jane said quietly as she moved to block the Sorcerer's line of sight to the smoking Tau battlesuit. "It is funny, in a sad kind of way. Same lines... Geez... The exact same lines." She holstered one pistol and her free hand came up with...something in it. Horus flinched from the icon in her hand. "Do you recognize this?" Jane asked quietly as she stepped towards the Chaos Sorcerer. It was... a small golden icon. A stylized 'I' of some kind.
"What are you doing?" Horus demanded. "You suffered at their hands as well! Why help them?"
"Because almost all of the ones responsible are dead." Jane's voice was still quiet and calm. "The last vestige of what happened... Last vestiges..." She corrected herself carefully. "Are you and me." Eldritch purple energy flew from Horus' fingers again, but this time, golden energy met it halfway to Violet and the two forces cancelled each other out. "You will kill no more humans. I will not let you."
"You cannot stop me, Jane Talona!" Horus snapped, power coruscating around his form now. "Not alone. Tzeentch! I call forth your power! Smite these slaves of the Corpse Emperor!"
Power was suddenly everywhere. Purple energy coruscating from every surface. The Tenno withdrew a bit, shielding the still form of Brother Abrahaim as the walls came alive. Figures from nightmare stepped out of the walls. Not even remotely human, many had faces that only nightmares could manufacture. Some were blue, some were red, others flew on scaly wings and still others slithered as they advanced.
"She is not alone." A voice spoke and Horus went still as a golden form appeared beside Jane. Two wore her warframe and her weapon of choice was in hand, the Paris Prime drawn and ready. The daemons shied away from Two's golden aura, moving to surround the pair. Violet fired again, her shots obliterating two of the horrors, but more appeared, climbing down from the walls and leering as the crept forward towards the two females. "You cannot win here, Horus." Two said firmly as the daemons closed in. "All you do is prolong the inevitable."
"I cannot win?" Horus chuckled maniacally. "And pray tell what will you do to stop me?"
"Me?" Two asked quietly. "Nothing. I stopped you before. I destroyed your machine. I killed Nils." She shook her head. "Well, Serene did." Horus stared at her and Two shook her head, in amusement this time. "What? You thought you were Nils?"
"That was my name." Horus snapped. "Once. I was weak. Once. No longer."
"No." Jane replied evenly. "Your name..." She paused. "You know...? I forgot it. Not that memorable." She shook her head. "What was it, Two? John? Jack? James? Started with a 'J'. I remember that." She ignored the chittering mass that surrounded her, all of her attention was on the Sorcerer.
"I think it was Julius or Juan." Two said and then she snorted. "Serene just called him 'Jerkoff'. I think I will do the same."
"Yeah." Jane said with a shrug. "He is not that important anyway. Just a vessel for powers far beyond him no matter how loud he screeches." She shook her head and golden power slammed into a daemon that had gotten too close. It vanished with a shrill scream and the others retreated a step.
"I have no quarrel with you." Horus said sternly. "Only the Orokin." He recoiled as Jane screamed at him.
"You are Orokin!" Jane shouted. "You stole that warframe and think it makes you a Tenno? It doesn't. You are nothing but a pretender! A role player who thinks that since you are a master gamer it makes you a master at anything you do. You are a fraud. You are Orokin! The last vestige of what was done!"
"You cannot lie to me, Jane Talona." Horus said firmly.
"You wouldn't know the truth if it bit you, Jerkoff." Two retorted. An arrow flew, impaling a Pink Horror and throwing it -and two more behind it- into a wall where they all shrieked in agony for a moment before falling still and vanishing in purple energy. "I am honestly curious though..." She said mildly. "How many of those can you control?"
"I am more powerful than you can imagine!" Horus snapped, anger flaring as he cast purple energy at the odd pair blocking him. Behind them, Violet fired again. The energy he threw did nothing. Violet's railgun shots slammed daemon after daemon into vapor. Horus... paused. "What are you doing?" He asked, concerned. "You have power that matches mine, so..." He shook his head. "A distraction. Find what they are decoying for!" He commanded and a phalanx of demons flew away from the group.
"You killed all of the humans in this colony." Two said quietly. "For that you will answer. But not to us. You have failed, Horus. Orokin lives. Eliza lives."
"You lie!" Horus spat at the glowing Tenno. The power around him grew in intensity with his rage.
"Do I?" Two asked quietly. They are probably going to be expanding anyway. Many people have been discussing the building of Hubs to allow for greater logistical support in various places. Better to have medical support and other supplied closer to the warzones. Difficult to do, but with Eliza's assistance... feasible." She shook her head. "Your attack on her galvanized her subjects. You made them angry. Bad idea. And even in if you had succeeded? They would have gone on." She shook her head again. "You lose."
"Do I?" Horus asked snidely as power erupted from his form. "Do I really?" He shouted, his words distorted. He was suddenly held up in the air and plummeted to the ground in a shower of blood and gore. Rising from it... a huge figure out of nightmare roared.
Far from cowed... Jane Talona just smiled grimly. Then she laughed. And it was amused, not scared.
"What?" The voice was undeniably Horus. But as massive as the huge winged monstrosity he now was.
"Like Two, I am curious." Jane said mildly. She waved a hand and a lesser daemon simply vanished in golden energy. She tilted her head a little. "Chaos Undivided, right? You summoned the Black Legion... A Bloodthirster and now a Greater Lord of Change. That... shouldn't be possible but you did." She shrugged. "The cultists were inevitable. Fodder for blades and guns. Sacrifices for the summonings." Her words were not question.
"And you will die!" Horus' voice was insanity. It gibbered and frothed around the square, but Jane just shook her head. The daemons did not approach past Two's golden circle.
"Will we?" Jane asked quietly. "You see... This is not the world in which Tzeentch is a deity of sorts. This is a very different world. Different powers, different rules. You are pulling two very disparate realities together and that rarely works out well."
"Your blather changes nothing!" Horus' daemon voice declared. "You cannot stop me! Nothing can stop me!"
"Ah..." Jane shook her head. "There you are wrong." She shook her head sadly as the daemon slammed the ground and started towards the two females who stood in its path. Violet fired again, more lesser daemons dying under the railgun fire.
"Am I?" Horus demanded as the daemon's fists came down and shattered the golden circle around the two women. "Your souls will..." He paused as the power... did something else.. "No!"
It wasn't really fair. The being who had become Horus hadn't really been the brightest of bulbs. He had been good at the Game, but nothing more. And while gamers had a great deal of imagination -it sort of went with the territory- he was more of a roleplayer than an actual wargamer. The concept of plans, contingency plans and such were not standard in role playing circles. If he had been a Dungeon Master or the Orokin equivalent of a storyteller, he might have asked himself why the two women simply stood for so long in front of such horrifying power.
He hadn't.
Jane held out her hand, the one with the icon in it and Two lowered a hand from her bow. It took the hand of the Mesa warframe and suddenly bright golden light seared out from both women. They both stepped back as the golden light erupted in a blaze so bright that the daemons that had surrounded them fled back several paces. Even the Greater Daemon of Change was stunned. If he hadn't been so stunned, it might have made a difference. He might have been able to counter this.
Probably not.
It seemed to take ages, but it was likely milliseconds before the golden glow faded. But what it left behind...
Five huge armored forms stood between the two women and the hordes of Chaos. Their armor was the same color as Brother Abrahaim's but there the similarities ended. Where Brother Abrahaim's power armor suit was large, these were larger. Each massive suit had a twin barreled weapon in one hand that was similar to the Bolter and Bolt Pistol Abrahaim used, if larger. The other hand held a melee weapon of some kind. One had a claw like Bother Abrahaim's. One held a sword that glowed with blue energy. Two had fists that crackled with the same kind of blue energy but the last... The shimmering hammer he held was huge. Easily twice the size of a Fragor hammer, he hefted it easily in one hand. He wore no helmet, but his face was partly covered by a mask and bionics. Each left pauldron held the same bone white cross and skull. The Crux Terminatus. Terminators! Blood Angels Space Marine Terminators!
"For the CHAPTER!" The hammer wielding Space Marine cried, waving his hammer forward. At the sound of his voice, Jane staggered and Two held her, her glow surrounding both women. "First Company! Charge!"
The daemon screamed as the five huge Space Marines charged into battle. They seemed to move slowly. In actuality, they were moving with such grace that even Two stared in awe. The were huge, and ponderous. But graceful and deadly. The stunned daemon horde didn't have a chance. Hurricanes of bolter rounds tore through the stunned lesser forms and the few, very few black armored forms that had survived Violet's storm of railgun fire. Then Two jerked as a human form simply appeared beside her.
"Violet needs to exit the battlesuit before they are done." Sister Abigail said quietly as the Tau drone that had cloaked her flew off. She laid Alicia's still form down and started working. "They will cleanse this place of all taint. Including xeno." Two looked around, but none of the daemons were looking at them. All were busy dying. Some were trying to flee, but they did not get far.
"Right." Two stepped back to the smoking battlesuit. "Violet. Come on. You do not want to be in that when the Space Marines have time to look at it."
"Okay." The front of the machine swung up and Violet slid out of it. Two swallowed hard as the operative's body shifted a bit, taking on a more human cast. "I still want one of these." She took a step and staggered. Her suit was tore and burnt. Two caught her. "I... ow?" She asked as Two half led, half carried her to where Jane was watching the slaughter. The hammer wielding Terminator was climbing the Greater Daemon now, his hammer slamming holds into the unnatural skin of the monstrosity. His storm bolter had been slung so he could climb and strike. "That is... not something you see everyday..." She said weakly as Two laid her down. Sister Abigail finished what she was doing with Alicia and started scanning Violet. The drone that had hidden Abigail from sight while she laid the teleport homer flew into the battlesuit and did not come out.
"Be glad." Jane said quietly from where she stood. "Such things have haunted my dreams since..." She bowed her head as Two rose to stand by her. "Since I lost him."
"The voice..." Two said quietly. "I... Jane..."
"I don't know." Jane said quietly as the hammer wielding Terminator reached his goal. He slammed his hammer repeatedly into the skull of the Greater Daemon. It gave a long, drawn out scream and collapsed slowly. The Blood Angel hit it again and again and again as it fell. Just as it crashed to the ground, he rolled off of it, his bulk impossibly agile for something that size. Jane sighed as the Terminators finished off the last of the lesser forms and turned their storm bolters on the still quivering daemon. "My turn."
Two nodded soberly and stood as Jane stepped forward, her bolt pistol in hand.
"I am Jane Talona." The Mesa warframe said formally. "Ordo Hereticus. This..." She shook her head and golden energy wafted from the icon in her hand to sweep over the form the Terminators were aiming at. It gave a cry and then a broken Limbo warframe was lying on the ground, fluids pooling beneath it. "...is the cause of most of this mess."
"Sergeant Nils, Inquisitor." The hammer wielding Marine said calmly as he drew his storm bolter and the aim point was the Limbo. "Blood Angels Chapter."
"Right on time, Adeptes Asartes." Jane said with a nod. "You have done your chapter honor this day. You have a battle brother down though."
"Right." The sergeant nodded to one of the power fist armed Terminator. "Apothecary Fraj! See if he can be saved. Everyone else! Secure and cleanse."
"Yes, Sergeant!" The designated Terminator moved to where Abrahaim lay. The other three moved about, checking still forms and occasionally firing careful shots.
"You..." Horus' voice was weak. "You will not beat me." He tried to rise.
"Shut up, heretic." Jane snapped, her boot coming out to slam the broken Limbo back to the dirt. "Sergeant? What are your orders here?"
"Eliminate the taint." The Terminator said with a nod. "I hear battle." Indeed, the cries of the Bloodthirster were audible in the distance.
"Another daemon." Jane said with a sigh. "Our allies here were to lure or drive it away while we set the homer for you. It should vanish as soon as soon as this scum finally dies. If not?" She shrugged. "It is what we are for, no?"
"We defend the Imperium." The sergeant said with a nod. "The xenos machine?" He asked, nodding to the abandoned battlesuit. Jane smiled grimly as it exploded. Abigail was nothing if not thorough."I see."
"Many forces worked to aid us here, sergeant." Jane said with a shrug. "I will not compromise the Sons of Sanguinius."
"Thank you." The Space Marine said calmly. "And him?" He asked of Horus who was staying very still.
"You... will not... stop..." Horus croaked and Jane's pistol roared. The Limbo's head exploded and the rest of his warframe fell into the blood soaked dirt.
"Funny." Jane said with a sigh as she holstered her pistol. The sounds in the distance just stopped. "I think we just did. Sergeant, we will break out the flamers. This place must be cleansed. It should be done as soon as possible."
"My battle brothers will do a thorough search." The sergeant said with a nod. "We will leave nothing to chance."
"And I will remain here, on guard." Jane said quietly. "If the Ruinous Powers came through once, they can again." The Space Marine nodded. "I have... an odd question." The Blood Angel just looked at her. "Do you know me?"
"No." Nils said calmly. Jane nodded. "May I ask why?"
"You sound and look like someone I knew a long, long time ago." Jane said heavily. "But it was too much to hope for. Hope is the first step on the road to disappointment."
"I was found by the chapter and recruited." Nils said quietly. "I do not remember who I was before. Probably for the best. I have my duty."
"And only in death does duty end." Jane agreed. "Our allies in this place are called Tenno. They wear armor that looks vaguely Eldar, but is not. Each set is different."
"I was briefed." Sergeant Nils said with a nod. He paused and listened to his vox. "The Daemons have vanished and all of the traitors are slain. Praise the Emperor!" The other Terminators approached, the Apothecary carrying Brother Abrahaim. "Our brother lives and our enemies do not. A good day."
"A good day." Jane agreed. "Fare thee well, Adeptes Asartes."
"Fare thee well, Inquisitor." The sergeant said as he knelt. All but the Apothecary knelt with him. That Terminator bent under his burden to mirror his battle brothers. Then, in a flash of gold, they were gone.
Only after they were gone did Jane kneel in the bloodstained dirt and cry.