Steel started tapping his Gauss rifle; this was going to some stupid mission where he would be bored out of his mind. He never liked going on diplomatic missions, even though he had never been on one. He had heard about it from the archives from the human's library. He liked the stories of wars, especially the stories of World War 2. He had heard and had seen holotapes of humans shaking hands and just talking. He would always yell to the holotape for one of them to pull out his gun now, but they never did. Steel sighed as he thought of nothing but talking, not even a punch would be thrown.
Forlon returned to the monolith hanger with a small crystal and a gauss rifle on his back. He motioned for his squad to settle down and come on over. When squad Apollo finally gathered around, Forlon threw the crystal down on the ground. The crystal touched the ground with a small tink noise. The crystal then began to hover and a holo screen was projected from it. The screen showed the schematics of the ship and pointed at a huge room that was on the side of the ship.
"This is the hangar of the ship. We'll be phasing in from there; there will be two water caste ambassadors there to greet us along with ten of their best fire warriors. I want you all to be on your best behavior, no fighting of the sort. I don't want them thinking we're a hybrid of orks." Forlon grabbed the crystal, the screen faded away.
"Any questions then before we phase out?" Steel raised his hand.
"How long will this take, anyhow?" Forlon knew he was going to say that.
"As long as it will take, Steel. We need to show them that Freedom's Legion is not part of the C'tan Necrons anymore." Steel grunted as he fixed his vox box.
"If there are no more questions, then let's get going." Forlon grabbed his gauss rifle off his back as he stabilized the energy output.
There was a slight chill in the air as air started whooshing around them. There was darkness, then light. When they fully phased into the hangar, they didn't see anyone there. No ambassadors, no fire warriors, not even a fighter ship in the hangar. It was empty, as if Tau just went and forgot about the meeting.
"Some welcome, eh Forlon?" some of the squad chuckled. Forlon didn't, in fact, he was very worried. Even though you couldn't see his facial features, you could feel that he knew something wasn't right. He held up his right hand, everyone stopped chuckling and pulled out their rifles. Steel came up behind Forlon, making no noise.
"What is it?" Forlon motioned to a door opposite from them, 10 meters from their spot. Steel couldn't see right away what it was, but then he saw it. A tau fire warrior's foot was hanging just outside the door frame. Forlon walked towards the door with Steel checking all around for any signs of trouble. When Forlon came to the edge of the door, he was greeted by a darklight dark lance's beam barley skimming his shoulder pad.
"AMBUSH!" The quiet hangar soon turned to chaos as dark eldar began appearing from nowhere. Steel began to fire his weapon at an eldar swinging a power sword. His beam met the eldar's throat, watching the eldar as he gripped at his disintegrating throat. Forlon swung his rifle, meeting the soft flesh of an eldar trying to grab at his waist. The eldar just shrugged off the blow like it was just a bug bite. He brought his sword down on Forlon as he was cut in two by Forlon's assistant captain, Rain.
"You alright, sir? Thought he would have gotten you for sure!" Rain was a quiet type, but when it came to fighting, he made sure that everyone in his squad was safe and sound. Forlon nodded at his assistant, he was wise to have found an assistant like him.
"Forlon, we need to get out of here, now!" Steel shot another beam, meeting the stomach of a dark eldar trying to load a terrorfex. Forlon nodded, calling out to his squad to get to better cover or to move back if they were too far away. Forlon tried to focus on the monolith hangar, but he couldn't phase out. None of them could and the eldar were starting to move in.
"Forlon, let's go already!"
"I can't, something is jamming the devices. I can't get us out of here!" Forlon took a pot shot from behind a crate. He tried focusing on the hangar again, and still he was on the ship. It was official, they were trapped.
"Looks like we get to have it your way, Steel. Rip 'em to shreds!" Steel chuckled, it was his lucky day.
"Aun'O, we have to keep moving." ShiShi'ur nodded and helped a fire warrior up. The fire warrior had been stuck by splinter cannon twice while opening a blast door. The fire warrior had shown courage and self-sacrifice to rescue his comrades, the epitome of the meaning of The Greater Good. He would not abandon the warrior to a fate of slavery or death by torture. The sighting of the dark eldar had decreased; they were nearing the lower levels of the ship. But, he and the Shas'Ui knew that the eldar would sweep the ship once more before doing what they needed to do. The fire warrior groaned, he was begging to wake.
"L-leave me Aun'O, I am no worthy to be carried by one such as you."
"Nonsense, you have shown me that you are willing to forsake your own life in order to save your comrades. You are what all beings strive for, to become even closer to the Greater Good. I will not leave you to die here." The fire warrior thanked him as Aun'O let him off his back. "How far till we get to the hangers, Shas'Ui?" Kais Shovah pulled up the schematics of the ship in his crisis suit. The hangar was surprisingly not far from here, but there were still dark eldar around, so they made the short distance seem like a day's walk.
"I will scout out the path before us, we are not far from the hangars now, Aun'O."
"Then let us make haste, Shas'Ui. This warrior still needs medical attention and the necrons could help us off this ship."
"Aun'O, with all due respect, I do not think that the necrons would still be here. They may have noticed that we went silent hours ago. They may be trying to blow us out of the sky."
"We aren't doing that." Kais Shovah turned to see a necron with red and black metal all over his body, with battle scars covering most of his body.
"Captain Steel of the 12th Freedom's Legion regiment, Squad Apollo." Steel held out a hand. Kais chuckled to himself as he shook Steel's hand.
"Shas'Ui T'au Kais Shovah, commander of the fire warriors stationed here on the Enlightener. Where are the rest of your men, captain?"
"They're over in a hanger, holding their position till we can figure out what's happening to our phase drivers."
"I see, so you are stuck here like us then?" Steel nodded before quickly pulling out his gauss rifle and aiming it at the side of the Ethereal's head. He pulled the trigger, missing the Ethereal's but hitting a dark eldar wrrior aiming a splinter rifle at the tau's head.
"Thank me later, now come on, I don't like dark places with a billion hidey holes."
Before any of them could take one step, they heard a voice. "My, my, my, what adorable mortals. Not even my pets are this fun." Steel raised his rifle, looking all around for the source of the woman's voice.
"Oh, don't bother looking for me, honey, I'm not even here. In fact, I'm not even in the same system as you, for now." Even if she said that she wasn't anywhere near them, it sounded as if she was standing right behind them. The voice was lustful, but full of evil intent.
"What trickery is this? Not even the eldar can do things like this without me knowing it." The woman just chuckled.
"Well, guess the cats out of the bag, I'm not an eldar, or even a being from this universe. I am something totally different. You see, I'm like a deamon, only not as pathetic. I'm even stronger than those dark gods your so scared about."
Steel motioned to the end of the hallway. "So you're the one who hired the dark eldar to attack the Enlightened? Pretty low, if you ask me."
"But, I'm not asking you, you pathetic mortal. You see, all beings fall in line when the planet they were stationed on was incinerated right before their eyes, by an invisible force. It just takes proper motivation."
Steel began walking towards the end of the hallway, before feeling a hand around his throat.
"Where do you think you're going, my young friend? I'm not finished yet." Steel felt a shiver run up and down his spine, as he felt a bone chilling wind. A black void appeared in front of him. The void looked as if it was sucking all the darkness out of the hallway. Out of the void, stepped a woman. She was in a Victorian age dress with a black umbrella. Her hair was black and her eyes were black, only her bone white skin prevented her from becoming one with the shadows. As Steel looked at her, he felt his sanity drifting way. Darkness began to envelop him as he fought to stay awake and standing, all to no avail.
"What are you…" He managed to say before falling to his knees.
"I am what you would call, the end. I am the blackness that takes your soul. I am no C'tan or god. In fact, I am what gods fear. I am what all beings fear, I am Death herself, and your time is near Steel. Let me see that metal soul of yours." She began to laugh as Steel grabbed at his chest; his life force was being sucked out of him and everything began to blur and slow down. Just when he thought that he was finally going to meet the eternal blackness, he heard a familiar voice. The woman's eerie smile turned to one of disgust as green gauss fire ripped through her. She disappeared, and in her place came Forlon, helping him up from the ground. Everything to Steel was still mute and blurred. He felt cold and was taken by darkness. When he woke up, he saw a tomb spyder working on his arm before saying good morning.
"You had us worried there, Steel. Not even the tomb spyders knew how to get you back up." Kan Wreek was at the end of the operating table. Steel tried to talk, but couldn't make a noise. He touched his face, realizing that his vox box was missing.
"Don't worry I have it right here." Kan was waving it above his shoulders. Steel took a look around the room. The room was rather big, so that meant that he was in the heavy care room, for when necrons are almost out of reach to be saved. His gauss rifle was at the far end of the room, next to the door and a window right next to his bed. The tomb spyder made one final adjustment to his arm and went off before saying "hope you don't have to see us too soon"
Kan Wreek handed Steel back his Vox box. After making a few adjustments to his box, he put it back on.
"y'know, we really have to find a way to make these stay on permanently. Kan chuckled.
"Forlon already told you about that woman right?"
Kan nodded, he was still thinking about the experience that Forlon had told him.
"She spoke to me, sir, just before I began to go insane and die. She said that she is death, that even gods fear her." Kan glanced at him for a moment before looking back down at the Orb of Cleansing. Kan recalled what the voice said, that a dark future was a head of them. Was this the future that it was talking about? Kan was still pondering about that.
"Hey, I'm going to leave you alone for a bit, to gather up your senses. I'm going to looking into what you and Forlon saw." Before Kan could leave, Steel called him.
"Do you think I'm going insane? Before I passed out, I swore that saw some kind of creature in the void the woman went out of." Kan stopped in the door way
"What kind of creature?"
"It was big, very big. It looked like that not even the void could hold it. It also had one big eye that was staring right at me." Kan looked back at him.
"It'll be ok, I'll look into it." And with that, Kan walked out the door. His calm posture hiding his biggest fear. If this was the dark future that the universe would be facing, then may the gods of freedom save them all.
Ok, that is all for chapter 3! Sorry for not posting a little faster than before, I was at the dmv and was out of town for a few days…
Just so I can answer one question. He does a voice. If you go back to chapter one, you will see that Kan Wreek was in an Imperial science facility. He found a bunch of radios and such from dead vox opperators. He is able to talk by thinking what he wants to say and producing sound waves using psychic energy. He has psychic energy from when he touched the orb.
NEXT TIME ON FREEDOM'S LEGION: Aun'O and Shas'Ui have gone back home to give their people information on what the necrons did to save Aun'o ShiShi'ur and Shas'Ui Kais Shovah. Meanwhile, Kan Wreek calls his best squads to go and find races that will join their cause. Squad Apollo and Squad One go to a jungle planet to set up shop, only to find that a huge Waagh of Orks is already there and that a human is leading them!