{oOo}
"You are insane," Roboute Guilleman said seriously.
It was a remarkable understatement of the Primarch of XIII Legion to make. But it was a remarkable moment.
"I am going to kill you," he added. The tone of his voice was perfectly conversational. The way that his gauntleted hands were moving was the only clue that he wasn't entirely calm. No one on the bridge had ever seen him show even that much agitation however, and more than one officer found that the movement focused their attention far more than the ill-defined readings coming from their still overloaded auspex systems.
The man displayed in the bridge hololith was no less unfamiliar with this as a mannerism of his brother. But where the officers of Roboute Guilleman's staff found it unnerving, he found it delightful.
"You sound distraught, dear Roboute," he declared in mocking tones of amazement. "Calm yourself, lest your father think less of his perfect son."
"He is also your father." Outside, the consequences of the death-ride of the cruise Campanile continued to spread through the orbtials with cataclysmic force and mind-numbing speed. Hundreds of ships had been wrecked by debris or by the eager guns of Lorgar's Word Bearers. Soldiers by the million had been blotted away before they even knew that they were under attack. Many of the superhuman Astartes who called Roboute Guilleman father had fared no better.
Beneath them all, Calth burned.
Lorgar Aurelian laughed like the madman that Guilleman named him.
"I have more worthy fathers now, Guilleman. More worthy than the one who you helped leave orphaned on the desecrated soil of Monarchia."
The consequences of the sudden dive of the Campanile into Calth's orbitals would take the supernatural genius of a Primarch to understand and perhaps only the genius of Guilleman and his renowned ability to make sense of thousands of apparently unrelated details could conceivably re-impose order and sanity upon a universe that had suddenly been upended.
"You bastard," Guilleman breathed. "You've been holding that as a grudge? This is some twisted revenge?"
He was, however, rather distracted.
His brother shook his head pityingly. "Oh no, Roboute. Not a grudge. I forgive you that trespass readily and without hesitation." His smile was that of a serpent. "You placed me on the true path, so please consider this to be my heartfelt thanks to you."
"You cannot possibly imagine that anyone will shield you from the consequences." Guilleman's voice did not shake in the slightest. Only the keenest of observers could have seen the fractional dilation of his pupils. "Traitoris Excommunicatus. Russ and his Wolves will hunt your sons to the end of the universe if they have to."
"Oh Roboute, are you losing your cool? Please don't diminish yourself in the such a manner." Lorgar's lips parted slightly to reveal his gleaming canines. "This tactic, this treachery as I have named it, is tearing the heart from your Legion. Please don't attempt to diminish my glory by suggesting that you are opposing it with anything but your best attention." Then he waved one gauntleted hand dismissively. "As for Russ... please don't concern yourself with him. Our trap has already closed around him, remember to ask him about it in whatever hell you might find yourselves sharing."
Guilleman's voice cracked with a stark warning: "No one legion, not even the largest, can stand alone against the Imperium."
"Has even your hearing deserted you." Lorgar's image stepped forwards, impossibly exiting the hololith to stalk the deck towards his brother. "I said our trap, Roboute. I do not stand alone."
There was nothing wrong with the reflexes of those around the bridge and despite their astonishment that Lorgar somehow walked amongst them, a dozen bolt pistols were aimed for him instantly. Only a concern for ricochet damage to the many delicate systems around them caused Roboute Guilleman to gesture for calm. That and of course that the mass-reactive shells would hardly be sufficient to harm his fallen brother even if he were truely present and not a mere phantasm.
"How arrogant you are, out here in your lonely kingdom," Lorgar mused. "The wise, noble Roboute Guilleman... the universe has changed and all will be made anew... yet you know nothing. The heavens are ablaze but Ultramar stands pristine and ignorant of the truth."
"Who?" That simple question fell into the silence that had followed Lorgar's words. The words of Guilleman of course. Even the stout heart of an Ultramarine might quail before the silver tongue of the Primarch of the XVII Legion, but their Primarch was made, quite literally, of sterner stuff.
Lorgar chuckled. "Magnus, of course, to lure the Wolf from his den. The Lion, to enter that den. I am sure that Russ will enjoy the warm welcome offered by his cold, cold world when he seeks to lick his wounds."
Instant dismissal: "That is nonsense."
"Is it? You think you know the hearts of men, Roboute? Consider the Lion, examine his pride and his ambition. Think of Dulan and how the two fought then. Imagine also that when that abusive parent you still revere has been ground into the dust, there will be room for a new Warmaster and el'Jonson has been promised it. The Gates of Fenris lie open for him..."
Guileman laughed himself, with certainty. "While the Storm Caller holds them? Thora is a fine host but far too shrewd for such a ploy."
"Thora is one of us." Lorgar's eyes gleamed. "She has always known that she was in communion with something greater than herself and her tale of how Russ wooed her speaks more of his brutality than his charm. She will gladly rid herself of him."
"Impossible." The words were confident. Convincing. False. For the seed of doubt had touched Guilleman's mind. The Emperor had placed strict limits upon exploration of psychic abilites, and there was no doubt that Thora was as potently gifted in her own way as even Magnus himself.
"So claimed Ferrus Manus," revealed Lorgar. "At first, at least. His tongue was stilled admirably by Fulgrim's sword and his skull is now a trophy. Alas, less evidence remains of Vulkan and Corax. The tools of exterminating worlds can be quite... indiscriminant."
He smiled slightly. "You are imagining yourself rushing back to Terra, at the head of an avenging army, are you not, Roboute? You may as well abandon such fantasies: I would not speak of such matters if you could avert them. We are, after all, so very far away and my allies are already crowding the star roads on their way to Terra."
"Dorn holds Terra. He will be an unbreakable anvil for your ambitions," promised Guilleman. The faintest touch of sweat was upon his brow. "Horus will be the hammer that crushes you against him."
"Oh?" The was a terrible mischief in Lorgar's eyes. "Imagine the great glories of Terra, my naive brother. Imagine the Iron Warriors laying siege to the Imperial Palace, for more than half of them have scorned their foolish Primarch and his whore to march under our banner. Imagine Angron's Legion alongside them, summoned for the greatest battle of history." He shrugged. "Take heart if you will, that Mortarion remains loyal if somewhat bereaved of his pet. How sad. Persephone had such potential, she could have taken Serenity's place and ruled as our Dark Queen but she lacked the vision to -"
Words were ended in the staccato boom of mass-reactive bolt shells tearing through the seeming of Lorgar as Guilleman raised his fists and the stormbolters built into each mighty gauntlet expressed their own counter-argument.
Explosions tore through the crew stations behind the apparition, and then into the calculating engines behind them. None plucked at the armour of the Ultramarines at those posts although each quickly threw themselves away from their posts to clear room for their primarch to work. Lorgar threw back his head and laughed, but there seemed to have been something material to his presence for not every shell passed through unhindered. A piece at a time, the surface was peeled away, revealing behind it something very different from Lorgar Aurelian, Primarch of the Word Bearers.
Then he lowered what ought to be his face, marked still by some miracle, with his eyes and met Guilleman's angry glare. "Once you have made me what I ought to be."
The explosion that gutted the bridge of the Fist of Macragge was lost entirely in the apocalyptic devestation that surrounded the battlebarge. Dozens of the senior staff of the Legion were killed and fires raged through the violated compartments of the command tower.
Flung out into the void, having been stood between Lorgar's... presence... and a sizeable viewport, Guilleman ignored completely the lack of atmosphere, instead twisting himself and firing one further shot to stablise his tumble. If the vaccum of space had not taken his breath away, no doubt the carnage - spread across literally billions of cubic miles but plainly visible to his eyes - would have done so.
A hand touched the elbow of his armour gently and that slight touch drew his attention away from the devestation around him.
Alta stood beside him, the chill of space and the merciless lack of air apparently of no more concern to her than it was to him. Her expression was no warmer than the frozen hell that they were in and for an instant Guilleman wondered if Lorgar's litany of traitors would have included her name had it not been cut off.
Then the shadows over her encarmine eyes were driven away briefly by the light cast by the death of the troop carrier Victory of Ullanor. The pain that Guilleman saw in those eyes made it clear that not every word borne by Lorgar could be false, yet that she at least knew the same agony that tore at his heart now.
There were no words, nor air to convey them had they been voiced. Yet there was one thing that he could offer her.
For a moment, adrift in the burning skies above Calth, two loyal warriors shared a comradely embrace.
{oOo}