Domus Discordia Chapter 39

Wrethan couldn't believe his eyes, the spectacle filling him with awe and dread in equal measure. Dreadnoughts, the most honoured and revered of all Storm Heralds, they were here in unprecedented numbers. The air thrummed with the noise of their reactors, making his teeth rattle and plumes of heat arising from the exhaust vents on their backs. The Castaferrums presented a wall of towering armour, an unassailable bastion and Wrethan could not help but notice that all their weapons were pointed right at the True Believers, not the Primarch's Own.

The Dreadnoughts peered down at the frozen True Believers and then Honourable Ajax growled, "GET OVER HERE NOW, LESSALL AND ANYONE ELSE RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS MADNESS."

Without his volition Wrethan was suddenly moving, his legs responding without his brain being in any way involved. With him came Lessall and Samect, Erathor and Tygra, all the leaders of the True Believers, coming forward like scholam children before a preceptor. Lessall raised his voice with a quiver of doubt saying, "I don't know what these liars have told you but…"

With a volcanic rumbled Ajax growled, "I HAVE SEEN THE EVIDENCE OF YOUR CRIMES, YOU MURDERED GORGALL."

Wrethan could not help but notice the clarity and purpose in Ajax's voice, the absence of distraction and confusion. Fury radiated from his presence, banishing the cobwebs of the ages, lending him a razor-sharp clarity and terrifying focus. Lessall gulped and protested, "We didn't…"

Ajax stomped his foot down, making everybody scurry back a step as he snarled, "THE ICON OF OUR CHAPTER UPON YOUR SHOULDER IS THE ONLY REASON I HAVEN'T KILLED YOU ALREADY. YOUR NEXT WORDS WILL BE THE TRUTH OR THEY SHALL BE YOUR LAST!"

"It's all true!" a voice arose and it took Wrethan a heartbeat to realise that it was his own, "We did it all!"

Samect's head snapped around and he hissed, "What are you doing? You're going to get us killed!"

Wrethan was surprised to find that he didn't care; he had waged a shameful war, covering himself in dishonour and disgrace. The honour of the Storm Heralds was dust but he would be damned if he would lie for those who had destroyed it. Ajax's voice lowered until it sounded like the earth quaking as he spat, "YOU HAVE TEN SECONDS TO EXPLAIN YOURSELVES."

Lessall could only stand there in mute distress but Samect raised his voice to proclaim, "The galaxy has fallen into darkness and woe, the rule of the High Lords has failed. The time has come for a new order to rise, a just and strong one. The Astartes must seize the reins of power; through faith in the Divine Emperor we will build an empire worthy of Him on Terra!"

Ajax listened and was silent for a moment. Wrethan held his breath, they all did, waiting for a response and then in one word Ajax laid down his verdict, "HERETICS!"

Everybody gasped and Lessall cried, "Wait!" but the Dreadnoughts were already acting. Simultaneously every war machine erupted in a storm of firepower, a solid wall of annihilation that crashed into the packed ranks of True Believers. Waves of destruction swept over them, sundering armour and snuffing out lives. Blast and shot and las and fire fell upon them, turning Transhuman warriors into clouds of red mist and showers of bone shards.

In the first second a missile hit the leaders dead on, flashes from Rosarius' and Iron Haloes dissipated the killing power but the kinetic force of it flung them high and left them to fall helplessly back down. Wrethan felt himself slam into the ground hard, breaking his reinforced collarbone but he instantly looked up, only to behold utter carnage.

Everywhere the Dreadnoughts were wrecking utter devastation, creating piles of shattered bodies. Ajax bellowed his fury as he led the charge, his Kheres assault cannon obliterating any who stood in his path. To his left strode the lauded hero Varngard, swinging an immense chainfist that mowed down Astartes like wheat before a scythe as he roared, "Heretics must die!" While to the right stomped Bretannia, the siege Dreadnought spewing burning sheets of Prothemium from his Flamestorm cannon. Waves of fire engulfed the Astartes as he hollered, "Hell comes for you!"

Wrethan was unable to move as he watched the True Believers desperately falling back, only to run straight into the path of Haniball. He greeted them with blasts from an immense Plasma cannon as he bawled, "The fruits of treachery are vengeance!" He was flanked by Yellico, whose Grav-cannon was crushing armoured warriors into tiny spheres of bleeding metal, while Sparticas liquefied foes with pinpoint shots from a multi-melta.

In the heart of the firestorm Tonnant strode majestically. His right arm was comprised of a blade as long as a grown man, covered with flaming promethium ejected from tiny nozzles along its fuller. He hacked and sliced ceaselessly, leaving a trail of bisected and burning corpses in his wake as he proclaimed, "There is only the Emperor!" Neptun moved with him, his seismic hammer shattering all resistance with contemptuous ease as the Ironclad smashed foes apart in droves.

The True Believers were reeling under the onslaught of the Dreadnoughts but they were yet Astartes and tried to fight back. A handful of Devastators attempted to bring their Lascannons to bear, seeking to bracket a war machine. Yet before they could fire a single shot Agincord spun about and brought up a Hurricane-bolter. He bellowed, "None shall escape our wrath!" as a blizzard of bolt-rounds engulfed the Devastators, leaving them ruptured and bleeding their guts out onto the cold ferrocrete floor.

From the rear a squad of assault marines flew high on blazing jump packs but at the apex of their arc, they were intercepted by a whirlwind of autocannon rounds. It was Jupitre, his two twin-linked autocannons spewing fire as the Mortis swatted down enemies like flies. While he was engaged a trio of True Believers tried to race up behind him with melta-bombs in hand but they were intercepted by Hibernia, who levelled the fat barrel of a Frag Cannon. With a thunderous retort the cannon fired, the shell shattering instantly to spray out razor-sharp shrapnel. Two True Believers died immediately while the third fell to the ground in a bleeding heap. He feebly tried to crawl away, hand over hand, but Hibernia contemptuously stepped on him and crushed him into a sickening paste.

Wrethan was aghast; it had been less than a minute since the first shot had been fired yet the Dreadnoughts had wrought utter carnage. Their size and power were irresistible but it was the fact that they were Dreadnoughts that the True Believers couldn't cope with. These were the most revered and honoured of Brothers, veneration of them had been hammered home repeatedly until it was instinctive. To fight these warriors was a paradox the True Believers couldn't process, not in a mere handful of seconds and in those moments the Dreadnoughts fashioned a massacre.

Suddenly Wrethan saw Tygra regaining his feet and watched as he charged into the fray, Eviscerator held over his head. Bellerophon saw him coming and swung to meet him, twin siege claws held ready. Tygra pounced, swinging his blade as high as he could. It stuck the armoured sarcophagus but merely skittered off, doing nothing more than scratching the iconography. Scornfully Bellerophon snatched Tygra up, he wrapped one claw around each arm and then he pulled. Tygra's voice screamed in agony as his shoulders shattered and then ripped free, both his arms tearing clean off.

Elsewhere Wrethan saw Erathor being targeted by Temeraire. The Captain managed to dodge the Hellfire's missile by leaping to one side but he was too slow to avoid the searing Lascannon beams that followed. The incandescent energy caught him in the legs and neatly sliced them off, leaving him limbless below the thighs. Erathor crashed to the ground and was left to flop there helplessly as the battle raged on around him.

Head swimming Wrethan finally staggered to own his feet, stunned and dazed by the slaughter all around, then he saw Apothecary Lessall or rather his back. Lessall was running away as fast as his legs could carry him, abandoning his troops to die as he cravenly fled. He was chased by a hail of assault cannon rounds and the rage of Ajax as he bellowed, "YOU CAN RUN BUT YOU CAN'T HIDE COWARD! I WILL FIND YOU!"

The battle was beyond recovery yet amid the death and destruction Wrethan saw Samect engage, woozily swaying on obviously broken leg bones. The High Chaplain staggered at Ajax like a drunk, trying to roar defiance but his cry came out as a mere wheezy gasp. Ajax saw him coming and paused in his rampage; he let the High Chaplain close and then spun his torso, swinging his red-hot assault cannon laterally. The wounded Space Marine was unable to dodge the multiple barrels and they caught him in the chest, knocking Samect down.

With surprising speed Ajax's foot slammed down onto Samect, pinning him to the ground. The High Chaplain's left leg, hip and shoulder were trapped under the Dreadnought's foot and he was unable to move at all as his Ceramite plates cracked under the strain. Ajax leaned down, an impressive feat for a mechanical war machine and wrapped one metal hand around Samect's exposed right half. Samect cried, "No, not like this!" but he was helpless to resist as Ajax gripped him tightly and then heaved upwards.

Ceramite shattered, bones snapped, sinews ripped and the High Chaplain shrieked as Ajax tore him in half, bisecting him diagonally into two gory halves. Incredibly Samect wasn't dead; his implanted organs fighting a losing battle to keep him alive. Samect screamed weakly and beat his remaining hand upon the Dreadnought's fist but Ajax merely tossed the remaining bits of the High Chaplain over his shoulder. Still screaming Samect fell into the melee where he was abruptly flattened by the rampaging Dreadnoughts.

Wrethan suddenly realised that he was the final senior officer, the True Believers would look to him to lead them in their last stand. Yet all he could do was watch in mute horror as the Dreadnoughts massacred any that stood against them. In barely two minutes they had killed half the True Believers and it would take less time than that to finish off the remainder. They were power incarnate, they were hatred made manifest, they were the Angels of Death. Suddenly Wrethan saw Ajax turn in his direction and stampede towards him, roaring, "YIELD OR FIGHT AS YOU WILL, IT MATTERS NOT, NONE SHALL ESCAPE OUR WRATH!"

Wrethan heard the words and they broke into his consciousness, triggering a revelation. It was a thought he had never had before, a concept he had never even considered. Suddenly Wrethan beheld another option; he grasped the alternative that he had been seeking so desperately. Wrethan saw the possibility of redemption bloom, not for himself but for his Chapter. He finally saw a way for the Storm Heralds to reclaim their honour, even though it was the most aberrant thought he had ever had. It was an idea that struck at the core of all his values, it was a notion that all his training and hypno-indoctrination would have him reject, for it violated every tenant and doctrine of the Adeptus Astartes. Wrethan thought it to be the single most inspiring notion he had ever conceived of and he thanked the Emperor for it with all his hearts.

As Ajax bore down upon him Wrethan shouted as loudly as he could, "We surrender!"

Ajax suddenly ground to halt, stopped in his tracks by the unexpected cry and he stammered, "YOU… YOU DO WHAT?!"

Wrethan answered by calling out, "All True Believers as the last officer standing I command you to lay down your arms. Do not resist the Dreadnoughts in any way!"

Suddenly silence fell, as all looked on in stupefied disbelief. Even the Dreadnoughts froze, unable to grasp what was happening. Astartes did not surrender, they never yielded, not when they had a principle to fight and die for. But at Wrethan had at the last moment realised that even though it was too late for him, he could yet save the honour of his Chapter.

By making sure the right side won.

With all eyes upon him Wrethan fell to his knees before Ajax, lifting his Crozius laterally above his head in both hands. Wrethan looked up at the monstrous war machine and cried out in blessed relief, "We surrender unto you Honourable Ajax. Victory is yours!"