Day 36, Continued
Corren had watched the power armored warrior depart, wondering as it did, if he had just encountered one of His Angels, a Space Marine. Surely… Surely not, right? They were said to be taller than that one had been, and bulkier as well. The power armored warrior did not fit with the icons of Space Marines found in many of the chapels Corren had been to in his life. And while he had felt intimidated by the being, especially when it had spoken to him and he'd wordlessly offered up his plasma pistol to it, it wasn't some divine experience as he would have expected it to be.
There had been an… odd feeling, though. Like he didn't need to be afraid, despite the power of the thing before him.
It was a short time later that the coffin or cradle, the device the not-Space Marine had arrived in, floated away, soon surrounded by a team of the black-armored troopers to escort it away into the back lines. It had possessed the symbols of the Mechanicus, so was it some kind of special project? A secret weapon?
He had no idea. The warrior had left after accepting Corren's plasma pistol, a gift which the Guardsmen was starting to regret giving when he'd had his lasgun on hand. Still, the warrior might have taken that as an insult to be given an inferior weapon like that. Or it might not have?
He glanced around by chance and saw Sulla, a dozen or so meters away, watching the departing coffin with a curious expression on her face. She turned her head, as if sensing his eyes, and nodded with a half-cocked grin, before returning to her defensive position, a pile of scrap rendered somewhat defensible by a number of sandbags strategically placed to ensure it didn't all come tumbling down if it was hit by autofire. Small arms autofire, in any case.
Corren sighed and shrugged to himself. This was all a bit above his paygrade, he supposed. His quartermaster would either be outraged or pleased beyond measure that Corren had given away a relic like the plasma pistol, given how rare the weapon itself was and how difficult it could be to acquire their hydrogen flasks. He'd probably be both, in all honesty.
Hopefully, it would be worth it.
Corren stepped back over to his own position, coming close to the wall, only to feel something drop from his pocket. Glancing down, he saw it was one of the spare flasks he'd just been thinking of and he winced, wondering if he should have given the coolant to the warrior as well.
Coming to one knee, he reached down and plucked the hydrogen flask off the ground, coming below the barricade he had built hours earlier, lowering himself just enough so that the burst of autogun rounds sent flying towards where he had been standing a moment earlier only passed through air. In an instant, the sound of autoguns filled the tunnel, followed in moments by shouts of alarm as Guardsman rushed for cover, some falling to the ground as they were struck.
Explosions followed, like the clanging of a manufactorum and he heard a sound like the tunnel collapsing, though this was smaller and directed behind him. He turned his head, at first afraid that the rest of the tunnel, perhaps destabilized by the initial explosions or this subsequent surprise attack, had indeed fallen, but he was mistaken. Instead, he blinked in surprise as what seemed in his eyes to be Chimeras and various other transport vehicles of the Guard opened up their hatches, unleashing a flood of Malum PDF.
How in the Emperor's Name are there so many of them? How did they get here so quickly? Corren wondered those questions, even as half-a-dozen rushed to his barricade, their autoguns firing all the time into the enemy mass, who Corren only now dared to look at, glancing up over his barricade.
A teeming mass of frothing maws, battle cries for some mutant god, and ramshackle weapons of a variety of types rushed towards him. Some had wargear as good as the PDF around him, others would not have been out of place laying in some dark alleyway, either drunk and asleep or dead. Thousands of them all rushed forward, those with ranged weapons firing continuously while those equipped with what could reasonably be called melee weapons waved them above their heads and charged forwards, a look of horrifying ecstasy on their faces as they praised a Four-Armed Emperor.
A hand with surprising strength gripped his shoulder, pulling him down from his vantage point and throwing him to the ground. He snarled, until he saw the face of the PDF trooper that had grabbed him, glaring at him.
"You should take a nap." The trooper said and Corren blinked at the other man giving him an order. He couldn't be… He couldn't be serious, right? Yet, when he tried to get up, tried to speak, Corren found he couldn't. In fact, he felt quite tired all of a sudden, strangely so.
He collapsed onto his chest, struggling to keep his eyes open as a wave of drowsiness took over. The last thing he saw before he finally fell away into nothingness were the rest of the Guardsmen he could see all falling to the ground, even as PDF moved up to take their places.
All the guardsmen… save one.
The hive city was strewn with corpses and battle. Whiro had become a slaughterhouse, as genestealers fell in waves to try and contain the onslaught of Malum's true master. The living fought over the dead they trampled underfoot. In more ways than one, Ahsael mused, as both parasite and hunter desired the flesh for their own machinations.
He stared down at the shimmering images of the scrying bowl. This attack was different, that much was obvious from the start. The so-called Malum PDF were not humans at all, but creatures born from the same place as the monsters that had overtaken first Limos and then Enyo. For some reason, the creature had chosen to fight alongside the Imperials and was unwilling to reveal its true nature. However…
During his research, he had scried the hive of Malum. There, the creatures moved with freedom throughout the hive, seemingly unseen by all, while its vines covered the lower hab blocks, producing strange fruits that the peoples freely ate. Some addictive substance or simple sustenance? Either could provide a leash around their necks for the entity.
He was tempted to peer deeper than simple sight, to try and look into the minds of one of these creatures. However, he didn't dare do more than watch. Vra'kzil had tried and its whereabouts and status were still unknown. If it was banished or imprisoned somewhere, Ahsael couldn't say, but while the daemon had not been the most powerful of its kind, neither was it weak or unlearned in the sorcerous arts. It was inferior to him, hence why he had been the master and it the servant, but anything that could deal with Vra'kzil posed a threat to him.
Perhaps if he had one of his acolytes look… But no, that could tip off whatever entity controlled all this. Once the Gallow's Eye was prepared for departure and he had made his case to the others, he could return with the resources of the Legion at his disposal and conduct a thorough study without risking himself.
He had been following the events regarding the Malum entity's attack on the genestealers closely over the last few days. When he saw no movements from Enyo towards Whiro, he'd noted the Malum PDF forces in the north and realized the attack was already prepared. While the genestealers had busied themselves preparing defenses against an attack from the South, the entity had already found a way to flank them and render their efforts worthless.
He had swept his eyes through the forces being sent from Deimos, surprised to find there were Guardsmen present. Not only that, these Guardsmen seemed entirely human, with none of the entity's mimics as far as he could tell. It made sense, he supposed, to use another's forces if possible, but didn't it risk discovery like this?
He'd noted the large number of carapace armored soldiers among their numbers as well, each with the bearing of a veteran soldier. It was disconcerting to see how easily the Malum entity could adopt the posture of decades of training and experience. How did it work? It had to be more than simple mimicry. Did it steal the memories of those it slew somehow?
If that was the case… What would happen if it stole the memories and experiences of a Space Marine? If every one of its soldiers possessed the skills of an elite warrior on top of its other, more esoteric abilities… it made significantly more sense how easily it had conquered Janus so swiftly.
No, he had no certainty that was the truth. He shouldn't jump to conclusions.
He had been intrigued by the black armored warriors, studying them intently. They seemed almost robotic in their movements, perhaps relying on the elite aura that surrounded them to explain their inhuman capabilities. What had caught his attention the most, however, was the casket.
He had watched that casket, yet been unable to pierce its outer shell because of the wards placed within it. It was legitimately of Mechanicus make then, he suspected, and it gave him reasurrance that the entity had not infiltrated at least that red-robed order. If the entity had possessed the knowledge to ward things, surely it would have done so already to protect itself.
Initially, he'd been dismissive of the power armored warrior that had stepped out of the casket. While capable, a mortal in power armor was still just a mortal. The armor was similarly warded by the faith of the Mechanicus as the casket that carried it had been. While strange in appearance, being a pattern he had never seen before, Ahsael could not have helped but feel some disappointment at the revelation that that was all it was.
Then he'd seen it in action and his disappointment had transformed into a deep concern.
Relatively speaking, the power armored creature was not that physically fast or strong. Relative to a space marine, that is. The inferior patterns of power armor used by mortals and clearly by this creature lacked the black carapace that Space Marine armor possessed that allowed it to connect to the nervous system of the wearer, becoming an extension of them and allowing them to move in it to the fullest extent. This creature had clearly been pulling its armor about rather than moving with it.
However, despite being slower than most space marines would have been, the creature had performed feats few, if any, could have accomplished. At first, Ahsael had assumed it was mere luck and incompetence on the genestealers' part that had kept it from being shot to shreds. However, as it got closer and closer and continued to avoid nearly every shot, he'd realized it wasn't either. Whatever was controlling this creature was carefully watching the trajectory of every ballistic and las round before it was fired and avoiding those paths in time with when they would be fired.
Ahsael couldn't have done that. He wouldn't have needed to in the first place, of course, but still. What kind of mental power was needed to perform a feat like that? The creature inside the armor couldn't have done it by itself, certainly not if it was a mortal, hence his determination that it had to be one of the entity's lot.
Now, the creature pushed on, finding more genestealers to slaughter. It never showed the same level of speedy reactions as it first had, but that was small comfort and it was still far faster than mortals should have been even in power armor. Was it something that could only be done occasionally or had the mind behind that shell of armor decided it just wasn't needed anymore? None of the foes it faced now were as dangerous as that kill-tunnel had been.
Concern filled him at all the questions. Concern… and greed. If he could harness this entity, harness its powers and combine them with his sorcery… Nothing would be beyond him. Monstrum itself was a paltry prize compared to that.
Ahsael imagined it, allowing himself that for just a moment. He saw worlds ablaze, an army of warriors with the skills of its greatest warriors and minds, with him to lead them in a conquest of the Materium. This sector, this segmentum, this entire galaxy.
All of it would be his.
Corren jerked awake, fear and confusion making him uncertain where he was for a moment. However, as he looked around, he remembered. His barricade still stood, his weapon was still in hand, but there was no sound of battle or cries of the wounded. He'd been… set against it, like he was sleeping?
He looked around, but there was no sign of the enemy hordes that he could have sworn had just attacked. Nor were there any Malum PDF he could see, or the transports that had carried them.
Had it… been a dream? Yet it had seemed so real. When had he fallen asleep?
Checking his waist, he noted the plasma pistol was still missing. So, the power armored warrior had been real, but what after that?
He looked over to where Sulla had been standing guard, but she was nowhere to be seen. He heard the thumping of boots on rockrete and looked over, watching as four of the black-armored soldiers sprinted off in one direction.
Just what had happened?
A portion of Tide's mind sent the four ODST's sprinting away, following an unusual and somewhat concerning anomaly he had noticed some time ago, but done nothing about just yet. Should he send the Spartan as well…?
No, not necessary, at least at this point. From what he could tell, the issue was a minor one, and the testing of the Faux-Mjolnir on the legitimate foes that still faced him was of greater priority. The four would be sufficient, he was sure.
Dozens of other such fireteams of his ODST's were being deployed throughout the battlefield as well. While he had withdrawn the vast majority of the attention he had previously been dedicating to this campaign, most of which had gone into that initial assault with the Spartan, and redistributed it to other tasks, he still had enough to control and devise tactics for his smaller units, rather than doing the headlong rushes and swarm charges the genestealers and their Tyranid masters seemed to prefer.
The genestealer counterattack had been expected, but Tide was more than a bit upset they'd gone after the Guard rather than his Puppets. He had prepared for such an attack, however, with pods like the one he'd sent up to infect the space hulk being readied in other hive cities, though these had been filled with Puppet soldiers.
To the minds of the Imperial Guard, the Neural Physics teleportation of those pods had appeared like Chimeras and other vehicles rushing to the front to deliver fresh soldiers. Though, to ensure he could focus on dealing with the genestealers quickly, he'd put them all to sleep temporarily, a simple matter, making their memory of the battle a quickly forgotten dream once he'd cleaned up a bit.
Well… almost all of them. One who had somehow avoided infection through a means Tide wasn't sure about just yet had stayed awake and would have seen the reality of the transports. That she had fled during the battle wasn't too surprising, disappearing into the many tunnels and corridors of Whiro, as seeing all that would have been… a lot for most people to handle. Hence the ODST's, who would bring her back and, perhaps, plant a small Flood infection form on her to allow for a more direct method of infection. He had some information on her past in Malum, mainly from those who'd known her, but nothing which would have granted some kind of resistance to the Flood. If she was immune because of some less obvious mutation, that was a concern and something to look into.
The genestealers would also have seen the reality, though he seriously doubted their Brood Mind would understand what had just occurred. Still, he wasn't happy to be showing more of his tricks if he could help it. However, if he hadn't acted when he did, some of the Guard might have died.
Many had been shot by stray bullets in the initial volleys, but those wounds had been easy enough to fix. Since he'd been pumping out spores, lots of the genestealers had started dying in scores as he waged wars inside their bodies as well as outside them, rendering the battle even easier. This had been a desperate attack, one to try and divert his forces, probably to make some kind of an opening, perhaps to mount further attacks or even an escape.
Instead of allowing that, he should probably add to their encirclement.
Speaking of, he should probably make sure none of them escape. Ever since the situation with the space hulk, he'd begun mass producing pods like the one he'd sent there for Neural Physical transit. They weren't strictly necessary, but he was less concerned about sending a pod with linked Flood forms through that could form a small proto-gravemind than he was sending individual units. If something did get lost in transit, the Flood forms at least wouldn't go completely feral. Probably.
Hopefully, nothing of the sort would ever happen. And, even more hopefully, if something like that did occur, another instance of Tide or even the same instance would be in control of said pod, rather than the Flood's inherent instincts taking over. There was the possibility that… something else might take over, but so far, Tide had not noticed any signs of the Primordial's presence within his Domain or any other entity exercising control over the Flood. Of course, if such a being was present, a true Precursor with far more experience could probably have hidden itself from him, right?
He set aside that disconcerting thought.
Part of him wondered what would happen if he sent something like a daemon somewhere via Neural Physics. He might test it one day… Then again, he might not. He didn't need any Warp entities discovering other universes beyond those already connected to the Empyrean, let alone being exposed to the whole of the multiverse.
He'd had a few dozen readied with Puppet soldiers, but the majority just had regular Flood forms. He'd rather not just drop them into the middle of genestealer forces in his version of a deepstrike, since he was testing his Puppet soldiers and their equipment for the moment. Instead…
In the depths of Malum, hundreds of pods, the bulk of his reserve, loosed their grip upon this universe, slipping through gaps like serpents sliding from shed skin. Then, like water bubbling from a creek, they were back. This time, however, they ringed the whole of Whiro, landing just outside their walls with quiet thuds, their occupants rushing out, breaking apart and becoming swarms of tiny, insect-like bodies that formed a long, circular river of glistening bodies and scuttling legs.
There would be no running from this battle.
The woman who was called Sulla moved at a pace that would not have been impossible for an ordinary human of her build, if difficult to sustain, through Whiro's tunnels and corridors. Where genestealers moved, she hid or struck when she could not leave them for whoever was following her, then continued on her way, never lingering for a moment more than she had too.
As she came to a fork in her path, however, she reached into a hidden pocket and withdrew a small humming device. It was a chain of finely wrought gold, each link no larger than a fingernail, their surfaces covered in the words of prayers. Hanging from it was a silver crystal that glowed with witch-light. It shifted in the empty air, turning and pointing to the right. Without hesitation, she stored the device back where it had come from and continued onwards, following its given directions.
Whatever had happened back there, in the battle, was dangerous. Hundreds of Guardsmen collapsing into unconsciousness while strange cylinders filled with soldiers teleported in via methods unknown to her and filled with mere PDF troopers who fought almost as well as Tempestus Scions. Initially, she'd intended to go along with the Guard as they moved further into the city, only slipping away when it would be more convenient. That incident had proven to her that could endanger her mission.
She paused midstep, going as still as a statue in the darkness of the corridor, where no human eyes could have seen without aid. Then, as silent as a ghost, she crept to the wall, fitting herself into a small gap a normal person would have struggled to fit into.
Dozens of footfalls could be heard moments later, thumping along the rockrete, as nearly twenty genestealer cultists half-marched, half-ran down the corridor, lit only by the glow-globes they carried, directed forwards. They completely missed the Guardswoman hidden not a meter away from them as they passed her by, entirely unawares.
She did not move, even after they passed. Minutes went by.
The soft sound of clicking and a quiet, trill-like growl could be heard. Razor sharp claws tapped lightly against the rockrete and something smelled the air with deep breaths.
The purestrain genestealer roared and leapt at the concealed Guardswoman, four claws outstretched for her neck, only for her to bend into a masterful roll that carried her easily under the leaping creature. The purestrain slammed into the wall, its claws leaving deep gouges in the rockrete, whirling around in a moment.
In that moment, she'd already drawn and readied her lasgun, firing ineffective blasts straight into its face. The purestrain roared in annoyance as its eyes struggled with the flashes of powerful light in addition to the slight amount of pain they brought. It thrashed about with its claws blindly, its every movement easily avoided by the Guardswoman with movements like a dancer's.
Like a serpent, she circled around it without a sound, drawing a combat knife far sharper and stronger than one any infantryman and even most officers should have possessed. With practiced ease, she drove the blade into the neck of the genestealer, severing its spine with a lethal twist, sending the creature to the ground where it lay, twitching wildly, its limbs and claws flexing as it went through its death throes.
Turning and sheathing her knife in the same movement, she continued on towards her target.