The campaign had been ongoing for close to a year now, running Horus's patience dry even as he carved out swaths of Orks. He had finally made it to the tower where the Ork Warboss holed himself in. It was a massive collection of scrap metal the shouldn't have held together, but somehow the green-skins made it work.
Horus made it to the top of the tower, slaughtered the Ork horde before finally facing the Warboss, a massive creature with protruding fangs and sporting mechanical limbs in place of normal arms, one fitted with a massive claw and the other sported a machine gun.
"Waaaagh!" The Warboss roared and charged forward. Horus wasted no words and his blade cut into left mechanical claw, damaging the appendage enough to put it out of commission. The Ork raised his gun arm and unloaded a barrage of slug rounds that bounced off the Primarch's armor, not even staggering the man as he made another swipe with his sword.
"My Lord!" Abbadon's voice crackled over his helmet's communications channel. "Urgent news from the fleet!"
"I'm a little busy here," he responded ducking down as he charged the Warboss, avoiding the barrage as he made to slice off the remaining appendage.
"The Man of Iron has been located, and it's engaging the Blood Angels." His son continued. "Also, the Imperial Princess has arrived with reinforcements from Mars, the Ultramarines, and the White Scars."
"ALESIA IS HERE?!" Horus roared as his blade cut the Warboss in two, ending the leadership of the Orks in Ullanor. "Why is my sister here?"
"Unknown, my Lord. Lord Guilliman says she contacted him and Lord Kahn, claiming that the battle with the Man of Iron is a trap for you and Lords Lion and Sanguinius."
Horus froze in his steps, feeling icy dread creep down his spine. Something wasn't right. His brother Sanguinius had foresight and would have seen the possible trap. If that were a possibility, they would have known during their planning phase.
"Cultist activity has been reported by the Dark Angels." Loken reported as he and the rest of his close sons approached him, all clearly coming to a similar thought.
"Contact the Emperor immediately," he commanded. "That abominable intelligence must fall now!"
"I'm still surprised the Mechanicum was willing to assist in this," Alesia said aloud, standing with Malcador, Kithes and Konrad on the bridge of the battle cruiser the Fabricator General gladly loaned them along with an auxiliary fleet specialized in neutralizing Men of Iron. Navis Imperialrus officers exchanged reports, forwarded orders, and occasionally called out updates regarding the battle unfolding below them.
"It helps that you have a good friendship with several Tech Priests," Malcador pointed out as the Princess adjusted the collar of the ornamental chest piece she had been forced into, "and they believe you to be an extension of their Omnissiah's will."
"That and the fact there's a Man of Iron to dismantle as well," Konrad added, staying close to his sister.
Alesia tugged on her gloves, not at all used to wearing the attire she had been provided. Normally, she'd wear a uniform similar to a bridge officer, but this time Malcador presented her the ornate uniform adorned in pastel plant motifs, a matching cloak, and decorative wings.
"The Man of Iron is on the field and opening fire on ally forces," an officer called out, a human with a few cybernetic implants that connected to the computer console.
"Deploy the ground troops," the Admiral in command of the ship ordered. "Let the Mechanicum loose on it."
"What is the status of the Legions and my father?" Alesia inquired, approaching the holo display.
"The Blood Angels are engaging with the Man of Iron," another officer informed her. "The Dark Angels have split with a majority moving to assist the Blood Angels, while the rest are engaged with a cult faction. The Lunar Wolves and the Emperor's forces are also moving to flank the Man of Iron."
"Cult faction? I wasn't aware there were cultists in this sector," she noted, remembering no mention of any Chaos activity during this campaign in the lore. We may have created an alternative universe at this point. "And brother, stop trying to creep out Lord Malcador."
"How do you even know I'm trying?" He asked indignant. She just shot him a look that conveyed that she knew him too well.
"There's no point in arguing with your sister, my Lord," the Admiral said with a chuckle. "You'll never win that fight."
"Spoken like a brother, Admiral." Alesia said with a smirk.
"I have five sisters, my Lady. I speak from experience."
"You have my sympathy."
"Oh, I imagine you had it worse with eighteen brothers."
"Nekona got permission to make some of them her bitches if they didn't get back to work for a while. If anything, they gave my nanny many grey hairs for not letting her do her job while I was a baby."
The Admiral glanced at the glaring Konrad. "Was he one of them?"
"No, but he is currently my bitch for ruining one of my greenhouses."
"You are never going to let that go are you?" Her brother groaned.
"You've done it three separate times, brother. I'll hold it over your head until you've learned your lesson." Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Malcador stiffen, alert and alarmed by something.
The hairs on her neck stood and she spun around just has Konrad tackled her to the ground and she was blinded by a flash of light.
The bridge was in chaos, and Malcador was furious. They had not noticed the cultist until he threw a crystal at the Imperial Princess, yet Konrad was fast enough to get to her before the object could make contact with her. However, non of them anticipated the crystal to be a teleportation device that would steal both the Princess and Konrad in a flash of light.
The Custodian, Kithes, was quick to seize the traitor, breaking his legs to keep him from running. Malcador calmly walked up to the crazed man.
"What did you do to them?" He tone, while low, conveyed his fury. The man only looked him in the eye and let loose a manic induced laugh. Foam bubbled at the corners of his mouth, and Malcador knew they would get no answers from him.
"Glory to the Gods!" Were the final words the man crowed before his eyes rolled back and he died. While they didn't have much to go by, Malcador had a hunch where the two had been taken to.
"Alert the Dark Angel forces dealing with the cultist faction," he commanded, getting the attention of all officers on deck, "and inform the Emperor of this. Our priority is locating and rescuing the Princess and the Night Haunter."
Alesia's vision cleared and didn't think twice about pulling out her hidden knife. Konrad was covering her with his body, his eyes trained on the robed cultist surrounding them with spears pointed at them. They were in a vast cavern large enough to house a Man of Iron, with one towering over them in fact from the far side wall and covered with scaffolding as though it were freshly dug up.
This was bad. Konrad didn't have his power armor, but he wasn't the Night Haunter for nothing. Alesia, while inexperienced in battle, was no slouch either; she'd been trained by Sigismund after all!
"Well, this is unexpected," one of the cultists said, not at all phased by the situation at hand. That made her all the more concerned if they weren't scared of facing the Night Haunter. "Oh well, it's more blood to offer the Gods."
"Don't get cut," Konrad whispered to her, drawing her attention to the spears. She nearly cursed when she noticed the thin film coating the blades that were barely visible in the dim light.
"Be careful, brother," she whispered back and they sprung up.
Alesia knocked away a spear and dispatched it's owner in one stroke while acquiring the additional weapon. Using her new weapon, she managed to slay three more cultists and keeping other away from her. If she had a gun, she'd feel like a Commissar again.
Konrad had already gutted five and was throwing taunts at the cultist as he continued with his slaughter, not at all paying attention to the cuts he received. The burning sensation, however, did get his attention as his sister beheaded a foe trying to stab him from behind.
"Brother, your wounds!" She cried out in horror as the cuts began to steam and bubble.
"Quite the nasty poison, isn't it?" The cultist from earlier said in glee. "It was designed to incapacitate you, Princess. I wonder how it'll work on your siblings."
Alesia used her power to push all the cultist away from her and her brother before erecting a barrier around them. She touched one of the cuts and thought of how to get rid of the poison. She sensed this poison had spread far too quickly to be anything made my mortals.
"This is going to hurt, brother," she warned him, her eyes glowing, and she raised her hand up. Konrad stiffened, then screamed as the poison was ripped out in a stream of blood while the barrier faded due to her concentration being focused on the task before her. She gathered the poison into an orb and threw it at the cultists with a roar, "Eat your own poison!"
The orb hit one cultist and splashed on five other close to him, and they screamed, writhed in agony as their skin melted and exposed muscle and bone. While a horrifying sight, this wasn't the worst she'd seen in her lives.
Then, they heard it. An unnatural roar of something that should not exist in this reality. From the foot of the Man of Iron emerged a massive, red skinned demon Alesia recognized to be a Kohrnite daemon.
"Sister," Konrad pushed her behind him, putting himself between her and the monster locking onto them, "you need to run."
"What? I can't just leave you behind!" She tried to protest, but he shot her a look that told her he was dead serious and she needed to not argue.
"You're not ready for a foe of this caliber."
"You can have the Primarch, just leave the girl for us!" Another of the cultists called out and Konrad shoved her away.
"Go! Go!"
She had to remind herself that her brother was a Primarch, the Night Haunter in fact, and that he could handle this, but it was still hard for her to turn and run. Every fiber of her being screamed at her to stay and help her brother, yet her Commissar experience won with cold logic as Sebastian's words echoed in her head.
"Don't stay in a fight you know you can't win. Back off and look for other options."
Those words, spoken in private, went against the teachings beaten into her skull by her teachers, yet it was the reason why she had been a successful Commissar. She would go get reinforcements, she just needed to get past these cultists first.
Alesia turned and ran to a lit tunnel she thought might be the exit, and twenty cultists moved to stand in her way. Steeling herself, she slew one, then three, felling foe after foe with little difficulty. Then her luck ran out. Five charged her at once; two met their end while the remaining three landed blows on her. The poison immediately burned and she forced herself to push through the pain to slay her attackers. More and more cultists swarmed her, though they didn't harm her further, they managed to bind her in a tangle of rope and disarmed her.
"Quit squirming, girl," one of the cultists yelled as she withered and did her damnedest to break out of the ropes. The pain was becoming more intense as the poison spread through her blood, but she also had a plan.
Multiple cultists got close to her, trying to get a better handle on her, and that's when she sprung her trap. Geysers of poisoned blood sprayed the cultists around her while also burning the rope. What the hell was this concoction anyway?
She staggered, picking up a spear and swung at the remaining cultists approaching her only to be subdued due to sheer numbers and loss of blood from her stunt. Something metal clamped around her neck and she was jerked around, forced towards the Man of Iron. She gripped the device around her neck, struggled and kicked against her captors. They had managed to drag her to the scaffolding and up the ramps, leading her to the chest of the Man of Iron when the roars of the daemon ceased.
"ALESIA!" Konrad called out from below them.
"KONRAD! UP HERE!" She called back and received a fist to the face, still being draged to the machine.
Now that she was up close to it, Alesia could see this whole situation had to have been in the works for years. Where she guessed the power supply used to be was a chamber painted in crude runes of Chaos worshipers and chains and shackles to hold someone in there against their will. These cultists had been busy, and she was about to find out the end results if they got their way.
The scaffolding behind them bent and exploded into splinters as Konrad tore through the construct to get to his sister. He was battered, cover in gore, and clearly very, very pissed. Alesia kicked up her struggling and finally managed to yank the handle of the vice out of the cultist's grasp only to be tackled down and another five cultists grabbed the handle with other pointing spears at her. Her brother continued to tear through the enemy lines, quickly catching up them, but not fast enough.
She was inside the machine now, her wrists and ankles quickly shackled before the vice was released.
"Remember, she needs to stay alive," one of the faceless cultists said as another stepped forward with a clean dagger. "And using the spears would be foolish."
"A shame you wasted your brain power in service to slavers," she spat out. The dagger sunk into her shoulder and she cried out in pain as blood gushed from the open wound. The enemy quickly backed away and out of the machine, closing the chassis and sealing her inside to watch the runes around her and on the chains glow.
Her body burned as she felt her energy quickly drain. She screamed, straining against the chains with all her might. Gears whirred, systems booted up and she felt the Man of Iron begin to move.