The Astartes looked about the station, his expression unreadable behind the midnight hue of his helmet, his red eyes twinkling in the twilight of the sparse lighting surrounding him. Despite this, Artemis couldn't help but feel a careless animosity coming from the Night Lord. The humans around him were nothing in his eyes, yet he was still disgusted to be near them.
"You ruined our barricade," she found herself saying, rising up fully from behind her cover. Fearful eyes turned to her, each set asking silently if she was mad for saying such words to the thing before her.
The Astartes—Taresh, based on the identifier on his breastplate—turned to glance over his shoulder at the wreckage he had created, then back at her. "I could have your skull for speaking to me in such a way."
Adrenaline. Terror. Annoyance. All of it shot through Artemis's veins in that moment, electrifying her. Her legs begged her to run from this monster. She willed them to remain put and lifted her chin instead.
"Take it up with Pyotr."
Taresh did not scoff or call her on her challenge like she expected most of his kin would. No, instead he ignored her and turned so that his back was no longer facing the open entranceway.
"Neverborn are coming. Prepare yourselves," he said.
Tension grew again at those words. Artemis fumed at the lack of comfort in them, the way they simply made her men more terrified and less prepared. It was about as much as she could expect from an Astartes, however.
Something approached down the corridor in irregular and maladroit rhythms. The hall itself was occasionally illuminated by sudden and incomprehensible gouts of multi-colored light.
"Artemis," a voice said next to her. She turned to see Jep still crouched down behind their makeshift barrier, only his head peeking out to see what's beyond. "There… there's something I should– Something I want to tell you before–"
"Save it for later, Jep."
"There might not be a later."
Artemis looked into her friend's wide eyes. She placed a hand on his shoulder and gave him a smile that she didn't feel but that he needed. "Of course there will. I'll make sure of it."
He gaped at her for a moment, but then nodded as his expression resolved itself into something that almost looked… Well, manly. Artemis blinked, wondering what happened to the skittish boy she'd seen just moments ago.
He stopped being that person years ago, she realized. You just never wanted to see it.
Artemis let her eyes linger on Jep for a few more seconds before lifting her weapon and addressing everyone around her.
"No one dies without my permission!" she roared. A round of grim cheers were given back to her in response. The Night Lord standing with them gave no indication he had even heard them as he lifted his boltgun and immediately began firing into the darkness.
Not a heartbeat later, three creatures spewing fire and death leapt into the chamber.
Ajax did not have much of a plan in dealing with the daemon aboard its flying disk; the nails would not let him formulate one. They shunned such thoughts, punished deliberation. They only rewarded action, the immediate gratification of violence.
So he charged.
Dimly, the berzerker heard something calling out to him, pleading with meek insignificance. His remaining cognition belonged to the threat in front of him. Its tongue lolled from its mouth, sliding along bladed teeth. It danced upon its disc and seemed to welcome the slash of Ajax's scythe before slipping out of reach at the final moment, chittering its mockery.
The daemon floated around behind Ajax. He swung again, the Neverborn zipped away and behind him once more. Ajax continued to flail in an attempt to kill the thing, to ease the throbbing in his head, but to no avail.
He suddenly felt pain spread from the joint between his chest piece and the armor of his left arm. Whirling around, he found the creature had drawn some form of curved, ceremonial dagger and had used it to pierce a chink in his ceramite. The blade dripped with dark, thick Astartes ichor.
"Blood for my god!" the thing giggled, then began to lap up the holy fluid with mocking fervor.
Ajax roared and charged again, receiving the same result once more. The daemon on its platform flittered out of reach, only for Ajax to suddenly feel pain blossom along the back of his leg. He turned and swung, blood dripped from his brow. He tried again, this time his abdomen. Again, now his knee.
The game continued, each wound driving him further into insensate rage that could process no more than the weapon in his hands and the damnable thing causing him such misery.
Occasionally, Ajax heard a crack of something, followed by the daemon bobbing erratically on its disc, as if in evasion. He paid it no heed. It had no bearing on his needs as of this moment.
"Dance, dance, dance!" the thing jeered after yet another round of Ajax wildly swinging his scythe, but having nothing to show for it but another slash across the face.
The daemon spun behind Ajax yet again, but, this time, the berzerker had enough fluidity within his mind to decide to lunge forward and spin to look at his enemy rather than thoughtlessly strike. Unfortunately, this seemed to be exactly what the creature had been expecting.
Atop its flying disc, the herald pointed its stave directly at Ajax, its end crackling with Warp-lightning that fluctuated with a multitude of colors never seen before by the eyes of men.
The berzerker felt something crash into his side, taking him off of his feet just as the lightning grew to unfathomable heights and was released. Where Ajax had been standing moments ago was instead a pillar of jagged metal, undefinable fluids, and blinking eyes. A figure in a skull-painted faceplate laid atop him and was currently grappling Ajax. The nails urged him to struggle and bash the figure's head into the decking until it crushed and flattened underhand, but he stayed himself as recognition slowly blossomed into him.
"Get off me," Ajax barked, shoving Gyrthemar away. The Night Lord relented and did so. It was at that moment that Ajax realized that his companion had tackled him behind a nearby section of wall paneling and the daemon likely was unable to see them. It may not even know that he was alive.
"You're welcome. Again." Gyrthemar said as he pressed his back up against the wall. Ajax mimicked the action with an annoyed grunt. "We need a better plan than whatever that was."
Ajax agreed. The nails still gnawed and gnashed, but now that he was out of the line of fire he could at least somewhat make rational decisions again. "Like what?"
The Night Lord turned and looked at him. "I was hoping you would have some ideas."
Ajax resisted the urge to grab the wings of Gyrthemar's helmet and use them to slam his head into the side of the wall until the legionnaire found some sense, or quit breathing altogether—whichever came first. Instead, the Eater of Worlds glanced around the corner of the wall to see the minion of the Changer of Ways flashing through the air to antagonize other Astartes.
Frowning, the berzerker watched it and thought. Slowly.
It didn't chase after them, implying it did now believe Ajax dead. He wanted to believe that a good thing, but instead only felt irritation at how meaningless it was. What did it matter what it thought if he wasn't able to even touch the damn thing? It was like he was fighting mist. The daemon was too quick, too crafty. It outthought and outplayed him at every turn during their encounter. He couldn't best it by being direct, especially without his god lending him any strength. Trickery was not defeated with blunt instruments. It required a finer, mirrored touch.
"This is like fighting you again," Ajax grumbled. "Only worse."
"Hmph, do not sell me so short. I am far more competent than this thing."
A tick of pain and annoyance sprung into Ajax's skull. He almost retorted, almost reminded Gyrthemar just what he thought of the Night Lord's "competence." Almost.
Slowly, the World Eater turned and looked at his compatriot, his expression morphing into something that felt uncomfortable to him. "That is our solution."
"What is?"
The discomfort grew as Ajax felt the edges of his lips strain backwards, the skin cracking like disturbed stone. "Tell me, Night Lord. How would you fight yourself?"
The irony was not lost on Pyotr.
He and Retrigan thundered down the dark corridors of the Savory Wound as a high-frequency whine echoed behind them, rapidly growing closer.
"Enemies are imminently approaching," Curie said from her position of being unceremoniously slung over Pyotr's shoulder. The techpriest had not complained when the lord discordant had insisted on the method of transportation. She had logically pointed out that she lacked the motorics augments to adequately match the pace of an Astartes in flight. That did not make the situation any less irritating, however.
"I can hear that, adept."
"Contact will be made in twenty… nineteen… eighteen…"
Pyotr glanced at Retrigan, who shook his head as they continued running alongside one another. "Do not look to me, brother. She belongs to your little cult, that makes her your responsibility."
He did not provide correction in regards to the misunderstanding of the branches and powers that belonged to Pyotr's "little cult." There would be little point in doing so.
"…sixteen… fifteen… fourteen…"
In accordance with Curie's continued countdown, the screeching grew progressively louder in an obtrusive chorus as a pack of Chaos spawn streaked through the air in animalistic pursuit after their prey. The noise reminded Pyotr of his initial thought.
Yes, he was quite aware of the sardonic parallel between him, a hunter in the dark who once had fantasies of flight as a child, and Retrigan, a marine cut from the same cloth who still longed for the skies, running in a desperate attempt at self-preservation from flying beasts of change and lies. He saw no humor in the situation himself, but was more than aware when the galaxy was seeking out its own forms of amusement at the expense of others.
"…twelve… eleven… ten…"
The shrieks reverberated through Pyotr's skull and caused his teeth to vibrate. He watched as several of the slaves also fleeing through the corridor collapsed to their knees and brought their hands up to their ears as they cried out in pain at the noise.
"We need to get out of this corridor!" Retrigan shouted over the din.
"Ineffective. Daemonological archives suggest this variety is capable of burrowing through solid metal at rapid rates. Cowering in a different room would do very little to improve our situation." Curie said, her vocabulator somehow speaking the words at the same time as her continued countdown. The end result was a distorted mess of sounds that was barely comprehensible.
Retrigan eyed Pyotr as if what she had said was his fault. "Fighting it is, then."
"…five… four… three…"
Pyotr looked over his shoulder. "That does not seem advisable either."
At least fifty Neverborn with ray-like bodies streamed through the air in a hunting party dedicated to running down the fleeing Astartes. Occasionally, Pyotr watched as one of the howling beasts deviated from their path, swooping down to attack and eviscerate one of the collapsed humans, but these strikes took less than a moment before the Warp-spawned predators flitted back up into the air, never having lost momentum, and rejoined the bulk of the pack.
"…Null. Hostiles abound." If Curie was concerned in regards to the nearness of her own death, she did not show it.
"Damn this!" Despite the futility of it, Retrigan repositioned to face the oncoming swarm as he ran, stretching his bolter to the side so that he could fire into the mass of spines, eyes, and wings. Pyotr saw little point. They were dead either way.
"Processing," Curie said, her oculars flashing blue and green. "Incomplete variables… Running inaccurate chronometer by a factor of point-null-null-null-three percent through twelve-point-nine-seven-eight-six percent. Twenty-four… twenty-three… twenty-two…"
"She's counting again?" Retrigan barked incredulously.
"Obviously," Pyotr said, but reached for his bolt pistol and began firing at the daemons.
"For what purpose?"
"I don't know…" Pyotr furrowed his brow. The mind of a techpriest was something esoteric beyond his capacity to unravel. This new countdown could have been any number of idle interests or terror responses that varied from anticipating the arrival of further enemies to the ship's next plumbing cycle.
The leading screamers swept down through the air towards them. Together, Retrigan and Pyotr managed to hammer enough bolter fire into one to cause it to dissipate, but the other two were still able to dive through the air and score compromising breaches in their ceramite, exposing flesh and armor cabling.
"…Nineteen… eighteen… sixteen…"
"I'm not above using your corpse as a shield!" Retrigan called, dropping his bolter and letting the lightning claws spring eagerly from their sheaths and begin arcing with power. No sooner had he done so did another daemon come diving towards him, resulting in his blades tearing into its immaterial hide and fading into nothingness.
"To what end? An extra two seconds of breath?"
"That is all I would need to curse your name."
Pyotr shrugged Curie on his shoulder as a meager effort to reposition her so that he could reach for his chainglaive. Activating the motor, he swung and carved a gash into the nearest screamer, causing its shrill cries to rise an octave and flounder in the air for a moment before falling back. Five others took its place.
I should not have sent Tzimiti off on its own, Pyotr thought with a mental sigh of exhaustion.
"Thirteen… twelve… eleven…"
The lord discordant watched as the heart of the pack surged forward to meet them and began to glide and descend down towards them in the dozens. It would take less than the length of a thought for them to shred the armor from his body, the flesh from his bones, and the life from his corpse. It would be over before he even finished blinking.
Pyotr tried to muster outrage in that moment. He tried to summon some form of anger or fury at the fact that all of his efforts, all of his planning to save his warband, was going to be undone due to a capricious machine error.
He could not. Even in death, his tormentor would not even grant him that mercy.
"…Nine… eight… seven…"
Retrigan turned to face Pyotr one final time as the lord discordant stopped in his tracks and awaited oblivion. He heard the once-raptor say something to him, but could not comprehend the words themselves as the screams became impossibly loud.
"Six… five… four…"
The first six screamers came upon him, howling into the darkness, their lamprey fangs open and poised in anticipation. Five meters. Four meters. Three. Two.
One.
The contact never came. Pyotr watched as, moments before teeth met ceramite, they flickered into nonexistence. As if they were never there.
The rest of the horde continued surging forward in an attempt to maul Pyotr, but, one after another, they vanished as well. Soon enough, the Night Lords' odds went from insurmountable to plausible as the Neverborn continued to naturally dwindle.
"Three– Processing. Realspace has begun to exert itself on these hostiles, thus banishing them. Mmm, disappointing. Calculations were off by a factor of–"
Curie did not finish her sentence as it was replaced in her vocabulator with irate binharic emissions as Pyotr roughly and "accidentally" swiveled his body so that her head bounced off the nearest wall. He then turned and nodded to Retrigan. The once-raptor nodded back, the relief obvious in his posture.
"Are we standing or running?" he asked.
"What do you think?"
The two locked eyes, then turned and fled from the fading daemons.
Gyrthemar wasn't much like his brothers. He was not crafty and conniving like they were—at least, not in the same way.
While they planned and made long-term schemes, he had always lacked the ability to see so far into the future. No, he emphasized a different aspect of their father's cunning instead: The ability to think on his feet.
Gyrthemar was a man of inelegant solutions. He knew how to stamp out problems whenever they arose while his brothers tended to try and ensure those problems never occurred in the first place. This did not bother him. They could belittle him for lacking intelligence all they wanted, but they couldn't account for every eventuality, and, when that inevitably happened, that was when he was at the height of his glory.
Very few of those times involved him serving as bait, however. Deliberately, at least.
Bolter fire sputtered from his gun towards the horror riding atop its disc, drawing its attention. The daemon dodged the blasts easily enough, only one shot having clipped the edge of its floating platform. The contact rattled the daemon to the side, but it swiftly regained control with abnormal grace.
"The bat and I will play," the daemon said with glee, "while the dead dog sleeps away!"
Gyrthemar rolled as a blast of Warp-magic emerged from the Neverborn's stave, narrowly avoiding… whatever such arcana might have done to him.
The dead dog sleeps away… the warrior mused. He hoped that meant Ajax. Daemons of the Changer of Ways had an uncanny intellect—but that didn't mean they couldn't be fooled.
Gyrthemar rose to his feet and began sprinting along the edge of the chamber, firing at his enemy all the while. The daemon began to zip towards him, cackling and firing bolt after bolt at him. Twice Gyrthemar registered the sizzling of Warp-energy on the back of his armored neck through his internal systems and prayed to the ghost of the Night Haunter that his battle plate hadn't been hit.
The horror was wholly devoted to him now. Other Astartes in the training grounds continued vanquishing the hordes of Neverborn that crashed upon them, though there were obvious signs of progress now.
"You jabber better than you shoot!" Gyrthemar shouted to his enemy. He wasn't sure how well taunts worked on daemons, but he wasn't about to start going against his natural instincts.
"A riddle that's new! What bleeds blue and has a spine with no glue? You!"
Not a very good riddle, Gyrthemar thought off-handedly as the disc swept directly towards him. He smiled beneath his helm and rolled under it, springing to his feet and firing into the daemon's back. The creature instinctively dodged, but spun to face Gyrthemar again, who quickly began to step backwards.
Almost there, he thought, trying to not look at the shadow edging along the wall of the chamber. Just a little more time…
Gyrthemar continued to backpedal into position. It was a slow process due to how often he had to dodge or take cover behind a twisted section of metal or bodies to avoid yet another arcane blast. Behind his eye lenses, he risked a quick glance to the side and saw Ajax in position behind the agreed upon cluster of floor slabs that had mutated into sloped spires of spongy, bonelike protrusions. The Night Lord could see the impatience contorted across the berzerker's face, along with the saliva dripping from his clenched teeth.
Keep those damn nails under control for a few more seconds! Gyrthemar willed, and was rewarded as his compatriot held off his bloodlust just long enough for Gyrthemar to fall back enough to get their target into position. Ajax then charged the daemon—thankfully without some barbaric roar that announced his presence.
The Night Lord continued firing at their enemy to distract it as the berzerker thundered towards it. The Neverborn noticed him then, but it was already too late. Ajax sprung into the air, his scythe raised to strike the daemon down the middle. It didn't bother attempting to dodge, as there would be no point. The daemon's unnatural instincts would do little more than allow it to watch its demise coming.
Gyrthemar watched, anticipating the fatal strike as the power weapon fell like an executioner's blade. Glass shattered instead.
Reality became shards, which became fragments, which became splinters that continued to spiral outwards. Each section reflected the same moment, only a little different, a little off. Truth fell into flux as the broken faces of time shifted, then reknit themselves into a new tapestry.
Things had changed. The daemon was suddenly now just far enough away to react. It raised its still-glowing stave and leveled it at Ajax. There was a sizzle of released psychic energy, then a bellow of pain. Ajax collapsed onto the deck.
"Damn," Gyrthemar hissed and sent a barrage of shots at the daemon. It carelessly twirled out of the way and faced the Night Lord once again with grinning fangs.
"Into death, into light," the daemon cackled, as if that were supposed to mean something. It raised its stave once more, pointing it directly at Gyrthemar who was now out in the open and no longer had any cover to use.
"Mate with dogs, filth," Gyrthemar spat, though he wasn't sure if the daemon would take it as an insult or a genuine suggestion.
The herald cackled again but stopped abruptly as it watched its arm flicker momentarily, the magic from its stave fluttering, as well. "What is this?" It turned rapidly in all directions, additional eyes sprouting from its hide, each rolling frantically to see the chamber at every angle as the pink and blue horrors littered throughout began to flicker and vanish into nothingness at an escalating rate. "No! Not done! Not done! More fun to be had! More secrets to learn!"
Gyrthemar raised his bolter and fired at the screaming creature as it continued to flicker and shift in and out of existence. It attempted to dodge, but the rounds exploding across its disc forced the daemon to buck free and land on the decking, its stave clattering out of reach. The Night Lord approached the sniveling daemon that was still muttering in desperation.
"I will tell you a secret," Gyrthemar said quietly. The daemon looked up to him with an almost hopeful expression. Gyrthemar smiled ruefully beneath his helm before lifting his boltgun. He fired once and his foe was banished back to the Immaterium.
Quiet fell over the chamber then as the remaining horrors either vanished or were slain. The warrior heard ragged breathing coming from behind him.
Gyrthemar quickly turned and traced the noise to a body in red ceramite lying on the deck. Stepping up to it, he found Ajax of the Carnage Stitchers alive, but only just. Blood pooled on the deck beneath him and barbed spines shot out from his armor at curved angles, each dripping with dark fluid.
"There you are, brother," Ajax said, his voice softer than it had ever been. He single eye stared into the middle distance as he wheezed.
"It is not one of your brothers, Ajax. It is only me." The Night Lord dropped to one knee beside his companion.
"I know damn well who I'm talking to, Night Lord," Ajax snapped, his vision focusing on Gyrthemar. His expression was pained, but softened marginally as their gaze met. "I was wrong about you. You fought by my side when my kin and yours would have likely left me for dead, too focused on themselves or the joy of bloodshed. You saved me twice in a single battle alone." Blood bubbled from between the berzerker's lips. "Though, I would have appreciated a third."
"You speak as if you're already dead."
"That is because I am," Ajax said with finality. With a twitching, yet somehow still firm hand, he grabbed onto Gyrthemar's vambrace. "I would be honored to call you my battle-brother, Gyrthemar. By deed if not by blood."
Gyrthemar looked down at the crimson gauntlet for a moment, then nodded. He locked forearms with Ajax and met his eyes. "Understood, brother. You fought well."
The Carnage Stitcher's wheezing grew stronger as his breathing became more labored. He released Gyrthemar's armor and began to fumble at his waist. When his shaking hand rose again, it was holding his chain flail. "Take it," he said, "while it is a gift. Before I am gone and it becomes cursed."
Gyrthemar only hesitated a moment before accepting the weapon. He looked it over, noting that it bore no recent use. Ajax had not drawn it once against the swarms of daemons. "It will taste the blood of many more yet to come, brother. I promise." But when he looked back, Ajax was already gone.
The Night Lord stared at the still body in silence for several moments. Then he reached down and collected something else from his dead brother's waist and rose to his feet. He began to step away to leave the chamber, but looked back one final time at the World Eater.
"The pain is gone. Sleep well, my friend."
Artemis had not been expecting many of the things she was experiencing to happen today. Chief among them was watching an Astartes wrestle a daemon.
The Neverborn were strange entities with trunk-like bodies that lacked limbs or even heads. Instead they simply possessed mawed orifices that belched torrents of fire that weren't actually fire. As a result, they did not move or walk, but instead bound from place to place in a manner that Artemis found difficult to wrap her mind around.
After the first initial leap upon entering the station, Taresh had slapped his bolter back onto his thigh and promptly tackled the nearest daemon, grappling it to the ground and twisting it so that none of its mouths could gnash at or eject flame onto him. He then proceeded to draw the gladius from his boot and begin driving it repeatedly into its uncanny flesh.
She'd half expected the other two to descend upon him in that moment and begin torching the marine alive. Instead, they lept deeper into the chamber and began spouting their iridescent flames across the room. Artemis watched as the fire curled around corners and barricades as if they weren't even there. She even thought for a moment that she saw the fires go through the solid materials.
Screams echoed and bounced off the walls and Artemis watched as some of the flames licked at the lower body of a crewman. Everything beneath his torso immediately crystallized and he collapsed in a shriek of terror at legs that would no longer obey him.
For every stunned and frightened worker, however, there were just as many who had begun fighting back. Proper, orange fire from flamers roared and bit at the daemons, lascutter beams seared into their enlarged bodies, explosion-propelled nail guns punctured and ripped through their mass, and waves of heat from melta-cutters caused Chaotic skin to slop off like liquified plastic.
It wasn't enough.
Despite all the damage and punishment they were doing, the daemons weren't slowing and continued the onslaught of colorful blazes.
"No…" Artemis whispered as she watched the fires roar and the heat rise. She'd tried so hard. Too hard. They couldn't die now. She couldn't accept that.
The headache that still nestled in the back of her mind burned brighter at her anguish. A scream rose up from her right and she turned to see the man from earlier, Kim, on his back and desperately scuttling away from one of the daemons, his weapon missing.
"What are you karking doing?" Brelja shouted from next to her. Artemis hadn't realized she'd been moving toward Kim, the daemon looming over him, several of its mouths beginning to glow with building fire.
She couldn't stop herself. Artemis dashed out from behind her cover and sprinted to the cowering man. Logically, she knew this was stupid, that she'd only get there in time for the both of them to die instead of just him. It didn't matter. She had to try.
Artemis dove and landed on top of Kim, her back to the daemon in a futile effort to protect him from the flames. She squeezed her eyes tight and awaited death. It never came.
Tentatively, the bridge officer opened her eyes and found the two of them… not where they had been previously. Had she somehow pushed the two of them out of the way in her dive? Artemis frowned. No, when she looked to the side they were well over five meters from where the daemon currently stood. How was that possible?
"What… What just happened?" Kim asked, echoing her thoughts. She suddenly felt exhausted and her headache spiked even higher, once again being dragged to the forefront of her mind.
The daemon didn't seem particularly confused or disappointed by the disappearance of its prey. It instead focused on a different set of workers using one of their fortifications for cover and began gushing forth a new wave of Warp-fire. Artemis's breath caught as she expected to see the unnatural flames destroy the small group completely, but was surprised to instead witness the broiling torrent being stopped by the blockade. The multicolored fire did not curl around or ignore the cover like it had before. It instead behaved almost normally.
How? She wondered, feeling the throbbing in her mind spike again as she stared into the bright and burning light. Had the daemon become weaker somehow?
There wasn't any time to consider it as she grabbed Kim by the collar and began dragging him back behind the barricade she had been behind with Jep and Brelja.
"You're alive?" Brelja said, raising her eyebrows. She obviously hadn't seen whatever had occurred with Artemis and Kim over all the stimulation of the battle.
"Feels like it," Artemis responded. She turned to Jep. He was staring at her with an unreadable expression. "I think they're getting weaker, somehow."
"What?"
"That fire, or whatever it is they use, it's not as effective as it was earlier."
Brelja frowned in consideration and Artemis poked her head up over the barricade. She saw utter bedlam still. The workers were doing very little against their enemy other than drawing attention to themselves. She watched as a woman took a full gout of flames directly. Artemis fully expected the fuel-loader to be dead from such a blast, but when the flames cleared, the woman was only sporting a few minor horned growths from her joints. She seemed just as surprised to be alive as Artemis was.
Then she saw the daemon fuzz for a moment. It was almost imperceptible, but… but it almost seemed like the thing became translucent and immaterial before snapping back into existence.
"They are getting weaker…" Artemis whispered.
"What was that?" Kim asked nervously.
Artemis looked to him, then abruptly stood. "All crew! Take cover, evade, and do not engage!" she shouted.
"What?" Brelja looked to Artemis as if she'd grown a second head. "Are you karking serious, girl?"
"Yes."
Jep chewed on his lip as he surveyed the chamber, as well. Something seemed to click in his mind too as he watched Taresh finish knifing his enemy to death—or however being killed worked for Neverborn—and begin trudging towards the next daemon, which had also started to flicker.
"We… We don't have to beat them, just out-last them," he said slowly.
Artemis nodded in agreement, shouting out her command again. Most of the crew listened, but there were a few who were either too focused to hear her or disagreed with the order outright. A small squad of men and women with their makeshift flamers huddled together and advanced on the daemon that Taresh wasn't busying himself with.
"Shit," she hissed, then left her position for a second time.
"You've got Astartes sized balls, girl! I'll give you that!" Brelja scoffed but had notably listened to Artemis and stayed behind cover.
"Hey!" Artemis shouted at the daemon, raising her nail gun and firing into it. It ignored her and continued to ready its flames against the group that had advanced on it. "HEY!" Artemis repeated, trying her best to project as much authority into her voice as she could muster as she fired another volley. The additional strain made her headache throb even more. Why was she so damn tired all of the sudden?
The daemon twitched, then its thrumming form flowed in a way that it was now facing her. Artemis couldn't even begin to conceptualize what she'd just watched before the daemon flung itself in the air and landed directly in front of her. She stood before it defiantly as its mouthy protrusions began to glow with blue, magenta, and orange light. It shuddered, its form slowly growing more transparent.
"Enough with you," Artemis snarled and fired one final nail. Perhaps it was coincidental timing, perhaps it was far more injured than it appeared, but the nail connected and the creature buffed into a shower of mist. She stifled her sigh of utter relief and tried to grapple control over her hammering heart.
That should not have worked.
Silence fell over the fuel-loading station and Artemis turned to see that Taresh had vanquished his second enemy—or perhaps it vanished on its own, she wasn't sure. Regardless, it didn't matter.
They were safe.
Abrupt cheers rose from the shaken workers turned soldiers, their cries echoing throughout the chamber. That was when Artemis noticed something else.
There were no corpses.
Her breath caught. Yes, there had been injuries and odd mutations—some benign while others severe—she could see that much. But not a single man or woman had died.
It took all of her will not to collapse and sob in joy at that knowledge.
"We… did it," Jep said, who was once again beside her along with Brelja and Kim.
Artemis felt a warm hand jostle her shoulder. "What a kill that was! You've got something to be proud of there, girl!"
"Yeah…" Artemis said dully. She was still trying to overcome her denial of what had happened.
"I can't believe it!" Kim laughed joyously. "We're alive! We're actually alive! I mean, how could we not be with one of the gods on our side?"
"What," a voice like cannon fire hissed from across the room, "did you say?"
The clamor fell silent as Taresh, who had previously been making for the exit quietly, stopped in his tracks and turned to look directly at Kim.
"I'm… I'm sorry, my lord," Kim said, now trembling in fear once again. "I only meant to give thanks to–"
"No," Taresh drawled maliciously. "Repeat what it is you said."
"I… I…" Kim looked around with wide eyes for assistance that would not come. In that same moment, Taresh pulled the boltgun from his thigh and fired it once. By the time Artemis was able to react, blood had already splattered across her face and clothes and Kim's body had collapsed to the floor, headless.
"Never call us gods," Taresh said simply, then turned and walked into the darkness of the corridor.
Everyone stood in stunned silence for what felt like hours. Artemis could not think, she could not move. She couldn't even speak as she gaped at the body in horror. After everything they had just gone through…
Finally, someone stirred. It was a man with a balding head and leathery skin. He approached Artemis and her group, crouched down to lay a reverent hand on Kim's body. Then he rose and laid the same hand on her shoulder, followed by a quick nod. "I'm with you," he said quietly, then left.
As the man's form vanished through the entryway, he was soon replaced by another crewman who repeated the same gesture. Then another. And another. Soon enough, a line had formed to pay respects to their fallen friend and whisper gratitudes towards Artemis.
She took it all with a sad, consolitary expression. The face she portrayed was true, but she also couldn't help but feel a spark of glee at the turn of events.
By the end of it, over twenty people had approached and embraced her. It wasn't until the station was entirely empty that she allowed herself a small smile.
They were hers now.