WARHAMMER DOES NOT BELONG TO ME. MASS EFFECT DOES NOT BELONG TO ME. I'VE BEEN INFORMED THAT TRYING TO CREATE AN ENGINE POWERED BY THE TORMENTED PSYCHE OF THOUSANDS OF SACRIFICED SOULS IS ILLEGAL. APPARENTLY, THERE WAS ALREADY A PRECEDENT.
It's a good thing Shepard has faced galaxy-ending threats in the past, because she's got a little frame of reference for the shitstorm she's entered.
Star-Bound
Chapter 5
Cleanse
Abaddon the Despoiler, Warmaster of Chaos, leaned back in his command throne aboard the Vengeful Spirit. He made no outward sign of displeasure, but the Daemons that flitted through the ancient and corrupted warship could sense his fury. They reveled in it, but also knew to keep their distance from the Gods' mightiest mortal champion.
"Explain this to me," Abaddon said, his tone mild, almost casual. "I was promised that Vigilus would be consumed by the Warp. While we did not witness it happening, I know that the area that was safe for Imperial travel was diminished. Now, my sorcerers tell me that not only has all trace of our presence on the world vanished, but the Nachmund Gauntlet has become larger." The Talon of Horus dug deep into the arm of the Despoiler's throne as he loomed over those in his court. "Explain it to me. Now."
In the presence of most Chaos Marines that were steeped in the power of Chaos, it was difficult for mortals to breathe, let alone converse. For particularly blessed heretics, even other Chaos Marines found it difficult to resist their will.
Abaddon was no normal Chaos Lord. He had been among the mightiest Astartes of the Legions of old, and his power had grown considerably in the ten thousand years since the Horus Heresy. He had slain the mightiest champions of the Imperium, cowed Daemon Primarchs, and conquered every challenge the Dark Gods had thrown at him. His black Terminator armor was as imbued with power as his own body, and his weapons had tasted the blood of a Primarch and the Emperor Himself.
It was all that Deshamentus could to not to fall to his knees. The Word Bearer, one of the three Dark Apostles that had overseen the placement of the Noctilith Crowns on Vigilus, saw Abaddon as a fool for not accepting ascension into Daemonhood, but his arrogance failed him while in Abaddon's presence.
"Warmaster, I cannot," Deshamentus rasped as he knelt. He dared not look up at Abaddon, and instead stared at the deep crimson of his own armor. "The rituals were perfect. Even if the Imperial dogs had destroyed the Crowns, the corruption of the planet was inevitable. Nothing I know of could undo such power—not in such a short amount of time."
Abaddon gently tapped one finger against the other arm of his throne. The many Chaos Lords and their attendants knew that the Warmaster was in a foul mood, and hardly dared to breathe. In the silence, the tapping was deafening.
"My sorcerers and seers have heard whispers in the Warp," Abaddon said quietly, though his voice reached them all. "One word. A single word, spoken with fear and hatred; it was enough to cause Daemons to recoil. A name. Do you know it, Apostle?"
Deshamentus nodded; he had had his own visions since the withdrawal—none of them were willing to call it a retreat—from Vigilus. He had sacrificed a dozen slaves and the bones of a long-dead Aeldari to learn a single name, and the Daemon who had spoken it refused to treat with him since.
"Shepard," Abaddon said. "Whoever they are, they have become a most hated foe of Chaos. I believe it was this 'Shepard' who undid your efforts on Vigilus." He slowly shifted his gaze to the others in his court. "What would you suggest?"
Haarken Worldclaimer, Abaddon's faithful herald, stepped forward and sank to one knee. "Master, send me back to Vigilus. The weak-blooded Imperials dared to defy you; I shall remind them of their place in this universe, and punish them for their temerity."
Abaddon did not speak at first, and more than one Chaos Lord rolled his eyes. Haarken was a talented warrior, but he didn't bother hiding his devotion to the Warmaster; some thought he elevated Abaddon above even the gods. However, his quick statement, one made by Abaddon's own Black Legion, prevented any other lord from trying to curry his favor. The more paranoid of their number wondered if that had been Abaddon's goal all along.
"I would enjoy destroying that defiant little planet," Abaddon agreed, "but the energies that once corrupted the world now repel the energies of the Warp. Most of us would be slain before the Imperials fired a shot. My seers also sensed many ships arriving to reinforce Vigilus. Our own fleet is damaged, and those not sworn to me have split away to pursue their own goals." He nodded to himself, as he came to a decision. "The Nachmund Gauntlet is a lost cause, but there are other routes through the Great Rift that the Imperium uses to reach the far side of the galaxy. It is those routes that we will close, and when the Imperium has only one way to pass through the Rift, it will be they who are bottled up."
Deshamentus admitted that it was a good plan. Even if the Imperium had a place that Chaos could never touch, all the Warmaster had to do was keep them from getting out. The irony of using the same strategy that the Imperium had used at the Cadian Gate was not lost on him.
Still, he had to wonder: this 'Shepard' had done the impossible. What could they be doing now?
…
"You know, I'm starting to feel kind of lazy," Shepard commented as she walked down the seemingly endless gothic corridors.
"How so, Your Holiness?" Temperance Blaise asked.
Shepard shrugged. "I feel like I'm the only one who needs sleep. By the time I wake up, everyone else is already moving."
Blaise shook her head. "You are not lazy, Your Holiness. It appears that your sleep schedule is different than ours, and I have noticed that you are waking earlier every day."
Shepard conceded that point; she didn't really feel lazy, she just wanted some way to break the awed silence that Blaise held while around her. In truth, most of Shepard's waking hours were spent studying just how the Imperium worked, the many factions within it, and how best to interact with them. Each of them was so different that it was a wonder they ever got along. She was disappointed, but not surprised, to find that every single one of those factions had fought each other, and even themselves, at one point or another.
When she wasn't looking at general overviews, or studying historical records—which were heavily redacted or revised by the Inquisition—Shepard kept her skills sharp by helping the forces on Vigilus deal with the remaining threats. Chaos had been purged from the planet, but Orks and the Genestealers were still a threat. Shepard had taken the opportunity to work with each of the factions in some way—she fought alongside Space Marines in counter-ambushes, helped plan defenses with the Astra Militarum, and recovering captured technology with the Adeptus Mechanicus. She had also helped destroy several cultist strongpoints with the Order of Our Martyred Lady; the zealotry of the Sisters made her uncomfortable, but it was hard to argue the effectiveness of killing the hybrid monsters with waves of fire.
Zaeed would have liked them, Shepard thought as she and Blaise passed a group of Sisters. They would have killed him as soon as he opened his mouth, but he would have liked them.
A good deal of the forces she'd fought alongside had also volunteered to join her Crusade—Several regiments from Vigilus, the Order of Our Martyred Lady, a large element of Stygies VIII's forces, and an entire Chapter of Space Marines, the Necropolis Hawks. Those were just the forces already on Vigilus; several fleets were on their way to reinforce the vital world, but one of them was made up of forces sworn to her.
It bothered her that literally millions of people were volunteering for a war on the word of someone they'd never heard of, let alone met, until a few short months ago. True, it was nice to have so much support, and Shepard could appreciate the value of faith, but people were worshiping her. It was… unnerving.
"Is there anything out of the ordinary on my schedule today?" Shepard asked, getting down to business. Technically, she should have had an Administratum adept as her secretary, not an experienced leader like Blaise, but the Canoness Superior had earned a great deal of experience in organization during the war on Vigilus, and helped Shepard manage her busy schedule. Also, it earned her loyalty by having her in such a trusted position, even if both of them knew it was temporary.
"Chapter Master Zandtus requested your presence," Blaise said, careful to keep her tone neutral. Shepard had quickly realized that many within the Adepta Sororitas saw Space Marines as mutants, and barely tolerated their presence outside of battle. Blaise had fought alongside many different Chapters of Space Marines during the war, and had come to respect them, but her teachings still caused some internal conflict.
"Did he say why?"
"He did not," Blaise admitted. "But it is likely that he wants to request additional training exercises with other elements of the Crusade."
"Which is not a bad thing," Shepard reminded her. "We're all on the same side, and we should learn how to best combine our forces."
"As you say, Your Holiness." Both women paused when they felt a shudder pass through the tower. "What was that?"
Shepard grimaced. "If it's another bombing by the cults, I'm going to have words with our security. Hyperia was supposed to be secure by now!"
The two picked up the pace until they reached the Vigilus Senate. The room was less crowded than it had been months ago; with Chaos driven from the system, many of the Space Marines had left to pursue more critical objectives elsewhere. Calgar had left Lieutenant Eothrus and his demi-company of Ultramarines behind, along with several small forces from other Chapters, but with the entirety of their strength now based on Vigilus—and because their Chapter Master had the highest rank among Astartes—Raquilon Zandtus of the Necropolis Hawks had overall command of all Space Marines on the planet.
Zandtus was lean, for a Primaris Marine. His skin was unusually pale, and though less than two centuries old—young for a Space Marine—his close-cropped hair and beard were grey. Like all Necropolis Hawks, his armor was blue-grey, save for the white on his arms, shoulder, backpack, and the helmet that hung on his belt. His Chapter's symbol, a black hawk's head, was prominent on his left shoulder. He was leaning over a tactical display—specifically, a hologram of the tower. A small red dot blinked at the base, while dozens of green dots converged around it.
"What happened?" Shepard asked as she and Blaise entered the room.
Zandtus nodded in greeting, and then spoke; his voice was calm, and his face showed no signs of alarm. "A cult cell used a stolen Militarum transport to slip past checkpoints. It was filled with explosives, but its path was unscheduled, so it was targeted and destroyed."
Shepard's eyes narrowed. "Do we know where it came from?"
"We ran the ident-code the crew provided," Zandtus said. "Tempestor Prime Vils has already deployed a unit to investigate the base it was housed in."
"Could it be compromised?" During and after the war, pockets of Militarum forces had turned out to be cultists that had infiltrated the military. Some of them were still in hiding, and the sheer size of Vigilus' garrison made rooting them out extremely difficult. The idea had been put forth for every bald-headed man or woman in each regiment be taken aside for testing, but that had resulted in an entire regiment rising up, and not all of them were cultists. It had taken a full month to put them down.
"If it is, it is very close," Zandtus assured her. "We will be able to contain it quickly. Until then, we must maintain our efforts to hunt down the cult's Patriarch. Doing so will cripple them, at least long enough to identify the abominations and purge them."
"They probably have contingencies in place, in case we get close." Shepard scowled. "I hate dealing with enemies that actually use their brains."
She didn't voice it, but Shepard knew that the situation on Vigilus had been improving, even with most of the Space Marines gone now. Without the forces of Chaos around, the Imperials had been able to focus on eliminating the Genestealer Cults. It was slow, grid-by-grid work, but the cultists were being driven from one district after another. Small kill teams of Space Marines would hit the cultists in a way that would force them into the guns of the Astra Militarum or Adeptus Mechanicus, or the fire of the Order of Our Martyred Lady.
Shepard had been part of the strike forces, but she did less fighting than expected. The Imperium was slow to react to threats, but when it did, the soldiers who fought did so with remarkable competence. Granted, that was just the forces she'd seen; the Imperium had an incredible amount of variation among its different militaries, and some of them weren't suited to fighting certain enemies. Thankfully, the forces on Vigilus had been exposed to a wide variety of enemy tactics, and could react accordingly.
"Actually, how is the search for the Patriarch doing?" Shepard asked. "Even if we can't kill him, we could probably throw off the cult's plans if we force him to relocate."
"We're reasonably certain that he's in the Dirkden Hivesprawl," Zandtus said, and then raised an eyebrow at the nearest Magos. "Our Mechanicus friends gave an exact percentage, but I thought you would appreciate something that wasn't fifty numbers long."
"You would be right." Shepard inclined her head at Zandtus, silently asking permission. When she got it, she switched the tactical display to show the massive hive of Dirkden. "This is a huge place to search; how much of it is already done?"
"Approximately sixty-two percent," the Magos replied, his voice heavily synthesized as he stared at Zandtus. "You are not the only one who can appreciate short numbers in times of war."
Shepard bit her lip and looked away as she tried not to laugh. It wasn't that funny, but even her brief experiences with the Mechanicus had taught her that even attempts at humor from them were to be treasured.
"Thanks for that," she said. "I don't think we've been introduced?"
"Xem-Beta, Magos Dominus." The Magos dipped his head in greeting.
Even hunched over as he was, Xem-Beta was as tall as Zandtus. He wore the black robes of Stygies VIII, and had several extra mechanical limbs reaching around from his back. His legs were replaced by six thin limbs of gleaming metal, and he carried several weapons, including a long-hafted power axe. His mouth and nose were concealed by a mask dotted by tubes that disappeared into the darkness of his hood, and his eyes were replaced by green-lensed augmetics; the left eye was actually a trio of smaller lenses that constantly rotated one way and then another, clicking with every switch.
"Nice to meet you," Shepard said. "What kind of resources would we need to finish searching the rest of Dirkden?"
"There are many reinforcements that have arrived in-system," Xem-Beta reported. "It would be a simple matter to utilize them to supplement available forces."
"Flood the hive with friendly forces, give the cult nowhere to hide," Shepard said approvingly. "We can put them under the command of units that have already fought the cults. Manpower plus experience equals efficiency in my book."
"A crude mathematical formula, but not inaccurate," Xem-Beta admitted. "With your permission, I will begin sorting the logistics for such an operation."
Shepard had a feeling that he was only asking as a formality, and that he would do it regardless. Still, he wasn't actively circumventing her decisions; unless that happened, she had no problem letting people do their jobs without her oversight.
"When Vils gets back, I want him to set aside some of his troops," Shepard said. "When we find out where the Patriarch is, we'll hit that location with the Deltic Scorpions, the Hawks, and the Sororitas. Mechanicus forces will keep watch over the perimeter, in case something happens."
Zandtus, Blaise, and Xem-Beta all nodded. Hopefully, the three elite forces would hit hard enough, and fast enough, to cut the head off the beast.
"Is there anything else I should know about while I'm here?" Shepard asked.
"Nothing on a strategic level, Your Holiness," Blaise said. "However, I have been told that your armor is ready."
Shepard's eyes lit up. "Ooh, thanks! What about the weapon I commissioned?"
Blaise shook her head. "Our artificers are still crafting it to your specifications. Perhaps in a few more days."
"Darn. Still, I'd better go see if my new suit fits, so I should go."
"There is one more thing, Your Holiness," Blaise said, just as Shepard turned to leave. "There is someone who wishes to speak with you. Forgive my assumption, but I thought that you would want to see him again, so I sent him to the armory to wait for you."
Intrigued, Shepard left the senate building and headed for the arming chamber that had been set aside for her personal use. It bothered her practical nature, but the entire chamber was decorated with religious symbols, purity seals attached to the walls with red wax, and dotted with incense burners. Still, Shepard had no intention of creating enemies with the Ecclesiarchy, especially since they were some of her most powerful supporters.
Guarding the arming chamber was a living symbol of her Crusade. Rather than show favor to any one faction that was signing on with her, Shepard had asked for a mixed force. There were five each of Battle Sisters, Skitarii of Stygies VIII, Intercessors of the Necropolis Hawks, and Deltic Scorpions. Personally, Shepard thought that twenty elite soldiers was a little too much for what was essentially a personal armory, but the gesture had created a sense of unity among her elite forces.
Waiting for her was one more person, someone that Shepard hadn't seen or heard from since the tests to prove her sainthood. He was thinner than Shepard remembered, and a small Aquila tattoo now rested on his neck, but the young man was still recognizable.
"Hiral!" Shepard grinned and pulled the boy into a hug before he could try to kneel. "It's good to see you again!"
Hiral froze until Shepard released him, but at least he didn't bow. "It is good to see you as well, Saint Shepard."
Much like she had done with Eliza or David when she had been apart from them for long—even when her son had become Emperor—she gently spun the young man around to check if he was all right. She took a bit of enjoyment at how uncomfortable he became at her motherly actions.
"You seem okay," Shepard remarked. "The Inquisition held you a lot longer than I thought."
"I was captured by the Great Enemy," Hiral said with a shrug. "I don't fault them for being thorough, and once I was deemed free of any taint, I was treated well."
"Good to hear. Now, not that I'm unhappy to see you, but why are you here? I thought you'd be sent back to your regiment."
"I made a request, and I was permitted to ask you directly." Now, Hiral fell to one knee. "Saint Shepard, I would be honored if you accepted me into your Crusade. Whether it be as a soldier or a servant, I swear to give everything I have and more in service to the God-Emperor."
Shepard was quiet as she considered what Hiral had just said. She noticed that the non-Mechanicus elements of her guard seemed to approve of his words. Granted, she didn't know Hiral all that well, but he was the only slave to survive her uprising. On the one hand, he could be a rallying symbol of his own for surviving alongside her; on the other hand, he was barely out of his teens, and Shepard didn't want a dead child on her conscience.
"I won't lie, I've got more than enough soldiers right now," Shepard said. "Besides, if you really want to fight alongside me, I'm going to have you go through some serious training to get you up to snuff."
If she was being honest with herself, Shepard was hoping that the training he'd be put through would make him regret wanting to fight. Maybe then she could persuade him to take a non-combat role.
Hiral nodded. "As you command, Your Holiness."
There wasn't even a second of hesitation; she could see that he would charge into hell if she asked. She almost sighed; she should have known that would have happened.
"Until then…" Shepard shrugged. "I could use another aide, one that isn't commanding forces already. Can you handle a schedule, take messages, that kind of thing?"
"I believe I can, Your Holiness."
"All right." Shepard sighed. "See about getting a bunk somewhere, get some rest. I'll be running you ragged later. For now, I have a suit to try on."
Hiral made the sign of the Aquila, and then a Scion escorted him away. Shepard opened the door to the arming chamber and beheld her new armor.
It was exquisitely made, and reminded her of her first suit of plate armor when she was in the Empire. The differences included the back-mounted generator, and the other mechanical parts. The artificers had offered to paint the armor gold, like many other Living Saints, but Shepard had declined; instead, it was a brilliant silver, though the shoulders and breastplate were decorated with a golden Aquila. At the center of the decorations were polished pieces of blackstone, with another piece set into the back of each gauntlet. After her interactions with the blackstone Noctilith Crowns, and when she used it in conjunction with her powers against the Iron Warriors, Shepard wanted to keep some of it with her at all times while in combat.
While the weapon she'd commissioned was still being created, Shepard was making do with a chainsword she'd borrowed from the Deltic Scorpions. It wasn't something she was used to, but there was a satisfying element to the roaring weapon. She also still had the bolt pistol, though the artificer had added some gold filigree since the last time she'd used it.
"What is it with the Imperium and gold?" Shepard asked herself as the mechanical arms of the chamber began the process of assembling the armor around her body. It was a rather arduous process, with hymns sung from speakers the entire time. By the time it was over, however, Shepard couldn't help but grin. The power armor enhanced her already considerable strength—even when not using her Saint powers—to a such a level that she felt like she could fight a Krogan on equal footing.
After her armor was on, she holstered her bolt pistol and mag-locked the chainsword to her hip before leaving the arming chamber. The doors opened to reveal the Scions and Sororitas on their knees, while the Space Marines and Skitarii nodded in respect.
"I won't lie," Shepard said casually as she flexed her hands. "This is the best armor I've ever had." She noticed one of the Intercessors twitch his head, and she thought he might have laughed. "All right, everyone here can return to their duties. I'm going back to the Senate and see if we all can find some cultists to kill." She realized that she might have sounded a little too casual, and continued. "I'm eager to do the Emperor's work."
…
Chapter Master Zandtus wasn't as experienced as most non-Primaris Marines, but he had more than earned his position. His strategic capabilities, coupled with the experience of Temperance Blaise and Jonah Vils, and Xem-Beta's sheer computing power, made organizing tactical strikes almost easy.
Vigilus had had a strong garrison even before the opening of the Great Rift, and with the Nachmund Gauntlet's importance, it had only been strengthened. The many regiments stationed there had taken terrible losses during the War of Nightmares, but fresh troops and supplies were arriving by the day. More importantly for ridding the world of the Genestealer Cults, other ships were arriving with forces for the Shepard Crusade.
These forces, mainly Astra Militarum regiments and Mechanicus elements, were quickly placed under the command of Shepard's rapidly growing council of advisors. Though many of the troops were fresh, they were commanded by experienced leaders; between that and the numbers they brought to bear, Dirkden was cleared block by block.
Shepard understood the value of being a symbol, and made a point of being a part of major field operations. Her presence boosted morale, and soldiers fought with almost insane vigor; suicidal charges were only stopped when Shepard specifically said that she would rather have an army that could win a war, not a mountain of martyrs. Tempered by the intelligence of smarter officers and the direct command of a Living Saint, the soldiers began to fight with efficiency not usually seen by the hammer that was the Astra Militarum.
After almost three weeks of urban combat, Zandtus and the rest of Shepard's war council were confident that they had cornered the cult's Patriarch in the southernmost district of the Dirkden Hivesprawl. After looking over the holographic maps, Shepard agreed.
"We've moved our infantry to dug-in positions around the target location," Vils said. "Mechanicus forces are patrolling the sewers, in case the xenos try to escape through there."
"My sisters have been deployed to strategic checkpoints, both in the sewers and aboveground," Blaise continued. "If the foe tries to get through there, they will be met by holy fire."
"Once the perimeter is secure, strike teams from the Deltic Scorpions and my own Necropolis Hawks will enter and cut the head from the beast," Zandtus finished. "You are, of course, welcome to join us, Saint Shepard."
Shepard crossed her arms. "I don't like leaving things half-done, and I certainly don't like people fighting on my behalf."
"Very well," Zandtus said. "We move out in three hours."
…
Dirkden was overpopulated, even by the standards of a hive—that is, until the last few months. It had been discovered near the beginning of the war that most of the population was xenos hybrids, and since then, the Imperium had been conducting regular purges, slowly peeling apart the cult's defenses layer by layer. By the time the final operation was in place, billions were dead, and the pyres that burned away the bodies were fed every hour of every day.
Shepard stepped out of her Valkyrie, and immediately had to resist the urge to gag. The stench of overpopulation, pollution, and burning corpses was one of the fouler things she'd smelled in her life.
"Let's get this over with," she said. "Vils, lead the way."
The Tempestor Prime saluted, and led her to a gathering of Scions and Primaris Marines. There were a hundred of the former, and about fifty of the latter, led by their Chapter Master. Thirty of the Necropolis Hawks were Intercessors, the standard infantry of the Primaris Marines; they were armed with drum-fed auto bolt rifles, which were excellent for the close-up fighting that they would be doing. There was also a squad of Infiltrators and Reivers; both wore a variation of power armor that enhanced stealth and mobility, but didn't sacrifice protection. The Infiltrators were equipped with comms-disruption devices on their backpacks and gasmask-shaped helmets, and carried marksman bolt carbines, while the Reivers had heavy bolt pistols and knives as long as Shepard's arm. The Reivers were also rather terrifying in their skull-masked helms, and Shepard quickly realized that that was the point.
"Are we ready to go?" Shepard asked.
Zandtus nodded. "According to the Magos Dominus, we only have a two-kilometer area that needs to be searched."
Shepard chuckled. "You know, I'd say that two kilometers is pretty big, but then I remember that this is the Imperium, and nothing is ever done small."
"It would be difficult for us to move around if it wasn't," Zandtus said, and put on his own helmet.
Shepard gave him a delighted smile; true, the joke wasn't very funny, but most Space Marines she'd met had had no sense of humor, and the Necropolis Hawks were a breath of fresh air there.
"Let's finish this," she said, and followed the Space Marines into the darkness of the lower levels.
Thankfully, everyone was wearing a helmet that allowed for night vision, but it did nothing to alleviate the oppressive aura the sewers gave. Every step she took gave Shepard a stronger feeling of foreboding.
"You know, if all else fails, we could just level this entire area with explosives," Vils offered.
"If we do that, we might never find the Patriarch's body, and I don't know about you, but I don't think I'd feel good until I was sure he was dead." Shepard scowled behind her own helmet, a Sororitas design that felt like a knight's helm. "I've made that mistake before, and it cost me."
"The Saint is correct," Zandtus cut in. "Better to be absolutely sure that the abomination is dead."
"Understood, my lord," Vils said, not sounding offended in the slightest. "It was just an option."
They fell silent after that, and though less than an hour passed, Shepard felt like days had gone by. Finally, the Infiltrator squad, which had been scouting ahead, sent a quick message that they had spotted movement.
"My warriors and I will take point," Zandtus said in a tone that brooked no argument. "Tempestor Prime, your troops will cover our rear. Advance thirty seconds after we do."
Shepard's helm concealed her unimpressed glare, but she thought that Zandtus felt it. "I'm going with you."
There was a miniscule slump in the Chapter Master's shoulders that suggested he'd sighed, but he didn't argue. "As you wish."
Shepard drew her chainsword in her right hand, and her bolt pistol in her left. It had only been in recent weeks that she'd gotten used to fighting in such a manner again—after all, it had been decades since she'd fought like that when she'd been in the Empire—but now, she was confident.
"Engage!" Zandtus barked, and the Necropolis Hawks moved. Despite their bulk, they were incredibly fast, almost a blur as they rounded a corner and engaged the cultists trying to hold a chokepoint. In an instant, the sewers were filled with the deafening echoes of gunfire and screams.
By the time Shepard caught up with them, dozens of cultists were dead, killed by rapid-fire bolt shells, shredded by grenades, eviscerated by knives, or just crushed by fists and feet. In contrast, the worst any of the Space Marines suffered was some chipped paint on their armor. Shepard almost stopped mid-charge as she watched the Astartes work; their tactical efficiency left no movement wasted, and if one missed his shot, his brother would compensate and eliminate the target for him. It was almost beautiful.
Still, Shepard couldn't let herself get distracted in the middle of combat, so she rushed several of the remaining cultists. One's bulbous head exploded from a well-placed shot of her bolt pistol, and then she was among them, swinging her chainsword. The howling weapon carved into a cultist's belly, then her spine, and out the other side; Shepard was already shredding another cultist before the previous one's two halves hit the floor.
The entire battle took less than two minutes, and though the Scions arrived less than halfway through, there were so few targets left that they just held the perimeter until Shepard and the Necropolis Hawks were done.
"Well, that was… something," Shepard said as she shook gore from her chainsword; she ignored the blood that spattered her armor—she had been covered in worse in her career. She had never had the chance to work alongside the Space Marines before, though she had seen the results of their missions. They were efficient, but they were also some of the most brutal soldiers she'd ever seen.
"We'd best hurry," Zandtus said, his voice emerging from his vox-grille as a deep growl. "If the enemy did not know were here before, they do now."
The strike force moved at a faster pace, hoping to find the Patriarch before it tried to escape. Several times, they were ambushed by hordes of cultists as they swarmed out of tunnels and hidden entrances. Each time, they were beaten back by sustained bolter- and las-fire; a few of the assaults were fast, and the attackers melted back into the shadows, but the Imperials didn't pursue such obvious feints. In fact, as the attacks grew more vicious the further they went, it only convinced Shepard that they were going in the right direction.
The Imperials didn't emerge from these ambushes unscathed, though. A dozen Scions were dead, and several Hawks were injured; one Intercessor had even lost his arm, and carried his auto bolt rifle in one hand.
Eventually, they reached the innermost lair of the cult in a hollowed-out section under the sewers. The bones of previous generations of cultists made a macabre carpet that crunched with every footstep, and bloodstained trophies hung from rusty chains above them.
"Movement detected ahead," the Infiltrator squad's sergeant voxed from up ahead. "Large, open area, many targets—primary target located, Master Zandtus. There are several hundred of its underlings between us and it."
"Prepare to engage," Zandtus ordered. He pointed to the Reiver sergeant. "Syoll, join Sergeant Jintan up ahead. When the battle begins, both of your squads will strike at the right flank. Tempestor Prime, your forces will take the left and suppress the enemy there. The rest of us will punch through to the target. Move fast, and strike with fury."
On Zandtus' signal, they attacked; waiting for them were the hundreds of cultists and Genestealers that the Infiltrators had reported. More extreme varieties of cultists could be seen, including three-armed fighters with limbs that included crushing claws, and living swords. There were also hulking monsters that matched the Primaris Marines in mass, and carried enormous industrial tools as weapons.
Autogun rounds flew at the same time as bolt shells. The former pinged off advancing power armor, but the latter shredded the packed mass of screaming fanatics. On the right flank, the Infiltrators fired withering fusillades of pinpoint fire, covering the advance of the Reivers. The terror troops preceded their charge with disorienting grenades, allowing them an easy attack; their heavy bolt pistols and long knives reaped a bloody harvest as they fought through mobs of cultists.
Leading the charge, Zandtus tore his way through cultists. At first, he used his bolt rifle, but when he ran out of ammunition and had no time to reload, he switched to his power sword, a masterwork blade as long as a human leg. Moving at blinding speeds, he sliced apart a dozen Genestealers in as many seconds.
As impressive as the Necropolis Hawks were, the Deltic Scorpions were no less efficient. Their hot-shot lasguns left scores of corpses with hissing burns, while flamers, hot-shot volley guns, and meltaguns carved deep swathes through the waves of cultists.
And Shepard fought as hard as any of them. Her bolt pistol roared, blowing apart hybrid flesh with every shot. Her chainsword hewed heads from necks, and limbs from bodies; when she tapped into her power, the strength she employed caused bodies to explode with every chop or punch.
The cultists might have outnumbered them several times over, but the quality of the Imperial attackers was proving too much. It wasn't until the leaders of the cult stepped forward that the Imperials' momentum finally halted.
A man in ragged armor, carrying an organic sword in one of his three arms, charged into the Scions, at the head of a crowd of the more alien hybrids. Though they were met by a hail of fire, the hybrids' zealotry carried them through, and many Scions found themselves fighting in desperate hand-to-hand.
Seeing the Scorpions losing ground, Shepard flew over on her golden wings and landed in the middle of the hybrids. Now it was the cultists' turn to lose momentum as a glowing, winged woman crashed into them like an armed comet. As Shepard rampaged in their midst, the Scorpions reorganized and fired point-blank; in moments, even their leader fell, his head reduced to ash by Vils' plasma pistol.
On the other side of the chamber, a woman in robes and carrying an ornate staff strode towards the Reivers. She held out a hand, and purple lightning crackled around her eyes; a moment later, two of the Space Marines collapsed as their minds were destroyed by psychic power. The woman had barely turned to do it again when the Infiltrators focused all of their fire on her; even with a shield of psychic energy to protect her, the storm of bolt shells reduced her to streaks of gore after a few seconds.
A deafening roar shook the chamber as scores of Genestealers charged. Leading them was a monster that could only be the Patriarch; it had the same basic anatomy as a normal Genestealer, but this one was at least twice as large, with scythe-like talons on each limb, and an enlarged cranium that crackled with psychic power.
One squad of Intercessors was able to get a clear line of fire and unloaded everything they had at the onrushing horde. Some of the aliens fell, but for every one that died, two were able to dodge with impossible agility. The Infiltrators focused their attention on the Patriarch, Grandsire Wurm, but the shots that weren't stopped by a psychic barrier were blocked by Genestealers that willingly put themselves between their master and death.
"Focus all fire on the beast!" Zandtus roared, his vox-amplified voice audible even over the sound of battle.
With the Scions now free from close combat, Shepard flew up to the ceiling long enough for Vils to organize a crossfire between the Scions and the Necropolis Hawks. Many of the remaining cultists were slaughtered, along with a good number of the Genestealers, but the Patriarch was still unharmed. That needed to change.
Shepard pushed off from the ceiling and flew straight at Grandsire Wurm; with her powers active, her reflexes were sharper than they'd ever been, but the Patriarch was still able to block her chainsword with one of its four hands. Shepard used her momentum to swing her legs forward; her power-armored feet connected solidly with the alien's jaw with a satisfying crack.
Shrieking in pain, Grandsire Wurm slammed Shepard onto the ground and brought its talons up to finish her. By then, however, Zandtus was there, his sword raised to block the blow. Several of the surviving Reivers fought their way past the Genestealers and fired their heavy bolt pistols point-blank into the Patriarch. In a move so fast that Shepard almost didn't see it, huge talons tore the head from one Reiver, and then impaled Zandtus through the chest.
"No!" Shepard got back to her feet and lunged; with its arms busy mauling the Hawks, the Patriarch was unable to stop Shepard from ramming her chainsword into its exposed throat. Amazingly, it was still alive, and continued to thrash about.
"Just die already, you son of a bitch!" Out of the corner of her eye, Shepard saw a talon heading her way, but with her chainsword lodged in the alien's flesh, she couldn't block in time.
Once again, Zandtus came to her rescue. Despite his injuries, he managed to swing his sword in an executioner's blow that severed the Patriarch's arm at the wrist. That bought Shepard the time she needed to drag her chainsword down the monster's throat and down its torso. Alien blood poured from the gaping wound, drenching Shepard in gore, but as she tore her chainsword free, Grandsire Wurm only twitched once, and then was still.
The effect of the Patriarch's death was immediate. The remaining Genestealers paused as their master's control faded; it wasn't for long, but it gave the Space Marines the time they needed to put them down. The cultists that had managed to survive either flung themselves into Imperial fire, or fled into tunnels; las- and bolter-fire harried them until they vanished into the darkness, but they weren't pursued.
As the echoes of combat faded, Shepard took stock of their losses. Nearly thirty of the Deltic Scorpions were dead, and many of the rest were wounded. The Necropolis Hawks had only lost eight of their number, and had nearly twice that who needed medical attention, including Zandtus.
"Stay still," Shepard said as she crouched by the Chapter Master, who sat by a mound of Genestealer corpses, a severed claw still buried in his chest.
"I will recover," Zandtus said, and tore the claw free in a wash of blood. Amazingly, the wound coagulated in seconds. "Only my secondary heart was damaged."
"You have two hearts?" Shepard looked down at his chest, and then his face.
"And a third lung," Zandtus added. Shepard could tell he was smirking behind his helm. "What is the matter?"
Shepard laughed tiredly as she sat next to him. She watched as one of the Infiltrators moved to the dead Space Marines and jabbed a needle-tipped device into their bodies, removing a set of organs from each.
"It is a solemn duty, preserving our Chapter's future," Zandtus said. "But those whose progenoid glands are saved guarantee that new Astartes take their place."
Shepard wanted to learn more, but something told her that Zandtus had already given her more than he normally would. Instead, she just nodded.
"I think we've done what we need to on Vigilus," she said. "It's time to get this Crusade started."
…
Another month passed, and Vigilus was quickly stabilizing. With their leadership killed and regular purges in the lower levels of the hives, the remaining cultists couldn't maintain a hold anywhere. In a few years, all trace of their existence would be wiped out.
During this time, Shepard began to understand just how important her Crusade was to people. Dozens of capital ships, belonging to the Imperial Navy, Adeptus Mechanicus, and the entirety of the Necropolis Hawks, made up their naval strength, while over a hundred smaller craft carried her armies.
The most numerous part of her force was the Astra Militarum; over seventy regiments had been sent, ranging from light infantry to super-heavy formations. The infantry elements alone numbered in the hundreds of thousands. The Adeptus Mechanicus sent thousands of Skitarii, battle-servitors, and hundreds of vehicles, plus their technical skills, as frustrating as they were to Shepard.
The Order of Our Martyred Lady had also sent an impressive roster. Ten entire preceptories had joined under Blaise's command—ten thousand Sororitas, along with their accompanying vehicles, ships, and support personnel.
Finally, there were the Space Marines. The fleet-based Necropolis Hawks numbered just under one thousand, making them the smallest of Shepard's allies in terms of numbers, but each Primaris Marine was easily worth a hundred normal soldiers.
More than once, Shepard felt like a fraud. She was willing to accept that the Emperor had chosen her, for one reason or another, but everyone looked to her as if she was a messiah, even though she had no idea what to do with this Crusade. The best she could do was look the part, and hope that the Emperor at least pointed her in the right direction.
The one good thing, she mused as she stepped onto the shuttle that would take her off Vigilus forever, was that she finally had the weapon she'd commissioned. Technically, it had been forged only a few weeks after she'd presented her design, but Hadrian Rex, her Crusade's Ecclesiarchy-appointed spiritual leader, had insisted on performing blessing after blessing. It was only a few days earlier that, during a ceremony full of pomp and gravitas, she'd been presented with Liberator.
Shepard patted the haft of the weapon fondly as she sat down in the shuttle. Liberator was not a pretty weapon, nor was it subtle; it was a war-pick, with an Aquila-pressed hammer on one side, and a long, curved blade on the other, all of which would be surrounded by a power field when active. Unlike a typical war-pick, the blade was not a spike that tapered to a point, but was more like the blade of a scythe. Shepard could use it to stab, cut, or smash a target.
Liberator had been made with Gregor in mind; her late husband, and the knights he'd led, used war-picks as their traditional weapon, and Shepard wanted to honor his memory by carrying a weapon inspired by his.
The other way she kept Gregor close was on the other end of the haft. Shepard had specifically requested that the top of her broken cane be attached to Liberator. Thankfully for her, no one had asked questions.
I know you'd want me to keep going, she thought as her armored fingers brushed over the Griffon-head. I will, I promise. But I think I'm allowed to keep a part of you with me while I do, right? Besides, if there really is something after death, maybe you'll use this to keep me safe. Deal?
Gregor couldn't answer her, of course; he was long dead. Still, Shepard nodded to herself, and her nerves steadied.
The time for hesitation was over. Now was the time for war.
Holy crap, this chapter took way too long to write! I would have had it done sooner, but I've been dealing with a lot of stuff lately. I won't go into details, but I've been really stressed, which led to me getting sick, and when I get sick, I don't sleep. This turned into a vicious cycle for a while, until I basically passed out.
Anyway, Abaddon is pissed, the Nachmund Gauntlet is even larger and more stable than before, the Genestealer Cult on Vigilus is broken, and Shepard has a signature weapon! I had the design for Liberator in my mind for a while, and I hope you like it! The Shepard Crusade is also ready to launch… sort of. Shepard still needs to meet her top naval and Astra Militarum officers, and I have to reveal what kind of ships make up her fleet.
Also, the Necropolis Hawks are canon, though there is almost nothing known about them. They're a Primaris Chapter, descended from the Raven Guard, and they apparently have a sense of humor. It isn't much better than most Space Marines, but by their standards, the Hawks are comedians. They were present on Vigilus in huge numbers (seven whole companies), and since there's nothing on where they might live, I decided that they were fleet-based, and the rest showed up to join the Crusade. Oh, and Zandtus is also canon, but again, there's no information on him.
Like I said earlier, I've been very stressed. Part of that is, as usual, my financial problems. My book sales are nowhere close enough to support me, but you can help by going to my website (link in my profile), or go to Amazon and look up Alpha Sanction, by Josh Gottlieb. More sales garner more attention, which in turn garner more sales.
You can also be an awesome person by donating on my P-atreon page. Remember, if enough of you donate, I'll be able to write fan fiction all the time, and I know you'd like that!
And now, I'd like to thank my awesome patrons!
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Next Chapter: Shepard receives her first mission, but also something more…
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