'Into the fray once more, my brothers!' bellowed Marduk. The other nine warriors strapped into the Deathclaw roared their approval. 'We are the true bearers of the righteous fury of the gods!' Another roar. 'And in their name, we kill! Kill! And kill again!'
With that the Deathclaw struck, smashing into the ground with bone jarring force, stabiliser claws embedding deeply. Infernal mechanics grinded as the drop-pod was lifted up on its four claws, and the bladed arcs of the circular floor slid back with a hiss.
Marduk was first out of the Deathclaw, his heavy boots slamming hard onto the cracked plascrete, the booming of his vox amplifiers sounding out over the barking of his bolt pistol.
'Hate the infidels!' he roared, his pistol kicking in his hands as he fired. 'Hate them as you kill them! Hate them with your bolter and hate them with your fist!'
The towering hulk of the Deathclaw had slammed into a crenellated, terraced balcony on the upper face of the palace. Other drop-pods screamed down from above, their hulls glowing with the heat of the rapid descent. Seeing the enemy around him and feeling the fear emanating from them, Marduk licked his lips.
He thumbed the activation rune blister on his chainsword and it screamed into life. He could feel it trembling in his hand with barely suppressed hunger, and he gritted his sharpened teeth as he felt the weapon bond with his flesh, tiny barbs piercing his armoured palm.
There were uniformed soldiers all around them, scattered across the cobbled open area atop the crenellated defensive structure. Not that it was any defence against enemies that landed in their midst, thought Marduk as he fired his bolt pistol into the soldiers. They were falling away in terror from the Deathclaws that were landing with titanic force all around them.
'Death to the False Emperor!' he roared, charging into the midst of the foe. He carved left and right, hacking and rending flesh with his screaming chainsword. Blood sprayed out as he tore through the PDF troopers.
Blood and brain matter sprayed across Burias's twisted visage as he swung the heavy, barbed icon two-handed into the face of a soldier, and Marduk knew that the change would be upon him shortly. Good, he thought. Let the mortals see the face of the daemon and know that hell beckoned them.
The Word Bearers ripped though the PDF troopers, and Marduk saw a group of blue-armoured warriors standing together, long lasrifles held to their shoulders.
'With me my brethren!' he roared as he raced across the blood drenched cobblestones towards them. The soldiers fired, and las-fire streaked past Marduk's head. With a roar of animal fury he was amongst them. His chainsword ripped flesh and armour apart with ease, and he felt that the beast bound within the chainsword was pleased at the bloodshed. It pulled at his arm, urging him to seek more death for its whirring teeth. It has been too long since you tasted the blood of the heathens, he thought.
Blood welled in the carefully designed catchments of the weapon and was sucked eagerly into its inner workings. Veins pumped and throbbed along the length of the chainsword as the beast within fed. Power surged through Marduk, flowing from the daemon weapon as it grew in strength. He cleaved Borhg'ash into the chest of another victim, its sharpened teeth ripping apart flesh and ribs in a shower of gore.
The change came over Burias suddenly. His face seemed to ripple and shimmer like a mirage on a horizon. His features flickered back and forth between his own and the horned, bestial face of the daemon Drak'shal. He opened his mouth wide as his lips curled back, exposing sharp fangs and a long, flicking, bruised purple tongue. His bolt pistol dropped from his hand and was instantly retracted to his hip, the length of chain linking the weapon to his belt withdrawing automatically. His index and forefingers fused into thick, bladed talons, and he gripped the icon two-handed once more. Burias dropped into a low, bestial crouch, even as he seemed to grow in stature as the daemon's power increased.
With a roar that was at once his own and the daemon's, Burias-Drak'shal leapt from his crouch, launching straight at a terrified PDF soldier who ineffectually fired off a frantic las-blast at the creature. Burias-Drak'shal smashed the icon down onto the man's head, killing him instantly. Nevertheless, the daemonically possessed warrior punched his fist through the man's chest and raised the dead body up into the air, letting out an ungodly roar that made the substance of the air ripple with warp spawned power.
'The gods themselves send us their aid to smite the infidels!' roared Marduk. 'Behold the majesty of their power!'
The battlements were almost clear. A blast from a lasrifle struck Marduk's helmet, and his head was jerked to the side. Snarling, he turned to face the attacker that had dared to shoot him.
Varnus swore as he waited for the las-lock to re-power. Though they fired powerful single bursts of energy, the weapons were painfully slow between firing. Still, the shot had done little more than irritate the towering monster that was leading the power armoured killers, so one more blast would be unlikely to do anything but stall the inevitable. Varnus knew that death had come to Tanakreg and that he had but moments left to live. Emperor protect my soul, he prayed.
The palace guard were being slaughtered. He saw one man explode as a bolt-round detonated in his shoulder, spraying blood around him like a mist as he fell to the ground, the entire left side of his torso missing. He saw another die instantly as one of the enemy clubbed him in the head with a bolter, the force of the blow crashing his skull as if it were glass.
The hulking fiend he had shot rounded on him, stalking through the melee, and Varnus swore. The monster towered over him. Varnus was in no way a small man, but he barely came halfway up the beast's chest. With a hum, the las-lock re-powered and he fired again at the huge Chaos Space Marine. The shot was taken in haste and was not on target. Nevertheless, it struck the beast in his wrist, and his accursed bolt pistol dropped from his hands.
Snarling in anger, Marduk cleaved the long lasrifle wielded by the infidel in two, and reached out and grabbed him around the throat with his empty hand. He felt blood seeping from his wrist where the wretch had blasted him, but it was already congealing. His hand almost encircled the man's entire neck, and he could feel the pathetic fragility beneath his fingers. Tendons and ligaments strained as he exerted pressure.
Lifting the man into the air, his feet kicking uselessly half a metre from the ground, Marduk drew him close to his helmeted visage.
'That hurt, little man,' he said, the vox amplifier booming his words into the face of the wretch, 'but this is going to hurt a lot more.'
With that, he hurled the man off the battlements.
'Your weapon, First Acolyte,' said one of the Word Bearers, and Marduk turned to accept his bolt pistol, held reverently in the warrior's hands. Without a word, he took the weapon.
Looking out over the battlements, Marduk saw scattered fighting on a lower tier of the bastion some fifteen metres below, where the broken body of the infidel he had hurled had landed. He could see fighting down there, but no Word Bearers. Curious, he thought.
'Warriors of the IV Coterie, with me,' he ordered. 'The rest of you, cleanse this level of the Imperial filth.'
'Burias-Drak'shal!' he roared, and the daemonically possessed warrior turned from his killing, gore dripping thickly from his icon, arms and mouth. 'With me.'
The twelve warriors of the IV Coterie extricated themselves from the killing, and jogged towards the First Acolyte. Burias-Drak'shal stalked along with them, breathing heavily.
Marduk launched himself over the edge of the battlements, dropping down towards the lower terrace. He landed in the midst of a firefight, and cobblestones cracked beneath his weight. He rose up to his full height as his brethren landed around him.
'Death to the False Emperor!' he roared. The shout was repeated by several dozen of the Imperial garbed warriors. Marduk saw that most of those that had shouted had ripped their clothing to expose a crude, tattooed representation of the Latros Sacrum on their shoulders, the sacred screaming daemon symbol of the Word Bearers legion.
He began
laying around with Borhg'ash and his bolt pistol, carving flesh and planting bolt-rounds through bodies. He didn't pay too much attention to those he killed, and doubtless he and the warriors of the IV Coterie slew as many of their cult followers as the Imperials, but it mattered not - the souls of both would be welcomed by the gods of Chaos.
The gunfire suddenly ceased, and the remaining men dropped to their knees, gazing up at the towering Chaos Space Marines with awe and reverence. Several had tears in their eyes. The Word Bearers held their killing in check, waiting to see the First Acolyte's reaction.
All except for Burias-Drak'shal, who stepped forward and smashed the icon into the head of one of the cultists. The man's skull crumpled and he fell without a sound.
'Burias-Drak'shal,' said Marduk quietly, and the daemon warrior looked up, snarling. His entire body trembling, Burias-Drak'shal stepped back and dropped into a half-crouch, staring hungrily at the humans. Marduk too felt the urge to step forward and slaughter the weaklings, but he knew that they had their uses. Borhg'ash trembled in his hands, wishing to kill more.
'Which one here speaks for you?' asked Marduk. The cultists looked around at each other, and finally one man stood and stepped through the other cultists to approach.
'I do, lord,' said the man, his head held high.
Marduk raised his bolt pistol and shot the man in the face. Pieces of skull, brain matter and blood splattered over the remaining kneeling cultists.
'Lower your eyes when looking upon your betters, dogs, or I shall ask Burias-Drak'shal here to remove them.' Marduk snarled.
'Now, who here speaks for you?' he repeated.
A shaven-headed woman in beige robes stepped forwards, her gaze lowered. 'I do, my lord,' she said in a shaking voice.
'What is the fourth tenant of the Book of Lorgar, dog?' asked Marduk dangerously, fingering the trigger of his bolt pistol.
The woman stood in silence for a moment, and Marduk raised the pistol to her head.
'Give up yourself to the Great Gods in body and of soul,' she said quickly. 'Discard all that does not benefit their Greatness. The First thing to be discarded is the Name. Your Self is nothing to the Gods, and your Name shall be as nothing to You. Only once you have reached Enlightenment shall you Reclaim you Name, and your Self. Thus spoke Great Lorgar, and thus it was to Be!
Marduk kept the pistol raised to her head. 'What is your name?'
'I have no name, my lord,' the woman replied instantly.
'If you have no name, what then shall I call you?'
The woman faltered for a moment, biting her lip hard, acutely aware of the bolt pistol held a centimetre from her forehead.
'Dog,' she whispered finally.
'Louder,' said Marduk.
'Dog,' said the woman. 'My name to you, lord, is dog.'
'Very good,' said Marduk, lowering his pistol. 'You are all dogs, to me, and to all of my noble kind. But perhaps one day, with faith and prayer and action, you will rise in my esteem.
'Arise, dogs. Gather your arms, and prove yourselves. Walk before your betters. Joyfully take the bullets of our enemies, so that not a scratch need mar the holy armour of the warriors of Lorgar. Such is a noble sacrifice. Lead forth, dogs.'
Jarulek stepped carefully through the carnage, the script covered orbs of his eyes taking in all the details of the slaughter wrought by his warriors. Bloodied and broken corpses lay sprawled throughout the palace. The fortress-like was enormous, and every living soul within it had been slain or was in the lower atrium on the ground level in shackles. He had sent the cultists out into the city, to spread panic and misery amongst the populace, and to hunt down the last remnants of resistance. He didn't care if they succeeded or not: Kol Badar and the bulk of the Host were fast closing on the city, and they would smash any final resistance utterly.
The Dark Apostle was pleased with the attack. The palace had been taken with few casualties and the kill-count was exceptional: a good sacrifice to the gods.
Picking his way carefully up the nave of the heretical temple, he felt hatred as he raised his gaze to the towering, granite statue of the aquila that dominated the back wall. Both of the heads of the two-headed eagle had been smashed by his zealous warriors, and the tips of the wings reduced to dust.
Dozens of clergy members were nailed to the defiled aquila, thick metal spikes driven through their flesh and bone, and into the stone.
The First Acolyte, Marduk, stepped forwards to greet him. He joined the fingers of both hands together, making the stylised sign of Chaos Undivided, and bowed his head. When he raised his head, he was smiling broadly, exposing sharp teeth: the row of smaller, razor sharp incisors in the front and the larger, ripping teeth behind.
'We left them alive, mostly, Dark Apostle,' he said. 'I thought that might please you.'
Jarulek too smiled. The intense hatred that the Word Bearers had for the Imperium of man was as nothing compared to the exquisite hatred that they reserved for members of the Ecclesiarchy. He stepped closer to the debased aquila statue, looking up at the priests, who were groaning in agony. Rivulets of blood ran down the statue, funnelled by the carved eagle feathers, and Jarulek placed a finger in the crimson liquid. He raised the finger to his inscribed lips and licked it with the tip of his script covered tongue.
'It does please me, First Acolyte,' he breathed. He stepped back, hands on his hips, as if he were appraising and admiring a favourite piece of artwork. 'Yes, it pleases me very much indeed.'
'Then there is this pair,' said Marduk. Two men were dragged forward and forced to their knees with heavy hands upon their shoulders. They both kept their eyes low, not daring to look up at the Word Bearers around them. One wore a red robe, his bionic eye buzzing softly as the lens rotated. The other, the larger of the two, wore a robe of plain cream. Both had exposed their left shoulders, showing the leering daemon face of the Latros Sacrum tattooed upon their flesh.
'The one on the left disabled the air defence turrets,' said Jarulek, not taking his eyes off the priests impaled upon the statue. Marduk looked at the man. His left eye had been replaced with a mechanical augmentation.
'While the other,' said Jarulek, 'ensured that the Cultists of the Word gained access to the palace. I believe that he was the bodyguard of the governor of this backwater planet. Was that not so?' he enquired, turning his face towards the man.
He nodded his head, wisely not speaking out loud.
'I have seen your faces in my visions,' remarked Jarulek. 'And in my visions of what is yet to come, your face is there, treacherous adept of the Machine-God. But I regret to inform you, bodyguard,' he said calmly, 'that yours is not. It would seem that your part in this venture is complete.'
The man stiffened, but did not raise his head.
'But you are not yet to be made a sacrifice to our gods. No, you are not yet worthy of that honour,' said Jarulek in his velvet voice. 'Take him down to the atrium to join the slave gangs. He can spend the last weeks of his life in service to the gods, aiding the construction of the Gehemehnet.' The man was dragged away.
'You, administrator, you are to stay close to me. But first, you must remove that abomination that you wear upon your breast,' said Jarulek, pointing at the twelve toothed cog upon his chest. The man instantly removed the metal plate from around his neck and held it in his hands, not sure what he was meant to do with it now that it was removed.
'First Acolyte, take the accursed thing and see that you perform the Rituals of Defilement upon it,' said Jarulek. Marduk took the metal emblem, his face curled in disgust.
'It is no god, you know, that your erstwhile brethren pray to,' remarked Jarulek conversationally.
'My… my lord?' questioned the administrator. Marduk paused as he was turning to leave, a snarl on his face for the man daring to speak in the presence of the Dark Apostle. Jarulek raised a hand to halt the blow that Marduk was about to deal the cowering man.
'They are coming, you know, coming here, your erstwhile brethren,' said Jarulek, alm
ost to himself, seeing the waking vision as it overlapped with his surroundings. 'Yes, they come soon. They fear that we will succeed where they failed.'
Jarulek came out of the vision, and saw that Marduk had paused, looking at him. That one's power is growing, he thought.
It was sometimes possible for one of powerful faith to experience, albeit considerably weakly, the visions that another experienced. How much had he seen? he wondered briefly, before discarding the thought.
It mattered not. What was to come was to come, and nothing could change the prophecy.
CHAPTER SIX
Days and nights blurred together into one long, nightmarish, pained existence. Varnus was plucked from death and his wounds had been tended by the horrific chirurgeons that served the Chaos Legion, even as he fought against their administrations.
They had borne him from where he had lain after the Chaos Lord had hurled him off the battlements, and placed him on an icy, steel slab. He was restrained with thick binding cords of sinew. Bladed arms had cut into him, and long, needle-tipped proboscises had plunged into his flesh. He screamed in agony as the skin and muscles of his shattered leg and arm were peeled back, and the splintered bones reset before being sprayed with a burning liquid. His veins burned with serums, and his eyes were held open with painful spider-legged apparatus, for what purpose he knew not, unless it was for him to witness the infernal chirurgeons at work.
The skin of his forehead was delicately peeled back from his skull, and a burning piece of dark metal in the barbed shape of an eight-pointed star was inserted there before the skin was returned to its position and stapled back into place.
A collar of metal the colour of blood was wrapped around his neck and soldered shut, and he was taken to join the tens of thousands of other slaves that the Chaos forces had rounded up once the occupation of Shinar had been completed. Heavy, spiked chains connected Varnus's collar to two other slaves. They too bore the mark of Chaos beneath the red-raw flesh of their foreheads.
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