Interlude 5

-991.M41-

-Rapturous Liberty, Segmentum Solar-

-Berdauernd the Bleak, Warlord of the Unbound Warriors-

“That’s almost certainly our target.” The low growl came from the warrior standing next to him, out of arms reach but within conversational range, the standard for talks amongst themselves in the strange years since the rebellion. 

A veteran of a hundred campaigns by now, Drumad was scarred well beyond his former beauty, face more a mass of callouses and old injuries than flesh and blood. Where appropriate, this scar was plated with reinforcing bands of steel, which added to the weathered respectability of his countenance.

Berdauernd respected his fellow veteran a great deal. He trusted him none. The rebellion against the gilded tyrant was long fractured and its adherents scattered, paranoia ruled in this age, and to trust a veteran was to trust one who had betrayed many to preserve themselves unto this point. 

He would know, as he was one of those untrustworthy veterans.

“The radiance is certainly more impressive than any common imperial daemon.” The refined voice had the distinct undertone of a sneer in its reverberation, and it came from a high-crowed figure standing to the other side of the hololithic they looked upon. With teal-blue armor plates covered in layers of parchment and carved with arcane symbols of sorcerous implication, the figure was immediately recognizable as one of the sons of Magnus.

Berdauernd did not trust Drumad out of a professional obligation, the same was not true for the sorcerer, who Berdauernd did not trust on account of his nature and bearing. Alliances could be made with Drumad to accomplish mutual goals, but alliance with this sorcerer and his allies could only be mustered from him with divine commandment.

Which was, unfortunately, what had occurred. 

Rare that they receive such clear guidance from their masters, and it was not guidance that could be refused. Scattered as the rebellion had become, they all followed the same terrible, unquestionable gods.

The radiance that the sorcerer had referred to was a shining pillar of rolling gold, burning through the immaterium as a great spoke and halo. Every few moments it pulsed again, ripping energy out of the surrounding warp, pulling it into its center, and discharging it as a plume of furious incandescence. 

The xeno bound before them moaned in agony, strapped to a machine-altar and cables trailing out from various sections of its eyes, skull, and spine. The psycho-active senses of the Eldar were useful in visualizing the immaterium, and the trick was commonly employed by brothers of his most-innovative primarch. The moan, even through the experiences that the wretch had experienced thus far, told him that the pillar was painful to look upon directly.

Which was good. The xeno had not yet suffered enough for its crimes against humanity. He derived a small, private satisfaction from seeing it occasionally twitch in pain.

The small, private satisfaction was contrasted against his overwhelming disdain for what the psycho-hololithic was continuing to display.

“No wonder their small, superstitious minds declared this one a ‘god-incarnate’, it draws and transfigures a prodigious amount of energy from the immaterium.” The sorcerer continued in an almost appreciative manner, like looking upon a finely crafted blade being brandished against him. “I’d compare it to a lesser astronomicon, but the ratios are not quite-”

“Compare it only to an enemy, as the gods command, sorcerer.” Drumad declared disdainfully. “Its shape is the shape of the tyrant-corpse, and nothing more.”

“Curiousity was never the virtue of your kin, I suppose.” The sorcerer dismissed with a wave of his hand. “Rest assured, our plan proceeds at pace. As we speak my juniors lead their brothers against key targets alpha, beta, and gamma. Just as we divined, the defenders are moving to secure their engines and void shields over the Gellar fields. They will be trapped in the materium for some time.”

The hololithic displayed a fleet of ships currently traveling through the materium, their position roughly analogous to the position of his own ship and the ships of his temporary allies currently in the warp. The warp-squall that surrounded them had done its work to perfection, forcing the loyalists into realspace where they were slower and more vulnerable to attack.

Were it not for the favor from the gods, the squall would surely tear them apart as it would the loyalists, such was the power of the warp. A raging inferno of cackling energy that surrounded them like a dark nimbus, their shield and prison so long as the sorcerers maintained their rituals and sacrifices. 

Humbling and terrifying. 

“Drumad, have your subordinates received word from the rest of the ships yet?” Berdauernd asked, turning his gaze away from the display and towards the steel-bound visage of his fellow Warlord.

“No, but I feel confident that it's just the infamously genial bearing of the Iron Warriors at play, rather than anything more suspicious.” Drumad growled in an agitated, sarcastic manner. “Last communication remains our initial planning for this operation, and their confirmation of intent. That frequency has been silent of return-communication hence.” 

Berdauernd sneered at the words, but nodded in understanding. The Iron Warriors were friends to none, and preferred minimal contact with the other bands. That suited him just fine, save that they maintained this minimal contact even in delicate operations such as this. 

Their duty as part of this brief alliance was to form the trap itself in the materium, a ring of ships and relays that could detect the target fleet and hold it in position long enough for the loyalists to commit to a battle and be struck on the flank by Drumad’s own ships. If they did not form an appropriate trap, then all this work will be for nothing.

The professional pride of the Iron Warriors suggested that they would, indeed, form a proper encirclement. The nagging sense of paranoia that had kept him alive all these centuries told him to demand that they answer to him. 

Even with the backing of the gods, the rebellion had yet to fell the golden tyrant. The collapse of their central leadership had reduced them to bickering and squabbling, ineffectual in its division and disunity. Warmaster Horus slain, the rest of their primarchs fled, in hiding, or lazing about in their homes- the closest thing they had to direction was the command of Abbadon.

Abbadon the twelvefold failure. Berdauernd would die before he accepted the command of one so incompetent.

The hololithic pulsed again, and his attention returned to it. The golden pillar of radiance that burned through both materium and immaterium flared up suddenly, magnifying to twice or three times its size before being suddenly muffled once more, and returning to its previous scale. He grimaced at the light.

“Is it being muted?” The sorcerer muttered, raising at hand to his helm and rubbing the trim in a parody of a held chin. “A pariah perhaps, which would explain why we hadn’t divined its presence until recently. It was hidden beneath a void in the immaterial.”

“Prodigous, the sight of the sons of Magnus is. A single pariah blinding you to an insult to our gods.” Drumad growled with a half-smile on his mangled face, provoking a blank-helmed stare from the sorcerer. 

“I’ll remember these insults when our alliance has completed its objective, spawn of Mortarion.”

“Good.”

“Sorcerer, what’s the timeframe for your subordinates completing their objectives and evacuating?” Berdauernd spoke up, interrupting the building argument with a firm question about the root of the matter.

“They have another three minutes before the spell woven upon them detonates.” The sorcerer waved off. “If they fail to complete their objectives on their own, their deaths will ensure it.”

“And if they teleport back without completing their objectives? What insurance do you have that it will not damage my ship, sorcerer?” He hated working with sorcerers, they conveniently failed to give critical information such as this until directly demanded to do so. He growled and leaned forwards in his most quietly intimidating fashion.

The sorcerer shook his head. “A ward around your ship, of course. Teleporting back will unravel a critical component of the spell and discharge the energies into the surrounding storm.” The sorcerer paused for a moment, tilting his head. “And of course, if they return without completing their objectives, they will have to answer to me.”

The threat was obvious in implication, and it was mostly satisfying. He grunted in acceptance, returning to a straight posture and bringing his gaze back to the hololithic. That brilliant, loathsome pillar shone brightly in a murky sea of bleak mists.

The light of the astronomicon was bright in this part of the galaxy, casting the entire warp into illuminated relief. Only the strongest and darkest of storms in the immaterium could quell its hateful glow.

This pillar was a lesser form of it, shining in the midst of their conjured storm, defiant to the howling chaos around.

In the midst of that light, he could almost picture a face. Imperial and stern, looking upon him with brilliant eyes beneath a heavy brow. The visage in fire seemed to address him, with a quiet whisper in the corners of his mind echoing a booming voice. 

‘Wayward Grandson’ 

He scowled.

Phantoms and sound. Nothing more. Only the superstitious minds of the loyalists make gods from mere psychic impressions. 

—

-991.M41-

-Miracle of Suffering, Segmentum Solar-

-Hercule, Shield-Captain of the Sentinel Guard, Custodian of the Golden Throne of Holy Terra-

Everything that he was, he owed to the Lord Emperor. The world that he was born upon, the people that he received his luxuries from, the biological alchemy that turned him from a mere infant into his perfected self, the training he received from his fellow custodians, the companionship he cherished from the Sisters of Silence.

All of it was bequeathed unto him by his Lord, by plans put into action nine thousand and five hundred years before Hercule was born, with his Lord’s ongoing suffering upon his golden prison ensuring that all those plans and actions were warded from the infinite malignancy of the warp and the denizens therein. 

It was often said that the Golden Demigods did not worship the Lord Emperor. This was true. Only a bare handful of his brothers participated in the grand rituals and devotional prayers to their Lord, and most of those regarded it as beneficial for the common men rather than themselves.

The Custodians did not worship the Lord Emperor as a God, but they did venerate him as a Man. 

His sentinel-blade split sound as it flashed through the air, edge hot with friction as it crashed into the corrupt, squirming mass of flesh and machinery that served as a joint for the abomination before him. A steaming spray of something analogous to oil or blood splattered the floor as the mass of mutant flesh and warmachine roared.

Its weapon-arm, a massive guncannon of some indescribable origin, began to fall as its connection to the main body was split. 

Hercule had already planned out and was in the midst of executing his next kah’tah by the time the weapon-arm crashed to the ground. The brutish thing before him could, perhaps, match him in raw strength. It had no hopes of matching him in pace.

He ducked slightly, just enough for the thrashing abominations flailing powerfist to crash into his broad shoulderplate and scrape across it, deflected up and above Hercule’s ducked head. His sentinel-blade flashed again, a hot white arc of steel that hissed through the air and into the writhing flesh that composed its upper leg.

Were he any weaker, the blade would’ve stopped short upon some manner of metallic bones that laced together in the center and the mutant flesh wrapped around. Fortunately, he was Hercule, his strength matched by only a handful of his brother-custodians.

The corrupted abomination began to collapse as its leg was torn in half, another spray of unhale blood-oil scattering across the broad chamber. 

Hercule leaned into the swing, using the momentum to turn himself and lean slightly.

Another kah’tah echoed through his mind, flashing through the memory of his body, engraved into it through decades of practice. 

His armored boot smashed into the monstrousities’ torso just as it began to experience the effects of gravity. A thunderblow of force channeled through his ideal thighs and calves and into its frame.

The beast toppled backwards, slipping on its lone remaining leg and crashing through a thin statue of some minor saint. It was not dead, not by a large margin. Whatever magic or biochemical insanity went into its creation left it with an uncanny resilience.

It was, however, now on its back, missing one of its primary locomotion limbs, and bereft of its ranged weaponry. It could do nothing more than attempt to slowly crawl. The mortal men could finish it off at their leisure with explosive munitions or similar.

What was important was that it was no longer any threat to his charge. He did not spend any additional time upon its execution, instead throwing himself into another dash, back in the direction he came.

There, near to the elevator shaft, was his charge. Long, slightly curled brown hair. Fair skin with barely a trace of scarring or callous. Heavy sockets containing machine-eyes that burned with a golden brilliance. A trace of burning light on his brow and trailing around his head like the hallowed rings of Jupiter.

And around him, as a blazing pillar of fire, was the presence of the Lord Emperor. 

Beloved Denaira had done well to ensure he was unharmed while Hercule had removed the danger of the abomination. 

Barely a step later, he had to firmly stomp both of his feet and plant his shield into the floor, ripping through thin layers of steel in the process of slowing his advance. His great strength propelled him with immense speed, and his equally great weight made slowing himself a constant mental calculation. 

He slid to a stop before his charge, a convenient position that allowed him to fulfill his duty while looking away from the radiance that surrounded Lord Joshua. Hercule found it… difficult to speak to his charge in a casual manner so long as that light was within his view. 

“We have to chase him!” Joshua declared as soon as he was sliding before, clearly referencing the sorcerer upon some manner of hovering disc that was speeding away in the air. Large chamberways allowed him to soar some three dozen feet in the air, well over the heads of any defenders and rushing down the halls towards the engine rooms.

Hercule knew that they were the engines because he had memorized the layout of this ship during his first month upon it. Not an insubstantial task, but one that had to be done. First with maps, then with personal investigation of the areas that the maps did not cover.

“He’ll destroy one of the engines unless we cut him off within the next three intersections!” Lord Joshua spoke with the absolute certainty of prophecy. It was easy to notice the difference between his normal behavior and his behavior when acting upon his divinations- the confidence with which he declared what was and what needed to be done was stark. 

The confidence of the Lord Emperor speaking through him, Hercule suspected privately. 

He took a moment to judge the speed of the flying disc, mind running through a half-dozen calculations regarding their objective, his stated time limit, and his speed. 

“Denaira, a grenade.” He spoke, holding out a hand. The Silent woman had a grenade procured and placed in his hand by the time his sentence was finished, and he moved through a well-practiced motion. One that removed the pin of the explosive using a section of his armor and threw it in one smooth flow.

The grenade, propelled with the sum total of his rotational strength, flashed through the air like an autocannon round. The sorcerer vanished just beyond the far corner of the chamberway by the time his munition was halfway to the end.

“Did you mis-?” Lord Joshua began to ask as the grenade bounced off a raised section of the far wall, back towards them and to the side, and then finally exploded.

A scream-yelp of frustration and pain confirmed that his aim was true. The grenade had burst against the sorcerer mid-flight and sent him falling to the ground. He quickly reached out and seized hold of his charge, throwing Lord Joshua against his chest and beginning a steady charge forwards to catch up with the sorcerer.

Denaira had dashed forwards and clutched onto his pauldron with time to spare. 

A third weight clung to him, and his hand briefly twitched to strike it down before realizing that it was merely the furtive remembrancer. Somehow he had managed to leap forwards and snag hold of Hercule’s armor again before he was totally out of reach, and was now coming along for the charge again.

How virtuous, this mortal’s tenacity was. 

He charged forwards, barely heeding the mass of traitor-marines and mortals that clashed between them on the path ahead. Lord Joshua was secured behind his shield, Denaira was clad in good plates, and the Remembrancer was not a high priority. 

His shield bounced a dozen bolter-rounds off its bulk, his pace not slowing in the slightest. His sword flashed to split a traitor in twain, then another, and he powered through their ashen remains with the piston-pumping of his mighty legs. 

Nothing in this battle could slow his advance. 

He slammed his shield and sword into the ground near the end of the chamber, sparks flying from the scream of metal against metal, slowing him just enough to toss his charge towards the dismounting Denaira and ready another charge. 

The sorcerer pulled himself up from the ground where he had tumbled down just in time to turn and see his approach.

Hercule did not need to see his face to see the panic that the sorcerer felt. A sudden raise of his staff formed a great barrier of blue-white energy between them.

Hercule’s shield smashed into it. A jolt of pain echoed through his mighty frame as he collided with the sorcerous barricade, and the sound of shattering glass echoed through the noisy halls. 

The barrier shattered, but not before allowing the sorcerer to dive out of the way of his charge, rolling towards his fallen disc.

Hercule smashed into the wall of the walk-chamber, not quite with enough energy left to break through, but more than enough to leave a Hercule-sized dent in its side. Half of his body was submerged by a layer of bent plasteel, which tore as he ripped himself out of his new prison and raised his blade towards the sorcerer.

Crack-crack-crack. His sentinel blade shot bolts of death towards the staggered sorcerer, provoking another round of uncanny dodges and energetic exclamations from the teal-armored foe. 

He ripped himself out of the wall just in time for the sorcerer to reach his disc, fingers outstretched to command it. If he reached it, then the sorcerer would lift off again, and possibly escape.

Hercule slackened his grip on his shield and slung his arm forwards. Spinning through the air, the heavy auramite of his shield smashed into the side of the levitation disc just as the sorcerer’s fingers brushed against it.

Both shield and disc went flying back, the sorcerer flinching back protectively as the hunks of thin metal skipped down the chamberway and smashed into the far walls, embedding themselves in the plasteel there and sticking fast. 

His now open hand went low to his belt and withdrew his Misericordia, the long dagger that served as his backup weapon. 

The Sorcerer finally understood that there was no escape from him, and rose up to his full height.

 A full two feet shorter than himself. 

His staff crackled with arcane energy, and his gauntlet went to his side to unholster a short-barreled firearm. 

“Custodian. Don’t you have some trinket to stake your life upon? Go harass something else.” The sorcerer commanded with a sneering voice, waving his staff at him. A crackling bolt of arcane lightning issued forth from its tip.

Hercule stepped to the side, but the lightning followed him, crawling across the force-barrier of his armor, onto the plates itself, and finally issuing a crackle of pain into his very flesh. 

Dodging looked to be ineffectual against that bit of psykery. Hercule grit his teeth and ignored the pain, keeping his helmet’s visor locked against the sorcerer’s eyes.

“My Lord commanded your death, sorcerer.” He explained it simply.

There was nothing more to be said.