User blog:Brady26/The Gathered Storm

The Gathered Storm

This story was written by me. The sky roiled with colour. A dark infusion of purple did battle with a warring mix of blues, blacks and reds, streaked by blinding flashes of lightning that struck the ground below, igniting the great trees that had stood for millennia on the swampy world that was burning in its final days. The ground thudded with the impacts of rocks hurled from the void from rifts opening and closing, the cries of animals and the creaking of alien wood adapted to a death world realising that death had come to them. Beyond the sight of mortals, in low orbit, three fleets clashed, mirroring the conflict of their champions below, the occasional flash of a ship-death cutting through the unnatural clouds and shifting lights, its silent burst the only indication that thousands had perished in an instant above.

With a loping gait, the Bloodthirster approached.

It was at least ten metres tall, its flesh peeled back from its fang filled maw so that it might better scream it's limitless fury at all around it, two great wings of shadow struck out from its back, though seeming to have no mass they allowed the great daemon to float forward as if they were wings of flesh. In its great right arm it wielded a great axe, its metal filled with screaming faces, the souls of those lives its edge has taken in countless battles, in its other hand, drips of blood flying off it as it curled and flexed was a terrible wipe, its form the shape of veins and arteries, barbs at the end rattling with anticipation as its master approached the melee.

Krantor saw the brute as he locked blades with the traitor Cogliostro, the mortal inquisitor invigorated to have strength beyond that of a normal man, the warp touched blade he wielded screaming at Krantor as it burned itself against Harpe, his relic blade from the Heresy Wars. Shifting his weight, the servos in his Cataphractii armour straining to compensate he pushed the Inquisitor back, his heavy books sinking into the mire around him. At his side Galleus, the Chief Archivist of his Chapter was clutching his head in agony, blood streaming from his nose, next to him was Pescios, a great wound in his shoulder from where a power sword had sunk into his flesh was being cauterized by his servo arms, the mechanical hands moving with the precision of a surgeon though Krantor doubted the Techmarine was fully conscious, his Chapter’s overactive Catalepsean Node was preventing the grievously wounded Astartes to fall into any state of unconsciousness.

To his left were two of the remaining members of his Honour Guard, Terminator Veterans that struggled in the muck and filth of the dying world, its stinking gases and putrid smells being unleashed from years of confinement below the layers of dead plants and animals. He signalled to the two, confirming they had seen the daemon and understood what it meant. In reply, they sent a series of confirmation chimes, in Astartes battle language they spoke a single word together: Adhere. They would stand their ground with him, against this Inquisitor and his dogs, against this daemon and against this whole dying world. Behind him he heard swords clashing, Brother-Captain Tarrin still stood then, duelling one of the Inquisitor’s retinue. He would likely retreat, take the high ground behind them on the rusted ruins, taking fire with his gravity weapon, escaping to the fall-back sites, destroying the outposts and bunkers as he went, methodically removing anything for the enemy to claim. Did he not understand that this world was lost? The entire system? The Wreath Sector? All lost. This storm was the agency of forces beyond the actions of a few bastard traitors and a mad Inquisitor. It was the work of world burners.

In front of him the humans screamed. The acolytes of Cogliostro the Liar turned away from the Space Marines before them to glance behind as the figure in dark blood red approached them, its axe raised to deliver a great sweeping blow, it would come down indiscriminately, it seemed whatever dark power had drawn this monster to this world was no allied to the Inquisitor. The idea of the traitor dying to the politics of entities beyond his understanding amused Krantor for a moment, an exhalation that could not be considered a laugh escaped his lips. Turning to lock eyes with him again, the Inquisitor flares with rage, his blade mutating and shifting as tentacles writhed across its length. He shouted at his men, something like: Stand your ground! Or you will not falter! Something a junior commissar might say to his men to stop them from retreating, but it was not his words that motivated them. These men were afraid of course, caught between the Angels of Death, the daemons of the Warp, on a world tearing itself a part as it died, who but the surest or most insane of souls would not experience doubts? But while these men did fear these horrors, they feared their master more. Krantor saw that, and for the briefest of moments he felt a tinge of respect for the Inquisitor, which was quickly squashed as he raised his blade to charge. Regrets filled his mind. He would die doing the Emperor’s will, and that is more than many can say, and it is the dream of every Astartes, but he found he did not feel such joy. He was filled with rage, but also excitement, like a new age was beginning and he was in risk of not being a part of it. This Inquisitor and the machinations of that mad fool Logos would be the death of him on some forsaken world. None would sing the songs of Krantor, he who died in the turning of the age, no one would remember him beyond those serfs that passed his name inscribed on a plaque in the archives of the Benthos.

From somewhere beyond his vision he heard what sounded like a thousand tiny thunder strikes, tools of the rogue Forgeworld Tarkus being unleashed upon the Traitor Marines claiming to be the true Sons of Horus, remnants from a darker age. Krantor could not see the mad Tech-Priest Dominus, the daemon’s approach filling the air with a blinding choking smoke, occasionally floating sparks danced into the night sky, their playful movements having no place in the hellscape they were forged in. Gripping Harpe tighter, he waded forward, his armour’s protective energy field crackling and hissing as flecks of blood and swamp water evaporated off it.

Drawing in what he believed to be the breath that would deliver his final breath, two of the Chapter’s champions already in the mud beside him, Krantor prepared to join them with one final act of defiance against all those forces against him.

Let fly the Steel! He bellowed, his war cry being picked up by the Honour Guard beside him, the sergeant thrust his sword forward in salute, the veteran with him raised his clenched power fist. Behind him, another voice picked up the cry.

Moving with a quickness beyond the human eye, Brother-Captain Tarrin, his own great relic blade hissing in the rain that began to pound down, his two hands gripping it tightly, his torn and battered banner marked with the symbol of the 4th Company, the green wreath of the sector guard. He stood alone, his black and yellow cape marked with the hazard chevrons standing out starkly against the dark smoke around them. He moved unhindered by the swamp, his exquisitely designed armour empowering his strides rather than hindering it like Krantor and his Honour Guard. Leaping forward, the Captain of the 4th Company leaped forward into the maelstrom of battle.

Chapter forged steel clashed with a blade crafted from the torment of millions. The two weapons making distinct sounds, when the daemon’s axe swung at the air where Tarrin has stood but moments before it made a horrific wailing sound as the mouths along its edge begged for an end to their suffering, Crocae however, the sword made from several blades taken from traitor warband’s during the Great Scouring sang as it cut through the air, its razor edge glowing with blue energies, it spoke of deeds and the acts of heroes that held it, swirling and dancing around its wielder, tracing the air with runes and symbols of its own.

The two warriors fought for only a moment, it was not until the last perilous seconds that the advantage was seized. The daemon had fought hundreds of battles, it had felled some of the greatest warriors of the Imperium across ten thousand years of lost history. It had broken armies by its mere presence. It had placed millions of skulls at the base of the Skull Throne. It had drowned worlds in seas of blood. But against Brother-Captain Tarrin of the 4th Company of the Steel Sentinels it met a match.

Using his superior speed, pushing his armour beyond anything even he had envisioned when he tinkered with his equipment, he slid beneath the daemon, slashing at its hooved legs, causing it to roar in pain, stamping down to crush the Space Marine. Dodging away, Tarrin leaped onto the monster’s back, unbalancing it for a moment as the wounds on its legs forcing it to the use its wings to try and keep itself up. Gripping one of the great horns that crowned the beast’s head with one of his hands, Crocae in his other, he plunged the blade down the daemons mouth, the energy fields flaring with power as it reacted to the roiling daemonic energies held within. The monster screamed, its fangs scratching and knowing at Tarrin’s arm which was half submerged down the brute’s gullet, the blade like teeth drawing blood as they pierced the armour and flesh of the captain. Dropping to its knees the daemon’s eyes, once windows into the heart of a dying star glazed over into the blackest pits of the untrodden void.

With a final burst of smoke, ash and sulphur, the daemon was cast from the Material Universe, its form driven back to the Immaterium to await some punishment to whatever entity it calls master. Krantor, his Honour Guard, the Inquisitor and his retinue stood shocked as the shockwave from the daemon’s dismissal washed over them. The brief silence created by the monster’s absence was punctuated by a flash of light quickly accompanied by the sound of crackling energy, the singing binaric cant of the Cult Mechanicus following soon after as praise was given to the Omnissiah and notes regarding the reaction of warp touched flesh to the surge of electronmancy. Well done Brother, Krantor quickly chimed with his battle language over the suit to suit vox, that is one monster defeated, now allow me to slay this one. Recovering from the shock first, the Terminator veterans surged forward, slashing apart the acolytes before them, Krantor’s Harpe sweeping great arcs of blood as it slew the wayward agents of the Inquisition. At last only Inquisitor stood, the human looking down at his fallen servants with disgust, raising his warp infused blade to strike at Krantor, who parried and blocked each strike that came at him with a fury and rage that could match the banished Bloodthirster. The two sparred for a few moments as Tarrin replied in what could considered polite thanks, Krantor let out another exhale one might take for an acknowledgement of humour, Cogliostro’s face twisting as he took the brief reaction as a final insult.

He moved to take one final attack with his blade, when without pose, any notable degree of skill or graceful art, the Terminator Veteran punched him in the side with his power fist. With his enhanced hearing Krantor heard the ribs crack, the snapping of bone as the Inquisitor’s power armoured plate caved in under the weight of the weapon. Then as if to highlight the inelegant manner in which the combat was ending, the Veteran struck again, this time spinning the Inquisitor around, the crippled human rolling for a few metres in the slick mud, landing on his side against the hull of his pockmarked Rhino transport.

Nodding to the Veteran, though internally he was disappointed he had not struck the final blow, Krantor approached the fallen human. He began to say something about inevitability, the end times and his master’s grand design. Krantor closed his mind to his heresy, his words were poison that corrupt any soul they touch. He realised he sounded like one of those mad Chaplains and he indulged himself another exhale grunt as he raised his blade to take the traitor’s head. As he swung down, his blade collided with the hull of the Rhino, before his very eyes the Inquisitor had vanished, his form becoming transparent for a moment before disappearing completely. A whispered voice murmuring of grander plans, fate and a weave of destiny that Krantor pushed out with the Litany of Adherence, something he had not had to do since his days as a neophyte. In his frustration Krantor lashed out at the Inquisitor’s Rhion, slashing open the hull and pelting the terrified driver with his volkite charger.

With the daemon gone so was of the cloak of smoke it had brought with it and Krantor could see much of the battlefield. He saw the fried bodies of the bastard Sons of Horus of the Moravec Covenant being prayed over by a group of the blind Electro-Priests. The ever-twitching form of Logos, the Tech-Priest Dominus of the Tarkus Forge World dragging his form upon clockwork legs that tentatively placed a foot upon the uneven surface of the muck and sludge around him, a crackling teslic weapon of his own invention shuddered with unfettered energies. The terrified mortals of the Achromus 13th along with their augmented members regrouped nearby, the officers shouting at one another as the command structure struggled to cope with the gates of hell opening around them.

Shaking his head, Krantor returned to where his Battle-Brothers lay in the mud, the two veterans were helping Galleus back onto his feet, Pescios was unable to stand under his own strength as well but was suspending himself with his servo-harness, blue sparks flaring as the wondrous machine spirit within his armour reknitted itself and him back together. Galleus spoke of their success, that they had secured the monolith, but Krantor did not truly listen, even as the geomancy swept aside the mud that had submerged the xenos artefact. He did not listen as Pescios explained the process that needed to take place to increase the flow of power to the pylon within the monolith to expand the disruptive strength of the device, allowing them to create a wedge in space unaffected by the Warp Storm giving them time to reach the Mandeville Point and escape the system. Krantor only gave the barest recognition to his Honour Guard Sergeant who praised his Captain, switching to offering his help to the Techmarine and the Librarian with his Veteran Brother.

Krantor just stared at Tarrin. He had underestimated the newest Captain of the Steel Sentinels, he had taken him for one of these new breeds of Astartes, with this new batch of gene seed that set him apart from many of the veterans, only rising to position due to the position of Chapter Master being filled by the previous 4th Captain, rather than through actual merit. But there was more to this warrior than he had thought.

Krantor did not help with the preparations, he just waited as the Techmarine and Librarian grew excited with their progress, nodding when he was told they were ready to be extracted, calling down Thunderhawks along with Apothecaries to treat the wounded. Tarrin’s transport came first, he took those most in need of treatment to the Tarrasch’s Folly, leaving Krantor with the dead and the walking wounded.

As he stepped onto the assault ramp, Tarrin, the Captain of the Fourth Compnay turned to see his fellow Brother-Captain behind him. Standing a head taller than him and in Cataphractii Pattern Tactical Dreadnought Armour, Brother-Captain Krantor of the Third Company was an imposing sight, and with his pale features and grim expression he looked like a spectre of death come to haunt the world in its last days. For a moment, the two men stood in silence, for a brief second the younger Captain wondered if he had offered some insult to the veteran of the Chapter, he quickly ran through the battle in his mind, recalling each shot, parry, strike and command with perfect clarity. He was halfway through recalling the instruction Pescios had given him regarding using his servo-harness and its reserve power supply to increase the potency of the Pylon device when Brother-Captain Krantor extending his arm. Though briefly taken aback, the Captain of the Fourth slapped his own arm into the offered hand, the two Astartes clasping arms in the way the Legionnaires of old did when they had formed bond of friendship.

As the assault ramp rose, white mist and smoke extending from vents as the compartment was pressurised for the brief voyage into the void to reach the Tarrash’s Folly. From the viewport of the steel grey Thunderhawk one could see the blade of reality cutting through the storm around the dying world. As it did however, one could not fail to notice that the storm was not isolated to this sector. The bleeding wound that was the great storm that had engulfed the galaxy was impossible to miss. Brother-Captain Tarrin strapped himself in, replaying the battle in his mind as he reviewed reports of the void battle that still raged around the world.

In another Thunderhawk, speeding towards the Strike Cruiser Anaxagoras, Krantor saw the same storm, the same tear that threatened to divide all the efforts of Mankind, undo the work of ten thousand years of struggling and plunge the galaxy into war without end. In the face of this doom, Krantor let out a grunt of exhalation.