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The Rise of the Warmaster

Skirax

By Skirax
in + FAN FICTION +

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Skirax Venerable Brother

Skirax

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Right, I'm going to be asking people which of the Primarchs they would like to come back next. So who?

Orange = Done

 

Loyalist

Guilliman

 

Ferrus

 

Corax

 

Vulkan

 

Russ

 

Jaghatai Khan

 

Sanguinius

 

Dorn

 

Johnson

 

Traitor

Fulgrim

 

Angron

 

Horus (Suroh)

 

Konrad Curze

 

Perturabo

 

Mortarion

 

Magnus

 

Alpharius

 

Lorgar

 

 

So, which shall be next? Voting is now open!

 

Edit: I'll keep a tally of votes per Primarch :D

Skirax Venerable Brother

Skirax

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Sorry guys, have had internet downtime for quite a while, but I'm back! And there shall be another short story by the end of the week.

 

By the way, just wondering; is the way I'm writing the series kind of rag-tag, as it switches from one person to another every few chapters?

Skirax Venerable Brother

Skirax

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Coming January 1st:

 

Jonson surveyed the assembled Dark Angels, all ten thousand of them. Each one ready to fight for him. Each one ready to die for him. They looked at him with steely respect, but all he could muster was a look of sadness and remorse. How had it come to this, he wondered. Brother vs brother again, after ten thousand years of Astartes brotherhood. But, deep down, he knew that it had to come to this. There was no other way. Guilliman, in the Emperor's place, had decreed so. Even Dorn and the immovable Ferrus Manus had agreed with the Ultramarines Primarch. There was too much corruption, too many selfish, careless beurocrats.

He knew it must be.

Terra must burn.

 

The First Legion Reunited

Skirax Venerable Brother

Skirax

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Angels and Deamons

 

It had been two months since the awakening of Jonson, and the Dark Angels were already on a crusade of epic proportions.

Kulic remembered the day when Jonson had returned to the ranks of the living. The rock was close to the northern section of the Imperium and the Angels were en route to combat a traitor chapter, the Accursed Apostles, when the Rock had stopped in its advance. The Chapter’s Techmarines gathered to try to solve the problem, but they could not fathom the setback. As they were considering abandoning the campaign and making a small base on a nearby Imperial World until the Rock had began moving again, when the entire conglomeration of Watchers in the Dark approached Grand Master Belial. A strange promotion, as it was nearly unheard of for Masters of the Deathwing to become the Grand Master. Kulic, being in his command squad at the time, saw the conversation with clarity and unfolding wonder.

***

Belial was conversing with his command squad when Kulic spotted the advance of the Watchers. They came from the darkness, the shadows clinging to them, as though unwilling to yield to the light of the holo-orbs. The cloaks that they wore became a strange cream colour, a colour that radiated attraction with a hidden malice that lurked beneath. He tapped his Lord on the shoulder and he turned, regarding the Watchers with wary eyes. They had approached Belial once before, near three weeks ago, just before his Lord had sanctioned the campaign. It was obvious they had advised him to begin the campaign, but what exactly passed between them was a mystery. Now they had come again, no doubt with battle in mind. As they spoke, Kulic became suddenly woozy and his head began to throb with a faint ache.

You have done as we wished. Now we shall do as you have wished, for millennia. The voice seemed to come from all around him, as though it was the soft wind that caressed their bear faces and whipped the cloaks around their armoured hulks, or the whisper of the hololith feedback that lingered at the edge of their hearing range, taunting them with its obscurity.

“What do you speak of? I have not been alive for a millennium. I see not how I could have wished for something before , birth?” asked Belial, a wary and suspicious tone to his voice.

We refer not to your personal wishes, fool, but those of your Chapter, and your Legion before it. One of the Watchers approached Belial and held out his hands. The Lion helm, please.

The gathered cadre of warriors gasped a little, the idea of allowing an unidentified life form to touch the Lion Helm was unheard of, never mind foolish. But Belial removed his helmet and handed it to the Watcher. The Watcher bowed, then the entire assembled Watchers vanished.

Then the Rock rumbled.

I began like a throaty growl, a soft rumble from deep in the earth. Then rocks began o shake and shift position, vibrating wildly. A crack appeared beneath Kulic’s feet, and he sidestepped death. He chuckled at the thought, fighting for decades in the Emperors service, and then dying from a fissure in the ground. Then another crack appeared a few feet away, then another, then another. All the while, the groan of the earth was building into a rising crescendo. Then everything stopped, and an eerie silence descended on the assembled Astartes. Then a pair of gauntleted hands took hold of the edge of one of the ledges and hauled a mighty figure over the precipice. The Astartes just stared in awe at the figure of Jonson pulling himself up and dusting himself off.

Then he looked back at the staring Astartes and his face cracked in a wide smile.

‘Brother,’ he said, his voice deep and commanding, and yet filled with great sorrow. The entire cadre of marines dropped to their knees in respect. Jonson raised his eyebrows at the kneeling marines. ‘Men, you have fought for longer than I have probably served the Emperor; I’m sure that most of you are above the age of 250?’ The assembled warriors nodded; Kulic couldn’t think of any warrior in the Deathwing that had not served for more than two hundred years. ‘You needn’t bow to me.’

‘But, Lord, you are the Primarch, the Great Lion, Lord of Angels!’ cried Belial defiantly, head still bowed.

‘I said, get up!’ snapped Jonson, a flash of anger appearing, then flitting away in but a second.

The soldiers rose to their feet, looking around at each other in uncertainty and concerned looks on their faces. When Kulic turned to see the Primarch, Jonson was smiling again. He regarded each of the Deathwing in turn, his eyes sparkling with the love that only a father could show his sons. When he came to Belial his smile faltered and his eyes dimmed but for a nanosecond, and as Kulic looked at each others, he could tell he had been the only one to see the tiny falter. But still, it troubled him.

***

Kulic looked out over the sea of stars, and regarded each star in turn. He had a troubled look on his face, and anyone who looked at him could have seen with certainty he was thinking deeply, though none could have guessed what was on his mind.

He had been the only one to see Jonson’s... well, he didn’t know what it was. Loathing? No. Concern? Maybe. Belial had always been a secretive person, at least that was what it seemed like to Kulic. Maybe that secrecy was a sign of evil in his heart.

He heard soft footsteps behind him, and before he knew it, Jonson was standing beside him. Although he had been around the Primarch for a month now, he was as close to scared as he could get when around him; he had never seen the Primarch in battle, and frankly, he was terrified of what he could do, especially after all of the legends he had been told during his time in the Chapter.

No, not Chapter, he corrected himself. The Chapter was dead, and now the Legion had reformed. It had not been hard, most of the successor Chapters of the Dark Angels had always kept close ties with it’s progenitor. Most of the Loyalist Primarchs had returned by this time, a full month after Jonson had returned and, like the Dark Angels, they had reformed their Legion. As to be expected, the Ultramarines had the largest of the Legions, with near 300 Chapters formed from their gene-seed. The Space Wolves, on the other hand, had never had any successors, and so had not changed at all. They had not stopped in their defences or attacks, like the others, but they had, obviously, ended all plans for Great Hunts. The only Legions who hadn’t had their Primarchs return were the Blood Angels and the White Scars.

Kulic suddenly became aware that Jonson was looking at him intently, and his throat clammed up as he sought for something to say to his Primarch.

‘Stars are nice, tonight,’ was all he could manage, and he swore at himself for producing such a meagre statement for such a mighty being. Jonson roared with mirth, and Kulic felt himself turn red. Was this how the Heroes of the Crusade had felt?

‘Brother, already I like you,’ commented Jonson after he had recovered himself, wiping away some tears from his lower eyelids. Kulic felt a boom of pride swell in his chest at being called ‘brother’ by one so mighty. ‘And that is why I need you.’

Kulic turned to the Primarch, the pride in him growing with every word. ‘Me, m’Lord?’

‘Yes. I hear you are a master of Planetary Assaults. And that is just what I need.’

Kulic considered this. He had never been regarded as a ‘master’ of anything, except maybe his squad, and at one point, the company he used to lead. ‘May I ask as to who has coined this term, m’Lord?’ he was shocked at the formality of his voice, and Jonson chuckled.

‘You may, Master Kulic,’ he replied, obviously humouring him, ‘but can we dispense with the formalities?’

‘Yes,’ sighed Kulic. ‘Sir, can I just say? I always thought that Primarchs were very strict, and, well, had rods up their asses.’ Jonson roared with laughter at Kulic’s latest comment and stood bent double for nearly a minute.

‘You make me laugh, young one,’ said Jonson. ‘But, back to your original question, it was Master Belial that told me that you have never failed in a Planetary attack, and have never retreated in defence. So, now I ask you, will you perform a deed that will be written in the history books, and be revered so greatly that even the Emperor will know of it?’

Kulic’s answer was obvious. ‘I shall.’

***

And now he was at the behest of a great invasion. He stood before a full five hundred marines, assembled for him and him alone to lead into the mouth of hell, and win. Each one had newly stick pieces of parchment stuck to their breastplates, inscribed with an Oath of Moment on it, a new notion presented by the Primarch. Apparently, it had been the custom tradition for the Legions to perform during the Crusade, and now that the Primarch had returned, it became a current tradition. Out of the sea of glossy green ceramite, the front rack, a full hundred bone-white Deathwing force had been committed to the drop. The power armoured marines were arranged into their squads and were waiting for his sanction to clamber into their Drop Pods and thunder to the planet below.

Kulic turned back to the viewing screen and stared at the planet below. He could make out, between the purple and black clouds, a single continent, covered in miles of trenches and dugouts. Fields of razor wire and forests of tactical redoubts and watchtowers covered the ashen wastes. He turned back to the assembled marines and thrust his sword into the air. ‘For Caliban! For the Primarch! For the Emperor!’ he screamed, and the assembled company followed suit, roaring cries of ‘In Jonson’s name!’ and ‘In the name of Lion!’ and they moved out to their Drop Pods. The Terminators remained in place, immovable giants awaiting Kulic’s signal to activate their teleporters.

 

In his command deck, Jonson looked out over the stars, and tears came to his eyes. Not for the first time, he wondered how it had come to this again. He turned back to the captains assembled before the hololith and managed a sorrowful smile. ‘Let’s get on with it,’ he said, and walked out of the door onto the embarkation deck. The vast space had been cleared for him to address the Legion that had been left on the ship. ‘Brothers!’ he cried, his voice carrying easily across the vast space, raising his hands. ‘Today is a sad day. The Regent of Macragge wishes us to make war on the Imperium. I know that this decision has enraged you, and many of you shall never come to terms with it, but I tell you, it is for the best. It has become corrupted and ruined, and the Imperium I once fought for died lone ago. Astartes have always kept out Imperial bureaucratic affairs, as will it always be.

‘But this has led to the Imperium becoming a dark place. It no longer makes war because it must, but because it wishes so. It sends crusades when the manpower should be sent to reinforcing beleaguered worlds. It withdraws men when it should be sending more in. And, most disgusting of all, it takes the Astartes for granted. They throw us into situations in which we cannot triumph. They waste precious gene-seed.

‘But, I say no more! It is time for us to purge the Imperium, and bring back the golden days of the Great Crusade!’ A chorus of cheers and agreements followed his speech.

Jonson surveyed the assembled Dark Angels, all ten thousand of them. Each one ready to fight for him. Each one ready to die for him. They looked at him with steely respect, but all he could muster was a look of sadness and remorse. How had it come to this, he wondered. Brother vs brother again, after ten thousand years of Astartes brotherhood. But, deep down, he knew that it had to come to this. There was no other way. Guilliman, in the Emperor's place, had decreed so. Even Dorn and the immovable Ferrus Manus had agreed with the Ultramarines Primarch. There was too much corruption, too many selfish, careless beurocrats.

He knew it must be.

Terra must burn.

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