And They Shall Know True Fear...

[exetus]

      Colonel Asurgi stared at the checkpoint, more accurately the remains of the checkpoint, that had defended the approach to the Glorious Citadel from the northeast.  The two heavy plascrete bunkers were shattered and gutted while heavy divots marked the impact of large-caliber weaponry.  Of the men that had manned them, there was no sign, but the blackened interiors and the stench of promethium betrayed the presence of at least one flamer and perhaps more.  The comms equipment, however, lay untouched aside from a single metal clamp that had keyed the hand-mic in the "transmit" position with the band set to the regiment's emergency frequency.  The emergency frequency that overrode other frequencies when within the 50 kilometer range.  The colonel's men had disabled the vox unit after securing the site.

 

      Outside of the bunkers, the sundered hulls of three Chimera personnel carriers lay many meters from where they had once been positioned to cover the redoubts and provide overlapping fields of fire.  No treadmarks were visible to show their displacement, evidence that they had not moved there themselves prior to being destroyed.  Of their crews there also remained no evidence aside from the random lascarbine or lasgun and footprints in the mud.

 

The mangled wreck of a Leman Russ Punisher was the most startling and dismaying, however; the ammo hoppers were still nearly full of the massive anti-infantry shells used by the primary weapon.  Asurgi had seen the tank as he approached in his Valkyrie; the wreckage had been peeled apart into the shape of an eight-sided pattern, not entirely asymmetric, but not a complete mirror, either.  At the center of the design lay the shorn glacis of the turret that had displayed the vehicle's name... Irrepressible Valor.  Evidently not. He had scratched his head at that one and made specific note of it to research in the archives when he got back to the citadel.  

 

The loss of the Punisher was especially disturbing for it had been the only one in the regiment's possession and it's massive firepower had enabled them to post a smaller force at this checkpoint without losing firepower.  Not only had it not helped in this case, but its loss would require significant assets to replace and a weakening of the entire perimeter to compensate for the safety of the major route it had defensed.

 

      "Lieutenant, clean up this mess and reconstitute this checkpoint before sundown.  We cannot afford to leave this approach unexposed, lest the enemy attempt to exploit it en force.  I will leave a squadron of Vendetta gunships on alert in case you need it.  Quickly man!  The Emperor protects!"  He marched off back to his Valkyrie before the junior officer could respond and hopped aboard as the aircraft began to take off.  What did that symbol mean?

 

 

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      It was similar to the northeast checkpoint, but this had been even more recent; the ground was still warm from the fires that had washed over it; warm enough that the heat radiated across the underside of Asurgi's face and drew beads of sweat from his pores.  Here and there, small fires still guttered amidst the wreckage in the steadily growing light of the rising sun, casting menacing shadows through the haze of smoke and morning fog.  Melted rubber dripped from a few surfaces and the warping of light from head radiating off of metal made the scene something out of an imagined hell.

 

      This had been an even more heavily defended location because it was the main access road to the Glorious Citadel from the southern approaches.  A massive highway, seven lanes on each side, rolled through the checkpoint, though it would have been more appropriate to call it a small fortress.  Plascrete and plasteel construction along with over a dozen heavy weapons emplacements, including two rapier platforms, had led to the approach being commonly known as the "Suicide Run" after numerous conflicts over the years had ended when forces attacking the famous city had attempted a full-frontal assault from the south and never succeeded.

 

      That untarnished record no longer existed.  While there was no proof that whomever had attacked Papa-Nine had penetrated beyond its boundaries, the simple fact that not a single defender remained alive removed any doubt that if they had wanted to, they could have strolled through the twisted remains of the access barriers.  Strolled through in a Warhound if they wanted as the archways to the massive gates lay strewn about as pieces of large rubble and detritus.

 

      The tanks that had guarded Papa-Nine were not as stylistically arrayed as Irrepressible Valor had been.  What vehicles had been stationed at the fortress were barely recognizable as such.  In their current state, they could have been at a junkyard and not seemed out of place.  Smashed, rent and sliced beyond repair they would be as effective to future soldiers as they had apparently been to those defending the "Suicide Run."  Perhaps a dog or a cat or some other small beast would be able to use what remained as shelter from the elements.

 

      Where there had been little remaining evidence of the soldiers at Checkpoint Papa-Four, however, there was abundant evidence of them at Papa-Nine.  Scorched earth marked the locations where they had died, the ash not yet mixed into the slurry of mud made from a vast array of liquids, from promethium to lubricants to water to the coppery scent of blood.  All of the personal weapons had been sundered and lay, neatly arranged off to the side, almost as if they were taunting the colonel and his team.  But that was the least of his worries; upon the central barricade tower that rose above the checkpoint and facing back towards the interior perimeter of the city was another stylized eight-pointed shape just like the one at the northeast site and it slowly came into view as the smoke dissipated and the fog burned away.

 

      But this time, instead of using the wreckage of a vehicle, it was composed of one-hundred and seventeen severed heads.

 

      It was all that Asurgi could do to not show fear, but his heart was thundering and his body threatened to lose control of certain functions.  A number of soldiers accompanying him were not nearly as successful.

 

 

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      Colonel Asurgi had eleven citations for bravery.  Eleven citations that he had felt worth mentioning, that is.  Had he not graciously turned down more than two dozen others, he would easily have been one of the most decorated of the Emperor's servants on the planet in comparable time served with the military.  In fact, if his deeds were compared to anyone in the sub-sector, perhaps the entire sector, it would be difficult to provide any individual that had displayed more valor than he.  

 

      Against the unrelenting menace of WAAAAGH RuckStompa! he had stood at the point of attack and commanded his troops to a brutal victory.  When faced with the technological nightmares of Rogue Adept Vucinix, he had laughed as he danced his way through them, his elite bodyguard at his side and the power sword Unfaltering Edge slicing its way to glory.  As his expeditionary force had been plagued by sadistic Eldar pirates, he refused to flinch and outwitted them at their own game and slaughtering them in a remorseless counter-attack in which he had lost his left arm, but refused to falter, bludgeoning the Dark Eldar leader to death with his severed limb before collapsing from blood loss.  Colonel Asurgi was the definition of the word bravery on Kuyken VII and a true champion of the Emperor.  He did not know fear.

 

      Correction.  He hadn't known fear.

 

      He now stood alone at India-one, the main entrance to the Glorious Citadel.  His uniform was impeccable.  He did not parade about with his decorations as did so many of the ridiculously pompous commanders, but instead wore a clean uniform that was perfectly tailored and as appropriate for combat as it was leadership.  It remained that way except for two details.  The first was that it was completely red;  a dark, rich red when the actual color of his uniform was traditionally white.  The second was that it had a strong ammonia odor clinging to it.

 

      His elite strike force had responded to the distress call and the cacophonous transmissions that followed as soon as they had been able to clear the airspace and launch from a nearby airfield.  It had been less than seventeen minutes from the time the initial call had come in before his Valkyries and Vendettas had arrived on-site, but it had still been too late and the evidence lay all around checkpoint's location.

 

      There had been no attempt to clear the bodies or arrange any of them or the debris into the shape he had now seen at eleven different sites.  This had been destruction and carnage on a scale and speed that he hadn't even known was possible.  The garrison at India-One had numbered seven-hundred and thirty-four. When he and his force had arrived, there were seven-hundred and twenty-nine corpses dispassionately strewn about the fortification where they had been, for lack of a better word, butchered.

 

      As his aircraft had briefly touched down and then roared back into the sky, he and his soldiers had been shocked into stillness as they made out a single discordant sound amidst the rumbling of unstable structures and the crackle of the towering flames; five voices together.  It was the first time that there had been anyone left alive at the locations of the attacks and that should have been a relief.  But what sense of relief could there be when those five surviving voices were the unbridled screams and shrieks of unadulterated terror?

 

     The colonel had blanched, but ordered his men to recover the individuals at which they immediately sprang into action, all things considered an extremely commendable feat in of itself.  A breaching team had quickly and efficiently staged a clearance of the target location and entered to find the last five soldiers, mouths open and screaming as they stared up at the ceiling, not seeing their saviors.  As the team had approached and taken hold of the five, their lifeless bodies had collapsed to the ground and in their midst lay a decoy transmitting biological signs on auspex frequencies and single speaker that suddenly went silent as the bodies were moved.  And then in crystal clear, but menacing tones came a single, resonant voice.

 

      "The Emperor protects."

 

      Outside of the bunker system, Asurgi had heard the voice over his vox-link to the breaching team and was about to utter an order when the four Vendetta gunships exploded above him, followed by two streaks of light and five rapid-fire blasts of plasma that sent the Valkyries into terminal flight patterns that met with the ground.  The suddenness of the Vendettas' deaths shocked the colonel into silence, but the ensuing targeting of the Valkyries and their near simultaneous demises threw him into action... or so he had thought until Asurgi realized that he couldn't move.  All about him, chaos had reigned, but his vision had become clouded and all he could make out were shadows darting back and forth and the indistinct chatter of las, stubber and bolter fire, coupled with shouts and screams.  He had been enveloped in warmth from head to toe.

 

      And then relative silence.

 

      Colonel Asurgi, Champion of Kuyken VII, Pride of the Asurgi Clan stood completely still, legs weak and soaked in the blood of his soldiers and reeking of his own urine.  Alone amidst the annihilation of the best infantry battalion on the planet.

 

 

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      "We've found the colonel!"

 

      "Rescue Seven-three, confirm your last transmission!"

 

      The pilot of Rescue Valkyrie Seven-Three repeated his call as the recovery medics re-transmitted their find and were half-carrying a figure in red towards the rescue hoist.  Funny, the pilot didn't recall any uniforms in the Kuyken Home Guard or Star Legion that were red.  Why was Colonel Asurgi wearing one?

 

      "Lieutenant Praust, we have a problem!"  The leader of the rescue team was clearly shaken.

 

      "What is it, sergeant?"

 

      "The colonel has some serious issues... he won't stop repeating the same phrase.  I can't get him to snap out of it!"

 

      "Are you sure that it's really Colonel Asurgi?"

 

      "Sir, I am absolutely positive that's who it was, have no idea who it is.  We need to get this guy off of this bird quick fast and in a hurry."

 

      Lieutenant Praust was a veteran pilot, but the fear in the voice of his rescue leader and the possibility that the Colonel was having some kind of episode shook him to his core.  He was so shaken that he missed his approach to the trauma center and needed to make a second run.  What could possibly have happened?  What could have done that?  If that could happen to the colonel...

 

 

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      "The colonel is useless to us, Lord Commander."

 

      "Impossible!  Colonel Asurgi is unbreakable!  I cannot believe that he is lost to us!"  Lord Commander Decimus Tria slammed his fist onto the tactical display before him, causing a flicker in the projected three-dimensional image of the Glorious Citadel even as yet another checkpoint along the inner perimeter went black as communications were lost and the last vital-signs of the defenders as monitored by the Citadel Command Center Network winked out.  All of the other cities had ceased communicated three days ago.  "Bring him to me now!  I must speak with him.  Without him, our defenses are lost!"

 

      Commissar Benedikt shook his head and sighed, "I cannot, my lord.  At this point, his presence is, at best, disruptive.  At worst it is beyond demoralizing and would be toxic to those defenders within the Citadel.  I urge you to consider withdrawal to the command bunker now."  The Lord Commander shook his head, vigorously rejecting that idea even as the commissar continued on.  'Sire, he's beyond broken.  The recovery teams that retrieved him from India-One returned him to us and then the majority of them promptly deserted as a result of what they had seen in the Hero of Kuyken VII.

     

      "Look at the tactical display!  Even you must be able to see that our position here is untenable.  We still have no idea who or what it is that we are facing aside from this symbol here!"  Benedikt activated a rune and the symbol that had been at so many of the sites appeared.  "We understand this to be what is called an ollin.  Ancient texts refer to it as the symbol for 'movement or change' back on Terra and some of the older colonies.  Beyond that, we do not have any other specific data since our break with the Imperium, though there are vague references to Five Suns and an ancient calendar."

 

      The Lord Commander growled and slapped away the mug of caf that was on the display before him, shattering against the wall and startling two of his aides.  "Useless information.  As useless as that sniveling governor and the Imperial lackeys that once held sway here.  The True Emperor, Beloved of All,  still holds this system and the other four in this sub-sector.  No more is that distant mockery of leadership on 'Holy Terra' in control here!"

 

      An incoming message icon marked "Urgent" and originating from Orestic, the new throneworld, suddenly appeared and pulsed an insistent red on the tactical projection.  Almost dismissively, Decimus Tria opened the message and began to read.  It took less than a minute for his complexion to pale to a shade shared by ghosts and the snow drifts of Fenris.  He quickly brought up the attached star map of the systems that had declared loyal to Orestic and watched, in time-lapse as, one-by-one the systems turned from a status of first green to yellow, then red and then black.  Kuyken VII was the last and the astropathic choir date indicated that this message, while just received, was over a week old... the same time that communications had been lost with the rest of the Empire.  The astropaths had claimed a warp storm was responsible for the loss of communications...

 

      An emergency icon flashed again and the Lord Commander scrolled out once more until the entire planet of Kuyken VII was visible and he could identify the new orbital threat.  A battle barge broadcasting its identity as Tyrannus Excelsior and its escorts had appeared from the shadow of the planet's largest moon.  The identifying Chapter badge was a stylized ollin.

 

      Commissar Benedikt fainted.

 

      Someone was crying.  It took a few moments before Tria realized that it was himself.

 

 

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      The dead lay all about, their bodies shattered and their instruments of war broken.  It had been sudden and it had been brief, but in that moment, Itztaca had felt the strength of the Emperor flowing through his veins.  The remains of the traitors were a testament to that righteousness and the burning hulks of vehicles the flames of justice that marked his victory.  The smell of cordite, promethium and blood flooded the senses and left no mistake, were you unable to see or hear, that the purge had been nearly complete.  Itztaca took one last look around to survey the scene and stalked towards a gaping pit in the middle of the desolation with a grim smile under his helm.

 

      What remained of Colonel Asurgi sat and the bottom of a vast funnel of debris before the Five Suns captain, rocking back and forth with his hands wrapped around his knees.  His blood-soaked uniform hung off of his near-skeletal frame and he remained exactly where the Space Marines had found him in a holding cell below the citadel.  It had been a well-appointed holding cell, but it was a holding cell nonetheless.  The Five Suns had dismantled the structure around him but he hadn't moved from his spot on the floor.

 

     The Five Suns captain looked down at the shattered form of the Hero of Kuyken VII and removed his helm.  His acute, post-human hearing easily picked up the quietly murmured words in ragged voice.

 

      "The Emperor protects... the Emperor protects... the Emperor protects..."

 

      "Not yours, Traitor."  A single report echoed from the gaping hole as four more Astartes crested the edge and looked down on the captain.  He rose from the pit with a single jet of fire from his jump pack and turned to the veteran sergeant to his left.

 

      "Cleanse this filth..."

 

      Yaotec grinned as he brought his flamer to bear.  "With pleasure, Captain!" Liquid hell erupted from the nozzle of his weapon to douse the corpses of the traitor guardsman as he softly recited the famous mantra of the great hero, Lord Tlanextic.

 

      "As the fires of the Five sear the life from the face of our world, so too do the Five Suns sear the stain of heresy from the soul of the Imperium..."

 

      Moments later, the brightly burning flames amidst the wreckage of the citadel danced wildly in the turbulent wake of the squad's jump packs' ignition, catapulting the Space Marines into the darkness as swiftly as they had appeared from it.  As the blast dissipated, the flames roared back to life, consuming the hated foes and leaving the purity of scorched earth in its wake.  The only evidence of who had wrought such devastation for future generations was a single stylized ollin traced in blood on the side of a shattered Leman Russ turret.

[Inquisitor Kravin]

Interesting story. I'm a little confused though, is the Ollin your own loyalist chapters badge because the description of the eight pointed device early on suggested Chaos?
 
Assuming that is a bit of deliberate misdirection, nice touch.

Two tiny mistakes that caught my eye: "He did not parade about with his decorations as did so many of the other ridiculously pompous commanders did,". It would be better without the second 'did', I know how it happens, you can't decide on your sentence structure and you end up with both and neither.

Yaotec, 'recounted', not 'recanted'.

[exetus]

It is a deliberate misdirection, as is their reference to "the Emperor."

Here it is on a vet sgt...

http://www.winterdyne.co.uk/maz/images/commissions/5suns/5suns_sgt1.jpg

Thanks for catching those two mistakes. The second was supposed to be "recited" not "recanted." I guess that's what happens when I throw something together in a few hours while bored out of my mind as CQ NCOIC

Fixed.

[Inquisitor Kravin]

Fantastic marine. Love the soft grey and the subtle references to Meso-American culture. I'm afraid I can't help but see the Ollin on the jump pack as a daisy!

The way that you play on "the Emperor" reminds me of the beginning of Horus Rising.

 

Also,  I did think "recited" fit better than "recounted" but from recanted I guessed you were going for recounted as I've seen that mix-up before.