Inspiration Friday 2016: Thousand Sons (until 1/13)

Warsmith Aznable · January 30, 2016

Erm...my story was about a 21st/Cursed Founding Chapter/warband called the Bahltimyr Reavers. Their geneseed was Raven Guard.Looks like I didn't explain that very well :(

Kind of the same reaction here since the idea was a Blood Angels Successor I left unnamed that had its Death Company being possessed by a Daemon who was slowly using the visions to twist the Chapter. Similar amount of success in that respect as well I guess lol.

No, I got all that. The judging was written in-character of someone who marks no difference between the Legions and their descendants. Sorry for any confusion it caused.

Kol Saresk · January 30, 2016

Ah, fair enough. Makes me feel better about my writing capabilities lol.

Aqui · January 30, 2016

Ah, fair enough. Makes me feel better about my writing capabilities lol.

+1

And that does make sense

Tenebris · January 30, 2016

"Rein your beast!" the Dark Apostle said "we have already lost three helots to its rages and it risks to endanger the other beasts too. Do it Shorta, or I will do it for you!"

Shorta grinned but then thought better and lowered his gaze, it was not in his right to question the Dark Apostle and if it wouldn't be for the patronage of his master he would have never risen high in the esteem of Khorne, the Blood Hand of Chaos.

Zurshakl was a temperamental steed, a spirited Juggernaut which never failed to amuse his Word Bearer rider with the sheer malice it exuded. A fine steed, a beast of blood and brass, savage and unpredictable, the avatar of Khorne's insatiable lust for violence.

The floor shook, Shorta smiled, again the beasts were competing for leadership, charging, fighting, gouging, trampling anything and anyone in their vicinity. Although lost in the cavernous holds of the mighty battlecruiser, the Crucible was as much a ground of trials as it was a shrine to the eldest brother of the Four.

The first thing greeting the Word Bearer were the remains of the trampled helots. Stacked in a gory pile outside the shrine, their mauled bodies were awaiting a servitor to retrieve them for the incinerator. A small tribute to the Bloody One, Shorta nodded as he entered the Crucible.

Reeking of blood and offal, the shrine was a temple to warriors of all creeds. Cages filled with combatants donned the roof of the chamber, the blood spilling from them elaborately pooling on the anvil upon which a Warpsmith was forging a weapon, thus honoring the god of battles.

At the end of the vast chamber, hidden behind a wall of spikes upon which the last offerings were bleeding their last, Shorta saw the ring. Five massive Juggernauts were butting their crested heads, heedless of the mortals observing them, intent on establishing the dominance of the pack.

"They are restless, they feel the wind of war blowing across the ship..." Mertak observed. A broad legionary, Mertak was the Sergeant of his coterie, a burly warrior who, it seems, took at heart the lessons learned from the Eaters of Worlds, so long ago. "They are always restless..." Shorta replied, and this was true. The Juggernauts never slept, never rested, for the beasts every breath was a challenge, every movement a threat, every step a provocation.

"The Dark Apostle wants them to stop" Shorta added. "He is welcome to try" Zerak joked coming from the other side of the ring, his crested helm in the crook of his arm. "Jest not brother, you know what happened the last time..." Shorta left the words hang in the air and his two brothers fell silent, remembering full well what punishment has befallen their coterie on that day.

"I fancy not a ride chained on the back of my steed, brother, but the beasts are restless, Khorne calls to them, I feel it and I know you feel it too. They hunger for blood, HE hungers for blood..." Mertak grimly added and the other two nodded.

"Than they shall have blood" a voice echoed in the Crucible and all turned toward the entrance. A massive figure clad in ancient terminator armor loomed under the archway and all the celebrants in the chamber fell on their knees.

"Coryphaus" was all Shorta managed to say before the figure silenced him with a gesture of his hand.

"The beasts are restless, aye, Khorne demands a tribute and we shall give him one to placate his ire. Gather your warriors Lieutenant, you will make planetfall within the hour." Shorta straightened himself and asked of his commander "Where to, lord, where shall the Brotherhood of the Axe descend, whom we hunt?" Mertak and Zerak closed their fists around their weapons, eager to be unleashed.

"You will not hunt today Lieutenant, they will" and the Coryphaus pointed at the five Juggernauts tearing into each other in the ring. "They are creatures of the Blood God and their nostrils cavort only one scent, witch-scent. As we exit the Warp we will translate near the moon of Oplanis, an uninhabited planetoid save for a conclave of Astropaths, a relay temple. The Dark Apostle demands silence so he can listen to the song of the Neverborn undistubed. You will follow the witch-scent and finish with your axes what your beasts did not trample to death. Understood?"

"I will need more helots to corral the beasts into the lander, they wont survive." Shorta added. "You shall have a dozen of them, make them count Lieutenant or it is you who shall herd your mounts next time."

Shorta grinned "a dozen will suffice my lord, more orders?"

"Yes, leave not a stone unturned, not a witch alive. That would be all lieutenant. Make haste, our lord Apostle is anxious to hear the song again."

Teetengee · January 30, 2016

-snip-

13. Teetengee wrote "Warp Born" and I won't even go into how disturbing the subject matter was.

-snip-

YES! I call disturbing a daemon of Malal a win! Even if there shall be no octed to claim. In fact, sigged.

EesiOh · January 31, 2016

I just had a much better thought for the Possessed challenge, I know that ship has flown but I wish to do a (hopefully) better re-entry. I'll make sure to title it as part of the Possessed Challenge so you dont get confused Captain Malachi

Carrack · January 31, 2016

I'll be adding to the possessed challenge too. In my case I started in on part 2 of the story I posted, and like where it was going, but lacked the time to finish it up.

@Teetengee. I don't think a mother like that would be getting flowers, brunch, and hallmark cards on Morhers Day

Captain Malachi · January 31, 2016

I'll make sure to ignore you two (unless you add another story later for the current challenge, of course) for the judging portion. Look forward to reading them though.

EesiOh · January 31, 2016

POSSESSED CHALLENGE

Kislev, Herald of Madness (looks like i've got me a new recouring character)

The daemon Kha’Gath looked around at its surroundings, it was in a strangely shaped room, which didn’t quite seem to fit any understanding of geometry, this to any daemon, and especially one of the Great Changer, did not mean much, but even to Kha’Gath it seemed particularly odd. As it grew accustomed to the stench of incense coming from 11 sanctified sticks in the room and the poor lighting from the 11 ritual braziers it realised why it felt wrong. Standing in front of the daemon were 10 Cultists and a Chaos Space Marine sorcerer, each wearing the cursed black and white diagonal pattern marking them as the Silent Laughter and dedicated to the one daemons fear most. Malal. The Sorcerer saw that the daemon had surveyed its surroundings and gave it a sardonic smile. He stepped into an 11 pointed star shaped summoning circle and looking down Kha’Gath realised he was in an identical one. Kha’Gath surged forwards but was met with a wall of force emanating from the circle.

Kislev found it amusing the way the daemon squirmed and writhed, they both knew what fate it had instore for it and yet it still fought. His cultists began to chant the words he had taught them, as he himself primed his teleporter and began to activate the runes he had earlier inscribed upon his armour. The smell of ozone permeated the air as the cultists chanted faster and louder. As soon as the chanting began Kha’Gath began to wheedle and plead, using every ounce of its power to try and get out of its situation but Kislev had foreseen this and burst the eardrums of all the cultists personally, to prevent just such an action. He himself was insulated in his own summoning circle. The cultists continued to chant as he punched in the final coordinates for his teleporter and as the chanting reached fever pitch activated it. There was a blinding flash of light and a wave of force so powerful it ruptured the internal organs of all the gathered cultists. The force billowed hard against the candles and incense sticks but simply made them burn stronger and brighter. The room had stayed mostly the same, save for the dead cultists, the first summoning circle was also empty.

As the warp dust began to disperse from the second circle laughter began to fill the room. Kislev strode out of the circle and looked in wonder at his arm. With a thought it became a claw, like a crabs, then a hammer, and then it solidified into rock. Finally he settled on a form he liked, long avian talons. In the back of his head he could still here Kha’Gath whimpering and complaining but he dismissed it and left the summoning room. “For the Renegade!” he shouted in triumph.

Son of Carnelian · January 31, 2016

Discuss

Inquisitor Zisa sneered at the chained beast in front of her, though "beast" hardly described it accurately. Its form appeared more like an obscene melding of metal and flesh, but without any of the visible seams that usually indicated such a merging. Rather, the metal flowed into skin in certain places. Bone became iron at different points. All of it had seemed random and without direction when Zisa first beheld the writhing prisoner, but it had taken on a certain order in her mind the more she observed it.

The fact that the creature had already imparted something of its own nature heartened her. She had taken the Disc of Tzeentch quite literally out from under Lord Eusebios some weeks ago, after a failed attempt at apprehending that rogue sorcerer of The Scourged. While he had made good his escape, the fact that his trusted mount now floated before her filled Zisa with confidence. She knew that some of her peers took a dim view of capturing artifacts of the Great Enemy rather than destroying them outright, but the disc represented a possibility Zisa couldn't resist.

<That's how it always starts, little human. You search for knowledge and reach too far, as your kind has done since the start of time itself.>

The sudden burst of foreign thought-speak into her mind didn't surprise Zisa. She know the disc could communicate with her in this way. It had done so infrequently over the past few weeks, but the implication that it could read something of her thoughts as well did catch Zisa unawares.

"I've no interest discussing my aims with you, thing. You exist to serve; first your God, then The Scourged, and now you serve me."

"Truly? Why do you think that?"

Zisa couldn't suppress a laugh at this remark. How could a creature, tied to such a vast intelligence as the Lord of Change, prove itself so stupid? She asked it as much.

<Consider, human. How many Inquisitors before you have captured a Neverborn? How many of them have emerged from their dungeons, servants of the dark gods?>

Zisa didn't answer. Inquisitorial records had plenty of instances of such heresies, but Zisa had examined as many of them as she could before committing to this interrogation. She had hoped she could avoid their same mistakes...

Again, the Disc of Tzeentch proved it could read her thoughts. Zisa shook her head in defiance, unnerved by the creature's total command of the situation.

"You're not in control here!' she blurted angrily. 'I am!"

Zisa bared her teeth, like and animal standing over prey. She unsheathed the force sword at her side and set it aglow with the power of her own innate psychic talent. Moving closer to the chained daemon, she brandished the weapon threateningly, but the creature never flinched.

Then, with a few swift and precise strokes of her sword, she cut the daemon free.

"Lower." She commanded the disc.

<As you say.> It responded into her mind, without any perceivable emotion.

Zisa stepped onto the disc without a moment of hesitation. The thing felt right under her. Despite its innate defiance of gravity, the union of the bottom of her feet and the top of the disc felt as secure as any surface Zisa had ever stood upon. It buoyed her, filled her with confidence, and reassured that she had made the right choice all in one moment.

"Come now, beast.' she said in a sinister voice not entirely her own. 'We have work to do."

Scourged · February 1, 2016

Ah, I had a lot of fun with this one. It was one of those effortless writing sessions, where the words just flow through the keyboard without pause. I hope you all like it, too.

Dominant Will

Stories and legends were part and parcel for all the steeds of Chaos, and Discs were no different. The desolate warscape of Kathalon is where he first witnessed their beauty. Before the grueling days of Kathalon, he had only ritualistic lore and hearsay to go on. But once there, upon that daemonic hellscape, he observed the awesome fury that a Disc and its rider could unfold. Bearing witness to a Disc in action made any previous scraps of desire a resolute certainty: Phtoleus would have his mount.

Phtoleus had been in the cabal tasked with bringing forth a mighty Lord of Change to the eternal war zone of blood and magicks. The Sorcerer Lord had chosen him - among the other aspirant sorcerers - for the task, both an honor and an opportunity. Still new to the warband, Phtoleus new he was destined for a greatness among his fellow sorcerers. He did not yet know how he would achieve this lofty position, but being hand-picked by Lord Dhelmas was a promising start.

The work was menial, but a step on his nebulous path to glory. Phtoleus would do his part and aid in the summoning. He would learn from the experience, and store the knowledge for his own selfish use in the future. He would absorb all that could be learned, whether from the ritual or from the daemonic planet itself. And so it was, amidst the charnel pit of their sacrifices, rites and incantations murmured without conscious effort from his lips, that he saw that which he never knew he craved so badly:

On the pyrite sands of a sulfur sea was yet another of countless daemonic clashes in this never-ending war. Bloodletters charged and howled, blade burning with their fury. Flamers coalesced and spewed the iridescent fires of the True Master. Beasts of red flesh and black horns slashed their blades as the burned to nothingness. Creatures of limbs and mouths were cut down to explode into flame, just to be born anew. And as the tides of Neverborn ebbed and flowed in their equal might, little Horrors danced among them all, endlessly euphoric in their brief material existence.

It was out of that sulfur sea that the first Screamer emerged, diving out of the scathing liquid into the humid air, streams of aetherial energy wisping off of its fins and razor-spines. It’s azure brood was not far behind, and a school of Sky-sharks was careening at the back lines of those that served the Bloody Hand. A rainbow bolt of pure psychic essence pierced itself out of the pack and struck a crimson daemon, it’s physical form instantly negated and removed from realspace. Phtoleus recklessly diverted his thoughts away from the summoning that he could truly admire the sight: a powerful Herald in resplendent robes mounted on a Disc.

Multi-armed and armored with gold and platinum, the Herald cawed violently from its hooked beak and thrust its crystalline staff forward, another bolt racing faster than light to obliterate all enemy daemons in its wake. Orbs of green fire shot as missiles from its multitude of other limbs, exploding ally and foe alike with magickal flame. The Herald’s psychic might was no shock to Phtoleus, however. These were powers and talents that even a lowly mortal could possess, and with training the sorcerer’s own power would be double that of the Herald. No, it was the Disc beneath the Herald’s taloned feet that captivated Phtoleus.

It raced amidst the sea of Screamers with the same fluid grace. The amalgamation of flesh and metal guided its rider through the battle, turning and spinning and flying in all directions, with the Herald suffering no ill effects from the turbulent ride. Bone-gold blades and hooks pierced the warp-flesh of its prey, rending them instantly to mutilated shreds. Gemstones-turned-eyes looked in all directions, lending the mount supernatural skill and grace to avoid all clumsy blows from the Bloodletters. With a focused gaze, Phtoleus swore he could see the essence and souls of fallen prey bleed into the Discs pulsing form.

It was beautiful…

After the summoning, the Sorcerer Lord had chastised him for his lack of focus in that fleeting moment, but it did not matter. It was worth it for the chance to bear witness to such a wonderful sight. Phtoleus knew, with unshakable certainty, that he would master a Disc all his own and command from on high. Nothing in the universe, Materium or Warp, could stop him.

Such mastery of the Warp would grant him unlimited power! None among the Scourged, not even the mighty Sorcerer Lord Dhelmas, had the will to tame a screaming ray into a subservient mount. And rightfully so: it is spoken that a Disc can only come as a gift from a Lord of Change. But other, quieter rumors assured the eager listener that a sorcerer with enough power could tame one all his own, needing no aid of a daemon. To be the first among the warband to achieve this honor would see Phtoleus rise from a pathetic aspirant into a revered champion. No, more than that: possessing a Disc would grant him the honor of lordship!

Decades of unceasing ambition found Phtoleus inside the Flaming Tomb within the Realm of Chaos. Close to a hundred years of real-time had passed since bearing witness to the Disc and its rider at Kathalon. It was a frustrating century of training his mind and will, of enduring the fruitless campaigns of the Sorcerer Lord, and of his silent plotting for grandiose ascension. In this time Phtoleus had risen and fallen in and out of favor with the Sorcerer Lord, the suspicion of secret plans most likely the reason. But it no longer mattered. With the theft of one of the few remaining Stormtalons - an act that most assuredly promised he was now an enemy of the warband - Phtoleus had made his flight into the depths of the Warp.

The ground beneath him was hills of cinder and ash that would engulf any without proper psychic warding. These grounds were few and far between, islands of blackened rock in a roiling sea of glowing-red magma. It was a land of fire and death - all flora burning to dust only to impossibly grow again and repeat the cycle. In the fields of fire-grass ran the spirits and specters of souls, their fear-stink ripe in the air. They were the prey, and the Screamers hunted happily.

Phtoleus stood motionless while flames coalesced harmlessly against his sapphire ceramite, watching the Sky-sharks dart and dance in the air, playfully chasing the doomed souls in the fields. The gliding predators toyed with their food, herding them into groups, picking off the weak, teasing them with shredding talons, until striking with horned mandibles and consuming the radiant ribbons of existence. Soon, that same merciless grace would be his to command.

The sorcerer indulged in hours of watching, studying their actions, before he allowed himself to begin. With a flicker of concentration, the psychic mask that hid his soul from the detection of Screamers peeled ever slightly away. It was a glimmer, a glimpse that new prey was swimming in the sea of flames. It was a single drop of blood in the water, but that is all that Phtoleus needed. That single drop drifted on aetherical currents, seemingly unnoticed, until one lucky Screamer caught wind, and shifted its flight to hunt a new, stronger prey.

This moment was crucial, and the easiest to fail. The beast must be ensnared for the ritual to take place. Move too slowly, and the sorcerer would be cut piecemeal like the worthless daemons on Kathalon. Move too aggressively, and the attention of other hunters would be earned, ensuring his catastrophic demise. Moments bled away, the razor-teeth of the Sky-shark in clear focus, the Warp currents bleeding off of its wings, and Phtoleus finally struck.

Just as the Screamer careened at him, the sorcerer dropped flat onto his back, tossing an obsidian athame into the gaping maw of the beast. Though he could not see while lying prone in the field of fire, Phtoleus both heard and felt the ray cry out and crash to the ground. He stood, using his force staff to push himself away from the clinging flames which tried pulled him down, and looked at the pathetic creature writhing agonizingly. The magicks in the athame rendered the beast unable to take flight in the skies where it belongs. The fires bled away from the beast, leaving a ritualistic circle of bare ash, and one which Phtoleus quickly moved towards.

With the hard part over, the sorcerer stood upon the helpless Screamer, pinning down each wing under two ceramite boots. He stood tall, head reared back, and thrust the point of his staff straight between the two primary eyes of the beast. The incantation began, and Phtoleus’ psychic will flowed from his mind to his hands, and further down through his staff into the instinctual consciousness of the Screamer. The battle of wills had begun.

It was strong, but Phtoleus had trained for this moment to ensure he was stronger. As he chanted in languages either long dead or never existing, his domineering will bled into the essence of the monster. They both began to rise, aloft with a new energy, the aetherial wisps of oil-slick rainbows swirling around them. This was it! It was working! His efforts doubled, pushing and pulling at the lesser consciousness beneath his feet, unholy words recited by rote from his mouth, until he felt the satisfying snap of the Screamer’s will breaking.

He had done it.

With the ritual over, Phtoleus removed his staff from the creature’s mind and stood, haughty with his arrogance while floating high above the burning grounds of the Flaming Tomb. He had done it. He had mastered a Screamer, made it his pet, and now stood upon a soon-to-be Disc. He was an aspirant no longer. He had become a sorcerer lord in his own right. Oh, if only the Lord Dhelmas and his followers could see him now! Would they further still doubt his prowess? Would they mock him for weakness of resolve? Or would they fall to knees and offer their subservience, just as this beast had done?

His celebratory laughter attracted the nearby Screamers to him, but they did not attack. Instead they schooled around him, apparently joining in his triumph. Phtoleus basked in this glory, reaching out and letting his fingertips pet the swirling mass of Sky-sharks around him, still ever-laughing. He silenced himself, however, when he felt the beast beneath him begin its metamorphosis.

It flattened beneath his feet, flesh becoming silver metal. Fins receded and multiplied, becoming irregular blades along the Disc’s circumference. The collection of yellow eyes grew and shrank, spreading and moving all around the changing flesh-metal of the mount. New mouths opened along every expanse of plain flesh that existed: some laughed, some bellowed, some cried, while others just hungrily slobbered with forked tongues.

It was beautiful…

Phtoleus was satisfied, beyond any true measure of that word’s meaning. Not only had his life’s ambition become realized, but new paths of glory were waiting for him. Few in this galaxy could now compete with him, on either the field of battle or on the psychic planes. Short of apotheosis, he was now one of the strongest sorcerers to swear loyalty to the True Master! The power radiating from the Disc moved through his core, lighting every nerve with sensations of speed and power. Arcane knowledge only the daemonic could possess poured through his mind. He and the Disc were truly one.

...which is why the sorcerer did not see nor feel the lamprey-tendrils chew through the sapphire and gold greaves and latch to his flesh. The sawing teeth bore down, chewing through any and all muscular fiber, before latching onto bone. The lamprey-tendrils held him still, and began to drain Phtoleus dry. Within the armor plate, his body grew frail and pallid, his physical flesh and incorporeal essence draining into the seemingly subservient Disc.

Once half of his mass had been consumed, a part of Phtoleus’ consciousness registered the physical pain he technically felt, but the thought was soon forgotten. It could not compete with the raw sensations overwhelming him. Never before had he felt the raw touch of the Warp course through him. It was bliss. But more than that, he could feel his Disc inside him, an extension of his own sensation. He was not the rider upon this steed; he and the steed were truly one. His will was not the dominant over the Disc, but a symbiotic partner to it. He finally understood. That Herald at Kathalon was not a rider, but an extension of the Disc’s beauty. And now, so too was he! The Disc was Phtoleus, and he was the Disc!

That’s when the remnants of the Scourged sorcerer’s armor, now devoid of an occupant, fell away in clattering pieces, instantly consumed in the fires of the Flaming Tomb. The school of Screamers still circled the newly anointed Disc, eager to be led on a hunt. The Phtoleus-Disc hovered, imbued with dual-consciousness and submissively awaiting its true rider. It would hopefully not have to wait long.

Carrack · February 1, 2016

The Master of the Stables

The old man looked out the corner of his milky, cataract afflicted eyes at his young apprentice. This would be the first command from Lord Carrack that the young Waynell would execute. Both his own fate, and that of his apprentice would be determined by whether they could execute the command. He was not optimistic. He himself was comfortable with his impending execution, he had lived a long life, and in its last years were filled with pain and increasing blindness. His apprentice however, deserved better.

The old man thought of the last command given to him by his lord some 30 years ago. The Black Maw had just conquered Frederic III and were setting up the city of Howler's Charn as a forward base of operations. Lord Carrack had called down to his stable master, then an ambitious young man with keen eyes, and told him to turn out his mount, Kharanaxus. There had been confusion at first with the order, the stables were set up on the ground level of the populous city, there was no pasture to turn the mount out into, but the stable master had known not to disobey his lord no matter the request. Kharanaxus, the daemonic Juggernaut of Khorne, had been turned out into the streets of the conquered city. The subjects of the city were its fodder.

The city had adjusted to the murderous beast terrorizing its streets. Even if they could, no one dared try to harm the mount of their new lord, so instead they contained him. Stairways were narrowed, alleys quickly walled off, and gradually a safe corridor was made from the city gates to the market, so the city could be fed by the surrounding villages. Manny a subject gave their life in this endeavor, the beast had to be lured away from the construction with at first volunteers, then the old and infirm. Those incapable of laying brick and mortar, gave up their blood and skulls instead. The rest of the ground level would become the hunting grounds for Kharanaxus, and only the most desperate would risk travel through its bloodstained streets. The unprotected ground level had become a sporting means of entertainment for Howler's Charn's new masters; thralls who had committed some minor transgression, were sentenced to a number of minutes, typically eight, on the ground level. It was almost always a death sentence, and wagers would be made as to how long the thralls would survive.

Waynell made his way out the armored stable doors, unarmored, and unarmed save the whip. The whip was a cruel thing, an eight tailed wire scourge barbed with stain glass from some desecrated cathedral of the Corpse God. Each tail carried a current of energy specifically calibrated to inflict pain upon Kharanaxus. The beast knew the whip, or so Waynell hoped. He made his way to the offering.

A trio of gladiator slaves were chained to stakes in the ground in an old plaza. They had been injected with a cocktail of combat stimulants that had boosted their performance, and heart rates to an unsustainable level. They would be dead within twenty minutes if left unintended. It would be a miracle if they lived that long. Cuts had been made on each heel of the slaves, Kharanaxus could smell their blood and was bellowing in rage as he rushed towards them. The blood call of Kharanaxus could be heard over the howling winds cutting through the cities towers that gave Howler's Charn its name. The beast rounded the corner to the street that emptied into the plaza at a canter. At the sight of the offered gladiators, it stepped out into a galloping charge.

Kharanaxus was a mono horned, armored behemoth. Black armored bands articulated from its slavering jaws up its thick neck to broader slab plates that covered its flanks and haunches. Greaves protected both its powerful forelimbs and its rear legs. Each black plate was trimmed in brass, along with a brass octed star along its right, and the outline of a gaping wolf's maw along its left, the Eye of Horus was centered on its brutish skull. Covered by skirts of mail, the flesh of the beast not protected by the plate barding was grey with a spiderweb of bright crimson veins glowing just beneath its surface. The same red glow emanated from its eyes in burning rage. Kharanaxus hit the lead gladiator with its head lowered, it's horn tossing the split wreckage of the man through the air in an explosion of gore. The mass and lumbering gate of the beast belied its speed, the force of the impact no different then a speeding tank hitting an enemy line. A jerk of its neck and the jaws of the juggernaut tore out the throat of the second gladiator. Both victims' blades scraping ineffectively along its armored neck. The third gladiator dodged back all the way till his hand planted behind him on the smog stained ferrocrete, narrowly ducking lashing hooves as Kharanaxus pivoted around to face Waynell.

The beast eyed Waynell for a moment, then snorted out a billow of black smoke and pawed the ground with a forelimb. Chunks of the street flew from the hoof in a shower of sparks. Kharanaxus lowered his head. Waynell remembered his training. Kharanaxus remembered the whip. Pivoting his shoulders to align his body with the haunches of the beast, Waynell raised the whip to shoulder height, pointing with his off hand down the road to the stable. Kharanaxus started to comply, and turn his body in the direction of the stable, but was not ready to fully obey the untested apprentice. The beast lifted a rear hoof and brought it down shattering the chain restraining the surviving gladiator. With a jerk of its head, it motioned to the frothing slave it had just released.

Waynell had spent all of his his adult years, and much of his youth training beasts of war. Their body language differed from species, but all were subtle and surprisingly complex. The camelidae mulus was an untrustworthy and onerous beast, but it's long limbs only lashed out after the flexing of its shoulders or haunches. It could be broken with the whip. The equus ferus caballas of Perci stock, both with and without the common cybernetic suites, was prone to emotional swings that could prove deadly if not noticed. It could be tamed with the careful forging of a bond between mount and rider. Even the lone captured canis lupus Fenris in stock, jokingly named Leman, could be read with its varying intensities of eye contact. Although a modicum of respect was eventually established, Waynell had never been able to bring the beast to saddle. He hoped Kharanaxus would be different. His life depended on it.

Waynell made his most educated guess as to what Kharanaxus was signaling with its gesture to the slave it had freed. He lashed out with the scourge. The slave ducked again, avoiding some of the tails of the whip, and took more tails on his buckler strapped arm, but could not prevent all from striking. One tail slashed the thrall's brow, the other his throat. Blood sprayed from both wounds, but did not deter the maddened gladiator from rushing Waynell. A second strike from the whip went largely under the slave's guard, just in time to trip him before he reached Waynell. Still, the slave tried to rise, clutching its blade with murderous intent. Mercilessly, Waynell stepped back, creating distance, then brought the scourge down across the slave's back, tearing out chunks of meat. Waynell followed through with six more strikes, ending the life of the thrall, then squared himself again with Kharanaxus's haunches and raised the whip once more. This time, there was no hesitation with the juggernaut's obedience and the beast followed Waynell's off hand towards the stable. It would only obey the commands of a proven killer.

The old man swung the doors open to the stable at the sound of Kharanaxus's approach. He could not make out if his apprentice was directing the beast or not with his diminished vision. He chose to accept his fate, whatever it might be. When the beast entered the stable, it looked over to the old man long enough to recognize its old master, then bit the man's head off. Kharanaxus would only tolerate one master of its stable, and the old man's time had passed.

This is part two of my possessed story, where the thinblooded Keeper decides to allow a possessing daemon to share his body in a grasp for power. I couldn't finish it in time for last week, but wanted to add it in anyway, consider it out of competition.

A walk in Man-Skin

Yenaldlooshi stretched out his new flesh form. It was interesting, and definitely bigger and more powerful than he remembered man to be. It has been a long time since Yenaldlooshi had worn man-skin, maybe it hadn't been that long, who knew, who cared, it was time to enjoy the world of men once again. He forced his way into the eyes of the man-skin, no doubt turning them yellow, as tended to happen ever since his own eyes were stolen by Tzentch, and he had been forced to make new ones out of aether sap. Oh and what dark and grand sights were there to see! This would be a fun walk in man-skin, indeed. He was in some cave, and there was evidence of a ritual, instinctively he knew this was what called him to the world of men. Summoning circles formed of silver and salt, sacrifices too mutilated to make out, but hopefully maidens, and a collection of eight trophies, each gruesome and representing completed acts that the gods would find pleasing, told of the care and wealth of those calling him. A flayed skin cloak, bearing the scars of a whip, a rotting and cirrhosis scarred liver, a skull, and a miniature man, still alive, but preserved in slime inside a small jar, were among the trophies present. Yenaldlooshi was pleased. The ritual offered attractive incentives for him to wear the skin of the victim. He could remember simple medicine bags as offerings and the force of a witch's mind had been the typical means for him be called to go on a walk in man-skin.

Something pushed feebly against Yenaldlooshi's will. It was the rightful owner of the man-skin, his name was currently Keeper, but the name felt new and unfamiliar, like moccasins that needed to be broken in. Yenaldlooshi sniffed through the man for a different, more familiar name. He found it, a child name his host had worn before he had completed some rite of passage, a dangerous one at that, the child name of his host was Puppy Spit, how amusing. But the search for the name had revealed far more interesting information. Puppy Spit was no mere mortal man, he was a superhuman warrior with genetic traces of a great master of the warp known to most denizens of the warp. Puppy Spit was a son of Horus, after a bizarre fashion.

Unfortunately, Puppy Spit was part of a tribe of other superhuman warriors known as the Black Maw. Many were in attendance for the ritual. Yenaldlooshi would need to be a little careful when testing the limits of his power in order not to bring the wrath of the tribe down on him. He had been similarly constrained in previous skin walks, but the consequences of offending the Black Maw were more severe than any tribe he had faced thus far.

Back to the task at hand, Puppy Spit was under the impression that he was in control, and that Yenaldlooshi was summoned to grant him power. Hosts thought the silliest things. Yenaldlooshi decided he would let Puppy Spit know who was in control, and take a position of dominance in the Black Maw. He fumbled with the solid clothes, power armor it was called, as he walked over to the edge of a summoning circle, lifted his leg, and marked his territory. The look on the gathered tribes' faces was exquisite. Keeper, Yenaldlooshi just couldn't make his child name stick, was horrified. Not just at the act of ownership Yenaldlooshi had displayed to the tribe, but at what the consequence of that act might be from the ritual master, one called Lavam, the Voice of the Black Maw. Keeper brought the full might of his will to bear on the skin walker. It was considerable for one not familiar with mastering the warp, it was the will of a warrior who had spent hours everyday mastering a variety of weapons and while so doing, mastering himself. However, in spite of the willpower of the warrior, Yenaldlooshi was stronger. He was old, older than even the other warriors of the Black Maw. He had tormented ancient Terra when mankind was still using flint tools. He was Yenaldlooshi, the Coyote Spirit, and he had walked in the skin of men many times, and he knew every tactic they would try to regain their bodies. Brute force was always the first attempt. He feigned submission to the warrior's will, and offered him a boon of power from the warp, if he could but ride in the skin of Keeper, and see what the man saw. He then asked Keeper to mentally describe the binds he would place upon Yenaldlooshi, and as Keeper did so, Yenaldlooshi misdirected Keeper's conscious into those same bonds, leaving the man naught but a rider in his own body. He laughed at the surprised Keeper, and told him he had been called Trickster since mankind was young. It was still funny, tricking men, after all these years. It appears they hadn't grown any wiser.

Lavam was a different matter. He walked nonchalantly towards Yenaldlooshi, casually swinging his lightning covered war club. He had begun to speak the words of calling backwards, without difficulty or strain. Other warriors of the tribe were lowering weapons, boltguns, he knew from his host's memories, in his direction. Yenaldlooshi knew his man-skin could not withstand the violence that was threatening him, and without it he would quickly have to return to the warp, and he wasn't done playing in the world of men yet. He lowered his eyes. Still they aimed their boltguns, still the Voice of the Black Maw chanted on as he advanced. Yenaldlooshi could feel the knots of his host that tied him to the world of men unraveling, his grip on reality was slipping with each backwards word. Never really a proud daemon, he dropped to the ground, exposing his belly and barring his throat. He decided to stick around, and see what havoc he could cause as part of the Black Maw. Keeper screamed in rage at his confinement, how amusing.

Kierdale · February 5, 2016

Adversity’s Sweet Milk

Hidden Content

The keening wail reverberated once more through the canyon and the guardsmen tightened their grips on their weapons, keeping them trained out in all directions. Both up and down the gorge but also covering the clifftops to both sides. The Catachan patrol had known this was an obvious ambush point and had acted accordingly. Rather than rushing through the choke point the commissar had had the squads combine, form a ring and had given each a quadrant to cover, with his fifth squad held in reserve. Thus organized they had steadily stalked through the thick vegetation, toward the narrowest point of the gorge like a clot crawling its sluggish way through an artery.

Commissar Pepes looked to the members of his command squad, receiving negative head shakes from Chet with the vox, Smitty on the scanner and Squint with his sniper rifle. The valley blocked the former and the latter two were little good with the trees so thick here. They could have stopped and dug in, sent a man up a tree with an antenna wire and Squint up another for a better field of fire but Pepes felt in his bones that the sooner they were through the chokepoint, the sooner they’d be safe. He could make out a clearing on the other side of the gorge, sunlight on turf and he swore he could hear a river. That clearing was mighty attractive and the way the eyes of his comrades lingered on it he could tell the Catachans felt the same. He would have laughed that the hardened Catachan jungle fighters wanted so much to get out from under the trees...he would have laughed had the last few weeks not been so terrifying.

The mission was messed up and their numbers were dwindling.

The enemy were astartes but whoever they were, they were no longer the Emperor’s angels of death.

A guardsman occasionally heard such scuttlebutt. Rogue astartes. Marines gone bad. The Warp got into their heads.

A load of Devildung, the late lieutenant had said. The kind of crap that guardsmen said to convince themselves they were still the Emperor’s Hammer, he had said. He was dead now.

Pepes, a Mordian, knew better. Not that it was for him to share such knowledge with the rank and file. Not that they were likely to listen, either. They saw the uniform, the peaked cap, the bolt pistol as likely to be used to execute them as to kill the enemy, and they bridled against his command.

But the sounds. The screaming which had come before each attack, it had been like claws tearing through his very soul. Like those ‘nids the regiment had faced on Val Verde. He shivered at the memory. No, this was worse. This was humans - post-humans - doing it to their own. Maybe that was what happened when you took a man and turned him into something more than man. Removed him from the greater race.

This time it was the ululating wail - always that or the keening - that dragged his thoughts back to the here and now. He raised his bolt pistol and took a deep breath. As soon as someone spotted a target - it wouldn’t be too hard what with the vivid shades the enemy clad themselves in - he’d give the order and have the platoon light up the jungle.

The next sound was a bestial braying, first one then a dozen or more joined it, all from the mouth of the gorge, where the platoon had come from. The rogue marines had...animals...with them? What was this madness? Images of goat meat roasting on a spit leapt to mind. That mission half a decade ago on the agri world. Throne how it had tasted so good!

Then a rustling from the bushes ahead. Guardsmen assigned to cover that quadrant shifted their aim.

Pepes aimed his pistol but as soon as the marine stepped into sight the guardsmen removed their fingers from the triggers of their lasrifles. Argent and sable. A cross upon his pauldrons and only a bloody chainsword in his hand.

A cheer went up from the Catachan platoon and Pepes swore under his breath. Intel hadn’t indicated any astartes on-planet, let alone a Templar. He swore again; he was happy to see the big marine either way, and motioned him forward.

The Templar staggered as he moved, favouring his right leg as he waded through the thick vegetation and cradling his right hand, wrapped tight against the left side of his body. Was he injured? Perhaps the blood splattering his armour was not entirely the enemy’s?

The platoon parted to let him in and Pepes stepped forward, holstering his pistol in order to give an Aquila salute over his tarnished breastplate.

In turn the Templar drove its chainblade tip-first into the ground and moved to return the salute, removing its right hand from its left side to reveal that the limb ended not in a gauntlet of mark seven powered armour but rather an oversized claw. A claw so similar to those of Catachan devils that at first Pepes thought he was being shown a trophy, the Templar attempting to ingratiate himself with the jungle fighters. Yet the claw was part of his limb, wrapped in a chain - as that chapter of astartes often did - though this was decorated with severed ears. Severed human ears.

The keening and the ululating screams commenced once again, coming this time from the rear, as the Templar set about the guardsmen with blade and claw. Though half a dozen Catachans were slain in as many seconds, one of the big sergeants swung his lasrifle like a club into the monstrous Templar’s head. At first Pepes - sat now on his rear in the long grass, cradling the deep gash in his guts and rapidly going into shock - had thought the blow had removed the marine’s head - for its helmet sailed off into the trees - but then he saw the face of the daemon. It was a Templar no more. The flat, giant’s features common to astartes were no more and a slender, purple-skinned face upon a head far too small for a space marine stood between the shoulders. It was almost comical but for the horror of it. The face was almost feminine, with large, green-glowing oval eyes and a top-knot of blue hair.

The curses and cries of the Catachans almost drowned out the sound of the approaching enemy. Dozens of them, bleating and beating their way through the jungle while the humans were occupied with the daemonic infiltrator.

“Withdraw! Withdraw!” the big sergeant shouted, parrying a chainsword blow from the possessed marine with his rifle, sparks flying.

While a couple disobeyed orders and stayed, clubbing and stabbing at the Templar as best they could, the majority turned and broke, trampling their fallen and wounded, commissar Pepes among them.

A lone, gaudily-clad astarte moved rapidly through the bushes, coming at them through the chokepoint the guardsmen were fleeing toward. The marine’s speed was soon explained as a slender, almost serpentine head reared up from betwixt the marine’s legs, a long sensuous tongue lolling from its lengthy muzzle and it let out the ululating call which had haunted the platoon for weeks. A second head then rose up next to it, almost identical but for the keening wail which it emitted. The beast broke cover and the guardsmen saw for the first time the double-headed monstrosity ridden by the Chaos lord.

Though most often seen striding slowly across battlefields clad in his ornate suit of tactical dreadnought armour, the huge falx horrificus in his gauntlets, vents and organ pipes atop his armour spouting hideous screams from beyond the veil, Slaangors capering and cavorting about him, lord Sophusar of the Psychopomps, the Facinorous One, occasionally favoured more speedy means such as this: Agdistis, the double-headed steed of Slaanesh.

While Sophusar, former chapter master of the Stgyian Guard before their fall to the worship of the Dark Prince, lay about the humans with his blade the two-headed beast was driven wild by the terror of the Catachans. One head choked a man, coiling its tongue about his neck and steadily dragging his head whole into its distended maw, while the other bit off the limbs of men as they attempted to flee past. Clawed feet raked through flak armour with ease, parting the thick muscle beneath and the creature’s tail lashed about, throwing men from their feet.

Laser blasts and knife slashes scarred its pale hide, drawing thick blue ichor when wounded deeply enough, though these injuries merely caused it to shiver with exhilaration at the pain. Men soiled themselves at the sound of its cries and others found themselves drawn maddeningly, against all sane thought, to its rank of pendulous bosoms which lined its underside, only to be trampled, slashed or bitten in two.

The Slaangor, devotees of the Chaos lord, showed themselves finally, falling upon the Catachans; beating them with clubs, slicing limbs with blades and taking as many as possible alive.

When the melee finally abated and the gorge was filled with not the sound of battle but the whimpers and cries of the fallen, lord Sophusar called out for his followers to calm themselves if but temporarily. The beastmen were first to heed his call, fearful of his temper yet equally tempted to ignite it and drink deep of the exquisite pain he would inflict. The possessed Templar was the last to cease its butchery and only did so at a reward from the former chapter master.

He dismounted and strode through the undergrowth, examining their captives and finally stopping before a fallen commissar, his uniform stained crimson, his flesh pallid and drained. The man barely noticed the ornate armour, the daemonic visages carved and painted into it, so fixed were his eyes upon the drinking Templar-daemon.

“Commissar,” the Chaos lord addressed him, the astartes’ voice distorted by a brass grill in the leather mask over his face. “Commissar,” the voice was strong, rich. He did not need to raise it in order to command attention.

Pepes tore his eyes from the Templar-daemon supping thirstily from one of the teats of the twin-headed beast and looked to the traitor lord, his gaze lingering on the hook-nosed alien mask which adorned Sophusar’s groin before meeting his powerful stare.

“You are dying, commissar.”

“A-as I l-lived for Him Upon The G-golden Th-Throne. S-so shall I p-perish,” he struggled, his body seized by shakes as his life drained from him. He could no longer feel his extremities and his peripheral vision was steadily darkening.

“There is new life to be had, and freedom of the soul, commissar.”

“I sh-shall march...in his...glor-ry.”

The towering astartes lord sighed sadly, a most curious sound for such a giant of war to emit. He batted away the possessed Templar and drew Agdistis closer, having it crouch low over the dying man.

Sophusar too crouched, to address Pepes. Though his smile was hidden by his mask, it was evident in his tone.

“No, commissar. You will live. Sup of the milk of Slaanesh...and rejoice!”

Edit: I've been busy and just got round to finishing reading everyone's recent pieces.

Carrack, I liked Yenaldlooshi and got a pleasant surprise when I Googled the name ;)

And Teetengee, the pregnant-with-a-daemon was an excellent bit. :tu:

Teetengee · February 5, 2016

It's more pregnant by than with, but the difference is fluid, sooo I guess it is a matter of perspective.

Also:

Dreadsteed

Hidden Content

Deep in the shadow

Delved Arkash Half-Dead

Into lashes of whips

And flashes of red

He forged a river of blood

past a mountain of bone

and then on a path

of brass and of bone

Arkash fought

and he fed

and he stole

and he bled

At the end of these roads

At the top of a hill

A hot wind scratched his throat

A howl screamed for the kill

The beast he beheld

was not of flesh or of brass

It was made but of darkness

and swift cooling ash.

It’s cry was the cut

Of a well sharpened blade

It’s mane formed of whips

of blood soaked scalps’ braids

It’s hooves were the tamp

Of hammer on steel

It’s breath were of flame

Forcing Arkash to yield

Turning deep on its haunches

The beast turned to fight

The quarry turned hunter

The day became night

Eight days, did Arkash

The mighty yet slain

Turn from his battles

Run once again

But at last he saw purchase

He leapt for the stars

When the beast tumbled under

He grabbed fast to its scars

Eight nights once again

Akrash held to its sores

Both lay battered and beaten

When it fell from all fours

Finally triumphant he rose

The beast steaming with heat

It’s fearsomeness slowed

Head bowed in defeat

Deep in the shadow

Delved Arkash Half-Dead

Into danger and hardship

And out he rode Dread

Kierdale · February 6, 2016

Thank you very much for your entries on the topic of Daemonic Steeds, and thanks to Carrack for suggesting it.

All of the stories were good reads and I don’t have time to comment on all - I’ll leave that to Captain Malachi, but a few words from me...

Son of Carnelian - I thought yours was excellently written, and had such potential...but then it finished. You...you...fictiontease, you! Too short! That the disc was so intelligent and willful was such a nice touch.

Scourged – that was excellent. I expected nothing less, and the twist at the end was so very Tzeentchian.

Carrack - I loved the idea of letting the juggernaut loose in the city streets, the populace using the old and infirm to lure it about...it brought to mind the bull-runs in Spain. I loved that the whip was barbed with stained glass from an Imperial temple. Sometime I’d love to read a story from the POV of one thrust into the city streets on the run for those eight minutes if you can!

I hereby close that topic (for the purposes of judging. If you have more tales of Daemonic Steeds to tell by all means post them at any time! I know I have ideas for one more) and open our next one...

Welcome to the fourth challenge of Inspiration Friday 2016.

Chaos Regiments

The turn of the mortals. While most often we focus on fallen Astartes and their daemonic allies, countless are the mortals under the sway of the Infernal Powers. This week I would have you tell us about an Imperial Guard regiment turned traitor. When, where and how did it happen? Is the regiment devoted to a single deity or worships the entire Pantheon? Do they operate alone, alongside traitor astartes or daemons? Where do they reside? What are their goals? Tell us too of their victories and losses.

Inspiration Friday: Chaos Regiments runs until Friday the 12th of February.

And who shall judge it? That decision lies in the hands of Captain Malachi. Captain, please announce the winner at your leisure and in whatever manner you deem fit!

And to our winner, do not forget to claim your Octed amulet:

Let us be inspired.

Carrack · February 6, 2016

Cheerleading with Carrack

Go team Chaos!

This week was a great week for IF. I thought I would give a little more feedback than the "like button", since I realized that I hit it on every story, again. So here is what I liked about your stories this week. My unusual disclaimer about my lack of education, sophistication, and questionable sobriety and sanity applies. :)

Captain Malachi. I like Frankie, and that you called him your chew toy. :) maybe one day you can come up with an explanation as to his many chances, but I think it would be best if you dropped a tidbit here and a bit more there, as the weeks go by.

Diabolist. The description of the warpsmith's forge was cool, it had a way of making the act of forging a weapon sinister and captured the feel of Chaos well. I also liked how this paragraph sounded.

"

"They are restless, they feel the wind of war blowing across the ship..." Mertak observed. A broad legionary, Mertak was the Sergeant of his coterie, a burly warrior who, it seems, took at heart the lessons learned from the Eaters of Worlds, so long ago. "They are always restless..." Shorta replied, and this was true. The Juggernauts never slept, never rested, for the beasts every breath was a challenge, every movement a threat, every step a provocation."

Awesome.

EesiOh. The ritual was well described. I like that Chaos has Sorcerers instead of Psykers, for particularly that reason. An evil ritual calling forth a possessing daemon is so much cooler than a psyker just using his mind. Great writing. Honestly, in my opinion, your possessed story would have been a serious contender last week, and that's taking into account the level of competition we have had.

Son of Carnelian. First off, great title. Secondly, it's good to see the Scourged loosing to the Inquisition. Serves them right for having such good background stories written about them weekly, making the rest of us look bad. :) thirdly, I liked the interrogation format, it worked well with this story. Lastly, good plot twist, I thought Ziza was a goner for sure, and never suspected the ending.

Scourged. In regards to your author's note; I love it when the words just pour out easily. I'm often surprised by the result as well, some stories I have taken 20 minutes on have been better than ones I have spent hours on.

Once again you have written a great story. I like how you captured the personality of a scheming Tzentchian, always grasping for power, but ultimately a pawn. I have to admit, I didn't like Phtoleus's chances when he went after his mount, but I didn't suspect in the least what happened to him.

Me, Carrack. I suggested this topic to Kierdale, who graciously used it. At the time I had some ideas about what to write, but my main challenge, was to try to use my knowledge of horses in a story, and not have it sound like a horse manual. That and juggernauts aren't horses. I think I did that well, and included some of the ideas I had about the challenge, but I could not get a good plot going, and the characters were bland. Kierdale's idea of using a sentenced thrall as a narrator sounds much better, I wish I had thought of it. I hope the good parts of the story outweighs the bad for the readers, I think they do personally.

Kierdale. I look forward to reading of the Psychopomps every week. Your ability to tell such grand stories as the overall plot of the warband sometimes just inches along is fascinating. I like all of your stories, but what I enjoys about this one, was the setting. I think it added suspense, and helped capture the fear of the guardsmen. I can't wait to see your possessed Templar, if that is the route you are going with the Daemonforge. I wouldn't post it in the Black Templar sub forum. They might get angry, well angrier anyway :) Oh, and two heads are better than one.

Teetengee. Bold choice writing a poem. It worked. The epic and medieval tone makes it seem like it might be read at a great feast, or a bard might sing it at a tavern, to pass on the legends of Arkash Half-Dead

That's all, I hope I'm not overstepping my bounds here.

Captain Malachi · February 6, 2016

I have to agree with Carrack, an excellent showing this week, it wasn't easy to choose a winner at all.

Kierdale and Carrack above me have already given much of the direct feedback I was going to give, so rather than simply repeat what they've said in slightly different words, I'll skip right to the judging.

As I said, very difficult to choose, but a decision must be made and so I name Scourged this week's winner.

EesiOh · February 6, 2016

Firstly Congrats to Scourged, Secondly I agree with Carrack, I loved this weeks entries, they were all fantastic. And dont worry Carrack yours was fine :). Also im glad you liked my story, I thought it would be fun to have a chaos marine possessing a daemon and not the other way around and who better to do that with than the worshipers of Malal

Scourged · February 7, 2016

Scourged – that was excellent. I expected nothing less, and the twist at the end was so very Tzeentchian.

Why thank you. I don't always capture the essence of my patron deity, but when I do, it's downright magickal.

...

Secondly, it's good to see the Scourged loosing to the Inquisition. Serves them right for having such good background stories written about them weekly, making the rest of us look bad.

...

Scourged. In regards to your author's note; I love it when the words just pour out easily. I'm often surprised by the result as well, some stories I have taken 20 minutes on have been better than ones I have spent hours on.

Hah, clever little jab there. And I agree. I, too, have had works I've spent days - literal days - on that pale in comparison to some of the spur-of-the-moment stories. When things work, they just work

Oh, and @Son of Carnelian: Always good to see some Scourged representation. You should know how tempting it was to make my Phtoleus-Disc a gift to Lord Eusebios, but I retrained myself.

As I said, very difficult to choose, but a decision must be made and so I name Scourged this week's winner.

Many thanks, Captain Malachi. Consider me honored.

While I'm positively ecstatic about winning out over all of those stories (hubris and Tzeentchians mix well), I'm not sure if it's a relief or not to escape judgement this week. Regardless, I'll begin crafting an inspirational tale about my Changemongers once again. May the blessings of the Dark Gods guide your minds and fingers as you write.

May Khorne allow you to articulate the carnage and gore that only the most honorable of battles may provide.

May Slaanesh grace you and your audience with the sensations that only the completion of the most eloquent and inspirational of tales can provide.

May Nurgle allow you to tap into the fear of mortality's end that you may capture its essence on the page.

May Tzeentch guide your mind to craft characters and plot that run deep with interest and growth that all shall be impressed.

...and may Malal (Malice) gift you with the self-hatred to ensure no one wins and we all burn, because CHAOS!!!

Carrack · February 9, 2016

Most High

Zanizar the Younger reclined in the plush velvet couch, idly watching the servant girl setting up the obscura pipe. She was had filled the bowl with citrus infused water from a crystal decanter, and had begun attaching a pair of immaculately cleaned hoses to the jet and gold pipe. With delicately manicured hands, one hose was passed to Zanizar first, as he was the guest, the second hose handed to the host, Lord Governor Mahaba. Next the beautiful serving girl picked a burning coal from a brazier with a pair of silver tongs and held it over the bowl full of potent black obscura. Under normal circumstances, the Lord Governor would be the first to partake in the drug, but Zanizar was a rogue trader, and held a similar, if not quite as lofty, social standing, and it was his pipe, his obscura, his first hit. The two leisurely smoked their way into bliss, enjoying the subtle changes in hues of the melodichromatic lamps, as they responded to the sublime quartet of bassoonist playing a low majory from behind a silk screen.

Mahaba broke the silence, "I do say captain Harlenge, this black reminds me of what I use to import from Callebra Hive." Zanizar the Younger took a moment to focus his thoughts, he had almost been startled by the use of his alias, then replied, "I can't go into any great detail, but I believe it to be the same." Which was true, Zanizar the younger had loaded his holds with the drug when he and his masters , The Black Maw, had plundered Callebra Hive. Zanizar went on, "Now to the matter at hand, In addition to a cache of this fine black, I have procured the work "Lament of the Bloodied Angel" by the master painter Vensominair, at quite a bargain. I believe the painting could be a centerpiece for your considerable gallery. Imagine what the merchant cartels would think if they saw it while touring your palace, they would know you to be both a man of taste, and an economic might not to be trifled with. The Lord Governor languidly continued smoking, caught up in a drug fueled daydream of what the rogue trader had offered. He had taken some losses lately from the cartels, they viewed him as a backwards degenerate who could be run roughshod over at the negotiation table. His father would never have been treated with such disrespect. He snapped out of his hazy cloud and said, "Name your price." Zanizar paused for a moment, like he was actually thinking about it, then said, "You recently founded three regiments of infantry for the Militarum. Give me one." Mahaba looked at Zanizar askance, until Zanizar elaborated, "I'm go to exploit a world in control of the foul xenos, I need muscle, and it's not like the regiment won't be fighting His enemies, they will just be doing it at my orders instead of sub-sector command." Mahaba waved a hand off, and said, "Sure, take your pick. I can always empty my prisons and asylums if they ask for another regiment." Zanizar the Younger, arose from his couch and said, "Done, and I think I'll take your servant girl as well." Mahabad finished the bowl of obscura and shrugged in agreement, unaware of what trouble he had just gotten himself into.

****************

Sergeant Namin conspiratorially looked at the small gathering of other NCOs in the empty mess hall. He started in, "We are going to war with the enemies of Holy Terra, and yet we haven't had mass once while on board this ship, what happened to our priests? Their were grumblings around the table, but nobody had any answers. Corporal Skella piped in, "How come we have seen none of the crew of this ship, I've heard that the navy keeps to themselves, but not once have we seen anyone other than ourselves in our hold, and no one has ventured out of our restricted area, not even The Man. More looks confirmed Skella's suspicions to be true. The quiet bear of a man, Platoon Sergeant Case, whispered, "The dreams are bad, my grandmother worked at the Voidlost Tavern, she heard that sleep didn't come easy in the warp, but do you know anyone who is not having nightmares every time they shut their eyes. I think more than a few are having them when they are awake as well. Silence reigned at the mess table. Finally, Color Sergeant Lahore, the senior man present, said, "I never thought I would say this, but where are our commissars?" The table went quiet.

A week later, same place, same gathering....

Color Sergeant Lahore broke the silence, "So everyone of our officers has been taken to a briefing elsewhere on the ship. I am in charge, and I have been informed that I need to put together a schedule, by platoons, for a week of briefings and training conducted by the very Finest of the Emperor, His Angels of Death. Once a platoon has completed this briefing, they will be berthed in the starboard hold, joining our officers. To make this interesting, we will have platoon ruck races to see who gets to go first. Dismissed!"

***************

"If I could dig the memories of what I have just seen out of my brain with my entrenching tool I would do it. I might try anyway." Trooper Ravone

"Why, oh why, please make it stop." Corporal Gastone

"At least we ain't fighting for the lie of the Emperor, that's something." Trooper Pinoute

"I think I need to sit down." Trooper Bahrain

"I can see the path to true power, it flows through the Warp!" Major Fajole

"Do you hear the voices to?" Trooper Nahone

*******^^******

Trooper Liaberrane pulled the stock of his lasgun tightly into the pocket of his shoulder before squeezing off a pair of blasts through the gap in the fence. Both missed, but the lackeys of the False Emperor checked their advance, ducking back behind the ruins of the passenger terminal. The Legionnaires of the Black Maw had taken the port in a lightning raid, and just as fast, moved out to strike the capital, leaving Liaberrane and the rest of the 156th Brodemain Infantry, the proud Teeth of the Maw, to secure the port. The Imperials were pouring everything they could spare into retaking the port, their one and only means of escape. The defenders found their courage, no doubt after the report of a bolt pistol that added bass to the treble of lasguns, and rushed around the terminal. Liaberrane pushed his cheek over the oiled stock of his lasgun, feeling the eight pointed star devotedly carved into the stock press against his unshaven face. This time, he took more careful aim. He dropped a trooper in the first rank with a shot below his flak vest, gore spraying across the advancing Imperials, his second shot grazed the arm of another. Glory to the Dark Gods! The rest of his platoon opened up with their own lasguns and the pair of barking heavy bolters. Still the loyalist drove on, the peaked cap of a commissar standing tall in the back ranks, no doubt steeling their courage with threats and pistol whippings. Their bayonets were fixed, their war cries straining their lungs, but their momentum was not enough to carry them forward once the troopers of the 156th let loose with their pair of flamers. The sight, the sound, and especially the smell of burning men had a way of unnerving even the brave. The straggling survivors turned tail and fled, trying to both avoid the Teeth of the Maw, and their own commissar.

The 156th had withstood the initial counter-attack, had withstood the time of Nurgle. Trooper Liaberrane fixed his own bayonet to the lug on his lasgun, the time to advance was at hand. The Time of Khorne. If he survived the ensuing bloodbath, and his lords of the Black Maw achieved their victory, the sacking of the port would commence, Liaberrane would revel in the time of Slannesh. Tzentch's time could never be predicted, but in the turmoil of battle, would undoubtedly strike when least expected. Thus the gods were honored by the Teeth of the Maw, in the temple most high, in the holy Cathedral of War.

Scourged · February 10, 2016

A little glimpse into the birth of the Changemongers.

Change Be Praised

Excerpts from the personal log of Allessos Shassul, Governor Militant of Tachylite

***

There have been further reports of a growing insurgency. Talk of this “Zephyr” cult seems to be propagating at a faster rate. Little is known, beyond it being a revival of Tachylite’s pre-Imperial beliefs in direct opposition to Ecchlisiarchial teachings. Though currently harmless, corrective actions will be needed.

However, assuming that the deviant actions of the cult do not interfere with the orchards’ harvests, a reactionary force can wait. Colonel Khal agrees. I am hesitant to activate a Pyrite Guard regiment and disrupt our tithes for another quarter. Our diminished supplies have gone unnoticed by the Departmento Munitorum, but I cannot skirt their gaze forever. I and my administration are aware of the issue and watching it carefully, but upsetting the Departmento is a greater concern.

***

The harvests went unaffected - thankfully - but the insurgency continues to grow. My analysts seem to believe that the importation from the harvest out of the agri-lands into the main populace brought word of the cult with it. Their leader has been appointed, or at least come out of hiding. Scouting reports from 4th Company’s forces indicate he is known within the cult as the “Zephyrmaster,” and is little more than machinist from the southern reaches. Somehow he has become the demagogue to this heretical coup.

What troubles me is the rapid nature in which this cult is spreading. This spread was unpredicted. The insurgency is no longer limited to the agri-lands, as large pockets of cult activity are appearing rapidly across the planet. Colonel Khal urged me to take no action yet, as the final remnants of the harvests have yet to reach central processors and distributors. Consul Dumas later provided me the raw data, and even with the remaining materials our tithes will still be far under estimates. I have thus declared mobilization of the Pyrite Guard.

***

I blame myself for my hesitance. Tithes be damned, I should have acted. The southern reaches are nearly a waste, field reports indicating only pockets of 4th and 5th remaining. What’s worse is 2nd and 7th Companies ran turncoat and joined the insurgency, bolstering resistance within the populace, and arming them. The eastern fringe is lost, 3rd Company either slaughtered or converted to the Zephyr cult. 6th Company has been sent to reclaim the territory, but I am losing hope.

I’ve sent out a request for aid from any ally regiments in the area, but all hails have come up empty. I fear I have, once again, hesitated too long.

***

Abominations! Filthy mutant abominations! Lieutenant Allensford has reported that the Zephyr cult has employed the services of mutants. Not only do they willingly consort with these filthy abhumans, they embrace the changes! Given the previous lack of excessive mutations in the populace, my consuls and I have agreed that the Zephyr cult is born from the corruption of Chaos.

Tithe shortage be damned, I have sent out word for Inquisition forces. I have extended the request for aid to any Adeptus Astartes in the area as well. Tachylite will need all the help it can get to survive.

***

Still no contact from the Imperium, and now I know why: warpstorm interference in the sector, diminishing or eliminating any chance of astropathic communication. There is no further question that the Zephyrmaster is an agent of Chaos.

The rural lands have been lost, as has the entirety of the Piskos subcontinent. The insurgents - now armed from fallen or turncoat Pyrite Guard and calling themselves Changemongers - have choked away more of our territory. Spires and monuments have been erected, no doubt in prayer to their false gods. Even the major cities are beginning to crumble to the Zephyr cult’s size. Colonel Khal is holding out in the west at Scurio, and Lieutenant Allensford in Delias Peak. With each passing day, I am left impotent and powerless, praying that the God-Emperor will send us salvation.

***

Damnit, I don’t know how, but the insurgents broke through the lines of 8th and now control Delias Peak. That blasphemous Zephyrmaster wasted no time accessing the city’s comm’s relay and broadcasting planetwide. I can still hear his grating voice, the filthy heretic. On and on the message loops, nonsense about the Zephyr. But damn him; it’s working. Citizens are renouncing the Imperial Truth at an alarming new rate. Even those within my administration are not safe from this serpent’s tongue.

Consul Dumas foreswore the Imperium today. Having executed him on the spot, I am now without a reliable source of information from the front lines. Colonel Khal has withdrawn to the capital with 1st and 9th. The hope now is to defend what remains of Tachylite until help arrives. The colonel and I will meet shortly to discuss strategy.

***

To whom it may concern:

The governor is dead. I have sergeants hanging his corpse from the portico as I write this. The cheers are already raucous. Tachylite no longer belongs to your false Imperium. We have given it back to the True Master. Together, the Zephyrmaster and I will spread His will through the cosmos. Change be praised.

Signed: Zhufree Khal, Overlord of the Tachylite Changemongers

Kierdale · February 12, 2016

A couple of quickies I put together today.

Voices down the thread

Hidden Content

The tyranid attack on the Imperial planet of Val Verde was so huge that every Guard regiment within a dozen parsecs was called in. Intel had identified which hive fleet it was a tendril of but to those with their boots on the ground it mattered not. What mattered was that the bugs had green and black carapaces and that made them hell to hunt in the planet’s continent-spanning rainforests. Throw in that some seemed chameleonic and the initial Imperial forces - those near but not tooled up for jungle warfare: Kierdale’s Worlders, Tallarns - were eaten up. Outhunted and outclassed.

It wasn’t until Catachan regiments started showing up that there seemed salvation for the Verdese populace. But the attention of one of the Infernal Powers was drawn to the conflict, and it watched with growing interest.

The heat yes but the Tallarns hadn’t been able to handle the stamina-sapping humidity. That and they simply weren’t accustomed to fighting surrounded by so much green. A battlefield so diametrically opposite to the desert terrain they were accustomed to, even their experience fighting in urban environments did them no good. Basilisks and Colossi could flatten block after block of city leaving rubble which would remain for centuries, but the jungle was alive. The jungle grew back. It healed.

The Kierdale’s Worlders, those pious soldiers in their pristine uniforms, officers with their shining helmets and sabers, they too were swallowed by the jungle and the enemy alike.

But the Catachans, they brought with them flame and grit and those who could listen to the forest. Natives of a Death World much akin to Val Verde itself, they were at home in the darkness under the canopy. Being stalked as much as they stalked the enemy did not instill in them the soul-rivening fear it did in the warriors from the deserts and the pews, they welcomed the test; and none so much as the Catachan 89^th. The Spiders. A veteran regiment of jungle fighters, they were accustomed to fighting guerilla wars of attrition against elusive enemies. Eldar pirates, believing themselves the epitome of stealth, had fallen to the traps of the Spiders. They had ambushed Tau forces, taking them as they moved through valleys and gorges, cutting away the advantage of the Xenos’ superior firepower and putting matt blades to alien necks.

The oily, black, non-reflective machettes of the Spiders were a signature weapon. Sharp as a razor on one side to cut tanglevines or cut the threads of fate of the enemy, and serrated on the other to saw through anything the blade could not handle. Well oiled so that the blade was not corroded by the bacteria and fungi of the jungles, and to keep them quiet when drawing them from their sheathes. And black, so dark that no light was reflected, none that could alert an enemy to the killer’s presence.

The Spiders excelled even their brother regiments deployed to Val Verde. They seemed to become one with the jungle in a way that had been thought lost since native tribes stalked the dense tropical jungles, now long extinct, of the race homeworld. The 89^th’s psykers, both their battle wyrds who accompanied the grunts and the primarii who advised command, were said to commune with the spirits of the jungle itself. They had the ear of the trees and the wind and could sense the enemy, the invading bugs, from far off. They listened to the voices of the great multi-eyed, multi-mouthed spider, reverberating down the threads of fate. As the war against the bug stretched on the Catachan commanders began to lean more and more upon their seers. The proclivity of the augurs to adorn themselves with bones and bits of the brain-bugs began to spread to the grunts. Bone pierced noses, ears and even limbs and chests. `gaunt talons and teeth became necklaces and charms. Battle psykers would cast fistfuls of `stealer knucklebones to scry the best course of action for their platoon, taking the fate they divined as fact, delivered from the Great Spider; he who wove fate.

In combat the Spiders took to laughing and cackling once firefights began. They feared neither the jungle nor the alien. They capered over the enemy corpses in the aftermath, cutting them open to examine organs for more omens, to study the web-like veins upon steaming hearts.

By the time the primaris psykers seized control of the regiment, they had been out of contact with the rest of the task force, their brother Catachan regiments included, for over a year and eventually the entire 89^th was written off as MIA.

Guard began to be recalled when, after five long years of fighting, it was judged that the bugs had been exterminated on Val Verde. It was then that command began to pay more attention to the rumours of blue-on-blue. Friendly fire. Not uncommon in the confusion of jungle war but, with the fighting supposed over, there were altogether too many reports trickling in.

Tempestus Scions, about to be redeployed after their actions on Val Verde, were deployed once more to the hellish jungles they thought they would never see again. Deployed to hunt down these ghosts who slayed their brethren and faded away so quickly. Twenty scions died before an enemy corpse was recovered.

The soldier was barely recognizable as an Imperial Guard, even for one from one of the less disciplined regiments, his body covered in tattoos of webs with horrific faces leering between the silky strands. Bones, talons and shriveled body parts -both human and xenos- adorned his body and gear, and his eyes...his eyelids had been cut away. A self-inflicted injury the medicae believed.

It was when the body was turned over and the commissar present at the autopsy saw the feathered, part-spider-part-fish chimera tattooed upon the soldier’s back that a full and immediate withdrawal was ordered.

The jungle, millions of square kilometers, within which the Scions had claimed their kill, was raised from orbit. But, jungles survive, jungles grow back, and it is whispered by the remaining Verdese colonists that the Great Spider himself wove threads to pull his pawns from the fire and save them for greater deeds.

Thirsty

Hidden Content

It not unusual, indeed it was quite common, for regiment numbers to be reused in the Imperial Guard. Regiments combined or were wiped out, and new regiments eventually formed. In some cases they knew of their predecessor’s fates though often they did not. Most did not desire to know, for whatever discovered was not likely to be positive.

Thus it was when a commissar of the Tallarn 389^th discovered an all-too-inquisitive guardsman researching into the previous 389^th and was forced to grant the incautious pryer the Emperor’s Mercy.

The previous incarnation of the 389^th lancers -

- we cannot be sure that it was the first use of that number, for the Tallarn regiments stretch back to before the Great Betrayal and a great many records are lost. Though any earlier 389^ths could not have fallen as far as this last incarnation -

-were a regiment of chimera-mounted infantry. Born, raised and trained on the desert world of Tallarn, they were possessed of survival skills and discipline matched by few other regiments in the Guard. Disciplined in their maneuvers, in the attack but also when not engaged in battle. The cleaning of their gear. Personal hygene. And the conservation of that most vital of resources: water.

Much of the regiment came from Tallarn’s most arid dune territory, where winds stole the slightest moisture and it was said that the nomads drained even their own dead of the last drops of water. So it was with the 389^th, or so rumours went, and the guard extended this practice to the corpses of their enemies too.

It was upon the blasted ash plains of Gilix III that the 389^th were drawn into a protracted combat against the Tau, and it was upon those dunes of industrial waste that the regiment fell to the sway of two of the Pantheon, in all-too-similar circumstances.

As the war stretched out resources became as vital as tactical objectives, with the guard and the Tau fighting over supply drops from orbit as they plummeted through the thick, toxic cloud cover. Water was scarce and the recycling of bodies human and Tau became an accepted practice. Discipline upon both side began to slide and disease set in to both camps. Thus did Grandfather Nurgle, via the maladies he wove into the water of the dead, begin to slowly exert his will over the Tallarns. But his fellow Gods would not let him have all, for Khorne drove on the hot blooded desert warriors, and they in their wrath partook of other nourishment from the enemy dead. That other most vital of fluids.

Blood.

And so by the end of the conflict a full half of the regiment were little more than staggering zombies, their bodies arid and cracked while the other were driven by a thirst for blood.

Teetengee · February 13, 2016

187th Nyriadnean

Hidden Content

It was my second day in fatigues when the Xenos came. We were standing at attention waiting for the 187th’s posting to be released when three figures uncloaked behind the commanders. We managed to take out one of them in the panic. I never thought I would be so happy that the Nyriadnean regiments don’t believe in dress uniform. Few of the new recruits that hadn’t been in a gang or the pdf at some point in our lives made it out with them intact. It took one hour for a chain of command to be re-established. The commissariat killed more than the Xenos in that time.

Still, we pulled together; the 187th Nyriadnean was not planning on its dissolution predating its deployment. Eventually we set up camp in the undercities. Astropaths were using boosting equipment that hadn’t been touched in two centuries to send calls for aid. For three days we fought with no response. But then the call came through. Rumours varied, but most said it was a rogue trader, supported by a small force of astartes. All we knew for sure was that we had to hold out for ten more days.

Those ten days were the longest of my life. All the other old members of the Red Skulls gang died. Hell, everyone I knew died. I shifted squads more time than I could count. We started making piles of bodies to hide behind. Friend and foe we piled them fourteen bodies high, blue goatmen mixed with the pinks and browns of the Nyriadnean pdf and guard. Eventually the ash of burning cities choked all the colours out. It was just a sea of black and grey; we only knew what to shoot because of roundness of the enemy armour.

After the fortnight was over, our salvation came. I was on the front lines when it happened. My hair stood on end and I heard screams mixed with laughter as three gaping wounds appeared in the air in front of me. Blue-green hulking monstrosities stormed out, but instead of turning their guns on me, they activated power weapons and crashed over the hill into a squad of the xenos. Their armour was covered in spikes and sigils. The leader had a massive standard, taller than I was, shooting forth from his back. On it was a stylized eye, weeping blood. It took me a minute to realize I was still alive. It took two minutes of screaming xenos for me to pick back up my gun and crawl out from my hiding hole. Turning back, I saw him: Captain Starscream, our savior had arrived.

The rest of the 187th were being lead toward the xenos battleline. Unfamiliar tanks rolled amongst newly deployed abhuman regiments spitting death into the crumbling enemy. The shock of the astartes assault had destroyed the enemy battle plan. I ran toward the enemy emboldened by Starscream’s litanies. Eventually I came across the terminators doing battle against some sort of ceremonial guard. It was a sight both glorious and horrible, and something I have no desire to witness so close ever again. The ferocity of the angels of death is unmatched, and that they were bred as weapons there could never be any doubt. I crept around the smoldering wreck of a xenos skimmer before charging bayonet first, straight into a robed commander of the enemy. When I did so they seemed to change. The fighting became more bitter, and the xenos fought to the last.

It wasn’t until we were counting the dead that we realized not one of the commanders or commissariat had survived the battle. Thirty thousand troops of the 187th remained, but we had no leadership to speak of. Our world was in flames, and no civilians were left, all had died or been conscripted. We pledged ourselves to the service of Captain Starscream as we had nowhere else to turn, and he alone had answered our calls for aid. Missives of regret were reported at last from the earlier communications. Neighboring planets had stood by to let us die. The hate was palpable, and Starscream stoked it into a firestorm.

Three planets later we stopped. We had cleansed the system of the cowards who feared to fight for the xenos menace. But we had no imperial backing, and news of our censor was only a matter of time. It was during those campaigns that we discovered who Starscream was, and the Tide. It was also during those campaigns that we discovered that we just didn’t care. The galaxy had abandoned us. So we abandoned them in turn. Let the galaxy burn.

Not my best work, I just wasn't quite feeling it. Still, the story is there.

Kierdale · February 13, 2016

Thank you very much for your entries on the topic of Traitor Regiments. Not a lot, and perhaps we would have had more if I had allotted us two weeks, but thanks for the good entries we did get.

I hereby close that topic (for the purposes of judging. If you have more tales of turncoat guardsmen to tell by all means post them at any time!) and open our next one...

Welcome to the fifth challenge of Inspiration Friday 2016.

The Primordial Annihilator versus the Vlka Fenryka

Vlka Fenryka - Space Wolves, the Sky Warriors of Russ, the Rout, the VI legion...the desecrators of fair Prospero. Since the times of the Great Crusade they have been the Emperor’s executioners and countless times since they have fought against the forces of Chaos - the Battle of the Fang, the Skarath Crusade, the great First War for Armageddon, the War of the Wolf in which they clashed against the Black Legion, the Third Purging of Lastrati, the Ormantep Raid and finally the 13th Black Cruade - while they themselves fought against the mutation within their own DNA.

Tell us of your forces’ clash with the sons of Russ.

Inspiration Friday: The Primordial Annihilator versus the Vlka Fenryka runs until Friday the 26th of February.

And who shall judge it? That decision lies in the hands of Scourged.

Scourged, please announce the winner at your leisure and in whatever manner you deem fit!

And to our winner, do not forget to claim your Octed amulet:

Let us be inspired.

Son of Carnelian · February 13, 2016

A Wolf's Luck

The Company of Misery had already wasted enough time on these feral savages, Huybrecht thought. That one single Space Wolf now stood between them and total control of this Space Hulk irked him even further. They might spend years looking for him if he could master the dark and secret passages of the hulk. Or he might already lay dead somewhere on this fusion of astroid and battleship, cut open by one of the unknown horrors that stalked its halls.

Either way, Huybrecht seethed at wasting his precious time going on patrol through the Space Hulk. Named Emissary of Doom by some forgotten past action of war, the mass of metal and material lumbered through space, with only the Warp propelling it at any speed. If not for the fact that the Emissary of Doom could stand up to practically any outside bombardment, Huybrecht would have thought it useless as a vessel. But while it could withstand any outside attack, boarders could prove far more deadly to its structural integrity, such as it was.

Huybrecht checked his bolter again as he continued walking. The Tigrus-pattern weapon had served him quite well over the years, originally plucked from the dead arms of an Iron Hand. The son of Ferrus had maintained his weapon exquisitely, to the point where it barely required any upkeep from Huybrecht. Still, The Company of Misery's resident sorcerer had supposedly divined ill portents regarding the weapon and Huybrecht, so he kept a watchful eye on it.

But something in the background of Huybrecht's mind changed. He looked up from examining his weapon and realized with a start that he had absolutely no idea where he now stood on this damnable Space Hulk. He cursed once, twice, then a total of seventeen times in varying languages as he failed to find his bearings.

"You are foul and a fool,' laughed a voice in the darkness. 'I will enjoy ridding the galaxy of you."

Huybrecht cursed again, but before he could finish the string of obscenities, the Space Wolf leapt at him from above. Huybrecht narrowly dodged, leaping away and letting a burst fly from his bolter. One of the shells hit and detonated inside the meat of the Space Wolf's calf. The grey-armored Space Marine howled in pain, a sound that disgusted Huybrecht to his core. The Space Wolf tried moving towards the traitor in retaliation, but his wound sent him to the deck instead.

Stepping forward for a closer look, Huybrecht examined the fallen Space Wolf. Upon inspection, the Space Wolf's features revealed his relative youth. A Blood Claw then, Huybrecht thought. The prone warrior had a bolt pistol locked to his waist, but it had no ammo remaining. In one hand, he grasped an axe of respectable size. Huybrecht could also see runes scrawled upon the Space Wolf's armor. The traitor spoke little Fenrisian and read even less, but he could make out that the runes said something about a "great destiny" and a "young wolf." It also, perhaps ironically, read "lucky." Huybrecht couldn't suppress a laugh at that, his humor coming through from his twisted helmet sounding more like metal grating on metal.

"Something amusing, traitor?" The Blood Claw asked through gritted teeth. His body had already clotted the bleeding from his leg, but it still wouldn't function properly for a while yet. Huybrecht simply kept laughing as he brought his bolter up for an execution shot. The Space Wolf closed his eyes and muttered something Huybrecht could not hear. The traitor Astartes depressed the trigger and-

Nothing. Huybrecht heard a click emanate from somewhere within the bolter, but the shot did not leave the chamber. His laugher stopped and he instead roared in frustration, slamming his bolter with all his augmented strength, cursing all the while as he willed the ancient bolter to life. After a few seconds of this, the bolter finally fired its delayed shot, slamming not into the Space Wolf but one of the crude metal plates that made up the floor beside him. Faster than any eye could follow, the bolt rebounded around the chamber and struck Huybrecht square in the soft armor of his neck. His final half-spoken words demanded an anatomical impossible act from the Space Wolf, before he fell to the deck of the Emissary of Doom in a gurgling heap.

The Blood Claw blinked. The whole ordeal had happened in less than a minute and it seemed somehow even shorter than that. He coughed once before chucking to himself. He reached over for where the traitor's bolter had fallen, smiling at its dark metallic surface still emblazoned with the sign of the Iron Hands. The Blood Claw uttered a word of thanks to the weapon before locking it to his side.

"Now I have a bolter,' he said aloud to no one. He chucked again, finally allowing himself the luxery of a full laugh a moment later. 'Ho ho ho!"

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