29

Vidriov was feeling sublime. For decades, he'd had ideas, moments of inspiration, yet the chances to act upon them were rare. As a Genetor, he understood a fair amount about the interface of machine and nerve. His mind had concluded long ago that the Machine God spoke its sacred truth in those moments of clarity. His encounter with Tide had solidified his faith, even if it was not shared by the Chosen of the Machine God.

For the moment, Vidriov was hard at the task of recrafting the power armor of the Inquisitor. He looked at the internal mechanisms of what had once been the Inquisitor and he understood them. He had a technical understanding of almost everything, how it worked and how it functioned, but this understanding was beyond even that surface-level knowledge. Everywhere he looked, he saw ways to reshape and improve, to bring that armor into its holy form. Ideas flooded him like a dam had been broken.

Do you see the blessings granted by the Machine God? Vidriov asked inside his own mind. He had adapted to always having access to Tide easily, perhaps from being used to having silent, mental communication with others via machine implants. This was not too different, only being constant, though Tide rarely spoke when not spoken to first.

I see someone who has had their mind stifled by restrictions their entire life set free, Tide replied. Vidriov would have smiled if he still had lips.

Only the Machine God grants life and knowledge, Vidriov responded simply. I am merely a vessel for its will, as you are.

We both know your fellow priests would disagree.

Some, no doubt, Vidriov admitted. The work of modifying such sacred machinery would have been seen as the actions of a heretek by many in the Machine Cult, even some of his own subordinates, but Vidriov knew it was for a higher cause. Tide had taken the form of that powered armor for a reason, to give Vidriov the insight to bring it into existence. Whether or not that had been Tide's intent was unimportant, as it was the Machine God's will that guided all things. I believe many more would accept you for what you are.

What you say I am, you mean.

There is no difference, Vidriov insisted. You merely need accept this truth, accept the Machine God.

I have little interest in being the chosen of a god, Tide stated. Not when so many of the monsters that claim that title in this universe are what ills it.

Vidriov paused for a moment, considering something. You speak to the universe, do you not?

Saying I speak to it is not remotely correct, but it's one of the closer metaphors I can think of to explain it.

Vidriov would have arched an eyebrow at that. It almost sounded like Tide was saying he was not intelligent enough to understand the truth. Which was true, Vidriov only had a single mind after all, and Tide was the Chosen of the Machine God. Regardless, he continued his line of thought.

The Machine Cult holds that the Motive Force fuels the action and reaction of all forms of life, whether crafted of machine, flesh, or both. However, I, and now you, know of some sects that believe this to be only one portion of the Motive Force's power.

You're referring to the Electro-Priests of Novarus? Tide seemed skeptical, perhaps having caught on or simply having read Vidriov's mind to understand where he was going. They're a fringe cult, at best.

In the grand scheme of things, yes, Vidriov agreed. The Electro-Priests of Novarus held great power in the three Forge Worlds of their star system and the vast expanse of disorganized space that were the Ghoul Stars, but their beliefs held little influence in the rest of the Mechanicus. However, after learning of you and your abilities, I believe they may be closer to the truth than the rest of us ever were. The Motive Force and the concept you claimed much of your power came from, Neural Physics, share much in common.

Tide was silent, waiting. Vidriov wondered if he had more of the Chosen's attention now.

You told me that Neural Physics allows for the manipulation of the forces of the universe by communing with it.

True enough. Tide admitted. When using Neural Physics, I am not actually doing anything besides asking the universe for aid, though that's not really accurate. It is difficult to describe in a way that is not open to misinterpretation. The universe does not think in the way you and I do, it does not really think at all in some ways, but it does in others. Language is an imperfect tool.

Indeed, Vidriov agreed and his mind drifted for a moment to Magos Zalum, who spoke only in the Lingua Technis. Yet, even that blessed language was insufficient to properly communicate such concepts. No, he corrected himself, it was simply his own insufficient nature that prevented him from fully comprehending. However, he understood well enough and could make connections. You ask. We pray.

They are not the same.

Aren't they? Vidriov asked.

I am not praying, nor invoking a request for aid from a god.

But you admit you are asking for it from a universe, Vidriov countered and Tide once more fell silent. Vidriov said nothing more, knowing that the process would likely take much longer than this to assure success of bringing Tide into the light of the Machine God.

All would be as it was willed to be, of that Vidriov had no doubt.

Ahsael was soaring, swimming through currents of thought, buffeted by gusts of emotion. The Warp was freedom, of a sort. He was a comet, a quiet blue flame tumbling through a void that was anything and everything except empty. Daemons and other things gazed hungrily at him from the waters, the strength of his soul drawing them like sharks to blood even as his sorcerous powers kept them at bay, at least for the moment.

The comparison brought form with it and Ahsael soon saw several fins like those of a shark of a variety of colors and sizes, poking out of the surface water, though there was no surface as such to the Warp. They circled him, coming closer and closer, moving almost as one, but these were no pack predators, working together to trap their prey. These daemons were as cautious of one another as they were of him. He did not recognize the signs and symbols of many of the creatures that now surrounded him, implying allegiances not to the Four.

However, implying something did not make it true and he was no novice. He knew daemons well and was versed in recognizing clues to their origins, if not their powers and forms. While daemons might not announce who their god was, they could never deny them. So, he waited and watched, careful to maintain his concentration and power to ensure that his soul was tantalizing enough to draw daemons towards him, but not great enough a prize that they would rush in and risk themselves, nor would he draw anything too large for him to handle.

The daemons writhed, darting to and fro in seemingly random motions, agitated by something unseen. They were always agitated these days, after the Great Rift had opened, but there were degrees and there was something different to them this time. One of them should have attacked by this point, even without any prodding on his part. Their inaction was unusual and unexplainable, neither of which Ahsael liked.

There, he thought. One fin, shifting in color from grey to black and moving in a pattern of certain shapes Ahsael recognized to be the letters of a certain language, one long taught by the Thousand Sons. The language of Prospero.

With a burst of power that sent the smaller daemons fleeing and the larger rushing in, ethereal jaws bared, Ahsael ignored all but the focus of his mind's eye, reaching out with invisible hands and clapping them shut around the surprised creature. It struggled with all its might, but Ahsael's power was far stronger.

When the first daemons reached him, he was already fading back into reality, his prize forced to cross the barrier with him through his sorcerous might. The daemons howled in rage and fell upon one another in a vicious flurry, seeking to sate their eternal hunger on their own kind instead.

Ahsael entered back into reality, ethereal claws caging the Tzeentchian daemon in their grip, who was now forced to take form by his spells. It shifted and twisted in upon itself, flesh exploding in rivulets of gore and blood that was black and speckled with the white of strange stars, like someone had taken the night sky and melted it into liquid form. It screeched in pain despite having no mouth and spoke outraged sounds that could have been the words of a language forgotten by all save it as much as they could have been meaningless shrieks. The poisonous will of reality bore down upon it, even as his sorcerous craft kept it from leaving either his presence or this plane of existence, and it was not happy.

"Betrayer! Incompetent!" The daemon shouted as a snarling grin stretched across the blob of shifting flesh which slowly began to stretch and widen, growing feathers of blue and white. It became a set of nine wings attached only to one another and a central eye of silver that shone with malevolence, its sclera of the same black speckled white its blood had been moments before. It flapped within an invisible cage, still pained as reality attempted to unmake this thing that should not have been.

"Speak plain, daemon," Ahsael replied, though he suspected it mattered little what he said. All the Tzeentchian daemons he'd spoken with, save those caged within the daemonhosts, had the same things.

"A flame burns brighter only to die all the faster!" The daemon snickered, now cackling at him. Ahsael growled, but he did not tighten his hold on the daemon. Instead… he loosened it.

Reality crashed down upon the Neverborn all the harder, eager to banish the unnatural thing before him back to the hellish realm from whence it came. Ahsael did not permit this, but let the neverborn howl all the harder, the shard of Tzeentch suffering as it was trapped between planes. Its body grew faint and flickered, almost as though it were a hologram whose power source was being disrupted, but it did not disappear.

"You claim I move too quickly then?" Ahsael was not truly speaking to the daemon now, more to himself. Its feathers turned thin and sharp like steel spikes and it collapsed to the ground from the weight, its wings suddenly turning into spider-like limbs. It stabbed at him with several of them, but it hissed each time it left the invisible wall of his spell, for outside the range where he provided it just enough power to continue existing was the place causing it so much pain. A trapped animal that was more dangerous than any beast on the material plane.

"Plans within plans have unraveled by your error," The daemon spoke with venom dripping from every syllable. Ahsael briefly wondered what that metaphor would look like in the mindspace of the Great Ocean. "What could have been now never will be."

"Such is the case with all actions taken," Ahsael replied, and the daemon hissed. "I took action because of the situation in Malum that had to be dealt with and the opportunity provided by the genestealers. If your masters take issue with that-."

"Ha! Fool! Wretch!" It interrupted him and was laughing again, speaking jovially. "A sorcerer with no wit for sorcery! An observer who sees nothing!"

"TELL ME THEN, CREATURE!" Ahsael roared and it screamed as he allowed it to feel more pain, more suffering.

"Four times! Four times the waters stir, rousing things from the deep!" The daemon suddenly cried. "Four times the tides of this world's fate shift and all we see is unmade and remade and unmade and remade again, four times!"

"Speak sense!" Ahsael shouted but the daemon merely screeched and leapt out of its invisible cage, claws extended for his throat, and into the unmaking grip of cold, hard reality. It vanished just before they grazed his neck, disappearing back into the Warp. Ahsael sighed.

Four times. That number had been coming up a lot lately whenever he demanded answers from daemons. It wasn't just Tzeentchian daemons either, as they could hardly be trusted. However, he'd spoken with neverborn of Slaanesh and Nurgle and even Khorne. When he could get answers out of any of them, they all were agitated by the number four.

It wasn't one of the gods sacred numbers, not that he knew of at least. It was half of eight, so perhaps it had something to do with Khorne. The Blood God's spawn were enraged by bringing it up, but whether that meant it was pleasing or displeasing to their master was difficult to discern.

If it was related to Khorne, then it was likely the work of the Blood God's cults on Monstrum, which mean Kalak. He had spies in almost every circle across his four cities, including Kalak's horde, whether it was aligned to a god or not, and they had not mentioned any rituals that would cause fate itself to unravel, even if in a local area. Mostly just blood sacrifices and the normal infighting of any cult of Khorne. He also doubted Kalak would even be capable of such a ritual.

Still, better safe than sorry. He'd have to inform Uirus to deplete the numbers of the Blood God's wretches and investigate whether they were up to anything nefarious. It wouldn't be hard. Kalak and his lot weren't given towards scheming.

Still, that was for later. The Great Ocean was disturbed and the daemon had mentioned that things were being roused from the deep. What exactly that meant was not clear to him, but perhaps it had something to do with the unusually high number of Warp entities he had encountered recently who weren't related to the Four? Still, daemons spoke as often in half-truths as they did outright lies and he had no verification of this one's claims.

Ahsael let out of a calming breath and focused his mind in preparation to return once more to the material realm's counterpart to get his verification.

Day 28

"FORWARD! FOR THE EMPEROR!" Serrita cried, thrusting her roaring chainsword into the air. A unified shout, a wordless warcry, went up among the Malum Cohorts, a hundred stouthearted men and women charging fearlessly into scything lances of autogun fire. Dozens fell, blown apart, but the rest did not falter and Serrita took heart from their fearlessness even as she and her sisters joined their rush.

They fought in a long tunnel, one of the many that lead through the wall of Janus and into the city itself, though it was not the service duct currently being journeyed through by Aliciel and other Sororitas. This one was protected by a small army equipped with heavy stubbers, making good use of the tight quarters to turn it into a bloodbath.

"LET HIS FURY FILL YOU!" Serrita yelled, her voice amplified by her helmet's vox. She felt an autogun round glance off her shoulder, the force of it nearly throwing her off-balance, but she managed to keep her pace.

A voice cut through her vox, shouting a warning Serrita barely heard over the blood pounding in her ears. She definitely heard the next sound, however.

CHOOM

The leman russ fired with its main gun, the force of the shell's journey over her head ripping her off her feet and shoving her to the ground, just as it struck the enemy stubber emplacement's ammo cache, causing an explosion that filled the tunnel with the screams of the enemy dying as they burned.

She rose, her armor caked in the blood of the troops from prior attacks. She tried to ignore the indignation rising in her, knowing it had been her own distraction that had led to her being unprepared for the shot. She saw her Sisters had not stopped, as was only right, and were already ahead of her by a dozen meters.

She had not lost possession of her weapons at least, and she rose to her feet, brandishing the chainblade, the words of scripture passing through her lips, growing louder and louder as she rejoined the rush.

The enemy's emplacement was still burning when she reached it, but the enemy was all dead, their screams cut short by autogun rounds. Her Sisters strode through the fire fearlessly, but the Malum troops were more cautious, not having the protection of power armor, throwing corpses onto the flames to douse them. Oddly, they didn't seem to use those of the enemy, only their own, but she chalked it up to them not wanting to touch the burned bodies.

"Fan out and secure the tunnel!" Serrita ordered and her assault force was quick to fulfill her orders. She heard the trundling of treads and turned to watch as the Leman Russ that had provided fire support rolled towards them, uncaringly crushing corpses as it passed through, as though it intended to grease its motors with the blood of the fearless. Serrita couldn't but wince a little at the sight and wondered if her assessment was wrong and these troops were simply callous towards the lives of their fellows. While she could respect their devotion, at times it seemed less like they were eager to die for the Emperor and more like they simply did not care if they lived. While the result was the same, she was starting to wonder just how these men and women were trained to acquire such a mindset. She was not overly familiar with the hive city of Malum, the journey through the tunnel that connected it and Deimos hardly qualified as visits, but she'd always thought it to be no different than the other hives. What made it so special?

A howl split the air and disrupted her thoughts, a bloodcurdling scream of rage and hunger. It was soon joined by others, countless more, a thrill of unnatural bloodlust passing through her. She recognized the feelings for what they were, the machinations of Chaos, and crushed them under her faith and will. She glanced at the Malum troops and saw, to her relief, they seemed as unaffected by the attack as she and her sisters were, merely turning to face this new threat.

The Leman Russ came to a halt, its heavy main gun pointing further down the tunnel while dozens of PDF took cover around it in the broken remains of their enemy's former choke point. Serrita and her Sisters stood in the open, unafraid of whatever was to come.

The first beastman to emerge at the end of the tunnel was small, fast, and utterly unprepared for over thirty bursts of autogun fire to slice through its flesh, chopping its mutated flesh into pieces that scattered across the ground.

Another united howl arose the moment its blood hit the ground, one somehow both delighted and infuriated. The source of the cry soon became apparent as dozens of beastmen poured into the tunnel, all wielding weapons only fit for chopping, stabbing, or bludgeoning. They wore little armor to speak of and charged ahead with reckless abandon.

"FIRE!" Serrita cried out, leveling her boltpistol and unleashing a hail of rounds into the encroaching horde, the explosive rounds ripping through flesh and detonating with devastating effect. Her own fire was joined by that of her Sisters and the rest of the PDF, cutting down the first row of beastmen with deadly efficiency.

CHOOM

The Leman Russ' main gun fired again, though Serrita was better prepared to deal with the rush of air as its shell passed by and kept to her feet, only barely pausing in her fire to regain her aim. The shell detonated in the middle of the horde, sending an explosion of blood and limbs into the air. The heavy stubbers of the tank opened up into the horde as well, slicing through flesh and muscle like a power sword through armor.

And yet, the horde came on, more beastmen rushing forward to replace the dead, closer and closer. Close enough that Serrita could see the madness and rage in their eyes, the pure insanity that gripped them. That she could see the spittle and froth that flew from their lips as they continued to scream in their fury, not the righteous sort that she and her sisters possessed, but a corrupted, wretched desire for blood, be it that of the God-Emperor's loyal servants or their own.

"THE SCIONS OF THE ARCHENEMY ARE UPON US!" Serrita called. "LET NOT YOUR RIGHTEOUS SPIRIT WAVER!"

There was no answering call this time as the PDF seemed to fall into a cold, precise unity of a kind. Their fire was coordinated, a sight to behold, cutting down swathes of the encroaching horde, and yet more still came closer.

"AFIX YOUR BAYONETS!" Serrita ordered and half the PDF began to do so, the other half maintaining fire to hold back the tide of bodies. Serrita pressed the activator on her chainsword, revving it to life, and holding it up above her head. "FOR THE GOD-EMPEROR! CHARGE!"

The PDF were already rushing forward, holding their autoguns out in front of them like spears, running fast and low. Serrita and her Sisters joined them and she sought out the largest beastman, the fastest, the strongest. She did not have to look long, finding a beastman with deep, red near-black fur swinging around a greatsword in a single, massive hand. It roared and bisected a pair of PDF troopers, who went down with their final acts being to shove their bayonets into the chest and stomach of the creature, though all this seemed to do was make it angrier.

"HERE, TRAITOR, HERE!" Serrita called out, slashing through another of the mad creatures that came at her, its snarls cut short in an almost pitiful whine as its flesh and bone were sawed apart by her blade. "COME AND FACE ME, SLAVE OF THE DARK!"

The beastman turned, roaring out a challenge of its own, before charging straight at her. Serrita brought her bolt pistol up and fired, but the beastman ducked low just in time and the shells detonated in the flesh of another of the wretches further back in the horde. She holstered her pistol and twohanded her chainsword, roaring a warcry of her own.

She caught the beastman's first blow, a downward slash, on her blade's guard with ease. She pushed off the strike and brought her blade around for a sideways cut, but the beastman rushed forward, catching her off guard, and she was suddenly aware of the second, smaller blade, the dagger it wielded in its free hand, already descending for the weakspot between her helmet and chestplate.

She turned and the dagger scraped harmlessly off her shoulder plate. No, not harmlessly, she realized, as the tattered ribbon of one of its purity seals fluttered away.

"FILTHY MUTANT!" Serrita screamed with pure, righteous fury at the supreme indignation. It flooded her veins with adrenaline and she moved almost faster than the gears of her power armor were able to accommodate, her chainsword digging down into the skull of the beastman, right between its maddened eyes. Her blade was already through the skull and digging into the neck when it finally collapsed, its limbs twitching and spasming. Serrita brought her boot up and stomped down onto the ruin of its head, crushing it fully and stilling it forever.

She looked up and around the battlefield, surprised to see the beastmen had begun to pull back. Perhaps the one now staining her boot had been the leader of this small group or perhaps they had been recalled by whatever other dark beings they called master. She was about to give the order to follow after them, to finish them off, when the Canoness' voice spoke to her through the vox.

"Legatine, are you there? Have you secured the tunnel?"

"Yes, Canoness," Serrita nodded despite the fact that the gesture couldn't be seen. "We also encountered a group of beastmen mutants, but saw them off."

"I'm afraid that is the only good news we have heard today. Leave the PDF to guard the tunnel, reinforcements will be along shortly, but I need you and your Sisters back at the base."

"What has happened?"

"It seems the service duct was not as unwatched as we'd suspected. Aliciel and her Sisters have gone silent."

Tide found his gaze being drawn again and again to the Warp. There was a sick fascination there, to look out into a sea of endless horror. While he did little beyond passive observation, unwilling to risk anything that might endanger himself or the souls now in his care, he did still learn several things.

Foremost in importance among that gained knowledge was his ability to move about the Warp. Or, rather, look around it? He did so by angling and moving the rift throughout his domain, almost as though he were looking through a screen.

He passed through the Warp, causing not even so much as a ripple in its waters, passing by countless predators. The daemons and other Warp entities he saw seemed to be growing increasingly agitated by something, though he couldn't say what for sure. His own presence remained undetected, as far as he knew.

In the distance, looming like dark mountains, the four floating icebergs remained around the dark storm that flashed with sporadic bursts of golden lighting. The Chaos Gods and their domains were tempting subjects to study more closely, but Tide had not dared go near their massive forms. While nothing had shown the ability to notice him yet, that did not mean it wasn't possible.

Instead, Tide began to construct a mental map of the 'local' Warp area, though it wasn't so much a map as it was a number of 'landmarks', objects or phenomena he had seen repeatedly. The largest and most prominent was what Tide could only assume to be the Warp Storm that had descended around the Monstrum system. However, notably, it was not the only recurring sight.

Inside the storm itself, he occasionally saw what could have been starships. Some were clearly Imperial, others obviously of Chaotic origin, some even looking closer to daemons than true warships. However, a great many of them appeared to be neither and even of a variety of different styles. They would flicker into his view and then disappear. He wasn't sure if they were being destroyed or simply returning to realspace.

Additionally, sometimes, he'd see the remnants of something like the branches of a giant tree. Sometimes they seemed to be connected to things. The ones that weren't were often swarming with daemons, like maggots on spoiled meat.

Finally, he'd occasionally see something akin to a glowing pillar floating through the Warp. At first, he'd thought it might have been the Astronomicon, that his suspicions regarding the dark storm where the Chaos Gods rested were wrong, but he'd quickly realized this to not be the case. The pillar was actually a trio of pillars, closer in color to molten yellow than true gold. They were also far too small to be what he had heard the Astronomicon to be, though size had little meaning in the Warp. Perhaps power was a better descriptor.

For whatever reason, few of the daemons and Warp predators drew near these pillars, perhaps put off by the similarities, however distant, to the true beacon used by the Imperium to navigate the Warp. He doubted any Navigator could use the pillars in a similar way, but he kept in mind the fact that the daemons seemed to dislike them.

Finally, there was something akin to an idea of 'up and down' in the Warp. Though, it was not uniform across the Warp and it was determined by something Tide had yet to really nail down. Sometimes 'Up' was left, sometimes it was right, sometimes it was a direction that couldn't be known by a Material being, though was more understandable to him for reasons he couldn't quite parse, though he assumed it to be his nature as a Precursor. 'Down' was even more complex, as it seemed to utilize higher dimensions more often than not.

It was down that fascinated him more. He'd already decided pursuing Slipspace was a worthwhile endeavor, but been stumped by having little ability to determine the presence of higher dimensions beyond those he already knew to exist. The down direction, what he had mentally labelled the Deep Warp, was intriguing for its greater complexities that he seemed to be well-suited to studying.

Tide took control of the rift once more and began 'moving' throughout the Warp, searching for a place where he could begin looking into the Deep. He passed by innumerable predators and daemons, some small, others titanic.

He neared the storm and saw the three pillars. He saw a fleet of alien craft made of webs and black wings slicing through the Immaterium, chased by a horde of enraged daemons kept at bay by some strange black energy. It was hours in real-time before he found it, but it could have been seconds or millennia in the Warp.

Then, he found it. A way down, travelling across the sixth dimension before cutting through the seventh. It was strange, moving across dimensions he could never have imagined in his previous life, yet it felt even more strangely from how natural it was. Precursors, his kind, this was simply something they did.

How much more could he be, were he not corrupted? If he were not trapped as a parasite? He wondered, if he gained enough biomass, would he gain all the abilities of the Precursors? Or would there still be some things denied to him, because he was, fundamentally, broken?

He didn't like that train of thought and he pressed further down into the Warp. Across dimensions in a labyrinth of nigh-infinite complexity. He briefly thought he might have stumbled into Tzeentch's realm, but he doubted it.

All the while, the Warp grew darker. However evil they might have been, the Chaos Gods and Warp Storms did cast light, of a sort. It was not warm, but cold and dim, but it was still light. And now, it was starting to disappear.

Similarly, the number of daemons he encountered also began to grow fewer and fewer. For a while, other Warp entities began to grow in number to replace them, before even they began to disappear. By the time he no longer saw any at all, he could tell he was at the edges of the light cast by the Chaos Gods.

Below him yawned a black abyss, empty and endless. Except it wasn't empty.

He could tell there was something down there. Or rather, some things.

A part of him wanted to go forward, wanted to keep exploring. A much louder, much more cautious part of him brought up a fear from his past life, a fear that had haunted him for years. A moment of his life where he was out swimming in the ocean… and had looked down. Down into the blackness that stretched beneath him. Down into the infinite dark… and something had moved.

Something was moving now. Through the black, up towards the light. The light that began to recede behind him.

For the first time since arriving in the Warp, Tide felt something notice him. Countless not-eyes, gazing up at him, through the rift and into his Domain, with feelings so utterly alien he was certain they could not have existed. And they were coming closer.

Tide fled from the Deep with all the haste he could muster, not quite retracing his steps back to the shoals, but near enough. Eventually, the darkness rising behind him receded, whatever creatures chasing him departing for some impossible to understand reason. He basked in the wretched light of the Dark Gods, once more hidden, once more unnoticed, once more safe. New knowledge and perspective, however dangerously acquired, had given him new insight:

It was safer to be among the gods than the things that fed on them.

Day 29

Blood. Rage. Skulls.

He tore through flesh and sinew, roaring madly. None were safe from the bite of his chainaxes, all who came near would die for the glory of Khorne. Friend, foe, these were terms he barely understood at his calmest, and he was far from such a state now. And as he killed, as he spilled blood and took skulls, he felt the whispers in the back of his own skull grow stronger, felt himself grow stronger. It would have made him gleeful if only he could feel anything but wrath and anger and agony.

A stabbing pain in his side exploded through him, but this only served to fuel his fury. Whatever its source perished a moment later, chewed apart by a sawing axehead, and the pain was gone just as swiftly, severed flesh and muscle reknitting into something stronger than it had been.

Through the haze of blood, the tearing of flesh, and the flashing of metal that was his vision, he occasionally saw other things, things he did not understand, but knew well. Through the pounding of his heart in his ears and the whispers that screamed in his skull, he occasionally heard voices that were familiar, yet unrecognizable. He saw faces, leering with hatred and scorn. He heard laughter and words of disgust and each blow against his flesh, each rip of muscle and spilling of his blood caused them to laugh all the harder.

He might have known those faces once, might have feared them, might have reviled them, might have felt… anything towards them. Back when he was still more man than beast, when he had not yet felt the burning in his veins that was Khorne's seething fury, not scarred his flesh with marks of devotion, not received the gifts of the Blood God, he might have recognized the faces of those he'd once hated so dearly that he'd run into the arms of dark powers for revenge against them, for the strength to get back at them.

Yet, that was all gone now. The names he'd whispered to himself at night before falling asleep had not been spoken in years. The things they'd done that had so driven him towards darkness before were forgotten long ago, the scars that had covered his flesh torn away and covered by newer ones. Only their faces and their taunting voices remained, barely understood now by the mind of the thing that had suffered their vileness, only serving as further kindling to the flame of his wrath as he failed to understand what it meant, what any of it meant.

Kalak the Mutant, Kalak the Freak, Kalak the Beastman was dead. He had died years ago, when he had first stepped onto the altar of the Blood God, a willing sacrifice for power.

Kalak Bronze-Blood howled in fury and torment and continued the slaughter.

Aliciel opened her eyes slowly and groaned. Her head felt like she'd stuck her ear next to a voxcaster during a sermon, the pounding like the beats of a drum. She had felt worse, probably. The only time she could recall was the morning after her final rites to join the Sisterhood and the subsequent celebrations, a night whose events she could not recall even a century later.

If she were less than what she was, she might have sworn, might have taken more time to wallow in her pain. But she was a Sister of the Cleansing Rains and so she opened her eyes, ignoring the stinging pain of the dim lights that were still too bright, or the way her stomach felt like it was doing backflips at the sudden motion of her head looking up. Her vision clouded over for a second and she thought she might pass out, her pride getting the better of her, but she managed to fight away the embrace of sleep. While her vision was still reforming its images, she tried to learn what she could from her other senses.

Her body ached, though less than her head, and her armor was missing, leaving her in only the plainclothes tunics worn underneath. She could smell grease and rust, so she was still in the tunnels or nearby. Her ears only heard her own heartbeat and were slower to recover than her sight. She could not feel her left hand, save for a dull, pulsing pain. Her vision was slowly coming back to her and she looked down to see why.

Ah. It was gone. Replaced by a set of blood-soaked bandages wrapped tightly around the stump of her wrist, thick ropes binding her arms together. Hm.

Looking up, her vision still swimming slightly, Aliciel became more aware of her surroundings. She was indeed still in a tunnel, though whether it was the service duct or a different area was impossible to determine by sight alone. She saw several of her Sisters that she had led into the duct, all wounded but amateurishly patched up as she had been, all with their arms similarly tied.

Their captors stood nearby, around two dozen mutants of varying levels of deviation from the holy human form, but all equally vile. They wore ill-fitting PDF gear but were equipped with Lasguns and one even had a plasma gun.

Memory returned to her. They had been ambushed, their vox jammed through some unknown means. She remembered there had been well over a hundred to their twenty, relying on surprise and numbers to overcome them. She remembered her Sisters reacting admirably, slaughtering a quarter of their attackers in the first minute. Then, Uriah had gone down, a plasma blast vaporizing most of the right side of her body. After that… things got spotty.

She remembered something flooding her veins, different from the adrenaline rush she was had grown to be so familiar with. Like liquid fire, she had moved and thought faster, her reactions had come quicker. The blessings of the God-Emperor took different forms, she knew. Her faith had been rewarded, but it- no, she had not been enough. She had squandered His gift and allowed herself and her Sisters to be captured rather than die in glorious martyrdom like Uriah. Shame filled Aliciel, even as one of her captors noticed her eyes scanning the area.

"The corpse worshippers awake," He said, drawing the attention of another 'man', one even more grotesquely mutated then the rest. The one who she could only assume to be the leader was tall and wiry, one arm replaced by a long, dark blue tentacle that ended in nine, much shorter sprouts like fingers. It writhed even when he stood at rest, as though it had a mind of its own. Perhaps it did. One could never tell with his wretched ilk.

"Glad to see you're awake." The lead mutant's voice was just slightly off, as though it were being echoed despite not being loud enough to produce one in the tunnel they were in. He strode over to her, a malicious grin on his face. "We've got a few… questions for you."

"Eat grox manure, heretic," Aliciel spat. "The Faithful have nothing to fear from your filth."

"Oh, that's where you're quite wrong, dear," The mutant knelt down, bringing his face close to hers. "I think you should be quite-!"

The mutant's next words were cutoff as Aliciel rammed her forehead into his nose in a vicious headbutt, taking grim satisfaction in the feeling of cartilage and bone breaking beneath the force of her strike. For a moment, the world seemed to spin, but she felt the not-adrenaline flood her again and it returned to normal, then sharper.

The mutant howled in pain, rearing back, but Aliciel was already moving. She pushed herself from her sitting position, just enough for her to fall forwards, barreling into the wretch and shoving him to the ground. The tentacle whipped out and slammed into her side, an explosion of pain causing her to wince, only for it to disappear a moment later. She drove her elbows into the exposed throat of the whimpering cultist, a gruesome crunch echoing far down the halls of the tunnel.

The mutant's body spasmed, the tentacle slamming into her side again, this time with enough force to shove her off, and she groaned in pain at the feeling of her shattered ribs. Yet, once more, she could feel her wounds lessening. Even the ruined stump of her hand no longer hurt.

The rest of the cultists raised their weapons and the world seemed to slow, far more than it had ever in the second-by-second rush of battle. She could see everything, the looks of fear in their eyes, the tightening of their fingers, the beads of sweat rolling down their faces, even the slight twitch of muscles under skin.

She kicked off the wall with an explosion of force far greater than anything she should have been able to achieve outside her power armor, sending her skidding across the ground just as the triggers were depressed, a burst of lasfire slamming into the floor where she had been lying moments prior, cracking the rockrete.

Aliciel tested the ropes and found the thick cords snapped easily under her newfound strength. She shoved herself up off the ground with her one remaining hand, reaching out and grabbing hold of the collar of one mutant's uniform, ignoring her disgust at touching a heretic with her bare hand. She wrenched him towards her, just in time to catch another flurry of lasfire from his comrades. He was dead after the second shot exploded his skull and his usefulness as a meat shield ended after the ninth, when the last of his limbs had been blown clean off.

She dropped low and tossed the carcass remains at the nearest cultist, whose scream of horror was cutoff in a gurgle as a shard of bone that could have been a spine or rib mere moments prior impaled his throat, dropping him and the terrible projectile to the ground.

She was already moving by the time the next volley came, leaping up and over their heads, a leap no mortal athlete could hope to emulate in a dozen lifetimes, landing right behind the cultist equipped with a plasma gun.

He had barely started to turn when she was already upon him, the stump of her wrist, its bandage gone and now revealing a sharpened spike of white bone, yet strangely no blood, slicing into the soft meat and tendons of his neck, her other hand reaching out to grasp the hand that held the plasma gun. She squeezed and the weapon fired, a collection of mutants unable to even scream before they were reduced to a smoking pile of charred corpses.

The mutant's grip loosened as he choked on his own blood, and she grasped the plasma gun in her free hand even as she held her new shield aloft via the wrist bone that had pierced his neck. She ignored his feeble attempts to staunch the bleeding of his throat, holding the heavy plasma weapon with utter ease in her one hand.

Another flash and another clump of enemies were gone, reduced to ash. Lasfire slammed into her shield, ending his struggles. She fired the plasma gun again and again, feeling the heat beginning to build up within it. It burned her hand, searing the flesh, and she found she knew how many shots it had before it would have a catastrophic issue.

Three shots. Two shots. One shot.

She threw the weapon that blazed so hot it warped the air around it, leaping away from it as it soared over the heads of the dozen mutants who remained, onto the other side of the tunnel, far from herself and her sisters.

The explosion was breathtaking. It made her retinas sizzle and she thought her eyes might have melted, yet she felt no pain. The plasma fires consumed the mutants, their screams like choir music to her ears. The edge of the flames rushed over her, but she did not scream.

Then… it was over.

The light died down and she found she could no longer see, nor feel. She heard nothing and the only smell was that of her own cooked flesh. She breathed hard, the oxygen like fire in her lungs. Her body pulsed, convulsed, and she knew she ought to be in pain, in agony. And yet, she was not.

I have one of machine and nerve, who has its mind concluded. You are but flesh and faith, yet not the more deluded.

A voice spoke to her, like a lovely caress upon her very mind. Her heart swelled with recognition, a single thought in her mind:

God-Emperor?

She might have heard a sigh.

"Canoness, thank you for seeing me," Agrippa saluted and Praxiah nodded.

"Colonel," Praxiah greeted. "You wished to speak about the duct?"

"As it stands, the service duct presents a vulnerability to our siege," Agrippa stated succinctly. "If I'm not mistaken, you chose not to send any more Sisters into the duct?"

"That is correct," Praxiah said. The loss of twenty sisters were the most casualties the Cleansing Rains had taken in five decades, certainly the most taken in this siege so far. Praxiah was surprised to realize how heavy the blow had been to her. She had lost Sisters by the hundreds before.

Was it because these were the first to die since their glory days? Had she really grown so weak in a mere fifty years? Aliciel and the rest were martyrs now, gone to serve at the side of the God-Emperor Himself. So why were their deaths still weighing on her mind?

"If you are worried about a flanking maneuver, I have already assigned a battalion to guard the duct's entrance," Praxiah said, casting the thoughts from her mind and returning to the matter at hand.

"I'm aware, Canoness, however I wish permission to send another battalion into the service duct," Agrippa said and Praxiah raised an eyebrow. She had denied him once, before sending Aliciel. Did he really think his men could succeed where her sisters had failed? True, numbers were a quality of their own, but the service duct would almost certainly be even more heavily defended now than it had been before.

"If this is a request fueled by pride, colonel, I will be severely disappointed," Praxiah said, her eyes narrowing slightly.

"It is not, Canoness," Agrippa replied. "My request is not to fulfill the mission of the Sisters, but to recover them."

Praxiah raised an eyebrow at that. "You believe they're still alive?"

"If this campaign has taught me one thing, Canoness, you Sisters are hard to kill," Agrippa said and Praxiah couldn't help but smile a little at the irony of that statement. Death in battle for a Sister was a glorious thing, something to be yearned for even. However, the martyrs of this campaign had almost entirely been PDF, possibly even in spite of the best efforts of the Cleansing Rains.

"I'm afraid the chances of that are slim," Praxiah stated and Agrippa even nodded in agreement.

"Nonetheless, I have faith, Canoness."

For a moment, Praxiah wasn't sure whether she should congratulate the man for his earnestness or fire her bolter directly into his skull for his impertinence with that statement. In the end, she chose neither.

"You are aware the service duct will be crawling with enemies? Possibly even those beastmen that have begun assaulting our front lines?"

"I am. I've recently formed a new battalion of PDF I believe would be well-suited to the task."

"They're of strong faith?"

"They're crazy, Canoness."

Praxiah arched an eyebrow at that and Agrippa quickly continued.

"I formed the battalion of PDF companies who have proven to be more… independently-minded than others."

"Disobedient, you mean," Praxiah said, leaning back in her seat.

"They've tended towards aggressive actions," Agrippa added. Praxiah wondered why she hadn't heard of this battalion before now or about these… 'independent thinkers'. Perhaps the Agrippa had only sent his most disciplined battalions to work directly with the Sisters. Certainly, there were not enough Sisters to accompany every battalion or fight on every front of this siege, not without spreading themselves so thin as to render them impotent. Or, perhaps those men and women fighting alongside the Order of the Cleansing Rains were inspired by the presence of her Sisters and more disciplined because of it. Certainly, it would be nothing new.

Regardless, she could guess why Agrippa had formed and chosen this battalion for such a task. Their army needed to be coordinated and disciplined. There was no room for such troops in a well-oiled and sanctified machine.

However, rather than simply execute them for disobedience, as most other commanders would, Agrippa seemed to have decided to send them on a mission of high risk, one where their aggressive tendencies would even prove beneficial rather than detrimental to the rest of the army. If the lot of them perished, they would be martyrs dying for the God-Emperor's will and their army would be stronger without the malefactors. If they succeeded, even if they had only recovered the bodies… Well, Praxiah was certain there would be other missions requiring such a force in the future. Not to mention the morale boost such a victory would give them.

"Very well, colonel, you may send this battalion to recover Aliciel and the rest's bodies," Praxiah nodded.

"ONI will be pleased, Canoness." Once more, her brow rose slightly.

"Is that some kind of animal local to Malum?" Praxiah asked, confused. "I've never heard of it."

"Ah, no ma'am, it's the name they chose for themselves," Agrippa answered swiftly. "I believe it stands for 'Outstandingly Nefarious Idiots', or something like that."

Praxiah stared at him. "They… chose this name themselves?"

"As I said, Canoness, they're-,"

"Crazy," She finished, shaking her head, somewhat in disbelief. She waved her hand dismissively. "That will be all, colonel."

"Thank you, ma'am," Agrippa saluted once more before turning on his heel and departing. Praxiah leaned back, watching him go.

These are certainly the oddest planetary defense forces I've ever worked with. Brave… but odd.