The Blackstone Fortress bled.
Every corridor was a wound, every junction a shattered artery leaking lives and sanity.
The shrieking stench of warp-taint was thick enough to taste, bitter copper and old rot clinging to the tongue. Firelight flickered off walls running with ichor, faces screaming in the metal wall as the Blackstone itself howled with the agony of those fallen inside.
On the command bridge, Lieutenant Darius Branek pressed himself against a blast-scarred pillar, lascarbine at the ready.
Around him, what remained of his platoon and the battered survivors of the 15th Raider Battalion from his post held fast — thirteen hundred men at the command bridge hours before. Less than half that still stood in mere moments.
The vox crackled.
[—defense sector Theta breached. No survivors.]
[Sector Gamma holding by a thread. They're through the outer barricade—]
[Emperor's Children spotted in defense sector Seven. Multiple daemonic forms.]
It never stopped.
Another wave came.
Warp-beasts lunged from the gloom — clawed things, impossible shapes that seemed to shift between forms with each step. Their shrieks rattled the teeth.
A Death Guard terminator waded through the fusillade of lasfire, laughing, a reeking scythe cleaving two Exile troopers into halves.
[Hold the line!] Major Halvra's vox-roar cracked through the noise. [Choke-point Delta cannot fall!]
Branek squeezed his trigger. A shot took a daemon square in its weeping eye-socket. It burst apart, splashing corrosive gore. He ducked a whip-like tendril of flesh. The walls themselves seemed to pulse with malevolent hunger.
Beside him, Sergeant Khor reloaded with a grunt, blood-slicked lascarbine steady.
"I count nine left from our Platoon, sir" Khor reported grimly.
"Could be worse," Branek said, voice a raw rasp. He, Khor, Narek, the two repeaters, and four others still surviving.
Another blast, this time the bulkhead at rear vent-duct six ruptured, spilling a pack of howling daemonettes into the rear lines. The marines with them firing heavy bolters round killing many defenders.
Trooper Narek led a desperate counter attack, using his last remaining missile to blast away the daemonettes and marine.
Raiders followed, hurling grenades.
Branek vox lit again.
[Talon 14 to Branek Platoon]
Branek recognized the voice. Lieutenant Karven Rael, pilot of Talon 14, the pilot of dropship that deliver his platoon unto the blackstone fortress.
"Lieutenant Branek… this is karven Rael… we're boxed. We've got daemons closing from all sides. we need help."
Branek closed his eyes for a heartbeat, teeth gritting.
"Can you hold?"
Rael's reply was steady, but beneath it, the exhaustion was evident.
"Negative. Not for long. Ammunition's dry, fuel's leaking. I called for help…none's coming. Figured I'd try asking you."
Branek glanced at the bloodied, thinning line of his defenses. The barricades were seconds from breaking. He swallowed the sick taste in his throat.
"I… can't help you, Karven. I'm sorry."
Silence for a breath. Then Rael answered, with a steady stating fact like tone.
[Understood, Branek. Wasn't really expecting a 'yes'. We'll make it count.]
A beat later
[Good luck on that line, brother. It's been an honor.]
Branek swallowed hard.
"I understand… Thank you for your service, Talon 14."
Sound of explosion and screaming is heard momentarily before the vox got cut.
"Talon 14 just die, I heard it detonate from vox channel." Branek said shooting at another approaching daemonette.
Khor muttered, "Poor bastards."
Branek forced himself to keep moving.
More vox reports blared.
[Armor company's returning to base, breaking through from sector two! They're requesting immediate firepower]
[Go ahead] Halvra barked. [Make sure you arrived in time to help our brothers and sisters!]
Branek looks at a neighbouring defense post, The Death Guard pressed harder than the rest of chaos marine. Clouds of flies and choking rot preceded their advance. The traitor marines bellowed blasphemies.
"The blessed rot will devour your world!"
"Rot claims all flesh!"
A bloated terminator swung its hammer into a Raider barricade, sending three men flying like broken dolls.
Khor turned to Branek.
"We can't hold this, sir."
"Then we bleed them here."
The line formed anew, infantry and Raiders side by side. Ambush charges detonated as the Death Guard entered chokepoints.
Raiders executed perfect ambushes tactics.
False retreats, plasma volleys, and volkites to finally take down the resilient enemy. A flamethrower to kill the fly swarm.
Captain Hallen Varik appeared, his battered helm streaked with gore.
Branek met his gaze.
"Didn't think you boys still had surprises left."
Varik smiled beneath his helm. "Once again, a magician never reveals his secret, Lieutenant."
More horrors surged. Daemons with too many limbs and faces of weeping stone. A Word Bearer with burning runes carved into his chest plate strode into the breach.
"You will drown in your own fear, mortals! Die for your false idol." he bellowed.
Lasbolts aim at him, but he didn't stop. Until a mine took his legs off.
"For the last time, we are not imperials!" a furious raider sent Lastbolt at his neck area, killing the word bearer.
They wait for a minute with a baited breath. Yet, no more enemies come to their sector.
"Quick! Grab ammo, grenades, anything! This won't stop them for long!" Varik shouted.
Branek nodded to his men indicating for them to do the same.
The lull was brief as the walls began to pulse again. Each pulse brings more discomfort and terror to everyone's mind.
Lieutenant Branek nodded at his men to do the same.
The vox exploded with more calls.
[Sector Gamma lost!]
[Enemy reinforcements breached our post!]
[Death guards on point Six — too many!]
[Fallback to last line!] Halvra's command vox cut through the carnage.
Time to make our stand," Branek said to Khor.
Varik said. "You boys go ahead we'll prepare some gift for our foe." Gesturing his men to rig more explosives.
"Alright, we will wait for you." Branek said.
As they moved, the walls bled anew. Pipes twisted into thorned tentacles. The very air grew heavy with twisted hunger and horror.