This story is an unofficial story based, without permission, on the Warhammer/Warhammer 40,000 intellectual property owned by Games Workshop Ltd.
The corners of his lips twitched upwards in a tight smile. "I'm sorry, Dashiva, but you're just wrong. I sent the sceptre away from here as soon as I heard you were here. I couldn't risk it falling into your unworthy hands, could I?"
His opponent snarled, digging the point of his weapon harder against his neck. "You wouldn't."
He chuckled lightly. "Oh yes I would, if only to see that expression on your face."
The magus screamed in defiance, the pressure lifted from the sword point for just a moment. A moment was all he needed. Ducking and rolling to the side, he grabbed his falchion and came to his feet beside the heretic.
Seeing the heretic's followers turn towards him, bringing their weapons to bear, including that monstrous cannon that had made such a mess of all his people, he sprinted for the cover afforded by one of the pillars dotted around the chamber. Just as he reached it, the mutant opened up, high calibre shells pounding the ground beside him and blasting chunks from the old stonework of the pillar. The noise was deafening, a sonic assault, punctuated by the sharper, quieter cracks of a lasgun.
He dived to his left, coming to rest behind a fallen pillar with pieces of shattered stone flying about his head. He heard the magus roar, and the booming report of a bolt pistol filled the air. He looked over at the dais, and saw the limp form of Kryllex, his head leaking thick, viscous matter where he had been burned out by the enemy psyker.
He cast around him as the thought suddenly struck him. Where was that immensely strong psyker? He could find no trace of it.
The thoughts were forced from his mind as a bolt shell exploded scant inches away from his face, showering him with bits of stone and shrapnel, leaving his ears ringing. Steeling himself, he waited until he next heard the cannon stop, presumably to reload, and burst out from his position, dashing towards the door at the back of the chamber with shots flying all around him.
A lasbolt scored his thigh, just below the plate of armour covering his upper leg, and he faltered, wincing in pain. Dragging himself onwards for a few more steps, he ducked round a corner and found himself face to face with the door. He quickly opened it and darted through, limping down the corridor as fast as his injured leg would allow.
He heard Rahvin scream, and his voice echoed down the narrow, bare corridor as he spoke. "Damn you, Fury! You'll not leave this place alive!" He paused, but screamed a last word at what seemed to be the top of his lungs. "Semirhage!"
He hurried faster. His leg was starting to unwind, losing some of the stiffness from the wound. He didn't know who or what Semirhage was, but he knew it would be best to get out of this place before it arrived.
He felt the explosion before he heard it, and was thrown roughly to the floor as the roof collapsed violently inwards behind him, throwing up a huge cloud of dust and smoke. As he scrambled to his feet, he risked a look over his shoulder.
A pallid figure with glowing balls of wychfire where its eyes should have been, surrounded by whipping gales of psychic energy descended from the ragged hole in the roof. A lone horn protruded upwards from it's sunken skull, framed by a mane of thick, greasy black hair. Its body was hammered through with brass icons, and the hand it extended lazily toward him was skewered by a brass spike half a foot long.
Daemonhost.
Semirhage stared in contempt at the pitiful mortal scrabbling to escape down the corridor. What was the point? It was only going to die in a few years anyway. It might as well let the daemonhost have some fun with it first.
The daemonhost sighed as it loosed a bolt of pure telekinetic force down the corridor, blasting pieces of rock from the wall beside the fleeing human. Such a stupid species, forever trying to escape their fate, trying to cheat death. So short-sighted. Death would come for them all eventually.
It floated down the corridor after the human, throwing telekinetic blasts before it. Each blast blew holes in the rock walls and floor of the corridor, dust and stone flying into the air with a shrieking boom.
It would have some fun with this human.
Then kill it, of course.
He scrambled down the corridor, narrowly avoiding the powerful psychic bolts that the daemonhost flung at him. He was totally outclassed. The thing could kill him at any time, he knew it. It was just toying with him.
No more. He would not run any longer from the enemies of the Emperor. He would fight. Turning, he slid his hand down to the shin holster he wore, drawing his gun, a compact derringer with one fat, man-stopper round. He braced himself, taking in the surprised expression on the abomination's face, and fired.
The gun bucked in his hands with a roar, sending the heavy bullet hurtling towards the daemonhost.
It never got there. The bullet stopped dead in midair, revolving slowly inches from the daemonhost's head. The thing reached up and took the bullet between two hooked fingers. It studied it for a moment, then dropped it to the floor.
The sound of the bullet bouncing off the floor echoed in the absolute silence of the corridor, breaking the astonished surprise that had frozen him in place. He turned and sprinted away, dodging round a corner and almost running straight into a door. Panicking, he dashed through it, throwing it shut behind him. His footfalls echoed on the solid stone of the floor as he ran through this newest section of the castle, dodging from room to room. He flinched as he heard the door explode behind him, but kept going, flitting from wall to wall. He fumbled his comm. From his pocket as he ran, bringing it to his mouth and depressing the button.
"Ryzor! I need extraction! Now!"
The voice of his pilot emerged in reply, heavy with static and disruption. "Understood, Sir. What's your position?"
He took cover behind a crumbled arch and studied the auspex built into the gauntlet of his armour. "I'm on the south side; the nearest exit is about halfway down the building. How soon can you be there?"
"Are you kidding, boss? This is me here. I'll be there in two minutes, tops." The pilot's voice was full of confidence. "How many with you?"
He ducked and ran across the room behind the arch, pressing up behind the next door. He daemonhost was getting closer. "None. They're all dead. We lost this one, but with any luck, Glix and Tryel should be out there somewhere with the sceptre."
The pilot's reply was incredulous. "Everyone? How? There were only three of them, right?"
"Wrong. They had another. A daemonhost. Beta level psyker at least. That's what's chasing me now, so get your ass over here!"
"Roger. Glix and Tryel are with me. Be waiting at the exit for you."
He returned the comm to his pocket and moved away from the door. He had to get to the exit. He took a deep breath and started running.
Ryzor exchanged long glances with Glix and Tryel. Everyone? They couldn't be. But Fury had said they were. Damn. A daemonhost. Beta level psyker. Damn.
He guided the craft, a boxy drop-ship designed to hold twenty passengers, plus equipment, down toward the castle. The ship was ungainly and heavy, but it was well armed. Two servitor-crewed autocannons protruded from stubby wings either side of the craft, and a missile launcher was mounted under the nose. One side was open, both to allow passengers to board easier, and to let them fire from the craft.
He set down in front of the exit, just a small opening in the ground by the crumbled stone wall of the castle. He trained the craft's weapons on the opening, ready to support the Inquisitor if anything went wrong.
Keeping one eye on the sensor readout, he turned to his passengers. "You guys want to give some covering fire? If that thing chasing him is strong enough to kill the entire team then I think he may need some backup." He laughed nervously, at odds with his usually gregarious manner. "Plus, we'll need all the guns we can get."
The two just looked at him, silent pain and loss shining in their eyes. They readied their weapons though, and from their manner, it seemed they were ready to exact their own personal vengeance upon the thing that had killed their friends.
FriendsRyzor hadn't known any of the team that well, having only started on with the Inquisitor a few standard weeks ago. The man, whose real identity had been unknown to him at that time, had contracted him to provide on-planet transportation for his team, had even thrown in a fortunes worth of upgrades for the transport, on top of the hefty fee.
The mission he had been hired for went pretty well, although he didn't think so at the time. He had adjusted quickly. They had found the objective, what he later discovered to be the sceptre Glix had tucked securely in her pack, with no resistance. The moment the Inquisitor had grasped the sceptre, though, all hell had broken loose. Ryzor had piloted the transport into a live pick up zone to rescue the team, shots pinging off the hull. He had been scared out of his wits at the unfamiliar and terrifying experience, flying through experience and instinct rather than any conscious effort.
Fury had apparently been impressed with his efforts, as he had asked for his continued service. Ryzor had agreed, and still didn't know why. But he was here to stay now, as if there was anything he had learned it was that it was damn hard to get away from an Inquisitor.
He cut off as movement flashed in the corner of his eye. He turned his head towards the exit in time to see Inquisitor Fury burst out, running at a dead sprint toward the transport. Ryzor gunned the engines, feeling the ship vibrate as the cyclic engines powered up. His eyes widened as he caught a glimpse of the thing following Fury. Pale, dead skin contrasted with black robes, and a single, curved horn the colour of old parchment thrust up from its head.
That wasn't what he noticed though. The thing was floating. It hovered a few feet above the ground, wreathed in a nimbus of warp-spawned winds as it hurled bolts of pure force at the fleeing Inquisitor.
He turned back to the controls, trying to black out the abomination approaching him. As soon as he felt the dull thud of the Inquisitor on the deck he fired up the engines, the ship shaking with the revolutions of the turbofans. He tracked the ships' guns round to pinpoint the daemonic creature, and tightened his fingers on the trigger. The signal reached the servitors a millisecond after being sent, and another millisecond saw streams of high-calibre rounds tear into the creature, churning up the ground around it. He rotated the craft to face it, and pressed another button. A frag missile shot from the launch tube on a tail of smoke and flame, smashing into the daemonhost back and enveloping it in clouds of smoke and dirt.
He elevated the nose and lowered the thrusters until they were pointing at the battered earth beneath the ship. He was preparing to fire up the main thrusters when he heard a low, insidious laugh echo around the ship. He looked back towards the viewport slowly, dreading what he might see.
The daemon thing hung there, suspended in midair by powers beyond his comprehension, ravaged by the punishing firepower directed at it, but not destroyed. Or even hurt. The thing's body was torn to shreds, great rents in the flesh with gruesome, sickly light spilling out of them. One of it's arms had been severed at the elbow, and a gaping crater was blasted in the centre of it's chest. It just laughed though, the impossible sound penetrating ship, helmet and mind, sounding madly inside the passengers' heads.
The laughter changed to words. "You think simple bullets enough to destroy me? I was old before time began. You cannot kill me. Though my feeble host has been broken I live on, and I am unharmed!" The creature began to float towards them, crackling arcs of electricity flashing around its hands.
"Go! It cannot be killed by conventional means! We must leave, now!" Fury's voice was strained and forceful, and Ryzor obeyed at once, powering the thrusters up to maximum. Their shrill whine filled the air as the craft tilted upwards almost torturously.
The scream of the engine was drowned out for a moment by a creaking bang as the floor beside them exploded violently upwards. Ryzor glanced sideways, and saw the daemonhost glowing in midair, it's hands sreathed in wychfire. He stared in horror as the creature thrust it's arms out, sending bolts of howling blue fire hurtling at them. The very air seemed to wail at the pyrokinetic blast, and Ryzor squeezed his eyes shut, knowing what was about to happen.
The blast struck the ship halfway down it's length. The impact crumpled the thin plates of the ship, the scorching heat blistering the paint and fabric inside. The failing engines made one last attempt at flight, but the blast had weakened them too much. A tiny stream of fuel leaking from a ruptured cable ignited.
The explosion ripped the ship from the air, throwing it violently to the ground. It dug a deep gouge in the earth, burying itself with the force of its crash. Secondary systems continued to spark within the destroyed transport as the screams of the dying faded below the crackling flames.
Semirhage drifted sedately towards the craft, held aloft by the eldritch power of the warp. Its cold, dead eyes scanned the wreck, as it reached out with its powerful mind, searching the destruction for any sign of life.
Nothing.
The daemonhost smiled. It reached into the ruined ship, refusing to let the growing inferno touch its host. Grasping the Sceptre, it floated back, hanging a few feet from the ship and watching as the flames consumed it all.
Soon its master would be there. Soon it would have to give up the Sceptre. Soon. For now though, the daemon was content to bask in Sceptres influence, torrents of raw warp energy pouring through the frail, dead body of it's host.
Soon.
Not yet.
Hive World Terra