Dark Apostle

The palace guard were being slaughtered. He saw one man explode as a bolt-round detonated in his shoulder, spraying blood around him like a mist as he fell to the ground, the entire left side of his torso missing. He saw another die instantly as one of the enemy clubbed him in the head with a bolter, the force of the blow crashing his skull as if it were glass.

The hulking fiend he had shot rounded on him, stalking through the melee, and Varnus swore. The monster towered over him. Varnus was in no way a small man, but he barely came halfway up the beast's chest. With a hum, the las-lock re-powered and he fired again at the huge Chaos Space Marine. The shot was taken in haste and was not on target. Nevertheless, it struck the beast in his wrist, and his accursed bolt pistol dropped from his hands.

Snarling in anger, Marduk cleaved the long lasrifle wielded by the infidel in two, and reached out and grabbed him around the throat with his empty hand. He felt blood seeping from his wrist where the wretch had blasted him, but it was already congealing. His hand almost encircled the man's entire neck, and he could feel the pathetic fragility beneath his fingers. Tendons and ligaments strained as he exerted pressure.

Lifting the man into the air, his feet kicking uselessly half a metre from the ground, Marduk drew him close to his helmeted visage.

'That hurt, little man,' he said, the vox amplifier booming his words into the face of the wretch, 'but this is going to hurt a lot more.'

With that, he hurled the man off the battlements.

'Your weapon, First Acolyte,' said one of the Word Bearers, and Marduk turned to accept his bolt pistol, held reverently in the warrior's hands. Without a word, he took the weapon.

Looking out over the battlements, Marduk saw scattered fighting on a lower tier of the bastion some fifteen metres below, where the broken body of the infidel he had hurled had landed. He could see fighting down there, but no Word Bearers. Curious, he thought.

'Warriors of the IV Coterie, with me,' he ordered. 'The rest of you, cleanse this level of the Imperial filth.'

'Burias-Drak'shal!' he roared, and the daemonically possessed warrior turned from his killing, gore dripping thickly from his icon, arms and mouth. 'With me.'

The twelve warriors of the IV Coterie extricated themselves from the killing, and jogged towards the First Acolyte. Burias-Drak'shal stalked along with them, breathing heavily.

Marduk launched himself over the edge of the battlements, dropping down towards the lower terrace. He landed in the midst of a firefight, and cobblestones cracked beneath his weight. He rose up to his full height as his brethren landed around him.

'Death to the False Emperor!' he roared. The shout was repeated by several dozen of the Imperial garbed warriors. Marduk saw that most of those that had shouted had ripped their clothing to expose a crude, tattooed representation of the Latros Sacrum on their shoulders, the sacred screaming daemon symbol of the Word Bearers legion.

He began laying around with Borhg'ash and his bolt pistol, carving flesh and planting bolt-rounds through bodies. He didn't pay too much attention to those he killed, and doubtless he and the warriors of the IV Coterie slew as many of their cult followers as the Imperials, but it mattered not - the souls of both would be welcomed by the gods of Chaos.

The gunfire suddenly ceased, and the remaining men dropped to their knees, gazing up at the towering Chaos Space Marines with awe and reverence. Several had tears in their eyes. The Word Bearers held their killing in check, waiting to see the First Acolyte's reaction.

All except for Burias-Drak'shal, who stepped forward and smashed the icon into the head of one of the cultists. The man's skull crumpled and he fell without a sound.

'Burias-Drak'shal,' said Marduk quietly, and the daemon warrior looked up, snarling. His entire body trembling, Burias-Drak'shal stepped back and dropped into a half-crouch, staring hungrily at the humans. Marduk too felt the urge to step forward and slaughter the weaklings, but he knew that they had their uses. Borhg'ash trembled in his hands, wishing to kill more.

'Which one here speaks for you?' asked Marduk. The cultists looked around at each other, and finally one man stood and stepped through the other cultists to approach.

'I do, lord,' said the man, his head held high.

Marduk raised his bolt pistol and shot the man in the face. Pieces of skull, brain matter and blood splattered over the remaining kneeling cultists.

'Lower your eyes when looking upon your betters, dogs, or I shall ask Burias-Drak'shal here to remove them.' Marduk snarled.

'Now, who here speaks for you?' he repeated.

A shaven-headed woman in beige robes stepped forwards, her gaze lowered. 'I do, my lord,' she said in a shaking voice.

'What is the fourth tenant of the Book of Lorgar, dog?' asked Marduk dangerously, fingering the trigger of his bolt pistol.