The steel flooring buckled as blood poured into the crater like a waterfall. Two Primarchs clashed within the deep pit.
The stench of the slick, copper-scented blood cleared the fog in Solas's mind. Realizing his predicament, he immediately grabbed the jagged edges of the torn steel to steady himself. He had to leave the crater; only by escaping this confined space could he neutralize his opponent's advantage and regain his footing.
But Alpharius would give his brother no such chance.
Bursting through the smoke and electrical sparks, Alpharius lunged, locking his arms around Solas's waist and tackling him back onto the adamantium spine of the ship. The Primarchs tumbled through the iron pit, their bodies washed in blood as they fell and rose repeatedly.
Solas kicked Alpharius away once more, digging his fingers into the steel and hauling himself out of the depths with sheer strength. But as he turned to re-establish the high ground, his brother pounced like a predatory tiger.
They fell again, their majestic frames now caked in gore as they skidded across the deck.
Leveraging his superior grappling skills, Alpharius stabilized his position mid-roll and mounted his brother's waist. He raised his arms high, fists clenched, and rained down a relentless barrage of blows upon Solas's face. There was no mercy in the strikes.
Like a god beating a war drum, the demigod Primarch unleashed iron-hard fists. The strikes were a blur, reducing the opponent's face to a bloody mess.
The bridge of Solas's nose shattered; teeth splintered.
With his face swollen and eyes struggling to open, Solas was forced to track the incoming blows by the rush of air alone, desperately tilting his head to protect his vitals. He managed to seize Alpharius's arm, snapped his right leg up, and drove his knee into his brother's back, bucking him off to break the mount.
Alpharius rolled forward, but by the time he turned, Solas was already standing. He immediately closed the distance again before Solas could regain his balance.
Fists tore through the air. Alpharius caught his brother's iron punch, planted a kick into his abdomen, and used the limbs as a pivot to flip his body. He hooked the back of Solas's neck with his knee, dragging him to the ground.
An armbar!
With his legs clamped across the chest and his hands locking the arm down, Alpharius applied leverage. The sickening crack of bone echoed through the air.
"AAAGH!!!"
The muffled roar of a giant in agony filled the room. Solas's forearm was snapped; jagged white bone pierced through muscle and skin, exposed to the air as marrow-flecked blood flowed.
This was no duel or sparring match; it was a ruthless struggle for survival.
Alpharius continued to use superior ground techniques to pin Solas, successfully breaking his brother's right arm with the lock. But the assault wasn't over. He decisively released the broken arm, leaped up, and dove to grip the belt of Solas's power armor. Using every ounce of muscle, he rolled once more.
He took Solas's back, wrapping his forearm around his brother's throat in an inescapable rear-naked choke.
While Alpharius's armed combat skills were merely average among his peers, his mastery of unarmed grappling was unparalleled. As the King of Spies, many of his missions revolved around subduing and capturing targets; he was a master of countless ground techniques and jujitsu, exceptionally experienced in neutralizing humanoid targets.
His arm pressed against the vagus nerve and the arteries. Solas's pale face turned a deep, bruised red. His legs kicked frantically against the floor, and his one functional hand clawed at his brother's arm in a desperate bid for freedom.
It was futile. From the feudal ages of humanity to the 31st Millennium, the mechanics of the rear-naked choke had remained unchanged. Its reliability was a testament to its perfection. Against a humanoid target, a fully locked-in choke is nearly impossible to escape—especially when applied by a Primarch.
Even between brothers of equal stature, once the lock is set, raw strength is no longer the deciding factor. The kill-shot was landed; there was no escape.
"Brother!" Alpharius grunted, tightening the lock as he lay beneath Solas, staring at the ceiling. His voice was a low plea. "Surrender. Accept Father's punishment."
Solas could not speak. He raised his left arm and hammered his fist back toward Alpharius's head with everything he had, proving through action that he would never yield.
The two remained in a silent, grim stalemate on the floor. Alpharius held the winning hand; as long as he choked Solas into unconsciousness, his infiltration mission would be a success. Even though a Primarch's unique physiology meant it would take a long time for Solas to black out, Alpharius was willing to wait.
Inside the council chamber, the sounds of battle were fading. The Loyalists were nearing victory, with only a few dozen traitors left fighting a losing battle.
Alpharius felt a surge of relief. Despite the brutality of the fight, he had succeeded in preventing an entire Legion from turning renegade. Once Solas was subdued, the mission would be complete.
True enough, as time passed, Solas's struggles grew weaker. His silver-grey eyes began to roll back; his consciousness hovered on the edge of the abyss.
Everything was settling. The turncoat warriors were being put to the sword; the rebel Primarch was captured.
"WARNING! WARNING! WARNING!"
Just as the loyalists began to breathe a sigh of relief, the auspex alarms blared through the cogitator arrays of the entire fleet: "Massive warp fluctuations detected. Large-scale hostile force incoming."
The faces of everyone in the room, Alpharius included, went pale.
Having just endured an internal rebellion, the Second Legion was at its most vulnerable. If the Rangdan struck now, the fleet would have almost no capacity to resist.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
At that critical moment, Solas tapped the ground, signaling a concession—he had something to say. A faint, knowing smile touched his bruised lips, carrying a hint of a sigh.
BOOM!
As the Rangdan fleet arrived, a massive explosion rocked the interior of the Second Legion's flagship. A vital facility had been sabotaged.
"What have you done?" A voice filled with grief and rage demanded. Captain Enas rushed toward the Primarchs, glaring down at his gene-father.
"Warp drive destroyed," the cold, mechanical voice of the cogitator answered in Solas's stead.
Holographic projections flickered from the eyes of the hall's statues. Rangdan Battle Moons tore out of the warp within the system, their massive gravitational signatures triggering astronomical disasters.
The First Captain breathed heavily, realizing he would find no answers in the Primarch's eyes. He slammed his hand onto his tactical terminal: "All ships of the Legion, hear my command: Leave the system immediately. Do not worry about us."
He turned to his Legion brothers. "Go. Capture the hidden traitor."
Several squads obeyed, nodding before sprinting from the chamber toward the warp drive core to hunt the saboteur. The warriors were fueled by fury; whoever had destroyed the engine had been a traitor long before today—this wasn't a snap decision.
"That unknown astropathic message!" Alpharius hissed in frustration. He grit his teeth and finally released the choke. He shoved Solas away roughly and stood, wiping the congealed blood from his face. His expression returned to a mask of calm.
"Cough... cough..." Solas coughed violently, drawing in huge lungfuls of the metallic air. Within seconds, his complexion returned from purple to its natural hue.
The Primarch managed a small smile, reaching out a hand to his brother. His eyes held both regret and a strange sense of relief. "...some necessary contingencies."
Alpharius gripped his brother's hand and pulled him up, his face expressionless. The operation had failed at the final hurdle; the Rangdan had arrived too soon.
"You knew?" Alpharius asked as he pulled Solas to his feet.
"Brother," Solas said with that same smile. He grabbed his right arm, snapped the bone back into place with a sickening pop, and flexed it. His hand regained its usual dexterity almost instantly. "When one dances on the edge of a blade, one is wise to tie a safety rope."
"A shame, truly..." The old gloom returned to Solas's eyes, the furrows in his brow reflecting his inner turmoil as he looked at Alpharius. "I truly wished to die by your hand. To finally end this inner schism."
"It seems fate requires me to walk a bit further. My life was not meant to end with you." He let out a long sigh. "If only it had been Russ..."
Alpharius remained silent. Having spent years at Solas's side, he knew his brother was a man deeply at odds with himself. Solas craved the release of death, but the Rangdan's timely intervention proved the game was not yet over.
"Why the look?" Solas asked. "My life in exchange for the safety of the Second Legion fleet, plus you and your embassy? Is that not a fair trade?"
"It will suffice," Alpharius nodded stiffly. Regardless of his frustration, he could not deny the reality.
Solas had summoned the Rangdan to extract him. The Second Legion was currently too weak to fight. Because this was a covert operation, the nearest Imperial reinforcements were over a hundred light-years away. If a full engagement broke out, the Second Legion would be annihilated before help arrived. Without a warp drive, the Gloriana-class flagship was a sitting duck for the Battle Moons.
Solas might not have predicted every move, but he had made a decisive choice at the critical moment, completely flipping the script.
"It is a bit meager, I suppose." Sensing his brother's lingering bitterness, Solas turned toward the lingering combatants and barked a low command: "Cease fire."
He called a halt to the fratricide. The final dozen or so rebels gathered around their Primarch, their auras radiating the relief of those who had cheated death.
Solas stepped into the adamantium crater, searching through the shards of power armor until he found a specific storage module.
"Adding this should make it a fair deal." Solas tossed the module to Alpharius.