Catalin's Extraction"
The barricades held.
Rubblestone and bone-choked metal, blasted apart from above by the righteous fire of the Imperial fleet, now sealed off the corridors behind them. But the heretics still howled — their cries for blood and skulls echoing beyond the stone like dying echoes from a nightmare.
The vox unit crackled.
> "—Catalin. Extraction in progress. Landing zone 14-E. Repeat, extraction in progress. All loyal forces—"
A Thunderhawk's engine roared above, cutting through the smog-choked sky. Escort bombers strafed the remaining enemy fortifications, autocannons ripping open trenches and mutant nests like overripe flesh. One wild AA emplacement fired into the sky, its crew shrieking as their last battery raked the clouds…
Until a fighter craft tore through it with a single strafing run, reducing the emplacement to molten slag.
Catalin turned. The surviving PDF troopers, soot-streaked and blood-soaked, ran for the Thunderhawk's open ramp. One paused to look back at him.
> "Sir—Catalin! Come on!"
Catalin stepped toward them.
Two steps… and he stopped cold.
The air thickened around him.
The gene-blessing of Dorn within his blood began to burn, searing through his bones as if fire had replaced marrow.
> "Don't go... Let's play."
A voice, sing-song, sweet and hideous, echoed from beyond the rubble. A crack in the shadows… and something stepped closer.
A psyker.
Not human.
Not daemon.
Something between.
A withered figure robed in warp-woven threads, its face hidden behind a veil of light and shadow. Its lips did not move, but its voice slithered through Catalin's mind like poisoned silk.
> "We will meet again soon… Son of Dorn. My master saw your slaughter. He marked your rage. You are… so very close..."
"You cannot escape us."
Catalin clenched his jaw.
Behind him, the Thunderhawk's engines flared, the last Guardsman pulling the ramp lever. The craft began to rise.
The psyker raised a hand, eyes glowing. A ray of warp-light burst forward — and missed the engine by meters.
Catalin turned, locking eyes with the figure even as it vanished into the smoke. The psyker staggered, clutching its head. He had focused every shred of his will, every ounce of killing intent, into a single mental strike.
Then Catalin spoke aloud, his voice carried by vox and fury:
> "I know your master. And I know what he is
I will never bow
> "Next time we meet… I will erase your corrupted essence from this plane."
The Thunderhawk screamed skyward. Behind them, the city burned.
Catalin, bathed in blood and ash, turned toward the heavens. For the first time in hours… he closed his eyes.
> "For the Emperor."
The Master's Design"
Beneath the Ashes of Hive Primaris – Lower Hive Depths, Level 300
The air shimmered with residual warp energy, thick and foul.
The Arch-Psyker stood alone for a moment, watching the rising columns of light far above as Imperial rescue ships broke through the red skies. He said nothing. His flesh twitched beneath his robes, warpfire pulsing behind his hollow eye sockets.
Behind him, a hundred cultists chanted, bleeding from their eyes, their veins lit with unnatural light. Great runes had been carved into the floor with blood and bone — the shape of a Warp Gate incomplete but… awakening.
From the shadows, another figure emerged — tall, robed, and wrong. A corrupted psyker, mouth sewn shut, power oozing from its ruined body. It knelt.
> "Master…" the being whispered through its mind alone, "The Imperials extract their wounded. The barge moves into full orbital range."
The Arch-Psyker turned slowly.
> "Let them. The bait was taken. The butcher sons of Dorn burn our surface filth… while our true work lies beneath."
His gaze rose again to the stars.
> "Ishvan was never the prize. It was the key."
He turned to the other psyker and raised both hands. Instantly, pain rippled through every cultist in the chamber.
> "All must be sacrificed. Their screams shall tear the veil. The gate must open. Gaia's World shall be exposed."
The ground shook.
The runes ignited.
The cultists began to scream, their bodies erupting into raw power.
> "My lord shall not be denied his prize. He who waits within the flame — He who walks the shattered mirror…"
He looked into the growing rift.
Beyond it… a fortress-world, unknowing.
Unprepared.
> "Let Graia feel the truth of damnation."