Fire Warrior

“Ui’Gorty’l? Are you still there?”

“Yes El’Lusha. I’m listening in.”

“The signal boost isn’t working. Try something else!”

“Fio’el Boran says he’s ru

“That’s an excuse, Kor’ui. Tell him I’m not interested. Tell him I want a comm-link. Tell him there’s something going on down there and I want to know what. Results! Now! El’Lusha out.”

Kais sagged to the ground without a hope, leg finally giving way, and prepared himself for the end.

The daemonlord’s second aspect had been a dream.

A thing of musk and stench: writhing barb-tendrils coalesced around its avian features, sensuous tongues and pseudopodia threatening to overwhelm Kais with a heady melange of pleasure and pain. It had groaned and screamed, shivering with whatever agonies and ecstasies it inflicted upon itself. At one point it lashed out with a hook-tipped tentacle, faster than he could hope to react, and dragged him hungrily towards some wet-lipped orifice that yawned open upon its chest. It puckered hungrily, dribbling moisture, and vented a blast of thick haze in his face. The musk coiled through his thoughts and dampened his mind, every movement felt like wading through an ocean of feathers, and he dropped to his knees to laugh insanely as, like some obscene slug, the mouth oozed itself forwards to roll hungrily over him. The daemon’s wings dipped down to encircle him, blotting out the light.

Kais snarled at his own fallibility, raging inwardly against the cloying effects of the drug. Mercilessly, as if punishing himself, he pushed his fingers deep into the gash on his shoulder; probing and twisting until he was sure he’d pass out, screaming unstoppably, feeling fluid warmth spreading across his arm and chest. Under such an assault the soporific musk fled from his senses like vermin before a cleansing flame, leaving him scrabbling aside and gagging, even as the monstrous sucker mouth squirmed closer.

After that he’d wasted no time in shooting the purple shrine — his satisfaction at its writhing discomfort no more dulled by the pain than by the intoxicating haze. Thus defenceless and severed from its second patron, the daemon gibbered and slunk away. Kais emptied the last of his grenades into its various mouths and oily orifices, hacking at its fronded tendrils with his knife before they could curl unctuously around his limbs. As it detonated from within it sounded disturbingly as though it was enjoying the experience.

Kais had begun, in that moment, to entertain the insane idea that he might just prevail.

He should have known better.

Turning to face the next shrine, the Changer’s body rippled and altered subtly, inflicting a new aspect upon itself. It became disease personified.

The writhing shape, avian face sagging with pus and pestilence, slouched forward tentatively. What little skin it had was blotched with mildew and bruise patches, hanging flaccid about its joints with little to prevent it from sliding and creasing with every creaking arthritic movement. Beneath the grisly dermis was a web of wasted muscles and suppurating sores, hernia knots wobbling and bulging fleshily, cascade gaps punched through to rotten bone and cancerous organs. There was no science to its appearance, no sensible arrangement of parts beyond the haemorrhaged disorder they clustered around, slopping jelly-like in pools of bile and pus. Its wings, once vibrant and exotic, now hung tattered and torn, feathers spiralling away with every movement. It keened lowly, like an animal in pain, and reached out its gnarled hands, supporting itself on its staff.

Kais hadn’t been much concerned by this pitiful thing when it manifested, attached as it was to the green, pestilent shrine chamber by a glittering light stream of flies and filth, but he’d quickly realised his folly. There were things living in the daemon’s body. Tiny balloon-like monstrosities that chattered and giggled, sucking on sores and clawing at the diseased flesh with their miniature limbs. They fixed their beady eyes on Kais and gibbered, rushing forwards in an endless tide of slime and haphazard physiology.

For every one he exploded with a satisfyingly wet direct hit, another three pushed their way past atrophied organs and emerged from the corpse, in a living carpet of pestilence and horror. Kais limped away from them, clinging to that tiny spark of sense in the sea of rage that told him, despite the desire to launch himself into their fray with a bestial roar, that rushing in to tackle these squealing prey things would be the last mistake he ever made.

The wound on his leg betrayed him. Infused with infection and filth from his long journey, it cramped and oozed a thick bloody sludge, grinding and opening with a life of its own. Responding to the presence of its lord and deity, the nascent disease in his flesh magnified and rejoiced, sending out its bitter tendrils into the surrounding tissue. To Kais, it felt as though his entire leg was dissolving, sending him clattering to the floor with a groan.

The Nurgling swarm rushed onwards, grasping out to claim him, hungry to share their plague gifts. Kais felt his blood rebel against him, leaving him shivering, unable to properly hold his gun. He kept firing regardless, holding them off less and less with every raik’an, slumped against the pit-wall.

And then he was down to his last clip of ammunition.

And then the daemonlord slouched ponderously towards him, ulcer claws reaching out. And now he was going to die.

The man, such as he was, pushed at the sphincter door weakly, refusing to allow exhaustion and pain to overcome him.

The vox was mangled, emitting a constant stream of white noise that he could neither shut off nor encourage to receive other signals. It was begi

The door wouldn’t open. Taking a deep breath, ignoring the bloodslick trail he left behind him, he thumbed the activation-rune on his chainsword and treated the membranous portal to an appraising look.

“Courage and honour...” he muttered, unable even to summon the appropriate gusto for a battlecry.

It had been a long, long day.

The first chittering midgets were almost on Kais now, tiny limbs flexing outwards, wide faces breaking in toothy grins. They pounced forwards, sinuous tongues flicking spittle and slime in their wakes, and—

And gunfire ripped through their ranks in a savage melee of tiny limbs, scabrous flesh and mucal fluids. The hungry chatter of a bolter echoed throughout the chamber.

“Back!” a voice grunted, thick with anger and pain. “Get back to the warp, Chaos filth! Get back in the name of the Emperor!”

Ardias ripped through the remains of a sphincter portal with a savage growl and swept the daemon creatures away with a sweep of his chainsword, revelling in the devastation. His armour was chipped and cracking, one arm messily fragmented below the shoulder, and the bronze sealant ring around his neck was shattered in two, components and cables bunched up in disarray. Despite his ragged appearance, Kais had never been so relieved to see another being in his life.

“I should have known better,” the Space Marine growled, with perhaps the merest hint of a smile, “than to trust something like this to a xeno.” He arched a respectful eyebrow briefly at Kais and returned to pumping bolter shells into the thrashing plague corpse.

“Better late than never, human,” Kais said, weakly.

“Ha!”

Slowly, Kais dragged himself upright, every tor’il a lesson in agony. He was surprised to find his leg still there at all — it felt as though it had bubbled away to liquid filth long ago.