An Icelus Story

"I want fire on that ridge! Do you hear me, make the scum eat laser!" Sergeant Elius bellowed into his headset, glaring across the acrid battlefield from the hastily-constructed barrier which constituted the front line. His voice was tinny, filtered through the beak-like rebreather, but the order was not misheard by his forces. After a few tense moments the ruby las-rays criss crossing the battlefield alighted upon the rocky ridge the traitors currently occupied. This was not the desperate spray of common lasguns, but the dangerous cracks of long-las sniper rifles as his marksmen painted the ridge with the blood of the traitors.

The traitor guard answered with their own weaponry, sheets of lasfire and searing gouts of plasma colouring the Icelusian outpost in stark primary colours. Elius was forced to throw himself down as a mortar shell screamed from above, the shrapnel eviscerating the poor soul happening to look up at the time, his shredded remains falling limply onto the barricade. Elius gritted his teeth and rose, squinting through his scope.

Eight hours. That was how long they were told to hold out against the onslaught of The Last Carnival, the former garrisoning regiment of the disputed world of Ivene III. The regiment, fresh from their victories against the encroaching Tau Empire, had turned on the colonists before the blood of the xenos had even dried. The war-weary planet fell into the embrace of the heretical soldiers within a day, and the Carnival had made worldwide preparations for something truly horrid.

Eight hours after planetfall, the Icelus 5th Volunteer Regiment was told it would be relieved. Elements of the 52nd Sarathan Rattlesnakes armoured company were en route to provide relief to the Icelusians, themselves a light infantry and irregular force, and to push back the Carnival.

It had been three days, and still no sign of relief came.

One of the heretics pulled himself into view, visibly grinning even from this distance. An all too familiar face, one which had appeared twice before, and twice it had escaped the Emperor's fury. Elius couldn't guess the original colour of the flak armour worn by this man, it was hidden beneath a horrid mat of paint, of all colours and textures, slapped on without a care. Numerous las bolts were spat out in answer, but they visibly dissipated before they hit their target. Elius shook his head, aghast that these traitors held even such rare and precious technologies as force fields. The heretic threw back his head and laughed.

"This third day I come to you, men and women of Icelus! Your commanders have failed you, there is no glorious victory awaiting you, no gleaming relief mission to come for you, you have failed! And this is no mere boast, my dear friends..." For a few moments all was quiet, the snipers on the barricade ceasing their fusilade to listen to this madman's pronouncement. The heretic basked in the attention, as even the planet itself seemed to hold its breath.

"Have you not seen it? The gleaming of the night sky, the crackling in the void, the eyes of the great ones watching your every step? Are you so blind that you cannot even feel the physical manifestation of the failure of your Emperor?" As if in answer, a purple bolt of lightning spat across the darkening sky, the accompanying crack of thunder managing to sound malevolant, like the mocking cry of something truly evil.

"Two days ago, a warp storm arose in the sector. For fourty-eight hours this leviathon has raged, undiluted testimony to the power of Chaos! There is no safe passage to this system, you cannot get in or out!" A shocked silence followed the speaker's words, the sheer absurdity of such a cosmic event occurring without their knowledge weighing on the Icelusians. The speaker licked his lips, savouring the tension.

"Do you realize now, my friends!? You have no way out! You're going to die here, on this barely-inhabitable rock, and you're going to die for nothing!"

Around that moment the signature growling of engines ground its way into earshot, and Elius cursed openly. Apparently the traitors had managed to repair their chimeras, and the ground shook as the gaudily-repainted APCs rounded the edges of the ridge. Lasguns blossomed from the firing ports, and here and there an Icelusian fell dead as the deadly weapons made themselves known. It was a bad situation. He knew too well that the chimeras would be disgorging the worst sort of madmen, chemically-frenzied shock troops with frag grenades strapped to their chests in case they died. The Icelusians were taught their trade by the Adeptus Astartes themselves, but they couldn't stand up to the depths of hatred and insanity the Carnival promised.

Gripping his weaponry Elius pulled himself up, racing along the barricade and propping himself up on the firing step to get a better look at the approaching armour.

"I want those charges blown as soon as that first transport reaches them. We need a road block and we need it now!" The sergeant instructed sternly, watching the area he knew his saboteurs had prepared in the prior night for this very purpose. He felt a flurry of movement behind him as his command squad moved to enact his orders, fetching the detonators for the charges. This had to work, or the outpost would have to be abandoned...

The sergeant found himself holding his breath as he watched the chimerae near the line, putting the rest of the battle out of mind. He paid for that oversight, as a stray las bolt slammed into the head dress of his helmet, close enough that he felt the startling heat and the acrid smell of burnt hair. Pulling himself down, he didn't witness the moment of the explosion.

But he heard it. And he felt it in his bones. And he saw the wave of earth thrown up by the charges as they let their fury be known to the planet. He counted to five, anxiety filling him, and rose.

The leading chimera was a twisted wreck, the charges blowing out the bottom and following through, gutting the machine. He could see one of the Carnival's soldiers, or at least half of one, still twitching and looking down blearily at the iron beam impaling his chest. A pit, a trench carved out by the explosives, rose across one side of the battlefield now. The other chimerae were unaffected by the blast itself, and were lining up now. Elius heard the thrum of access ramps being lowered, and took a deep breath.

"They're still coming at us. Get ready, and show these whoresons why a little bit of space turbulance isn't going to frighten the Sons of Icelus!" Elius' voice was strong, made stern by years of command, but it still sounded weak compared to the deep, authorative tone of Commisar Lloyd. De facto command of this pocket of the force was still something Elius was unused to. But he would try to fill in that shadow. Unsheathing the hilt of his power sword and giving it a few test swings, he bit his lip.

Would it be enough? Or would he and his men fall to the symptoms of this insidious blight upon humanity?

Only time would tell.

Piling out of their transports, the assault troops of the Carnival promptly hopped into the trenches. Elius had had the displeasure of fighting these fiends, once proud veterans of their regiment, now more fodder for the unending armies of the Dark Gods. They seemed very calm, almost unnaturally so, once in the trenches they stayed upright and unmoving even when some fell to Icelusian sniper fire. This was the calm before the storm, Elius knew, before the frenzon was administered. Each of them wore battered carapace armour, painted over in riotous colours and shades like their peers, and in their hands they each sported long-bladed combat knives and the occasional chainsword.

Elius looked away from the eerie sight, and looked across the outpost. His men were few now, a mere handful of the regiment's force sent to guard a vital point, now one of the forefronts of the battle. Mostly snipers and demolitions experts, the outpost was ill-equipped to take a frontal assault like this. Marcus, Elius' plasma gunner, satnearby. As usual he was seeing to his weapon, his decorative mask at his side while he cleaned the volatile and ancient device. As always Serafina, the vox operator, stood by her sergeant's side. Elius nodded to her, and leaned in.

"Okay, we're all going to mass up and unleash hell on these bastards. If it doesn't break them we're sounding the retreat and the Lord Commander Commisar can deal with it when he sends more men." Serafina frowned, nodding a few times and studying her sergeant through his mask.

"Get on the horn to him, and tell him about the warp storm. We need a plan, and we need a plan involving more than sending out a few token forces while he sits at the HQ with half the regiment."

"Aye sir, right away." Elius didn't stop to make sure the vox caster did her duty, he turned away to look once more upon the enemy. He heard the crunching of boots on the dirt as the orders were heeded, the Icelusians forming up around their sergeant and training their weapons on the trench.

"The moment they're out of their hole, show them what you can do. And when I tell you to go you bloody well go, I'm not in the mood for heroics!"

The speaker heretic rose again, raising the gunmetal bulk of his power fist up high.

"As much as it pains me to do so, I must hurry you up. Throw down your weapons and you shall receive admission into our ranks, and amnesty for your crimes!"

Elius' eyes narrowed, he brought his bolt pistol up and took careful aim.

"Crimes!? You have some nerve, traitor! You, who have spat on what it means to be a guardsman! It is YOU who will answer for your crimes, and the Emperor's justice will come sooner than you think!" He pulled the trigger and the gun spoke, the deep roar of the bolt dwarfing the spit-crack of the exchanged las fire. The shot hit true, and the speaker stumbled back as his force field took a hard hit. HIs grin twisted into a frown, an almost hurt look as he looked upon the sergeant.

"...Then I have nothing more to say to you. Finish them." The speaker turned away, walking out of sight. At the moment movement in the trenches caught his eye, and he groaned. The heretics within that hole were jerking violently, some tearing at their masked faces, some lashing out violently. The time had come.

"Be ready to put those bastards down! For the Emperor and for Icelus!" His voice was dwarfed by a series of horrid screams as the berserkers clambered out of the trench,. Steadying his nerves and raising his bolt pistol once more, he readied himself for battle.

On the traitors came, screaming their hateful battle cries and brandishing their cruel weaponry. The Icelusians answered with their rifles, las bolts finding their way into eye sockets and between sheets of carapace. At Elius' side Marcus' weapon roared into brilliant life as incandescent balls of plasma arced across the battlefield, melting its victims where it hit. Someone behind him threw a grenade into the mix, and Elius nodded approvingly as the explosion blew several traitors to their deaths. This was going well...If they kept this intensity up there was a chance they could destroy these forsaken bastards there and then. But they were getting close now...

"Sergeant! On the ridge!" Serafina cried out, and Elius turned to watch what she indicated, fear gnawing at his innards.

"Oh no..."

Taking advantage of the reprieve, the heretics were busy setting up a battery of heavy weapons platforms. Even now he saw a pair of renegades attatching the belt feed to a newly-mounted heavy bolter, and shuddered.

"Get back! Get back I said!" He cried desperately, but his men were too focussed on the rapidly-approaching assault troops. He cursed and turned, looking around on the ground. Nearby one of his men lay dead, his rifle clutched in a death grip. Carefully prying the weapon from his clutches, Elius knelt down and looked down the sights.

"Sorry Soldier, I'm going to have to borrow this."

---

It was the smell he hated the most.

The central Headquarters of the Icelusian 5th was nothing special, an off-white prefab jutting out from a rocky mesa, the gold and purple livery of the Icelusian regiments and the faded green of various sparking consoles. Soldiers and support staff moved to and fro, the bold colouring of their armour and clothing at odds with the standard military drabness of their surroundings. But that smell refused to go away. The combination of engine oil, wet cement and the stink of too many people in one room for too long. The man had stayed in many such installations, but it hit him every time.

Commander-Commisar Azrael stood at the flickering tactical map, hands clasped behind his back as he appraised the situation. His cap rested to his side and his beak-rebreather dangled around his collarbone. A wavering shock of blonde hair lapsed into a narrow face, relatively young by the standards of Icelus' Commisar-Commanders but not without his share of scars. It was his first deployment as Commander, and the way things were looking it may well be his last.

Standing opposite, a masked lieutenant read off the reports coming in from the outposts. The traitors were overrunning them thick and fast like the debased locusts they were, and all but three of the forward posts had been annihilated. He had received nothing but garbled pleas for help and the sounds of battle, yet something was preventing his own messages from getting through. His fingers gripped the table as he recalled the number of times he had personally sounded the retreat, shouting himself hoarse and not receiving a reply. Something was interfering with his communications, and it was up to his soldiers to get out of there. Relief was out of the question, the sheer breadth of the renegade advance made ambush and flanking attacks too likely.

He prayed it wasn't too late.

---

Elius pulled the trigger and with a crack the long-las spoke, the beam burying itself in the shoulder of one of the loading crew. The renegade fell from the ridge with a scream, his left side catching fire.

Three or four of his men, following the ruby trail, saw the imminent threat and turned their own rifles to the task. The vast majority were still fixated upon the assault force, which had been quite effectively stymied by the sheer volume of fire laid out by the Icelusians. They continued heedless of casualties however, and Elius was caught quite off guard when the first reached the barricade and vaulted over it. Roaring hatefully the profane berserker slammed his shoulder into the Sergeant, sending him sprawling in the mud and knocking the wind out of him.

"Throne!" He wheezed, groping blindly to the firing step where he'd left his own armaments. His foe wasted no time in pulling his serrated dagger back for the killing blow, cackling madly as he did so, and Elius braced for death.

At that moment the traitor's head exploded like an overripe fruit and he fell to the ground, covering the sergeant's uniform with gore. He found a hand offered to him and took it, pulling himself to his feet, and cleared the blood from his visor in time to see Serafina turn, her eyes narrowed as she pulled a long-bladed knife from her boot.

The traitors were amongst them now. There was a pitiful amount still standing after the punishing fire laid upon them but each one moved like a man possessed, breaking bones and cutting flesh, the drugs in their systems allowing them to shrug off even las-fire.

Retrieving his weapons Elius leapt into the fray, his power sword cleaving through a traitor's arm. The smell of cooked flesh smothered all else almost immediately and the traitor looked blankly at the cauterised stump, fascinated, moments before the blade hacked off his head.

The butchery lasted for a few more moments, then Elius managed to chance a look at the ridge. With the reprieve given by the arrival of the assault troops, the weapon teams had deployed and were even then training their sights. His heart sank.

"Back. GET BACK! RETREAT!"

Elius' command was acted upon in an instant, and the Icelusians switched from desperate defence to measured withdrawal. The sergeant brought up the rear, the ornate blade crackling as it sheared through carapace armour and naked flesh alike. Things were going well, but Elius could only wonder how long that would remain a fact once those guns opened up.

One of the remaining assault troops brought the glowing barrel of a laspistol to bear, only to have it shorn off by the sergeant's sword. Without even pausing the heretic brought up the falchion held in his other hand, but Elius wasn't about to let him swing it. A single pull of his bolt pistol's trigger and the man went soaring back, ragged strips of what used to be organs going in all directions as the shell punched through his stomach and detonated. Another came, nearly knocking the sergeant down with the force of his charge, but he met his end before Elius even registered it as a searing glob of plasma ate through his face. Las fire arced all around him, and it finally seemed as though realization of their losses had gotten through to the addled minds of these traitors. Howling their curses, the tatterred dozen or so soldiers started a retreat. Panting, Elius raised his blade in a wordless cheer. This cheer was taken up audibly by his men, numbering around twenty or so after the losses taken in that bloodbath, a cry that rose the spirits of all.

"Ave Imperator Dominatus! The Lords of Icelus are with us!"

It was then the heavy weapons spoke.