V3 Chapter 11: The Tide of Emotion
The hymn of praise echoed through the minds of everyone present.
For the first time, an expression appeared on Duvette's face that had never been there before—genuine tension.
He had heard the name he least wanted to hear.
Shalaxi Helbane.
A Greater Daemon of Slaanesh powerful enough to defeat Skarbrand. It had been created by the Prince of Pleasure for one purpose and one purpose only: to hunt the strong.
Humans. Eldar. Daemons.
If it was powerful enough, it became prey.
This was nothing comparable to the eighth-tier Greater Daemon he had faced on Formal Prime's main world.
Duvette tightened his grip on the power sword, his expression darkening.
A Greater Daemon of this tier—how could it manifest in realspace this easily... Taking the proclamation just heard in combination with everything else, this was almost certainly what Slaanesh had actually deployed to deal with them. Lucius had never been anything more than a sideshow.
He did not look back at Lucius's burning remains. He did not continue attending to the last of the fighting in the hall.
"We need to get outside and assess."
Duvette gave the order immediately.
Anderson, Markus, and the remaining warriors moved at once. Ideaus and Tigurius led the Ultramarines through the hall and pushed toward the governor's palace exterior.
Yvraine and Sylandri followed at the rear.
Their expressions were no better than anyone else's.
The group burst out of the governor's palace and into the courtyard.
The clear sky was gone.
Darkness had settled over the entire capital, as though daylight had been dragged away by force. Six blinding psychic columns of light were rising from the direction of the city wall, carrying terrifying psychic energy straight up into the sky.
An immense psychic vortex obscured everything above.
The sky had become something like a rotating eye. Emotion, screaming, suffering, and desire were being drawn into it. The storm covered the sky above the capital and then spread outward in every direction.
Duvette raised a hand and pressed the vox.
"Resolute, respond."
Only harsh static came back through the channel.
He switched to the fleet main frequency, then tried the Inquisitorial encrypted channel. No difference. The orbital fleet appeared to have been cut off entirely, and ground coordinates were shifting continuously on the display.
"Our communications are completely down," the vox-operator beside him said.
Duvette did not answer.
He looked up at the sky.
The entire capital zone was now isolated inside a raging psychic storm. Even from planetary orbit, a phenomenon of this magnitude would be clearly visible.
The friendly forces above had certainly seen this.
But they might not be able to come through immediately.
Extreme emotion began churning inside every living thing present.
The sounds reached into the ears and into the soul. Fear, anger, longing, regret, and urges that could not be named crossed and tangled together, making people want to fall to their knees, making them want to scream.
Even the Astartes were showing reactions.
Several Ultramarines tightened their grip on their weapons, their breathing pattern shifting to something heavier. Ideaus's eyes held steady, but the pain of the severed arm was being amplified by the storm, as though something was deliberately working at the wound.
No mortal could be immune to Chaos corruption at this level of intensity.
No mortal except the soldiers under Duvette's command.
The 112th's troops stayed where they were.
Their expressions did not change. They held their formation and redistributed their fields of fire based on officer hand-signals. The storm churned around them, and they stood in it like rock formations in a wave.
Tigurius looked from Duvette to the mortal soldiers.
Something entered his gaze that had not been there before.
In his psychic perception, a Warp storm was pressing inward from every direction. And yet these mortals' minds had not broken. Their will had not even wavered.
That was not normal.
But now was not the moment to ask about it.
Tigurius raised his force staff.
A psychic barrier expanded outward from his position, covering the Ultramarines in the courtyard, Duvette, the Black Shields, and the soldiers nearby. The barrier blocked part of the noise coming from the Warp, and the clarity of everyone's thinking improved by a small but meaningful degree.
The Chief Librarian's expression was grim as he looked up.
"Those towers are collecting emotion."
"They are converting the extreme emotion of this entire city, this entire planet, into fuel."
"The towers must be dealt with. Otherwise a psychic storm of this intensity will not stop until it has consumed this world."
Duvette said nothing for a moment.
He looked at the strategic map in his field of vision.
The map, fortunately, was unaffected by the psychic storm.
Friendly forces throughout the capital had already been thrown into disorder. But the Salamanders Fourth Company's position was still clearly visible.
They were near the central plaza, in the same area where the large concentrations of civilians and resistance fighters were located.
Duvette raised his hand and pointed toward the Salamanders' position.
"Find the Salamanders first."
"Consolidate whatever units we can still reach."
"Then concentrate force and counterattack a single tower."
He looked around at everyone present.
"What is happening here has certainly been seen by the fleet in orbit and by friendly forces in other areas."
"We only need to hold until reinforcements arrive."
"Victory is still ours."
Ideaus gave a nod.
Even without fully trusting Duvette, he could not argue with the assessment. Splitting the force to attack all six towers simultaneously would only result in each element being swallowed in turn.
But his gaze moved quickly to Yvraine and Sylandri.
The two Aeldari were no longer concealing themselves, and every Ultramarine in the courtyard was watching them with hard suspicion.
Sylandri registered the weapon muzzles and the stares, and said coldly: "Facing a Chaos tide, we are all survivors on the same vessel."
"Cooperation is the only path to living through this."
Ideaus looked at her.
"I do not trust you." His voice was held down over something close to fury. "What if this disaster is exactly what you brought here?"
He raised his chainsword and pointed it toward them.
"Everyone heard those words of desecration."
"That abomination from the Warp named you specifically."
Yvraine did not move back.
Her hand was on her weapon, her eyes equally cold.
Duvette had just begun to speak when a shriek that was capable of piercing the soul of any mortal rang out again.
Everyone turned at the same moment.
In the centre of the city wall's expanse, and in the void between the six towers, Warp rifts finally tore through the veil of realspace.
The rifts opened like wounds.
Pink-purple light poured out, and behind it came countless shapes.
Daemonettes flooded into reality.
They came in on waves of discordant melody, driving into the unprepared mortal forces. Their movements were unnaturally fast, their bodies threading through streets, walls, and wreckage without pause.
The Ultramar Auxilia took the first impact.
They opened fire.
Las-rifles fired in massed volleys but could not reliably hit targets moving with that level of agility. Many soldiers heard the voices of dead family members before they had finished firing, and in the next instant their throats were opened by claws.
Slaaneshi influence was dissolving their will.
Some were crying as they dropped their weapons. Some turned with vacant smiles on their faces. Some raised their barrels toward the soldiers standing next to them.
The fear and despair before death, the desires and longings at the core of each person, feeding the Slaaneshi host once again.
The elite troops under Duvette's command were still returning fire while falling back.
Under the skill effects, they could hold formation and suppress some of the daemon advance with heavy weapons and overlapping fields of fire. Even so, they could only fight and give ground.
There were too many daemons.
The rifts were still widening.
Tigurius's psychic barrier shuddered repeatedly.
Ideaus watched the Auxilia line collapsing in the distance and tightened his grip on his chainsword. He understood that every moment spent arguing here cost more Imperial lives.
Duvette looked at him.
"We do not have time to debate trust here."
His voice was quiet.
"If this Warp catastrophe is not ended, this entire planet will be pulled into the abyss."
Ideaus was silent for several seconds.
Then he lowered the weapon he had been pointing at the Aeldari.
"If they make any move, I will deal with them myself."
Duvette did not argue the point.
He confirmed the Salamanders' position on the strategic map again.
Harath Shen and his company were fighting hard at the plaza edge. A large number of civilian markers were still visible there, and the red intensity was deepening.
Duvette raised the power sword.
"Everyone, with me."
The Ultramarines, the 112th Second Assault Regiment, the Storm Troopers, and both Aeldari moved out of the courtyard simultaneously.
The streets between them and the central plaza were already filled with Slaanesh daemons and a crowd that had lost all cohesion.
Duvette looked at the mass of red markers ahead. Nothing on his face had softened.
"Open the way."
"We are going to find the Salamanders."