Laron smiled as he saw the enemy surge forward. This was the moment he had been waiting for. He commanded his signal communicators to order the attack. They had stormed forward from their final defensive line. Now the sheer weight of the Imperials must surely prevail.
Laron raced back down the embankment towards the waiting Valkyries. He leapt aboard the closest aircraft and hooked himself onto the rappel line attached just inside the open bay door, nodding to Captain Elias. The aircraft's engines roared as it took off and the flight of thirty Valkyries rose just high enough to clear the embankment of the third defensive line before screeching over the heads of the frantically battling combatants in the no man's land below. The crewmen manning a pair of secured heavy bolters opened fire as the Valkyries swooped low over the field of battle. Laron's storm troopers, kneeling in the open doors and secured with rappel lines, fired their hellguns down into the melee, picking out targets amongst the chaotic battle surging below.
A hellish shape burst through the open bay door, ripping with daemonic claws, and blood splashed across the close interior of the Valkyrie. The stench of the creature was foul and it slashed around frenziedly, ripping at the storm troopers and hacking through rappel lines as if they were twine. Two storm troopers fell from the aircraft as it roared across the battlefield, jinking from side to side to avoid incoming fire. They fell into the mayhem below, and another's face was ripped off as the creature's tri-hinged jaw snapped.
Laron clubbed the hateful thing in the face with the butt of his pistol. Its head swung towards him, eyes burning with flames and steam emanating from the twin gashes that marked where a nose should have been. Its foetid breath made him gag and he saw that its tongue was made up of a thousand wriggling worm-tentacles as it reached for him. He jammed his melta-pistol into the daemon's mouth and pulled the trigger. The thing was lit up from the inside before it broke up into a million tiny pieces of ash and was blown out of the aircraft.
Laron grimaced as he spat the foul ash from his mouth, before grinning at the surviving storm troopers.
The Valkyries carried large cases packed with explosives. The Ordinatus might well destroy the tower, but he wasn't taking any chances and he didn't like the idea of their victory relying upon the disconcerting Adeptus Mechanicus magos. This might have been an old-fashioned way of blowing something up, but sometimes that was the best way.
'Havoc squads, shoot them down,' ordered Kol Badar as the Valkyries appeared over the ridge, flying fast and low over the top of the raging battle, fire pumping from their forward-mounted guns and from their open doors.
Shells smashed down along the defensive tier as carefully timed and targeted artillery fire was unleashed, and an echelon of thunderbolts screamed along the line, peppering the heavy weapons teams with their intense strafing runs. The Havoc squads took down over a dozen of the Valkyries, but the relentless attacks forced them to take cover, and the remaining Valkyries screamed overhead, past the fourth defensive line, heading towards the base of the Gehemehnet.
'Rearguard, incoming.' Kol Badar said as he ripped through a pair of enemies with his combi-bolter.
'Acknowledged, Coryphaus,' came the response.
Varnus could see nothing but red as his rage lent him strength and he swung his lasgun into the face of the Elysian, smashing his visor. He leapt upon the Guardsman as he fell and smashed the butt of his las-gun into his face again before rising from the kill and gunning down another.
Something struck him from behind and he was thrown forwards, falling at the feet of a man dressed in black. A commissar, he recognised dimly, seeing the man level a pistol at his head. He stared back at the commissar hatefully, awaiting the shot that would end his life.
But it never came. The commissar's hand was hacked off by a chainsword and Varnus surged to his feet.
'This one is mine!' he roared and the Chaos Marine towering over him turned its helmeted head in his direction. With a dignified nod of its head, it left the wounded commissar to Varnus and leapt back into the fray, its twin chainswords whirring.
Varnus stood on the one good hand of the commissar as he scrabbled for a weapon and the man turned his face towards him, twisted in hatred and pain.
'Where is the Emperor now?' asked Varnus in a language the commissar could not understand. 'He has abandoned you, just as he abandoned me.'
Varnus placed the barrel of his lasgun against the commissar's forehead. The man's eyes were defiant till the last and Varnus pulled the trigger. He watched as the life faded from his eyes and a pang wrenched inside him. He dropped to his knees over the dead figure, confused and lost. The anger drained from him and was replaced with self-loathing, guilt and anguish.
He caught the sight of his own reflection in the highly buffed, silver pin on the commissar's hat and he lifted it up, staring at his own hate-filled visage.
What had he become? This was the face of the enemy. The False Emperor is the enemy!
He looked upon the two-headed eagle symbol upon the black leather hat he held in his hands and he felt duel emotions: hate and sadness. They betrayed you! The worship of the False Emperor is a lie!
Maybe it was a lie, but was this a better alternative? This embracing of evil and slaughter?
Slaughter is the holy sacrifice that the gods demand.
The madness was descending upon him again and he had not the strength to fight it any longer. He would continue to fall into damnation. No, he would not fall, he would embrace it. He felt the rage building within him and it terrified him that it was not unpleasant. He would be lost and he would not care that he was lost.
With the last vestiges of himself, he lifted the pistol from the commissar's hand and raised it to his head. Emperor, save me, he thought. Before the unrelenting rage descended upon him once again and he was completely lost, he pulled the trigger.
At last he had found release from the sound of Chaos in his mind.
'Those damned explosives set! We ain't got much time!' shouted Laron as he hunkered down behind the Valkyrie. His storm troopers were firing on the incoming enemies, but they would be on them in a moment. Bolter rounds impacted against the aircraft, and the crewman operating the heavy bolter flew backwards as a bolt shell detonated in his skull, splattering Laron with blood. He swore and took the man's position, swinging the heavy weapon towards the enemy. A missile slammed into one of the other Valkyries, which detonated explosively, throwing flaming debris in all directions.
Laron pressed the twin thumb triggers of the pivot mounted heavy bolter and fired a spray of heavy calibre rounds towards the incoming foe, dropping several of them. Rhinos could be seen cutting towards the storm troopers from further off, and Laron swore.
'Set the damned timers! Move it!' he roared in between bursts of fire.
'Sir, we have incoming hostiles from the east,' said a wounded storm trooper as he pulled a piece of metal from his shoulder.
'Just great,' muttered Laron as he gunned down another enemy.
'All set.' Captain Elias shouted.
A sudden scream from the base of the tower made Laron glance around and he did a double take as he saw the scene unfolding. A long, spined arm had reached out of the stone of the tower, grabbed one his men around the throat and was dragging him towards the wall. Another storm trooper was hacking at the arm with his knife, and hissing ichor dripped from the wound. Fleshy, hooked claws burst from the wall and latched onto another man. He was pulled off balance and tumbled into the wall. He half disappeared into the surface of the stone, and tentacles and claws gripped his armour and hauled him fully inside as he screamed.