Word Count: 3,414
War was simple, I mean you could simplify it down to: kill them because they want to kill you, but the overall morality of such a situation could be called into question.
But in this universe? In this galaxy? War is simply necessary.
The Imperiums' goal switched from unity to survival, or that's what the propaganda would say. However, since I'm slightly different from the other beings around me I know that the Imperium wins nine out of ten engagements they face.
Propaganda is a hell of a thing.
I breathed freely as the wall Ivarr and I were stationed at screamed in protest as both last stands and pushes were made all around me, it was less of a situation where we were surrounded but rather the discipline of the guard simply didn't allow them to take a step back.
A bolter round ricocheted off my left shoulder, the force rattled my resolve but I stood, the ash settled onto my cheeks like makeup for an interview for the news.
Red lasers filled my vision as the ashes of the dead archenemy freely fell down to the ground and settled on the winds of war down below.
Ivarr next to me didn't stare at a data slate, didn't hiss out a prayer, didn't even initiate conversation with me, he just stared off into the distance probably tasting Mjød on his tongue as he thought about the end of this war.
I could use a drink.
Hell everyone involved deserves a drink.
Except the inquisition.
"What's your shortest campaign?" I asked lowly.
Ivarr slid his eyes towards me before he inhaled "gotta be our last one, it only lasted a month, against the Dark Eldar when they attempted to enslave a trade ship. We were close by, they were forced back on their ship as we assaulted their own ship."
I nodded as he talked, half listening, half drifting off as another round bounced off my chest plate.
"Miss Fenris?" I asked.
"Always" Ivarr nodded.
"I've noticed something about us" I noted, this time the bolter that was aimed for me missed wide, I felt the air displaced nearby but didn't move.
"That is?" He questioned.
"We do not act like our brothers" I spoke as I grimaced a bit as a guardsmen nearby was reduced to a reddened puddle.
"Individuality; unlike most other chapters, we do have more leeway upon our own time. For example, on my own time I do not pray, I do not act in escoterism, instead I drink, I brawl, I act true to myself. I am Fenrisain, for that is who I am and what I am." Ivarr declared to both himself and me.
"And tell me, what is it to act Fenrisain?" I asked carefully.
"To answer that I must ask you - what did Russ do when he gained his strength?" He asked her as he fully turned to me and I faced him.
"Are you talking about on Fenris before the Allfather, or when he gained his legion?" I asked.
"On Fenris, before the Allfathers' arrival" he clarified.
"He conquered every tribe, he protected his pack, he-" I was cut off.
"No, no. What did Russ declare when he conquered every dispirited tribe?" Ivarr asked.
"He explored Fenris… and he built his fleet and refused to be idle" I spoke slowly unsure of my own answer.
"Aye" Ivarr nodded.
"Where are you going with this?" I asked.
"What does it mean to be Fenrisain? If you asked me, it is to not be idle, sure train, but also drink" all of that just for an answer of 'just be yourself' was such a letdown.
"I…" what a waste of time! Just for a bunch of horseradish!
"…understand"
I didn't!
But I didn't want to potentially embarrass myself so I let it ride.
I sighed as the horde of violence waned closer, thousands upon thousands of hungry maws grinded together as Ivarr and I stared down at them like scheming Greek gods.
I slowly stepped back, Ivarr noticed.
"Abandoning your post?" He asked.
"No, I am… tired, tired of waiting, tired of just standing here… I want to do something" I spoke as my fists clenched and unclenched, I knew what I was doing wasn't very Astartes-like but I felt less like a genetically modified human and more like anxiety wearing the skin of a human.
"You want to do something?" He stroked his beard as I nodded once.
"Then give them a speech" he gestured towards the guardsmen.
What?
"What?" The words came out uncontrollably.
He smirked "you are young in Astartes terms, even to regular humans who live commonly more than a century, you've yet to see your first reach of a century"
"So?" I didn't get it.
"Show us, not the mortals but us - your brothers that you can do something other than swing a blade like a newborn babe" Ivarr stared into my eyes.
"Say something that'll put fire into their fading blood Agnar" Ivarr motioned towards his vox.
I stared at my own, my throat suddenly feeling drier than a desert and colder than glacial ice.
—————————
Sergeant Everius is in command of a squad for the 356th Vigilant guard, he was aged, sixty if the calendar was correct, he's seen it all short of chaos itself, from foul Xenos to the sickening smell of Tyranids.
The Archenemy was one of the few he'd hoped to never meet, but he wouldn't deny that he was blessed to cut them down for The Emperor; however, he'd heard tales, from executions for the Arbiters, to whispers from the hive he came from.
No one survives the Archenemy.
Only His angles of death do.
"Sergeant, to the left!" A private, male. Probably told stories of heroes that never came back to their families, or was forced by debt or by tithe.
Now he was here.
Everius ducked to the right as he brought up his las-bolt and the weapon roared in rage as it unleashed itself into a bulge that was made by the approaching horrors below.
A woman next to him who was enlisted at the same time as Everius, who was his second in command, was shot in the left shoulder. Before Everius could call out her name another bolt got her in the head and the upper part of her body was just erased.
He felt sick, he wanted to scream, to shout, to cry. Instead he merely picked up his las-gun and continued to fire.
A vox beamed to life, it was attached to his back and sadly, in a place where he couldn't freely turn it off.
Usually he'd be forced to hear others scream out their final words, hear officers barking out orders, or even a damnable commissar giving out suicidal orders.
He learned long ago to tune them out unless it concerned himself or his squad, however with his ears now ringing like a cathedral's bells and his best friend now dead.
Fear couldn't help but show its ugly head.
"I look around" a voice, an accent, a space marine he could tell, an angel from The Emperor himself was speaking from what he could tell an unsecured box channel.
Everius was not a man for speeches, he was not a man of standing around and listening to moral boosters from commissars and commanders alike. Which most officers were fine with, they liked results rather than just mere moral boosts.
So why was he listening?
"I see weak and dying men, people who've come across this forsaken galaxy and came here to die for a cause they believed in" his voice, strangely, wasn't rough for a space marine, especially a Space Wolf. It was soft, warm, the best way to describe it was when he first walked into a cathedral back on his homeworld, where he first felt the warming light of The Emperor.
"Even with us - the Space Marines by your side you still fall… Why? Why do you fall still?" Everius exhaled slowly as he shot a lesser daemon and reduced its personified violence into nothingness.
"Is it because you face odds that cannot be beaten? Is it because you fight because your faith demands you to? Is it because you simply will die otherwise?" Questions that has always followed Everius in every battle that he'd entered and walked out of with more scars to show for his bravery than anything else.
He never got any medals, those go to the officers, he never got a good meal, he's not nobility. What he got was orders on top of orders and more orders, he got calloused hands and nightmares to fight through.
"I will answer this question on why you fight: because you are strong" Everius faltered for a moment, for a breath his right foot refused to move from its place, but the sounds of war forced it.
It was strange, beyond strange, to have a space marine, the Emperor's angels call beings that they notoriously called mortals now called 'strong'. It seemed like a small joke that he was finally let in after years of not being allowed to know.
"You are strong because out of the billions, trillions, quadrillions of people within the Imperium you alone are brave enough - are strong enough to stand before these horrors and fight them, are strong enough to come from their homes to here" the words continued to spill out from the vox bead and Everius couldn't help but chuckle.
He was human, untouched by both chaos and untouched by The Emperor so how could he be strong in an angel's eyes?
An explosion rocked the wall he stood on, he felt it shift and groan underneath him, sergeant Everius braced himself, but still felt himself slide towards the railing.
"Sergeant!" A scream, a yell, a desperate cry of hope called out to him as Everius' back slammed into the railing and he felt himself go over the railing.
A kilometer down.
'Was I strong?' Everius thought this as he felt the wind through his ears, he was tired, he was exhausted from decades of war. Everius spent a lifetime in war, he could've stayed home and started a family and work underneath harsh conditions for the betterment of the Imperium.
Instead he chose this, why he chose this he could never explain it to anyone for he himself has no other reason the 'because I could' Everius thought of the thousands he saw killed, of the planets he saw destroyed by an Inquisitor's hand.
"How cruel" Everius spoke before his back broke into a destroyed tank down below.
———————————
This was cringe, I will forever look back at this moment with the single thought of 'cringe'; when I speak of any newer wolves entering the chapter I will hide it from them!
I'll die before they find this moment!
"Good job" Ivarr said this but I see the light in his eyes, I see the look.
He's making fun of me. I know it!
"Agnar! Angron has appeared! The squad has been deployed, hold on for longer!" I heard the sounds of further warfare in the vox as Logan's voice came through.
"By the Allfather" I sagged a bit, the Grey Knights can take over for all I care! I just want to do anything else than be here.
'Don't tell me the guardsmen also cringed at my words' further dread filled my bones as I wanted to but my cheek.
"M'lord!" A guardsman approached me and I wanted to wallow my fears almost immediately.
"Yes?" I raised an eyebrow.
"We've got word from the Mechanicus, we've twenty batteries ready to fire" the guardsmen, now that I'm looking at him, was fairly young.
No more than a private.
I nodded "fire them, give the men a break"
The guardsmen saluted as he jogged away.
"A break?" Ivarr sounded offended.
"They aren't us Ivarr" I sounded like a parent.
"They are normal humans, trained, yes, but they need rest more than any of us" I continued as Ivarr snorted.
"Let them taste the glory of war" Ivarr threw his hands out.
"What if they don't want the glory of war?" I asked him.
"Then they shouldn't've taken the oath of a guardsman" Ivarr spoke and I couldn't help but silently agree.
"Okay… so look good again?" I spoke as multiple batteries rang out overhead, shaking everything including my ears.
"Look like you're about to get a barrel of Mjød" Ovarr smiled and I couldn't help but smile as well.
—————————
Bjorn for the first time in a very long time was excited, it wasn't every so often that you get to fight a Primarch, ignoring that he already fought Angron once. This time he wasn't going to get upstarted by a young wolf.
He'd break the back of Angron!
"What is your duty?" A Grey Knight paladin or Chaplin-whatever gave off a speech and Bjorn silently stood there, the mechanicus around him checking weaponry.
He'd ate with the Great Wolf, he pissed and what with the Allfather himself - he perhaps will never fully understand the need or the want to worship the man.
'Then again, no one expects us to worship the wolves' Bjorn thought to himself as the Brother-Captain himself walked around, Taremar stared at a mural depicting the Allfather.
"Ah, the Allfather" Bjorn mused slowly "Tell me Taremar, what gene-seed do you descend from?"
"We deploy in ten minutes" Taremar ignored the question entirely.
"Is it that piss-boy Magnus?" Bjorn goaded "only his sons would have such a great aptitude towards psyker powers" Taremar didn't answer as he walked forwards as the 'chosen' as they were called by their brothers followed him.
Bjorn silently grumbled as he followed suit, he didn't really care about their gene-seed, but Logan was.
And the 'Blessed Wolf'
Bjorn's thoughts were brought to Agnar once again, called The Blessed Wolf by his little brothers; he couldn't help but feel amusement from it. They wouldn't know blessed if it shat out of their asses, he's seen the decay of the Imperium since the siege of Terra.
If the Great Wolf or the Allfather were here.
Heads would roll…
"Initating teleport assault!" Taremar announced as nemesis spears raised up and the mechanicus stepped away from Bjorn, He'd released his massive bolter gun in favor of a powerfist. Without the aid of the mechanicus he'd lose the ability to fire the weapon rather quickly.
"For the Fang" Bjorn's words echoed out like tectonic plates grinding uselessly against each other.
Flashes of lightning and sounds of screaming and curses filled the ears of everyone almost immediately.
Angron stood before Bjorn, his massive form matched Bjorn's; the air around Angron was violent and that was putting it lightly. Red lightning crackled around the reddened form of the Primarch.
The sky was black and the hollering of daemons and cultists was loud even for Bjorn who stared at the Primarch of the twelfth legion.
'Where did he go wrong?' Bjorn asked himself, was it simply because the Allfather wasn't there? Was it Horus's machinations that caused his fall? Or was it designed by the very start of his birth?
Questions that'll never get answered.
"We are the hammer!" The grey knights bellowed out as they almost immediately surrounded Angron and a few daemons close to the Daemon Primarch, almost immediately blood flowed as the Grey Knights dismantled the unorganized chaos forces.
Bjorn on the other hand immediately went towards the towering Daemon Primarch, they didn't stare each other down, as they were practically the same size it was like two forces of nature finally meeting in a final bout.
Angron however was faster, and his massive chainaxe Spinegrinder was raised high to cleave the dreadnaught in two, but just before his blade tasted the holy armor that encased Bjorn the newly acquired powerfist slammed into the jaw of Angron.
Angron howled in rage before he brought his other weapon Samni'arius - a massive blade - towards the Dreadnaught to stab Bjorn.
"Pathetic, just like your sons attempts to follow you" Bjorn didn't really strike deep with his words, but either way it worked well enough as Angron's blow went wide enough from Bjorn's form that it only gave sparks as it scrapped uselessly on the chassis.
Bjorn's lightning claws crackled as it sang through the air.
The lightning claws digged deep into the gut of Angron, blood poured forth from the wound. Angron screamed in rage as Spinegrinder came back down and dug into the top of Bjorn's form.
"Kneel traitor!" A Grey Knight's nemesis spear struck deep into the achilles of Angron as another below of pain and rage came forth.
Angron dug into the ground with Samni'arius before it went back and took the Grey Knight with it, less cutting and more as a blunt instrument that took the Grey Knight into the sky for no less than a kilometer in total distance.
Bjorn was forced to take a step back as Samni'arius threatened to cut into his form, he'd already had a cut on his top he didn't need another wound, or at least yet.
"Come, XII" Bjorn goaded "come and fall so you may cry to your bumbling god once again"
Angron charged.
Powerfist met Spinegrinder, Lightning Claw met Samni'arius. All the while The Grey Knights kept their perimeter while they cut down Daemons and traitors alike.
Bjorn felt himself sliding back and he couldn't help but curse under his breath as he slowly made ravines in the muddy ground.
Bjorn sidestepped to the right as Samni'arius flew past him and Bjorn smiled viscously as the Lightning Claws came down like divine judgement and reality seemed to break for just a small breath.
Angron's left arm that held Samni'arius - a blade that held a powerful Slaaneshi daemon that he had beaten into a blade - was left useless as Samni'arius broke in pieces as a female voice screamed into the air. Colors filled the void as lightning crackled where the blade broke for just but a breath of a moment.
Bjorn couldn't help but be reminded of when Russ himself broke Angron's other weapon, Widowmaker during his great betrayal.
Now he'll break the back of Angron like Russ did Magnus!
"Now brothers!" Taremar commanded as he found his opening and all at once the entire squad of Grey Knights used their Psyker powers upon the twelfth son of the emperor.
It was catastrophic, Angron screamed in pain as he brought his weapon up, unwilling to let go of his weapons as he clutched his head.
Bjorn capitalized.
He moved far faster than any dreadnaught of any model should move, he crashed into the form of Angron with the force of a planet.
Angron was forced off his feet and tumbled on the ground, thrashing and howling in rage and pain, Bjorn followed. Bjorn stood over Angron's form and slammed down both his fists like lightning strikes, each one causing more and more damage to the Daemon Primarch.
"Brothers, at once; BANISH THE PRIMARCH!" Taremar ordered as the ritual was commencing, and Bjorn couldn't help but feel insulted; Agnar didn't require a ritual, so why did he?
He'd kill Angron before the ritual was completed!
Bjorn grabbed the form of Angron who's wounds leaded blood like a keg being stabbed and raised him above his head.
"Stare and despair at your god!" Bjorn announced before he brought down the form of Angron directly in his knee.
A sickening crack and a scream that quite literally shook the air as Angron's form slammed down into the disgusting ground. Angron's once powerful and frightening form had been reduced immensely, at the hip, Angron's body was twisted in a horrid way that in no way was comfortable.
Angron didn't heal immediately, as his upper half thrashed around in rage and pain. Bjorn stared down at the maw of Angron's mouth, the sharp teeth seemingly wept of blood.
"Tell me Angron, what caused you to fall?" Bjorn only got a roar of rage in response.
"No matter" Bjorn leaned down and with a swipe of his Lightning Claws he lifted the upper part of Angron's head and lifted it to the sky.
He'd one upped the 'Blessed Wolf'! He'd killed Angron before the Grey Knights initiated their ritual!
A/n: Snow storms over and I got Covid, also to note about Power Stones, they do nothing here, so don't waste them if your expecting a bonus chapter or something like that.