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The Clockwork Plague is a mix of
This: http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-217
The virus that overcame Iron Thorn (Path Of The Renegade)
And the Obliterator Virus.

If I had the money and skill, I would certainly make some armies from the alternate history I'm making. (Heresy of Iron, where Ferrus Manus was the Arch-Traitor and the Adeptus Mechanicus survived the Heresy mostly intact)

I'm going to do a new thing! Prompt Me! Request a prompt and I'll write about it a little. Just make it relevant to 40k, please!

Hm... How about, "One man's trash is another man's treasure."?

The Heresy of Iron sure sounds interesting, any stories about that coming our way any time soon?

And the Prompt me thing... well, since I requested the story about the badass Russian Space Priests, I'll let someone else request something first If you have some time to spare though, could you check out some of my short stories? It'd help me out a lot

How about some Skitarii poetry? A hymnal perhaps.

These boys are forever chanting and uttering mystical things over their machines, well let's hear it?

What do they sing?

Roolz of WAAAGH!

Namwig stalked through the cratered streets and ruined buildings of Praxos III, his gitfinda beeping slowly and steadily in his one hand. He sniffed the air, and briefly detected the stench of metal, oil, blood, and, oddly, some sweet scent he had never smelled before.

He turned to his first mate, Ramsquigg. "Ya gitz seein' the tinboyz yet? Da boss sayz dat we'll have us a good and propa scrum against dem." Ramsquigg pointed towards a large, ornate, and miraculously undamaged manufactory shrine.

"Dat shiny mekshop ova der is makin' a squeaky noise, kaptin. Itz soundin' like da tinboyz' little stabby boyz." Ramsquigg responded eagerly, after consulting his own gitfinda. Namwig remembered the awful mess the Ruststalkers his mob had encountered earlier made when squished and smiled. "Da stabby boyz put up a nice fite, but dey die real easy, but we's Orkz, so we alwayz win anyway."
"Right you are, kaptin. Da boyz are spoilin' for a scrap now. Da fatboyz didn't do nothin' for them."

Namwig remembered the fight with the Kastelan battle robots and winced. They had gone down easily, and left his mob completely unsatisfied. He raised a green hand and beckoned his mob forward. "See dat shiny fort over der? Da tinboyz are in der, not even lookin' at us! Follow me! Dis'll be easy!"

With a mighty WAAAAGHHHH, Namwig's mob broke cover and charged the manufactorum. Sporadic Galvanic Rifle shots blasted out of the windows, knocking over some slower boyz, but the main wave reached the wall and crashed through the door. A small subclade of Sicarians jumped out at the mob of Orks when they breached the door, laying into the tough greenskins with hissing knives and claws. Orks fell, blood jetting into the air, but Namwig's mob kept fighting. Namwig's Power Klaw smashed one spindly Sicarian to the floor, snapping its frail back and breaking its reinforced limbs. Another one leapt at him, and stabbed him in the shoulder with its glowing knife. Namwig body checked it into a concrete pole, breaking the killer's neck.

Beside him, Ramsquigg fought the Princeps. The formidable augmented warrior sliced his leg off effortlessly, and nimbly dodged an attack from his huge knife. With another brutal slash to the neck, Ramsquigg hit the floor. Namwig was there before the Princeps located another target, slamming his Power Klaw into the thing's side and wrenching a component free. Credit to it's builders, the Princeps only rocked forward a little, and it brought its shrieking chordclaw around, turning Namwig's prized shoota into a pile of metal scraps.

With a howl of rage, Namwig threw down the gun, and rammed his Power Klaw right through the Princeps' chest. The robed figure fell with a crash, it's stomach almost gone.

Breathing heavily, Namwig surveyed the room. The floor, once white, was a morass of blood and oil. He and his ammo grot were the only things still standing. He threw the Princeps' body behind him with a clatter and started up the stairs to the second level, where the shots had originated from. When he was fully out of sight, the ammo Grot paused, looking at the fallen Princeps. Pulling out a small spanner, the Grot deftly disconnected the Princeps' Transonic Razor. The newly acquired blade glowed in his hand, and he whispered an ancient saying of the Deffskull klan before starting up the stairs after his "master."

"One git's trash..."

Loads of fun! I'm loving this. You've got a good way of putting across the Orky speech without labouring it.
Very creative take on the prompt, too!

I'd suggest that you could maybe put a brief description of Namwig early on, because, "Namwig's Power Klaw smashed..." comes as a bit of a surprise if you've not previously pictured the ork with one of those arms. Pulling a weapon or a gun, a reader can cope with, but having to rearrange your mind's eye because he's got one less hand can be a little trickier.
Also you want to watch your it's and its (they're a reet swine, I was about 20 before I stopped using it's when speaking about possessions).

Thanks for the feedback! I have fixed the issues you pointed out.

PURGE ALL FLAWS. PRAISE THE MACHINE GOD.

Good stuff. Salute to the grots!

Life entails weakness, the product of flesh.
The burden of Humanity is flesh
And burden is a necessity
Embrace bone woven with steel
Embrace muscle merged with motor
Embrace advancement without end
Embrace survival, in void or in rock
Purge those unclean, who violate the Machine
So His light may shine upon Us.

Wow, I think that made my old iPhone work better! Thanks

how did you find the change of style? It's a strange thing rendering the old grimdarkness in verse. It really makes you think differently about things. Who is the poet? what is their intention? What is their experience or perspective? It's more imersive in a way but also can be a bit harder to access.

I think there's not nearly enough poetry in the WH/40k fluff. It would be a perfect avenue to expand cultural identities of some of the different factions and races.

There are some examples of prayers in the Infantrymans Uplifting Primer but they're by far the exception.

Anyway, thanks for having a crack at it. I'd be interested to hear more about this piece. When does it enter the life of regular Joe Skitarii? It seems like a personal invocation of some sort.

It's actually my personal Invocation for the purpose of intimidating my opponents!
The author is most likely a Sicarian of some sort, as it has a more martial, feral feel that I feel the regular Skitarii utterly fail to convey.

You know the whole "it's just psuedo-religious mumbo jumbo imposed on misuderstood mechanical phenomenon" notion? that there aren't really any machine spirits and such litanies etc derive from mechanical Workshop manuals? (i know it's heresey but there is an element of scepticism at play)

well what if you took something like a call and response liturgy from a religious text and reworked it to be called by a tech-priest and responded to by (posibly a fleet of) the machine spirits.

Wouldn't that actual interaction blow such scepticism out of the water? Probbably not really but anyway, I really like the idea of it.

Here's another prompt if you're still looking for suggestions.

What happens when a machine spirit goes bad? Can a priest perform an exorcism?

Damn, I'm late.
I'll get writing!

Deletion-

++Adept Feld, a new ticket has arrived.++

Feld slowly shifted his attentions from the regicide game he was playing on the Noosphere to the cogitator in front of him. The screen displayed nothing but static. Feld shook his head slightly and begin whispering a small prayer.

"In the place of the holy Omnissiah, master of all machines, I beseech you, machine-spirit, to work dammit!"

With the completion of the Litany of Percussive Maintenance, Feld brought his ceremonial spanner once upon the errant cogitator's casing, causing the ticket to appear on the screen. In terrible handwriting, it said "Tech Support, the southern tertiary Noosphere router is malfunctioning. I demand a complete reconsecration and repair."

The ticket had clearly been handwritten and scanned, apparently by an epileptic manipulator-skull.

"Fething Armorian", Feld thought. The venerable High Adept was known for demanding complete reconsecration and repair whenever so much as his door threw an error. He had probably wasted more tech support time than any two other Adepts combined. He quickly sent a message to the Adept in the next cubical over.

++Going to be out for about two hours. Router is acting up again. Mind taking over the help desk?++

With a loud clicking noise, Feld retracted his plugs from his chair and desk, and set out on the kilometer-long walk to the southern tertiary Noosphere router.

Finally, tired and irritated, he reached the stairwell to the chamber that housed the router. To his surprise, he found it under armed guard.

***Halt! Identify!***, the two Skitarii guarding the door canted aggressively.

++Adept Mediocrus Feld, Adeptus Mechanicus Tech Support++, said Feld, uncertainly.

The left-hand Skitarius tilted his head to the side, scanning Feld's single biological retina.

***You will need a containment suit and a weapon to enter!***

++Why?++

The left-hand Skitarius shifted, uncomfortable, and spoke in his fleshvoice.

"I... believe it would be better to see for yourself. It's a tad embarrasing."

Feld followed the Skitarius into a decontamination room, where he was blasted with anti-rad foam and put on his laspistol and hazmat suit.

"Did you have anything to do with this?"

"Neither I or nor my comrade were here when the issue began. We are both technically on break."

"That's the Skitarii's idea of fun? Guarding doors and spraying people with decontamination foam?"

"You're clearly new here. Once you actually get some metal on you you'll understand how fun getting to stand still is.", the Skitarius said, ignoring the sarcasm in Feld's voice.

"Suit yourself.", retorted Feld.

"I do believe I am suited.", said the Skitarius, pointing at his full-body armor.

Feld winced at the awful joke, and finally pulled the hazmat suit's hood over his head.

"Ready to see what's going wrong with the router? Follow me.", said the Skitarius.

Feld followed the Skitarius back to the bottom of the stairwell, and his companion waved the second Skitarius off.

***Guard here. Make sure it doesn't escape.***

Feld almost jumped in surprise.

++Escape?++

***You'll see.***

The Skitarius opened the door to the stairwell and lead Feld up it. The single light at the top was flickering, until Feld flicked it with his one metal finger. Finally coming to the door at the top, Feld scanned his intent-card and entered the router room.

It was utter chaos with a side of Chaos. Two Nurglings dressed in tiny red robes were riding the sparking, flailing router around, bouncing off walls and the ceiling.

After a shocked silence, Feld and the Skitarius pulled their guns and shot the Nurglings, spattering the room with pus.

++What the feth? Was it doing that when Armorian filed the ticket?++

***When I got here it was just shaking and blasting "I AM UNBOUND, I AM FREE!" into the Noosphere.***

Feld stopped suddenly and attempted to tackle the errant router, pinning it to the ground.

++Could you hold it still while I try to figure out what's wrong?++

The Skitarius grabbed the router and held it tightly against the floor, attempting to prevent it from vibrating out of his grip, and Feld quickly plugged one of his cables into the broken machine.

++Seems here like the machine-spirit has... completely flipped it's gak. Something managed to unbind it from the router, but it's still trapped inside the physical casing.++

***Should we free it?***

++Do you like a completely free spirit that can possess our secret technology?++

The Skitarius got a sudden, horrible vision of the planet exploding into nuclear fire.

***No.***

++Can you help me exorcise it?++

***How?***

++Just hold it still.++

Feld removed his helmet and began to speak.

"Evil spirit, I banish thee to your unholy home, the Empyrean, the Warp, and the Aether. I name you Abomination, and may you never find rest in this realm. May you be consumed by the light of the Machine-God, and be reforged... reforged as a benevolent, radiant machine-spirit by the fire of your own death. I banish you, abomination, affront to the machine-god, leave this reality and dissolve screaming! Die, trash!"

With that, Feld drew a haywire grenade, stuck it to the router, and stood back as the machine suddenly went dead.

++You may return to your duty. I need to go dispose of this unfortunate, lost shell.++

Feld slowly walked into the decontamination room. dropped off the dead router in the recycling bin, and walked back to his lonely desk, dismissing his substitute. He was just about to resume his game when a new flood of messages poured in.

++Adept Feld, a new ticket has arrived.++
++Adept Feld, a new ticket has arrived.++

The day of a warrior is never done.

The first chapter of a story about the Inquisition in the post-Wrath of the Omnissiah galaxy.

Fragmentation - Chapter One

The palace of King O'Shovah was simple for the capital to an empire. The throne room was a simple hall, with old pattern Battlesuits lining the wall between the forty great bronze pillars. The most elaborate feature in the hall was the small stasis dome containing the Dawn Blade on a wall-carved Eldar plinth. On the simple wooden throne at the end of the hall, King O'Shovah the Farsighted sat, next to his deactivated Battlesuit. It was to that figure that Valko walked to and kneeled.

"I bow to you, King O'Shovah, Lord of the Fire Caste, Over-Shas'O, Beastslayer, Farsighted One. I seek audience and fair discussion with you."

The stern facial expression on Farsight's face slowly morphed into a kind, genuine smile.

"You may rise, Gabriel Valkos, Emissary to the Free Enclaves, Inquisitor Xenos."

Valkos stood up and took a seat upon a slightly cushioned wooden stool.

"What do you desire to speak to me about?", continued O'Shovah.

"The forces of the Machine-God have been sighted near our neighboring forge world, Sendus Delta. We need support to keep our Alliance alive."

O'Shovah sighed. His eyes held weariness beyond his years.

"Although I am a warrior above all, our worlds cannot spare the amount of troops you would need to fight those monstrosities. I can provide advisors, trainers, and a handful of warriors in Battlesuits, and they would fight bravely, but they could not make enough of a difference to defeat the Machine-God's Iron Legion."

Valko shifted slightly and handed Farsight a dataslate, which the Tau scanned quickly and frowned.

"I am afraid that the Omega got the favorable end of that deal. Those that we have, we lack the facilities to make large quanitities."

"Could you spare even a squad? I am sure that even a squad of them on my lines would give our troops hope."

"I believe we could, but what are you willing to offer for our support?"

"Our spies have finally retrieved copies of schematics for the Omega's tanks. We are willing to offer half of them now, and the rest after the Iron Legion is defeated."

"I will consult my advisors. I do believe those schematics are worth the cost."

Farsight slowly rose, and lead a group of robed Tau into a side room. Valkos remained seated, waiting for the King to finish his meeting. His eyes wandered across the face of a few fellow emissaries, retainers, and entertainers, and finally settled on the King's old Crisis suit. Designs of ceramite and copper were masterfully worked into the red surface, giving the armor a ancient, regal appearance. A shattered Omega was worked into the chestplate, the symbol of the empire that Farsight had seceded from. The shiny, green glass lenses of the armor's sensor array shone brightly. The battlesuit was clearly extremely well maintained, and most likely ready for use at a moment's notice.

After two hours of waiting, O'Shovah finally emerged from the chamber, escorted by his advisors. He strode back to the throne, with his smile restored.

"That price will be sufficient. I will provide all of my available forces, and a squad of Ixion's Marines. I bid you success in battle, and may the Machine-God yet fall into ruin upon Sendus Delta."

With that, Valko bowed again, and made his exit, rejoining his retinue outside the hall. His Navigator, Karen, greeted him first.

"Greetings, Inquisitor Lord. I receive tidings of a broken cog, an empty room, and a bruised giant from the Tarot. The Empyrean forms paths for thousands of ships."

The Captain of the storm-trooper platoon under Valkos, Davi, and his ally, the Ranger Whinumere, were sitting under the wing of Valkos' transport, arguing about energy weapons. They both snapped hasty salutes when they saw the Inquisitor.

"Sir!" Said Davi, smiling. "I thought you would be an hour more, at least! What did he say?"

"I am afraid not", said Valkos. "I am promised a squad of Space Marines under Sergeant Ixion, and some general Battlesuit equipped advisors and trainers."

Davi's smile faded. "That's nowhere near enough. Tac Logis says that-"

Valkos interrupted.

"I am aware of the predictions Tac Logis has made. I know that it's not enough, but Ultramarines are a rare commodity. The shipment of Pulse Rifles we retrieved in our latest raid on the Omega should be enough to equip at least two regiments of Guardsmen, which will be trained by O'Shovah's warriors."

"Then we will still die, but we will die covered in the blood of the Machine-God's sons of bitches."

"Is it not a worthy death?"

With that, Valkos stepped into the small Valkyrie transport. His Mechanicus accomplice, Kent-34, canted greetings, and stepped to the side to allow Valkos to pass through and access the loudspeaker to the outside of the Valkyrie.

"Takeoff in 1! Get inside! We are to return to G'Enya and board the conveyor there! Ixion and his men will meet us!", the loudspeaker blared.

Precisely a minute later, the hatch was shut, with every henchman inside and strapped into their flight-seats. The Valkyrie retracted it's sturdy landing legs, carefully rose into the air, and accelerated towards G'Enya, city of the Fire Caste.

Preview of Chapter 1.5
“Actually, equal population. The humans of Ultramar are our partners in the Omega, after all. It is only fair that both Tau and Humans could live on each other’s worlds. Is it not the same in your Imperium?”
“Our Imperium has no formal Xenos allies. I have autonomy, however, and the sector I serve has an agreement with the Free Enclaves for military support and trade goods. I am glad the the Imperium learned the importance of tolerating Xenos after the Tarsus Incident. I wonder what would have happened if Fulgrim hadn’t listen to that Eldar seer?”

Great stuff. Really enjoyed the exorcism story.
The litany of percussive maintenance! Brilliant.

I'm glad that you liked it! Writing all of the humor sort of came naturally, and I hope you found it somewhat humorous!

I am about halfway done with Fragmentation chapter 2, expect it by the end of this Weekend.

Fragmentation Chapter 2. Please feel free to comment and critique as necessary.

An Inquisitorial Valkyrie in the sky of an Enclave world was an unusual sight, causing Valkos’ craft to be noticed by a vast amount of the inhabitants of G’Enya. Sergeant Ixion was waiting next to the landing pad when Valkos arrived, calm in his azure, gold, and crimson armor. Valkos could appreciate the hybrid design, which took cues from both Imperial power armor and an Omega Battlesuit.
“Inquisitor.” Ixion rumbled curtly.
“Where are your men?” Valkos observed. “Are they at the spaceport?”
“We are Ultramarines, Inquisitor. We do not separate. We are all brothers in blood.”
The nine other Ultramarines stepped out from behind the Valkyrie, the servo-motors in their armor whirring slightly.
“I present to you my brothers.” The Ultramarine continued warmly.
The other Marines bowed slightly to the Inquisitor. Valkos could see that their armor was newly polished and well maintained.
“And I greet you, Space Marines.” said Valkos, completing the ritual by bowing low.
One of the Marines, a shining Omega fusion blaster strapped across his back, removed his helmet and looked at Valkos. He was dark-skinned, with very short hair and brown eyes.
“How are the Enclaves so far, Inquisitor?” The Marine inquired.
“It seems far less oppressive than the Omega’s realm, and also somehow more rustic and quiet, despite the advanced technology. I went to a Battlesuit show on my second day on Vior’Los. There was a rather spectacular purple XV-86 that won the acrobatics competition easily. Definitely far more interesting than most Imperial sports. Do you have anything comparable in Macragge sept?”
“There are the hover-races, although I have never participated. Have you ever piloted a Battlesuit yourself?”
“No. I thought they were only useable by Tau?”
“Only in the military, and even then, the Omega is phasing the ‘Tau only’ rule for Battlesuit piloting out.”
“Really? To take advantage of their human population? Do they have more humans than Tau?”
“Actually, equal population. The humans of Ultramar are our partners in the Omega, after all. It is only fair that both Tau and Humans could live on each other’s worlds. Is it not the same in your Imperium?”
“Our Imperium has no formal Xenos allies. All we have are simple non-aggression pacts and small trade agreements. To fight the honorable Eldar and Omega would be our death kneel. We cannot afford distractions from wiping out traitors, heretics, and the more… distasteful Xenos. I have autonomy, however, and the sector I serve has an agreement with the Free Enclaves for military support and trade goods. I am glad the Imperium learned the importance of tolerating Xenos after the Tarsus Incident. I wonder what would have happened if Lord Fulgrim hadn’t listen to that Eldar seer?”
“Let us all simply be glad that the Imperium is a tolerant power. When the Warp Storms around the Omega disappeared and the Imperium made contact with us for the first time, I dread to think of what would have happened if they had sent an extermination fleet instead of ambassadors.”
Both the Ultramarine and Valkos sat quietly for a minute. Davi broke the silence, striding up from the Valkyrie’s belly.
“Is it time for us to go yet? My boys are itching to meet this O’Myen character. I’ve heard some interesting things about her.”
“Oh? Do tell…” Valkos replied.
“Total hardass, of course, like the rest of these Enclavites, but apparently the best damn Battlesuit pilot on Vior’los.”
Valkos shot him a dirty look.
“After Farsight and his bodyguard, of course.” Davi added hastily. “I hear that she dueled an Emperor’s Children captain in the air and won.”
Valkos looked somewhat interested. “Oh? Which Captain?”
“The Eighth Company, I believe. The one in charge of their Assault Marines and Land Speeders.”
“So we’re getting the best of the best? Seems that somebody is smiling upon me from up very high. Could you get Whin? Patience is not a trait present in many great beings.”
Davi stepped over to the Valkyrie, knocking vigorously on the rear assault hatch.
“Whin! 34! Get out here! None of us are getting younger!” Davi yelled.
A soft, melodically accented voice in his ear startled him.
“I am already out here. 34 is staying with the Valk to fly her to the orbital transport. He doesn’t seem the type to trust her to anyone else.”
Davi looked distinctly uncomfortable. “Alright. Did he ask Valkos?”
“I believe he passed him a note on the flight. Valkos agreed.”
“Well, whatever he says. Let’s get a move on.” With that, Whinumere and Valkos joined with the rest of the now-considerably large group, and filed into the two waiting Mako transports. Davi, the fusion blaster-bearing Marine, Ixion, Whinumere, Valkos, and Karen filed into one of the hovering vehicles, and the Stormtroopers and the rest of the Space Marines boarded the other. The inter-transport commscreens flickered to life, and the Enclavite pilots began masterfully driving the vehicles onto the main elevated highway of G'Enya.
Valkos stared out the wide, bulletproof left-hand window, marvelling at the elegant white-and-brown skyscrapers that rose like stalks of grass. The highway curved gently, and entered a large glass dome. Valkos could see Enclavite Tau and humans walking along glass catwalks above the road, stopping to buy from automated kiosks.
As the Makos passed into another elevated road, a piece of graffiti featuring a shattered Free Enclave symbol flashed by.
"What was that?" Inquired Valkos. Ixion responded, sounding annoyed.
"Pro-Omega graffiti. Not every citizen enjoyed the split of the Enclaves and the Omega. Some still crave unity and the influence of the Ethereals."
"Are those... unionists dangerous?"
"Not that I know of. They seem to mostly protest peacefully, or vandalize signs, but last week a firebomb went off in this city's War Museum. Killed a city council member and seriously burned his bodyguard."
"I saw that on the holoscreen. O'Uaine?"
"Enclave ambassador to the Craftworlds. Unfortunate that he should meet his end in such a cowardly manner. The perpetrator has been executed, but the unionist movement still isn't dead."
"So be the fate of all cowards and heretics."
With that, the short conversation ended and Valkos went back to staring out the window. The elegant, white skyscrapers soon transformed into small farm-domes, and then approached into large rock formations.
"Heads up, five minutes to arrival." The pilot voxed from his seat at the front of the vehicle.
The Makos took a turn, following the now grounded road, and entered a tunnel through a stout hill. Suddenly, the lead transport halted. The pilot of Valkos' Mako swore and swerved left, stopping the vehicle brutally.
"The feth was that?!" Davi squaked indigently from the seat next to Whinumere. Karen suddenly shut her two primary eyes, her third eye beginning to glow under its protective membrane.
"Trouble. A phosphor-fly blinks and devoures the moth. Trojan Horse."
Valkos took a glance out the window. There was a two-meter tall barricade, littered with stacks of stolen EMP grenades and rusty metal spikes.
"Fething down!" Davi shouted as all the EMPs went off at once, and plunged the interior of the craft into darkness. Ixion immediately pulled a small lamp-pack out of his belt, and activated it. Karen had hidden under one of the seats, and Whinumere was splayed across the fusion blaster-bearing marine's lap. He groaned as he untangled himself.
"Fething really? Not a single damn day." The Eldar grunted, as he pulled an elegant pistol from his holster.
Valkos looked around to see the occupants of the vehicle drawing their weapons, and the pilot manually screwing down the windshield's blast-proof shutters.
"I shall assess the situation." said Ixion bluntly, as he crossed the transport compartment and pulled the emergency door open. He was immediately greeted by a pulse carbine shot that bounced off his thick helmet. There was the throaty boom of a boltgun firing, and the unionist attacker's torso exploded into red mist.
More shots cracked out from behind the barricade, one smashing into Valkos' Mako's windshield and one hitting the engine intake, causing one side of the skimmer to smash into the ground. The rest of the Ultramarines and Stormtroopers spilled out of the other Mako, punching hellgun, plasma rifle, and boltgun shots into the improvised barricade. A unionist with a mounted burstcannon opened up, stitching a line of shots across the ground and decapitating a Stormtrooper, who fell with a scream.
Valkos, Davi, and the fusion blaster-bearing Marine jumped out of the downed Mako. Valkos hit the ground rolling and came up firing his laspistol with both hands at the burstcannon operator, who fell with a shout, shot through the chest and shoulder. A badly-aimed autogun shot whickered through Valkos' stormcoat, causing the Inquisitor to roll behind the damaged engine of his transport. Davi joined him, and began yelling into his wrist-mounted vox.
"We are being engaged by active, armed hostiles! We will need medevac and support! Status: One transport downed and one transport-"
Davi's shout was drowned out by the sound of a boltgun opening up mere feet away from him. Another unionist screamed, and a retaliating autogun shot hit the pavement two feet from Davi's outstretched hand.
Valkos, using the engine as cover, snapped off another shot at a ducking unionist, and missed. A return shot hit the Inquisitor directly in the chest, and caused him to hit the ground, the shock almost causing him to pass out. The slug had almost penetrated his protective carapace chestplate.
There was a thin-sounding crack, and the unionist that had shot Valkos' eye exploded, causing him to drop like a dead fish. Whinumere saluted the downed Inquisitor, and fired another sniper shot, killing the another unionist taking aim at Davi. Valkos watched as the fusion blaster-bearing Ultramarine fired at the barricade, and then charged through the hole, drawing a wicked honor blade. Two other Marines followed him, and the air was soon filled with the screams of dying unionists.
The gunfire stopped, and the relative silence of the tunnel returned, only puncuated by the crackle of the fires ignited by the fusion blaster shot.
"Casualty count!" Valkos yelled to Davi, who was leaning to inspect the fallen Stormtrooper.
"One blue dead, one blue wounded. Looks like nine reds dead and none wounded."
Valkos nodded slightly at the effectiveness of the Ultramarines and his Stormtroopers.
"Send word to that unfortunate soul's family with my condolences. Make sure to tell them that it was quick, at least."
Davi nodded once, and moved back into the downed Mako, helping Karen to her feet.
"Situation as I said, of course." The psyker woman said. "It is unfortunate that one brave soul made his end in the dark."
Valkos nodded once and went to inspect the barricade. It had clearly been thrown together quickly, being primarily made out of chunks of rockcrete and rusty barrels. The shape of a technical drone turned on its side stuck out of the improvised roadblock, as well as some hastily-made weapon mounts. Valkos could see that only one was occupied.
"Is it possible to move this thing?" Valkos said to Davi.
"Seems possible, but I think I got the rust disease just by looking at it. The Ultramarines could probably clear a path through it."
Thankfully, they did not have to. There was the sound of an anti-grav ram firing, and the roadblock was violently shunted to the right side of the tunnel. In its place hovered a heavily-armed Hammerhead tank, escorted by a Devilfish transport. The Tau commander of the Devilfish took a bow, and shouted to the scattered group on the ground.
"O'Myen got worried at your lateness. I am ordered to give you a ride." The commander stated, in labored Gothic. "Could you get those transporters off the ground?"
"One of them is intact, but the other has a wrecked engine. Do you have towing capability?"
"Yes. Your crashed transport could be towed by mine. Do you have any wounded?"
"Only one. My Stormtroopers and the Ultramarines are effective soldiers."
"Place him in the back of my transport, on the medical bed. My medics will assist him. What is your composition?"
"Ten Ultramarines, five Stormtroopers, three of my associates, and myself. We don't have much baggage."
"Split your party, the Ultramarines in my transport and everybody else in yours. That should suffice until we get to O'Myen's location."
With that, Valkos climbed the ladder into his Mako, followed by Karen, Whinumere, and Davi. The Stormtroopers joined them a moment later. There was a loud noise of shrieking metal as the downed Mako was lifted by the Devilfish's recovery drone, and then a jolt as the now larger convoy started moving.
Valkos turned his attentions to the window again, mentally preparing himself for meeting the esteemed Tau commander. He hoped that they had sufficient time to beat back the Machine-God's forces, and that the Imperium and Enclaves combined could truly survive the birth of the new god...

Thinking of splitting this thread and my AU content, as Heresy of Iron seems a lot more niche (being limited to those who like an altogether weirder universe AND 40k fans) than my usual fiction. Thoughts on whether I should do that or not?

I think if it's a long form story, then it should get its own thread.
If not, just tag the post with whether it's 40K or AU 40K.

If I continue with my current plot diagram, Fragmentation will be about 20,000 words long at the point where I stopped mapping plot.
I'll migrate it over when I finish chapter 3.

Thanks!