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END KAALEK. NO MORE KAALEK! traitorous scum..

this was a great additionn !

Indeed it was a great one. Too bad for Kaalek I started to like the dude...

Qul was angrier than usual.

He was angry because Kaalek was dead, and the pain hadn't gone away. The Dreadnought's smoldering corpse lay before him, and his wounds still ached. Ash had been rubbed into his blistered and crackling flesh. Tongues of flame had licked at his eyes.

He was angry because as his body made its pain-filled recovery, as it regrew itself over a long span fever blurred days, he still hurt. The wounds sealed themselves, and even the scar tissue faded. The pain refused to.

Qul was angry because, for all his strength, part of him would always lie in Kaalek's grip, drowning in flames.

Chapter Thirteen
Behind These Cold Eyes

Scyrak the Slaughterer, they called him. Scyrak the Mad.

He held the beast's reins in a lax grip, allowing it a degree of rest. The beast crawled about on six multijointed and steel plated limbs, each of which ended in an almost ball-like fusion of a claw and foot. Its back was a grated sheet of iron, boxed in by a fence of skull-bearing trophy poles. Its underbelly was a solid mass of charcoal black engines, furious pistons, clanking gears, and exposed circuitry. A long appendage, running with segmented cables, emerged from the creature's rear, and curled like a scorpion's tail. Instead of a poisoned stinger, it bore a twin barreled lascannon.

At the front of the creature was a great horned xenos skull, the closest thing it would ever have to a face. An organic tongue rolled out from its learing maw, glistening with oily hydraulics and machine sweat. Flanking the skull were two gargantuan limbs, each one ending in a blood slicked pincer.

Scyrak stood on the Beast's back, reins in hand, as the beast made its way towards the bridge. Imperials knew it as a 'defiler'. Scyrak, on the other hand, just called it the Beast. No other name seemed to fit.

It shifted slightly, glancing towards a prison tube. Held in a capsule of glass, a naked Astartes of the Emperor's Children writhed. His beautiful, chiseled form was marred with all sorts of scars. Each day, Scyrak's attendants took something new away from the Slaanesh enthralled freak. First, he'd lost his eyes. Then his hands. Then his ears. He was already close to cracking. By the time they reached his genitalia, he'd tell Scyrak everything. If not - he wasn't the only prisoner. There were plenty of others, still awaiting their own torment.

Scyrak wrenched on the Beast's reins, guiding it back towards the bridge. It had committed no crime; the only thing it'd done was glance at the prisoner. But Scyrak knew better than to treat the Beast with any semblance of kindness or mercy. Give a daemon an inch, he thought. And it'll take a mile.






This is Scyrak.

The other World Eaters can claim disadvantaged backgrounds and impoverished upbringings. Not him. He was born to a powerful noble, and raised in a luxury. From the 203rd floor complex of his parent's estate, he could look out the window and see a whole world of shoeshiners, doormen, waiters, secretaries, and beggars beneath him. Scyrak was raised to be his father's heir, and keep his family's name alive.

As of now, he doesn't even remember his family's name, though he is fairly certain that it started with an 'H'.

The World Eaters started using his family's homeworld as a recruiting ground. At age twelve, Scyrak was in exceptional shape, one of the strongest and tallest children the recruiters had ever seen. He was taken. It was an occasion of mixed blessing for his family. On the one hand, it was a great honor to have a children in the Adeptus Astartes. It demonstrated that one's family had superior health, and was free of any genetic taint. On the other hand, it meant that the World Eaters were taking little Scyrak away.

His family was rich. They could afford Astropathic messages to the World Eater's fleet, and pull political strings so that Scyrak could receive them.

He passed the trials and became a scout. After only six months in service, he was promoted to the rank of Slaughter Brother, and became a true Astartes. That was when he received the Butcher's Nails; the neurological implant responsible for the World Eaters Legion being known as Berzerkers, not soldiers. His family still kept in touch with him, even as his responses to their messages became less and less frequent. Angron displaced his father, and the Legion displaced his siblings. As for his mother, he'd never particularly even cared for her.

They stopped sending messages when the Horus Heresy broke out. By that point, Scyrak was a Sergeant.

A year into the heresy, one of his family's political enemies learned of their traitor son. He (illegally) accessed the messages they had sent him and found that many were sent during the World Eaters' descent into Chaos. Of course, Scyrak's family didn't know this. They were brought to court, where a judge found them guilty of conspiring with traitors. His father was executed, as was the man he dictated the messages to. His relatives were stripped of their titles and wealth.

When Scyrak learned of this, he didn't particularly care.

From as early on as he can remember, Scyrak has been different from others. People connect with him, but he never connects back. He never feels concerned with their well-being. Why should he? They're just maggots beneath his feet. The closest he's come to ever bonding with someone is wanting something from them.

Love is completely and utterly alien to him.

Anger though. That makes sense. There are plenty of things to be angry about. Scyrak can be angry that he doesn't have enough men beneath him. He can be angry that the Blood God has denied him of Daemon Princedom, after all of his successes on the battlefield. He can be angry that the Imperium still stands.

This is why Scyrak is such a dangerous foe. He feels no attachment, not even towards his genebrothers of the World Eaters. He feels no remorse, not even towards any of the great deal of warcrimes committed during his long career. His conscious is free from such things.

This is why Qul is going to regret dealing with him.

I am now your mortal enemy! I will miss the dread, but your skull will adorne my wall!

Yeah I liked the dread to, he was almost likeable, ah well least we got a new character and a new direction for the story.

Who is this fell rider that rides upon the beast of midnight black like a twisted night of old.
Who is he to defile the Imperium that has stood for 10,000 years and gave gift to his once noble form.
Who is he to deny the Emperor' vengeance to his flesh.
I will smite him if he ventures forth into my domain and my blade shall thirst from his blood.

Captain Evander 3rd Company of The Panthers Claws .

You will all fall before the migth of the Adeptus Mech! And ona more serious note. Well told LL, you really set a highy benchmark for us to jump after with this story

Very true^

Fantastically done. Subscribed!

More soon please.

It was a tremendous show of bravado on the Eldar's part, to meet him there.

He wore dusky grey robes, ones that seemed to flow about his form. His chest and shoulders were armored with shining obsidian plate, giving him an almost beetle-like appearance. Sharp edged runes, the color of bone, ran about the armor. Crimson gems, embedded into the metal, glowed softly in the bridge's dank light. The Eldar's helmet was tall and sloped, with a flowing mane of black hair and a bone colored faceplate. It stared at Scyrak, glass eyes narrowed and unblinking.

The Eldar stood on the bridge of Scyrak's ship, the Pureheart, surrounded by snarling and rasping Berzerkers.

"Monkeigh," the Eldar said at long last. It spoke slowly and carefully. "What brought you to call on me?"

Scyrak didn't like the awkward way it spoke. "I have a deal for you," he said.

"What kind of a deal?"

"Slaanesh is eating your souls, and you wear those things," said Scyrak, gesturing to the stone in the Eldar's chest. "To stave her off. Now, take it off."

Scyrak could hear the agitation and, more than that, fear in the Eldar's voice. "I can't."

"Eldar live a long time. Almost as long as us Legionnaires. You've lost it before, haven't you? Just for a little bit. Maybe you took a shot to the chest and it fell off, or maybe you were changing your clothes and you were careless. You didn't die; Slaanesh didn't get you. But you could feel her. Couldn't you? Now. Take it off."

"I can't," the Eldar repeated, voice steeled by resolve. "This is a sacred matter, of my kin. You show great disrespect."

"If you don't take it off, we'll destroy it." Scyrak placed a hand on his holstered boltpistol. Neither quickly nor slowly, he drew the weapon and held it up, barrel fixed on the stone. "I'll shoot straight through it. Take out your heart and soul in one shot."

The Eldar took in a deep breath and exhaled slow. He undid a clasp just above the stone, and let the stone fall into his hand.

There was a lingering silence.

Then, the Eldar spoke. "I don't feel it."

Scyrak laughed, deep and heartily. He rested a gauntlet on the Eldar's shoulder. "You can put it back in now. Or leave it out, if you like. It doesn't matter. Slaanesh can't reach you here. This is a sacred place, where the Blood God's power waxes strong. You see the flesh climbing up the walls? That's his flesh. You see the eyes in the ceiling, and the veins in the floor? Those are all his. Do you see my own World Eaters, with their flesh armor and their clawed hands and their cloven hooves? That is the Blood God's touch. The Blood God is Slaanesh's greatest enemy, and where he is strong, she is weak."

"We, my kin, have heard such things," the Eldar admitted.

"Well, I can give you something that's been blessed by the Blood God himself. His mere presence deters Slaanesh," Scyrak said.

"His?"

"Yes, his. He'd Daemon Prince, by the name of Qul. He's recently contacted me. We're going to have some sort of meeting, on the Tailstun Plateau of Skalathrax. Remember that. Because, I'm going to give you Qul's head on a plate," explained the World Eater. "I'm giving you this information, so that you can set up an ambush for him. I suggest taking him alive. I doubt his corpse will be worth much. All I want, in return, is for you to leave his ship and his men intact. I'm taking those for myself."

"We, my kin, will have to deliberate, on such matters. We do not like to... consort, with beings of kaos. Do you understand?"

"Absolutely. That being said, I'm not finished. Using him, you can die naturally. Now, I haven't tested this, but I believe that, by drinking his poison blood, you just die. Slaanesh doesn't get to claim your souls."

"Yes, but my kin must deliberate. I am not certain if we will, appreciate the Blood God's interference in our lives. Many of my kin protested this meeting. They, my kin, may not wish to meddle with kaos."

"Absolutely," Scyrak said. "But I assure you, you won't regret this."

I didnt see the eldar coming into this... should be cool to see where this goes.

 Warp Angels wrote:
I didnt see the eldar coming into this... should be cool to see where this goes.

Nobody sees the eldar coming.

Can't wait to see where this is going.

The tale takes a new twist, I like it.

Well done, now shed some Eldar blood!

Excellent addition m8! Keep it up!

Can't wait for more!