“Brotherhood!” Ivaldi Wootz roared in a sonorous, rumbling war-cry. The Warlord rose from their defensive works, drawing his artificer-made chainsword, Höggr. He was a Squat, a son of mighty Rymr, and the incoming volleys of las-fire didn’t quail him in the slightest. “Let us bleed for our Stronghold!” With his rallying words, his Brothers rose from the trenches with their own close-combat weapons. Then, with a wordless shout and the thundering of feet against the muddy earth, they charged.
The heretics did their best to try and make the Squats pay for it. Hails of autocannon shells whizzed past, splattering any they hit into wet redness and little more. Yet, still, the Brotherhood came onwards, inexorable, indomitable. Their stocky, mighty forms and their abiding rage at the foe propelled them forth, into the valley of death. Ivaldi was at the head of the pack, with his Hearthguard close beside him.
Dark were the skies with ash and smoke as they collided with the heretic lines. Höggr’s steady growl filled the air as Ivaldi got stuck in. His eyes were wet with tears as he tore into them - tears of rage, bitterness and determination. For his foe was no
umgi follower of
dum. No, it was the Squats’s greatest shame that had dared to rear its sickly, misshapen head.
Chaos Squats. The stain of mutation was obvious on their pale, pocked, wide-eyed faces. A discerning eye would note some had too many limbs, others marks of favour, and still others were one with their weapons. Years spent under the dominion of the Dark Powers had warped their once-noble minds and bodies. Clad in armor of blackened metal and holding strange weapons, they were reavers of the space-ways, not unlike the Drukhari pirates. And now it fell to the Brotherhood to put them down.
Ivaldi kicked out, sending one of the wretches to the ground. A swift slash of Höggr’s blade ended him. Then, to his right in the swirling melee, he heard a piercing cry from one of his Hearthguard, Brokkr. Ivaldi whipped about, rushing to his aid. Only, he was too late. Horror greeted his eyes.
It was some kind of mutant, that much was obvious. The lower half of a four-legged beast was blended with the upper half of a Squat. At least, it was what could be charitably called a Squat, twisted by Chaos’s mutating touch as it was. Clad in the spiked black-iron armor of its evil kin and a brassy horned mask, the ghastly thing bore a great two-handed maul caked in Brokkr’s brains and blood. With a loud bellowing and spray of dust, it shot forth to confront Ivaldi.
The Warlord quickly rolled to avoid the charging horror, rising to his feet. It turned back towards him, but he was ready for it this time. Leaping up, he lashed out with his chainsword, biting deep into its exposed shoulder. It howled, inchoate rage and red gore spewing out in equal measure.
While it was blinded by pain, Ivaldi redoubled his attack. Gripping his weapon two-handedly, the son of Rymr swung - and took the thing’s head clean off in a single stroke. As the beast fell to its doom, Ivaldi inhaled deeply of the acrid air. The melee was subsiding, he saw.
The battle was won. Yet many more Chaos Squats remained, a stain on their race's honor.
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I decided to start a fiction thread for some ideas I've had around my Squat army. Hope you enjoy.