The Sons of Iron came into the system at the ready. The space hulk Portent of Terror was at the center of an armada consisting of seventeen ships heading towards an Imperial space station. An amalgamation of several large imperial battleships lost in the warp, the Portent of Terror was one giant spaceship. The Sons of Iron came across the space hulk by chance and spent two standard weeks clearing it of it's inhabitants. It took Warpsmith Verral another three standard weeks to get the space hulk's seperate machine spirits to combine and work together as one. Once the machine spirits melded, the armaments needed to be brought on line and that took him another standard week.
Warpsmith Verral then moved on to creating a main bridge in the center of the barge. He calculated the space Warlord Prillis needed to maneuver and spaced the consoles and servitors so that the Warlord could view the void clearly and move without feeling restricted. The main skull throne sat on a dais in the middle of the circular bridge. It was higher than normal command thrones, but the further away Warlord Prillis was from his human officers, the better off they were. The humans with the greatest resolve were chosen as officers as Prillis had a sickening effect on most of them.
The next step down on the dais was steering and weapons control. Many consoles stretched across the platform in front of the throne. One for every ship that was a part of the Portent of Terror. At the end of the consoles was a smaller dais with a chair and several computer monitors. This area had access to all the vital information on the hulk and was the command station of Captain Levus. Everything that happened on the Portent of Terror went through him.
The last step down was sensors and ship readouts. This was the level where all the humans would enter and exit the bridge. There was always constant movement at this level. A small representation of the constant movement all over the hulk.
The two adjoining rooms were for the Warlord. On the left was his personal chambers where he kept his personal effects and trophies. An even larger throne made of skulls was the main center piece of the room. The majority of the skulls were human shaped, but there were many other species scattered about the throne. There were two Tyrannofex skulls taken from a battle on Styml Prime created the armrests of the throne. The top of the throne had a large Ork skull taken from a Warboss on Woosk IV. All the skulls brough back memories of the battles from which he got them.
On the right was a war room much larger than the bridge where plans for the Warband were made. A large projector table was in the middle and three quarters of the room circulated up in a stadium style seating. The large form of Warlord Prillis was at the projector table checking the system on his own not waiting for his servitors and human officers to relay information. Warsmith Breven entered at the top of the room dressed in full plate. The silver, purple and black polished to a high shine.
A deep rumble left the Warlord's mouth. "Hello brother."
"Greetings brother. You wished to see me?" He said through the vox of his helmet.
Warlord Prillis was tapping buttons with his large claws. "I wanted your input. I am suspicious."
Breven started walking down the steps. "Our spies are sound. The information looks to be up to date and spot on. There are no ships in the quadrant and our attack will be swift."
"Just because you picked these spies does not mean they are sound." The Warlord's metal jaw clicked and was caught open. Saliva dripped to the floor leaving small burn marks where ever it landed. Prillis worked his metal face until his jaw clicked back into place. His metal teeth scraping together.
Breven made it to the projector and stood across from Prillis. "Do not worry yourself, brother. Scanners have picked up the Angels at the other end of the system meaning we will be just fine. Honestly brother, you are getting worse."
Prillis and Breven were true brothers. They were taken at the same time for the trials. They both worked their way through the 21st Grand Company. And they were the ones who took their squads and left the Iron Warriors. Prillis had begun his ascension threatening the current Warsmith and his power. The backstabbing within the Iron Warriors was rampant. Everyone was trying to win favor with Perturabo while he sat upon his throne on Medrengard passing the time making toys. The brothers wanted more.
Many more marines followed them taking ships from their Warsmith's armada. A few were lost, but what they gained out weighted it. The hierarchy of the warband was simple. Prillis and his new gifted form would be Warlord and Breven would be his second as Warsmith. Everything else within the warband would function as normal. The brothers wanted to bring a sense of honor back to their Legion and the way to bring that back was not sitting on one's hands, but bringing death to the False Emperor and his followers.
Breven never understood why his brother would get paranoid at the slightest things, but he did not have the gifts of his brother. He did not give up his body and soul as Prillis had. He had seen what could happen to those that displeased the Gods and no reward was worth the possibility of that.
"The Gods are fickle, brother. If I wish to ascend, I cannot fail." Prillis said as his metal teeth chattered together.
"We will not fail. The Gods helped us come from the warp at a point no one else could. The space station is ours as this system will be." Breven smiled behind his helmet as he watched his brother look upon the space station and his ships moving towards it.
Ulan sat silently waiting. He would check his las pistol every so often then check his watch, then a look out into the void and back to the las pistol. He looked over to the other four playing cards. "This is taking forever."
Jax rocked back on the two back legs of his chair and looked at his latest addition to his group of scoundrels. "Aww, relax mate. You're part is done. We'll be leavin real soon for the fun stuff." On his lap was a little hairless creature with no eyes. It had skin that would ripple between deep purple and black and it would crawl all over him like a small primate. Jax rubbed the creatures head and it gave a light rumble.
Ulan pointed to the creature. "That thing is creepy."
"You're creepy, mate."
The group of men began to laugh relieving the tension for a moment and that moment ended quickly. The creature moved to Jax's ear and began to chatter.
"Right. Time to move. Lets get loaded up. We got ten til things bust loose."
The rest of them started putting on backpacks, grabbing large duffle bags and checking weapons. Jax snapped a buckle around his waste to secure his backpack, checked his las pistol and started walking out the door. "Let's do this. Stay in the shadows."
Wil filled his cup and took a sip looking over at Dell. "Nothing ever happens here." He said as he leaned against the wall. For the most part, he was correct. Nothing did happen around here except the transfer of raw materials and goods for shipment to other Imperial systems. Sure, the Space Marines would dock and restock their supplies. They were always present, but never really seen. No one really knew how many there actually were. To this day, the defenses of the space station had never been used. Wil didn't even know if they worked. Hell, he didn't even know if the alarms worked.
At that moment, the alarms went off. Both he and Dell broke into a run to their control room in order to see what the problem was. They jumped into their seats and clicked the vox. "This is station twelve, we are picking up seventeen ships on the scanners. Very close. One very big. Calling for conformation." Wil let the vox drop waiting for conformation before cycling the weapons system live. He waited several seconds.
The voice that responded was female and had a hint of indecision behind it."This is station five. We confirm. All stations going live. Distress call going out. Defense system being brought online."
Dell hit the vox switch. "This is station twe... twe... twelve. Acc... acc..' he cleared his throat. "Acknowledged." He turned to Wil who was slumped over and foam coming from his mouth. He was moaning. The room began to swirl and tilt. Dell's body started to become very hard to move. He could not form words. Somehow through the corner of his eye he saw a figure standing in the doorway. He tried to move, tried to say something, but nothing happened.
The figure in the doorway took a step into the control room and was followed by more people. He stopped and knelt next to Dell and grabbed his chin to bring them face to face. "Aw mate, it will be all over soon. After hearing your friend, it's sad you are going to miss all the action.' Jax snapped his fingers and pointed at the bodies. They were removed and he took his seat. "Right. Time to set up these defenses. Start blocking the entrances to this level. Lockdown this entire floor."
He then punched in a secret frequency to contact the Portent of Terror. After a few moments a servitor answered the signal and Jax left his message. "The defenses on your trajectory are down. Should be an easy ride in, Portent."
"Confirmed." Was all he heard.
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