Chapter 33
Blood Price
Capella
13th August, 3025
Killclade Princeps.
The descent onto Capella had not been difficult, masked as it had been by regular business of a merchant simply bringing trade goods to Capella with which to leave it. The capital city was bright and the ComStar facility was obvious and large. Little did they know what was about to descend on them, chosen warriors from the fall of Lathe, grievously wounded had volunteered and been modified into Sicarian Infiltrators and Ruststalkers. The cargo-9 with the mechanicus team and their equipment had moved out at dusk, leaving a handful of Capellan customs agents in seizures from the disabling wavelengths of the Infiltrators helms.
Series of clicks filled his perception as his teams made their way to the facility, moving through the cityscape as if nightmares, the orders for this job however had been clear, no civilian casualties. And so they had avoided people with practiced skill. The coded communication was invaluable as his people built up the map of the facility as best as they could find it. The mech-bays had been easy to locate, the auspex finding the voids of the cubicles and their occupants easily enough. Power generators were found with even more ease giving themselves away long before any team was close to the walls.
"Princeps Tolstoy, situation report."
He canted back a binaric representation of their intelligence so far, of the heat signatures on the walls patrolling their routes, of the mechs in their bays, and naturally, of those turrets that seemed inactive for now.
"Very good. Very very good. Princeps, you are authorised to begin Operation Blood Price."
The Princeps looked at the walls. ------------------------
Guard Duty on Capella was a bore, march the same 40 foot stretch of wall every night and report all is well, on a good night maybe somebody would get drunk and piss on the wall, but by and large this was a nothing post. Important but nothing. Leaning against a wall the guard took out a cigarette and lit it up, the sudden bright light of his lighter blinding him to the fast black shadows that crossed the street to the wall in moments.
He paused as he felt his teeth vibrating and looked up. Along the wall shadows moved and their blades pumped into bodies with impossible ease, he saw one guard stabbed a dozen times before his attacker moved on and he thought the attacker had actually missed until a few moments later the guard collapsed in two, spinning he reached for the alarm when he was treated to the novel experience of watching his hand sail over the wall.
He didn't even feel it as he watched the blade arm plunge into his ribcage three, four, five times, like a criminal shivving a rival in prison, he didn't realise he'd gone to his knees as moments later blood began to flow from the wounds, as if his cardiovascular system had paused unsure how much to pump.
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The Locust was in for the fifteenth time in three weeks, and Yev had just about had enough of it. The warrior who handled it was either reckless or incompetent, the gyros had once again been knocked out of alignment near to the point that the Locust trying to run looked like a drunk trying to walk in a straight line. The open guts of the machine were half draped over his shoulders when a ringing started in his ears and he had trouble focusing his eyes, the taste of burned copper thick on his tongue. Shaking his head he tried to get the spanner in before dropping it trying to stop a drop of blood from his nose.
Quickly climbing from the cavity of the Mech he sat down hard in time to notice the figures moving into the mechbay, antennae crackling with power and domed heads studying the C* personnel. They moved without worry or care and Yev saw one of the guards retching and clutching his ears in agony, a guard that was callously executed as the dome-head nearest him raised a weapon and a burst of fire cut him down, as if it had been a signal all of the domes began firing at the debilitated guards, leaping into action with terrible alacrity, those mek-teks in reach were jabbed by the goads crackling with electrical power while the guards were just cut down with brutal bursts of fire.
Yev scrambled across the Gantry in time to see one of the figures burst up the ladder like liquid lightning and charged over to him planting one steel hoof on back as he knocked him backwards, looking towards the Locust he saw the alien machine plant a device within the open cavity and shut his eyes in pain as it activated, the blast dumping so much thermal energy into the mechs innards that the hardware simply melted down under the inducted energy turning the Locust into scrap.
It was almost with gratitude that the prongs of its goad touched his back and sent him into a blissful state of unconsciousness.
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The slow slide back to consciousness was wrought with pain as he felt like somebody had been jackhammering his skull. Almost forty men and women were clamped down naked into chairs as Yev looked around and saw the burning wreckage of all their mechs. "Precentor!" Yev shouted seeing the woman who ran the Capella station in front of him. "What's happening!"
She'd been weeping as she looked up to face Yev and he felt his heart go out to her. "I don't know, they attacked us, they've destroyed the HPGs, burned out our generators... but not before they forced me to send a distress signal to Terra."
Yev looked around as he noticed that there were many crates of equipment before finally he saw one of their attackers. The dome wasn't even watching them, instead communicating to someone behind him. When that figure stepped into view Yev quailed at what he saw. It stood tall, multiple arms emerged from its back and tentacled limbs writhed like medusas hair as it signalled several other, more human, types.
The monstrous one stood at the centre of them all and looked them over one at a time. "For your crimes against the technology of the Lathe Nation, ComStar has been found guilty of crimes against the Lathe Nation itself in a manner we consider to be sufficient for a declaration of war. As servants of the enemy you have been chosen to deliver a message from Kane."
The Precentor looked relieved. "You would be foolish to do this. Our power is..."
"Over. You see Precentor Danielle, we don't require your co-operation to deliver our message. You and those here with you will be that message." Other figures stepped forwards and Yev began to scream as they began to sever her extremities, she screamed in agony as clear tubes pumped fluids into her body. Clicking machines peeled back her flesh to the elbows, the process was even more horrifying as Yev watched them layer other material and technology into the damage and he realised that she was being forcibly implanted with some sort of horrifying technology.
Weapons were brought out of caskets and bound to her flesh, powerful bolt drivers bolted them to her bone as she screamed, the artificial arms only the beginning of the troupe of horrors, the seat snapped back and Yev whimpered as machines went to work on her head, shaving it down and carving through her flesh and bone. He realised then that they were all in various ways screaming, whimpering or begging as they watched in nightmarish compulsion as the cybernetic men pried the top of her skull off and discarded it before working and implanting devices into her brain.
The Preceptor had stopped screaming as her eyes were plucked out with barbed stabbing needles and artificial inhuman replacements were installed in their place. It was all too clear that there were no anaesthetics or other numbing agents as her body continued to whimper as they implanted all manner of parts into her body.
Were they to witness all this as a warning not to ang....
Yev never even completed the thought as he saw the robed figures that had started on the Preceptor move onto the next person in line, a somewhat gloomy man from supply that he'd sneaked some time in the broomcloset with once a week. Even as his boyfriend began screaming as they exised his hands at the wrist Yev could not spare any time for him as his mind screamed out the truth.
They were all being turned into... that