At first, the true nature of the intrusion eluded him. But soon, Vashtorr the Arkifane sensed a grotesque warp signature manifesting within his inner sanctum—a jagged scar signifying a violent breach of the Immaterium. He looked upon the remains of his fallen Soul Grinders; their mechanical husks were not sundered by the physical bite of power swords or phase blades. Instead, they bore the mark of a foul, transformative corruption.
The warp-forged daemonic metal, birthed in the heat of the Forge of Souls, had become as brittle and porous as seafoam wherever it had been touched.
In all the galaxy, Vashtorr knew of only one source for such a thing: the warpstone of the upright vermin. Even within the shifting tides of the Warp, the Arkifane could find no record in any timeline of a substance possessing such a concentrated, solidified essence of pure Chaos. While the psychic energies of the Empyrean are fundamentally spiritual, manifesting in infinite phantasms, they almost never coalesce into a naturally occurring solid state—save for this.
"Where are those vermin?!"
Vashtorr roared in blind fury, the mass of iron, brass, and cables that formed his body lashing out like living serpents, vibrating with the wrath of a demigod of the Warp.
He did not have to wait long. Once the Skaven achieve their ends, they are not a race prone to the dignity of silence.
"K-aaah... Dark Omnissiah save us... the pelted Xenos... they are overrunning us!"
Reports from the Dark Mechanicum began to chime like a relentless rain of static. Vashtorr forcibly slaved his consciousness to the visual feed of a nearby Magos. Through the tech-priest's augmented lenses, he witnessed a deluge of warp-green tracer fire slamming into the Dark Mechanicum's defensive lines.
The battlefield was a graveyard of scorched iron. Amidst the ruins, an ocean of Skaven surged forward, their vermillion eyes glowing with a manic, terrifying light as they screeched in high-pitched unison.
They moved in a choking tide—shoulder to shoulder, mangy brownish fur and skeletal frames pressed tight. They brandished rusted short-swords and daggers, more for ritual bravado than true lethality, while their other paws gripped warp-pistols—crude, revolver-like mechanisms that spat crackling green bolts into the fray.
These lowly Slave Rats carried weapons of the simplest construction, rarely possessing more than a dozen rounds. In the brutal calculus of the Under-Empire, a slave rat's life expectancy seldom lasted long enough to see an empty cylinder, let alone for them to complain about a lack of ammunition.
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM!
The horrific war engines of the Dark Mechanicum fought back. The heavy lascannons of Onager Dunecrawlers vaporized dozens of slaves in a single beam. Kataphron Breachers fired gravity cannons, collapsing the bodies of a score of ratmen into dense, bloody spheres of crushed meat.
Yet, the carnage did nothing to stem the tide. The Skaven continued to pour from every conceivable fissure, tunnel, and sewer pipe, accompanied by swarms of Giant Rats the size of hounds. Even the galvanic rifles of the Dark Skitarii, capable of detonating an enemy's potential energy to incinerate them from within, were rendered useless by the sheer mathematics of the horde. There were more Skaven than there were bullets in the armory.
Meanwhile, the Dark Angels, currently embroiled in their own assault, watched the unfolding chaos with grim confusion. Though they saw the loathsome Xenos tearing into the Dark Mechanicum, the Unforgiven had no intention of forming an alliance. They unleashed their fury with cold impartiality, pouring bolter fire into traitor and alien alike.
Thus, in the Idolatros System, a three-way slaughter erupted between the Dark Angels, the Dark Mechanicum, and the Skaven.
Lion El'Jonson, the newly returned Primarch, stood amidst his Inner Circle Companions, veterans of the Long War, observing the most violent sector of the Wyrmwood battlefield.
"What are these creatures?" the Lion demanded, his voice like grinding stones. "Why was I not briefed on this Xenos threat?"
Faced with the Primarch's interrogation, Supreme Grand Master Azrael and Chief Librarian Ezekiel could only lower their heads in grim silence. They had never encountered the Skaven before.
Acting with characteristic Astartes efficiency, several Dark Angels ignited their jump packs, plunging into the swarm to seize several Skaven alive. With brutal strength, they tore open the creatures' craniums and consumed the grey matter within. This was the function of the Omophagea, one of the nineteen gene-seed organs, designed to allow a Space Marine to absorb the memories and knowledge of his foe by devouring their brain.
Azrael waited for his battle-brothers to report.
Suddenly, the scouts, warriors usually defined by iron discipline, began to convulse. They let out a horrific, discordant shriek. "No—NO! Gene-father! I feel them… the vermin... the foul monsters are inside my mind!"
"Brother Grinco! What ails you?" Azrael and the others rushed to steady the thrashing Space Marines.
The struggle lasted only minutes before the scouts abruptly went still. When one spoke, his voice was calm, eerie, and possessed a mocking boldness as he stared directly into the eyes of Lion El'Jonson.
"Oh... foolish Primarch," the scout hissed. "You can never escape the stupidity of your kind. All vermin are my servants, and to devour the rat is the height of folly."
The Dark Angels instantly leveled their weapons, their paranoia spiking as a surge of Warp energy washed over them, so chaotic it threatened to unmoor even Ezekiel's seasoned mind.
The Lion's eyes narrowed. He recognized the signs: an unknown Warp entity had hijacked the minds of his sons. Curiosity flickered for a second, but it was instantly drowned by a tidal wave of righteous fury. Nothing, no god or daemon, would be permitted to humiliate his progeny.
With a blur of silver steel, the Lion's blade sang through the air, hewing the possessed scouts apart.
CRACK.
The power armor was cleaved in two, but it was not blood that spilled from the split husks. Instead, a deluge of screeching, biting rats erupted from within the Astartes' bodies, lunging at everything in sight. The Dark Angels acted instantly, grinding the vermin into the dirt beneath their armored boots like common insects.
"Yet another Great Enemy," the Lion said, his face a mask of cold stone, his eyes burning with icy resolve. "Slay them all. Purge the Xenos and the heretic alike. Leave nothing."
"By your will!"
The waves of Slave Rat fodder had served their purpose—they had spent the enemy's initial fury. Now, the main strength of Clan Skryre began to deploy.
Clanrats armed with warp-muskets took up positions in the trenches, trading shots with Skitarii and Astartes.
"Forward! Faster-quicker!"
Under the prodding of Warlock Engineers, the Skaven weapon teams moved up. Poisoned-Wind Mortars began their rhythmic thumping, two-man teams working in frantic unison to lob glass globes of lethal gas into the thick of the fight.
Then came the heavy ordnance. Ratling Guns, Warplock Jezzails, and Warpfire Throwers, some operated by Rat-startes in modified power frames, unleashed a storm of verdant destruction. The sheer volume of fire created a vacuum of death. Even Terminators and Dreadnoughts found, to their horror, that their vaunted ceramite plating could not withstand the corrosive, reality-tearing properties of warp-weaponry for more than a few heartbeats.
When Assault Intercessors used their mobility to crash into the Skaven gun lines, the ratmen did not hesitate. They turned their weapons upon their own positions, detonating their volatile fuel tanks to ensure the Space Marines died alongside them in a jade-colored inferno.
The battle for the Idolatros System had become a meat grinder, drawing every ounce of Vashtorr's strength and attention. For in the Great Game, the war in the Materium is always but a reflection of the war in the Heavens.
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