Dedaleus’ Labyrinth

As Lord Carl Walsh returned from a partially successful campaign near the Sanctus system, he was alerted by a crew member of an all too familiar call sign on the radar.

"Ah, ha! There you are," exclaimed Lord Walsh seeing a familiar number on the radar. Their old ship, the one that was stolen, was sending out a signal. "Alright, boys! Let's go get what is ours. Set a course for Kevillon. We will take back our ship and set a world on fire!" Lord Walsh laughed with anticipation. "With any luck, someone will be looking for a fight."

The men prepared for battle as they travelled through the warp at impressive speeds to reach their destination. Commander Robert McGee reflected upon why Pallas expedited their way through the warp.

"She wants something, doesn't she?" asked McGee.

"Likely. That sorcerer always wants something. Maybe there is some jewel she likes or a new brand of Champagne on that planet. Who knows? It is more than likely that she wants us to turn the people of that planet to her side and use them as soldiers. We'll know soon enough. I'd prefer to burn that world down, but whatever the Lady wants, the Lady gets."

The door to the control room slid open. Walsh rolled his eyes in annoyance. The sound of high heel shoes hitting the cold metal floor echoed in the near silence of the room. Walsh and McGee turned to greet the newcomer.

"That is correct. I get what I want, and what I want is..." Pallas inhaled deeply and shivered. "Do you feel that? Can you hear them? I miss them so. The power and their screams of agony. Walsh, you will get my cloak back, and you, McGee, you can pick up your ship. I also need someone to stay behind. I have a plan. Call your best Seeker!" Pallas exclaimed.

"Yes, my Lady," McGee answered quickly and bowed. "Whatever pleases our Lady," answered Walsh, refusing to bow down to the spoiled brat.

Pallas smiled and turned back to leave. As she turned, she flicked her wrist elegantly, and Walsh folded in half in pain. Then, Pallas spoke angrily without turning.

"BOW TO YOUR LADY, INSOLENT! Next time, I will not be so lenient!"

Walsh righted himself as soon as Pallas left the room and grumbled under his breath.

"Alright! What are you waiting for! Let's go!"

The Verum Illuminate prepared for the landing. Lord Walsh chose their best psyker grudgingly, sending him to Pallas' quarter. He would receive a briefing on his secret mission. Walsh was angry. He wanted that mission. How would Walsh ever be recognised by the God of Change if no one allowed him to do anything significant? He would take the gene-seed back, but that was not nearly enough for Tzeentch to bat an eye. Taking back his own ship and getting the spoiled brat her freakish cloak back? Nothing!

The Echo and Foxtrot squad approached the grandiose Fortress- Monastery when they arrived. The Marines from the Delta squad were sent up the stairs first. This planet was much nicer than their own homeworld. Stygian was falling apart. Desert everywhere you looked were ruins instead of a grandiose fortress-monastery. The loyalists had ruined everything. Why could they not just fall into the mould?

"Alright, we are going in and out. We are getting the cloak and the ship and leaving. Destroy anyone who gets in your way. It is time to disappear. ECHO! Verum Videre!"

The Marines repeated their war cry in unison. Half of them headed to the shipyard with Commander McGee while the other half would join Lord Walsh in the quest for the cloak and the gene-seed. Lord Walsh's team walked boldly to the fortress-monastery, up the steps, knowing they were unseen and confident they would locate and take back the cloak. Walsh could feel the hair on the back of his neck standing on end. He always felt disturbed in the cloak's presence.
Commander McGee marched to the ship with the same confidence as Lord Walsh's team.

McGee wondered how it had gotten here, on Kevillon? Why would Alessander Vek and Somek come here, this close to Sanctus? They would be killed for just being members of the Renegade Chapter. It did not make sense. Oh, well, they are dead, he thought to himself. The Red Crusaders would never let them live. He stepped aboard with a techmarine and a navigator, the rest of the squad waiting outside. The ship was in working order, and the usual prayers soothed the spirits as the board lit up.

"Ah, I've missed you," said Commander McGee to the ship. "Alright then, let's get the ship into space and see what progress Lord Walsh has made."

The ship did not protest as it left the surface of Kevillon. Instead, McGee radioed the main Spacecraft to inform them that the mission had gone without a hitch. He also asked if Lord Walsh had returned. Commander McGee would have been happy to help Lord Walsh with his quest. The recognition would do him some good.

There had been no communications from Lord Walsh. He liked to do his own thing and was rarely unsuccessful. Commander McGee was only mildly concerned, although they were bound to need more time to find the cloak. McGee was staring at the pretty planet below, wondering what it was that Pallas could possibly want. Maybe there was another sorcerer. He started feeling jealous when he heard her footfalls behind him. He turned quickly and bowed.

"My Lady, you have special orders?"

"Yes, my dear Commander. You know you are my favourite, don't you?"

The corner of his lips turned up in a small, fleeting smile as he answered.

"That is quite the compliment, my Lady. What can I do for you?"
Pallas waved a hand at the planet below.

"I am tired of this perfect planet. I wish to return to Stygian. Take me back."

"Yes, my Lady. Set a course for Stygian," he ordered the navigator, and with that, they were gone.

On the planet, Lord Walsh and his small company started up the steps of a Fortress Monastery. The steps leading to the front entrance were made of white marble. The Fortress itself was large and had clean lines. The architecture was ancient. Reminiscent of an old Terra era called ancient Rome. The Fortress-Monastery looked and sounded empty, but the Verum Illuminate Seeker made sure to keep their approach hidden from all eyes and ears. He informed Lord Walsh quietly that there were souls inside the Fortress. Once they arrived at the courtyard, they saw an impressive golden statue wielding his mighty sword. Lord Walsh's eyes were riveted on that statue. It felt like the Emperor was watching him, judging him.

When they entered the Fortress, they noted the oddly shaped corridor made of marble, the roof held up by columns. The halls were lined with statues. Lord Walsh asked his Seeker which way to go for the vaults. The Marine told him he was uncertain, but he had a sense of chaos on the left. As they started down the oddly shaped hall, the silence continued to weigh on them. Their footfalls seemed to echo so loudly, but nothing else could be heard. The halls were lined with life-size statues, dressed in bronze power armour, red robes and red accents, like the depicted Marines.

The Verum Illuminate had never seen the icon of this Chapter of Space Marines. Seeing the faceplates of bronze, moulded to look like the Marines who once served the Emperor, was impressive and even a little disturbing. He studied some of the statues. This was when he realised that they all had different faceplates that seemed to be moulded to the face of a revered Space Marine. Lord Walsh had to admit that this place's aesthetics was absolutely magnificent. As they continued walking down the hall, a marine of the Verum Illuminate whispered:

"Doesn't that one look like Vek?"

Walsh's head spun so fast, he stared at the statue. It had to be a coincidence? Vek was dead. There was no way the Red Crusaders would let them live. They were do-gooders, straight arrows. He looked away and continued up the step. Another Marine, on the other side, commented on another statue.

"This one looks just like Somek." He gave a nervous laugh. This time, the Marine did not bother to whisper. The place was deserted; he felt no need to whisper. Lord Walsh did not like this at all, but he had a mission, and he needed to get that cloak, no matter what. The air seemed to fill with tension. He imagined things, he thought, or maybe not. The Seekers from the Verum Illuminate grabbed their heads and screamed. Something seemed to be wrong with his psykers. This was not good. The rest of the company turned to look for a threat, weapons drawn and ready. That is when Lord Walsh heard it.
The screams of hundreds of people filled his head. It was an almost unbearable war cry, but there was no attack. Some of the Verum Illuminate Marines dropped their weapons, but the Delta squad held fast. Every other realistically crafted statue had been a real Marine, guarding the Fortress Monastery.

The swiftness of the movements and rage-fueled attack by the living statues on the unsuspecting Verum Illuminate made Lord Walsh's team slow to react and put them at a disadvantage. The resounding screams of anger from the Guardians lining the hall, disabling the intruders, flooded them with a sense of terror. The Chaos Marines were stunned into inaction, and their hands instinctively went to their ears in a protective reaction.

Walsh tried to understand how this could happen. He then realised that the shape and the size of the halls were made to intensify the sounds of the warriors' cry. They had been ambushed by architecture and statues.

He could feel it. He hadn't felt anything quite like it in more than a hundred years. He could never forget it; the memory associated with this feeling made it hard to be still. Silently, he warned the others. They were coming. The ones from the Traitor scroll. They were unseen, but they were there. Their seekers, masking their presence. He tried to contain his rage, he wanted to scream out, but they were not in position. Then, there...a whisper, one of them recognised Vek. He smiled in his bronze mask, but he did not move. Just a little bit further. He waited until, right in front of him, he heard a traitor say: "This one looks just like Somek."

Roman Somek screamed in with all his psychic might, incapacitating the Verum Illuminate, causing the illusion to fail. He maintained the psychic scream as he reached out and grabbed the now visible intruder by the neck. Somek lifted the chaos marine off the floor, impaling him onto the sword that the statue across the hall was holding. The other guardians screamed as loud as possible, their screams filled with rage and hatred. The Guardians attacked the group of traitor marines. Finally, Somek's anger could be expressed, and this time, they were ready. They would win against their traitor founding chapter.

In his office, up a few floors from the entrance of the Fortress-Monastery, Chapter Master Marcellus Tacitus was discussing a mission with the Legatus Legionus of the third company. Then, abruptly, he stopped talking, and his face contorted in anger. He told his Commander to send all available Marines to the main hall of the Pantheon and to have the ship sweep for any enemy ship. The Verum Illuminate were here. Tacitus would be granted his revenge.
He grabbed his golden mask off his desk and ran as fast as he could down the hall. Down the stairs at an incredible speed. Too slow, he thought. He ran to a room and broke a window. He pulled himself onto the ledge and went through the window, his jet pack slowing his descent. Instead of being excited, as he thought he would be, he was enraged. When he arrived in the hall, his power sword was immediately set to work against those hateful traitors.

No, no, no! This was not right. This was not the plan. In and out, no one even knows we were even there. Lord Walsh realised that they were at a disadvantage. These marines had the same training as they did. They had Seekers and, they had their gene-seed. He had just successfully stolen the gene-seed of the Champions of Mortis not 50 years ago, and here lies his own gene-seed. So he made a quick decision. He informed the two seekers of his plan. One was to go with him and the other, return to the ship where he would be safe.

They would get their gene-seed back and Pallas' stupid, freaky cloak. He and his escort disappeared from sight. They ran through the battle, avoiding power swords and other weapons as they went until they came to a halt in front of a large arch. They leaned against the wall as over fifty Marines rushed past. Lord Walsh shook his head more out of disappointment than sadness. He knew his men would all be lost. Walsh could not turn around and run. He had to get what was theirs and Pallas' precious fashion faux-pas.

The last Marine in the procession, a Librarian, stopped in the archway. Lord Walsh gathered his thoughts and projected a feeling of both anger and excitement. He tried mimicking what the marines from the loyalist chapter were thinking and feeling to better hide from the Librarian. It would be the only way for them to not be caught. The Librarian continued, and Lord Walsh and his Seeker continued down a long hall. They turned to a large wooden door that looked out of place in this whitewashed marble fortress. The Seeker motioned to Lord Walsh that their scroll was somewhere behind that door. As more Bronze Guardians rushed by, they stayed close to the wall. When the Fortress Monastery fell quiet except for the sound of distant fighting, Lord Walsh opened the door. What he saw was curious.

There was a large tunnel leading down. It was lit by glass sconces which gave off yellow light. Lord Walsh knew immediately that this tunnel led to the vaults where he would find and take back his. Confident in his ability to discover the gene-seed and the cloak, Lord Carl Walsh sent his Seeker back to the ship with an order to wait for him before they should leave. He could feel the magical pull of the cloak. It was a mix of...miserable and powerful at the same time.

He started down the tunnel. The walls were rounded until the tunnel branched out in three different directions. A curious-looking square about 2 feet by 2 feet was built into the wall. A dark screen was displayed above it, but there were no prompts. He could feel the pull of the cloak down the right corridor. He pressed some buttons on instinct, hoping the screen would come on, but it did not. He could hear the sound of the machine humming, but nothing happened. He chose to ignore it and walked down the left corridor, wondering when to encounter guards.

There were no doors or any kind of decorations. This was the oddest underground vault Lord Walsh had ever seen. The walls were smooth and white, with light flickering from sconces. The floors were slick and shiny. They twisted and turned, moving slowly but steadily lower into the mountain where the Fortress-Monastery was built. He followed his instincts, but his instincts told him to go right. There was no door to the right. He felt the walls to perhaps find something to push to open an unseen door. He fiddled with a wall sconce to no avail.

Frustrated, he turned around and noticed a passageway to the left, or he could keep going right. Confused and having to turn his back on his instincts, he thought that the left passage may circle around to where he wanted to go, so he started down that hall. Suddenly, he realised that the hallway was, in fact, turning to head the correct way, but he did not notice that there was a slight incline. As he trudged on, he found another fork in the tunnel. Again, he followed his instincts and stepped into the brighter tunnel. After a few steps, he heard a click under his boots. It was so loud that he was surprised by the sound. He drew his weapon, expecting an attack, but nothing happened.

After a few more steps, Lord Walsh realised that he was putting in a little more effort than before. Soon he noticed the incline. What went unnoticed was how sticky the floors had become. After a few more seconds, he realised that his boots had sunk into the floor. He had tripped a trap. He started to turn to go back the way he had come when he stopped and heard a familiar chant. Lord Walsh cursed quietly under his breath, but the time it had taken him to listen and recognise the chant had been enough to create a more immediate problem. His boots were now completely stuck on the floor, and the floor had hardened. This was not a problem that would take very long to solve, but he knew that he now had a time limit before real trouble came.

In the hall of statues, the Bronze Guardians fought the traitors with one goal in mind. Destroy those that had made them flee their planet and turn their backs on the Golden Throne. These heretics must all be purged. The battle was fierce, but the Verum Illuminate were outnumbered and no match for the Bronze Guardians.

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Chapter Master Tacitus ripped through the enemy as he walked calmly in the centre of the hallway. He raised his power sword and brought it down in an arc even though no one had attacked him. He met with resistance and heard the screech of his sword hitting power armour.

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As he pulled his power sword back, he thrust it into the traitor Marines chest, the light of his lenses flashing off. This could have been him. He could have been a traitor, purged by loyalist marines. Fortunately, he had discovered the truth in his first days as a Seeker. He had felt the power of chaos in that underground vault emanating from the scroll. He had understood immediately that it had been corrupted, that the higher-ranking members of the Verum Illuminate were traitors, tainted by the God of change. If it hadn't been for his curiosity and his gift of chaos sense, they would all be turned, and the Bronze Guardians would have never come to be.

The fight did not last very long. Finally, all the traitor invaders were purged. Chapter Master Tacitus felt avenged until Roman Somek informed him that the labyrinth had been breached. Tacitus smiled.
"Our old friend, Ikarus, will gladly dispose of him."
Tacitus expected reinforcements to come, but they did not. He thought it odd, so they would go to the Verum Illuminate. This was their chance to purge them from existence. He sent some marines to the maze as a precaution. A small team of Space Marines prepared to take the fight to space. He called to the ship he had sent on orbit.

"Report?"

"They are gone," answered the voice on the vox.

"What do you mean gone? They ran?"

"Yes, sir. Not before we caused them some damage. They just left mid-battle. We kept firing, but they did not return fire."

Chapter Master Tacitus thought about this new piece of information.

"Go to Stygian. We will bring the fight to them. I will send reinforcements on Aegis."

As the clean up of the hall of statues began, the Chapter Master was informed that the underground labyrinth had been breached. A smile momentarily appeared on his lips and disappeared just as fast. He made his way to the entrance of the maze to guard the exit. He wanted to be there to confirm the kill, and he also wanted to know who had gotten past them.

In the labyrinth, Lord Walsh looked at his sunken boots in annoyance. He planted his power sword into the now, solid floor. The Commander used the sword to carve around his boots, attempting to free himself with his sword. He began hearing a very troubling sound as the floor and walls started shaking. Lord Walsh worked faster to free himself soon. Finally, he was able to free his boots from the floor. He turned to face the tunnel on the right, as the noise was coming from that way. A loud electronic sound came from that path, and around a corner, about 40 feet away, the tunnel was aflame. Behind the flames was a Dreadnought holding a large axe. Lord Walsh swore under his breath and looked around for the best place to make a stand. He ran back the way he came to an intersection where three different tunnels connect together.

If he could make it around the corner, he would have the element of surprise on his side. As he rounded the corner, the sound of the roar of the dreadnought was deafening. The architecture of the tunnels allows the sound to travel. The booming of every step of the foe made the whole labyrinth shake under its weight. Unfortunately for Lord Walsh, the noise the dreadnought makes masks the sound of walls falling into place through the labyrinth, ready to trap the intruder and force him to face Ikarus.

Lord Walsh jumped out and immediately attacked the dreadnought. He was met with a wall of flame, but it did not stop Lord Walsh. He slammed his power sword into the enemy, causing very little damage. He tried to step away from the axe that came toward him, but it swept him off his feet, and he hit the wall behind him. He lumbered to his feet using a wall for support and realised that there used to not be a wall there. Walsh realised he was boxed in with the dread. There were only two ways out, through the dreadnought or through the walls. He chose to stand his ground. He wanted his geneseed back...if he could get at least that, he would consider it a victory for the Verum Illuminate.

The Argo and Aegis approached Stygian just in time to see the planet being slowly pulled into the warp. Hopefully, this would mean the end of the Verum Illuminate. They stayed in place, far enough away to not be seen or appear on radar and watched until the planet had vanished. The Bronze Guardians reported to Chapter Master Tacitus of the unexpected turn of events. Tacitus recalled the Aegis, which would require minor repairs and ordered the Argo to stay and patrol for any stragglers.

Marcellus Tacitus stood in front of the entrance and listened and waited. The traitors in the hall of statues were being disposed of in silence. A feeling of satisfaction came over him. Finally, they got what they deserved, a victory against the Verum Illuminate. Behind him, he heard the unmistakable cry from his brother Ikarus. His lips turned up into a small smile. He wondered what the traitor would choose to do, stand and fight or run like a coward only to be stuck between Ikarus and himself at the bitter end. The screams stopped, and so did the massive footsteps. He waited a little more. Ah, the traitor decided to stand and fight. The sounds of battle in the labyrinth began. Ikarus hadn't been awake for a very long time. The dreadnought was taking his time destroying Lord Walsh. Cries of pain were heard all the way to the entrance. The light beside the door was still flashing, even after the last cry was cut short. Finally, the light by the door stopped flashing.

Chapter Master Tacitus opened the door and stepped into the labyrinth. He untied the knot from his robes and placed the rope on the correct peg. The tunnels to reorganise themselves. Tacitus unhooked his rope and walked until the next set of pegs and repeated the procedure three times until the tunnel opened up on a dismembered traitor Marine, laying in a pool of blood. Tacitus spoke to the dreadnought.

"Thank you, brother Ikarus. Your work here is greatly appreciated. Your labyrinth worked perfectly, as planned."

An electronic voice answered." I did tell you this would work. Have I been asleep for long?"

"Only two centuries."

"Then, if I am not needed at the moment, I would return to rest."

"Very well, old friend."

The dreadnought turned away and made his way back to his resting place at the centre of the maze.