“Interrogator, Mech-Wright; find some cover and open fire. Epistolary, with me. We’re killing this thing.”

The Boom Boom of a combat shotgun double-tapping a target echoes down the hallway. You know from the painful experience of watching scouts under your command die that even Astartes combat shotguns will do little or nothing against the thick, chitin-crusted hide of a Hive Tyrant.

“Scout N’vier to all Astartes on this net. Ammunition black, requesting support.”

“Hunter to N’vier, fall back on my signal if you can.”

“Hunter, N’vier, unable to comply. Obstructed by the foe.”

“Understood N’vier. We’ll come to you.”

You race down the corridor, Tayib close at your heels. A buzzing steam of living ammunition screams past you. A female scream rings in your ears, but you don’t have time to process it now. You round the jagged corner where a tear in the passageway leads into the shell feed. Intended to supply munitions to the ships macro cannons, the floor is covered in rails and the high vaulted ceiling is draped in chains.

The massive Hive Tyrant dominates the space, hunched forwards to duck under the chains with boneswords spread wide for balance and two freshly-fired devourers drip slime. You could swear the thing is smirking at you, but the chitin and fangs of its jaw make that impossible.

You bring up your Stalker Bolter, flick the pinky switch to select your limited supply of hellfire bolts, take a second to aim, and pull the trigger.

Single aimed shot from Stalker Bolter (magazine #3 - Hellfire Bolts): +0% to hit. Range is short: +10 to hit. Target is Size: Massive: +30% to hit. Accurate weapon: +10% to hit. Red dot sight, firing only one shot: +10% to hit. Magazine is now at 23/24 rounds.

Fire at Hive Tyrant: Success! needed <113, got 80.

Accurate basic weapon firing a single shot succeeded by >20%: +1d10 damage delt.

Damage inflicted: 3d10+5 explosive. Result: 30.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 3d10+5 damage. Result: 54 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 3d10+5 damage. Result: 73 total damage.

The bolt strikes the Hive Tyrant on the hard ridge of chitin just above its eyes. With a normal bolt it would have detonated to minimal effect. With the mutagenic acid core of a Hellfire bolt the impact is significantly more effective. The Hive trant jerks it head, spraying the walls with a bubbleling mess of melted chitin. Its beady eyes lock onto you as the single most deadly threat it now faces.

“That’s right you abomination, I am your DOOM!”

Tayb grunts in exertion over the vox, “N’vier, Seeker. Catch!” Interrogator MacWater’s bolt pistols tumble past you and slide behind a pile of fallen chains. His own bolt pistol cracks on rapid fire, targeting the same wound you already inflicted. The Hive tyrant flinches, but doesn’t go down.

You expect some sort of supporting fire, but all you can hear from ZTO are whimpered blurts of binaric cant. Some sort of prayer you guess, as you have no real idea what it is actually saying, having no understanding of that language yourself.

Scout N’vier scrabmbles out from behind the pile of chains, grabs up to bolt pistols, and dives back into cover. “Seeker, N’vier. My thanks.”

The hive Tyrant opens its jaws and you can feel unnatural energies begin to pull and spiral in the air about you. Tayib Raises his empty hand and grasps at something insubstantial. “I Deny your Power, Abomination!” Despite his bold words, whatever warp energy he is attempting to chanel recoils against him. His head is wreathed in sparks and he shakes for a moment. The Hive Tyrant’s jaws glow with a bile-green light, but whatever psychic power it is attempting to manifest goes awry. The bile-light flickers out, and a fell wind sweeps over you. The image of a lance of that light bisecting your dying body flickers through your mind for a brief moment, but it passes as the breeze fades. The Hive Tyrant snaps its jaws shut and shakes it head, then levels its Devourers at you and pulls their bioelectric triggers.

Dodge incoming fire: +0%. Success! Needed <44, got 17. Avoided three incoming projectiles.

Combat Damage: multiple hits by Tyranid Devourers firing Brain-Leech Slugs! 10d10+30 (rending) Damage.

Randomised hit location: Right Leg. Incoming damage: 99.

Damage reduction for Armor (7 armor - 0 penetration): 7. Damage reduction for Toughness: 10.

Total damage taken: 82. Armor Breached! It is no longer atmospherically sealed!

0 Health remaining. Right Leg Armor Destroyed.

Critical Damage would result in Death - 1 Fate Point burned to avoid death. 1 Fate Point remaining.

Critical Damage: Right Leg 8.

You throw yourself to the left in an attempt to avoid the worst of the incoming storm of buzzing organic ammunition. Your efforts are partially successful, taking your torso and head out of the line of fire. Your right leg lags behind you, hovering in the air for a brief moment. That moment is all it takes for dozens of slugs to splatter across your armor, and for five to tear right through the gaps at your knee. Your lower right leg comes off in a bloody chunk, promptly chewed beyond recognition by the dying Devourer ammunition.

Gritting your teeth at the pain shock you force yourself to one knee. Balancing on the stump of your right leg you bring your Stalker pattern bolter to bear on the Hive Tyrant. Taking a moment to aim, you pull the trigger.

Single aimed shot from Stalker Bolter (magazine #3 - Hellfire Bolts): +0% to hit. Range is short: +10 to hit. Target is Size: Massive: +30% to hit. Accurate weapon: +10% to hit. Red dot sight, firing only one shot: +10% to hit. Magazine is now at 22/24 rounds.

Fire at Hive Tyrant: Success! needed <113, got 03.

Accurate basic weapon firing a single shot succeeded by >40%: +2d10 damage dealt.

Damage inflicted: 4d10+5 explosive. Result: 30.

Spoiler: Holy Crits Hunter!

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 64 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 104 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 138 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 178 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 214 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 243 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 278 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 308 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 340 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 380 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 416 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 454 total damage.

Critical Hit! One damage die rolled a 9 or 10: inflict a further 4d10+5 damage. Result: 486 total damage.

Your shot impacts on the fleshy barrel of the Hive Tyrant’s right-hand devourer and detonates inside the weapon. The mutagenic acid stars melting and necrotising the weapon itself, the Brain Slugs go berserk looking for a new home as their old one dies around them. Some chose to leap to the thorax of the Hive Tyrant, carrying mutagenic acid when them. As they burrow between plates of chitin, they carry that same acid deep into the internal organs of the beast. The Hive Tyrant goes into spasms. Wracked by pain both from the Brain Slugs eating any tissue that they can find and the mutagenic acid melting internal organs with wild abandon, it collapses to the deck of the shell feed in an ungainly heap.

“Hunter, N’vier. It’s dead then?”

“N’vier, Hunter. It is for now.”

“Hunter, N’Vier. Do they not stay dead?”

You pull the plasma grenades from your belt and eye the corpse. “N’vier, Hunter. The only other Hive Tyrant encountered on this hulk was caught in the blast of a self-destructing cruiser and likely heavily injured. If this is the same organism, and it seems that it is, then it has impressive powers of regeneration to come back from such damage.”

“Hunter, Seeker. Or it was brought back. This thing stinks of the Fly Lord.”

“Sekker, Hunter. Would plasma work, or should we call upon your powers?”

“Seeker, Hunter. Plasma would be best. I did not fare as well as I would have liked in a psychic duel with the thing while it was alive.”

“N’Vier, Hunter. Check on the Mech-Wright please. Seeker, plasma charges are with me. Lingering burn, so try to avoid dropping the corpse through the deck. I need to find a crutch.”

You get your first good look at the scout as he walks past you. The form fitting carapace armor over a black undersuit is familiar from your long service as a scout sergeant, as is the magazine fed semi-automatic combat shotgun slung over the scout’s shoulder. The green-splashed camouflage and the gold accents are unfamiliar to your eyes, more used to the blue of Ultramarines and the mottled camo-nets used by scouts. The cave-black skin and red eyes on N’vier’s unhelmeted head are unmistakable markers of the Salamanders Space Marine Chapter.

You pull yourself to your foot against the twisted rubble where you entered the shell feed, and cast about for a likely piece of pipe or girder to use as a crutch. Eventually you settle on a split-ended piece of pipe, into which you wedge a section of girder to form a shoulder support. You tie and wrap the shoulder rest with scraps of cable, trusting in the sturdiness of your Power Armor to deal with any scratches or rough edges.

The Fwoomp of the first plasma grenade prompts you to turn around and hobble back to look at the corpse. The glowing orbs of plasma flicker and flash, atomising the Hive Tyrant corpse in neat one meter radius spheres. The body is too large to be completely atomized, particularly as Tayib is taking care not to touch it wherever possible, forgoing stacking up severed pieces for destruction. After the sixth plasma grenade detonation finally fades, you become aware of N’vier and ZTO standing next to you.

“The Interrogator?”

“Beyond any aid sir. Torso torn in half, major organs destroyed. I recovered what ammunition she had, along with her holsters.”

“Good work scout. We’ll make those bolts count.”

“We’re pressing on with your mission sir?”

“Seeker?”

“Hive Tyrant confirmed as tainted by the Warp. Unusual for Tyranids, but not unheard of in the archives. If the Blighted Heart has managed to ensare such a beast, then it must be destroyed before it can escape the Capitalis Congestus.”

“You speak of the Heart as if it were a thing.”

“With the nearly non-existent information available to me, it may well be a thing, a place, or even a being. Its existence is no longer in doubt however.”

You open your mouth to respond, but stop as the hulk shudders violently. The shaking goes on for several minutes, and you pick out several after-shocks making their way through the deckplates. Several ships either just exploded or were wrenched from the hulk in rapid succession. Tayib clutched his brow, shaking his head.”

“Seeker, report.”

“Psychic aftershocks accompanying the physical ones. Eldar in origin. Ships wrenched from claws of iron, shattered sails on solar winds.”

“Meaning?”

“If I had to guess Hunter, I would say that almost every eldar ship in the Capitalis Congestus was either torn from the hulk, detonated, or mangled beyond all salvaging.”

You look at N’vier, “which means our extraction route was just severed. We press on with the mission.”

N’vier looks up at you, the top of his head coming to your chin thanks to your Power Armor. “Objective?”

“Get Seeker and his payload to the Blighted Heart, whatever it is, and destroy it.”

Mission 5 Actual: Glass Line Shattered Chalice

Type: Recon Search and Destroy

Primary Objective: Circumnavigate the destroyed section of the Hulk

Primary Objective: Escort Epistolary Tayib to the Blighted Heart

Primary Objective: Destroy the Blighted Heart by any means at your

disposal.

Secondary Objective: Survive!

Tertiary Objective: Eliminate all targets of opportunity encountered.

Personal (Bonus) Objective: Hunter - Eliminate all foes of Elite or Master rank.