Authors Note: I almost had as much fun writing this fight scene as Attelus had fighting it XD
Attelus and Kalakor didn't bother with stealth or subtlety, and the Space Marine led the way as they stepped out of the corridor and onto the hangar's catwalk.
Instantly las and solid shots rained against Kalakor's power armour, and Kalakor raised his bolter and replied in kind.
Attelus slipped past Kalakor and, in a split second, took in his surroundings. The docking bay was now crawling with dozens of cultists and guardsmen. Two huge, hunched, horned daemons were amongst them, standing head and shoulders taller than any of the Resurrected.
Grinning, Attelus smashed aside a few shots and vaulted over the handrail. His sword sliced through one unlucky cultist from head to the groin as he was in mid-fall.
Attelus landed into a kneel then lunged across six metres to cut through the chest of a guardsman as he was raising his lasgun. The throne agent whipped out his foot in a hook kick which sent the corpse's upper half flying and spinning, then smashing into the skull of a charging cultist who collapsed and crashed into a guardsman beside him.
He laughed and dashed aside a withering hail of shots that followed him as he continued to sprint.
A cultist stepped into his path; a chainsword held ready. Attelus slid into a kneel, and the chainsword swing, which was meant to tear through his torso, passed over his head. Attelus gutted the cultist with a horizontal cut, darted onto the screaming cultist's flank, then onward, so the rounds raining in his wake tore the heretic to shreds.
He charged for the enemy flank, a Marangerian trooper roared at Attelus, stabbing with a bayonet. Attelus sidestepped, then bisected the Maragerian's skull with a downward, diagonal stroke.
A cultist let out an enraged screech and came at Attelus, but before Attelus could counter the cultist's stabbing combat blade, the bastard's head exploded in a haze of red and sent spinning back, the neck spewing out a thick tendril of blood.
Attelus back-pedalled a Velrosian sergeant's whirling chainsword, then his sword parried through a swinging lasgun. Attelus sent a side-kick that bashed in the last guardsman's face. Attelus' backswing then opened the sergeant's throat. He carried his slash into a 180-degree arc that sliced through the elbows of a cultist as he was in the midst of a wild overhead chop.
A thrusting bayonet made Attelus duck, then as the enemy guardsman was about to swing out the butt of his lasgun Attelus kicked him under the jaw with his boot knife; Attelus pulled his foot out and kicked the man back into his ally.
Attelus blocked a slashing axe, then weaved beneath another cutting chainsword. He then impaled the axe-wielding cultist through the skull, pulled out his blade, then sliced straight diagonally from the shoulder to hip of the guardswoman sergeant with the chainsword.
A split second later, one of the daemons burst through its Resurrected allies; it snarled and, with a sword as long as it was tall, smashed out a downward, diagonal strike. Attelus danced back of it, then ducked its huge reverse swing. The second daemon pushed past the first's left and swung down vertically. Attelus dashed out of its path, and the black, hazed with blood-red blade hit the deck with a deafening clang and smashed in some of the steel.
"Get out of the way," Kalakor said over the vox, and Attelus started darting toward the stairs.
Two frag grenades clanged at the daemons' clawed feet and exploded. It sent them and the six nearest Resurrected flying.
Attelus sprinted up the stairs while drawing his autopistol from its chest holster and stood beside Kalakor.
"You are a fool," said the Raven Guard as he fired bolter round after bolter into the enemy horde, which seemed to grow and grow. "Why did you abandon cover and an elevated position?"
Attelus took cover behind the marine and added his piddling fire to Kalakor's roaring deluge.
"Mostly out of fun," said Attelus. "And a little so I can be a distraction for you to be able to kill as many of the enemy as possible."
Kalakor sighed. "You aim for the mortals; I will take care of the Bloodletters."
"Bloodletters?" said Attelus while sending a cultist cracking, bouncing down the stairs with around to the chest. "Is that what they're called?"
With incredible speed, Kalakor ejected his empty clip and reloaded. "You are a part of the Inquisition, but you do not know what those daemons are named?"
Attelus shrugged as he darted back from a brief fusillade. "We're Ordo Hereticus; the daemonic isn't our speciality. I do know that they are in the service of the blood god, though."
"But you still ally with Xenos, despite the fact that you are not Ordo Xenos, but the alien is not your speciality, either."
Attelus said nothing, just cut down a guardsman as he was starting to advance up the stairs.
His vox bead beeped.
"We're about to enter the city," said Darrance. "Get ready for-"
"Yes, yes," said Attelus. "Evasive manoeuvres, we know."
"Hold on to me," said Kalakor as he magnetised his boots.
Attelus sheathed his sword, holstered his pistol then grabbed the Space Marine by his overly-large backpack.
The ship began to tilt right, and an idea hit Attelus, and he activated his vox bead.
"Darrance, keep the line open and tell us how you and when you are going to turn."
"What?... Oh yes, I see where you are going with this. I am about to turn hard to starboard."
Before Attelus could ask what the hell that meant, the ship whirled right, almost ninety degrees; Attelus cried out and only just managed to hook his hand around Kalakor before he was thrown against the wall. The Resurrected and the daemons weren't so lucky. Their crashes were almost deafening as they hit the wall, as were their pained cries.
Kalakor pumped bolt round after bolt round into the stunned, injured enemy ranks; even if he weren't shooting insanely powerful miniature missiles, each shot would've been a kill shot.
Attelus found purchase with his left hand, pulled himself behind Kalakor and drew his powersword with the right.
"I am going upward," said Darrance and a second after, the Guncutter straightened and started swinging up.
The Resurrected were thrown back against the airlock doors, but the daemons were ready. They'd already dug their huge claws into the bodywork, but that was what Attelus was counting on as he hurtled at one so fast that it had no time to react before Attelus' powersword sliced through the Bloodletter's chest. The daemon roared. Attelus forward momentum carried him onto the large airlock door, but he'd angled himself so he could roll into a kneel to negate the impact.
He ignored the pain which flared through his legs, stood and faced the huge cultist coming at him, his whirling chainsword smashing for Attelus' skull.
Attelus slipped aside the attack's path, but the cultist turned it into a horizontal cut. Attelus weaved beneath the attack; then, he heard the huge, clawed feet hitting the steel behind him.
He darted past the cultist and sliced his sword across his ribcage on the way. He drew his autopistol and put a point-blank round through the face of a guardsman while he was in the midst of raising his recently retrieved lasgun, then gutted a cultist with another bolt. Kalakor's bolter blasted, and Attelus glanced over his shoulder to see the daemon reeling and writhing beneath the deluge.
His senses sent him dashing left just out the way of a blurt of las. The last blast managed to nick his shoulder, making him reel and pain to flare down his arm, but his flak jacket protected him from the worst of it. With a backhanded throw and an enraged roar, he sent a knife into the eye socket of the guardswoman who'd shot it, sending her writhing and screaming in agony. Attelus dashed forward and put her out of her misery with a horizontal cut that sliced through her hips.
Attelus parried an incoming chain axe, then ducked a swinging las rifle butt. He sent the guardsman smashing against the wall with a sidekick and back-pedalled the cultist's back-swing.
His powersword was a blur as it deflected a few blasts of las-fire.
Then he flinched as another pair of huge, clawed feet smashing onto the door behind him.
Attelus glanced to see the two Bloodletters that towered over him. One of them still had a tear through its elongated torso.
"Fire in the hole," said Kalakor over the vox, and a grenade fell amongst the Resurrected advancing on Attelus. The explosion sent them screaming and writhing off their feet.
Attelus burst out in laughter and sidestepped the first daemon's downward diagonal cut, then darted back as it reversed it into an upward diagonal.
Attelus was still laughing; he imagined the daemons had the sneering face of his father.
"You are enjoying this far too much," said Kalakor as his bolter shots sent the daemon blanching away.
Attelus was in the midst of opening his mouth to retort, but Darrance's voice interrupted him.
"I am about to dive."
"Shit!" Attelus said through clenched teeth as he jumped over the daemon's blade as it arced for his legs.
Attelus heard the Resurrected being shot to shit by Kalakor behind him, and he hunched into a sigh; perhaps going down here wasn't a good idea.
Then the Guncutter began to drop into a dive. Attelus jumped just before it met the apex, so when it did, he was already diving toward Kalakor. It took him less than a second for him to sheath his sword, holster his pistol and grab Kalakor by the backpack and spun to face upward. The abrupt stop caused pain to burst up and down his arms, and he cried out.
Around the Resurrected rained in screams and flailing limbs.
Kalakor's barking bolter also made it rain blood as he exploded heads and torsos into chunks. There was so much blood it almost disturbingly reminded Attelus of the underhive of Omnartus all those years ago.
Attelus was forced to let go of one hand and hang aside a guardsman's falling corpse. The two Bloodletters claws had allowed them to keep from falling, and the entire time, they'd been moving into the middle of the door, directly overhead. Their snarling visages stared down at Kalakor as their long tongues flicked and writhed.
A shiver passed through Attelus as a realisation hit him.
"Kalakor, the daemons," he said.
"I know," said Kalakor. "I am going to de-magnetise, jump for the handrail on my count."
"I-"
One of the Bloodletters dropped.
"Now!" said Kalakor.
With a roar, Attelus flung himself off Kalakor and wrapped his fingers around the catwalk's handrail.
Kalakor leapt from the arc of the hurtling daemon's blade, and the crash of their collision with the wall was deafening.
The other Bloodletter let go and flew straight for Attelus.
"Shit, shit shit," cried Attelus and slid left.
The Bloodletter's weight buckled in the adamantium handrail, and it made Attelus' hands slip. With desperation fuelled strength, Attelus managed to keep hold by the tips of his fingers. It wasn't far to fall, but he could hear Kalakor's and the other Bloodletter's fight raging beneath his feet, and he sure as hell didn't want to drop into that.
The daemon turned to him and stabbed its sword for his face, Attelus clambered leftward, and it whistled past him by a hair's breadth.
With a cry, he threw himself up and perched onto the handrail.
He drew his sword and activated its powerfield.
The daemon let what may have been a laugh and swung for his chest. Attelus slipped back from it and cursed; the Bloodletter was a good two metres tall, its reach with its sword almost double that, he had no way to get in close enough to use his sword effectively.
The daemon cut out a large horizontal blow that Attelus just managed to duck; then, he was forced to jump over the reverse swing aimed for his legs. Attelus clenched his teeth and leapt onto the top of the catwalk, and the daemon was a split second behind him.
He stumbled back from another whistling slash, well aware of how he was getting closer and closer to the wall. He parried a thrust and almost made him lose his sword in the process. It then whirled out an upward diagonal cut which he knelt beneath. It stabbed again, and he hurtled himself back so far his back hit the wall.
He stared at the daemon, eyes wide.
It let out what may've been another laugh and drew back its sword.
Las fire smashed against beneath its jaw, a full auto flurry which made it flinch and look down at the source of the shots from down the corridor. It had to be Adelana, yet again saving Attelus' arse.
It gave Attelus the opening he needed, and he pushed off the metal into a sprint. The Bloodletter turned to him and swung out its huge sword, but it was too late. All Attelus had to do was slide beneath it and hold up his blade, so the daemon's arm was sliced off at the elbow by its strength.
It bellowed out in rage and pain, and that allowed Attelus time to close in further. Attelus first cut hacked into the side of its neck, as did the second, but before he could hack, Darrance's voice again came over the vox.
"I am levelling out."
Attelus was forced to dart away from its swinging stump then drew his pistol as another idea hit him.
The Guncutter began to flatten.
More las shots erupted from the corridor and smashed against the side of the daemon's head.
Attelus ejected the clip of standard ammo and slammed in a fresh one of dumm dumm rounds, the daemon was unarmoured, so it was worth a try. He added his shots to Adelana's, unleashing point-blank shot after point-blank shot into its face. Their combined shots blistered its features, exploded its eyeballs and smashed its teeth into nothingness. The Bloodletter growled and backed away, trying to raise its arms to protect itself.
Once it'd stepped far away enough, Attelus charged again; by then, the Guncutter was angled about twenty degrees.
Despite its mashed face, the Bloodletter still managed to swing out at him. Without breaking stride, Attelus ducked its huge claws, then, with all his inhuman speed behind him, lunged into a cut that went clean through the last half of the daemon's neck.
Attelus dropped into a silent roll as the Guncutter finally equalised, while the Bloodletter's limp, headless corpse smashed against it with a clang.
He turned to the fight between Kalakor and the last Bloodletter.
Kalakor was on the back foot; his bolter wasn't in his grasp; all he had was his knife, a knife which would've been a long sword for an average person but was minuscule compared to the daemon's. Attelus had the feeling that Kalakor's armour would be but tissue to the Bloodletter's blade as Kalakor was trying his best to keep away from its arcs. Attelus raised his sword and waited for an opening.
"Attelus," said Adelana as she started down the stairs, a lasgun in her hands. "I'm sorry I didn't come sooner."
"It's alright, Adelana," gasped Attelus as the exhaustion from the fight seemed to smash into him. "You made up for it by coming right at the right time. Please stay on the walkway; more might be coming."
"Coming? Coming from where?"
"The warp, I suppose," said Attelus.
The ship suddenly tilted left, causing Attelus to stumble slightly.
"Damn it, Darrance; you were supposed to warn us-"
The pained roar interrupted him.
Kalakor's right hand had his knife buried in the Bloodletter's forehead; his left clutched the daemons sword arm. As it writhed to get free, its other claw was slowly pulling the knife out.
"This...is...your...cue...throne agent," said Kalakor.
"Oh! Right," said Attelus and lunged. His slash took the daemon in the neck, it only went halfway, but his momentum knocked it off balance and made it let go of Kalakor's wrist.
Kalakor then ripped out his knife and tore its head off with one brutal blow.
For a few seconds, they stood as Attelus struggled to regain his breath.
"Well," managed Attelus with a grin. "That was one hell of a fight."
Kalakor's helmet's inscrutable glowing red gaze swung to Attelus as he went to retrieve his boltgun.
"You need help," he said, shaking his head.