How to start a New Solar Year
The Battle Barge Supreme Lance slammed her crackling horned helm into the broadside of the wounded Tyranid bioship, the beast groaned the sensation of pain as unnatural energies burned at its innards. Muscles convulsing and crushing its crawling swarms, the ultra-powered thrusters pushing it against another of its kin-ships. Inside, the designated slave-captain bounced and cackled at the pain he insured.
“Yes-yes! Give the xeno-ship sweet-pain! I want to hear it scream!” He cackled to his servitors, the last remnant of humanity in those half-machines were bleak at best but it acknowledged in dull crackling voxes as multiple servo-limbs translated the maddened bloodlust of their master to the barge’s combat capabilities.
The hundred years in warp-space was ample time to the inventive minds of the Blessed Ratmen of the Horned Emperor. The thousands of battery guns lining her starboard, portside and bow were relentless, millions of bolts flying across the air to hit ships of the Nom-things, big and small. Careless of the fighters between their destruction.
The Vermintide washed over the Rift-stolen Nom-Fleet, a great fleet of greedy hunger devouring the Incarnation of Hunger itself. Two of the same coin but it was clear who had the clear disadvantage as the screaming daemons born from the Black Hunger writhed and reached from between stars to tear at these offences of their very existence.
The Shadow of the Warp pained them and in pure ugly spite, the Children of the Rat-God fought with bloody teeth and claws.
Tearing the groaning bio-ship in chunks, the Captain cackled with madness clear in his eyes. “Yes-yes! More-more!” He cried out, “Spill excess heat and fire! Hahah!” The command made manifest, the deadly overheat of both the converted engines and constantly shooting guns was siphoned in a fatally clever way, feeding one of the countless armaments that fed out from the Supreme Lance of Clan Skryre. Like a massive meltagun, vents spewing sun-level heat out into the vacuum of space - shields actively keeping the temperature to the barest capabilities of burning every mutated crewmen at the bottom and sides of her vessel before all was sung into one great belch of pure hatred through the bio-ship and the ship beyond it, spilling millions of charred Nom-things in the cold talons of space.
The fleet kept moving, even as one of the strike cruisers exploded from an overexcited core. Blossoms of green fires before it literally lunged for one of the Nom-ships in a twisted sacrifice of noble spite before taking the xenos with the crew.
Hissing out with a smile and tears running his messy face, the slave-captain clicked on the vox-link for the barge’s inner sanctuaries. “Great and Ever-Ingenious Master-Warlock of Sciences and Knower of the Great Rat in the Cables, we-we lost Strike-Cruiser Gaggle’s Cry.” He alarmed, there was a moment but a growl that was hard to distinct of the vox malfunctioning, the blessing of electronic vermin-daemons crossing between their airways or the True Master of the Barge’s vocal replacements.
“Good-good, ship full of fool-thralls. We get more! Keep forward-up to the Nom-Things’ Head Ship. Prepare the Warp-Cannon!” The cold clicks and malign hiss of the Lord-Warlock commanded, then the Supreme Lance herself started to react to her master before actual input was made.
Now the Master had the command and the Slave-Captain was the spectator, the entire Vermintide of Skryre’s Front started to mobilize with disquieting unity, even as the shipmasters screamed in demand for their ships to obey them - the Spirits of the Ships were the Master-Warlock’s and his dominance was made clear with each ram of slave-ship biting a wound into a Devourer-ship and Astartes-ship slicing and beating the fleet in sections like a finer dining noble-rat of the Skavenblight.
In the Supreme’s heart, the great Warlock’s six optics gleamed with the wide metal-toothed smile, cackling with the great cape of cables flexing and feed his inhuman ambition into his beloved ship. His ship was second-biggest to the Chaptermaster, his despicable counterpart - Seerlord Qhet may have the Master’s ear and attention - but the Master of All Warlocks had the intelligence to give the Great Rattus Astartes the power that all envy!
All of his hatred, envy, ambition, pride, and logical bloodlust pumped into ichor and the Supreme Lance sung her infernal love for him, directing every shot to the swarm of small nom-interceptors with undeniable precision. Those that managed to evade and only slam into the front shields as bubbling memory upon the crackling green warp-shield. The great vessel painstakingly tattooed from bow to stern with hemogrammetic wardings inlined with crushed Warpstone of a hundred worlds etched by the bleeding hands of thousands of slaves, whose souls now scream and howl in each cornerstone of his polish warpstone works.
All in the name of Clan Skryre Supremacy and in extent, the Great Chapter Chosen by the Great Emperor!
And in this beautiful destiny manifest, the great Lord-Warlock Zextal laughed with the madness of a thousand plans in each black heartbeat as his vessel fired the tri-cannons of his Warp Cannon, lancing pure weaponized warp-lightning in its raw extremity across the vacuum of space and arched against anything that dared to stand in its way or near. The cooking of chitin and flesh, innards, and spawnlings before hitting the heart-ship into nothingness.
In return of such awesome power, the cannon’s links exploded and took at least a hundred thousand slave-rats and man-things in green fires and ashes. The self-wounding brought a soft chatter of pain...but it was worth it.
A good war-testing for his works, yes-yes!