Persistence paid off.
After brutally blasting through more than a dozen thick bulkheads with Melta Bombs, ploughing a straight path of destruction through the space station's ever-shifting steel Labyrinth, Chelast and his two Word Bearers finally reached a relatively open junction and regrouped with the main force led by Lucius.
Yet the sight before them offered no relief.
Lucius and his warriors had their backs to the massive base of an energy core, forming a tight defensive ring.
Like rocks amid raging seas, they endured wave after wave of near-frenzied enemy assaults.
There were far more enemies than Chelast had encountered earlier. They poured endlessly from the depths of four corridors like a tide, las-beams raining down so thickly that they splashed continuous ripples of energy across the Space Marines' armour and the cover behind them.
"Now! Can someone tell me!"
Lucius's voice still carried his distinctive blend of fury and elegance. His Power Sword whirled into a storm of death, a single horizontal slash cutting five or six charging enemies in half at the waist, green fluid spraying like torrential rain.
"How can there possibly be this many xenos bastards?! Are they growing out of the walls?!"
An Emperor's Children warrior beside him blasted apart the head of an enemy trying to climb over their cover with a bolt Gun, then answered, "Battle-Brother Lucius! It's as if they're being copied! There's no end to them!"
As though to prove his point, a small patch they had just cleared was instantly filled again by "crewmen" and "soldiers" emerging from the shadows, their faces blank and their movements stiff.
Just then, something changed!
Chelast had only just entered the regrouping point and was preparing to support Lucius from the flank when he suddenly felt something seize him from behind!
Though his