Kian Voss sprinted, dove, and rolled through the undergrowth, the Chira's massive treads snapping trees behind him like dry bones.
Logically, a vehicle in reverse shouldn't have this much torque, especially while navigating a forest. But logic had long since fled. The Machine Spirit was in the driver's seat now, fueled by a century of accumulated spite and a fresh injection of Sanctified Oil. It wanted Kian dead for the "insult" of the ceramite dust.
Kian scrambled over a fallen log, screaming as the tal bumper missed his heels by inches. "NIKLAS! Tell the girl to stand down! Tell her I'll give her high-grade prothium every cycle! I'll polish her pistons myself!"
Inside the cab, Sergeant Niklas was wrestling with the controls, sweat pouring into his eyes. "Easy, my lady! Calm your heart! The Master promises the Sacred Ointnts! He promises deep-cycle maintenance and gear-rituals every week! Forgive him this once!"
He slamd the brakes, but the treads kept spinning, the engine letting out a roar that sounded like a chanical snarl.
"Master Voss! It isn't enough! You wounded her pride! She demands a greater tribute!"
Kian vaulted over a jagged rock, his heart hamring against his ribs. "BLOOD! Tell her I'll lead her to a field of heretics! She'll taste the crunch of bone under her treads and the heat of lting armor! I'll let her turn the Fertilizer Syndicate into floor-polish!!"
VROOOOM—CLUNK.
The Chira stopped instantly. The engine cut out, and the forest fell into a sudden, eerie silence. The armored beast sat there, smoking quietly, as if considering the offer.
Niklas exhaled a breath that slled of stale amasec. He patted the dashboard. "Whoa... I think she likes the sound of that. You've got a real Valkyrie on your hands, Boss."
[VOSS BREWERY - SECTOR 0]
One day later.
A row of heavy timber tables had been set up in the center of the brewery conduit. They were loaded with a feast that would have made a Mid-Hive rchant weep with envy: roasted Grox-fowls, fresh greens from the surface, piles of spiced tubers, and even a few bowls of real fruit.
Despite the luxury, the thirty-three souls of the Voss Syndicate sat in a heavy, expectant silence. No one touched the food.
Kian Voss stood at the head of the table. He wore his full Grade-4 Carapace armor, the matte-black plate shimring under the glow-globes. He looked first at the thirteen PDF regulars—the technical crew Rudolphson had "loaned" him.
"Brothers of the PDF," Kian began, his voice amplified by his rebreather. "The contract was simple: help stabilize this sector, and you get 50,000 scrips each. The credits are already in the lockbox. You take them now."
He signaled Shiv, who dropped a heavy bag of scrip-rolls onto the soldiers' table.
The regulars let out low whistles, their eyes turning a greedy shade of green. Fifty thousand scrips was more than half a year's combat pay. For their families in the Mid-Hive, this was security. This was freedom from the debt-collectors.
"And if you fall?" Kian continued. "I pay your kin another hundred thousand. I'll ensure they have a hab-unit in this enclave, protected by my guns and fed by my vats. If the Spire spits them out, I'll be the one to catch them."
Sergeant Niklas, currently nursing a flask of Voss Reserve, raised a glass. "If the Boss is offering that kind of 'Audit,' what else is there to say? We're with you, Valkyrie-King."
Kian nodded and turned to the three rebel veterans from Parson's cell.
"If you die, your families on the surface beco my responsibility. I'll send them at, dicine, and steel until the day they return to the earth. You have my word."
The rebels stood tall, their hands on their scavenged rifles. "Our lives were yours the mont you pulled us from the dirt, Boss. We won't fold."
Finally, Kian looked at the Joels and the families of the "Dispossessed." He stopped in front of Caleb, the legless soldier.
"Keeping your head clear, Caleb? Staying off the swill?"
The man nodded weakly. "I'm clean, Lord Voss. I'm just... tired of sitting."
Kian looked at Caleb's father and brother, both massive Schwarzenegger-tier laborers. "When we take the Syndicate factory, I'm sending a request to the Twin Serpents. I'll buy you a set of Hydraulic Bionics. You won't just walk, Caleb; you'll be the tallest man in the brewery."
Caleb's eyes widened, a flicker of genuine hope piercing through his depression. His father gripped Kian's hand, unable to speak through his gratitude.
Kian stepped back, addressing the entire group. "For the rest of you—the new recruits—this battle determines your future. Follow orders. Be ruthless. Those who prove their worth will earn sergeants' pips and double rations. But those who run? Those who betray their brothers? I won't just kill you. I'll cast your families into the Sump-wastes to be eaten by the mutants."
He raised a glass of pure, undiluted Sanctified Amasec.
"Drink deep, warriors of the Voss Syndicate! Tonight we feast, but tomorrow we march for the reactors! Tomorrow, we carve a gilded path through the filth!!"
[THE FERTILIZER SYNDICATE - PERITER CHECKPOINT]
The Fertilizer Syndicate's headquarters was an industrial fortress built around four gargantuan chemical reactors. Fifteen hundred laborers lived in rusted hab-shacks welded directly to the machinery, huddling near the heat-vents to survive the Sump's chill.
The entrance to their territory was a maze of reinforced pipes and heavy plasteel gates. Dozens of gangers patrolled the barriers, bored and overconfident.
Suddenly, a rhythmic, chanical thrumming began to echo from the darkness of the main transit conduit.
"Oi! What is that?" one guard asked, squinting into the gloom.
"Sounds like an engine. Is the cargo-trolley back? I didn't see a manifest for a chemical haul today."
"Throne's teeth... get the others! Soone's approaching the wire!"
The Syndicate gangers scrambled to the gate, seventy n leveling a collection of rusted stubbers and pipe-guns toward the tunnel.
The roar of the engine grew deafening. A lone rifleman stepped behind a high-output searchlight and flicked the switch. A beam of brilliance cut through the soot.
The gangers froze. They rubbed their eyes, certain they were seeing a Warp-hallucination.
Blocking the entire width of the conduit was a massive, grey-green armored hull. A Chira Armored Transport was idling twenty ters from their gate, its 40mm autocannon already whirring as the turret locked onto the crowd. Behind the tank, a squad of heavily armored warriors in black carapace plate moved in perfect, military synchronization.
"Is that... a tank?" a gunman whispered, his hand trembling. "How did the PDF get down here?!"
The next mont, he saw the armored beast's muzzle erupt with a tongue of fla several ters long.
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