Fun with Omophagea

      SKREE.
      The sharp splintering noise of plasteel on plasteel grates in Brother Grybban's head as he strains to hear the thing that haunts him. The corridor is lit only by the external status runes on his powered armour suit, a light so dim that while his eyes are pained from their forced dilation, he can not make out more than his own arms. Perhaps the indications of which way the hall leads, but no more.
      He takes another step, forcing his ears to accept the pain and to hear past his own breathing for another noise, his helmet long discarded in favour of the immediacy of his own senses. One hand followes the wall, barely gliding across it as the marine makes his erratic way through the darkness. While the seeing and feeling part of him strains against the limits of his body to sense what comes, part of his mind plays over his path through the labyrinthine passageways, comparing them against the known layout of what he suspects this place to be.
      Something comes for him, not even bothering to approach from behind. It is, after all, silence in the night, and the only disturbance of its passing the the scattering of dust in its wake. If the light was better, it would be grey, a many-clawed horror with inhuman speed. The light is as nothing, but the same claws and same speed reach out for Grybban regardless, appearing as a red-rimmed phantom from nowhere. The fearsome claws descend with insane quickness, grooved so that despite the air torn from their path, they are silent.
      "Umph."
      Nothing moves.
      The thin plasteel of Grybban's gauntlets hold as the claws reflexively tighten, not on his throat as the beast expected, but rather caught tight, enmeshed in his grip. In a flash, the human-like lower arms reach out and wrap latch onto his armoured forearms. It lifts up into the air, scrabbling with its feet-claws and opening huge gashes in the Brother's breastplate. Two arms against four, coupled with the alien strength of the monster could only end one way, and Grybban is relentless forced back against a bulkhead, his arms straining but unable to hold the thing away. It opens a venomous maw in what could be its head, a wriggling protuberance topped with a flowering lotus-head. At the heart of thing are needle-like teeth which twitch in time to the hapless marine's struggles. He twists back and forth, but it is useless; the tongue approached, promising a deadly kiss. As the sight of it blurs, his eyes no longer able to focus on it, it begins to pulsate, rippling along its length. As the first wave reaches the tip, an obscene fluid begins to dribble from it, a caustic syrup of genetic oblivion. It spatters across the rents of Grybban's armour in an erratic stream, scarring the once-proud Imperial Eagle into a broken mosaic of meaningless yellow.
      !
      The creature snaps back, ceasing its push towards the marine and writhing against his grip in a frenzy. Grybban leans forward, pushing himself off the wall, and bows over, forcing the maddened creature to the floor. To the crackling of crushed chitin, he pulps the thing's attack claws. With seeming negligent ease, he plucks up the pain-ridden thing and dashes it against the wall, leaving only a battered and broken sack of alien flesh. The marine smiles a little as he chews thoughtfully on the still-wriggling ovipositor he had bitten off. He swallows and activates the comm runes at his throat.
      "Praise the Emperor. Genestealers confirmed."
      Static sounds in his ears for some time.
      Finally.
      "The Emperor be praised. Message acknowledged. Begin the Feast of Flesh."
End.

Fun with Omophagea

Go back to da Oomie Library