Gethsemane IV right now is a world broken by war, its surface a scarred testament to the horrors unleashed upon it. Once, its skies might have been blue, its cities alive with the bustle of Imperial life, but now the heavens hung heavy with a perpetual pall of ash and smoke. The air was thick and acrid, the stench of promethium fires mingling with the coppery tang of spilled blood. Jagged spires of ruined hab-blocks clawed at the gloom, their skeletal frames silhouetted against the sullen glow of distant, unending fires.
The battlefield itself sprawled for kilometers, a wasteland of churned mud, shattered armor, and the twisted remains of war machines. Trenches, half-collapsed and filled with the dead, snaked through the ruins. Here and there, the hulks of Leman Russ tanks and Chimera transports lay gutted, their hulls blackened and pitted by bolt shells and plasma fire. Scattered among the wreckage were the bodies of soldiers-some still clutching lasguns, others huddled in the last moments of terror or defiance. The ground was cratered and uneven, slick with mud and blood, and littered with the detritus of a thousand desperate last stands.
Amid this devastation, the survivors moved like ghosts. Civilians-haggard, hollow-eyed, and caked in soot-picked their way through the ruins, clutching what little they had salvaged. Mothers gathered their children close, shielding them from the worst of the carnage, while elders whispered prayers to the Emperor. Some children stared in numb silence, too shocked to cry; others wept openly, their small voices lost in the vastness of ruin. A few, their innocence not yet fully crushed, gazed in awe at the towering forms of Thaddeus and Vorn as the two Blood Angels strode through the wreckage. To these children, the Astartes were living legends-giants in crimson and gold, their battered armor gleaming even in the ashen gloom. Some reached out timidly, as if hoping to touch a piece of myth, while others simply stared, wide-eyed and silent, as the Space Marines passed.
Thaddeus and Vorn moved with purpose, their presence a rallying point amid despair. After patching their wounds and seeing to the extraction of Cassian's gene-seed-a grim and sacred duty performed with reverence-they gathered with Colonel Voss to organize the survivors. The gene-seed, carefully sealed, was entrusted to Thaddeus, who knelt beside Cassian's body for a moment of silent prayer. And as the battered survivors gathered on the ashen fields of Gethsemane IV, the air heavy with smoke and sorrow, Vorn also knelt beside Cassian's grave. The Blood Angel's crimson armor was dulled by soot, his head bowed in reverence. Around him were Thaddeus, Voss, the Imperial Guardsmen, and even the civilians-children and elders alike-standing in a silent, expectant circle. The ruined world seemed to pause, the distant thunder of collapsing hab-blocks and the crackle of lingering fires fading into the background.
Vorn's voice, though deep and rough, carried a solemn clarity that cut through the hush. He began the rites of the IX Legion, the ancient prayers and vows passed down since the days of Sanguinius:
""We are the sons of Sanguinius,
Born in blood and fire,
Forged in the darkness,
Raised to the light.
We remember our fallen,
Their names etched in the marrow of
our bones.
Their sacrifice is the seed of our vengeance,
Their memory the shield of our souls.
In the shadow of death,
We do not falter.
In the face of darkness,
We do not yield.
By the blood of our father,
By the angel's grace,
We rise from ashes,
We endure.
For the Emperor. For Baal. For the Legion.
Red in honor. Gold in hope.
We remember. We avenge. We endure.""
His words resonated with the survivors. The Imperial Guardsmen, many of whom had lost friends and family in the carnage, bowed their heads. Some civilians wept quietly, clutching each other for comfort. Even the children, sensing the gravity of the moment, stood in respectful silence, their wide eyes fixed on the armored giants who now seemed both fearsome and deeply human.
Thaddeus placed a gauntleted hand on Vorn's shoulder, and together they finished the ritual with a moment of silence, honoring Cassian and all who had fallen. The rites of the IX Legion were more than words-they were a promise: that the dead would not be forgotten, and that the living would carry their memory forward, no matter how dark the night became.
---
The survivors of Gethsemane IV worked in grim silence, their movements mechanical as they loaded the last of the supplies onto the Dauntless. The air still reeked of ash and blood, but now it carried the sharp tang of urgency. Guardsmen stacked crates of ammunition, their faces gaunt, while civilians huddled in clusters, children clutching ragged dolls or the hands of older siblings. The battlefield's scars stretched endlessly-shattered tanks, half-buried corpses...
Vorn stood apart, his massive frame silhouetted against the ruins. His chainsword-arm twitched at his side, still caked in traitor blood. The Red Thirst gnawed at him, a primal drumbeat in his veins. He could smell the blood... the survivors' fear, their sweat, like a siren's call. His fists clenched, ceramite creaking.
Remember Thaddeus, he told himself. He pictured the sergeant's calm amid the storm: golden hair streaked with ash, eyes like chips of frost, never flinching as he carved through the Night Lords, and how he fought against the Daemon or the Necron Lord. Thaddeus had faced the Thirst a hundred times and never faltered. Vorn forced his breathing to steady. The rites he'd chanted over Cassian's grave echoed in his mind: "We rise from ashes. We endure."
But the Thirst hissed back. Thaddeus found him at the edge of the encampment, where the ruins gave way to desolate plains. Vorn's helm was off, his face a mask of strain, veins throbbing at his temples. The Red Thirst had turned his eyes fever-bright, the pupils slit like a predator's.
"Brother," Thaddeus said, his voice low.
Vorn didn't turn. "You shouldn't be here. Not when I'm... like this."
"You're not alone in this fight."
A bitter laugh. "Aren't I? You don't feel it chewing at your bones. You're steady. Always."
Thaddeus watched him, his face as calm as carved stone. "The Thirst doesn't spare me. It whispers. I choose not to listen."
"How?"
"The same way we survive any battle. Focus. Purpose." Thaddeus gestured to the hulks of Night Lords strewn across the field. "They wanted us to break. To become monsters. We deny them that victory."
Vorn's gaze flickered to him... "You said that the daemon... fighting it...helped."
Thaddeus's eyes hardened, and he stepped closer, his voice dropping. "Next time we face one of those daemons, we won't purge it. We trap it. Cage it's power. Use it."
Vorn stared. "You're mad, brother. The Mechanicus would burn you for heresy."
"Perhaps. But if we could contain it... it might be a key. To temper the thirst..."
The idea hung between them, blasphemous and electric. Vorn's mind raced. Trapping an abomination, a daemon?! It reeked of recklessness, of the very corruption they fought. Yet Thaddeus stood unshakn, his resolve as immovable as the armor he wore.
"You'd risk damnation?" Vorn growled.
"I'd risk anything to spare our brothers this curse." Thaddeus nodded toward the civilians-a young girl with wide eyes, clutching a guardsman's coat. "They deserve more than to see us become the monsters they fear."
Vorn's eyes narrowed, his voice a low growl. "We are His angels, brother. The abominations must be purged. Our duty is to the Emperor, not to coddle mortals. Sometimes... sometimes they must die. To preserve the Legion. To preserve us."
Thaddeus, unflinching. "You were like them once, Vorn. Before the implants, before the Thirst. A child of Baal, scraping survival from the sands."
Vorn's gauntlet creaked as his fist clenched. For a heartbeat, his resolve wavered-a flicker of memory: a younger self, thin and sunburned, staring up at the crimson giants who had come to save his clan from xenos raiders. The awe he'd felt. The hope.
He turned away, staring at the horizon where the Night Lord's battle barge had vanished. "That boy died on the sands of Baal. What remains is a weapon. Nothing more."
Thaddeus's gaze hardened. "A weapon without purpose is just a blade rusting in the dirt. We fight for Sanguinius, for the Emperor, for Terra, for them." He gestured at the end to the civilians-a mother clutching a child, a pair of siblings sharing a scrap of ration bar. "Or we become monsters."
He turned to leave, but Vorn's voice stopped him... "Do what you will. But if we trap one of those... things..." He glared at Thaddeus, eyes burning with defiance. "...I'll be the first to face it. To make it suffer. To carve its essence into scraps." He said, remembering Dreadnought Kael's sacrifice on Valthrex Prime...
Thaddeus nodded, solemn. "Then we'll face it together. as brothers."
As Thaddeus's figure receded into the distance, Vorn remained still, the weight of the Red Thirst... faded, almost imperceptibly. Thaddeus's words from their conversation echoed in his mind: focus, purpose, and control. That brief exchange had anchored Vorn, helping him wrest back command over the beast within. For the first time in long hours, the Blood Angel felt a fragile calm settle over his soul.