Descent to Purgatorum

Sergeant Burnatis checked the location of his men on his tactical display. He saw that in a couple of seconds every last one of them would be ready and in position. Then, checking the sensorium's display on his visor he saw several blips showing biological activity, all of them closing in on his marines. However, at this point there was no visual contact with whatever it was that was heading towards them. Whatever lurked in the halls of Purgatorum would soon be upon them.

‘Brother Marines!' ordered Burnatis, ‘We are continuing with pattern alpha, sigma 616 beta. Brother Fergus, you are to hold the eastern corridor. The rest of the squad will follow pattern to position beta.' The sergeant began to move into the southwards corridor his heavy Terminator's boots thudding loudly as he did, before him stretched endless darkness, broken only by the Terminators' spotlights. The whole Purgatorum, once the pride of the Ultramarines, seemed to be totally deserted, darkness filling its many halls.

In spite of the darkness and obvious lack of power, Burnatis felt an odd humming and electricity to the air around him, it brought nothing but discomfort. Suddenly, Brother Fergus' voice boomed into his ears, ‘Brother Sergeant, I have visual contact!'

‘Report,' Burnatis ordered. ‘They seem to be animals, crouched and they're moving very fast! 45 meters before contact. I think they're hostiles.' It took no more then a second for Sergeant Burnatis to decide the next course of action. While they were not to kill everything on sight, their mission being that of information gathering and relic acquisition, He also knew the records in the Librarium on Maccragge about Space Hulks and their often deadly inhabitants. ‘Squad, fire at will!' he ordered. Barely had his orders been spoken before the storm bolter of Brother Fergus started to fire. For a short while the corridors were filled with the sound of gun fire and explosions, as the Marines let loose on whatever was attacking them, then everything became silent.

Brunatus checked his tactical view to see that Brother Fergus was alright. ‘Brother Fergus, report!' Fergus' voice crackled over the comm ‘Sergeant, they died easily to my storm bolter fire but they erupted into flames as they fell. I can examine them now, or at least what remains of them. The closest died but 10 meters away. Brother Sergeant, I think they're…' however, Fergus dared not finish the sentence. . .

Yes, Burnatis thought to himself, it is as we feared. The Purgatorum was indeed infested with Chaos warp spawns. But the Space Marines would never turn back, they were the Emperors chosen, if they could not achieve this mission then no one could. He grasped his storm bolter, and commanded ‘Brothers, bless your weapons! The Emperor is watching us! Follow pattern to phase gamma, Brother Fergus fall back into line and cover our back!'

The future looked grim…