Steely Hearts

by nothing_to_see_here

Rating: teen
Tags: Spike, Comedy, Cutie Mark Crusaders, Adventure, Crossover, Human, Gore, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Original Character
Length: 22433

Steely Lathe was just like any other mare in Canterlot. Then Aliens decided to bring their war to Equestria's shining capital. Through a series of misfortunes and a few lies, she joins the 38th Company.

Steely Lathe was just like any other pegasus mare in Canterlot. Then Aliens decided to bring their war to Equestria's shining capital. Through a series of misfortunes and a few lies, she joins the 38th Company, anger issues and all.

A spin off from the Iron Hearts series
Thank you to 2135D for cover art and SFaccountant for the free commission.

Published 2015-10-21 20:20:01 UTC
Last updated 2016-04-05 02:07:16 UTC

Anger issues and new organs

Canterlot hospital recovery ward

Steely Lathe woke up in her hospital bed groggy and confused about a few things around here. She noticed she was in a surgery recovery ward, she was wearing a hospital gown usually reserved for those who had received surgery, and most importantly, she noticed she had no pulse.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” Steely screamed. “Nurse?! Doctor?! Anypony?! Help!”

A doctor and nurse burst through the door and rushed to her side.
“Miss Steely, I’m Doctor Needles! I’m here to help! What’s the matter?! Where are you hurting?!” The pink unicorn doctor shouted over her screaming.
“Heart not beating! DO SOMETHING!” Screamed Steely before starting to hyperventilate.
“Oh. Right. Your heart…” Doctor Needles said, a sheepish look coming across her face. Doctor Needles looked over at the nurse. “Go back to your rounds, I’ll handle this, and send him in here if you see him, I want him to help explain this.”

“What do you mean ‘Oh’? My heart's not beating! Do something!” Steely yelled and continued to hyperventilate.
Doctor Needles sighed before turning back to Steely. “I say ‘Oh’ because your heart not beating isn’t really something I can do anything about. I’m a doctor, not an engineer.”
This panicked Steely more than anything. “What do you mean you can’t do anything?! Why would you need an engineer?! It’s a heart! Not a motor!”
“May as well be one now.” Doctor Needles muttered under her breath, “Look, I can’t do anything about it because you may have… well… undergone a heart transplant on… accident.”

This caused Steely to pause and stop hyperventilating for a moment, her face adopting a confused look. “What? How the hay do you ‘accidentally’ get a heart transplant? And what kind of heart doesn’t beat?”
“Well you ‘accidentally’ receive a heart transplant when the surgeon doesn’t understand metaphors, as for what kind of heart doesn’t beat…” Doctor Needles’ voice trailed off. An answer to the question came from the doorway
“Statement: What kind of heart does not beat? A superior one to the pathetic lump of flesh you one had sitting in your chest.”, a metallic sounding voice droned from the door leading into the ward.
Steely Lathe and Doctor Needles both looked over to see a human in dark robe with a hood that obscured his face, the only thing that was visible underneath it was looked like a grille where the mouth should be, and a trio of glowing green eyes. Out of his back came a variety of servo arms and tendrils, each tipped with various pieces of equipment that looked like it could be used for either surgery or repairing an armored vehicle.
“Doctor.”
“Yes?”
“What is that?”
“That would be your surgeon, Dark Techpriest Carmed.”
“Ok.” Steely said weakly.
The Techpriest strode over to where Steely currently lay and stared at her for a few moments, saying nothing to ease the obvious fear that the mare had for the man.
After another minute the Carmed spoke. “Satisfaction: I’m pleased to say the implant has taken. Congratulatory: You are now the proud host of a Mark XXXIX Synthetic Cardiac Muscle.”

Canterlot Hospital. The office of Dr. Needles M.D. five minutes later.

“So let me just try and summarize this. I came in here for a mental health examination, and I got a heart transplant?”, Steely said, slightly frustrated by this turn of events, “I came in here because my boss and coworkers said I should, now I have a new heart.”
She gave the the Doctor and the Techpriest a glare. “Would you perhaps like to fill in the blanks there?”

“Well…”, Doctor Needles began, “I suppose you could say it was my fault, but I believe most of the blame lies on him.”, the doctor pointed a hoof at the Techpriest standing beside her, “Because apparently metaphors go over his head.”

“Negative. Expansion: with my superior reflexes nothing going below the speed of a bolt round would be able to fly past my head without being caught easily.”

Both mares stared at the Techpriest for a few moments to see if he would say something that would allude to that being a joke. He said nothing.

“See what I mean?”, Dr. Needles said, “All I had to say was that you had a ‘broken heart’ and, well…”.

“So me getting cut open was because this guy doesn’t know metaphors?! WHAT THE HELL!?” Steely yelled, her irritation rising with the absurdity of the situation.

“Now, now, this shouldn’t be anything to get too worked up about,” Needles paused, perhaps realizing that maybe wasn’t right in this instance, “Okay, well... maybe in this case it is, but there is no need to get that angry.”

“Easy for you to say! You didn’t get your heart taken out by some walking tin can! No offense.”, Steely said, turning to the dark Techpriest.
“Affirmative. Expansion: none taken, meatbag.”

Steely took the Techpriest’s jab in stride before returning her anger to the doctor in front of her.

“How is this going to affect me really? I mean, am I going to have to come in for oil changes or something?”

“Negative. Explanatory:The XXXIX Synthetic Cardiac Muscle can operate for an estimated one hundred and seventy four years before requiring any form of maintenance. This superior organ will be more of a boon to you than anything.”

“How so?”, Steely asked, curiosity overtaking anger for a brief moment.

“Explanatory: The XXXIX Synthetic Cardiac Muscle will in times of stress release a superior form of adrenaline and a cocktail of various combat drugs that would need to be refilled through the hole that is now present on the back of your neck. It can filter out bloodborne toxins that would attempt to reach the brain.”

“Wait... WHAT!?” both mares yelled.

“When did you put holes in the back of her neck? WHY DID YOU PUT A HOLE IN THE BACK OF HER NECK?”

“Statement: the refill ports were installed when you were on your eating period. Expansion: they were placed there to refill the combat drug cocktail dispensers, as previously stated, would you like me to replace your ears with superior mechanical ones? You seem to be hard of hearing.”

“You were able to install a whole system of tubes into her body while I was on lunch? That’s… actually sort of impressive, I mean I’m still appalled and angry but to do all that in around a half hour is sort of impressive.”

“Affirmative. Expansion: I will take that compliment.”

Steely, who was up until this point frantically feeling for the small port, froze up and looked at the doctor, her eye twitching slightly.

“He shoves a bunch of tubes and a hunk of metal into my body, and you’re impressed?!”,
Steely yelled, Needles actually shrinking away from her, “I’m going to! Going to! RAAAAAAAAAA-!”

Was all Steely could get out before slumping over into a sleeping state a small dart sticking out of her side

Needles let out a sigh, and turned to the Techpriest, one of his tendrils was pointed at Steely.

“Didn’t know you could do that.”

“Affirmative. Expansion: when working with animals it is always handy to have a dart gun loaded with tranquilizers at the ready.”

“So you’re a vet and a doctor?”

The Techpriest said nothing

“Now then what to do with her?” Needles said, “I mean I know she was in here for depression, and her records say she has a slight history for violence, but I don’t think there is anything we can really do for her; our only qualified psychologist left on a vacation a month ago and he still isn’t back and probably won’t be for a while.” She sighed, “We’ll just have to hope for the best for her.”

“Affirmative. Expansion: Now if you’ll excuse me, there is a kidney transplant I need to get back to.”

“What? We’ve been here for nearly an hour! Are you telling me you delayed a surgery because you wanted to make sure she was okay?”

“Negative. Expansion: I was in the middle of surgery, and I wanted to make sure that the heart had taken to its host properly, this is the first time a model XXXIX has been placed inside a xeno, and I wanted to see if there were any negative or positive side effects.”

“Wait. How far were you into the surgery when I called you?”

“Statement: We had just taken out both of the ineffective kidneys.”

Needles absorbed this for a moment and then spoke.
“So right now there is a pony on an operating table hooked up to life support, cut open, with no kidneys?”

“Affirmative.”

Needles sighed, burying her face in her hooves.

Downtown Canterlot temporary shelter camp. 5 hours later

Steely sighed as she walked through one of the camps that had been set up to house those whose homes had been destroyed during the fighting between the humans and the tau. She had lost her home in the fighting due to a battlesuit pilot deciding her house would make an excellent vantage point just before being blown apart by a daemon engine with a pink pony riding on it.

Steely herself had gotten away unharmed (save for the fact that all her things had been destroyed) and proceeded to watch the rest of the fighting from a nearby rooftop. Now she just had to wait around camp until her house was rebuilt, which, given the damage Canterlot had taken, would likely be a whi-

“Want revenge on the blue skinned mules that did this to our fair capital? Want to get a fancy gun and armor? Want to go into space? If any of these sound interesting to you join the Iron Warriors 38th Company!”, shouted a pony on a street corner in the middle of the camp, interrupting Steely’s train of thought.

Steely looked over at the stallion who was currently shouting at passersby, he was wearing a dark colored robe sort of like what her ‘surgeon’ had worn in the hospital, and he even had one of those little tentacle things that her ‘surgeon’ had had as well; Though this one just had a small gripper that appeared to be handing out… pamphlets? To those who had stopped to listen to the stallion.

“Thats right folks! You if you want to become a gun-for-hire space pirate, all you have to do is join up with the 38th Company! If you play your cards right, you may even get a little augmentation like I got! You won’t believe how useful this thing is folks! I can now spread jam on my toast with ease! That may not sound impressive, but you earth ponies out there will know what I’m talking about!”, The stallion continued to shout, “Recruiting station is right next door to the Iron Chest!”.

The stallion continued to shout, oblivious to the two royal guards who were walking up to him.

“Gear Works, I’m going to have to ask you to stop.”, the Royal guard stated calmly, “We’ve told you before, you’re free to do your recruiting anywhere in the city except for the refugee camps.”

“Ah come on! Nopony really listens except for here! I mean I’ve already got like five ponies to go down to the recruiting station within the past hour. Do you know how long it’d take otherwise to get five ponies to join? It’d take like two hours each.”, Gear Works complained, “I mean you don’t have a problem when I just leave the pamphlets.”

“Pamphlets alone are different, but this is something else all together, now unless you stop, I’m going to have to ask you to come with us.” The Royal Guard said a bit more sternly.

“Not if I do…” Gear Works began, mechadendrite reaching inside of his robe for something, “do…”

“Do…? What? Gear Works come on we have a patrol to finish and I’d rather not arrest you.”

"Just hold on one second! Where did they go? I put them right- Aha! There they are!"

“What?” The guard asked, looking back at his partner who shrugged in response.

“Smokebomb!” Shouted Gear Works as his mechadendrite withdrew from the robe and quickly threw a small ball on the ground that began to rapidly began to produce a thick smoke, causing many of those close by to begin coughing.

“HAHAHA!” Gear works shouted as he fled from the scene.

“Damn it! *cough* This is the third time *cough* this has happened this week! *cough* *cough*” One of the royal guards shouted through a coughing fit as they ran after him.

Well that was fun to watch, Steely thought, a small smile creeping onto her face after watching the fiasco. But I better get going if I want to get to work on time, first shift since the attack and I want it to start right.

Canterlot hospital recovery ward. 8 hours later

“Bwuh?”, Steely said as she roused from her sleep, taking in her surroundings with a sense of deja vu, she noticed the pink unicorn doctor looking over her chart at the foot of the bed and smiled, “Hey there doc, you won’t believe the dream I just had, it was crazy, I got my heart replaced and I got to work and I had a heart attack as soon as I walked onto the assembly area and-”, Steely stopped after a moment when a realization hit her. “Oh sweet Celestia.”

“Yes Ms. Lathe I’m afraid you weren’t dreaming.” Dr. Needles said, curiously refusing to meet her eyes.

“So then my heart and all that stuff with me having a heart attack…”

“Well I wouldn’t call it a ‘heart attack’ per se, more of a… malfunction maybe?”

“Whatever!” Steely shouted before continuing, “The tin head told me that thing could operate for over a hundred years without needing maintenance and now it just shuts down for no reason?! I want to know what exactly is wrong with it!”

“Correction: My head is made of a plasteel and ceramite alloy, not tin. Expansion: As for what is wrong with you, I believe I can explain.” Carmed said arriving through the doors in a similar fashion as he had that morning.

“And?” Steely asked impatiently.

“Statement: It appears that this model of the XXXI Synthetic Cardiac Muscle, has a history slight defects around electromagnetic fields. Expansion: the defect being in this case that it stops working.”

Dr. Needles spoke up, “I’d call that more of a fatal flaw than a ‘slight defect’.”

“Statement: It is only a slight defect when you have more than one blood pumping organ inside of your chest. Expansion: I also wished to see how the other new implants were taking.”

“What new implants? What else did you stick inside of me?!” Steely asked, angry that they may have removed even more of her organs without asking. “What metaphor did you use this time?!” Steely shouted at Needles, who shrunk away slightly.

“Okay this time it was not me, I didn’t even know about it until he had finished.”

Steely turned on Carmed, “Well?”, She asked.

“Statement: I replaced some of your nerves with wiring. Expansion: Your reaction times should be much faster than they were before.”

“Why? Why did you do that?”, Steely asked, exasperated.

“Statement: no data available.”

Steely began to twitch in her bed. Just her eye first, then her head began to slight cock to the side every few seconds.

“Now Steely I know that this likely another traumatic experience for you but-”, Needles began before being cut off.

“I’M GONNA TO KILL YOU!” Steely shouted leaping out of her bed, catching a dart from the Carmeds mechadendrite, but continuing on towards the Techpriest to brutalize his person regardless of the tranquilizers working their way through her system.

“Statement: Oh dear.”

Steely’s first blow actually managed to knock the Techpriest onto his back and she proceeded to get on top of him. Ignoring the pain in her hoof and the numbness working its way through her she proceed to rain blow after blow onto the the face of the techpriest while all the while Carmed continued to hit her with darts, Dr. Needles running out of the room in order to get help from other unicorn staff to restrain the violent patient.

“You! Stupid! Piece! Of! Tin! You! Belong! In! A! Scrap! Bin!” Steely said, punctuating each word with another blow to the Techpriest’s facial area. Steely could barely hear or feel a thing now, blood rushing through her ears and vision both fading and tinged red for some reason. She could barely hear the string of binary curses Carmed was letting out as she pummeled his face, she barely even registered as Dr. Needles returned with another three unicorns who lifted her off the Techpriest and restrained her onto the bed, thrashing against it all the while. Then everything went dark.

Downtown Canterlot temporary shelter camp. 1 Day later

Steely supposed she should count herself lucky. I mean really they could have just carted her off the prison after that little incident with the the Techpriest. But after she had woken up many hours later, the Techpriest had been actually rather happy about what had happened, saying something about ‘superb results’ and ‘unintended cooperation between implants’, really she had still wanted to turn him into scrap so it had been a good thing she’d still been tied down.

Dr. Needles had been really hesitant to turn her loose after that too, but the Techpriest seemed to assure her that there likely wouldn’t be a repeat incident unless she was ‘sufficiently provoked’ what that really meant, Steely wasn’t sure, but she was sure of one thing. She was now homeless and unemployed.

She grumbled to herself as she walked through the refugee camp before spotting sight she had seen a day before on the corner, but this time there was a key difference. That difference was a human mercenary standing guard while Gear Works did his regular spiel.

Steely wandered over closer to the augmented pony and his guard and listened, took one of the pamphlets offered by the mechadendrite and read it.

‘50 bits a day plus hazard pay when on assignment’? Not too bad, she wondered how much hazard pay was? It didn’t say on the pamphlet. ‘Free room and board’? Now that was especially enticing. ‘visit exotic worlds, meet new aliens, then kill them and conquer their land’? Not sure that’s what she would put on a recruitment pamphlet, but she didn’t really know much about how recruiting worked. ‘Protect Equestria from the blue skinned menace!’. Now that was tempting, get payback at the aliens that had destroyed her house… well, the alien that was the root cause of her house being destroyed anyway.

Steely was beginning to see why this would be so tempting to so many people in the camp, offered everything they wanted and a little payback on the mules who caused this mess.

‘Ah what the hay. Not like I have a lot of other prospects for employment at the moment’, Steely thought, beginning to walk towards where the Gear Works and the pamphlet said the recruiting center was.

Author's Note

So I'd first like to say thank you for reading this, and I hope you stick around for more.
Second I'd like to thank SFaccountant for creating the Iron Hearts stories, and I'd like to thank Nightweaver for proofreading and editing this first chapter.

Cake and Blood Rage

Iron Warriors Recruiting Station-Downtown Canterlot
The recruiting station waiting room wasn’t quite what Steely was expecting. She had been expecting something…. futuristic. Really it just sort of looked like every other waiting room she’d been in, whether it was a dentist’s or a doctor’s, really you could have replaced it with this one and nopony would have been able to tell the difference… Except maybe the presence of armed guards at every doorway and the cameras in every corner. That may give away that it wasn’t the average waiting room. Maybe.

‘41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, and 55. Welp, that’s the third time I’ve counted the ceiling tiles. Let’s see if I can win a staring contest with the guard’s visor again. If nothing else it’s better than reading the usual old magazines. Oh! Maybe I’ll make faces at the camera next!’ Steely thought, bored out of her mind at how long it was taking to get in and see the recruiter.

‘How long does it take to fill out some forms and sign a piece of paper? When I got hired making magnets, it was a quick glance over my resume, sign a paper, then ‘bam’! You’re hired. Can’t be that different for signing up to be a mercenary right? I’ll ask the guard, maybe he’ll know.’

“‘Scuse me? Sir?” Steely asked the guard standing by the door leading to the recruiter’s office.
“Yes?”
“Does it usually take this long to sign up for a position?”
“Wouldn’t know. I had the choice of ‘join or we space you’.”
“Same”, another guard chimed in.
“I got ‘join or you get fed to the daemon engines’”, said another
“Am I really the only one that joined up willingly?”, asked the last guard.
“Yes”, the other three said simultaneously.
Then the door open and all conversation stopped. The recruiter, dressed in similar garb to the guards, stood in the door.
“Next, Ms…. Lathe?”, the recruiter said, glancing down at a clipboard in his hand.
“Yes, that’s me.” Steely responded.
“Alright, just step in and we’ll get started.”, the recruiter said, stepping back and motioning for Steely to come into the office.

She hadn’t really known what to expect when walking into the recruiting office of a group of space pirates, but she hadn’t been expecting something so.... mundane. It could have been mistaken for the office of a high school principal, or the office of a small store manager. It was just kinda… boring. No big banners hanging from the walls, no skulls mounted on plaques, nothing really put it apart from any other office.
Save for the lasgun hanging on the wall. And the giant chaos star above it. And the pistol lying on the desk next to the inkwell.
And the servitor that was filing papers in the corner.

“Sorry about the wait out there,” the recruiter said cheerfully, taking his seat at the desk, “had to request your medical file from the hospital. “Took a bit but once I got in touch of the cogboy there, it was easy as gutting a PDF trooper.”
Ignoring the somewhat disturbing metaphor, Steely took a seat in one of the chairs in front of the desk
“Oh it was no trouble” I wanted to bash my head against the wall I was so bored “So, how does this whole process work anyway? Do I sign some papers and we’re done? Need to go through a waiting period? Get some bloodwork done?”
“Oh no, nothing like that. You just have to sign once after we decide what you’ll be doing in the 38th Company.”
“Oh, uh, okay, sounds easy enough.”
“Now then let’s start off with why you want to join the 38th Company.”
“Alright, well, uh, I’m out of a job-”
“Looking for work, alright, well we offer a lot of-”
“-because your Techpriest gave me heart that made my job impossible to do.”
“Um… that’s….. uh…” the recruiter stalled for a minute, then continued, “Well, uh, Ms. Lathe, what was that job, exactly?”
“I worked in a magnet factory, I worked on the factory floor, shaping magnets. I now cannot even go on the floor because my heart stops working.”
The recruiter coughed awkwardly before continuing., “The cogboy mentioned something along those lines…. So I imagine that that knocks anything in our industrial and labor section right off of the list. So let me just tell you what I’m thinking.”
“Shoot.”
“Infantry. Just like almost every other pony that has come in to join up.”
“Right. So what’s that entail? Do I get to shoot the blue bastards who are responsible for destroying my house?”
There was an awkward silence as the recruiter considered the choice between the hard truth or an easy lie with pony whose medical record featured edits from a Techpriest that said things like ‘Do Not Provoke’ and ‘Mean Right Hook’.
“Um… Yeeesssss?”
“Alright, I’m in.”
“Excellent!” the recruiter said quickly, the sooner he got this potential incident out of his office, the better. “Just sign here and you’ll belong the 38th, mind, body and soul.” the recruiter pushed a very official looking document with a fancy border toward her.
“What was that last part?”
“Nothing.”
With a shrug, Steely took the pen from the inkwell with her wing and signed it.
‘Well, so begins a new chapter of my life. I’m sure I’ll have a great time.’

Ferrous Dominus Mustering/Training Yard Sector 23 1500 hours 2 days later
‘I am not having a great time.’
Steely thought as she crawled forward under the barbed wire, while rounds, both solid slugs and lasers, flew mere inches away from her head, and the instructors yelling at certain individuals to keep moving or to move faster, intermixed with curses and invoking of god’s names.
The last two days had been an… experience. As soon as her and the other hundred and nineteen recruits had stepped off of the train they had been corralled into this yard and been told to form ranks (which had taken a lot longer than even she would have expected) and from there their instructors had introduced themselves by yelling their names and then insulting the recruits with language that would have made a griffon sailor blush. Then had come the physical training to make sure that they had all been up to snuff physically. That hadn’t actually been too bad. For her. For the few unicorns that had decided infantry was right for them, well… she just hoped the infirmary was treating them alright. And not sticking new organs in them.

Steely reached the end of the barbed wire and proceed full gallop to the finish of the course, from there she continued to gallop to where everypony was supposed to muster after they had run the course. She arrived to see another five or six ponies standing in formation, breathing heavily. She took up a place alongside them. She didn’t know their names that well, there hadn’t been a lot of time for all the recruits to socialize since they had gotten off. Every day consisted of getting run ragged with courses, physical training, and drills, then a quick tasteless meal of nutrition paste and off to sleep.

After another ten minutes the rest of the recruits finished the drill and got into formation, then the head instructor proceeded to get in front of them and speak.
“RIGHT YOU MISERABLE SACKS OF DUNG, YOU HAVE NOW GOTTEN PAST MOST OF THE PHYSICAL PORTION OF YOUR TRAINING! NOW WE WILL BE MOVING ON TO THE EQUIPMENT SECTION”
Okay, not speak, yell. They never talked at normal volume. Ever.
“YES SIR INSTRUCTOR SUR SIR!”
Another weird thing, the head instructors name was Sur. So whenever you responded to him, you had to say ‘yes sir Sur’. And he could somehow tell when you just said ‘sir’ twice times and not ‘sur’.

“AND AFTER THIS PORTION OF YOUR TRAINING, YOU WILL BE ALLOWED TWO DAYS OFF WHILE YOUR GEAR IS READIED BY THE DARK MECHANICUS. NOW THE FIRST THING YOU’LL BE DOING IS CLEANING OUR- I MEAN LEARNING HOW TO CLEAN YOUR LASGUN IN THE FIELD. IF YOU SEE ONE THAT HAS MY NAME ON IT, BE SURE TO CLEAN THE TRIGGER MECHANISM CAREFULLY, IT IS ESPECIALLY FINICKY.”

The other instructors came onto the field with wheelbarrows of dirt and grime encrusted lasguns, dumping one in front of every single recruit on the field, along with a cleaning kit.
“RIGHT THEN, YOU HAVE HALF AN HOUR TO CLEAN OU-YOUR LASGUNS, AND DARK GODS HELP ME, IF WE FIND SO MUCH AS A SCRATCH ON ONE OF THOSE LASGUNS, YOU’LL DO DRILLS TILL YOU DIE! DO YOU GET ME MAGGOTS?!”
“YES SIR SUR!” Steely shouted, echoed by all the other recruits
“GOOD! NOW GET TO WORK!”

‘Right so let’s give this puppy a once over see what the damage is’
Steely thought as she gave the filthy lasgun a once over, seeing all the hardened mud and grime that caked the old weapon. Then she picked up a screwdriver that had come with the cleaning kit and proceeded to open up the gun’s inner workings to the world. Steely was immediately hit with a wave of nostalgia as the smell of machine oil hit her nostrils, taking her back to memories of her old lathe that had been at her workstation in the factory, the late nights she had spent shaping the material, grazing it off in flakes or long coils to the shape that was needed. She then stepped out of the memory as she truly began to survey the inner workings of the lasgun and saw the grime and that had caked a majority of the parts. She didn’t recognize a lot of them, or how they worked, but she did notice how they all fit together and what mucky parts were interfering with what.
‘just like cleaning up the lathe during maintenance week’ she thought as she applied a bit of oil to a rag after taking out a part, ‘just get the gunk off the important bits first, then take care of everything else’.

Having worked with lathes and machining equipment for a better part of her life, Steely was actually rather at home with cleaning the weapon, it felt familiar taking the thing apart and cleaning each piece individually, it felt calming and put her in a sort of familiar trance that she went into when working on things like this.

‘Oil, wipe gunk, oil, next part. Oil, wipe gunk, oil, next. Oil, gunk, oil, next.’ a mantra began in her head as she moved from part to part, cleaning each one methodically and thoroughly before moving to the next. Before she knew it, every part in the gun was clean, and she proceeded to put them all back into place before sealing the cover of the lasgun back on with the screws, then, she proceeded to wipe down the whole outer casing lovingly before setting it back down and raising her hoof to signal to one of the instructors that she had finished.
“RECRUIT LATHE! WHY ARE YOU RAISING YOUR HOOF?!” yelled a nearby instructor
“TO SIGNAL THAT I FINISHED CLEANING THE LASGUN SIR!”
“WHAT? YOU HAVE ONLY BEEN CLEANING THAT LASGUN FOR THE LAST SEVEN MINUTES, AND YOU MEAN TO TELL ME THAT YOU’RE FINISHED? I CALL BULLSHIT RECRUIT LATHE!” the recruiter stormed over “YOU MEAN TO TELL ME THAT YOU HAVE SUCCESSFULLY CLEANED THIS LASGUN, A WEAPON THAT YOU HAVE NEVER ENCOUNTERED BEFORE, IN SEVEN MINUTES, WHEN EVERY OTHER RECRUIT HAS BARELY EVEN FINISHED FIGURING OUT WHAT GOES WHERE?!”
“YES SIR INSTRUCTOR!”
“WELL LOOKS LIKE WE HAVE AN OVER ACHIEVER”
‘Oh no’ Steely thought, ‘this sort of thing never goes well’
“ATTENTION RECRUITS, AS IT SEEMS RECRUIT LATHE IS A MASTER MANUFACTORY WORKER IN DISGUISE, SHE WILL FINISH CLEANING ALL OF YOUR LASGUNS WHILE YOU ALL GET TO ENJOY YOUR LEAVE EARLY. NOW PLEASE REASSEMBLE AND PILE YOUR LASGUNS NEXT TO HER ON THE WAY OUT, AND SAY THANK YOU TO THE MASTER MACHINIST.”
‘Oh Celestia why...’ Steely had a look of despair on her face as the other hundred and nineteen recruits shuffled past her, throwing their lasguns in a pile beside her saying “thanks” and “good luck” to her as they passed. By the end of the line, a pile of a hundred and nineteen lasguns sat next to her, each in varying degrees of cleanliness.
“RIGHT THEN”, the recruiter shouted, “YOU GET ALL OF THESE CLEAN, AND THEN YOU CAN GET YOUR LEAVE. UNDERSTOOD?!”
“Yes sir instructor.” Steely said with little enthusiasm. For once the recruiter didn’t yell that he didn’t hear her, instead he smiled smugly and walked off from the field, the other instructors following him.

Steely sighed as the last one left. She liked cleaning machinery, yes. It was familiar and comforting to do, reminded her of her old job and the hobby that was machining. But this? This was ridiculous. She sighed once again as she picked a lasgun from the pile and proceeded to repeat the same process she had with the first one, pop it open, clean the parts, pop it closed, clean the body, rinse and repeat.
After the tenth lasgun however, she got a feeling someone was watching her. She stopped cleaning the part she was currently holding with her wing and looked around. Nothing.
“Huh.” Steely said aloud, turning her head around once more, “Felt like someone was- GAH!” Steely jumped as she turned her head back towards the part only to be met with the face of a batpony mere inches from hers.
“Why hello there” The batpony said in a friendly voice, the kind of friendly that most people generally found annoying.
“Uh, hi?”
“This your pile of lasguns?” the batpony asked
“Yeeesssss?”
“Why are you cleaning a pile of lasguns? Wait. Let me guess. You cleaned yours quickly?”
“Yeah, how’d you know?”
“Oh they pull the same trick when training the night guard, first person to clean their kit has to clean everyone else’s kit too.”
“Oh well that makes-”
“That and I’ve been watching you all train for the past hour.”
‘well that’s not weird at all’ Steely thought ‘wait…’
“....Can I ask why?”
“I was bored really, not much to do right now. And I’ve already spied on Twilight enough for today.” the baypony muttered something at the end.
“What?”
“Nothing. Did I forget to introduce myself? How rude! I’m lieutenants Dusk Blade!” Dusk said, eager to change the subject away from his ‘non stalker’ behavior.
“Right well, my name’s Steely Lathe, and if you were watching you’ll know that I have a lot of lasguns to go through and-”
“Well how about I keep you company?”
‘Can I finish a single bucking sentence around this stallion? If he keeps this up, I’m gonna knock him flat, lieutenant or not’
“Right, sure, I’ll just keep cleaning and you can… I don’t know, take a seat?”
“Alright. So where you from Lathe?”
“I prefer Steely, but I’m from Canterlot”
“Oh that’s nice; used to be stationed there all the time, before well, this whole… situation. What with the aliens and such.”
Steely continued to clean the lasguns as Dusk went on talking, oblivious to the fact that Steely had once again fallen into cleaning. Steely was nearly done with her eleventh lasgun when she dropped a piece. Leaning her head down to grab it with her mouth rather than put down the rag and oil container.
This action ended up saving her life, as a bright crimson beam scorched the air where her head had been a few moments ago.
Steely shot up and looked where the shot had come from, finding the source with the lieutenant holding one of the recently cleaned lasguns, one marked ‘Sur’, in her direction, surprise evident on his face.
“Wow! Trigger is sensitive on this one, I just jostled it and zap! I don’t think this is really-”
Dusk flinched back as the lasgun fired again, pointing up this time, and then fired a third time as he dropped it into the mud.
“Yeah, I think the drill instructor needs to get his gun checked.” Dusk said, looking at the gun as though it were possessed. Which knowing what he did about chaos, it may very well be.
“You nearly blew off my head! And now I’m going to have to clean that gun again!” Steely yelled, abandoning rag and oil, as well as spitting out the part she’d picked up.
“It was an accident, I didn’t think it was that touchy!”
“It was still your fault!”
“Well, I think it’s kind of the dark mechanicus’s fault for providing sub par gear to the common soldiers? Don’t you think? I mean I get the best in weapons and armor and equipment and I don’t think that it’s-” Dusk started to attempt to go off on a tangent of laying the blame for nearly killing somepony elsewhere, but was cut off by Steely.
“Listen, Dusk. If you do not stop talking and go away right now. I will hurt you.”
He then chuckled at that. Chuckled. At her threat. Chuckled.
“Listen, I know that you just got through your physical stuff and you think you’re hot stuff, which, you are, don’t get me wrong, but I’m Night Guard, I’m Elite. So I don’t want to insult you but the chances of you laying a hoof on me ar- Oh Sweet Luna!” Dusk was cut off as Steely tackled him to the ground and began to beat him senseless. She positioned herself so that she was sitting on his chest and beating his face with her hooves.
“Oh! Sweet! Luna! Why! Ow ow ow ow! Ow!”
Steely hit Dusk, his voice punctuating each blow, then just silently taking each hit with the occasional grunt, this went on for about three minutes, until one of his fangs actually popped out and skittered across the training field. At this point she got off of him and went back to sitting next to the pile of lasguns. But not before she turned back and said to the brutalized batpony
“I know a dentist in Ponyville who can actually put that tooth back in if you want, her name’s Colgate.” With that she went back to cleaning the part she had been working on and fell back into her maintenance trance, she registered the lieutenant getting up after a few minutes and collecting his tooth, muttering something about ‘every mare in this fortress being crazy’ before taking off, presumably to schedule an appointment with the dentist she mentioned.
‘eleven lasguns down, a lot more to go’ Steely thought as she completed another lasgun, adding it to the ‘clean’ pile. Then going over to the dropped lasgun to clean the outer casing again.

Sector 6 bakery-three hours later

Steely, her wings covered in machine oil, walked into the bakery, closing the door behind her and taking off the rebreather she had been wearing for nearly two days.
‘This thing stinks so bad they can probably smell it in Cloudsdale.’ Steely thought as she hung it on the rack placed near the door. Steely walked up to the counter, noting how busy the bakery seemed to be despite it being rather late in the day. She was greeted by a mare with a big smile on her face behind the counter.
“Hello there! I’m Cinnamon! Welcome to the Sector Six bakery!” Cinnamon said cheerily.
“Is that really it’s name?” Steely asked.
“Well we’re waiting on the Dark Mechanicus to make us a sign with the real name on it so until then we’re just calling it that. So what can I get you today? We have a special on the carrot cake.”
“Thanks. Sorry if I’m not too chatty right now. Just had a really stressful day, had to run drills since dawn and I’ve been cleaning lasguns for the past three hours. I really just want to get some cake, take a seat, and eat it.” Steely said exasperated. Really at this point she’d pay whatever price they asked for, she just wanted some cake so she could unwind and forget about the whole day.
“Well, alright, no harm in wanting to relax. So what can I get for you? We have an extensive collection, there’s a menu on the counter here of some of the favorites everyone seems to love, we’ve even had some kroot drop in for a slice of the Death by Chocolate”
“I’ll take that then”
“Alright be right back with a slice”
Steely was feeling better already, when she got that cake she was going to take a seat and-
Something clicked in her brain.
‘Kroot. Wasn’t Kroot the name of some species the tau use as meatshields? Why would there be Kroot in the 38th Company’s home base?’ Steely thought ‘I’ll ask her once she comes back’
Cinnamon came back from the kitchen with a small frown on her face
“Sorry, but we just sold out the last of the death by chocolate to a little dragon for some birthday party in motor pool.”
“That’s fine, but you mentioned something about Kroot earlier? Why would there be Kroot in Ferrous Dominus?”
Cinnamon looked at the mare oddly, like she had just asked what two plus two equals.
“Because they’re our allies now? I mean I’m not a huge fan of them, but they spend money here just like anyone else so-”
Steely’s vision turned half red. and she began to twitch
“Um…. Are you okay? Because it looks like a blood vessel just burst in your eye-”
Steely’s vision turned completely red. She felt something rush through her blood. Something needed to get hit. Now.
“-s.” Cinnamon finished weakly, looking worried at the twitching mare with two bloodshot eyes standing in front of the counter.
“Listen. Very. Carefully.” Steely growled, each word coming out restrained, like a dog on a short chain, ready to be unleashed. “I. NEED. To. Know. Where. I. Can. Find. Records.”
“Um…. I’m not sure I should tell you….”
“Now.”
“S-Sector 1 administration building, big square building with no windows and steel door in the front, can’t miss it.” Cinnamon said as fast as she could without stuttering.
“Thank You.”
RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-
Steely yelled as only someone out for blood could as she took off, flying through one of the bakery’s windows, startling and causing all but the most jaded of the bakery’s occupants (mostly human mercenaries who had gone into battle with World Eaters) to duck for cover. Flying down the road towards Sector 1, the occupants of the bakery could still hear her as she went.
“Someone want to go ask the Mechanicus for a new window?” Asked Cinnamon as she donned the rebreather she kept behind the counter. “Free cupcakes for the ones to install it.”

Ponyville-Cutie Mark Crusaders Club house
“Check” Scootaloo said as she moved the rook into an open space, putting the opposing king in danger.
“Hmm.” Tellis grunted in an annoyed manner as he moved the king, sacrificing a turn.
“Ah’m really surprised she’s beatin’ you, Tellis” said Applebloom
“Yeah, aren’t you like, a thousand years old? How are you losing to a filly at chess?” Asked Sweetie Belle.
“I”m a Khornate Berserker, not a nerd wizard who plays this game all day, that’s for Tzeentch followers.” Tellis said as he moved his knight into position to take Scootaloo’s bishop.
“Oh yeah, Well,” Sweetie Belle looked up to the sky for a moment, “Why does Khorne sit on a throne all day then?”
“Because he’s tired from beating up nerd wizards. Damnnit! WHERE DID THAT PAWN COME FROM!?” Tellis yelled as Scootaloo took his queen.
“You weren’t paying enough attention” Scootaloo said as she placed the queen alongside of the many other pieces that she’d taken from Tellis over the course of the game.
“Well Ah think it’s nice for yah to come and play a game with us mister Tellis” Applebloom said “Ah thought you’d be getting ready to fight the Orks, or doing stunts with Rainbow Dash like you usually do”
“Eh I thought I’d take it easy for a bit, ya know? When the Orks get here, I’m going to be plenty busy, blood for the Blood God and all that, right kid?”
“You bet! Skulls for the Skull throne”
RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!
The three fillies and one chaos lord looked up from the game to the sound of a rage filled yell from very far off.
“Huh, wonder who that could be.” Applebloom said aloud
Tellis tapped his lightning claws on his helmet’s chin for a moment before snapping his fingers.
“I know that sound! That right there is the sound of someone snapping and going on a blood and chemical fueled rampage! Those are always fun.”
“Where?” Sweetie Belle asked
“Ferrous Dominus”
“You can tell from here?”
“I’m a Blood Cultist, remember? We get an ear for these sort of things, right kid?”
“You bet!” Scootaloo shouted in agreement.
“Right well I’m gonna go check on this and see if I can get in on any of the fun before whoever’s doing it gets pumped full of either tranquilizers or bullets. Or both. Both is fun too.”

Ferrous Dominus Sector 1 Administration/record building
All was quiet in the building that housed a large portion of the 38th Company’s records on personnel. No one ever really came in here because no one ever really cared to know when a certain mercenary had joined or where they were from. Even when the 38th did have records on when someone was born, it was usually to rule out whether or not the could be considered young or old enough for certain duties or if they were to be placed up front or in the rear when being used as cannon fodder for the enemy guns.
The main lobby where most people would access the information stored in the databanks behind thick blast doors, was occupied by a Techpriest who was fixing a light, a servitor that was cleaning the floor, and a bored clerk who had at one point worked for Imperial Administratum, his job was to man the terminal and get anyone the information they asked for. Currently the clerk was constructing a Baneblade replica out of toothpicks, he’d been working on it for months, and he was very nearly done with it. One last toothpick was all he needed to add, he carefully and slowly applied the adhesive to the toothpick, and then slowly lowered it onto the turret of the replica. He sighed, another project done. Maybe he’d make a titan ne-
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! BANG
The clerk jumped and looked at the source of the noise, even the Techpriest stopped rewiring the light to look. The servitor just kept cleaning.
It had come from the solid steel door that was the entrance and exit to the building.
It had two small circular dents in it just above mid level.
BANG BANG BANG BANG
The door acquired a few more dents as who or whatever was trying to gain entrance continued to pound on it. Each time the door seemed to give in a little more.
BANG
The door came out of it’s frame with one final pound and fell inwards, revealing a…. pony?
Oh this pony looks very angry.

Steely hovered in the door for a moment before proceeding inwards. The Techpriest moved towards her, either in an effort to try and fix the door or berate her for the damage, she didn’t care. She grabbed the Techpriest’s head when he got close, and then twisted and pulled on it as hard as she could. Which was very hard considering she was fueled by rage and a chemical cocktail that eliminated the usual limits the brain placed on muscles.

The Techpriest’s head came off with a sickening crunch and groan of metal and bone breaking, the body stood there for a moment as though the head was still there, then the neck stump which the head had once sat on began spurting oil and other mechanical replacements for blood around the room, undoing the servitor’s work on cleaning the floors.

Steely approached the desk, oil soaked trophy in hoof, slamming it on the desk, crushing the model Baneblade in the process.
“C-c-c-can I h-h-help you?” the terrified clerk asked
“Yes. I need two things from you. You cooperate and you don’t end up like scraphead here” Steely tapped the severed head twice.
“O-o-of course! Of course! Whatever you need!”
“Right. I need to know who is having a birthday today so I can kill them. And then I need to know the location of somepony named Gear Works.”
“Why?”
Steely tapped the head again.
The clerk got to work as Steely began to talk aloud, he desperately avoided making eye contact with her blood red eyes.
“All I wanted was a slice of cake, but no, the Tau had to ruin that too, I’ll show them, I’ll kill every person whose birthday is today, that’ll show those blue skinned mules! I’ll kill everyone with birthday, then I’ll eat the cake, then I’ll kill the Tau, then I’ll kill everypony at my old job, then I’ll kill everypony at my new job. Then I’ll kill…. everypony in saddle arabia. Maybe. That’s pretty far after all….”
Steely continued to insanely rant to herself as the clerk continued to work, faster than he had ever worked before, his head was on the line here.
After about a minute a sheet began to print out from the terminal, containing the information the insane mare had wanted. It had around fifteen names on it.
“H-here you are. Do you need anything else?”
“Nope. Thank you.”
Steely snatched the list from the clerk’s hands and turned around to fly out, tearing the head off the servitor on the way out, and throwing it with such force that it embedded itself in the wall next to the clerk.
“Have a nice day?” The clerk said to thin air.

Ferrous Dominus-Sector 9-Motor Pool
Steely ran her now blood covered hoof over another name as she moved towards the last few names on the list, none of the others had had cake. Or a party. But she had killed them anyway. ‘So this last guy has to be the one with the cake. After I kill the party and eat the cake, I’ll be paying the little lying mule who told me I’d get to kill Tau a visit. Yeah.’

‘Now then, I just to find the par- oh. There it is. The balloons really stick out don’t they?’
Surely enough, she was flying nearly directly over a gathering of mercenaries, they had balloons tied to the ends of nearby tanks guns, and were all sitting at a small fold out table with six mercenaries and a baby dragon sitting at it. At the head of the table was a mercenary with multiple scars wearing a party hat the cake in front of him had the candles still smoking from being blown out. He was going at the cake with a knife.
‘No. No. No. No. THAT IS MINE. MY CAKE!’
RRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!
Steely yelled as she fell into a steep dive towards the party. Everyone at the table immediately looked up to see the angry mare dive bombing them.
“What the-” One of the mercs began to say as Steely slammed into the mercenary with the knife. Unfortunately for Steely, you don’t get to be thirty in the 38th Company without developing some good reflexes, and as she slammed into the man, the knife he was holding was thrust out and up, cutting her across her left eye, leaving a nasty cut there, but otherwise doing no damage.
The older mercenary was thrown back into one of the nearby vehicles, knocking the wind out of him as he impacted the tracks, as he caught his breath the other mercenaries moved to support him, while the baby dragon ran for help.
Steely moved between the mercenaries as they tried to hit her, showering them with blows to the chest and head, cracking ribs and skulls. Not to say that she didn’t get out scot free, she did take quite a few kicks and punches here and there, even another knife wound on her body; but she didn’t feel them, the mixture of adrenaline, rage, and chemical cocktail kept her from feeling much of anything save the sweet crunch of impacts and the pulsing of blood in her ears. Her vision had gone a deep red again, as it did when she had killed the other people on the list.
One by one the mercenaries began to fall victim to the raging mare, either their necks were snapped, their chests caved, or their windpipes crushed, they fell. The last one was especially satisfying for her as she drove her hoof all the way through him. What a rush.
As the blood began to settle in her body and she began to calm, she took stock of her surroundings. Six mercenaries lay dead at her hooves. Slaughtered by her. Blood was sprayed here and there, painting the surrounding vehicles in haphazard fashion. And there, in the center of it all, untouched, was a whole Death by Chocolate cake. A perfectly sized slice was already cut out of it. Taking up the plate with one wing, she leaned in and took a bit out of it. It tasted like…. like….
Blood. ‘What? Why does it taste like… oh, wait…. I tore out that one person’s throat with my…. Oh yeah… Well I suppose that ruins this whole venture.’
Steely then unceremoniously dropped the piece on the floor and took off to Sector 18 to find a certain earth pony who had lied to her.

Spike ran away as fast as he could from the psychotic mare that had interrupted the party he’d been attending, occasionally glancing over his shoulder to make sure she wasn’t following him. He needed to find Twilight, or Gaela or someone who would be capable of stopping that psyc-
Spikes train of thought abruptly ended as he ran into a large, deep crimson leg attached to a chaos lord.
“Hey, what’s up Spike?” Tellis asked.
Spike sat up and rubbed his head. Tellis. Not the first person he’d wanted to have run into in this situation, but probably the best match for what needed to be done.
‘Heck, he’ll probably be happy to lend a hand with this.’ Spike thought.
“Well I was just at a birthday party for this older mercenary that I’d help organized and then-”
“Blood raging psychotic mare comes out ofnowhere and starts killing people?”
Spike blinked “Yeah… How’d you know?”
“Been the same story at the last like. fourteen places I’ve been to where there were survivors. She is really dedicated to this too, I mean I haven’t seen this kind of bare handed carnage-or would it be hoofed? Do you know what the right word is here?”
“Look, that doesn’t matter! This psycho is a few rows away and I want to get as far as possible from her before she decides that I’m next!”
“Aw, c’mon, don’t be like that, we’ll go to her together!”
“I’m not sure that’s a good-”
Tellis grabbed Spike by the head and started his jets
“Together!”
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” Spike yelled as Tellis took off, his head firmly in the Raptor’s grip.

Ferrous Dominus-Sector 18-Dormitory 611
Gear Works hummed happily to himself as he packed the few belongings he had brought to the fortress into a bag to take to his new accommodations with the Dark Mechanicus. He was overjoyed that he’d been accepted just a few days before. Now he just had to pack his things and he could get to work on all sorts of exciting things within the Mechanicus. Then he heard a knock at the door.
“Who is it?”
The door then caved inwards and fell to the floor revealing a grey mare with blood red eyes, blood soaked and somewhat odd looking hooves and a snarl on her face. Which also looked a bit bloody. Somehow.
“Room Service.” Steely growled.
“Oh dear. Um. Who are you?”
“I’m from Canterlot.”
“Going to have to be a bit more specific there, miss.”
“Lathe, Steely Lathe, you handed me pamphlet for joining the 38th Company, telling me I’d get to kill Tau. Now I get here and it turns out I’m not allowed to kill Tau, now I have to work with them. Mind explaining?”
“Oh! You mean those pamphlets I handed out in the refugee camps! Oh yeah, it really raked in the recruits. I mean, I sort of knew I was lying but I figured that- this isn’t helping my case with you, is it?”
“Not particularly, no.” Steely said as she advanced on the augmented stallion.
“N-now just hold on! I’m heavily augmented, there’s no way that you can-” Gear Works was stopped as Steely hit him with her left hoof, actually managing to knock one of the tubes attached to his head loose and cracking his mechanical eye a bit more.
“Okay, maybe you can-” Gear Works was once again cut off as Steely picked him up by his servo arm and threw him against the wall, leaving an impression there.
“Now ew mabye coudl-” Gear Works speech was slightly off this time, disoriented from the previous two blows, he got up and was immediately knocked down by Steely who proceeded to get on top of him and began to rain blows on his face.
‘Left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Right.’ Steely thought as she pounded the aspirant Techpriest senseless, actually managing to knock a few teeth out in the process, sending them skittering across the floor. After five minutes of blows to the face Steely got up off the the stallion and moved towards the door.
She paused in the doorway and turned to address Gear Works, who lay on the floor with a few teeth missing, a fat lip, quite a few bruises, the non mechanical eye badly swollen, and the mechanical one sporting a few dents.
“Be seeing you around then Gears. Maybe we’ll get cake or something.” Steely then spat in his general direction and left the room.
“Bye.” Gear Works said weakly from his position on the floor.

Author's Note

Well. That took longer than expected.
I want to say sorry for how long this took, I had a two really big projects to do in my university classes and I needed to get them done.
On a side note, you'll have noticed the story got some cover art. This is thanks to both SFaccountant who got a free commission and threw a bone my way (thank you for that), and the artist 2135D, who did a fantastic job on rendering Steely in all her angry glory.
If you're wondering why she has mechanical legs, you'll have to wait till the next chapter. I swear I will do my best to get this next one done in a more timely manner.

Body mods and Blood cults

Ferrous Dominus-Outside Visitors Dormitory
Steely flew threw the door leading outside to Ferrous Dominus and took a deep breath of smog in satisfaction of a job well done. Justice had been served. From her perspective anyway.
‘Reeeeally wish I’d brought my rebreather, the air here smells like a mix of burnt metal and burning rubber’
Steely wobbled slightly as she began to feel strange, becoming slightly lightheaded and tired. She felt like she needed to lay down. That pleasant rush and burning feeling that had been in her blood began to recede, her head became a bit clearer, and her vision began to clear of the red hue that had been present since the start of her totally justified rampage.
‘I think I’ve been flying too long, I’ll walk back to the barracks I’ll be-’
Her thoughts were cut off as pain surged through her forelegs when she landed. Like needles had been pushed through every part of them and then crushed. Her eyes began to water from the pain as she collapsed forward, her legs unable to hold her up.
“OW! OWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW! OH SWEET CELESTIA IT HURTS! WHY DOES THIS HURT SO BADLY!? OOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWW!”
No one in the vicinity immediately rushed to the aid of a mare who was covered in blood and cuts. A few ponies looked on with some hesitation, deciding whether or not to move forward and help the mare, but the sight of blood that was most likely not her own was definitively a reason they were in no rush to help.
Humans who were passing by had seen much worse on the battlefield, and simply ignored the crying mare. Steely’s cries continued for a few minutes before over her cries she heard a roar that sounded like the engines of the dropships the humans used, only smaller. And shouting with them, audible over the roar.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”
“FOUND HER!”
The roar of engines stopped and a moment later there was an impact in the ground behind her large enough to pick her up off the ground for a moment.
And then immediately back down onto her broken legs.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!” Steely’s cries began with new strength after this horrifyingly painful impact.
“Wow she certainly has some lungs, right?” a voice with a metallic filter to it sounded from behind her.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!” the other voice just kept shouting.
“Uh. You can stop. We’re on the ground, man.”
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA…. We are? Oh sweet celestia thank you thank you thank you.” The thank yous were peppered with what sounded like someone kissing the ground beneath them.
“May not want to do that unless you want to cut your lifespan by a few years.” the metallic voice said, “Anyway, this who crashed your party?”
“Oh, uh, yeah, I mean she’s covered in blood so…”
“Right let’s see what we’re dealing with.”
Steely felt a massive hand wrap around her body and pick her up, bringing her face to face with a giant crimson space marine.
“P-please, help me….” Steely begged “Legs hurt. So. Badly. Need doctor.”
Tellis looked at the pleading mare’s legs and back to her face.
“Yeah, I’ve seen enough people on a Slaught combat cocktail to know that those things are probably jelly on the inside, ‘specially with all the doors you’ve banging down. By the way, really just want to say nice job on the one with the ripped out throat, that was a beautiful blood spray onto those slave’s faces. I mean from one professional serial murderer to another, I gotta give credit where it’s due there. That one you tossed down a smoke-”
“Uh, Tellis? I think we should probably get her some help.” Spike interjected concerned for the mare even though she’d just murdered the attendants of the party he was just at.
“Hm? Oh yeah, probably should…. Hmmmmm…..Well those legs probably need to come off. Probably could get some nerd to do it.”
“You mean a techpriest? Maybe Gaela could do it.”
At the mention of techpriests Steely began shaking her head.
“No. No. Techpriests. Hate. Techpriests.”
“Well I think I know one other person who could hook you up with some sweet prosthetics. And he’s not a dark nerd so thats a win-win”
“You mean Solon? I don’t know if he’d be okay with us just barging in and demanding some surgery. I mean won’t he be mad about her killing those guys?”
“Not if she’s a follower of Khorne. See, we get leeway on killing guys cause you never know when we’ll snap.”
“But she’s not a follower of Khorne, is she?”
“Lets ask. Hey? You wanna follow Khorne?”
Steely by this point had passed out from the throbbing pain in her legs and hung limply in the chaos lord’s hand.
“I think that’s a yes, you think that’s a yes?”
“I think she’s passed out.”
“Pefect! Boss nerd won’t even have to waste time knocking her out.”
“I’m still not sure about this”
“Then you can wait here. See ya later Spike, tell your geek owner I said high!”
“She’s not my-”
Before Spike could correct him, Tellis took off with Steely in hand, leaving spike standing in front of the building next to the pool of blood Steely had had drip off her in her time on the ground.
Spike sighed, and began walking back towards the psyker dorms.

Ferrous Dominus - Solon’s Forge
Warsmith Solon finished the final details on a large blueprint he’d been laboring over for the past few days between meetings with the command staff and Princess Luna. The blueprint was for a teleporter signal interceptor, now that it was done all that would be needed were a few trials and prototypes before he had the final version installed into his forge to catch unwanted ‘guests’.
“Perhapsh now I can get shome work done without being interrupt-” Solon began to say as there was a crash behind him and the roof caved in.
“Hey! Boss Nerd! I need you to hook this pony up with some new legs!” Tellis shouted to Solon, holding the still passed out Steely to him.
Solon sighed inwardly and made a mental note to have the roof reinforced with a few inches of plasteel before answering.
“And why would I do that when you’ve broken my roof? There ish a door and that ish much eashier to repair than a roof.”
“Too slow. And way more fun to come in through the roof”
“Fine, moving on, why ish thish pony sho important that you want her to get augmentationsh?” Solon said as he began to scan Steely
“She already hash an augmetic heart, odd, it appearsh that the Shlaught injectorsh have been emptied, and it looks like the forelegs are as close to pulped as they can get”
“See that’s part of why I want her fixed up, she went on a awesome rampage and killed like, fifteen people, I think she’d make a great khornate!”
“That would explain the blood…”
“So can you fix her up? Maybe give her some armor like the other ones?”
“Hmmmm….” Solon reviewed the data the scan had given him and gave the idea some thought.
“Very well I’ll give her some legs, but no power armor, power armor ish for people who ushe doorsh.”
“Sweet. Where do I put her?”
“Jusht hand her to me and get out of here, go fly around with the blue idiot or shomething”
“Cool. See ya Boss Nerd!” Tellis shouted as he took off, creating another hole in the ceiling next to the one he’d entered from as he left.
Solon sighed, and doubled the amount of plasteel he was going to add to the roof, with some adamantium for good measure.

Ferrous Dominus - Solon’s Forge - 1 day later
“Bwuh?” Steely said groggily as she lifted her head off the cold metal table she was on.
“Where am I?” she asked as she shifted her view around and blinked her eyes a few times
“Oh, you’re awake, hopefully I can orient you to the new partsh and move onto more productive projectsh”
“What are you talking about? Wait. Why can’t I feel my forelegs? Why does my chest feel weird? What’s….. I got more bits of metal shoved in me, didn’t I?”
“Well the mosht major of the augmentationsh ish more on you than in you, really”
Steely’s head reared back as far as it could go when the owner of the strangely accented voice revealed himself from behind a large console.
“I am Warshmith Sholon of the Iron Warriors 38th Grand Company, and to you missh Shteely Lathe, I am your shuperior”
Steely could do nothing but stare at Solon with her eyes as wide as they get, silence dominated the forge for a few moments as before Steely finally worked up the ability to respond.
“Ok.”
“‘Ok’? That’sh all you have to shay? I’ve just operated on you and replaced two of your limbsh and some of your organsh with augmeticsh and all you have to shay ish ‘ok’?” Solon didn’t sound upset by her apparent lack of awe or fear for him, but he didn’t sound like he completely believed her neutral response.
“Well to be fair, this is the third time I’ve woken up with new organs.”
Solon stared at her for a few moments.
“Fair enough. Sho do you want a full technical analyshish of your new partsh, or a shimple overview of what they are and what they do?”
“Well I don’t speak tech, I can work metal pretty well but I don’t know circuits and junk, soooo…..”
“Huhhh.” Solon Sighed, “Fine. I’ve replaced your forelegsh with fully functioning mechanical onesh which alsho can act as power fishtsh-”
“What’s a power fist?”
Solon sighed once more, bringing his gauntleted hand up to where his nose would be without a helmet on, rubbing the area.
“A power fisht ish a weapon that hash a field which tearsh’ apart foesh on a molecular level, moving on, I did get perhapsh a bit carried away with the augmentationsh, sheeing ash the wiring for mosht of the organsh and nervesh to be replaced with shynethic counterpartsh was already present. The work of Carmed, if I had to guessh, hish proposhalsh to turn you equinesh into shervitorsh wash a curioushity, but utterly futile; I can shee that didn’t shtop him from trying, however. Getting back on track, I replaced the equivalent of your adrenal glandsh with a series of chemical injectorsh, shome to shlow bleeding and dull pain, that short of thing. Finally, while brain augmentationsh aren’t my area of expertishe, I did some poking around in your head and either heightened your pain threshold or made it sho you can’t shee the color green any more. Posshibly both.”
“Uh…. Thanks?” Steely said, standing up and looking down at her new legs, “So that power field thing, how do I, uh, turn that on?”
“Currently it ish dishabled to prevent you from making a mess of my forge. But it can be activated and deactivated by shufficient concusshive force againsht the opposhing limb.”
“What?”
Solon covered his helmet’s face with a hand and shook his head.
“Hit. The hoovesh. Together. To turn them on and off.”
“Ohhhh. Alright. What about all that other stuff with the drugs?”
“That just reliesh on the shignalsh from the nervoush shyshtem ordering the body to work harder to enshure shurvival.”
“Um…”
“When your body thinksh you’re about to die. The drugsh will kick in.”
“Alright, alright sounds good so far. Anything else I should know?”
“I’ve got a set of carapace armour modified for equine use. Should be relatively easy to put on alone.”
“Sweet, so do I need to pay for this or?” Steely said taking her eyes off her new leg to look at Solon with an eyebrow raised.
“No, Tellis is the only reason you’re getting all of this, he apparently thinks you’ll be of great use for the blood cult.”
“Oh alright then….” Steely smiled and nodded before the last part of sentence was processed, “Wait. Blood Cult?”
“Yesh, it wash my undershtaning that after you were to join the blood cult that company maintains, I actually sent Tellis a message a few minutes ago informing him of your awakening so he can take you there and you can get out of my forge.”
“Um, I’m not too sure about this, I mean, joining a band of space pirates is one thing, but joining something call a ‘blood cult’ is something else enti-”
Steely was cut off as a loud metallic bang came from above them, followed by some muffled curses and the sound of activating lighting claws. Another moment passed before the roof caved in and the crimson space marine Steely remembered before passing out came through.
“Yo Boss Nerd! You said the newest Khornate on the block was ready for joining?”
“Yesh, get her armour on and get out pleashe, I have work that needsh doing.”
“Got it. Come on… uh… I don’t know your name.”
“Steely Lathe, and I’m not sure I want any real part of this blood cult thing. I mean I know I may have gone overboard but I’m sure that I’ll be-”
“If you’re not going to join the blood cult, I’m afraid we’ll have to charge you for the death of the fifteen men you killed. As well ash for the damage caused.”, Solon added helpfully.
“Well maybe-”
“And if you join you get to kill pretty much anybody and blame it on Khorne telling you to.” Tellis remarked, putting an arm around the mare’s neck.
“Within reashon.”
“...I could give it a shot.”
“That’s the spirit! Now get that armour on and let’s go get you inducted”
“What does that involve?”
“Beatings, for humans, or just generally being pissed off.”
“What about ponies?”
Sector 5 Ferrous Dominus - Temple District - Temple of Khorne waiting room - 2 hours later
Once again Steely found herself in a waiting room that didn’t look that different from any other waiting room in existence.
Well, actually this one was probably pretty different from any other waiting room.
For starters every wall was red, all the lights were red, the chairs were red and actually very uncomfortable to sit in, the few magazines and books that were available had bloodstains on all but a few pages, and most of them were from around five years ago on top of that.
And then there was a body being suspended from the ceiling by meat hooks which was so fresh it was still dripping blood onto the already bloodstained floor below.
But really it was the chairs that stood out the most.
‘What kind of waiting room has uncomfortable chairs? Isn’t the purpose of a waiting room to make it so people are comfortable while they wait?’
These thoughts passed through Steely’s mind as she absentmindedly stared at one of the less bloodstained books she had found, having not turned the page in a the last five minutes and simply spacing out.
The book itself was titled:

Kharn the Betrayer: Post-Human, Folk Tale, Urban Myth

By Kharn the Betrayer.

In the back of the book was what you usually find in the back of a novel, a small biography of the author and a picture of them in a large backed armchair wearing glasses and holding a pipe.

This was mostly strange because the space marine was still in full armor, he had a commissar’s hat on top of his helmet along with some glasses, and he had a chainaxe in his other hand.

In reality Steely had stopped reading after the fifteenth page, as up to that point it had simply been a recipe book for banana bread, and then it began to tell stories that weren’t even from the author’s perspective. Steely simply kept the facade of reading up to distract herself from the hellish decoration of the room, or the uncomfortable chairs. Or to do anything but talk to the large raptor guard who had been staring at her since she and Tellis entered the room.

Tellis had already left around twenty minutes ago, exclaiming “Bored now!” and then flying through the door they had entered through. This left Steely alone with a silent chaos raptor who did nothing but stare at her and occasionally tap his foot talons on the floor in a slight pattern before stopping, and eventually a familiar if slightly beaten pony acolyte of the Dark Mechanicus.

Suffice to say the room was a bit tense.

‘Okay I should probably say something to him, to ease the tension if nothing else’

“Soooo…. How long have you been with the blood cult?”

The raptor continued to stare but began to tap on the floor again.

“Um... “ Steely began to go back to her book, but then the raptor began to tap a new pattern.

“So do you, uh, tapdance or something? Is that why you keep tapping your talons?” Steely asked, trying to get some kind of response.

Gear Works finally decided to prevent this conversation from being completely one sided and turned to Steely as his mechadendrite continued to repair the door.

“He’s obviously mute you idiot, he’s been trying to communicate via morse code for the past ten minutes.”
Steely turned her head to argue, already a look of anger on her face which Gear Works flinched away from slightly.
“Well I don’t speak morse code, so if you can, translate, you tin can.”

“Well I’m a bit rusty, but I think I can give it a shot.”

The raptor turned his gaze to Gear Works and began tapping rapid succession.

“Uh… Okay…. Mhmmm….Alright….Got it.”

“Well?”

“He said, ‘To answer your questions in order, two hundred and sixty years, and once when under the spell of a witch of the whore god.”

“Okay well, tell him-”

“He’s mute, not deaf you idiot, you can ask him, I’ll just translate while I fix this.” Gear Works cut her off as he turned back to his work.

“Want me to make another impression on the wall with you scrap head?”

Gear Works seized up like a rusty techpriest at the thought of another beating from the psychotic mare.

“No.”
“Then don’t call me an idiot.”

“Ok.”

“So anyway,” Steely said turning her head back towards the raptor, “Why are you mute? I figured they’d just cut you open and shove a new voice box in or something.”

The raptor tapped out another series of words

“He says ‘the silence is voluntary, I had my vocal chords cut as a penance recommended by Virgil after killing an unworthy combatant in a fit of rage at the battle of Torinthis.’.”

“An unworthy combatant? I thought you guys were all about slaughter a murder.”

Another flurry of taps

“ ‘That is the feeling of many who bend knee to the blood god, but many more among us find such an attitude unworthy of a true servant of Khorne, Khorne wishes his throne to be made of the skulls of great warriors and worthy foes, not women and children. To assume he wants a throne made of unworthy skulls is an insult.’.”

“Well that’s nice to know going in mister, um… I never caught your name.”

A quick series of taps

“ ‘Champion of Khorne Tharix, originally of the Iron Warriors 2nd Grand Company, now of the 38th.’. Well that’s quite the demotion.” Gear works muttered under his breath

Tharix drew his chainsword and activated it, pointing the whirring blade at GearWorks and practically slamming his foot into the ground to make his message heard above the chainsword’s roar

“Whow! Okay! Yes! I’m a worm and I’ll shut my mouth!”

Tharix nodded and deactivated his chainsword, placing it once again at his side before turning his attention to Steely and letting fly another storm of taps.

“He says he likes your hooves and wants to know where you got augmetic work that fine.”

“Warsmith Solon made them for me because Tellis asked him to”

“Wait what?!” Gear Works ceased working on the door and rushed over to Steely as quickly as he could and seized one her hooves with his servo arm, holding it up to his face to be examined in detail.

“What the buck do you think your doing?!” Steely shouted at Gear Works, cocking her free hoof to hit his face

“I’ve heard stories about Warsmith Solon’s quality of craftsmanship, but I never really thought I’d see it up close, oh! The joint work on this is amazing! It provides full free motion! And the materials look to be some kind of alloy. I don’t even recognize this alloy and I’ve got access to Mechanicus databanks! I hope you don’t mind if maybe I take some shavings and-”

“Gear Works. Look at me. Now.”

Gear Works stopped rambling for a moment to look over at Steely.

She had murder in her eyes.

“Well *cough* I’m sure I can take a closer look later, maybe?” Gear Works released her leg and backed off slightly

“If you let go now and ask politely next time, yes, maybe.”

“Can I at least have a few shavings?”
Steely slammed the hooves together and the power field crackled to life.

“Right then! That is a no on those shavings! I’m just going to go finish fixing this door and get out of here! Okay? Okay!” Gear Works quickly turned back around and got to work at a pace much faster than before and didn’t even translate when Tharix attempted to continue the conversation.

Before Steely knew it he was done and out of the room like his tail was on fire.

And so silence once again dominated the room as Tharix and Steely lost their one effective means of communication.

The silence was broken by the sound of a door opening and a hooded figure walking out. Tharix proceeded to fall to his knee in respect for the figure who turned to the raptor before speaking.

“Rise Champion Tharix, you need not bend knee to me.” Tharix obeyed the figure and rose to his feet before gesturing at Steely and making some quick taps.

“A new convert, eh? And another pony no less. Tell me, what is your name my child?”

“Steely Lathe, mister...?”

“I am simply known as Father Virgil to the mercenaries in this fortress. But most call me Virgil for expediency.”

“Well then Virgil, I suppose I’m here to join the blood cult.”
“And why do you want to join? What makes you consider the blood cult to be your place on the eightfold path?”

Tharix tapped a few words to Virgil

“Oh you mean the one we found impaled on the Chaos star out front was her work?”

Tharix tapped what could be assumed as an affirmative

“Well then I suppose the blood cult is for you, come, my child, follow me into my office. I and one other shall help induct you into the ways of khorne.”

____________________________________________________________________________

Virgil’s office was disturbingly tidy and normal looking for the priest of an evil religion.

There wasn’t a single chaos star in the room at all, hardly any black and no marks or shrines to a god or anything. Compared to every office and waiting room Steely had been in, this one was by far the most frightening and disturbing solely because it was so normal. There was absolutely nothing odd about this office at all.

There was a piece of art on the wall behind the desk depicting some scene of a showdown between a golden figure and a black figure. There was a wall of bookshelves on the left side with many large tomes that looked ancient if their condition was anything to go by. on the right you had a water cooler and some tables with various knick knacks on them. None of those knick knacks being of the evil sort either, simply small things like snow globes or small replicas of vehicles.

On the desk in the center of the room there was nothing save for an inkwell with its pen and a metronome.

All in all, it was the most normal thing Steely had scene since coming to Ferrous Dominus.

And that’s why she was shaking like a leaf in the wind while facing the priest. It was too normal, too regular and plain, it looked right, but it just didn’t feel right.

“Now then Miss Lathe, you’ve already proven yourself to be of the right mindset for joining the Blood Cult, and with your augmentations you’ll be fine physically, but we now must test your mental and spiritual readiness for serving the blood god.” Virgil said as he withdrew something from a drawer in the desk, and then walked around to stand in front of Steely, who had yet to take a seat. Steely saw that the object in his hand was some kind of writing utensil, which Virgil began to draw on Steely’s face with.

“What are you doing?!”
“Hold still a moment, one wrong symbol and your soul may be sucked from your body.”

Steely decided to stand still.

After a few more seconds of marking her face, Virgil backed off from Steely and nodded in satisfaction at his work.

“Now then, with these markings, your soul and your memories will be laid bare for us to judge whether or not you are fit to serve the blood god.”
“So how does this thing work exactly?”

“One moment.”

Virgil pressed a thumb onto Steely’s forehead and began chanting in languages that turned Steely’s blood to ice.

After a few moments of chanting, Virgil drew back his hand as the room darkened and, flashes of Steely’s life began to appear before the two. The first being from Steely’s childhood, images of her chasing another pegasus filly down the street with anger clear on her face.

“Now I want you to tell me of these memories as they come, start with this one.”

“Oh, uh, Speedy Cross always made fun of my family for not working in weather, so eventually I just got fed up with her teasing and chased her down.”

“What did you do then?”

“Nothing too serious if my memory is right, just usual kid stuff, pulled her hair, pushed her in the mud…. I think I may have hit her with a stick I’d managed to pick up and gave her a concussion.”

“With a stick?”

“It was a big stick.”

Then another memory of Steely flashed before them, this one showing Steely covering her ears as all the other ponies around her were singing in the oddly common public sing alongs that occur in equestria.

“Do most ponies not enjoy singing in public? Discord informs me that every few weeks there is at least some kind of public singing.”
“Never had the voice for it. Plus it’s really weird when you think about it. I mean, I don’t know why we need to sing while we’re changing the season, wouldn’t the work go faster if we weren’t out of breath from singing?”

“Pragmatic.”

Next showed a slightly drunk Steely fighting off three bouncers in a bar with a broken bottle.

“I don’t remember that one actually. That might be from my weekend in Las Pegasus. I got kicked out of a casino but I don’t remember which.”

“How did this start, exactly?”

“Eh, some stallion trying to get lucky pushed his luck a bit too far, so I bashed a stool over his head.”
“That seems like something of an overreaction given the situation.”

“I may have been a little tipsy. Anyway, so I hit him with the stool and he goes down, it all becomes sort of hazy. Like, red hazy. I woke up leaning against my hotel room door with some scratches and a bit of blood on me, may have been mine.”

“So it appears you have a history of violence.”

“I don’t know where you get that from.”

Virgil held up a hand and began chanting, causing the light in the room to return to normal and the memories to disappear. He then gestured for Steely to take a seat in one of the chairs before moving back behind the desk and sitting down.

“It is my opinion that you are worthy of serving the Blood God, however, I require the power of a higher authority before I induct a xenos such as yourself into the cult.”
“ ‘Higher Authority’? I thought you were the high authority?”
“ I am merely a shepherd of another’s flock, I tend to them and care for them, but in the end it is not my flock.”
“Um… okay?”

“Please follow me” Virgil said as he got up from his chair and proceeded over to a miniature bust of some no doubt notable historical importance, and tilted the head slightly to the left, moving one of the bookshelves on the left side of the room, revealing a sizable room with summoning circle in the middle.

“Alright, I’m sort of impressed by the quality of this secret passage. I mean I didn’t really expect this to be here at all.”

“Please hold still a moment.” Virgil said as he withdrew a small knife and proceeded to give Steely a light and quick slice on the rear leg, spilling Steely’s blood onto the summoning circle and causing it to begin to glow with a warm red.

“OW! What’d you do that for?! You mule!”

“I required fresh blood to correctly perform the summoning.”
“And your own wouldn’t have done trick?”

“Probably, yes, but this test isn’t for I, the blood of the aspirant must be used for the ritual to be done properly.”

“What?”
“Don’t worry about the bleeding either, you will likely be bleeding bit more before this day is over.” Virgil said as he turned around and walked back towards the entrance of the room. “Now stay here, I’ll be back for you in a about… five hours? I believe that will be enough time.”

“Enough time for what?”

The seal beneath Steely’s hooves was now glowing with a harsh, hellish red and it began to feel warm to the touch. Like blood.

“Goodbye aspirant Lathe, should you survive, you will be welcomed as a servant of Khorne.”

“Survive what?! What am I surviving?!” Steely shouted at the man, anger rising along with the volume of her voice.

“That.” Virgil pointed to something behind her as the entrance to the room slammed shut and locked in place.

Steely heard a snarling sound behind her turned to face a horrifying red creature with an overly long tongue, oddly shaped head with massive horns, digigrade legs, claws that looked very pointy, teeth that probably would hurt to be bit by, and a giant glowing spikey sword that dripped blood.

“.....Well... this isn’t good.”

The bloodletter charged forward with a howl, swinging its blade in attempt to behead the mare. Steely took off quickly to avoid the swing, activating the power field on her legs once in the air and attempted to dive bomb the bloodletter.

The daemon, which had existed for millennia and fought hundreds of thousands of opponents, masterfully dodged out of the way. As Steely impacted the ground with enough force to crack and pulverize the stone beneath her hooves, she ducked under the daemonic blade as it came at her head, then jumped back into the air as the blade drove forward.

‘Alright, so I’m probably safe in the air.’ Steely thought as she hovered just out of the daemons reach ‘Now I just have to-’ “Gah!” Steely shouted as the daemon jumped, closing the small distance that separated her and it. Steely was just able to avoid the daemons blade, but not before it took a small chunk out of her mane.

‘Oooohhkay, so just waiting it out isn’t an option… maybe if I-’ “Damnit!” Steely once again just barely avoided become a skewer as the daemon jumped at her.

‘Not giving me a second are you freak? Well let’s see how you handle this.’

The daemon once again jumped up to take a swing at Steely, but this time, she was ready. Steely ducked under the swing, and, before the daemon could begin to fall, flew below the daemon and then upwards to deliver a swift and powerful uppercut, causing the daemon to be propelled upwards and impact it’s head on the ceiling before falling back to the floor. The bloodletter lay there for a few moments, dazed by the blow and the following impacts. This was just enough time for Steely to dive bomb the daemon with as much speed as she could gather, both of her mechanical hooves impacting the daemon’s midsection.

Hearing bones crunch from the blow, Steely assumed the fight was finished, bringing her hooves together to turn off the power field and began walking towards the door.

The sound of stirring behind her made her turn around to see the daemon up and on it’s feet like nothing had happened to it.

“This is gonna be a looong few hours, isn’t it?” Steely said to the daemon as she began hovering and turned her hooves power field back on.

The bloodletter answered with another howl as they both charged.

4 hours and 59 minutes later

Steely lay on her back with wings spread wide as she held back the infernal blade the daemon was attempting to bring down on her head. Her mechanical legs and the field they produced strained with every ounce of artificial strength they had been designed to have as the blade was held between them, inching ever closer to Steely’s face as the hooves grip began to falter.

‘Not gonna die. Must. Kill. This. Thing.’ then Steely heard a voice, in the back of her mind.

‘If it is power that you seek, the ability to defeat any foe, no matter how great, I can give it to you. I can help you… all you must do is swear to serve in life by fighting great foes and dedicating their skulls to me, by baptising them with their own blood, by giving into the rage I know you feel inside of you.’

‘So I do this and I don’t die?’ Steely didn’t question where the voice was coming from as the blade inched ever closer to her face, the razor edge that had nicked and cut her, missing her by mere inches each time came so close it was practically touching her nose.

‘Everyone dies, I can merely promise that you won’t die here, to this simple wretch. Swear now to serve, and you shall be spared and know the glory of Khorne.’

‘Deal.’

Then in a cloud of red smoke, the daemon vanished and the door that she had come through at the start of this ordeal opened.

“Ah, aspirant Lathe, good to see you are still in once piece. I trust the daemon did not do too much damage to you, did it.?”

“You could have bucking warned me you were just leaving me to fight that thing! I nearly died! And now I’ve got cuts all over my body, my armor is probably gonna need a patch job, and I think my legs need to get looked at!” To emphasize the point, Steely held out one of her hooves which then began sparking and sputtering smoke from near the joint.

“I am surprised something of Warsmith Solon’s making is malfunctioning at all, even after fighting a daemon, they should be in working order.”

“I… may have had to use them to block that thing’s sword once or twice…”
“Once or twice?”

“Alright so maybe it was a few dozen times. Honestly I’m surprised they held up this long, my armor got cut up pretty bad.” The carapace armor Steely was wearing was covered in scratches that went alarmingly far into the heavy body armor, some scratches even had blood slowly leaking from them where the blade had gone all the way through and scored a hit.

“Regardless of the state of your wargear, you have passed the test and may now officially join this sanctified cult as a servant of the great Khorne.”

“That’s it? I just fight a daemon and I’m all set to serve a god?”
“Do you not feel it? Do you not feel the anger? Did you not commune with the Blood God himself? Swear to serve him?”

“Was that what that voice was?”

“Yes.”

Steely put her non smoking hoof to her chest and felt around. “I don’t feel that different.”

“Give it a moment.”

Then she heard it. In the back of her mind but quickly come to the fore of her thoughts were thoughts and words that were not her own. And actually it was getting pretty damn irritating.

‘kill, kill, kill, kill, blood, skulls, murder, slaughter, kill, slaughter, kill, kill, BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD, murder, kill, kill’

“Yeah there it is, so is this just going to be in my head forever now?”

“Yes.”

“Damn.”

Battle and Beds

Ferrous Dominus - Solon’s Forge

Solon busied himself with various projects and curiosities while he waited for data from the scouting parties to compile to be reviewed by himself and the senior staff.
Then his door was knocked out of its frame.

Solon sighed as Steely flew into the room after turning off her augments.

“What do you want Msh. Lathe. I have precioush little time right now.”

“Repairs? I need one of my legs looked at and my armor patched. Daemon in the temple really did a number on it.”

“A daemon? What kind?”

“Uh…. kinda human sized? Maybe a bit bigger? Had a sword and some horns?”

“A bloodletter?”

“....I think?”

“Hm. Well I shupposhe that that would be shufficient to damage your augmentsh and armor…” The Warsmith’s voice trailed off as he put a hand to his chin in consideration before continuing, “Very well Msh. Lathe, I’ll repair them thish time, but after thish you musht find shomeone elshe to repair them.”

“Ok, fair enough I guess. Who should I take anything to?”

“Just go bother the Mechanicush inshtead of me.”

“So do I just...”

“Do you have shomeone who can read shchematicsh?.”

“Well I think I know somepony who can do it…”

Ferrous Dominus - Sector 4 Dark Mechanicus Temple Secundus - 3 hours later
“Yes! Gear Works! G. E. A. R. W. O. R. K. S. Gear Works! Do you understand you stupid toaster?! I need to see a pony named GEAR WORKS!” Steely yelled while hovering in the face of one of the servitors at the door.

The servitor continued to ignore her.

Steely groaned as she moved away from the servitor’s face and landed to begin pacing back and forth in front of the door to the temple. Her movement tracked by the turrets mounted on the building.

‘This is getting on my nerves. I’ve been out here for… what? A couple hours? Still can’t get in… maybe… if I ‘knock’ on the door.’

Steely then took off and backed up a few feet, enough so that she could gain some speed and that the guns would stop tracking her movements.
Then she activated her augments and flew forward as fast as she could.

The reinforced entrance to the temple then flew open as an Acolyte ran out and stood in front of the entrance with arms crossed.
Steely took a steep turn upward in attempt to avoid hitting the Acolyte and get rid of the speed she’d build up for her attempt to batter down the door. When she looped in the air and began a dive back towards the ground, the acolyte took a few steps back in preparation for Steely’s impact.

With a loud crack and a cloud of dust and rockcrete chips, Steely impacted the ground and immediately took off again to begin hovering in the face of the Acolyte.

“I am Acolyte Sheraan of the Dark Mechanicus. May I ask what you were planning on doing?” The Acolyte asked in as much of an annoyed tone as could be managed with a voxcaster instead of a voicebox.

“Yeah. Was planning to break the door down and find somepony I’m looking for in there. Your stupid toaster over there wasn’t listening.” Steely replied, bringing her muzzle inches away from Sheraan’s hooded face.

“You do realize that the servitors only guard the temple and eliminate intruders, yes? It has neither the ability nor capacity to understand you and grant entrance.”

“Well…. You should put up a sign or something saying that.”

“Before now, no one has been idiotic enough to attempt to converse with a servitor; Well, except for perhaps a few of the more intoxicated mercenaries.”

“So are you going to ask why I’m here or should I just tell you?” Steely said as she backed off from the hooded Acolyte.

“I do not care why you are here, equine. I only exited the temple to prevent you from attempting to batter down our door.”

“Look, I just need some repair work done and I’m only gonna trust one pony to do it. You got a pony named Gear Works in there, right?”

“You are acquainted with the aspirant?”

“I… may have broken his jaw and cracked his metal eye thing... “

“....Go on.”

“Well see, I got these augments from the Warsmith and…”

One of Sheraan’s mechadendrites shot out from beneath his robe and seized Steely’s right augment and brought it up to his eye level for examination.

“Interesting that the Warsmith would see fit to bestow upon you such advance augmentations, but then I suppose both he and others of the company have come to have a strange fixation upon you equines.”

“Hey! Let me go you scrapheap!” Steely said as she attempted to pull her hoof from the acolytes iron grip.

“Hmmm, yes. I can see that there is indeed some damage to the augment. Nothing too serious, but if left unattended it could cause severe failure. Very well, I will have the aspirant tend to your augments tomorrow.” Sheraan said as he released Steely’s leg, Steely retreating a good distance to prevent anymore grapples.

“Nonononono. No. He fixes my leg tonight! I’m not waiting till morning! I have briefing in the morning.”

An idea crossed Sheraan’s mind.
“Well I suppose that you could have the Aspirant repair the augments tonight, however I believe that he has already retired to his dormitory for the evening.”

“Well just show me to his room then, I don’t care.”

“I cannot, as that would require taking you deep within the temple, far past where any outsider is allowed.”

“So what should I do then? Just wait for you to go get him?”

“I am not your errand boy equine. If you want the Aspirant to repair your augments tonight, you’ll have to see him in his dormitory along the east wall of the building to the right of the red coolant pipes.”

“Is there a door there?”

“No.”

“Window?”

“No.”

“So how am I supposed to get in! I don’t have all night scraphead!”

Sheraan sighed as he brought his hand up to his face. Silently cursing this equine’s stupidity before finally spelling it out for her.

“There isn’t a door, but you can make one.”

“With what?”

“......”
“......”

“Alright, dumb question. But are you really okay with me making a hole in your precious temple?”

“Oh yes, completely fine with you making a hole in that specific spot. Actually let me just show you exactly where to hit the wall. Come.” Sheraan said as he began to walk down the road towards where the Mechanicus temple ended and another structure began.

Dark Mechanicus Temple Secundus Dormitory - Aspirant Gear Works Dorm

Gear Works breathed a sigh of relief as he sprawled out on the ‘bed’ in his dorm, looking over happily at this recently reacquired buffalo cleric figure. He did have to be thankful that he still had that thanks to Dusk Blade sacrificing his own buffalo shaman. The lieutenant wasn’t the best of friends, actually he wasn’t even a decent friend to have. But sacrificing your own model for someone else’s had to mean something, didn’t it? Those things cost so much you’d be crazy to just give it up so easily.

Ferrous Dominus - Sector 20 - NightWatch Barracks

Private Full Crescent of the Lunar guard rummaged through his footlocker, trying to find his buffalo shaman figurine for O&O night with his squad, but couldn’t seem to find the small figure among his other personal effects. ‘I know I left it in here. Where’d it go? Hm. Maybe I’ll ask Dusk Blade, he borrowed my painting kit from here the other day, maybe it was in there?’
Full Crescent grabbed his papers off his bunk and shut his footlocker with a sigh, he’d just have to play using a bit for his character tonight or something.

Ferrous Dominus - Aspirant Gear Work’s dorm
Then Gear Works Wall imploded and rained rather large chunks of rockcrete onto him, crushing his left foreleg and barely missing his head. All Gear Works could do was sit in silence and stare at the bloodied piece of rockcrete occupying the space his leg once had been in.

“Wooooo! That was actually a lot of fun! I gotta do this more often!” Steely yelled as she flew into the room, followed by Sheraan.
“I would prefer if you didn’t, repairing walls in this fortress is a rather time consuming activity.”

“Whatever. Hey Gear Works how you doing? Remember me? I broke your jaw a few days ago!” Steely shouted, oblivious to the obvious shock that Gear Works was in having his leg trapped and bleeding beneath a large chunk of rockcrete.

“Oh, ouch. Want me to get that for you?” Steely said as she activated her augments and brought both hooves over her head, preparing the bring them down on the rockcrete.

“NONONONO! WAIT!” Gear Works said, snapping out of his shock as Steely brought her hooves down on the chunk, obliterating it and further pulverizing Gear Works leg beneath it.

“Owwwwwww.” Was all Gear Works could manage after the blow, his voice low and weak.

“There we go. So listen, I need you to repair my legs right now so I can be ready for a briefing tomorrow.”

“Yes Aspirant, this Reaver is in need of minor repairs to her augmetics, it should not take any more than ten minutes, after which I’ll likely need to get you a new leg so that you may then fix the wall. Maybe not in that order.”

“Ok, just-just come over here and put it in front of me so I don’t have to move please.”

“Alright” Steely flew over to place her damaged leg in front of Gear Works, who began to scan it and brought his own augments forward to begin repairs.

“Just wanted to also drop by and say sorry for breaking your jaw the other day, I just was having a reallly stressful time and honestly it’s all kinda hazy now anyway. Also sorry for calling you an idiot and everything in the chaos temple, the chairs were just uncomfortable and it really wore me down.”

“Right-Right, no big deal.” Gear Works said as he focused on his work and not the pain in his now mangled leg.

“So how about after my first deployment we get some cake and celebrate a bit, eh? The bakery in sector six is going to be having a special on bundt cake in a few days and I haven’t had bundt cake in forever.”

“I suppose as long as I can get permission from-”

“You may get cake, Aspirant, so long as you make up for lost time and improve your work quality.”

“Of Course, Acolyte.”

The three lapsed into silence as the repairs continued. Steely began to observe the small room as she waited. Then she noticed the small figure on the desk

“Oh, cool! You play O&O? What is that? A buffalo druid?” Steely asked enthusiastically.

“Buffalo cleric, actually, he’s got a medicine staff that cures poisons and curses.”

“Nice, I always played a pegasus warrior, pretty basic but I always liked the the basic stuff, ranged combat just never did it for me in the game.”

“Maybe we should play sometime, I have a few…. Friends, we could play with.”

“Nah, if we play, we play with my friends, I think Tellis already plays, next time he’s around I’ll ask him, and Tharix probably could pick it up easily enough.”

“Um. Alright then, your friends it is.” Gear Works didn’t want to imagine what a Iron Warrior like Tellis would do if he rolled a one as he finished up with the repairs on Steely’s leg. “There we are, all done and fit for combat.”

“Sweet. So wait, that medicine stick your cleric has, it cures poisons and curses? Haven’t heard of anything like that in third edition.”

“It’s… It’s not third edition.”

“Three and a half then?” Steely said cautiously.

“No. Not three and a half either.” Gear Works braced himself for the worst.

Steely’s face adopted a neutral look as she sighed and flew behind Gear Works, seizing hold of his back right leg and planting her back legs on top of him

“W-What are you doing.” Gear Works asked nervously

Steely began to pull on Gear Works leg as hard as she could, and very soon her bones popping and flesh tearing as regular muscle gave way to augmented strength.

Gear Works barely had time to yell before the leg was off and Steely began to hit him over the head with it.

“FOURTH! EDITION! IS! AN! INSULT! TO! EVERY! PLAYER! IN! THE! WORLD!” Steely said, each word punctuated by a blow to Gear Works head… with his own limb. This was too much for Gear Works who then blacked out.

Eventually Steely stopped assaulting the Aspirant with his own flesh and threw the leg on her back as she flew back out the hole in the wall.

“Where are you going with that?” Sheraan asked the Khornate Reaver as she left

“Gonna see if I can get some Kroot at the temple to kill each other for it.”

“Very well.” Sheraan said as he turned back to the bleeding and brutalized Aspirant. “I suppose since one leg has been disintegrated and the other is soon to be food for xenos, I will need to requisition you new limbs. Which means I’ll have to interact with Carmed. You will pay for making me interact with Carmed, Aspirant.”

Ferrous Dominus - Sector 17 - briefing room

General Gnoss looked over the battle plan that Lord Sliver had put together as he prepared to enter the briefing room to brief the next batch of troops on their part in the upcoming battle against the Orks. He paused near the entrance and looked to the guard standing by the door, “Which group is in there now?” Gnoss asked the guard.

“Khornates and raptors, sir. Only five fatalities since we sealed them in there by what we can tell.”

“Only five? Hm. Would’ve thought there’d be more by now.”

“Well we may have put a couple of slaves in there with them, just to keep them occupied.”

“Excellent work, soldier. Now then.” Gnoss said as he opened the door to the stage where he would be delivering the brief from

Gnoss came to center stage and looked at the crowd below him, the chairs that had been placed for the briefing had been scattered (along with the bloody remains of those five fatalities and the slaves that had been thrown to the bloodthirsty mob) and more than one was bent and damaged beyond all repair. Those who were supposed to be occupying the chairs, a mixture of humans, Kroot, and a handful of Raptors that were left in the company by this point, were all gathered around in a circle in the center of the room, chanting.

“GO! GO! GO! GO! GO! GO! GO! GO! GO! GO! GO! GO!”
Gnoss came to the edge of the stage and attempted to see over the crowd. Eventually he got a good look at what appeared to be a Raptor and a pegasus in armor having a tug of war with an unfortunate slave. The mare holding the slave by the upper body by hooking her mechanical hooves under his arms while the raptor held each of the slave's legs

Gnoss continued to watch the competition with curiosity; not because of any real interest in the fate of the slave or the reason for it, throw followers of the Blood God in a sealed room and they’ll kill everything that isn’t one of them and then each other. What was curious was the pegasus. As far as he knew, Phage squadron were the only ponies that had dedicated themselves to the dark gods in service of the 38th Company.

Eventually with a yell from the slave followed by an audible crack and tearing of flesh, the slave was torn in two, the pegasus taking off with her gory prize before dropping the body on the ground and seizing the head to twist it off and hold it triumphantly between her hooves.

Gnoss decided to interject at this point by loudly coughing.

Suddenly every eye in the room was upon him; not that he was worried, followers of Khorne were unstable, but they knew their place in the company, when to attack and when to wait for orders. Except maybe Tellis, but he was the exception to many of the Company’s rules.

“Khornate Berserkers, Reavers, Ravagers, and my lord Astartes, I have come here to deliver to you your place in the battle plan for our coming fight with the Orks.” Gnoss took a moment to find the page detailing the place for the Khornates in the coming battle, “Your place will be in the rear for the worst case scenario of our lines breaking, this is where a good majority of you will be stationed.” Gnoss looked out into the crowd, many seemed deflated at this announcement. Save for the pegasus, she looked rather angry, but that may just be due to the fact that she worships Khorne. “Others, and the Raptor units we have at our disposal, will be deployed to the forest, to wait with Lord Sliver for the enemy Gargants to be eliminated before engaging the Orks on the right flank. Any who fail to follow this order shall be executed by firing squad after the battle has ended should they survive. Dismissed”

Ponyville - 38th Company reserves section - one day later

Steely grumbled as she shifted around on the branch she’d chosen to lay on while the reserves waited for something to happen, anything really. She could hear the far off booms of artillery, and the clatter of heavy bolters firing. After the gargants had been destroyed, it seemed the battle had been in the Iron Warrior’s favor, she thought she might not even get to fight. But by what the vox man that had been stationed with them was telling, the battle was still a desperate situation for all on the front.

‘Wonder if they’ll break through? That’d be nice, finally be able to tear something apart with my bare hooves, right Khorne?’
‘Kill kill kill kill kill kill kill murder blood blood blood blood kill slaughter carnage slaughter kill kill murder murder kill’
‘Right.’

Then the vox man pressed his head to the ear piece and his face turned pale. He began to shout for them to mobilize, but was cut short as shoota rounds pierced his armor and turned him into a bloody mess along with his vox set.

At the same time a hail of shoota fire and rockets seemed to come from every direction, tearing through the host of Khorne as the rounds and explosives did their job, tearing men, women, and aliens to pieces. Steely herself felt a more than a few close calls as rounds quickly stitched up the tree she was in. Taking to the air, she flew haphazardly as she attempted to make herself a hard target for whoever was shooting. She saw that many fellow cultists were taking cover and those with ranged weapons (mostly a few bolt and las pistols) were firing wildly in every direction, attempting to hit the phantom foe.

Then she saw a barrel sticking out a nearby bush; seeing a target, Steely activated her augments and dove onto the bush, crushing it and its occupant. Moving the remains of the bush off of her target, she found an Ork with purple face paint beneath her, its chest caved inwards from the impact of her dive.

“The enemy is here!” Steely shouted, barely being heard over the still sounds of battle. “We’ve got Orks behind the lines! FIND THEM AND KILL THEM! BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!”

“BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!” Her fellow Khornates echoed before finally finding their bearings and pin pointing where the Orks were hiding and either charging them in a frenzy or pouring fire on their location until they stopped firing back.

Abandoning stealth, the Kommandos emerged from their hiding places, cresting roofs, jumping from shrubbery with choppas in hand, ready for a straight fight. Steely zeroed in on an kommando still firing from atop a nearby roof. Taking off, she rammed into the Ork and followed him on his fall to the ground, pulping his head after he landed. Steely reveled in the blood that spattered across her for a moment until another burst of fire drew her attention to another group of Orks coming at her, this group didn’t look like the ones she’d killed so far, these just looked like ‘normal’ Orks.

“Well, guess the line broke after all.” Steely muttered before she readied herself to charge right into the pack of boyz. Feeling the stimulants coursing through her system and the roar of blood rushing in her ears.
Then the Orks were burned by a giant fiery pillar from the sky.

“Huh?” Was all Steely could manage as she watched the Orks burn.

Looking around, she could see a giant pillar of light coming down around the center of town, where the command center would be. She heard a shouting in her head, more so than usual

‘FUCKING MAGIC BULLSHIT! KILL KILL KILL KILL PROVE POWER OF THE BLOOD GOD TO THESE PATHETIC SPELL FLINGERS!’

Steely took off, making a beeline for the center of town, stopping only to scatter and kill groups of Orks with diving attacks, pounding their skulls and bodies into the dirt. On one instance of these attacks, she came into conflict with Nob with some fancy armor who actually managed to survive having her hit his chest. The Nob let loose a volley of gunfire from his deafening heavy stubber. The carapace armor Steely wore held firm, however, she was thrown back by the weight of the impacts. Steely fell to the ground in a heap, dazed by the sound and impact from the Nob’s gun.

“Stupid hos’, don’t matta’ wut fansy bits you’s gots on ya, we’ze da Orks and we’ze gonna krump youz and dem spikey boyz good!”

Steely shook her head to clear it, and felt another rush of combat cocktail work its way through her system as the Nob brought the choppa down. Everything seeming to move more slowly as her life was on the line. A sane and smart move would be to move to the side to avoid the swing, but that’s not how followers of Khorne do things. So Steely flew forward into the Nobs chest as the blade took off a chunk of her tail. With the Nob on the ground, stunned, she brought down her hooves onto the Nobs arms, shattering them before bringing them both down onto his head.

A thunderous roar echoed from nearby as a squiggoth smashed through a home and stopped, the Ork crew taking great joy in spraying the ground with gunfire.

Steely looked at the squiggoth, and then at her hooves, and then back at the squiggoth, and then up towards the sky.
Then a devilish smile crossed her face, and she flew up as far as she could go while still being below the layer of clouds. Looking down on the battlefield, and more specifically, the squiggoth.

“This is stupid, but if it works, I’m a genius, and I’m taking that things jaw as a bedframe. If it doesn’t… well I guess I’ll be a stain on the ground.” Steely muttered to herself as she prepared for a vertical dive

“Okay. Now. One… two…. BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!” Steely shouted as she dove straight down, picking up speed faster than she ever truly had before, barely able to keep her eyes open against the force of the wind flying in her face. The ground was certainly getting a lot closer. And so was her target. She swore that she could hear whistling like a shell falling while she dove.

‘Reaaaallllly hope this thing doesn’t move.’ Steely thought as her speed neared the point where she wouldn’t be able to survive if she missed. ‘Also really hope they don’t start shooting at me.’

On the Ork Squiggoth ‘Smashy Smasha’ - in the crew compartment

Shotty pulled his gun back from one of the openings the compartment had to reload his shoota’, he was glad that the squiggoth driver had stopped so the boys could have sum gud fun shooting lots of dakka all over.
Then he noticed one of the other boys looking up at the ceiling, his shooter fully loaded but forgotten at his side. The git looked like he was trying to hear something.

“Oi! Ya Grot! Wat do ya think yur doin’!? Get ta shootin some dakka!” Shotty yelled.

The boy turned to shotty and just said, “Yu ear dat?”

Then a hole was punched through the roof right on top of their big pile of explosives and ammunition, and continued down through the compartment and the squiggoth before impacting the ground with enough force as to dig a crater of significant size and knock out the pony that had created it.

Not that Shotty or any of the other boys in the compartment noticed this, as they had been vaporized by the explosion created from a powerfield impacting a large pile of explosives and ammo.

The explosion did it’s fair share of damage to the squiggoth as well, destroying a large chunk of its spine and other vital organs near the explosion site. This was more damage than the beast could take and with a final roar, it keeled over onto it’s side.

Ponyville - 4 hours after Nethalican activation
Steely snapped awake from unconsciousness to the feeling of a cart moving under her. And a dead body on top of her. She surged upwards, using the mechanical strength of her legs to lift up the dead bodies piled on top of her and climb out from underneath them.

“Oh hell I think we’ve got another plague zombie.” Said a mercenary as he readied a bolt pistol.

“I’m not dead you idiot! Now where’s the Orks? Where’s the squiggoth I killed?”

“Well to answer your questions in order, Miss Demanding, scattered after we killed their warboss, and back across town.”

“Thank you!” Steely shouted as she took off towards where her trophy for khorne and future bedframe lay.

Steely flew across town as fast as she could with sore wings and a bit of a hangover from the combat cocktail that’d been pumped into her during the battle. Eventually coming to the sight of her biggest kill yet.

With a bunch of dark nerds getting ready to torch it.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Steely yelled as she flew in front of the nearest nerd she could find.

“Preparing to incinerate this beast’s body as it is too large to fit inside of the nethalican site.”

“No! This is my kill and I’m taking this things skull back with me!”

“Infeasible, you alone cannot carry this and the company will not waste precious resources bringing a trophy back with us.”

Then with a roar of engines, Tellis arrived, landing on top of the dark acolyte, who let out a string of binaric curses as the raptor stood on top of him.

“Hey! You! I remember you! You’re the one with the legs! What was your name again? And what’re the nerds doing that’s pissing you off so much? That’s bad for your health.”

Steely quickly recovered from having the person she was having a conversation with be crushed in front of her, and responded to Tellis.
“I’m trying to keep’em from torching my kill there” Steely said, gesturing towards the squiggoth, “I wanna take it back to the Chaos Temple and dedicate the skull to khorne, maybe have a pony I know make the jaw into a bed frame.”

“That sounds pretty awesome. Why don’t I have a bed made of my enemies bones?”

“Don’t know. But could you help me out here?”

“Yeah sure, sure. Always willing to help with an idea like this.” Tellis said as he turned around and turned on his helmet’s loudspeaker function before yelling at the Dark Mech preparing to torch the squggoth, “HEY NERDS BACK OFF OR WE KILL YOU ALL, THIS KILL IS OFF LIMITS!”

The Dark Mechanicus looked at one another and shrugged before moving on from the squiggoth, looking for another piece of detritus to dispose of.

“You can probably just shout that at’em again and they’ll back off.” Tellis said as he turned back Steely, “So how you gonna move this thing anyway?”

“Yeah that’s my dilemma…” Steely said as she brought a hoof to her chin, lost in thought for a few moments before thinking out loud.

“I mean if we had like, eight or ten more guys like you we could probably carry the head back, but I don’t know how we’d get them to agree to that.”

“Hmmm. Yeah, I don’t know how either.” Tellis began scratching the back of his helmet.

“Wait. Aren’t you in charge of the raptor units?”

“Oh yeah, totally forgot about that. Been busy hanging out with Dash and her friends. Hold on.”
Tellis opened the long disused com channel that was dedicated for his units use.

“Yo, how many of you are still alive?”

“Lord Tellis? This is raptor Rabalis. You have not communicated over this channel since the siege of the equine capital.”

“Yeah, right, whatever. Listen, I need like, ten guys, we still have that many right?”
“Yes lord, we do, but may I ask why-”
“Cool, I just need you to send ten guys to my location, you guys are still in Ponyville right?”

“Yes, we’re-”

“Great, just send’em to me.”

A few taps were heard over the vox channel, then a suppressed sigh. “Confirm, my lord, we are en route.”

“Sweet.”

Tellis shut off the channel and looked down at Steely who was prodding the Techpriest twitching beneath Tellis’s boots.

“They’re on the way, when they get here, just tell’em I put you in charge, and if they question it, smack’em around a bit till they listen.”

“You’re not staying?” Steely asked, looking up from the Techpriest.

“Nah, got better things to do. See ya, Steel.”

And with that, Tellis was gone.

Steely could see twelve Raptors closing in on their position from the direction of the town center.

The Techpriest, who had been slowly rising from his position on the ground was crushed once again as another Raptor landed on him, crushing his arms and making him yell out another string of binaric curses.

The lead Raptor, having looked around for Tellis, settled his eyes on Steely.

“I am Raptor Rabalis. Where is Lord Tellis… Reaver Lathe?” The raptor said, clearly taking a moment to read Steely’s identification rune.

“Gone, but he left me in charge.” Steely said as though the Raptor had asked him the time.

“...I beg your-” the Raptor began before being interrupted by a raptor tapping his own chainsword against his armor in a pattern. “You know this pony, sir?”

Another quick set of taps affirmed this.

Steely’s face lit up as she looked at the familiar… helmet. “Tharix! Haven’t seen you in a while! What’s it been, a few days?”

A quick set of taps.

“Yes.” The lead raptor said, translating

“Right so listen, you think you guys could help me out here? Tellis said I was in charge, and I need to move that head” Steely gestured to the squiggoth, “Back to the Rhaos temple in Ferrous Dominus so I can dedicate it to Khorne and get the jaw made into a bed frame.”

Silence dominated the group.

Then Tharix moved forwards toward the head, revving up his chainsword in order to begin separating it from the body.

“Sir! You cannot seriously be considering doing as this pony asks. It is beneath us to follow the orders of a xeno!”

“I’m standing right here.”

Tharix turned and revved his chainsword to communicate.

“Yes, I understand Lord Tellis ‘put her in charge’ but I don’t think Lord Tellis would even care if we ignored his order.”

Another flurry of taps.

“But-”

More taps and sigh of defeat.

“Very well sir.”

With, the remaining Raptors drew their weapons and moved towards the squiggoth to begin separating the head from the body and the jaw from the head. Except for Tharix, who moved towards Steely while gathering a small object from a pouch at his waist and handing it to Steely, who held it with her wing.

“What’s this?”

Tharix answered with a flurry of taps.

Steely sighed and then kicked the Techpriest who was still on the ground in front of her.

“Hey, nerd! What’d he say?”

“Damn you equine.”

Steely rolled her eyes and gave him a light tap on the head. “Wrong answer, try again.” She said

“He said it’s a beacon to let them know where to drop off the jaw, and their communication channel. Apparently you’re in charge now.”

“What? Why? I don’t know the first thing about commanding people.” Steely said, confused by this turn of events.

Tharix answered her with taps and a nod to the Techpriest to translate.

“He says that day to day running falls to the second in command, him, while you have the honor of leading the unit into battle. As for why? Lord Tellis has placed you ‘in charge’ as it were. While he likely only meant for this operation, he cares little for his command in general, so I see no reason not to extend this order. I have little doubt you’d be able to keep up with us. With perhaps a few more augmentations, of course.”

“So why not have you take over as commander? I don’t think Tellis would care.”

More taps, more translation

“The thought has occurred to me before, but having consulted father Virgil on the matter, he recommended that I not attempt to usurp the position, nor give it to any of my subordinates.”

“Soooo…. I’m in charge because Virgil said so?”

Taps

“Obliquely, yes.”

“Cool, so… as my first order, uh, get that skull to the temple and get me registered as commander, I guess.”

Tharix nodded and turned back towards the squiggoth to help with the grisly work

Steely nodded as she looked at the beacon she still held with her wing. Then she looked over to the Techpriest who was slowly crawling away with broken arms.

“You going to be okay?” Steely asked

“Go away, equine.”

“Just asking, jeeze.” Steely said she took off for the train station. It’d be a long ride to Ferrous Dominus after all.

Ferrous Dominus - Dark Mechanicus Temple Secundus Dormitory - Aspirant Gear Works Dorm

Gear Works sighed as he settled down onto his ‘bed’ and Striker into her charging station after a hard days of work, with the battle at Ponyville won, Phage Squadron and other pony units like them had come back to Ferrous Dominus with their equipment damaged from the fight, with Gear Works and Striker having to fix all of it.

But now, with a majority of the work done, Gear Works and Striker could relax.

Then the wall exploded inwards. Again.

Luckily, no debris landed on Gear Works this time, only embedding a small shard of rockcrete into his organic eye. Looking to the hole with his augmetic, he saw Steely, standing in the makeshift entrance with what looked to be a grenade in hoof.

“My eye!”

“Don’t care.” Steely said as she looked down at the device in her hoof, trying to discern how to activate it. “Okay I think I press… ah, forget it. Here turn this on and keep it with you!” Steely threw the beacon at Gear Works, who managed to actually catch it, despite being somewhat blinded.

“Why do you keep doing this!? What is this thing?!” Gear Works yelled, unable to decide whether to leave the shard of rockcrete in his eye or pulling it out.

“Cause they won’t let me use the front entrance. But now that I sort of have rank, that may change. Or not. I kinda like smashing your wall. And it’s a beacon. My guy’s will be dropping it off soon. Make it into an awesome bed frame, will you?”

“What is it?! Who are your guys!? Make what into a bed frame!? I have so many questions and you’re answering none of them!” Gear Works yelled as he looked at Steely with his augmetic eye. Then he noticed her ID rune had changed.

“Wait… acting commander of Raptor forces? How? Why? When did yo-”

“Don’t feel like answering those questions! See you at the bakery in Sector 6 tomorrow, alright! And if I don’t, I’ll come back here!” Steely said as she took off through the hole and flew away.

“But. I….” Gear Works sighed and then looked to the beacon she’d tossed him, recognizing its design, he hit the activation rune and the beacon began to blink. “So does she expect me to just wait for her guys or-”

Gear Works was interrupted by the lower jaw a squiggoth expanding the hole in his wall, and actually knocking down the wall of other dorms beside his. He had to back up until he was pressed against the door to avoid being crushed, quickly grabbing Striker from her charging station as he did so.

From outside the hole he heard someone say “Delivery completed, returning to barracks until next deployment.” Before a roar of engines signaled the voice leaving.

The door opened up behind Gear Works, Acolyte Sheraan standing in the hallway. He took a moment to observe the destruction, the squiggoth jaw, and lastly the injured aspirant, who still had a shard of rockcrete sticking from his eye.

Silence dominated the scene for at least five minutes before Sheraan spoke.

“You are going to clean all of this up, Aspirant.”

Author's Note

This chapter took way too long again, and I'm sorry. Writers block hit me quite often on this one.
Thank you to Nightweaver for proofreading and editing, and SFaccountant for answering my many dumb questions, and for giving this chapter a quick once over.