"Object of sanction: Khrave!" the "Disciplinary Paladin" Dixon shouted in Dunnic. A dawn-like light flickered across his body. The blue glow of his power fist's disintegration field took on a pure, clean luster.
He lunged at the Khrave, reaching for his Honour Guard member.
"Death!" He leaned forward, swinging his fist. His body merged with a strange power, shooting towards the Khrave in a blur.
The Khrave, raising its claws, abruptly withdrew.
Propelled by telekinesis, its body grew insubstantial.
It blurred, seeming to retreat at supernatural speed through a series of micro-teleports.
Dixon's fist, inescapably, struck the Khrave like a missile.
Bang!
The Khrave's back exploded. Pus and chitin fragments sprayed.
The Khrave's eyes swiveled. A clicking sound came from its body.
The cabin's temperature plummeted by dozens of degrees. A piercing psychic shriek slammed into Dixon's mind.
The scream bypassed the Lymann's Ear and the skin's sensory cells, resonating in the raw ganglia of the Shadows of Order, then spreading to the surrounding, more complex cortex.
"I will devour your personalities and-"
A silver-white bolt of lightning blazed deep in the full-fledged "Interrogator's" obsidian eyes, spreading to the surface in an instant.
The Khrave staggered. Its dry eyes swiveled, numb and rigid.
"Imprisonment!" Dixon raised his right arm. A stream of viscous, translucent liquid flowed, landing on the Khrave's chest.
It spread rapidly, encasing the Khrave.
The 1st Company Captain, Dixon, lowered his arm, turning his gaze to his Honour Guard member.
Foaming healing agents bubbled from the wound in his chest, where a heart had been torn out. The terrible psychic wound was slowly healing under the effect of the super-coagulant.
For the "Disciplinary Paladin's" resilient body, the healing was painfully slow.
He stepped towards the Honour Guard member, about to speak, when his instincts screamed a warning.
The "Sheriff's" ability sensed the approach of a malevolent presence. He spun.
From all directions, black xenos leaped out.
They were roughly humanoid bat-creatures, their wings extending far longer than their bodies.
Their black skin was dry as paper, yet gleaming.
Their brutal joints, from which sharp bone spurs protruded, crackled with sharp sounds.
They moved, trailing the smell of rust. Psychic emanations crackled in the air.
As they moved, their bodies, like serpents swimming in a psychic mist, emanated supernatural cold that made the thermal dispersion fields of the Saturnine-pattern Terminator armor crackle.
The Khrave's joints crackled. It ducked nimbly, evading the power fist.
Its clawed foot swept. With a crack, the thermal dispersion field shattered into a wave of heat.
Fibrous, web-like structures on the crystal spindle's walls burst, as if stimulated.
A series of implosions shook the chamber, the Supernatural senses of the Shadows of Order nearly overwhelmed.
Dixon's right gauntlet slammed against the floor, his swept legs springing back. He lashed out with a kick at the Khrave's grotesque head.
The Khrave contorted its limbs, blocking with its elbows and knees.
Dixon, whose "Arbiter" abilities granted superior combat prowess, leaped, his body clearing the bat-wing's upper edge.
He swung his left arm, his fist crashing down.
A pale blue force field, wreathed in light, screamed down, tearing through the void.
The Khrave raised its right arm. Psychic emanations warped the air.
Shimmering aetheric energy flared. Black lines traced a blade of psychic energy.
Dixon's gaze narrowed. The Black Emperor's data had mentioned that the Khrave could use their psychic talents to forge weapons suited to them.
Among the most notable were the so-called Warp Distortions. These used solidified Warp material as blades. They were dangerous to wield, but powerful enough to cleave a fully armored Astartes in two.
The Warp Distortion rose, and where it passed, the fabric of reality was torn, rippling with distortion.
In the split second of his thought, the power fist met the Warp Distortion.
A shriek, unlike the usual sound of force fields colliding.
Time seemed to freeze in the impact. The pale blue disintegration field and the psychic field tore at each other.
In a series of detonations, a devastating psychic wave hurled Dixon backward.
He flew through the air, seeing his Honour Guard members fighting the Khrave in small groups.
Khrave emerged from the walls, raising their Exterminator carbines.
Terrible psychic storms tore through the thermal dispersion fields, felling the "Disciplinary Paladins" like lightning-struck statues.
A string of runes scrolled across his tactical display. Two hearts, three lungs, the brain, all destroyed by the psychic storm.
'The Khrave in their true forms are far more powerful than the hosts on Muspel.'
'No wonder my Lord said the lowliest Khrave can match a Custodes.'
Even though Dixon and most of his Honour Guard were "Disciplinary Paladins," the disparity in power was immense. None of the others could handle a Khrave alone like he could.
Amidst the shrieking Warp-ammunition, the "Disciplinary Paladin" opened the vox channel.
"Combined: 'Sanction,' 'Prohibition'!"
Dixon and his Honour Guard raised their arms in unison, shouting together.
"Object of sanction: Khrave!" Their black armor shimmered, their power fists gleaming with a pure luster.
"This place is forbidden to psychic powers!"
Golden light blazed. The layers of "Prohibition" stacked.
The rules set by the "Disciplinary Paladins" made the Khrave's black bodies shudder.
Psychic mist exploded like fireworks. The black Warp Distortions screamed.
A dozen Warp Distortions vanished with a shriek. Those remaining were visibly shorter and thinner.
The Exterminator carbines were unchanged, but the Warp-bolts they fired shrank and, upon detonating on the thermal dispersion fields, could no longer pierce the defense.
The "Disciplinary Paladin" Dixon lunged down, his fists hammering.
With each blow, the Warp Distortion crackled with black lines. The Khrave's psychic blasts grew weaker.
He drove the Khrave back, hammering blow after blow. With a final, resounding explosion, the Warp Distortion dissolved into multicolored light.
"Imprisonment!"
Layer after layer of translucent fluid fell upon the Khrave, encasing it in amber in an instant.
Having captured one Khrave, Dixon immediately rushed at the next nearest.
....
If you enjoy the story, my p@treon is 30 chapters ahead.
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