Editing The 13th Black Crusade (section)

===More Damage To Be Done===

As resistance stiffened once more, Urkanthos thoughts returned to Abaddon's orders: destroy the Null Array. He gathered the remains of the Hounds, and made cut their way towards the command bastion. There was little that Creed could do to delay the Daemon Prince, as another threat had made itself an immediate priority -- the traitor [[Baneblade]] ''Vicanthrus'' and the armored column it lead had just cleared the rubble of the Kriegan Gates. As the lead lines of Creed's men disintegrated from Demolisher Cannon fire, the Lord Castellan ordered every available heavy weapon to target the super-heavy tank.

In front of the command bastion, the conscripts of the 111st where barely a speedbump to the Daemon Prince, but they held the line to the last. The Sisters of the Martyred Lady were much more of a threat, but while the Sisters smote the last Hound with zeal and bolter fire, Urkanthos could not be denied, and he soon reached the Egressium Gate. Canonness Genevieve and Eleanor was there waiting, along with a host of Seraphim. The remaining Sisters fought hard, and the twin Canonesses were able to gravely wound the Daemon, but it wasn't enough, and as they died, nothing left stood in the way of Urkanthos destroying the Null Array.

Back at the muster field, Marshall Amalrich tried to muster another assault at the traitor Baneblade, but as the tank's massive guns turned toward the Cadian 8th's Aegis line, it suddenly froze in place. Its weapons suddenly opened fire, but not at the Imperials. Instead it cut down its escorting Chaos [[Havoc]]s, as well as the Alpha Legion predator beside it.

For a moment, neither side could make heads or tails of the Baneblade's sudden turn, and no one certainly noticed the [[Trazyn the Infinite|cloaked figure]] from whose hands flowed a stream of nanomachines that seeped into the ''Vicanthrus''. But that was all Creed needed, and he ordered led his troopers in the direction of the command bastion. On the way they passed through the bloody ruin that were scant hours before fellow soldiers and Battle Sisters. That was not a good sign, no matter how one sliced it.

Inside the command bastion, Urkanthos had just finished off Magos Klarn and his Skitarii maniple. With nothing in his way, the Daemon Prince dove down into the depths of the arcane technology keeping the Null Array functioning.

By the time Creed and his forces arrived at the Egressium Gate, it was too late. An explosion that signaled the destruction of the Null Array ripped across the Command Bastion, and Creed and his command barely survived its passage. The Lord Castellan knew what that meant, and grim determination once more set upon his craggy features. Regardless of the outcome, he knew his duty -- he, and every Cadian on world, would continue to fight to the very end.

Still, some of his frustration boiled over, and he took it out on one of his troops. But the trooper had seen something he hadn't, and as Creed turned to look himself, he found himself cracking the first sincere smiled he'd had in a decade.