Kharn

The following article is a /tg/ related story or fanfic. Should you continue, expect to find tl;dr and an occasional amount of awesome.

Khârn the Betrayer is a famous Chaos Space Marine who revels in bloodshed. All bloodshed. Exactly who is doing the shedding, he doesn't care so much, and thusly has a wholly deserved reputation as a teamkilling fucktard. Despite this, he's actually a pretty fun guy.

Anecdotes About Khârn

Not heresy! *chop*

As I always say, Khârn the Betrayer was pretty fun to be around, and contrary to popular belief he actually had a sense of humor as well. Probably the best example was in the middle of the campaign during a sweeping of an Imperial Guard command post, with Khorne Berserkers and our Red Rivers company marching directly into the defensive fire. The closer we got, the more apparent it became that the only thing holding the Guardsmen together was a grizzled looking Commissar in full uniform, one gun turned on us and another firing on any of his men who looked like running.

Khârn was at the tip of the assault, and so he got to the Commissar first, plucking the screaming officer up by the neck and holding him over his head.

Then, out of nowhere one of the other berserkers grabs the Commissar's legs and roars "MAKE A WISH!". Well, as you can imagine everyone on both sides forgets about the fight, and watches Khârn and this other Khorne-worshiping marine just start pulling on this Commissar at both ends, the old man screaming out oaths and curses like you wouldn't believe! You could almost hear the sound of flesh tearing and bone snapping over the cheering.

Then, Khârn just let go. Totally not expecting it and pulling with all his might, the Khorne Berserker just falls backwards and starts tumbling with the near dead Commissar into a damaged hellhound, his armor grating off it and sparking!

Well, after the explosion we all turned back to Khârn, who had managed to keep a hold of the Commissar's fancy hat. Ol' Khârn put it on, and damned if it wasn't the funniest thing any of us had ever seen... till he turned to us and bellowed "I'M THE NEW COMMISSAR" at us.

They tell me five thousand traitor guardsmen died that day before someone could take that hat off him.

What a kidder!

---

Sporting his new hat.

Contrary to popular belief, Khârn the Betrayer was a pretty fun guy to be around during a blood-letting campaign. Sure, he'd get so wrapped up in the blood-lust that he'd butcher friend and foe alike but it's not like you didn't get a fair warning from his name or anything.

I served in the traitor guardsman legions known as the Red Rivers, because we got sent in first to soften up the positions and you could see our progress by the red river of our blood. I kept running into Khârn during one of the bigger scourging campaigns, and he wasn't dickish about the whole him being a space marine and me being killed by laser-lights or angry glances at all.

The first time I saw him, I was on perimeter patrol at one of our forward outposts, we'd just overrun a Sororitas non-militant chapel, and the Slaanesh boys were shirking their duty to go rape the sisters in a clearing near the chapel. I was watching from afar when Khârn strides up, cool as you like holding the largest stone pillar I've ever seen. I turned back and the whole fucking chapel was falling down. He'd just ripped the goddamn thing right out and was carrying it on his shoulders!

Then, if that wasn't insane enough he went and hefted this whole pillar through the air, and crushed the entire congregation of rape in the name of Slaanesh, defilers and victims all in one go.

I was just standing there dumbfounded when Khârn looked at me, as though noticing me for the first time and yet not surprised by my presence at all. He held his palm out, and I obliged him a high five. He'd earned it.

Damn well shattered every bone in my arm doing it though.

Nice guy, that Khârn.

---

The second time I crossed paths with Khârn was in a later stage in the campaign. We were besieging one of the major hives of the planet, and I tell you what that place was locked up tighter than a Dark Eldar's pants. My commander, Oxlor the Vilest, was stuck in an argument with some idiot leader of some group of Death Guard. You could see the smell it was so bad. I could tell Oxlor wasn't happy, since everyone knows the Death Guard's answer to everything is to just walk at it and watch your bits fly off. Not so good for us soft and squishy guys.

Out of nowhere, this big hand grabs our commander by the shoulder and just hefts him aside, three whole trenches back where he rebounds off a basilisk. The crew was so shocked they fired off a round on a horrible trajectory, and the shell streaked high into the sky.

Khârn the Betrayer just dusts himself down, and then picks back up what he had been holding. Now, I'm no techpriest and I never will be, but I know a nuclear warhead when I see it. I don't know where he got it.

No one says anything, so The Betrayer just punches the Plague marine in the face, and stuffs the warhead into the leaking mess of his stomach while he was still reeling.

No run up, no preparation. He just fucking throws the other marine into the air at the hive. For a moment it actually looks like he's thrown the warp-damned fool OVER the hive, but as he flies over the top the basilisk shell comes down and spears him through the whole hive! There's a low boom noise, the ground shakes, and then the whole hive IMPLODES!

Everything clears, and Khârn looks at me, and I feel about one foot tall. I don't know if he recognized me, but he leans down and whispers. Khârn WHISPERS to me.

"I was trying to hit the Emperor's Children on the other side" he confides in me, and then nudges me as though it's supposed to be our little secret.

I was in traction for a MONTH.

---

I've been fairly insistent to you readers out there that Khârn the Betrayer was a pretty fun guy to be around. I know he gets a bad rap for the whole 'slaughtering his own allies' thing, but unless you've been there after a battle with him you don't really appreciate how much he strives to please his chaos god.

It was after one of our many conflicts that the Red Rivers Infantry were preparing to march on to our next destination. Never mind that it was half the planet away, we as traitor guard didn't get transport vehicles. So as you can imagine when someone declared they'd found an Imperial Drop-ship in working condition everyone clamored and fought to get a free ride to our next engagement.

Knowing full well I was too far away to get on the ship, I stayed with some of my fellow traitors at the battlefield. I'd seen Khârn after the battle, and as soon as we'd gotten our marching orders he was picking up corpses and putting them down elsewhere. This took an hour before he was satisfied, and seeing an audience he happily led us up onto a hill as the drop-ship flew a pass over the top of us, probably to gloat. Proudly, Khârn gestured to the battlefield, and then waved up at the drop-ship with his other hand. I peered down the hill, and realized he'd arranged the bodies to make out words, so many killed to form:

On your drop ship hull
I planted a melta bomb
Blood for the Blood God

It was at that point the drop-ship erupted in a violent plume, and crashed down on top of the haiku. Roaring in a cheer, we lifted Khârn up together and made to carry him to the next battlefield as a sign of our appreciation and devotion to his art.

We got about five paces before our spines liquefied, but Khârn didn't hold it against us for trying.

Seriously, what a guy.

---

Kharn the Betrayer stood atop the battlements of an ancient Space Marine stronghold with a leer and wide, manic grin beneath his corrupted Khornate-styled helmet. His entire body pulsed with flares of anger and hatred and pure malice to dominate anything that might writhe beneath his heel in an effort to preserve itself before him. His genetically-enhanced eyes scanned the interior of the stronghold, finding nobody worth slaying at the moment. For the past few years, bloodshed had been his at every twist and turn, every day another adventurous slaughter. He had drawn every color of red blood possible, and some blue blood from a few aliens. His grin widened at the thought. Blood was just one of those things that got his hearts racing and his bloodlust fueled once again.

In his armored fist, his axe Gorechild revved with anticipation, the daemon snarling within its adamantium and mica-dragon-teeth form. Its presence filled him with such emotion as to simply run into a battle and roar that he was going to slay everything in sight, and then do so indiscriminately. The thought made the hairs on the back of his neck prickle and he grew even more excited. He searched eagerly around the battlefield once again, hungrily searching the fighting masses of Space Marines and his own eight detachments of berserkers. He found a worthy-looking captain with a heavy weapons squad surrounding him. Kharn found this to be pleasing, that he would be able to kill such men of worth!

The crazed berserker let out a roar filled with terrible mirth and leapt from the battlements, his entourage of seven Chaos Marines at his heels, all with revved chain axes and bolt pistols ready. Kharn raised his plasma pistol and aimed for the PDF troopers standing between him and his chosen foe’s skull. The Guardsmen stood for not a single second as another squad of berserkers overtook them in a furious and frenzied charge. Kharn used the heads of one of his berserkers as a springboard and leapt up above the mass of his warriors in the middle of their battle lust. His heels pounded against the bloody soil beneath him and he continued toward the captain without losing step.

Inside this low-walled fortress there was a bunker atop the central hill, and three support platforms surrounding it. The bunker itself was situated in a tiny crater of sorts, where the captain was hiding from Kharn like a coward, directing fore support to the battle from a safe distance. Kharn would soon put an end to that, just as soon as he could get through this support platform and head up the rest of the hill to the bunker. He ducked a stray rocket and felt Gorechild shiver in his grasp, the anticipation building within the mighty weapon. Kharn cursed the nearest living thing as he leapt up the last few feet to the platform’s plascrete surface. His ceramite boots thudded against the platform and a dozen surprised Guardsmen stared at him like he was the god Khorne himself! Kharn put a searing plasma ball into the auto cannon’s handler and the man slumped to the floor with half his torso gone.

The rest of Kharne’s squad arrived and they tore into the Guardsmen without question, even beating the heavy weapon into a pile of machine parts. Kharn was proud to call them his warriors, and he let out a howl in satisfaction. More of his fellow Khornate worshipers let out a similar series of howls and roars as another platform was taken. Kharn sprinted up the last leg of his journey to the captain, taking a few hapless PDF troopers with the butt of his pistol. He leapt upon the lip of the shallow crater and bellowed his challenge.

‘Weak Emperor-worshipers! I come for the head of your greatest warrior! Provide me one, or you shall all be slain at once!” he roared. Within the second, a purple stream of laser fire streamed just past his helmet, searing the ancient armor set upon his body. He growled, knowing that these were not the type to let him attack their leader so easily. With a curse to their god, he jumped to the bunker’s side and hacked down a Space Marine holding a heavy bolter. Ceramite ripped to ribbons as Gorechild shrieked with pleasure and satisfaction, blood gouting out of the Space Marine’s newly-bisected body. The Emperor’s servant hadn’t the time to even scream as Kharn dug Gorechild deeper into his body, a gleam returning to his eyes when the marine tried to grab the axe as to prevent it from tearing all the way through him. His attempt was in vain.

Kharn cut clear through the marine’s torso and his daemon weapon left the Space Marine’s body with a whirring hiss. The disheveled corpse sank to the ground in two pieces, organs and all manner of genetic augmentation spilling out onto the ground. Kharn whipped his head around to find the captain aiming at him a twin-linked storm bolter. The Khornate Champion leapt to the side as a flurry of white-hot death sprayed forth from the powerful weapon’s muzzle, tearing to shreds a berserker just entering the crater’s mouth. Kharn swept his axe across the marine;s ankles, but his adversary was quick enough to dodge with only minor scrapes.

‘Chaos-worshiping filth! Betrayer!’ the captain hissed, drawing a chainsword from his belt. Kharn grinned and began to laugh uncontrollably.

‘Good to see that you’ve heard of me! I knew your weak man-Emperor, and Khorne is a god nothing like your fool-Emperor ever was!” Kharn bellowed with rage and fury renewed. He leapt forward, discarding his pistol to take his favored chain axe in both hands. The captian raised his blade to parry and the two weapons met with a blinding shower of white and red sparks. Unfortunately fot eh Space Marine, his sacred weapon was no match for the daemon axe, and soon the toll of facing down such a fearsome weapon showed. The chainsword’s teeth wore down and the weapon bellowed smoke. Kharn saw the Space Marine’s right arm swing to put the storm bolter’s muzzle against his gut.

Twisting in almost a boneless motion, Kharn managed to dodge the gun’s flash of death and heard the frenzied death-cy of another of his fellow berserkers. Further fueled by the terrible noise, Kharn put his knee against the marine’s chest with blinding speed and daemonic power, cracking the ceramite armor with relative ease. Blood sprayed out from the wound and the marine’s strength failed for the tiniest of seconds. Kharn pressed down again with Gorechild, and this tie was rewarded when the weapon’s nigh-indestructible teeth spilled his adversary’s brains all across the floor beneath their feet.

Gorechild finished its rampage in the center of the Space Marine’s chest, where Kharn removed it with a spiteful kick to the standing corpse holding fast to the weapon. Kharn swung back with one arm and caught another marine in the back of the neck, severing his head almost instantly. Kharn laughed with the favor of his god filling his corrupted soul and the blood of fallen foes began to pool around his feet. He looke dup at the greenish sky and laughed even harder, so that maybe his god could hear the laughter and join him on this glorious battlefield to rejoin the slaughter he had promised and given for so many thousands of years on end.

And as he looked back to the ground, he noticed that he was standing atop an elevator, directly on a lift that seemed to go to the interior of the bunker. With a grin, he found the controls and smashed them with the butt of his pistol, dangling from a thick set of cables hooked up to his power armor’s exhaust and power pack. The three others with him were silent, but trembling with the thrill of battle, as the lift began its descent into the bunker. All around were wires and flashing lights and intercom systems of all kinds. Kharn paid no attention to them as the sky disappeared above them and the lift stopped to reveal that they were not alone in this place.

Before them was what looked to be a large hanger, housing several transport ships that were still running, servitors carrying various boxes and other supply items into them with an order that made Kharn’s blood boil. This was not how it was to be! He needed disorder, Chaos! He needed the thrill of battle, the uncontrolled lust for blood! And he strode forward, axe and pistol held ready to do the work he wished for them. It was his duty…no, his privilege, his right even! To be able to draw blood and sacrifice blood to the Blood God! He raised Gorechild and charged forth, eyes gleaming with little more than blind fury. These weaklings would learn that their folly was not worth the price in blood they would pay!

Kharn smashed into one of the busy servitors, his heavily armored shoulder crushing bone and metal alike. The servitor was thrown aside and the contents of his crate spilled out onto the ground. Kharn watched as dozens of grenades rolled across the floor, and he laughed again, this time out of real humor. Khorne had provided him a means of spreading blood all across this place! He picked one up and pulled the pin, tossing it into the back of a transport ship. The mindless servitor drones didn’t even realized that they were being killed until an explosion rocked the transport, blood and oil spraying in all directions.

Kharn glared around, finding that more of his fellow berserkers had managed to break into this hanger from different entrances and were overwhelming the PDF troopers and Space Marine task force left to defend this place. Kharn searched for more worthy foes, and found a very interesting one in the middle of the room. He looked to be an Adeptus Mechanicus Enginseer, a crimson cowl over his head and the rest of his cloak flowing down to his midsection. Upon his back was a pack that seemed implanted to his very body, with two limbs rising from it. There were other smaller limbs as well, and several bodily augmentations.

This engineseer was fighting alongside three space marines armed with a chainsword and bolt pistol each, doing battle with more than their fair share of foes. Berserkers came at them from in front and behind, crying out curses and baying for blood like hounds awaiting a kill. Kharn raced ahead of his squad members and witnessed a truly surprising sight. The enginseer lashed out with both mechanical limbs and pierced the armor of two oncoming berserkers. Each limb raised the marines off the ground and tossed them away, whirling around to snap another warrior’s head into three pieces not a second later. The enginseer roared orders, and Kharn found the voice to be too feminine, less baritone than he’d previously thought.

Grabbing the plasma pistol dangling from the wire hooked into his arm, Kharn managed to get a bead on one of the space marines and fired. The Adeptus Astartes blocked with his own pistol, the thing turning into a melting, useless, heap of slag. Kharn was close enough now to find out that the enginseer was not at all what he had thought, but had no time to think about it as the pistol-less marine met his charge, chainsword in both hands.

Kharn swung up with Gorechild and the marine managed to parry his blow, though at the cost of half the teeth on his blade. Kharn struck again with practiced ease and caught the marine in the shoulder with his axe, teeth whirring and ripping ceramite from the marine’s paudron. This time, however, Kharn used his pistol to finish the job with a ball of plasma to the Astertes’ head. Blood sprayed forth as the marine’s thick skull was melted away and his brain exposed. Kharn rammed his fist into the exposed cavern and found that squishy brains awaited his fist, and no genetic implants. He roared again and kicked away the standing corpse, thumbing the Chaos rune so that Gorechild’s many teeth whirred again with fury.

Another marine was overwhelmed by Khornate worshipers and Kharn leapt into the fray once more, swinging his axe cruelly into the warrior’s side through his arm. Mica-dragon teeth bit home and severed the marine’s arm, and then sliced the warrior in half in another moment. With the marines dead, Kharn turned to the enginseer for a fight. But the Adeptus Mechanicus lying unconscious on the ground was not as he had been a few moments ago. In fact, he was not male at all, but a woman.

She had a Gothic number eight electoo just above her robust left breast. The mechanical thing on her back had two large, gangly arms ending in a clawed metal hand with five fingers and another one with a grappling claw with three curved and sharp prongs. Six other small limbs wrapped around her body and acted as artificial ribs, piercing her flesh so that the augmentations grafted to her back had a firmer hold on her torso. On each thigh were four Adeptus Mechanicus symbols: a gear surrounding a half human, half machine skull. Her right hand was mechanical, made of a black metal and with clawed fingers, dripping with blood and gore. Eight wires entered her skin from the hand, all of them red and gold. On her left hand was a fingerless black glove, and she wore eight blinking rings on her fingers. Her legs were incased in what seemed to be mechanical boots that ran up to her thighs, each of them bearing four small, blinking bulbs of light. Around her were eight slain berserkers, all of them put down by her strength.

Kharn squatted down at got a closer look at her before one of his fellow berserkers raised his axe to strike.

‘Blood for the Blood God!’ he roared. Kharn flipped his pistol against the berserker’s head and fired, turning the warrior’s helm and head into slag. Kharn stood back up and searched the immediate circle of warriors for any who might defy him in a similar manner. They all stared silently at him, trembling as they awaited new orders of slaughter and bloodletting. Kharn turned his gaze back to the woman, not sure of what to do.

‘Bloodmaster,’ spoke Veridun, one of Kharn’s favored companions. ‘What of the mechanicus cult woman?’ he questioned.

‘She bears eight artificial limbs, eight wires in her hand, the symbol of eight, eight tattoos, eight artificial fingers, eight rings, eight red bulbs on her legs, and eight slain warriors about her. Eight of sacred eight. Khorne’s favor is with her, and she shall be a fine warrior for me to slay,’ he stated, watching the woman. He realized now why she had been knocked unconscious. The chains wrapped around his left forearm had beaten her unconscious, a side effect from the attack against the final marine with Gorechild. The woman’s organic eye opened and she stared directly into Kharn’s soul, or so it felt to the Chaos Marine.

‘Data retrieval, file three five four four one seven, Adeptus Astartes Chaotica, version Exemplar Cultus of Khorne. Data retrieval successful, uncorrupted data, proceed in backing up process,’ came the emotionless, mindless chant from her lips. Kharn had it in his mind to kill her now, but the fact that she had eight sacred numbers of eight stayed his hand. Tiny Gothic script flashed over the green lens of her mechanical right eye and then vanished. The woman sat up, putting the crimson robe back to cover most of her breasts. She looked up at Kharn and tilted her head to the side curiously.

‘Prepare yourself, machine-worshiper,’ Kharn threatened, raising Gorechild.

‘You are a Chaos Space Marine serving Khorne, god of blood, are you not?’ she questioned. Kharn was frozen. What was this? She did not fear him? She did not plan to strike out at him, nor defend herself in any way? Did she plan to die here?! No, this was some sort of trap, meant to lure him into a false sense of security. If he touched, her, electricity might burn his flesh, or shut down his brain and kill him. She could have some form of hidden weapon waiting to blast him back into the Warp, which was an unpleasant thought at the very least.

‘Yes, now prep-’

‘You must be from the World Eaters Chapter, correct?’

‘Yes! Now bloody fi-’

‘Which means that you must be a champion due to the age of your armor,’ she stated with a tiny smile on her face. Kharn fumed. He no longer cared what manner of hidden weapon she might have! She would be silenced one way or another: be it by his words or his axe!

‘Silenc-’

‘You are Kharn of the World Eaters, Eight Assault Company Commander,’ she stated, flipping open the Deus ex Machina book in her left hand and reading a passage out of it to herself, as if completely oblivious to the raging champion of Khorne before her. Kharn would have mistaken her for the bravest being in all the galaxy had he not known any better. She knew exactly who he was, and yet did not cower of run, but simply stared at her book and its words rather than at her seeming-iminent doom. This woman, whatever had happened to her while she was unconscious, had lost her allegiance to the Emperor and her hatred towards those who would kill her false god-Emperor. Kharn felt a malicious grin spread across his face.

‘Tell me, woman, what you know of Khorne and your false-Emperor,’ Kharn said, lowering his axe for the moment. The woman closed her book.

‘Retrieving data files, one through three eight one, The Emperor of Mankind, the Dark Gods of Chaos. The Emperor is the savior of mankind, the Great Unifier who rests upon the Golden Throne and will on day reclaim his Imperium and save mankind from the brink of destruction. Khorne, one of the four Chaos Gods, the god of blood. Primary worship is bloodletting and the drawing of blood in battle. Skulls are taken to gain favor. Champions of Khorne are bloodthirsty and murderous,’ she said robotically, a gleam in her organic teal eye. After the was through, she smiled up at Kharn faintly, as if awaiting another question.

‘Which do you serve?’ the champion of Khrone asked, gripping the adamantium haft of Gorechild tightly. He wanted her to say her own god, but…it was almost a feeling of wanting her to say Khorne that stayed his hand. He didn’t have to wait long.

‘I am surrounded by the worshipers of Khorne. My hands are covered with blood: by practical deduction, I am a warrior of Khorne.’ She reopened her book and continued her reading silently this time. Kharn was both pleased and enraged at her statement and found that no matter how much he wanted to slay her here and now and take her skull as another trophy, the fact that she had eight eights and had stated that she followed Khorne made him relent and simply bellow a roar in fury and confusion.

He turned to the nearest warrior he could find, which was Durinak, and cleaved his head in twain with Gorechild, splattering blood all over the woman in front of him. She closed her book just before the shower of blood rained down upon her and covered her entire form. Kharn laughed maniacally once again and his warriors did so with him at a moment’s notice. Gorechild completely severed Durinak’s head, left shoulder, and much of his torso from the rest of his red-armored body and the tow pieces fell to the floor in a pool of crimson blood and swirling Chaos energies. Kharn’s eyes glowed red with the bloodlust Khorne had naturally set upon him. He glared at the woman.

‘Your name, so that I may call you a proper fool when you die,’ Kharn barked. The woman stared at him for a moment before licking the blood from her teeth. She smoothed out her blood-drenched black hair as she spoke.

‘I am Kuria.’

‘You are Khoria! You are a dog of Khorne, nothing more!’ Kharn shouted back at her. She nodded.

‘I am Khoria,’ she corrected herself. Kharn fumed with ill-tempered anger and turned on heel and stomped away, his warriors and new convert to Khorne in tow. Back on his ship, he was going to slay something a thousand times for this! Not only was the thought of a woman following him infuriating, but one who was apparently favored of Khorne was even more so! Kharne had seen no visions, had no pictures in blood spread out for him to tell him of this! His god had not even told him of what planet to wreak havoc upon! He roared again in rage and kicked a corpse so hard that it split in half. His entire body trembled as he made his was back to the elevator that would take him back to the surface.

The Wrath of Khârn

By William King, Short Story in "Let the Galaxy Burn"

‘Blood for the Blood God!’ bellowed Khârn the Betrayer, charging forward through the hail of bolter fire, towards the Temple of Superlative Indulgence. The bolter shells ricocheting off his breastplate did not even slow him down. The Chaos Space Marine smiled to himself. The ancient ceramite of his armour had protected him for over ten thousand years. He felt certain it would not let him down today. All around him warriors fell, clutching their wounds, crying in pain and fear. More souls offered up on the altar of battle to the Supreme Lord of Carnage, Khârn thought and grinned maniacally. Surely the Blood God would be pleased today. Ahead of him, Khârn saw one of his fellow berserkers fall, his body riddled with shells, his armour cracked and melted by plasma fire. The berserker howled with rage and frustration, knowing that he was not going to be in at the kill, that he would give Khorne no more offerings on this or any other day. In frustration, the dying warrior set his chainsword on to maximum power and took off his own head with one swift stroke. His blood rose in a red fountain to slake Khorne’s thirst.

As he passed, Khârn kicked the fallen warrior’s head, sending it flying over the defenders’ parapet. At least this way his fallen comrade would witness Khârn slaughter the Slaanesh worshipers in the few delicious moments before he died. Under the circumstances, it was the least reward Khârn could grant such a devout warrior. The Betrayer leapt over a pile of corpses, snapping off a shot with his plasma pistol. One of the Slaanesh cultists fell, clutching the ruins of his melted face. Gorechild, Khârn’s daemonic axe, howled in his hands. Khârn brandished it above his head and bellowed his challenge to the sick, yellow sky of the daemon world. ‘Skulls for the skull throne!’ Khârn howled. On every side, frothing Berzerkers echoed his cry. More shells whined all around him. He ignored them the way he would ignore the buzz of annoying insects. More of his fellows fell but Khârn stood untouched, secure in the blessing of the Blood God, knowing that it would not be his turn today.

All was going according to plan. A tide of Khorne’s warriors flowed across the bomb-cratered plains towards the towering redoubt of the Slaanesh worshippers. Support fire from the Chaos Titan artillery had reduced most of the walls around the ancient temple complex to just so much rubble. The disgusting murals painted in fluorescent colours had been reduced to atoms. The obscene minarets that crowned the toweres had been blasted into well-deserved oblivion. Lewd statues lay like colossal, limbless corpses, gazing at the sky with blank marble eyes. Even as Khârn watched, missiles blazed down from the sky and smashed another section of the defensive wall to blood-covered fragments. Huge clouds of dust billowed. The ground shook. The explosions rumbled like distant thunder. Sick joy bubbled through Khârn’s veins at the prospect of imminent violence. This was what he lived for, these moments of action where he could once again prove his superiority to all other warriors in the service of his exalted lord. In all his ten thousand year existence, Khârn had found no joy to touch the joy of battle, no lust greater than his lust for blood. Here on the field of mortal combat, he was more than in his element, he was at the site of his heart’s desire. It was the thing that had caused him to betray his oath of allegiance to the Emperor of Mankind, his genetic destiny as a Space Marine and even his old comrades in the World Eaters Legion. He had never regretted those decisions even for an instant. The bliss of battle was reward enough to stay any doubts.

He jumped the ditch before the parapet, ignoring the poisoned spikes which lined the pit bottom and promised an ecstatic death to any that fell upon them. He scrambled up the loose scree of the rock face and vaulted over the low wall, planting his boot firmly into the face of a defender as he did so. The man screamed and fell back, trying to stem the flow of blood from his broken nose. Khârn swung Gorechild and ended his whining forever. ‘Death is upon you!’ Khârn roared as he dived into a mass of depraved cultists. Gorechild lashed out. Its teeth bit into hardened ceramite, spraying sparks in all directions. The blow passed through the target’s armour, opening its victim from stomach to sternum. The wretch fell back, clutching at his ropy entrails. Khârn dispatched him with a backhand swipe and fell upon his fellows, slaying left and right, killing with every blow. Frantically, the cultist’ leader bellowed orders, but it was too late. Khârn was in among them, and no man had ever been able to boast of facing Khârn in close combat and living. The numbers 2243, then 2244, blinked before his eyes. The ancient Gothic lettering of the digital death-counter, superimposed on Khârn’s field of vision, incremented quickly. Khârn was proud of this archaic device, presented by Warmaster Horus himself in ancient times. Its like could not be made in this degenerate age. Khârn grinned proudly as his tally of offerings for this campaign continued to rise. He still had a long way to go to match his personal best but that was not going to stop him trying.

Men screamed and howled as they died. Khârn roared with pleasure, killing everything within his reach, reveling in the crunch of bone and the spray of blood. The rest of the Khornate force took advantage of the destruction the Betrayer had caused. They swarmed over the walls in a howling mass and dismembered the Slaanesh worshippers. Already demoralized by the death of their leader, not even these fanatical worshippers of the Lord of Pleasure could stand their ground. Their morale broken, they panicked and fled. Such pathetic oafs were barely worth the killing, Khârn decided, lashing out reflexively and killing those Slaanesh worshippers who passed too close as they fled. 2246, 2247, 2248 went the death counter. It was time to get on with his mission. It was time to find the thing he had come here to destroy – the ancient daemonic artifact known as the Heart of Desire. ‘Attack!’ Khârn bellowed and charged through the gaping mouth of the leering stone head that was the entrance to the main temple building.

Inside it was quiet, as if the roar of battle could not penetrate the walls. The air stank of strange perfumed. The walls had a porous, fleshy look. The pink-tinged light was odd, it shimmered all around, coming from no discernible source. Khârn switched to the auto-sensor systems within his helm, just in case there was some trickery here. Leather-clad priestesses, their faces domino-masked, emerged from padded doorways. They lashed at Khârn with whips that sent surges of pain and pleasure through his body. Another man, one less hardened than Khârn, might have been overwhelmed by the sensation but Khârn had spent millennia in the service of his god, and what passed through him now was but a pale shadow compared to the battle lust that mastered him. He chopped through the snake-like flesh of the living lash. Poison blood spurted forth. The woman screamed as if he had cut her. Looking closer he saw that she and the whip were one. A leering daemonic head tipped the weapon’s handle and had buried its fangs into her wrist. Khârn’s interest was sated. He killed the priestess with on back-handed swipe of Gorechild. A strange, strangled cry of rage and hate warned him of a new threat. He turned and saw that one of the other Berzerkers, less spiritually pure than himself, had been overcome with the whip’s evil. The man had torn off his helmet and his face was distorted by a sick and dreamy smile that had no place on the features of one chosen by Khorne. Like a sleepwalker he advanced on Khârn and lashed out with his chainsword. Khârn laughed as he parried the blow and killed the man with his return stroke.

A quick glance told him that all the priestesses were dead and that most of his followers had slain their drugged brethren. Good, thought Khârn, but part of him was disappointed. He had hoped that more of his fellows would be overcome by treachery. It was good to measure himself against true warriors, not these decadent worshippers of an effete god. Gorechild howled with frustrated bloodlust, writhing in his hand as if it would turn on him if he did not feed it more blood and sinew soon. Khârn knew how the axe felt. He turned, gestured for his companions to follow him and raced off down the corridor. ‘Follow me,’ he shouted. ‘To the slaughter!’ Passing through a huge arch, the former Space Marines entered the inner sanctum of the temple and Khârn knew they had found what they had come for. Light poured in through the stained glass ceiling. As he watched, Khârn realized that the light was not coming through the glass, but from the glass itself. The illustrations glowed with an eerie internal light and they moved. A riotous assembly of men and women, mutants and daemons enacted every foul deed that the depraved followers of a debauched god could imagine. And, Khârn noted, they could imagine quite a lot.

Khârn raised his pistol and opened fire, but the glass merely absorbed the weapon’s energy. Something like a faint moan of pleasure filled the chamber and mocking laughter drew Khârn’s attention to the throne which dominated the far end of the huge chamber. It was carved from a single gem that pulsed and changed colour, going from amber to lavender to pink to lime and then back through a flickering, random assortment of iridescent colours that made no sense and hurt the eye. Khârn knew without having to be told that this was the Heart of Desire. Senses honed by thousands of years of exposure to the stuff of Chaos told him that the thing fairly radiated power. Inside was the trapped essence of a daemon prince, held forever at the whim of Slaanesh as punishment for some ancient treachery. The man sitting so regally on the throne was merely a puppet and barely worth Khârn’s notice, save as something to be squashed like a bug. The man looked down on Khârn as if the had the temerity to feel the same way about Khorne’s most devoted follower. His left hand stroked the hair of the leashed and naked woman who crouched like a pet at his feet. His right hand held an obscenely shaped runesword, which glowed with a blasphemous light. Khârn strode forward to confront his new foe. The clatter of ceramite-encased feet on marble told him that his fellow berserkers followed. In the matter of a hundred strides, Khârn found himself at the foot of the dais, and some odd mystical force compelled him to stop and stare.

Khârn did not doubt that he was face-to-face with the cult leader. The man had the foul, debauched look of an ancient and immortal devotee of Slaanesh. His face was pale and gaunt; make-up concealed the dark shadows under his eyes. An obscene helmet covered the top of his head. As he stood, his pink and lime cloak billowed out behind him. Tight bands of studded leather girded his naked chest, revealing lurid and disturbing tattoos. ‘Welcome to the Heart of Desire,’ the Slaanesh worshipper said in a soft, insinuating voice which somehow carried clearly across the chamber and compelled instant, respectful attention. Khârn was instantly on his guard, sensing the magic within that voice, the persuasive power which could twist mortals to its owner’s will. He struggled to keep the fury that burned eternally in his breast from subsiding under the influence of those slyly enthralling tones. ‘What do you wish?

‘Your death!’ the Betrayer roared, yet he felt his bloodlust being subsided by that oddly comforting voice. The cult leader sighed. ‘You worshippers of Khorne are so drearily predictable. Always the same tedious, unimaginative retort. I suppose it comes from following that mono-maniacal deity of yours. Still you are hardly to be blamed for your god’s dullness, I suppose.’ ‘When Khorne has devoured your soul, you will pay for such blasphemy!’ Khârn shouted. His followers shouted their approval but with less enthusiasm than Khârn would have expected. For some reason, the man on the throne did not appear to be worried by the presence of so many armed men in his sanctum. ‘Somehow, I doubt it, old chap. You see, my soul has long been pledged to thrice-blessed Slaanesh, so unless Khorne wants to stick his talon down Slaanesh’s throat or some other orifice, he’ll have a hard time getting at it.’ ‘Enough of this prattle!’ Khârn roared. ‘Death is upon you!’ ‘Oh! Be sensible,’ the cultist said, raising his hand. Khârn felt a tide of pleasure flow over him, like that he had felt from the whip earlier but a thousand times stronger. All around him he heard his men moan and gasp.

‘Think! You can spend an eternity of pleasure being caressed by the power of Lord Slaanesh, while your soul slowly rots and sinks into his comforting embrace. Anything you want, anything you have ever desired, can be yours. All you have to do is swear allegiance to Slaanesh. Believe me, it’s no trouble.’ As the cult leader spoke, imaged flickered through Khârn’s mind. He saw visions of his youth and all the joys he had known, before the rebellion of Horus and the Battle for Terra. Somehow it had all looked so clear and fresh and appealing, and it almost brought moisture to his tear ducts. He saw endless banquets of food and wine. For a moment, his palate was stimulated by all manner of strange and wonderful tastes, and his brain tingled with a myriad pleasures and stimulations. Visions of diaphanously clad maidens danced before his eyes, beckoning enticingly. For a moment, despite himself, Khârn felt an almost unthinkable temptation to betray his ancient oath to the Blood God. This was powerful sorcery indeed! He shook his head and bit his lip until the blood flowed. ‘No true warrior of Khorne would fall for this pitiful trick!’ he bellowed.

Suddenly the rest of the berserkers were upon him. Khârn found himself fighting for his immortal life. These were no mere Slaanesh cultists. Newly tainted though they might be, they had once been worthy followers of Khorne, fierce, deadly and full of bloodlust. Mighty maces bludgeoned Khârn. Huge chainswords threatened to tear his rune-encrusted armour. Bolter shells tore chunks from his breastplate. Khârn fought on, undismayed, filled with the joy of battle, taking fierce pleasure every time Gorechild took another life. At last, these were worthy foes! The body count swiftly ticked to 2460 and continued to rise. Instinctively Khârn sidestepped a blow that tore off one of the metal skulls which dangled from his belt. The Betrayer swore he would replace it with the attacker’s own skull. His return stroke made good his vow. He whirled Gorechild in a great figure-of-eight and cleared a space all around him, sending two more traitors to make their excuses to the Blood Good. Insane bloodlust surged through him, overcoming even the soporific influence of the Heart of Desire and for a moment Khârn fought with his full unfettered power. He became transformed into an unstoppable engine of destruction and nothing could stand against him. Khârn’s heart pounded. The blood sang through his veins and the desire to kill made him howl uncontrollably. Bones crunched beneath his axe. His pistol blew away the life of its targets. He stamped on the heads of the fallen, crushing them to jelly. Khârn ignored pain, ignored any idea of self-preservation, and fought for the pure love of fighting. He killed and he killed.

All too soon it was over, and Khârn stood alone in a circle of corpses. His breathing rasped from his chest. Blood seeped through a dozen small punctures in his armour. He felt like a rib might have been broken by the last blow of that mace but he was triumphant. His counter read 2485. He sensed the presence of one more victm and turned to confront the figure on the dais. The cultists’ leader stood looking down on him with a faint expression of mingled disbelief and distaste on his face. The naked girl had fled. The throne pulsed enticingly. ‘It’s true what they say,’ the man said with a delicious sigh. ‘If you want anything done properly, you have to do it yourself.’ The insinuating voice drove Khârn’s fury from him and left him feeling tired and spent. The cultist strode down from the dais. Khârn felt almost too weary to parry his blow. He knew he must throw off this enchantment quickly. The runesword bit into his armor and a wave of mingled pain and pleasure passed through Khârn like poison. Summoning his last reserves of rage, he threw himself into the attack. He would show this effete fop who was the true warrior here. Khârn hacked. Gorechild bit into the tattoos of the man’s wrist. Gobbets of flesh and droplets of blood whirled away from the axe’s teeth. The rank smell of hot bone filled the air as the hand separated from the arm – and began to crawl away with a life of its own. Khârn stamped on it and a rictus of pain appeared on its owner’s face, as if the hand was still attached.

Khârn swung. The cultist’s head separated from its shoulders. The body swung its blade, a puppet still controlled by the strings of its master’s will. It bit into Khârn and the wave of sensation almost drove him to his knees. ‘Nice trick!’ roared Khârn, feeling the hand squirm beneath his boot. ‘But I’ve seen it before.’ He brought his chain-axe down on the head and clove it in two. The body fell to the ground, a puppet with its strings cut. 2486, Khârn thought with some satisfaction. The Betrayer advanced upon the throne. It pulsed enticingly before him. Within its multiple facets he thought he saw the face of a beautiful woman, the most beautiful he head ever seen – and the most evil. Her hair was long and golden, and her eyes were blue. Her lips were full and red and the small, white fangs that protruded from her mouth in no way marred her perfection. She looked at Khârn beseechingly, and he knew at once he was face to face with the Daemon trapped within the Heart of Desire. Welcome, Khârn, a seductive voice said within his head. I knew you would triumph. I knew you would be the conqueror. I knew you would be my new master. The voice was thrilling. By comparison, the cult leader’s voice had been but a pale echo. But the voice was also deceptive. Proud as he was, mighty as he knew himself to be, Khârn knew that no man could truly be the master of a daemon, not even a fallen Space Marine like himself. He knew that his soul was once more in peril, that he should do something. But yet again, he found himself enthralled by the persuasiveness of a Slaanesh worshipper’s voice. Be seated! Become the new ruler of this world, then go forth and blast those meddlesome interlopers from the face of your planet.

Khârn fought to hold himself steady while the throne pulsed hypnotically before him, and the smell of heavy musk filled his nostrils. He knew that once he sat he would be trapped, just as the daemon was trapped. He would become a slave to the thing imprisoned within the throne. His will would be drained and he would be a decadent and effete shadow of the Khârn he had once been. Yet his limbs began to move almost of their own accord, his feet slowly but surely carrying him towards the throne. Once more, visions of an eternity of corrupt pleasure danced in Khârn’s mind. Once more he saw himself indulging in every excess. The daemon promised him every ecstasy imaginable and it was well within its power to grant such pleasures. He knew it would be a simple thing for him to triumph on its behalf. All he had to do was step outside and announce that he had destroyed the Heart of Desire. He was Khârn. He would be believed, and after that it would be a simple matter to lure the Khorne worshipers to ecstatic service or joyful destruction. And did they not deserve it? Already he was known as the Betrayer, when all he had done was be more loyal to his god than the spineless weaklings he had slaughtered. And with that the daemon’s voice fell silent and the visions stopped, as if the thing in the throne had realized its mistake, but too late.

For Khârn was loyal to Khorne and there was only room for that one thing within his savage heart. He had betrayed and killed his comrades in the World Eaters because they had not remained true to Khorne’s ideals and would have fled from the field of battle without either conquering or being destroyed. The reminder gave him strength. He turned and looked back at the room. The reek of blood and dismembered bodies filled his nostrils like perfume. He remembered the joy of the combat. The thrill of overcoming his former comrades. He looked out on a room filled with corpses and a floor carpeted with blood. He was the only living thing here and he had made it so. He realized that, compared to this pleasure, this sense of conquest and victory, what the daemon offered was only a pale shadow. Khârn turned and brought Gorechild smashing down upon the foul throne. His axe howled thirstily as it drank deep of the ancient and corrupt soul imprisoned within. Once more he felt the thrill of victory, and knew no regrets for rejecting the daemon’s offer. 2487. Life just doesn’t get any better than this, Khârn thought.

See also

• Abbadon at the Therapist