Even for the Thunderborns, navigating and executing operations across the vast expanse of the Upper Hive was an arduous task, a feat that demanded at least a full day and night to complete.
Each of them had a mission. Each had a role to play.
As his comrades focused on their missions, Grey without the bulk of his Thunderborn power armor, continued his stealth reconnaissance, moving through the city unseen, weaving through the shadows.
When Anruida had suggested that the full-scale assault could begin by tomorrow, Grey had disagreed immediately.
"Don't be hasty, brother," Grey had said over their vox-link "The Upper Hive is far larger than we expected. No matter what, the attack will have to wait until the day after tomorrow."
A short silence, then Anruida sighed.
"You're right. Maybe I'm just anxious, being deep in enemy territory does that."
Grey pressed forward through the dark, his senses keyed to the hunt, seeking more critical enemy assets—command centers, high-ranking officers, anything of strategic significance.
Every target marked. Every key structure logged.
The destruction wrought by his comrades served as the perfect cover for his infiltration.
Las-shotgun blasts echoed across the hive.
Energy beams lanced through hab-blocks, igniting fuel reserves in chained detonations.
Explosions lit up the darkness, enemy squads scrambled, their orders frantic, their cohesion shattered.
At times, the sky above would momentarily illuminate with fire, only for darkness to swallow the streets once more.
However, most of the Upper Hive's architecture made it feel more like a labyrinthine interior rather than an open-air city—narrow alleys, bridges connecting towers, massive interior chambers, as if the city itself were designed to entrap intruders.
Grey moved swiftly.
...
After more than fifty minutes of silent advance, Grey halted.
Ahead stood a massive wall-like structure, stretching across the center of the district.
Massive. Old. Unyielding.
Grey's augmented vision processed its structure.
The results displayed a 20-kilometer-wide square complex. The fortress had endured for over 1,100 years, and there was only one entrance, 700 meters ahead.
The scans showed heavy life signs inside at least in the thousands, but that wasn't conclusive. Many areas of the hive were densely populated.
At first glance, it seemed like any other hive fortress.
Yet the name etched into the structure's data logs made his eyes narrow.
[The Wall of Koy.]
He had never been to the Upper Hive before, yet everyone in the Lower Hive knew of this legendary fortress.
....
The Legend of the Wall of Koy
A thousand years ago, during the Great Rebellion, the Governor of Tyrone Hive, Koy, had faced an uprising.
A war sparked by a gladiator-slave who vowed to decapitate the ruling nobility, leading hundreds of thousands in revolt.
But Koy had anticipated the insurrection.
Before the rebels could gain ground, he constructed the Wall of Koy—a last bastion, dug in and held until reinforcements from Talon II arrived.
The rebellion was crushed. The gladiator's army was massacred to the last man.
The name of the slave gladiator who led that rebellion? Valor, the Champion of Blood.
Grey had always dismissed the story as propaganda, a fabricated Imperial cautionary tale.
But now…
As he stood before the fortress itself, he knew, it was real.
And putting himself in the mind of the enemy's command: if he were holding the Upper Hive and the Spire, what better place to establish a headquarters than within a fortress that once crushed a rebellion?
His decision was made. He would confirm this hypothesis with further recon.
Scanning the area, Grey spotted a spire five hundred meters to the rear left and moved toward it immediately.
Its altitude and proximity would serve as a perfect vantage point.
....
The streets leading between the Wall and the spire were infested with enemy patrol units.
But Grey didn't need to fight.
Instead, he moved unseen.
He avoided line-of-sight, sometimes slipping into side rooms, sometimes clinging to walls like a spider, his synthetic musculature allowing him to perch and leap with superhuman precision, other times scaling walls and darting across rooftops.
Within moments, he arrived at the spire's perimeter.
The spire's base was fortified, encircled by a high wall.
Inside were more than fifty infantry and a single Leman Russ battle tank. Outside, multiple patrols and sentries.
Something felt off.
Why was a single spire so heavily fortified?
The sounds of distant explosions echoed across the hive, yet the defenders didn't react. They held their ground, visibly tense but unwavering.
Grey looked up.
His optics zoomed in on the spire's apex, magnifying the view until it was clear as day.
Atop the tower were over a dozen missile silos, their payloads not immediately identifiable, but clearly dangerous.
Grey concluded that the missile batteries needed to be neutralized first. Only then could he confirm whether the Wall of Koy housed the enemy's command structure.
With a quick tactical plan formed, Grey infiltrated the compound, slipping behind a stone cherubim statue within the perimeter, preparing to strike.
The fifty-some soldiers inside were clustered around the Leman Russ, staring at the horizon as distant blasts colored the sky.
Like spectators watching fireworks, they gazed for minutes until fear etched itself into their expressions.
They spoke in hushed, anxious tones.
"Shit, brothers… I think the enemy's already teleported in."
"That damn teleport tech is heretical. I heard a psyker say he saw an entire regiment appear inside one of our battalions… they wiped them out instantly."
"Or maybe it's those cursed bastards in there fancy power armor doing another stealth op. Either way, our orders are to hold the Whirlwind launchers."
While they chatted, none of them noticed that half their sheathed combat knives had begun to float off their belts.
Slowly, silently, the daggers drifted behind their owners' necks, aligned to strike.
With a thought, Grey launched the blades.
Controlled by a neural-linked telekinetic field, the daggers moved faster and struck harder than any mortal hand could manage. In less than a second, they lunged forward, slashing through throats like whispering guillotines.
But to Grey's augmented perception, time slowed to a crawl.
His spinal augments kicked in. His reaction speed multiplied exponentially.
Voices became stretched and distorted.
"Wwwhaaat… the hell… is thaaaat…"
As the knives slowly pierced necks, Grey heard the stretched, wet tear of steel meeting flesh.
Their nervous systems had just registered pain, but they hadn't processed death yet.
And before the pain could fully register in their minds, Grey's cybernetic arm's plating retracted, a gun barrel extended.
He fired ten shots in rapid succession.
The bullets drifted forward in slow arcs, their impact delayed.
Grey lunged toward the remaining soldiers, snapping necks one by one before the bullets even landed.
By the time the last skull cracked, the ten rounds had reached their targets, punching through skulls and shredding grey matter.
Fifty bodies collapsed—kneeling, slumping forward, twitching, dead.
The chaos was drowned in the ongoing thunder of distant demolition charges detonated by the Thunderborns.
Inside the tank, the crew hadn't even realized their comerades outside were dead.
Until another explosion shook the district.
Grey punched through the tank's turret plating, with his cybernetic arm.
Metal cracked, splintered.
He emptied the last of his micro-rounds, killing the crew instantly.
With the tank silent, Grey extracted his arm and leapt down from the turret.
Then, he turned.
The spire's interior awaited.
The enemy within had no idea what was coming for them.