Once more, as was the usual case in war, things happened in a very slow order but at an extremely swift pace; one moment Nergui was happily speeding through the passageways and tunnels, crushing heretics under the tracks of 'his' APC, the Celestian firing away at anything that moved...and then it all began to go wrong, again.

His teeth ground together and his jaw tightened as the unnatural and sibilant ravings of non-human entities - or perhaps the tortured souls of those that had once been human - began to make themselves known throughout the transports comm-channels and even through the very air itself.

[i]Warp spawn...[/i] he though to himself, a sudden sense of unease, nay [i]anticipation[/i], making its way through his body. Without even thinking he felt a sudden jolt, his armour injecting combat-stimms into his bloodstream in preparation for an encounter he somehow knew would be coming, whether on a conscious level or not.

"Emperor's teeth," came the amplified curse from his helmets conical mouthpiece as the first rounds of heavy bolter fire struck the Rhino, his eyes narrowing into slits as the fast-moving rockets sped from the darkness; he hated being right.

A [i]whump[/i] and crash of ejecting metal signalled that it was time for them to go, the Sister having pulled the emergency lever it seemed, and in short order they were flinging themselves from the doomed Rhino - a small part of the White Scar dying a little inside to see the death throes of such a piece of technology and its machine spirit. 

Nergui was lucky it seemed, his armour having saved him from the majority of damage, stabilizers in his feet securing him to the ground even as others were flung across the tunnel, his helmets internal HUD showing injuries through the group even as his unblinking eyeslits adjusted to the grim darkness of their surroundings.

It was mere moments later that incoming fire started again, their enemies clearly wishing to give them no time to regroup and fight back, the sound of deep curses and the distinct clicking of internal-vox communications reaching his gene-altered ears. Inside he could feel his blood rising once more, the stimms doing their work particularly well at this juncture, and his spirit wrestling with the decision to help whichever of his teammates were wounded or to take his vengeance out on the most hated of the Emperor's foes.

Aviza had already crippled the armament of one of the Chaos Marines by the time the Apothecary decided upon his course of action, leaving a trio of heavy specialists with two weapons between them, Nergui able to pick them out as clear as day from within the confines of his helmet - only their armour, and thus their cursed allegiance, unseeable in the dark. Not that it mattered in the slightest.

[i]One...[/i] He unlocked the bolter from his waist and checked it hastily, yet thoroughly, making sure all was in order. [i]Two...[/i] He thought as he focused his mind, standing from a half-crouch and facing in the direction of their attackers. 

[i]Three...[/i]

"[b]For the Khan and the Emperor![/b]"

It was a warcry that had sounded over battlefields for thousands of years, one that now caused even the stones of the tight-packed tunnel to reveberate, amplified to almost ear-splitting proportions by the Astartes that bellowed them as he advanced straight and true toward the mortal adversaries of he and his Imperium; these were not Orks, not some rabid Greenskins who's very lives were nothing but war, these were not mere savage xenos intent on carnage...no...these were traitors that had made a conscious choice to turn from the Emperor's light and embrace the darkness of the Immaterium and all that went with it!

His footsteps carried him forward at the same pace as a running man, his bolter rising and firing in brisk movements, explosive-tipped rounds whizzing down the tunnel even as the Traitor Astartes sought him out - as eager for his blood as he was for theirs.

Soon he reached the Skitarii firing line - giving a brief nod to Malig as he passed, knowing as well in the back of his mind that others of his squad may be injured but caring little about it at that point in time - moving past the firing line and into what potentially could be a trap. He knew this but went willingly, if it meant the demise of traitors then he was only too happy to fall for that honour.

Red targetting reticules surrounded the fire-illuminated figures like crimson halos, his HUD picking them out as accurately as if they had been standing in the open, his feet beginning to pound the ground faster and faster but his bolter remaining steady enough to pitch the unarmed Chaos Marine from his feet as his chest - ceramite and tainted flesh spraying his comrades as he fell - imploded and then exploded.

In one fluid motion, holding his bolter and loosing shots off with one hand, he drew his tulwar from its sheath and ignited the power-cell in the hilt of the blade. Projectiles from the firing line behind him continued to move past him, his trust in the targetting abilties of the Mechanicus' pets obvious at this point, his eyes not leaving the heretics even as an anti-tank rocket missed him by barely a few inches.

Minutes had passed since they had leapt from the Rhino - the flaming carcass still burning in the distance behind him - minutes since he had taken off up the tunnel, and minutes until he had gone from there to here like some black-clad bullet. Now he was in among them, and now, whether he or Aviza liked it or not, he was some distance away from his squad.

Leaping a small barricade that the traitors had constructed for themselves, he moved like the very lightning bolt which represented his Chapter (and before that his Legion), cleaving the tube of a rocket-launcher in two as the second Astartes prepared to fire again, the third moving in on him and hammering his own weapon into the back of the Scar with enough force to send him rolling.

Recovering with cat-like grace, something entirely at odds with the extreme height and bulk of a Marine, Nergui twisted from his roll and blew apart half the head of the second Marine in a spray of bolts and gore, standing back up in time to see the third infuriated Traitor dropping his own heavy weapon to draw a crude combat-knife and charge toward him.

What happened then was something that very few mortals ever got to witness, the combat of two Astartes at close range, two superhuman and gene-forged warriors coming to blows not over the sights of a bolter but with muscle against muscle and sinew against sinew, so fast that a human eye could barely follow.

"ARGH!"

The Apothecary bared his teeth inside his helmet and managed to place his bolter on the floor in time to recieve the charge, deactivating the power-cell of his blade so that both now fought with what were essentially rudimentary close-quarter weapons, the Traitor thrusting forward and causing Nergui to twist aside and deliver a strike toward the outstretched arm of his enemy. Blocking the blow with his forearm vambrace, the metal of the tulwar sending sparks from the ceramite, the Chaos Marine moved too slowly to avoid the point of Nergui's elbow in his face, snapping his head back for long enough that the Scar rushed forward into a clinch.

Each held their weapons tight, in spite of them being more-or-less useless at this distance, both straining against the other in a stance reminiscent of ancient Terran pankration poses, their arms curved like the horns of a bullock as they jostled for an advantage.

A twisting of his wrist broke that stalmate, the pommel of the Scars tulwar smashing down into the back of his enemies neck, the forearm of the same arm hammering against the side of the neck simultaneously, and in a move that could well have seen him dead Nergui let go of his enemies knife-arm to pivot his weight and body outward like a door on a hinge. 

Slipping his arm about the neck of the Traitor in one fluid motion, his other gripping his foes forearm as the bastard tried one last swing of his knife at the White Scars gut, the Apothecary began to crush the windpipe between his forearm, bicep and shoulder, squeezing and squeezing...and squeezing...tightening until the knife dropped from his enemies hand...until the Traitor went limp...until he felt the crack of bone and vertebrae. Only then did he drop the Chaos Marine to the floor in a clatter of armour and body mass.

[color=ed1c24]"This is Nergui,"[/color] he voxed to the Sister through her helmet systems, [color=ed1c24]"visible enemy neutralised."[/color]