The nightmare ended as soon as it began. Swiftly, but impartially. Calculating, but wild. Metal carapace rattled like ancient armor, drowning out the brief rumble of bolters firing. The legionnaires drove back the enemies with boarding shields. Bursts of bolts fired through special loopholes in the shields gutted the vanguard of the creatures, but the xenoplague was inexorably approaching them. As empty bolters and mangled shields crashed to the ground, the roar of gunfire was replaced by the whine of chainblades and the grinding of monomolecular bladed teeth gnawing through segmented armour. The noise tormented the ears, the Raven Guard created a circle of absolute death around themselves, in which the severed appendages of the xenos swirled and streams of ichor flickered, flooding the floor like unrefined oil.