Susan's mechanical arm tore through the final airlock, her plasma pistol glowing red from overuse. She stumbled into the reactor's control room, only to be confronted with a scene that would haunt her forever:
Carlisle knelt before the violet crystal cluster. Iron Skull loomed over him, injecting a writhing black substance into his spinal cord. Her husband's left half had entirely crystallized, with nebula-like patterns of light swirling beneath his translucent skin.
"Let him go!" Susan fired her plasma pistol, but the beam refracted into a cascade of rainbow hues by the crystal cluster. Iron Skull turned with a sneer, missile pods unfolding from his armored shoulders. "And what can an insect like you save?"
In that instant, Carlisle's crystalline left arm surged, elongating unnaturally to pierce Iron Skull's chest plate at its seam. The Chaos warrior staggered, giving Susan just enough time to reach the control console—where half an Eldar memory crystal was embedded, its frequency resonating with her arm's core.
"Don't touch it!" Carlisle roared, his voice now laced with a metallic reverberation.