Warriors of the Imperium - Andy Hoare & S P Cawkwell

by Warhammer 40K

  The whine of a chainsword powering up added its voice to the fray and there was a grinding crunch as its adamantium teeth bit into ceramite and plasteel.

  ‘Matteus! Damn you... the one time I don’t want you to shut up, you go quiet on me! I need a report on Kyanite’s situation as soon as you can.’ Hurrying, he raced down the corridor to join Dasan and his squad. They were engaged in combat with other Space Marines. Some were wearing the grey battleplate of the Space Wolves Chapter, others wore armour that proclaimed allegiance – or at least a former allegiance – to other Chapters. In a frenzied moment, Ryarus saw the unmistakable yellow of an Imperial Fist and the bone-white of a White Scar. There were others too; some had defiled insignias that the Apothecary could not name. It mattered little. They were traitors one and all and they would all die.

  Every one of them had one thing in common. The Imperial aquila across their chests were defiled and mutilated. Where their Chapter emblems had once been was a disfiguring red stain, a blotch of colour that obliterated their former fealty. A stain as red as the blood that had spattered the walls and floors of the Wolf of Fenris. Red as the blood that flowed through Ryarus’s own veins. A blatant insult to the Chapters in question, it meant that those wearing the armour were allied to no loyal cohort of the Adeptus Astartes.

  Ryarus had seen such armour markings before. He had fought against these warriors. He knew who they were. If the Space Wolves were already fighting with them, then any hope they may have had for their cousins was lost.

  A chill ran through him at the realisation that in order to survive this situation they would have to kill their own brethren.

  Not your brethren now. Not any more.

  Traitors.

  The two words that he barked across the vox carried a blatant undercurrent of disgust.

  ‘Red Corsairs.’

  Ryarus gripped the hilt of his power axe, screamed out guttural expletives in his native tongue and let the Apothecary mask drop for battle before wading into the fray.

  The battle was brief and frenzied, an intense tangle of limbs, weapons and exploding bolter rounds making it difficult to distinguish where one warrior stopped and another began. A battle rage gripped the Apothecary as he lay about him with his axe, fending off the encroaching warriors in the constricting corridor. The Silver Skulls had numbers on their side, but the Red Corsairs warriors were ably supported by human raiders who were emerging from the distant gloom in a steady stream. They didn’t present a major challenge, not to warriors of Adeptus Astartes calibre. But their small-arms fire was a distraction the battle-engaged Space Marines could well do without.

  Across the vox Ryarus paid close attention to the battle conversation between the two squads. The noise eventually faded out to be nothing more than background as he played his own part in the battle. He grunted and flew backwards as one of the Space Wolf warriors ploughed into him with a full shoulder charge, sending him barrelling to the floor.

  The Space Marine who had attacked him was flaxen-haired with ragged rats-tails hanging around an unshaven face. The warrior went without a helm and the fury and hatred in his ruddy face was visible for all to see. He spat bitter curses at the Silver Skulls Apothecary as he dropped to place one knee on Ryarus’s chest. The Apothecary was pinned, the Space Wolf being stronger by far.

  A bolter was brought up to his head, the heat detectors in his visor screaming alarms at the proximity of the white-hot muzzle. This was it, then. This was how it ended.

  As abruptly as the Space Wolf had floored him, the dissident Son of Russ was sent staggering by a Silver Skull who had been flung away by the maelstrom of battle. It was a moment of fortune rather than judgement and Ryarus seized the opportunity with all the ferocity of his gene-enhanced might. The crackling, energy-sheathed axe head buried itself in the traitor’s chest and split it like old wood. The Apothecary dragged himself free of the gory wreckage of the Red Corsair and clambered to his feet as quickly as he could in the frenzied melee.

  There was no point in thanking the battle-brother who had knocked the Space Wolf clear. He was dead, his headless corpse the solid weight that had fallen into the battling pair and saved the Apothecary. Ryarus swore softly.

  ‘We’re outnumbered down here, Apothecary.’ Matteus reported in. The sounds of battle were heavy across the vox.

  ‘All units... begin a fighting retreat to the Thunderhawk.’ Ryarus gave the order inbetween swings of his axe. ‘Kill anything in your way. Matteus, keep trying to contact the Dread Argent. Tell them it’s a trap.’

  ‘Already on it, sir. They’re filling the corridor behind us.’

  ‘Concentrate on cutting your way through them. And get that message to Captain Arrun!’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘And no matter what else you do... don’t stop. Fall back to the Thunderhawk and disengage. Do you understand me?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ The faintest hint of annoyance was there in the tone and Ryarus almost smiled.

  Almost.

  Ryarus brought his axe above his head with all the force he could muster and slammed it with deadly accuracy into the skull of another Space Wolf assailant. He took no pleasure from the kill. He couldn’t. This was not some foul xenos. This was a great warrior from a noble Chapter with a long and glorious history who had lost his way. In ending his existence in this manner, he was offering a service. It was the only way he could see it.

  The retreat was slow but steady, the Silver Skulls managing to hold off the worst of the attack. But despite their best efforts, they were not winning. More of his brothers had fallen to the onslaught and there was no chance for respite. He yearned for a moment where he could check to see if they were dead or whether they were merely incapacitated. Worse still… if they were dead, he would be allowing their prized gene-seed, the Quintessence Sacred, to fall into the hands of these traitors. Being denied the opportunity to recover the organs from the fallen was anathema to Ryarus’s core ethic. To abandon the Chapter’s legacy in this place was unthinkable. He was an Apothecary. He had sworn oaths to preserve the lives of his brothers and to preserve their heritage.

  He forced himself to concentrate instead on aiding in the preservation of the living. It did not come easily.

  At some point the two squads merged, but the chaos in the corridor made it impossible to tell when that had happened. As they retreated up the corridor, Mohave and Kyanite squads dealt with the human element attempting to halt their egress, in some instances by crushing them underfoot. Skulls and spines gave way easily under their heavy tread. The screams of the dying and the stench of the dead was everywhere, permeating every fibre of the Silver Skulls being... and it also had the effect of driving the already semi-feral Space Wolves Corsairs into a further frenzy of near berserker rage.

  The situation was unquestionably dire. There was very little that could make it even more perilous. At least, that’s what Ryarus’s fleeting thought was, right before the ship’s light levels began to increase, brightening to an almost dazzling brilliance. The chorus of screams was temporarily muted by the sound of plasma engines that had been gently thrumming on emergency power firing back up to full thrust.

  The Wolf of Fenris was awakening.

  ‘She’s powering up!’

  Captain Arrun looked up from his command throne at the words, his brow furrowing as he turned sharply to the viewscreen. The strike cruiser, which until now had been drifting aimlessly through the Rift was indeed taking on very visible and obvious life. Lights glowed in the viewports and contrails were starting to form in the wake of the engines as they switched gradually from emergency power to full. The massive ship began to nudge forward sluggishly.

  There was a brief moment of jubilation. It ended abruptly when the next words were spoken. The console operator’s voice shook as he spoke. ‘Their weapons are charging. Sir, the Wolf of Fenris is preparing an attack.’

 
Arrun’s reaction was instantaneous. He had allowed himself a moment’s optimism: a spark of hope that Ryarus and his squads had been successful in locating and aiding the Space Wolves. He regretted that moment of laxity now. His orders came out in clipped, precise tones.

  ‘Get the gunships ready to launch. Divert more power to the shield banks. Load the prow bombardment cannon. All other weapons batteries on standby.’ His arms folded across his massive chest. ‘If it’s a fight that they want…’ Arrun scowled, his scarred face darkening with anger. ‘Then it’s a fight that they will get. And we will fight them face to face. Aim to disable rather than destroy. We need that ship intact if we can manage it.’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’ The operative activated the ship-wide vox. ‘Calling all hands, calling all hands, this is an Alpha-level emergency. All hands, prepare for combat. This is not a drill.’

  ‘Send out fleet-wide astropathic messages to the other ships in the Rift. They will have been waiting for this. They should all be prepared to mobilise on my command. None of them should be far away if they’ve stuck to their prescribed course.’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’ The human serf couldn’t keep the tone of impressed awe out of his voice at the realisation that the Silver Skulls Master of the Fleet had already laid the seeds of a counterstrike seemingly based on little more than intuition.

  But then, there was a reason why Daerys Arrun had become Master of the Fleet in the first place.

  ‘One step ahead,’ he murmured.

  Around the bridge, servitors and serfs scurried to carry out Arrun’s orders. Theirs was never to question. Theirs was just to carry out the will of their masters. Despite a tendency to let his temper flare on occasion, the captain was both respected and even revered amongst the human crew.

  ‘You are wise sometimes, Daerys,’ remarked Brand from his position at Arrun’s side. ‘I occasionally wonder if you need me at all.’ Arrun shot a glance sideways. Throne, but the Prognosticator could move silently when he wanted to. He had appeared seemingly out of nowhere. The captain shrugged, a barely perceptible movement.

  ‘Of course I need you here, my friend. I need you to remind me how clever I am.’

  They shared a moment of levity, but it was swiftly replaced by a mutual concern for the safety of their warriors.

  Both wrestled with the other dilemma that faced them. If it came down to basic survival, if they had to destroy the Wolf of Fenris in self-defence, there would be many questions from the Space Wolves; something which would be hard to validate without proof that they were attacked first. Of course, were the Wolf to fire on them first, it would be recorded in the banks of both ship cogitators. It would still be excruciatingly awkward, though. This situation held far reaching consequences that both Silver Skulls were acutely and agonisingly well aware of.

  ‘She’s coming about.’

  ‘Cannon crews are engaged.’

  ‘All hands reporting ready.’

  ‘As it should be.’ Arrun switched his vox-bead to the ship-wide channel. His words carried throughout the whole of the Dread Argent, reaching every soul on board. He only had to speak a few simple words, but they would be enough. Fourth Company knew their captain well.

  ‘Silver Skulls, be prepared to take up arms. And, my brothers – Primus inter pares! Never forget!’

  Arrun didn’t give the order to contact the squads and order them back. There was no point. His men were no fools. They would be doing that already.

  If they still lived.

  They still lived. But they were losing the battle.

  They were not entirely failing in their mission, though. Not counting the humans who were swept aside like sacks of meat by the Silver Skulls, several of the Red Corsairs were now lying inert on the ground, either dead or incapacitated by ably placed bolter shots. Despite the visible evidence of their triumph, the rapidly diminishing runes on the inside of his visor screamed at Apothecary Ryarus, informing him that the Silver Skulls numbers were decreasing far too swiftly. There was no sign of any break in the onslaught, either.

  The Wolf of Fenris had woken up, and he felt the unmistakable jolt as she engaged her forward engines. He cursed and corrected his balance as the motion caused him to lurch slightly. The servos in his power armour compensated, keeping him upright but the sudden motion was an unwelcome distraction. His moment of unsteadiness proved enough for an opportunistic Red Corsair to take his chances. His chainsword cleaved through the Apothecary’s left shoulder guard with a whine of servos and an unmistakable crunching of bone. The ceramite plating split and clattered to the ground along with his axe. The Silver Skulls Chapter motif leered up at him from the floor. In a moment of misplaced irrationality, that somehow incensed him more than the injury.

  ‘Apothecary!’ The shout came from over to his right somewhere. A flare of pain blossomed in his shoulder, swiftly countered by the flow of drugs administered by the power armour. Although the chainsword had destroyed his pauldron and bitten into his bone, his body would work quickly to repair the damage. But he was blessed with two arms and although in battle situations he usually favoured his left, it didn’t mean for one moment that he wasn’t in possession of an equal level of skill with his right. Stooping briefly, the Apothecary picked up his axe again.

  His opponent sneered at him as he hefted the axe’s weight. Not waiting, the enemy brought down the chainsword in a fierce overhead smash, its teeth emitting a furious growl of hunger that would only be sated with the Apothecary’s blood. Ryarus put his own weapon up to guard against the attack and there was the harsh, metallic screech of metal on metal. The chainsword bit ineffectually into the adamantium head of the Silver Skull’s axe.

  ‘Apothecary!’

  He could hear the voice again, somewhere on the periphery of his aural awareness, but it seemed distant and unreal. He shook his head briefly to clear it of the fuzz that always accompanied a moment of pain. The burst of narcotics was familiar enough, but even for a post-human warrior at the peak of genetically enhanced perfection, there was a second or two of disorientation as his biology went to work.

  He pulled back from the attack, then went at his opponent with renewed vigour. He felt a hand on his shoulder, tugging at him urgently and he shrugged it off angrily. Whether it was one of his own men or one of the Red Corsairs didn’t matter. He did not welcome the physical contact, not whilst he was in the midst of battle.

  Ryarus stared at his enemy through the red of his eye lenses. His power armour was gravely compromised and whilst he was an accomplished warrior, at this very moment in time, his opponent was physically superior.

  The Silver Skulls had pulled back almost to the landing bay. He could hear the unmistakable sounds of weapons discharging, their echoes getting ever closer. Dasan’s squad, being closest had reached the Thunderhawk first and were keeping the Corsairs pinned down with the gunship’s heavy bolters. Even in his moment of distraction, Ryarus grunted approval at their methods.

  His attacker launched at him once again and this time he was pressed back. It took every shred of his strength to keep the chainsword from biting into his helm.

  ‘Keep moving back, Matteus,’ he roared through the vox. ‘I can keep this traitor engaged for a while.’ He was not completely alone though; three or four other Silver Skulls were engaging in the rearguard battle with him. His heart soared at the fraternal sense of solidarity this gave him and his strength renewed, he shoved the Red Corsair away from him.

  Matteus was dealing with his own situation. Whilst Dasan’s squad were holding the wave of Red Corsairs back, his own men – or what were left of them – were setting krak grenades to blow the mag-clamps locking their ship to the floor. With the awakening of the Wolf of Fenris, all its systems had come back on-line, effectively cutting off their escape.

  But they would not be trapped that easily.

  The charges set, Matteus took advantage of the covering fire
of the heavy bolters to get inside the Thunderhawk. Already it was beginning its power cycle, making ready to leave. The Apothecary and the other warriors were at the landing bay door. They would make it.

  Then, Matteus’s spirits fell with an almost audible crash.

  ‘Apothecary, behind you!’

  Interposing himself between Ryarus and his escape was one of the single most massive Space Marines the Apothecary had ever seen. With a pockmarked face boasting a scarred but ruddy complexion, the warrior had dirty blond hair pulled back from his face in a topknot falling down past his shoulders. The many fetishes and runes that decorated his grey battleplate told Ryarus that here was another Space Wolves warrior who had turned his back on the Imperium.

  In front of him, a blockage that he could not hope to defeat, not in his weakened state.

  Behind him, chainsword teeth hungering for his flesh.

  So this is how it ends. It was the second time he had thought that within the hour. Last time, it had not been the case. This time, he felt the truth of the moment far more keenly.

  A humourless smile spread across his face beneath his helm.

  ‘Go,’ he voxed, hefting the weight of his power axe in his hand. He would not be removed from the Emperor’s cause without putting up resistance. Matteus’s head came down in an abrupt, curt nod and his voice, for once without humour, fed through the vox-bead in Ryarus’s ear.

  ‘Fight well, my brother. Primus inter pares.’

  With those words, the Silver Skulls destroyed the controls to the staging area doors and they ground slowly closed with a shrill shriek of straining gears. As they slammed close, they left Ryarus and four others to stand their ground and buy the retreating squads enough time to complete their task and to get clear.