The children screamed at the monsters, begging for their lives or their mothers, but the black-robed monsters paid them no heed and continued their macabre procedures.
Uriel twisted in his captor's grip, fighting desperately as he saw the opened belly of a daemonculaba before him.
'No!' he roared. 'Don't!'
Another of the Savage Morticians assisted its fellow surgeon with the ovariotomy procedure and Uriel bellowed in anger as he felt a blunt needle punch through the ossified bone shield that protected the organs within his chest cavity.
His struggles grew weaker as the powerful soporific sped around his body and overcame his fearsomely resistant metabolism. He felt rough hands laying him within the soft, wet embrace of the daemonculaba's womb and warmth enfolded him as he felt his limbs sutured into its bloody interior.
He felt pulsing organs around him and the rapid tattoo of a heart beating too fast above his head.
'You die now.' said the Savage Mortician. 'Too old to become Iron Warrior. Gene-seed will foster new growths to rupture your flesh. Mutant growths and unknown results ensue. You will be in pieces soon. In jars.'
'No...' slurred Uriel, struggling feebly against the incapacitating drug. 'Kill you...'
But the swathes of the daemonculaba's blubbery flesh were already being folded over his supine body to leave him trapped in darkness. Moist, blood-rich flesh smothered his face and he fought to free his hands, but a warm numbness suffused his body.
The last thing Uriel heard before he slipped into unconsciousness was the sound of the daemon womb's thick, leathery skin being stitched shut above him.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Ardaric Vaanes fought the Savage Mortician all the way, though it did little good. It had a firm a grip of him in its bronze claws, his limbs held immobile and only his head able to move. The monstrous surgeon loped through the screaming chamber on long, stilt like legs, its stride smooth and long, despite the unevenness of the ground. It towered over the abominable hybrid creations that toiled at blood-slick experimentation tables, making its way towards some hideous destination of its own. 'Pasanius!' he shouted. 'Can you hear me?' The Ultramarines sergeant nodded dumbly, his head rolling slackly on numbed muscles, and Vaanes knew there would be no help from him until the drug he had been given wore off. With the exception of Ventris, he could see that the black-robed monsters were taking all of them to the same place, a procession of the grotesque creatures bearing them towards their doom. Pasanius was near as damn unconscious behind him, closely followed by Seraphys, the Blood Raven and the two Guardsmen. The remaining nine members of their warrior band were there as well.
Not for the first time since they'd begun the journey to Khalan-Ghol, Vaanes cursed Ventris for deluding them into believing they could pull this suicide mission off. But more than that, he cursed himself for falling for his fine words of courage. Vaanes was under no illusions as to his lack of honour, and should have known better than to believe the same tired old lie.
Honsou had been right when he talked of where honour got you. Vaanes had given up believing in such things long ago and all it had earned him were decades of wandering the stars as a rootless mercenary until he had ended up on this miserable hellhole of a world.
He had dared to believe that Ventris represented his final opportunity for redemption, that by taking this one, last chance, he would be redeemed and renewed in the sight of the Emperor. Now he knew better, as that promise turned to bitter ashes.
He shut out the cries and moans of those poor unfortunates who suffered in the Savage Morticians' lust for knowledge, their piteous cries unable to penetrate his bitter heart of stone. They were weak, allowing themselves to feel. To feel pain, remorse, anguish and pity. Vaanes had long ago shut himself off to those emotions and knew that it made him stronger.
'The strong are strongest alone.' he whispered, remembering those words when he first heard them from the mouth of one of his former paymasters.
At last their hellish journey came to an end as they entered a wide, circular arena with a dozen, rusted steel mortuary tables around its circumference, deep blood gutters running down the length of each one. An arrangement of iron poles, like the framework for some great gazebo, encompassed the anatomist's theatre, supporting a heavy block and tackle arrangement of meat hooks above each table. Large tubs and barrels for blood and waste trimmings were placed at convenient intervals, together with a long trough of dark water. A soiled workbench sat in the centre of the theatre, strewn with an assortment of short and long-bladed knives, cleavers, hatchets and hacksaws.
Swiftly, the Savage Morticians deposited each of the warrior band on one of the tables, securing their limbs with thick bands of iron and heavy bolts. Vaanes kicked out as the beast carrying him hacked off his jump pack with one blow and slammed him down on the table. A bronze claw slashed out, and Vaanes blinked away blood as the blade laid his face open to the bone.
The creature's dead features leaned in close to his own, hissing its crackling, unintelligible language in anger, and he spat blood in its eye. Its claw drew back to strike him again, but another of the Savage Morticians angrily hissed something and the blow never landed. Instead, it secured him to the table, ensuring that his hands were bound such that he could not unsheathe his lightning claws.
Vaanes watched as a robed monster on spiked tracks carried their weapons to an examination table and a pair of the Morticians began cataloguing them with studied interest. He tugged at the bindings on the table, looking to free himself and kill his enemies.
He didn't expect to escape alive, but perhaps he could take a few of these bastards with him before he died. Pasanius was bolted onto another table: his silver arm bound above the junction of metal and flesh, his forearm dangling over the sharp-edged sides. Their charges secured, most of the Savage Morticians departed, each of them eager to be about their own particular macabre experimentation.
Only two remained and Vaanes knew that if there was ever going to be a time to try and escape, this was it. The mutant creature their daemonic captor had called Sabatier limped into the theatre, nodding in satisfaction as he saw that the Space Marines were securely restrained.
'Not so defiant now.' it said to Vaanes, its malformed head still resting on its shoulder.
'When I get loose, I'm going to tear that head clean off and see if you still get back up, you damn freak!' shouted Vaanes.
Sabatier laughed his gurgling laugh. 'No. I going to watch you hoisted up on hooks and butchered. You and all your fellows.'
'Damn, you. I'll kill you!' screamed Vaanes, thrashing ineffectually at his bonds.
Sabatier leaned closer, its snapped neck causing its head to lurch and sway. 'I will enjoy watching you die. Watch you weep and soil yourself as they open you up and your innards spill out in front of you.'
Vaanes heard Leonid's familiar hacking cough, and twisted his head, his frustrations spilling out in an exclamation of rage. 'Will you shut up!' he yelled. 'Shut up or just die and stop making such a pathetic noise!'
But Leonid's cough was soon obscured as he heard the sharp whine of a sawblade powering up. Vaanes twisted his head to watch as the Savage Morticians bent over Pasanius, one extending steel clamps to hold his arm firm, while the other lowered a shrieking saw towards the flesh just above the sergeant's elbow.
Horrified, but morbidly fascinated, Vaanes watched as the saw bit into the meat of Pasanius's arm, sending arcing sprays of blood across the mortuary theatre. Pasanius yelled as the, Savage Mortician worked the blade deep into his convulsing arm, the pain cutting through the fog of the sedative. The pitch of the slicing saw changed and Vaanes smelled the burning tang of seared bone as the blade cut into the humerus.
Blood flooded from the wound onto the floor, draining through a partially clogged sinkhole in the centre of the theatre with a horrid gurgling. Vaanes heard the two Guardsmen weep in terror at what was happening, but pushed them from his mind as he continued to watch the grisly amputation.
A gleaming cryo-chest was brought forth, wisps of condensing air gusting from within as it was opened, and the severed limb was placed carefully within.
The Savage Morticians straightened from their labours and moved around the theatre to the next body laid out before them: Seraphys.
'You will watch your men die one by one.' rasped Sabatier. 'Then you will join them.'
He felt no pain and that was good.
The air was balmy, and condensation fell in a pleasantly warm drizzle from the cavern roof high above him. Uriel knew he should be working to gather in the long, gently waving sheaves of the harvest, but his limbs felt as though warm syrup flowed through his veins and he could not summon the effort to move.
A sense of peaceful contentment filled him and he opened his eyes, watching the stalks above him and knowing that he would be in for a hiding from his father if he didn't fill enough baskets, but, strangely, not caring. The sweet smell of moist crop sap filled his nostrils and he took a deep breath of the familiar aroma.
Eventually, he sat up, massaging the back of his neck where it had stiffened while he had been dozing, rolling his head back and forth on his shoulders. His muscles burned from his earlier exertion and he knew that he would need to stretch properly if he was to avoid painful cramps later. Pastor Cantilus's evening callisthenics at the end of the day should be enough to stave off such cramps though.
The soft, wet rain felt good on his clammy skin and he gave thanks to the Emperor for blessing him with such a peaceful life. Calth might not be the most exciting of worlds to grow up on, but with the entry trials for Agiselus Barracks coming up soon, he knew he would soon get the chance to show that he was ready for great things.
Perhaps if he did well he might...
Trials...
What?
He looked down at his limbs, seeing the powerfully muscled arms of a Space Marine and not the wiry arms of the six year old boy he had been when he had dreamed of entering the martial academy where Roboute Guilliman himself had trained. He pushed himself to his feet, standing head and shoulders above
the harvest crop that had seemed so tall to him back then.
The people of his collective farm filled the underground fields, dressed in simple chitons of a pale blue as they worked hard, but contentedly, to gather the harvest. The field filled the cavern, stretching away in a gentle curve and following the line of the rocky walls of the underground haven. Silver irrigation machinery hummed and sprayed periodic bursts of a fine spray across the crop and Uriel smiled as he remembered many happy days spent industriously in this very cavern as a child.
But this had been before...
Before he had travelled to Macragge and begun his journey towards becoming a warrior of the Adeptus Astartes. That had been a lifetime ago and he was surprised at how vividly this scene, which he had long thought vanished from his memory, was etched upon his consciousness.
How then was he here, standing within a memory of a time long passed?
Uriel set off along the line of crops towards a series of simple white buildings arranged in an elegant, symmetrical pattern. His home had been situated in this collective farm, and the thought of venturing there once again filled him with a number of emotions he thought long-suppressed.
The air darkened as he walked and Uriel shivered as an unnatural chill travelled up his spine.
'I wouldn't go down there.' said a voice behind him. 'You'll accept that this is real if you do, and you might never come back.'
Uriel turned to see a fellow Space Marine, clad in the same pale blue chiton as the workers in the field, and his face split apart in a smile of recognition.
'Captain Idaeus.' he said joyfully. 'You are alive!'
Idaeus shook his scarred and hairless head. 'No, I'm not. I died on Thracia, remember?'
'Yes, I remember.' nodded Uriel sadly. 'You destroyed the bridge across the gorge.'
'That's right, I did. I died fulfilling our mission.' said Idaeus pointedly.
'Then why are you here? Though I am not even sure I know where here is.'
'Of course you do, it's Calth, the week before you took the first steps on the road that has ultimately led you back here.' said Idaeus, strolling leisurely along the path that led away from the farm towards one of the silver irrigation machines.
Uriel trotted after his former captain. 'But why am I here? Why are you here? And why shouldn't I go down to the farm?'
Idaeus shrugged. 'As full of questions as ever you were.' he chuckled. 'I can't say for sure why we're here, it's your mind after all. It was you that dredged up this memory and brought me here.'
'But why here?'
'Perhaps because it's a safe place to retreat to.' suggested Idaeus, lifting a wineskin slung at his waist and taking a long drink. He handed the skin to Uriel, who also drank, enjoying the taste of genuine Calth vintage.
'Retreat to?' he said, handing the wineskin back. 'I don't understand. Retreat from what?'
'The pain.'
'What pain? I don't feel any pain.' said Uriel.
'You don't?' snapped Idaeus. 'You can't feel the pain? The pain of failure?'
'No.' said Uriel, glancing up as the dark shadows of clouds began to gather in the topmost reaches of the cave and evil thoughts began intruding on this pastoral scene.
Dead skies, the taste of iron. Horrors unnamed and abominations too terrible to bear...
A distant rumble of thunder sent a tremor through the clouds and Uriel looked up in confusion. This wasn't part of his memory. The underground caverns of Calth did not suffer such storms. More clouds began forming above him and he felt a suffocating fear rise up within him as they gathered with greater speed and ferocity.
Idaeus stepped in close to Uriel and said, 'You're dying Uriel. They're stealing the very things that make you who you are... can't you feel it?'
'I can't feel anything.'
'Try!' urged Idaeus. 'You have to go back to the pain.'
'No.' cried Uriel, as a heavy, dark rain began to fall, hard and thick droplets sending up tail spumes of mud.
Suffocating, cloying, questing hands within his flesh, a horrific sense of violation...
'I do not want to go back!' shouted Uriel.
'You have to, it's the only way you can save yourself.'
'I don't understand!'
'Think! Did my death teach you nothing?' said Idaeus as the rain beat down harder, melting the skin on his bones. 'A Space Marine never accepts defeat, never stops fighting and he never turns his back on his battle-brothers.'
The rain pounded the fields flat, the workers running in fear towards the farm. Uriel felt an almost uncontrollable desire to join them, but Idaeus placed a palm on his chest and struggled to speak in the face of his dissolution. 'No. The warrior I passed my sword to would not retreat. He would turn and face the pain.'
Uriel looked down, feeling the weight of a perfectly balanced sword settle in his hand, the blade a gleaming silver and its golden hilt shining like the sun. Its weight felt good, natural, and he closed his eyes as he fondly remembered forging its blade in the balmy heat of the Macragge night.
'What awaits me if I go back?' he asked.
'Suffering and death.' admitted Idaeus. 'Pain and anguish.'
Uriel nodded. 'I cannot abandon my friends...'
'That's my boy.' smiled Idaeus, his voice fading and his form almost totally washed away by the hard rain. 'But before you go... I have one last gift for you.'
'What?' said Uriel, feeling his grip on this fantasy slipping and his perceptions growing dimmer. As the vision of his captain diminished, Uriel thought he heard him say one last thing
, a whispered warning that vanished like morning mist... beware your black... sun? But the words faded before he could hold onto the sense of them.
Uriel opened his eyes, feeling the sting of amniotic fluids on his skin and hearing the heartbeat of the dae-monculaba above him as reality rushed in once again. He roared in anger, feeling questing, umbilical tendrils invading his flesh. They burrowed in through the sockets cored into his body where the monitoring systems of his armour interfaced directly with his internal organs.
Suckling, feeding parasites wormed inside him, feeding and sampling his flesh.
Chains clanked as a pair of dangling hooks connected by a horizontal iron bar were lowered from the framework that encompassed the anatomist's arena. Connected to sturdy block and tackle, the heavy hooks were dragged onto the metal gurney upon which Seraphys lay. As one Savage Mortician prepared the hooks, the other cut his armour from his body with practiced ease. Lastly, it removed the helmet from the Space Marine and produced a heavy iron mallet from the whirring mechanisms of its arm.
Before Seraphys could do more than shout a denial, it smashed the mallet repeatedly against his skull.
Seraphys grunted in pain, but after the sixth blow, his eyes glazed over and his head rolled slack. The Mortician nodded to its compatriot, who lifted the unconscious Space Marine's legs and sliced a heavy blade across his Achilles tendons then thrust a hook into each ankle for hanging support. Seraphys's legs were spread so that his feet hung outside the shoulders, and, satisfied his body was secure, the Savage Mortician hauled on the rattling pulley and dragged the body into the air.
'What are you doing?' shouted Vaanes. 'For the love of the Emperor just kill him and be done with it!'
'No.' hissed Sabatier. 'Not kill him. Not when he has such succulent meat on him. See how they keep arms parallel to legs? This provides access to the pelvis, and keeps his arms out of the way in a position for easy removal.'
Warhammer - Ultramarines 03 - Dead Sky, Black Sun (McNeill, Graham) Page 20