The First Wall
Page 21
‘They will be a great help, my lord. If possible, I would suggest a counter-aerial assault to coincide with a renewed offensive from my attack from Sky City.’
‘You want me to send Sigismund’s force in by air?’
‘That would be the swiftest way into the battle, my lord.’
‘I agree. I will have Sigismund contact you directly to work out the details once the strike force is ready to leave.’
‘Thank–’
The vox hissed into dead static, the connection broken. Rann flicked the dial to his command channel.
‘Lieutenant-Commander Haeger! Bring my strategic council to the briefing room. We have a counter-attack to plan.’ He sat back in thought for a moment before activating the switch again. ‘Have Magos Deveralax come as well. We need to discuss how to eliminate this new electronic threat. And have her bring her best demolitions experts.’
Sanctum Imperialis, central zone, three days since assault
Looking across the expanse of the Hall of Widows, Euphrati Keeler watched the Custodian carefully, the steady tempo of his breathing coming to her ear through the vox-receiver. He hadn’t raised his weapon, which was encouraging only to a certain point. Her next words would frame the rest of their relationship. She wanted to tell him that the Emperor had guided her to this time and place, but a lesser truth would have to serve for now.
‘Malcador sent me to help you.’
‘I see. How did you know I would be here?’
‘I’m sorry, but you’ve been led on something of a false trail.’
‘Explain.’
‘You went into shadow guise before Malcador could tell you that I would be assisting you. Your training meant you would ignore all vox contact. I tried to find you but had to give up, even though I knew you were following the colonel. You’re very good at what you do.’
‘How did you know I would follow Colonel Nhek to this place?’
‘I wouldn’t feel put out, Custodian Amon. It was Valdor himself that helped lay the bait once it was clear we could not contact you by conventional means. From your request he deduced you would follow the lead of the colonel and Sindermann received word that she would come to this meeting. I thought I would have to wait a while longer but you were very prompt.’
‘Has this been some kind of trial? A reverse blood game to test my abilities?’
She shook her head.
‘No, Custodian Amon. This is all very real. The apparition, the confession, the gathering you are witnessing were not staged for your benefit.’
‘These are members of the Lectitio Divinitatus. Conspirators in the cult of the Emperor.’
‘High-ranking, as you can see. They are unaware of our presence. I agreed to help you navigate the labyrinth of the Lectitio Divinitatus. Conditional upon my aid was Malcador’s promise that nobody within the cult will be prosecuted unless found guilty of some greater crime. You are here to uncover the source and scale of the daemonic intrusion, not to wage war upon the Lectitio Divinitatus.’
‘I do not take orders from political agitators, nor does Malcador’s oath bind me.’
Keeler sighed.
‘Firstly, without my help you will find out nothing. The moment the Lectitio Divinitatus knows you are seeking them, they’ll disappear. Secondly, perhaps you miss the meaning of Valdor’s involvement. I am here with his full, ah, blessing.’
Amon stared at her silently for several seconds longer, not moving at all. His expression was impossible to read, a blank canvas of emotion. Eventually he gave a perfunctory nod.
‘Very well. We need to agree our objectives and approach. There is a disused common area on the fourth level of the adjacent quarters. Do you know it?’
‘I can find it. I’ll meet you there in ten minutes, Custodian.’
He hung up the receiver without further acknowledgement, disappearing back through the curtains a heartbeat later. Keeler slid her vox-handset back into its sconce and turned to lean her back against the wall next to it, letting the tension flow from her body. The curtain twitched.
‘Is it done?’ a voice asked from the hallway beyond.
She pulled back the curtain to reveal a silver-haired man, face lined with age. Despite his wizened features he held himself straight, gaze firm, voice strong. He was every bit as imposing and charismatic as he had been at the height of his prowess as one of the iterators of the Imperial Truth. Kyril Sindermann, now her herald to the growing masses of the Lectitio Divinitatus.
‘That went better than expected,’ she told him. ‘Malcador warned that he is a hardliner when it comes to matters of faith. He was at Monarchia.’
‘Perhaps that was why Valdor chose him for the task.’
‘If Valdor wanted the Lectitio Divinitatus eradicated, he would have ordered it so, long before now. I think Custodian Amon has a talent for rooting out hidden things. Nothing more.’
‘Even so, you cannot trust him too much. You are a saint, a valuable hostage…’
Keeler stepped through the curtain and answered with a smile.
‘Trust is a commodity that comes and goes, my dearest friend. Faith is eternal.’
Nagapor Territories, fifty-nine days before assault
An insistent banging and the stench of smoke woke Zenobi. She was still strapped to her gunnery chair, hanging over the control console. The armourglass of the dome was intact, heavily smeared and scratched, but through it she could see the bent barrels of the autocannons and the furrows they had scored through the dirt as the car had tipped off the track.
The metallic clang of a hammer dragged her senses back inside. Between each blow she heard the crackle of flames and through the ringing in her ears caught her name, very muffled from outside. She braced a foot against the side of the turret and unclasped the strap, falling sideways between the control console and the dome. From this new position she could see that a panel had torn away, blocking the access ladder into the cupola. Flames flickered from the cables that had been exposed. The fire didn’t seem very big, but it was between her and the route out.
That was when she remembered the ammunition feed.
‘Help!’ She slid boots first along the hatchway and slammed her foot against the twisted metal sheet. ‘I’m alive! I’m in here! Draw the ammo feed! There’s a fire!’
She battered the metal several more times, shouting for her companions to remove the ammunition belt feeds. The fire was growing in brightness, sputtering and flaring as it reached the lubricated turntable of the quad cannons. She worried that an electrical discharge might make the whole metal turret live and scrambled back, trying to wedge herself into the non-conductive armourglass dome, one rubber-soled boot pressed against the chair.
A thump right behind her jolted her head back, banging it again. There were figures outside, scraping away at the grime that had accumulated on the dome. Menber peered through, eyes shielded by his hands, a cry of relief becoming a short laugh as their eyes met. He grinned and said something but the thick armourglass reduced it to meaningless mumbling.
‘I can’t hear you,’ she mouthed deliberately, shrugging her shoulders. ‘There’s a fire. You need to disconnect the ammunition before it blows.’
He nodded and gave a thumbs up. Zenobi focused on his mouth as best she could, turning her body so that she was more or less parallel with him. Menber nodded but she couldn’t tell if he had really understood. She raised her voice, shouting each word with careful intonation while pointing back to the hatchway.
‘Fire! Get! Me! Out! Of! Here!’
A few others gathered, their lasguns turned in their hands. They started hammering at the armourglass with the butts of their weapons, but the only discernible result was deafening noise within the turret.
‘Stop, stop!’ Zenobi waved her hands and then shielded her ears. Menber noticed and called for the others to back away.
The smoke was far more dangerous than the heat from the fire. Zenobi was almost unable to keep her eyes open, blinking hard all the time as tears streamed through the grime on her face. Every breath felt like inhaling razor blades.
That was when an idea struck. Zenobi turned her attention back to the dome and signalled for Menber and the others to move back. Almost blind, her fingers fumbling every delicate motion, she persisted. Every few seconds coughs wracked her, doubling her up. She eventually unlaced her boots and wedged them under the control pedals. A dizzy spell stopped her for several erratic heartbeats. She wanted to suck in air but knew that would only make it worse.
Next came the coverall, an even more awkward struggle in the confines of the turret. First one arm then the other came free. A sudden crack and green flare from the entranceway marked the fire reaching some new source of fuel. The smoke became darker, leaving a black slick along the metal as it flowed up into the turret. She shifted to the rubberised seat, nearly lying down to pull the heavy uniform off her legs. Folding a rough rectangle, its arms and legs tucked inside, she put it to one side and drew her boots back on, still nervous about electrocution.
She moved along the ladderway at a crouch, trying not to touch anything. The curls of her hair stood up with static and the choking smoke was thick in her throat. With the folded coverall held out before her like a shield, she lunged forward, thrusting it into the exposed cable compartment.
The thick folds of material fitted almost exactly, cutting off the air. Cautiously, she drew it back to see if there were any flames left. A spark from a severed wire caused her to flinch, but as far as she could see, the fire was gone. Zenobi filled the hole with her uniform just in case, hoping it wouldn’t catch alight from a stray discharge. She started to kick at the cover that had come away to block the entry hatch.
‘Can you hear me?’
There were voices and movement below. Lieutenant Okoye’s face appeared in the small gap between dislodged sheet and floor.
‘We are improvising a cutter out of the laspacks. Step back.’
‘What about a melta?’ she replied.
‘Too powerful, it might blast all the way up into the turret.’
She obeyed, scuttling back up to the dome. A hiss joined the symphony of other noises that creaked and rattled through the derailed car, and she saw a red glow appear on one corner of the lodged metal plate.
Hammering resumed, bending the metal where it had been heated. Gloved hands grasped at the torn edge, twisting and pulling. Zenobi almost blacked out again, trying to breathe as little as possible – the fire was producing no more smoke but there wasn’t enough ventilation to let the trapped fumes escape.
The sheet buckled. Almost unconscious, Zenobi threw herself towards it, slamming shoulder first into the metal. Corners screeched along the entranceway but it gave under the impact, sending her, the metal and several troopers sprawling into the main gangway. A shriek left her lips, coming from somewhere she hadn’t known existed, quickly followed by a lungful of acrid but smoke-free air.
She lay on the metal, eyes closed, chest heaving for several seconds, the heat from where the lascutter had melted it warming the back of her legs.
It was this that reminded her she was dressed only in her undergarments. Slowly opening her eyes, she found herself with five troopers and Lieutenant Okoye looking down at her with a mixture of humour and amazement. Kettai was among them.
‘I need a drink,’ she croaked.
‘I have some water here,’ said one of the other rescuers, pulling a canteen from her belt.
Kettai met her gaze as she swigged down tepid water, a smile on his lips.
‘Let’s get you outside,’ he said, draping an arm over her shoulder to lead her away, his other hand moving to the flask in his pocket.
Abaddon joins the attack
Among the masses
A question of faith
Lion’s Gate space port, mesophex core, two days since assault
There was a lot to be said for the simple pleasure of combat. Abaddon had always been a fighter, first and foremost. Born to be a king, he had chosen the road of battle rather than rulership, giving up that birthright to honour his blade-kin.
Wreathed in armour-shattering energy, his fist made short work of the VII Legion warrior that barred his passage into the upper sensoria of the Lion’s Gate space port. Another fell to the sleeve-blades of Layak’s bodyguards, while the sorcerer ended a third with a fork of black lightning from his staff.
This was purity. To be victorious and live, or to know defeat and death. A clear foe, a defined objective.
Abaddon’s gun roared, a hail of bolts cracking open the plastron of an Imperial Fists legionary in the livery of a veteran sergeant. He followed up with long strides, smashing his gauntlet into the broken armour, pulverising bone and organs beneath, the blow hurling Dorn’s fighter across the tiled floor.
Bolt and blade did not care for allegiance, nor the wiles of priests and sorcerers. They were loosed for many reasons, honourable and vile, but once set on their way they either hit their target or missed. Abaddon remembered a time of similar clarity, when he had been a legionary, newly recruited into the Luna Wolves.
Follow orders. Kill the enemy. Protect your brothers.
Now he could barely stand to be in the same room as those he had once thought close as kin. He raised his blade alongside an abomination that paid service to powers existing beyond mortal comprehension. And more than anything, he fought for a lord whose true ambitions were impossible to know.
Despite his doubts, perhaps because of them, the First Captain of the Sons of Horus was not content to be an observer during the battle for Terra. Behind him came three thousand Sons of Horus, their weapons raking fire through the warriors of Rogal Dorn. By Stormbird and Thunderhawk they had been summoned, another blade aimed at the heart of the Lion’s Gate space port.
It had not been by the order of Abaddon that they had come; rather they had been despatched by the Warmaster on the word of Layak. Though he had received no order himself, Abaddon had assumed command.
Ezekyle Abaddon, First Captain of the Sons of Horus, the right hand of the Warmaster and victor of countless campaigns had not come to Terra to watch others overthrow the Emperor. He would sooner die in battle than see a Word Bearers sorcerer lead the first of his battle-brothers into the Imperial Palace.
The line of yellow that held the hallways around the upper sensoria buckled under the attack, unable to hold against the ferocity of their newly arrived foes. In the close confines of the interior Abaddon swapped his bolter for powered blade, so that with sword and gleaming fist he carved his path through to the objective.
With him came the Justaerin, their Terminator war-plate proof against withering volleys of fire, their loyalty to Abaddon as certain as their armour. In a time when he trusted little but himself, he placed his life in the hands of his close guard without question and they followed him without hesitation.
A last knot of VII Legion warriors held the doors to the sensoria. At a conjuration from Layak a black cloud blinded them, flickers of warp energy in its heart. Abaddon charged into the gloom, ignoring the sporadic bolt-rounds that burst from his war-plate. His sword took the head from the first foe he encountered, his fist deflecting the gladius of the second. A blade slave pounced past, burying its dagger-like limbs into the Space Marine’s neck, its momentum carrying them both into the murk.
Abaddon pivoted at the sound of heavy footfalls, driving the point of
his sword forward to meet the onrushing Imperial Fist. He slowed too late, running onto the blade tip. Abaddon advanced, driving the sword on until it erupted from the Space Marine’s back. Ripping his sword free, the gloom dissipating as Layak’s spell faded, he stepped past the falling body into the broad chamber of the upper sensoria.
‘We will blind their commanders too,’ said Layak, hurrying past, head turning quickly as he surveyed the room.
‘Secure the orbital augur channels,’ Abaddon told the Terminator-armoured legionaries fanning out into the chamber. His sensor data carried the signals of the rest of the force dispersing to secure the area against counter-attack. Within thirty seconds the sensoria was ringed by Sons of Horus.
‘Over here, First Captain,’ one of his Justaerin replied, indicating a nearby console.
Layak strode over, staff leaving trails of sparks where it struck the bloodied floor.
‘Yes, this is perfect,’ crowed the Word Bearers sorcerer. ‘I will guide Volk’s essence to the auguries to mask the arrival.’
‘And what of the barrier of the Emperor?’ demanded Abaddon. ‘I have seen little enough from you to prise open the shield that guards against the Neverborn.’
‘That work is ongoing. All elements must come together, Ezekyle.’ Layak turned to regard the First Captain with six gleaming eyes. ‘The gods are with us and the Utterblight is growing in strength. Our work here aids the greater plan. Even as Dorn must commit more strength to the defence of the space port his grip on the Inner Palace is weakened, his eye drawn elsewhere. Progress is being made, though it is not visible to you.’
‘We are on the brink of taking the port, regardless of your efforts.’
‘The gods will decide when the space port falls, and we shall claim it not a moment earlier.’ Layak returned his attention to the console. He drew a curved knife and started etching symbols into the plasteel of the terminal housing. The scratching of its point punctuated his words. ‘When we move to the Ultimate Wall, would you have the elevated primarchs be baulked again, or shall they lead their Legions in the final battle?’