The Ultramarines Omnibus

by Graham McNeill

  Less than forty Space Marines still fought.

  But fewer than this number had won against impossible odds before and Learchus knew that while there was still blood pumping round his body, he would never surrender.

  Together the Space Marines dragged the corpse back towards a wide plaza from where a great many aircraft had launched earlier. It crossed his mind to wonder how close Captain Ventris had come to succeeding, but supposed it didn’t matter much now.

  ‘Wait,’ said Astador.

  ‘What?’ snapped Learchus. ‘We have to keep moving.’

  ‘No,’ said Astador, pointing to the base of the next wall. ‘It is already too late.’

  Learchus saw hundreds of tyranid beasts sweeping around their flanks, cutting off their escape. Giant creatures, three times the height of a Space Marine, and hordes of warrior beasts filled the area between them and the next wall.

  Astador was right. It was too late for escape.

  PHASE V – CONSUMPTION

  SIXTEEN

  THOUSANDS OF LITRES of stinking bio-fluids roared past the Space Marines with the force of a tidal wave, pummelling their armour and ripping them from the walls of the pipe. Uriel felt alien flesh tear under his gauntlet and cursed as he was swept along.

  He spun crazily in the flow, slamming into the sides of the tunnel and his battle-brothers, losing his orientation as he tumbled along with the waste matter. All he could see was murky fluids and occasional glimpses of the tunnel walls. He tried to grip the sides of the tunnel, but the waving cilia had withdrawn into the meat of the walls.

  Uriel flipped upright for a second, seeing an outthrust gauntlet. He grabbed onto it, an iron grip clamping around his wrist and halting his headlong tumble. Thundering fluids threatened to rip him from his saviour’s grip, but he found his footing in a fold of flesh and hauled himself upright.

  His head broke the surface and he saw the Deathwatch clustered on a bony ledge above the raging torrent of filth. Pasanius hauled him from the tunnel and he collapsed wearily onto the reassuringly firm surface.

  ‘Thank you, my friend,’ he gasped.

  Pasanius nodded, too exhausted to reply. Uriel pushed himself to his knees, taking a closer look at their surroundings. They lay in an oval chamber that obviously fed into the fluid-filled tunnel. Damias, Henghast and Pelantar crouched beside a mesh of sinew that blocked their passage from this chamber and Uriel speculated that they were perhaps in some form of filter chamber. Noxious gusts of gas soughed from beyond the mesh of fibres and the ramble of multiple hearts was even stronger.

  ‘How close are we, Brother Damias?’ asked Uriel.

  ‘I do not know, brother-captain,’ replied Damias, his voice full of reproach. ‘I was careless enough to lose my grip on the auspex as I was swept along. I shall perform whatever penance you deem suitable upon our completion of the mission.’

  Uriel cursed quietly, but contented himself with the thought that so long as they headed in the direction of the hive ship’s heartbeats, they couldn’t go far wrong. It had been a long-held belief of Kryptman’s that the reproductive chambers of the Norn Queen, the brood mother of the hive, would be close to the hearts, where the nutrients and vital fluid flow was purest.

  ‘Do not worry, brother. The Emperor shall guide us,’ said Uriel, drawing his power sword and hacking through the fibrous mesh that blocked the chamber’s exit. Once he had managed to relight his flamer, Pasanius took point again, leading them along the glistening passageway. Mucus-like saliva dripped from the walls and more of the slithering, worm-like beasts burrowed in and out of the walls and floors.

  ‘By the Emperor, this is worse than Pavonis, and I thought that was bad,’ said Pasanius.

  Uriel nodded in agreement. The darkness beneath the world had been terrible, but this grotesque mockery of the gift of life was almost too much to countenance. The blasphemy of the tyranids was beyond measure and he could not fathom how a race that gave nothing back to the universe, that lived only to consume, could be allowed to come into existence.

  ‘What is Pavonis?’ asked Henghast.

  ‘A world on the eastern fringe, but that is a tale for another day,’ said Uriel.

  ‘I shall hold you to that promise, brother-captain. I will need a saga of your bravery to take back with me to the Fang.’

  Uriel was struck by the undiminished optimism of the Deathwatch. Despite their losses and the scale of the task before them, not one had uttered a single sentiment that suggested that they did not believe utterly that they would prevail.

  He slapped a palm on Henghast’s shoulder guard and said, ‘When we return to Tarsis Ultra I shall share the victory wine with you and tell you all about Pavonis.’

  ‘Wine! Pah, wine is for women. We will drain a barrel of Fenrisian mead and you will wake with a hangover like continents colliding.’

  ‘I look forward to it,’ said Uriel as Pasanius raised his hand.

  Uriel joined his sergeant at the head of their column, listening as the boom of multiple hearts and other, less obvious organs rambled close by. A low-ceilinged chamber with a heaving sphincter muscle at its centre rasped with tendrils of ochre vapours gusting through it. Booming echoes rang from the fleshy walls.

  ‘I believe we are close, brother-captain. The sounds converge on this place’ said Pasanius.

  ‘I think you’re right, my friend, but where is it coming from?’

  Brother Henghast entered the chamber and removed his helmet, coughing briefly before his enhanced respiratory system was able to adapt to the toxic atmosphere.

  ‘What are you doing?’ demanded Uriel. ‘Put your helmet back on!’

  Henghast cocked his head to one side and whispered, ‘Auto-senses are all well and good, but my own are better.’

  The Space Wolf sniffed the air, his features twitching as he filtered the smells and sounds of the hive ship with senses more sensitive than even Uriel’s. The Ultramarine’s senses had been enhanced by the Apothecaries of his Chapter, but were still no match for those of a Space Wolf.

  ‘The heartbeats are strongest from this passage,’ said Henghast, replacing his helmet and standing clear to allow Pasanius to proceed. Uriel said, ‘Well done, Brother Henghast.’

  As they proceeded along this new passage, wisps of smoke filled the air and the sound of monstrous hearts beating in

  counterpoint grew louder and louder. The glow of Pasanius’s flamer silhouetted his sergeant and cast a flickering blue glow around the dripping walls of the passage.

  They followed the twisting passage for several kilometres until a sickly green glow replaced that of the flamer. The passageway angled downwards, gradually widening until Uriel could see and hear the booming organs whose noise they had been following.

  Larger than super-heavy tanks, the pair of thudding hearts pulsed with massive intra-muscular motion, pumping life-sustaining fluids around the hive ship. Uriel fought the urge to open fire. Kryptman had warned him that these organs would be protected by metres of tough, fibrous skin and that there were sure to be others that could take over.

  Hissing organisms prowled the chamber beyond, but whether they were aware of them yet, he could not say.

  Uriel and the Deathwatch crouched at the end of the smoky passageway, staring into the heart of the hive ship.

  They had reached the reproductive chambers of the Norn Queen.

  SNOWDOG GRIMACED IN pain as Jonny hauled him upstairs, hearing the booming impacts against the door below. His head hurt and his ribs felt like he’d gone ten rounds with a Space Marine. He glanced down the stairs.

  ‘Where’s Sister Joaniel?’ he gasped.

  ‘Dunno,’ said Jonny without breaking his stride. ‘I guess she’s dead.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Yeah,’ confirmed Jonny, ‘she shut the door behind us.’

  ‘She shut the door?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Snowdog mentally shrugged. It was a shame she was dead, but if she was crazy enough to try and take on t
he entire tyranid race, then that was no concern of his. Crashing thumps on the door below made him glad she’d shut the door. He wasn’t sure he’d have trusted Jonny to remember to do it. The door was armoured, but with these monsters, you couldn’t count on any barrier holding for too long.

  ‘Where are the others?’

  ‘Upstairs I guess. Why you got to ask so many questions?’ said Jonny.

  ‘Because that’s how I find things out,’ snapped Snowdog, regretting it instantly as the pain in his ribs flared bright and urgent.

  They rounded another landing and Snowdog could have sworn that there hadn’t been this many stairs before. As his senses began returning to normal, he heard a soft pattering, like a wind-chime in a strong breeze, and wondered what it was. He realised a second later and cried out in alarm.

  ‘Jonny! Stop! Stop!’ he yelled. ‘Turn around!’

  ‘Huh?’ said Jonny, but complied.

  Snowdog moaned in frustration as he saw a cascade of gold, silver and precious stones forming a glittering trail back down the stairs. He wriggled free from Jonny’s grasp and painfully shucked the backpack from his shoulders as the crashes on the door below became even more frenzied.

  The backpack had saved him from the worst of Lex’s bomb sure enough, but it was in a hell of a mess for having done so. Everything he’d taken from the wreck was spilling through long, burnt tears in the canvas. There was barely anything left.

  He began transferring the remainder into his pockets, hearing the scream of buckling metal from below. He heard a footfall on the stairs behind him, but ignored it as he continued to stuff precious stones into his pockets.

  ‘Hey, Trask,’ said Jonny.

  Snowdog felt his blood chill and reached for his pistol, but it was too late.

  He heard the rack of a shotgun slide and rolled to one side, yelling in pain as the splintered ends of his ribs ground together.

  But the shot wasn’t aimed at him. Jonny Stomp toppled to the stairs, a halo of blood splattered on the wall behind him.

  Snowdog squinted through a haze of tears of pain and raised his pistol.

  Trask kicked him in the face. He felt teeth break and spat blood.

  ‘You and me got some unfinished business, Snowdog,’ said Trask.

  THE SIGHT OF the Norn Queen was something that Uriel would never forget for as long as he lived. The creature was massive, easily the size of a Battle Titan, its bulk filling the chamber with countless means of producing its monstrous offspring. A vast, mucus-ribbed tube hung from the walls, pulsing with disgusting motion and dripping great swathes of egg sacs to a slime filled pool where nurse organisms carried them away in great, scooped pincers.

  Huge pools of protoplasmic ooze bubbled and burst with motion as screeching infant beasts were drooled from its surface along bony chutes to begin growing almost as soon as they hit the ground. Thousands of gelatinous incubation larvae hung from resinous mucus on the great arched ceiling, supported on huge ribs of bone, each thicker than the columns in the Temple of Correction on Macragge. Stinking fluids coated the floor and foetid steam gusted from millions of tiny orifices in the walls. Ropes of dripping intestine and nutrients pumped viscous fluids into the belly of the Norn Queen, its vast, bloated head fused with the ribbed ceiling of the chamber. Six-legged creatures that resembled fat spiders crawled all over its body, cleaning, feeding and ministering to their queen. Huge javelin-like spines protruded from her bony carapace, each dripping with hissing poisons.

  The Norn Queen itself was as much a part of the bio-ship as an individual creature. Warrior organisms patrolled the chamber, snapping their glossy claws at any of the slave-beasts that approached too near the queen. Bigger than the largest tyranid warrior Uriel had ever seen, these warrior beasts were bred for once purpose and one purpose alone – to defend their queen to the death.

  ‘How do we proceed?’ asked Damias.

  ‘With this,’ said Uriel, unholstering the weapon Kryptman had given him. It was the silvered pistol with which the servitor had administered the gene-poison to the lictor, but with an added refinement. Fitted atop the barrel was a long, metallic tube, its blue-steel sheen subtly crystalline. At the end of the tube was an offset ring of nine small spines that slotted over the barrel of Kryptman’s pistol. It was always distasteful to use the weapons of the xeno, but Inquisitor Kryptman had assured him that hrud fusil technology was simply a symbiosis of melta and plasma technology. A product of vile alien

  heresy to be sure, but one that, in this case, would prove useful in administering the gene-poison.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Pelantar.

  He slid the gun back into its ill-fitting holster and said, ‘It is the means by which we can end this. Just get me to the hive-queen.’

  Uriel rose to his feet and said, ‘But first we need to fight our way in, and we’ll have to do it the old-fashioned way, with flesh, blood and steel.’

  The Deathwatch followed their captain as he marched into the Norn Queen’s chamber, Pasanius beside him, Henghast on his left and Damias on his right, Pelantar covering them with his heavy bolter.

  Almost immediately, a warning screech sounded from one of the nurse organisms and the guardian warriors spun to face the intruders. A cacophonous wailing echoed throughout the chamber, a furious beat thrashing the walls as the tyranids rushed to defend their queen.

  Pasanius bathed the first attackers in fire, the guardian creatures howling in anger at such destructive energies being unleashed in their queen’s chambers. Pelantar fired a hail of mutagenic bolts into the mass of aliens, chanting the rites of firing as he slew.

  Uriel ran forwards, the energised blade of his power sword cleaving through alien flesh and bone with ease. The smaller beasts fell like wheat before the scythe and though he felt the killing rage building behind his eyes, he made his peace with it, turning the taint of the Bringer of Darkness into a positive force.

  Flames lit up the hellish glow of the chamber and crackling arcs of energy flared from Damias’s power glove as he battered his way forward. Henghast howled in fury as he charged the alien creatures. Pelantar’s heavy bolter ripped a path through them.

  Uriel spun under a scything blow from a leaping beast that was more fanged maw than anything else, hacking it in two as he sensed the presence of something huge behind him. He threw himself forward, barely avoiding being sliced in two by a guardian organism.

  The alien beast towered above him, larger than a carnifex, but more slender and quick. Its jaw was filled with dripping

  fangs and its upper pair of limbs ended in flashing talons that slashed for his head. Uriel rolled aside as they gouged the floor and slashed his sword at its legs.

  The creature bounded over his blow, smashing its claws against his armour. Ceramite parted under the blow and blood washed down his side before the Larraman cells halted the flow. Pain-suppressors pumped into his body and he staggered as the beast struck him again. He flew through the air, landing on the edge of a bubbling pool of stinking ichor. Whipping tentacles burst from the pool and wrapped around his midriff.

  Uriel cried out and slashed his sword through them, rolling to the base of the pool.

  The guardian organism bounded across to him, its hooves throwing up gouts of stinking fluids. Uriel rolled desperately, pushing himself to his knees and raising his sword to block just as the claws hammered down towards him.

  Sparks flew and he grunted as he held the strength of the beast at bay.

  He rolled beneath the claws, releasing his block and thrust his sword upwards into the creature’s groin. It howled and collapsed to one knee, driving the blade deeper into its flesh.

  Uriel ripped the weapon clear and hacked it through the monster’s midsection. It thrashed as it died, insectile creatures swarming over its corpse to devour it as food for their queen. Uriel staggered towards his target as Pasanius joined him. His sword was bloody and the armour of his silvered arm was missing.

  Brother Damias fought with skill and cunn
ing, his power fist reaping a bloody tally in the furious battle. Henghast killed with all the ferocity he and his Chapter were famed for as Pelantar sprayed shells throughout the chamber, bursting egg sacs and perforating the gristly tube that snaked across the chamber walls.

  Three warrior organisms blocked their path, each as deadly as the one Uriel had killed.

  Damias and Henghast fought their way towards the two Ultramarines.

  ‘The old fashioned way,’ he breathed. ‘Straight through them, eh? Pasanius, Henghast and I will hold them, you get to the queen!’

  Uriel nodded and the four Space Marines raced towards the guardian beasts.

  Pelantar saw what they intended and fired a carefully aimed blast towards the tyranids. Two reeled from the fusillade, their carapaces no match for the blessed ammunition of the Deathwatch.

  But in doing so, he neglected his own defence for a fraction of a second.

  And that was all his foes needed.

  With a snap of claws, the heavy bolter was smashed apart and Pelantar was lifted from his feet in a massive set of powerful talons. He fought with every last bit of strength, punching bloody holes in the beast’s carapace, but it was too late. With a bellowing roar, the beast ripped Pelantar in two, tossing the shorn halves away for the scavenger beasts to feed on.

  Damias and Pasanius attacked while the beasts Pelantar had given his life to wound still staggered from his shells. One burned in the flames as Damias punched through the other’s carapace with the lethal energies of his power fist. Henghast joined Pasanius in attacking the burning monster.

  Uriel ran for the bloated belly of the Norn Queen, his sword raised to strike down the final beast between him and his goal. Its claws snapped shut and Uriel swept his sword through them. He leapt to meet the creature, ducking inside its guard as it flailed its razored claws at him, slashing its own flesh to ruin.

  Uriel pulled himself up the creature’s body, its bony exo-skeleton providing ready-made handholds. The creature thrashed as it sought to dislodge him, hacking itself bloody as its claws tried to pluck him from its body. Secondary jaws punched down through his breastplate, biting a fist-sized chunk of flesh from his chest and tearing free a portion of his pectoral muscle.