KNIGHTS OF MACRAGGE

by Nick Kyme

  The lamp flickered, revealing frozen crystals of blood stuck to his gloves. Bodies ringed the perimeter, red tears streaming down their faces. The light died before he could find the way out. He crawled forwards on his hands and knees, desperate to distance himself from the dead as if their mortality were contagious.

  ‘I have seen…’ said the voice, and the sharp clicking of metal followed it as Barthus lowered himself down behind Ludik, who cowered on his knees, his hands contorted into claws and clutching at his fatigues.

  ‘Please…’ murmured Ludik, breath ghosting like thin wisps of smoke from a dying fire.

  ‘You must see…’

  Ludik felt the Navigator’s breath on the back of his neck, and the undeniable sense of his arachnoid form arched over him.

  He begged. ‘I don’t want to. Please…’

  ‘It is coming. You must see…’

  Ludik’s eyes burned from the cold, from his partially frozen tears. He couldn’t close them even if he wanted to.

  ‘No…’

  ‘From within…’

  Ludik felt the bite of the Navigator’s golden nails in his flesh. Barthus was strong, far stronger than him. He wanted to fight, but the terror had him, vice-like and unyielding.

  ‘Please…’

  ‘It is here,’ hissed Barthus as the lamp flared brightly, revealing the ice panes surrounding the entire chamber, a many-faceted and mirrored labyrinth of frozen crystal.

  Ludik saw his own horror reflected back at him. He saw the hunched Navigator looming over him. He saw thin lips parting to deliver their judgement.

  ‘It is here…’ Barthus repeated, ‘the hell we bring with us.’

  Ludik saw the eye… and screamed.

  Reda stopped, eyes clamped shut but willing herself to go on.

  ‘That was Ludik,’ rasped Gerrant. He had his weapon up, casting its aim in every direction, searching for their terrifying quarry. The lamp pack was shaking.

  ‘We can’t kill him, Vanko.’

  ‘Then how do you suggest we proceed? That was bloody Ludik. A death scream. You know it, I know it. The Navigator has murdered every poor bastard who’s been sent in here to fetch him.’

  Reda was thinking. Kraef might be as good as dead, but he was not a foolish man. He would have taken precautions, even if those measures had proven to not be enough.

  ‘A visor,’ she said, opening her eyes.

  Gerrant frowned, still swinging his autocarbine around like a club.

  ‘A blind, a shackle. For the eye. No chance that Kraef goes in here without one.’

  ‘I didn’t see anything like that when we found him,’ said Gerrant.

  Reda had searched him, cursorily but enough to know the colonel wasn’t carrying any specialist equipment.

  ‘So he must have dropped it.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Wherever that scream just came from.’

  ‘Throne…’ Gerrant was about to shake his head, but what other choice did they have? ‘And if you’re wrong?’

  Reda didn’t answer. She gave him a look, then reached out to gently touch his face. Gerrant’s fear and anger abated, and he was about to touch her hand when the moment passed and she withdrew.

  She turned her back on Gerrant to face the direction where she thought Ludik’s scream had come from. ‘When Barthus ran, he went to his refuge. That’s where he is. That’s where Ludik is. And the others.’

  ‘And you want to walk in there?’

  Reda tore a strip of cloth from her uniform, fashioning it into a blindfold.

  ‘You’re going to be my eyes, Vanko,’ she said.

  ‘He has claws too, you know,’ she heard Gerrant say.

  ‘I don’t think he wants to kill us.’

  ‘Really?’ Gerrant sounded incredulous. ‘And what gave you that idea?’

  ‘He could have done it before when we found the colonel. Instead, he ran. He’s afraid. I think he wants to show us something.’

  ‘Yes, death from whatever warp terror drove him mad.’

  ‘It’s not that. He said, “you must see”. See what? It’s a warning. He’s seen something, a portent from the warp.’

  ‘How can you know that’s true?’

  Reda took off her helmet then tied the blindfold around her head like a bandana. Standing before her was a man in an old Militarum uniform, his face hidden by the darkness.

  ‘It’s just a feeling,’ she said.

  SPOILS

  The mob gathered in the ration yard replied with fearful shouts and curses, though the volume lessened.

  ‘I said, who speaks for you?’ Scipio asked again, louder. His hands were still by his sides but he looked far from submissive.

  The mob quietened, reduced to scattered murmurings. The noises of the ship became more prevalent. Footsteps could be heard, shuffling through the crowd.

  Scipio waited.

  A man emerged, a labour master judging by the metal rank stamp stapled into the flesh of his cheek. He had burn scarring on his face and blackened fingers from years working the plasma vents. Broad shoulders framed a short, stocky body. What little hair he still possessed was grey like ash, the stubble around his jaw a black gauze.

  ‘I speak,’ he declared in a strong, clear voice. His blue eyes were bright with intelligence, and Scipio wondered how such a man could have ended up in the bowels of a starship performing such a miserable task.

  ‘You lead this rebellion?’ asked Scipio as he and the man came face-to-face.

  ‘I am not afraid to die, Space Marine,’ he said. ‘Slay me and another will just take my place. You can’t kill all of us.’

  Scipio touched the winged skull icon upon his chest. ‘This sigil means I am a servant of mankind. I do not kill loyal Imperial citizens. My oaths given as an Ultramarine prevent it, as does my honour.’

  The man made the sign of the aquila, though his hands trembled as he did so. Scipio knew he must be terrified. Whatever bravura he had managed to muster at first was already spent.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘S-sire?’

  ‘Your name. I am Vorolanus.’

  ‘Oben, sire.’

  ‘And that is the name of your house, your tribe?’

  ‘I have none. I am void-born, and have no house, no tribe.’

  ‘You have Ultramar, you have Macragge. That is your tribe.’ He tapped his chest. ‘My tribe. Do you see, Oben of Ultramar?’

  The man nodded.

  Scipio’s eyes narrowed. He gestured to the hanging corpses. ‘Did you kill these men?’

  ‘Some, yes we did.’

  ‘And the silos… you set them on fire?’

  The labour master nodded.

  ‘You burned your rations and you killed your masters. How am I to judge this, Oben?’

  ‘We cannot eat it. We told them, but they would not listen. It is filth, sire.’

  Someone stirred in the rear ranks of the mob, hidden by the shadows and the masses.

  Scipio assumed it was more nervous shuffling. ‘It is all the ship can provide. In this you serve the Emperor.’

  A few muttered the words Ave Imperator at that remark.

  ‘Aye,’ Oben replied, ‘and yet we will not eat it.’

  ‘By Guilliman’s mercy, why not?’

  Iulus’ voice came through the private vox. ‘Scipio…’

  Something was happening farther back in the crowd, a ripple of movement coming towards him.

  ‘They would be fools to try anything,’ he murmured back to Iulus.

  ‘It is unfit,’ declared Oben, seemingly unaware of the other conversation happening at the same time.

  Scipio was only half-listening now, part of his attention on the mob.

  ‘They are certainly desperate enough to be foolish,’ Iulus replied.

  The shouting returned, a few voices in isolation at first but growing as fear took a firmer hold.

  ‘We cannot let this turn to bloodshed, brother,’ said Scipio.

  ‘Those w
ho ate the rations grew sick and then the sickness spread,’ Oben continued, finding his courage again. ‘There was panic and the overseers thought to quell it with lash and cudgel. Some died, torn apart by those who had sickened. Others climbed to the rafters above and tied belts around their necks.’

  The crowd parted to admit a metal ration drum, hauled by a pair of burly deckhands. It was upended, the contents poured in front of Scipio. It looked like grain. He didn’t see anything untoward at first. Iulus was speaking into his ear.

  ‘Something is wrong, brother. Movement in the crowd…’

  Scipio saw the grain as if for the first time. It churned of its own volition, turning black before his eyes and suddenly alive with contagion. Plump maggots writhed in the mass. A dark spot blossomed on the head of one… then opened to reveal the sclera of a human eye. Scipio reached for an empty holster, his hatred for this thing white-hot and blazing. A slit ran down its obscenely ribbed body, splitting into an inhuman maw caged with newborn saliva. It squealed.

  ‘Guilliman’s blood…’ uttered Scipio, and crushed the filth under his boot, where it died shrieking.

  Oben recoiled, falling back into the other deckhands who had begun to turn at an unseen commotion behind them. Iulus shouted across the vox, and Scipio heard him vault the shield wall at the same time.

  ‘Prabian was right. There were too many. The cultists, some of them came from within.’

  The smoke had grown thick and the darkness heavy but Scipio saw the danger at last. Parts of the crowd had donned crude masks and daubed their ragged smocks in the sigils of Ruin. They had knives, sharp tools, and began killing. In the same moment, an explosion tore through the ration yard.

  BLIND

  They reached the octagonal room, and found Ludik kneeling in the centre. Reda couldn’t see the sergeant’s face because it was dark and he had his back to her. The gauzy light of the lamp pack picked out his hair, the bloody state of his uniform. It found the other armsmen too. She kept her gaze low and on the floor. There were no bullet casings, no burns from las-discharge. A squad of dead troopers lay in the octagonal room, but not a shot had been fired. She found no sign of Barthus either, and listened intently for the distinct clicking sound that signalled his presence, but all she could hear was her own breathing and that of Gerrant.

  ‘Is he here?’ Gerrant pressed his back against the wall, standing at the edge of the chamber. He looked down at Reda, who was crouching next to him in the open.

  ‘Ludik, yes. Barthus…’

  ‘I can’t hear him.’

  ‘Me neither.’ Unhooking her power maul, she handed it grip first to Gerrant.

  ‘That’s the plan?’

  ‘Keep the charge low,’ she warned. ‘Too much and you’ll kill him.’

  Gerrant shook his head. ‘I can’t let you do this, Arna. I’ll bait him out.’

  ‘You’re barely holding it together, Vanko,’ she hissed. ‘You won’t make it two feet beyond the door.’ She held his gaze, daring him to argue. He didn’t. ‘Low charge,’ she reiterated. Gerrant took the maul.

  Reda pulled the bandana over her eyes and made a tight knot behind her head. Her last glimpse was of a metallic visor, a beam of light shining across it like a sickle moon. ‘It’s here,’ she whispered. ‘The visor. We get that thing on Barthus and only a damn tech-priest is getting it off.’

  She stepped into the room. She’d left her shotgun behind. No sense in tempting fate. After her first few shuffling and uncertain steps, the vox gently hissed to life.

  ‘Edge left, half a step,’ came Gerrant’s voice. ‘I can’t see.’

  Reda obeyed, hearing ice crunch underfoot. Effectively blinded, every other sense was heightened. The cold, the scent of blood particles merging with the frost. The rustle of fabric as she moved and the slow, deliberate breaths she took to remain calm and focused. She heard no rap of metal against metal, the telltale chime of Barthus’ manic finger drumming.

  ‘That’s better,’ whispered Gerrant, his breath sawing back and forth across the receiver. ‘I have eyes on. Ten paces straight ahead.’

  ‘Keep that beam low and on the ground,’ Reda warned as she started to advance, counting out the steps in her head.

  ‘Aye, lieu–’

  The sudden pause made Reda stop.

  ‘I caught movement! Above…’

  ‘Light on the ground, Vanko! Do not bloody well defy your ranking officer.’

  ‘He’s in there with you, Arna. Oh shit, he’s really in there.’

  Now she heard the clicking, faint at first and coming from overhead.

  ‘How close, Vanko?’ She moved slowly, but had lost count.

  ‘Throne, Arna. He’s right above you.’

  ‘Gerrant.’ She gritted her teeth, trying not to surrender to the fear, her mind on the mission. ‘How close?’

  ‘Six more, no… sorry, eight, eight more paces. He’s following you, Arna.’

  ‘I told you light down, trooper.’

  ‘It’s down, damn it. I can see his shadow.’

  Reda counted the steps, trying to ignore the clicking overhead, and stopped when she touched something heavy with the tip of her boot. She was leaning down to grasp it when she heard the buzz of the overhead sodium lamp and guessed what had happened to Elam and the others.

  ‘Shoot it!’ she cried, sinking to her haunches and gathering up the visor as Barthus dropped down with arachnoid grace and enveloped her. ‘Strafe the light!’

  Light intruded against her blindfold, tingeing the black a muggy yellow.

  She heard the discharge of Gerrant’s autocarbine a second later, before being struck by pieces of falling glass. Barthus shielded her from the worst of it, and she heard the Navigator hiss in pain as the shards cut through his robes and into his flesh. Reda tried to raise the visor but her wrist was pinned, seized in a manacle of golden fingers.

  ‘Navigator…’ she gasped, the pain of his grip forcing her breath to catch.

  ‘You must see…’ said Barthus. ‘The eye will see…’

  Reda felt a hooked nail slip beneath her blindfold and recoiled. The ragged strip of cloth tore away and she clamped her eyes shut, but could feel the urge to open them and Barthus willing her to.

  ‘You must see… All must see… It is coming.’ He sounded more afraid than insane.

  Reda lashed out with her free hand and felt her fist strike the Navigator’s jaw. She roared, ‘Gerrant. Now!’

  The pressure on her wrist released, though she already felt the pain of an angry weal encircling it in a bracelet of red-raw skin. She heard hurried footsteps, and the sudden electric charge as the maul engaged.

  She opened her eyes and saw Gerrant, his lamp pack swinging wildly as he ran, the cold glow of the maul as it cut through the air. Barthus had his back to her and was facing Gerrant, who stared into the abyss as he laid his blow.

  ‘Vanko!’

  Barthus fell back, his flailing, unconscious body blocking Reda’s view. As the Navigator collapsed, Gerrant was revealed standing stock-still, the faintly crackling maul held loosely in his grip.

  ‘Throne, Vanko…’ Reda rasped, tears already blurring her eyes.

  And then Gerrant blinked and aimed his lamp pack at the prone Navigator. He was breathing hard and dropped the maul, which plinked out as it hit the ground and quickly rolled to a stop.

  ‘How?’ asked Reda.

  ‘I didn’t see it,’ was all Gerrant could say.

  Reda looked down at Barthus and realised why. The Navigator’s face had been badly cut. His eyes were shut, his hair plastered over his face with blood. Taking no chances, she pushed the visor onto Barthus’ forehead, where it snapped shut like a trap.

  Then she sank to her knees, and breathed again.

  ‘What did he mean?’ asked Gerrant.

  Reda arched her head back and let out a long breath.

  It is coming. The words echoed in her head. It is coming.

  BLOOD AND BONE

  Pillium regarded
the human soldiers closing in around the Munitorum officer with disdain. Their tattered uniforms did them no service, nor did the way they held on to their rifles with such grim determination. Each of them, three men and a woman, carried a riot shield on their back and laboured with the weight of it. Pillium had studied hundreds of weapons. The stub-nosed autorifles would sit in the crooks of their shields as soon as they were planted, surrounding the quartermaster, with her the reptile hiding ineffectually behind their shell. They were brave enough souls, he supposed, but utterly superfluous in the current situation. He had considered this escort duty Helicos had assigned might be a punishment for humbling the veteran in the arena, but it scarcely chafed if it was. He had grown increasingly restive, knowing he was made for war and not knowing when he would next be able to fulfil his purpose.

  He burned to prove his worth and demonstrate the superiority of the Primaris Marines. They had been gene-forged for the darker and more perilous galaxy in which mankind found itself. Pillium had expected glory aplenty from the primarch’s crusade, yet instead he had been consigned to the fringes, lost in the warp and impotent to do anything about it. The distraction, then, of a missing platoon, quarantined on a sealed deck, was welcome if not particularly invigorating. It became more enticing when the resounding echo of the door shutting subsided and Pillium’s heightened senses detected a different sound.

  He had already advanced into the main entryway, bolt rifle in the crook of his armpit, steadied with one gauntleted hand on the grip and the other on the stock.

  ‘Stay behind Secutius,’ he said, gesturing to the other sergeant then nodding for the rest of his squad to move up. He spared no further thought for the quartermaster and her ‘shield-bearers’. His attention focused on the faint cracking sound he could hear coming from further in. It could be stanchions settling, or even a drum-fire if the platoon had got cold in the abandoned halls. The deck section they had moved into was long and wide after the entryway, and he knew from the schematics he had studied that it ran far enough for sound to carry. As open and relatively uninhabited as it was, this would confuse matters where noise and distance were concerned.