[Ciaphas Cain 05] - Duty Calls

by Sandy Mitchell - (ebook by Undead)

  “So the moment they do, we fire,” I explained, keeping it as simple as I could for the civilian. “Shoot everything and anything that looks like a threat. Got it?”

  “Got it.” Zemelda looked as green as her hair, but nodded anyway.

  “Good.” Abruptly the noise stopped, and we rose together, looking for targets. Jurgen found one immediately, two women both carrying autoguns, charging towards us with the berserker fury of orks. One was dressed as a medicae orderly, the other enveloped in a sea-green smock that blurred the outline of her body, but not enough to hide the subtle wrongness of its shape, a subtlety which all but vanished as I noticed the third hand emerging from its depths to replace the depleted magazine.

  “Genestealer hybrids,” Jurgen said, recognising them instantly after our run-in with their brethren on Gravalax, opening up on full auto and catching them both in a blizzard of lasbolts. The faux medicae went down, plates of chitin armouring her thorax becoming visible as her robe tore, while the three-armed horror dived for cover again behind an abandoned car. Zemelda began blowing holes through the metal protecting it with her stubber, an expression of stunned horror on her face.

  Forewarned by a flicker of movement in the corner of my eye, I turned, just in time to take another assailant, as garishly dressed as the late fellow with the shotgun had been, squarely in the face with a bolt from my laspistol. He screeched and fell back, dropping from the roof of the sanitation truck with a wet, meaty thud, and another figure in a pair of nondescript overalls leapt at me, clawed hands poised to rend and tear. Unfortunately for him, my chainsword had a far longer reach than he did, and he expired in several pieces before he got close enough to use them.

  “What are those things?” Zemelda asked, still playing bullet tag with the hybrid behind the car, while Jurgen tried to get a clear line of sight on the one disguised as a medicae.

  “Xenos,” I said, “crossed with humans, who didn’t even know they’d been tainted with alien genes. We’ve been finding them hidden on worlds right across the sector.” I glanced up, and froze. Three purestrain ’stealers were hurtling towards us, bounding across the tangle of stalled metal with all the malignity of hunting dogs catching the scent of something small and furry. I rounded on Jurgen. “Forget the hybrids!” Dangerous as they were, they were barely worth considering compared to the real threat. I’d seen purestrains shredding Terminator armour aboard the Spawn of Damnation,[1] and I knew that if they got within arms-length of us we were all dead. [1. A space hulk Cain boarded with the Reclaimers Astartes Chapter, while serving as the Imperial Guard liaison officer to them during the Viridia campaign.]

  We concentrated our fire against the oncoming creatures, but they were hellish fast and agile, and most of our shots went wild. We managed to down the first one momentarily, but it rose again almost at once, while the others swept on past it without even breaking stride. Just to make things even worse, we came under fire again from the autogun-armed hybrids, which made us keep our heads down and prevented us from aiming properly. Looking into those slavering jaws, I had no doubt that we would all be dead in moments, and as so often happens in these situations, I found myself preternaturally sensitive to every detail of my surroundings.

  Perhaps it was that which first alerted me to the faint trembling in the rockrete beneath my bootsoles, as though something large and fast was passing below my feet. In any event I distinctly recall feeling that faint tremor of movement, but before I could remark on it to my companions I became aware that something was happening on the road ahead of us. A bright yellow flatbed in the path of the oncoming ’stealers seemed to be shifting and rising up, and for a moment I found myself suspecting warpcraft of some kind. Then as it rose even higher I caught a glimpse of something standing beneath it.

  “Emperor be praised!” Zemelda said, with every sign of sincerity, and I have to admit I could scarcely have been more surprised if he’d put in an appearance in person. The lorry was being pushed aside by something roughly human-sized, but completely encased in finely wrought metal, from which the sun struck the unmistakable refulgence of gold. Smaller than the suits worn by one of the Astartes, but power armour nevertheless, and even at this distance it had clearly been crafted by a master artificer whose skill would certainly have impressed Tobamorie.[1] [1. The armourer of the Reclaimers, who seem to have considered Cain as close to a friend as was possible for anyone outside his Chapter.]

  As we watched, scarcely daring to believe what we were seeing, the gilded warrior tipped the heavy truck over on top of the charging ’stealers, crushing two of them against the other vehicles with a scream of rending metal. After a moment, rancid ichor began to drip through the tangle of wreckage, making it obvious that neither was getting back up again in a hurry.

  “Where did he come from?” Jurgen asked, his habitual expression of mild bafflement almost comforting under the circumstances.

  “Down there would be my guess,” I said, indicating a manhole cover lying on the carriageway next to a dark hole in the rockrete. “He must have come through the undercity.” I had no time for further speculation, as the sole surviving purestrain charged at the golden warrior, and the breath caught in my throat; but the armour-clad figure evaded the creature easily, with a casual grace that looked more suited to the ballroom than the battlefield, catching one of its wickedly-taloned arms and ripping it clean out of its socket. The ’stealer screeched, and tried to rally, but the foe it was facing seemed as agile as it was. As the chitinous horror tried to charge home once again, the mysterious warrior levelled its right arm, which proved to have a heavy bolter built into it. One short burst was all it took to reduce the hideous creature to a messy stain.

  “Well, that was lucky,” I said, trying to sound casual for Zemelda’s benefit, but I needn’t have bothered. She was still so stunned by this unexpected turn of events that I doubt she’d have noticed if the Emperor Himself had tapped her on the shoulder at that point.

  “But who is he?” Jurgen asked. I shrugged.

  “I think we’re about to find out,” I said. Sure enough our mysterious saviour was walking towards us at an unhurried pace, pausing just long enough to dispatch the remaining hybrids with a couple of casual bolter bursts. They tried to make a fight of it, but it was a futile endeavour really, their bullets just pattering off the gleaming golden armour like summer rain.

  I have to admit to a prickle of apprehension as the refulgent figure approached us, allowing me to take in the full splendour of its armour for the first time. It was, as I’d immediately surmised, the work of a master, of that there could be no doubt. The elegance of its construction was all too obvious, at least to anyone who’d spent as much time as I had listening to Tobamorie rhapsodising over some tech-sorcerous toy or other. It had barely been scratched by the hybrids’ bullets, the full intricacy of its decoration undimmed and undamaged.

  It was not, as it had first appeared, made entirely of gold, (which given the softness of that particular metal wouldn’t have given much protection to its wearer anyway). Rather, the gold was etched onto a polished surface of much darker metal, forming intricate filigree, which in turn twisted around icons of the saints and well-known scenes from the life of Him on Earth. For all its beauty, though, there was no disguising its deadliness, the muzzle of the bolter on its right forearm and the faint crackle of ozone around the power fist on its left mute testament to the destructive power its wearer was able to wield.

  The figure halted a couple of metres away, and, to my astonishment, addressed me by name.

  “Hello Ciaphas,” it said, through a vox unit on its chest. The voice sounded familiar, although I couldn’t be entirely sure until a golden gauntlet rose to push back its visor. It opened, with a hiss of breaking atmosphere seals, and a well-remembered face, framed with golden hair, grinned at me, devilment dancing as always in the depthless blue eyes. “We really must stop meeting like this.”

  Clearly enjoying my stupefied expression, which by this point I�
��m bound to admit would have done credit to Jurgen, Amberley’s smile widened still further.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  With all due modesty, I have to say that I recovered remarkably fast under the circumstances.[1] I resheathed my weapons, while Jurgen slung his las-gun across his shoulder and went to look for a primary aid kit before Nyte bled to death. Fortunately the limousine seemed well equipped with more than just hidden weaponry, and he was able to begin cutting the straps holding what was left of the justicar’s body armour in place free with his combat knife after only a moment or two spent rummaging in the wreckage. Nyte was looking distinctly the worse for wear, and Jurgen cracked a vial of smelling salts under his nose, blissfully unaware of just how pointless that was in his case. [1. So he says. I recall a distinct resemblance to a stuffed fish for quite some time.]

  “Last time was more pleasant,” I admitted, having spent the bulk of it chatting about the necron threat in the palatial surroundings of her hotel suite, before the obvious question occurred to me. “What in the warp are you doing here, anyway?”

  Amberley smiled again. “The same as you, I imagine. Trying to save Periremunda from a ’stealer infestation. Although I was hoping Keesh would have had a chance to explain what’s going on before you found out about it for yourself.”

  “I’d have preferred that too,” I said feelingly, before the full implication of what she’d said got through to me. “You mean the Arbites know about this already?”

  “Of course they do. Why else do you think they insisted on the Imperial Guard being sent in to contain it? You know the PDF’s bound to be compromised.”

  I nodded slowly. I’d seen the same thing on Gravalax, and Keffia before that. “The infestation’s well established then?”

  Amberley nodded as best she could inside the collection of ironmongery surrounding her. “Worse than Gravalax, if I’m any judge. We’ve taken out the patriarch, so that ought to slow them down a bit, but another purestrain will evolve to replace it before too long, you can bet on that.” She turned a little, with a faint humming of servos, and glanced at Zemelda, who was still standing behind me with her mouth hanging open, the stubber dangling slackly from her hand. “Who’s your little friend, by the way?”

  “Zemelda Cleat,” I said, looking from one woman to the other as though we’d all just met casually in a ballroom somewhere. “An unfortunate bystander. Zemelda, this is Inquisitor Vail, an old friend of mine.”

  “Inquisitor?” Zemelda’s face paled even further, if that were possible, and she looked for a moment as if she was about to make a run for it on general principle, but commonsense reasserted itself and she remained rooted to the spot. Amberley nodded, and smiled at her, the warm friendly grin most people seemed to find reassuring.

  “Of the Ordo Xenos. So unless you’re an alien, you needn’t worry about anything I might do.”

  “I see.” The snack vendor clearly didn’t, but smiled hesitantly in turn nonetheless. “No one will ever believe me, you know, about meeting a real live inquisitor, and a commissar” She glanced at me again, and something seemed to click behind her eyes. “Oh wow, I’ve just realised, you’re that commissar. Cain: the one who liberated Perlia, and all that other stuff.” Flattering as it was to be recognised by, now that I had the leisure to appreciate the fact, quite an attractive young woman, I began to feel a little concerned. The way she was babbling looked to me like nothing so much as delayed shock, which I suppose wasn’t all that surprising under the circumstances. “That settles it they’ll definitely think I’m making it all up.”

  “I’m afraid you won’t be able to tell anyone,” Amberley said kindly, no doubt coming to the same conclusion as I had. “My presence here’s a secret, and so is the real nature of the enemy.” She raised the right arm of the power suit, and for a moment I found myself wondering if she was simply going to solve the problem with a quick burst of bolter fire, but she was merely reaching out to open the food locker on Zemelda’s somewhat battered-looking tricycle. She extricated a lump of something encased in greyish pastry with surprising dexterity given the bulk of the mechanical claws encasing her hands, then stopped, with a rueful expression. “I’m sorry, I haven’t got any change. No pockets in this thing. Ciaphas, can you lend me a couple of credits?”

  “I think so.” I rummaged in the depths of my coat for a handful of currency. Zemelda shook her head.

  “Forget it. You just saved my life. That ought to be worth a portion of glop at least.” She shrugged. “Besides, the insulation’s been punctured, so they won’t stay hot long enough to sell anyway. Just help yourselves.”

  In truth the snacks didn’t seem all that appetising to me, but Amberley had evidently had a strenuous afternoon of it (quite how much I was to discover later), and piled in with almost as much alacrity as Jurgen did once he’d realised there was free food on offer.[1] [1. Actually, I only ate two, and they weren’t that large to begin with. And I’d expended a lot of energy; cleansing a genestealer nest can really take it out of you.]

  “He’ll live,” my aide reported around a mouthful of reconstituted protein, with a final glance back at Nyte, who was looking a little happier now the bleeding was staunched and his rescuer comfortably downwind again. “Do you want me to check on the others?”

  “No point.” Amberley licked a trickle of gravy from the corner of her mouth, and consulted an auspex screen embedded in her helmet. “I’m not picking up any more life signs in the vicinity, so we might as well get moving again.”

  “Moving where?” I asked.

  Amberley glanced at the manhole cover she’d emerged from a few moments before. “Where do you think?” she asked, hoisting Nyte over her shoulder with one hand as she spoke.

  “What about the bodies?” I asked. “If the ’stealer presence is supposed to be a secret…”

  “Not a problem,” she assured me cheerfully, detaching something from a clip on the power suit and lobbing it casually away. “There’s so much spilled promethium around, it’ll incinerate all the evidence.” She took a couple of steps towards the dark hole in the carriageway, and glanced back in our direction. “I’d step it up a bit if I were you. That inferno charge only had a two minute timer.”

  Well that was enough to get me moving, you can be sure of that. Pausing only to grab Zemelda by the arm and urge her into motion, as I’d already had one jaunt through a ’stealer infested undercity with Amberley and wanted as many warm bodies between me and potential trouble as possible, I sprinted for the relative safety of the tunnels. We barely made it, shrugging the heavy metal plate into place behind us, before the ground shook over our heads and a faint pattering of dust drifted down from the ceiling to discolour my cap.

  Zemelda coughed diffidently. “Excuse me,” she said, looking rather lost in the glow from the luminators built into Amberley’s suit, “but what do we do now?”

  Well that was a pretty good question, of course, but to my complete lack of surprise Amberley was well on top of it, setting off at what looked like a leisurely pace, but which left the rest of us trotting to keep up. The tunnels were broad and high, lined with cables and ducting, which meant nothing to me, but which I assumed had something to do with the infrastructure of the city above our heads.

  The local techpriests were obviously frequent visitors, judging by the fresh wax seals set on junction boxes every dozen metres or so, and the faint lingering scent of burned incense that hovered in the air, almost obscured by the fresher ones of dust and damp. A couple of times we passed shrines to the Omnissiah, and I took fresh heart from their presence. I’ve never really understood the doctrinal aspects of the clockwork model of the Emperor the cogboys[1] worship, but if they were down here as often as those icons implied, there wouldn’t be much risk of running into a ’stealer cult. (Not that I’d really expect to this close to the surface, they tend to go to ground in the lower depths, but by now, as you’ll appreciate, I was hardly in the mood to take anything much for granted.) [1. A mildly disparaging
nickname for techpriests and enginseers common among the Imperial Guard.]

  It was at about that point I noticed another light in the distance, moving towards us, and began to draw my weapons again. Amberley didn’t seem terribly concerned, though, just glancing in my direction with a faint moue of amusement, before calling out a cheery greeting.

  “I found them,” she said.

  “Splendid.” I recognised the speaker at once, although he hung back in the middle of the group, his scribe’s robes looking even more incongruous than usual in this utilitarian environment. Even if I hadn’t spotted his face and his distinctive attire, his dry, pedantic voice would have identified him immediately, not to mention his logorrhoea. “I would have estimated your chances of an opportune arrival, given the maximum sustainable speed of that armour and a relatively unencumbered route to the surface, at approximately eighty-seven and two-thirds per cent, although my observations of the tunnel system as we followed the path you took would probably reduce that to somewhere in the order of eighty-six and a quarter…”

  “Hello Mott,” I said, and Amberley’s savant finally stopped babbling for long enough to nod a cordial greeting.

  “Commissar Cain. A pleasure to see you again.” I braced myself for another torrent of verbiage, but apparently the phrase didn’t trigger any more random associations in his peculiar augmented mind, for which I was profoundly grateful. As we drew nearer to the little knot of people, I wasn’t surprised to find another familiar face, hanging back as far as possible. Divining the reason for her reticence I nudged Jurgen back to the rear of our party too, trying to maximise the distance between them.

  “And Rakel. How are you keeping?” Mad as ever would be my guess, but Amberley’s pet psyker seemed as lucid as she ever got, simply staring at Jurgen with a degree of loathing even more profound than most people’s. But then most people wouldn’t actually pass out or go into convulsions if he got close to them.[1] [1. Cain’s not exaggerating here, Jurgen was a blank, one of those incredibly rare individuals with the innate ability to nullify any psychic or sorcerous influence in the vicinity. It was Rakel’s reaction to their initial meeting on Gravalax that first brought his gift to my attention.]