[Battlefleet Gothic 02] - Shadow Point

by Gordon Rennie - (ebook by Undead)

  “Contact! Another capital-class vessel incoming on the same approach vector as the Drachenfels. It’s following on right behind it.”

  “Identify immediately!”

  The seconds seemed to stretch out forever before Semper got his answer.

  “Another Imperium registry code, wait, it’s the same one… energy signatures match too! Golden Throne, according to the readings, the second ship is also the Drachenfels!”

  Aboard the dark eldar cruiser, all was silent as they awaited the order to fire. Suddenly, there was a commotion amongst the crew manning the ship’s sensor systems. Their captain’s threatening hiss of displeasure was abruptly cut off by a warning shout from one of his crew.

  “Mon-keigh vessel detected, directly astern. It’s powering up weapons and locking onto us with targeting scanners!”

  The dark eldar captain hissed in fury. His plan had been a good one, but he had been out-thought and out-captained by a mere mon-keigh animal. His humiliation would be great indeed, if he ever survived to return in disgrace to Commorragh.

  Erwin Ramas smiled as his mind-link to his ship’s systems confirmed that targeting systems had locked onto the alien craft. It had been a difficult chase, and only luck and skilful navigation had allowed him and his vessel to follow the alien ship and remain undetected on its tail for so long. The enemy vessel was a hunter, all its senses focussed on the prey ahead of it, little suspecting that it itself was also being hunted.

  Yes, it had been a difficult chase, but now the chase was over.

  “Fire,” Ramas commanded.

  A full quartet of torpedoes rumbled out of their prow silos and roared away towards their target. Caught by surprise, with its attacker appearing at such close quarters, the dark eldar vessel did what it could to evade the attack, turning rapidly to port and putting on a sudden burst of speed to escape the reach of the torpedoes. Had it been shadow-cloaked in the usual manner of a dark eldar vessel, its manoeuvre might have succeeded, but there had been no time to disengage its mimic engines, and it was still broadcasting the energy signature of a larger and more powerful human cruiser vessel, giving the crude machine-minds of the torpedo warheads a clear target to lock onto.

  One of the torpedoes went astray, while another struck the target astern, inflicting serious damage on the dark eldar cruiser’s engine systems. The remaining two torpedoes missed their target, but, armed with proximity fuses, the warheads detonated close enough to the target to cause widespread minor damage to the ship’s thinly-armoured hull, and to violently buffet the cruiser vessel from prow to stern.

  The damage was not crippling, but it was more than enough to achieve the intended purpose. The cruiser’s mimic engines imploded, unmasking its true shape to those watching on the viewing screens on the bridges of both the Macharius and the Vual’en Sho.

  Human and eldar eyes alike saw the same thing, as the image of the first detected vessel claiming to be the Drachenfels suddenly wavered and flickered weirdly in and out of existence in the direct aftermath of the torpedo hits. For a brief second, those watching thought they saw the images of ships of many different classes and races appear in rapid, bewildering succession, but then the cascade of false images was abruptly gone, and all that remained was the image of another different kind of vessel entirely.

  To human eyes, it looked like something more akin to an engine-powered blade than a space vessel. Its lines were sharp and cruel, its silhouette vicious and dagger-like. It had little exterior hull detail, and the black, non-reflective material of its hull seemed to suck in the available light from the starfield around it, so that its shape blended into the blackness of space.

  An assassin’s blade, that was what it looked like: sinister and concealed, fast and lethal.

  Aboard the Vual’en Sho, Lileathon and her crew looked at the newly-revealed vessel in dread, instantly knowing it for what it truly was.

  “Druchii cruiser!” spat Ailill, his tone full of utter loathing. Lileathon looked at the image on the screen, suddenly realising the full implications of the discovery of the dark eldar presence in the Stabia system, suddenly realising the game their enemies had been playing against her and the humans, and realising the terrible mistake she had come so close to making. Anger welled up within her, but was quickly subdued again. Instead of any personal anger, all that remained in her was the cold, calm fury and hatred and loathing all those of her race bore towards their once-kin.

  “Signal the attack squadrons. They have a new target. Mael dannan: No mercy to the druchii abomination.”

  “Goon to have you with us again, Drachenfels. You had us worried there for a moment.”

  Erwin Ramas’s rasping, electronically-created laugh sounded over the comm-net of the Macharius’s bridge.

  “The Emperor’s favour was with us, Leoten. We caught a glimpse of that damned thing on our surveyors, after it goaded us and one of the alien ships into attacking each other. We pursued it, and since then we’ve been chasing ghosts and shadows all over this damned hole of a star system. After we finally found it again and got on its tail, we couldn’t break comm-net silence and risk letting them know we were there.”

  “Understood, Drachenfels,” smiled Semper. “Do your gunnery crews require any help finishing the target, or do you think you can handle this one without our help?”

  “Let the damn xenos-kind kill each other, Leoten,” snarled Ramas in reply. “I’ve found better targets for our gunners to practise on.”

  In his strategium, Ramas directed his bridge crew to send their gathered surveyor findings through to the other Imperial Navy ship. Moments later, its contents sifted through by the living machine-mind that inhabited the Macharius’s logic engines, the data was fed through to the bridge crew and, instantly, three new target icons appeared on the surveyor screens.

  Ramas chuckled to himself, and the sound carried over the comm-net, even as the startled cries of “Contact!” rang out through the Macharius’s command deck.

  “Yes, Leoten, there are still more surprises. Three of the Despoiler’s fleet, one Carnage and two escorts. The cruiser and one of the escorts have been clipped once or twice already, so it would appear that von Blucher gave a good account for himself. They were sneaking round your flanks, hiding amongst all this damned pulsar interference, when we crossed their path and picked up traces of their energy wake.”

  “They’re working with the other alien vessel?” asked Semper.

  “You have another explanation for their presence here?” answered Ramas.

  Semper did not. He turned to the communications section. “Relay the information we’ve just received to the eldar vessel. Tell them that their enemies and our enemies are the same. Our enemies have united against us, so let us do the same.”

  He turned to Nyder, but the Macharius’s Master of Ordnance had already anticipated his captain’s next question. “All attack craft squadrons are mobilised and ready. The eldar squadrons are already closing in on the other alien target vessel. We follow them in?”

  Semper smiled. “We do indeed, Mister Nyder. We’ll let the alien bomber pilots have their fun, and then we’ll have our pilots show them how a precision bombing run should really be done.”

  Like avenging harpies, the formations of eldar Eagle bombers fell upon the dark eldar cruiser. All their race’s hatred and loathing of their fallen kin came to the fore as the bomber pilots and their crews attacked the fleeing cruiser with unsurpassed fury. Heedless of the fire from the cruiser’s own defences, they flew in recklessly close, not releasing their payload until they were sure of striking the target at some vulnerable point, not peeling away from the curtain of fire thrown out by the dark eldar vessel’s defence turrets until they were satisfied that their missiles had caused sufficient damage to the enemy ship. Of the Eagles that had left the Vual’en Sho, only three quarters would return to their wraith-bone cradles within the cruiser’s launch bays.

  The dark eldar ship staggered under the fusillade of missiles.
It threw out a protective shadow-field to conceal itself from the enemy craft, confusing pilot’s senses and targeting scanners, but these were not human eyes and human targeting scanners they faced now, and the eldar pilots and the infinity circuit systems of their craft easily saw through such evasions. Sonic warhead missiles, designed to impact against the far denser armour and hull structure of ork and human ships, pierced the body of the dark eldar craft with ease, exploding deep within it and wreaking bloody havoc amongst the ship’s shadow-haunted decks and galleries.

  The crews of the eldar attack craft were well aware that this vessel was probably responsible for the loss of Medhbh’s Shield and possibly also at least one of the missing human vessels too. The slave pens in its dismal holds were most likely crammed with captured prisoners—fodder for the druchii’s abominable appetite for cruelty and pain—and it was also likely that there were eldar amongst those prisoners. Such awful knowledge did not deter any of the bomber crews as they brought their craft in close-range attack against the dark eldar ship, and more than one pilot or bombardier mind-spoke the words of prayers of solace to themselves as they launched their deadly payload at the target, knowing that the death they were now condemning the captured slave-fodder to was a far cleaner and quicker one than whatever fate otherwise awaited them in the druchii’s secret citadel base.

  By the time the last of the eldar bombers peeled away from the target, they left behind them a vessel transformed in minutes into a shattered, broken ruin. The ship’s hull was pierced in dozens of places. Fires raged out of control on many of its decks, while others had been blasted completely open and exposed to the hard vacuum of space, sweeping them instantly clean of all life. Panicked by the explosions which had wracked the ship from end to end, and hunger-maddened by the pain-filled psychic screams broadcast from the minds of the dead and injured, the warp beasts and haemonculi-created monstrosities imprisoned in their lightless kennels in the hold decks broke free of their restraints and went on the rampage, killing dark eldar and terrified prisoners alike. For those slaves who had survived the initial bomber attack, the interior of the crippled ship must have seemed like hell itself. Some decks were an inferno of flame, others were gripped by the stellar chill of open space, while the mindless abominations from the ship’s darkest depths wandered freely through its chambers and passages, killing everything which crossed their path in the most brutal and terrible ways imaginable.

  Fortunately for any innocents still alive within the dying craft, this particular vision of hell would prove to be mercifully brief.

  As the eldar attack wave peeled away, the slower-moving Starhawks from the Macharius followed in their wake. What the eldar had begun, the pilots of the Imperial Navy craft would complete. Waves of plasma warhead missiles smashed into the dark eldar cruiser’s fatally-weakened body. Entire sections of the ship were vaporised: the prow section blew apart, struck by ten or more missiles. The vessel’s dark matter reactor was breached, releasing the pent-up fury of the ship’s nameless power source in an all-consuming blast of destructive energy. The rear portion of the ship was disintegrated, disappearing in a lightless explosive flash which seared itself into the surveyor screens of the Imperial craft, appearing as a brief and miniature black hole which hungrily sucked in every available piece of matter in the vicinity, including three luckless Starhawk craft trailing in the rearguard of Firedrake squadron’s formation.

  The dark eldar ship’s commander need have no fear now of the prospect of the cruel wrath of his kabal lord when he returned in failure and humiliation to Commorragh, for there was literally nothing left to show that he and his vessel had ever even existed.

  The carnage-class cruiser Despicable and its two escorts had expected to take their targets by surprise, coming in with their energy patterns subdued and following the surveyor-confounding pulsar lines already mapped out by their temporary allies. They had expected to find an enemy force divided and possibly even warring amongst themselves, an enemy thrown into doubt and confusion by the subterfuge tactics of the dark eldar.

  What they found instead were three cruiser-class vessels, including two powerful Imperial ships of the line, already alerted to their presence and bearing down upon them fast and hard.

  The Vual’en Sho darted ahead of the slower Imperial ships, drawing the enemy fire upon itself. Lance shots from the Despicable and torpedo shots from its escorts reached out into space in search of the eldar ship, but its speed, manoeuvrability and baffling cloaks of holofields eluded the enemy’s best efforts. Then, suddenly turning and effortlessly slipping past a brace of torpedoes from the escorts, it quickly closed to within firing range and opened fire with its pulsar lance. One of the escorts, already damaged from the early battle against the Graf Orlok, took the full brunt of the stream of tightly-focussed laser energy, and exploded apart. The Vual’en Sho attempted to slip away again, but the manoeuvre brought it within reach of the Despicable’s rows of powerful flank batteries.

  Even with its holofields fully deployed, the eldar ship could not evade the full effects of the punishing curtain of fire projected from the Chaos cruiser’s weapons batteries. The delicate crystalline membranes of its topsails were partially shredded by the impacts of half a dozen macro-cannon rounds and a bleeding, ragged gash opened up along the length of its portside hull by the slashing beams of batteries of laser cannons, the Vual’en Sho retreated out of range of the Chaos guns again, its holofields projecting a rearward display of confusing multiple false images to cloak the escape manoeuvre. Lileathon knew that many long and painful months awaited her ship in its berth on An-Iolsus, as the Bonesingers and Fabricators repaired the damage done to the living psycho-plastic material of the Vual’en Sho’s structure.

  The gambit had paid off, however. By seizing the Chaos gunners’ attentions, the Vual’en Sho’s risky manoeuvre had permitted the two Imperial ships to close to within firing range of the Chaos force.

  Dual torpedo salvoes from the Macharius and the Drachenfels hammered into the Despicable, registering several successful hits upon it. One struck the base of its command tower, bursting through the thick armour there and sending columns of fire roaring up through the interior of the tower. Another detonated amongst the galleries of gun batteries on the cruiser’s forward portside, knocking out of action the weapon emplacements located there.

  Moving in closer, and coming under fire from the Despicable’s prow batteries, the Macharius opened up with its own portside batteries, goring the Chaos cruiser’s void shield defences. The Despicable’s remaining Infidel-class escort darted in towards the Imperial cruiser, launching torpedoes at its vulnerable underbelly and engine sections. A patrolling swarm of Fury interceptors, launched for just such a task, moved in quietly to intercept the ordnance weapons, subjecting them to a bombarding hail of lascannon and missile fire and detonating them harmlessly in space before they could reach their target. Any further annoyance value the Chaos escort ship might have had was brought to a swift end when the Drachenfels turned its starboard side lance turrets upon it. Eviscerated by the sweeping lance beams, the craft was quickly reduced to a blazing and lifeless wreck.

  Outgunned, outnumbered, stripped of his escorts and with the fighting capability of his ship dangerously reduced, the master of the Despicable chose to withdraw, trusting to his vessel’s superior speed to carry him away from the Imperial vessels, judging also that the faster but lightly armoured eldar vessel would be unlikely to give pursuit on its own. Disengaging, he turned away, presenting his undamaged starboard side toward the Imperial ships and allowing the gun batteries there to bring their sights to bear on the enemy cruisers. The Drachenfels took the full brunt of the fire from the Chaos cruiser’s formidable array of weapons batteries. Its void shields vanished in moments, and Erwin Ramas barked in pain and anger as he felt the enemy gunfire punch through his vessel’s armoured skin, several particularly wounding hits penetrating deep into his vessel’s body to damage its most vital systems. Every surveyor screen
on the bridge and gunnery bay command posts went temporarily blank as one salvo of plasma missiles smashed into the ship’s surveyor system, knocking them out of action, while a stream of laser fire also crippled the ship’s void shield generators. Blinded, and robbed of its shield protection, the Drachenfels would be of little use for the time being in any further engagements.

  Staying close by to protect its damaged sister ship, the Macharius had little choice but to allow the Despicable the prize of its fortunate escape, although Semper ensured that a brace of launched torpedoes would further speed the Chaos vessel on its way, and give the enemy’s defence turret crews something to occupy themselves with.

  Standing on the bridge of his ship, still flushed with the unnerving euphoria of battle, Semper at first did not hear the report from his communications officer.

  “Incoming ship-to-ship communications signal, sir,” the man repeated again, finally catching his captain’s attention.

  “From the Drachenfels?” asked Semper.

  The officer paused before answering. “No, sir. From the alien ship. They’re hailing you by name.”

  At Semper’s signal, the communication from the Vual’en Sho was put onto an open comm-net channel.

  “Craftmaster Semper, I/we are Lileathon, second-born of the union of Faryiarda and Morgyell, who is also now known to you as craftmistress of this vessel which we term Vual’en Sho.”

  The eldar’s voice was strange and eerie, her phrasing of the Gothic tongue of the Imperium stilted and awkward. Semper and those listening could not know it, but Lileathon did not speak one word of the language, and was speaking the words as they were psychically communicated to her by the Thought Talkers who had some fluency in Gothic.

  “This is Semper, Vual’en Sho. Go ahead.”

  Again, the strange alien voice sounded over the command deck comm-net. “You fight well, human. I/we thank you for the aid you have given, and I/we regret what nearly came to pass between our two ships. But we still have comrades trapped on the world below, Semper-human, both your people and those craft-brethren precious also to us.”