by Nick Kyme
Obek frowned. ‘And yet you didn’t. I admit, I thought he was dead. I saw him destroyed.’
‘A version only. He has many, to widen his reach and confuse his foes, but close by there will be a prime, his primogenitor vessel. The other renegades will take us to it. Our long-range augurs have been monitoring the planet and detected a ship inbound. The Regulus-prime will be aboard that ship.’
‘If each incarnation is a version of this adept then why not simply take the one at the Wrought? Or send forces to capture it now?’
‘It must be the prime. A facsimile can be abandoned, but if we have the prime there will be nowhere for Regulus to escape to.’
‘And if there is more than one prime, have you considered that?’
‘There is one, and one alone.’
‘This is reckless, Ulok.’
‘No, it is logical. It is the only action that makes any sense.’
Obek considered it, wondering if he truly had a choice. Ulok made trusting him very difficult, but Obek could not in good conscience simply deny his request.
‘What is it you ask of us?’
Ulok’s eye narrowed. ‘Your fury, and will to fight until the bitter end, captain. I plan to attack the renegade vessel but need a second force to infiltrate its heart as a larger major assault is taking place.’
‘I have my own mission.’
‘To escort your relics,’ Ulok nodded. ‘The armoury is no longer viable. It has been denuded of worth, a cache I fully intend to share with its rightful Legion, but my warhost also has need of it. Where will you take your relics now?’
Obek had to concede that was a salient question, the salient question.
‘There are other Salamanders strongholds, like Geryon Deep, other places the relics can be kept safe.’
‘And are these strongholds nearby? Can you reach them alone in your ship?’ asked Ulok, opening his hands in an expressive gesture. ‘Or would an outrider, a warship with a heavy garrison aboard, enhance your chances of reaching your safehold? I can offer you that.’
‘And compromise your proposed attack on Horus. Geryon Deep is far from Terra.’
‘Join us, Obek. Become a part of the Shattered Legions. You are alone in the void and in need of allies. Join with me, fight for us, and your concerns shall become my concerns and together we will see them done. None could be greater than removing the head of the serpent himself.’ He held out his bionic hand. ‘Join us. At least in the attack on the renegades. Take your vengeance for all you have suffered at their hands, and I shall see your sacred mission fulfilled and the relics you carry escorted to their rightful place. This oath I swear to you.’
A brief silence fell between them as Obek considered his decision. Ulok seemed part logistician, part zealot. It made him unpredictable. His plan to kill Horus was insane. No assassins could get close, no Throne-allied Legion fleet would even dare. Obek could think of only one primarch volatile enough and still allied to the Throne who would be willing to do it, and he was dead. To attempt such a thing, even with the supposed knowledge that Regulus possessed, was suicide, but then he suspected Ulok and his Shattered Legion brothers had embraced and accepted that fatalistic notion long ago.
But Obek did want vengeance and his oath-bound duty was to kill the enemies of the Imperium, and there were none greater than Horus’ own Legion.
He firmly clasped the Iron Father’s arm in the warrior’s grip. Ulok reciprocated and the bond was made.
‘We’ll help you take the ship and capture the adept. Then I shall hold you to your word about escorting us. I will not agree to the attack on Horus. I cannot. I am still Eighteenth Legion and after my mission is done I plan to return to Nocturne and Prometheus. We can agree on what you need from the Wrought later.’
Ulok nodded agreement. His grip was firm, unyielding, and as he released Obek again, his lips parted in a thin smile.
‘Your wounded.’
Obek started, about to pull away, but Ulok held firm for a moment longer.
‘I will have a servo-skull direct you to the apothecarion,’ said Ulok. ‘You still wish to see them, I take it? I won’t deny you.’
Ulok released him, and Obek nodded.
He thought of T’kell and of the mission, his brothers aboard the Chalice of Fire. Refusing Ulok’s request had felt unwise. Honour bound him to the Shattered Legions now, regardless of where it might lead.
‘Yes,’ he said, and sensed his grip loosening on his own fate and those of his brothers.
Since their meeting in the workshop, Obek had not seen Ahrem Gallikus again. In fact, as he followed a servo-skull to the apothecarion, he did not see another Medusan Immortal or any Iron Hands legionary at all. Regardless, he felt eyes upon him and not from the mechanised drone.
Morikan.
He wants me to know he sees me, thought Obek, but his mind swiftly wandered to Gallikus’ cryptic behaviour.
No rest. None at all.
Obek could not discern its meaning and the Medusan had not elaborated further as he affixed the bionic the Salamanders captain now wore in place of his severed arm.
He reached the apothecarion, the servo-skull hovering noisily above the entrance, and he consigned his thoughts on the matter to later consideration. The apothecarion door slid open with a faint hiss of pressure. Several Drakes awaited him. Not all were alive.
One of the living Drakes stood before him now, his white armour bearing a single shoulder guard but unmistakably draconic in aspect.
‘You are Saurian.’
The apothecary gave the slightest incline of his head.
‘Brother-captain. It is my honour,’ he said. ‘It has been a long time since I met another of my Legion, before…’ he gestured sadly to the fallen Salamanders.
Fai’sho lay beneath a veil, his blood staining the gossamer-like material. He had been stripped of his armour, as had all of the Salamanders legionaries. He was not the only fatality, either. Obek murmured oaths for them all. The rest were unconscious, deep in suspended animation comas and would not soon be roused, but it appeared they would live.
T’kell’s fate was much more uncertain and Obek came to his side last of all.
‘Forgefather…’ he murmured, his gauntleted fingers poised above the wound in the Techmarine’s skull. Now he saw it, Obek realised what T’kell had done, what he had to do. ‘You were purging the infection, ridding yourself of the adept’s influence.’ He gently closed his hand and withdrew it. ‘At such cost…’
Saurian spoke up, intruding on Obek’s reverie.
‘After Isstvan, I had begun to lose hope that I would ever see my Legion again.’
‘None?’ asked Obek, fighting down the pang of regret at the mention of the Dropsite Massacre. ‘Not amongst your Shattered Legions?’
‘We were scattered after the attack. I fled aboard the Obstinate, some of my brothers also, but none survived,’ he said, his mood darkening. ‘Since then, we have remained isolated, fighting against the rebels where we can. To gather together… it would only ensure our swift destruction.’
‘I have met others like you, Saurian. Those who had joined the Shattered Legions. A few returned to Nocturne, their tidings grave, I’m afraid.’
‘Of Vulkan?’ Saurian asked, though his tone suggested he knew the answer.
Obek nodded. ‘His body. It has since been returned to Deathfire.’
Saurian looked grave, but he swiftly marshalled his grief.
‘Is that how you also came back to Nocturne? Were you amongst the Isstvan survivors?’
Obek found he could not meet the Apothecary’s gaze. ‘No, that was not our fate. We have been garrisoned at Prometheus, standing watch.’
‘And the burden of that has lain heavy upon you.’
‘It has.’ Obek regarded the prone form of T’kell. ‘It still does.’
‘Rest assured, brother,’ said Saurian softly. ‘They will be well tended to.’
‘I can attest to that.’ Xen emerged into the apothecarion from a meditation cell, still fatigued but greatly recovered. He stood without his armour and his skin glistened like oil, his wounds like tears in the black. But Obek was not looking at his battle wounds.
‘Your honour brands, brother… They are removed.’
Xen bowed his head, but Obek looked to Saurian.
‘At his request.’
‘Unscarred at last,’ said Obek, returning his attention to his vexillary.
‘I am unworthy of them.’
‘You are worthy of my respect,’ Obek replied, clapping Xen on the shoulder. He drew a sword from his scabbard, a green spatha with a serrated blade. ‘And worthier of this than I.’
Xen took the proffered hilt reverently.
‘I am eager to rejoin my brothers, captain, as Drakos is to rejoin his.’
‘And you shall, vexillary. They have need of you. Saurian…’ He turned to the Apothecary.
‘The servo-skull that brought you here will take you to an arming chamber. The vexillary’s weapons and repaired war-plate will be there.’
Obek nodded in gratitude. He had judged these legionaries falsely. They were a beaten blade, battered, hard to trust but still true for all of that. He could not explain the shield-bearer’s behaviour, but then there was much about the warriors of the Obstinate that was more unconventional than Ahrem Gallikus.
‘We have a… saying,’ he said to the Apothecary. ‘You will not have heard it.’ Obek hoped the words would bring him solace. ‘Vulkan lives.’
Ahrem Gallikus sat alone in the darkness of the reliquary.
It had been a long time since any legionary had been inducted here and those interred had been reduced to wasted flesh on bone, their augmetics removed and repurposed. Amongst the honoured dead, Gallikus found a measure of peace and used the solitude to meditate.
He had almost been too rash in trusting the Drake. He barely knew him, or his warriors, but a faint hope still burned within. He counselled himself caution, knowing the Silent was ever watchful.
His shield stood before him like an unwelcome guest, a symbol of his shame and failure.
Gallikus remembered the Retiarius and the World Eaters. He remembered Azoth as he was, a Frater Ferrum who had been reduced to a shield-bearer like him.
Neither of them could have known there was greater dishonour to come.
‘I will end this,’ he whispered to the darkness and to Azoth, his cold bones and those of his brother Revenants by now held in cryostasis until the call to war sounded again.
Ulok had created the chamber aboard the ship. He had unlocked an avenue of proscribed research and turned the Keys of Hel. Few knew the inner workings of the ‘mausoleum’, but Ulok had been forced to confide in a small cadre of iron-brothers to perpetuate its continued function.
It could not simply be deactivated. Numerous safeguards had been put in place to prevent this. Similarly, it had its own power source separate from that of the ship. Gallikus knew of only two ways to effectively sabotage the cryo-vault – destroy the ship or find a servant of the Omnissiah greater than Ulok.
A betrayal. Did its end justify its means, he wondered? Had Horus faced a similar dilemma?
Rising to his feet, Gallikus gripped the breacher shield and slung it onto his arm.
He knew he had no choice.
‘I will end this.’
Twenty-One
The returned
Zandu saw the burning man, and knew it was a portent of his doom. It had come to him invisibly through a broken seal in his armour, not via some spectre or apparition. He had taken to wearing his helm as much as possible, not wishing to alert his brothers to his condition, but as he stood mag-locked to the deck of the Thunderhawk, its presence became stifling.
They were still on the embarkation deck of the Obstinate, awaiting sanction to depart. The engines burred hungrily, eager to be unleashed, and sent vibrations through the fuselage that made Zandu’s bones ache. They had taken the dead with them to burn in the pyreums of the Chalice of Fire and the caskets lay in rows in the hold, a potent reminder of Zandu’s fate.
Through the fog of his weakening senses, he had heard Obek speak to Phokan about the Sons of Horus. Zandu knew some of the renegades had escaped the Wrought during the assault by the Iron Hands and assumed they had been found.
His fingers clenched reflexively at the thought of potential vengeance, and for a brief moment the dull throb in his skull ebbed. He shut his eyes, trying to ward off the pain and fatigue but saw the burning man appear from his subconscious. Emitting a shallow gasp, he opened his eyes again and hoped none had heard him. Weakness would prevent him from joining whatever mission Obek had committed them to and end any chance Zandu might still have of a meaningful death.
Zandu looked up from his thoughts and saw Xen looking back.
He and the vexillary had seldom seen an accord, their philosophies of war too divergent. But the proud swordsman seemed different and nodded to Zandu from across the hold.
He laughed to himself. Even my mind betrays me…
‘You cannot fight this,’ uttered a low voice beside him, the sound of it deadened as if submerged.
‘What?’ he slurred, and saw Zeb’du Varr.
He too wore his helm, but to hide the scars of his own fiery obsession. It was blackened by fire like the rest of his armour.
‘Your fate. You cannot fight it.’
Zandu’s skull felt like it was under orbital bombardment. His mind swam and he struggled to focus on what Varr was saying.
‘You are mistaken, brother.’ Even his voice sounded different now, filtered through the fog of agony. Zandu fumbled at his helmet clasp in an attempt to remove it and alleviate the heat prickling his face.
‘It won’t help,’ said Varr, the thrumming engine noise masking their conversation from the other Salamanders legionaries in the hold.
‘I am not dying.’
‘All of us are dying, Firefist. Only you have seen the manner of yours.’
Zandu turned, his eyes glowing fiercely as they fell upon Varr. He felt his body tremble, but not from anger.
‘Do not concern yourself,’ Zandu rasped, flecking the inside of his helm with spittle and filling it with the scent of copper.
‘Remember him,’ answered Varr, ‘the burning man.’
Zandu shook his head. It would pass, the pain, the fatigue. It came and went. He tried to fool himself that it was fading now. It wasn’t.
‘No more riddles…’
Varr had lost his mind. He had seen too much, endured too much. Even without being part of the Isstvan massacre, it had stained them all the same.
Unscarred.
Zandu found that wryly amusing.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
And then darkness took him.
Zau’ull stood on the secondary embarkation deck of the Chalice of Fire with Krask and his entire squad of Terminators in two ranks behind him. They had been waiting for some time before the klaxons began to sound, signalling the arrival of the ship he had sent for his errant brothers.
Menials and servitors from amongst the reduced deck crews made ready, their vacuum suits proof against the cold void as the embarkation gate levered open to admit the long dark and expose this part of the deck.
Zau’ull looked on through the retinal lenses of his helm, feeling neither the chill of the void nor the drag of venting pressure, as the gunship alighted on a docking station and the embarkation gate slowly closed behind it.
Once the repressurisation indicators turned from crimson to green, the deck crews unhitched the harnesses that had kept them from being swept into the void and rushed to the ship to attend to it.
The rear l
anding ramp opened amidst this sudden flurry of activity and a solemn procession of Salamanders legionaries filed out, flanking the caskets of the dead.
Zau’ull had his arms crossed over his chest and his crozius mace clutched in his right hand. When he saw Obek, he nodded and the captain’s voice crackled over his private vox-feed.
‘Firefather, it is good to see you again but we have urgent matters to discuss. My quarters.’
The Iron Hands had done little to soften Obek’s demeanour, it seemed. It was only as he noticed the absence of T’kell and Zandu that he realised why.
Zau’ull blink-clicked a vox acknowledgement and dismissed the Terminators.
‘Is he dead?’ asked the Chaplain.
‘He lives,’ uttered Obek, his back to Zau’ull as he regarded the gilded drake icon carved into the facing wall of his quarters. The chamber was sparse, with little to distinguish it save for a meditation dais, armoury and the crackle of embers from the firepits delineating the back half of the room.
‘Barely,’ added the captain, turning to face his Chaplain, who had removed his skull-helm and held it in the crook of his left arm. ‘Zandu too. That’s why we were late. Rad-poisoning. They are aboard the Obstinate.’
‘The Iron Hands ship?’
Obek nodded.
‘I see. Their Iron Father said they had taken you prisoner?’
‘They did, convinced we might be traitors.’ Obek shook his head at the thought. ‘I swear to you, Zau’ull, I have never seen such desperation and mistrust.’
‘These grim, dark times are ripe with it.’
Obek nodded, his thoughts distant for a moment as he looked away.
Zau’ull asked, ‘The Wrought. What happened?’
‘It is overrun, brother. We cannot use it now. That door is closed to us.’
‘And the artefacts?’
‘Without T’kell, I am without guidance. Vulkan’s bidding was to take them to the Wrought and secure them there, but he could not have foreseen this.’