“My lady?” Naal interrupted her brooding. “Por’O Dal’yth Ulor Kanti approaches.”
Brielle looked up as the tau diplomat, who preferred to be addressed as “Aura”, approached. His long silver robes and fluted collar shimmered in the light of the command centre, dancing with the multihued reflections cast by the huge holograph below.
“Mistress Arcadius,” Aura said as he inclined his head towards Brielle. As with all tau, his face was flat and blue-grey in colour. Compared to a human’s it was relatively plain, with black, almond-shaped eyes, a wide, flat mouth, no nose and an odd, slit-like organ in the centre of the forehead. “The time is upon us. You will soon be attired as am I, in the robes of an emissary of the water caste, and you will go before the humans and demand their surrender. But first, as we have discussed, you must appraise us of their full military potential, that our brothers and sisters upon Dal’yth might put a stop to human aggression and force them to negotiate, as reasonable beings.”
Reasonable beings? Brielle suppressed a snort of derision as memories of Inquisitor Grand and Cardinal Gurney came unbidden to her mind. What they had done to the tau prisoner they had taken in the opening phase of the crusade was hardly the act of reasonable beings…
“Mistress Arcadius?” Aura repeated.
Gathering her thoughts, Brielle bowed to the tau envoy. “Indeed, Aura,” she said. “I will be happy to provide a full appreciation of the enemy’s capabilities.” Aura turned, his silver robes shimmering as they swept behind him. Steeling herself for what she was about to do, Brielle followed in his wake.
Chapter Two
Veteran Sergeant Sarik grunted as the drop-pod lurched violently and its retro thrusters flared to life. Not much larger than a tank, the drop-pod was essentially an armoured passenger compartment attached to a hugely powerful retro thruster, and although it would be recovered later, after the coming battle, it provided an essentially one-way journey directly into the heart of battle. Such operations had led to the Adeptus Astartes being labelled the “angels of death”, warriors of vengeance who descended on their foes atop pillars of fire. The White Scars were masters of the lightning strike, drop-pod deployment just one of their many forms of attack.
The tactical cogitation readout in the centre of the pod’s cramped passenger compartment told Sarik that it was seconds away from slamming into the surface of the world the alien tau called Dal’yth, the world the Damocles Gulf Crusade had come to conquer in the name of the Imperium.
“Steel your hearts, brothers,” Sarik called out to his four companions. The other five brethren of his ten-man squad were in another drop-pod, his squads deployed as five-man units for the initial drop. “Your ancestors’ eyes are upon you!”
The thrusters reached full power, and no more words were possible. Withstanding forces that would incapacitate any unaugmented human being, Sarik readied himself for the glorious moment when the drop-pod would touch down and release him into the crucible of battle. All that remained now was to mouth a final prayer to the primarch of the Chapter, honoured be his name…
And then the impact came. Even with its descent arrested by the drop-pod’s potent thrusters, the shock was stupendous. Every bone in Sarik’s body was jolted, despite the huge bars that restrained him and kept him from being turned to pulp. The thrusters died and a klaxon wailed. With a pneumatic hiss the restraint bars lifted upwards. The bulkhead in front of each Space Marine dropped away to form an assault ramp, which slammed to the earth with a resounding crash. Harsh light filled the pod, followed a moment later by the unfamiliar air of the new planet.
“Out!” Sarik bellowed, surging forwards and grabbing his boltgun from the nearby quick release cradle. In an instant each Space Marine was bounding down his ramp and setting foot on the ground of the alien world of Dal’yth.
The ground was dry and sandy, coloured the dull ochre of a semi-arid land. The sky above was a serene shade of jade, and Sarik could see thin, column-like mesas rising into the skies all around the drop zone. The temperature was warm and the air appeared clean, though Sarik’s armour systems would need a few more minutes to declare the atmosphere entirely free of toxic elements. Sarik’s preparation told him that while other regions of the surface were host to cultivated farmland, this particular area had been left in its natural state, untouched by the aliens’ hands or their heretical technologies, and not a single plant was visible.
Sarik rejoiced in the feel of solid ground beneath his feet and the knowledge that his enemies were nearby. Soon, the deaths of so many of the Nomad’s crew would be avenged.
“The ring of horns!” Sarik called out, using the unique battle-cant of the White Scars Chapter to order his warriors into a defensive perimeter around the drop-pod. The act of issuing orders to his fellow White Scars was a simple, long-missed pleasure; one denied Sarik at the bridge of his frigate. Hyper-velocity projectiles spat across the jade sky, fired from a distant defence turret towards more Space Marine drop-pods streaking through the air upon churning black contrails. The passage of the rounds through the sky was marked by silvery lines of disturbed air rather than the smoking black contrails of the Imperium’s ordnance.
Sarik grinned savagely, knowing that even the aliens’ heretically advanced anti-drop defences could not hit so small and fast-moving a target as a drop-pod, for the vehicles plummeted at impossibly fast speeds, slowing only at the last possible instant. Nonetheless, Sarik noted several shots coming perilously close to the drop-pods, evidence, if any were needed, of just how fearsomely effective the aliens’ weapons truly were.
Sarik activated the tactical display within his helmet, reams of battlefield and command script suddenly appearing across his field of vision. Status runes indicated that the six White Scars drop-pods were all safely down, and the thirty warriors were all deployed as per their mission orders. A line of text scrolling across the lower portion of his vision told him that the other Space Marine contingents were also under way, each with the objective of destroying one of the sensor pylons that formed an extensive network across the entire surface of Dal’yth.
The White Scars were one of the smaller contingents amongst the two hundred or so Space Marines accompanying the crusade, the Iron Hands, Ultramarines and the Scythes of the Emperor far more numerous. The Ultramarines and the Scythes of the Emperor were each spearheading one of the other two main assault groups, with the smaller squads of the other Chapters each attacking a secondary objective. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, Sarik was determined that his Chapter would claim its share of the glory, and he would lead his brethren to victory. General Gauge’s main force would only be able to land once a bloody wound had been torn in the heart of the aliens’ defence network.
Satisfied that the assault groups were all on target, Sarik scanned the surrounding area for his own objective. A kilometre distant, in the midst of a cluster of tall rock columns, Sarik located the massive tau sensor pylon.
“White Scars!” Sarik shouted above the high-pitched whip-crack of tau projectiles splitting the air overhead. “Move out.” With savage joy welling within him, he added, “Let’s complete our mission before the Ultramarines complete theirs!”
“White Scars deployed,” the chief of staff reported. “Ultramarines groups in nine minutes, Scythes of the Emperor group in twelve minutes. All other sub-groups within twenty minutes.”
“Good,” replied General Gauge, turning from the huge pict screen that dominated the main wall of his command chamber aboard the Blade of Woe. The entire space was crowded with command terminals, glowing readouts and blaring phono-casters describing every detail of the landing operations. Tacticae advisors and Imperial Guard staff officers manned dozens of stations, and vox-servitors and Munitorum logisters shuffled from one to the next, collating and dispensing raw data in ream after ream of parchment. Located in the heart of the Blade of Woe, the command chamber was Gauge’s personal domain and it could have been a high command bunker at the front line of any of the Imper
ium’s sector-spanning wars.
Gauge faced Lucian and the others of the crusade council who had assembled to witness the assault on Dal’yth Prime. “Gentlemen,” the scarred, craggy-faced veteran soldier addressed his fellow councillors. “Phase one of Operation Pluto is under way.”
The general nodded to the chief of staff, and then turned back towards the huge pict screen. The image resolved into a real time capture of the surface of Dal’yth Prime, transmitted by an orbital spy-drone controlled by one of Gauge’s command staff. The dry atmosphere of the world below contained few clouds, so Lucian and the councillors were afforded a clear view of the main continent’s eastern seaboard.
“As you can see,” General Gauge indicated the centre of the image, “this region is ideal for our purposes. The land is relatively flat, and the sea to the east and the mountains to the north will mask our landing operations from those two directions.”
The staff officer worked the controls of his command terminal. The image on the pict screen blurred, and then came back into focus having magnified the central region.
“Sector zero shall be the site of the main landings,” Gauge said. Lucian caught a glint in the old veteran’s eye, something that told him the general would be quite happy leading the planetfall operation from the very front. He smiled wryly as the general continued. “The main landings can only commence once the tau’s sensor network has been disabled,” Gauge gestured towards a number of blinking, red runes that represented the primary objectives being assaulted by the White Scars, Ultramarines and the Scythes of the Emperor, “here, here and here.” Lucian saw that around a dozen secondary objectives were also marked, but the general was only interested in the primary ones, for now at least.
Each of the three primary runes represented a vital node in the planetwide sensor network. Taking out those nodes would blind the tau to the exact details of the main landings. The landings themselves could never be hidden, but at least the tau could be put at a major disadvantage if they could not clearly see what was happening at the landing zone. The defenders would be forced to commit their forces piecemeal, probing for the Imperium’s armies.
“What of their air assets, general?” Lucian asked, his mind calculating every possible risk to the successful landing of the main crusade ground forces.
“That is the great unknown, Lucian,” Gauge answered, with unusual honesty for one of his station. “All ground forces will be equipped with as many anti-air weapons as they can carry, and what sub-orbital fighter capacity we do have will be fully committed. But frankly, we really have no idea what the tau might throw against us.”
“Then why not wait, general,” said Cardinal Gurney, standing resplendent in the finery of his office. “Or bombard the entire world into submission.”
“Cardinal,” Gauge bowed his head ever so slightly as he spoke. “I am merely enacting the will of the council in this matter. I was given the task of conquering Dal’yth Prime, and that is what I intend to do.” Then he looked the cardinal straight in the eye. “I have done this before.”
“General,” Lucian cut in, forestalling any further interruptions or objections from Gurney and his faction. “When will the main landings begin?”
“That, friend Lucian, is in the hands of the Adeptus Astartes.”
The dry ground at Sarik’s feet erupted into plumes of dust as the turret atop the sensor pylon brought its weapons to bear on him and opened fire. He continued running for another ten paces, before throwing himself to the right into the cover of a large boulder.
The other warriors of his squad, who had reformed into a single ten-man unit having disembarked from the two drop-pods, had caught up with him. Brother Qaja, the Space Marine who commanded the Nomad’s fire control station when the squad was serving as the frigate’s command cadre, was the first to join him. He seemed unencumbered by the huge plasma cannon he carried in both hands, and by the massive, humming power source on his back.
Sarik reached up and released the catches around his neck, then lifted his helmet clear and shook his long, black topknot loose. He took a deep breath, allowing his genetically enhanced senses to taste the air, testing it for contaminants and other indications of the nature of the immediate environment.
Qaja too had removed his helmet, and appeared to be laughing.
“Something amuses you, brother?” Sarik said, grinning with the joy of battle despite himself.
Brother Qaja shook his head, his long, plaited moustaches waving freely. “My apologies, brother-sergeant,” Qaja said. “I am merely grateful to be on solid ground once more, with my enemy before me and my battle-kin at my side.”
“Aye,” Sarik grinned. “I feel it too, brother.” Sarik risked a glance around the boulder, hoping to get a fix on the turret that pinned him and his squad down. No sooner had he leaned around the outcrop than he was forced to pull his head back sharply. A torrent of rounds erupted against the rock, sending up plumes of vaporised stone and shards of razor-sharp shrapnel.
Nonetheless, Sarik had learned all he needed. The pylon was a mere fifty metres distant, its white tower rearing high above the arid landscape. Its form reminded Sarik of the funnel of a great sea-going vessel, and it was covered in domes and blisters that bristled with sensor veins. Sarik had seen a ring of smaller structures around the base of the pylon, and halfway up its flanks the turret from which the hail of blue energy bolts was being unleashed.
Furthermore, in the brief instant he had been exposed, Sarik had caught sight of at least one squad of enemy warriors about the base of the pylon, weapons trained on the boulder the Space Marines sheltered behind.
“Brother Qaja,” said Sarik. “I want that turret silenced. Squad,” he called out, “Cover him!”
With that, Brother Qaja hoisted the heavy bulk of his plasma cannon, his face split with a feral grin at the prospect of the coming destruction. Sarik nodded once, and the Space Marine stepped out from the cover of the rock and brought his heavy weapon to bear on the turret.
Even as Qaja raised his plasma cannon, Sarik and the remainder of the squad emerged from either side of the boulder, each taking aim at one of the enemy warriors. At the very same moment, they opened fire.
The boltguns spat explosive death towards the aliens, who should have been cut down in a bloody swathe. But instead of striking the tau warriors and exploding inside their bodies, the rounds detonated in mid air without striking a single one.
“Energy shield!” Sarik bellowed, frustrated once more by the perfidiousness of the aliens’ technology. The tau warriors brought their own long-barrelled rifles to bear on Brother Qaja. Before the Space Marine could fire, a dozen blue energy bolts lanced towards him as the alien soldiers opened fire through what was clearly a one-way energy shield that allowed the tau to fire from behind its protection.
Brother Qaja was caught in the storm, the blue bolts slamming into his power armour and vaporising large chunks of ceramite and the flesh beneath.
Sarik bellowed a wordless curse at the sight of his closest battle-brother gunned down before him. The two warriors had shared such glories and such tragedies that a wound to one was a wound to the other. Rage and pain welled up inside Sarik and reason threatened to flee his mind entirely, so strong was the urge to avenge his fallen brother.
But Sarik’s curse turned into a howl of joy as he saw that his battle-brother was far from dead. Dragging himself up onto one knee, his face a mask of grim determination, Qaja levelled his cannon at the turret.
As the turret’s multi-barrelled weapons tracked him, Qaja opened fire. His target was high up on the side of the massive sensor pylon, and was not protected by the energy shield that had saved the alien warriors on the ground. The plasma cannon spat a roiling ball of raw energy, which lanced upwards and slammed into the turret. The side of the pylon erupted in an explosion of blinding violet light as the turret disintegrated, showering the tau below with liquid gobbets of the fabric of the pylon, turned molten by the plasma blast.
Sarik saw his opening. “White Scars!” he bellowed, filled with battle-rage. “On them!”
Limbering his boltgun and drawing his chainsword, Sarik surged out from cover, his battle-brothers close behind. As he passed Brother Qaja, he saw that the warrior was grievously wounded, but willing and able to fight on. The plasma cannon whined as it drew power for a second shot.
The world became a blurred rush of sights and sounds as Sarik powered across the open ground in front of the pylon. His armoured boots pounded the dry ground and his blood thundered in his ears. His heart sang with the sensations of battle and he roared a savage cry to lead his warriors onwards. As the range closed and the White Scars approached the nearest of the smaller structures circling the pylon, the enemy warriors opened fire again. The weight of fire had lessened, for a handful at least had been incapacitated or killed by the molten debris showered on them from above by the destruction of the turret. Small yet deadly bolts of blue energy split the air scant centimetres from Sarik’s body or stitched the ground at his feet. Miraculously, Sarik crossed the open ground without being struck and slammed into the nearest structure, a projector for the invisible energy shield.
[Rogue Trader 03] - Savage Scars Page 4