by Gav Thorpe
When the opposing groups were half a kilometre apart two trucks broke away from the Covenant contingent, flying long green pennants of parley above the flags of their church. Kor Phaeron gestured to Axata to command the temple-rig to stop, though around them the patrols continued to circle like protective silver eagles. At the masthead a green pennant was raised in reply.
The Covenant vehicles disgorged a platoon of warriors a hundred metres from the temple-rig. They were dressed in robes, the plain grey of acolytes, beneath bronzed armour plates. They carried tridents and spears, the bulky shape of slug-throwers fitted onto the hafts of the weapons beneath heads that gleamed in the Post-noon sun. Each wore a portable sun-hood that spread between two extensible poles from their backs, so that their helmed features were hidden in shade.
Another disembarked, her armour a finery of gold and rubies, a bared tulwar that gleamed with power in one fist, an archaic pistol in the other. Tendrils of semi-organic exoskeleton ran along her limbs from a backpack that clung crab-like to her form.
Nairo had never seen so much archeotech in one place. Next to him, Aladas gave him a pointed look, her eyes filled with doubt.
Disconcerted mutters rippled across the deck until a growl from Axata silenced the murmuring converts.
The Covenant commander's voice rang out from amplifiers set into her helm, as loud as the hailers of Kor Phaeron.
'I am Gun-Deacon Hal Aspoa, commandant of the Third Tower. You are forbidden from approaching closer to Taranthis. If you continue on this course you will be attacked. Survivors will be subject to enslavement for their trespasses against the Holy Church of the Powers.'
Hearing a chuckle, Nairo turned to see L'sai suppressing her laugh. He glared at her.
'As if that would matter to us,' she said between stifled giggles. 'Hopefully they'll string up Kor Phaeron.'
'We'll burn with the converts, all the same,' Nairo reminded her, ending her humour.
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Kor Phaeron watched the approach of the gun-deacon warily, arms resting on the side of the pulpit. The millicrawlers followed behind, spearguns tracking the roving outriders of his caravan. The delegation stopped about thirty metres away, a black blot on the red sands cast by their personal sunshades.
He activated the sermoniser.
'I am Kor Phaeron, seeker of the Truth, Herald of the Powers. You have no right to claim these free lands for the Covenant. You have no moral authority to deflect me from my Powers-appointed vocation.'
'The Holy Church of the Covenant extends to where its servants are, and as we are all ordained priests of the Covenant that means these are holy lands. Your blasphemy will not gain you passage. Continue and I will vouch you a heretic for the trespass.'
'Vouch away, false believer!'
The stand-off continued for several heartbeats, the two combatant priests staring at each other across the divide. A movement below drew Kor Phaeron's attention to the deck. Lorgar emerged from the shadow of the hatchway and turned to address him.
'Let me speak to them,' Lorgar said. 'Let them hear the Bearer of the Word.'
'No,' Kor Phaeron replied. 'These ingrates do not deserve to learn the Truth. Thugs in robes, nothing more. There is no more despicable thing than a traitor to the Powers masquerading as their guardians.'
'I can persuade—'
'No! You must learn an important lesson here, Lorgar. To proselytise is to invade. The act of conversion is one of spiritual violence that we must embrace. None come to the Truth on an easy road. None willingly heed the Word at first. For the soul to be pure, the flesh must endure.' Kor Phaeron switched on the address system again. 'It is you who blasphemes, harridan of Vharadesh. Depart these lands or suffer the wrath of the Powers at my hand.'
Lorgar looked to protest again but before he could speak, Gun-Deacon Hal Aspoa declared her judgement.
'You are charged with heresy, the most dire of trespasses,' she declared as more of her troops issued from their serpentine transports, electrospears snarling. Her bodyguard levelled their weapons at the temple-rig while she brought up her pistol directly towards Kor Phaeron. 'I shall cleanse your body and the Powers shall determine the fate of your soul.'
Kor Phaeron felt Lorgar move rather than saw him. He caught the sparkle of the gun-deacon's pistol but an instant later his giant acolyte was in the way, the gleam of phased particles striking an upraised grating in his fist. In the other he had the mace he had fashioned for the pursuit of the mutineers.
Gunfire from the other guards crackled along their line and bullets whirred over the rail, met by the crack of carbines and the snap of bowstrings.
Lorgar tossed the grating discus-like into the gun-deacon's squad, felling two of them, and then vaulted over the rail.
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Crackling ammunition from the transports' spear-hurlers and deafening shell bursts wracked the armoured side of the shrine wagon. Cowering behind a plated stanchion, shuddering at every rattle of shrapnel, Nairo peered through a hole in the metal left by a missing bolt. As when he had fought the mutineers, Lorgar became a thing of movement and energy, a stunning reminder to Nairo that the Bearer of the Word was not a mortal man but an agent of the Powers. The gun-acolytes were caught unprepared, not expecting their enemies to abandon the relative safety of the temple-rig; it would certainly have been folly for a normal human to have done so as bullets and blasts seared across the divide.
So it was that the Covenant soldiers took a few moments to react to the giant charging into their midst. Sand churned around Lorgar as he sprinted towards the gun-deacon with powerful strides. The Covenant guard leader tracked him with her pistol but her shot went astray through the flurry of grit and dust that surrounded the charging acolyte.
Lorgar met the counter-charge of the gun-acolytes with a roar that could have been the bellow of Khaane himself at the Fall of Nashesh. A sweep of his huge mace crushed the first foe into the ground while sparking tridents glanced from his skin and scorched his robes. Another swing of the mace pulped the armoured heads of two more.
Though Nairo was no expert in war he had seen enough of Axata and his ilk to recognise that Lorgar fought without training or thought. The gun-acolytes surrounded him quickly, thrusting with their tridents, aiming for the legs of the giant to fell him. Only his shocking size, speed and strength kept them at bay, forcing them back with each wild attack. Yet blow by blow they were dragging down Lorgar like lich-dogs tearing at a sternback bull.
Sooner or later a more telling strike would land.
Axata must have recognised the same, for at the instant the dread thought entered Nairo's head the commander of the converts leapt down to the sands and bellowed for his warriors to follow. Into the teeth of the Covenant fire they ploughed, spurred on by the thought of their spiritual master falling. Over their heads seared fresh volleys of fire from the spear-hurlers and Archer Brethren at the mastheads.
The crashing salvoes from the millicrawlers ceased for a moment, the gunners taken aback by this sudden offensive, unable to target the converts who sped towards their own troops. More hatches wheezed open in their flanks to disgorge fresh squads to outflank the converts pressing into the centre of their force.
Lorgar shouldered his way through the gun-acolytes to confront their leader, who ditched her pistol in favour of a two-handed grip on her tulwar. The first slashing blow scythed into the haft of Lorgar's mace, almost severing the axle. The Bearer of the Word let the weapon drop and punched a fist into her face, mashing visor and skull with a single blow, the gun-deacon's head snapped back with spine-breaking force Now that the concentration of fire had relented from the temple-rig, Nairo timorously stood up to look over the bulwark. A third transport was heading towards them from a more distant tower, alerted to the fighting.
Soon Lorgar and the converts would be outnumbered.
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Fingers gripping the edge of the pulpit tight, Kor Phaeron watched with growing concern as Axata and his converts were
slowly surrounded by a ring of robed Covenant thugs. The guns of the transports had turned to targeting the solar yachts and patrol wagons, forestalling any aid from the mobile elements of the caravan. The same sprawl of melee that prevented the millicrawlers from targeting Lorgar and his companions also shielded the Covenant soldiers from the weapons crews of the temple-rig.
Lorgar did his best, fighting now with a scavenged electrospear in each hand, but as gifted as he was with tongue and mind, as fearsome as his bulk and Powers-gifted speed, he was an unwieldy fighter, and the press of foes and friends hampered his broad, swinging attacks. Already a dozen converts lay dead or bleeding on the sands, though twice that number of gun-acolytes had paid a similar price at the hands of the converts and the Bearer of the Word. But it was not enough, and it would not be long before the transport dispatched from the third tower would arrive to swing the balance decidedly against Kor Phaeron's followers.
'Not like this,' he growled to himself, before he raised his voice to address those remaining on the temple-rig. 'Not like this, brethren and sistren! The glory of the Truth does not die today on some unmarked field of sand and dirt! The Powers favour us still, if we are to seize the moment. All is a test, and we shall rise to each challenge. Cursed is the man or woman who stands by to let our dreams fail today. In the abyss will wander the souls of those who save themselves rather than see the Truth delivered to the unbelievers.'
Incensed now, righteousness replacing unease, Kor Phaeron all but threw himself down the ladder from the pulpit. Filled with vigorous energy from the Powers, inspired by the sight of the Bearer of the Word beset by a ring of foes, the priest searched about for a weapon. At the rail lay a wounded convert, her robes reddened with escaping blood, fusil lying on the deck beside her. He snatched up the longrifle and held it over his head, glaring at the slaves around him.
'If you would be messengers of the Truth, be ready to give your lives for it!'
And with that he dashed to the ladder and started to climb down to the sands, not caring whether any chose to follow. For victory or defeat, if the Powers willed it, so it would be.
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On reflex, Nairo took a step after Kor Phaeron. A hand grabbed his wrist and he spun around to find L'sai holding him, her eyes wide and intent.
'Let them die,' she insisted, letting go. 'Let them all kill each other.'
The former teacher hesitated and looked around the deck. Several dozen slaves watched him and L'sai, ready to take their lead from one or the other. He cast his gaze out to the continuing swirl of fighting on the sands, and to the figure of Kor Phaeron striding purposefully towards the chaos. There was no hesitation there. Was Nairo any lesser man?
'Why would you give your life for him?' asked L'sai, thinking that she guessed his thoughts. 'He is nothing to us!'
'Not him.' Nairo moved his eye to the giant form of Lorgar just as the acolyte lanced one of his spears through the chest of a Covenant enforcer, bodily lifting the gun-acolyte into the air. 'For him.'
There was a look of pain in L'sai's expression. She shook her head and addressed the others.
'This moment will come again even if we live today. The Church of the Covenant will not let this lie. Heretics they'll call us. Not just slaves, lower even than we are now. A lingering painful death at the hands of the excruciators and penance-deacons.' Her face changed, taking on a more conniving look as a thought occurred. 'Better yet, let us aid the Covenant, the better to cement our dedication to the Church of Vharadesh!'
'No,' said Nairo. He spoke quietly but quickly, seized by urgency, the thought of moments passing that could bring doom like a fist about his heart. 'No, we do not do that, for we do not answer to the Covenant but to the Powers. Believe what you may about the lives and rules of mortals, but the Powers exist and they will judge us today. Kor Phaeron is right, we stand beneath their gaze. See Lorgar! See the Bearer of the Word, the gift of the Powers to us. Think not of today but of all the days to come, and ask if that isn't worth fighting for, and even dying for?'
L'sai moved to interpose herself between him and the ladder but Nairo shoved her aside and stooped to pick up a wrench that had been discarded upon the deck. He saw others arming themselves with improvised weapons from among the corpses and blood of their companions, or looting the bodies of dead converts.
'Who do you think you are?' L'sai laughed scornfully. 'You are just a slave to them.'
'I am no slave. I have a name, and he knows it,' he replied, staring at Lorgar. He held aloft the wrench as though he wielded the mythical golden blade of Pir Olourius itself. 'I am Nairo!'
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It took about ten heartbeats, ten lung-burning, chest-pounding heartbeats for Nairo to realise he had no idea what he was doing. As bullets spat past and the slaves to his left and right were scythed down by blasts and spear volleys, the wrench in his hand felt impossibly heavy. His strides became laboured, the sand tugging at his legs, feet made of clay as he tried to forge across the dunes that had become the centre of the battlefield.
He fixed his eyes on Lorgar, about forty metres ahead, and put his head down, ignoring the whisper of arrows and the shouts of his companions - shouts cut horribly short.
His bare feet stumbled on sharp stones and pieces of shrapnel in the sand, causing him to falter and then fall as the shock wave from a shell detonation swept over him from the right, heat and sound that blocked out all sense.
Gritting his teeth he dragged himself up, determined that if he was to die, it would be on his feet.
This is ridiculous, part of his brain cackled at him. You're a teacher. A slave. You're going to die here unmourned.
The thought spurred him on. He knew that today his life had meaning, more than in the academy cloister, certainly more than when polishing and sanding and labouring on the temple-rig.
Lorgar was covered in cuts, his robes in rags, blood coating arms and bared chest with a wash of crimson.
Yet he stood and fought on.
The gigantic acolyte, now flanked by Axata and several other converts, slashed and battered all who came before him. Even in the short time since the battle had begun in earnest his movements had become more fluid, his fighting less wild and more cultured. He thrust the spears with short stabs, gutting and piercing with faultless accuracy.
One of the transports crashed towards the melee, its crew no longer caring whether they injured allies as well as enemies, intent only on bringing down the giant who continued to defy the will of the Covenant.
Its course brought it ploughing along the ridge of the dune, directly towards Nairo and the other slaves. Small arms from visor-like slits coughed burning bolts into the mass of disorganised fighters. Nairo saw Husan's hair set aflame, flailing into the dirt. Gor Daos lost a leg to a flurry of burning projectiles that seared bone as easily as flesh. L'sai…
He had not thought L'sai would follow, but there she was, snarling and howling like a beast, a stolen glaive in her hands as she faced down the metal serpent bearing down upon them. Nairo saw her cast a glance towards Lorgar, and then she broke into a run, heading directly for the transport.
A cannon in the nose of the millicrawler belched alchemical fire and in an instant L'sai and three others with her were nothing more than steam and hissing gobbets splashed across a pool of cooling glass.
Nairo felt her death like a stab in the gut.
The sensation continued and something wetted his thighs. He looked down and realised that it was a literal wound; a short, barbed projectile stuck out beneath his ribs. Blood flowed and his legs weakened.
Again he fell into the sand, the wrench dropped from twitching fingers. The bulk of the millicrawler laboured towards him, plumes of smoke issuing from its stacks, the dune shifting and trembling under its weight, slides of sand cascading towards the vehicle as it mounted the slope.
Nairo floundered in the red-and-grey particles, possessed by the idea that the Powers would look upon him more kindly if he died with a weapon i
n hand. He thought of the Prophets and of the Pilgrimage into the Empyrean to bring forth the light of the Truth. Would he go there also, or into the nothingness and torment of the abyss?
The shadow of the millicrawler's nose fell upon him. He could smell the vapour fumes from its engine and the stink of grease through the blood and charred flesh. Beyond an armoured slit he saw the driver's face, eyes looking at something else, utterly unaware of the life he was about to crush from existence.
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A sudden storm of sand raked across Nairo's face, obscuring what happened next, though he heard well enough the titanic impact and the following scream of twisting, tearing metal. Wiping tears and grit from his face, the slave saw the nose of the crawler tom open, ripped along its length, the legs of the driver still in his seat, his upper half missing.
He turned at movement in the corner of his eye and saw a giant figure sprawled on the sand a few metres away, cocooned in an elongated crater like a crashed meteor. He held two warped strips of bloodstained metal in his hands, the skin and flesh of his arms shredded from wrist to elbow.
'Lorgar!' Nairo rose, ignoring the stab of pain in his abdomen.
The acolyte roused, sitting up with the air of one not wholly in control of his senses. He said something in a tongue that Nairo didn't understand. It sounded like he could be cursing, but the slave was not sure. Lorgar tossed away the pieces of millicrawler while Nairo scrambled down the dune, following the blood-spattered course of Lorgar's descent. Shouts caused him to glance over his shoulder, where Kor Phaeron, Axata and the converts were falling back to form a position around the wrecked transport. Doors hissed open along its length. The soldiers inside staggered out to be confronted by a wave of slaves who swept over them and poured into the broken millicrawler.