‘It doesn’t matter,’ Karlaen said harshly. ‘They are here, and we must employ every weapon remaining to us to achieve our goal. The tyranids want to keep us out, brothers, so we must go in, if only to teach them the folly of such hubris.’
Before anyone could reply, a deafening bellow echoed across the plaza, and Karlaen realised that the genestealers had, perhaps, had other reasons for retreating than just the arrival of the Death Company. One of the ruined structures on the other side of the plaza from the palace steps exploded outward, as if struck by a mortar. Chunks of stone and shrapnel filled the air for a moment, heralding the arrival of a hulking shape. A second bellow, louder than the first, echoed out across the plaza.
Armed with razor-sharp talons easily the size of a man and a massive bio-cannon beneath its heavy amethyst carapace, the carnifex strode into the plaza. Bits of rubble slid from it as it stomped forwards. Its heavy, wedge-shaped skull oscillated slowly as if taking stock of the armoured figures before it. Then it reared up to its full impressive height, and let loose a cry of challenge, before it thundered forwards, the ground trembling with every step it took.
Nine
The carnifex stamped forwards, its enormous claws swatting aside broken statues, its weight causing the stone squares of the plaza to crack and buckle. The immense bio-beast levelled its bio-cannon at the closest members of the Death Company, who spiralled towards it on tails of flame, roaring out challenges in the name of the Emperor. The organic artillery piece tensed and spat a living round, its barrel venting gas from the gill slits which opened in its length as it did so.
The projectile exploded into a constricting tangle of thorny vines that lashed out and caught the Space Marines, dragging them to the ground. They hacked at the vines to no avail, and the carnifex ignored their struggles as it stormed past, intent on getting to grips with the rest of its enemies. Its tiny eyes fixed on the heavy shapes of the Terminators, and it emitted another roar of challenge.
‘Well, now it’s a party,’ Joses grunted. ‘Look at the size of him.’ He raised his power sword in readiness. ‘He’ll take some work to bring down.’
‘Work and time,’ Karlaen said. ‘And we don’t have enough of the latter.’ He raised his hammer. ‘Form up, phalanx-pattern sigma. Overlapping fields of fire, hold nothing back. If it gets to us…’
‘I’ll handle it,’ Joses said, swinging his sword experimentally.
‘See that you do,’ Karlaen said. There was no time to argue. The beast was charging towards them faster than any creature that size ought to have been able to move. Another Death Company warrior charged to intercept the creature, his chainsword held in both hands. The carnifex swung its monstrous head towards him, and the air around its jaws began to shimmer with a greasy light. There came a roar of boiling plasma, and in a flash of superheated bile, the black-armoured warrior was vaporised in mid-leap.
The carnifex continued on, lumbering through the smoke of the warrior’s passing. Its bio-cannon swung about, vomiting more strangling thorns across the plaza, and its scything talons swung out in deadly arcs, sending Death Company berserkers crashing to the ground in clouds of blood and entrails, their power armour cracked open and their torment ended. It spat plasma, incinerating anything that dared stay its progress. And when none of those weapons sufficed, it simply crashed through the opposition, be it a living warrior or an unfeeling statue. It was unstoppable, and it was heading right for Karlaen and the others.
As one, the Terminators fired. The carnifex shrugged off the explosive shells and continued to bull forwards. It would not stop, Karlaen knew, until it was dead, or until something even bigger decided to get in its way. Nevertheless, he continued to fire, his targeting array trying to find some weak point in its carapace. The ground shook beneath his feet as the carnifex closed in. Joses readied himself to meet it, his face split by a wide, feral grin. Karlaen could smell the incipient blood-lust in the other Blood Angel’s sweat, and see it building in his eyes. He hesitated, wondering if he should order the sergeant to step back. Would that stop him? Would he listen? Or was he already too far gone?
Before the question could be answered, something black smashed into the charging carnifex from the side and sent it slewing through a column. The carnifex rolled to its feet in a cloud of dust, but its attacker was on it before it could move. Metal talons, each as long as a sword blade, flashed out, carving bloody tracks in the carnifex’s flesh. The alien reared back, screaming in rage. Its cry was answered by its opponent.
‘Come, traitor. Come to Cassor. Come and fight, come and die, but come all the same,’ the vox-speakers mounted in the Dreadnought’s hull crackled. ‘Come and meet thy doom, dogs of abomination. Come and feel the angel’s wrath, curs of Angron. Come screaming or in silence, but come so that Cassor might lay thy hearts at Sanguinius’s feet. The walls of the Palace stand, the Eternity Gate remains barred and Cassor will break thy crooked spines across his knee.’
The Dreadnought, hull painted black and daubed in red, set itself as the carnifex charged towards it. The talons mounted on the ends of the piston-like arms rotated and flexed. Then one rose, revealing a storm bolter mounted beneath the claw. The storm bolter spat, and the carnifex shuddered as its already abused flesh received new punishment. It crashed into the Dreadnought and drove it back into a statue. The Dreadnought shrugged off the blow and rammed itself into the carnifex’s gut, lifting the beast into the air momentarily before smashing it down onto the ground.
‘By the wings of the Angel, it’s Cassor,’ Alphaeus breathed as he watched the battle unfold before them. Karlaen did not ask him how he recognised the Dreadnought, for there was only one Cassor.
Cassor the Chained, Cassor the Mad, Cassor the Damned – whatever name he was known by, he had been one of the greatest warriors ever produced by the Blood Angels, even before he had been interred in a Dreadnought sarcophagus, to rise and fight again after his death on some far-flung battlefield.
He was also a warning, a testament to the dark truth that even the dead were not truly safe from the curse which afflicted the Sons of Sanguinius. For almost three centuries after his death, Cassor had served the Blood Angels from the war machine’s sarcophagus, until that final, fateful day at Lowfang. In the early hours of the battle, his mind had shattered, though no one could say why. Some swore that it was the shadows of the wings of the Sanguinary Guard falling on him as they passed overhead. Karlaen suspected that there was more to it than that. Whatever the reason, however, Cassor now belonged to the Death Company and was far too dangerous to be unleashed without cause. He could barely tell friend from foe, and he was, in his own way, as monstrous as the tyranid creature he was now fighting.
‘The Damned One,’ Zachreal murmured, as he watched the battle. He looked at Karlaen. ‘Truly, our mission must be important if Commander Dante has unleashed him to aid us, captain.’
‘Were you ever in any doubt?’ Karlaen said, watching as the black-hulled Dreadnought crashed into the carnifex again. The two maddened beasts, one metal, one flesh, came together like rival bovids. The stones of the plaza were crushed and churned to rubble as they strove against one another.
‘Ho, traitor, strive and strain all you wish, you will never conquer Cassor. While Cassor stands before the gates of Holy Terra, none shall pass. Shriek, daemon. Scream out your prayers to the gods of wrong angles and shattered skies. Summon them. They shall not defeat Cassor. It cannot be done.’
Cassor’s emotionless, rasping monotone echoed across the plaza, drowning out the shrieks of the carnifex. The carnifex ripped at the Dreadnought with its huge claws, scoring the ancient armour but failing to pierce it. Cassor slashed at the beast with his own talons.
Xenos and Dreadnought reeled across the plaza, brawling through the ruins, the carnifex howling out bestial challenges as Cassor roared out gibberish in reply. Suddenly, a ceramite plate buckled, and one of the carnifex’s claws lanced down into the nest of grav-plates and fibre bundles that made up the Dread
nought’s innards. The claw crashed down through the war machine and on into the ground, pinning Cassor in place.
‘Pinned. Inconceivable. Cassor shall not stand for this, puppet of false gods. Release me, so that I might wipe thy stain from the earth,’ Cassor rumbled.
In reply, the carnifex opened its maw wide. A greasy ball of plasma began to form between its jaws.
‘Sorcery. You dare? Suffer not the witch to live, so says Cassor.’ One heavy mechanical claw closed around the carnifex’s throat, holding it in place. The beast, as if understanding what Cassor had planned, began to struggle, but to no avail. As surely as it had the Dreadnought pinned, Cassor had it held fast. Before the monster could release the burst of bile it had prepared, the Dreadnought brought up his wrist-mounted meltagun and shoved the barrel between the creature’s jaws. With a dull hiss, the back of the beast’s skull vanished in a cloud of superheated gas.
The carnifex toppled sideways, freeing Cassor in the process. The war machine shoved himself upright. His chassis rotated, as the optic augurs mounted in the hull scanned the plaza for more enemies. ‘Listen, traitors. Hear Cassor’s words: I still stand. The Emperor’s hand is upon my shoulder. I am death incarnate!’ The words echoed out over the area. But no new challengers appeared. Then, with a grinding of unseen gears and a whine of servos, Cassor the Damned stalked towards the palace, in search of new foes to slay.
In the aftermath of the carnifex’s death, silence descended on the plaza. The gore-spattered survivors of the Death Company had cleared the plaza and entered the ruins of the palace, followed by Cassor. Karlaen could hear the sounds of battle echoing from the gaping doors of the palace, and knew that some of the genestealers, at least, had not made a clean escape. He looked about, taking stock.
Alphaeus and the others joined him. Karlaen clasped the sergeant on the shoulder for a brief moment, and then turned to look at the others. ‘We still have a mission to complete, brothers. Our enemy will soon turn its gaze here, and the full might of the Hive Mind will fall on us. If we are to succeed, we must move and swiftly.’
‘We don’t even know where they are. Our searches revealed nothing,’ Melos said, his fingers playing across the curve of the skull set into his armour.
‘Yours, perhaps, but ours was more successful,’ Karlaen said. He patted the servitor head dangling from his belt. ‘I know where Flax is, and I know how to get to him.’ He smiled slightly. ‘We were right on top of him the whole time.’
‘What?’ Melos asked.
‘Easier to show you than explain,’ Karlaen said. He started towards the palace. ‘Come. Let us go claim Corbulo’s prize.’
Ten
As they entered the ruins of the palace, they could see the handiwork of the Death Company all about them. The broken, ruined corpses of genestealers and tyranid warriors lay everywhere, reeking in the dust and gloom. Karlaen led his men back to the Tribune Chamber, past the fire-blackened ruins that marked Bartelo’s final passing.
Silence descended on them as they followed the trail of carnage. The vox popped and hummed, but no voices broke the stream of static. Outside the palace, the consumption of Asphodex had entered its final stages. Parts of the planet’s crust were already being scoured of every trace of organic matter, from cowering human survivors to the mould clinging to the rocks in the deepest caves. Soon, the oceans would be drained, and the air made toxic. But the warriors of the Blood Angels and Flesh Tearers would tear up the roots of the hive fleet before then, if all went according to plan.
An eerie sight was waiting for them in the chamber. The remains of Aphrae lay broken in the centre of the Tribune Chamber, arms flung out to either side, his ruined features staring upwards towards the shattered glass of the dome above. The survivors of the Death Company surrounded the corpse, staring down at it in complete silence with something that might have been reverence. Their silence was eerie after the brutal, snarling cries that had filled the air upon their arrival. The Death Company sergeant knelt beside Aphrae, one hand on his chest, head bowed. His helmet sat on the ground beside him, and Karlaen stopped as he caught sight of the other Space Marine’s tortured features.
‘Raphen,’ he murmured. Sadness filled him, dousing his momentary sense of triumph. Raphen’s head turned, as if he had heard Karlaen, and he rose slowly to his feet. The other members of the Death Company turned, weapons raised. Madness and violence bled off them, and Karlaen felt pity and disgust in equal measure as he gazed at their twitching, shuddering forms. This, then, was what awaited him – what awaited them all – if he failed here. He could not bear to look at them, at his brothers, so distorted by rage that they were no longer proud sons of the Imperium, but instead battle-frenzied beasts.
‘Raphen,’ Alphaeus whispered. ‘You were aspirants together, were you not?’
‘We were,’ Karlaen said softly. Memories of another young aspirant, the scars of battle fresh on his body, sitting across from him in the three-day vigil that followed their selection. He remembered fighting beside Raphen on a hundred worlds, battling the Chapter’s enemies. But he had taken one path, and Raphen another and now… here they were.
There was a crash from behind them, and Karlaen, shocked from his reverie, spun, raising his weapon. The others followed suit, only a half-second more slowly. Cassor lumbered towards them from the other side of the chamber, hull painted with steaming ichor. The Dreadnought raised his storm bolter talon. ‘Who comes? Friend or foe? Announce yourselves or taste my fury.’
‘Hold, gentle Cassor,’ Raphen croaked. His voice had the raw tinge of one who had screamed himself hoarse. ‘Can you not see that these are our brothers? They wear the colours of the Legion. What word, brothers? Does the Eternity Gate still stand? What of the primarch?’ There was a terrible desperation in his words, like those of a tormented child seeking comfort. Raphen shoved past the other black-armoured warriors in his haste to meet them. ‘Has the Khan come to relieve us, as he promised? Speak, brothers.’
Karlaen hesitated, uncertain how to answer. The things of which Raphen spoke had taken place millennia ago, when Sanguinius still walked among them. He was possessed by ancient memories which were not his own, reliving battles he had never fought. He was mad and broken and Karlaen, for the life of him, could not think what to say.
He stared into the cold, blue eyes of the man he had once called a friend and said, ‘Do you know me, sergeant?’
‘I… cannot say,’ Raphen said. Insanity danced behind his eyes, and his face contorted as if he were seeking to wrestle his memories into some semblance of coherency. ‘Did we fight on the walls of the Palace together? Did we… Are we embarking for the Vengeful Spirit, brother? Has the Emperor assembled his strike force? Is it time to smite the Arch-Traitor, cowering aboard his battle-barge?’ He reached out, as if to touch Karlaen’s armour. His fingers curled into a fist before they reached Karlaen, and fell. ‘Say yes, brother. Say that the Angels are to be the point of the spear,’ he growled, half-pleadingly.
Karlaen stared at Raphen, pity wrestling against necessity within him. Then he closed his eyes and said, ‘Yes.’ He heard a soft, communal sigh rise from the Death Company. He looked at Raphen. ‘The honour of leading the advance is yours, brother. You and your men will form the tip of our spear, as we seek out the one we have come to find.’
‘And what of Cassor, brother? Is there honour here for me as well?’ Cassor rumbled. His great claws snapped together in eagerness. ‘Are there traitors to be slain? If so, Cassor will slay them.’
‘There are traitors here, mighty Cassor,’ Karlaen said. ‘You will accompany us, and rain down your wrath on those who would seek to block our way.’ He pulled the servitor’s head from his belt. ‘But first, we must find them.’
He directed Alphaeus and the others to the centre of the chamber, where they swiftly cleared away many of the bodies from a circular area. It was a seemingly innocuous patch of floor, but the information he had gleaned from the servitor’s memory showed him that this was
the entrance to the undercity of Phodia. He sank to his haunches and uprooted the stone that hid the crypt-lock. He lowered the servitor head, tilting it so that its eye was in line with the lock’s sensors. There was a click, then, with a whirr, a section of the floor irised open. Bodies tumbled into the gap in a sudden avalanche.
Damaris examined the aperture. The Terminator glanced at his twin, and then said, ‘Tunnels, captain.’ He stepped back as the Death Company moved quickly past him and into the darkness. Raphen, his helmet in place once more, led them. Cassor followed, mechanisms wheezing. Karlaen watched them descend, the servitor head dangling from his grip.
Alphaeus came up beside him. ‘That is what they are here for, captain,’ he said.
‘And how long until someone says the same of us, Alphaeus?’ Karlaen said, bitterly.
‘Hopefully never,’ Alphaeus said.
Karlaen shook his head. ‘Sometimes I wonder if that is our true curse – hope. Hope that we can escape the fate that befell our brothers. Hope that we can change the inevitable.’ He looked at Alphaeus. ‘I hear it, brother. It’s like a melody I can’t help but hear, a song from an unremembered past. I heard it when I woke for the first time, after my Sanguination, and I’ll hear it when I close my eyes for the last,’ Karlaen said softly.
‘We all hear it, captain… brother,’ Alphaeus said. He raised a hand, as if to place it on Karlaen’s arm. But instead, he dropped it. ‘All that matters is whether you choose to follow it.’
Karlaen jerked his chin towards the loping, black-armoured shapes of the Death Company. ‘I don’t think they had a choice, Alphaeus. I don’t think any of us do.’
Shield of Baal: Deathstorm Page 8