by Gav Thorpe
They were nearly out of sight, no more than twenty metres from the closest broken wall, when light flared through the gloom. An arc of lightning erupted from a stairwell leading down to a basement level, earthing into the lead Raptor. His armour and body exploded, sending bloody fragments of bone and ceramite thudding into the legionaries around him. Navar had never heard mention of anything like it during the training exercises.
‘Emperor’s oath, that’s a stormcannon!’ yelled Cald. ‘Saturation fire! Level that building!’
Switching his bolter to full automatic, Navar emptied the remaining bolts from his magazine into the enemy position, the crackle of the detonations just a few flickers amongst the storm that engulfed the stairwell. Behind Navar, the remote cupola of the Rhino opened up, hammering away with combi-bolter fire. As he slapped home another magazine, the Raptor’s hearts kicked into high combat pulse, flooding his body with adrenal compounds, seeming to slow time as his nervous system surged in response.
His auto-senses blacked momentarily. When they returned, Navar saw the fiery trail of a plasma jet streaking through the mist. The Rhino’s point-defence missile had passed within a metre of him, causing the blackout. It detonated in an airburst just above the insurgents’ den, showering white-hot promethium across the stairs and wall.
‘Pull back to the Rhino,’ said Sergeant Cald, calm and authoritative. The lead team started to withdraw as the promethium melted through the rockcrete, turning it to a dwindling pile of burning slag. ‘Commander Branne, encountering guild-tech weapons. We might have a problem.’
As they returned, one of the surviving Raptors from the forward section stumbled. At first Navar thought he had just lost his footing, but as the Raptor pushed himself to his knees, he spasmed violently, his bolter flying from his grasp. Navar had not seen any weapons fire and his first thought was of some other unknown guild-tech the sergeant had not warned them about. Just as he thought this, Navar heard grunting over the squad vox-link and turned to see the Raptor to his right falling to one knee, his head rocking madly forwards and back.
Tightness gripped Navar’s chest. It reminded him of the sensation of fear he had used to feel before his transformation, though he felt no dread attached to the cramping. A sudden burning shot up his spine, causing Navar to gasp with pain. He tried to fight the urge to crouch, his legs and pelvis felt as if they had been shattered.
‘Hef? Lastar? Devor?’ He didn’t recognise the voice, but the panic it conveyed was something he had never expected to hear from a Raven Guard.
The Raptor realised he had fallen to his knees and looked up to see Sergeant Cald standing over him, looking rapidly to the left and right. Another surge of flaming agony roared across Navar’s chest, his muscles contorting, throwing him to his back. He couldn’t help the scream that erupted from him. He smelled and tasted blood inside his helm.
‘In the Rhino! Get in the Rhino!’ Cald was bellowing. The sergeant grabbed one of Navar’s arms and started dragging him to the transport.
‘I can… make it…’ Navar snarled, pushing himself to his feet. He stumbled a few steps and hurled himself onto the Rhino’s ramp. The impact sent another shuddering burst of pain through his body.
‘Command, command!’ Cald’s voice over the vox was almost lost under the pounding in Navar’s ears. ‘Urgent evacuation needed. All Raptors are down. I repeat, all of the Raptors non-combatant.’
‘I know,’ came Branne’s terse reply. ‘It’s happening across most of the squads. No assistance available. Get them back to Ravendelve as best you can.’
Navar felt himself lifted bodily into the Rhino, seeing the helm insignia of his sergeant through a crazy patterning of hyper-inflated blood vessels in his eyes. He was dumped onto the floor, landing on top of another Raptor; the marking on his shoulder pad rim marked him out as Devallia. Navar saw Devallia tearing at his helmet, trying to rip it free. After a few seconds, the seals snapped and the helm came off, tossed away by the frenzied Raptor.
He found himself looking into a pair of inhuman eyes, almost completely red with blood, save for pupils that had shrunk to dark pinpricks. Navar was gripped with horror as he saw veins and muscles pulsing beneath blackening skin. Devallia cried out, and in opening his mouth revealed another row of sharpened teeth erupting from his gums. Corrosive saliva dribbled onto his chestplate, hissing and spitting where it fell.
The Rhino jerked into motion, rolling Navar to his back. He stared up at Sergeant Cald, who was crouched at the open ramp, one hand held to the brow of his helm as he shook his head in disbelief.
‘Sergeant…’ The words were difficult to form, Navar’s tongue feeling swollen in his throat. He held a hand out towards Cald and noticed long claws had broken through the fingertips of his gauntlets. ‘Sergeant? What’s happening to me?’
Cald looked at him for several seconds, as if he had no answer to give. Then he stepped closer and stooped over Navar, clasping his deformed hand in his own.
‘Stay strong, legionary,’ said Cald. ‘Remember who you are. You are Raven Guard.’
PART THREE
MONSTERS AND MARTYRS
FIFTEEN
The Fortunate Ones
Divided Loyalties
The Legionnaires Revealed
HE HAD ONLY wanted to buy a little more time, but as he crouched next to the receiver beneath the bent girders of a toppled viaduct Omegon was delighted with the static-broken message passed on by the cryptoduct. The poor quality of the signal was due to a communications block being broadcast from the Ravenspire. It was the response Omegon had been depending on, though it meant his own transmissions would be severely hampered. The message was from Contact Three, who knew nothing of his fellow Alpha Legionnaire’s action.
Omegon played the recording again, his fingers adjusting the dials of the receiver to get the best possible signal. The report was still quiet and fragmentary, and only his experience and superhuman hearing allowed him to pick out words and phrases from amongst the white noise that was blanketing every frequency.
‘…widescale degradation throughout the latest batch… degenerate, bestial… more recent recruits are worst affected… Corax has ordered… nearly a thousand of the poor… suspects mutation due to some mistake in the gene replication for large scale implantation. Apothecary Sixx housing the… howls and roars like caged animals. Security has been tightened around the gene-tech, but access still possible. There seems… overall mission integrity intact. Awaiting…’
THE SACRIFICE OF Eloqi’s guild had been worthwhile, after all. In the grand scheme, their survival or success was irrelevant. The guild insurrection, and the Order of the Dragon who had instigated it, were simply the means to pry open Ravendelve.
The Beta would be moving into position, while the Order of the Dragon was ready to strike their final blow. It was time that his operatives knew their full part in the endgame. He shut down the receiver and packed it away, going over the final parts of the plan in his mind.
Tomorrow, twenty-nine Terran hours from now, the Alpha Legion would make their move.
THE PAIN HAD subsided for the last few hours, leaving Navar with a deep ache in his flesh and bones. He sat in the corner of the cell, not able to look at Marls, Kharvo, Dortaran, Benna and the other twenty Raptors who shared the room. They were amongst the fortunate ones, apparently, though Navar did not feel fortunate as he looked down at the jet-black talons jutting from his fingers.
He had seen a few of the worst-affected, as Sixx and his attendants had hurried them into the quarantine area that had been quickly established in the depths of Ravendelve. It was only temporary, the Apothecary had said, reversible if they could isolate the mutated strands in the gene-seed. Navar knew he had not experienced much of life, but he recognised a comforting lie when he heard one, even if Sixx had been lying to himself as much as the Raptors.
He could hear the muffled yells and screams of the most degenerate and could not push away the visions he had seen. Some of them had be
en bent almost double by elongated spines, others had been twisted by insane muscle growth, their limbs warped and engorged. Bony growths split their skin, fangs punctured their lips, and all had the same bloody eyes as Navar.
As a child, Navar had never suffered nightmares. Growing up in the shadow of the Ravenspire was more assurance than any mother’s words that there were no monsters that could harm him. Yet the sight of the degenerated Raptors was something from the darkest recesses of his imagination, causing a primal revulsion and fear that no amount of Legiones Astartes discipline and training could eradicate. That he was counted amongst the monstrosities only increased his unease.
His brain, his body, no longer produced the fear response of a normal human, but on that primitive level, in the core of his mind, Navar was distressed and unable to articulate his worry. It was if he could not form the thoughts, could not grasp the concepts required to voice his dread.
Navar stood up to ease the pressure on his lower back, where one of Sixx’s attendants had surgically removed a vestigial tail. The Raptor’s knees and hips ached, wound about with tight, overgrown ligaments and sinew. He started to walk, completing a circuit of the room, which was bare save for the thin training pads on the floor that had been provided as rudimentary bedding, the best the Legion could offer for the moment.
He neared the door, and heard voices. The door was not locked, not for them. Elsewhere, the most bestial sufferers had been taken to the cages that had once housed Sixx and Orlandriaz’s animal subjects. They could not be trusted to stay where they would be safe, though none had been violent towards their fellow Raven Guard.
The voices grew louder and Navar recognised the deep timbre of the primarch. He gestured to the others and they rose from their positions to crowd as close as they could get. The conversation seemed to be taking place a little further down the corridor beyond, near to the infirmary entrance.
‘…is an intrinsic problem with the gene template, I am sure of it,’ they heard Orlandriaz replying to something said by Corax. ‘There is no error in the replication process.’
‘Then why are the first five hundred Raptors unaffected?’ said Corax. ‘At some stage, we have made a mistake. The reduplication to this scale must be responsible.’
‘Unless there has been degeneration in the source material,’ replied Sixx.
‘It is kept in stasis, how could it change?’ countered Orlandriaz.
‘Incrementally,’ replied Corax. ‘It is removed from stasis for reprocessing new batches of gene-seed. Perhaps it has degraded a little during each removal, so slightly that we have not noticed it.’
‘That would suggest there is an inherent flaw,’ said Sixx. He cleared his throat before continuing, apparently uncomfortable with what he had to say. ‘The flaw is not in the Raven Guard gene-seed, it has been verified many times over since its creation.’
‘What are you suggesting?’ said Corax.
‘That there is something wrong with the primarch data,’ said Orlandriaz, as coolly as if he were discussing inclement weather.
‘Or our analysis of it,’ Sixx added quickly. ‘The traits we are seeing, the deformations, are consistent in their own way. Not entirely random.’
‘I fail to see that,’ said Orlandriaz.
‘I do not,’ said Corax. ‘We know that there are elements of non-human structures within the primarch data. Similar strands are encoded into every gene-seed. The Legiones Astartes make-up owes a small part to characteristics found in other species, introduced by the Emperor into the gene-seed. The scales, horns and other growths may be indicative of these traits being accelerated, out of step with the rest of the adaptation. Whatever was holding them in check, maintaining the balance, has deteriorated. Judging by the timing of the change, I would start by looking at those physical functions under greatest stimulation during combat. It seems that the something in their enhanced metabolism triggered this.’
‘An uncomfortable thought,’ said Sixx. ‘To think that all of us contain the potential for such transformation.’
‘Not all of us,’ said Corax.
‘Apologies, lord, I did no–’
‘I don’t mean my primarch heritage,’ Corax continued. ‘The standard Raven Guard gene-seed is stable, as you said before. We have done something to destabilise it. Isolate that cause, and perhaps we might find a means to reverse the errant genetic material.’
‘It is a possibility,’ said Orlandriaz. ‘I shall conduct more tests to compare the initial Raptors created with the most recent, to see if I can identify a consistent differential.’
‘I’ll concentrate on making them as comfortable as possible,’ said Sixx. ‘If we can’t…’
‘We will!’ said Corax. ‘They are Raven Guard and deserve our greatest effort. Keep me informed. I must return to Ravenspire to discuss the attack on Ravendelve with the command council.’
‘You fear it is the start of something more threatening, lord?’ asked Sixx.
‘We all but wiped out the insurgents, so the threat is debatable. That proscribed guild-tech weapons have surfaced cannot be ignored, though. We could do without further distraction while we resolve the issues with the gene-template.’
The noise of the conversation receded, followed by the clank of the infirmary door closing. Navar turned back to the others.
‘You heard Lord Corax?’ he said. ‘They’ll find a way to change us back.’
Some of the other Raptors smiled, a few sadly shook their heads. Navar headed back to his corner and sat down, ignoring the pain in his rump. The primarch believed that there was a way, and he had the most brilliant mind imaginable. Feeling a little happier, Navar leant back against the wall, closed his eyes and tried to sleep.
THE DISCUSSION BETWEEN the commanders and Corax had lasted for several hours. Branne was happy to leave the command chamber, the last of the council to do so, having been intensely questioned by Corax regarding the insurgent attack, and he was anxious to return to Ravendelve and oversee its defence. The primarch had been adamant that the timetable for the attack on Narsis was not changed. If the Raptors could not be included in the force, the Raven Guard would adjust their strategy. Branne definitely wanted as many legionaries as possible to take on the Perfect Fortress, and so his place was at Ravendelve to provide an encouraging presence for Sixx and Orlandriaz.
As he stalked towards the conveyor down to Alpha Dock, he was met by Controller Ephrenia. She held a data tablet in her hand, a sight that Branne did not find encouraging.
‘A moment of your time, please, commander,’ said Ephrenia.
‘Walk with me,’ Branne replied, continuing past.
‘We have found several odd signals, commander,’ she said. Branne stopped.
‘Commander Agapito’s channel?’ he asked quietly.
‘No, commander, not this time,’ said Ephrenia. She handed Branne the data-slate. ‘There have been several encrypted messages concealed within normal Legion traffic. Hidden amongst the data-pulse between Ravenspire and Ravendelve, riding the pulses to bypass the communications block. They appear to originate from several places on Kiavahr.’
‘So we’ve found out how the guilders are communicating? Good work. Can we stop it?’
‘I already have, commander,’ said Ephrenia, looking a little hurt by the implication. ‘One such transmission that was hijacked was a routine upload from the infirmary core in Ravendelve. In picking apart the entwined codes, it became apparent that the core log had been tampered with. The log was accessed and then the access was crudely wiped.’
‘There are only a handful of us with access to that log,’ said Branne. ‘Why would any of us try to hide such action?’
‘Digital markers indicate that it was Commander Agapito,’ Ephrenia said, her voice hushed. She stepped closer to Branne, though he could hear her lowered voice with ease. ‘I was about to tell Lord Corax, but as you are here I think that perhaps you should deal with the matter.’
‘Thank you, controller,’ said
Branne. ‘I’ll handle this.’
Branne turned around and headed back towards the central transporter that ran the full height of Ravenspire. Whatever reason Agapito had for accessing the gene-tech datalogs, it could not excuse an attempt to conceal the act. The commander quietly fumed as he made his way up to the personal chambers of his brother. He did not knock, but threw open the door, ready to demand an explanation from Agapito.
The chambers were empty, and showed no sign that Agapito had returned here after the command council. Branne activated his vox.
‘Spire command, can you locate Commander Agapito?’
‘One moment, commander.’
Branne waited impatiently, pacing around Agapito’s main room. He spied a tablet on the arm of a couch and picked it up. Activating the slate, he brought up the last screen display. It seemed to be a duplicate of the files Branne had been given by Ephrenia no more than ten minutes before.
His communicator chimed.
‘Commander Agapito authorised a pilot and Stormbird for launch, commander,’ the Legion functionary in the command chamber told him. ‘Course logged was for Ravendelve.’
‘When?’ demanded Branne.
‘Two and a half hours ago, Terran standard, commander.’
Branne cut the link and threw both data-slates to the floor.
‘What are you doing, brother?’ he asked the empty room. Two hours was enough time for Agapito to already be at Ravendelve. Branne ran from the room, heading for the Thunderhawk waiting for him at Alpha Dock.
THE SCANNER TICKED monotonously, every pulse accompanied by an image on the screen in front of Alpharius. He turned his chair and checked the audio pick-ups, seeing nothing detected except for the wind. The gun towers had been constantly manned since the last attack, and Alpharius and the rest of the squad had been on watch since dawn. Nothing was happening, there had been no sign of any insurgent activity in the last twenty hours.
The chair creaked as he leaned back, laying his hands in his lap. Behind him in the control room, Sergeant Dor was cleaning his bolter, cloth and tools laid out on an instrumentation panel. Marko was also there, monitoring the communications station.