by Andy Smillie
‘Incoming!’ Drual motioned to the sky with his assault cannon, his other arm hanging limp at his side where a whipping blow from a beast’s tail had shattered armour and bone.
Zophal lifted his gaze. A pair of the four-winged beasts that had attacked them during their descent were swooping down from the clouds. ‘We are no easy meal,’ Zophal snarled. ‘Bring them death!’ The Chaplain’s crozius crackled as he activated its power cell and pointed to the avian beasts.
Drual’s assault cannon whined as it spun to firing speed, joined an instant later by Tilonas’s. The two Terminators opened fire, the barrels of their weapons burning hot as they spat an unceasing hail of shells towards the winged creatures. The first of the avians came apart in a crimson mist, ripped asunder by the heavy rounds. The second slammed into the earth, its wings perforated by fist-sized holes.
Zophal was on it an instant later, smashing his crozius through its skull.
‘They’re peeling off.’ Tilonas gestured to the beasts as they turned from the line, angling off towards the flanks.
‘Keep firing, and do not break the line.’ Zophal had yet to observe the creatures employing anything approaching tactical cunning: their attack had seemed hurried, desperate. But he was not willing to take the chance.
‘There!’ Drual shouted over the shrieking creatures.
‘Emperor’s blood,’ Tilonas whispered over the vox.
Zophal followed their gaze as the treeline ahead of them disappeared, smashed under a giant pair of clawed feet. A lumbering beast stood in the clearing it had made for itself. Supported by two huge hind legs, its forelimbs hung from its shoulders like a Terran primate’s. Three more of the beasts stomped into view. They were four times larger than anything the Flesh Tearers had faced so far, their serpentine eyes full of violent intent, dwarfing even the Dreadnought, Grigori.
Drual and Tilonas fired, but Zophal didn’t waste his ammunition, instead opening a vox channel to the Storm Eagles’ gunners. ‘Targets to my north. Engage.’
On the Chaplain’s command a fusillade of missiles streaked from the gunships. An instant later the monsters disappeared behind a halo of explosions. When the fire cleared, two lay in dirt, their corpses crushing dozens of smaller beasts. A blast from the Serrated Angel’s turbo laser flickered out to incinerate the third.
Zophal cursed; the fourth was untouched. Displaying a level of low cunning, it had taken shelter behind its kin, avoiding the Flesh Tearers weapons. ‘Fire again.’
‘Negative, Chaplain. We’re awaiting charge.’
Zophal growled, glancing around for a way to kill the beast. ‘Drual, Tilonas...’ He trailed off, catching sight of a lone warrior in Terminator armour racing towards the beast. The Chaplain didn’t need to check the ident-tag to know it was Amit.
Grigori stood in a crater of his own making, the teeth of the massive eviscerators he held in each powered hand choked with flesh and viscera. Broken corpses were piled around him like grisly sandbags. He strode over them, feeling a rush of cold satisfaction as he heard bone crack beneath his footfalls. For a son of Sanguinius, entombment in a Dreadnought was a great honour, and the cruellest of torments. He had been given the strength to serve long after his body had faded to atrophied mush. But to maim, to kill, while unable to feel the hot splatter of gore on his face made Grigori’s mind itch. Many Flesh Tearers had gone mad, succumbing to the darkest of rages while locked inside a sterile sarcophagus.
Blood. He tasted the familiar tang as a measure of the dead creature’s arterial fluid seeped through a channel in his armour to mix with the bio-fluids sustaining him. The pain in his mind eased, the Thirst sated for the moment. Had Grigori still been able to articulate his facial muscles, he would have smiled. Emperor praise you, Cael. He gave thanks to the Techmarine who had engineered the complex structure of veins that made such relief possible.
The sensorium wired into Grigori’s sarcophagus threw up a slew of warning sigils as he crested the mound of bodies. An instant later, Amit flew past him, struck by the remaining beast. The Chapter Master’s body gouged a deep furrow in the earth as he slammed into the ground.
Angry data lit up Amit’s helmet display as he pushed himself to his feet. The blow had shorted out one of his chainfists and cracked his breastplate. Blood ran from his nose and his teeth felt loose in his mouth. He snarled, glaring up at the gargantuan beast as it crushed some of Sergeant Dael’s squad under its feet. ‘Grigori, let us kill that thing.’
The hydraulics and pistons in Grigori’s legs resounded like heavy bolter fire as he cast aside a twitching creature and powered towards the giant beast. It turned to meet him, opening its mouth and lowering its head to devour him. Grigori didn’t slow, firing a salvo from his frag launchers up into its face. The beast roared, closing its eyes and reeling away from the cloud of explosives. Grigori ploughed into it, thrusting his eviscerators into its abdomen. The beast bawled in pain, smashing its head down into Grigori. The Dreadnought stumbled backwards under the impact, unable to recover in time to avoid the beast’s jaws as they snapped closed around him. Warning icons scrolled across Grigori’s display as the beast’s metres-long incisors punctured his adamantium shell and damaged his power plant. Without it, it would not be long before the final death claimed him.
‘You die first!’ Grigori roared. Amplified by his sarcophagus’s audio casters, the sound was more terrible than the roar of any beast. Activating his flamers, Grigori sent a gout of superheated promethium into the wounds he’d carved in the beast’s abdomen, roasting its innards. The beast staggered backwards, smoke bleeding from its wounds as traces of its organs dribbled down its skin like milky bile. Grigori paced backwards, using what remained of his power to draw the beast after him and towards the Vengeance, and Amit.
Amit grunted with effort as he climbed up the Vengeance, driving his fist and boots into its armoured flanks for purchase. If it hadn’t been for the protection offered by his bulky Terminator armour, he would not have survived the blow the creature had dealt him. But hanging from the Vengeance, his muscles burning with effort, he missed the relative flexibility of power armour.
With a final snarl of effort, Amit pulled himself up onto the wing as Grigori passed beneath it, the beast a pace behind him.
‘Sanguinius feast on your soul!’ Amit roared, leaping from the Thunderhawk, and punching out with his functioning chainfist to impale himself upon the beast’s torso. He swung his other hand up, his power gauntlet crackling with energy as he dug his fingers into the beast and ripped open its flesh. Grunting with effort, he pushed a pair of melta-charges inside its body and activated his chainfist. Driven by Amit’s weight, the weapon’s teeth tore down through the beast’s side, lowering the Chapter Master towards the earth. The beast thrashed wildly in a vain attempt to dislodge him as he maimed its flank. It staggered but did not fall, turning its eyes on the Chapter Master and issuing a final roar as the melta-charges detonated.
The blast threw Amit clear, hurling him into the side of the Vengeance with enough force to shatter the armoured glass of the cockpit. He thudded to the ground as the beast’s body came apart, burying him in slabs of cooked meat and boiled blood.
‘Even we have our limits, brother. Though as with all truths, there are those who would cry this false. The ignorant of humanity believe us to be gods, worshipping us as divine beings of impossible power, who bring hope and terror in equal measure. But there is no mercy in our hearts, brother. Salvation does not run in our veins.
‘But the Rage, the Rage knows no limit. Some think we clad the damned in black to mourn their passing. But that is to misunderstand our purpose. We are angels of fury and violence. We are wrath and we are death, and nothing more. In the last moments of life we embrace the darkness, for there is no light after death, no forgiveness, only the blackness of rage and the absolution of death.
‘For only in death does duty end.’
THREE
CONQUEST
‘Can you move?’ asked Cassiel, grimacing as he pulled a barbed tooth from his bicep.
Behind him, Hamied sat with his back to a wall of earth, his hands clasped against his abdomen, blood seeping between his fingers. ‘Well enough.’ Hamied paused. ‘But I cannot carry the sergeant.’
Cassiel snorted as he glanced down at Asmodel. The sergeant was still unconscious, dried saliva caking his mouth.
‘We have both bled to get him this far, brother. Do not make it for nothing,’ said Hamied.
‘Emperor damn you, Hamied,’ Cassiel growled, hoisting Asmodel over his shoulders. ‘Let’s get this over with.’
Hamied winced as he got to his feet, following Cassiel over the crest of the firing pit towards the trench line.
A thick cloud of dust hung in the air, thrown up by the mines when they’d detonated.
‘I can’t see a thing,’ Cassiel said, stumbling on the uneven ground as he negotiated a section of razorwire.
‘It’s this way,’ said Hamied, stepping ahead of him.
‘How can you be certain?’
‘There’s fuel leaking from one of the Thunderhawks. Can’t you smell it?’
Cassiel gestured to his broken nose. ‘No.’
The two Scouts pressed on, ignoring the occasional bark of a bolter that sounded from the middle distance. No Flesh Tearer would show such restraint in battle. A single round was the mark of an execution. Every gunshot was the end of a life, a wounded creature being put to death or, Cassiel felt his jaw tighten, one of his brothers receiving the Emperor’s mercy.
Cassiel stopped walking as they closed on the encampment proper.
It was in ruins.
The earthworks had been trampled by marauding beasts, the Flesh Tearers’ measured defence lines churned apart by claw and hoof. The Barbed Angel and the Blood Drinker had been reduced to smouldering wrecks, leaving the Mortis Wrath the only intact Storm Eagle. The three Thunderhawks had fared little better. Baal’s Fury was missing a wing, the Serrated Angel’s hull was scored by hundreds of deep lacerations, its ceramite coating chewed away by monstrous teeth, and the Vengeance’s engines had been beaten beyond recognition.
‘How under the sun of Baal are we supposed to get out of here now?’ Cassiel dropped to one knee, Asmodel’s bulk proving a strain for his battered body.
‘Leaving so soon, brother? You’ve only just arrived.’
Cassiel turned to find Bieil grinning at him.
The sergeant’s left arm was missing from the elbow and his Devastator markings were lost under the thick layer of soot covering his scorched armour. Cassiel felt a pang of guilt in his gut. Locked in combat with a long-snouted creature, and then driven into cover by a mass of retreating beasts, he and Hamied had been unable to reinforce Bieil and his squad. ‘It seems we weren’t the only ones to run into the locals,’ said Cassiel with a rueful smile.
‘So it would seem,’ Bieil answered, indicating the wounds covering Cassiel and Hamied. His smile faded as he noticed Asmodel.
Cassiel’s face hardened. ‘The Rage.’
‘Sanguinius keep him.’ Bieil clasped his hand to his breastplate in salute. ‘You’ll find Zophal to the south, by the Mortis Wrath.’
‘The Blood protects.’ Cassiel nodded his thanks.
Bieil looked away, gazing over the dozens of dismembered Flesh Tearers whose corpses were strewn in every direction, the red of their armour punctuating the dark earth like blood spatter. ‘Not today, brother.’
‘Leave me,’ Amit said to Iezalel, waving the approaching Apothecary away, and knelt down beside Grigori. Without power, the Dreadnought had collapsed onto his back. Lying motionless in the dirt, his armoured shell was now little more than a decorative tomb.
‘It’s been too long since we’ve had something worthy to kill,’ Grigori rasped through his armour’s damaged augmitters.
Amit said nothing.
‘Spare me your silence, brother. Your sorrow does neither of us any good. I have fought the Emperor’s wars for three lifetimes.’ Grigori’s voice softened as much as the antiquated casters allowed. ‘My death is long overdue.’
‘I could not have slain the beast without your help.’
‘Yes, you could.’
Amit smiled.
‘Take heart, brother. I die in crimson. Even after all these years, after all the blood I’ve spilled, the lives I’ve ended, the Rage has never been my master.’ Grigori’s voice began to distort, his vox-casters spitting static as his power became exhausted. With the last vestiges of his strength, he opened a secure vox channel to Amit. ‘There is hope for us yet, brother. There is hope for you.’
There were few who knew of Amit’s shame. Of the terrible Rage he had succumbed to and of those he had murdered. He had walked with the guilt since the days of the old Legion, since long before he had been reborn a tearer of flesh. The wolf blood still lingered on his tongue, his eidetic memory a cruel keeper of his hate. Yet, he had dared tell none of the truer shame, of the terror that haunted his dreams: that deep in his core, a darkness longed to sample its like again. ‘I hope, brother, that you are right.’
Grigori did not reply.
‘Chaplain.’ Cassiel eased Asmodel’s body onto the ground, and knelt before Zophal.
Zophal stood over a throng of dead Flesh Tearers, his black armour lost beneath a layer of gore. The corpses had been laid out in supplication to the heavens, arranged on their backs, arms spread wide by their sides, palms facing the sky. It was an old Baalite tradition, but one that, given the barbaric nature of the planet, seemed oddly appropriate.
‘Forgive me, Chaplain–’
Zophal paused in his ministrations, turning to regard Cassiel. ‘Forgiveness is for those who have failed. Have you failed, Scout?’
Cassiel felt his mouth run dry under Zophal’s gaze. ‘I...’ He struggled to speak, the suggestion of failure robbing the last of his strength. He looked up into the Chaplain’s unreadable eyes, finding neither solace nor damnation. ‘Brother-Sergeant Asmodel succumbed to the Rage,’ Cassiel continued, forcing his voice to rise above a whisper. ‘I would have killed him if not for Hamied.’ He motioned to the other Scout.
Zophal kept his eyes fixed on Cassiel. ‘But you did not.’
Cassiel didn’t answer, his brow creasing as he replayed the events of the previous days in his mind.
‘Even under threat of death, many do not find the strength to set aside their desires and do what they must. So I ask you again, neophyte. Have you failed in your duty to the Emperor and to the Chapter? Have you let weakness guide your actions?’
‘No, Chaplain. He has not.’ It was Hamied who spoke, his voice a crisp growl.
‘Then you have no need of my forgiveness.’ Zophal motioned for Cassiel to stand, and instructed two serfs to pick up Asmodel’s body. ‘You honour Asmodel by returning him to me.’
The two serfs shuffled Asmodel to a piece of wing fragment that stood in the ground, their augmented limbs whining under the sergeant’s weight.
‘You are a son of Sanguinius, a child birthed from wrath,’ Zophal said as the serfs fastened Asmodel to the wing with a length of chain. He leant close to the sergeant, gripping his jaw in his hand, and growled.
Asmodel awoke screaming, a tortured wail that degenerated into a hoarse roar. The chains rattled as he strained against them, his body convulsing in fits.
Zophal stepped away, unwrapping a bundle of cloth to reveal an ornate hand flamer. It snarled as he activated the igniter. ‘Daryn Asmodel, I armour you in darkness, for there is no light after death, only absolution.’ Zophal depressed the trigger, sending a gout of fire across Asmodel’s carapace.
Asmodel snarled, baying like a beast as the flames scorched his armour and blackened its surface.
‘The dead have no blood, and so we grant you ours.
’ Zophal finished the rite of Iranatus. ‘Repay us with the blood of the foe.’ Removing his gauntlet, he drew a blade across his palm, using his blood to daub a saltire on Asmodel’s shoulder guard.
‘It is done.’ Zophal turned to Cassiel. ‘Go now. Mourn the loss of your sergeant.’
Cassiel went to speak but found himself without words. Instead, he took one final look at the warrior who had been Asmodel. He walked on, mouthing a silent prayer to the Emperor that when death came for him he would still be clad in the crimson armour of a Flesh Tearer.
‘Contact, north,’ Barakiel rasped in Amit’s ear.
‘What now?’
‘Ident-tags... Brother-Sergeant Manakel, but...’
Amit growled as his damaged comm-feed hissed, burying Barakiel’s voice in static. ‘Drual, Tilonas, with me.’
Flanked by the two veterans, Amit crossed the northern defences and joined Barakiel. The captain said nothing as Amit approached, his gaze fixed on the kill-clearing Bieil and his warriors had reclaimed from the forest. Amit followed his gaze – the kilometre of land was no longer clear.
‘By the Throne...’ Tilonas slowed to a stop.
‘I don’t think we brought enough ammunition,’ said Drual, reflexively bracing himself for firing.
Amit said nothing as he studied the thousands of barbarian humans, clothed in torn animal hides and dyed skins standing in serried ranks behind Sergeant Manakel. Most of the warriors carried a flint spear and a rough-hewn blade. They appeared to have given no thought to defence, only attack. The remainder held aloft crude standards: skin banners, stretched across frames of bone and wood, emblazoned with the Flesh Tearers Chapter symbol.
Drual growled low as he sniffed the air. ‘That’s not plant dye,’ he said, indicating the saltires splashed across the warriors’ chests.
Gesturing for the barbarians to remain where they were, Manakel approached his Chapter Master. ‘I allowed no man to follow who would not bleed for the Chapter,’ said Manakel as he knelt before Amit. Behind him, his army of barbarians did likewise. ‘It is good to see you again, Chapter Master.’