by Ben Counter
Zadkiel allowed himself a thin smile.
‘THE FIGHTERS ARE lost,’ said Vorlov. His face was ruddy with frustration as it glowered out of the viewscreen on the bridge of the Wrathful.
Almost to a man, the crewmen of the ship were watching Captain Vorlov’s report of the total failure of the attack run.
‘What, all of them?’ asked Admiral Kaminska.
‘Twenty per cent are en route back to the Boundless,’ said Vorlov. ‘The rest are gone. Our crews turned on each other.’
‘You think this was a psychic attack, captain?’ asked Cestus, suddenly glad that Brynngar was off the bridge.
‘Yes, lord, I do,’ Vorlov breathed, fear edging his voice.
This was a worrying development. All the Legions knew full well what had been decided on Nikaea, and the censure imposed by the Emperor on dabbling in the infernal powers of the warp and the use of sorcery. The Ultramarine turned to Admiral Kaminska.
‘What of our remaining escorts?’
‘Captain Ulargo on the Fireblade is leading them in,’ she replied. ‘No problems so far.’
Cestus nodded, processing everything unfolding on the bridge.
‘Maintain lance barrage from the Wrathful and the Waning Moon. Captain Vorlov, add the Boundless’s from distance and let the escorts engage. No ship, however massive, can withstand such a concentrated assault.’
‘At your command, my lord,’ Vorlov returned. Cestus turned to regard Kaminska, seething at her command throne. ‘As you wish, captain,’ she responded coolly.
THE FIREBLADE STITCHED the first volleys of lance fire down against the upper hull of the Furious Abyss. It had nothing like the firepower of the fleet’s cruisers, but up close it could pick its targets, and each lance fired independently to blast off hull plates and shear turrets from their emplacements with fat bursts. Defensive guns retaliated in kind and shots blistered against the Fireblade’s shields, some making it through to the escort’s dark green hull. The Fireblade twisted out of arcs of fire and sent a chain of incendiaries hammering down into the dorsal turret arrays. Silent explosions blossomed and were swallowed by the void, leaving glittering sprays of wreckage like silver fountains.
The Fireblade’s hull was resplendent with kill markings and battle honours. It had done this many times before. It was small, but it was agile and packed a harder punch than its size suggested. Behind it was the Ferox, its younger sister ship, using the heat signatures of the Fireblade’s strikes to throw bombs and las-blasts through the tears opened up in the upper hull.
The Fireblade finished its first run and corkscrewed up over the Furious’s engine housings, letting the heat wash of the battleship’s engines lend a hand in catapulting it void-wards before it lined up for another pass.
Below the two escorts, the last of the squadron, now just the Ferocious with the dramatic and sudden demise of the Fearless, was making its run along the underside of the massive vessel, pouring destruction into the ventral turrets. All three remaining escorts came under fierce fire, but their shields and hull armour held, their speed too great to allow a significant number of defensive turrets to bear at once and combine their efforts.
Captain Ulargo, at the helm of the Fireblade, commented to his fellow escort captains that the Word Bearers appeared to want to die.
ANOTHER BROADSIDE THUNDERED from the Waning Moon as the strike cruiser turned elegantly, keeping level with the Furious Abyss’s prow. The void was sucking fire out of the prow, so it looked like the head of a fire-breathing monster made of smouldering metal.
The enormous book that served as the ship’s figurehead was intact. Slowly, silently, the metal book cracked open and folded outwards.
The massive bore of a gun emerged from behind it.
The end of the barrel glowed red as reactors towards the rear of the ship opened up plasma conduits to the prow and the weapon’s capacitors filled. Licks of blue flame ran over the ruined prow, ignited by the sheer force of the building energy.
The prow cannon fired. A white beam leapt from the Furious Abyss. At the same time thrusters kicked in, rotating the Furious a couple of degrees so that the short-lived beam played across the void in front of it.
It struck the Waning Moon just fore of the engines. Vaporised metal formed a billowing white cloud, like steam, condensing into a silver shower of re-solidified matter. Secondary explosions led the beam as it scored across the strike cruiser’s hull, until finally it was lost in the shower of debris and vapour as its energy expended and the glowing barrel began to cool down in the vacuum.
Further explosions rippled across the Waning Moon in the wake of the crippling barrage, and the rear third of the strike cruiser was sheared clean off.
SIX
The void
Squadron disengage
A way with words
THE PACE OF space battles was glacially slow. Even when seen through viewscreens it was carried out at extreme ranges, with laser battery salvoes taking seconds to crawl across the blackness.
The battle had been raging for over an hour when the cannon on the prow of the Furious Abyss fired its maiden shot. The broadside from the Waning Moon had crossed a gulf of several hundred kilometres before impacting on the enemy ship’s prow and that had been point-blank by the standards of ship-to-ship warfare. The Boundless’s fighter wings had flown distances that would have taken them across continents on a planet’s surface.
When something happened quickly, it was a sudden, jarring occurrence that threw everything else out of kilter. The slow ballet of a ship battle was broken by the discordant note of a rapid development, and all plans had to be re-founded in its wake. An event that could not be reacted to, that was over too quickly to change course or target, was a nightmare that many ship captains struggled to cope with.
It was unfortunate for the captains of the Imperial fleet, then, that the death of the Waning Moon happened very quickly indeed.
‘BY TITAN’S VALLEYS,’ gasped Admiral Kaminska on the bridge of the Wrathful. ‘What was that?’
The instruments on the bridge suddenly lit up as one as an intense flare of light filled the forward viewscreen.
‘Massive energy reading,’ came the confused reply from Helmsmistress Venkmyer. ‘Energy sensorium’s blind.’
‘Did the Waning Moon just go plasma-critical?’
‘There were no damage control signs that suggested major engine damage. They’d got the reactor-seven leak locked down. Maybe a weapons discharge?’
‘What weapon could do that?’
‘A plasma lance,’ replied Cestus.
Kaminska turned to face the Ultramarine, whose grim expression betrayed his emotions.
‘I did not know such a device had been wrought and fitted,’ he added.
The admiral’s initial shock turned to stern pragmatism.
‘My lord, if I am to risk my ship and the souls onboard, I would have you tell me what we are up against,’ she said, with no little consternation.
‘I have little idea,’ Cestus confessed, staring into the viewscreen, analysing and appraising tactical protocols in nanoseconds as he considered Kaminska’s question. ‘The Astartes are not privy to the secret works of the Mechanicum, admiral.’ The Ultramarine sensed the challenge from Kaminska, her growing discontent, and was determined to crush it. ‘Suffice to say that the plasma lance was developed as a direct fire close-range weapon for ship-to-ship combat. In any event, it matters not. Your orders are simple,’ said Cestus, turning his steely gaze upon Admiral Kaminska in an attempt to cow her veiled truculence. ‘We are to destroy that ship.’
‘They are Astartes aboard that ship, Cestus, our battle-brothers,’ Antiges said quietly. Until now, the fellow Ultramarine had been content to maintain his silence and keep his own council, but events were unfolding upon the bridge of the Wrathful and out in the wide, cold reaches of real space that he could not ignore.
‘I am aware of that, Antiges.’
‘But captain, to condemn them
to—’
‘My hand is forced,’ Cestus snarled, suddenly turning on Antiges. ‘Know your place, battle-brother! I am still your commanding officer.’
‘Of course, my captain.’ Antiges bowed slightly and averted his gaze from his fellow Ultramarine. ‘I would request to leave the bridge to inform Saphrax and the rest of the squad to prepare for a potential boarding action.’
Cestus’s face was set like stone. Antiges met it with a steely gaze of his own. ‘Granted.’ His captain’s curt response was icy. Antiges saluted, turned on his heel and left the bridge. Kaminska said nothing, only listened to what Cestus ordered next. ‘Raise Mhotep at once.’
The admiral turned to regard her helms-mate monitoring communications with the Waning Moon.
‘We cannot, sire,’ Kant replied. ‘The Waning Moon’s vox array is not operational.’
Kaminska swore beneath her breath, turning to the tactical display in the hope that a solution would present itself. All she saw was the massive enemy ship manoeuvring for a fresh assault against the Boundless.
‘Captain Vorlov,’ she barked into the vox, ‘this is the Wrathful. She’s heading for you next. Get out of there.’
There was a crackle of static and Vorlov’s voice replied, ‘What is this monster you have us hunting, Kaminska?’
There was a slight pause, and suddenly Kaminska looked very old as if the many juvenat treatments she’d undertaken to grant her such longevity had been stripped away.
‘I don’t know.’
‘I never thought I’d hear you at a loss for words,’ said Vorlov. ‘I’m breaking off and hitting warp distance. I suggest you do the same.’
Kaminska looked at Cestus. ‘Do we run?’
‘No,’ said Cestus. His jaw was set as he watched the debris from the Waning Moon rain in all directions as the ship’s hull split in two.
‘That’s what I thought. Helmsmistress Venkmyer, relay orders to engineering to make ready for full evasive.’
THE BRIDGE OF the Waning Moon was in ruins. Massive feedback had ripped through every helm. Crewmen had died as torrents of energy had hammered through their scalp sockets and into their brains. Others were burning in the wreckage of exploded cogitators. Some of them had got out, but there was little indication that anywhere on the ship was better off. There was smoke everywhere, and all sound was swamped by the agonising din of screaming metal from the rear of the ship. The ship’s spine was broken and it could no longer support its own structure. The Waning Moon’s movement was enough to force it apart with inertia.
The blast doors had buckled under the extreme damage inflicted upon the stricken vessel and would not open. Mhotep had drawn his scimitar and cut through them with ease, forcing his way out of the bridge.
Engineering was gone, simply gone. The last surviving readouts on the bridge had been tracking the engines as they spun away below the ship, ribbons of burning plasma and charred bodies spilling from the ship’s wounds like intestines.
No order had been given to abandon ship. Mhotep hadn’t needed to give it.
‘Captain, power is falling all across the ship,’ shouted Helms-mate Ramket, his voice warring against the din of internal explosions somewhere below decks.
‘We are beyond saving, helms-mate. Head for the starboard saviour pods immediately,’ Mhotep replied, noting the savage gash across Ramket’s forehead where he’d been struck by falling ship debris.
Ramket saluted and was about to turn and do as ordered when a sheet of fire rippled down the corridor, channelled through the Waning Moon’s remaining oxygen. It flowed over Mhotep in a coruscating wave, spilling against his armour as it was repelled. Warning runes within his helmet lens display flashed intense heat readings. Ramket had no such protection, and his scream died in his burning mouth as the skin was seared from his body. Smothered by fire, as if drowning, Ramket thundered against the deck in a heap of charred bone and flaming meat.
Mhotep forced his way through the closest access portal and hauled it shut against the blaze. The fire had caught on the seals of his armour and he patted them out with his gauntleted palm. He had emerged from the conflagration into one of the ship’s triage stations, where the wounded had been brought from the torpedo strikes on the gun decks. The injured were still lying in beds hooked up to respirators and life support cogitators. The orderlies were gone; ship regulations made no provision for bringing invalids along when abandoning ship.
They had given their lives to the Thousand Sons. They had known that they would die in service, one way or another. Mhotep ignored the dead and pressed on.
Beyond the triage station were crew quarters. Men and women were running everywhere. Normally, they would know exactly where to head in the event of an abandon ship, but the Waning Moon’s structure was coming apart and the closest saviour pods were wrecked. Some were already dead, crushed by chunks of torn metal crashing through the ceiling or thrown into fiery rents in the deck plates. In spite of the confusion, they stood aside instinctively to allow Mhotep clear passage. As an Astartes and their lord, his life was worth more man any of theirs.
‘Starboard saviour pods are still operational, captain,’ said one petty officer. Mhotep remembered his name as Lothek. He was just one of the many thousands of souls about to burn in the void.
Mhotep nodded an acknowledgement to the man. The Thousand Son’s own armour was still smouldering and he could feel points of hot pain at the elbow and knee joints, but he ignored them.
Abruptly, the crew quarters split in two, one side hauled sharply upwards in a scream of twisting metal. Lothek went with it, smashed up into the ceiling and turned to a grisly red paste before his mouth had even formed a terrified scream.
A huge section of the Waning Moon’s structure had collapsed and given way. Its inertia ripped it out of the ship’s belly and air shrieked from the widening gaps. Mhotep was staggered by the unexpected rupture and grabbed the frame of a door as air howled past him. He saw crewmen wrenched off their feet and dashed against torn deck plating that bent outwards like jagged, broken teeth. The tangled mass before him gave way and tumbled off into the void, over a dozen souls screaming silently as they went with it. Their eyes widened in panic even as they iced over. They gasped out breaths, or held them too long, and ruptured their lungs, spewing out ragged plumes of blood. Hitting space, their bodies froze in spasm, limbs held at awkward angles as they drifted away into the star-pocked darkness. The scene was bizarrely tranquil as Mhotep regarded it, the swathe of black-clad nothing silent and endless where distant constellations glittered dully and the faded luminescence of far off suns left a lambent glow in the false night.
Gravity gave way as the structure was violated.
Mhotep held on, armoured fingers making indentations in the metal, as the last gales of atmosphere hammered past. A corpse rolled and bumped against his armour, on its way to the void. It was Officer Ammon, his eyes red with burst veins.
They were dead: thousands all dead.
Mhotep felt some grim pride, knowing that, had they seen it would end this way, the crew would all still have given their lives to Magnus and the Thousand Sons. With no time for reverie, the Astartes pulled himself along the wall, finding handholds among shattered mosaics. With the air gone, the only sound was the groaning of the ship as it came apart, mumbling through its structure and up through the gauntlets of Mhotep’s armour. His armour was proof against the vacuum, but he could only survive for a limited time.
The same was not true of anyone else aboard ship.
Mhotep passed through the crew quarters. In the wake of its demise, the Waning Moon had become an eerily silent tomb of metal. As power relays failed, lights flashed intermittently, the illumination on some decks made only by crackling sparks. Gobbets of blood broke against Mhotep’s armour as he moved, and icy corpses bobbed with the dead gravity as if carried by an invisible ocean. The Astartes shoved tangled bodies aside, faces locked in frozen grimaces, as he fought his way to a pair of blast doors and open
ed them. The air was gone beyond them, too, and more crewmen floated in the corridor leading down to the saviour pod deck. One of them grasped at Mhotep’s arm as the Astartes went past him. It was a crewman who had emptied his lungs as the air boomed out and had, thus, managed to stay conscious. His eyes goggled madly. Mhotep swept him aside and carried on.
The starboard saviour pods were not far away, but the Thousand Son had to take a short detour first. Passing through a final corridor, he reached the reinforced blast door of his sanctum. Incredibly, the chamber still retained power, operating on a heavily protected, separate system from the rest of the ship. Mhotep inputted the runic access protocol and the door slid open. The oxygen that remained in the airtight sanctum started to pour out. Mhotep stepped over the threshold quickly and the door sealed shut behind him with a hiss of escaping pressure.
Ignoring the damage done to the precious artefacts within the room, Mhotep went straight to the extant sarcophagus at the back of the sanctum. Opening it with controlled urgency, he retrieved the short wand-stave from inside it and secured the item in a compartment in his armour. When Mhotep turned, about to head for the saviour pods, he saw a figure crushed beneath a fallen cry-glass cabinet. Shards of glass speared the figure’s robed body, and vital fluids trickled from its bloodless lips.
‘Sire?’ gasped Kalamar, using what little oxygen remained in the chamber.
Mhotep went to the ageing serf and knelt beside him.
‘For the glory of Magnus,’ Kalamar breathed when his lord was close.
Mhotep nodded.
‘You have served your master and this vessel well, old friend,’ the Astartes intoned and stood up again, ‘but your tenure is at an end.’
‘Spare my suffering, lord.’
‘I will,’ Mhotep replied, mustering what little compassion existed in his cold methodical nature and, drawing his bolt pistol, he shot Kalamar through the head.