Battle for the Abyss

by Ben Counter

  Ripping away the last barrier of shielding, now several metres below the surface of the engineering deck, he passed the threshold of the reactor core’s inner chamber. A blast of intense heat struck him at once, his armour blistering before its fury, and for a moment the wolf recoiled. A deep cone fell away from a narrow platform over which the Space Wolf was perched. Hot wind, boiled up by the lake of liquid fire churning at the nadir of the cone, whipped his hair. Brynngar felt it burning, his skin too, as the intense radiation ravaged his flesh.

  Beautiful, he thought as he regarded the glowing reactor mass below: raw, incandescent energy that boiled and thrashed like a captured thunderhead.

  Priming the melta bombs around his waist, the Space Wolf closed his eyes. It was a hundred-metre drop down into the reactor core. Its smooth, angled walls were bathed in light.

  Brynngar stepped off the narrow platform and fell. The first explosion was like a thunderclap.

  Storms ravaged the platinum sky as Brynngar stood upon the edge of the silver Fenrisian ocean. The tide was high and the waves crashed against the icebergs, shattering the ice-flows with pounding surf. He was dressed in only a loincloth, with his knife tucked into a leather belt and his baleen spear thrust into the hard-packed snow. Out beyond the glowing horizon, there was a keening echo. The great orca was calling to him.

  Brynngar took his spear and dived into the ice-cold waters. Light was rising on the horizon, the storm receding. As he swam, he felt a strange sensation. It felt as if he was going home.

  THE SUDDEN RELEASE of explosive power rippled through the main reactor. The conical structure ruptured and the plasma roared out. It fell in a massive fountain of fire, drenching the whole reactor section in a monstrous burning rain. Bolts of it punched through machinery and walkways, and through the bodies of Zadkiel’s warriors. Secondary explosions tore up from the minor reactors as a terrible chain reaction took hold. There was a deep and sonorous crump of force as one of the engines shattered apart with the backwash of energy.

  A chunk of reactor housing shot like a missile right through the main chamber of reactor seven, which echoed the explosion with a huge expanding flood of ignited plasma. Emergency systems slammed into place, but there was no way to seal the breach when plasma was free and expanding within the hull.

  Reactors two and eight were breached, emptying their plasma into the reactor section’s depths. The hapless menials still at work in the labyrinth were devoured in the sudden flood. The level of plasma reached the base of reactor seven, which blew its top, throwing a second burst into the air like a vast azure fountain.

  Heat-expanded air ripped bulkheads open. The hull gave way, the inner skins breaching and filling with plasma before the outer hull was finally torn open and a black-red ribbon of vacuum-frozen fuel bubbled out of the Furious Abyss’s wounded flank.

  Zadkiel crawled away from the destruction as his ship began to destroy itself from within. He reached the portal, sealing it shut before the few survivors of his squad could get through. He watched, curious and detached, as a bolt of plasma fell like a comet and ripped the gantry apart on which they stood. Survival instincts got Zadkiel to his feet. Reaching the vox, he ordered the abandon ship and proceeded to head for the shuttle bays before it was too late.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Eve of battle

  Face-to-face

  Still we’ll fight

  THE BANNERS OF the Word Bearers, deep crimson with the emblems of the Legion’s Chapters, barely stirred in the artificial air of the Cloister of Contrition. Kor Phaeron knelt alone in front of the altar, which was crowned with the image of Lorgar, the Prophet of Colchis. The primarch’s image, carved from porphyry and marble, was brandishing the book in which he had first written the Word.

  The arch-commander was praying. It was this faith that set the Word Bearers apart. They understood its power. Lorgar had been an exemplar of what a man could achieve when he realised his full potential. Indeed, Lorgar had become much more even than that. Each Word Bearer prayed to commune with himself, with the forces of the universe, to discover the means to unlock their latent strength so that they might use it to do the work of Lorgar. On the eve of battle, it was prayer that made the Word Bearers ready.

  Footsteps echoed through the cloisters. It was a place of worship large enough to house three Chapters of battle-brothers, or all of the Infidus Imperator’s crew, and the echoes lasted for several seconds.

  ‘I am at prayer,’ Kor Phaeron told the intruder, the powerful cadence of his deep voice exacerbated by the acoustics of the temple.

  ‘My lord, we have received no signal,’ came the disembodied reply.

  It was Tenaebron, Chapter Master of the Void.

  ‘Nothing?’ asked Kor Phaeron, incredulity masking his anger as he turned to look upon his subordinate.

  ‘The supplicants on the Furious Abyss were activated,’ replied Tenaebron, ‘and some time after, a psychic flare was detected: very powerful.’

  ‘Formaska?’

  ‘Assuredly not, Lord Kor Phaeron.’

  The arch-commander stood up. Bareheaded, he was resplendent in his prayer vestments and towered over the Chapter Master. ‘You must be certain of this, Tenaebron,’ he said, a warning implicit in his tone.

  ‘Formaska still exists,’ the Chapter Master replied. Compared to most Astartes he looked old and weak, and some who did not know the Legion’s ways might have thought he was a veteran, half-crippled in body, whose role was to advise and lead from afar. In truth, his small wet eyes and sagging, mournful face concealed a warrior’s soul, which he could back up with the force staff scabbarded on his back and the inferno pistol at his side. Even that was of little significance compared to the horrible injuries that Tenaebron could inflict on an enemy’s mind.

  ‘Zadkiel has failed,’ he added unnecessarily.

  Kor Phaeron thought for a moment, turning back to the altar as if the statue of Lorgar could advise him.

  ‘Follow,’ he said at length, and marched towards the great doors at the far end of the cloister. Kor Phaeron threw them open.

  Hundreds of Word Bearers knelt in prayer, by the light of a thousand braziers, filling the cathedral to which the Cloisters of Contrition adjoined. Each one was deep in his prayers, seeking some greater self within him that could win this fight in the name of Lorgar and seal the truth of the Word. Almost the entire muster of the Chapter of the Opening Eye, that which was being transported by the Infidus Imperator, was assembled, with Chapter Master Faerskarel in the front row.

  Faerskarel stood up and saluted at the arch commander’s approach. ‘Lord Kor Phaeron,’ he said, ‘is it time?’

  ‘Zadkiel has failed,’ said Kor Phaeron. ‘Soon the fleet’s presence will be revealed and Calth will be waiting for us. It is time. This will not be the massacre of which we have spoken. This will be a fight to the end, and Calth will not give up its victory easily. We must wrest it from the enemy as we have always done.’

  Faerskarel said nothing, but turned to his Word Bearers, who stood to attention as one.

  ‘Word Bearers!’ shouted Kor Phaeron. ‘To your drop pods and gunships! Now is the time for war, for victory and death! Arm and say your final prayers, for the Ultramarines are waiting!’

  CESTUS REACHED THE shuttle bay quickly. In the ensuing panic once the abandon ship had been declared, few enemies opposed him. Those that did were mainly zealous ratings or blood-hungry menials and he despatched them with bolt and blade.

  The deck beneath the Ultramarine shuddered and lurched to the side and, for a moment, Cestus struggled to keep his feet. He heard the first of the explosions from the main reactor as they’d ravaged the ship. Now, further internal detonations were erupting across all decks as the chain reaction set in place by Brynngar’s sacrifice tore the Furious Abyss apart.

  The rest of the crew, the cohorts of Word Bearers and the officers of the bridge, had yet to reach the bay. As plumes of fire spat up from the bowels of the ship like white-orange jets thr
ough the deck, and the infrastructure of the shuttle bay disintegrated around him, Cestus doubted that they ever would.

  Crossing the metal plaza of the bay was like running a gauntlet, as vessels exploded in storms of shrapnel and debris fell like rain. Cestus saw a rating crushed beneath a hunk of fallen arch, the corpse’s hand still twitching in its death throes.

  Hundreds of small antechambers bled off from the main bay, each housing a quartet of shuttles, racked in a two by two arrangement. Cestus stepped into the first antechamber he could find that wasn’t wreathed in fire or sealed shut by wreckage.

  Stepping over the threshold, he saw a solitary figure lit up by the warning strobes set into the shuttle runways. It was gloomy in the chamber, but Cestus recognised the livery of the armour before him.

  ‘Word Bearer,’ he called out.

  The figure turned, about to step into the first shuttle, and regarded the Ultramarine coldly.

  ‘So you are the one who I am to thank for this,’ he said calmly, looking around the room as he opened his arms.

  Cestus returned the Word Bearer’s contempt and drew his power sword. The arcing lightning coursing down the blade lit the Ultramarine in a grim cast.

  ‘You are Zadkiel,’ Cestus said as if it were an accusation. ‘I thought the captain was meant to go down with his ship.’

  ‘That will not be my destiny,’ Zadkiel replied drawing his sword. Energy crackled down its blade too. It was longer and slightly thinner than the Ultramarine’s weapon, master crafted by some Martian artificer no doubt, the aesthetic flourishes added by a Legion artisan.

  ‘I have your destiny right here,’ Cestus promised him, and thought of Antiges slain in battle, his battle-brothers killed by the warp predators aboard the Wrathful; of Saphrax and his warriors smashed against the hull, their honour denied them; of Skraal and Brynngar sacrificed upon the altar of victory and hope. ‘This is where your words end.’

  ‘You are a fool, Ultramarine,’ snarled Zadkiel, ‘ignorant of the power of the galaxy. Gods walk among us, Astartes. Real gods! Not ghosts or ciphers or interloper aliens, but beings of true power, beings who pray back!’ Zadkiel’s eyes blazed suddenly with fervour.

  Cestus knew this was the religiosity for which the Emperor had once scolded Lorgar’s Legion. Zadkiel was a fanatic, all the Word Bearers were. It was all they had ever been. How could their duplicity and deception have gone unnoticed for so long?

  ‘We have spoken with them. They hear us!’ continued Zadkiel. ‘They see the future as we do. The warp is not just a sea for ignorant space-farers to drown in. It is another dimension far more wondrous than real space. Our reality is the shadow of the warp, not the other way around. Lorgar and the intelligences of the warp have the same vision. For the warp and our reality to become one, where the human mind has no limits! True enlightenment, Ultramarine! Can you imagine it?’

  ‘I can,’ Cestus said simply. There was pity in his eyes. ‘It is a nightmare and one doomed to fail.’ Zadkiel sniffed his contempt.

  ‘You underestimate the power of the Word,’ he scoffed.

  ‘Talk is cheap, fanatic,’ Cestus snarled, casting aside his helmet so that his enemy could see the face of his slayer, and launched himself at the Word Bearer.

  A massive energy flare lit the room in actinic radiation as the two power swords clashed: Cestus’s broad-bladed spartha versus Zadkiel’s rapier-like weapon.

  Sparks cascaded as the two Astartes raked down each other’s blades before withdrawing quickly. Cestus let anger fuel his blows and crafted an overhead cut that would cleave into the Word Bearer’s shoulder. Zadkiel foresaw the attack, though, and rolled aside, thrusting the tip of his blade into the Ultramarine’s thigh. Cestus grimaced as the tip went in and recoiled, swiping downward to force Zadkiel back.

  ‘I am an expert swordsman, Ultramarine,’ Zadkiel told him, goading his opponent carefully, ‘as martially skilled as any of the sons of Guilliman. You will not best me.’

  ‘Enough words,’ Cestus roared. ‘Act!’ He smashed his blade, two-handed, against Zadkiel’s defence. The Word Bearer wove away from the blow, using the Ultramarine’s momentum to overbalance him, forging his parry into a riposte that pierced Cestus’s shoulder beneath the pauldron. A second stinging blow cut a gash across the Ultramarine’s chest and he staggered back.

  Breathing hard, using the precious seconds his retreat had given him, Cestus sank into a low fighting posture and went to drive in beneath Zadkiel’s guard. The Word Bearer turned, casually avoiding the Ultramarine’s lunge and placing a fierce kick in his guts.

  Doubling over, Cestus felt a sharp pain in his side. There was a flash of blazing light, and he felt heat on his exposed skin as Zadkiel’s power sword came close. Searing agony filled his world utterly as the Word Bearer plunged the blade deep into the Ultramarine’s leg. Cestus fell to one knee, dizzy with pain. Another blow struck him in the chin. It felt like a punch, and he fell over onto his back.

  Cestus brought his blade up just in time as Zadkiel launched himself at him, lashing his rapier down against the Ultramarine’s improvised guard. It hovered near to Cestus’s face, his power sword the only thing preventing it from cutting his head clean off. All the while, the shuttle bay and the Furious Abyss disintegrated around them.

  ‘Give it up,’ hissed Zadkiel, pressing the blade ever closer to Cestus’s throat.

  ‘Never,’ the Ultramarine snarled back.

  ‘Calth is dead, Ultramarine!’ shouted Zadkiel. ‘Your Legion is doomed! Guilliman’s head will be mounted on the Crown of Colchis and paraded all the way to Terra! Nowhere is it written that one such as you can change the Word!’

  Once, when Cestus was a mere aspirant, one of hundreds drawn from the valleys of Macragge to be judged before the sons of Guilliman, he had scrambled up the steps of the Temple of Hera. He’d defied the whips of the previous year’s failed aspirants, who lashed at the youths as they tried to be the first to reach the top. He had hunted through the forests of the Valley of Laponis. He had learned there, not just that the weak gave up and the strong persevered; he had learned that at a far earlier age, or he would never have been considered an aspirant at all. He had learned that perseverance did not just make the difference between success and failure. It could change the test, and create victory where none had been possible. Will alone could change the universe. That was what made a mere man into an Ultramarine.

  It was will alone that allowed Cestus to throw off his attacker in the shuttle bay antechamber, crushing the ruin of Zadkiel’s severed fingers in his fist to loosen the Word Bearer’s hold. It was will alone that brought him to his feet, and will alone that made him cut Zadkiel’s sword, hand and all, from his wrist as he hefted it.

  Clutching the stump of his arm where Cestus had cleaved it, the Word Bearer got to his knees and bowed his head.

  ‘It means nothing, Ultramarine,’ he said with finality. ‘It is the beginning of the end for your kind.’

  ‘Yet, still we’ll fight,’ he said, and with a grunt Cestus cut off Zadkiel’s head.

  The Word Bearer’s lifeless body slid to the ground, as the rest of him rolled across the deck. Cestus sank to one knee beside him and found that he could no longer carry his sword. It clattered to the floor and the Ultramarine pressed his hand against his side. There was blood on his gauntlet. Zadkiel had struck him a mortal blow after all.

  Cestus laughed at the ludicrousness of it. It had felt like nothing more than a sting of metal, so innocuous, yet so deadly.

  The world was turning to fire around Cestus as he fell bodily beside Zadkiel. The sound of rending metal told him that the integrity of the shuttle antechamber would not hold for much longer.

  The Furious Abyss was all but destroyed, the plan for it to cripple the Legion in tatters. The thought gave Cestus some solace in the moments before he died. As his cooling blood pooled around him, he thought of Macragge and of glory, and was finally at peace, his duty ended at last in death.

  THIS CONCLUS
ION TO the Word is no conclusion at all, for it shall go on. The future as it is written is but the merest fraction of the wonders that will be unveiled by my vision. When mankind and the warp are one, when our souls are joined in an endless psychic sea, then the truth of reality will be open to all and we shall enter an aeon where even the most enlightened of us shall be revealed to have been groping in the darkness for some truth to sustain us.

  ‘Yes, the wonders I seek are but the beginning, and for our enemies, those who would defy the future and attempt to crush the hopes of our species, the pain is only just beginning too. Our enemies will fight, and they will lose, and destruction will be visited upon them, for it is written. Even beyond those first battles there is a purgatory of the soul that the most tormented of our foes cannot imagine. Yes, for those who will deny their place in the Word, these hateful birth pangs of the future will be but a splinter of their suffering.’

  — The Word of Lorgar