It was a decision that Bjorn might have made in their place. Fighting another Legion was an unsettling experience: they thought like he did, were as quick as he was and almost as familiar with the layout of his vessel. It was like fighting a mirror.
The Thousand Sons had been different. They’d already been half beaten once the Space Wolves had made planetfall, and their defence had been desperate and messily, confusedly defiant. The Alpha Legion had no such disadvantages: they were in better shape than the Wolves, better resourced and with the advantage of the initiative. They had coming looking for this fight, for reasons that even Russ hadn’t fathomed with any precision.
We understand so little – they hold all the cards. How has this been allowed to happen?
Bjorn reached the end of the corridor and burst through the doors into a massive, half-ruined vault. Octagonal walls soared up into the darkness, enclosing a shaft over a hundred metres high. In the centre stood a principal power-relay for the sub-warp drives – a hulking spire of pipe-webbed ironwork and glowing plasma conduits. It jutted up into the roof-space in a grotesque thrust of industrial majesty, wreathed in forks of electrical discharge that sent streaks of lightning dancing across the chamber.
Bjorn’s helm display gave him five targets, each in scale-patterned power armour, each knee-deep in corpses and charred engine components. The enginarium defence crew were down to a few dozen mortal warriors, hunkered down behind whatever cover they could find and firing furiously.
‘Hjolda!’ roared Godsmote, thundering across the pipework floor towards the closest Alpha Legionnaire. The pack fanned out in his wake, aiming with precision, adding to the furious volley of shells already ricocheting off the enemy’s power armour.
Bjorn was faster. He raced across the chamber, veering around piles of debris and swaying through the bolts loosed at him by the legionaries. Two shots connected – one glancing off his pauldron, the other cracking his vambrace. That made him stagger, but not lose speed.
‘Heidur Rus!’ he bellowed, feeling spittle lace the inside of his helm.
This was his ship, his environment. Everything about it – the shouts of guttural Fenrisian from the warriors, the stink of oil, brazier-coals and blood-wet pelts, the savage aspect of the raw, unfinished ironwork – was home ground. Such things were important.
He crashed straight into combat, trading blows with Blódbringer and knocking the first Alpha Legionnaire back a pace. From the corner of his eye he caught Urth tearing into another; Angvar had fallen back and opened fire with his bolter.
‘This is no place for you,’ Bjorn snarled, working his axe blade with fury, giving the legionary no time to do anything other than parry. ‘Traitor.’
The enemy said nothing – no taunts, no jibes. His masked helm was blank and unmarked. He fought expertly, swiftly, countering the axe blade with a disruptor-shrouded gladius. When the weapons clanged together, the energy fields snarled and spat, sending throbbing vibrations down Bjorn’s arm.
Blood raged thickly around his system, fuelling a hot burn behind his eyes. He hated the warrior before him: he hated his silent efficiency, he hated his brazen effrontery in coming to his ship, and above all he hated the lack of explanation.
Why are they doing this? Why are they here?
They clashed again, blades ringing from the impact, both swung with equal strength. Bjorn’s hatred was the only difference between them, and in the end that made the difference – his blows were fractionally wilder, fractionally harder to predict.
‘Allfather!’ he roared as Blódbringer plunged down a final time, cutting through the legionary’s last, hasty defence and biting deep into armour-cables. The energy-field tore through them, issuing a hiss of escaping gases, swiftly mingled with an aerosol spray of blood. Bjorn dragged the blade in deeper, severing the warrior’s neck in a froth of mingled gore and coolant. The Space Marine crumpled, gasping for a breath that would now never come.
By then Bjorn was already moving, leaping over the twitching corpse and seeking new prey. Godsmote and the others were busy with their own fights, locking the enemy down on the chamber floor amid the echoing clash of hard weapons-fire.
The last Alpha Legionnaire had broken free of the battle, racing over to the power-spire and leaping up at it, lit gaudily by flickering blades of arc-lightning. Bjorn went after him, mag-locking his axe and sprinting to the base. The two of them clambered up the filigree of pipes, racing up it like rats on a hawser.
A bolter-blown rupture in the spire’s outer shell yawned above them, revealing a glowing grille that seethed and fizzed with barely contained energy. Forks of plasma lashed against the edges, silhouetting the approaching legionary and licking against the moving shadow of his power armour.
Bjorn pulled himself higher, hampered and made weaponless by his single functioning hand. The legionary was almost at the rupture, poised below the lip with his fist clutching a brace of krak grenades.
A full detonation could take the whole chamber out, dragging half the enginarium with it and leaving the Helridder crippled and drifting.
Bjorn halted, planting his boots solidly. Braced, he retrieved the axe from his back, hefted it, then threw.
The axe flew end over end before thunking solidly into the Alpha Legionnaire’s back. The edge pierced deep into his backpack, cracking open the protective housing that covered the suit’s power cabling, and the lines shorted with a burst of crackling discharge.
The legionary spasmed as if paralysed, suddenly inert and twitching. His grenades, unprimed, fell from his outstretched hands.
Bjorn hauled himself upwards, clambering level with his enemy. Robbed of a weapon, he curled his hand into a fist.
‘Get down,’ he snarled.
The Alpha Legionnaire could do nothing to avoid the blow – Bjorn’s gauntlet slammed into his helm-mask with the force of a forge-hammer, hurling him away from the spire’s flank to crash down upon the deck.
Bjorn leapt down after him, driving his armoured knee into the legionary’s stomach as he landed. Then he punched again, and again, smashing the warrior’s face until the eye-lenses were shattered and his head lolled back in a thick slough of blood.
Bjorn ripped the helm free, exposing a ruined and pulped face within. One eye had been torn from its socket and was little more than a well of bubbling blood. The legionary’s breaths came in a wet rattle.
‘Why?’ Bjorn hissed.
The Alpha Legionnaire looked barely conscious. His one functioning eye focused weakly on Bjorn, and something like a weary smile flickered across his bleeding gums.
Bjorn felt his rage flare. ‘How long were you planning this? Ullanor? Before?’
The legionary coughed up more blood. His eye lost its focus.
‘Do not die!’ roared Bjorn, grabbing him by his charred scalp and rocking his head back and forth. ‘Why are you here? Give me a reason!’
He wanted to hurt him, to pour out some of the agony of betrayal, to inflict damage upon those who had ripped the Imperium open.
The legionary lost his smile. He didn’t laugh or spit defiance or promise vengeance. He just lay there, slowly dying, his ruined face resigned.
It was then that Bjorn smelt it, the faint tang of nerve toxins, fast-acting, already in the blood. The warrior hadn’t planned on being taken alive.
I hate this Legion.
Bjorn lowered his helm towards the legionary’s face, as if inviting a confidential whisper. He could hear the last breaths of his victim, soft and untroubled.
‘Tell me, brother, just one thing.’ Bjorn spoke then as one warrior to another, desperate to extract something – anything – concrete. ‘Why are you doing this?’
At that the dying legionary looked regretful, as if he wished he could do better but protocol restrained him.
‘For the Emperor,’ he said weakly.
Then his eye rolled upwards and the thin breaths stopped.
Bjorn stared at him, baffled. Only slowly did he register that the
chamber around him was silent, save for the growl and crackle of the power-spire operating at full pitch. The fight was over.
Godsmote strode over to him, limping badly. His bolt pistol had been discarded and his chainsword was plasma-scorched.
‘I don’t like the way they fight,’ he rasped through damaged augmitters.
Bjorn said nothing. He clambered to his feet.
Godsmote looked down at the battered corpse on the floor. ‘Are you sure you need two hands?’ he asked, knocking his helm to try to get his vox-filters working properly again.
‘For the Emperor,’ murmured Bjorn. ‘Was that a joke?’
His comm-link activated. ‘If you’ve finished,’ came the shipmaster’s voice, ‘you may want to get back up here.’
‘Status,’ ordered Bjorn, starting to walk.
‘The fleet’s falling back,’ said the shipmaster. ‘Taking heavy fire on all fronts. They have more guns than us.’ He paused then, as if unwilling to go on. ‘And the Hrafnkel. I think they’ve crippled it.’
Bjorn started moving faster. ‘Do not fall back,’ he ordered. Russ had been on the flagship. ‘Hold course until I get there.’
A sigh came over the vox, as if the shipmaster had predicted such a command. ‘And what course would that be, lord?’
‘Direct for the Hrafnkel,’ Bjorn growled. ‘If it goes down, we go down with it.’
Above the serenely cleansed orb of Chondax, the darkness of space was beginning to fracture. One warship after another burned in close from the jump-points, gliding to a halt in high orbit above the White World, each one as immaculate as the planet below.
At the centre of the gathering hung the Swordstorm, as ornate as the old palaces of the Khitan emperors. Its hull bulged with the modified engine-coils that made it just about the fastest thing in the Imperium’s many battlefleets. Like all White Scars vessels it was kept in spotless condition, scoured and cleansed by armies of crawler-cherubs until it glowed in the velvet void like a jewel.
Beyond its escort perimeter waited other cruisers – the Tchin-Zar, the Lance of Heaven, the Qo-Fian, each one attended by a flock of smaller craft. Other V Legion task forces were spread across the galaxy in scattered bands, but only here on Chondax was the core strength of the Legion mustered, and it was a formidable sight.
Trying to get her head around the rapidly coalescing formations, Ilya hurried down the spinal corridor of the Swordstorm, heading from the main operations chamber toward the command bridge and strategium. Halji strode effortlessly beside her, matching her frantic pace with easy, languid strides.
‘Do we have word of the Uzan?’ she barked into her vox-bead. ‘What about the Kaljian?’
Responses came back in delayed bursts. Her liaison officers were getting much better, but they still found it difficult keeping account of the straggling set of Legion assets.
‘Kaljian is incoming,’ came an answer at last. ‘Nothing yet from the Uzan, or the Hawkstar. We will keep trying.’
Ilya spat out an old Terran curse, and Halji chuckled.
‘You have done well,’ he said approvingly. ‘I think Khagan will be pleased.’
‘He is never pleased,’ muttered Ilya. ‘Everything has to be faster, faster, faster. That’s all he thinks is important, but there’s more to deployment than speed.’
‘There is?’ asked Halji, looking interested.
‘Any more information on what this is all about?’ asked Ilya. ‘I could really use it.’
Halji’s dark face was apologetic. ‘You know as much as I do, szu. Some treachery has been enacted. I heard talk of Wolves of Fenris, which, if I am honest, would not surprise me.’
Ilya stopped walking for a minute. She was feeling a bit light-headed – the past few hours had been a non-stop flurry of orders and counter-orders with no respite. Ahead of her she could hear rapid footfalls as ship crew hurried to their stations.
‘Just what is it with you and the Wolves?’ she asked. ‘Every time they’re mentioned you go quiet.’
Halji gave her a wary look.
‘Seriously,’ said Ilya.
‘For me? There is no issue,’ said Halji, nonchalantly. ‘Their reputation goes before them.’
‘There’s more to it.’
Halji paused. ‘I am not sure it is easy to explain in way you will understand.’
‘Try me,’ said Ilya testily. ‘I’ve lived with you all for long enough.’
‘All Legions have reputations,’ Halji said, awkwardly. ‘Some… overlap. The Wolves boast of it. We have difficulties in past because of it. Others assume that we were the same. They see ritual marks, the scars, and make judgement.’ Halji winced as he spoke, as though he were ashamed of it all. ‘We are not savages. We do not wish to be seen as savages.’
Ilya laughed. ‘You’re… jealous?’
Halji looked stung. ‘That is not what I said.’
‘It was what you meant,’ smiled Ilya, shaking her head in amusement. The Scars were still capable of surprising her. ‘I would never have thought it – the Emperor’s perfect killing machines, and you’re still capable of envy.’
Halji turned away from her and started walking again, looking irritated. ‘I told you, hard to explain.’
‘You explained perfectly,’ said Ilya, trotting to keep up with him. ‘But what worries me is what happens next. If they’ve committed some crime, what are you going to do? Go after them? You’re right about one thing – they’ve got a reputation.’
Halji halted then and turned on her. His expression became uncharacteristically dark, like the sun filtering behind a cloudbank. ‘Listen to me,’ he said firmly. ‘We may not be “executioners” or “world eaters” or “the perfect”, but we are what we are. We have never demanded respect from anyone, and if they know nothing of us then that is their loss, because we know about them. We are faster – we move faster, kill faster. They are brothers, but if Russ has committed crime then the Khagan will swat him aside like ragged dog he is. Have you ever seen our primarch fight? That is perfection.’
Ilya stared back at him, startled. Halji almost never raised his voice, but now it shook with fervour.
They resent it so much, this disregard, she thought, and yet they will not change. But then, why should they?
She bowed in apology. ‘I was not speaking seriously, Halji. I have offended you. I’m sorry.’
Halji shook his dark-skinned head dismissively. ‘The fault is mine. I should not be troubled by it.’
Ilya looked up at him thoughtfully. The sigils and devices that had once seemed so alien to her – tribal marks, jagged-edged brotherhood kill tallies – were now a part of her own life. If she stayed with the Legion much longer then she might even come to understand their mindset. A bit longer still, and she would start to share their resentments.
‘So will it come to that?’ she asked, seriously this time. ‘Will the Khan take on the Wolf?’
Halji started walking again. ‘Loyalty matters,’ he said flatly. ‘If Warmaster orders it, how could he not?’
The Hrafnkel wallowed in a torrent of incoming fire, slewing amidst a silent cloud of las-beams and torpedo trails. The mighty guns still returned volleys, lighting up its gunmetal flanks in flashes of sudden brilliance. The corpses of a dozen vessels circled it like moons around a planet, their shells hollowed out by the vast explosions that had ended them.
The flagship was pulling back towards the beleaguered core of the Space Wolves fleet now, its escorts gone and its shields flickering out. A typically rash plunge into the heart of the battle-sphere had brutalised its magnificent outline, despite the carnage it had caused on the way in.
It was isolated, out of position, exposed. Those Alpha Legion warships that had withstood its initial charge were now returning fire in organised volleys, staying at long range and peppering the crippled beast with lance strikes.
Bjorn watched the carnage though the realview blisters on the Helridder’s bridge. Every impact on the flagship’s broken hull felt
like a strike at his own heart. He’d seen boarding torpedoes loosed, just as they had been against his own frigate. The Alpha Legion’s skill with those Hel-damned things was phenomenal.
‘Bring us in close, shipmaster,’ Bjorn commanded.
The Helridder wasn’t the only ship burning towards the crippled Hrafnkel – attack craft from both fleets had scented blood and were racing into position. The Alpha Legion warships came in waves, ramping up the volume of incoming fire; the Wolves vessels responded with increasing desperation, hurling their already damaged hulls into the path of the withering barrage.
‘We won’t last long in this,’ replied the shipmaster. His voice betrayed no fear, just a blunt openness to the facts.
‘That is understood. What’s the Hrafnkel’s status?’
‘Void shields are down, though it’s still got power and lances. We’ve tracked repeated boarding impacts.’
Bjorn looked out at the incoming ranks of Alpha Legion warships, most of which outgunned the Helridder by an uncomfortable margin. His ship might divert some fire from the flagship for a while, but he guessed it would be a painfully short respite.
‘They’ve landed hundreds,’ observed Godsmote, looking at the sensor readings streaming in from the flagship.
Bjorn nodded. ‘That’s the fight we need to be in.’ He licked his tongue along his fangs, feeling a faint acid-tang. ‘This seems to be the day for torpedoes. Time to show them how good our aim is.’ He turned to the master. ‘Wait until we’re away, then take the ship into the Alpha Legion firing line and do what damage you can. You know what that means?’
The shipmaster looked up at him, his grizzled Fenrisian face defiant. ‘The Hand of Russ be with you, lord.’
Bjorn bowed respectfully. ‘Until next winter.’
Godsmote, Eunwald, Angvar, Urth and Ferith were already itching to go – Bjorn could sense their kill-pheromones, as rich and animalistic as predator-musk, and they fed into his own.
Horus Heresy: Scars Page 9