by Guy Haley
‘Sub-group two, follow. Sub-group three, cover our advance.’ Lethicus made no effort to mask his vox for the time being. Let the traitors know they were coming.
They advanced to the sleeve’s inner door. Attempts to open it were unsuccessful, and Lethicus motioned the lascutters to work. Dazzling flashes flooded the corridor as intense, short-range coherent light sawed through the plasteel. Lethicus’ auto-senses darkened his helm lenses, rendering the red-lit corridor sinister. Gobbets of molten metal rolled and beaded atop one another as the Space Marines worked their tools down the door.
When they were three-quarters of the way through, Lethicus sent a coded signal to Caias. He received swift acknowledgment – three random blurts against the growl of the storm’s interference.
The lascutters snapped off. Brother Marbullo put his foot on the door. Lethicus nodded.
With a power-assisted kick, the breached airlock door fell inwards, bouncing off the floor and hitting the wall with a thump the Space Marines felt through their boots.
Lethicus reached through and shoved the floating door down.
The inner ring corridor was dark and empty.
‘Move on,’ said Lethicus. ‘Quickly.’
Squad Lethicus exited the docking sleeve and jogged their way down the main radial corridor of Relay Station Seven. There the fifteen of them divided into fire teams, Lethicus and the breaching squad taking point position as they approached the elevator. The others covered their comrades’ advance smoothly, using the bulky reinforcing stanchions of the corridor as cover.
Sergeant Lethicus kept a wary eye on his squad’s auto-senses input. So far there was no sign of the enemy. The vox-traffic had abruptly silenced as they had docked, short, nervy bursts coming thereafter. Lethicus hoped that Caias was right, and that there were only a few of the traitors aboard the station. If the obvious theoretical were the correct one then the enemy had been blind to their approach until the last minute, and were now deep in hiding.
They reached a chamber highlighted on Lethicus’ helm display as the origin of some of the vox-signals. Two Space Marines took up station either side of the door, Lethicus using battlesigns to order the door breached. The bulkhead was heavy, and took as long for the lascutters to cut through as the inner airlock had.
They heaved it aside while its edges still glowed with heat.
‘Clear!’ shouted Lethicus. He tossed in a couple of grenades. No air meant a minimal shockwave, but the explosion was fiercer than Lethicus expected, battering him with debris and flames that died as soon as they were born. He put up his breaching shield and threw himself in immediately in their wake.
He covered every angle with his gun as he entered. His fellows came after him. The grenades had torn holes in the walls. In the rents, ruptured optic bundles glowed like subterranean worms.
‘There’s no one here, sergeant.’
Lethicus let his shield drop a fraction, then fully. ‘Our grenade didn’t do that. That’s a crater from an anti-personnel mine,’ he said, pointing to a circular wound in the wall.
‘Sergeant.’ Brother Tilus motioned with his bolter.
Lethicus looked down. A severed head was wired to the floor. Mortal. It had taken damage from the blast, but enough remained to show that the skin had been flayed off prior to that, leaving a bloody mess of banded muscle and exposed teeth. The eyes remained, lidless and staring up with a terror that would never end. Part of a helm’s vox-mechanisms were wrapped around the skull.
‘A trap,’ Lethicus said. ‘A remote vox-relay. We will start in the centre, and work our way outwards. From now on, ignore all intelligence as to the enemy’s location unless you can verify it first-hand.’
Lethicus’ coded order chimed in Caias’ helmet. With a bound he led his sub-squad off the crenellated spine of the Probity. He experienced a fleeting thrill as looked downward into endless nothingness. Below the galactic plane the storm attenuated, and the stars glowed through its violent shrouds. The fringes of the galaxy were at his feet, the last few systems straggling into the incomprehensible infinities of the universe.
After all that Caias had seen and done in his life, it still amazed him to think that the brightest of those lights were distant galaxies. This far out in the east there were many to see. Caias wondered what wars raged there, if there was peace to be found anywhere at all. If brother could turn on brother as they had in the Imperium, he seriously doubted it. His propensity to make light of all things annoyed Lethicus, but it hid a great sorrow that the long stretches of forever held only war.
The dream of the Imperium was dead.
His auto-senses described an environment inimical to life. Outside of his battleplate he had a greater chance of surviving hard vacuum than a standard human, but it was still barely a chance. They had to cross the gulf between ship and station quickly. A mental command swivelled his backpack’s stabilisation nozzles backwards. Another sent a hiss of gas from each that propelled him across the narrow gap to the station. Using the nozzles as manoeuvring jets, Caias’ squad flew carefully across the void. All Caias’ group wore Mark III plate with void harnesses. Even so, the spacing between the nozzles on that particular variant’s power pack was not the most ideal for hard void work, and he regretted the limited range of equipment kept on ships the size of Probity.
The station appeared much bigger from outside than it had through the oculus. The antennae stretched out so far they became distorted by perspective. The pale plates of the main hull, so delicate-seeming before, became huge slabs tinted red by the warpstorm.
‘This is taking too long,’ he said to himself.
Caias let out another burst of gas from his backpack, lending him a dangerous speed. They were heading for the main segment. The interior there was far more expansive than that of the docking ring or central shaft, and densely packed with mechanisms. Detection was therefore less likely. As he raced towards the station he brought his feet up a moment before he hit. Impact shock reverberated around his armour as his boots connected. His mass wished to continue its movement, and he swayed, but held position, maglocking himself into place. His brothers joined him, all of them gaining firm footholds. The long corridor to the Probity where Lethicus advanced stretched out beneath them. Their destination was elsewhere.
Caias pulled his bolter from his thigh and directed his warriors forward. Secrecy was of the essence, and he dared not use the vox. Moving as stealthily as they could, they made their way around the station’s exterior to the far side. There was no damage, he noted. Whatever their enemy had done to sabotage the station’s relay was internal. If the traitors had intended to call for help, he could not formulate a theoretical that would make it advantageous for them to knock out the main emitter.
Lethicus’ misgivings began to trouble him.
Secreted high up on the antennae of the station, Kellenkir watched a small group of Ultramarines exit an armoured hatch on the spine of their vessel. There were five of them, a paltry number, yet among the immensity of the Probity’s dorsal armaments their foe appeared oddly large. Blocky figures, as square as industrial units, and huge. Why had it taken so long for the scales to fall from his eyes? Nothing like that could be called human. They were no longer men at all, but something far worse.
‘We are machines in the manufactories of war,’ hissed Kellenkir.
‘What?’ said Kellendvar irritably.
‘A thought.’
‘Then silence your thoughts, brother, you risk betraying our presence. The ambush will be ruined.’ Kellendvar squatted on a thick plasteel band binding the antennae array together. His head was level with Kellenkir’s boots. It would be a small thing for Kellenkir to reach down and bury his combat blade in his neck. Mark IV armour was so vulnerable that way. He imagined the grind of the point as it parted the metallised seal, the change in pressure as it pierced flesh and parted bone. It would be a mercy to end him. He should have done i
t long ago. The thought had crossed his mind many, many times. Daily when they had lived in terror of the meat gangs of the deeper darks of Nostramo, and despair had its claws in him.
He had not killed his little brother then. He could not do it now. Kellenkir examined his reasoning dispassionately. There was no good purpose in staying his hand. No matter what either of them did, his brother would suffer as all thinking creatures must. They had suffered so much, and still Kellendvar did not see. Perhaps, one day, Kellenkir would teach him the truth. It would be a mercy.
Fratricide darted from his mind, back to its hiding place in the dark of his soul.
‘They cannot hear us,’ said Kellenkir with chilling certainty. ‘Why must we keep up this pretence of soldiering? I am a hunter, and I know when my prey cannot see me.’
The warriors hidden around them stirred at the breach in vox-protocol.
‘You risk angering Skraivok.’
‘Damn him,’ growled Kellenkir. ‘He cannot hear us. He is a coward, a painted popinjay noble’s brat, beholden to rules that no longer have relevance. Who is he to order one such as I? A dandy of the high families, born with a golden spoon in his mouth and a steel blade in his hand. He thinks himself our master. I could break him without a second thought. We pulled our way up hand over bloody hand from the depths of the night. When has he tested his mettle?’
‘In a hundred campaigns, brother. He is a worthy lord.’
‘There are no worthy lords!’ scoffed Kellenkir. ‘Listen to yourself, dogging his footsteps like a beaten cur hopeful of a kind hand. We have no allegiances. If we can break with the Emperor we can break with any. No command has any meaning. Skraivok has no authority over me.’
‘He is your master,’ said Kellendvar. The reflected turmoil of the Ruinstorm curled across the curved planes of his war-plate.
Kellenkir smiled at the undoing of order he saw within.
‘Death is my master,’ he said.
There was a gentle pop in Kellenkir’s ear as Kellendvar switched to a private vox-channel.
‘Why are you this way? What has got into you? You have become bitter, brother. We are free! Can you not revel in that sensation? We were taken from our home, used as tools for the ambition of a man from a distant world. But He misjudged us. The gifts He gave us are ours to use as we see fit. We shall be princes, you and I, and live a fine life! We will be masters, not slaves.’
Kellenkir laughed unpleasantly. ‘The Night Haunter has taught you nothing. There is no such thing as triumph. The primarch knows it to be an illusion – a cruel trick played by death to make us despair when our works come tumbling down around us. Death enjoys our suffering. The finer the life, the greater the anguish when its glories are revealed as false. A golden palace will not stop the creep of decay. No fortress wall is proof against those who would destroy you. If the first one thousand of your enemies fail to take your life, one will succeed. You have always seen a pattern to the universe. The Imperial Truth, the metronome of cause and effect. Lies! The truth of the world is out there, in the storm. It is chaos.’
‘You speak of death as if it is a god.’
‘Oh, little brother, the Imperial Truth contained so many lies. There are gods. Look into the storm, and you will see their faces.’
‘I do not care for such gods, if they exist,’ said Kellendvar. ‘They have dominion only over the hopeless, over the weak and those who whine about their fate. They have no hold over the strong. Let the Word Bearers chant and rave. I will live by my own talents.’
‘Death cares neither for gods nor men, nor their talents, brother. He will bring them all low in time.’
Kellendvar turned his face upwards. His lenses were gloomy blood-glows peering from the death’s head painted on his helm. Kellenkir caught a hint of eyes behind the armourglass, but otherwise the humanity of the man before him was entirely occluded.
He sensed his brother’s childish plea nonetheless.
‘Why did you give up?’ said Kellendvar.
It was the hopelessness of it that got at Kellenkir. He remembered little of his time before their induction to the Legion. Days of hiding and nights of blood, forever at the mercy of the strong – there was nothing there he wished to recall. But the rhythms of survival, the relentless horror of their day-to-day life, remained with him. He had a flash of Kellendvar as he had once been; a defiant, dirty child, starved to the point of emaciation, and utterly dependent on his older sibling.
Love was the greatest weakness of all, for it was that which stayed Kellenkir’s hand. Kellenkir’s mind bit at itself in vexation. He betrayed none of it.
Kellenkir broke eye contact. He looked down the length of the antennae at the figures crawling over the curved dome of the station until they disappeared from view.
‘Never say that to me again,’ Kellenkir said. ‘I have not given up. I see the truth, but I will not go easily. I have many lessons to teach, my brother, and will enlighten as many as I can before death takes me.’
Kellendvar ignored him.
‘They are out of sight,’ said Kellendvar. ‘We go now.’
Caias motioned for his men to stop. They drew up beside him and he pointed downward. They were now above one of the smaller docking ports, on the opposite side to the Night Lords saviour pod. They walked under the lip of the main structure then down the side of the central shaft.
The lesser docking ports were closer in to the station than the cargo ports. Designed for ship’s barques and lighters, the port below them had a minimal docking sleeve that stuck only a few metres out from the ring. Caias signalled to Brother Rovarius. The Space Marine maglocked his bolter to one leg and retrieved a melta bomb from his chest. He walked past his brothers, and placed the fusion device in the centre of the doors. Caias and his brothers took a few steps backward. Arming lights on the bomb blinked with increasing rapidity until they shone solidly, and it detonated. The miniature fusion generator enclosed in its shell activated for its first and final time, coring the door. Spheres of cooling metal gas drifted away from the station.
Caias’ group went to the airlock. Caias himself pushed wide the wrecked doors and scanned the room. ‘Clear,’ he said.
A huge detonation burst through from the docking ring, blasting the port’s inner doors outward in a shower of sharp metal. His men cried out as they were hit. Caias was caught in the chest. His armour’s alarms clamoured as his suit was breached.
The force of the blast sent him away from the station, jets of white air setting him spinning until they were arrested by hardening foam sealant spilling from the gap. He stabilised himself, but was seriously wounded – a half-metre metal splinter jutted out through the plastron of his armour, and he was falling away from the station. The icons for his four men were all red, except one. Colobus still lived, but not for long. He clawed at his throat, tumbling out of control. Maenas had been cut in half by the explosion. The two halves of his body spun away from each other. His other two brothers he saw no sign of.
Colobus’ frantic scrabbling ceased. He sailed away from the relay station into the void. Light caught the hard edges of his armour, then he vanished into the shadow of the station.
His icon blinked, and turned red.
Caias let out a puff of gas from his nozzles, wincing as the motion tugged at his wound. He turned back to look at the docked destroyer. A line of figures were moving over from the station towards the spine.
‘Gellius, hear me, you have boarders inbound.’
Vox-static sounded harshly in his ears. Blinking lights on his helm display indicated active jamming.
He looked down at the metal protruding from his chest.
Slowly, he grasped it and with a roar of pain wrenched it free. The ragged edges of it scraped painfully on his breached rib cage. Bright globs of blood followed it.
Shuddering with the pain, Caias cast the splinter aside. He almo
st passed out from the agony, but his war-plate responded, his pharmacopia flooding him with anaesthetics. Still leaking blood and air, he steadied himself. He gritted his teeth, set his nozzles to maximum thrust, and went after the Night Lords boarders.
SIX
A trap sprung
Joy in death
Taking Probity
Skraivok watched from behind a bundle of cables. His fake vox-links sent panicked messages in the background. The Ultramarines had been ignoring them for the last few minutes. He had expected this, but the fake vox-net had done its job, luring the arrogant sons of Guilliman into his trap.
The Ultramarines were communicating on encrypted squad channels. It was nothing that Gallivar could not circumvent. The first rule of terror was knowing more than the enemy. To this end the Night Lords had more than their fair share of brothers skilled in communications. Gallivar breached the cypher and opened the Ultramarines’ communications. Vox-feed and squad datalinks poured into Skraivok’s helmet. He could not induce terror in the warriors of Ultramar, but their tense vox-exchanges told him that they were on edge.
And so they should be, he thought.
He waited with the utmost of confidence. His earlier concerns were forgotten for the moment. He was fully immersed in the game.
The Ultramarines approached the central chamber. A blue-clad warrior came in cautiously, a sergeant’s markings on his armour, and a breaching shield gripped in one hand. He covered the room expertly with his gun, seeking his enemy but finding none.
Four more Ultramarines stepped into the room after their leader, breaching shields raised. They were as smooth and methodical as their reputation suggested.
Skraivok trusted to the interference given out by the cables he hid within to mask his presence, but no matter how skilful this ambush, it was going to be costly.
‘Standard spread. Sub-squad one, cover left, two, cover right,’ voxed their sergeant. ‘Keep them back around the curve of the corridor. Keep them back from the elevator.’ Skraivok smiled at this sergeant’s certainty – Lethicus was his name, according to the squad – so pompous and sure of himself. He was oblivious to his enemy listening in.