by Guy Haley
‘Does it matter?’ said Hasquin. ‘There’s only going to be more as we go further in. We might as well toss ourselves into a phantine mating rumpus. Our chances of survival would be just about as good.’
‘What now, sarge?’ asked Tiny Jonno. ‘How are we going to get through that?’
Morio pulled a face. ‘Can you see that look? That’s Mericus’ “I’ve got an idea, but you’re not going to like it,” look.’
‘The cloaca,’ said Mericus. ‘These ditches link up nearby, and go into an infall. We can get right into the city that way.’
The men groaned.
‘I told you you wouldn’t like it,’ said Morio.
Every civic infrastructure in the Five Hundred Worlds of Ultramar was planned meticulously, from the largest to the very smallest. As carefully designed as they were above ground, so it was below. When the Sothopolis was founded, the sewer network had gone down before anything else. The scale of it was far in excess of Sothopolis’ current needs. Guilliman’s foresight and confidence amazed Mericus. The world was off-limits, the galaxy was being torn apart by war, but still he looked to the future, envisaging a Sotha that Mericus wouldn’t see if he lived to be a thousand years old.
The men dropped down into the ferrocrete ditches, keeping their heads down and crawling through the muck at the bottom when they had to. Mericus looked often to the lightening sky. They ought to turn back to the safety of the mountain, but Mericus had to see, he had to know what was happening to his adopted home.
The battle around the castellum reached a crescendo as they entered the cool mouth to Sotha’s drainage system. The discharge of heavy weapons banged sharply, barely muted by the drain. Bare grey walls hemmed the Sothans in, bringing with them a sense of security that was entirely false. If they were found down there they were as good as dead.
A thin stream of water ran in the angle of the floor. Other channels joined the tunnel, and the stream grew until it swirled around their ankles. After a time, the agricultural ditches gave out, and plastek pipes covered with hinged flaps protruded into the tunnel – the first of the domestic outflows of Sothopolis.
They came to the end of the tunnel and were into the main sewer of the city, the Cloaca Maxima. A walkway ran alongside a deep canal of waste water. From up the tunnel came the churning sound of the treatment plant. If Mericus strained his ears, he could hear the faraway pounding of surf.
They went on, guns up, eyes darting into every shadow. The closer they came to the centre, the quieter it became. Isolated bursts of gunfire rattled down from storm drains. A scream had them all freeze, but it was over as soon as it came, cut off with horrible suddenness.
Sothopolis’ compact size had them under the main square in no time, and from the noise filtering from above, there was a lot of activity there.
‘Sounds like construction work,’ hissed Morio. ‘I hear hammers. Power tools.’
‘That and… and moaning?’ said Hanspire.
Mericus’ mouth was suddenly dry. He licked his lips to moisten them. The need to know still had him in its clutches, but part of him quailed at the thought of what he might see. He looked up to a band of early dawn light creeping in through a storm drain tube. He went and stood underneath and looked upward.
He weighed his need to know against his desire not to.
‘Hasquin, boost me up,’ he said eventually.
Standing awkwardly on his trooper’s shoulders, Mericus went up into the storm drain, and carefully looked through the slit there.
‘What can you see?’ Hasquin hissed.
‘Nothing. There is something in the way. Be quiet.’
Centimetres from the end of his nose were a pair of dark blue greaves cladding transhuman legs. They moved away, allowing him a view right into the middle of the square. What was revealed revolted him.
‘Konor’s bones,’ he breathed.
‘What? What?’ said Hasquin.
The world seemed to throb queasily in front of him. In a detached way, Mericus realised he had never felt horror, not truly. Not until that moment. There were so many words so easily used. To be confronted with their true meaning upended reality.
That’s what they want, thought Mericus, fighting down his panic. They want you to be afraid. Keep it together. He struggled to in the face of what he saw in the square.
Mericus’ eyes flicked from horror to horror. Very quickly he had had his fill. ‘Let me down,’ he whispered.
‘What did you see?’ Hasquin said.
‘You don’t want to know. We should never have come.’
‘The moaning…’ said Morio. ‘What are they doing to them?’
‘We can’t help them. We have to go,’ said Mericus.
The others were spooked. They all began to whisper at once. He managed to get them into some form of order just as cruel laughter and voices echoed up the cloaca, and they fell into terrified silence again.
The Night Lords were coming.
Quick as vermin, the Sothans hid themselves away in the branching tunnels of the sewers.
Three Space Marines came past. Two were invaders, huge and threatening in their battleplate. The third had been stripped of his armour. His hands were bound, and he moved oddly. The Night Lords prodded him with sparking goads, and laughed at his involuntary spasms and grunts.
The Night Lords went past without noticing them. They were thirty metres away before Mericus dared speak.
‘We can’t just leave him.’
‘Right,’ said Hasquin. ‘What are we going to do? There’s two of them and only six of us!’
‘We can’t help our people, but we can help him. I’m going out.’
‘You’re insane! They’ll just shoot you!’
‘No they won’t,’ said Mericus. They’ll want more sport from me than that. Their sadism is their weakness.’
‘They’ll just blow us all away,’ hissed Hasquin.
‘I’m thinking on the fly here!’ Mericus hoped if it came down to it he did get shot, not end up in the square. At least it would be quick. ‘Demethon, Morio, Jonno, Hanspire, over the other side, quietly! Jonno!’
‘Yes, sarge?’
‘Do your stuff.’
Tiny’s ratty face set with determination.
The four men slid into dirty water up to their necks and went to the other side of the canal. There a tunnel with no walkway entered the Cloaca Maxima, and they concealed themselves inside. The legionaries were too occupied with their prisoner to notice. Sadistic and over-confident, thought Mericus. That doubles our chances.
‘I’m going to draw their attention. Be ready,’ said Mericus.
Hasquin touched a krak grenade at his belt. Mericus nodded, closed his eyes, and stepped onto the walkway.
‘Hey!’ he shouted. ‘Over here!’
He opened fire, stepping back down the tunnel with every shot. He kept his gun up to his shoulder and made sure he hit, stilling the shaking of his arms with purpose. Sharp lasbeams cracked the air, scoring the metal of the rearmost warrior’s armour. The Night Lord turned around, to get a shot in the face. Instinctively the Space Marine threw up his hands to protect his vulnerable eye-lenses.
Relatively vulnerable, some phlegmatic part of Mericus reminded him.
The Night Lord charged.
Mericus had never been so terrified in his life. He had never felt completely at ease around the transhuman warriors of Ultramar. Nobody did. But to face a Space Marine coming at him in anger was an entirely different experience to awkwardly sharing a drink with one.
He had become used to how big they were. Too used to it. The warrior coming at him was too huge to be called a man. His was the human form pushed to the limits of recognisability. The armour made him into something that, in earlier eras, would have had him classified as an armoured vehicle. Ceramite boots stamped flinders from the f
errocrete as he came down the walkway. He swung a polearm longer than Mericus was tall. The chainblade at the head of it was blocky as an ammo crate, the teeth spinning there as large as dinner knives. The whole effect was one of massive, almost ridiculous overscaling.
This was a man distorted beyond the capacity of a normal mind to absorb. He was more than an ogre. More than the wildest story. There was simply too much of the Space Marine to appear real.
Everything about him was intended to inflict maximum damage to beings and machines far greater than a mere man. He was heavy, strong, fearless, unbelievably fast and utterly deadly.
And he was coming for Mericus.
If the fact of this war-giant’s existence were not enough, he had gone to lengths to make himself even more terrifying. The breathing mask of his helm had been refashioned into the shape of a skeletal mouth, with long, monster’s teeth. The image was carried on around the eyes and forehead in paint, so that a twisted death’s head glowered at Mericus. Skulls that were tiny by comparison to the Space Marine’s massive helmet bounced on cords attached to his pauldrons. Only when he was within ten metres did Mericus realise that they were the bleached bones of full-grown men.
Somehow he managed to compartmentalise his terror and kept on firing until the Space Marine was on top of him.
Hasquin lived up to his promise. As the giant passed the junction, Hasquin’s krak grenade rolled out onto the walkway. It rattled between the feet of the Night Lord and exploded. Mericus flung himself into the sewage channel as fire billowed up the tunnel. The Space Marine was flung sideways by the blast, one foot coming off and splashing into the water some way from its owner. The stricken Night Lord flailed at the surface and sank from view.
The rest of Mericus’ men opened fire. Three lasguns burned the paint off the armour of the other traitor. He dropped to one knee unconcernedly, drawing his bolt pistol. Hanspire exploded, his torso reduced to red mist and flying fragments of bone. Another round tore through Morio’s shoulder, spanking off a wall further down the tunnel without detonating.
Through all this Jonno knelt motionlessly, his rifle sight to his eye. Mericus felt guilty for teasing the little man. What Jonno lacked in stature and brains, he more than made up for in courage.
The Night Lord levelled his gun at him, but Jonno got there first. He fired a single shot. A wisp of smoke curled from the Night Lord’s shattered helm lens and he toppled dead into the water.
It all felt wrong, killing the Emperor’s sons, for all that these came draped in the skins of the innocent. Mericus shook off his dismay and ran to where the Ultramarine had collapsed.
‘My lord, can you get up?’
The warrior had difficulty speaking. His teeth were gritted hard, his muscles quivered. ‘Pain… spike… Neck port… Pull it out!’
Mericus ran his hand over the back of the Space Marine’s neck. The skin felt odd under his fingers. A circle of scarring drew his fingers inward, and he found a hard metal socket in the back of the warrior’s neck. There was something stuck into it. With a jerk, he yanked it free. The Space Marine screamed in agony, but as his pain was voiced, it was gone.
An expression of intense fury crossed the legionary’s face. He reached for the Night Lord’s dropped bolt pistol and brought it up to point in Mericus’ direction. The Sothan fumbled his rifle in response.
The Space Marine fired a single shot between Mericus’ legs. He spun around to see the first Night Lord sinking back into the water, red pumping from his shattered throat.
‘I am Brother-Sergeant Solus,’ said the Space Marine, apparently unconcerned by the sight.
‘Mericus… Sergeant M-Mericus Girald-dus,’ Mericus stammered.
Solus got to his feet, seemingly none the worse for his ordeal. Mericus felt intensely awkward at having touched him.
‘Well, Sergeant Mericus – it seems I owe you my thanks.’
‘You owe Hanspire your thanks, not me,’ said Mericus angrily. ‘He died to save you. I’m still alive. Then there’s Jonno there, he killed the other.’
‘A good shot.’
‘An excellent shot,’ said Mericus, all his rage at the Space Marines and his feelings of helplessness packed through those three words. Solus regarded him emotionlessly.
‘You should take my thanks, whether you think you deserve them or not. You and I are not long for this world. Konrad Curze’s murderers have overrun the city. Leave.’
‘No,’ said Mericus through gritted teeth.
‘No?’ said Solus. ‘It is self-evident. No theoretical. We are past supposition, only the actual exists. Flight is the only option for you.’
‘I mean, come with me. We have a place. Somewhere safe.’
‘There is nowhere safe.’
‘Safer, then. Come to the mountain. We’re regrouping there. Sotha needs you.’
Solus nodded. This too, was apparently a self-evident truth. He fell in with Mericus’ depleted squad, and they left as quickly as they dared.
Somehow they made it through the grey dawn-lit fields. They ascended the mountain, Sothopolis in flames behind them. The fighting around the castellum had subsided. By the time the group of soldiers had mounted a ridge sufficiently high for them to see its broken defences, the main gate hung open. The gaping doors cast a rhomboid of yellow light on the road. Tiny figures of legionaries moved within, dwarfed by massive siege tanks.
The sun was up in the red sky and they were close to their refuge when the screaming started. Mericus had been on the mountain many times when the colony’s schola had put out the students for their recreation time. It was surprising how far away a playground full of happy children could be heard. Their high cries and bubbling chatter carried for miles.
The noise that came up from the centre of town was a little like that, a distant chorus of high noises underpinned by a frantic hubbub. Only the high notes were bloodcurdling screams and not shrieks of delight, and the hubbub was a wailing rich with fear.
Mericus stopped. The sun was shining in his face and he had to scrunch his eyes tight to see anything of the town. A pall of blue smoke made its shattered buildings into meaningless blocks. The central square was a dark pit. Nothing could be seen in detail there, only distant sparks of flame that must have been huge fires. Threads of oily black climbed up to flatten themselves on the blue. He kept his eyes fixed on the central square for as long as he could.
Fires and noise filled the square every midsummer, but now the Night Lords held a festival of their own there.
The Ultramarine brought up the rear of the column, Morio flung over his shoulder, shepherding a knot of tired people. They had encountered a few more on the way back. These were the old, the very young. They clustered round Brother Solus, close as crustaceans on a rock.
Solus carried a bolter taken from the drop pod wreck on their return. With a weapon in his hands, he looked formidable, though he still lacked for armour.
The Space Marine stopped by Mericus.
‘Do not look back. There is nothing you can do for them, save to survive and avenge them another day.’
Mericus looked up at the grim giant. He blinked. His eyes were gritty, but no tears would come.
‘Why do they do it?’ he said.
‘Because they can,’ the Ultramarine said.
‘So could you,’ said Mericus. ‘You are the same.’
‘And I do not. That is the difference between a son of Ultramar and a murderer of Nostramo. We are the same and we are not the same. The Emperor in His wisdom made it so.’ He rested a massive hand on Mericus’ shoulder. ‘Do not sorrow. We shall all die, but my gene-father will see them pay for what they have done.’
The old Mericus would have cracked a joke, but the old Mericus was dead in the wreck of the city.
Feeling sick, he turned his back on his countrymen, and followed the line of civilians into the safety of th
e mountain.
SEVENTEEN
Master of Macragge
Dantioch’s message
Nova
Guilliman came to the Pharos locus as soon as the news of the attack reached his ears. Full of wrath he strode into the ruins of the Chapel of Memorial. Behind him came his assembled senior officers, all the Chapter Masters of the Ultramarines on Macragge, and representatives from every other Legion present. They jogged to keep up with the primarch’s furious pace. Then came the human members of his war council at a full run, men from the Imperial Adepta, the Astra Telepathica, the government of Macragge, their aides, their servants. The frailest lagged far behind.
The Lord of Macragge did not wait for them. He came to a halt at the boundary of the Pharos’ communications field, right before Dantioch’s seat. His expression was unreadable, but his anger roared through the Pharos with the force of a blow. Polux thought that if Guilliman were to take another step he would leave Macragge behind again whether he wished to or not. That would be a disastrous eventuality, and he willed the primarch to remain safely where he was.
Dantioch began to rise, but Guilliman held out his hand, palm flat.
‘Sit, Dantioch, report. Tell me what occurs at Sotha.’ The primarch’s face was regal as ever, but his voice was clotted with supressed emotion.
Dantioch sank stiffly back into his chair, his neck craning so that he could look up at his commander. Guilliman had enough presence of mind, even in the depths of his fury, to notice the discomfort that caused him and took a step backwards. Polux felt a little easier at that.
‘The emperor?’
‘I will advise him once I am apprised of the situation,’ said Guilliman hotly. ‘Report!’
‘Very well,’ said Dantioch. ‘We are under attack by a large force of the Eighth Legion. They came upon Sotha unobserved, in direct opposition to the Pharos’ interference field. They have taken the city, my lord, and the orbital has fallen.’
Guilliman’s lips thinned and became paler.
‘What of the Aegida company? What is the fate of my Hundred and Ninety-Ninth?’