by Paul Kearney
‘Commander of the Fleet you may be, but I am planetary governor here, and have been for the better part of three decades. You will obey my orders, or I will replace you with someone who does. Do we have an understanding between us?’
Glenck’s face was flushed red. He stood up.
‘I understand you perfectly, Fennick,’ he said, his voice dripping hatred. ‘But let it be said here and now, if your meddling in the affairs of my command results in any kind of setback or unfortunate incident, I will pursue redress of the matter all the way to Macragge itself if I have to.’
‘I expected nothing less,’ Fennick said. He pressed a button on his desk. ‘Pherias, Rear Admiral Glenck is leaving. See him out.’ And as the young aide opened the tall doors behind Glenck, he said, ‘My compliments, admiral, to you and all those who serve so devotedly under you.’
You damn fool, he added to himself. And he was not sure if the thought was meant for Glenck or for himself.
Five
The void. It was a frightening thing, all that black; an absence of everything that was necessary for life. One might term it empty, except that it was not. There was life in the void, organisms barely known to Imperium science that drifted on the faint pulse of solar winds and somehow subsisted in the vacuum, garnering all that was needed out of the nothingness for their tenuous existence.
The void was mystery, and fascination. A man who looked too long into it could well find something staring back at him. The immaterium beyond the material universe – the deeper blackness beyond black, which housed things no man should ever see.
But men had gone there, many never to return. The peerless warriors of the Adeptus Astartes had fought wars in that place and come back again, their enhanced intellects protecting them from the madness of the journey. But even they had been lost to the darkness, time after time. Entire Chapters, gone. It was a dark legend of the Imperium. And it was fact.
The immaterium stared out of the blackness with a cackle and a grin, daring those who plied the void to look into it and indulge that horrible fascination. The fascination for the cliff edge, the impulse towards self-immolation that existed in all men.
Ghent Morcault knew more of the void than most, for he had been travelling it these sixty years. During that time he had blazed trails across the Eastern Fringe and carried cargoes between worlds that were mere names on Administratum star charts, far beyond Imperial compliance.
All over the Fringe there were forgotten little moons with men struggling to survive upon them. They invoked the Emperor’s name, they told tales of the titanic wars of the Imperium, they spoke in whispers of the Great Heresy. But for them the true reality of existence was bounded by the horizon they could see and the sky above it. All else was lights in the night, far unknown stars upon which their fellows strove to keep the flame of civilisation alive. And in the dark between the stars, there were monsters.
Monsters, Morcault thought. Well, they are no legend. They exist, more fearsome than any nightmare of the dark.
They are here. I am looking at one right now.
‘The anatomy of the creature is singular indeed,’ Scurrios was saying. He bent low over the carcass on the gurney, and the overheads played back in flashes from the array of surgical blades that were arrayed to one side. Scurrios was bent over the flayed flesh like a child burning ants with a magnifying glass, his rat-like face drawn tight with concentration.
‘Look here, Ghent. It’s the first time I have seen it.’
‘I prefer to remain where I am,’ Morcault said dryly, leaning on his stick. He tapped the pitchthorn on the deck, and poked aside a tiny globe of green that had tumbled there from the tabletop. His mouth twisted in revulsion.
‘We will have to open the vents when you are done and blow this compartment. I want none of this filth on my ship.’
‘Yes, yes, of course. Though I doubt any of the spores would grow in this environment. They are fungus-like. They need moisture, and, I would hazard, a minimum of nutriment. Soil-based, of course.’ Scurrios grinned his little rat-faced grin. ‘Not much of that on a starship.’
‘What about a corpse – would that be enough?’
Scurrios blinked behind the thick lenses he wore. ‘Why yes, I should think so.’
‘So they could grow out of their own dead. Throne, what a thought.’
‘They are an amazing species.’ Scurrios straightened as far as his hunched spine would allow. He stepped back, and Morcault saw the full horrible glory of the body the little man had been carving open.
An ork.
A small one, by their standards, only some six and half feet tall. Scurrios had carved it clear from skull to knee, flaying the green flesh from the bone and laying open the thoracic cavity. Morcault felt his stomach give a brief twinge, and the bile rose in his throat.
‘Notice the lack of recognisable internal organs,’ Scurrios said with unforgivable enthusiasm. ‘Its very flesh is, in effect, one large digestive tract, and whatever vital systems it possesses are not centralised, but distributed through the body. Only the brain is as we might expect it, and it is well protected.’ He gestured to the empty skull-case that lay like an oversized bowl on a side table. ‘I would hazard that its skin is capable of limited photosynthesis also, meaning–’
‘I know what it means,’ Morcault said irritably. His joints ached. He popped a stimm from the pouch in his pocket.
‘Yes. This is only supposition on my part, you understand, but it seems to me that while the ork can ingest nutrients in the usual mammalian way, it may well be able to top these up by utilising light itself as an energy source. And the spores–’ Scurrios picked up a marble-sized green globe from the gurney in his black-gloved hands and studied it, his eyes bright and huge behind his lenses.
‘The beast sheds them more or less continually, but especially, as we have seen, at the moment of death. These spores could be each and every one a little ork in the making. They start out as tiny creatures which seem almost harmless, but every record I have consulted emphasises that the ork never – never, Ghent – stops growing.’
He studied the green mushroom-like globe in his fingers. ‘Given a few centuries, this nondescript object might bloom into a mighty chieftain, an enemy to be reckoned with, the leader of armies.’
He crushed the globe in his gloved hand. Was it his imagination, or did Morcault’s old ears hear a tiny, high-pitched scream?
Scurrios dusted off his gloves. ‘What we have then, is a creature which has been genetically engineered. There seems to be no evolution involved here that I can see. The ork may even be an artificial creation, born through the application of some science long lost to the known artifices of the galaxy as we understand it.’
Scurrios rubbed one lens, leaving a green smear.
‘In sum, it is a species which is fearsome beyond belief, bred to war, and incredibly hard to eradicate.’
‘What is the best way to kill it?’ Morcault asked impatiently. ‘That’s the rub. It’s why I have allowed you to turn my sick bay into a charnel house.’
Scurrios smiled. ‘For which I am duly thankful, captain. It is a long time since I have had the privilege of dissecting such a perfect specimen. How to kill it?’ He began to strip off the elbow-length rubber gloves that encased his hands and forearms.
‘Simply put, one blasts the hell out of it.’ He giggled, but sobered at the look on Morcault’s face. The huge eyes blinked behind the green-smeared glass lenses.
‘The ork’s nervous system is so effectively distributed that the usual targeting strategies would be rendered almost ineffective. This beast could lose a limb and barely feel it. You could burn out its chest with concentrated las-fire and it would probably be able to keep fighting for quite some time.
‘No – headshots are most effective. The creature’s brain is anatomically similar to that of any basic humanoid, contained wh
olly within the skull – a very thick skull, mind – and with its destruction, the ork should, finally, fall.’
‘And when it does, these… spores pop out of its hide,’ Morcault said with a sigh. ‘I thought they were boils or warts, all this time.’
‘In death, the ork seeds its very corpse with the makings of new life,’ Scurrios said. ‘Not just new life, but a new ecosystem. Not all the spores are the same. I would hazard that many, if not all creatures of ork biology are hidden in these, for I have identified at least five different types. Left unhindered, one ork corpse could engender an entire new host of the creatures and everything they need to subsist and prosper.’
‘They are like a virus,’ Morcault said with disgust.
‘No, captain. They are an incredible fusion of plant and animal. They have more in common with a mould.’
Morcault laughed. ‘A mould! The great scourge of our galaxy, the green storm that has toppled Empires – a mould!’
Scurrios did not smile. ‘What could be more effective? Captain, these things have been bioengineered to be the perfect fighting animal, almost impossible to eradicate once they have been introduced into an ecosystem. They make it their own. Only prolonged exposure to complete vacuum can wipe out all traces of them – as it killed this one – that, or a firestorm so complete that it destroys almost all other forms of life alongside them.’
‘An Exterminatus perhaps,’ Morcault said. His lined old face was even grimmer than age had made it.
‘Well,’ Scurrios said with a trace of nervousness, ‘that might be a little on the drastic side. But a planet which has known an ork incursion must be prepared for further troubles in years to come – not from without, but from the spores that have incubated on its own soil.’
Morcault nodded to himself. ‘In half a century, I have not seen them so far into the Eastern Fringe. And this fellow you carved up was only a scout. If his engine had not failed, who knows where he would have ended up?’
‘Ork technology is unreliable at best,’ Scurrios said, blinking like an owl of old Terra.
‘But surprisingly effective. They maintain space fleets, armoured vehicles and heavy weaponry. How can such stupid creatures grasp warp technology?’ Morcault’s white eyebrows shot up. ‘It seems bizarre.’
‘They do not understand technology as we do, it’s true. But if you read up on the history of interactions between humanity and their kind, it seems plain that in some orks the mastery of machinery and technology is an inbuilt skill, as much part of them as a gene. There are orks for all occasions, captain. Some are psykers of sorts, others crazed kinds of physicians. They do not learn these trades – they are born to them.’
‘And are some born to lead, Scurrios?’
‘That I do not know. Orks will keep growing larger and stronger until fate or ill luck cuts them down. The largest orks are the warleaders and chieftains that are the scourge of our galaxy. I would guess that a few centuries of constant warfare create a kind of low animal cunning at the very least. And history tells us that when they gather in large enough numbers something happens to them, as though they are somehow psychically attuned to the prospect of massive, all-out conflict. It is then that they are at their most cohesive, and their most dangerous.’
‘They are always dangerous,’ Morcault said quietly.
‘You have encountered them before, captain?’
‘More times than I would wish. I have seen what they can do, Scurrios, and it is as ugly as all hell.’ He tapped the pitchthorn stick on the metal deck of the sick bay.
‘I want you to wrap up here. Bag the body and scour the sick bay for all remnants of it, then clear the place out of everything that is not nailed down, and we will vent this filth into space.’
‘Captain, may I keep some samples, for scientific enquiry?’
‘You may not, Scurrios. It is too dangerous.’ Morcault set one blue-veined hand on the little stooped fellow’s shoulder. ‘I am sorry, but the risk is too great, my friend. You have done sterling work here. I had suspected some or all of what you have told me, but it is something to have it confirmed at last. By keen scientific enquiry, no less.’ He smiled, but Scurrios still looked glum. The little scientist was brilliant, in his way, but sometimes his keen mind was blind to certain consequences. He knew so much, and so little, at the same time.
‘And the ork craft?’ Scurrios asked.
‘Gortyn is out setting charges to its hull as we speak. We’ll blow it to shreds and leave the debris for the void.’
‘Captain, that craft was not long-range–’
‘I know, Scurrios. Another reason why I want this wrapped up quickly. This area of space has become unhealthy. And besides, we must get the Mayfly back to Zalidar and bear this news to Fennick.’
‘Is the vox still down?’
‘The vox is always down when there is something important to send on it,’ Morcault growled. ‘And Zalidar has no astropath worthy of the name. So we must make our best speed. I am no magos, but if there is one thing I have learned about the orks down the years, it is that where there is one, there are many. They never hunt alone.’
Morcault regained the bridge, leaning on the pitchthorn and grimacing at what it cost him to make it up the metal stairs. The blast-shutters were raised from the viewports – old-fashioned titanium, for the Mayfly had not the power for full-time void shields – and he could see a wide expanse of almost starless space, dark beyond the blinking glimmer of the consoles.
Hester was in her chair, murmuring in Low Gothic that was spiced with elements of binaric terms, and the two servitors plugged into the Mayfly’s cogitators went about their arcane business without pause. Morcault patted one on its bald, wired scalp, as he always did, and took the captain’s chair in the centre of the bridge, glancing at the surrounding data-slates and monitors to make sure his ship was as it should be.
‘Gortyn will be back shipside in fifteen minutes, he tells me,’ Hester said. ‘Twenty-minute delay on the charges. I take it that we are going back to Zalidar?’
‘As fast as she can run,’ Morcault agreed. ‘And keep trying the vox.’
‘Damn the vox,’ Hester snapped. ‘I might as well climb out on the hull and try some semaphore.’
Morcault chuckled.
‘The void currents are strong out here,’ Hester went on. She turned to Morcault and her bionic eye gleamed blue in the low light of the bridge. ‘The immaterium is close to our plane, this far out, Ghent. It is not a place to linger.’
‘No, it’s not,’ he conceded. ‘But that ork rattlebag came from somewhere. A scout ship if ever I saw one. You can bet there is heavy metal somewhere out there, Hester.’
‘Long-range augurs have come up empty. I’ve had the servitors sweeping constantly since we stopped. Not so much as a squeak. The ork ship was in a dire state, Ghent. Perhaps it was just puked out by the warp. I’ve seen it happen.’
‘So have I. But not with orks, my dear. And never with a ship that small.’
Hester turned back to her screens with a grunt. ‘First time for everything.’
Morcault sat back in his chair and let his tired old eyes range over the bridge. Everything was as it should be. Hester knew the Mayfly as well as he did himself. Twenty-five years, give or take, she had been first mate on his crew. Longer than many marriages, and more successful than most.
This bridge – this ship – was the closest thing in the world he had to a home and a family. He had spent his life chasing first glory, then profit, and finally knowledge, and the Mayfly had been with him every step of the way. A tiny craft by Imperial standards, she displaced only a few thousand tons, and though she was older by far than Morcault himself, Gortyn the chief engineer kept her running like a well-built chronometer.
With the odd hiccup, of course. But she had not failed him yet. Not totally, at any rate.
‘How long to
Zalidar at full burn?’ Morcault asked Hester.
‘You go full burn all the way, and you’ll make Gortyn weep,’ she retorted. ‘The ship can’t take that kind of abuse any more, Ghent.’
‘How long?’ Morcault repeated.
Hester punched her console with impatient fingers.
‘Forty-six days, give or take a few hours.’
‘Damn.’
‘Want to take to the warp?’
Morcault thought about it. ‘How is Jodi?’
‘Same as always. Drunk.’
‘Damn.’ Jodi Arnhal was their Navigator. Brilliant but erratic, he sometimes doubled as the ship’s cook, a whim of his they had not thought to contradict. Psykers were fearsome, unpredictable creatures all in all, and even years aboard ship had not divested Arnhal of his innate strangeness.
‘We’ll have to get him sobered up. We may have to chance the warp. Orks in the system – it’s news that needs to travel fast.’
‘Maybe he could get word to Ultramar.’
‘He’s not an astropath, Hester. We have to contact Fennick as soon as we can. Zalidar is the only world worth raiding in this part of the sector. The blasted place should have had an astropath of its own well before now.’
‘Beggars would ride, if wishes were horses,’ Hester said.
‘You’ve never even seen a horse, Hester.’
‘Hey, I can read.’
Morcault smiled. He was about to say something else when the comm crackled and they heard Gortyn’s voice.
‘All right, chief, I’m inboard. Charges set to blow in eighteen minutes and counting. Time we made some distance between us and that ork wreck.’
‘Acknowledged,’ Morcault said crisply. ‘Hester, get us under way. And vox Scurrios. See how he’s getting on in sick bay. I want that compartment vented as soon as possible.’