by Ben Counter
As Daenyathos wrote - when all is darkness and every way out is lined with blood and lit with the fires of battle, there is still hope.
But it wouldn't come to that. The Mechanicus wouldn't fight. These were Space Marines, the best of the best, no one would dare actually fight them face to face.
It wouldn't come to that.
IT WAS A man's life in the Sixers. The regiment's proper name was a twelve-digit string of letters and symbols that indicated its size, composition and base camp location on board the 674-XU28. It was only the tech-priests and magi of the crew, and the senior officers who might one day be accepted into the tech-priest ranks, who could remember the whole thing in full. The logic-string happened to begin with the number six, and so it was as the Sixers that they knew themselves.
Kiv had been a Sixer all his life, as had most of the tech-guard. On his rare forays out onto inhabited worlds he would be alarmed and dismayed at how so many people seemed to have nothing around which they built their life. He had his grenade launcher, entrusted to him as a child when the neurojacks were first sunk into the back of his skull and he was upgraded to a member of the tech-guard. He had learned its exact rate of fire down to tenths of a second, and the range at which the electromagnetic pulses and photon glare would be effective. He knew that at that particular angle he could lob a haywire grenade over two partitions on the Geryon platform's muster deck and drop it right down the throat of an attacker. It had been stripped and repaired so often that none of the original components remained, yet it was the same because it was bound by the weapon's spirit, to which Kiv spoke thrice-daily as the Rites of Maintenance decreed. He knew that the shadowy figure of Archmagos Khobotov had a similar affinity with the unimaginably vast and complex ship itself, which must have given him a deep and holy understanding of the ordered universe the magi laboured to create. It was something that tied him to the great spirit of logic that stood against the random chaos of the universe - the Omnissiah, Machine God, the defender of reason and knowledge. He assumed that the Omnissiah and the divine Emperor were different sides of the same coin, although the magi he had asked found some way of avoiding the question. The answer must involve concepts beyond his understanding, he guessed.
'Heads up, Sixers! Combat protocol ninety-three, defence in depth and repel!' Colonel-priest Klayden's voice was artificially amplified so every Sixer on the muster deck woke from their reveries. 'Action stations, dogs, action!' The klaxons started up a second later - Klayden's rank allowed him access to the simpler levels of the ship's own machine-spirit, and he was able to anticipate the more important decisions it made. A whole Sixer battalion had transferred to the ordinatus platform before it had been launched. Every one of them was suddenly up and aware, throwing open ammo trunks and pulling on their quilted flak-armour. There were even units stationed on the Geryon itself. The huge barrel of the cannon was high above, jutting above the upper hull of the platform, but the immense recoil-dampeners and ammo feeds were housed in the centre of the muster deck and it was on this steel mountain that tech-guard squads were preparing defensive positions.
Combat. Kiv had seen it many times, and was chilled by the randomness of it. It was something akin to righteous determination with which the tech-guard and the other forces of the Adeptus Mechanicus would take up arms and strive to win the fight, so that the supreme logic they built could be preserved and the disordered tide of battle turned back. Kiv shrugged himself into the heavy flak-tabard and strapped up the knee-high boots that would protect his feet and legs from the backwash of haywire chaff released from the disruptive grenades he could fire. He hefted the cylindrical metal bulk of the grenade launcher that was as familiar to him as another limb. He drew the jack-lines from the targeting array and pushed them into the sockets in his skull, feeling the orientation of the launcher through his own sense of balance, the barrel temperature through his skin, the ammo count through the fullness of his stomach. The augmentation was a simple one compared to the near-total prosthesis of the tech-magi, but it gave Kiv a taste of how it was to be truly at one with the Machine.
'Subsystem nine! Muster and deploy!' came Klayden's amplified voice. Subsystem nine was Kiv's unit, a mobile defence squad, equipped to hunt down attackers and expel them.
The other tech-guard of Kiv's unit hurried past bearing melta-guns, plasma rifles and hellguns. Each one would fulfil a particular role in the fight, where the confusion of Kiv's haywires, destruction of the energy weapons and precision of the hellguns would combine to form an efficient combat machine.
There was fear. But it was a good fear, like a diagnostic rite, running through his mind and checking for flaws of cowardice. There were none. He had been a Sixer all his life, and Sixers never died. They just broke down.
'Multiple signals, tracking.' boomed the machine-spirit voice. The machine-spirit on the platform was a part of the 674-XU28 itself, and spoke with the ship's authority. 'Approach vectors confirmed. Prepare for boarding on platform twelve.'
The enemy, whoever they were, would probably think they were making a surprise attack. But the sub-spirit that controlled the Geryon platform was as cunning as its parent on the 674-XU28, and no one could approach without the platform, and then the tech-guard, knowing about it. The attackers would be met by a fully-prepared tech-guard battalion and the weapons system of a fully-aware orbital platform.
High above the muster deck other tech-guard units were scrambling over the vast loading rams and ammo cranes, prepared to sell their lives rather than have disorder infect a masterpiece like the Geryon.
Chapter Four
THE GERYON ORDINATUS platform was a silver diamond against the star field, bright with light reflected from the planet Lakonia. Sarpedon watched it growing closer through the age-grimed glass of the porthole, the Hammerblade fighter-bomber juddering around him as the Chapter serf-pilot flew Sarpedon's Marines towards their objective.
Sarpedon's craft held eight other Space Marines under Sergeant Givrillian. There were eleven other craft like it, Hammerblades and Scalptakers, speeding in scattered formation towards the Geryon platform. They would land all over the upper surface, and the Soul Drinkers would enter the upper decks of the platform from a dozen different entry points. Once inside they would link up as they swept through the structure, with the ultimate objective being control of the Geryon itself. Once they had the platform the Soul Drinkers could be sure the Adeptus Mechanicus would have no choice but to return the Soulspear. Then the two Chapter cruisers could swoop in unmolested and pick the Soul Drinkers up from the platform, along with the nearly two hundred Marines remaining on the star fort.
'Taking fire!' crackled a serf-pilot's voice over the vox – Sarpedon glanced at the holomat set up in the centre of the Hammerblade's cargo bay and saw the rune that flashed was that of Squad Phodel.
'Squad Phodel, give me details.'
'Magnalaser turret fire.' replied the serf-pilot, voice warped by sudden static. Sarpedon peered through the thick porthole glass and saw ruby-red lines of laser flashing out from the platform, lancing past the silver glimmers that were the Soul Drinkers' makeshift assault craft.
In spite of everything, of all honour and tradition and basic loyalty, the Adeptus Mechanicus would resist. This should have been little more than a show of strength, a lightning raid that would leave the Geryon platform in Soul Drinker hands and convince the Mechanicus to return the Soulspear - but instead, the tech-priests had seen fit to turn this into a battle.
Deep down, Sarpedon had feared this. Those willing to steal the Emperor's finest could have it in their hearts to fight them for it, too. He had thought it hardly possible that sane men would dare take up arms against the Soul Drinkers, and now it seemed that this enemy was not sane after all.
There was a sudden flash of sparks against the black of space and the vox-link to Squad Phodel filled with static. A glint of silver sheared away from a magnalaser beam and tumbled towards the fast approaching Geryo
n platform. Six good Marines died as the Scalptaker hit at an angle, its scything wingtip catching on the edge of a hull plate and flipping it over and over until it smashed into a support stanchion. It burst, spilling its guts of fuel and machinery against the structures supporting the gargantuan ordinatus barrel above.
Two of the runes were still lit - an Assault Marine from Squad Phodel and an apothecary. They clung to the hull, hard vacuum against their backs as the fuel evaporated around them, watching the rest of the attackers come down.
Sarpedon watched the half-dozen life-lights winking out on the command holo.
They were the first he had lost as a commander.
The Hammerblade juddered violently - Givrillian and the six Marines of his squad clung to the beams and struts of the cargo-passenger compartment. Through the porthole
Sarpedon could now pick out the great metal plain of the artillery platform and the mountainous bulk of the Geryon cannon itself. The wide mouth of its squat main barrel could have swallowed a whole flight of attack craft, and Sarpedon had seen cities smaller than the web of recoil dampeners clustered around its base. He saw three more Soul Drinker craft swoop in low, aiming for the wide expanses of flat hull between sensorium arrays and thruster jet columns.
The Adeptus Mechanicus's apparent treachery had cost the lives of Space Marines, better men by far than any tech-priest. Every Soul Drinker would know it, in the star fort and the attack force. Their hearts would be steeled by the loss of their battle-brothers even as they whispered prayers to Dorn for the souls of the lost.
Sarpedon could feel their anger, for it was inside him, too, channeled into cold determination. This was war, it had been all along. The Mechanicus would have to kill to keep what they had stolen. Honour demanded that Sarpedon ensure they died for it, too.
Defences opened up all across the platform's surface, lasers and missiles. Bright bolts of power streaked across the porthole as servitor-emplacements took aim and fired. But there was nothing like the forest of fire they would have encountered had they gone for the platform's underside, where bombing runs would target the main thruster columns and ammunition holds. The Soul Drinkers weren't trying to blow the platform up - they were trying to get in.
A near-miss and the craft lurched violently, the Marines struggling to keep stable in the zero gravity. The platform loomed up ahead of them - they were heading for a wide expanse of metal with two craft going in beside them. Below the whine of the engines Sarpedon could hear the zips and crackles as las-bolts passed close and scored the hull.
Another Hammerblade was hit, one wing sheared off, and it angled sharply down towards the platform. Sarpedon didn't see how it impacted, but another eight lifelights turned cold.
Then the serf-pilot dipped the craft's nose and they were on their final run, hills and valleys of metal speeding by, explosions stuttering blooms against the blackness of space above them.
They hit shallow and belly-first, the pilot using the impact to slow the craft down given the Hammerblade's lack of retro-thrust power. The noise was awesome - a screech of metal that felt like it would never end, stanchions snapping, hull peeling back like shredded skin. The floor buckled and ruptured, and the platform's hull plates could be seen scudding past below their feet as the compartment was shaken as if grabbed by a giant fist. Sarpedon glanced through to the pilot's compartment and spotted the Chapter serf wrestling with the attitude controls, void shield splintering in front of him. The atmosphere had gone by then and his rebreather hood was misted with perspiration.
They stopped. The lights had failed and the command holo was just a glowing green smudge in the air.
'Report!'
The squad counted off. They had all made it intact. The serf, should he survive, would be suitably decorated upon their return.
'The cargo door's jammed.' said the serf-pilot breathlessly.
'Get us out.' said Givrillian, glancing at Trooper Thax at the tail-end of the hold.
The gravity was normal now they were in the platform's gravitic field, and Trooper Thax stepped forward holding the las-cutter with which each craft had been issued. The only sounds as he carved a wide arc in the side of the craft were the tingling vibrations through the Hammerblade's hull, and the faint background hiss of the vox-link.
They needed to get into atmosphere soon. The Mechanicus were undoubtedly capable of jamming their vox-net and the Soul Drinkers needed the option of verbal communication.
The hull section fell away and Sarpedon looked out on this new battlefield. A rolling expanse of riveted hull plates, punctured by mechanical outcrops and bulky mech-shed hills. The mighty peak of the gun soared above them, brooding and dark, picked out in reflected light from the glowing disk of Lakonia and hung against the backdrop of stars.
Givrillian was at his side, bolter levelled as the squad deployed from the wrecked Hammerblade. 'Looks like a munitions supply tunnel half a kilometre west, commander. Good for an entry point?'
Take us in, sergeant.'
The Marines moved swiftly across the platform deck, forming a cordon around Sarpedon. Thax and his plasma gun were on point and two Marines jogged backwards to cover the field of fire behind them. The munitions tunnel was a large square opening in the platform deck covered with metal slats of a shutter - there was a good chance the tunnel shaft led somewhere useful. There was an equally good chance the place had been marked as a likely entry point by the enemy and would be well-defended.
Good. Let them try. Let them find out what happens when they cross swords with the Soul Drinkers.
Sarpedon opened the command channel of the vox-net. The too-familiar broken chatter of battle flooded into his head.
'Squad Phodel down, I've got visual...'
'... hit hard, we have wounded and are heading into the secondary intake...'
'... pressure suits and energy weapons, taking fire.'
They were losing men already. But that was to be expected in such a high-risk deployment. When they were in the thick of the enemy and could fight back, it would be a different story. If there was another way, he would have taken it. But there was not. They had forced him into this, these thieves not fit to wear the Imperial eagle. And now they had shown the depths to which they would sink.
He held that thought and cherished it. Purity through hate. Dignity through rage. The words of the philosopher-soldier Daenyathos, written eight thousand years before in the pages of the Catechisms Martial, were a rock in the sea of war.
Purity through hate. Dignity through rage. Let the fire within you light the fires without.
The vox-net picture built up. The first craft had landed unmolested, with only a few injuries reported. The next flew into the defensive fire and two of these had been lost, with at least fourteen Marines dead and probably more. Amongst them the six members of Sergeant Phodel's assault squad and one of the Tech-Marines. There were no reports from the other two.
Tellos's squad, inevitably, was already inside, emerging in a main thoroughfare and blasting a great wound in the defenders they found with melta-bombs and bolt shells. In the background of his vox-frequency was the unmistakable thrum of chainblade through bone.
Las-fire stuttered soundlessly overhead as Sarpedon and Givrillian's squad reached the lip of the cargo-feed. Krak grenades blew off enough slats to provide an entrance, their small armour-piercing bursts imploding strangely in the vacuum.
'Go! Go!'
The Marines vaulted into the shaft in quick succession, Thax first, with Givrillian and Sarpedon in the middle. The shaft twisted alarmingly into the body of the platform and the Marines straggled to keep their footing. Sarpedon visualised their position - the shaft curled down alongside the massive machinery of the Geryon's loading and recoil mechanisms, right down to the muster deck where the Soul Drinkers would be able to move around the platform and secure it. They were heading in the right direction.
'Auspex is not transmitting,' said Givrillian from somewhere in the darkne
ss. 'Interference.'
Deeper, through the guts of massive machinery. Through grilles in the shaft's side Sarpedon's enhanced eyes glimpsed immense cogs turning slowly, pistons thudding out a rhythm. The vox-net was fragmented - he could tell there were combats breaking out all over, but no more. Tellos's voice cut through for a second, bellowing triumphant.
'Contact!' came a yell from beneath, a split-second before a wall of air whumped up the shaft. An atmosphere. Somewhere for the tech-guard to fight.
The bright wash of Thax's plasma gun rippled up from the bottom of the shaft. Fire from both sides crackled. Sarpedon tore off his helmet, felt the oily air in his throat, and leapt downwards.
'For Dorn!' he yelled, force staff raised to stab and thrust.
Contact.
THE AIR HOWLED into the shaft when tech-guard Grik slammed the intake lever down. The 674-XU28's machine-spirit spoke to the platform, which breathed atmosphere in the cargo feed so the Sixers could fight there without fear of vacuum-death. As long as they fought on this platform, the Sixers knew the very battlefield was on their side.
The loader shaft the enemy was entering through emptied into the throat of an ammo shifter, all huge blocks of brashed-steel machinery chased with bronze icons and inscribed machine-prayers. The great cogs beyond would move and the machinery would form a great swallowing gullet, dragging shells down to be slammed into the Geryon's breech. The shifter had reversed flow and brought the Sixers up here, to meet the attackers forcing their way in from above.
The twenty-strong tech-guard fire-team drew up around the feed exit, torchlights darting up into the twisted shaft. Klayden held up a metal hand flat and they waited for a second or two, listening.
A voice, shouting from inside the shaft. Panic, without a doubt. The attackers knew they had been found and they would probably be scrambling back up, trying to find a way out of their trap.