The Last Hunt
Page 19
Joghaten spent the night passing through the battle lines, speaking to each hunt-brother in turn. In the distance thunder continued to rumble, the ominous crashes lit with distant flares of hideous pink lightning. There were other noises too, carried on the humid, spore-choked wind – shrieks and ululating cries, and occasionally a deep, resonating bellow. The sounds were bestial, alien, and caused even the Space Marines to adopt a sombre mood. The hunting kindred spoke quietly among themselves as the hours wore on until someone, probably Jamek or Surbach, started the khoomei.
The primal sound rose quickly, passing like a lit flame in dry steppe grass from one squad to the next. It was a throat-chant, the form of song practised by the tribes of the Plain Zhou. It was the sound of distant Chogoris, brought here to its honour world. The throbbing baseline pitched and rolled across the grasslands and out into the night, steadily lowering, rising and lowering again, accompanied by the rhythmic slapping of gauntlets into breastplates and pauldrons. Despite himself, Joghaten found himself smiling by the time he had rejoined his honour guard, on the far right of the battle line.
Whatever happened, it was good to hunt with brothers such as these. He was guilty of forgetting that sometimes, when the weight of command dragged his spirit down. Now there was nothing between him and the hunt, nothing to cloud the reason for his existence.
A sickly, yellow dawn light revealed the things they had come here to kill. They seemed to stretch from one end of the horizon to the other, at first a black line beneath the edge of the storm that swiftly coalesced into a swirling mass. The sky was full, a great flock not just of gargoyles but also bigger, more terrible beasts, half shrouded by the leathery swarms around them. Those beneath were just as terrible – Joghaten’s optics picked out a chittering carpet of gaunts tens of thousands strong, a bristling sea of black chitin, fangs and gleaming eyes. Their leader-beasts drove them on, phalanxes of warriors, brain-bloated zoanthropes and worse. And there, at the heart of it all, the orchestrator of the invasion force: a king tyrant, master of the devouring horde, dragging its supreme bulk across Darkand’s trampled plains.
The thunderhead had come with the swarm, a broiling black morass through which the airborne flocks circled. The darkness, poised on the edge of the dawn light that still dashed across the steppe where the White Scars stood, rent into roiling pillars by the darting cloud cover. The brotherhood’s auspex displays were unable to compute the number of individual organisms converging on their positions, the screens reduced to a single mass of enemy contacts. The khoomei had ended – only the thunder of a hundred thousand hooves, and a rising swell of alien shrieks and roars, remained.
‘Khan-commander, we are in the air,’ clicked a voice in Joghaten’s ear as the Master of Blades took post on the right flank of his line. He surveyed the swarm for a moment more. He had almost forgotten how utterly sick their presence made him feel. Almost. He clicked the response rune.
Strike.
A new roar filled the air – engines. Sticks open and turbofans screaming, the Fourth Brotherhood’s strike wing tore over the Founding Wall and the White Scars’ positions, angled like a speeding arrow towards the heart of the approaching wall of alien ferocity. Someone let up a cheer, and the rest of the hunt-brothers joined in, hailing their airborne brethren and the first blood they were about to spill. Joghaten didn’t join in, but the sight of the five white-plated berkut sent a fresh surge of adrenaline through his veins, and he felt his secondary heart kick in, his systems flooding with battle stimulants.
‘It matters not if the foe faces us on the ground or strikes from the skies,’ he said to his bondsmen. ‘With such craft as these, none shall escape our wrath.’
The swarm reacted to the incoming attack, its pace increasing once more. A great, rolling shriek rose, shuddering the air with its potency, pealing out across the steppe and up the slopes and cobbled streets of Heavenfall. The Devourer had come, and it would not be denied. The strike wing opened fire.
Joghaten’s uplink with the Pride of Chogoris was still transmitting. He opened the channel, watching as the first distant specks tumbled from the sky amidst a hail of fire and metal.
‘Voyagemaster, we have engaged the primary swarm.’
Approaching high orbit, Darkand
The warfleet of the Fourth Brotherhood returned to Darkand on a battle heading. The Pride led them, swept and cleared for action, macrocannon batteries run out and lances primed. A smile was playing across Tzu Shen’s scarred lips as he sat in his throne mount in the primary bridge dome.
‘The xenos are still clustered north of the equatorial segment, quadrant eleven-fifteen, voyagemaster,’ an augur zart reported.
Shen accepted the information with a nod, despite the fact that he was already aware of it. His body was riven with the electrical charge of his ship, his hands clenched into fists, potent with the power of a whole strike cruiser’s weapons systems. He could see the hive fleet in his mind’s eye, polluting the upper atmosphere of Darkand, clustering like parasites suckling off a host creature. He would wipe them away.
‘Let them know we are here,’ he ordered, routing the command to lance battery control. His words received an almost immediate response – a spear of energy lashed the nearest edge of the void swarm, missing the nearest bio-ship and dissipating in the upper atmosphere. The shot was a long one, but it had the desired effect – across the oculus stands, viewscreens and augur arrays, a large section began to break away from the tyranid fleet, rising like oceanic beasts from the depths to meet the oncoming White Scars fleet. Shen let them come, before issuing a fresh burst of reading coordinates.
‘Hard to port,’ he ordered. ‘Mark three. Make sure they follow.’
The fleet turned, offering their starboard flanks to the approaching flock of xenos bio-ships. Shen scanned the approaching creatures, sending a vox update planetside as he did so.
‘Next phase initiated.’
Outside the Founding Wall, Heavenfall
Joghaten and the bikers of the Fourth Brotherhood turned north with the lodge pole at their head. They were riding parallel with the swarm and away from the hill that was acting as the firebase for the brotherhood’s tactical and devastator squads. Jubai, the horsehair plumes streaming above him, rode alongside Joghaten and Whitemane as they led the squadrons on, between the bastions and parapets of the Founding Wall and the left flank of the xenos swarm. Behind them the battle had been joined. The strike wing had claimed the first kills, as they so often did, scything in amongst the enemy from above. The tight phalanx of Stormtalon and Stormhawks had attacked the flocks of gargoyles above the main swarm head-on, a hail of high-energy las, heavy bolter rounds and twin assault cannon streams clearing a path before them. They turned back on themselves, cutting the other way, white-and-red armour plates already slick with steaming acid, bio-plasma, and the remains of gargoyles torn apart by their ferocious lightning passage.
Their third run cut low, in beneath the bloodied flocks to target the lumbering leader-beast at the heart of the swarm. They were forced to pull up almost immediately – a bolt of energy burst from the swollen brain-stem of a zoanthrope drifting close to the leader-beast, clipping Red Berkut’s wing and causing it to drop out of formation. The rest of the strike wing fell in around it, protecting it from the shrieking gargoyles while its pilot regained control.
‘The leader-beast is protected,’ the wing’s leader, Agaar, reported over the vox. ‘As we expected.’
‘Just keep the flocks off the firebase on the hill,’ Joghaten ordered. ‘Is the swarm dividing yet?’ There was a moment’s silence before Agaar replied.
‘Yes, khan-commander.’
A moment later Whitemane’s auspex confirmed the report – a glance at the reading told Joghaten a large section of the swarm was peeling away from the main body and pursuing his bikes north, away from the hill where the brotherhood’s Devastators, heavy armour and tactica
l squads were deployed.
‘Press on,’ Joghaten urged over the vox. Behind him the main swarm was starting to come under fire from the hill. The White Scars there followed their targeting directives and focused their heavy weapon fire on the leader-beasts. The brood’s fury rose audibly as krak missiles, plasma and lascannon bolts slammed into clusters of warriors and leader-beasts, splitting chitin and bone. The infantry support weapons were bolstered by the brotherhood’s battle tanks, Vindicator battle cannons, Predator las turrets and Land Raider heavy bolters ripping gouges amidst the smaller creatures attempting to protect their masters.
The first wave of the main swarm charged, a mass of gaunts that was met by a wall of bolter fire from the tactical squads. The thunder of a full, pitched battle dragged at Joghaten, calling him back to the hill. It was all he could do to focus and continue to ride north, using the Founding Wall as a guide.
The section of the swarm that had broken off to shadow the bikers continued to follow them northwards.
High orbit, Darkand
The hive fleet splinter in orbit was still following the Pride and her escorts. Shen focused on the brood of bio-ships intently, body rigid and quaking with the strain of the ship’s systems. His vital signs were beginning to spike, pushed to the edge by the ship’s systems being routed through his own nervous centre, but he brushed off the mental alarms. Now, more than ever, he needed to be at one with his ship.
The Pride of Chogoris was leading the fleet along the rear of the swarm, drawing the greater part of it up out of Darkand’s increasingly choked exosphere. The hive ships themselves remained in a lower anchorage, their presence overseeing the planetside swarms and providing the option of further reinforcement seedings, but most of the bio-ships that protected the ruling triumvirate were now pulling themselves after Shen’s vessels. The fleet had turned in-system towards Darkand’s star, adopting a speed that was both brisk and unhurried.
‘Hold course and maintain formation,’ Shen instructed for the umpteenth time, not truly aware of the orders leaving his lips. He was too engrossed in the Pride’s own progress, his sense of the bridge yurut now distant and blurred.
Still the xenos followed. A few launched acid spores and trailing gnaw-pods, but the organic projectiles trailed off before making contact and drifted away, the range too long. The White Scars carried on, keeping just out of the edge of the engagement zone. Shen’s concentration remained fixed, his breathing rapid and shallow, his whole body rigid. The crucial moment was fast approaching.
Near the Mountain Gate, Heavenfall
Wind Tamer was caught up in the aerial battle spreading through the air outside the Mountain Gate. Timchet gritted his teeth and dragged his heavy bolter back along its rail mount; his armour was locked, struggling to keep the viciously kicking weapon on target as he pumped hard rounds into a flock of gargoyles shrieking towards them. Winged aliens tumbled or burst apart in showers of stinking purple gristle, but most came, careering past Wind Tamer, over, under and around it, splatters of bio-acid and clawing black insects making the scarred Land Speeder shudder.
For once, Hagai didn’t criticise his gunner’s accuracy. The pilot was too engrossed in his own battle, struggling to keep pace with Joghaten’s bikes and steal between the thickest clusters of airborne alien flocks. The entirety of the brotherhood’s skimmer complement was providing air support for the bike wing while the Stormtalons and Stormhawks protected the infantry firebase on the hill. What had started out as boastful competition among the three sets of Land Speeder crew had quickly grown serious – they were beset. While most of the swarm was still attacking the hill, a huge flock had detached and was now focusing on the right flank of the White Scars formation. The Land Speeders’ orders were straightforward – keep the flying xenos away from the bikers – but it was quickly proving easier said than done.
‘Harpy,’ crackled the voice of Sai’li over the vox. ‘Your nine o’clock, Wind Tamer. Don’t let it through.’
Hagai confirmed with a blink-click, grunting a warning to Timchet as he wrenched the Land Speeder to the left. The movement hardly made any difference to Timchet’s aim – there were xenos all around them, it didn’t matter which way he fired. They were at the heart of a swirling, shrieking storm of leathery wings, snapping maws and drooling orifice weapons. Everywhere his heavy bolter turned it was blasting apart flesh and chitin, and everywhere the gaps torn by his shots were swiftly filled.
‘Visuals,’ Hagai said over the vox. Timchet dragged the heavy bolter back round so it was facing directly ahead, just in time to vaporise a clutch of gargoyles coming at them head-on, their hideous, unearthly shrieks stripped out by his Lyman’s ear.
Behind them was the harpy. It was a larger sister to the flocks of gargoyles under its command, a great, sinuous thing with a wingspan wider than a Stormtalon. Its forelimbs were fused ranged bio-weapons, but worst of all were the spore cysts clustered beneath its wings. The tactical briefings had been clear about the damage it could do if it was allowed to rain explosive organics down onto those below.
Timchet opened fire without hesitation. The oncoming harpy took a string of explosive blasts to its tough exoskeleton before it pulled up, its deeper roar making the whole Land Speeder rattle.
‘Follow it up,’ Timchet barked as he tried to track the lithe airborne alien, his stream of bolts eviscerating a clutch of its underlings but failing to catch it.
‘Trying,’ Hagai growled, wrestling with the stick. Wind Tamer started to climb, turbofans protesting at an agonising pitch. For all its speed and agility, the Land Speeder was not an air superiority fighter. Against something like the harpy it was outmatched, and both pilot and gunner knew it.
‘It’s coming overhead,’ Timchet warned, still unable to get a lock on the thing’s serpent-like body. ‘Break left! Break!’
Too late they realised what the harpy was doing. Its climb hadn’t been simply to avoid them, it had been to bring them into range of its cysts. With the Land Speeder momentarily directly below it, the creature loosed another bellow and spat the spores clustered beneath its wings. Thanks to Timchet’s warning, Hagai’s reflexes and Wind Tamer’s response, the Land Speeder was veering out of the cone of destruction dropped from the winged xenos, but it could not escape entirely. One spore clipped the right tail fin, a gout of steaming bio-acid melting away the plasteel in a heartbeat and damaging the workings of the right turbofan within, after a few seconds of hissing, metal-gnawing insistence. Another spore clipped Wind Tamer’s nose and burst with a wet pop, showering both pilots with a hail of chitin shrapnel. Timchet’s auto-senses pinged with impact warnings, his armour riddled with spines, but none had penetrated.
Hagai was not so lucky. The burst found weak points in his right elbow’s electro-seal and punctured his helmet above his left visor lens, scraping his temple. He grunted, Wind Tamer twitching off course for a moment before his enhanced body overcame the pain.
‘I’m fine,’ he managed.
‘I wasn’t asking,’ Timchet responded, already firing again. The evasive manoeuvre had carried them right into the heart of another flock. The xenos were all over them.
‘It broke through,’ Hagai said into the vox, twisting Wind Tamer hard to the right.
‘I’ve got it in my sights,’ Sai’li responded. Even over the labouring scream of their engines, the hammer of Timchet’s heavy weapon and the screeches of the xenos all around them, the two pilots heard the familiar rattle of an assault cannon, followed by a monstrous bellow.
‘Always taking our kills,’ Hagai said, slewing Wind Tamer into another violent turn.
Supporting fire from the Pinnacle Guard manning the Founding Wall bought the White Scars on the hilltop precious time. In truth, Subodak and his Devastators had expected the human defenders of Heavenfall holding the bastions behind the White Scars to abandon their positions at the first sight of the oncoming swarm. Instead, as the
lead elements of the tyranid invasion closed with the Space Marine tactical and devastator squads out on the hilltop, a barrage of las-fire and parapet-mounted heavy weaponry brought them to a halt.
The intervention was a welcome one. The Devastators under Subodak, holding the very crest of the hilltop, had followed their directives and focused fire on the large leader-beasts interspersed among the carpet of gaunts and rippers, but that meant the smaller, fleeter beasts had been able to close the range more effectively. The relentless bolter fire of the supporting tactical squads had checked them for a while, but even the most disciplined fire protocols and engagement arcs could not help but be overwhelmed by the sheer size and speed on the onrushing swarm. The brilliant barrage of las-bolts checked the dark tide of claws and fangs just a few dozen yards from the Tactical Marines.
Subodak knew they had two minutes at most before the tyranids rallied once more and closed the final distance. He told Joghaten as much on the vox. Several miles north, the khan-commander acknowledged and checked his scope. He was out of time. The moment had come. He held up one hand, fist clenched but for a single finger pointing skywards.
‘Hunt-brothers,’ he said over the vox. ‘Break.’
High orbit, Darkand
Onboard the Pride of Chogoris a bell clanged, its sonorous tone rolling out across the bridge dome. The motions of the zarts came to a standstill, and all eyes turned towards Tzu Shen. The voyagemaster held a single finger up towards the yurut’s dome, and smiled.