Armageddon Saint - Gav Thorpe

by Warhammer 40K

  ‘And you would face these tribulations by gallivanting off with the Space Marines?’

  ‘It is a well-prepared mission,’ interjects Aladia. ‘The Sisters of the Argent Shroud can contribute a significant effort to securing victory against the Abominations of the Antithesis. I would rather embark on this endeavour with your blessing, but I do not require your permission. The Decree Passive makes it clear that you cannot involve yourself in the direction of the Orders Militant.’

  ‘Well, actually, it is the Synod Guidance of Ecclesiarch Dioclevis the Eighth,’ the priest retaliates. ‘If you had studied canonical lore–’

  ‘We are leaving, Deniumenialis,’ the Sister Superior tells him sharply. She gives a nod of salute to the canoness and is about to turn away when the frail preacher raises a hand to stop her.

  ‘I relent,’ he says. He takes up his ecclesiary beads and makes the sign of the holy ‘I’ in front of the Battle Sister, ‘Of course you depart with the blessings of the Emperor upon you, Sister Superior. The God-Emperor of Terra loves you and fills you with His grace to defy the darkness that besets us. Look to His Will to guide your weapons, and see in His ­sacrifice the strength you have to prevail against all foes.’

  The Sister Superior lowers to one knee to receive the benediction, head bowed. As Old Preacher finishes, Aladia stands and proffers her boltgun. The priest wraps the length of beads about its muzzle and says some words in High Gothic.

  ‘If I recall correctly,’ he says, holding the beads to the gun, ‘you are required to provide a bodyguard to all members of the clergy.’

  ‘You will be safe,’ says the Sister Superior.

  ‘That is not what I said. I am due an appropriate bodyguard, led by a Sister Superior. I insist that you provide it.’

  ‘It will weaken my force to leave Battle Sisters at the abbey.’

  ‘I insist. This is holy ground of the Ecclesiarchy. It is still manned by your Sisters.’

  ‘They have protection.’

  ‘Your oaths, Sister Superior, are binding.’

  Aladia stares at him for several seconds, fingers flexing around the grip of her bolter. The Sister Superior turns her attention to Erasmisa.

  ‘Canoness, what do our Articles of Faith say is the appropriate guard for a preacher?’

  ‘One Sister, I believe, Aladia. One Battle Sister for a preacher of the second order.’

  ‘Ridiculous!’ snorts Deniumenialis. ‘How much protection can one Sister provide me? No, you should keep your command here, Sister Aladia.’

  ‘One Sister, canoness?’ says the Battle Sister. Her gaze returns to Old Preacher. ‘I will stand as guard for you, Deniumenialis.’

  The rumble of the vehicle engines grows louder as they start to pull out.

  ‘No, no!’ snaps the priest. ‘Recall them immediately! This is impiety, to ignore my bidding!’

  Each vehicle passes out through the gate along the cratered remains of the metalled road, tracks grinding through broken pieces of armour while spiked prows push through the scattered remains of Immolators and the drop pods destroyed by Space Marine melta bombs about an hour earlier.

  I watch them for a few hundred metres, until oily smoke and dust clouds obscure the column from view. The cloister is now home only to a few dozen wasters, hivers and ancillary abbey staff, save for those wounded and the ones tending them below. I turn to my other companions and then meet the gaze of the Colonel with a sigh.

  ‘That’s it then? Anyone got some dice?’

  It’s been nearly an hour since the Battle Sisters left us to protect the abbey and refugees. We’ve got sentries on the towers and walls – a mix of hivers and wasters – while Canoness Erasmisa and Aladia conduct an inspection of the supplies situation. With the Battle Sisters gone there’s plenty of room in their former dormitories, so everyone else is making good with bedrolls, blankets and whatever they brought with them. The corpses were moved before the expedition force left – honoured dead have been placed in tomb cells below the abbey while the remains of the traitors are burning on a pyre about half a kilo­metre away. Old Preacher is preparing to conduct funeral prayers for the non-Sisterhood casualties.

  A shout from an ex-trooper at one of the tower heavy bolters has me dashing up the rampart and into the gun room, Schaeffer close on my heels.

  ‘What is it?’ I demand, even before I’m fully through the door. ‘Neverborn?’

  ‘Movement,’ says the gunner. I recognise Terrick, the soldier from Hades Hive. She points out of the gun slit, across the defence lines between the abbey and wastes. ‘About four hundred metres. Something following the way we came in.’

  I peer through the embrasure, trying to see what’s caught her eye. There could be something, where Terrick said. Might just be a shadow or it might be something else.

  I can’t feel any prickle of the skin, but I’m not ready to rule out something otherworldly just yet. It’d be just typical if the warpborn arrived so soon after the Space Marines and Battle Sisters left.

  The door bangs open, causing me to jolt, banging my head against the inside of the gun window.

  ‘Mind yourself,’ says Orskya as she ducks through the doorway. ‘I heard a shout.’

  Rubbing my head, I draw back from the embrasure.

  ‘Perhaps something coming this way,’ I say, stepping towards the duneseer. ‘Do you still have your magnoculars?’

  She takes the viewing glasses out of her coat, another duneseer family heirloom, and hands them over. I return to the window and scan across the defences again, following the line of Rhino tracks that lead back to where we fought the Neverborn and were rescued.

  ‘There it is,’ I say, spotting a figure clambering across the broken wall of a gun pit. A smaller shape follows at its heel and I laugh.

  ‘It’s Nazrek!’

  Along with a few wasters for company, I venture out of the abbey to meet the ork about a hundred metres from the gate tower. Nazrek sees us coming and sits down on a waymarker by the metalled road.

  Drawing level, I see the ork looks in rough shape, eyes closed as Grot sets to work with a bodkin thick enough to be classed as a weapon, stitching a length of heavy cord through a gaping wound in Nazrek’s side.

  ‘Still alive,’ I say.

  The ork opens its eyes, the red reminding me of the inhuman gaze of Sergeant Ohuak.

  ‘Me live too,’ it replies, lips curling back in an approximation of a grin. ‘Need new arm.’

  It lifts the stump, a trickle of blood seeping out of the horrendous wound, shards of bone jutting from ruptured flesh. I suppress a gag, wondering how Nazrek is even conscious, never mind calm.

  Part of the answer comes when Grot pauses in its labours and pulls a fistful of the mushrooms packed into a pouch at its belt. It tosses them into the ork’s mouth, and Nazrek closes its massive jaw and chews. A contented sigh escapes the ork as its eyes close again.

  Grot offers up a bright orange toadstool but I decline with a raised hand.

  ‘Tempting, but I better not,’ I tell the small alien. It shrugs, pops the fungus into its mouth and sets to work on its needlework again.

  ‘I can’t believe the warp dogs didn’t get you,’ I say.

  Nazrek smiles, listless with the effect of the narcotic.

  ‘Fight two. Run from rest.’ It chuckles, chest rising, causing Grot to mutter something under its breath as the stitching starts to part. ‘See silver humans fight. Hide. Then see sky stars and big dakkaship. Think that Burned Man in trouble. Find trail.’

  ‘And here we are…’ I look back at the abbey and wonder how the Sisters will react to an ork. I don’t think there’s anything the Hospitallers can do for the alien, but Nazrek’s got a better chance of surviving with us than out here. And as far as bodyguards go, there’s not much better than a giant ork. I wish Nazrek had been at my side when the Traitor Ast
artes had come.

  ‘Come on,’ I say, gesturing for the ork to stand up. It opens an eye and then both, and then heaves itself to its feet. I had sort of forgotten just how massive Nazrek is, but even so, it seems bigger than before. ‘Have you been growing?’

  The alien grunts and lifts a fist in front of its face.

  ‘Good fightin’, make Nazrek strong again.’ It bares its fangs. ‘Not runt scraps. Proper fights, make Nazrek big.’

  ‘I figure you’re gonna get bigger still, my green friend,’ I say.

  There’s a lot of fighting still to come. Whether its orks, Traitor Astar­tes or Neverborn, something is going to find us at the abbey. Just a matter of what and when.

  I found a fold-out camp chair in one of the abandoned cells, and I’ve set it up on the gate rampart overlooking the road. There’s recaff in my mug – nothing stronger to be found despite pressing Deniumeni­alis – and I sit there for a few minutes just listening to the quiet bustle.

  Nazrek and Grot disappeared into the vehicle cloister as soon as I showed them around the abbey. There’s been banging and orkish cursing on and off ever since. Nobody’s dared investigate yet.

  Aladia is less than happy at having ‘xenos scum’ in her abbey, and both Erasmisa and Old Preacher went pale at the thought. Despite their reservations, none of them was prepared to argue the point at this time while face-to-face with the massive brute, or the teams of armed underhivers and wasters aligned to my cause. For its part, Nazrek said that the Emperor had ‘lots of dakka’ and it would die to defend the Emperor’s ‘shak’. Grot even made an offering, laying a small pile of half-chewed fungus at the feet of the holy statue.

  A shadow falls over me. It’s the Colonel. He’s still dressed in his waster coat, cap and shawl, but from somewhere in the stores he’s procured a couple of aquila brooches he’s fastened to his breast and hat. He also holds a steaming mug, hands in fingerless gloves clasping it to his chest as he looks out over the expanse of the abandoned defences.

  ‘Nothing between us and Acheron, or the orks at the rok fort,’ he says, almost to himself. ‘These people need protection.’

  ‘Didn’t drag them out of the hive and across the wastes just to leave them to the beasts and hunters,’ I murmur.

  ‘Of course, there is little we can do against a full-scale assault of the warpborn,’ he adds, glance moving to the wound in the sky and back to me.

  ‘The abbey provides sanctuary. The warpborn can’t enter.’

  ‘That was the faith of the Battle Sisters.’ He gives me a long look. ‘Do you really think you are holy enough to drive back the imma­terial fiends?’

  ‘I’m basically a living saint,’ I reply and take a swig of recaff. ‘Denium­enialis says as much.’

  ‘There is good reason why it requires a conclave of cardinals and many noted miracles to declare a man or woman a saint, and not just the word of a single priest.’

  I sit forward, elbows on knees.

  ‘Why shouldn’t I be a living saint?’ I ask, as much for myself as him. ‘Do you really think I’m just that lucky that I’m still alive? Would luck have got me out alive from the fire chasm? Or maybe you don’t think the Emperor protects. All that shit you spew about saving our souls, that’s just an excuse for you.’

  ‘I do not doubt that the Emperor can extend His Will to shape the course of our lives. There are many tales of His doing so or guiding His followers to victory with the Imperial Tarot. Even so, I will not ascribe every outlandish event as divine intervention. And I refuse to accept that a murdering, treacherous blasphemer like you would be so elevated by His glorious purpose.’

  ‘But what better vessel for His Will than one that was broken but He has mended?’ I take another drink and then point at Schaeffer. ‘You are partly responsible for bringing me onto this holy path. What drew you to that world, those years ago, when you came for me? It was the hand of the Emperor, acting through you, setting me on this course.’

  He looks thoughtful for a moment, not dismissing me out of hand. The Colonel shakes his head.

  ‘No. I went to that world because garrisons always get bored, giving the malcontents like you opportunity to show their true colours. I knew I’d find my type of scum, it just happened that you were one of them.’

  ‘How many survivors have there been?’ I ask suddenly. ‘Except you, I mean. All the missions, all the Last Chancers, how many people have got through with life and limb intact?’

  ‘Sane or just alive?’ asks the Colonel, as plainly as someone might ask if I want my recaff with synthi-lact or not.

  ‘Let’s just go with breathing,’ I say, not wanting to think too much about the alternatives. A little close to home, some might say.

  ‘Eight,’ says Schaeffer. ‘Not including you or me, there have been eight other Last Chancers that survived to take their pardons.’

  ‘Eight?’ I nearly fall out of the chair. ‘Out of thousands? Eight!’

  ‘Never failed a mission,’ the Colonel says in defence of this appalling survival rate. He sees my expression and scowls. ‘Do you think you can win wars without people dying? What is it that you think the Imperial Guard is for?’

  ‘To protect the realms of the Emperor. To uphold the Imperial Will of Terra,’ I say, quoting from the oath I swore when I was recruited into the Astra Militarum. ‘Remember what Ollanius Pius said about the Emperor? We protect Him, and He’ll protect us.’

  ‘To die for the Imperium,’ says the Colonel. He leans a little closer, stare fixed on me. ‘An Imperial Guardsman’s duty is to die for the Emperor. The Emperor sacrifices all for humanity, and so humanity will sacrifice all for the Emperor. You will kill for the Emperor, but more importantly you will die for the Emperor so that others do not.’

  I look at him, amazed at this forthright confession. I have a bleak view of the universe but to see the Colonel’s summed up like that… It puts his idea of a Last Chance into a different light, that’s for sure.

  ‘Did you think heroes keep the Imperium alive?’ he continues. ‘Living saints? Battle Sisters? Space Marines? All very fine warriors, each the equal of many soldiers of the Astra Militarum. But that is also their weakness. What can one Space Marine achieve that a thousand Guard cannot? Think back to your victories, Kage, and tell me what you have achieved that any other man or woman could not? I thought you had grasped this, when you ranted on the wall to that underhiver scum. You are not special; you are simply here. Your role is to die so that others live, and yet you seem incapable of fulfilling that simple bargain. Saints are martyred. You simply refuse to die.’

  ‘I…’ Where is the argument against that? How do you speak against a creed that’s so dismissive of individual life and liberty? More to the point, I know he’s right. Every damned word of it is like the truth hammered into my skull.

  ‘Your life can be spent doing many things, Kage, but your death can only be spent once. Tell me a tale of how a living saint sat upon the walls of a battle abbey drinking recaff while the warriors of the Adeptus Astartes and Adepta Sororitas took the war to the enemies of the Emperor.’

  ‘I didn’t choose–’

  ‘Remind me of the time Saint Lithoria stayed at the ruins of Hope Station and fed the weak, giving of her own plate for others.’

  ‘I’m sure she–’

  ‘Saint Lithoria died upon the breach of Darkwell so that the armies of the Emperor could storm the citadel! She knew it was her duty to strike back at those that had broken Hope Station even though she would not live to see the victory. Look around you, Kage. Does this seem like a victory to you?’

  I’m going to say something about people being alive out here rather than dead in the underhive, but I know that’s not going to convince him. And it shouldn’t. As many hivers as I’ve saved, there’s a dead waster or Battle Sister. I mean, the warpborn and the World Eaters didn’t attack here because we came,
but we didn’t really achieve anything either. Only the Battle Sisters and the arrival of the Salamanders stopped us all from getting butchered.

  If I look at the story again from where we are now, seems to me all I did was lead them into the path of a different danger.

  ‘I see that you are starting to understand, Kage,’ the Colonel says, voice softening. He looks at me with those ice-blue eyes, not with compassion but a fierce determination. ‘I told you before, you cannot save them all. In fact, you cannot save any of them. Death cannot be cheated. You have lived that lie, again and again.’

  ‘Is it so wrong to want to live?’

  ‘If you are a farmer, or a clerk, or a tech-menial. You are not. You are a soldier. You must accept that you will die in the Emperor’s service. Not embrace it, not chase it as a doom, but to take the Emperor’s ­sacrifice into yourself and share the burden.’

  I nod, understanding again what it was that he was trying to achieve. Again, because I’d sort of forgotten it with everything that had happened after the fire chasm. It’s like coming out of the flames washed the memory from me. That clarity I had standing on the edge, just before I threw myself and von Strab to our fiery deaths.

  I turn to look at the people on the walls, the others down in the cloister going about their displaced lives.

  ‘But if we’re not trying to protect this… It’s their lives we are shielding, even if the place has changed.’

  ‘No, you are thinking too narrowly, Kage.’ The Colonel straightens, eyes scanning over the abbey and those within it. ‘You owe them nothing. A few dozen flakes of ash on the wastes. The Emperor rules countless billions. It is all of them that you serve. Which is better? To wait for the battle to come and fight here, scrapping your last breath for these people, or to find a higher purpose, a greater mission that will defy the plans of the enemy and save thousands, or millions?’

  I think back to the things we’ve done. It all seemed so small at the time. A reactor going critical. A bullet in an alien’s brain. A man throwing himself into a fire with another man. Simple acts. Almost impossible to create the circumstances, but so small to finish once we were there.