Scipio was about to raise Sergeant Vandar on the vox to discuss potential attack-run vectors when something fast bolted across the skyline and shot between them. A thunderous boom shook the air and the hold, resonating down the Gladius’s hull.
A pair of vessels cruising at supersonic speed had just arrowed between them, making the gunships look slow and cumbersome by comparison.
‘Guilliman’s sacred blood!’
Brakkius tried to follow their flight path through the open side-hatch, but it was impossible.
Vandar’s voice crackled over the vox.
‘Did you see that, Vorolanus?’
‘A pair of flyers. Sickle-shaped, I think,’ said Scipio, tracking a rapidly disappearing smudge through his magnoculars. ‘Extremely fast.’
‘They’re headed for Kellenport. I’m going to pursue in the Thunderstorm. We might not catch them but we’ll sure as Hera take them apart if they are bound for the city.’
‘Two birds against one, Vandar. We can guard your wing for you.’
‘Appreciated, but we’ll have plenty of support when we arrive. Stay with Chronus. I don’t believe this is all there is of our enemies.’
Vandar cut the link. A few seconds later, the Thunderstorm streaked past on full engine burn.
There was little time for the warriors aboard the Gladius to watch their fellow gunship depart because, below them, a storm was about to break.
Chronus watched the bombardment commence from the Rage of Antonius’s cupola. The Whirlwinds fired in strict and regimented succession, one missile per salvo. Their rocket-fuelled payloads streaked into the air on thick contrails of white smoke, their perfect telemetry bringing the combined barrage down amidst the necrons with destructive results.
Vengeance-class missiles were solid-fuel, fragmentation ordnance. Not tank-busters by any gauge, but against densely packed infantry they were devastating. Necron bodies were blasted apart under this aggressive and sustained barrage. Three salvos went out, nine missiles in total, shattering one region of the ice plain into craters and gouging a cleft in the enemy ranks.
Through his raised scopes, Chronus saw the telltale flashes of multiple phase-outs. On a tactical screen slaved to one lens of his retinal display, the entire tank formation was arrayed and lit.
‘Cease barrage,’ he uttered into the vox, speaking directly to the gunnery crews of Fury Unbound, Ceaseless Endeavour and Scion of Talassar. ‘Resupply, Castellan load-out.’
He smiled grimly, all his good humour faded as the aspect of war came upon him. ‘You think that hurt,’ he muttered, watching the dogged necron advance. ‘That didn’t hurt.’
Returning to the vox, the icons of Glory of Calth, The Ram and Wrath of Invictus glowed brightest on the right lens retinal display as Chronus opened his command channel to their crews.
‘Vindicators advance fifty metres and engage.’
A string of affirmation runes flashed across Chronus’s display as the three battle tanks ground forwards in unison. At the fifty-metre mark, the hull-mounted Demolishers jutting belligerently through each Vindicator’s siege shield spoke.
Their combined voice was terrifically loud and roared with captured thunder that shook the earth as far as the Rage of Antonius. Chronus laughed loud and wrathfully as his Predator shuddered with the awesome resonance of the siege tanks. Three wide and impossibly powerful explosions erupted to the front of the necron ranks. Amidst the flying limbs and other body parts, Chronus witnessed over a score of phase-outs. After the smoke cleared and the few surviving necrons had managed to crawl from the trench dug by the Vindicators’ ordnance, there was almost nothing left of the first phalanx. He had done it to prove a point, to show the mechanoids that the Ultramarines yet had weapons in their arsenal that could dismantle them, just as Chronus had vowed to his comrades.
Five more fully intact phalanxes advanced after the necron vanguard, the broken remnants slowly to be absorbed into the larger formations. Their weapons were fixed forwards, intent on the artillery squadrons occupying the ridge.
Chronus watched the necrons enter the killbox and gave the order for the flanking forces to circle around and entrap them.
‘All gunners on the ridge,’ he voxed, as Novus got the Rage of Antonius moving steadily in concert with the other Predators. ‘Sustained barrage until flanks reach within two hundred metres. Commence with extreme prejudice.’ He leaned into the hatch to speak directly to his driver. ‘Bring us in, Novus. I want to vent the guns. Vutrius?’
‘We are weapons-ready, commander.’
‘Good. The turret is mine, brother.’
Vutrius responded with a clipped affirmative, switching control to Chronus.
Heavy thunder was rolling down off the ridge, turning the ice plain into a wrecker’s yard and the necrons into a distant memory. If he had not wanted to taste some of that righteous fury himself, Chronus would have gladly watched the faultless display of his battle tanks and revelled in its perfect destruction.
Overhead in the Gladius, Scipio marvelled at the superlative tactical display being orchestrated by Chronus. A sizeable contingent of almost three hundred necrons had already been reduced to two-thirds that number, and they were but casualties of the bombardment. Chronus had yet to even engage with his flanking forces.
A stilted layer of return fire was coming from the necrons now that they had advanced far enough across the ice plain, but it was sporadic and at extreme range. Certainly, nothing to trouble the Ultramarines armour on the ridge.
Even still, the sergeant could not put his mind at ease.
‘Bring us in closer, but circle the flanks,’ he voxed up to their pilot, prompting an immediate shift in velocity and altitude from the Thunderhawk.
‘Do you see it too, brother-sergeant?’
Scipio turned sharply at the resonant, machine-like voice. Something in his subconscious almost made him draw his pistol, but it was no necron that addressed him. It was Vantor, skulking in the shadows behind them.
‘See what?’ asked Scipio, though he thought he knew the Techmarine’s meaning.
‘A trap…’
‘We all see it, Techmarine, it is Chronus’s–’ Brakkius began.
‘Around our armour, brother,’ Vantor corrected. ‘This is but a feint.’
‘How is that even possible?’ snapped Brakkius. ‘Look at them, they are all but defeated. There is no tactical acumen at work, just mechanised shells slaved to routine.’
‘I agree,’ said Vantor, ‘but analyse that battlefield below us… What word comes to mind when you see the necrons?’
Brakkius snarled, still not comprehending. ‘Scrap. Metal.’
‘Bait,’ said Scipio, believing the Techmarine but unsure what their next move should be. ‘And how do you suggest I convey to the commander that he is being drawn into a trap?’
‘What trap?’ asked Brakkius, exasperated. He gestured to the decimated necrons. ‘It’s already over.’
Vantor ignored him, and looked impassive as he answered Scipio’s question.
‘How do you tell a hero of Ultramar his perfect strategy is part of an elaborate enemy ruse? I’m not sure you can, brother-sergeant.’
Scipio looked down onto the battlefield.
The Predators were engaging.
Novus pushed the Rage of Antonius up to combat speed, leading the first squadron by the smallest of margins. Rather than envelop the necron infantry in a pincer-like movement that would amply suit a ground-based force, Chronus had the two lines attack in file obliquely so they overlapped and enfiladed the enemy prior to the point of intersection.
The Rage of Antonius was on its first pass, The Vengeful and Hellhunter on its tracked heels in close squadron formation, when the optimum range marker flashed on the tank commander’s retinal display.
‘Unleash guns!’ Chronus roared, without ceremony. Wa
r sang in his heart, buoyed higher through the exhilaration of tank-mounted combat. Still rolling at combat speed, the Predator’s turret swung around to forty-five degrees and released a searing lance of energy. The azure beam struck the edge of a necron formation and vaporised one of the automatons. It was followed fractionally later by a second beam. Paired phase-outs overlapped, creating a bright burst of viridian energy. Capacitors in the Rage of Antonius took a few seconds to build back up to power before a second volley was released.
Targets in his sights, Chronus poured on the punishment, shifting his aim and the turret as the battle tank moved. The side sponsons chattered below, spitting out shells that detonated upon impact and chewed holes in the packed necron ranks. The heavy bolters kept up a steady refrain, audible between the high-pitched whine of the pounding lascannon.
Twelve engines released their weapons on one flank, whilst on the opposite side the half-dozen Land Raiders lit up the dwindling snowstorm with ranks of explosive muzzle flare from assault cannons and hurricane bolters. Las-beams, distant on the opposite side of the battlefield but getting closer, stabbed from the shadows like spears of light and were joined by the barking report of heavy bolters. Necrons were cut apart. Those struck by the lascannons were summarily destroyed in actinic flashes. The solid-shell weapons took a heavier toll at first, levelling a veritable deluge of fire, but several necrons were showing signs of self-repair and those felled in the earlier salvos were returning to their dauntless ranks.
Down the centre, the bombardment ceased as the other tanks came to within the two hundred metre no-fire zone. It mattered little – the necrons had been drawn into the trap and were being picked apart by Chronus’s armoured squadrons.
‘Dismantle you,’ the tank commander said to himself, holding fire for a moment to appreciate the carnage his engines were causing, ‘piece by piece.’
Through the open hatch of the Gladius, the battlefield below looked strung out. From his vantage leaning out of the hold, Scipio saw vast gaps emerging in the necrons’ previously closed ranks. Even the slow-moving automatons had reverted to defensive protocols now, recognising the danger posed by the artillery to their front and the more dynamic battle tanks to their flanks and rear.
Keeping up a steady stream of verdant gauss fire, the necrons towards the core of their now slowly collapsing formations remained still, whilst those further out and cut off began to retreat. Like the musket regiments of old Terra, they were forming square.
As part of Roboute Guilliman’s teachings in the Codex Astartes, all Ultramarines were comprehensively versed in military tactics, both contemporary and archaic. Scipio recognised what the necrons were doing at once. They attempted to fight their enemy on all fronts and prevent them from breaking up their coherency. Only these were not mere cavalrymen armed with lance and flintlocks; the battle tanks of the Ultramarines Chapter assailed them. Their outmoded strategy was fated to fail. And yet, the idea persisted in the brother-sergeant that these mechanoids were just sacrificial, intended to draw Chronus and his battle tanks in.
Straying from the systematic destruction of the necrons, Scipio’s gaze was drawn to the ice. The constant barrage, the heat of energy discharge from las-weapons and gauss flayers had damaged its integrity. He looked through the scopes, training them on a point just outside the shrinking square of necrons.
‘Pilot, bring us in closer,’ he voxed.
With the dull growl of engine deceleration, the Gladius descended.
‘What is it? What do you see?’ hissed Vantor before the others could speak.
‘I’m not sure… Increasing magnification.’
The image through the scopes blurred then quickly refocused, a line of data scrolling down one side of the lens telling Scipio he was at maximum range. There were small fissures in the ice, nothing that would split it; the frozen plain was thick and densely packed. But it was not this that had caught the sergeant’s attention.
‘I see…’ he began, ‘a shadow.’
‘Say that again,’ said Brakkius, staring down at the point where his sergeant was looking, trying to see the same shadow but without success.
‘Under the ice,’ Scipio went on, his heart rate increasing with sudden, irrational urgency.
He looked up from the scopes as the shadow came so close and grew so large against the frosted lens of surface ice that even Brakkius and the others saw it.
‘Fortress of Hera!’ the second-in-command shouted.
Suddenly the gunship they were riding in felt perilously low.
‘Kastus,’ Scipio said quickly into the vox. ‘Bring us up!’
The Gladius was rising just as a vast flash of light ignited to the west, within a half-kilometre of where Chronus had almost vanquished the necron infantry. It was massive, like a verdant sunrise only much faster and more violent. Scipio had seen its like before: it was a teleportation flare.
‘Guilliman’s blood…’ breathed Brakkius.
The necrons had activated a phase generator and transported an entire phalanx into sudden and immediate battle.
Auris and Largo stared, disbelieving, and Garrik made the sign of the old Legion, a single clenched fist, against his breastplate.
‘We’ve sprung the trap, brother-sergeant,’ said Vantor.
Scipio snarled into the vox. ‘Bring us up, damn it!’
Within the verdant light, which was slowly dying after the force of its dramatic arrival, a second necron horde had emerged.
‘Not infantry,’ said Garrik, sighting through his launcher’s targeter.
‘Something worse…’ added Vantor.
The Gladius was rising, Kastus pushing the turbofans to achieve a faster escape velocity.
Facing down the rapidly deploying flanking force, Scipio already knew they would not be fast enough.
An entire fleet of large skimmer-tanks was surging across the ice plain, devouring the kilometres between them and the Ultramarines with alarming speed. Before Scipio could get a decent look at the force in the dying after-flare of their materialisation, a slew of crackling beams arced from several necron turrets. One struck the left wing of the Gladius as Kastus was attempting to turn, ripping up one of the turbofans.
Thrown back into the hold and slamming into Vantor and Brakkius, Scipio saw a spit of flame shoot up from the engine, smoke pluming a second later before being sucked up by the still-turning fan and coiling in over itself.
Alert sirens were wailing in the hold, the engine noise high-pitched, almost desperate. If the Gladius had a living, beating heart, some sense of anima, it had just been wounded and was crying out in pain.
‘Hold on!’ Kastus bellowed through the vox, the sound of emergency systems kicking in audible in the background as the pilot struggled to keep them airborne.
‘What else does he expect us to do?’ growled Brakkius, clinging to the overhead rail.
The Thunderhawk was spinning, the gaping hatch revealing ever-quickening flashes of the advancing necron host and then the harsh white of ice mountains. The former was shrinking as the latter grew inexorably closer.
Ditching fast, the Gladius would not clear the rugged terrain that was rapidly advancing upon them.
‘Brace yourselves,’ Scipio shouted above the shrieking engine noise bleeding in from the outside. He managed to get on his battle-helm and bring up the ident-markers for his combat squad as well as one for Vantor.
The Techmarine was kneeling, his servo-arms extended and braced either side of the hold to keep him steady. Vantor had no helmet, so the Ultramarines aboard the stricken gunship could see him muttering litanies of function to soothe the Gladius’s injured machine-spirit.
‘Maybe we should all start chanting,’ sniped Brakkius.
Scipio shot him a stern look through his retinal lenses.
‘Just hold on.’
With a spurt of throttle, the damaged t
urbofan cycled down to a full stop, leaving Kastus relying on the remaining engine to keep them up. Its protests were loud and discordant – it was not going to keep them aloft for long.
Scipio tried to catch a look out of the side hatch, but the terrain was whipping by too quickly for him to determine how far they had strayed from the battlefield. In its current predicament, directionality was not a facility the gunship had in abundance at that moment. It was taking all of Kastus’s concentration and effort just to keep them going and find a safe place to land. Wherever that was, it would be far from the ice plain now.
Scipio felt a sudden shift in velocity, a brief interlude of anti-gravity followed by an acute sinking sensation, and assumed they had dipped. The Gladius was burning at full speed; peaks and crags jetted by in a frost-hazed blur.
Despite the disadvantage of having only one functioning turbofan, Kastus had guided them around the peaks and was racing through a narrow canyon.
The Ultramarines in the hold grimly seized the crash rails. There was no way they could reach their harnesses and strap in. The slightest upright movement could throw them out of the gaping hatch and into the white void streaking beyond it.
With the creak of sundering metal, the rail where Brakkius was clinging bent and came away from its fixings. He hung on for another second, roaring defiantly, before the railing snapped and was thrown loose.
Despite the risk to himself, Scipio reached out one-handed to grab the flailing Ultramarine. His gauntleted fingers snagged armour, then slipped as Brakkius was torn from his grasp.
‘Brother!’
Horrified, Scipio thought he was about to watch his second-in-command be dragged to almost certain death when Vantor pinned him with one of his servo-arms. Brakkius cried out as his back and shoulder were pierced, but at least he was secured.
There was no time to feel relief. Kastus’s voice crackled through the vox just as the engine noise rose sharply in pitch and the violent shuddering felt within the hold increased.
Damnos - Nick Kyme Page 38