The Space Wolf Omnibus - William King

by Warhammer 40K

‘Fair enough.’

  They went down a long way. Ragnar felt as if he had been climbing for weeks. Even his reinforced muscles were aching and he felt sorry for the normal humans who accompanied them. They must really be in pain.

  The climb had been interesting though. His tutors had taught him that geological and archaeological remains were found in layers, and this climb reminded him of that. As they descended, their surroundings grew more ancient, it seemed, as if the hulk had been built outward from some exceedingly old core. They passed through levels that had spoken to him of many different cultures and civilisations. He realised that they really were descending, not through one huge spacecraft, but through an accumulation of smaller vessels that had been built in many different places and times, and which, over the years, had been occupied by members of many different races.

  Everywhere he saw evidence of the crude handiwork of orks. Here and there he saw crudely daubed graffiti which bore the chilling marks of Chaos. How many different types of people had lived and died here, he wondered? How long had it been since this place was first occupied? Were these traces from individual ships in the time before they had drifted in to become part of the hulk or were they evidence of occupants in the time since? Only whatever dark spirit presided over this hulk could tell him, and there was no way he could commune with it, and no way he would want to even if he could.

  Behind him he could hear the nervous chatter of the guards, as they kept up a constant cross-talk on the comm-net. He could smell their deepening unease as they proceeded, an unease that was only increasing with tiredness and distance from their mothership. Ragnar did not blame them. He was beginning to wonder at the wisdom of this penetration into the space hulk. To get back by conventional means was a long trek over dangerous ground, and the teleport beacon was very unreliable, as he had already discovered. Their line of retreat was far from secure.

  And yet what other options had they? If they wanted to reconstruct the Talisman of Lykos and save the world of Aerius from the dark plague then they simply had to push on and pray for the best. Sometimes the only way was the longest way. As a Space Marine he realised he should not be daunted by that fact.

  Gnawing unease had settled on him like a cloak. He did not like this place. With its endless miles of corridors it seemed like a twisted parody of the Fang, but it lacked the comforting scent of the Space Wolves and their vassals, and the sense of long, continuous and benevolent occupancy. If the Fang had been abandoned by the Wolves thousands of years ago, then used by whoever had stumbled across it as a temporary lair, it might have looked like this.

  He muttered a prayer and tried to push away these grim thoughts. The oppressive atmosphere of the place was getting to him. Or perhaps it was something else. Perhaps the malevolent presence he imagined was real, and was placing these shadowy fears in his mind. Perhaps…

  Get a grip of yourself, he told himself. Concentrate on the foes which might actually be there. Don’t people this place with imaginary enemies while real ones are capable of sneaking up on you.

  So he pushed on into the darkness and the gloom, all too aware that somewhere out there something wicked was waiting. He could tell from his comrades’ unease that they felt the same way.

  Ten hours in, they stopped to rest. The Space Wolves could have kept going easily but the inquisitors and their bodyguards needed to stop.

  They set up camp in a huge hall. It had once been a pavilion of some sort. Overhead was a crystal dome through which the stars had once beamed down. Now overhead they could see only the great shadowy bulk of another part of the hulk. Sometimes odd lights could be seen shimmering in portholes, which only added to the haunted atmosphere of the hulk. It was not a reassuring thought that behind the crystal there was only hard vacuum and a hungry void waiting to devour any unprotected thing that fell into it.

  The floor was a vast mosaic, but the picture had long since been eroded away into a blur of shapes and colours. Without wind and rain, Ragnar could only imagine that this had been done by the passage of countless feet or vehicles. Dotted around were huge empty pits that had once been fishponds or swimming pools. In the middle of some were islands on which stood fountains. Here and there statues depicting an alien race that he recognised as the eldar stood on plinths. It was oddly peaceful and oddly beautiful and for the first time since their arrival on the hulk he had a sense of security. Perhaps that was why they chose the place to rest.

  The warriors slumped down where they stood, leaving their lasrifles close at hand. Inquisitor Sternberg and Gul passed among them, dividing them up into watches. Without speaking, at a gesture from Sergeant Hakon, the four Blood Claws took up positions covering the four corners of the chamber. Ragnar knew they would prove far more effective sentries than any mere human. Hakon himself went to consult with the inquisitors.

  Ragnar took up his position near one of the statues, thinking that not only would this give him a closer look at its alien workmanship, but that he could use it for cover in case of an attack. This was not a bad defensive site. The sunken empty ornamental ponds and the fountains they contained could be used like earthworks if danger threatened. They could have done worse.

  He took a deep breath and murmured a prayer to the Emperor, willing himself to relax. His muscles were aching more than they should be, and he was tired in a way he had never felt since being chosen. It seemed that his wounds and his subsequent illness had drained him more than he had imagined. Perhaps this was why his imagination was playing up. Perhaps he was simply tired and ill. Somehow he doubted it. There was something about the gloom and stillness of the space hulk that was simply evil. He knew this to be the case. Right at this moment, he felt as if they had walked into a troll’s lair unarmed.

  He looked up at the statue. It showed a tall, lean humanoid garbed in oddly elongated, curved armour. The figure carried a gun of some strangely beautiful alien design in one hand, and a banner in the other. The face was hidden by a mask that was as beautiful as it was functional. The whole thing was made from a substance that Ragnar did not recognise. It looked like polished stone but something about it suggested bone. When he touched it, he felt a slight tingling, not unpleasant yet odd enough to make him snatch his hand away.

  Who were you, Ragnar wondered? Some hero of the eldar fallen in battle long ago? A god they worshipped? Or a vain chieftain who caused his image to be placed here for eternity? It was another riddle to which he would never know the answer. The universe was full of them, a place of mystery and horror, that no man could ever really understand.

  He wondered about the people who had made the statue. Where were they now? How had their ship come to be part of this hulk? Had they been lost in the warp and drawn into it? Had they dwelt here as part of the hulk, or had the ship been abandoned long before? It was a thing to tease the imagination of a man and drive him mad with speculation.

  He had heard the eldar dwelled on huge spaceships, craftworlds they were called, and had long since abandoned all surface dwellings. He knew they were a decadent and sinister race who performed arcane rituals for their own unguessable purposes, and who interfered in the wars of mankind for no discernible purpose. And now they were seeking parts of an artefact that had once belonged to that eldritch race. Was the fact they had found this hall significant, an omen? Or was it simply chance, the only pattern here being the one imposed on events by his own mind? No, there had to be a connection. Had not the eldar built the Black Pyramid on Aerius? Had they not been there the last time plague had ravaged that world?

  He caught a familiar scent approaching from behind. ‘Hello, inquisitor,’ he said without turning.

  ‘Practising your psychic powers?’ Karah Isaan smiled softly.

  ‘No. I recognise your scent.’

  ‘What is it like?’ she said, curious.

  ‘Unlike any other.’

  ‘I am the only woman here.’

  ‘No. It is not that. You smell differently. Like someone who was raised on a different wo
rld from these folk. Amid jungles and flowers and under a hot sun. I have never been there but I would guess that Aerius is cold like Fenris in winter, and gloomy, and smells of industry and metalwork.’

  ‘You would make a very good seer, Ragnar, for you are correct in almost every respect. And you can tell all that by scent? Your nose must be very keen.’

  ‘Keener than a true wolf’s, or so they say.’

  ‘It would be quite a gift for an inquisitor. For tracking and questioning and such.’

  ‘It is a gift given only to the Space Wolves, a legacy of the geneseed of Russ.’ Remembering Ranek’s words about secrets back in the Fang, he wondered if he was telling her too much. She moved around in front of him. He was struck by her beauty. She was a lovely woman, if rather stern-looking. In her own way, with her dark skin, brown eyes and alien scent she was as exotic and unknowable as the eldar. He guessed that, in some way, he was probably the same to her.

  ‘I wanted to speak to someone,’ she ventured. ‘This is a vile place and I have no desire to share that thought with our troops.’

  ‘This is an evil place,’ he agreed.

  ‘Your nose tells you that?’

  ‘My nose and my spirit… and my common sense. Were it not our duty to do so, we should not have come here.’

  ‘But it was our duty. And our duty often takes us to places we would rather not be, to do things we would rather not do.’

  ‘I am a Space Wolf,’ he said. ‘I live to fight. There is nothing I would rather do.’

  ‘You lead a rather simple life then, Ragnar of the Space Wolves.’

  ‘No. You lead a rather complicated one.’

  ‘Perhaps… but I sense there is more to you than meets the eye, Ragnar, and that you are not quite as unafraid as you would have me believe.’

  Her words brought back his dark thoughts from earlier and he looked away, embarrassed. They were his secret shame, one that he wanted no one to know. He certainly did not want this woman, with her disturbing beauty, to be aware of them. He said nothing and simply stared off into the distance.

  ‘There is no shame in being afraid in a place of darkness like this, Ragnar. There would only be shame if your fear mastered you. And I am enough of a seer to know that will never happen.’

  Her words and their tone were meant to reassure him, he knew, but he was not reassured. He wondered if he would ever regain the feeling of invulnerability, of immortality, that he had once enjoyed. She seemed to sense his dark mood and turned and walked away.

  Ragnar watched her go, and then gave his attention back to his guard duties. If there are monsters out there, he thought, let them come. They will find me ready.

  After six hours of rest, they broke fast on ration tablets washed down with purified water, and then pushed on deeper into the hulk. Once again the nature of their surroundings changed. The glowglobes became less common, and in many places they had burned out altogether. The shadows became deeper. The guards turned on the beacons on their shoulder pads to give them more light. As yet Ragnar’s altered eyes could still penetrate the gloom easily, but the increasing darkness had a dampening effect on his spirits.

  Sometimes, up ahead of them now, he thought he could hear sinister scuttling movements, so faint as to be barely perceptible even to his superhumanly keen ears. He tried telling himself it was rats or some of the huge mutant cockroaches that were all too common in ships like this, but he could not. A quick glance at Sven told him that his fellow Blood Claw was thinking the same thing. He raised his hand and gave the signal for Be careful. From the change in the rhythm of their movement, he knew without looking back that the guards were paying attention.

  ‘Wonder if it’s edible,’ Sven said. ‘I hate bloody food tablets.’

  ‘We’ll know soon enough,’ said Ragnar, catching the tension behind his friend’s words.

  ‘You know what I like about you, Ragnar? You always have a stupid answer to whatever I have to say.’

  ‘You know what I like about you, Sven?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Absolutely nothing.’

  ‘Like I said before,’ Sven snorted, ‘you missed your calling. You should have been a court jester, not a Space Wolf.’

  Ragnar smiled and clutched his weapons tighter. If there was trouble ahead, he was glad Sven was there. Any man who could trade such dumb insults when danger threatened was worth having around.

  They moved on through the depths of the great hulk. Ragnar felt as if it were coming alive all around him. He had a sense of ancient evil things waking from long dormancy. Even with his hyper-acute senses he could not quite put a finger on why. There were subtle changes in the scent patterns in the air. The almost subliminal hum of the life support systems had altered. Occasionally he felt vibrations pass through the hull beneath his feet as if some giant were moving or a vast piece of machinery had been activated.

  He could tell by the tension of Sven’s body and the subtle alterations of his stance and scent that his fellow Blood Claw felt it too. Sven held his weapons ready and glanced around as if he expected to be called upon to use them at any moment.

  Karah Isaan’s words about a new threat coming from the ship that followed them echoed through his mind. Was this sense of something stirring connected with their own presence, trespassing on the ship, or were the two unrelated?

  ‘At the next junction take the passage that slopes down,’ Karah’s voice sounded loud and clear over the comm-net earbead.

  The tension was starting to drain him. He spoke into the comm-net: ‘Are we any closer to what we seek, or have we been wandering around in circles?’

  ‘Be patient, Ragnar; we’re getting there,’ Karah soothed.

  ‘Thank Russ for that,’ Sven muttered.

  As they progressed downwards, it became evident that machinery had been switched on. Huge compressors were at work, great flexible accordion tubes expanding and contracting. Mighty pistons pumped up and down. Huge clouds of steam and smoke swirled out of cracked and defective piping.

  ‘What in all the bloody cold hells of Frostheim is going on here?’ Sven asked.

  ‘It looks like somebody activated all of this machinery,’ Ragnar replied.

  ‘You don’t bloody say,’ said Sven. ‘I mean – why?’

  ‘It could have switched on automatically when we came in. Some ancient devices do that.’

  ‘Or, Ragnar? I hear an “or” in your voice.’

  ‘Or maybe somebody switched it on to provide themselves with cover. Noise, smoke, confusing smells. They will all make it more difficult to spot an ambush.’

  ‘Noise and smoke, yes, I understand. But scents – why that? Surely they can’t know there are Space Wolves on board.’

  ‘Can’t they? Why make that assumption? You are assuming that whoever did it thinks and senses like a human; that may not be the case. Many alien races have made their homes on hulks.’

  ‘You’re not a particularly reassuring man to talk to in a situation like this, Ragnar.’

  ‘This is not a particularly reassuring situation.’

  ‘Aye, you are right there.’

  Suddenly the stink that hit his nostrils suggested something that was not even remotely human. The figure emerging from the smoke reinforced this impression.

  It was larger than a man and it moved much, much faster. Four huge arms, tipped with monstrous rending claws, swivelled from its shoulders. Row upon row of hideous fangs gleamed in its mouth. A horny shell of armour encased its body. It loped along on clawed and padded feet. Its manner suggested the scuttling of some enormous insect. The memories placed in his brain by the teaching engines told him what it was instantly.

  ‘Genestealer!’ Ragnar yelled, taking a bead on the thing with his bolt pistol and squeezing the trigger. Quick as he was, the thing was quicker. It jinked to one side and his shells passed over its head. Ragnar had never seen anything move so swiftly. Its reflexes made his own seem slow by comparison. The fear he had felt earlier returned l
ike a wave of ice running through him and, for one horrible vital moment, he froze. The thing came straight at him and it was on him before he could react. Its weight crashed into him, bowling him over with irresistible force.

  In an instant its face was in his, snarling and snapping. He could smell its foetid breath, see the thick, mucus-like saliva dribbling from its mouth. He could feel those impossible strong talons grasp him, and heard his armour begin to crack under the pressure. He knew that his split-second of hesitation was going to cost him his life.

  Blood and flesh splattered his face. The blade of a chainsword sheared through chitin an inch before his eyes and the beast stopped moving.

  ‘Get up!’ he heard Sven bellow. ‘We’re under attack.’

  Ragnar shook his head and sprang to his feet, throwing the genestealer’s corpse to one side with the force of his movement. He was appalled. In the moment of crisis he had frozen, as he feared he might. Only Sven’s quick thinking had saved him. The fact that he had been surprised by the thing’s speed and strength was no excuse. He was a Space Wolf. Nothing was supposed to be able to take him unprepared.

  No sense in worrying about it now, he realised, hearing the padding of dozens of approaching feet, and seeing the monstrous forms of half a dozen genestealers emerge from the smoke. In his state of heightened awareness he noticed that their carapaces were all blotched and cracked. They had an odd, diseased look that differed from the images placed in his brain by the tutelary engines.

  The beast within him snarled in fury. He knew that it, too, had been shocked by its near-death, and that its rage was all the stronger because of it. Gratefully Ragnar surrendered to it.

  Laser bolts spat over his shoulder as the inquisitors’ guards opened fire. He heard the thunder of bolters as Sergeant Hakon and Inquisitor Sternberg opened up too, and he could hear more bolter fire from the rear. It was Strybjorn and Nils, he realised. The things were attacking from behind them too, then. So these were no mere beasts. An inhuman intelligence was at work here, guiding the attack.

  Ragnar raised his pistol and shot. This time his aim was true. The shell passed right through the head of one of the stealers. He howled with satisfied bloodlust and fired again. The stealers were too closely packed to miss, but this time the armour of his target’s carapace partially deflected the shot so that instead of killing it cleanly, it merely removed one of its huge clawed arms. If the creature felt any pain it gave no sign, and it kept on coming.