Sons of the Hydra

by Rob Sanders

  Fighting to stay awake, Occam resisted the exhaustion of his continued efforts and kept opening his ash-encrusted eyelids. Every time he did, he saw that the gathering had grown about him. More cultists and dark pilgrims. Foul cardinals with the flocks, come to pray before the altar of afflicted forms.

  Feeling hands and claws about his arms, the strike commander opened his eyes. The crowd was now punctuated with hulking figures in dull red plate. A number shared their genetically engineered forms with horrific entities. Monstrous daemonic brawn spilled from their armour. Amongst the reverential gathering of deviants and Word Bearers, Occam could see a party from the cathedra-palace. Members of the Abyssal Prince’s court stood by, watching the strike master as he was taken down from the Chaos star. Daemon monstrosities waited in grand robes while overlords of the Word Bearers stood sentinel. Occam could see Zothrac of the Graven Gate and Drach’Var Tal, First Apostle of the Daemon Council. Neither looked pleased. On a huge iron palanquin, incorporating a barbed throne, sat the grotesque figure of the Abyssal Prince of All-Ghalmek. The palanquin was carried by hundreds of flagellant cultists and the weight of the monster above appeared considerable.

  Cultists swarmed about Occam, flicking unholy oils at his ash-smeared plate and tracing dark symbols across its surface. Standing on the backs of two others, a cultist placed Occam’s helmet on his head and locked the seals in place. As he did, Occam’s head turned and he saw that Goura Shengk had similarly been taken down from his star. Cultists were gathered about the Dark Apostle, assembling a suit of spiked plate about his abominate form. Shengk looked different. Bigger. His body had been favoured with the warped blessings of Chaos. A daemonic entity had taken residence in his engineered form. The black ruin of his frostbitten face had changed. It was now an infernal nightmare of fang, nostril slits and straight horns vaulting forth from a malformed skull. A network of black scarring still afflicted the apostle’s red cheeks and thin lips.

  Zothrac of the Graven Gate stepped forth but Drach’Var Tal placed a clawed gauntlet on his pauldron and pushed forward instead. He looked up at the Abyssal Prince, who nodded his horned head.

  ‘Goura Shengk,’ First Apostle Drach’Var Tal announced, prompting the cultists about him to scatter. ‘You have been offered to the beyond. You have been tested on the ruinous star, before a constellation of your daemon peers. Your failures have been forgiven and you are once more one with the darkness.’

  Goura Shengk looked to Occam and gave him a fang-filled grin. In the swirling blackness of his eyes, the strike master saw the glinting presence of the daemon entity that now lived within the Dark Apostle.

  ‘We are honoured to serve the dark powers,’ Goura Shengk told the First Apostle and his Abyssal Prince, ‘as both daemon and Bearer of the Word.’

  ‘As we are honoured,’ Drach’Var Tal said, ‘to welcome Morphidax the Primordial back to the world of flesh and Goura Shengk to his rightful place at the Chapter head of the Barbed Oath.’

  ‘This unnatural thing that you brought before us, however,’ Zothrac said of Occam, ‘has not been favoured by our daemon overlords. He has resisted their attentions. They are angered and insulted.’

  ‘We are surprised that the serpent had such strength,’ Goura Shengk told them.

  ‘The Abyssal Prince has sanctioned your return,’ Drach’Var Tal told Goura Shengk, ‘as Dark Apostle of the Barbed Oath and to your daemon ship, the Dissolutio Perpetua. He wishes you to halt this White Crusade and to use your brothers of the Word, your cultists and daemons to spread our darkness through the ranks of the Corpse-Emperor’s servants. Turn them against their priestly lords. Corrupt their purpose and lead them in pilgrimage into the storm and back to unholy Ghalmek. Will you do this?’

  ‘I shall die trying, my Abyssal Prince,’ Goura Shengk pledged.

  ‘You had better,’ Zothrac of the Graven Gate said, ‘for if you fail us again, Goura Shengk, you shall be torn apart – body and soul – by the very daemon legions who fought for the right to infest your flesh. Even Morphidax will not be able to save you from them and the wrath of your brothers.’

  ‘We understand,’ Goura Shengk told them. ‘What of the serpent?’

  ‘Support for your reinstatement was not unanimous,’ Drach’Var Tal said. ‘Some among the daemon legions believe your hearts conflicted – that you do not have the strength to do what must be done.’

  ‘The serpent will be offered to them in your stead,’ Zothrac said. ‘The spilling of his blood shall ritually anoint your new endeavour while the spiritual savagery of his end shall appease the wrath of our daemon overlords. Already, his brother serpents fight body and soul above us as entities unleashed possess their pitiful vessel and metal turns on flesh.’

  Occam stepped forward. As he did so, Word Bearers in Terminator plate stiffened and aimed their boltgun-mounted glaives at the Alpha Legion commander.

  ‘You seem to have this all worked out, my lords,’ Occam the Untrue said. ‘But think on this before you sacrifice me and my men to your daemon lords and Dark Gods. Only I know where the White Crusade gathers. They wait to venture forth into the storm and hunt the sons of mighty Ghalmek down. Only I know where the combined frater forces of the Crozier Worlds are gathering and unless you know exactly where, you will not find the rendezvous in time to stop them. One word from me, utilising the same disguise as I used in gathering such a White Crusade, and they will wait – growing bored and impatient – fertile ground in which the Brothers of the Word can sow betrayal and spiritual dissent. You cannot convert an army already on the march to destroy you.’

  The First Apostle and Zothrac of the Graven Gate stepped up onto the iron palanquin, making the trembling cultists carrying it wince. Approaching the throne, they conferred with the Abyssal Prince.

  As they did so, Occam noticed that amongst the growing number of cultists gathering about the palanquin, another Word Bearer had arrived. The strike master recognised the markings on his plate straight away. It was Vilnius Malik. Surreptitiously, the legionnaire shrugged back his camo-cloak to reveal his plasma gun at the ready, should things not go according to the strike master’s plan. As the gaze of their optics met, Occam saw Malik nod his helm slowly, indicating that his mission had been a success. He had the alien Tesseraqt in his possession.

  ‘What are your demands, serpent?’ Zothrac asked as he turned to face Occam with his master. ‘Think before you speak. You are in no position to overplay your hand here.’

  ‘Like the Dark Apostle,’ Occam said, ‘I only seek a way to serve – but with my flesh as my own and in my own way. Do not the dark and perverse Powers revel in such variety? Free my ship, my men and crew. I shall require them to meet your needs. Send us on our way. As he led me through the storm, like a guide, I shall lead Goura Shengk to the prize he has promised you. My pitiful vessel, as you call it, will be under the mighty guns of his daemon ship. I shall give the frater armies to Goura Shengk and he to you. As recompense, the Alpha Legion asks to recruit only those most suited to the demands of service in our Legion – a small sacrifice. And, of course, we will all benefit from the havoc such a great gift shall bring the Corpse-Emperor’s empire by your hand. My lords, this is an opportunity for all who fight under the banner of heretic.’

  ‘Perhaps too good an opportunity,’ Zothrac said before returning to confer with both the First Apostle and their Abyssal Prince. Finally the daemon bowed the extravagant horns on its head.

  ‘Both the decision and associated burden is yours,’ Drach’Var Tal said finally.

  ‘Then we accept the burden,’ Goura Shengk said, ‘and shall take the serpent with us as we venture back beyond the storm. We will not allow him to fail us.’

  ‘Good,’ the Abyssal Prince said, flames roaring forth from his nostrils as he spoke. ‘For further failure is your doom. Do not let the serpent slither away. The Word Bearers have forgiven you once but we shall not forget, Goura Shengk. Remember that.’

  ‘Fear not, daemon masters,’ Occam the Unt
rue told the Abyssal Prince and the gathering. ‘You will get what is coming to you. The Alpha Legion will ensure it.’

  PART V

  HYDRA DOMINATUS

  τ

  To Cut The Head From The Hydra

  Suspiria Proctor was a cardinal world and sub-sector capital located on the edge of the Crozier Worlds. With only a few rocky shrine worlds and pilgrim waystations situated further stormwards, the planet was the closest of the Adeptus Ministorum’s major fiefdoms. This had made the cardinal world a logical place for the frater forces of the Ecclesiarchy to gather before mounting their White Crusade.

  Occam the Untrue walked the avenues and boulevards of the capital plate. Suspiria Proctor was a gas giant. Overhead, the sunburst smear of the Maelstrom dominated the sky, casting in silhouette a blizzard of pilgrim transports and Adeptus Ministorum carriers. They had arrived from all corners of the Crozier Worlds at Cardinal Trazier’s request, each Ecclesiarchical planet sending a small army of frater militia to join the White Crusade.

  The bilious blues and greens of the cardinal world’s upper atmosphere raged like a stormy ocean beneath the city. The capital plate was made up of an interconnected network of atmospheric platforia, each supporting a jagged stratoscape of spires, steeples and cathedral towers. Arched avenues ran between ornamental gardens and baroque architecture and over bridges connecting the network of plates. The air was full of the hiss of the storm below, the clouds of high-speed acidity roiling beneath like furious death.

  ‘Inquisitor Van Leeuwen,’ a cleric in trailing robes said as he met Occam on the avenue leading into the Cathedral-Primus. He was flanked by a ceremonial honour guard of armoured crusaders. ‘My name is Deacon Borshach – I am aide-maximus to the lord cardinal and have been coordinating the arrival of frater forces above Suspiria Proctor. May I beg your indulgence – there are no weapons allowed in the cathedral. My men will hold onto them for you. This way please. My lord will see you now.’

  Occam looked up at the sky swarming with crusader vessels. The Iota-Æternus and the Dissolutio Perpetua were not among them. The Alpha Legion armed freighter remained hidden in the system from the gathered armada and system monitors. It waited in the shadow of one of the gas giant’s distant, pock-marked moons, close enough to reach the cardinal world by shuttle but not close enough to attract unnecessary attention from snooping system ships. The Word Bearers daemon ship did not benefit from the Q-ship’s ability to disguise itself. It had been forced to wait on the edge of the system where its unholy presence could be hidden from the armada of Adeptus Ministorum vessels holding station above the gas giant.

  Much closer, the Iota-Æternus had been sending forth an assortment of lighters and hump shuttles carrying Freydor Blatch and the Seventh Sons to make contact with the Low Serpent and his cultist infiltrators. The Low Serpent had long been hidden amongst the frater billions, planting the necessary seeds of doubt and recruiting operatives.

  Occam and the Redacted had been upon one such lighter, their identities hidden by the psychic manipulations of Carcinus Quoda. Once again the sorcerer made the Emperor’s devout servants think they were seeing Inquisitor Van Leeuwen and his Space Marine entourage, instead of a motley band of Alpha Legionnaires and heretic Bearers of the Word. While the warpsmith had remained behind on the Iota-Æternus to continue supervising the warped vessel’s repairs, Autolicon Phex was still in the infirmary recovering from his grievous wounds. Goura Shengk and a pair of possessed Word Bearers accompanied the Alpha Legion instead. They were hidden, like the Redacted, by Quoda’s psychic talents and intent on everything proceeding smoothly so that the billion souls above Suspiria Proctor might one day fight for unholy Ghalmek.

  Surrendering their substitute weaponry to the crusaders – loyalist boltguns that completed their disguise – the Redacted followed the deacon in through the grand entrance and across the vaulted chambers of the cathedral. When Occam saw that the episcopal throne was empty, he began to suspect something was amiss. The cathedral was vast but empty. The crusaders had dropped behind with the deacon and their weaponry.

  Occam looked around at Quoda, who was concentrating on manipulating surrounding minds and maintaining their illusion. While the strike master walked once again in the guise of Van Leeuwen, the renegades had taken on the appearance of loyalist Space Marines recruited to the inquisitor’s cause. Sergeant Hasdrubal and Vilnius Malik flanked Occam and kept close watch about the chambers of the cathedral. Goura Shengk and his two daemon Space Marines were clearly suffering in the holy environs of the cathedral. Their bodies, twisted with infernal brawn and monstrous horns, sagged under the burden.

  ‘Sergeant,’ the strike master said.

  ‘I don’t like it,’ Hasdrubal confessed. ‘Enclosed. Too many entrances. Without our weapons. It’s an ambush waiting to happen.’

  ‘Malik?’

  ‘Agreed,’ the former Night Lord said. ‘We should abort.’

  ‘Bearers of the Word have come for the souls promised,’ the Dark Apostle said. ‘Do not lose your nerve now, serpent.’

  ‘Something’s not right here,’ Occam said, the echo of his slowing steps carrying through the cavernous chambers. He stopped and turned but Goura Shengk grabbed his arm to stop him. Despite the draining effect of holy ground and the daemon Space Marine’s suffering, the strike master could still feel his infernal strength.

  ‘We go through with this,’ the Dark Apostle said. ‘We will not return to Ghalmek empty-handed again.’

  Out of the corner of his optic, Occam saw a figure step out from behind the cardinal’s throne. It was not the cardinal. Magnifying his gaze, the Alpha Legionnaire realised that he recognised the figure. He was staring at himself: Inquisitor Van Leeuwen – in the flesh and walking towards the new arrivals in his Ordo Hereticus plate. The inquisitor was escorted by two Celestian Sisters of the August Vigil.

  ‘I think we may have overplayed our hand,’ Occam said, shrugging the Word Bearer off. He looked at his sergeant, who had spotted the inquisitor also.

  Occam’s gaze moved from the inquisitor to Goura Shengk but the strike master found it hard to believe that the Word Bearers would work with the Holy Ordos or vice versa. The Dark Apostle had too much to gain from Occam’s plan. The strike master thought on the cultists under his control and even the renegade Space Marines that made up the Redacted. They were traitors all, to their own loyalist Chapters and had more than enough reason to suspect Occam himself – the strike master sharing with the Holy Ordos a devotion to the God-Emperor of Mankind.

  No, Occam decided, but still such a double cross demonstrated the signature of the serpent. One way or another, the Alpha Legion were behind this. Perhaps Omizhar Vohk and the Lord Dominatus, impatient for their precious piece of alien technology.

  As armoured shapes appeared at the archways and entrances, Occam began to comprehend the true depth of their doom. While Inquisitor Van Leeuwen and the Battle Sisters advanced, Space Marines in the magnificence of dark silver power armour marched forth from transept openings either side of the Redacted, levelling wrist-mounted storm bolters at the gathering. Their plate was decorated with the glory of etchings and purity seals. From the mighty archway entrance of the cathedral, Occam saw others approaching in formation: battle-brothers in immaculate Terminator plate, carrying halberds crackling with otherworldly power.

  These were no ordinary battle-brothers of the Imperium. Their armour and weaponry gleamed with the honour of ages and they moved with a perfection of purpose. Occam could almost feel their dread confidence and power.

  The strike master felt the quake of heavy footsteps through the cathedral flagstones as two towering walkers, boasting their own huge blades and heavy weaponry, stomped up behind the Terminators.

  ‘Quoda?’ Occam said.

  ‘Grey Knights,’ Carcinus Quoda told his strike master. ‘Brothers of Titan, the righteous blood of the God-Emperor flowing through their veins.’

  Occam suddenly felt the daemon claws of Goura Shen
gk about his armoured throat. The Dark Apostle had lurched for him.

  ‘So you think to lead us back to the Inquisitorial dungeons,’ Shengk roared, his voice assuming the dark reverberation of daemonic presence. ‘And forfeit on the dread bargain you made with the Daemon Council.’

  Sergeant Hasdrubal and Malik grabbed an arm each and desperately attempted to tear the Dark Apostle from their master. In turn, Shengk’s Word Bearers escorts tried to do the same to the Alpha Legionnaires.

  ‘I wish I had thought of that,’ Occam managed, as the daemon Dark Apostle throttled him. ‘It might have given us something to bargain with.’

  The sound of clapping filled the cavernous chamber, the inquisitor’s ceramite gauntlets clashing together in applause.

  ‘There is no honour among traitors,’ Van Leeuwen called, his voice bouncing about the cathedral. ‘Here you fight, turning upon each other in the holy temple of the God-Emperor. Occam the Untrue, strike master of the foul Alpha Legion – from under which rock have you slithered? Goura Shengk, you should have remained in the storm, Word Bearer. You escaped my clutches once. It will not happen again.’

  ‘They know our names,’ Hasdrubal said.

  ‘They probably know a lot more than that,’ Occam said as Goura Shengk released him. He looked around at the closing Grey Knights. ‘Which at least tells us something. They had help. Dissemble.’

  There was no point in indulging the deception further. The Inquisition had them. The best Occam the Untrue could hope for was that the sight of renegades in Alpha Legion plate and the monstrous, daemon Space Marines of the Word Bearers might rattle the nerves of the Grey Knights. This was no hope at all, since the strike master knew better. The psyker sons of Titan were amongst the best battle-brothers the Imperium had to offer. Renegades and traitors were their quarry and in the Redacted they had such prey in their sights.