Rogue Trader

by Andy Hoare

  As the crusade pressed in to capture the capital world of the Dal’yth system, Dal’yth Prime, more tau forces closed in. The fate of the Damocles Gulf Crusade would come to rest in the hands of three individuals – the White Scars Veteran Sergeant Sarik, the rogue trader Lucian Gerrit, and his daughter Brielle, who had fallen by her own hubris into the hands of the tau water caste envoy called Aura.

  Mustering its forces, the crusade prepared for ‘Operation Pluto’ – the Dal’yth Prime landings. All would depend on those landings, and the actions of but three very different individuals.’

  – Extract from preface of The Truth of the Damocles Gulf Crusade (unpublished, author unknown)

  Chapter One

  Deep within the dense stellar cluster that was the crucible and the cradle of the alien species known as the tau, the frigate Nomad was a dark shadow against the roiling blue nebulae permeating the entire region. The cluster seethed with anomalous energies not witnessed anywhere else in the galaxy, a phenomenon that the most learned of Navigator-seers and astro-cognoscenti had entirely failed to explicate. The stars here were young and the very fabric of space somehow charged with raw potential, and the same appeared to be true of the species that had evolved here. The tau had developed from primitive nomads to a heretically advanced, space-faring empire within a handful of millennia. The tau’s very existence was now a threat to the Imperium’s rule in the area, and the Damocles Gulf Crusade had been set in motion to restore order and adherence to the rule of the God-Emperor of Mankind.

  But Veteran Sergeant Sarik cared little for inexplicable nebulae or esoteric stellar phenomena. He didn’t even care a great deal about the tau or any other alien species, so long as they adhered to the one, defining principle by which he himself led his life. That principle was honour, and to Sarik, everything else was secondary.

  Sarik was standing on the bridge of the Nomad, the lambent nebulae washing his weather-beaten, honour-scarred face and causing his folded eyes to glow with ice-blue luminescence. His polished white armour glinted in the light of alien suns. Sarik was the master of his vessel, a one-and-a-half-kilometre-long Nova-class frigate bearing the white and red livery of the White Scars Chapter of the Space Marines, but truth be told, he held little love for the role. He yearned to fight on solid ground, to engage his foe not in ship-to-ship combat at a thousand kilometres but in the brutal, face-to-face savagery of close-quarters melee.

  Turning his back on the lancet-paned forward viewing portal, Sarik strode the length of the bridge, reading in every step the deep throb of the plasma drives as they propelled the Nomad through the void at full speed. The air was heavy with the smoky scent of the purifying unguents used to bless the vessel, its machine systems and the crew that tended her. The scent reminded Sarik of the cold, windswept plains of home, the world of Chogoris, for the Techmarines of the White Scars worked into the incense the resin of the rockrose gathered from the uplands of the north. Dozens of sounds filled the bridge, from the chattering of the cogitation banks and logic engines to the muted conversation of the bridge-serfs as they coordinated dozens of secondary operations, none of which were of immediate concern to the master of a vessel crewed by several thousand souls.

  One of the bridge-serfs was a man called Loccum, a veteran with the rank of conversi, an appointment that honoured him with the right to address his Adeptus Astartes masters directly. Unlike many Adeptus Astartes, however, Sarik eschewed the aloofness so often displayed by the superhuman Space Marines, and while he might not converse with his crew or others as peers, he nonetheless valued their skills and their opinions.

  Loccum glanced up as Sarik approached, and reported, ‘Pathfinder squadron is approaching segment delta-nine, brother-

  sergeant.’ The man was permanently connected to the frigate’s machine-systems by a complex web of mind impulse link cables, and every fragment of visible skin was a matrix of Chogoran tribal tattoos. ‘In-loading remote telemetry now.’

  ‘Shunt it through, please, Loccum,’ Sarik replied, frowning as he focussed on the icons tracking their way across the glowing blue screen of his command lectern. Machine chatter blurted out of the bridge phono-casters, a harsh sound that grated on Sarik’s nerves whenever he heard it. He was reminded again how much he yearned for the howl of wind in his ears and the feel of a clean breeze on his face. The machine noise cut out as suddenly as it had appeared, a series of figures and icons resolving on the lectern’s screen.

  ‘Damn,’ Sarik cursed, as he took in the full import of the lines of data scrolling across the lectern. A semi-circular form appeared at the edge of the screen, representing the enemy-held planet towards which the pathfinders were probing. In between the squadron and that planet three new returns blinked ominously. The Imperial Navy pathfinder squadron ranging ahead of the Nomad were the elite of the crusade’s scout forces, the master of each vessel a man Sarik knew personally. He would not see them blunder into an alien trap, not while he could influence matters.

  ‘Confirmed,’ said Loccum. ‘Three capital-scale defence platforms.’

  ‘Initiate tight-beam communion,’ ordered Sarik. ‘We have to warn them.’

  Loccum hesitated, causing Sarik to look up in response to his silence. ‘Well?’

  ‘Brother-sergeant,’ the bridge-serf replied. ‘Orders from fleet.’

  ‘I am aware of fleet’s orders, conversi,’ Sarik said, using the serf’s rank title to remind him of his status. ‘If we must risk detection, so be it.’

  Loccum bowed deeply in response to Sarik’s order, and turned to a nearby vox terminal. The data script that was being fed back to the Nomad before being relayed to the bulk of the fleet continued to scroll across the lectern. The three icons that represented the alien defence platforms indicated that they were deployed in a relatively tight cluster, approximately 100,000 kilometres from the world they protected. Sarik’s lip curled as he recalled the last time the fleet had faced one of those platforms. Then, it had been just one platform, but so heavily armed it had inflicted a fearsome toll on the Damocles Gulf Crusade fleet. Men had died by the thousand, screaming silently into the void as their vessels had burned around them, a death that Sarik considered an unsuitable one for such brave servants of the Imperium.

  That station had finally been destroyed when Sarik himself had led a boarding action, consisting of a composite force of Space Marines drawn from the White Scars, Ultramarines and Scythes of the Emperor Chapters. The Space Marines had destroyed that platform’s power plant, sending it burning like a meteor through the atmosphere of the world the alien tau knew as Pra’yen.

  Sarik glanced up at the conversi, who noted his attention and replied, ‘Seventy per cent, brother-sergeant.’

  Grunting, Sarik resumed his study of the lectern’s screen. He was looking for any sign of tau vessels, praying that the pathfinders would not be drawn into an ambush. The scout vessels were built for speed and stealth, and would stand little chance if they were engaged. The fleet had already faced a sizeable tau force as it had pushed into the system, and communications intercepts indicated that more were incoming.

  A group of augur returns resolved out of the background noise, some distance ahead of the scouts.

  ‘Tight-beam communion established,’ announced the conversi. ‘On main terminal now.’

  ‘Nova-zero-leader,’ said Sarik, using the pathfinder squadron leader’s call sign. ‘This is Nomad. I read multiple contacts inbound on your trajectory. Report status.’

  ‘Received, Nomad,’ replied the comms officer aboard the lead pathfinder, his voice clipped and metallic over the heavily shielded vox-link. ‘Conducting passive augur reading of the platforms. Will relay to you when complete, over.’

  The icons on the lectern blinked as the tau vessels rapidly closed on the pathfinder squadron. ‘Enemy vessels have you in their sights, Nova leader,’ Sarik growled. ‘You don’t have time for a full reading.’


  There was a pause, before the pathfinder replied, ‘We know that, Nomad, over.’

  Sarik scowled and his grip on the edge of the lectern tightened as his frustration mounted. Inside, he honoured the pathfinders for their dedication to their duty, but he saw no reason for them to throw their lives away. ‘They’ll be on you before you can complete the reading, you know that.’

  ‘We have our orders, Nomad. Fleet has to know of those platforms,’ the comms officer insisted. ‘Whatever it costs.’

  Sarik forced himself to calm before responding. ‘Nova leader, I honour your courage.’ He did not say such a thing lightly, and many Adeptus Astartes would never have considered saying it at all. ‘But if you do not take immediate evasive action, fleet will never hear your report. You’ll be dead.’

  ‘We can’t simply–’ the officer replied, but Sarik cut him off. ‘Listen to me, Nova leader, and we’ll get fleet their reading and share a victory horn together later. This is what I want you to do…’

  As the Nomad had ploughed onwards towards the pathfinder squadron’s position, Sarik had monitored the vox-channels. The elite crews of the scout vessels had accepted his plan, and were enacting it with supreme skill and courage. Even as the tau vessels closed, all but one of the scouts had veered off on a new heading, on Sarik’s order, drawing the aliens away.

  Only one pathfinder vessel now remained on station.

  ‘Nova leader,’ Sarik said, aware of how isolated the scout crew must be feeling. ‘Status, please?’

  ‘Preliminary readings compiling now, Nomad,’ replied the comms officer of Nova leader. ‘Initial cogitation suggests all three defence platforms are of a different configuration to those we have previously faced, over.’

  Sarik’s mind raced as he considered what devious new combination of offensive and defensive alien technology might await the fleet as it closed on the platforms. The tau had proved able to adapt rapidly, their forces displaying a wide range of unpredictable technologies. ‘Different?’ he said. ‘How?’

  ‘Unclear at this stage, Nomad–’ the scout replied. Before he could complete his transmission, the channel burst with a sudden scream of feedback. Sarik knew from previous fights with the alien tau what such vox interference often foreshadowed. Yet another of their abominable weapons systems.

  ‘Conversi Yosef,’ Sarik addressed the tech-serf manning a station nearby. ‘Source?’

  ‘Enemy contact, brother-sergeant,’ the crewman replied. ‘Augur spirits sing of a homopolar energy surge analogous to mass driver weaponry previously encountered.’

  Sarik had no idea what that meant, his gorge rising at the prospect of losing even a single fellow warrior of the Emperor to these aliens. Yosef’s words spoke of the technological heresy of the tau, but they were as impenetrable and repellent as a sorcerer’s hex to Sarik. ‘Meaning?’

  ‘The xenos are opening fire, sir.’

  ‘At?’

  ‘At the scouts, sir.’

  A moment later, a bright blue pulse illuminated the scene beyond the bridge’s armoured viewing port. Bitter experience had taught Sarik just how lethal the aliens’ weapons could be, and he braced himself against the sturdy lectern, even though he doubted the shot was aimed at the Nomad.

  He was correct. Although the distance was far too great to see any detail of the attackers, the glowing readout on the lectern told him all he needed to know. The blurred return that was the group of enemy vessels was resolving into five separate icons as the scouts’ augurs got a better fix on them. One of those icons, the vessel that had just fired, blinked as a line of cogitation data scrolled rapidly beside it. The machine script described just how alien the vessels were, their manoeuvring characteristics, displacement and weapons systems so different from the Imperium’s warships and Sarik’s anger rose at the thought of techno-heresy of the tau.

  The vox-channel came to life as the comms officers of each of the scout vessels reported in. Sarik breathed a sigh of relief that none had sustained any major damage. Nova-zero-three had been the target of the attack, and had suffered a temporary failure in flight control as the shot had passed dangerously close. The scout vessel’s tech-adept was even now tending to the outraged machine-spirits and nursing his systems back to life.

  ‘They’re going for it,’ Sarik growled, as the icons representing the enemy ships changed course to power after the bulk of the pathfinder squadron. Nova leader still appeared mightily vulnerable, but at least the enemy were being drawn away. ‘Helm,’ said Sarik. ‘Take us in.’

  Helmsman Kuro, a bridge-serf who had served aboard the Nomad for three decades and whose voidsmanship was nigh ­legendary, hauled on his mighty brass control yokes, setting the vessel to come around to the new heading.

  ‘Intercept at seven zero delta by five nine sigma,’ Sarik snapped, before addressing Conversi Loccum. ‘Do we have resolution yet?’

  ‘In-loading now, brother-sergeant,’ the serf replied, his face underlit by his readout and his eyes flicking impossibly fast as he rapidly scanned the reams of cogitation script passing across its glowing surface. ‘Enemy vessels appear to be pickets, sir. Light displacement only.’

  ‘Thank the primarch,’ Sarik breathed. While the alien vessels might prove superior to the pathfinders, they would hardly be a match for the Nomad. That left the three defence platforms to face. Sarik determined to worry about those later. Right now, his attention was focussed on closing the trap without the loss of any Imperial lives.

  Even as Sarik watched the icons swarming across the lectern screen, another bright blue pulse illuminated the bridge. Silence followed, during which Sarik fixed his gaze on the icons representing the pathfinder vessels. Far from machine phosphorescence, each was a crew of dozens of brave men and women.

  Then one of those icons turned red. Involuntarily, Sarik held his breath.

  ‘Pathfinder Nova-zero-two hit, brother-sergeant,’ Conversi Yosef reported grimly.

  ‘Damage?’ Sarik replied, fearing the worst having seen all too closely the potential of the alien weapons.

  ‘Port drive disabled,’ the serf said. ‘Reading grievous reactor failure.’

  I’m sorry, Sarik said inwardly, no doubt in his mind as to what would happen next.

  A second bright flash illuminated space, and a small sun flared into existence thousands of kilometres away, before collapsing in upon itself within the span of a second. The icon representing Nova-zero-two blinked once, then vanished. Sarik mouthed a silent Chogoran prayer to ease the passage of the dead into the halls of their ancestors, before resuming his duty.

  ‘Helm, open her up,’ Sarik ordered. Flicking a switch on his lectern to activate the internal vox-net, he said, ‘Fire control?’

  ‘Brother Qaja here,’ the reply came back. ‘Go ahead, brother-sergeant.’

  ‘Qaja,’ Sarik addressed the Space Marine who supervised the gun-serfs, a warrior Sarik had served alongside for decades and counted amongst his closest of brothers. ‘I want your crews to concentrate fire on any enemy vessel that so much as thinks about breaking off from the decoy group to engage Nova-zero-zero. Understood?’

  As Brother Qaja signalled his understanding, Sarik turned to Conversi Nord, the bridge-serf manning the shields station. ‘Nord, we’re about to draw a lot of fire, from the enemy scouts for certain, but possibly from the defence platforms too if they have the range. Be ready.’ The conversi nodded his understanding, and Sarik turned his attention back to the screen on his lectern.

  The tau pickets were closing on the bulk of the pathfinder squadron. The Nomad’s projected course would bring her into weapons range within minutes. The tau vessels opened fire on the scouts again. The scouts had scant point defence capability, but what few weapons they did have opened fire as one, stitching the void with streams of bright fire.

  Screaming silently in, the tau pickets swept directly through the pathfinder’s for
mation, reminding Sarik of a pack of silversharks attacking a shoal of moonwyrms. The brave pathfinders ploughed on, relying on their speed to push through the enemy. The tau vessels were fast, as Sarik knew they would be, but they were also supremely manoeuvrable, each vessel selecting a victim and latching onto it whatever evasive actions the pathfinder attempted. Just hold on, Sarik thought, counting down the seconds until his own weapons would be in range to intervene.

  ‘Nova-zero-three’s in trouble, brother-sergeant,’ a crewman said. Sarik glanced upwards through the armoured portal, but besides the staccato flashes of distant weapons discharges, the opposing vessels were still far too distant to be seen with the naked eye. The readout on the lectern, however, told the full story.

  The scout vessel with the call sign of Nova-zero-three was being closely pursued by a tau picket, the human pilot jinking sharply from side to side in an attempt to avoid the constant hail of high-velocity projectiles streaming through space towards him. The scout pilot was good, Sarik could tell, but so too was his pursuer. The scout’s life must surely be measured in seconds.

  ‘Intercept?’ Sarik said, denial welling up inside him.

  ‘Closing to long range now, brother-sergeant,’ Conversi Kuro replied.

  Sarik activated the vox-net link to Brother Qaja. ‘Fire control,’ Sarik said, ‘Zero-three needs our help – I got him into this situation, and by the primarch I will get him out. Fire when ready.’

  ‘Aye, brother-sergeant,’ the other Space Marine replied. A line of targeting script scrolled across the readout beside the icon representing the enemy picket. ‘Fire control cogitation plotted. Opening fire.’

  A moment later, the Nomad’s weapons batteries spoke, the report shuddering through the frigate’s hull as titanic energies were unleashed. Each shell was as large as a tank, and had been hauled into the breech of its cannon by gangs of sweating Chapter-serfs, who even now would be racing to load the next. A barrage of shells was propelled from the forward guns at supersonic velocity, tearing across the intervening gulf of space in a matter of seconds.