Angel Exterminatus

by Graham McNeill

  Whatever Perturabo had expected to find at the heart of the Sepulchre of Isha’s Doom, it wasn’t this. He’d expected an array of tombs, grave-markers or some other visible remembrance of the dead. Something literal. He’d expected to see great statuary, monolithic obelisks, grand records of deeds and legacies. Now he realised that was a very human conceit – the eldar remembered their dead very differently.

  The last passageway had brought them out onto a walkway thirty metres wide above a vast domed space filled with the same green light that suffused the tombs and mausolea of the city. The ultimate source of that illumination was now revealed, a titanic geyser of brilliant emerald, pouring up in a column of radiance from the opening of an abyssal shaft in the centre of the cavernous space.

  High above, instead of the underside of the golden dome they had seen from the outside, was a void of utter nothingness that was at once static and churning with motion. The blazing light from below thundered into its depths, swallowed without disturbing the blackness.

  ‘It’s like looking into the heart of a black hole,’ said Kroeger, entranced by the sight.

  Perturabo nodded, his mind creating recognisable shapes within the fuliginous depths of the blackness: distant horizons, far-off lands and galaxies beyond imagination.

  ‘I think that’s exactly what this is,’ he said, tearing his gaze from the half-imagined horizons in the dark. ‘I think this has something to do with what’s keeping the planet from being dragged into the core of the Eye.’

  ‘Then let’s try not to do anything stupid in here,’ said Falk. ‘There’s still a war to be won once we finally get finished with this.’

  The floor of the chamber was like a pearlescent seabed; a forest of slender towers, segmented, bulbous and tapering like stalagmites. Each was studded with glittering gemstones that winked in the spuming torrent of light, like barnacle growths on tidal rocks. Winding paths snaked between the towers, the shortest of which was still surely hundreds of metres tall. Though they appeared random, Perturabo immediately saw the pattern in the arrangement of the paths and roadways.

  ‘They all converge on the opening through which the light pours,’ said Fulgrim.

  ‘You noticed that?’

  Fulgrim gave him a withering look. ‘Perfect patterns, recurrent geometry and naturally occurring Fibonacci sequences? Please.’

  Perturabo smiled. ‘I forgot you would have read the Liber Abaci.’

  ‘Read it? I rewrote it.’

  Perturabo gestured to the interior of the colossal chamber. ‘So is this what you expected?’

  Fulgrim strode to the edge of the walkway, his white cloak billowing out behind him like the mane of his hair, which was held back from his face by a silver circlet of exquisite working. Perturabo recognised the same hand that had fashioned the cloak pin Fulgrim had given to him on Hydra Cordatus. He glanced down at the jewel set in the gleaming skull, its blackness now completely eclipsed by gold.

  With the Iron Circle formed up around him and his triarchs on either side, Perturabo led them around the circumference of the chamber to where a tightly wound ramp led down to the floor like a coiled serpent draping over the edge of the walkway. Berossus brought up the rear, and as Perturabo descended to the bottom of the ramp, he watched the trailing warriors above him. They had entered the sepulchre with perhaps a thousand legionaries and a similar number of mortals, but now there were considerably fewer among Fulgrim’s followers.

  Had the labyrinth claimed them without anyone noticing or had they succumbed to violent urges or carnal desires along the way? Perturabo cared nothing for their fate. Either way, they were as good as dead.

  The floor of the chamber was warm like a jungle floor, humid and feathered by wisps of glittering fog that seeped from the towers like breath. Brought to their level, the vast scale of the towers became fully apparent – soaring sculptures that bore no hallmarks of a builder or craftsman. Stark black shadows danced on the ground and slithered over the towers, the cascading light from the chamber’s centre spilling between them like rushing water.

  The Iron Warriors marched in lockstep, moving as a single column of martial power, while Fulgrim and his warriors spread out, moving between the towers with their heads turning in awed appreciation of their scale. Fulgrim walked with his arms outstretched and his head tilted back, as though basking in the light of the first dawn. What had begun as a military operation was rapidly descending into something else entirely.

  ‘Whatever these are, they weren’t built,’ said Kroeger, reaching out to touch one of the towers with his fist.

  ‘Don’t touch it, you idiot!’ snapped Falk.

  Kroeger snatched his hand away, the lenses of his helm shimmering with reflected green light and hostility.

  ‘You don’t give me orders,’ said Kroeger.

  ‘Not yet,’ said Falk.

  ‘What does that mean?’ barked Kroeger, stepping towards him.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Falk, as surprised by his words as Kroeger was angered by them. Perturabo saw Falk glance over at a tight, crystalline knot of gemstones encrusted to the tower at his side as though he saw something, something he wished he couldn’t see.

  ‘Falk?’ said Perturabo. ‘What’s wrong?’

  Barban Falk didn’t answer until Perturabo put a heavy iron gauntlet upon his shoulder.

  The triarch flinched as though struck and shook his head, throwing off his momentary lapse of concentration. Perturabo read the warrior’s biometrics through his visor and saw his pulse was spiking and his respiratory rate was unusually elevated.

  ‘I… thought I saw something,’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Falk. ‘Nothing, I think.’

  ‘It’s this place,’ said Kroeger, flexing his gauntlet on the hilt of his sword. ‘Gets inside your head. Eldar witchery.’

  Falk nodded and clenched his fists.

  ‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’

  Perturabo led them deeper into the chamber, following the looping paths through the towers. As they drew nearer to the centre and the tower of light, the green mist gathering around the towers grew thicker, like a toxic fog sinking through the thoroughfares of some industrial hive-sump.

  Eventually, as he and Fulgrim had seen, the pathways spiralled in ever decreasing loops until at last they stood before the vertical river of light at the heart of the sepulchre.

  It was not solid as they had supposed, more like a cascade of brilliant helices of pellucid light, as though a celestial loom at the planet’s core were gathering a billion times a billion radiant threads and weaving them together into one vast stream. The torrent was an intricate mesh of infinite complexity, and Perturabo was not surprised to see that the path they were on led towards the edge of the shaft from which the light rose.

  The shaft was two hundred metres in diameter and like this world itself, perfectly circular, without so much as the tiniest imperfection to mar its ideal geometry. Its circumference was cut with cursive symbols, ancient runes beyond even his understanding of language, and Perturabo considered himself fluent in numerous eldar dialects.

  Fulgrim marched to the very edge of the shaft, haloed in a corona of emerald light, with his cloak billowing behind him like ivory wings.

  ‘It’s so beautiful,’ said Fulgrim, turning on the spot to face Perturabo.

  Before Perturabo could answer, he heard a cry of alarm. He spun on his heel in time to see a legionary snatched into the mist by an unseen assailant.

  ‘To arms!’ he shouted as the mist began coalescing around them.

  Screams came from the cloying fog, mortal screams. Bangs of bolter fire sounded, muffled by the mist and weirdly distorted by the unnatural architecture of the chamber. More rattling shots followed, and more screams.

  Perturabo saw a starscape of bright lights within the fog, spots of crimson, azure and jade that pulsed with angry illumination. At first he thought it to be nothing more than the gemstones encru
sted on the towers reacting to what was happening, but then he saw the tower nearest him… move.

  No, not move. Reshape.

  The material of the tower surrounding a brilliant ruby gemstone set into its flank began to extrude a humanoid shape, like a figure pressed from a mould. It was taller than a Space Marine, but slender and with a bulbous, elongated head, the gemstone borne at its centre. The figure stepped from the tower, trailing lambent light from the residue of its birth. Its arms were clawed, and one bore a slender tube-like device that could only be a weapon of some kind.

  Nor was it alone.

  Wherever a gemstone was set, similar figures stepped from the depths. Like automata, but with a hideously organic feel to their movements, they were emerging in their hundreds with every passing second. They drew the mist to them, as though breathing it in, and Perturabo saw with a sinking heart that the chamber was now full of the things.

  Thousands upon thousands of them.

  ‘Fulgrim!’ shouted Perturabo.

  But his brother was nowhere to be seen.

  Forrix smashed his fist through yet another of the eldar wraiths, its insubstantial form as vulnerable to damage as any body of flesh and blood. It broke apart in an explosion of light shards and a deathly cry that faded like a lost dream. But just as they could be wounded, so too were they able to cause harm. Forrix’s chest was icy cold where one of the wraiths had simply reached through his armour to clutch at his heart.

  A backhanded blow had dissipated the ghostly essence, but Forrix had not forgotten the lesson. His ring of Terminators ploughed through the ghostly ranks of the eldar, crushing, swiping and tearing at their mist-formed bodies. Three of his warriors were already dead, left behind on the plaza without any obvious wounds upon them.

  Julius Kaesoron fought at his side, a hateful presence, but a welcome additional fighter.

  Kaesoron’s madness may have brought this about, but the man could kill like no other.

  Gunfire from the battlements of the strongpoint surrounded them, battering the wraiths from behind iron walls. Mass reactives were rendered impotent, passing through the ghostly bodies of their attackers and exploding on impact with the ground.

  ‘Fists only!’ shouted Forrix. ‘Save the bolter rounds for the constructs!’

  The weapon systems of the Tormentor flensed the plaza, sawing arcs of lascannon fire and chugging barks of heavy bolters cutting down constructs by the dozen and vaporising wraiths with every bolt of laser energy. Forrix batted aside a sword blade of mist and light, punching his enormous fist through the shimmering helm of the eldar ghost before him. It vanished with a diminishing scream of loss, but more were there to take its place.

  Thunderous streams of light blazed overhead as the Mortis engines duelled with the colossal guardians of the sepulchre. Streaks of cannon fire, plasma comets and flaming ordnance lit the sky in a furious borealis of weapon discharges. Void shield flares sent arcs of static leaping from every metallic surface. The entire strongpoint was wreathed in tendrils of lightning.

  The ground shook as the Titans jockeyed for position between the nearby mausolea. The eldar war machines were faster and blurred with haloed streams of refracted light, but the Mortis engines were belligerent maulers who excelled in close-range brawls.

  ‘Incoming!’ cried Kaesoron, with relish.

  Moving with spindly grace, the glassy constructs moved unimpeded through the spectral army, their arms blazing with blinding emerald bolts. The majority of them were tearing at the strongpoint, ripping sheets of armour from the walls with their bare hands or unleashing pulsing streams of energy at the warriors upon the battlements, but a vengeful group was rushing towards Forrix and his remaining warriors.

  Kaesoron barrelled towards the constructs, his fists mashing into the nearest and breaking it in two. He took a blow to the head that almost toppled him, but he moved with a speed that astonished Forrix. Cataphractii armour offered a warrior many advantages, but speed wasn’t normally one of them.

  Kaesoron righted himself and crushed his attacker’s head between his fists, laughing as he did so, as though now privy to the universe’s ultimate joke. He fought like a man possessed, his raw-meat face writhing in the throes of some miraculous transformation.

  Forrix put Kaesoron from his mind as another of the smooth-skinned constructs charged him. He met its fist with his own, the two colliding with a searing discharge of polarised energies. He felt the fiery charge race up his arm, but the heavy plates and thick insulation of his armour kept the worst of the pain at bay. It had made the first strike, but that was all it was getting.

  Forrix swung his other arm up and fired a stream of explosive rounds into its groin. Glass and light spewed from the wound as they punched through its vitrified body. The thing backed away, but Forrix wasn’t about to let it go. He stepped in and thundered his fist into its bulbous head. It staggered, and another blast from his combi-bolter tore the top of its skull off. Another came at him, but a stabbing blast of retina-searing light from the strongpoint’s battlements punched into its chest and blew it apart in a storm of molten glass.

  Another of his warriors died, his head crushed by an overhand blow from one of the crystal giants. His helmet a flattened ruin, his skull a mass of pulped bone and blood, the body refused to fall – kept upright by the bulk of his armour.

  ‘Get to the gate!’ shouted the Stonewrought over the vox. ‘I’ll be ready to get you back in.’

  A roiling fireball lit the air above the battle, and Forrix risked a glance up as he saw what looked like an enormous pipe or hive conduit fall through the layer of gunsmoke. It took a moment for him to realise he was seeing the shorn length of a Titan’s cannon. The weapon barrel slammed into the ground with seismic force and the deafening crash of its shattering structure echoed like the pealing of the Eternity Bell of Olympia on the day the Legion had first departed its mountainous glory.

  Braying warhorns screamed in pain and the electric tang and flare of void shields made the plates of Forrix’s armour twitch.

  ‘Keep moving, damn you!’ growled Kaesoron, his capricious mood now enraged.

  ‘I need no lessons from you, Kaesoron!’ barked Forrix, angry it had taken a warrior of the Emperor’s Children to remind him of the fundamental rule of warfare in Cataphractii armour. Movement and momentum were the key. Keep lumbering forwards and there was little that could stop you, but lose that momentum and it would be nigh impossible to regain in the face of enemy fire.

  ‘I beg to differ,’ spat Kaesoron, punching through the middle of a construct and heading towards the sealed gate of the strongpoint. Forrix followed him, his fist pummelling and his combi-bolter roaring as he stomped forwards.

  The last of his warriors was dragged down, overwhelmed by the spectral warriors and their ghostly touch of death. His screams over the vox were silenced in an instant, and Forrix cursed the Phoenician anew for bringing them to this place.

  ‘Damn you, Kaesoron, and damn Slaanesh!’

  No sooner had the last name spilled from his lips than his stomach spasmed and his mouth filled with bile. Forrix unsuccessfully fought back a wave of nausea, and sour vomit spurted over his teeth. It pooled before him, choking and acrid, and super-efficient acids ate into his helmet’s systems. Fumes rose from the mechanisms, stinging his eyes.

  Blinded, Forrix kept moving and swept his combi-bolter around with the last of his shells. He reached up and tore his ruined helmet free. The sounds of battle surged, booming reports of high-velocity solid rounds, the electric crack of energy weapons and the barking of small-arms fire.

  Something enormous exploded nearby. He couldn’t see what. Heat washed over him and he saw the strongpoint silhouetted by a towering mushroom cloud striated with electric blue plasma discharge.

  A hand gripped the edge of his breastplate and hauled him onwards. His eyes were streaming, but he saw Kaesoron dragging him to the gateway. Each Rhino reversed enough for them to squeeze through and a roaring blast of bolte
rs and handfuls of grenades were lobbed back outside. The detonations were hardly audible over the crash of war-engine guns overhead.

  ‘Situational update,’ he demanded of the Stonewrought, spitting the last caustic mouthful of bile. Flashes of muzzle fire ringed the interior of the strongpoint as the army of wraiths fought to get inside.

  ‘It’s bad,’ said Soltarn Vull Bronn. ‘The fortifications at the wall are under siege on all sides. A mix of the statue creatures and these…’ He almost couldn’t bring himself to say it. ‘Ghosts.’

  ‘Any word from the primarch?’

  ‘None,’ said the Stonewrought.

  Forrix nodded. ‘What about Toramino?’

  ‘No word of any hostilities,’ said the Stonewrought. ‘Looks like the citadel’s getting all the attention, warsmith.’

  ‘Then we might live through this yet,’ said Forrix, unclipping a vox-caster from the nearest Rhino.

  Perturabo cursed taking his eye from his brother, but knew Fulgrim would have found a way to engineer his scheme no matter what he had done. The creatures oozing from the towers were growing ever more numerous, tightening the ring around the great plume of rushing light.

  His Iron Warriors remained at his side, alongside a small cadre of Emperor’s Children who stood sentinel at the beginning of the ramp that led down into the shaft. At least the question as to where Fulgrim had gone was answered. The Phoenician’s mortal followers, with their bulky containers still strapped to their backs, stood at the very edge of the abyss, their faces alight with the passion of zealotry. He recognised the stuttering movements of Eidolon and the fluid grace of the scar-faced swordsman, Lucius. Scores of Emperor’s Children whipped them into place, though there appeared to be no need for violence as the mortals were only too happy in their tasks.

  Perturabo had no time to wonder at their actions, and hauled Forgebreaker from his back, gasping at the sudden weight of it. Where he could normally bear it with the ease a mortal man might lift a dagger, its weight now seemed to be exponentially greater with every passing moment.

  ‘My lord?’ said Barban Falk.