The Ultramarines Omnibus

by Graham McNeill

  Curious onlookers surrounded the spores that did manage to land, eager to see, first-hand, this threat to their world, most paying with their lives as the spores erupted with alien killers: slashing beasts and sickle-armed monsters with pitiless eyes and voracious appetites.

  Snowdog had watched as a handful of spores had smashed through the thin, corrugated iron roofs of nearby dwellings, wincing at the impacts and knowing that the inhabitants were already dead. People scattered, shocked into action by the violence around them.

  Nearly a hundred of the leaping, hissing beasts thronged the narrow streets before the warehouse building serving as their base. Screaming people, carrying children and pathetic bundles of personal possessions had fled before the aliens and, in a moment of weakness that he just knew he was going to regret, Snowdog had allowed them sanctuary in the warehouse.

  Since then, he and his gang had been fighting for their lives as aliens fought tooth and nail to get inside. Jonny had held them at bay long enough for Snowdog to break out the weaponry they’d snagged from one of the many crooked supply sergeants at the busy port facilities, and with everyone carrying such powerful guns, they’d sent the aliens packing with their tails well and truly between their legs.

  It pained Snowdog to use these guns, because the resale value would be a hell of a lot less now they’d been fired. Still, he figured, he had crates and crates of ration packs and medical supplies in storage and would bet the sun and the moon that there’d be a hell of a demand for them in the coming days.

  He coughed as sudden quiet descended on the hab-unit, his lungs filled with acrid smoke from the heavy calibre weapons’ fire. Trask and Jonny Stomp high-fived.

  ‘You see that one I got between the eyes?’ snarled Trask. ‘Blew its Emperor-damned head clean off!’

  ‘Aye. But what about the one I nailed with the grenade launcher? That was sweet,’ said Jonny, miming firing his weapon again and again.

  Snowdog left them to their bragging, shouldering the smoking heavy stubber and smiling at Silver, who nodded back and reloaded her pistols. Lex and Tigerlily slumped to the floor, sparking up a couple of obscura sticks and Snowdog let them, figuring the threat was over for now.

  Silver sidled next to him and rubbed the back of his neck, leaning up to kiss his cheek. She smiled and nodded towards

  the crowd of terrified people at the back of the warehouse, her normally icy demeanour melting.

  ‘That was a good thing you did, letting those people in,’ she said.

  ‘Yeah, ain’t I the hero?’ snapped Snowdog.

  ‘No,’ replied Silver, ‘but I think maybe you’re a sentimentalist.’

  ‘Me? Don’t bet on it, honey. I don’t even know why I did it. If I’d had time to think about it, I’d have shut the door in their faces.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Really.’

  Silver searched his eyes for any sign that he was joking, then removed her hand from his neck when she found none. He saw her aloof exterior reassert itself as her stare penetrated his apparent altruism to the white heat of his self-interest.

  She turned away and said, ‘I just bet you would have.’

  Snowdog returned his gaze to the snow-covered city through the window. He didn’t blame Silver for thinking the best of him, he could be charming when he wanted to be, but he knew that he was basically a guy whose selfishness was too deeply ingrained for him to change. He knew his faults and they weren’t his defining characteristics, they were casual attributes – a monument to his desire to look out for number one.

  He cursed softly to himself as he remembered how Silver had looked at him when she believed he had let the fleeing people into the warehouse through unselfish motives. There was no guile in that look and its naked honesty scared him with how it made him feel. Snowdog rested the stubber against the wall and pulled a pack of bac-sticks from his trouser pocket, lighting one as he considered what would happen next.

  He’d have to feed these people, and keep them safe, a duty that went against every instinct in his body. He looked out for his nearest and dearest and that most certainly did not include civilians. Damn. He glanced over at Silver, feeling the chill of her eyes and cursed again.

  He ran a hand through his bleached hair, hearing the sound of screams and gunfire as more aliens ran into resistance in

  other parts of the city. He looked at the huddled people and shook his head.

  What had he been thinking? What was he thinking?

  Stacked crates stretched all the way back into the darkness of the warehouse: it was a veritable treasure trove of weapons, medical supplies, food, clothing, blankets – all the things a city in the grip of winter and invasion would desperately need.

  He switched his gaze from the crates to the huddled people and as he saw the desperate longing in their eyes, he pictured the contents of the crates.

  Snowdog smiled, suddenly scenting opportunities multiplying.

  TEN

  URIEL AND LEARCHUS surveyed the wreckage of the trench lines with practiced eyes, realising that against another aerial assault they would probably hold, but against a combined assault of land and airborne creatures, they would not. Reconnaissance provided by the Fury pilots stranded on Tarsis Ultra after the Kharloss Vincennes had been unable to recover them had indicated that a chitinous tide of unimaginable proportions was barely sixty kilometres to the west.

  A conservative estimate of their speed of advance put the tyranid horde less than hour away. Three aircraft had been lost to discover this information, brought down by roving packs of gargoyles lurking in the coloured clouds that billowed up from the mutant growths propagated by the alien spores.

  ‘We will not hold this line, brother-captain,’ said Learchus.

  ‘I know, but it will be a bitter blow to morale to have to pull back so soon after the first attack.’

  Stretcher bearers and field medics moved along the trenches, applying battlefield triage where they could and marking those who needed immediate removal to the medicae facilities with charcoal sticks. The soldiers of all the regiments had performed heroically, but Uriel knew that heroics alone were not enough to win this war.

  Further along the trenches, Uriel could see Chaplain Astador of the Mortifactors, kneeling in prayer within a circle of his brother Space Marines. Smoke from an iron brazier set before Astador drifted skyward and even over the stench of today’s battle, Uriel’s enhanced senses could pick out the scent of boiling blood.

  Learchus followed his captain’s gaze, his lip curling in distaste as he too caught the scent of blood in the dark smoke.

  ‘What devilment are they about now?’ wondered Learchus.

  ‘I do not know, sergeant, but I’ll wager that you will not find its like within the pages of the Codex Astartes.’

  Learchus granted in agreement as Major Satria of the Erebus Defence Legion and Captain Bannon of the Deathwatch made their way towards the two Space Marines. Bannon moved with the leisurely stride of a born warrior: his armour was bloodstained, the yellow and black symbol of the Imperial Fists obscured with purple ichor. Satria’s features were bloody and exhausted. A red-stained bandage bound his left arm and his helmet bore deep grooves, scarred by alien claws.

  ‘Sergeant Learchus,’ he said.

  ‘Major Satria. Your men have fought bravely,’ said Learchus.

  ‘Thank you,’ replied Satria. ‘There’s steel in these lads. We won’t let you down.’

  ‘Your fighting spirit is commendable, Major Satria, but I fear this is but a taster of what is to come,’ said Uriel.

  ‘You may be right, Captain Ventris, I’ve just received reports that seven other cities have been attacked already. And we can’t raise many of the smaller settlements.’

  ‘They are already dead,’ said Bannon.

  ‘You can’t know that,’ protested Satria.

  ‘But I can, Major Satria,’ answered Bannon. ‘I have fought the tyranids before and we can expect more attacks very soon, launched w
ith even more ferocity and cunning.’

  ‘So what do we do?’

  ‘We will fight,’ stated Bannon, his tone brooking no argument. ‘This is the largest settlement on Tarsis Ultra and the tyranids will see it as the most vital organ of their prey to strike. They will attack throughout Tarsis Ultra, of course, but their greatest effort will be directed at us.’

  Uriel nodded, his blood flaming with the certainty and passion of Bannon’s voice, feeling the killing rage and hatred of the tyranids boil upwards through his veins.

  ‘Where are your men?’ asked Learchus.

  ‘I have stationed them at key points in the defence line,’ answered Bannon. ‘Each has the Litany of Hatred of the Xenos carved on his breastplate and will recite them to the soldiers around them as they fight. The Emperor’s holy wrath will infuse every man with the courage to do his duty.’

  ‘They will do so anyway,’ promised Satria.

  Uriel let the words of his companions drift over him as the scent of blood in his nostrils suddenly leapt in clarity, swelling to fill his perception until he could see and feel nothing beyond the desire to see it shed. He could feel the pace of his heart rates increase until he realised he was in danger of hyperventilating.

  ‘Captain Ventris?’ asked Bannon. ‘Are you alright?’

  With an effort of will, Uriel dragged his perceptions back to the present, feeling the real world suddenly snap back into focus and the overpowering stench of blood recede like a forgotten dream. He unclenched his fists and nodded.

  ‘Yes, yes, I am fine,’ he said slowly. ‘I am simply eager to spill more alien blood.’

  Uriel swore he could feel the amusement of a dark spirit lurking just behind his eyes.

  IN ANOTHER SECTION of the trenches, Pasanius wiped black streaks of alien blood from his silvered bionic arm, a frown of consternation creasing his features. He picked up a handful of snow and smeared it over the gleaming metal, watching as it melted and washed yet more of the blood from his arm. Finally, he stooped and picked up a fallen scarf, wiping the surface of his arm clean.

  The metal beneath was gleaming like new, its surface smooth and unblemished by so much as a scratch.

  Pasanius caught his breath and closed his eyes.

  He held his arm close to his body and prayed.

  AGAIN THE WARNING klaxons blared and soldiers rushed to man the trenches. Distant swarms of gargoyles swooped in the sky as a swelling, rustling noise built from a whisper to a roar.

  Uriel recognised it as the sound of millions of creatures frantically jostling together as they churned forwards in an unstoppable mass, driven to kill and fight by the implacable will of the hive mind.

  A rippling black line appeared on the horizon, an undulating tide of claws, armoured carapaces and leaping monsters. He flexed his fingers on the grip of his sword, his thumb hovering over the activation rune, willing the tyranids closer so that he might slake this bloodlust in their ripped entrails.

  The horizon seethed with motion, the entire width of the valley filled with alien monsters intent on killing. Imperial artillery pieces, placed nearer the city walls, boomed and plumes of black smoke and explosions of ice fountained on the ice plain. Defence turrets and hastily constructed pillboxes opened fire, filling the air with deafening noise and lethal projectiles. Howling Lightning and Marauder aircraft streaked over the trenches to strafe the forward elements of the tyranid swarm or send high explosive bombs to crater the ice and incinerate tyranid creatures in their hundreds. Imperial Guard tanks lobbed shells on a high trajectory, their commanders knowing they would find targets without the need to aim. The vast cannon on the frontal cliff of Colonel Rabelaq’s Capitol Imperialis fired, its thunderous shot sounding like the crack of doom. Sheets of ice and snow fell from the mountains as the thunderous barrage of a well dug-in force unleashed the full fury of its firepower against the enemy.

  Thousands of tyranid organisms were killed, their carcasses trampled in the furious rush of the surviving creatures to reach their prey, but Uriel could see that the actual damage inflicted was negligible: Thousands were dead, but a hundred times that number remained.

  Among the swarm, he could see larger, more threatening looking beasts, their shape suggesting giant, living battering rams. Creatures that felt no pain and whose nervous systems were so rudimentary that it could take their bodies many minutes to realise that they were in fact dead. Crackling arcs of blue energy sparked amongst the swarm and the screeching wails of the aliens echoed from the valley sides, plucking at the strained nerves of the soldiers.

  He glanced at the nervous faces around him, seeing the regimental insignia of Krieg, Logres and Erebus Defence Legion

  units. Every face was wrapped in snow goggles, scarves and helmets, but he could sense the fear in all of them.

  ‘Place your trust in the Emperor,’ shouted Uriel, ‘He is both your shield and your weapon. Trust to His wisdom that there is purpose in everything, and you will prevail. Kill your enemies with His name on your lips and fight with the strength that He has given you. And if it is your fate to give your life in His name, rejoice that you have served His will.’

  Uriel activated his power sword, coils of energy wreathing the blade in deadly energy.

  ‘Let the aliens come,’ he snarled. ‘We will show them what it means to fight the soldiers of the Emperor.’

  CHAPLAIN ASTADOR FELT the pulse of the world through the ceramite plates of his armour, sensing the planet’s pain at this invasion in every strand of life that took its sustenance from its spirit. The scent of his own burning blood filled his senses and allowed his ghost-self to commune with those who had gone before him, who had worn the holy suit of armour in ages past, whose perceptions of the universe were uncluttered by the fetters of mortal flesh.

  He could feel the flaring energies of the soldiers around him, fear radiating hot and urgent, but also courage and determination. It was a potent combination, but Astador could not yet tell whether it would be enough to stand before these creatures that gave neither thought nor obeisance to the spirits of the dead and all that they could know.

  Though he could sense individual intelligences lurking within the swarm, he could feel a single keening voice that lanced through the swarm, a single driving imperative that gave them great strength of purpose, but no will of their own. It felt like cold steel, a glacial spike driven through his ghost-self. The sheer horror of this utterly alien consciousness threatened to overwhelm Astador, and the awesome scale of such domination of the self beggared belief.

  There was no hunger, no anger, no courage, or ambition in that imperative, only a single-minded desire to consume.

  There was strength in that, to be sure, but also great weakness.

  But should that cold steel imperative be broken, what then could such slave creatures achieve with no will of their own?

  Casting his ghost-self further into the chill of the ghastly tyranid psyche, Astador probed for ways to do just that.

  CAPTAIN OWEN MORTEN hauled violently on the stick of his Fury interceptor, pulling a hard dive for the deck. Whiteness flashed past his canopy and he levelled his wings as he pulled out some forty metres above the ice. He feathered the engines, pulling around and craning his neck over his right shoulder. A trail of bright explosions bloomed in his wake, alien carcasses cartwheeling through the air and Morten’s icy countenance hardened even further.

  Hastily reconfigured to carry air-to-ground munitions following their landing on Tarsis Ultra, Captain Morten’s squadron of Furies were taking the fight back to the tyranids. His last sight of the Kharloss Vincennes was of her launch bays in flames before the violence of the refinery’s explosion had eclipsed her death throes. A blood price had to be paid for all their shipmates and the Angel squadrons were reaping it in the blood of these damned aliens.

  Erin Harlen’s Fury looped overhead, the bombs on his centre pylon pickling off in sequence to impact in a string of detonations that merged into one continuous roar.
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br />   Morten rolled his Fury, screaming back across the trenches below and checking that his two wingmen were still on station with him. High above, Lightning interceptors looped in lunatic acrobatics with packs of gargoyles, their pilots keeping the flying creatures busy while they delivered their explosive payloads. Even a cursory glance told him that the Lightnings would not be able to hold the flocks of aerial killers off their backs for much longer.

  He thumbed the vox-link on his control column.

  ‘We’re going in again,’ he said. ‘Low altitude strafing run. Follow on my lead.’

  ‘Captain,’ warned Kiell Pelaur, his gunnery officer, ‘we’re all out of missiles. We don’t have anything left to drop.’

  ‘I know, lieutenant. Switching to guns.’

  Morten pushed the nose of the aircraft towards the ground, the swarm rushing towards him through the canopy. The shuddering of the airframe increased and a red light flashed on the panel before him as the proximity alarms shrieked as the Fury’s altitude dropped to a mere thirty metres. Flying at such height required the steadiest of hands on the stick, as the slightest error would smear the Fury across the ice.

  But the commander of the Angel squadrons was amongst the best pilots the Kharloss Vincennes battlegroup could put in the air and his control was second only to that of Erin Harlen. The tyranids rushed towards them, plumes of ice crystals foaming in the wake of the screaming Furies.

  Captain Morten pulled the trigger on his control column, sending lancing bolts of energy from the Fury’s lascannon into the horde. Explosions of blood and ice tore through them as the powerful weapon fired again and again. Morten screamed as he fired, feeling the burning desire to kill every single one of these abominations in one fell swoop. He pictured a blooming red fireball, the destruction he could achieve by simply letting go of the Fury and allowing her a final, glorious death in the heat of battle.

  Another red light began blinking as the last energy cell for the lascannon was ejected from the Fury’s underside and the frequency of the proximity alarm rose to a shrill new height.