by C Z Dunn
The noise of battle filled the cold night air, but the weapons of the Space Marines and Astra Militarum had fallen silent, the clash of ork blades and discharge of their crude guns the only sounds that rang out. As far as the eye – or augmented vision – could see, ork had begun to kill ork.
Ezekiel looked at the three Dark Angels in turn, then to the arch magos. None of them could offer an explanation for what they were seeing.
‘Is this happening anywhere else?’ Ezekiel asked, already reaching out psychically to contact Dark Angels still stationed at outlying gates. Balthasar and Serpicus began to vox the Vostroyan and Mordian commanders garrisoned at those fortresses without a Space Marine presence.
‘All other gates reporting that the orks are holding position,’ Serpicus said after a minute had elapsed.
‘Likewise,’ Ezekiel added. ‘Sergeant?’
Balthasar held up a hand, gesturing that he was yet to finish. ‘Those gates I’ve been able to contact are reporting the same,’ he said after several seconds. ‘But one of the gates is not acknowledging.’
‘Which one?’ asked Serpicus, activating a data-slate and holding it out so that his brothers and Diezen had a clear view.
‘Annantine Gate.’
Serpicus manipulated the screen, zooming in on the gate’s location on the flickering map. ‘There. It’s one of the most remote gates and has yet to come under attack from the orks.’
‘What is manufactured there?’ Ezekiel asked.
‘It was of little import to us,’ Diezen replied. ‘It did not manufacture weaponry or munitions, merely transport vehicles of similar patterns to those already held by Mars.’
‘Armed transports?’ said Balthasar.
‘No. They are used only to ferry components from one gate to another. The only notable thing about them is that they are well adapted for use in the inhospitable climate of Honoria.’
In unison, the four Dark Angels’ nostrils flared and they inhaled deeply, raising their heads slightly as they did so.
‘What is it?’ asked Diezen.
‘Smoke, in the distance,’ Serpicus replied. ‘Its chemical composition is different from that drifting up from the battlefield.’
He looked out in the direction of the Annantine Gate, his augmetics adjusting to maximum magnification.
‘The forge,’ he said, turning to the others. ‘The orks have restarted the forge.’
Chapter Fifteen
Ezekiel withdrew his blade, the blood-slicked metal sliding free of the ork’s chest with a wet popping sound before the brute fell to the cold stone floor of the fortress. The xenos thrashed as it bled out, until Turmiel neutralised the threat with a psychic dagger, the greenskin’s eyes rolling back in their sockets as its brain functions were violently terminated.
All around the courtyard, brothers of Fourth Squad silently despatched xenos with clinical strikes from their combat blades. Serpicus merely tore them apart with his servo-arms, the bare metal now the same colour as his armour. Vastly outnumbered by the orks who had claimed the Annantine Gate – just as they were all over Honoria – Ezekiel had decided that stealth was the best option to determine what was going on inside its walls and, in all likelihood, neutralise the new threat posed by the orks.
‘The window is open,’ Ezekiel voxed to the circling Valkyries. ‘Commence insertion.’
The Thunderhawk from which Ezekiel, Turmiel, Serpicus and Fourth Squad had teleported into the fortress, reappeared over the battlements high above, brothers of Seventh Squad alert at its open doors for any sign of anti-aircraft fire. From out of the Honorian night, three Astra Militarum Valkyries emerged, barely visible against the darkness, their engine noise masked by the din of the operational forges. From two of them, ropes were flung towards the ground, allowing a mixed force of Vostroyans and Mordians to swiftly rappel into the corpse-strewn courtyard. From the other leapt two dozen skitarii, the man-machines freefalling the near three hundred and fifty feet to the ground, and landing in a crouch, their cybernetic legs silently cushioning the impact.
Within seconds, the forces of the Imperium were inside the fortress, their transports peeling off into the night sky to await the order for extraction or, if things did not go to plan, support.
Assembling into their predetermined squads, each Space Marine led a handful of Imperial Guardsmen into the cacophonous depths of the fortress, leaving the skitarii to pursue their own mission.
Ladbon had been surprised when the Techmarine had personally selected him and his squad for the mission, especially in light of how the Dark Angel had chastised him on the walls of the Sularian Gate, but the Vostroyan made no claims to know the inner workings of the mind of a Space Marine. What he did know was that he was glad not to be part of the Librarian’s squad after their encounter in the cells.
The vox-bead in his ear crackled to life as the Techmarine issued instructions in his gruff voice. ‘We get into the heart of the fortress, we plant the explosives and we get out. If we encounter any greenskin resistance, we leave no survivors to raise the alarm. Don’t be concerned about the noise of your weapons, the orks won’t be able to hear it over the noise of the forge. Understood?’
Ladbon nodded in acknowledgement, and turned to see the rest of the squad doing likewise.
‘Good,’ said the Techmarine before striding off down the dimly lit corridor, lume strips flickering as the forge drank the bulk of the fortress’ power supply. ‘Try to keep up.’
High above in the outer walls of the fortress, Ezekiel led his squad of Mordians ever upwards towards the top of the fortress’ main gate. Whereas Serpicus, Turmiel and the other Dark Angels were tasked with delivering their explosives to the assembly lines that made the war machines, Ezekiel’s role was to collapse the main exit so that any vehicles the orks had already built remained entombed within the fortress. The skitarii’s mission was unknown to him, though on the flight from the Sularian Gate, Serpicus had postulated that the Mechanicus’ presence was a fail-safe; if the Dark Angels and Astra Militarum failed to bring the forge to a halt, the skitarii would deliver a payload of scrapcode to shut it down instead. Given the abhorrence of such an act to a devotee of the Martian cult, this would surely only be an act of absolute last resort.
A new sound joined the constant noise of the gargantuan production lines reverberating through the thick stones walls, and Ezekiel motioned for the Mordians to halt. On the steps above them stuttering lume strips picked out the huge outline of a lone ork, metal boots clanging as it moved. It spotted the intruders at the same time they spotted it, its eyes widening as it raised its huge gun, before their colour changed from yellow to blood-red, Ezekiel liquefying its tiny brain with a single thought. The Librarian and the Mordians stepped to the side, backs against the wall of the stairs to allow the dead ork to crash harmlessly past them. After a brief pause to ensure the greenskin had been patrolling alone, Ezekiel motioned them onwards.
‘Shipmaster Selenaz, are you receiving me? Over,’ Ezekiel said, opening a vox-link with the fleet, as he had done at regular intervals since the Annantine Gate had unfathomably restarted production. As on every previous occasion, there was no reply.
The orks had started jamming all long-range communication just as the forges sprang back to life, and flashes in the night sky suggested that the battle in the void had restarted. The easy option, that of destroying the captured fortress from orbit, was not open to the Dark Angels so Ezekiel had been forced to make his first significant command decision and lead a force into the heart of the enemy. He tried several more times, switching channels each time in case the fleet had been able to unscramble any, but the result was the same.
Two more orks loomed out of the darkness up ahead, only for Ezekiel to mete out the same treatment received by their predecessor, though not before one of them was able to loose off a shot. Alert to the danger, Ezekiel raised a psychic shield, the round fi
zzing out of existence three inches away from the forehead of a very relieved Mordian. Again, they waited to see if any more orks had followed them.
Satisfied that the route ahead was clear, they continued their ascent.
Not all of the squads were finding the going as easy as Ezekiel’s.
Brother Aspiriel’s team had met heavy resistance on their route through to the forge, and although none of the orks had lived long enough to give away the presence of the intruders, three Vostroyans had died – among them the trooper carrying the explosives, which had detonated prematurely after a lucky shot from a dying greenskin. With the rest of them, Aspiriel included, being nothing more than walking wounded, Ezekiel had no choice but to order the squad back to the insertion point and hold it until they were ready for extraction.
Brother Luciel’s squad had fared little better. Like the others, they had not alerted the main body of orks to their intrusion but were down to only three survivors, including the trooper carrying the demolition charges. In their diminished state, their chances of making their target were slim, especially if they encountered any more ork patrols.
Of the remaining squads no other had lost members, but all bore the marks of battle. Even among Ladbon’s team, Gaspar and Mute bled from shrapnel wounds, while Kas had been grazed across the temple by a shot that by rights should have taken his head from his shoulders. Despite his fortune, the squad had to stop for several dangerous minutes while Dmitri applied bandages to prevent the blood from dripping into the big man’s eyes, much to the Techmarine’s annoyance.
When they started moving again, the Dark Angel picked up his pace even more, forcing the Vostroyans to run at a near sprint lest they become separated. As the Space Marine disappeared around a bend in the corridor, the darkness gave way to strobing orange light as the Techmarine opened up with his bolter. The Vostroyans moved up to support him but Ladbon stood still, staring off into nothingness as if in a trance. As Grigori moved past his captain to lend his gun to the battle up ahead, Ladbon suddenly snapped out of it and grabbed him by the wrist.
‘Wait,’ Ladbon said urgently. ‘Stay here.’
Grigori was just about to protest when the flickering gunfire briefly illuminated several dark shapes moving up the corridor behind them. Both Vostroyans opened up with their lasrifles, the bright beams revealing the full extent of their peril.
At least eight greenskins advanced through the tight confines, the first two almost close enough to open fire with their crude stubbers. Without any cover, and with the Dark Angel and the rest of the squad engaged further ahead, the two men only had one choice.
‘You first,’ Ladbon said.
Grigori nodded, unclipped the cylinder from his belt and rolled it along the corridor.
The lead ork was about to squeeze the trigger when the grenade detonated, ripping it to pieces along with the orks directly behind and alongside. Body parts and bone showered the following ranks. Still reeling from the initial blast, the surviving greenskins could only look on in dumb horror as a second grenade bounced along the stone floor, landing amongst them with the same devastating effect as the first. Already weakened by the first blast, part of the ceiling collapsed, trapping those not killed by the explosion under rubble.
With one exception.
Its weapon ripped from its grasp in the blast, a lone ork stood defiant among the smoke and dust, its green flesh sullied and stained with the blood of its fellow xenos warriors. Roaring a pained threat, it put its head down and charged, eating up the metres between it and the Vostroyans. Ladbon and Grigori let off a furious volley of las-fire, almost every shot finding its mark, but to no avail. In its enraged state, the ork was oblivious to any pain.
With no grenades left between them, the two men began to scramble backwards along the corridor, continuing to fire in the vain hope that one of their shots would fell the wounded beast. So intent were they on self-preservation that they failed to notice the figure move up behind them.
Shoving both Vostroyans roughly to the ground, Serpicus raised his bolter and squeezed off a single round. The ork’s head evaporated into a cloud of crimson mist. Even devoid of its brain, the body carried on along the corridor and as the Techmarine sidestepped it, he gave it a hefty push in the back, slamming it hard into the wall of the bend. It fell backwards, still twitching as its neck stump bled messily onto the floor. Just to be sure the thing wouldn’t suddenly spring back to its feet, Allix and Mute emptied their lasrifle power packs into it at close range.
Unconcerned, the Dark Angel approached the collapsed section of the tunnel, where one of the orks still lived, albeit minus three of its limbs and covered in several tons of masonry. With an almost imperceptible whirr, his servo-arm swung swiftly around and gripped either side of the ork’s head before popping it like a piece of overripe fruit. Gore dripping from his armour, the Techmarine turned and rejoined the Vostroyans.
When he got alongside Ladbon, who by now had regained his breath sufficiently to rise to his feet, Serpicus stopped and stared intently at the Vostroyan’s augmetic eye, in the same way a lover of art might regard a sculpture or painting. After several uncomfortable seconds the Space Marine spoke.
‘I think that eye lets you see more than you let on, Guardsman.’
Resuming his previous quick pace, the Dark Angel continued onwards, leaving Ladbon wondering exactly what he had meant.
High above the roaring forges, the true extent of the orks’ operation became apparent to Ezekiel. Tens of thousands of small, orkoid creatures operated production lines or fed raw materials onto conveyer mechanisms, vast machines turning ore into engine pistons, nuts and bolts, armoured plates and other vehicle components. Larger figures worked alongside them, taking the constituent parts and passing them over to yet bigger orks, who haphazardly put the pieces into place before they were soldered or riveted by yet more of the small greenskins. If Diezen had been there to witness the end results of the orks’ construction efforts he likely would have blown a circuit.
What struck Ezekiel was the speed with which the completed vehicles rolled off the production line. With hundreds of teams working relentlessly in the gargantuan forge, a new transport was delivered to the staging area every couple of minutes. The Librarian adjusted his position on the gantry to try to gauge the number of completed vehicles, but found his view obscured by banks of machines. Though unable to get an accurate figure, Ezekiel recognised that he had made an error in his initial assessment; the vehicles weren’t being moved into a staging area; they were being taken to the final stage of the production line. That this was so far away from the rest of the construction operation could only mean one thing – the orks were adding their own modifications.
An explosion at the centre of the forge prevented the Dark Angel from dwelling on this revelation’s significance for too long. Whether one of the other squads had been discovered or a timer had detonated prematurely, the greenskins were now alerted to their presence. Even though the noise of the explosion had been obscured to human and ork ears alike by the industrial hubbub, the plume of flame and smoke rising towards the forge’s high ceiling had the xenos reaching for their weapons and converging on the blast site.
Attempting to turn misfortune into opportunity, Ezekiel was about to order the Mordian with the explosives to make haste and plant them, when, in a rush of blood, two of the other members of his squad opened up with their lasrifles. Neither lived long enough for the Librarian to admonish them, their fire returned tenfold from below.
Get those explosives planted now,+ Ezekiel sent, the grind of the huge door mechanisms adding to the din of the forge and combat. If they hurried and blew the doors, they could still prevent the flow of transports to the ork war effort.
Raising a psychic shield around his remaining squad members, Ezekiel opened up with his bolt pistol, using his high vantage point to assist his brothers and the Guardsmen down below. Yet more c
olumns of flame and smoke rose up from all sections of the forge, the Dark Angels having the tactical acumen to complete their mission objectives even though their plan had gone awry.
The noise levels, already impossibly loud, rose again, the engines of the ork-constructed transports joining the chorus. What his eyes had been unable to see, Ezekiel’s ears now revealed to him: the individual signatures of close to a thousand vehicles.
The Mordian with the explosives was almost in position when, either by ork cunning or sheer frustration at not being able to shoot the shielded Guardsmen, a rocket-propelled grenade slammed into the gantry several metres down from the squad. His concentration broken, Ezekiel dropped the psychic shield, reaching out with one of his huge hands and grasping twisted metal. Not all of the Guardsmen fared so well, all but two tumbling to their doom far below. To Ezekiel’s relief, the trooper with the explosives was not one of them. He raised the shield again.
When I give the order, drop the explosives on a three-second delay,+ Ezekiel sent to the Mordian. The Guardsman, clinging to a piece of ruined gantry hanging pendulously like a set of ladders, acknowledged the Librarian, pulling a pack from his belt before manipulating the dials and cogs that set the fuse.
With his initial plan impossible to complete, Ezekiel had decided to improvise. Grinding along on poorly constructed caterpillar tracks, billowing thick black smoke as it went, the first of the transports approached the now open doors of the forge. Waiting until it was almost directly below them, Ezekiel sent the order. Spinning end over end, the explosives landed a split second before they detonated, though, more importantly, at the exact moment the front of the lead vehicle passed over them. Track links split apart, buckling under the sudden burst of heat and energy, and sheared away as the vehicle continued to move, its driver seemingly unaware that it had been catastrophically damaged. Coming to a halt with its hull squarely blocking the doorway, its engine revved hard in frustration as the convoy behind it ground to an abrupt halt.
