Predator, Prey

by Rob Sanders

  Aspiria had been a large Imperial mining world that dominated the system. Now, in its place, sat the ugly attack moon of which the astrotelepathic distress call had warned. The abominable thing bristled with gargantuan weaponry and fluxed with field shielding that routinely seemed to short and crackle away before returning with a blinding flash. Part of the monstrous moon was missing – perhaps the victim of a former planetary collision or malfunctioning weapon. In its place was a ramshackle framework of rusted girders and scaffolding, revealing the horrors of the planetoid interior: fleet bays and an internal anchorage for a barbarian armada of greenskin cruisers, attack ships and scrap-clads. Tearing the mine-riddled Aspiria to rubble with its great gravitic weaponry, the attack moon – like a spider’s nest disgorging its young – streamed gunships, capsules and rocks at the surviving worlds of the system. What the bombardment of planetary debris didn’t destroy, the swarms of delivered greenskins swiftly decimated. By the time the combination Black Templar and Imperial Navy fleet arrived, there was nothing but the enemy left.

  Marshal Bohemond’s gauntlets dug into the arms of his pulpit throne. It was not fear or concern for his safety that prompted his tightening grip, despite the tremors that felt their way through the battle-barge’s superstructure and the command deck. It was anger. It was hatred. As the Black Templars battle-barge Abhorrence banked as sharply as its blunt prow and length would allow, a gargantuan piece of Aspiria tumbled by. Castellan Clermont, the battle-barge’s commanding officer, had ordered the evasive manoeuvre. Never one to miss an opportunity to smite the xenos enemy, Clermont bawled at the bondsmen on the bridge to smash the battle-barge straight through a ragged vanguard line of ork ram ships and boarding hulks. Bohemond had allowed himself a moment of satisfaction with the castellan’s strategy, imagining the xenos’ surprise at the vessel they were intending to ram turning and crashing clean back through them. As the Abhorrence banked about the obstacle, however, with greenskin junkers detonating against the battle-barge’s void shields, the bridge lancet screen revealed the xenos attack moon. Bohemond felt bile climb the back of his throat. Like the tug of tiny threads in the muscles of his face, his mouth formed an involuntary snarl.

  Bohemond had fought the greenskins many times before. Gililaq 3-16. Horner’s World. Gamma Phorsk. Draakoria. It had been on Draakoria that a feral greenskin shaman had taken his eye. With its unnatural powers the creature had set everything around it alight, but Bohemond had strode through the strange flame using his hatred of the thing as his compass. The marshal had slain its chieftain and thousands of its depraved tribe-kin, and had promised himself that the witch would suffer the same fate. With his blade encrusted with greenskin gore, the marshal had charged through the inferno.

  The wyrd-creature had saved a little of itself for the encounter, however, and had called upon its sorcery to bathe Bohemond in a blazing stream so powerful and intense that it all but scorched the ceramite plate from his body. Dropping his sword and holding an outstretched gauntlet before his disintegrating helm, Bohemond had managed to save an eye and part of his face. With much of his roasted armour falling from his burnt flesh in a cloud of cinders and his hair still alight, the Black Templar had stomped through his agony and on towards the despised alien. Grabbing the spent monster, he had beaten the greenskin to death with his sizzling fists.

  As he beheld the attack moon with his one good eye, Bohemond felt the soul-scalding hatred he had felt for the green plague of Draakoria resurface. He knew he was in the presence of something alien, unnatural and abominable. Something well-deserving of its end. Deserving of Dorn’s cold wrath and the instruments of his zealous fury: the Black Templars.

  As the Abhorrence resumed its course and the planetary decimation of the Aspiria mining world began to clear, the derelict madness of the greenskin fleet came into focus. Between the battle-barge and the ork attack moon lay a blizzard of vagabond vessels. Jury-rigged derelicts. Drifting cannon-platforms. Rocketing voidscrap. Ungainly experiments in sub-light engineering and death. Bohemond’s teeth gleamed from within his widening snarl. The marshal would only be at peace standing in his battleplate beneath the surface of the moon, slaughtering its denizens. Between him and that purity of purpose lay a small armada of inconvenience.

  ‘Castellan,’ the Marshal called. ‘Order the Umbra to pull back.’ Bohemond had noticed that the strike cruiser had drawn ahead of the Abhorrence.

  ‘Commander Godwin wants to be let off the leash,’ Clermont observed.

  ‘I sympathise,’ Bohemond growled. ‘You can tell him that Rogal Dorn himself blesses this action.’ Bohemond turned in his pulpit throne and looked up for confirmation at Chaplain Aldemar. The Chaplain didn’t return his marshal’s gaze. With his cenobyte slaves clutching Chapter relics about him and his face hidden behind the featureless faceplate of his Crusader helmet, Aldemar merely nodded slowly. ‘Abhorrence, however, has the honour of leading the charge,’ Bohemond continued. ‘Order Sodalitas and Sword of Sigismund to take station on our flanks. The Ebon and Bona Fide are to support the Umbra in protecting our ships on the approach. All vessels to fall behind the battle-barge and benefit from the protection of our forward shields. The enemy are many and will hit us hard, but we will endure. Like a bolt-round through their miserable scraps of armour, we will punch through their assemblage of hulks and junkers.’

  As bridge serfs fell to relaying Bohemond’s orders, Castellan Clermont asked, ‘And what orders for Commodore DePrasse, marshal?’

  ‘Tell the commodore to have his captains form a line of battle behind us,’ Bohemond commanded. ‘His ships may fire as they bear. We shall take them through the greenskin armada, where we will need the big guns of his capital ships to support the Abhorrence in cracking that abominate moon open. Meanwhile, the Black Templars shall bring havoc to the xenos wretches hiding within.’

  ‘Relaying now, marshal,’ Clermont said.

  ‘Frater Astrotechnicus,’ Bohemond called. Techmarine Kant was standing amongst a nest of bondsmen and bridge servitors, monitoring the enginarium rune banks.

  ‘Yes, marshal,’ Kant replied without moving his stapled lips. His voice boomed from vox-hailers set in the sides of his muscular neck.

  ‘Forward void shields powered to full,’ Bohemond growled. ‘Nothing gets through, Brother Kant.’

  ‘Affirmative, Marshal.’

  Bohemond jabbed a vox-stub in the arm of his pulpit-throne with a ceramite digit. ‘Captain Ulbricht, this is the marshal. You are authorised to board Thunderhawks and assault ships in preparation for void insertion. I will join you on the final approach.’

  ‘I would expect nothing less, marshal,’ Ulbricht voxed back from the launch bays. ‘As the xenos will recieve nothing less than annihilation, ardent and absolute.’

  ‘Very good, captain,’ Bohemond said. ‘Stand by for the order to launch. Accelerate to ramming speed,’ the marshal added to his bridge crew as the Abhorrence plunged towards the enemy ship swarm. Both Space Marine and bondsman felt the sudden change in velocity shudder through the decking as the battle-barge’s mighty drives pushed them onwards into the oncoming greenskin barrage.

  ‘Crusader cruisers and frigates accelerating in line with new speed and heading,’ a bridge bondsman announced.

  ‘Marshal,’ Clermont called. ‘We appear to have a problem.’

  ‘Report.’

  ‘We’ve lost vox-contact with the commodore’s flagship.’

  ‘Lost contact?’ Bohemond rumbled. ‘Is the Magnificat under attack?’

  ‘The battleship is yet to engage,’ Clermont said.

  ‘Kant?’

  ‘Nothing on augurstream or binary frequencies,’ the Techmarine reported with metallic reverb. ‘The Navy vessels are slowing, marshal.’

  ‘The Preservatorio? The Falchiax? The Thunderfall?’

  ‘Static, my lord,’ the castellan said.

  ‘Try the destroyers and
the heavy escorts,’ the marshal barked. ‘What the hell is he doing?’

  ‘Only the cruiser Aquillon is keeping pace with our approach, marshal,’ Clermont reported after failing to contact the smaller commands. ‘Captain Grenfell, my lord.’

  ‘Kant – could this be the xenos? Their technology overwhelming our communications?’

  ‘Arrays and transmitters are returning both trace waves and background radiation,’ the Techmarine returned. ‘Vox-transmissions between the battle-barge and crusader vessels are unaffected.’

  ‘My lord.’ The barbican bondsman who had been stationed by the bridge doors presented himself, pulling back his hood.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I realise that it’s irregular, marshal,’ the bondsman said, ‘but the battle-barge astropath craves a moment of your time. He asks for permission to enter the command deck.’

  ‘Does he not know we are about to enter into battle?’ Bohemond seethed. The Black Templar was furious enough with Commodore DePrasse. A detested audience with one of the only psykerbreeds allowed on board the ship would probably drive the marshal over the edge.

  ‘I would ordinarily forbid it, my lord,’ the bondsman said, not wishing to attract the Marshal’s ire. ‘But he insisted it was important. Something about the communications issue.’

  Bohemond looked from the bondsman to Clermont, then from the castellan to Chaplain Aldemar. The Chaplain nodded slowly and solemnly.

  ‘Admit him,’ the marshal said.

  ‘Master Izericor,’ the barbican bondsman announced.

  Izericor shuffled onto the bridge, his staff tapping before him across the unfamiliar command deck. He bowed and drew back his hood. Blinders, like those found on livestock, partially hid the ragged holes where the astropath’s eyes used to be.

  ‘You have intelligence for me?’ Bohemond snarled.

  ‘I have just intercepted a message, my lord,’ Izericor said with deferent enthusiasm. ‘A communiqué of such import that I risk your displeasure, marshal.’

  ‘Speak,’ Bohemond said with difficulty. ‘What know you of our communication difficulties?’

  ‘Commodore DePrasse has just received new orders from Terra, my lord,’ the psyker said. ‘Commandments that supersede your own.’

  ‘What new orders?’ Castellan Clermont demanded.

  ‘The commodore is ordered to take his flotilla to a Navy rendezvous point in the Glaucasian Gulf, as soon as possible.’

  ‘Whose authority is carried by this communiqué?’ Bohemond asked.

  ‘The message bears the telesignature of Teegas Urelia, astrotelepath to Lord High Admiral Lansung himself.’

  ‘They’re playing for time,’ Clermont said. ‘They don’t know what to do for the best: disobey an order or offend the Adeptus Astartes.’

  Marshal Bohemond suddenly took to his feet, prompting even the blind Izericor to step back.

  ‘Send a telepathic communiqué to the chief astropath aboard the Magnificat,’ Bohemond said, his voice low and furious. ‘Tell him that I want an explanation from his master presently or I am coming over to the flagship myself.’

  ‘Marshal…’ the castellan started.

  ‘Do it!’ Bohemond bellowed, causing the astropath to jump.

  ‘As you command,’ Izericor replied.

  ‘The enemy lines,’ Techmarine Kant announced. ‘Brace for impact.’

  While the bondsmen and servitors reached out for handles and restraints, the Black Templars rode out the tremor, the magnetic soles of their boots keeping them in place. The forward void shields flashed and flared with a storm of impacts. First came a short range wave of torpedoes, kamikaze bombcraft and macrocannon blasts. This onslaught was followed by beak-prowed gunships and ramming hulks that would have delivered their brute cargoes of boarding orks if they hadn’t detonated against the intensity of the battle-barge’s void shields. As the Abhorrence ploughed on through the crude belligerence of greenskin engineering and weaponry, the aggression and monstrous bulk of the opposing vessels increased, with cruisers and gun-hulks manoeuvring into the battle-barge’s irresistible path.

  ‘Marshal,’ Clermont called as an obscenity masquerading as a battlecruiser drifted a rusted broadside before the Black Templars battle-barge. Bohemond nodded.

  ‘Explain it to these savages,’ the Marshal sneered.

  Clermont jabbed his gauntlet at several bridge bondsmen. ‘Ready bombardment cannon.’

  ‘Weapon standing by, castellan.’

  ‘Fire!’

  The battle-barge bucked as its dorsal cannon fired, sending a magma-bomb warhead streaking ahead of the prow. As it struck the ork battlecruiser, a searing explosion rippled through the reinforced scrap of the derelict’s side. The mountain of salvage broke away in two sections, between which the Abhorrence charged on.

  ‘Is it done?’ Bohemond demanded.

  ‘It is, my lord,’ the battle-barge’s astropath answered.

  Moments passed. Wreckage drifted clear of the lancet screens. Explosions flashed and rumbled before the void shields. Greenskin gunships drew in with their puncture-prows and grapnels, like predators of the deep.

  ‘Vox-transmission from the Magnificat, marshal,’ a bondsmen broke the silence on the bridge. ‘Flag Lieutenant Esterre.’

  Clermont saw the flutter of cold fury pass across his marshal’s grizzled features.

  ‘Put the flag lieutenant on the loudhailer,’ Bohemond commanded.

  After a brief burst of static, a patrician voice cut across the command deck.

  ‘Am I addressing Marshal Bohemond?’

  ‘The question, flag lieutenant,’ Bohemond rumbled, ‘is why on Terra aren’t I addressing your commodore?’

  ‘Commodore DePrasse is currently indisposed, marshal,’ the flag lieutenant explained with silky authority. ‘Please accept his humble apologies.’

  ‘I am waging war against the xenos as we speak,’ Bohemond told him, ‘yet I am still in contact with force contingents – as protocols dictate.’

  ‘Again, marshal: please accept my apologies.’

  ‘Damnation take your apologies,’ Bohemond boomed. ‘You think it prudent to lie to an Adeptus Astartes?’

  The vox-stream went silent. There was no protocol for this. ‘This is the heat of battle, lieutenant. We do not have time for anything other than the truth: cold and swift. Think before you answer. I hold all of the Emperor’s subjects accountable for their actions – and inaction. Have no doubt, for the Black Templars, the latter is the graver offence.’

  Lieutenant Esterre seemed to take a moment. Perhaps he was considering his future in the Imperial Navy. Perhaps he was simply considering his future. Perhaps he was conferring with a peer or superior.

  ‘We have received a recall, Marshall,’ Esterre told him, the truth uneasy on his lips. ‘The Lord High Admiral himself requires the commodore and his flotilla at a rendezvous above Lepidus Prime. We have no choice: it’s a vermillion-level order.’

  ‘And I’m not suggesting you don’t follow it, lieutenant,’ Bohemond said. ‘Attend your rendezvous, haul off to Lepidus Prime – just after the completion of this action. When victory is in our grasp and the enemy threat eradicated.’

  Static. Silence.

  ‘Lieutenant, this is Castellan Clermont. We need Magnificat’s heavy guns. We need the Preservatorio and Falchiax. We need the Thunderfall’s lances. We cannot crack the xenos attack moon without them. We can’t do it.’

  ‘My lords,’ Flag Lieutenant Esterre came back, ‘I suspect there is little that the Adeptus Astartes cannot do.’

  ‘Then you know how much it pains a son of Dorn to admit as much,’ Clermont retorted. ‘Your vermillion-level order no doubt concerns manoeuvres reacting to this new enemy threat.’

  ‘The threat is here, Esterre,’ Bohemond said. ‘Why pull corewards when we can end
these mongrelbreeds here on the segmentum rim?’

  ‘I’m sorry, marshal,’ Esterre said finally. ‘I really am. We all have our orders. Commodore DePrasse intends to follow his. Magnificat out.’

  ‘Esterre…’ Marshall Bohemond roared. His anger echoed about the cavernous command deck.

  ‘He’s gone,’ a bondsman informed him. ‘Vox-link broken from their end. The Magnificat is hauling off.’

  ‘Open channel,’ Clermont ordered. ‘All frequencies. Captains and commanders: this is the battle-barge Abhorrence requesting fire support, coordinates three, fifty-six, fifty-two. We are under attack. We are invoking section four-two-seven of the Vortangelo-Heidrich Proclamation signed by Marshal Grigchter and Grand Admiral Hadrian Okes-Martin during the Auriga Wars. This is Abhorrence, requesting fire support.’

  Clermont waited. About the battle-barge, turrets cut through boarding rocks and breaching capsules. Broadsides crashed through terror ships and gun-hulks. A sea of wreckage and void mines tested the battle-barge’s forward shields, with the Abhorrence’s prow forced to crash through the crowded chaos.

  ‘Preservatorio, hauling off, sir,’ a bondsman announced. ‘Thunderfall, hauling off. Falchiax, hauling off…’

  Clermont looked to his marshal. Bohemond had slammed his armoured form back into his pulpit-throne.

  ‘Marshal,’ the castellan said. ‘Without the Magnificat or the commodore’s cruisers, we cannot hope to damage the xenos abomination.’

  ‘Oligarch Constantius, hauling off,’ the bondsman droned. ‘Ministering Angel, hauling off. Morning Star, hauling off. Tiberius Rex, hauling off.’

  ‘Marshal…’

  ‘Who’s still with us?’ Bohemond murmured.

  ‘Marshal…’