Astra Militarum

by David Annandale, Justin D Hill, Toby Frost, Braden Campbell (epub)

  I stopped dead in my tracks. On the far side of avenue was a pair of Chimeras painted in the colours of the Zhenyan militia, fitted for urban combat with extra armour mounted on their hulls and a dozer blade attached to the front. One had smashed through part of the retaining wall and come to rest at a sharp incline, never to move again. The other was simply stopped in the middle of the street. Their hulls bore dozens of dents and burn marks and their rear access doors were open to the elements. Nearly two dozen headless bodies lay nearby. Their weapons were nowhere to be seen.

  I signalled my men to crouch down. It had all the hallmarks of being a trap, and yet there was a very real possibility that the two abandoned personnel carriers contained vital supplies. My stomach growled at the thought of ration packs, candied energy bars or grox jerky. They might contain medi-packs, pain killers and healing elixirs, and there was still a cosmically remote chance that the Chimera sat in the open was still operational.

  Sergeant Ingram was crouched down on my left and Velez was behind me on the same side.

  ‘Thoughts?’ I asked.

  ‘Bit too good to be true,’ Ingram said, ‘but there might some materiel inside we could use.’

  ‘Officer thinking, Ingram. Velez?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  They were three words that I’d never heard from him. ‘What do you mean, you don’t know? You can see the future.’

  The pupils of his eyes had reduced to tiny circles of black. ‘All I see is an unholy man standing in a once holy place. There is nothing except for him and all probability is drowned out by his rage.’

  ‘What… what are you talking about?’ I recalled the whispered name that Isaias had sworn his hundred-fold vengeance upon. ‘Samnang Margh. Does that mean anything to you?’

  Velez didn’t have an answer. He seemed lost, taken hostage by something only he was privy to. I actually thought, however brief, that I would have to perform a commissar’s work right then and there, shooting Velez through the temple for his own good.

  The Land Raider was a block behind us. I realised something was waiting for us up ahead; something so terrible that it required the attention of the Space Marines. My self-preservation instincts kicked into overdrive and, suddenly, I had never wanted so badly to be ensconced behind walls of plasteel. I drew my laspistol.

  ‘Ingram, you see that Chimera closest to us, the one in the middle of the street?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I want it. Pick a small team to check out the other one. Everyone else, stay here and provide cover.’

  The sergeant brought three of his scouts, and together we dashed across the wide street. Ingram and I stepped around the decapitated, frozen bodies and entered the first transport. The hatch leading up into the top-mounted turret hung open, its insides painted with blood. The tiny storage lockers along the walls had been thoroughly ransacked. The floor of the rear section was littered with empty food tins, drained lasgun power packs and crumpled pieces of paper. I picked one of the pages up; it was from an Imperial Infantryman’s Uplifting Primer, a copy of which I hadn’t seen since leaving Cadia. The ‘Prayer for the Lost and Endangered’ stared back at me. I crumpled it back up and stuffed it in my coat pocket.

  In times of trial, some men find their convictions increase. Others see them crushed beneath a weight of suffering. Lantz was one of the former. I was not.

  Sergeant Ingram had gone into the pilot’s compartment. After a moment he returned, shaking his head. ‘The controls seem fine, sir, but the fuel reserves are dry. I’d guess that’s why it stopped here in the first place.’

  ‘No medical supplies, either,’ I grumbled, kicking one of the empty tins out into the street. ‘No food. No help.’

  As we exited the Chimera, I looked down at the nearest corpse. It was sitting upright with something metallic clenched in its right hand. I knelt down and discovered that it was a silver igniter. I yanked it free, noting with satisfaction that it was finely engraved with the crest of the Zhenyan forces, and wondered if the dead soldier might have tabac or perhaps a pipe on his person. Throne, it had been seasons since I’d had a good smoke. Having disturbed it, the body slowly tipped over. Something made a distinct pinging sound. Ingram shouted and grabbed me by the shoulders, flinging me to the side just as something exploded.

  I had worried that the depraved occupiers of Rycklor would trap the vehicles. I should have known that they would instead, trap the corpses of the fallen. It’s what we Cadians informally call a ‘road kill bomb’.

  I felt the wave of heat that pushed me through the air. Skidding across the frozen pavement, I struck something. Filthy snowflakes were falling into my eyes. I wanted to brush them away, but my arms refused to obey. My ears were ringing and my cry for help came out as little more than a croak.

  I felt frantic hands reach under me, carrying me somewhere, and then just as quickly, set me down again. A face swam in front of mine. After what felt like an eternity, I recognized it as belonging to one of Sergeant Ingram’s scouts. He was mouthing words, looking very concerned. The scout tore open a square paper package and pressed a field compress to my forehead. The sharp tang of medical elixirs filled my nose.

  ‘Where did you find this?’ I finally slurred, but my would-be physician was gone. I looked around and discovered that I was alone inside one of the Chimeras. I began to make out the sounds of shouting and lasgun fire. After two tries, I managed to get up onto my feet and remain vertical. Stumbling to the rear hatch, I looked outside.

  Eight creatures were attacking my men. They looked like giant, hairless dogs with red, blistered skin and pale horns protruding from their backs. Thick brass collars were cinched around their powerful necks, and their eyes glowed with supernatural hate.

  They had charged towards the Chimeras in a tightly-formed pack, only to be intercepted by Velez, Lantz and the others. A stream of promethium set one of the monsters on fire, but it remained undeterred. I saw the psyker and the priest fighting side by side, their differences momentarily put aside in the face of this shared danger.

  There was a flurry of teeth and claws, then six Guardsmen lay dead, their blood staining the freshly fallen snow. Velez motioned for the men to fall back and regroup closer to the Chimeras. The daemonic hounds charged again, but this time Velez was ready for them. The two flamers played back and forth, creating a wall the creatures had no choice but to move through. They leapt through the fires, their skin blackening, and were hit with a point-blank volley of lasfire. Three of the hounds appeared to explode in a shower of bone fragments and quivering chunks of flesh. The remaining five tore into their targets with teeth the size of my hand.

  Before I understood what was happening I was running out into the melee, weapons drawn. Lantz belonged more in an abattoir than a pulpit as he used a massive chainsword to carve up any of the creatures that came within his reach.

  I helped the priest dispatch the last two monsters. Like all the others, they detonated into gristly pieces as soon as the twisted life force that drove them was extinguished. Small shards of bone embedded themselves in our armoured chest plates.

  We stood triumphant, but the skirmish had taken the lives of six more of Cadia’s finest. ‘Ingram!’ I called. The effort made my head pound.

  Lantz looked grim. ‘Taken into the Emperor’s glory,’ he said.

  ‘The bodies of the Zhenyans,’ I said. ‘They were trapped.’

  ‘We saw,’ Velez added. ‘He pushed you aside and took the brunt of the blast. He might have been all right still if he hadn’t had that canister of explosives in his pack.’

  ‘We moved you to safety, but the noise brought these daemons out of hiding,’ Lantz said.

  ‘Where the hell are the Space Marines?’ I shouted.

  As if in reply, Integuma slowly turned the corner.

  One of Ingram’s scouts stepped forward. ‘If there’s any good new
s in this, sir, it’s that we found a medi-kit stashed under the pilot’s seat in the other Chimera.’

  ‘The spirit of the Emperor is with us,’ Lantz said. All around him, the men nodded. ‘He provides for those who remain fervent in his service.’

  I wiped my mouth on the back of my glove, which came away covered with blood. Leaning over, I spat a long stream of it onto the ground. As much as I found his constant sermonising an annoyance, I had to admit that Lantz was excellent for morale.

  ‘I want to try and get one these Chimeras up and running. Someone should inform Castellan Isaias. Lantz, I can’t think of a better messenger than you.’

  The priest smiled. ‘Indeed, captain. I should be glad to.’

  He was halfway across the avenue when the three riders came charging out of the mist.

  They shared the same red, blistered skin as the daemonic hounds, but were more humanoid in appearance. Curving, black horns stretched above the crown of their heads, and each one carried a jagged sword that seemed to glow with heat as if pulled from some terrible forge. The creatures that bore them were squat and powerful, covered entirely in heavy plates of armour, and their hooves melted the surface of the street as they galloped.

  Lantz spun around and faced them, even as I cried out in warning. Fearlessly he raised his chainsword, but the weapon was so unwieldy that it had barely come up to his chest before the daemons struck him down. The molten swords of the riders slashed downwards, leaving smoking trails in their wake, and then they were past him. I saw the priest’s armour opened up in half a dozen places. He spun slightly, a look of dismay on his face as his entrails spilled out onto the street. Finally he fell face down into his own organs, his hands twitching.

  The daemonic riders, now half a block down the avenue, spun and headed directly for us.

  There were only a dozen of us left and, whatever these things were, something told me that we would prove no match for them if we remained out in the open.

  ‘Embark!’ I ordered.

  We scattered as quickly as we could, clambering into the abandoned Chimeras, but I could still hear the dying wails of at least two more Guardsmen as I slammed the access door behind me.

  Velez, myself and eight others had made it into the transport intended for the remainder of our stay in Rycklor.

  ‘One of you fire this thing up. I need power!’ I yelled.

  The floor pitched upwards at a steep angle, and it was with great effort that I managed to get to the turret hatch. As I swung it open, I could hear the riders slam into the other transport. I pulled myself up into the gunner’s position just in time to see the daemons knock the other Chimera over on its side. One of the riders and his mount leapt on top of it. The other two plunged their swords into its vulnerable undercarriage again and again. Ceramite plating began to glow and melt with infernal heat. If anyone was still alive in there, they didn’t have long to remain so.

  A little further away, Integuma’s assault ramp had opened. The Templars were striding towards the battle as quickly as they could with Isaias leading the charge.

  So, I thought bitterly, only when things are about as bad as they’re going to get do you bother to help us?

  The Chimera came to life, and the indicator lights before me turned green. Determined not to let the Templars take all the glory, I seized the controls and spun the turret. The multilaser fired, striking one of the riders, but it seemed unaffected by the trio of holes that had been burned into it. Below me, some of the men manned the lasgun emplacements built into either side of the vehicle. The beams bounced harmlessly off the iron hide of one of the riding beasts.

  Something inside of the overturned Chimera burst, and black smoke began to billow out of every seam. Satisfied, the three riders turned their attention to the Space Marines and pounced. I managed to fire the multilaser one more time, but the daemons took no notice of the holes I burned into them.

  I had been too busy fighting for my life to fully appreciate the combat prowess and fortitude of the Templars back at the bridge. Now, I had a perfect seat to take it in.

  The three riders crashed into the Templars with hurricane force, swinging their swords in sweeping, limb-removing arcs. The mounts reared up and lashed out with their front legs. Yet, the same attacks that had been enough to easily destroy a military transport couldn’t do much more to the Space Marines than scratch the paint from their armoured suits. Boltguns fired, fists pummelled, daemonic flesh and metal were rent open and steaming gouts of dark liquid poured everywhere. The hulking beasts screamed and collapsed, and once they fell into the snow, the Templars proceeded to slaughter their riders.

  One daemon and his mount remained, and it fell to Isaias to deliver the coup de grace. His hammer swung and struck the creature in the neck. There was a blinding flash of light and sound like artillery being detonated. The rider sailed backwards through the air and landed half a block down the avenue. His riding beast lay dead at the Castellan’s feet, its chest completely ruptured.

  Isaias pointed his hammer at the daemonic rider and slowly walked towards it. To my utter disbelief, the daemon was still alive. It picked itself up from where it had landed, sword raised above its head. It gave an ear-piercing scream of defiance and then flew apart, painting the snow with bloody gore and pieces of jagged yellow bone.

  Dizzily, I climbed down from the turret. The eight troopers were trying their best to remain composed. ‘Sir,’ one of them said quietly, ‘without the priest…’

  I cut him off with a raised hand, opened the rear hatch of the Chimera and walked outside. There was no need to examine the overturned transport for survivors; it was obvious that any occupants were dead from the fire raging within its perforated shell. There were ten of us left now, including Velez and myself. Half my troopers had died in a single day, and we hadn’t yet arrived at our destination. At this rate, the only ones to enter Verevya Basilica would be the Black Templars.

  Isaias approached. He considered the burning Chimera and the fallen bodies. His face showed all the emotion of a carved statue as he offered us what sounded like congratulations. ‘Your people fought well against the flesh hounds, and it was wise to utilize cover against the bloodcrushers. They can prove to be fearsome cavalry if encountered in the open.’

  ‘Who is Samnang Margh?’ I challenged.

  Ah, how to describe the perverse joy I felt as I finally saw the Castellan’s impassive exterior crack. His eyes widened by the tiniest amount and his jaw, for the briefest of moments, slackened. I had privileged information, he realised, and he had been one to let it slip.

  I crossed my arms and waited for an answer. Behind me, Velez and the others exited the Chimera and stood silently.

  Isaias regained his icy composure at once. ‘You do not need to know,’ he said.

  ‘I think we do.’

  ‘Perhaps I should have said it is better for you if you do not know.’ He began to turn away.

  ‘An unholy man, standing in a once holy place.’

  Isaias whirled. His mouth twisted with indignation and he levelled his hammer toward Velez. ‘Psyker! You have been using your damned witchcraft to peer into my thoughts!’

  ‘No,’ Velez pleaded. ‘No, I swear.’

  ‘Has he spoken to you? Have you been listening to his foul whispers? Tell me true, or I will kill you where you stand!’

  ‘No, nothing like that. I just… I can see him. I can feel his power.’ Velez lowered his eyes and his voice dropped to whisper. ‘He frightens me.’

  Isaias lowered his hammer. ‘He should.’

  The snowfall began to abate. The daylight was nearly gone. I shivered, and plunged my hands into my coat pockets.

  ‘Samnang Margh is one of the bloodlords,’ Isaias said. ‘A long time ago he was one of humanity’s champions, a Space Marine, but he has since fallen into darkness.’

  I felt the blood drain from
my face. One often heard stories of the Space Marines and their heroic, superhuman exploits, and one also heard about the traitorous Space Marines. They were ones who had renounced their oaths to the Emperor millennia ago to embrace the Ruinous Powers: brutal, cunning and utterly inhuman monsters. They had attacked Cadia many times over for the past ten thousand years, though never in my lifetime, but to encounter them was to court certain death. As we were leaving for the Krandor System, there had been rumours that one of their massive invasions – a so-called Black Crusade – was preparing to attack once more.

  ‘A Chaos Space Marine,’ I breathed.

  Isaias nodded. ‘One with all the powers of the warp at his disposal.’

  ‘And he’s here? On Zhenya?’

  ‘Only recently. We believe that he has been active in this system for decades, beginning with the capital world. Once it fell, his minions spread throughout the other Krandorian planets, including this one.’

  ‘So, he’s the cause for all of this?’ I swept my arm across the ruined cityscape. Suddenly, I was having trouble catching my breath. ‘One man. One man is able to completely destroy an entire civilization?’

  ‘Hardly a “man”,’ Isaias said.

  ‘How are we supposed to kill such a… thing, then?’

  ‘You cannot. That is for us to do.’ Isaias said, setting his hammer down and leaning on it slightly. ‘You are ambitious, men of Cadia, and you admittedly do not lack for courage. However, to face one as great as Samnang Margh requires a third thing that you, regrettably, no longer have.’

  ‘And what is that?’ I asked, as the last rays of the sun dipped behind the ruined plaza.

  ‘Weapons, vehicles, armour. These things are important, yes, but in the end they are only tools. Faith in the Emperor is what lends power and permanence to our actions. Your priest is dead, and without another such as him to focus and strengthen your resolve I do not believe you have the endurance to face what is otherwise unbearable. Captain Kervis, you and your troopers are dismissed. We will continue alone from this point.’