Plague Harvest

by Cavan Scott

  Thumping his chestplate with an armoured fist, Vabion rose to his feet, his mind clear and his purpose true.

  His will be done.

  The Librarian trod the steps he had walked so many, many times – ignoring the nagging fear that told him that the battle was already lost, no matter how many prayers he uttered.

  The skies of Orath reverberated to the sound of the Stormtalons. Kerna sank back into his harness, feeling the rumble of the engine surge through his body. He had been asked before why he had never pushed for promotion, why he remained happy to serve the Emperor as a pilot. Others took his reluctance to scale the chain of command as a lack of ambition, but it was simply a case of knowing one’s place in the universe. He belonged here, in a Stormtalon’s cockpit, feeling the vibrations rise up the stick he held in his hands, the roar of the stabilisers in his ear, knowing he could bring death raining down from the skies on their enemies at any moment.

  Up here, the years weighed less, the burden of his service easier to bear. Death would come, there was no changing that, but here, at the controls of the Heart of Sorrow, he would always make a difference.

  ‘The Emperor is our protection,’ Kerna said to himself, recalling the invocation he had learnt when he had first taken to the skies of Gathis II. ‘The Emperor is our guide. And we shall be His teeth.’

  He opened the Heart’s throttle and felt the Stormtalon respond, increasing in speed without hesitation. Doom Eagle through and through.

  ‘Kerna, come in.’ Meleki’s eager voice broke through the vox-line.

  ‘I hear you, Meleki,’ the older pilot responded.

  ‘Look to your eight o’clock.’

  Kerna did as instructed, scanning the horizon.

  ‘Do you see them?’

  ‘Hard not to,’ Kerna replied. ‘Low hanging clouds.’

  ‘Are you sure they’re clouds?’

  The lad was right. The clouds were dark, heavy, but so near the ground, localised to small areas. Kerna tapped the runes on his display screen, zooming the Stormtalon’s nose pikters into the nearest cloud mass.

  ‘Twenty kilometres away,’ he muttered to himself.

  ‘And another to the south-west. Much larger’

  ‘I see it.’

  ‘Kerna, isn’t that the location of the human settlement?’

  ‘I am afraid it is.’

  Kerna heard a growl to starboard and glanced through the canopy. Meleki had brought his Stormtalon, The Endurance of Gathis, to Kerna’s wing.

  ‘They could be fires.’

  ‘Possible,’ Kerna acknowledged, but his gut told him they were anything but. If what Artorius had told Meleki was true, a few cereal fires were the best they could hope for. He thumbed a toggle on the vox. ‘Kerna to base. Unidentified cloud formations sighted due west of Kerberos. Will investigate.’

  ‘Understood, Kerna.’ The pilot raised his eyebrows. Artorius himself was manning the vox. He had expected to hear Ritan’s contemptuous tones. The sergeant was taking this threat seriously. ‘What about the harvest?’

  Kerna twisted in his seat, looking down through the reinforced canopy. ‘Definite signs of disease, sir.’

  ‘Over how big an area?’

  ‘As far as the eye can see.’

  There was a silence at the other end of the vox-line, then: ‘Meleki, swing around and head towards the grox farms to the south. We need to know if this is limited to arable crops.’

  Kerna turned, seeing the younger steersman nodding within the Endurance.

  ‘Understood. Will report back.’

  Meleki immediately dropped his left wing, swooping below the Heart. To the south of Fort Kerberos, the crops gave way to vast hangars, each housing thousands of lobotomised grox, bred intensively for their meat.

  ‘Keep in constant communication,’ Kerna instructed Meleki as he gunned the Heart towards the nearest swirling black cloud. ‘Let me know what you find.’

  ‘Likewise,’ came the reply.

  The descent had been difficult, both physically and mentally. Even with the protection of his psychic hood, Vabion had been shocked with the intensity of the warp energies that rushed up to greet him, wave after wave. He had been forced to stop numerous times and place a hand on the wall to steady himself.

  A song was playing through his mind.

  The song he had heard in his vision.

  Now he stood at the foot of the stairwell, preparing himself to stride forward, trying to block the tuneless dirge that seemed to emanate from the stones themselves.

  ‘You must be strong,’ he told himself, ‘to overcome whatever lies ahead.’

  The words bolstered him. The Emperor was with him. He was sure of that. What was it his Doom Eagle cousins said?

  ‘Ah, yes,’ he murmured. ‘No hesitation.’

  The Ultramarine marched towards the threshold of the shrine, exploring the eldar’s sacred space with his mind.

  ‘I know you are here,’ he declared, striding into the chamber. ‘I know what you want. And I know I will defeat you.’

  ‘He is confident,’ came the shrill reply, a voice Vabion found familiar. He made straight for the Key, climbing the three shallow steps on the dais, feeling the crystal’s familiar pressure against his mind. At first, the shard’s strange energies had been a frustration, a puzzle that needed to be solved. Now, after all these years they were a comfort. Like an old friend.

  He placed a palm on the crystal, the malicious presence in the chamber subsiding. He allowed himself a moment drawing strength from the mysterious crystal, staring into the flickering lightning trapped at its heart. Then he closed his eyes, focusing deeply. It was a ritual he had performed thousands of times before. Imagining he could see every inch of the shard’s translucent surface at once, searching for flaws.

  ‘There…’

  The revelation hit him with such force that he nearly reeled back, stumbling from the platform. Not opening his eyes, he tracked the fault, running his hand to the base of the crystal, where the shard plunged into the wraithbone seal.

  He could see it in his mind, highlighted as if aglow. A hairline crack in the surface, no more than a few centimetres.

  But that is all it would take.

  For a moment, Vabion’s mind jumped, away from the shrine. He was back in the rolling skies, higher than any vision so far. As always, the rot was spreading in the sorghum, forming its patterns.

  ‘No, not just any pattern.’ Vabion flinched at the sight. An all too familiar sigil. ‘No. Not here. Not now.’

  ‘He’s found it,’ the voice cheered, pulling the Librarian back to the shrine. ‘Found the imperfection.’

  Vabion rose unsteadily to his feet.

  ‘It was the earthquake, wasn’t it,’ Vabion said, stepping down from the dais. ‘That’s what your masters used to fracture the Key.’

  As he talked, Vabion explored the darkness with psychic tendrils, immediately recoiling as they brushed against a lost mind.

  ‘You are right to cower,’ he announced, holding his force sword with both hands as he crossed the rune-covered floor. ‘I will send you back to whatever hell you have been dragged from. You have no place here.’

  ‘No place he says,’ the strident voice came back. ‘The arrogance. Always the same.’

  ‘You speak as if you know me.’

  ‘Oh, we do.’

  ‘Then show yourself.’

  ‘That’s what the other one said.’

  ‘The other?’

  ‘Show yourself. Show yourself. Over and over. He fell, fell so far. Come and see.’

  The stench hit Vabion at once. He had been concentrating so much on the psychic realm that he had blanked out the real world – but it was now impossible to ignore. He felt his gorge rise as his eyes fell upon something sprawled next to one of the buttresses.

&n
bsp; No. Not something. Someone.

  ‘Ritan!’

  Not that Vabion could recognise the Doom Eagle from his face. The warrior was on his back, one arm reaching for his discarded chainsword. Bubbling flesh seeped through lacerated power armour, pooling beneath the ceramite. Only the eye implant slowly sinking into the mass of tumours that used to be Ritan’s once-proud face betrayed his identity.

  ‘Does he see now?’ the sibilant voice continued. ‘Does he realise nothing can save him? Not his witchcraft. Not his husk of a god.’

  ‘He is greater than yours,’ Vabion snapped, barely keeping his temper in check. Ritan had been an insufferable pup at times, but he hadn’t deserved his fate. ‘The Holy Father will protect me. I am an Ultramarine. No daemon will have my soul.’

  He felt the blow coming before it struck, lashing across his back, stripping the armour away in one strike.

  Vabion span, bringing his sword down despite the pain, slicing through excrescent-smeared flesh. His attacker fell back, gaping at the stump where its plague flail had been. The repulsive extremity thrashed at his feet like a wounded snake before the afflicted skin burst, spilling wriggling maggots over the gleaming floor.

  The Ultramarine didn’t wait for another opportunity. He dived forward, burying his sword deep within the beast’s misshapen flesh – but the real damage was yet to come.

  The Librarian opened his mind to the warp itself, channelling its terrible energies down the blade, into the creature’s body. The aberration bellowed in pain, its humped back exploding in a cascade of brilliant, cleansing balefire. Corrupted matter and twisted bones splattered across the shrine as Vabion yanked his weapon free, dragging the mutant forward, down on its knees.

  The monstrosity lurched forward, retching on the floor, a deluge of ichor splattering across Vabion’s feet. The Librarian watched disgusted as the body shrank, like a deflating balloon.

  ‘This is for Ritan,’ Vabion barked, raising his sword high above his head, the pox-ridden traitor almost at its original size.

  ‘Wait,’ the pawn wailed, looking up at its would-be executioner. ‘Tell us… tell me one thing.’

  Vabion’s eyes narrowed, wondering if this was a final, desperate trick.

  ‘What do you want to know?’ he growled, curiosity getting the better of him.

  ‘Do you know my name?’

  Vabion brought his sword down, severing the serf’s neck. The body flopped into the mess on the floor, the head rolling to the side, eyes wide and unseeing.

  ‘Yes,’ Vabion uttered, finally feeling the pain that raged across his back. ‘Your name was Falk.’

  The Librarian sank to his knees, shuddering as his body fought the pestilence the plague flail had delivered.

  ‘You are my protection,’ he prayed, leaning on his sword as he had before. ‘You are my deliverance. You…’

  The sound of a voice singing made Vabion pause.

  Not just any voice.

  Falk’s voice.

  Vabion opened his eyes and found himself staring into the eyes of the serf, eyes very much alive, eyes filled with malice.

  ‘Join the song,’ the decapitated head giggled.

  Vabion didn’t have time to react. Fresh agony coursed through his back, not caused by Falk’s previous attack, but by a new, unexpected weapon. As blood bubbled to his lips, the Ultramarine looked down in amazement to see a barbed spearhead sticking out of his chest, transfixing him to the floor.

  Even as he cried out in pain and surprise, the Librarian heard the noise he had dreaded from the moment he had set foot in the shrine over two hundred years ago. The sound of the Great Key beginning to shatter.

  The force sword fell from his hands, clattering across the floor, as he watched heavily corroded boots stalk around Falk’s body, stopping directly in front of him.

  The Librarian tried to look up at the newcomer, but the spear twisted savagely in his chest. A vice-like pressure gripped his body, his vision bleaching.

  ‘One of his hearts is stopping, master,’ babbled the head. ‘Are you pleased? Did we do well?’

  Vabion gasped for a breath that would not come.

  ‘You did wonderfully,’ said a foul voice drenched in corruption.

  ‘Will we receive our reward?’ Falk asked hopefully.

  ‘Without question.’ One of the heavy boots reared up for a second, before stamping down on the serf’s abscessed head, crushing it to a pulp. ‘As will you, custodian. As will you.’

  Vabion’s body began to convulse, shaking as his augs fought the infections. He still couldn’t see his tormentors, but knew what they were.

  ‘Plague Marines,’ Vabion sneered, naming his enemies, the first step to controlling them. ‘Tainted by Nurgle. Cursed.’

  His captor laughed, grinding the remains of Falk’s skull beneath his boot.

  ‘Not tainted, Librarian. Blessed.’

  TEN

  Kerna tipped the nose of the Heart of Sorrow, swooping towards the strange cloud Meleki had spotted on the horizon. It was much larger than he’d originally estimated, blossoming out across the surrounding fields even as he watched.

  ‘What are you seeing?’ Meleki’s voice was heavy with interference over the vox-line.

  ‘It’s no fire,’ Kerna reported, slowing the Stormtalon, ‘but I’m not sure it’s cloud either. What about you?’

  ‘It’s the same here. Like a veil stretching across the grox farms.’

  ‘Any sign of livestock?’

  ‘They would be inside even if I could see, but there’s no sign of activity. No workers, vehicles. Nothing at all.’

  Kerna made a decision. ‘I am going to take the Heart down…’

  ‘Into the cloud?’

  The pilot nodded, even though his battle-brother couldn’t see. ‘The jet wash may clear the fog, let me see what is happening beneath.’

  ‘Understood.’

  Meleki was learning. Not long ago, he would have questioned the decision, suggested an alternative – but there must be no hesitation.

  ‘Stand by.’ Kerna hit the airbrakes, slowing the Stormtalon, while simultaneously reaching for the vector controls. It was a manoeuvre he had performed time and time again. As the retro-thrusters fired, the gunship’s wings began to rotate with a clank of gears, the Heart’s engines swivelling down to face the cloud itself. Within seconds the Stormtalon was hovering above its target, waiting for the command to drop. Kerna glanced out of the canopy and began the descent; the thrusters roaring like a Gathis mountain lion.

  He peered closer, glyphs flashing across his helm as the cogitator struggled to analyse the swirling mass.

  It wasn’t until the Heart’s weapon stacks dipped beneath the cloud that Kerna realised his mistake. A black dot shot up from the whirling mass, heading straight for the cockpit. Kerna didn’t have time to react until its oversized, hairy body slammed into the canopy, livid guts splattering in a wide arc. Then there were more of them, throwing themselves at the Stormtalon as if trying to smash their way through. They rattled against the canopy like rain, coming from all angles, an ever-growing mass of twitching corpses plastered across the glass.

  Kerna swore beneath his breath, opening the engines, the sudden thrust parting the brume beneath him.

  ‘It’s not a cloud,’ he barked into the vox. ‘It’s a swarm.’

  ‘Say again…’ Meleki’s response crackled through his helm’s earpiece. ‘You’re breaking up.’

  ‘Deathbottles.’

  The Heart lurched, falling deeper into the insect throng. The rat-a-tat-tat against the canopy intensified, drowning out the warning bell that tolled as fault locator glyphs flashed across his vision. He twisted in his seat, seeing thick smoke belch from his port thruster. The infernal bugs had clogged the intake, the engines on the point of overheating.

  ‘How can something
so small cause so much damage?’ he growled as the Heart bucked, before finally beginning a laboured ascent. The engines had cleared – but not enough.

  ‘Meleki, I require assistance,’ he reported as calmly as possible, trying to turn the Stormtalon to face Fort Kerberos as they rose. ‘The Heart is compromised.’

  ‘Are you bailing out?’ Another textbook response. Straight to the point.

  ‘Not yet, but…’

  His voice trailed off as he cleared the swarm. The Heart’s nose had dropped, leaving him staring down at the fields of rotting sorghum. The deathbottles were multiplying, spreading out over the decaying harvest, their drone unnaturally loud even above the troubled roar of the engines – but that wasn’t all.

  ‘Kerna!’ Meleki called over the vox, alarmed by the sudden silence. ‘Are you there?’

  ‘They’re running,’ Kerna reported, almost to himself. ‘On the ground.’

  ‘Who’s running?’

  ‘Survivors.’

  ‘From the settlement?’

  ‘Must be. No, wait…’

  ‘Kerna?’

  ‘Something’s not right. The way they’re moving…’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Kerna frowned. None of the survivors, if that is what they were, looked back as they ran. He’d expect at least a couple to steal one last glance of their infested home, of the horror they were fleeing. No one stopped to help their neighbour as they stumbled in the mud. They all looked forward, towards the fort, their arms and legs strangely uncoordinated, like marionettes dragged across a stage by an inexperienced puppeteer.

  ‘Dozens of them, probably more, moving as one.’

  ‘As a pack.’

  ‘They’re not human. Not any more.’

  ‘Then what are they?’

  When Kerna replied, his voice was flat, without a glimmer of emotion, simply stating the facts, nothing more.

  ‘Plague Zombies. The settlement has been infected – and they’re heading for the bastion.’

  Dain was in agony. Beautiful, exquisite agony. He barely noticed the air pressing down on him as the Space Marine’s gunship banked overhead; hardly felt the vibration of its stricken engines running through his bones.