by Dan Abnett
Horus led them out of the sanctum onto the strate-gium deck, the four captains of the Mournival and the company commanders: Sedirae of the Thirteenth, Qruze of the Third, Targost of the Seventh, Marr of the Eighteenth, Moy of the Nineteenth, and Goshen of the Twenty-Fifth.
'Let's have tactical.’ the Warmaster said.
Maloghurst was waiting, ready. As he motioned with his control wand, detailed hololithic images shimmered into place above the dais. They showed a general profile of the system, with orbital paths delineated, and the position and motion of tracked vessels. Horus gazed up at the hololithic graphics and reached out. Actuator sensors built into the fingertips of his gaundets allowed him to rotate the hololithic display and bring certain segments into magnification. Twenty-nine craft.’ he said. 'I thought the 140th was eighteen vessels strong?'
'So we were told, lord.’ Maloghurst replied. As soon as mey had stepped out of the sanctum, they had started conversing in Cthonic, so as to preserve tactical confidence whilst in earshot of the bridge personnel. Though Horus had not been raised on Cthonia - uncommonly, for a primarch, he had not matured on the cradle-world of his Legion - he spoke it fluently. In fact, he spoke it with the particular hard palatal edge and rough vowels of a Western Hemispheric ganger, the commonest and roughest of Cthonia's feral castes. It had always amused Loken to hear that accent. Early on, he had assumed it was because that's how the Warmaster had learned it, from just such a speaker, but he doubted that now. Horus never did anything by accident. Loken believed that the Warmaster's rough Cthonic accent was a deliberate affectation so that he would seem, to the men, as honest and low-born as any of them.
Maloghurst had consulted a data-slate provided by a waiting deck officer. 'I confirm the 140th Expedition was given a complement of eighteen vessels.’
Then what are these others?' asked Aximand. 'Enemy ships?'
We're awaiting sensor profile analysis, captain.’ Maloghurst replied, 'and there has been no response to our signals as yet.’
Tell Master Comnenus to be... more emphatic.’ the Warmaster told his equerry.
'Should I instruct him to form our components into a battle line, lord?' Maloghurst asked.
'I'll consider it.’ the Warmaster said. Maloghurst limped away down the platform steps onto the main bridge to speak to Boas Comnenus.
'Should we form a battle line?' Horus asked his commanders.
'Could the additional profiles be alien vessels?' Qruze wondered.
'It doesn't look like a battle spread, Iacton.’ Aximand replied, 'and Frame said nothing about enemy vessels.’
They're ours.’ said Loken.
The Warmaster looked over at him. You think so, Garviel?'
'It seems evident to me, sir. The hits show a spread of ships at high anchor. Imperial anchorage formation. Others must have responded to the call for assistance. Loken trailed off, and suddenly fought back an embarrassed smile, "гаи knew that all along, of course, my lord.’
'I was just wondering who else might have been sharp enough to recognise the pattern.’ Horus smiled. Qruze shook his head with a grin, sheepish at his own mistake.
The Warmaster nodded towards the display. 'So, what's this big fellow here? That's a barge.’
The Misericord7.' suggested Qruze.
'No, no, that's the Misericord. And what's this about?' Horus leaned forwards, and ran his fingers across the hard light display. 'It looks like... music. Something like music. Who's transmitting music?'
'Outstation relays.’ Abaddon said, studying his own data-slate. 'Beacons. The 140th reported thirty beacons in the system grid. Xenos. Their broadcasts are repeating and untranslatable.’
'Really? They have no ships, but they have outstation beacons?' Horus reached out and changed the display to a close breakdown of scatter patterns. 'This is untranslatable?'
'So the 140th said.’ said Abaddon.
'Have we taken their word for that?' asked the War-master.
'I imagine we have.’ said Abaddon.
There's sense in this.’ Horus decided, peering at the luminous graphics. 'I want this run. I want us to ran it. Start with standard numeric blocks. With respect to the 140th, I don't intend to take their word for anything. Cursed awful job they've done here so far.’
Abaddon nodded, and stepped aside to speak to one of the waiting deck officers and have the order enacted.
You said it looks like music.’ Loken said.
'What?'
You said it looks like music, sir.’ Loken repeated. 'An interesting word to choose.’
The Warmaster shrugged. 'It's mathematical, but there's a sequential rhythm to it. It's not random. Music and maths, Garviel. Two sides of a coin. This is deliberately structured. Lord knows which idiot in the 140th Fleet decided this was untranslatable.’
Loken nodded. You see that, just by looking at it?' he asked.
'Isn't it obvious?' Horus replied.
Maloghurst returned. 'Master Comnenus confirms all contacts are Imperial.’ he said, holding out another wafer slip of print out. 'Other units have been arriving these last few weeks, in response to the calls for aid. Most of them are Imperial army conveyances en route to Carollis Star, but the big vessel is the Proudheart. Third Legion, the Emperor's Children. A full company, under the command privilege of Lord Commander Eidolon.’
'So, they beat us to it. How are they doing?' Maloghurst shrugged. 'It would seem... not well, lord.’ he said.
THE PLANET'S OFFICIAL designation in the Imperial Registry was One Hundred and Forty Twenty, it being the twentieth world subjected to compliance by the fleet of the 140th Expedition. But that was inaccurate, as clearly the 140th had not achieved anything like compliance. Still, the Emperor's Children had used the number to begin with, for to do otherwise would have been an insult to the honour of the Blood Angels.
Prior to arrival, Lord Commander Eidolon had briefed his Astartes comprehensively. The initial transmissions of the 140th Expedition had been clear and succinct. Khitas Frome, Captain of the three Blood Angels companies that formed the marrow of the 140th, had reported xenos hostilities a few days after his forces had touched down on the world's surface. He had described 'very capable things, like upright beedes, but made of, or shod in, metal. Each one is twice the height of a man and very belligerent. Assistance may be required if their numbers increase.'
After that, his relayed communiques had been somewhat patchy and intermittent. Fighting had 'grown thicker and more savage' and the xenos forms 'appeared not to lack in numbers'. A week later, and his transmissions were more urgent. There is a race here that resists us, and which we cannot easily overcome. They refuse to admit communication with us, or any parlay. They spill from their lairs. I find myself admiring their mettle, though they are not made as we are. Their martial schooling is fine indeed. A worthy foe, one that might be written about in our annals.’
A week after that, the expedition's messages had become rather more simple, sent by the Master of the
Fleet instead of Frome. The enemy here is formidable, and quite outweighs us. To take this world, the full force of the Legio is required. We humbly submit a request for reinforcement at this time.'
Frome's last message, relayed from the surface a fortnight later by the expedition fleet, had been a tinny rasp of generally indecipherable noise. All the articulacy and purpose of his words had been torn apart by the feral distortion. The only cogent thing that had come through was his final utterance. Each word had seemed to be spoken with inhuman effort. This. World. Is. Murder.' And so they had named it.
The taskforce of the Emperor's Children was comparatively small in size: just a company of the Legion's main strength, conveyed by the battle-barge Proud-heart, under the command of Lord Eidolon. After a brief, peace-keeping tour of newly compliant worlds in the Satyr Lanxus Belt, they had been en route to rejoin their primarch and brethren companies at Carollis Star to begin a mass advance into the Lesser Bifold Cluster. However, during their transit, the 140th Expedi
tion had begun its requests for assistance. The taskforce had been the closest Imperial unit fit to respond. Lord Eidolon had requested immediate permission from his primarch to alter course and go to the expedition's aid.
Fulgrim had given his authority at once. The Emperor's Children would never leave their Astartes brothers in jeopardy. Eidolon had been given his pri-march's instant, unreserved blessing to reroute and support the beleaguered expedition. Other forces were rushing to assist. It was said a detachment of Blood Angels was on its way, as was a heavyweight response from the Warmaster himself, despatched from the 63rd Expedition.
At best, the closest of them was still many days off. Lord Eidolon's taskforce was the interim measure: critical response, the first to the scene.
Eidolon's battle-barge had joined with the operational vessels of the 140th Expedition at high anchor above One Forty Twenty. The 140th Expedition was a small, compact force of eighteen carriers, mass conveyances and escorts supporting the noble battle-barge Misericord. Its martial composition was three companies of Blood Angels under Captain Frome, and four thousand men of the Imperial army, with allied armour, but no Mechanicum force.
Mathanual August, Master of the 140th Fleet, had welcomed Eidolon and his commanders aboard the barge. Tall and slender, with a forked white beard, August was fretful and nervous. 'I am gratified at your quick response, lord.’ he'd told Eidolon.
Where is Frome?' Eidolon had asked bluntly.
August had shrugged, helplessly.
"Where is the commander of the army divisions?'
A second pitiful shrug. They are all down there.’
Down there. On Murder. The world was a hazy, grey orb, mottled with storm patterning in the atmosphere. Drawn to the lonely system by the curious, untranslatable broadcasts of the outstation beacons, a clear and manifest trace of sentient life, the 140th Expedition had focussed its attentions on the fourth planet, the only orb in the star's orbit with an atmosphere. Sensor sweeps had detected abundant vital traces, though nothing had answered their signals.
Fifty Blood Angels had dropped first, in landers, and had simply disappeared. Previously calm weather cycles had mutated into violent tempests the moment the landers had entered the atmosphere, like an allergic reaction, and swallowed them up. Due to the suddenly volatile climate, communication with the surface was
impossible. Another fifty had followed, and had similarly vanished.
That was when Frome and the fleet officers had begun to suspect that the life forms of One Forty Twenty somehow commanded their own weather systems as a defence. The immense storm fronts, later dubbed 'shield-storms', that had risen up to meet the surface-bound landers, had probably obliterated them. After that, Frome had used drop-pods, the only vehicles that seemed to survive the descent. Frome had led the third wave himself, and only partial messages had been received from him subsequently, even though he'd taken an astrotelepath with him to counter the climatic vox-interference.
It was a grim story. Section by section, August had committed the Astartes and army forces in his expedition to surface drops in a vain attempt to respond to Frame's broken pleas for support. They had either been destroyed by the storms or lost in the impenetrable maelstrom below. The shield-storms, once roused, would not die away. There were no clean surface picts, no decent topographic scans, no uplinks or viable communication lines. One Forty Twenty was an abyss from which no one returned.
'We'll be going in blind.’ Eidolon had told his officers. 'Drop-pod descent.’
'Perhaps you should wait, lord.’ August had suggested. "We have word that a Blood Angels force is en route to relieve Captain Frome, and the Luna Wolves are but four days away. Combined, perhaps, you might better-'
That had decided it. Tarvitz knew Lord Eidolon had no intention of sharing any glory with the Warmas-ter's elite. His lord was relishing the prospect of demonstrating the excellence of his company, by rescuing the cohorts of a rival Legion... whether the word 'rescuing' was used or not. The nature of the
deed, and the comparisons that it made, would speak for themselves. Eidolon had sanctioned the drop immediately.
TWO
The nature of the enemy
A trace
The purpose of trees
THE MEGARACHNID WARRIORS were three metres tall, and possessed eight limbs. They ambulated, with dazzling speed, on their four hindmost limbs, and used the other four as weapons. Their bodies, one third again as weighty and massive as a human's, were segmented like an insect's: a small, compact abdomen hung between the four, wide-spread, slender walking limbs; a massive, armoured thorax from which all eight limbs depended; and a squat, wide, wedge-shaped head, equipped with short, rattling mouthparts that issued the characteristic chittering noise, a heavy, ctenoid comb of brow armour, and no discernible eyes. The four upper limbs matched the trophy Lucius had taken in the first round: metal-cased blades over a metre in length beyond the joint. Every part of the megarachnid appeared to be thickly plated with mottled, almost fibrous grey armour, except the head crests, which seemed to be natural, chitinous growths, rough, bony and ivory.
As the fighting wore on, Tarvitz thought he identified a status in those crests. The fuller the chitin growths, the more senior - and larger - the warrior.
Tarvitz made his first kill with his bolter. The megarachnid lunged out of the suddenly vibrating stalks in front of them, and decapitated Kercort with a flick of its upper left blade. Even stationary, it was a hyperactive blur, as if its metabolism, its very life, moved at some rate far faster than that of the enhanced gene-seed warriors of Chemos. Tarvitz had opened fire, denting the centre line of the megarachnid's thorax armour with three shots, before his fourth obliterated the thing's head in a shower of white paste and ivory crest shards. Its legs stumbled and scrabbled, its blade arms waved, and then it fell, but just before it did, there was another crash.
The crash was the sound of Kercort's headless body finally hitting the red dust, arterial spray jetting from his severed neck.
That was how fast the encounter had passed. From first strike to clean kill, poor Kercort had only had time to fall down.
A second megarachnid appeared behind the first. Its flickering limbs had torn Tarvitz's bolter out of his hands, and set a deep gouge across the facing of his breastplate, right across the Imperial aquila displayed there. That was a great crime. Alone amongst the Legions, only the Emperor's Children had been permitted, by the grace of the Emperor himself, to wear the aquila on their chestplates. Backing away, hearing bolter fire and yells from the shivering thickets all around him, Tarvitz had felt stung by genuine insult, and had unslung his broadsword, powered it, and struck downwards with a two-handed cut. His long, heavy blade had glanced off the alien's headcrest, chipping off flecks of yellowish bone, and Tarvitz had been
forced to dance back out of the reach of the four, slicing limb-blades.
His second strike had been better. His sword missed the bone crest and instead hacked deeply into the megarachnid's neck, at the joint where the head connected to the upper thorax. He had split the thorax wide open to the centre, squirting out a gush of glistening white ichor. The megarachnid had trembled, fidgeting, slowly understanding its own death as Tarvitz wrenched his blade back out. It took a moment to die. It reached out with its quivering blade-limbs, and touched the tips of them against Tarvitz's recoiling face, two on either side of the visor. The touch was almost gentle. As it fell, the four points made a shrieking sound as they dragged backwards across the sides of his visor, leaving bare metal scratches in the purple gloss.
Someone was screaming. A bolter was firing on full auto, and debris from exploded grass stalks was spilling up into the air.
A third hostile flickered at Tarvitz, but his blood was up. He swung at it, turning his body right around, and cut clean through the mid line of the thorax, between upper arms and lower legs.
Pale liquid spattered into the air, and the top of the alien fell away. The abdomen, and the half-thorax remainin
g, pumping milky fluid, continued to scurry on its four legs for a moment before it collided with a grass stalk and toppled over.
And that was the fight done. The stalks ceased their shivering, and the wretched grubs started to whistle and buzz again.
WHEN THEY HAD been on the ground for ninety hours, and had engaged with the megarachnid twenty-eight times in the dense thickets of the grass forests, seven of their meagre party were dead and gone. The process of
advance became mechanical, almost trance-like. There was no guiding narrative, no strategic detail. They had established no contact with the Blood Angels, or their lord, or any segments of other sections of their company. They moved forwards, and every few kilometres fighting broke out.
This was an almost perfect war, Saul Tarvitz decided. Simple and engrossing, testing their combat skills and physical prowess to destruction. It was like a training regime made lethal. Only days afterwards did he appreciate how truly focussed he had become during the undertaking. His instincts had grown as sharp as the enemy limb-blades. He was on guard at all times, with no opportunity to slacken or lose concentration, for the megarachnid ambushes were sudden and ferocious, and came out of nowhere. The party moved, then fought, moved, then fought, without space for rest or reflection. Tarvitz had never known, and would never know again, such pure martial perfection, utterly uncomplicated by politics or beliefs. He and his fellows were weapons of the Emperor, and the megarachnid were the unqualified quintessence of the hostile cosmos that stood in man's way.
Almost all of the gradually dwindling Astartes had switched to their blades. It took too many bolter rounds to bring a megarachnid down. A blade was surer, provided one was quick enough to get the first stroke in, and strong enough to ensure that stroke was a killing blow.
It was with some surprise that Tarvitz discovered his fellow captain, Lucius, thought differenuy. As they pushed on, Lucius boasted that he was playing the enemy.
'It's like duelling with four swordsmen at once,' Lucius crowed. Lucius was a bladesman. To Tarvitz's knowledge, Lucius had never been bested in swordplay Where Tarvitz, and men like him, rotated through weapon drills to extend perfection in all forms and manners,
