by Gav Thorpe
Rather than be surrounded, he bounded towards the group of three. Secondary guns – bolter systems operated by their own cogitators, he assumed – spat rounds at him while the brutes lifted their arms, bearing whirling blades, crackling fists and guns of unconventional design.
They reminded him of the Chaos walkers on Iapetus, but these suits bore none of the arcane runework that had marked the bodies of the half-daemon machines created by Azor and Delvere. They were clearly battleplate rather than automated machines – he could see muscle moving beneath meshwork linking segmented ceramite and adamantium plates. Rage-filled eyes glared at him behind smoky-grey visors as the traitor creatures broke into lumbering runs to meet his charge.
A fork of lightning erupted from the golden tip of one gun, catching Corax’s left arm. The energy crawled up the limb, seemingly growing in strength, feeding off the power circuits of the primarch’s armour. His arm became leaden as internal systems shut down. It felt as though heavy weights had suddenly been strapped to his side, causing him to stumble. With some effort he ran on, left arm hanging uselessly at his side, the combi-weapon in his right hand.
He fired. The flurry of bolts sparked from the armour of the closest enemy, cracking ceramite but having little effect on the creature within. The primarch was still out of effective range with the melta and he increased his speed, pounding across the dirt-spattered rockcrete.
A boom and a whine alerted him to a shot from behind; a moment later his right leg buckled as a flickering shell slammed into the back of his thigh, punching neatly through armour and into flesh. He toppled, hand outstretched to prevent himself falling face first into the rockcrete as another boom and crack heralded a second shot. Splinters of flight pack vanes sailed over his shoulder from the impact.
He looked down at his leg, bemused that any weapon could hit so hard. In the past his warplate had been proof against missiles, lascannons, autocannons and even plasma. Unnatural energy wreathed the small hole, glowing with dark fire.
Sorcery!
He heaved himself up, noting that some sensation was starting to return to his left arm as systems recovered from the shock of the lightning hit. The warrior’s weapon was almost recharged though; Corax could see arcs of energy coiling around the jutting fins that surrounded the main body of the gun.
A burst of plasma splashed over his left shoulder, showering molten droplets of metal and ceramite across his helm. Corax heard the crack of the sorcerous rifle from behind him, and gritted his teeth as he expected another piercing blow.
But the shell whined past overhead.
With a wordless shout, fuelled by genuine concern giving rise to a boiling anger, Corax hurled himself at the trio of warriors in front of him. He fired the melta into the chest of the plasma-armed warrior, slamming the traitor to the ground.
Before he could finish off his downed adversary, a chainblade skittered across the primarch’s left arm, carving ragged grooves with whirring teeth. Corax flailed, slashing his fingers towards his attacker’s face. The blow went wide and the chain-weapon screeched down again, striking sparks from the seal of his outstretched elbow.
Corax hooked his gun and smashed a fist down into the fallen traitor. As he pulled his hand free, a thick oil-like gunge oozed from the wound but no blood. He did not have time to consider the implications of this as a third traitor joined the fight, bodily slamming into the primarch, a clawed power fist grabbing hold of his chest plastron as they skidded a dozen metres across the hard ground.
Corax rolled as they slowed amidst a pile of rocky debris, twisting to slam the traitor into the rucked ground. Armour cracked under an impact that would have shattered natural bones and pulverised the internal organs of a mortal man. The augmented traitor glared at him through his visor, demented rage in his eyes. The warrior jabbed a short-hand punch into the side of Corax’s helm, slamming his head sideways. Another ringing blow from the other traitor’s chain-weapon sent shards of cracking ceramite spraying from the primarch’s shoulder guard. The primarch was surprised that his other attacker had been able to follow him so swiftly.
Corax lashed out wildly, throwing back the traitor with the chainblade. Rising to his feet, he stomped on the helm of the power fist armed warrior, crushing his head to a pulp of blood and flattened metal. The body twitched twice and then fell still. The traitor who had been punched in the chest was slowly pushing himself to his feet. Taking a step towards him, shaking his head with amazement, Corax drew up his gun and levelled the melta for a shot.
The other warrior fired his lightning gun again, sending black energy coruscating up Corax’s chest. He fell backwards, all but paralysed between neck and waist. His hearts hammered in his chest, overloaded with energy, but the systems of his plate were going haywire, sending erratic signals to arms and legs, causing spasms that fought against the primarch’s muscles rather than boosted them.
The boom of the heavy rifle caused Corax to wince in the moment before another projectile slammed into the gap between left pauldron and neck, tearing into the muscle of his shoulder. For the first time since Isstvan, Corax let out a shout of pain, wrenched from him as the sorcerous fire of the shell burnt into his flesh, seeping its warp taint into blood and tissue.
Something heavy pinned down his left arm and he looked up to see the chainblade-warrior with a massive boot on the primarch’s wrist. Normally he would have been able to cast the traitor aside with little effort, as large as he was, but his armour was not responding. There was triumph in the brute’s eyes as he pointed the crackling muzzle of his lightning gun at Corax’s face.
The others gathered around him, the one with the rifle also sporting a barbed powerblade that glittered with sparks of silver energy. The last warrior had no ranged weapon that Corax could see except for a pivoting set of twin bolters mounted on his shoulder; both arms ended in spiked hammerheads surrounded by a pulsating dark aura.
Silhouetted against the sky, the four massive warriors loomed over Corax, weapons at the ready. It seemed impossible. He had been ready to face his death at the beast Angron’s hands in the mountains of Isstvan V, but to die like this? It seemed ludicrous. He did not even know the manner of soldiers that had defeated him.
It had not been difficult and Corax felt the failure like a gash in his gut.
Another point-blank blast from the lightning gun sent shocks pulsing through his armour systems, keeping the primarch immobile. One of the soldiers stood aside, allowing Corax to see a group of figures gathering on a rampart atop the bunker ahead. There were four more individuals there, garbed in Legiones Astartes armour, two with the markings of the Emperor’s Children, another in Sons of Horus livery.
The fourth stepped out from the others and stood looking down over the wall edging the fortification. His warplate was black, and on the shoulder was the unmistakable sigil of a white raven. He wore no helm, pale hair hanging lankly across his features.
A warrior of the Raven Guard.
‘You made it too easy!’ the warrior called down and immediately Corax recognised the voice along with the face.
‘Nathian.’
Corvus was half as tall again as the youths around him, and broader by far, but of all those who had met the guerrilla leader Nathian showed almost no fear. The prisoner’s stare matched Corax’s in its intensity.
‘That’s the boon I bring, ain’t it?’ said Nathian. ‘They think I can be trusted. I run the largest smuggling ring on the wing. A few bribes and words here and there will make it a lot easier for you to be moving stuff around, I’d warrant. And I’m no shirker in a fight. I’m dishonest, but I give you my word, for what it’s worth. I want out of this stinking hole as much as any of this lot.’
‘He knows too much already – a curse on him and his prying,’ said Agapito. ‘Let’s be rid of him. We’ll put the body in the incinerators next shift.’
Nathian sneered, but did not look afrai
d.
‘No,’ said Corvus. He looked at Nathian closely, and saw the feral danger behind his eyes. A multiple-killer, aged only thirteen. It was not pleasant, but what Corvus had planned would sometimes need men of cold disposition, not just courage. ‘I can use him. Yes, Nathian – I accept your oath. And make no mistake, I will hold you to it.’
‘Well met, Lord Corax,’ the former Raven Guard sneered. The wind tousled white hair across his thin face. ‘You forgot the First Axiom of Stealth, brave leader. You came to me, exactly where I thought you would be.’
Corax tried to sit up. A sparking hammer smashed into his face, knocking him back. The lightning cannon crackled just a few metres away, ready to paralyse his armour with another blast the moment he tried to get free. There was satisfaction and monstrous intent in the eyes of the warrior holding it.
‘Of course, getting you here was the easy part, I suppose,’ Nathian continued. His voice was rasping, filled with bitterness. He glanced at the Emperor’s Children legionary. ‘Using some of the superior gene-serums from... Well, I won’t bore you with the details. These are the “New Men”, as Fabius called them. He’s an Apothecary, you know. Very clever.’ He waved a hand towards the hulking warriors. ‘I think the name’s a little understated, though. The aborted failures in the cells aside, they are far more than men now, aren’t they? We all are. “Legiones Superior”, maybe? I don’t know, I was never the best with words. I left that sort of thing to Agapito. He has the poet’s soul. Anyway, they don’t really have a name yet, so I’m afraid you’ll die in ignorance.’
Nathian walked away. Corax noticed a slight limp as the traitor Raven Guard disappeared back into the bunker. Around the primarch, the so-called New Men stepped forwards, raising their weapons.
‘Time to find out how well the Emperor really made you,’ said one of them, his bass voice modulated by the augmitter systems of his armour.
He fired a shot through Corax’s left forearm. The primarch gritted his teeth, not permitting himself even a snarl; the traitors would be granted no additional pleasure by his cries of pain.
‘Perhaps he needed to make you a little tougher,’ the warrior sneered.
Corax surged up, leaping towards him. He was a step away from grabbing the traitor around the throat when searing pain crashed through his skull. As agony flared along his neural pathways and down his spine he realised that a fresh lightning blast had struck him in the head.
His nervous system failed him, plunging him face first into the gravel-strewn rockcrete. It took all of his effort to raise himself up, pushing with his left arm, ignoring the ache that throbbed down to his wrist.
A plasma blast smashed into his back, flattening the primarch with its detonation, melting the carefully forged feathers of his wings. Feedback from his armour blared warnings as coolants raced through the systems to stop the heat spreading further.
He was almost blind with the shock of the electrical hit and burning pain, barely able to focus on the ground just in front of him. Corax took in a shuddering breath, determined he would die on his feet, not on his face.
Another round smashed into his knee, cracking cartilage. He could not stop the cry that escaped from his lips. With a herculean effort he managed to flop over onto his back, wings closing beneath him.
He wasn’t sure what happened next. One moment the warrior with the lightning cannon was stepping forward, chainblade raised with teeth whirring. An instant later he became a ball of fire and metal splinters, hurled bodily away by the explosion, an arm spinning off across the ground.
The roar of jets dragged Corax’s eyes skyward and he looked up to see five black shapes plunging down from above, jump packs flaring.
The New Men reacted fast, turning their weapons on the incoming legionaries. A plasma bolt seared wide of its target but the traitor with the anti-tank gun found his mark, putting a round through the head of an incoming Raven Guard, turning helm and skull to a trailing mess of bone and blood.
The lead warrior landed on the hammer-handed soldier, plasma pistol vaporising the creature’s face a second before the Raven Guard crashed feet first into its chest, cracking open armour and sending both spilling to the ground.
The other New Men rushed to the attack as more shapes with jump packs landed, the headless corpse of the last crashing to the ferrocrete a few metres away. Missiles and battle cannon fire from their wheeling dropship pounded the bunkers, secondary weapons stitching smaller detonations across the armour of the New Men while fire from the encircling emplacements tore past and crashed against the Stormbird’s armoured fuselage.
The shock of the lightning blast was wearing off. Corax could feel sensation returning to his hands and feet. The Raven Guard fell as a pack onto their next target, hacking with power axes and blades, blasting with their pistols to drive the soldier away from their primarch.
Corax saw the plasma gunner turning his weapon on the black-armoured legionaries, recognising the glow of a fully charged weapon. With a snarl he forced himself from the ground and took a running leap, damaged flight pack flaring, slamming awkwardly shoulder first into the giant warrior. The plasma blast rocketed into the sky and the primarch followed it, his wings snapping out to carry them both up past the Stormbird, which was turning its weapons to the perimeter defences.
The comm crackled in Corax’s ear.
‘Lord Corax! This is Branne. The commandant’s compound is a trap!’
‘Thank you for the warning, commander,’ Corax replied through gritted teeth.
The New Man had a grip on one of Corax’s wings but the primarch extended both arms, prising away his enemy’s grasp. Inverting quickly, he threw the mutated warrior groundwards and pitched after him. The New Man’s impact threw up a cloud of dust and grit into which Corax dived without hesitation, slamming fist first into the brute, the blow carving through plate and into bone, splitting the augmented soldier from shoulder to gut.
‘Shall I send reinforcements, my lord?’ Branne sounded desperately worried.
‘No,’ Corax replied. He looked around. Two of the New Men were still alive, battling with the Raven Guard. The primarch ran towards the melee. ‘Maintain current missions.’
The New Man with the sorcerous rifle heard the incoming primarch and turned, raising his weapon. Now fully focused Corax saw the flash of the muzzle and the dark blur of the armour-piercing round coming towards him. Still accelerating, he swayed to his left, letting the projectile pass harmlessly over his right shoulder.
The traitor took a step back and hurriedly worked the breech mechanism of the heavy rifle. He chambered another round and lifted the weapon to his shoulder just as Corax reached him.
The primarch’s uppercut caught the New Man square under the helm, lifting him from his feet as his head snapped back, dark filth erupting as Corax’s fist parted metal and bone like air. He shouldered aside the flailing body as momentum carried the primarch into the last attacker.
The final New Man had the helm of one of the Raven Guard in an iron grip, ceramite cracking crazily and reinforced plate buckling under the pressure. The legionaries blazed with bolt pistols and hacked with their chainswords, futilely battering at the armoured behemoth.
Corax turned and landed feet first, snapping through both arms with mighty blows from his gauntlets, leaving the Raven Guard to topple backwards as the New Man stumbled away. A bestial half-roar, half-scream bellowed from the mutilated warrior’s vocalisers as he waved the stumps of his limbs helplessly, black gore splashing to the ground.
Another kick sent him reeling back still further. Corax boosted his next step, leaping up half a dozen metres before crashing down upon the inhuman warrior. Fuelled by the realisation of how close he had come to dying, Corax let his emotions flow, tearing and shredding, fists a blur as he reduced armour to fragments, skin to strips and flesh to tatters.
When he was done he stepped back. The Ne
w Man had been turned into a ruin of congealing black fluid and severed limbs, scattered about with pieces of ceramite and plasteel.
Breathing heavily, Corax turned to his warriors, who were now exchanging fire with human soldiers racing out onto the top of the bunkers.
The legionaries’ leader dragged off his dented helm and took in a ragged breath.
It was Arendi.
‘Gherith? Why are you here?’ The primarch glanced up as the Stormbird’s engines changed in pitch, taking the gunship towards the outer defences. It was pocked with return fire but its cannons were still laying down a curtain of blasts along the emplacements. He returned his attention to Arendi. ‘You were supposed to be supporting Commander Soukhounou.’
The former bodyguard commander doubled over, coughing and retching. When he looked up at his primarch, Corax saw that Arendi’s face was covered with the spreading darkness of massive bruises. He grinned and then winced at the pain this caused.
‘Sometimes you’re an idiot, Corvus,’ said Arendi, using the name that few had since the coming of the Emperor. The primarch bridled at the comment but did not have time to reply before the legionary continued. ‘The others told me what you said. “Do you really think I need a bodyguard?” That was it, correct?’
Corax recalled saying those words on Isstvan V, after the Thunderhawk carrying them all had been downed.
‘Something like that,’ the primarch answered, feeling suddenly foolish for such bravado. ‘How did you know about... about all of this? Did you know about Nathian?’
‘Not as such, no,’ said Arendi. The Space Marine tossed away his deformed helmet. ‘There were rumours – some of the Legion sided with the traitors after the massacre at the Urgall Depression. There was some connection to this place but nothing solid. We were preparing to link up with Soukhounou when we caught a flash of open-band traffic. Something about a target approaching the commandant’s compound. I just figured that, as usual, you would get yourself into more trouble than you were worth. Branne filled us in. Sorry we did not get here sooner.’
