by Ben Counter
armour. His eyes were rolled back and he was convulsing. Sarpedon
could not help him.
Sarpedon jumped and skidded through the blast doors. A tangle of
wreckage was blocking them from closing completely. He hauled the
twisted metal free and the doors boomed close, air howling around him
and screaming in his ears as the corridor beyond repressurised.
Sarpedon took a breath. It felt like the first in a lifetime. His throat
was raw as he gulped down air. His mind, tight and dull in his head,
seemed to flow back to full capacity with the return of oxygen.
Sarpedon looked around him. He was in a tech lab, with benches
heavy with verispex equipment and banks of datamedium racked on
the walls. It was where Techmarines and their assistant crewmen
would conduct experiments on captured tech, or craft the delicate
mechanisms of bespoke weapons and armour. The walls were inlaid
with bronze geometric designs and a cogitator stood against one wall
like an altar, its brass case covered in candles that had half-burned
away. The floor was scattered with broken equipment and the detritus
of their work, thrown about by the gale of escaping air.
Sarpedon paused. He did not know the layout of the Phalanx. He
remembered the way back to his cell well enough, but he doubted
there was any point in returning there.
What point was there in doing anything? He could not escape the
Phalanx, surely. The Imperial Fists would be hunting him down as
soon as they had counted their own dead. He was free, but what did it
matter?
It had to count for something. He fought the fatalism that had
weighed him down since his capture. While he still lived, he could still
fight, he could still make his life mean something…
‘Sarpedon!’ yelled a voice that he recognised with a lurch.
Reinez, his pilgrim’s tatters even more ragged and his face
scorched, limped from a doorway into the lab. He had been caught in
the flames and the edges of his armour were singed, but he had not
lost his grip on the thunder hammer that served him like an extension
of his own body.
‘Captain Reinez,’ said Sarpedon. ‘I see that neither of us is easy to
kill.’
‘You are not free, traitor!’ barked Reinez. ‘There is no freedom under
my watch! I sought your execution, and it will happen this day!’
Sarpedon was unarmed and unarmoured. He had not fought for what
was, by his standards, a long time, and his lungs and muscles still
burned. But he was still a Space Marine, and the moment did not exist
when a Space Marine was unprepared to fight.
Reinez charged, yelling as he held his hammer high. It was a move
of pure anger, reckless, unthinking. Wrong. Sarpedon scuttled up one
wall, talons finding purchase in the raised designs, and Reinez’s
hammer slammed into the wall behind him. The hammer ripped a deep
dent in the wall, wires and coolant pipes spilling out as he wrenched it
free.
Sarpedon clung to the web of lumen-strips and wires that covered
the ceiling. Reinez yelled in frustration and swung up at Sarpedon, but
he dropped down onto a lab bench in front of him and kicked a
complex microscope array into Reinez’s unprotected face. Dozens of
lenses and sharp brass struts shattered and Reinez stumbled back,
blinded for a moment.
Sarpedon pounced on him, front limbs striking down, back limbs
wrapping around. Reinez fell back with Sarpedon on top of him, fighting
for the hammer which was the only weapon between them. Sarpedon
tore it from Reinez’s hands and threw it aside, the power field
discharging like caged lightning as the weapon tumbled across the
room.
Reinez punched up at Sarpedon. Sarpedon batted Reinez’s fist
aside and followed up with a punch of his own, his knuckles cracking
against Reinez’s jaw. With his armour on, a gauntleted fist would have
broken the jaw – as it was Reinez was merely stunned for a moment,
long enough for Sarpedon to roll him over, lift him up off the floor and
drive him head-first into the cogitator against the room’s back wall.
Power flashed. Components pinged out of the ruined machine,
valves popping, cogs firing out like bullets. Reinez pulled himself free,
blood running down his face and the pitted surface of his tarnished
breastplate.
‘You are no executioner!’ yelled Sarpedon. ‘You failed! You have
become this unthinking, hating creature, because you cannot accept
that you failed! If you killed me your failure would still stand and your
life would mean nothing! You should be grateful I never gave you the
chance!’
Reinez coughed up a gobbet of blood. He was still standing, but he
wavered as if his legs wanted to give way. ‘Heretic,’ he slurred.
‘Vermin. You were never any brother of mine. The warp took you long
ago. Your whole Chapter. Stained… tainted… down to your geneseed…
Even Dorn’s blood rejects you!’
Reinez’s hand flashed down to his waist and a bolt pistol was in his
palm. He raised it in a flash.
Reinez was a fast draw. Sarpedon moved faster. He crouched down
onto his haunches, behind one of the lab benches. The bolt pistol
barked and hit the lab bench, blasting sprays of hardwood and bronze
shrapnel. Another few shots and it would come apart.
Sarpedon dropped his shoulder and barged into the bench. It came
off its moorings and he powered it towards Reinez. The bench
crunched into Reinez, pinning him against the wall and trapping the
wrist of his gun arm.
Sarpedon reached over the bench and tore the pistol out of Reinez’s
hand. As quickly as Reinez had drawn it, Sarpedon had it against
Reinez’s temple.
‘I let you live,’ said Sarpedon. ‘Remember that, brother.’
Sarpedon smacked the butt of the pistol into the bridge of Reinez’s
nose, crunching through cartilage and stunning Reinez again. The
Crimson Fist’s head lolled, insensible. Sarpedon let go of the bench
and Reinez clattered to the floor. Sarpedon left him there, scuttling
from the tech lab into whatever paths the Phalanx had laid out for him
next.
The liquid explosive with which Brother Sennon had replaced his blood
ignited, and incinerated him in an instant. The door to Daenyathos’s
cell was ripped off its mountings. The Imperial Fists accompanying
Sennon were blown off their feet and hurled down the corridor of the
Atoning Halls, their armoured weight crushing the rack that stood at
the intersection.
Luko was knocked senseless by the shockwave. When his senses
returned, his vision shuddered and his ears were full of white noise. He
did not hear the footsteps of the Dreadnought emerging from the
smouldering hole, but he saw the rubble-strewn ground shaking. Soul
Drinkers stumbled from their cells, for the walls of the Atoning Halls
had been forced out of shape and cell doors had sprung open. One or
two of them had used shrapnel to lever their restraints open, and
helped their fellows in neighbouring cell
s do the same. Two of them
were on the Imperial Fists, who were still stunned and could not fight
back as the Soul Drinkers grabbed their boltguns, combat knives and
grenades.
Luko kicked against his own cell door. It was still held fast. A
shadow fell over him, and silhouetted in the hazy light was
Daenyathos. The Dreadnought body, even disarmed, was a powerful
and terrible thing. Luko, still deafened, did not speak. The Dreadnought
looked at him, the dead eyes of its mechanical head focussing, and
then it walked on, disappearing into the swirl of dust and smoke.
Sergeant Salk appeared in the Dreadnought’s wake. He had a pair of
shears for cutting through chain or bone, likely taken from one of the
cases of torture implements with which past generations of Imperial
Fists had purified themselves. Salk shouted something that Luko
could not make out, then worked on the hinges of the cell door until
Salk could wrench it free.
Salk then cut the manacles holding Luko to the back wall, and
helped him to his feet. Salk’s words were getting through to him now,
dulled by the ringing inside Luko’s head.
‘… have to go now! The Fists will be here in moments!’
‘Who… who is dead?’ said Luko. His own voice sounded like it was
coming from somewhere else.
‘Four or five of us, I think. Maybe dead, maybe hurt. There is no time
to be sure. There is a way out through the far end, towards the
archives.’
Luko saw Apothecary Pallas emerging from the dust and rubble,
together with several other Soul Drinkers. Two more were forcing the
door off another cell and Luko saw it contained Librarian Tyrendian, the
inhibitor collar still clamped around his neck to quell his psychic
powers.
‘What of Daenyathos?’ said Luko.
‘He is not in his cell.’
‘I saw that. Where did he go?’
‘I do not know, brother. I have not seen Chaplain Iktinos, either. We
must gather and find somewhere we can defend, brother. We are free,
but not for long if we cannot make a stand.’
‘Yes. Yes, brother, I agree. We must move.’
‘What of justice?’ said Pallas. The Apothecary was standing just
outside the cell, Soul Drinkers gathering around him. His hands were
slick with blood – he must have tried to save Soul Drinkers who had
been wounded in the blast.
‘Justice?’ said Luko.
‘We are renegades. We were brought here to face justice. Is it right
to flee from it? And what will we do after we have fled? Fight all the
Space Marines on the Phalanx? We have less than a company’s
worth. There are three companies of Imperial Fists on this spaceship,
and Throne knows how many from other Chapters. What does one
more battle mean to us when the outcome will be the same? None of
us is getting off this ship, captain. You know that.’
‘Then stay, Apothecary,’ said Luko. ‘While there is freedom left for
us, I for one will grasp it. There may not be much left for us, but to die
free is worth a fight, I think. Come, brothers! We need to leave this
place. Follow!’
Luko and Salk left the cell. Luko saw what remained of the Soul
Drinkers Chapter – unarmed, bloodied, they were still marked by the
manacles and shackles. But they were his brothers, and for one final
time they would fight side by side. The Emperor only knew why
Sennon had killed himself to buy this freedom for them – this was not
the time to ask such questions. It was enough that they had the
chance.
Luko was a man who seized his chances. He took the bolter offered
to him by one of the other Soul Drinkers, and led the way through the
Halls of Atonement towards his final moments of freedom.
Chapter 8
Luko kicked in the door of the archive. Musty air swept out, mixing
with the cordite and rubble dust that rolled off the Soul Drinkers. The
archive was a high-ceilinged, dim and age-sodden room with rolls of
parchment mounted on the walls for several storeys up, and huge
wooden reading tables over which bent the archivists, who looked up in
surprise as almost sixty Space Marines stormed into their domain.
‘Not too bad to defend,’ said Salk, taking in the sight of the archives.
‘Lots of cover, not many entrances.’
‘At least we’ll have something to read while we’re waiting,’ replied
Luko.
The archivists fled. None of the Soul Drinkers had any heart to
pursue them. They would tell the Imperial Fists where the escapees
had holed up, but the Imperial Fists would learn that anyway, and too
many people had died already.
‘Spread out!’ ordered Luko to the other Soul Drinkers. With Sarpedon
and Iktinos elsewhere, it had seemed a natural fit for him to take
command. ‘Find something we can use! Weapons, transport! It’s too
much to hope to find a shuttle that can get us off this can, but that
doesn’t mean we shouldn’t look.’
‘And get me something to take this damned thing off!’ Librarian
Tyrendian was still wrestling with the inhibitor collar around his neck.
‘Until then I have to think down to your level.’
Luko caught sight of movement and his eyes flickered to the dim
interior of the archive. From the shadows shuffled an old, bent figure,
wearing the same robes and symbols as the youth who had blown
himself up to free the Soul Drinkers from the Atoning Halls. The
archivists had all fled, but this man, who seemed more decrepit than
any of them, showed no fear.
‘Hail!’ said the old man. Luko saw the rosarius beads and aquila
icons of a pilgrim, and the symbol of the blinded eye embroidered on
his robes. ‘Brethren of the Chalice! How my heart grows to see you at
liberty!’
‘Who are you?’ demanded Luko. ‘One of your pilgrims died to free
us, though we didn’t ask for it. What do your kind want from us?’
‘I want only for the path of fate to be walked true,’ replied the pilgrim.
‘Time has sought fit to grant me the title Father Gyranar. My brothers
and I are the Blind Retribution, the seekers of justice, the instruments
of fate, the Blinded Eye. For longer than I have been alive, fate has
taught us of the part we are to play in the fulfilment of the Soul
Drinkers’ destiny.’ Gyranar limped forwards and took Luko’s huge paw
in his tiny, dry hands. ‘I rejoice that I have lived to see that time! When
I drank from the grail, I dared not to beg of the fates that I witness the
day the chalice shall overflow!’
‘Explain yourself,’ said Luko.
‘We are a long line of those who have been tasked with making this
day happen,’ continued Gyranar. ‘The Black Chalice, the Silver Grail,
and countless others, have all followed the same path, one that would
ensure they crossed paths with the Soul Drinkers so they could help
destiny become reality. You must go free, Captain Luko, you and all
your battle-brothers! You must fight here, and see that what must be,
shall be! I have broken your shackles, but only you can strike the
blows!’
‘What fate?’ demanded Luko. ‘If we are here to do something, then it
is news to me. We were brought to the Phalanx against our will, and at
the risk of sounding ungrateful, our freedom was something equally
unsought.’
‘But now you fight one last battle!’ said Gyranar. The old man’s eyes
were alight, as if he was looking beyond Luko to some religious
revelation. ‘Instead of a dismal execution, you die fighting, and in doing
so your sacrifice will change the Imperium for the better! All human
history hinges on this point, captain!’
Luko pulled Gyranar close. The old man barely came up to Luko’s
solar plexus. ‘He who longs for one last battle,’ Luko said darkly, ‘has
never truly fought a battle at all.’
‘Fate cares not that its instruments are ignorant of their importance,’
said Gyranar. ‘I have been given the blessing of knowing what is to
come. You, captain, are no less blessed for having it revealed to you
at the moment of your glory.’
Luko let Gyranar go. The pilgrim had no fear. A Space Marine knew
no fear because he mastered it, broke it down and discarded it as
irrelevant. Gyranar had no fear to begin with, as if even an angry Space
Marine bearing down on him was a scene from a play which he had
seen many times.
‘You remind me of someone I once knew,’ said Luko. ‘He was Yser,
and much like you, a believer. He was the pawn of a power greater and
darker than he could have imagined, and it killed him. You will find few
friends among the Soul Drinkers, Father Gyranar.’
‘As I said,’ replied Gyranar, ‘there were others. I am merely the most
fortunate.’
‘Captain!’ yelled Tyrendian from deeper within the archive, among the
shadows that clung around the many archways leading out from the
main chamber. ‘I’ve found something. You want to see it.’
Luko followed Tyrendian’s voice. The Librarian stood in an archway
leading into another chamber, this one lit sparingly by a few
spotglobes that shone their shafts of light onto hundreds of exhibits,
like the inside of a museum.
Almost a hundred suits of power armour stood there, on racks that
made it look as if their owners were standing there in ranks. The
armour of the Soul Drinkers, still spattered with the mud and ash of
Selaaca, still with the scars of necron weapons and the claws of the
