by C. L. Werner
The warsmith didn’t try to pull free of the hybrid’s grip. What he did instead was press the barrel of his pistol into its gut and empty the clip. As the creature’s body went slack, he threw it contemptuously at the pile of debris.
Foolishly, the cultists poised along the mound of rubble had held their fire while Rhodaan was in the grip of their malformed comrade. There was a pause while they took aim again, a pause that the warsmith used to the utmost. His bolt pistol cracked away again, this time smashing into the stubber itself and knocking the gun from its perch.
‘Iron within! Iron without!’ Rhodaan bellowed as he reached the rubble and climbed the heap of broken rockcrete. His chainsword was in his hand now, lashing out at the rebels who tried to contest his ascent. Their maimed bodies went sprawling to the road below.
Roaring their own war cries, the other Iron Warriors followed Rhodaan’s lead, butchering their way through any rebel that tried to stand against them.
Rhodaan reached the top of the obstruction, hurling aside the bloodied husk of the last cultist to fall on the whirring blade of his sword. He gazed across the havoc he’d unleashed, then turned his attention to the road ahead. What he saw had him snarling orders to Uzraal and the others to join him. Ahead he could see a wide plaza that terminated in a series of broad steps that rose to the cathedral.
The Warmason’s Cathedral was a titanic edifice, redolent of the pomp and decadence of the False Emperor’s slaves. Elaborate flourishes of adornment and lavish excesses of ornamentation were in abundance everywhere. A riotous proliferation of windows and balconies opened across its upper reaches, presenting a hundred points of entry to disperse the building’s defenders and stretch their strength. The immense gateway that stood at the end of the steps leading down into the plaza looked to be the most formidable feature on display. A strongpoint those inside would be depending on to keep them safe.
The crack of lasguns and the snarl of bolters rang out from the plaza. Rhodaan could see masses of rebels dressed in purple and crimson laying siege to the building. Their attentions were returned with vigour by warriors encased in black armour poised on the balconies above. The plaza was something of an abattoir, the dead strewn deep upon the ground, a stream of blood trickling off down the various approaches. Rhodaan focused on the massive door that sealed off the entrance to the cathedral, a door the cultists were striving to gain control over and which the cathedral’s defenders were just as determined to deny them.
‘It seems we aren’t the only ones trying to get inside,’ Rhodaan declared across the inter-squad vox. ‘Our objective is also of interest to the xenos,’ he added, just a hint of accusation for Cornak’s benefit.
‘Your orders, warsmith?’ came Uzraal’s response.
Rhodaan could appreciate the irony of the plan that had occurred to him, inspired by the confusion at the spaceport. The Imperials inside the cathedral might mistake the Iron Warriors for allies if provided with a little encouragement. With the city in such confusion, it was possible those inside the cathedral lacked lines of communication to the outside. They might be unaware of who it was that had landed on their world. Would they be recognised as invaders or celebrated as liberators? True, if it was the latter, the deception would be brief, but the fools inside the cathedral would have even less time to rue their mistake.
‘Fighting the rebels and the defenders will delay us,’ Rhodaan voxed to his retinue. ‘Fire only on the xenos. Take no action against the flesh inside the cathedral. Let us see if they won’t open the doors for us and spare us the effort of smashing them down.’
Chapter X
The throng of deformed cultists swarmed across the plaza, rushing the Great Gate from every direction. As they charged the steps they mercilessly raked the remaining refugees with their clawed hands and gunned down the crowds with a motley array of arms. No longer did these subhuman hybrids value the refugees as living shields. Now the panicked masses of humanity were nothing more than an obstacle to be swatted aside with heinous abandon.
The Great Gate was closed to the cultists, the gatehouse now under the watchful guard of the Adepta Sororitas. Battle Sisters stood upon the balconies overlooking the square, vengefully shooting into the purple-garbed cultists, trying to exact from them every drop of human blood they’d spilled in their push to the cathedral. Droves of the snarling hybrids were ripped apart by bolters or burned alive by sweeping bursts of flamers. Grenades lobbed down from the overlooking walkways and balconies exploded amidst the hybrid mob, mangling dozens of the degenerates. Yet still they came. With inhuman tenacity, they pressed the attack. The madness of the fanatic was upon them, a frenzy that paid small notice to the casualties inflicted upon their own. From the balcony above the statue of Vadok Singh, Trishala aimed her pistol at one of the hybrids carrying the cult’s obscene banner. Her first round ripped through the standard, tearing a jagged hole in the painted wyrm that writhed across the purple cloth. Her second round turned the hairless head of the cultist carrying it into a red smear. Even as the standard bearer fell, another cultist scurried forwards to take up the flag, waving it defiantly as he shrieked obscenities at the Sisters.
‘They won’t break,’ Kashibai called out in frustration, nearly tripping over the bloodied body sprawled at her feet. The frateris militia had taken it upon themselves to support the Battle Sisters, but unlike the female warriors they didn’t have power armour to protect them from the cultist guns. The balconies and walkways were littered with their bodies.
‘Kill them all,’ Trishala sent her order across the vox. ‘Don’t let even one reach the Great Gate.’
Though Debdan and Azad had tried to seize the gatehouse intact, their failure might have caused the cult to change their plans. If one of the charges used on the barricades was brought against the cathedral, it would be the finish.
‘We can’t hold them,’ Kashibai objected. ‘We can’t kill enough of them to keep them from overrunning us.’
The admonition broke through the cold fury that gripped Trishala. Was this revenge or duty? She could recognise the distinction. Her first responsibility was to protect the relics locked away within the cathedral, the Warmason’s Casket, the Shroud of Singh and all the lesser artefacts. Her second was to protect the multitude of refugees that had already taken sanctuary within the cathedral.
Trishala looked over the balconies above the steps. She had twenty Sisters with twenty more posted at interior windows. Add another twenty up on the higher balconies and walkways. Arrayed against them were hundreds, perhaps thousands of cultists. Thus far there’d been little evidence of heavier weapons or full genestealers among the mob, but she knew it could only be a matter of time before the cultists brought these deadly assets into play. A plasma gun or heavy bolter would be capable of piercing the power armour the Battle Sisters wore. She’d seen for herself that the genestealers were able to climb the cathedral walls in a matter of heartbeats.
‘We only have to hold them back until the lockdown sequence has been completed,’ Trishala said. She looked aside at Kashibai. ‘When the sequence is ready you will lead half the Sisters back inside.’ She shook her head when she saw Kashibai wanted to protest. ‘There has to be a rearguard to watch your back and I am the one to lead it.’
‘The Order of the Sombre Vow needs you more than me,’ Kashibai retorted. She punctuated her words with a burst that tore apart a four-armed hybrid rushing up the steps with a snarling power pick in each hand.
‘Do as I command and listen for the alert from the gatehouse,’ Trishala snapped. A shell from her pistol punched through the abdomen of a cultist trying to direct a flamer at their balcony. The round did more than rip through his body, it also exploded the fuel canister for his weapon, bathing the hybrids around him in searing promethium.
Trishala appreciated Kashibai’s show of concern and loyalty, but now wasn’t the time to express it. Trishala trusted the duty to no one else. If the
rearguard was too weak, if the cult saw a chance to punch through and get inside then she expected they would call up the genestealers. The swift aliens could rush past a weakened rearguard and slip inside before the siege-plates closed off the cathedral. Trishala wouldn’t risk that, not when the cult already had elements hiding somewhere within the cathedral.
‘Sister Superior, look!’ The cry came from Sister Archana. She pointed towards the street that connected one of the approaches to the plaza. Trishala watched in amazement as the cultists there began to draw back, retreating before something ascending the path. For an instant she expected to see one of the huge mining trucks the cult had transformed into weapons of war driving out into the square. Then she saw some of the hybrids dropping, heard the thunderous discharge of a bolter sounding from somewhere just beyond the path.
An instant later the cause for Archana’s excitement marched into Trishala’s view. She felt a sense of awe flood through her as her eyes set upon the lone warrior who advanced fearlessly into the xenos throng. He was a huge, superhuman figure, easily three metres in height and encased in power armour of immense, massive bulk. The ceramite was a dull colour, touched with sections of shiny metal and gilded ornamentation. The bolter he held was barking away, ripping into the cultists, driving them back with a maelstrom of violence.
All her life, Trishala had hoped to see such a being. Though she’d never set eyes upon one, there was no mistaking the exalted champions of the God-Emperor, the Adeptus Astartes, the mightiest of mankind’s defenders. To see one now, to see him fighting against the cultists, could mean only one thing. The distress call had been answered! Amazing enough that the call had been answered only days after it was dispatched, but that it had been answered by no less than the Adeptus Astartes was miraculous! She closed her eyes, whispering a prayer of gratitude to the God-Emperor for extending to Lubentina such a miracle.
The rebels reeled at the sight of the Space Marine. Before they could recover from their surprise and confusion, the lone warrior was joined by comrades as mighty and imposing as he was. Eight armoured Space Marines marched out into the square, their guns ploughing a path through the xenos.
‘Space Marines!’ Kashibai gasped. ‘We are saved!’
Trishala slapped a new clip into her pistol. ‘They are still outnumbered!’ she growled across the vox. ‘Support them! Help the Adeptus Astartes clear a path to the cathedral!’ She glanced down at the Great Gate and thought of the lockdown that would seal the cathedral off from the outside. It would close before the Space Marines could reach the cathedral. They’d be cut off, left among the surging masses of the cultists. Awesome and mighty as they were, Trishala feared even they could be overcome if the xenos brought enough numbers against them.
‘Sister Jyoti!’ Trishala voxed. ‘The acolytes have to terminate the lockdown or they will cut off the Space Marines!’ She waited anxiously for the reply, anticipated with dread the sound of the alert siren screaming from the top of the gatehouse as the siege-plates started coming down. When Jyoti replied, Trishala released the breath she’d been holding. She issued fresh orders, commanding the Sisters to remove the barricades from the abbot’s door and be ready to open it at her word. The path was clear for the Space Marines and the Order of the Sombre Vow would keep it open for them if it meant fighting to the last round and the last drop of blood.
Even with the Sisters supporting them, the Space Marines were making slow progress across the plaza. The cultists had decided keeping them away from the cathedral was of more import than charging the gate themselves and their full fury was turned upon the giant warriors. Though they were decimated with bursts of bolter-fire, ravaged by chainswords and vaporised by the hideous energies of a meltagun, still the cult sought to overwhelm these liberators. Cutting a path through the hybrids threatened to slow the Space Marines’ advance to a mere crawl.
Then from behind the Space Marines a new force appeared. Trishala saw hundreds of soldiers rushing up the Chastened Road and into the plaza. At first she thought they’d come to support the Space Marines, but soon it became clear that their intentions were anything but friendly. They formed firing lines and unleashed a fusillade into the armoured backs of the advancing giants. Trishala stood aghast. Despite the local militia uniforms the soldiers weren’t loyalists, they were more traitors, like Captain Debdan!
Trishala was about to order her Sisters to open fire on the soldiers when a frantic voice came across the vox. It took her a second to recognise the panicked tones as belonging to Palatine Yadav.
‘Sister Superior!’ Yadav cried across the vox. ‘You must close off the Warmason’s Cathedral. The soldiers I’ve brought up the Chastened Road will only be able to distract the enemy for a little time. Use that time to protect the cathedral. “Epsilon Omega”, input that sequence into the cogitators to revoke the safety rites and drop the siege-plates!’
‘Your grace,’ Trishala voxed back. ‘We’re ready to close off the cathedral, but we must give the Astartes time to...’
Horror was in Yadav’s tone. ‘Adeptus Astartes! I defy the Cardinal-Governor’s order when I tell you this, but those aren’t the Emperor’s holy angels! They’re an enemy worse than the xenos cult! They are Chaos Space Marines!’
‘Chaos!’ The word coursed through Trishala, chilling her to the very bone. The awed reverence of a moment before collapsed into horror and loathing. The Chaos Legions, the abominable traitors who’d turned upon the God-Emperor! The ancient monsters who had forsaken the Emperor’s light for the madness of Chaos!
‘Jyoti, resume the lockdown sequence!’ Trishala countermanded her order. She waved the Sisters on the balcony to fall back inside. The cult was fixated upon the Chaos Space Marines, allowing the Sisters a chance to slip away. The Traitor Space Marines themselves were caught between two foes. Though the armoured giants had withstood the fusillade and everything the cult had thrown at them, the press of enemies had brought their advance to a halt. Until they butchered their way clear, they were caught.
As Trishala withdrew from the balcony, she wondered how long it would be before the Chaos Space Marines could cross the square. If even half the legends about them were true, there might not even be time to get the siege-plates dropped before they came charging up the steps.
The battle for Tharsis was favouring the militia at the moment. The cult was being driven from many of their earlier gains, though the rubble the Imperials recovered was hardly a cause for cheer. The Cloisterfells and tunnels below the city remained firmly in the grip of the rebels; any foray into the underworld saw the decimation of entire companies. Worse, entire platoons would expose themselves as traitors once their companies ventured into the tunnels, killing their loyal comrades before slipping away to join their xenos masters. Most of a division had been lost when a stretch of old mines a kilometre long had been demolished by the rebels and brought down on the heads of their pursuers.
Colonel Hafiz had better news from the spaceport to report to Cardinal-Governor Murdan in the Sovereign Spire’s council room. The militia had retained control of the facility, though two landing pads had been compromised in the struggle with the rioting pilgrims trying to leave Lubentina. Strangely the rebels had made no move to attack the spaceport during the action, though there’d been ample opportunity to do so. Hafiz was concerned that the cult had some ulterior motive for this exhibition of restraint. With the revelation that many of his troops – even trusted officers like Captain Debdan – had been corrupted by the cult, Hafiz worried that some of the pilgrims had been infected and would carry that corruption with them if they got off-world.
Murdan, however, was focused on Lubentina’s problems and destroying the rebels on his own world. He seized upon Hafiz’s revelation that the cultists had massed considerable numbers for an assault on Mount Rama. It had prompted the Cardinal-Governor to issue a command that staggered the colonel.
‘You have your orders,’ Cardinal
-Governor Murdan declared. He leaned back in his chair, sinking into the heavy folds of his robe. His eyes glittered with an almost reptilian intensity as he studied Colonel Hafiz.
The officer rose from his chair, his face grim. When he set his hand down against the table, a visible shiver swept through his arm. ‘Palatine Yadav and the Three Hundred and Forty-Fifth are on Mount Rama. The Order of the Sombre Vow, Sister Superior Trishala and all those refugees inside the cathedral...’
Murdan bowed his head, his tone becoming solemn. ‘They shall all be martyrs. Their blood shall consecrate the slopes of Mount Rama and purify it of the taint that has descended upon Lubentina.’ He waved his thin hand towards Hafiz. ‘The Traitor Space Marines are there. So too is this massed concentration of the xenos cultists. If it troubles you, then think on this. You will be annihilating the enemies of the Imperium when you attack. These Iron Warriors are a perversion of the mighty Adeptus Astartes, yet still they are a force of such power that no direct action by your militia could overcome them. Even the Battle Sisters are unequal to their menace. This is the only way to destroy them.’
Minister Kargil listened to the exchange with mounting unease. Murdan’s mind was collapsing under the burden of his responsibilities, seeking refuge in the madness of zealotry. Hafiz had to see it, had to realise what was happening. If only the soldier would stand up to him, they might be able to restrain Murdan before he took his convictions too far. ‘If we could delay, try at least to get the Order of the Sombre Vow out of there...’ Kargil started to say.
The Cardinal-Governor laughed at Kargil’s interruption. It was a bitter, cheerless humour. ‘The Iron Warriors are monsters, but they aren’t stupid. If they see anyone being extracted, then they will know something is coming.’
