Word Bearers

by Anthony Reynolds

  The bombardment from the ridges above continued unabated, but Kol Badar was furious. There should have been more fire coming from above, and he was still angered by his earlier conversation.

  ‘Unacceptable losses against a weakling foe,’ he had growled through the vox-unit.

  ‘My warriors hold the ridges still, Coryphaus,’ was the snarled response from Marduk, the First Acolyte.

  ‘The barrage will not be as effective as anticipated. Your failure will cost the lives of more of our brethren,’ retorted Kol Badar.

  ‘You did not predict an attack of such strength,’ snapped Marduk. ‘If there has been a failure, it has been yours.’

  Kol Badar lashed out in anger towards an attendant daubing fresh sigils on his armour, but pulled the blow just before it connected, and merely clenched the talons of his power fist tightly, instead. The robed figure flinched backwards, then tentatively continued with its work. If the warlord had continued through with the strike, it would have instantly killed the attendant.

  ‘You go too far. One day soon there will be a reckoning between us, whelp,’ Kol Badar had promised, before severing the vox transmission.

  The slaves stampeded ahead of the Word Bearers, running blindly through the rain. They began to die before they even glimpsed their killers.

  A thick beam of white energy surged out of the gloom, cutting through the ranks of slaves. Their bodies burst into blue and white flames that rose fiercely, melting the chains binding the wretches to dripping liquid. A millisecond later, the flames all but died away, leaving piles of white ash in the shapes of the victims. A second later the morbid statues crumbled as they were trampled by the press of bodies that filled the sudden gap in the ranks.

  As if the shot was the clarion call announcing the commencement of battle, the gloom was suddenly ripped apart as the guns of the Adeptus Mechanicus spoke. Blasts of plasma screamed through the air, massive rotating assault cannons upon the back of tracked units roared as they began to spin, and salvoes of hellfire missiles were launched.

  The slaves surged through the inferno of death, hundreds of them slaughtered within the first second of the barrage. Those at the rear turned to flee from this new threat, but the bolters of the Word Bearers barked, dropping them in droves. And so, the slaves surged forwards once more, running towards those that they would call allies, who were cutting them down mercilessly, killing them in droves.

  A barking roar was unleashed as the Skitarii fired. Heavy bolters tore through the flesh of the slaves, and flashes from thousands of lasguns streaked through the rain.

  The chained slaves surged towards those who appeared, through the gloom, to be Imperial Guardsmen, clearly not registering that their saviours were to be their executioners.

  Kol Badar laughed as the Cult Mechanicus wasted its ammunition. All the while, the Word Bearers marched relentlessly forwards, shielded by the flesh of the Imperial slaves.

  The Chaos Space Marines began to fire their own weapons. Lascannons from the lower reaches of the ridge seared down through the gloom, spearing into the heavy weapon platforms grinding along slowly. Predators of ancient, extinct design and Land Raiders daubed with Chaos sigils added their own weight to the fire, and the demented Dreadnoughts and daemon engines roared in excitement, bitterness and anger as they sighted the foe. Battle cannons boomed, autocannons shrieked, missiles screamed through the rain and heavy bolters barked.

  The Anointed opened up, cutting down the last of the slaves as they neared the true foe. Striding forwards, Kol Badar saw the approaching ranks of Skitarii through the press of frantic slaves and impatiently shot down those in his way.

  The front rank of the foe consisted of heavily augmented servitor warriors with massive shields built into their mechanical arms. These shields shimmered with power as they deflected bolter shots, protecting them and those in the ranks behind. They advanced slowly step by lumbering step, a walking barricade, firing their lasguns through the slaves and into the advancing Word Bearers. The top right corner of each shield was cut down to allow the larger guns of those behind to fire. The two opposing forces were close, and the fusillade was furious. Kol Badar grinned as he powered unscathed through the carnage, the revered plasteel plating of his Terminator armour absorbing the incoming fire.

  He had ensured that his most vicious, blood-hungry warriors, those who strayed closest to the dedicated worship of blessed Khorne, were the first wave of Word Bearers to engage the enemy, and they cleaved into the foe with brutal force. The heavy shields of the front line of the enemy were hacked down with powerful blows from chainaxes and spiked power mauls, and bolter fire tore into the flesh of those behind. The shield-servitors were slow and lumbering, though they took a lot of punishment before they stopped moving. Kol Badar saw several of them fighting on, even with limbs hacked off and bolt having removed parts of their skulls.

  Lasgun shots peppered off Kol Badar’s armour like flies, and he punched his talons through a heavy shield, sparks flying and power conduits screaming as the blow impaled the Skitarii through its neck. With a flick of his arm, he hurled the servitor warrior over his shoulder, and unleashed his combi-bolter on full auto into the packed Skitarii ranks behind. These were softer targets. They had been augmented in lesser ways, not taking them fully down the path to becoming mindless servitors. Targeting sensors had replaced their left eyes, and the left halves of their heads were a mass of wiring and mechanics, but their bodies were easily torn apart by the bolter fire of the advancing Word Bearers.

  At a distance, they would be dangerous foes, for many of them carried heavier armaments than a humble Guardsman would be able to bear, but up close they were slaughtered by the brute force and speed of the Word Bearers. The Anointed bludgeoned their way into the heart of the Skitarii formation. It mattered not to these elite killers that the enemy fought on after having sustained wounds that would drop a regular human. The Word Bearers, and the Anointed in particular, were far from regular humans themselves – they were demi-gods of war, and they tore apart the Skitarii with fury and passion.

  Within ten minutes, as if a switch was flicked inside the mechanical heads of the thousands of remaining Skitarii, they began to re-form, walking steadily backwards as one, while continuing to lay down their withering fire into the Chaos Marines.

  With a surge of his servo-enhanced muscles, Kol Badar pushed forwards into the retreating foe, punching the whirling chainblade that served as a bayonet upon his combi-bolter through the pudgy white face of another foe, and ripping the head and spinal column from another, electrodes and sparking fuses still attached to the vertebrae.

  Heavily armoured servitors moved to the fore, stalking forwards between the ordered ranks of the lesser warriors, and Kol Badar was pleased to see that these foes were more to his liking. Around the height of a regular Chaos Space Marine, these were heavily armoured in thick, dark, metal armour. The mechanics of their left arms ended in spinning cannons that roared as they pumped fire from their multiple barrels. Ammo-feeds smoked as fresh bullets were fed to the guns from heavy integrated backpacks.

  Concentrated bursts from the weapons were carving through power armour, and Kol Badar hissed in anger as he was rocked backwards by their force, though his Terminator armour was not breached. He fired his combi-bolter, blasting the gun-arm from a warrior in a shower of sparks, but it kept coming at him swinging its other arm towards him in a murderous thrust as the drill-arm began to spin. Metallic tentacles attached to the Skitarii’s spinal column reached forwards to ensnare him, but Kol Badar had no intentions of backing away from the machine warrior.

  With a backhand swipe of his power talons, he smashed the whirling, industrial drill away and fired his combi-bolter into the chest of the foe. Mechadendrite tentacles latched onto his chest and shoulder plates, and small drill pieces whined as they began to bore neat holes through the ancient suit. Firing his bolter again into the chest of the warrior, he ripped at the tentacles. Their grip on him was stronger than their bi
nding to the warrior’s spine, and he ripped them free of the Skitarii’s back. Firing again, its armour cracking and shattering, the Skitarii fell onto its back. Kol Badar ended its struggles by slamming his heavy foot down into its head, pulverising the human skull and brain within its blank, metal face-plate.

  Ripping off the tentacles still attached to his armour, he saw with pride that not one of his Anointed had fallen to these warriors, though several power armoured warrior-brothers had succumbed to their weaponry. He saw one of the Skitarii warriors torn apart by the fire from the reaper autocannon of one cult member, its chest a ruin of armour, machinery and seeping blood.

  The enemy continued to retreat, but the thought of calling off the battle never entered Kol Badar’s head. He would push on, deep into the foe, and inflict as much damage as possible, only calling off the attack when the terrain began to favour the Imperials once more. Even then, calling off the slaughter would be difficult, nigh on impossible, for the frenzied Dreadnoughts that were ploughing into the enemy.

  One of the insane war machines broke into a lumbering run, smashing aside a warrior-brother in its eagerness to reach the foe. It was roaring incoherently, and gunfire leapt from its twin autocannon barrels and from the underslung bolters beneath its scything array of war blades. Other, swifter warrior-brothers backed out of the way of the charging machine, and it ripped into the Skitarii, its war blades cutting down four of them with one scissoring blow.

  The Coryphaus recognised the Dreadnought as housing the corpse of Brother Shaldern, who had fallen against the hated coward Legion of Rouboute Gullimen, the Ultramarines, during the battle on Calth. His sanity had long since abandoned him. Such was the way with those entombed within the sarcophagi of the dangerous war machines, and Kol Badar wondered briefly if he would rather die upon the field of battle than suffer endless torment within one of those cursed engines. Few retained any semblance of rationality. That the Warmonger maintained as much lucidity as he did was a testament to the intense faith and belief that the Dark Apostle had wielded in life, and had taken with him into his hateful half-life.

  The machine ploughed through the enemy and a great roar went up from the Word Bearers.

  ‘Forward, warrior-brothers!’ Kol Badar bellowed. ‘For the glory of the Legion!’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Mechadendrites attached to the spinal column of Techno-Magos Daroiq stretched out before him. Needle-like electro-jacks emerged from the tips of these mechanical, clawed tentacles and plunged into circular plugs around the base of the cylindrical device rising smoothly from the floor of the control room. Each of the electro-jacks was around fifteen centimetres in length, and they rotated as the magos connected with the machine-spirit of his command vehicle.

  The room was dark and claustrophobic, with exposed pipes and wires lining the walls and twisting across the low ceiling. Eerie light spilled from the screens around the room as lines of data flicked across their surfaces. Hissing steam vented from latticed grills in the floor plates, and thick, ribbed tubing snaked from the grills to climb the walls and disappear amongst the dense, confusing network of conduits.

  Pilots and technicians hard-wired into the control room were built into the walls, their forms almost hidden amongst the mass of coiling pipes that engulfed them. Insulated wiring entered the fused hemispheres of their brains through eye sockets, nostrils and ears. They manipulated controls through cables that plugged into the remnants of flesh that remained of their mortal bodies, and from each fingertip spread a spider web of intricate cables, attaching them directly into the holy machine that they were a part of.

  Daroiq muttered the incantation of supplication to the machine-spirit and recited the logis dictates that would ignite the spark of connection as his electro-jacks continued to manipulate the inner core workings of the command column. Speaking blessings to the Omnissiah, he tripped the internal switches within his own mechanised form, and his spirit joined with that of his flagship in a surge of images, information and release.

  Hovering fifty metres in the air, the bloated airship that served as Daroiq’s command centre was as stable as the ground, despite the torrential downpour of rain and the sharp burst of wind that the magos felt buffeting its banded sides. Connected to the huge machine’s spirit, he felt the rain and wind on its thick sides as if it were an extension of himself. Massive rotating spotlights that cut through the darkness were his eyes, and endless feeds of information flooded through the multiple logic engines within his construction, filing through the domed hemispheres of his ‘true’ brain, which then filtered relevant data out into the charged liquid housing domes that enclosed his secondary brain units.

  He felt the smooth running engines that powered the mass turbines keeping the hulk airborne, and sensed the holy oils lubricating the cogs and gears slipping through the mechanics, as the dictates required. He could feel the scurrying feet of servitors, Skitarii and priests through the labyrinthine tunnels within the airship’s underhull, and the spark of sensation as these servants of the Omnissiah plugged themselves into the vast machine, linking them to him and him to them. He could see through the augmetic eyes of these lesser minions and feel the twitch of their vat-born muscles.

  His spirit reached out through the thick, insulated cabling that fed from his control station, travelling through the circuitry and carefully constructed piping that linked the airship to the Ordinatus Magentus far below. He linked himself to the intractable spirit of that great creation and whispered a prayer to the shrine-machine as he flowed through its holy workings.

  Probing at the plasma-reactor at the core of the Magentus, he felt the contained power within, a blessing from the Machine-God. Back in his command station, he felt the vibratory impulse that pre-empted a vox transmissions arrival. An electro-pulse fired within Darioq’s true brain and the magos recognised the sensation as irritation. He retracted his spirit from that of the Magentus in an instant and returned to his flagship. Though he remained in connection with the airship, he allowed his physical faculties to come to the fore and received visual stimulus through the glowing crystals of his augmetic right eye, and through the blearing, inferior gaze of his left, organic eye.

  With a twist of one of his mechadendrites, Darioq turned a function dial on the command pillar and a hololith atop the pillar sparked into life. A three-dimensional image of an Imperial Guard officer sprang into existence, his every feature picked out in the intricate network of crisscrossing green lines. It showed the man’s head and shoulders, and extended down to his chest.

  ‘Blessings of the Omnissiah to you, Brigadier-General Ishmael Havorn,’ said Darioq.

  ‘Blessings of the God-Emperor to you, magos,’ said the green rendering of Havorn, the sound issuing from the speaker box built into the command pillar slightly out of time with the movement of the lips.

  ‘Your tech-guard suffer many losses, my reports tell me.’

  ‘The losses of the servitors and Skitarii units is acceptable, Brigadier-General Ishmael Havorn. The Hypaspists and the Sagitarii units are replaceable. The Praetorians’ destruction was necessary to conduct the falling back of the cohorts. The loss of several of the Ordinatus Minoris machines of the Ballisterarii is regrettable, but predicted by my cogitator engine. The Omnissiah has reclaimed their spirits unto the bosom of Mars.’

  ‘And are your preparations for the second push proceeding as planned, magos?’

  ‘The Exemplis advances, Brigadier-General Ishmael Havorn, and a larger concentration of cohort units advances beneath its hallowed shadow. My Cataphractarii lead the holy procession.’

  ‘Six companies of the 133rd will accompany your tech-guard. They are advancing as we speak. Alongside them are heavy armour squadrons,’ said the image of the Elysian commander. ‘Members of the 72nd will re-engage the foe within the highlands to coincide with our combined assault.’

  ‘I will accede to your wishes, Brigadier-General Ishmael Havorn. Your flesh units and heavy armour will accompany the second
push.’

  The image of Havorn’s face frowned darkly, but Techno-Magos Darioq had long passed the point of being able to read facial expressions. He could read more from a blank data-slate or the turning of an engine than he could from the facial contortions of the fleshed.

  ‘Never have I heard of such willingness by the Mechanicus to throw its tech-guard at an enemy, bar one threatening one of the Forge Worlds. You can understand my… confusion, magos.’

  ‘The Adeptus Mechanicus supports the armies of the Emperor in all endeavours, Brigadier-General Ishmael Havorn. The Adeptus Mechanicus wishes to support the battle against the enemy on this planet c6.7.32.’

  ‘Yes, as you have said, magos. I just wish to the Emperor that I knew why.’

  ‘To many within the Cult Mechanicus, the Emperor of Terra and the Omnissiah are one. They would say that the Imperial Guard and the regiments of Mars enact his will equally.’

  The image of Havorn raised its eyebrow at a figure off-screen.

  ‘It is usual for brothers in arms to share pertinent information regarding their purpose.’

  ‘The Adeptus Mechanicus wishes to support the battle against the enemy on this planet c6.7.32. That is the purpose of this expedition force.’

  ‘Expedition force? This is a war zone!’

  ‘You are correct, Brigadier-General Ishmael Havorn. Your voice has risen by 1.045 octaves, and my logarithmic codifier indicates that your volume has increased by 37.854 Imperial standard decibels. Are you unwell, Brigadier-General Ishmael Havorn?’

  ‘What?’ asked the Imperial commander.

  ‘Your voice has risen by–’ began Darioq before he was interrupted.

  ‘Emperor above!’ exclaimed Havorn.

  ‘The mnemo strands within my logic engines suggest that some savage cultures within the Imperium believe that the Emperor does exist beyond the atmosphere of their home world. Do you believe this, Brigadier-General Ishmael Havorn? Is that why you speak the words “Emperor above”?’